The opposite of Stephen and the Farm?

~beatnick Mon, Jul 9, 2001 (08:14) seed

I remember how Stephen reacted to seeing the hippies carrying Bhaktivedanta around Golden Gate Park in the sixties, he said he couldn't hack it and made a few other less than kind comments about other gurus. Muktananda, Maraji, Yogi Bhajan, Rammed Ass. And tho he called Gurdjieff elitist, I thought maybe Stephen was a bit elitist in his judgements of these poor guys. We all have our pretentions, even Gaskin. So with that in mind, on Saturday I went to see the guru du jour Ammachi at the Hilton Hotel in Washington D.C. It was a new-age smorgasbord with Amma dolls for sale, and everything else you could think of for sale, but the program was free and stuff costs money, like 2 days of Hilton bills and rental cars and airline tickets. They served up a really great vege lunch, and in general, I was treated really well. 6-700 people came for the morning program, which went from 10AM to 4PM. My friend and I didn't get there until 10 so our "numbers" were 422 and 423. Pick a number just like at the deli. She did have clean juice and lots of it, but I didn't need to be right in her face to feel it. We sat on the stage with her for about an hour and just swam in all the darshan energy. I must admit I've gotten much stronger stuff from the gatehouse itself. Just the boards and timbers, without anyone even being there, haha. When our number range came up, we had been at lunch and when we got back I saw they were now "serving" up to 500 and I wisecracked that we had missed our darshan. People took me seriously and I had to explain that I was just joking. They had 200 people sitting in line scooching up every minute to make room for more. When I got to the stage (after about an hour of scooching), My every move was micro-managed by her people. "Ok now you move to this spot. Now move to that square inch, now that one. It was annoying, but they had the stage so packed with folks, I could see why they were doing it and dropped my annoyance. Finally I was in her face, she held my head, pressed her cheek to mine and whispered nanji nanji in my ear which just sounded like baby-talk to me, but hey, she's the divine mother, so whaddaya expect? She was another awakened person, it's really amazing how such a natural thing like being awake is promoted. Like she was god herself dropped down from heaven. She's just another natural person in my mind, not the avatar that so many promote her as. But if you like shakti, she's got it.

~terry Mon, Jul 9, 2001 (10:44) #1

There are quite a few Amaachi people around Austin, mostly living out in Radiance in the Hill Country. She comes to Dallas fairly often to do her gig, and I think she's been to Austin. Their fervor is pretty amazing, like that of the Farm folks in the early days. I did a search on the web and only found one single reference to Amaachi which is surprising, so this must not be the correct spelling, but here it is because it's flavorful (and excerpt): Many in the crowd have only Amaachi's incredible feast of bhajan and enormous hugs as a point of reference. After a long meditation, Shree Maa, who has the voice of a diva, starts to sing. The Bhava Dude band, composed of a harmonium, electric and accoustic guitars, synthesizer and drums joins in. The sound can only be described as somewhere between a heavenly choir and Blind Willy Thorton. Shree Maa's and Swami's sense of humor loosen up the crowd and people get the idea that it's okay to have fun. This spiritual path is definitely not about being a humorless, uptight yogi. People start getting up and dancing and pretty soon the gathering has the quality of a Southern Baptist revival. At the end of the evening, each person reverently bows to Shree Maa and receives her tilik blessing. http://www.web-alive.com/dm/html/story_by_mahavir.html

~beatnick Mon, Jul 9, 2001 (11:31) #2

Here's the website http://www.ammachi.org/, that link you have is someone else, Ammachi is even cooler that her. The vibes WERE just like the old Farm days, and Ammachi's realization isn't really different in it's manifestation to Stephen's either. She's big into charities, just like the Farm is. I guess "real" realization is always the same, like he said "meet one buddha, met em all", tho some of these people sure manifest in some weird ways, like Adi Da, or Rajneesh. Guess that's why some gurus have told certain students NOT to teach. Purity is important in a guru. Or at least cleanliness, haha.