Starting the Spiritual Life

I always enjoy hearing what caused people to take up the spiritual life so I thought I would add what encouraged me.

I was a student at University having a good time doing the various things students usually do. I was also involved in Politics and used to enjoy take “unorthodox” opinions. On one issue I wrote a letter to a national newspaper, and they published it.

O God! I became famous, everyone was talking about it; some thought it funny others thought it awful.

Anyway I hated the attention and criticism; I started to avoid people and became depressed. It was then I started to read a spiritual book. I think the first was the Gospel of the Buddha, but I was soon reading from many different Spiritual Masters. A life of inner peace and harmony seemed to now offer great attraction and the writings of Indian Gurus seemed to have a tangible spiritual consciousness.

I was trying many different paths, and at one point I came to meditation classes given by the Sri Chinmoy Centre. I liked them a lot. But it was not the right time. I was still following other paths and at around this time I started to become very ill. I had to take a year of university. I was so ill I couldn’t meditate or anything like that. The illness led to a period of depression which was pretty painful. But somehow this ended and I still retained a strong desire to follow spirituality. I decided that when I got back to University I would join the Sri Chinmoy Centre and that’s what I did.

- Richard

Story about Spirituality and Politics from Descent of the Blue - A Play about the life of Sri Aurobindo