In View - Summer / Fall 1989

"The program was a new beginning, the launch of a journey."
"I've been going through a difficult time and almost didn't come to this program."
"My practice of Knowledge had subsided to almost nothing since I attended one of the Rejoice programs last year. I had been abusing the gift. I was like a car running on one cylinder. That lonesome feeling within me drastically changed at this program. Twice I was reduced to tears unexpectedly. My heart. which had become so hardened from not practicing Knowledge, was cracked open by Maharaji's inexplicable and oh so profound love and presence."

Maharaji is meeting with the musicians at the end of their first day of rehearsal. He looks wonderful. Gleaming. The band looks awful - a combination of jet lag, pre-program insomnia, bad hotel lighting, and nervous joy. But the songs are coming back and the band sounds, well … OK. Maharaji talks to them about the feeling of the music and the meaning the songs will convey. It is a beautiful privilege to be standing in the back, seeing the sun come up on whomever he is talking to. As Maharaji leads the musicians through the song list, each song sounds a little brighter, a little better. By the time he leaves rehearsal with the suggestion that everyone get some rest, the band is One again, on a familiar Foundation.

I am sitting in Sydney, Australia, involved in all the usual business of living, when I hear that Maharaji has just invited everyone to a festival in Miami. I go through all my usual reflex responses: "I'm out of money. It's impractical. It's unrealistic. Maybe he'll come here. I can't possibly get it together." Was this really me, making all these excuses? I couldn't deny, however, that I had reached a point - a familiar point in my life - where I was feeling that something more had to happen. Like before I first heard about Knowledge.

I flew to Abidjan, Cote d'lvoire, on the west coast of Africa, with only the hope of seeing Maharaji once again. Twelve former instructors and I had been invited to help with the ReCon Program Knowledge Review. Once there, we discovered a land rich with sweet smells and sounds, where bright colors and bold patterns adorned the noble people who moved with a grace and a rhythm much gentler than most of us know. It was a thrill to use my rusty French and work side-by-side with the Ivoirians, putting together a program that had been called only a few weeks before. It had been three years since Maharaji had come to Abidjan. This would be the first review.

Los ANGELES: "People have been saying that, after eight or nine years, the festival clinched something for them in their practice of Knowledge. I have the sense of something new in the air. People want to be ready for that, ready for whatever Maharaji has in store for us." Marta Kepes

More than 3,600 people in the United States have now pledged their monthly support. Throughout most of 1989, support for the program has been fairly consistent, with 65 percent of all pledges being honored. However, if everybody who pledged support followed through, we'd be fully able to meet the North American pledge for our pan in the support of Maharaji's work.