Criminal Carma

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The lights had been dimmed and the air was mystic with the scent of sandalwood incense. The candles Reggie had made reference to were flickering on the altar. I took two small round pillows from a pile in the corner and sat down on them. It had been years since I practiced hatha yoga, but I was still able to contort my legs into a lotus position without actually screaming out loud. Sitting on two pillows took some of the strain off my knees.

“Where’s the chairs?” Reggie asked in a stage whisper after watching me make a pretzel out of myself.

“They don’t use them for meditation,” I said. “Grab a couple of cushions and sit down.”

People around us stirred and cleared their throats, giving us a subtle spiritual signal that we were disturbing them.

Reggie piled up three cushions and plopped down on them, sitting American Indian-style, with his thick legs crossed but not locked into the lotus position.

Ganesha closed the double doors, which had cloth draped over the glass on the inside, and sat down on the floor by the wall, showing his relative enlightenment by not using a cushion.

I closed my eyes and began to take deep breaths, pushing my abdomen out so that the bottom of my lungs could fully inflate, then slowly pulling it back in to expel the air, taking twice as long to exhale as to inhale. It is the simplest form of breathing exercise and one of the simplest forms of meditation, very effective at dissolving negative emotions such as anxiety or sadness. Yoga has many complex breathing exercises with specific and startling psychic effects, but simple deep breathing is a surprisingly powerful technique. If you keep your attention focused on your breath, and breathe in and out steadily and slowly, it invariably calms the mind.

A feeling of peace had begun to stain me, spreading like blue dye from cell to cell, when there was a stir at the front of the room. Opening my eyes, I saw Baba Raba entering through a door at the far end. An attendant helped him up onto a low platform. It creaked beneath his barnyard weight as he walked forward and sat down cross-legged in front of the altar, facing the audience. The blonde, who came in with him, walked around and sat down on the floor in front of the platform, keeping her distance from a cluster of flower girls.

“Om namah shivayah,” Baba Raba intoned.

“ Om namah shivayah” the devotees responded with a single resonant voice.

“The purpose of meditation is to still the mind so that it can perceive the infinite peace within,” Baba said. “The mind is like a curious little monkey. It is always running everywhere to look at everything, attracted first by one thing and then another, always trying to find something that will satisfy it. It sees a glittering jewel and wants that. But the jewel doesn’t make it happy. So it wants a shiny new car. Or a big house. Or a beautiful girl or boy. Because it thinks those things will make it happy. But nothing satisfies it for long. Everything in the physical world dies or decays. By cultivating attachment to material things, the mind ensures its own misery. What the mind truly seeks, the only thing that can truly satisfy it, is already within each of us. The Bhagavad Gita teaches that we are all sat chit ananda. Every one of us. Young or old. Rich or poor. Man or woman. That is our essential, unchanging nature. Sat chit ananda. Infinite existence. Infinite consciousness. Infinite bliss.”

Baba paused. The dark room, heady with the smell of sandalwood, was utterly still.

“This bliss, or ananda, is the peace that passeth understanding that Jesus spoke of. It is within each one of you right now, far brighter and vaster than the sun. You must train your mind to be still and look inward so that it can begin to perceive your spiritual reality. Everyone likes to come to Southern California because of the bright warm sunshine. Oh, it makes us very happy. The beautiful light. We love to go to the beach and lie in the sun and feel its warmth. If we get a nice tan, we will be beautiful, too. Everyone will want us. But you have a light inside you brighter than ten thousand suns and a beauty surpassing anything on earth. Still your mind through meditation and you will perceive it. Then you will not need jewels to make you happy. You will not need cars or houses. Or boys or girls. Or money or fame. You are happiness. You are joy. Plunge into meditation and the light within you will burn up all your pain and sorrow. All your shame and disappointment. Meditate. Meditate. Meditate.”

Here, presumably following his own advice, Baba closed his eyes, lowered his chin to his hairy chest, and placed his hands together in his lap in dhyana mudra, the back of one hand resting in the palm of the other, thumbs touching. Again, I wondered if I was misjudging the big-butted guru. Spiritual truth is a tricky thing. In the mouth of someone who doesn’t fully understand it, the truth becomes a lie. It is dead and empty. In Baba’s mouth, it was thrilling and alive. His gloss of Vedanta’s most essential principle was flawless.

Ganesha stood up by the door and bowed toward Baba with his hands steepled in front of his chest, then turned to the room.

“For those who are new to meditation, Gurudev recommends tratakum. This is a very simple meditation that anyone can do. While breathing slowly and deeply, fix your gaze on one of the candles on the altar near Gurudev. If you keep your gaze steady on the flame, it will still your mind. Each time you catch your mind wandering, gently bring your attention back to the candle flame. We will now meditate for forty-five minutes. Baba will answer questions in the library afterward.”

I knew all about tratakum. Fixing your attention on a single object. It did indeed steady the mind. Continuing to take deep, slow breaths, flooding my blood with oxygen, I visualized the pink diamond necklace and waited for those around me to sink down into whatever meditative state they were capable of reaching.

After ten minutes or so, I opened my eyes and slowly swiveled my head to reconnoiter. To my right, Reggie was curled up like a giant baby in a fetal position with his head resting on two of the round cushions, snoring softly. He was holding the third cushion to his chest like a child holding a doll. Everyone else in the room seemed equally unconscious of their surroundings.

Ganesha had opened one of the French doors partway to let fresh air into the packed room, where fifty people were steadily inhaling and exhaling the atmosphere, extracting oxygen, adding carbon dioxide and moisture. Slowly, carefully, I unhooked my legs from the lotus position and stood up. My knees ached and my ass was numb. I did a dozen shallow knee bends to get the blood circulating, then tiptoed to the door, taking care not to bump anyone.

I watched Ganesha’s face as I slipped out. He didn’t stir. In the hallway, I resisted the delinquent impulse to rifle the cash register and headed straight for the stairs.