I went to India in 1984 seeking my Spiritual Master, though I didn't know who he was. I had a strong intuition and feeling that I did have a Master and that he would reveal himself to me there.

In the middle of May, I went on a one-week, self-directed meditation retreat at the center of a Tibetan Buddhist refugee community in India. The retreat had perfect conditions for meditation: a peaceful and beautiful Himalayan hill. Yet even though the conditions for meditation seemed ideal, I couldn't find peace. My mind was totally distracted and disturbed and I couldn't sit for any length of time — something that for many years had been an easy daily practice. As the retreat progressed, I became totally frustrated, because I realized that all the efforts of years of meditation had not changed me in my fundamental being. I realized the fruitlessness of self-effort and became sensitive to the necessity of Grace to mature in my Spiritual life.

After the retreat, I realized that I was constantly seeking Enlightenment, realization, happiness, and so on, but that the process of seeking itself was what I was bound by. I had already been involved in the Spiritual search for more than ten years. But still something deep in my heart was missing. I felt this longing for Love in my heart that none of this Spiritual life could satisfy. I realized that I couldn't do it, I couldn't attain Happiness through my efforts. I realized I had nowhere to turn, and I began to simply pray for help, for my Master to reveal himself to me.

A few days later, I received a book by Avatar Adi Da. It was sent to me by a friend from London. At this point, having no direction whatsoever in my Spiritual practice, I was willing to read something that I wouldn't have been open to before. And since it was a gift from a friend, I felt that I should receive it and read it.

I knew very little about Avatar Adi Da. I had a good feeling and intuition about Him, but He was an American, so I did not give Him much attention, for it seemed obvious to me that America could not produce One of Great Realization.

So I took the new book and went out to the top of the hill, which had been my favorite place of meditation and a place used by the Tibetans for worship. I sat down on the ground and started reading. Soon I was awestruck by what Adi Da was revealing to me. Until that moment, I never believed that anyone could write that way. He was communicating the intuition of absolute Truth in words. I had felt that only God could do that, and yet here I was reading that in a book. Energy started to rush through my body, and tears of joy ran down my face.

Suddenly, there was no limitation, no self-contraction — only Divine Freedom. And this was the most simple and obvious thing in the world. At the same moment, I could see the whole of my ordinary life as the result and effort of my own separative activity.

My heart was broken by the unbelievable Love of Avatar Adi Da. It was the first time in my life that I truly felt loved without any limitation whatsoever, loved to and from infinity.

I felt like God in Person was loving me. I tacitly knew that Avatar Adi Da was my Master and had been my Master before all time. His Presence was so familiar and so personal that there was no way I could deny it.

I felt liberated from the seeking and dilemma of my life and reunited with my Beloved. And I knew that this moment was the true beginning of my Spiritual life. I was so grateful that my Master had revealed Himself and drawn me to Him. There was nothing else I could ask for.

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I am a servant and devotee of the Great One, Who has Revealed the Truth and the Secret of Life to me. I bow down at the Feet of Avatar Adi Da Samraj.

This story appears in the sections
Finding Adi Da and
Spiritual Recognition of Adi Da