LIFE SKETCH OF DAVID GODMAN, WHO HAS SURRENDERED TO SRI RAMANA

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LIFE SKETCH OF DAVID GODMAN, WHO HAS SURRENDERED TO SRI RAMANA

 

 

The following first- person account of the U.K.-born Godman,[His

family name], the best-known biographer of Sri Ramana devotees,

based on his replies to questions, and not something written by

Godman himself. For details see: www.davidgodman.org.

 

Godman who has written thousands of pages about Sri Ramana and his

devotees, has at one place dedicated his work to Bhagavan as

his " own personal act of worship " in the following manner -- Words

are the only jewels I possess./ Words are the only clothes I wear. /

Words are the only food that sustain my life. /Words are the only

wealth I distribute among people. [A poem by Saint Tukaram]

 

Godman's books include: Be As You Are, No Mind – I Am The Self,

Papaji Interviews, Living By The Words Of Bhagavan, Nothing Ever

Happened [An over 1200- page biography of Papaji in three

volumes], Annamalai Swami: Final Talks, and The Power of the

Presence, Part one, Two and Three. He has also edited Sri Ramana

Darsanam [A book by Sadhu Natananda], Padamalai [which means a

garland for the feet] which contains 3059 verses by the great poet

Muruganar, and Sorupa Saram, a hundred-verse poem on the advita

experience composed by the 16th century Tamil guru – Sorupananda.

Godman says:

 

I was born in 1953. My father was a schoolmaster and my mother

specialized in treating physically handicapped children. After

getting educated at local schools, I won a place at Oxford

University in 1972. Sometime in my second year I found myself

getting more and more interested in Eastern spiritual traditions. I

seemed to have an insatiable hunger for knowledge about them. One

day, I read Arthur Osborne's The Teachings of Ramana Maharshi in his

Own Words. Reading Ramana's words for the first time completely

silenced me. By the time I put the book down, it had completely

transformed the way I viewed the world and myself.

 

The experiences I was having made me understand how invalid were the

academic techniques of acquiring and evaluating knowledge. I dropped

out in my final year at Oxford and went to Ireland with my Ramana

books, and spent about six months reading Ramana's teaching and

practicing his technique of self-enquiry. This was in 1975. When I

decided to have a quick trip to India and Ramanasramam, I figured

out the costs and found that I would need another pound 200 for this

purpose. I decided that if Bhagavan wanted me to go to India, he

would send me the money. Within a week, I received a letter from my

grandmother's lawyer that he had just found some shares that she

owned, and that my share of them would be pound 200. I came to

India, expecting to stay six weeks, and have been here more or less

ever since.

 

I did find it hard to practise self-enquiry merely by reading books.

Arthur Osborne seemed to think that concentrating on the heart

center on the right side of the chest while doing self-enquiry was

an integral part of the process. But when I read the books Talks

with Ramana Maharshi and Day by Day with Bhagavan, I got a correct

understanding of the method of self-enquiry. I feel that if the

attitude is right and if the practice is intense enough, it doesn't

really matter what you do, when you meditate. The purity of intent

and purpose carries you to the right place. I consider self-enquiry

a bit like swimming or riding a bicycle. You don't learn it from

books. You learn it doing it again and again till you get it right.

 

In Tiruvannamalai, I spent my first 18 months just meditating,

practicing self-enquiry, and occasionally walking around Arunachala.

I looked after Sri Ramanasramam library from 1978 to 1985. In the

later 1980s and early 90s I also devoted a considerable amount of

time to looking after Lakshmana Swamy and Saradamma's garden. They

bought land in Tiruvannamalai in 1988 and I ended up helping to

develop it. In 1993 I went to Lucknow and spent four years with

Papaji, where I wrote Nothing Ever Happened. Since my return to

Tiruvannamalai in 1997 I have been writing and researching new books

on Sri Ramana.

 

Regarding the financial means to maintain him, Godman said: Grace

has supported me. I have found that if you give all your time to God

and his work, then He looks after you. I came to India in 1976 with

$500. I didn't earn money for twenty years, but always had enough to

live on.

 

When I first came to Arunachala I fell in love with the place and

wanted to stay as long as I could. I knew that I didn't have enough

money, but I wanted to make it last as long as possible. There was

meter ticking away in my head: I have so much money, I am spending

so much per day, and that means I have so many more days here. Those

numbers, those equations were there all the time. Then, one day, as

I was doing pradakshina of Arunachala, it all dropped away. It was

not a mental decision; I stopped walking, turned, and faced the

hill. I knew in that moment that whatever power had brought me here

would keep me here until its purpose is finished. From then on I

stopped caring about money. In the period when I was worrying about

money, all that I had was spent. When I stopped caring, complete

strangers would come up to me and give me money. Whenever I needed

money, money just appeared out of nowhere

 

Nowadays, I am not supported by any institution, so I publish my own

books and live off the proceeds fairly comfortably.

 

(David Godman lives in Tiruvannamalai and can be contacted on e-

mail: davidgodman or care of Sri Ramanastramam)

 

prof laxmi narain (prof_narain)

 

Source and courtesy: Sri Ramana Kendram, Hyderabad

This article was published in Sri Ramana Jyothi,

monthly magazine of the Kendram.