High on Wisdom

Here's the text of the Times of India review of The Crazy Wisdom of Ganesh Baba. I think it's the best review I've seen. Thanks, Manu Dev!

 High on wisdom

Manu Dev

Aug 1, 2011, 04.04pm IST

The Crazy Wisdom of Ganesh Baba
By Eve Baumohl Neuhaus
Pages: 160
Price: Rs 295
Wit and wisdom, posture and possibilities, drugs and discourse on the hippie trail — the book on the multi-faceted Shri Mahant Swami Ganeshanand Saraswati Giri, aka Ganesh Baba, has enough to keep the serious seeker as well as those just curious, engrossed. Written by Eve Baumohl Neuhaus, one of Baba's many students, this unusually candid book throws light on the life and times of Baba, who "considered himself the true guru of the psychedelic generation."

If the title, The Crazy Wisdom of Ganesh Baba is a teaser, then the blurb "psychedelic sadhana, Kriya yoga, kundalini and the cosmic energy in man" points to the many topics that the mystic shares his insight on. Copious notes of the teacher himself are reproduced to illustrate his profound thoughts, which were more often than not inspired by chillum sessions.

Eve's book traces Baba's early days from his initiation by Lahiri Mahasaya to his discipleship with Swami Sivananda and also the period when he ran the Anandamayi Ma ashram. The author also covers the mystic treading the path of Naga Babas, whose affinity to cannabis and other entheogens are well documented. Baba's dos and don'ts for joint sessions are also touched upon, which include the importance of keeping your back straight and controlled, deep breathing while focusing your attention.
Absolute honesty is the trademark of this book. The author pays glowing tributes to her beloved teacher, who is shown to predict that "the psychedelics, rather than the beefy-alcoholics are due to inherit the earth". Then she explains her surprise when she got to know about "his drunken rampages in New York City". Eve writes that even though Baba advocated vegetarianism, he had fish once in a while. She rationalises his behaviour with her arguments that teachers sometimes do have "crazy wisdom" to impart.

Baba's lessons on Crea (for creative) Yoga are given in alliterative 4 P's: posture, pranayama, pinealisation and pronov-mentation or posture (conscious posture and exercise), prana (conscious breathing and eating), practice (conscious action) and presence (constant awareness of consciousness).
The various diagrams and charts for "The Cycle of Synthesis" that depicts the evolution of matter to consciousness and back help the reader appreciate Baba's scientific bent of mind. The book has its origins in Eve's work with Baba in updating his manuscript for a book titled Crea Sadhana.
Ehud Sperling of Inner Traditions, which published Eve's book, gives an account of his days with the "outrageous" yogi in the preface. The picture of the 90-year-old Baba enjoying joints and dancing into the night with naked Brazilian Samba dancers at a New York City party thrown in his honour adds to the esoteric aura of this maverick mystic.

Along with the fun and laughter of Ganesh Baba, the book captures his insistence on what he considers one of the basics of sadhana — keeping the back straight. As Eve says: "If, in the end, you learnt nothing from Ganesh Baba except to keep your back straight, he would be satisfied." That's one thing the reader can implement as a first step and reap benefits, if not the entheogen part.

current project

Practice

For several months I've been deeply involved in Tolle's teachings and suggested practices. This, in the midst of writing a book called Crea Sadhana (crea: "creative action", sadhana "spiritual practice") based on my teacher's unpublished manuscript with the same title. The manuscript is mostly a manual for my teacher's "crea-tive" version of Lahiri's kriya yoga.

All fall I practiced crea as prescribed in the manuscript, seriously, up to three hours a day.

I came home from my winter trip to India, however, more excited about the teachings of trika yoga, a practice of Kashmiri Shaivism, which is a synthesis of Hinduism and Buddhism described in the tenth century text, the Tantra Loka. A friend in Benares, Mark Dyczkowski, had just begun teaching trika yoga (the day we arrived at his house!). Our first evening there, he led a meditation based on being aware that you are aware. For me, it was an extraordinary meditation, one of those experiences that touches you so deeply that afterwards, your soul longs to return to that place.

Mark's lectures on trika yoga and the Tantra Loka are online. I was back home listening to those lectures an hour or so a day when I saw Greg's original recommendation to tune in to Oprah and Tolle.

As it happened, I had a credit with audible.com, so instead of joining Oprah's online group, I downloaded Tolle's reading of A New Earth and began listening to it between Mark's talks. I was thrilled when I realized that Tolle and Mark are passing on the same message. I listened to A New Earth quickly and then slowly, and then slowly again, and then I listened to it with my husband more than once, and now, on Sunday evenings, a group of friends comes over and we listen to short sections of it and have a discussion. I've listened to the talks Tolle gave at a retreat in Denmark ("The Art of Presence") many times, and I reread The Power of Now, which I liked when I first read it several years ago but was not moved by it the way listening to A New Earth moves me.

I continued to work through Mark's lectures slowly, often listening to one lecture 4 or 5 times before moving on. I listened when I walked the dog or walked to the store for groceries, I listened while I folded laundry or worked in the garden. Sometimes Mark, sometimes Tolle. Mark is a scholar and practitioner rather than a spiritual teacher - his talks are largely interpretations of the text, and considerably more detailed than Tolle's broad-brushed synthesis — yet the message is identical, and in the end, very similar to Jung's, I think, though the language is different.

I started doing the practices Tolle prescribes, which, as opposed to most of the crea exercises, are done during one's daily life. For example, Tolle suggests trying to do everything you do as if it is not the means to an end. Every small action is given full attention - and it becomes beautiful. Quality trumps quantity.

Soon I was so engaged in the practice of being present that I lost interest in my regular practice. Crea yoga began to seem old-fashioned. Its step-by-step process aimed at an end I never reached paled in the face of the glory of the present moment. For several weeks I set the manuscript aside and gardened and cleaned instead. I wanted to be out of my head, to leave thinking and writing behind for a while. I stopped listening to talks and threw myself into the present as fully as I could.

I knew that eventually I had to go back to my crea practice (I have a contract for this book, after all), but the moment kept calling me to the garden. Time passed, several weeks, I think. My relationships with my family, pets and neighbors blossomed, and friends commented that there was a new light behind my eyes. My eating habits changed. I lost weight. My house and garden glowed, as anything getting that much attention will. Tolle's system is very forgiving - I stopped scolding myself for not doing this or that, trying instead to do my best at whatever was in front of me. His teaching trains you to be receptive, open-hearted, and non-judgmental. When you give up resistance, life flows along easily.

Periodically I would try crea again, but it wasn't the same. The exercises I had been doing for so many years were lifeless in comparison to the simple joy of going through life in this new awakened state.

One day, working in the garden, I had a marvelous aha! It struck me that time really is an illusion. In the philosophy of the yoga I practiced all these years, time is considered to be an illusion, and long before I met my teacher, I was convinced of the artificiality of time systems, but it wasn't until I stood there at that moment, trimming that rose bush, that I really got it. My perspective changed dramatically. I'm free, I thought! I'm no longer tied to yesterday or tomorrow! The realization instantly released me from the need to worry about my in-laws coming the next week and from all my regrets and resentments. And, marvelously, the moment I stopped believing in time, I had all the time in the world.

This euphoria lasted a few days. A couple of friends were experiencing a similar shift at the same time; it wasn't until the three of us got together that we saw the downside of our new perspective. We discovered we'd all missed a few appointments! So that's what happens when you leave time behind.

It occurred to me that the concentrative practices of crea would probably correct the imbalance, but it was another couple weeks before circumstance and my conscience got together and woke me up early enough in the morning and inspired enough to return to my crea practice. The intervening weeks went to family, a short vacation, and four days of stultifying heat.

As I began stretching that morning, the synthesis I'd sought was suddenly obvious.

Tolle's practice of presence is a being practice. Crea yoga is a doing practice. (Kriya is Sanskrit for "action.") It seems painfully obvious now, but it hadn't occurred to me until then that I could practice presence while practicing crea. The relaxed, alert awareness I practiced in the garden is the ideal background for crea.

Crea is a masculine practice, a step-by-step linear progression to a goal, the eventual re-merging of the self with the Self. It trains the attention to one-pointedness by blocking sense perceptions. Little by little it uncovers the spark of divinity within.

Being present opens the awareness as much as possible, welcoming sensation, recognizing the Now as the Source. It is a feminine practice.

Now, my crea practice is at a whole new level. I do each exercise as if it was not a means to an end. I gave each move, each breath, each visualization, each mantra, my full attention. I recognize and easily dismiss all thoughts of what I should be doing and let the process take over. Quality over quantity. Oh my.

The shift in consciousness that Tolle is talking about is happening now. Conscious awareness is growing whether you buy into his ideas or not. It's another manifestation, a huge one, of the rise of the feminine.

The trick is to move into the new consciousness without forgetting the schedule.