About two years ago I heard some buzz about an impressive spiritual teacher named Mooji who was coming to town. “You must see him” a friend insisted. I couldn’t because of another engagement that weekend. Regardless, too many disappointments with “must see” gurus made me skeptical, if not dismissive. I became cynical about a repetitious pattern that I observed: A depressed, bewildered and desperate seeker gets “the call” from India, goes there on a pilgrimage and receives an infusion of spiritual energy from a guru. Then while sitting along the banks of the Ganges a spontaneous explosive spiritual awakening occurs. The transformed seeker returns to a spiritual center in the U.S.—most often in Arizona, New Mexico or the Bay area of San Francisco—for reflection and assimilation of the enlightenment experience. Soon after, the awakened one hits the satsang trail bringing teachings of enlightenment to the world. But few if any that I sat with could pass muster with the great teachers that inspired me. So I wondered about Mooji.

The following week I ran into my friend and asked: “How did it go with Mooji.” and what did you learn? He then reported one message from Mooji that stuck with him. “Mooji,” said, “observe the observer.” That phrase stuck with me as well. “Isn’t the observer near the end of the journey,” I asked myself? ”How could there be something beyond the awareness of the observer?”

A number of months later when I heard about a Skype live video satsang with Mooji broadcast from his home in London and hooked up to an apartment in Chelsea in New York City, I was eager to attend. I did and was not disappointed.

Mooji’s bigger than life presence on the 40 inch screen communicating with the small gathering of followers had an intimacy as good or better than a live appearance. And Mooji’s demeanor was warm and inviting—no airs of a distant aloof guru speaking down to ignorant or lowly students. He was more like a wise concerned friend who knew something that you didn’t—and he seemed genuinely passionate about sharing with you the key to transformation. The occasional sound of children and family in the background gave the satsang a wholesome feeling. But make no mistake about it, the teachings were profound.

While listening to and observing Mooji it occurred to me that if someone believed in reincarnation he or she would have no trouble thinking that Mooji might be a reincarnation of the great sage of non-duality (“all is one”) Ramana Maharshi. Like Ramana, Mooji uses self-inquiry to relentlessly confront you with the singular most important question of the spiritual quest: Who are you?

Most of us think we know who we are since we have been functioning as the person we think we are all of our lives. Mooji, though, will persuasively show you that the person of your unquestioned conviction of who you are is not only misguided but is not a real person at all. More shocking, he will convince you that what you have called “me,” the entity that you have built your life around, is in fact a lifeless concept constructed from thoughts — in a sense, a transient puff of air that requires enormous attention and energy to maintain the illusion that it’s real.

Now that’s a hard insult to take. Worse, if true, it means that most of us have been living a dream which we took for real and have yet to awake from. All the while, the ground of being that projected the limited concept of the me self is abandoned as you get lived by your concept.

Once you grasp this portrait of self and reality — and Mooji will not let you easily slip away from that realization—you are hooked, even though you may not yet know how to reclaim your essence. That’s why his students keep returning. Moogji’s magnetic pull is based on an age old piece of wisdom: Present the truth and they will come.

Much of what Mooji says is not entirely new—a point he acknowledges by frequently quoting sages like Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj (“I Am That”). Others as well have followed in the non-duel self-inquiry tradition. My own book (“Escape Your Own Prison”), that resonates with Ramana and Nisargadatta, spells out similar teachings, as well as their applications in psychological terms—hopefully making them more accessible to westerners.

But “getting it “ requires going beyond words. The presence of the teacher can be the powerful tipping point for that awakening. And Mooji's presence projects a sense that he speaks from the depths of a transcendent consciousness—a place that is his natural habitat. No wonder that he frequently appears frustrated. You can almost feel him saying to himself, “it’s so simple and obvious. Why don’t they get it?”

When you don’t get it after he artfully confronts you with the distortions in your thinking, Mooji doesn’t give up or let up. He will pause and reflect and then come back at you with another, and another, and another assault on your blindness in the hope of opening a passageway for light to enter. He relentlessly keeps up the pressure through self-inquiry prodding that forces you to see that your questions and preoccupations are thoughts and concepts of mind that arise in awareness and that YOU are before the appearance of any objects of mind: “Who are you? Who is suffering? Who is asking the question? Who will benefit from an answer? If the answer is out there how can that be about you? Can you observe the problem, the seeker, the sufferer, or the entity ‘I’ who is asking the questions?

If you can observe something then you are not that thing —you are the awareness within which things happen or appear. He insists that even meditation, considered the ultimate experience of higher consciousness by spiritual practitioners–the ground of consciousness—is also something that is happening in awareness: “Can you observe the meditator when you are meditating?” Mooji asked a seeker in one of his dialogues. At first thrown by the question, the student retreated into a long thoughtful pause and then fired back with excitement, “yes.” I reflected on that as well and discovered to my amazement that I was aware of meditating. Try it yourself during meditation and you too will find that you can observe yourself meditating. Therefore, Mooji concludes, “awareness is before meditation” — even meditation, is a conceptual occurrence that is happening in awareness. Meditation may be a springboard or channel to awareness but it is not the ground of consciousness. Awareness Is! Mooji urges his students to cut through the tangle of ego attachments and distorted notions of who we are with his dictum: “Make your stand with consciousness itself.”

Students squirm, argue, fidget, rationalize and in general try to dodge who they really are. Mooji gently and lovingly blocks all their escape routes. One student finally blurted out: “You’re cornering me.” “Yes,” Mooji acknowledged happily with his typical warm engaging broad smile. Cornered is exactly where Mooji wants you —trapped, stripped of escapes with no other choice but to be who you really are: Pure consciousness—formless, contentless, and free.

Words can only go so far in capturing the Mooji experience. For a more direct taste go to his website (www.mooji.org) where you can find CDs and DVDs of his dialogues and teachings during satsangs and retreats—and information about his background and personal spiritual journey. Mooji’s recently published book, “Before I Am” is another excellent source of his philosophy and teachings expressed in his own voice.

I’m looking forward to seeing Mooji this week when he comes to New York City for a satsang and two day intensive (Oct.10-12) . Later this month he will be at the Kripalu Yoga Center in the Berkshires for a five day silent retreat (Oct. 26-31). He also has satsangs and retreats in other parts of the United States, South America and Europe. Check out his schedule to see if he is coming to your town, or nearby.

— — —

(My recently published book "Escape Your Own Prison: Why We Need Spirituality and Psychology to be Truly Free" is published by Rowman and Littlefield (Oct. 2007) and is now available at Amazon.com,Barnes & Noble.com and other major book outlets.)
— — —
Bernard Starr, Ph.D., formerly professor of developmental and educational psychology at the City University of New York, now teaches “Spirituality and Psychology in Film” at Marymount Manhattan College. In addition to his work in radio (“The Longevity Report”), he is a longtime contributor of commentary and opinion articles to numerous major newspapers and other publications. He is also the President of the Association for Spirituality and Psychotherapy and is the main United Nations representative for the Institute of Global Education that founded the Mucherla Global School in Mucherla, India. © Copyright 2008 by Bernard Starr