Initiated

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I wish I could recall the fine details of when I received my mantra. What do I recall? Enter that time frame Carol....

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[1975/1977]

The Transcendental Meditation Center was in a small, white, wood-frame house with a covered wooden front porch. I liked the front porch; it had a grey slat wooden floor. I liked the TM Center and hung out there often.

When a person entered the house, they entered what would be a den or living room in most houses.  In the TM Center this room was a greeting room. There were chairs and a table with some literature.  To the right was a door that entered another room; that was the initiation room.  When a person turned left in the initiation room, she would see the 'altar.'  That's what I would call it.  That's where I received my mantra as I sat in an upholstered chair.  The carpet was green.

Mantras were sacred. At least I felt mine was.  I never told anyone my mantra sound; it was mine.  I thought it was uniquely for me.  It seemed to change over time. The inflection of it, the accent.

Back on the front porch again. When one entered the home and walked straight through the living room, they then entered the kitchen.  It had a linoleum floor. The ceramic white sink was on the left. That's where I washed the fruit that new initiates brought.

When assisting with initiations, I had to be really careful with a new person's fruit and handkerchief. If I dropped them, they were no longer pure.  I don't recall handling the flowers, but maybe I did. I do recall that we had flowers on hand, just in case the flowers an initiate brought were not healthy enough.  It seems we had extra fruit too. Yes, in a fruit bowl on a kitchen table.

My TM teacher's name was Dee.  I think she was from New York and drove an off-white 70's Dodge Dart or something like that.  I liked her. She was petite, short hair, probably in her mid-twenties.  I was 16 when she initiated me and gave me my mantra.

The TM Center was near my high school just beyond some tall trees at the far end of the south-side parking lot.  At least I think it is south.  From the TM Center, I could see the school through the trees.

On the walls at high school, I displayed Maharishi posters advertising introductory TM lectures.  But I never got anyone to the lectures, that I recall.  At least no one that stuck around. I was the only person at the high school that was into TM. I wish I could remember if my boyfriend, Ron, ever came to a lecture.  Surely he did?  But he never received a mantra; he never got initiated. He continued with drugs; I had quit drugs.

Dee lived alone at the TM Center.  She was the only teacher.  There were a handful of us that were loyal Center volunteers.  I think Steve and I were the most loyal. Like Dee, Steve was in his twenties.Seems there was a lady named Donna. We shared some pot luck meals together.

I think I paid $75.00 for my mantra and later $100 to take the Science of Creative Intelligence Course (SCI). I was the only student as I watched Maharishi on the T.V. giggle with his flower.  He always had that flower.

As I took The Way International's Power for Abundant Living Class (PFAL), over two years after taking SCI, my spiritual eyes were enlightened. SCI is a counterfeit of PFAL. The devil, the Adversary, is a parasite. He takes the truth and counterfeits it as a lure to keep people away from the real Truth. Jesus said, "No one cometh to the Father, but by me....I and my Father are one...Let them be one as we are one." The only way to be One with God is through Jesus Christ, through the "rightly-divided" knowledge of who He really is, of what He really accomplished. I'm now a steward of the 'musterion,' the "Mystery." I am of the initiated, "of them that are 'teleioo.'" Wow...

Yes, SCI had to be a lure, a counterfeit in the spiritual battle. After all, both SCI and PFAL cost $100 and were about the same length. Both classes were taught by God's representatives. Maharishi was a guru, but he was deceived. Dr. Wierwille was the true man of God. 

Doctor was "The Teacher."

I sat at his feet drinking in every word.

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Click here to read an introduction to memoir: Journey through Memoir: Introduction

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