What do you think?
Rate this book
Rudi: 14 Years with My Teacher
Rudi was an authentic spiritual genius who nourished a deep personal contact with his hundreds of students. His teaching was direct and intense, yet the essence of simplicity. The force of his personality immediately captured John Mann--and never let him go. Here is their story, a chronicle of a special friendship and an evocation of Rudi's remarkable wisdom.
- GenresSpirituality
352 pages, Paperback
First published August 31, 2001
2 people are currently reading
20 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 7, 2023
A DISCIPLE OF RUDI TELLS A VERY COMPLIMENTARY STORY
Author John Mann wrote in the first chapter of this 1987 book of an early meeting with Rudi: “It was the essence of simplicity---pure vitality given from one human being to another. Yet I suspected, with increasing intensity during the following weeks, that this experience, invisible, silent, and almost off-hand, was the most important thing that had ever happened to me. I also had the immediate conviction that what I had experienced was available nowhere else in the world.” (Pg. 13)
He explains, ‘if I had been asked at the time about the nature of Rudi’s work, I could hardly have given a coherent reply. I knew Rudi was a natural psychic… As a social scientist, I should have been impressed and excited to see such evidence of paranormal ability on a daily basis. But it seemed entirely natural that Rudi should know these things… I could not, however, classify the experience of formally sitting with him. I knew it was real and that it constituted a trail that I was slowly following through the maze of my own wilderness. That was enough.” (Pg. 24)
He recalls, “There had been many years of searching before I met him. When I was fifteen, I underwent my first inner experience. I began to hear an inner dialogue between myself and a presence whom I sensed as utterly alien… I had the chilling realization that the alien being was my real self… During the next fifteen years I led an outwardly normal life… It took several years after I met Rudi for anything to change.” (Pg. 39-40)
He states, “Rudy slowly clarified the basic outline of his teaching… His basic concept was that there existed a psychic digestive system within the human organism. Its function was to directly transform internal and external energies into nourishment for higher human and spiritual functions, which were usually dormant due to lack of proper fuel. This conception … exists in various forms of yoga philosophy. But the specifics were different and Rudi’s approach as a teacher was unique.” (Pg. 46)
Rudi told him, “the great spiritual beings are gone in India. There was a final generation of great God-men. They all died within a few years of each other. Bhagavan Nityanand was one of them. And who is left to take their place?... Muktananda is the partial inheritor of Nityananda’s spiritual force… There is a psychic connection between them which I can experience and use… In most ashrams in the East, the guru doesn’t pass on his power until death intervenes… I don’t believe in doing it that way. There is no reason that death has to be the source of the gift. I intend to pass on my own capacities during my lifetime.” (Pg. 87)
Rudy said, “Intelligence is a wonderful thing, John, but there is nothing cheaper. It is a futile ability unless one also knows how things work. A man of power buys and sells people who can think. The average intellectual is helpless when removed from his environment, whereas he should be like a cat, landing on all fours wherever he is thrown. But the one thing you must never do with any of your colleagues is to threaten their security, unless you are prepared to replace it with something better.” (Pg. 114)
Mann observes, “Rudi’s whole life was a continuous ferment of forced growth. He would not accept anything less. In a talk for an evening class, he said: ‘We always think of growth as something pleasant and light, like a flower petal unfurling in the sun. How does the seed feel when it is buried alive in the dirt?... Probably uncertainty, fear… That s growth!... All of this is exactly paralleled by what occurs inside an evolving person. The only difference is that inner growth can only proceed through conscious suffering. It never occurs otherwise.’” (Pg. 135)
Mann observes, “I had been working with Rudi for nine years. During that time, my own process of inner transformation had gradually begun… I had read books, visited various groups, and invested eight years of work in other approaches before meeting Rudi. Though I had attained few positive results, at least those years of exploration had helped me to understand my own situation realistically and had given me the capacity to endure.” (Pg. 161)
Rudi invited Swami Muktananda to come to America, and Rudi told his students: “The basic difficulty which you will face as a group is that you have not been trained in how to behave with a Hindu saint… I don’t mean to scare you. He may be on his good behavior and make things very easy for all of us. But you have to realize that the guru is the absolute dictator in his domain… Swami Muktananda is as complex as a three dimensional chess board… He is a caged tiger. Nothing occupies him for very long. He goes through an experience and moves on…” (Pg.
179-181)
He states, “During the first day, after one of Muktananda’s classes, Rudi started to wok with some of his students in a totally new way. At first, all I noticed were people approaching Rudi and then collapsing onto the lawn… he put his fingers on the person’s forehead, and shorty thereafter they seemed to become dizzy and fall to the ground in some kind of fit. It was scary… And then Rudy turned toward me… My head went back, he touched my heart center, and then the base of my spine. I felt myself … falling to the ground..” (Pg. 207-208)
He notes, “Rudi had talked to us about the significance of the relationship between student and teacher… A student’s loyalty is to his own teacher; your loyalty is to me. Baba is my teacher. My loyalty is to him. You honor him because of the level that he represents and because he is my teacher. But do not forget that I am your teacher and that without me you would never even meet Baba/” (Pg. 213)
One day, Rudi announced, “In a year or a year and a half… I feel I am going to leave New York for the Middle East. There will be others here who will carry on. It will be the start of a totally different life for me. But don’t worry, John… You can visit me once or twice a year and get what you need. Believe me, by that point it will be enough.” (Pg. 250)
Rudi and some of his students visited Nepal: “Rudi was jubilant. ‘I bought a million dollars worth of goods for almost no money; fabrics, furnishings, rug. It was the most remarkable trip I ever made. I just happened to go at the perfect time. A month from now is the international trade fair. The Japanese will buy everything…” (Pg. 281)
John asked Rudi about whether he still wants Mann to write the present book, and was told, “If you want to have a live, then write it! Personally I don’t care. There have been plenty of people eager to write books, articles, do interviews with me. I have always discouraged it. I have postponed fame as long as I could. It is better to delay something, so that the foundation is strengthened and one is mature enough to endure it. I want you to write the book for your sake, John, not mine.” (Pg. 292-293)
In a last conversation, Rudi told him, “You have to work deeper. If you don’t, you will spend the rest of your life in a backwash if sh-t… The experience was real. It was your higher self… You never listen. You never try hard enough… I wouldn’t bother saying this if I didn’t want you to have a wonderful future. The easiest thing for me to do is to sit back and watch you go over a cliff…” (Pg. 311)
He concludes, “For several years before his death, I had invited Rudi to come to the Rochester area to talk and teach. He had always put me off… But finally… he had agreed to come. I had made preliminary arrangements for him to talk to an ashram in Rochester. When the time came, I had to appear in his place…” (Pg. 321-322)
This book will be of interest to anyone studying Rudi, or similar Eastern teachers.
Author John Mann wrote in the first chapter of this 1987 book of an early meeting with Rudi: “It was the essence of simplicity---pure vitality given from one human being to another. Yet I suspected, with increasing intensity during the following weeks, that this experience, invisible, silent, and almost off-hand, was the most important thing that had ever happened to me. I also had the immediate conviction that what I had experienced was available nowhere else in the world.” (Pg. 13)
He explains, ‘if I had been asked at the time about the nature of Rudi’s work, I could hardly have given a coherent reply. I knew Rudi was a natural psychic… As a social scientist, I should have been impressed and excited to see such evidence of paranormal ability on a daily basis. But it seemed entirely natural that Rudi should know these things… I could not, however, classify the experience of formally sitting with him. I knew it was real and that it constituted a trail that I was slowly following through the maze of my own wilderness. That was enough.” (Pg. 24)
He recalls, “There had been many years of searching before I met him. When I was fifteen, I underwent my first inner experience. I began to hear an inner dialogue between myself and a presence whom I sensed as utterly alien… I had the chilling realization that the alien being was my real self… During the next fifteen years I led an outwardly normal life… It took several years after I met Rudi for anything to change.” (Pg. 39-40)
He states, “Rudy slowly clarified the basic outline of his teaching… His basic concept was that there existed a psychic digestive system within the human organism. Its function was to directly transform internal and external energies into nourishment for higher human and spiritual functions, which were usually dormant due to lack of proper fuel. This conception … exists in various forms of yoga philosophy. But the specifics were different and Rudi’s approach as a teacher was unique.” (Pg. 46)
Rudi told him, “the great spiritual beings are gone in India. There was a final generation of great God-men. They all died within a few years of each other. Bhagavan Nityanand was one of them. And who is left to take their place?... Muktananda is the partial inheritor of Nityananda’s spiritual force… There is a psychic connection between them which I can experience and use… In most ashrams in the East, the guru doesn’t pass on his power until death intervenes… I don’t believe in doing it that way. There is no reason that death has to be the source of the gift. I intend to pass on my own capacities during my lifetime.” (Pg. 87)
Rudy said, “Intelligence is a wonderful thing, John, but there is nothing cheaper. It is a futile ability unless one also knows how things work. A man of power buys and sells people who can think. The average intellectual is helpless when removed from his environment, whereas he should be like a cat, landing on all fours wherever he is thrown. But the one thing you must never do with any of your colleagues is to threaten their security, unless you are prepared to replace it with something better.” (Pg. 114)
Mann observes, “Rudi’s whole life was a continuous ferment of forced growth. He would not accept anything less. In a talk for an evening class, he said: ‘We always think of growth as something pleasant and light, like a flower petal unfurling in the sun. How does the seed feel when it is buried alive in the dirt?... Probably uncertainty, fear… That s growth!... All of this is exactly paralleled by what occurs inside an evolving person. The only difference is that inner growth can only proceed through conscious suffering. It never occurs otherwise.’” (Pg. 135)
Mann observes, “I had been working with Rudi for nine years. During that time, my own process of inner transformation had gradually begun… I had read books, visited various groups, and invested eight years of work in other approaches before meeting Rudi. Though I had attained few positive results, at least those years of exploration had helped me to understand my own situation realistically and had given me the capacity to endure.” (Pg. 161)
Rudi invited Swami Muktananda to come to America, and Rudi told his students: “The basic difficulty which you will face as a group is that you have not been trained in how to behave with a Hindu saint… I don’t mean to scare you. He may be on his good behavior and make things very easy for all of us. But you have to realize that the guru is the absolute dictator in his domain… Swami Muktananda is as complex as a three dimensional chess board… He is a caged tiger. Nothing occupies him for very long. He goes through an experience and moves on…” (Pg.
179-181)
He states, “During the first day, after one of Muktananda’s classes, Rudi started to wok with some of his students in a totally new way. At first, all I noticed were people approaching Rudi and then collapsing onto the lawn… he put his fingers on the person’s forehead, and shorty thereafter they seemed to become dizzy and fall to the ground in some kind of fit. It was scary… And then Rudy turned toward me… My head went back, he touched my heart center, and then the base of my spine. I felt myself … falling to the ground..” (Pg. 207-208)
He notes, “Rudi had talked to us about the significance of the relationship between student and teacher… A student’s loyalty is to his own teacher; your loyalty is to me. Baba is my teacher. My loyalty is to him. You honor him because of the level that he represents and because he is my teacher. But do not forget that I am your teacher and that without me you would never even meet Baba/” (Pg. 213)
One day, Rudi announced, “In a year or a year and a half… I feel I am going to leave New York for the Middle East. There will be others here who will carry on. It will be the start of a totally different life for me. But don’t worry, John… You can visit me once or twice a year and get what you need. Believe me, by that point it will be enough.” (Pg. 250)
Rudi and some of his students visited Nepal: “Rudi was jubilant. ‘I bought a million dollars worth of goods for almost no money; fabrics, furnishings, rug. It was the most remarkable trip I ever made. I just happened to go at the perfect time. A month from now is the international trade fair. The Japanese will buy everything…” (Pg. 281)
John asked Rudi about whether he still wants Mann to write the present book, and was told, “If you want to have a live, then write it! Personally I don’t care. There have been plenty of people eager to write books, articles, do interviews with me. I have always discouraged it. I have postponed fame as long as I could. It is better to delay something, so that the foundation is strengthened and one is mature enough to endure it. I want you to write the book for your sake, John, not mine.” (Pg. 292-293)
In a last conversation, Rudi told him, “You have to work deeper. If you don’t, you will spend the rest of your life in a backwash if sh-t… The experience was real. It was your higher self… You never listen. You never try hard enough… I wouldn’t bother saying this if I didn’t want you to have a wonderful future. The easiest thing for me to do is to sit back and watch you go over a cliff…” (Pg. 311)
He concludes, “For several years before his death, I had invited Rudi to come to the Rochester area to talk and teach. He had always put me off… But finally… he had agreed to come. I had made preliminary arrangements for him to talk to an ashram in Rochester. When the time came, I had to appear in his place…” (Pg. 321-322)
This book will be of interest to anyone studying Rudi, or similar Eastern teachers.
June 19, 2013
Incredibly insightful. If you've had any kundalini activity, or have received shaktipat, this book will help you through the process, indubitably. If nothing else, it will ramp up your internal work ethic!
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews