Teachers/Gurus

[Guest guest]

Hello Harsha-ji. Several times you've mentioned your teacher, but I don't

remember the name...? Who is/was s/he?

 

With love,

 

--Greg

 

Harsha wrote:

>My teacher has kindness and warmth but let me know in his own way not to be

>much impressed with gurus. He had known them (swamis and all) as ordinary

>people with all the weaknesses and strength human beings have. "Be

>independent and do not rely on any guru", he would say. "What if the guru

>goes crazy and nuts, what will you do," he would ask? Then I would laugh

>and laugh.

[Guest guest]

 

Greg Goode [goode]

Monday, December 13, 1999 11:58 AM

advaitin ; (AT) onelist (DOT) com;

NondualitySalon (AT) onelist (DOT) com; Advaitin (AT) Onelist (DOT) Com

Re: Teachers/Gurus

 

Greg Goode <goode

 

Hello Harsha-ji. Several times you've mentioned your teacher, but I don't

remember the name...? Who is/was s/he?

 

With love,

 

--Greg

 

 

Hello Sri Greg Mahatama Ji! The person I have called Gurudev is Sri

Chitrabhanuji. He is a Jain teacher who guided me closely and advised me in

my early twenties and initiated me as Harshadeva. He will be 77 years in

the summer.

 

Love to all

Harsha

[Guest guest]

 

Zo Newell [zonewell]

Monday, December 13, 1999 11:20 AM

advaitin

Re: Teachers/Gurus

 

Zo Newell <zonewell

 

I mentioned Dr. Mishra...I met him in 1964, when I was in the 9th grade,

and he had just started Ananda Ashram outside of New York City. He

taught me to meditate and introduced me to Vedanta. I remember Elsie

Becherer of the East-West Bookstore was a very serious meditator and she

thoroughly disapproved of his allowing me to meditate with the adults

because I was too restless, but he always defended me. He had a daughter

about my age, who was in India, and I think I must have reminded him of

her; in any case we developed a very close,

surrogate-father/surrogate-daughter sort of relationship.

 

I was separated from him for a number of years when I was sent off to

boarding school and college, and during that time (70's-80's) I gather he

did give a lot of respect to Rajneesh's teachings. I became a follower

of Meher Baba of Ahmednagar but I was reunited with Dr. Mishra (now Sri

Brahamananda Sarasvati) a few years before his death. I also had a hard

time believing that he really could approve of Rajneesh, but I think it

was his way to see the core of truth and unity in any person or

situation. He had a serious stroke in the 80's which left him

half-paralyzed and his speech very hard to understand without an

interpreter, but he continued to write, travel, teach Sanskrit, give

darshan, and do devotional chanting literally until the very end, in

spite of a failing heart; he was teaching Bhagavad Gita even as he was

having the heart attack that killed him. He never lost his sense of

humor or his enthusiasm. He was a remarkable man, and it is nice to hear

from someone who remembers him when he was well.

 

Zo (Sarada) Newell

 

 

Thanks for sharing Zo. Yes. Dr. Mishra was a very colorful personality and

highly knowledgeable about a variety of yogic paths. Although he was

controversial in his own ways, his knowledge of intricacies of pranayama as

given in his book was impressive. The fact that he was a medical doctor

added credibility to his detailed explanation of Kundalini Shakti in terms

of different centers of the brain and the vagus nerve that he had

identified. His book on pranayama is out of print but probably available

through Amazon. Did you know that (probably in early 1960s?) Dr. Mishra

shared an apartment with the founder of the Hare Krishna movement, who used

to cook very nice vegetarian dishes for him. I always found that humorous.

This came to my mind because in the late 1970s I used to go to the Hare

Krishna temple on Sundays to eat to my heart's content their free meals and

they were really great tasting!

 

Harsha