My Guru & His Disciple by Christopher Isherwood

July 29, I got further instructions from Prabhavananda. He told me to meditate on the Atman, the indwelling God, “this thing” within each one of us: “Imagine that there is a cavity within you. In the middle of this cavity there is a throne, in the form of a red lotus. In the middle of this lotus, a golden light is burning. Approach this light and say ‘Oh Self, reveal Yourself to me.’”
    My comment on this was:
    My imagination revolts from this: it sounds like a stage scene at the Radio City Music Hall. But I shall try to do it. I have put myself into the Swami’s hands and I must follow his instructions, just as I follow Dr. K.’s. We always want to choose our own medicine. A rose, for example, wouldn’t seem nearly so silly to me. But perhaps the lotus is better, just because I don’t like it.
    â€œThe Swami is too Indian for me” was a complaint I would return to, again and again. But, even while persisting in my prejudice, I had to admit to myself that the very Indianness of Vedanta was helpful to me. Because of my other, anti-Christian set of prejudices, I was repelled by the English religious words I had been taught in childhood and was grateful to Vedanta for speaking Sanskrit. I needed a brand-new vocabulary and here it was, with a set of philosophical terms which were exact in meaning, unemotive, untainted by disgusting old associations with clergymen’s sermons, schoolmasters’ pep talks, politicians’ patriotic speeches.
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    I had now met Aldous Huxley many times—usually with Maria, but occasionally by himself at M-G-M, while we were both working there. ( He was earning fifteen hundred dollars a week, and sending most of it to help relatives and friends in wartime Europe.) I already felt at ease with Maria, who was charmingly outspoken; she asked me frank questions about my personal life, which I answered with equal frankness. When the three of us were together, we behaved like intimate friends. When Aldous and I were alone, I felt uneasy because I was aware—indeed, it was Gerald who had made me aware—that Aldous, with all his liberalism, found homosexuality and the homosexual temperament deeply distasteful. I am sure that he liked me personally and that he fought against his prejudice. He was a nobly fair-minded man. Nevertheless, my uneasiness remained.
    That Aldous and I were both officially disciples of Prabhavananda didn’t strengthen the bond between us, as far as I was concerned. I was beginning to realize that Aldous and Prabhavananda were temperamentally far apart. Prabhavananda was strongly devotional. Aldous was much more akin to his friend Krishnamurti, who was then living at Ojai, a couple of hours’ drive from Los Angeles. Krishnamurti expounded a philosophy of discrimination between the real and the unreal; as a Hindu who had broken away from Hinduism, he was repelled by devotional religion and its rituals. He also greatly disapproved of the guru-disciple relationship.
    According to my diary (July 31), I must have told Aldous at least something about Prabhavananda’s latest instructions to me, thus prompting Aldous to tell me that Krishnamurti never meditated on “objects”—such as lotuses, lights, gods, and goddesses—and even believed that doing so might lead to insanity.
    This conversation disturbed me very much. Suppose Gerald is barking up the wrong tree? But I’m also aware that these doubts are not quite candid; they are being prompted by the Ego as part of its sabotage effort.
    My indiscretion in talking to Aldous about Prabhavananda’s instructions was inexcusable. Indeed, it was worse than an indiscretion, since I must have known in advance that Aldous would be critical, and would thus disturb me and strengthen my doubts.
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    The refugees weren’t the only ones who drew me into their midst and away from Prabhavananda. There