Intuition
“The Gift of Giving”
~ a Synchronicity Story with Quotations
‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’
~ Acts 20:35 (Paul quoting Jesus)
“The wise man does not lay up his own treasures.
The more he gives to others, the more he has for his own.”
~ Lao Tzu
“For in truth it is life that gives unto life –
while you, who deem yourself a giver,
is but a witness.”
~ Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
“You can give without loving,
but you can never love without giving.”
~ Robert Louis Stevenson and/or
~ Victor Hugo, Les Misérables
“Lovers are givers, not getters.”
“Life is for giving, not getting.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Ron Rattner and Carol Schuldt at Aquatic Beach, 2012
“The Gift of Giving”
Here is another amazing synchronicity story about my now 79 year old friend Carol Schuldt, one of the most unforgettable people I’ve ever known.
Carol is an extraordinarily intuitive free spirit, with her own unique path of communing with Nature while surfing, swimming, sunning, hiking, biking, and gardening, and helping troubled souls – especially young people. Though raised Catholic, she has never knowingly followed any prescribed Western or Eastern spiritual path. Because of her great generosity, especially toward needy young people, Carol is sometimes known as the “Mother Teresa of the Sunset District”.
We met long ago at Aquatic Beach on San Francisco Bay (across from Ghirardelli Square), where Carol often comes to escape ocean fog and swim in the sun. Since then, we’ve had innumerable synchronistic encounters and exchanged many “miracle” stories about our lives. [I’ve posted other synchronicity stories about Carol, which are linked below as “related posts”.]
As I write, I have just returned from another magical encounter with Carol at Aquatic Beach, on a cold December 29, where Carol shared with me a wonderful synchronicity story about her experiences earlier today and yesterday.
Here it is:
Carol swims or surfs in the ocean or Bay almost every day. But, on rare days when she can’t swim because of inclement or cold weather, Carol sometimes browses and shops at the main Goodwill resale store near downtown San Francisco.
Yesterday, was one of those rare days when it was too cold and rainy for Carol to swim. So she drove her old truck toward the Goodwill store, and parked several blocks away in front of a community garden on Fell Street. After walking to the Goodwill store and shopping, Carol was returning to her parked truck when suddenly she urgently needed to urinate. There were no available public restrooms, so she had to relieve herself in a nearby empty lot. Afterwards, to her chagrin and embarrassment, Carol discovered that she had mistakenly peed on an elderly homeless man’s tent.
In remorse, Carol opened the tent entry flap and apologized to its homeless occupant, telling him “I’m very sorry, but I just peed on your tent”. Then Carol pulled a twenty dollar bill out of her wallet, and tendered it to the homeless man, saying: “Here, please take this.” After looking at Carol (who is sometimes mistaken for a ‘street person’ or ‘bag lady’ because of her unusual attire and appearance) he replied: “No baby, I can’t take it.”
But Carol insisted he take the twenty dollar bill, emphatically repeating that she had just peed on his tent. So he relented, and took the money with a broad smile. Her guilty feelings assuaged, Carol then drove off in her old truck.
This morning it was again cold and inclement in San Francisco. So Carol decided to return again to the Goodwill store. As she again parked her old truck on Fell Street near the community garden, a small moving van stopped after its driver observed her. The driver got out of the van and offered to Carol the load he was transporting, asking her to take it onto her truck. On his van Carol saw many valuable garden tools and other artifacts in good condition which she could use in her organic garden, plus a new volley ball which her son Pete could use. So Carol accepted the van driver’s offer, and relieved him of responsibility to dispose of his load, by transferring it to her truck.
Thereupon, on seeing that the morning overcast was lifting to reveal patches of blue sky, Carol spontaneously decided to drive to Aquatic Beach instead of walking to the Goodwill store. At the beach, Carol swam in very cold water, then dressed and was sitting and warming herself in sunshine when a family group of tourists walked onto the beach and looked at her.
Jovially pointing at Carol, the family’s father exclaimed to his companions, “She’s having fun. There’s a happy person.” Then after walking to the shore with a child, he came back to Carol and offered her a twenty dollar bill. Carol – who is economically well off – told him “I can’t take that.” But he insisted. So Carol reluctantly accepted his twenty dollar gift.
Thus, just a day after she had spontaneously given a twenty dollar bill to a reluctant homeless man, Carol drove home from Aquatic Beach with another twenty dollar bill given her by a stranger after she reluctantly accepted it. And her old truck was filled with valuable garden equipment given to her by another stranger near the very same place where she peed on the homeless man’s tent.
Moral of this story:
“It is in giving that we receive.”
Introduction to Ron’s Memoirs
Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas
“Follow your heart – even if it contradicts my words”
“If there is love in your heart, you don’t have to worry about rules.”
~ Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas
During a traumatic divorce and “mid-life crisis” in 1975, I experienced what Hindus call a spontaneous awakening of the kundalini energy with sudden realization that I was much more than my physical body, its story and thoughts with which until then I had always self-identified.
That realization triggered an extraordinary and unforgettable “rebirth” experience, accompanied and followed by many amazing mystical experiences, which forever changed my life and impelled me to begin questioning whether the universe worked the way I’d thought or been taught; and to soulfully seek answers to ultimate questions and a new paradigm guiding the remainder of my life time. So, paradoxically, a broken heart opened me to a wonderful new way of experiencing life.
Since then my life has unfolded in ways I couldn’t previously have imagined, like a spiritual mystery story. For example, after starting life as a non-observant Jew – a secular Hebrew, I was initiated into a Hindu tradition by a venerable Hindu guru, and for many years thereafter regarded myself as a “born-again Hindu”. Though I no longer consider myself a “born-again Hindu”, but an “uncertain Undo”, I write today because of what my guru told me eighteen years ago.
It was February, 1992. I had just retired after thirty four years of practicing as a San Francisco litigation attorney, and had come to Ahmedabad, India, to pay my respects to my then 114 year old venerable Hindu guru, Shri Dhyanyogi Madhasudandas (Guruji). Guruji was living in the apartment of a local doctor. His mental, intuitive and prescient powers were amazingly acute – as ever, but his 114 year old body was weak, and he was obliged to spend his days mostly in bed. On one of those days, I was granted an audience together with a small group of Guruji’s closest Indian devotees, including his female successor Shri Anandi Ma, her parents and her husband, Dileepji. Except for me, all present were Indians with whom Guruji conversed in Gujarati, while I knelt facing an altar at the foot of his bed.
After a while, Shri Anandi Ma’s father, Pravin Jani, a Vedic astrologer and pundit, spoke in English to me: “Guruji wants to know if you have any questions.” Having just retired, I was thinking of starting a daily diary of spiritual experiences as a way of promoting my spiritual progress – my “sadhana”. So I asked if this would be OK, and received an answer which astounded me, and which I’ve been considering until now.
Guruji said: “Rasik should write and publish his spiritual memoirs. They will inspire many people”. Rasik – meaning “one engrossed in devotion” – was the spiritual name he had given me upon my initiation in 1978. I listened in astonishment and bewilderment, thinking: “Publish my personal memoirs? Shouldn’t they be kept private? How could the experiences of an ordinary person like Ron Rattner inspire many people?.”
Eighteen years have passed since that day in India. Since then, I lived for many years in introspective semi-seclusion, without a TV, computer, newspaper, or radio news of the “real world”, meditating, praying, seeking answers to ultimate questions, and “enlightenment”. Since then I’ve made many mistakes and have had many experiences and insights from which I think I’ve learned and benefited a lot. Though I haven’t stopped making mistakes and learning, I’ve now lived long enough to realize the prescience of Guruji’s instructions to me, and wish to honor them and you by sharing with you some of my spiritual stories, and their significance and lessons for me.
I feel that Humankind is now processing an extraordinary evolutionary leap in our common consciousness; that we are evolving from millennia of hierarchical dominance and constraints to an epoch of egalitarian and democratic sharing and openness; that we are democratizing and merging the spiritual and secular aspects of our lives. So, though I began my mid-life spiritual journey with an hierarchical Guru-disciple relationship, which I eternally honor, I now consider Life to be my spiritual teacher. But I am guided by Dhyanyogi’s highest teachings: “Follow your heart – even if it contradicts my words”; and, “If there is love in your heart, you don’t have to worry about rules.”
Many meaningful and noteworthy experiences have revealed to me the deep and essential commonality, connection and interdependence of all life on Earth, so that everything we think, do or say changes this world in some way.
This life has become like an amazing spiritual mystery story. Without yet – and perhaps never – solving the Mystery, more and more I’ve learned to honor it, with gratitude and awe. And I now gratefully experience my life as synchronistically magical and miraculous – feeling happier than ever before. So in sharing with you what I’ve learned from these spiritual experiences, I do not and can not write as a Guru, but as just another participating ‘fellow traveler’ on the spiritual path to an ever mysterious shared destiny.
My deepest aspiration is that everyone everywhere – all life forms – flourish and be happy; that all humankind be empowered to use their unique gifts to fulfill their highest potentialities, and thereby harmoniously to benefit all life on our precious planet – and beyond.
So in now sharing with you some of my experiences and perspectives my intention and dedication is to contribute to that vision and goal. As a ‘senior citizen’ and member of ‘Generation Exit’, I especially wish to be of help to younger people to whom we bequeath our future, as they inherit the mistakes and learning experiences of their forebears in an ever changing world.
