part l : Th e m y st e r y of S y n d h r o n ic it y

T he Play of
Co n s c i o u s n e s s
Swami M uktananda and Siddha Yoga

ver the years, my wife, Christina, and I have observed in our work and

O personally experienced many remarkable synchronicities. Sometimes

these were isolated occurrences; other times they came in entire chains and
aggregates. However, there was a period of eight years in our lives when we
had the opportunity to encounter and observe synchronicities on a mass scale.
This was the time o f our close relationship with Swami Muktananda, Indian
spiritual teacher and head o f the ancient Siddha Yoga lineage. In 1975, when
Christina and I met in Big Sur, California, and started working and living
together, Christina was Swami Muktananda’s student and ardent follower.
She had met him when he had stopped in Honolulu during his first world
tour, accompanied by Ram Dass, famous Harvard psychology professor and
psychedelic researcher turned spiritual seeker and teacher.
Christina was at that time experiencing a powerful awakening o f Kundalini,
which had started during the delivery o f her first child, Nathaniel, and had
been further intensified and deepened by the delivery o f her daughter, Sarah,
two years later. According to the yogic tradition, Kundalini, also called the
Serpent Power, is the generative cosmic energy, feminine in nature, which
is responsible for the creation o f the universe. It has its representation in the
subtle or energy body, a field that pervades and permeates, as well as sur­
rounds, the human physical body. In its latent form, it resides in the sacral
area, at the base of the spine. The name Kundalini means literally “the coiled

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one,” and it is usually depicted as a snake twisted three and halftim es arouq eyes met. At this point, she experienced a penetrating lightning bolt radiating
the lingam, symbol of the male generative power. This dormant energy c from the guru’s eyes and hitting her between her eyes in the area where the

become activated by meditation, specific exercises, the intervention of an e spiritual traditions place the “third eye.” This triggered intense kriyas, waves

perienced spiritual teacher (guru), or for unknown reasons. of overwhelming emotions and shaking.

The activated Kundalini, called shakti, rises through the nadis, channels o The experience with Muktananda greatly intensified Christina’s process

conduits in the subtle body. As it ascends, it clears old traumatic imprints an of Kundalini awakening, which had already been well underway before she

opens the centers of psychic and spiritual energy, called chakras. Awakenin met him. This was the beginning of her important relationship with this re­

of Kundalini is thus conducive to healing, spiritual opening, and positive per: markable Siddha yogi, which lasted until 1982, when he died at the age of

sonality transformation. This process, although highly valued and consider seventy-four. After the weekend retreat, Christina offered as a meeting place

beneficial in the yogic tradition, is not without dangers and requires expe for Muktananda’s devotees her small apartment in Honolulu, where she lived

guidance by a guru whose Kundalini is fully awakened and stabilized. Th after her divorce with her children, Than and Sarah. Muktananda accepted

most dramatic signs of Kundalini awakening are physical and psychologic her offer, visited her apartment, and blessed it as a Siddha Yoga meditation

manifestations called kriyas. The kriyas involve intense sensations o f energ center. After leaving Hawaii, Christina tried to use any opportunity to recon­

and heat streaming up the spine, which can be associated with violent shakm nect with her teacher.

spasms, and twisting movements. < Shortly after Christina and I started living together at Esalen, Swami

Powerful waves o f seemingly unmotivated emotions, such as anxiety, anger Muktananda came to the Bay Area to spend several months in his ashram

sadness, or joy and ecstatic rapture, can surface and temporarily dominat in Oakland, near San Francisco. Oakland is only about a three-hours’ drive

the psyche. This can be accompanied by visions of brilliant light or vario from Big Sur, where we lived, and Christina used this occasion to arrange for

archetypal beings and a variety of internally perceived sounds. Many peopl the two o f us a personal audience, or darshan, with her spiritual teacher. As I

involved in this process also often have powerful experiences of what seem t~ found out later, she was uncertain whether Swami Muktanada would approve

be memories from past lives. Involuntary and often uncontrollable behavior^ of our relationship and wanted to find out. I could certainly understand her

complete the picture: speaking in tongues, chanting unknown songs or sacre ^ concerns. Being a “transcendental hedonist,” as I often jokingly referred to

invocations (mantras), assuming yogic postures ( asanas) and gestures (mu , myself, I did not exactly meet the conventional Indian criteria for an austere

dras), and making a variety o f animal sounds and movements. spiritual seeker. I was not a vegetarian, enjoyed sex, and was known for my

Swami Muktananda had the reputation of being a perfected master, ari' work with LSD and other psychedelic substances.

accomplished Kundalini yogi, capable of awakening spiritual energy in h i'1 I had heard about Swami Muktananda before I met Christina, and had the

disciples. Christina heard about his visit to Hawaii from her friends and de-j chance to leaf through a manuscript of his autobiography, entitled Guru, later

cidedto attend an “intensive,” as Muktananda called weekend retreats he was to become The Play o f Consciousness. I was not particularly eager to drive to

offering. During one of the meditations in this retreat, Christina received from; Oakland to meet him because I had somewhat mixed feelings about him. Two

him shaktipat, which is the Sanskrit name for transfer o f spiritual energy from;’ of my friends had converted to Siddha Yoga and were showing what I saw as

the guru, mediated by a touch, a look, or even a thought. For Christina, this an uncritical passionate devotion to Muktananda. They were certainly not the

powerful energy transfer occurred when Muktananda looked at her and their best advertisements for Muktananda and the influence he had on his followers.
 I M R 1*1 T S | £ K Y \Jb
b V N C H R n ^ ic iT V

Their behavior drastically changed following their attendance o f a Muktanand^ My first encounter with Shiva occurred in one of my early LSD sessions,
weekend intensive and created much commotion at Esalen. Instead of coverin when I was still in Prague. I spent the first four hours o f this session in the
the topic they had promised in the Esalen catalog, they brought into their work* birth canal, reliving the trauma o f my birth. As I was emerging from the birth
shops little drums and cymbals and tried to engage the participants in chanting canal, all battered, covered with blood, and tasting vaginal secretions, I had a
“Shree Guru Gita,” “Om Namah Shivaya,” and other Hindu devotional chants. terrifying vision of the Hindu goddess Kali and experienced a complete un­
Devotional yoga had never been my favorite spiritual practice. According to
conditional surrender to the power o f the feminine principle in the universe.
the ancient Indian tradition, people with different personalities need and seel|
At that moment, I saw a gigantic figure o f Bhairava, Shiva in his Destroyer as­
flifferent types o f yoga. While Christina’s preference was without any doub"
pect, towering above me. I felt crushed by his foot and smeared like a piece of
bhakti yoga, an approach emphasizing devotion to the guru, I felt great af­
excrement on what seemed to be the deepest bottom o f the universe. It was a
finity to jnana yoga, a spiritual strategy that pushes the intellect to its utmos
complete annihilation o f what I then considered to be my identity, a shattering
limits, where it has to surrender. I also resonated very much with raja yoga*; death of my body and ego. But having become nothing, I became everything.
a system that focuses on psychological experiment and a direct experience < I had a sense of dissolving in a source o f light o f indescribable intensity and
the divine. I could easily accept karma yoga, the yoga of service accumulatin exquisite beauty. I realized that I was experiencing what had been called in the
karmic merits, but bhakti yoga was low on my scale of values. ? ancient Indian scriptures the union o f Atman and Brahman.
But because I am very curious by nature, my reservations about devotion*?,
My second encounter with Shiva happened many years later, during my vi­
al practice did not override my interest in meeting a Siddha Yoga guru wT' sion quest in the Ventana wilderness in Big Sur. In an overnight LSD session
Muktananda’s reputation. And I knew that this darshan was very importart that took place near a waterfall in a redwood dell, I had the vision o f a giant
for Christina. As we were driving toward the Bay Area, Christina kept telliri archetypal river, representing time and the impermanence of all creation. It
me some remarkable stories about her spiritual teacher, as a preparation fa. flowed back into what appeared to be the source o f all existence— an immense
our meeting. W e overestimated the time it would take us to drive from Big Su ball o f radiating energy that was conscious, possessed infinite intelligence, and
to Oakland because this was not our usual route, and arrived at the ashrar was simultaneously creative and destructive. I heard a compelling sound and
about twenty minutes before our scheduled meeting. knew instantly that it was dambaru, the drum o f Shiva Bhairava, the Destroy­
While we were sitting in the car waiting for the darshan, we continue er, commanding all creation to return where it came from.
our discussion about Swami Muktananda. At one point, Christina men**! The history o f the universe and of the Earth was passing in front o f my eyes.
tioned that he was a Shaivite, which means a follower o f Shiva. This capture As if m an incredibly sped-up movie, I saw the birth, development, and death
my attention and increased my interest in meeting him. I knew that amon of galaxies and stars. I observed the beginning, evolution, and extinction of spe­
the methods the Shaivites were using to get into non-ordinary states of con!, cies and witnessed cultures and dynasties originating, flourishing, and facing
sciousness was ingestion o f bhang and datura seeds. And I considered Shiv" destruction. The most memorable sequence o f this session was a procession of
to be my most important personal archetype because the two most power-, dinosaurs of all shapes and sizes entering after millions of years o f existence the
ful and meaningful experiences I have ever had in my psychedelic session ! River of Time and disappearing in it. Permeating this amazing scenery like a
involved this Indian deity. As we were waiting, I described these two experi­ magnificent cosmic hologram was a giant figure o f Shiva Nataraja, Lord of the
ences at some length to Christina. Cosmic Dance, performing his dance o f the universe. After sunrise, when my

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attention turned from my inner world to the incredible beauty o f nature around?, My curiosity concerning Muktananda and interest in spending some time

me, I heard for many hours in my ears the enticing and irresistible chant “Omr with him increased considerably after what had just happened. Our exchange
hare Om, hare Om, Shri Om,” which I had heard throughout this unforgettable? following this dramatic opening seemed at first anticlimactic, although the
experience as a leitmotif o f the River of Time. f topic of our discussion was quite interesting for me from a professional point
I finished telling Christina about these two experiences, which had trans- '* of view. Muktananda knew that I had worked with LSD and initiated a dis­
formed my life, just when it was time for our darshan. As we entered the rooin| cussion about the use o f psychoactive substances in spiritual practice. He
' jif
and saw Swami Muktananda, I was struck by his extraordinary appearance. - expressed his belief that the experiences induced by them were closely related
He wore a thick red ski cap, large dark glasses, and the lunghi, an orange robe. ? to those sought in Siddha Yoga.

In his right hSnd he held a wand o f peacock feathers, which— as I found out| “I understand you have been working with LSD,” he said through his
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later— was heavily scented with fragrant sandalwood essence. Hitting people | interpreter, Malti, a young Indian woman whom he many years later ap­
with peacock feathers over the head was one o f Swami Muktananda’s princi- > pointed as his successor under the name Swami Chitvilasananda. “We do
pal tools for imparting the shaktipat. . ‘ something very similar here. But the difference is that, in Siddha Yoga, we
‘i
Baba, as his followers fondly called him, invited me to sit down next to himf teach people not only to get high, but to stay high,” he stated with confi­
'4
and turned his head toward me. He then took o ff his dark glasses, something ; dence. “W ith LSD you can have great experiences, but then you come down.
he very rarely did, and he started to inspect my face from a short distance. I ;! There are many serious spiritual seekers in India, Brahmans and yogis, who
saw in a close-up his widely dilated pupils, which seemed to be floating freely use sacred plants in their spiritual practice,” Swami Muktananda continued,

on his eyeballs; this was something I was used to seeing in my clients who had’ “but they know how to do it properly.”

taken large doses o f LSD. He focused his sight on my eyes and examined them "i He then talked about the need for a respectful ritual approach to cultiva­
with the thoroughness of an ophthalmologist. As if summarizing his profes- ■■ tion, preparation, and smoking or ingesting o f Indian hemp ( Cannabis indica )
sional observations, he suddenly uttered a phrase that sent chills up my spine;1 in the form o f bhang, ganja, or charas and criticized the casual and irreverent

“I can tell you are a man who has seen Shiva.” use o f marijuana and hashish by the young generation in the West. “The yogis

I was astonished by this extraordinary synchronicity. Muktananda’s state- f grow and harvest the plant very consciously and with great devotion,” he said.
ment came only a few minutes after I had finished telling Christina about; “They first soak it in water for fourteen days to get rid o f all the toxic ingredi­
my experiences o f Shiva and their importance for my life. It was absolutely ents and then dry it. They put it in a chilam (a special pipe) and smoke it. And

impossible for Muktananda to have any knowledge o f this fact had he relied then they lie naked in the snow and ice o f the Himalayas in ecstasy.” Talking

on ordinary information channels. It was also hard to imagine that this was about smoking the chilam and the ecstatic rapture o f the yogis, Baba acted out

only a meaningless coincidence. The probability o f something as specific as the appropriate facial expressions, movements, and postures as if remember­
this being a result o f chance was so low that it could be practically excluded. I ing what it was like.
could see only two possible explanations for what had just happened. Swami In the course o f our discussion, I asked Baba about soma, the sacred potion
Muktananda had to have paranormal access to information about facts in the of ancient India that is mentioned more than a thousand times in the Rig Veda
surrounding world or be part o f a field that fostered meaningful synchronici- and that clearly played a critical role in the Vedic religion. This sacrament was
ties in the Jungian sense. prepared from a plant of the same name, the identity of which got lost over the
centuries. I found the reports about soma fascinating and hoped that Sw skillfully unwrapped them, and stuffed them into my mouth while simulta­
Muktananda might know something that would lead to its botanical iden‘ neously slapping me quite strongly on both o f my cheeks, hitting me on the
cation and, ultimately, to the isolation o f its active principle. Discovering forehead, and kicking me on my shins.
secret o f soma was at the time the dream of many of us who were involved Then he stood up, making it clear that the darshan was coming to an end.
psychedelic research. At the door, as we were on the way out, he looked at Christina and me and
Talking about soma, Muktananda dismissed the theory expounded by m said: “W e’ll have two weekend intensives on Kashmir Shaivism; I invite you
cologist Gordon Wasson that this plant was Amanita muscaria, the fly agar* both as my guests.” Before I left the room, he gave me a meaningful look and
mushroom. He assured me that soma was not a mushroom, but a “cree said: “It will be very interesting for you.” At that time, I did not know any­
er.” This seemed to make sense and did not particularly surprise me becau thing about Kashmir Shaivism; I could only infer from the name that it had
another important item in the psychedelic pharmacopoeia, the famous M something to do with Shiva and with Kashmir. W e thanked Muktananda,
soamerican sacrament ololiuqui, was a preparation containing the seeds said good-bye, and walked out of the darshan room into the spacious medi­
morning glory (Ipomoea violacea), which would qualify as a creeper plant bef tation hall o f the ashram.
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cause it grows with the help o f tendrils. Outside the darshan room was a large crowd of people, waiting for us to
But what followed came as a great surprise to me. Baba not only knew wh come out. Most o f them seemed to be people who had been brought to Siddha
soma was, but he assured me that it was still being used in India to this ver Yoga by their psychedelic experiences. They suspected that my discussion with
day. As a mater o f fact, he claimed that he was in regular contact with Vedic Muktananda would include psychedelics and wanted to know if he had said
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priests who were using it in their rituals. And, according to Baba, some o f thes anything about this subject. I had to walk through a gauntlet o f these people
priests actually came every year down from the mountains to Ganeshpuri, % showering me with questions, such as: “What did you talk about? Did Baba say
little village south o f Bombay that hosted his ashram, to celebrate his birthday. anything about acid? Did Baba think psychedelics were okay?”
On this occasion, they regularly conducted soma ceremonies. At the end o I did not feel the least inclination to socialize. I was aware o f some strange
our discussion, Baba extended his invitation to Christina and me to visit his sensations in my body and felt that something was churning inside my head. I
ashram at the time of his birthday and promised to make arrangements for us apologized, disentangled myself from the crowd, and walked into the farthest
to participate in this ancient ritual. area of the meditation hall. There I sat down in a cross-legged position, with
By and large, it seemed that the darshan would have the form of a quasi­ my back pressed into the corner, and with my eyes closed. I felt this would be
professional exchange o f information about “technologies o f the sacred.” the best way to get a better insight into what was happening to me.
But then the situation took a sudden, unexpected turn. W ithout any prepa­ Siddha yogis have the reputation of being able to awaken the inner psychic
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ration or warning, Muktananda brusquely reached for a pink can o f Almond energy by shaktipat, and I knew that what Muktananda had done with me
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Rocca that was displayed on a small table on his side. There were always belonged to this category. However, I did not expect any significant reaction
many sweets around the ashram because Baba made it clear that Shakti, the because I did not consider myself particularly suggestible. I did not think, at
divine feminine energy, had a great affinity for sweets. Amrit, the ashram’s that time, that anything short of a potent psychoactive drug would significantly
well-stocked cafeteria, abounded in the most incredible confections of all change my consciousness. And I knew from literature and from my experience
kinds. Muktananda now fished out of the can two pieces o f this candy, with Christina that a typical response to shaktipat involved kriyas— intense

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 between humans and the divine, the role o f evil in the universal fabric, rein­
emotions, involuntary sounds, and dramatic motor responses. My own reac-1
carnation and karma, the enigma o f time and space, and the like.
tion took me by surprise.
I found to my surprise that the individual metaphysical insights o f my cli­
Seconds after closing my eyes, I found myself in a state of complete noth'?;
ents were strikingly similar from person to person and that they constituted
ingness and emptiness, in a void that had cosmic dimensions. One way cf*
various partial aspects of one overarching cosmic vision. This extraordinary
describing my condition would be to say that it felt like being suspended L
perspective on the cosmos and human existence that emerged from this analy­
interstellar space, somewhere midway between the Earth and Alpha Centau
sis was radically different from the one formulated by Newtonian-Cartesian
However, this would pertain only to a very superficial aspect o f this experitj
materialistic science. However, it bore striking similarity to various spiritual
ence and would not capture the sense o f profound peace and tranquility .
systems to which Aldous Huxley referred to as perennial philosophy.
this condition and the extraordinary metaphysical insights associated with if|
Many aspects o f this vision also showed impressive convergence with the
I felt that I was in a state that transcended all polarities and that I had a total1
•:4 worldview o f quantum-relativistic physics and other revolutionary advances
understanding of existence. It seemed that this cosmic vacuum somehow held?
in modern science, usually described as the “new” or “emerging” paradigm.
the secret of being and creation. When I opened my eyes again, I found out
The article discussing my findings, entitled “LSD and the Cosmic Game: Out­
that more than an hour had elapsed since the darshan had ended.
line of Psychedelic Cosmology and Ontology,” had been published in 1972,
We gladly accepted Baba’s invitation for the weekend intensives on Kash­
three years before the Oakland intensive took place. Twenty-six years later,
mir Shaivism, Christina because of her devotion to the guru and myself
this article became the basis for my book The Cosmic Game: Explorations o f the
because o f the curiosity aroused by the peculiar synchronicity and my un­
usual experience. The first intensive turned out to be another surprising and fj_ Frontiers o f Human Consciousness.
And, in his introductory talk in the Oakland intensive, Swami Tejo seemed
very interesting experience. It started with an introductory lecture on Kashmir I
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to shamelessly plagiarize my ideas. It took me a while before I realized that
Shaivism, delivered by Swami Tejo, a member of the Muktananda staff. As the f
what he was describing was actually Kashmir Shaivism and not passages from
swami began talking, I found myself increasingly baffled and slightly para­
my paper. This was truly astonishing because more than a millennium and
noid. He seemed to be reading passages from an article that I had written and i|
thousands of miles separated the origins o f this spiritual philosophy and the
published several years earlier in one of the last issues of a short-lived, obscure
insights of my clients. The beginnings of Kashmir Shaivism can be traced back
periodical, Journal for the Study o f Consciousness. The similarity was astonish­
to the eighth century A.D., when a Kashmiri sage had a vision that directed
ing, down to specific images and metaphors.
him to a specific location outside of Shrinagar, the country’s capital. There he
In the late 1960s, when I was still working at the Maryland Psychiatric
found sacred inscriptions carved in the rock that later became Shiva Sutras,
Research Center, I decided to write a paper describing the ontological and
t the principal sacred text of Kashmir Shaivism. Nobody knows who their au­
cosmological insights that become available in non-ordinary states of con­
thor was or how long they had been there before their discovery.
sciousness. It was based on observations from over five thousand psychedelic
It was difficult to believe that the experiences of twentieth-century sub­
sessions that my colleagues and I had conducted in Prague and in Baltimore.
jects, central Europeans of Slavic or Jewish origin, Caucasian Americans, and
I extracted those parts o f our clients’ reports where they tackled some funda­
African Americans, who had ingested LSD-25, could bear such a deep resem­
mental problems o f existence— the nature o f reality, mystery o f the cosmic
blance to passages from ancient Kashmiri texts. What was the relationship
creative principle, the process o f creation o f the universe, the relationship

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between the effects o f a semisynthetic psychoactive substance, discovered by a§ Our relationship with Swami Muktananda deepened and intensified in the

strange serendipity by a Swiss chemist, and philosophical insights described in last years o f his life. During a darshan following the conference of the In­

the scriptures o f an ancient spiritual discipline? And what was the explanation! ternational Transpersonal Association (ITA) in Danvers, Massachusetts, he

for the fact that they were not erratic and delirious products o f the individual, suggested that we hold one of the future ITA meetings in India, and he offered

psyches, but took the form o f a shared, internally consistent, well-integrated, ’ us his personal support, as well as the help of his staff and o f the Ganeshpuri

and comprehensive cosmic vision? ashram. The conference was held in the Oberoi Hotel in Bombay in February

It took me some time to find the solution to this puzzle, but once I had it, the 1982, several months before Baba’s death. It was called Ancient Wisdom and

answer seemed quite obvious. LSD was not a pharmacological agent generating Modern Science and provided a forum for exchange between new paradigm

exotic experiences by its interaction with the neurophysiological processes in the scientists and spiritual teachers.

brain. This remarkable substance was clearly an unspecific catalyst o f the deep The program had a stellar cast; it featured brain researcher Karl Pribram,

dynamics of the human psyche. The experiences induced by it were not neuro­ physicist Fritjof Capra, biologist Rupert Sheldrake, family therapist Virginia

chemical artifacts, symptoms o f a toxic psychosis as mainstream psychiatrists: Satir, neurophysiologists Elmer and Alyce Green, child development expert

called it, but genuine manifestations of the human psyche itself. These experi­ Joseph Chilton Pearce, and many other scientists. The spiritual world was

ences could then naturally be triggered by many other approaches, including represented by Swami Muktananda, M other Teresa, Parsee high priest Das-

various “technologies o f the sacred,” developed by Eastern spiritual disciplines. toor Minocheer H om ji, Turkish Sufi Sheik Muzafer Ozak Al-Jerrahi, Taoist

Our friendship with Swami Muktananda continued until his death seven Master Chungliang A1 Huang, Aurobindo scholar Karan Singh, Benedic­

years later and formed an important part of our life. Christina and I had many tine monk Father Bede Griffith, and rabbis Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and

additional personal darshans with him and attended a number of Siddha Yoga Shlomo Carlebach. Among the highlights of the cultural program was an

meditations and weekend intensives in different parts o f the world. During evening o f Hassidic dances, sufi zikr o f the Halveti Jerrahi dervishes, musi­

these years, I also had ample opportunity to compare spontaneous experi­ cian Paul Horn, and Alarmel Valli, the rising star o f Indian classical dance.

ences o f people who had received shaktipat with those that were induced by The meeting was a thundering success in spite o f the absence o f the Dalai

psychedelics, and could confirm their remarkable similarity. Lama, who could not deliver his opening address because he fell ill on his
way from Dharamsala to Bombay, and o f the Karmapa, who had died a few
Shortly after my first meeting with Baba, Christina and I developed
Holotropic Breathwork, a powerful nonpharmacological method o f self­ months before the conference and was not able to close the conference with

exploration and therapy. W ith this approach, non-ordinary states of the promised Black Crown ceremony.

consciousness are induced by very simple and natural means— faster breath­ On the day following the conference, Baba invited all 700 participants to his

ing, evocative music, and release o f blocked energies by a certain form of ashram in Ganeshpuri for a bandara, a traditional Indian feast. As it turned out,
Baba’s presentation at the Bombay ITA conference was his last public appear­
bodywork. The experiences triggered by this approach can be very powerful,
ance. When the meeting ended, he retreated into his quarters in the Ganeshpuri
and they resemble both the states induced by psychedelics and those de­
scribed in Kashmir Shaivism. They thus represent an additional proof that ashram, where he spent most of his time in silence, making gradual prepara­

the phenomena induced by LSD and other similar substances are not chemi­ tions for the transmission of the Siddha lineage and his own demise. Christina
and I spent two weeks on a pilgrimage to various sacred sites in India and then
cal artifacts, but genuine expressions o f the human psyche.

39
returned to Ganeshpuri for our final two weeks with Baba. He appeared in the had suffered from various male figures in her life. She felt that it was a major
marble-covered courtyard twice a day and sat there in silence, while the ashram? emotional clearing and healing of old traumas.
residents and visitors paid homage to him and offered various gifts. The next day, Noni brought us a message that Baba wanted to see us in
Everything seemed to indicate that we would not have another chance tO| the meditation hall at the same hour for “round two,” as he called it. This
talk to him or see him privately. That unexpectedly changed two days before time, he repeated the same procedure o f compressing our eyeballs, but added
our departure. Noni, Baba’s personal valet, delivered to us a message that Baba another element. He pressed his forehead, decorated with several ashen hori­
wanted to see us. He wanted us to come at five o’clock to the meditation hall, zontal stripes— the sign of Shiva— against ours and forcefully blew air into our
where he would “tune up our meditation.” The meditation Hall was the spiri­ nostrils. This time, the resulting experience was very positive for both o f us. In
tual heart of the ashram. It was built around the place where Muktananda’s the morning o f our last day in the ashram, shortly before our departure, Baba
own guru and powerful Siddha yogi Nityananda lived in a cottage. This place unexpectedly invited us into his private quarters for a darshan. In retrospect,
was marked by a large hide o f a tiger, the animal consecrated to Shiva. One of it became clear that this was meant to be the final good-bye.
its doors opened into Baba’s bedroom, another one to the staircase descend­ At the beginning o f this meeting, he gave us each a meditation shawl and
ing underground to the Tiger Cave, another favorite place for meditation. a beautiful dark amethyst. Then he broke his silence and told us that we
Christina and I arrived in the dark meditation hall at the appointed hour should have the amethysts set in gold and made into rings. He emphasized
and sat down on a large hide. We might have meditated for about five minutes, that it was very important that we wear these rings all the time. As we were
when the door of Baba’s private quarters quietly opened up and he walked in. parting, Baba surprised us with an enigmatic sentence: “Go back and con­
Without saying a word, he approached Christina and pressed on her eyeballs, tinue to work with people! I will help you. You are doing my work!” And
maintaining the pressure for about fifteen or twenty seconds. Then he moved he motioned us to leave. This was the last time we saw Baba, and all that
on to me and did the same. I felt his thumbs delving so deep into my eyes remained were memories o f this remarkable human being and o f the play of
that they seemed to be touching my retinas. I experienced an indescribable consciousness that he represented.
pain and pressure in my head and had to control my impulse to interrupt this Devotees often try to explain scandalous events that happen around their
procedure. I felt that nobody, not even a Siddha guru, should be allowed to do gurus by saying that large light casts a big shadow and that such problems
with my eyes what Muktananda was doing. But my curiosity took over, and I are caused by dark forces fighting enlightenment. Swami Muktananda’s light
said to myself: “This is very interesting; stay with it!” And I did. must have been very bright because its shadow was large and dark. The final
The pressure grew to intolerable intensity and then my head exploded into months o f his life were tainted with ugly rumors about his sexual abuse of
a brilliant light that gradually turned into a vision of star-filled sky. I experi­ young girls. Some of his devotees were appalled by what they considered hy­
enced an ecstatic rapture o f truly cosmic proportions, which ended in a state pocrisy and an inexcusable flaw of their guru and left the movement. Others
o f blissful emptiness, similar to the one I had experienced after I had first decided not to believe these rumors or tried to excuse this behavior by seeing
received shaktipat from Muktananda. This experience matched those in my it as some advanced Tantric practice, culturally acceptable in India but mis­
high-dose psychedelic sessions in terms o f its intensity, but it was of shorter understood in the West.
duration. Christina’s experiences were equally powerful, but they continued After Muktananda’s death, the situation was further confounded by a pro­
throughout the night. They brought a chain o f memories o f abuse that she found dissent between Chitvilasananda and Nityananda, the two siblings to
 whom he passed the Siddha Yoga lineage. The ugly intrigues that were in­
volved were widely publicized by Indian and American press and further? T he Guru in th e Life
deepened the already existing rift in the inner circles o f Siddha Yoga, as well □ f His D evotees
as in the larger group of followers all over the world that, according to some ?
Is the Siddha Yogi a Cosmic Puppeteer?
estimates, exceeded one hundred thousand.

Christina and I visited the Ganeshpuri ashram twice more, but the magic ■
o f the old days was gone. W e have dissociated ourselves from the movement
and its politics, but remain connected to the Siddha movement on another
level. Baba continued to appear in our dreams and various non-ordinary
states o f consciousness. We also have repeatedly had experiences o f partici­
pation in powerful Siddha rituals in which we felt a strong connection with
what we call “Shiva energy.”
ne o f the most extraordinary aspects o f our experience with Swami

□ Muktananda and Siddha Yoga was the astonishing incidence of

synchronicities in the lives of Muktananda’s followers. We heard about
them on a regular basis from our friends and acquaintances who were asso­
ciated with the Siddha Yoga movement. The weekend intensives offered by
the various ashrams regularly featured speakers who told their remarkable
stories about meeting Baba. These stories contained without any exception
descriptions o f fantastic coincidences similar to those that introduced me to
the world of Siddha Yoga.
One example came from a man who spent some time in an Australian ghost
town looking for leftover gems in abandoned mines. At the time, he lived
alone in a ramshackle cabin. During the long evenings, he tried to read using
the light of a candle. One of the previous dwellers had left on the wall of the
cabin a picture o f a strange dark-skinned man in a red ski cap holding a wand
of peacock feathers. It happened to be a portrait o f Swami Muktananda, al­
though there was no inscription on the photograph identifying him as such.
In one o f his lone evenings, the gem hunter lifted his eyes from the
book he was reading and becam e captivated by the face o f the man on the
picture. As he was focusing on the eyes, he experienced a radiant thunder­
bolt that seem to emanate from the portrayed m an’s pupils and hit him
between the eyes. It triggered powerful waves o f em otions and a strong

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