Maharishi & Me

by Susan Shumsky

  “Please, try. Try to explain,” Robert urged.

  “A combination of heaven and hell,” I stated. “Very personal and felt deep within my heart. Maharishi helped me develop inner strength, flexibility, one-pointed perseverance … and deep silence in awareness.”

  “What about heaven and hell? What do you mean?”

  “One day heaven, next day hell.” I dropped the subject. He’ll never understand.

  However, when Robert continued to press me day after day, I realized I might try to explain it as Maharishi did. So I asked him, “You’ve read the Bhagavad Gita?”

  “A while ago,” he answered.

  “Krishna teaches his disciple Arjuna similarly to how Maharishi trains his disciples,” I said. “Prince Arjuna is a strong, mighty, seasoned warrior. But his chariot driver Lord Krishna says one simple sentence that sends him into a tailspin. That sentence is this: ‘Just behold, Partha, all the Kurus who are assembled here.’

  “With this statement, Krishna reminds Arjuna of his family name and thereby draws attention to the cruel, immediate reality: With nearly four million soldiers arrayed to fight this war between forces of light and darkness, Arjuna’s kinsfolk, the Kauravas, are lined up with swords drawn—on the other side of the battlefield. Arjuna is about to slay his own cousins, teachers, and loved ones.

  “This realization hits Arjuna like a bombshell. He reacts with fight-or-flight response. His heart pounds, body quivers, mouth dries up, hair stands on end, skin burns, and mind reels. He was so sure of himself, prepared for battle. Then Krishna throws him for a loop, and he falls into what Maharishi calls a ‘state of suspension,’ meaning frozen and unable to act.”

  “Was that the same Gita I read?” Robert laughed.

  “Yes, in the first chapter,” I said unequivocally. “Arjuna gets shaken and foresees only hell resulting from the battle. His mind is overcome with compassion and grief. His eyes brim with tears.

  “So then what happens?” Robert asked.

  “Well, in the second chapter, Krishna insults Arjuna, branding him impure, degraded, lamenting, impotent, with petty weakness of heart. Yet in the same breath, Krishna lauds him as ‘chastiser of enemies.’

  “After Krishna has artfully confused his disciple and diminished his confidence, Arjuna becomes putty in Krishna’s hands. Arjuna ultimately concedes: ‘Inflicted by this miserly weakness of mind, bewildered in my heart about my dharma, I am your disciple, I am surrendered unto you. Please instruct me clearly what is best for me.’”

  “So Krishna pressed Arjuna’s buttons until he finally broke down and asked for help,” Robert said. Then he paused. A light seemed to switch on. “This is what Maharishi does?” he asked.

  “Yes, and with Maharishi it was incredibly intense, because he did it over and over. Like combination heaven and hell,” I said. “Once Arjuna surrendered, then Krishna’s teaching could begin. The rest of the Gita is that teaching—most importantly, the verses that said, ‘Be without the three gunas, freed from duality, ever firm in purity, independent of possessions, possessed of the Self,’193 and ‘Established in Being, perform action.’”194

  “Wow. Amazing. I’ve got to read the Gita again,” Robert said.

  I was bewitched by Robert—his eyes, the sound of his voice, his muscular, tall body, his scent. I took a 180-degree turnabout. No longer did I want to be a recluse. I wanted a relationship. My infatuation for Robert persisted, even after he became bored of our walks and began chasing Tinker Lindsay, daughter of New York City ex-Mayor Lindsay.

  One day Robert knocked on my office door, out of breath. “Just heard. Maharishi’s in South Fallsburg at a conference. Can’t promise we’ll get in. We’re leaving in a few minutes. Hurry.” My heart beat fast. Maharishi! I ran to my room, grabbed my coat, combed my hair, and was out the door in a flash.

  We pulled up to the TM residential facility, an imposing group of white-stucco red-roofed buildings nestled amidst maples and oaks near South Fallsburg. It was known as Windsor Hotel in the Borscht Belt Catskills’ heyday, twenty years previously. We entered the lobby. “Only Executive Governors allowed,” someone announced.

  All the way from Armonk, a two-hour drive, and I’m not an Executive Governor. At that devastating moment Helene and Luther Koffman happened by. I knew them from the “108.” He was a chief surgeon’s son, she a Campbell’s Soup heiress. After waiting an agonizing hour, finally I got permission from Luther to enter the hall.

  I tiptoed in, trying to remain invisible. I don’t belong here. Maharishi was addressing a group from the Pentagon, lecturing on defense. A few hundred Executive Governors were present, attending a one-month conference.

  Maharishi eyeballed me. Will he throw me out, as he did one time in Vitznau? My face blushed and palms got clammy. I tried to blend into the wallpaper. I breathed a sigh of relief when no one seemed to care I was there.

  Next day, some conference attendees got on the mike and described their projects. I was sitting in the back row, and “the back row” was exactly how I felt. After a few hours of feeling too insignificant to exist, something extraordinary happened.

  Three women ascended the stage. They were describing children’s stories to Maharishi in what seemed an overbearing manner. As they showed puppets and told stories, he appeared woefully unimpressed. “These stories are too complicated for children,” he said. “They should be simple and to the point. Just a few words, hmm? No rambling stories that go on and on. Children should not have to follow complicated logic of a story.”

  I wish I were an Executive Governor. Then I could tell Maharishi about the two children’s books I wrote—I Can Do Anything and Age of Enlightenment Alphabet Book. But I can’t. I don’t even belong here.

  Maharishi grew impatient. He waved the women off the stage. Then he announced in a booming voice, “There should be different kinds of stories. There should be Age of Enlightenment and there should be I Can Do Anything.”

  What? What did he just say? I turned to a woman seated next to me. “Did he just say Age of Enlightenment and I Can Do Anything?”

  “That’s exactly what he said,” she affirmed.

  This is just too Twilight Zone. I raced forward and grabbed a microphone. “Maharishi,” I said, “I’ve just written two children’s books. One is called I Can Do Anything and the other is Age of Enlightenment Alphabet Book.

  Maharishi laughed. “You see, how Mother Nature supports? She fulfills our every desire.”

  I said, “Should I go ahead with these books?”

  “Yes. Get them published.” Maharishi said, smiling, darting a powerful glint of divine love energy toward me.

  I felt deeply touched. Tears of joy welled up, and waves of divine energy coursed through my body. Such infinite compassion, I thought. Maharishi is indeed unfathomable.

  Due to my efforts in designing jewelry, two years after departing Switzerland I finally saved enough for the six-month AEGTC Course.

  In July 1978 I took the plane to Zurich and train to Brunnen and arrived a day early, hoping to see Maharishi before the course. I stepped onto the ferry. The sight of the lake, swans, sun streaming onto snow-capped peaks, Seelisburg atop the cliff, it was all too much. I broke down in sobs. Home again. Home. I took the funicular railway and trudged up the incredibly steep road toward the Sönnenberg.

  The crystalline blue lake, bordered by sun-laden peaks, taunted me, recalling another time—a time when I had everything. I used to be on top of the world. Now what’s my life? Designing jewelry? Being obsessed with a John Travolta lookalike? I’m nothing. The lake morphed into a gigantic mouth lined with hideous white teeth, mocking me as I dragged my burdensome suitcases uphill.

  Short of breath, I entered the Sönnenberg lobby. WYMS Nazi types, guarding the place like SS troopers, stopped me from ascending the imposing double staircase. I remembered the code for Maharishi’s meeting room and used the intercom. Brahmachari Nand Kishore, whom I’d known since 1970, answered.

  January 12, 1991,
Maastricht, Holland: Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and Brahmachari Nand Kishore at World Peace Assembly Hall. CC-BY-SA-3.0: Centre Védique Maharishi

  I identified myself as Susan the Artist, and he remembered me. I asked if I could stay here until my AEGTC course started. He said he would check. Then I waited—all day.

  People on Staff came and went. Some were friendly. Others ignored me. The kindly Hannah asked if she could help. Reginald walked by, gave me a toothy grin, and we exchanged a few words. He said he’d taken the AEGTC course a year before. We reminisced about sneaking out for Coupe Dänemark sundaes.

  How did I ever leave? This is my home. But where’s the welcome for the prodigal daughter? Oh, God. This is agony.

  That evening I used the intercom again. “Did you talk to Maharishi?”

  Nand Kishore’s voice replied, “Yes. He said you should not be in Seelisburg. Go to Weggis. Come to Seelisberg later, after the course.”

  “What do I do tonight? I’ve got nowhere to stay,” I said.

  “Susan.”

  “Yes?”

  “Remember. God Consciousness.”

  The intercom clicked off.

  20

  FROG-HOPPING TO ENLIGHTENMENT

  1978 TO 1980

  Life is not a struggle. Life is bliss.

  The natural state of man is joy.

  The highest state is laughter.

  —MAHARISHI MAHESH YOGI

  Demoralized and desolate, I checked into a cheap hotel down the road in Seelisberg. The curtains and bedding reeked of cigarette smoke. I tucked myself into a featherbed but couldn’t sleep. What should I expect? After all, I’m a nobody, I thought.

  The next morning, heavyhearted, I dragged across the lake to Weggis and checked into Hotel Alexander, where I’d often stayed with Maharishi—when I used to be somebody. Five people attended my AEGTC Course: three women and an octogenarian couple, Arthur and Christina Granville from Santa Barbara, old-time devotees since Maharishi first arrived in the USA. Nearly every other Initiator had already taken the course.

  1978, Weggis, Switzerland: AEGTC Course. I am at upper right, Granvilles seated.

  Suddenly Jerry and Debby Jarvis showed up at our hotel. Why aren’t they in Seelisberg? I was floored to hear Jerry and Maharishi were on the outs. Apparently Jerry had become somewhat rebellious. He opposed course fee increases and didn’t like the TM-Sidhi Program. But the last straw was Jerry pushing to fight and appeal the case Malnak v. Yogi, though Maharishi told Jerry to drop it.

  SCI (Science of Creative Intelligence) curriculum was being taught at five New Jersey public high schools. The course book I edited and illustrated while on International Staff was used as evidence that “Creative Intelligence” was a religious concept. And puja ceremony was deemed “student offerings to Hindu deities.” The District Court of New Jersey (and later United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit) ruled that teaching SCI/TM violated the first amendment of the US Constitution, because SCI/TM is a religion, prohibited in public schools. So much for TM being a mechanical, scientific technique, and Creative Intelligence being a “field.”

  When the plaintiffs prevailed and TM lost, Jerry paid the lawyers one million dollars, though Maharishi told Jerry not to pay anything. As a result, the Advanced Training Resources (ATR) fund, earmarked for Initiators to take Advanced Training Courses (ATC), was depleted.

  It seemed impossible to imagine Jerry no longer on Maharishi’s A-list. His closest disciple for decades wasn’t immune to baseless blame and ego bashing. He was treated like the rest of us, crushed into oblivion like insects.

  After years of anticipation, it was depressing to find Maharishi no longer taught AEGTC. Instead his videotaped image on a screen said, “The TM-Sidhi Program is an advanced meditation practice that cultures the ability to think and act from the most powerful and unified level of consciousness—Transcendental Consciousness. It was brought to light from the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, from the ancient Vedic tradition. The word siddhi means perfections …”195

  Adding to the letdown, my nemesis Mindy Leibowitz and her Mindettes, complete with nauseating pretentions, facilitated our TM-Sidhi Program initiations by playing videotapes. We boarded the ferry to Seelisberg for our first initiation, July 19, 1978, while I tried to quell the revulsion of reunion with not-so-kindred spirits.

  Some consolation—Guru Purnima (full moon of the guru) happened to correspond with that day. Since the Granvilles were present, Maharishi invited us on a full moon boat ride. After that happy coincidence, we settled into our course routine—rounds of asanas, pranayama, TM, TM-Sidhis, readings from Rigveda Ninth Mandala, repeated all day. After meals was “walk and talk” with our “buddy.” (Maharishi had instituted his “buddy system” at the Rishikesh Beatles course, a decade earlier.) At night we watched videotapes.

  To soften buttock blows, we three women practiced “flying” on thick foam mattresses covered with cotton sheeting in the hotel basement. Powerful wave upon pulsating wave of energy surged through our bodies, and rapturous exhilaration coursed through our minds, suddenly, strangely, lifting us off the ground.

  In loose white cotton pants and shirts, seated in lotus posture, looking ridiculous, we hopped across the foam like frogs jumping across a shallow pond, squealing, laughing, and shouting. I had never had so much fun. The fun wasn’t in hopping, though. It was the inner experience of indescribable bliss.

  According to Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, the first stage of levitation is bodily shaking. The second is hopping like a frog, and third is hovering in the air. So we achieved frog-hopping stage—lifting into the air, then falling right back down. That was actually impressive, considering we did the impossible—overcome gravity.

  After “flying,” we lay down on the foam for fifteen minutes, bodies charged with electric energy, flooded with intense feelings of joy and integrity in our higher self. Then we read from Rigveda: “Flow, Soma, in a most sweet and exhilarating stream, effused for Indra to drink,”196 and so on.

  During course meetings we discussed mind-blowing spiritual experiences. As the course progressed, we took the steamship to Seelisberg five times to get more sutras. After each initiation by Mindy and her Mindettes, the “TM-Sidhi Administrators,” we visited Maharishi in the lecture hall.

  The press didn’t report Maharishi’s “yogic flying” in enormously favorable light. That’s an understatement. Hopping across foam rubber didn’t make a graceful or believable impression, though Maharishi invited reporters to film it. However, when strong professional athletes tried to duplicate yogic flying, they were incapable of achieving more than a few hops. Yet sedentary TM-Sidhi meditators effortlessly hopped for an hour with increasing energy.

  Seelisberg lecture hall: l. to r.: Charles F. Lutes (SRM president), Praveen Srivastava (Maharishi’s nephew), Pundit Parameswar Iyer, Maharishi, Acharya Ram Vilas Shukla, M.V. Mahashabde, Hans-Peter Ritterstadt (TM leader), Vesey Crichton (TM leader) at podium.

  Keystone Pictures USA/ZUMAPRESS

  I engaged in a little secret project during the course, fabricating a cardboard model of intertwined discs that represented ten mandalas (“circles”)—chapters of the Vedas. These mandalas supposedly structure all life in the universe. Maharishi often described them fitting together in a configuration resembling a mosquito.

  At the end of the course, we took a final boat ride. As I boarded the glass-topped boat, I showed Maharishi my bizarre-looking model. He smiled, exclaiming, “The mosquito!” and darted his glance of divine love. He displayed the mosquito enthusiastically to the passengers, explaining how the mandalas fit together.

  “This should be done in plastic,” he said. As always, he wanted a better, improved version. “Sit here, Susan.” Overcome with joy, I took the seat right next to him.

  Whenever near Maharishi, I entered an alternate reality. My mind became either amazingly still, or exceedingly jumbled—either blanking out or freaking out. Occasionally I would forget why I was there and what my question was. />
  This time my mind spun like an Osterizer, calculating every possible repercussion of the “mosquito.” He asked for it in plastic. Was that an invitation to stay and work on it? Maharishi had said, “Make a lot of money and then come back and stay.” Nand Kishore had said, “Come to Seelisberg later, after the course.” There I was. I’d created the mosquito. Maybe I could stay.

  Then I argued with myself: But I don’t know how to fabricate it in plastic. What about my jewelry business? What about the stuff I left in New York? What about Robert?

  The boat reached Weggis—too soon. I thought we were returning to Seelisberg. But he’s letting us off in Weggis! I panicked. Reacting without reason, I blurted out, “Maharishi, do you want me to go back to the States?”

  Maharishi snapped, “Yes, you should go back to the States,” in such a condescending tone that conveyed how utterly insignificant I really was, confirming my worst fears.

  One minute later, floods of regrets engulfed me: I could have asked whether I could stay and work on the mosquito. I could have asked permission to go and come back. But it was impossible to think straight in his presence. My shyness, powerlessness, frozen mannequin-like veneer, and failure to communicate blocked me from so many precious opportunities.

  Don’t worry, Susan. It doesn’t matter. It was just the most precious opportunity of your life, which you screwed up royally.

  Frankly, I never got over it.

  I foolishly returned to the USA in November 1978, to my jewelry design business and idiotic obsession with a John Travolta lookalike fantasy man. Of course, returning to Robert proved futile. For a couple of years, I bumbled around chasing him like a pathetic fool with zero self-esteem.

  In August 1979, Maharishi called an emergency one-month meeting in Amherst, Massachusetts—his first “World Peace Assembly.” Twenty-six hundred meditators showed up.