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.

“Planet Earth, itself, now demands what the sages and prophets shouted in vain.”

Inside: Three excerpts from the book, An Interview with Shamcher Bryn Beorse and an article on Shamcher’s retirement at the age of 80 from Keyport, where no one knew of his Sufi work and activities. After “retirement” he moved to Berkeley, California, and returned as Emeritus to University of California Seawater Lab to work again on promoting OTEC.

Three excerpts from An Interview with Shamcher Bryn Beorse

Self-Investigation

The mind is a good instrument of discrimination, and as Inayat Khan says: “The mind and the heart are as two wheels of a carriage.” We must utilize them both in a process that is balanced.

An example is the story of the yoga aspirant. This one had such a keen mind developed that when a bird disturbed his meditation he was able to send up a flame of fury and the bird was burnt to a crisp. That is a mind without a heart. It is only when the mind and heart are in balance that one can go about the real process of self-investigation. Then you can develop the powers of the mind and direct them with the heart to the area that you want.

If you want to use the mind to understand yourself, then you express it as a desire of the heart. You say “Yes, I want understanding.” But you do it gently, you don’t ask in a fury, that’s not the right way. Anything that your mind wants legitimately, that is, directed by the heart, and which it has a right to want, will come. Either this same second, or perhaps a week later, or even a thousand years later sometimes. You don’t know when, but this doesn’t mean you postpone it by saying, “Oh, it may not come for a thousand years.” You simply say, “I want it”. Just say that.

Darshan

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 felt 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.

High Mountains

On your path you should try to remember at least this life. And maybe more than that, all the way from the beginning. That’s why l touched on the unbalance I had when I was younger, when I had to go on those mountain trips etc. I don’t need that any longer, maybe because now the hills are so darn steep (hmm, is it because I don’t need it, or the combination of these two things together?) But it is true, one should try one’s best to remember all the lessons, and then it is easier to be in communication with all ages.

“Retired” at 80

Not the Retiring Type: The Story of Bryn Beorse

You wouldn’t have known he was 80 by looking at him, but that was his age when he finally retired from Keyport on December 22, 1976.

The slightly white-haired man who spoke with a bit of a Norwegian accent was well-thought-of by his coworkers who would remember him as one who had the incredible ability and initiative to pursue more than a dozen different fields of study in his lifetime.

Born in Norway in 1896, Bryn earned his masters degree in civil engineering there. Before coming to the U.S. in 1938, he traveled to more than 65 different countries and worked all over the world.

Bryn was a pioneer in the field of thermal energy, with ideas thought to be ahead of his time. Preferring thermal to atomic, he believed that a system of thermal energy plants in the earth’s warm oceans could provide 200 times as much energy as needed in this country.

Before coming to Keyport in 1961, he worked at the University of California, Boeing, and North American Aviation. He was 65 when he first passed through the Keyport Station’s gates, an age at which most have already retired. Bryn believed that age had nothing to do with limitation. “When you run into a barrier one place, then you should look elsewhere,” he said.

Bryn spent 15 years as an engineer in the Quality Assurance Program. At the age of 80, Bryn was faced with a mandatory retirement regulation by which he abided with some regret, but with even more hope for a new career field to pursue.

As he left Keyport, he affirmed that keeping active would keep him young. “I don’t think long life is a sign of a man being very wise. But keeping the mind bubbling with ideas all the time helps a man to live fully.”

(from Maritime Park Association)

Top Photo by Bruce Hong on Unsplash

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The Shamcher Bulletin is edited by Carol Sill, whose newsletter, Personal Papers, is HERE.

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