July 5th
The Shamcher Bulletin brings you snippets from Shamcher’s writings that might help frame and context our experience of the world we live in today.
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Selections from An Interview with Shamcher Bryn Beorse
The Flow of the Universe
Shamcher: Obsession only occurs when you are concerned with the fruits of your labor. There is an old piece of wisdom in both yogic and Sufi lore, and that is that you may be fond of your labor, you may do your labor for humanity, but if you think about the fruits and are concerned primarily with them then you are off the track, and for our purposes here you could say such a one was obsessed. For instance, you do certain things, and are overanxious with the result.
“Will they understand me, will they go along, will I have no success at all?” Such thoughts make an obsession out of your work.
Q: There seem to be two sides of dealing with this, On the one hand, the idea of struggle into self mastery, as suggested by the Gita quote: “O Arjuna, you can fight,” and the other approach which is to yield to one’s impulses and “go with the flow.”
Shamcher: You give in to the flow, but this is perhaps not as simple as it sounds. Say there is a trend in our civilization right now to strive for more income. Civilization tells you that you are a bigger and better person the more you get. If you give in to this, you are not giving in to the ‘flow’, you are giving in to a quirk of civilization. There is a difference.
Giving in to the flow really means giving in to the flow that is the flow of the Universe, of the spirit. It is important to know which flow we are speaking of.
Like the way we give awards, titles, prizes. A person receives a Ph.D. or a Nobel prize. One rather wise head of a university once said: “I’d like to add a little note on everyone who gets their Ph.D. This man has strived hard to become a very narrow specialist in this field, so never listen to him in anything else.” This is the correct way, this man was trying to listen to the real flow. Whereas the others, the ones who have such great respect because they are Ph.D.s or some other title of being a great scientist, may be giving in to another flow altogether different, and one quite unworthy.
Inayat Khan, Darshan and Initiation
Inayat Khan once said: “I was sent to the West by my teacher to unite East and West with the music, that you know, and I did that in the beginning. I played my music, and now I have come to hear the music of every living soul and this is not merely uniting the geographical directions of East and West but any two apparently opposite units, uniting them through the harmony which I hear when I listen to the music from individuals.” And by this he didn’t think that these individuals were going to sing to him, but he heard something, he looked at the person and the vibrations that he felt was the music he heard. So in one sense he stopped his musical life, but really it was a continuance of the same thing: uniting East and West through the harmony of his music.
Darshan is communication between two beings, and shouldn’t be thought of as anything else. I have described to you how Inayat Khan used the darshan, how you and he would suddenly open your eyes and look into each other. Some people got no feeling from such darshans and others felt their lives had been changed, that they had experienced a part of his mind and gotten from it just what they wanted, and were very happy because of it.
Darshan is not the kind of thing that I would go for, because, in my case at least, it would be a sort of almost an imposition. Rather, I would advise everyone to sit - or stand or whatever - and simply get in touch with what emanates from the silence within them. This is the thing, drop the personality, the worries, everything and just be in touch with that silence within yourself.
And there are many people who understand this.
Everybody who has ever been initiated is in communication with Inayat Khan. In fact, Inayat once said: “People who have never seen me, who will be born after I’ve left, may often be in closer contact with me than you people who have known my person, because you will not confuse me with my physical person.”
Influences, Elements and Power
Some people have superstitions about these types of influences. They say, “This man is a vampire, he takes all my powers!” Well, I say to these people that if anyone is taking your powers its your own damn fault! No one can take your powers if you don’t let them, and besides, it is not that he has taken your power, it is that you have emptied yourself of it to him for some reason.
When asked, “Do we have power over the elements?”
Shamcher replied: We don’t have power over them. If we behave right they will gladly cooperate with us. The elements have much more power than the present civilization. We have very little power even over ourselves. Even over our health and bodies. We are almost morons in the way we behave, and the elements are much more effective in their operations than we in ours. Although we could become even better than the elements in time.
A taste from the start of Fairy Tales are True, as the preparations for the journey begin.
Scientist, Sir James, discusses his science fiction writing
“If I need to defend myself, my science fiction originated before my status in science, when I was just a boy and tried to orient myself in this contradictory world. That was long before science fiction became a craft.
“I wrote fantasies about the universe and man and his destiny and our sisters and brothers on other planets. It was on the basis of these speculations that I decided to become a scientist, patiently probing for the truth.
“Of course, I was delighted when, at long last, my fantasies became a product which would sell. Now, my science fiction is not only an outlet for thoughts not yet ripe for scientific journals, but it is also a source of extra income which has paid for many of the instruments which, day by day, bring us closer to my boyhood dreams.”
“What particularly interests me about science fiction,” said Dr. Jacques in his melodious voice, “is that it has made acceptable to a large segment facts and feats long realized — not necessarily by aliens from other planets, but by hermits, sages, Yogis, Sufis and other simple geniuses here on earth. What Americans and Europeans would not believe of their own species, they readily accept when applied to interstellar beings.”
Sir James nodded. “I have often thought that our dreams of mastery of life and death, psychic powers, invulnerability and so forth, expressed in our science fiction may stem from memories of past achievements of our own race, or from half-conscious communications with adepts existing here on earth.”
Mathematician Jane Weiner is unconvinced.
“Sir James Oss, my ideal in the realm of physical science, has turned out to be a dabbler in science fiction, the hash which is about to destroy the sobriety of our youth.
“And now, worse, Sir James and Dr. Jacques both come out for the yogis and mystics – charlatans living off the credulity of uneducated people – phonies who have been debunked a thousand times over.”
… “Our charming mathematician is right,” Dr. Jacques said. “Yogis and mystics have been found wanting time and again and thousands more will fail the test. But there is one point to consider,” he paused for emphasis, “A counterfeit is, after all, made from a pattern.”
“Your point, of course, is that phony mystics prove that genuine ones exist,” said Jane. “But if they do, where do they keep themselves? Have you ever seen one?”
“Where would you keep yourself if you were one?” asked Dr. Jacques.
“Available,” said Jane passionately. “Available to the sick and needy, available to science, so that my faculties could be registered and investigated and repeated, if possible.”
“In that sense,” said Dr. Jacques, “I’d say that they are available. They are available to the sick and needy who do not need to see them in order to benefit. They are available to the people who are willing to give their whole lives to studying them and repeating their feats.
“But they are not available to lightweight scientists who thoughtlessly invade their intricate worlds with inadequate theories and instruments, leaving a trail of confusion. They are not available to the curious who would mob them, to the show people who would first exploit them and then destroy them or to the envious who would strangle them. For people with such talents, there is little choice but to hide.”
“Hide?” said Jane. “Where?”
“There are two ways of hiding,” replied Dr. Jacques. “A simple way and a subtle way. (A geographical way and a personal way.) Some of my friends have, in remote areas, stumbled onto hermits who can almost stop their hearts, who take no food, who communicate with friends without words. Near the Gangotri Glaciers, for example, in the upper Himalayas, beyond the shrines of Badrinath and Kedernath, in places untenable to any human needing food and shelter.”
“But why should they hide in such outrageous places?” asked Jane.
“Why not?” said Dr Jacques, shrugging. “If they communicate freely at any distance, they have no need of close company. If they do not eat, except for, perhaps, a pinch of crushed rock for mineral supply, they have no need for farm land. They have no craving or need for palaces or huts or any shelter at all.
“But a more subtle way to hide is in a crowd. Such people hide, not their bodies, but their powers…”
The Shamcher character introduces himself; he will guide the group to the Kumbha Mela
“Not even a Ph.D. I am just a nobody and I claim to be nothing else.”
“I travel extensively in the Far East and I have come here to offer myself as your guide to the Kumbha Mela.”
“Kumbha Mela? What is the Kumbha Mela?” asked Jane.
“It’s a sort of fair, Miss Weiner. An occurrence every twelve years when the holy men come down out of their hiding places and mingle with the populace. A sort of pilgrimage in reverse.”
“And you expect to meet some remarkable person at this Kumbha Mela,” said Jane Weiner.
“Yes,” I answered. “At least, I hope to. One can never be sure, but my expectations are great.”
Sir James Oss … laughed quietly and said, “Well, I shan’t argue with you. Count me in. This is the sort of thing I like to be in on. Something indefinite, unsure, like my doubts before my instruments, like my childhood speculations. And, like them, holding great promise. This is full of the only attitude which can possibly bring up anything new. And the idea of such a trip arranged by a nobody.”
He paused and smiled at me. “With all due respect, sir, I’m overwhelmed with the privilege of just meeting an honest nobody. Such a rarity. Such a gem.”
“And I am with you,” said Edward Fitzgerald enthusiastically. “I have long wished to study the behavior patterns of a factual nobody. Not to mention Sir James’ reaction to one.”
Keys to understanding a teaching story
“Your intuition… would not necessarily have encouraged belief in hermits with great powers, but it would certainly have looked up when I told the story of the humble father and his son. For this is a story rich in the subtle language of symbology.
“It is a message about the riches of experience gained through a humble life as against tricks learned during a spurt of hurried ambition. To the intuitive, the details fade against the deep, symbolic truth. Then, when the sensitive tentacles of intuition would go on to ponder the possibility of actually walking on water, there would just be a suspension of judgment. Intuition does not care. It does not affirm, nor does it deny, in any case where there is no experience.”
“Remember that no one wants to convince you of anything. None of us go because we believe or want to believe. We go to see and listen and perhaps learn.”
Listen to archived podcasts - the Writers Radio features on two of Shamcher’s books:
Part I - A Sufi Went to War. Part 2 - Man and This Mysterious Universe
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The Shamcher Bulletin is edited by Carol Sill, whose newsletter, “Personal Papers”, is HERE.
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