The First USA/Russian Darshan with Kalki Bhagavan

Satyaloka Monastery-Aug 15, 1998:

The previous night, the meditation session with the monks ended early. Acharya Ananda Giri who was conducting the 42 mukti yajna told to us to stay in our quarters and not walk about Satyaloka that night. We could hear music being played through loudspeakers in the distance which was odd as it was normally so quiet there, but we just figured that there was a celebration in the village. We did not go out.

When we arose at dawn, it was quite a surprise. In that secluded place, there was a line of people as far as the eye could see lined up for darshan with Kalki Bhagavan. People were drumming and dancing in the central field. swimming in the lake. There was a marketplace with vendors with Sri Murthis on everything from keychains to handbags. Dance was such a big part of the early process for as we awakened to a truth beyond the 5 senses, we wrote songs and danced with the Antaryamin well into the night. It could not be helped. It was a very joyful, energetic dharma in those early years. Even the suffering, the dark riddle of the Universe, was embraced as one would embrace a guru-as we danced through it.

The monks cooked for all the people who had come from many places for darshan-close to 300,000 in all and the steam was so thick in the kitchen area from the rice cooking you could hardly see your hand in front of your face. Crows were everywhere fighting over bits of rice and guarding piles of coconut shells. The ancient symbolism of the crows was death. It could be a spiritual shamanic death or a physical death. We rejoiced to see the crows as they meant liberation.

 Ananda Giriji met with us that morning and prepared us for darshan. He told us to be silent and look into Kalki's (Bhagavan's) eyes and do not even blink as we could only be in his presence a very short time. "Do not waste even a moment by blinking or looking away," he told us.  We prayed and were called in for darshan with Bhagavan. Amma did not give darshan there in those days. Bhagavan did not speak then during darshan as he does now, and he rarely opened his eyes. If he did some of the people would just pass out and have to be carried out.

We had been told before we went to Satyaloka by one of the monks that we would reach a state of a christ or a buddha or they would carry our dead bodies out of there. A woman laughed and was asked to leave if she could not take it seriously. We did not know what to expect. There was no going back. Even if anyone wanted to leave the police had come once more and taken our passports.

The monks (dasas) went to the front of the thatch darshan hall with a golden orb on the top to see Bhagavan.  They monks were jumping up and down weeping with Bliss and calling out "Kalki! Kalki!".  Some collapsed or fainted. Others wept with joy or bawled like babies.  Then we stepped forward to get our first glimpse of the physical form of the one they called "The Lord of Enlightenment."

Before that we had been relating the Sri Murthi (an empowered portrait or icon). I do not recall even seeing a photo of Amma until years later. All manner of miracles and supernatural events occurred surrounded that picture. Healings, material blessings, manifestations, miracles. Much later honey began to pour from the hands of a Sri Murthi in California (see Miracle of the Honey on www.vedicshamanism.com). When asked about it, Bhagavan said, “It is a marriage of science and religion. They have been separated for too long,”

Kalki Bhagavan sat in a beautiful carved chair. I had the impression there were eagles on the arms. His eyes were closed. He was not like any human I had ever seen. It shocked me and I jumped. "This cannot be real!" was the thought. He was so empty I though he was dead.

"This is taxidermy- a stuffed person," I thought. But then I saw him move just a bit, and at first doubted my eyes and jumped again. The movement was so shocking and unexpected that another jolt came and I almost fell backwards. I could find no definition for what I was seeing, and all circuits were on overload. I did nothing but stare at him as Ananda Giri had ordered and hung on to the railing.

It was difficult to stare at him-almost painful-like looking at the sun. The mind tilted back and forth. I stared at his closed eyes and was amazed to see that I could see his eyes burning through the lids. It was like fire.  I blinked and could still see his eyes through the lids. Suddenly he was a forest, the trees, a leopard, a leopard hunting a mouse, a mouse, a man hunting a leopard, a giraffe, the African continent, the world, my relatives, my loved ones, the people, the crowd the mass.  Faster and faster- all that ever was and all that ever will be. He opened His eyes and he was gone yet was still there-in the way you know the fan is there yet the blades are spinning too fast to see.

And I realized that I had seen the formless state of God. Parabrahma.  I had thought that Formless meant invisible. It was not that at all. I could find no definition. Love came. My heart broke into a million pieces.  Agony, Passion then Bliss.  The Universe empty. Everything is there yet there is nothing there at all.

The Russians were screaming "Come to Moscow!" and singing a song in a horrible way-it was a thousand double parked taxicabs blowing their horns. Raniji started screaming and fell. Louder and louder the sounds came until it was a tidal wave. No one could possibly survive. Others, including a few monks, were carried out weeping with bliss or not conscious-perhaps in samadhi.
 
I staggered out of the darshan hall. We began to bring buckets of  water for the people waiting in line, seeking some shred of reality in the labor. It was like going off a high dive. There was no going back. Would I even want to? Nothing would ever be the same- that I knew. For better or worse-there is no difference. The suffering is in the perception. I must only turn around-step aside to see differently. The transformation is in the perception.

Miles of people there were as far as the eye could see. It was a very hot day but no one complained. Some girls who had just seen Kalki Bhagavan were standing in the open area by the dhyana vihar, weeping. One fell into my arms and cried like a child. She wept and wept and wept until we both were soaked. I gave her some kleenex and she cried some more. There was a man crawling about at our feet weeping with bliss, and he was babbling and kissing the dirt.

By sundown there was no visible sign that the people had ever been there, except the mountains of coconut shells stacked up along the path. Even the crows had departed. I felt as if I had been crying for a million years and could find no more pain. I looked for it like a lost ring. It was an empty feeling not without relief.
 
Later that week as the mukti yajna progressed I entered a state where there is no judgment, as you see that your thoughts are not your thoughts.  You see how thoughts are attached to various places and people and are dependent on many factors. They just happen automatically. It is the same with desire.

 Later as the state or way of seeing progressed the experience moved to the seeing of the Universe in everything. I was in the restroom tying the drawstring on my pants and suddenly it was bliss to tie the knot. I untied it and tied it several times. When I looked at it, the knot was everything. Much later, maybe hours, someone found me in the stall happily staring at the knot and led me out of there by the arm. To walk in that state is amazing. The ground appeared as everything and nothing at all. I read once of a scientist who learned, or perhaps saw, something about quantum theory and had to wear snowshoes so he would not go through the floor. It was conceivable that that was his state except he cared one way or another what happened-about the outcome of whether he would or would not be absorbed by the ground. The heck with the snowshoes lets meld into the Earth.

When I passed that spot where the man had been weeping with bliss and talking to the dirt the morning of darshan, I experienced what I feel the man was experiencing. In that place I saw God in everything and I fell and began to kiss the grass in the dirt because there was grass in the dirt.

The experience could still be had in that same spot the following year and the year after that for as you walked through that place you entered that state. You saw God in everything. Just as a lake has warm spots and cool spots, Satyaloka has many spots where experiences folks generally only read about can be experienced for ones self. Like gifts from those who walked there before you.