How did you come to know about Mooji?
The first experience with Mooji was a video
that my wife had come across.
We watched this video together on a Sunday afternoon.
It was very interesting for me.
She and my daughter had decided to go to a retreat at Zmar after that.
They had a very nice time.
My daughter came back from the retreat and said,
'It's OK Dad, you can go too'.
I had a bit of apprehension, 'What's this spiritualism?
What are they going to do?
Do I have to sing and dance?' I didn't want to do that.
So I went to the first retreat at Zmar,
and it was very interesting. For a few days, it was very interesting,
on other days it was starting to,
'Oh, there is an effect there, there is a message there'.
I went away with that.
I remember going back to Switzerland,
it was always in my mind, how that retreat affected me.
Since then I've always been looking at the pointings in a practical way,
which Mooji always brings across so well.
It's not just a theoretical mind type of thing,
but also, 'How does it work in daily life?
How do I work with the roles of a husband, father and grandfather,
and all of these kinds of things?'
So it has been a very good experience on a daily level.
Which of Mooji's pointings impacted you the most?
'Don't take it personally.'
That was one of the first pointings that I said,
'Oh, this is right, don't take it personally,
don't take these things into yourself'.
The other was stepping back, that was the first thing I realised
after the first retreat at Zmar, and certainly after Sahaja.
In daily life where you'd drive down the street and you'd see someone,
and you'd go, 'Oh, they are big, they are tall, they are this colour',
these kinds of things that you start to judge people on.
I was catching myself. I'd catch myself and think,
'Why did you do that?' And then let that slip away.
I think those are the first two things that affected me the most.
Since then there is always a further development, particularly this week,
when Mooji, in the Satsang we were able to attend yesterday,
was talking about roles, 'Don't be a role. Roles come, you play a role.'
After hearing that I just happened to be reading Ramana yesterday,
and also came across a line that said,
'An actor does not need to forget himself to play a good role'.
And that was like, 'Oh, I am hearing this, this week'.
'Don't play those roles, don't let those roles take you.'
There is something behind that, there is something always present there,
that is me, and not that particular role.
About a year ago I worked with a company, with some gentlemen
that I'd worked with in various other companies before.
When I came to work with them after being at Zmar and here at Sahaja,
some of them I'd worked with over ten or fifteen years, and they said,
'There is something different, I don't quite know what it is,
but it is very nice when you come'.
I realised in that interaction that I'd dropped a lot of the role-playing,
'I'm this, you're that. I have to play this role,
you have to play that role.'
It just flowed very easily. I didn't take it personally.
Your daughter has been at Sahaja for several years.
Would you like to say something about that?
It always shows when Sajani comes back to Switzerland for visits.
We have completely different conversations.
It's not about, 'How do you feel?' And, 'What are you eating?'
Or, 'What are you putting on?' ... and day to day things.
Many times we can just sit quietly and not do anything.
There is different energy there. I think that is a wonderful thing.
Also we'd played certain roles, and the roles have kind of disappeared.
We are learning from her.
She is learning from us of course, but we are learning from her.
The first times it was a bit of,
'She is telling me this, but oh ... Oh yes, she is right.'
That kind of thing. It's very open, it is a much easier atmosphere,
very, very smooth, very pleasant I must say.
How have these 2 weeks at Monte Sahaja been for you?
We are leaving on Monday and I would say that
it's been such a wonderful time! [exhales]
You always come with a hope, 'Maybe we will have one satsang'.
We've had two. And then meeting ...
And the interaction yesterday morning with Mooji,
and the tea invitation was ...
That surpassed anything that I have realised,
or experienced here up until now.
I must say that that is the first time, to be honest,
the first time that I really felt what he was saying,
rather than understanding what he was saying.
It was like time had stopped, and you just are there,
and you feel this movement and such.
That is something that I will not just take back with me,
but it is something ...
It hit something yesterday that had not been hit before.
Beyond my wildest dreams, these two weeks have been like that.
Then of course my wife,
this has been the first time she has been on the land.
She also understands now when I say, 'I would like to go to Sahaja'.
She says, 'Yes, I understand that'. It is a given.