Michael Fischman - Stumbling Into Infinity: An Ordinary Man in the Sphere of Enlightenment

STUMBLING INTO INFINITY

An Ordinary Man in the
Sphere of Enlightenment

MICHAEL FISCHMAN

STUMBLING INTO INFINITY
An Ordinary Man in the Sphere of Enlightenment

Copyright 2011 Michael Fischman. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical or electronic, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from author or publisher (except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages and/or show brief video clips in a review).

ISBN 978-1-6003-7648-1 (trade paperback)

First Edition

Published by
MORGAN JAMES PUBLISHING
1225 Franklin Avenue, Suite 325
Garden City, New York 11530-1693
Toll Free 800-485-4943
www.MorganJamesPublishing.com

Excerpts of copyrighted material by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
used by permission of the Art of Living Foundation.

Cover design by Supriya Gupta. Back cover photo by Michael Lloyd.
Interior design by Jeffrey Ainis, www.ragingpages.com.
Set in Garamond Premier Pro.

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Control No. 2009928756
Stumbling into infinity: an ordinary man in the sphere of
enlightenment / Michael Fischman. 1st ed.

Author royalties are donated directly to the Art of Living Foundation,
a global non-profit educational and humanitarian organization.

A Reading Group Guide is available at www.stumblingintoinfinity.com.

If you do not change direction,
you may end up where you are heading.
LAOZI (LAO-TZU)

STUMBLING
INTO INFINITY

YOURE A VERY LUCKY MAN, Mr. Fischman, said the short, stocky ticketing agent as he squinted at his computer screen. You must know someone who can work miracles. He typed rapidly on his keyboard. For no apparent reason, he declared, youve been upgraded to first class!

He looked up with a big grin. Removing his reading glasses, he extended his arm and gave me my ticket. I smiled back and nodded my head, acknowledging that I knew I was lucky. But there was no time to explain. I needed to get to the plane.

In a few days, I would find myself in a giant dusty field in Bangalore, India. But I wouldnt be alone. Looking out at more than 2.5 million people over three days, I would be sitting on a stage with kings, presidents, movie stars, religious leaders from several faiths, and more than a thousand musicians (who had barely rehearsed). They would all be there for the Art of Living Foundations twenty-fifth anniversary and the fiftieth birthday of its founder, His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. It was nothing I could have imagined when I first met Sri Sri on that wintery day in 1979, when only a handful of people had even heard of him.

Now, I had boarded the plane, and could finally close my eyes. I was exhausted. I drifted into a sort of half-sleep, thinking about the long and unlikely journey that had brought me to this moment.

But my reverie didnt last long.

An attractive, middle-aged woman suddenly plopped herself in the seat next to me, banging my knee with her purse. Her perfume was sweet, and a bit overpowering.

Do you fly often? she asked, as she adjusted her skirt and made herself comfortable.

I am usually eager to meet new people, but that night I simply needed to keep my eyes closed. A flight attendant joined the conspiracy and interrupted my brief silence by reminding me to buckle up, and offering some warm roasted cashews and something to drink. My seatmate saw my open eyes as an opportunity.

I have a real fear of flying, she explained, removing a pill bottle from her purse. Well, its not the flying itself, she said, clarifying her phobia, its taking off that really terrifies me.

She placed some pills on her tongue and washed them down with red wine. I usually take Valium to help me relax when I fly, she explained. Speaking nervously, she asked, What do you do for a living?

I help people relax and get rid of stress, I said, aware of the irony. But my answer felt incomplete. In any case, she was no longer listening.

She squeezed her eyes closed and sighed heavily, as the plane started rolling down the runway. Grabbing my arm, she moved closer. Im sorry, she said meekly. I cant help myself. I dont want to die.

Dont worry, were safe, I assured her. And in a few minutes she fell asleep, clutching my arm.

I have often wanted to explain the life I lead more fully. But, in some ways, it is a life I barely comprehend myself, and certainly one I would never have predicted or even imagined for myself.

In fact, if you had told me when I was growing up that someday Id write a book about the grace of an enlightened teacher, I wouldnt have believed you. For one thing, school was such a struggle that writing a book would have seemed impossible. But mostly, the idea of an enlightened teacher or guru was completely foreign to my Western upbringing.

Like many New Yorkers who identified themselves as belonging to the tribe of people known as the Jewish Middle Class, I grew up knowing the kind of future that would make my parents proud. I would have a successful career as a lawyer or doctor, a home in the suburbs with a tree-dotted backyard, and maybe a swimming pool to relax in during the hot summer months. Id have a beautiful wife who would shop at upscale malls, and two adorable children, each one the brightest and most popular in their class. Yet, over time, this destiny became increasingly less attractive.

Perhaps you could blame it on my generation. As a baby boomer growing up in the sixties and seventies, idealistic, revolutionary, and counter-cultural ideologies filled my head with hopes of a better world. After reading such popular books as Autobiography of a Yogi, by the Indian mystic, Paramahansa Yogananda, and Be Here Now, by psychologist and former Harvard professor Dr. Richard Alpert (better known as Ram Dass), I was more interested in attaining a state of nirvana and enlightenment than in studying for my chemistry finals and graduating from college.

I knew vaguely that in India and in many Eastern traditions the spiritual guru is a normal feature of family life. But, like many Westerners, I was generally independent-minded, and assumed that, in spiritual matters, most people found their own way. Certainly, there was nothing to suggest that I would someday become a friend to a great spiritual leader, much less the head of his U.S. organization.

I started writing this book as a way to answer the many questions Ive been asked about the early days around His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. As someone who had an intimate seat at the beginning of a great spiritual movement, I wanted to convey some of the magic and mystery of those early years little-known stories, private moments with Sri Sri