Take Me for a Ride: Coming of Age in a Destructive CultLaxer, Mark E.
Religion
Take Me for a Ride: Coming of Age in a Destructive Cult
Laxer, Mark E.
Cults -- United States; Lenz, Frederick, 1950-
Rama's lessons about movies often turned my topsy-turvy world
further upside down. He told me, for instance, that Star Wars
creator George Lucas was wrong to have Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill)
prematurely leave a mystical apprenticeship, wrong to have evil
unmasked by good, and wrong to portray Yoda as being gay.
"Yoda is gay?" I asked.
"Yes," Rama replied, "but don't worry--you are not gay. No way.
Of course you're not gay. Don't believe anyone who tells you
that you are. Why even allow yourself to think that you are gay?"
Then, after laughing heartily, he hissed an imitation of the Emperor,
Darth Vader's evil master.
Rama, who assumed broad powers to interpret reality and myth,
seemed to believe that he was made of the stuff of legends.
He got touchy, however, when disciples looked to legends outside
the realm of his control. One time, for instance, I excitedly told him
that I had seen an autographed photo of Mark Hamill.
"Here you are sitting next to a fully enlightened teacher,"
he said bitterly, "and all you can do is live in a world of fantasy."
Rama was right, I decided, as I pushed the broom down the long driveway
in Malibu. I was living in a world of fantasy. There, shaded by billowing,
yellow smoke and accompanied by a talkative real estate agent,
was Harrison Ford, quietly stepping toward Goldie Hawn's house,
toward the "Last Incarnation of Vishnu." Ford wore dungarees.
Rama introduced himself as the renter and as a teacher of advanced meditation.
Anne introduced herself as a friend of Rama's.
"Sure is a blade runner kind of day," I blurted.
Ford said hello and went inside with the agent. We followed.
When the entourage reached the master bedroom, Rama gazed
at the ocean and declared, "The Force is strong here."
But Ford did not seem interested in Rama's assessment of the local
mystical energy field. Nor did Ford seem interested in Rama's
recollections about his fire fighting days. (Rama failed to mention
that he had fought the fires while in a prison camp, where he
had been serving time for selling drugs.) Ford was interested
in the construction of the house, and now he had seen enough.
He started to leave.
Rama handed him a Self Discovery, the free, promotional publication
that had taken the place of WOOF!. Rama gave him an issue
that had been distributed throughout southern California.
On the front cover was a blowup of Cindy, a beautiful, young,
blond woman, meditating on the hood of Rama's red Porsche.
Inside were stories from The Last Incarnation. On the back cover
was Rama's past-life resume advertisement, in which he claimed:
"1531-1575, Zen Master, Japan; 1602-1771, Head of Zen Order, Japan;
1725-1804, Master of Monastery, Tibet; 1834-1905, Jnana Yoga Master, India;
1912-1945, Tibetan Lama and Head of Monastic Order, Tibet; 1950- ,
Self Realized Spiritual Teacher and Director of Spiritual Communities,
United States."
Ford took the issue and left.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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