Turning Points All Around

A simple question and a wonderful answer Q: What was the turning point that moved you to spirituality? A:- I survived a plane crash, which should have almost definitely resulted in my death. The crash happened on July 8, 1982. About 18 of us were on that plane. I was a crew member. When it caught fire, I knew there was no way out. We took the crash position. I saw my whole life unspooling before my eyes, then I saw the vision of a rising sun and I got absorbed into it. However, the plane plunged into the Dharmapuri lake in Salem district, Tamil Nadu, and all of us survived. This incident made me realise that life is not in our hands. Earlier, I was confident that I was master of my destiny. Now I recognised that there was a force operating from behind. I felt convinced that my life had been spared for a reason and thenceforth I decided to live for peace and not for war, as I had been doing earlier. Eventually, I left the Defence Forces. Being a Marxist, I did not want to accept the existence of God immediately, so I decided to read and find a solution to this that would suit my rational mind. However, I soon understood that this was beyond the rational mind. I returned to religion, which meant Christianity for I had been born a Syrian Catholic in Kerala. While I was trying to understand more about Christianity, I was revealed my first guru, Justice Vithayathil, in a dream, where I was shown as a little boy sitting on his lap. I went to him the next day and his very personality gave me the assurance that he could guide me. I often use concepts like 'butterfly spirituality' which I would credit to him. This term refers to the butterfly's transition from the pupal stage. There is a lot of struggle it has to go through when emerging from the pupa, but if you help the struggling insect it will die. I find that this law holds good for us. One has to wait and allow nature's processes to unfold. Around then, I had a vision of Jesus Christ and realised that the spirit of Christ went beyond the Jesus of history. Jesus is not the only Christ. Gandhi was also Christ. Anyone who embodies light can be Christ. Jesus can be the standard. This is an excerpt from Suma varghese's (Life Positive') interview with Swami Sachidanandaji. Suma was with 'Life positive' since its inception in April 1996, beginning as bureau chief (Mumbai). She took over as editor-in-chief of Life positive in December 2005. A veteran journalist with more than 25 years of experience in magazine journalism, Suma was editor of the popular lifestyle magazine Society, for six years. Her movement into spirituality arose out of a deep experience in 1991, which enabled her to understand that true happiness arises only when one transcends the ego and focuses on the larger good. Ever since, she has been in pursuit of this absolute form of happiness.