Paul Cash - Reflections on Paul Brunton

Note: reprinted from Yoga International Vol 3, Number 6 May/June 1994

O n every day but one during the last five months of his life, I was with Paul B
runton in the Montreux area of Switzerland. Much worth writing about happened du
ring those months, much worth knowing about. I came to see how much more there w
as to him than I could glean from his books alone. Without knowing him as I did,
he may well have remained just another gifted writer with whom I sometimes agre
ed, sometimes not. He certainly would not have become, as he is now, one whose w
ords I take to heart even more deeply when they disagree with what I already thi
nk than when they agree.
But writing truthfully about Paul Brunton is difficult for me, as well as for ot
hers who knew him. It's not so much that we're not willing, though sometimes tha
t too is the case. More often it's simply because we're not able. The part of ou
rselves that drew to him remains deeper than we yet understand or can explain. S
o we end up describing that instead of him, or reacting to how awakening to its
presence has affected our own lives instead of speaking truthfully about his.
Writing about his teachings is much easier. That allows a safe intellectual dist
ance from undomesticated parts of ourselves that emerged when we were with him--
good parts and bad parts, both of which inevitably crashed through the boundarie
s of our self-images and images of what spirituality means.
It would be easier, for example, to fashion an intellectually fascinating articl
e by focusing on a few key points in his teaching--how Hinduism and Buddhism nee
d each other and together form a complete doctrine, for example; or why the goal
of spiritual practice can be neither annihilation of the ego nor its merger wit
h or dissolution into the unselfed Absolute; or why equating atman with brahman
is a needlessly exaggerated statement of an already sufficiently tremendous trut
h; or tracing his movement from what he ultimately called "Idolatry" of his earl
y years to his mature vision of the West's spiritual revival in terms of its own
creative and native mind. In all these places he lends precision to our desire
for freedom by offering clearer intellectual distinctions than have been readily
available in either the West or the East for a long time.
His scholarship was excellent, after all, though in his writing he deliberately
forsook the academic style. He had the benefit of in-depth practice, study, and
dialogue with many great teachers--including Ramana Maharishi, V.S. Iyer, Atmana
nda, M. Hiriyanna and T.M.P. Mahadevan among the Hindus and Ananda Metteya among
the Buddhists. He also kept abreast of the latest developments in modern scient
ific thinking, both inner and outer, and could speak knowledgeably about such th
ings as the effects of Heisenberg's spontaneous experience of nirvikalpa samhadi
.
It would be even easier to write about the outer glamour of parts of his life: h
is extensive travels in both hemispheres--by steamship, donkey, camel, etc.,--se
eking out faithkeepers and advanced practitioners of esoteric teachings long bef
ore such journeys were even heard of, let alone popular. There are engrossing st
ories about his intimate relationships with Asian and European royalty, and with
groups of oppressed seekers behind the Iron Curtain, who would have been impris
oned if caught with him or his books. There are the reasons Somerset Maugham sou
ght his advice about whom to visit on his trip to India--and why Paul Brunton se
nt him to Ramana Maharishi's ashram, where Maugham has the experiences he wrote
about in The Razor's Edge.
There are also instructive stories about how his two marriages played out in the
imaginations of would-be disciples who couldn't accept them and what they meant
for Brunton himself. There are his early experiments with occultism, culminatin
g in his being the first European to spend a night alone in the Great Pyramid. (
He later observed that he was extremely fortunate to have gotten through that ph
ase without losing his sanity.) There's also the little-known fact that one of h
is first spiritual teachers was an Iroquois Indian, and related stories of his e
xtensive experience with North American shamans.
But for me, as I reflect on him today, all these things seem too much on the sur
face, too "outer." They hold no promise of conveying the dynamic peace I felt in
his presence--a peace so rich that it calmed the entire emergency room of the h
ospital where I brought him at the end.
They tell nothing, or too little, of how he was not only an astonishing source b
oth of information but also of life-changing inspiration; nothing or too little,
about how this intellectual giant--this charming, kind, and sophisticated Briti
sh gentleman--was also an authentic spiritual presence.
Admittedly, the Paul Brunton I knew was the one in which an extraordinary life h
ad nearly completed itself. I first met him in 1977, when he was seventy-eight.
So I'm not a source of firsthand information about steps along the way--or about
"mistakes" as we might call them, that he made enroute. There are many versions
of many things about his life. Others tell those better than I can, each adding
his or her own two bits to the mixture of myth and reality a secondary literatu
re is sure to produce.
But perhaps I can convey something of what makes this man so hard and yet so imp
ortant to understand, and why the voluminous writings he left us behind deserve
special attention. If so, it's likely to come across best if I simply tell a few
stories.
Different Faces
One bright day in the spring of 1981, P.B. (as Paul Brunton was affectionately k
nown) was walking me toward a vegetarian restaurant in Lausanne. A Lebanese man
in his early twenties quickly crossed the street just ahead of us and then cauti
ously approached from a short distance ahead.
"Hello," he said tentatively, and then paused for an uncomfortably long time bef
ore P.B. answered, "Yes?"
"Can I please...just spend a little time with you?"
P.B. looked at him silently for a moment, then asked, "Why should you want to do
that?"
"I don't know," the young man answered. "I just have a feeling that if I do, som
ething wonderful might happen."
"If something wonderful happens," P.B. replied, it will be because of you. I don
't do anything."
As it turned out the young man worked in the restaurant we were head to, joined
us for lunch, and saw that we got the best food the place had to offer. Until th
e night before, he had no conscious interest in things spiritual; but that night
a friend had given him a copy of Gurdjieff's Meetings with Remarkable Men, and
he stayed up all night reading it. "When I saw you across the street," he explai
ned, "I said to myself, 'I don't know how I know but that's one of those guys!"
That was the first of several meetings we had with that young man whose name was
Nouki. When he arrived for a third meeting at a tea house in Lausanne, he was s
o exuberant that his face didn't seem large enough to hold his smile. P.B. asked
 him what he was so happy about. Nouki replied that being with P.B. filled him u
p with love.
"Why do you think that is?" asked P.B.
"Maybe because you love everybody?" Nouki answered.
"No," P.B. replied. "I am not that advanced. I don't love everybody." Later in t
he day when P.B. and I were alone, P.B. said of Nouki: "That young man has alrea
dy acquired half his wealth in his temperament. Now he only needs the intellectu
al understanding." At this point Nouki didn't even know P.B.'s name or that he h
ad written books.
One morning as the three of us were walking together, a Swiss German man who wro
te on spiritual topics approached us. He knew of P.B.'s literary work and wanted
to ask some questions. P.B. seemed somewhat reluctant but finally said, "All ri
ght, I will have a cup of tea with you."
That afternoon, the four of us met for tea. P.B. sat at my left; Nouki sat acros
s from me; the Swiss writer sat across from P.B. Nouki, as usual, was enjoying t
he atmosphere of being together. The writer was eager to pin P.B. down about cer
tain doctrinal issues, particularly about Krishnamurthi's formulation of the tea
ching. P.B. seemed more interested in hearing how the Swiss man liked his tea, b
ut the only answer he got in that regard was a quick "Oh, it's fine" as the writ
er persisted in trying to get the answers he wanted.
Nouki began to get annoyed, and started to criticize the Swiss man's demeanor. A
nd then things got particularly interesting.
"Well," P.B. said to Nouki, how would you answer that question?"
"What question?"
From that point on P.B. began to look physically different to me depending on wh
ich of them he was talking to. When he turned to Nouki, it was to make him aware
of how important the writers questions were and how Nouki really needed to thin
k about them. With the writer, it was mainly to ask yet again how he liked his t
ea or if he could understand why Nouki thought the question was irrelevant.
Facing Nouki, he was firm and strong, like a stern Western professor. He seemed
inches taller, broader in the shoulders, and at least twenty pounds heavier than
when he turned toward the writer and, like an unassuming Oriental tea master, s
lipped away from the question and expressed concern about the tea getting cold.
When the pot of tea was finished, P.B. said time was up for the meeting. The wri
ter was clearly frustrated and unhappy with the "evasive" answers. As we parted,
P.B. told him gently, "I said I would have a cup of tea with you, but it seems
you didn't want to have a cup of tea with me."
I couldn't help imagining how differently Nouki and the writer would describe th
is man to others. Or how long it would take either of them to get his point.
Inner Guidance

My own first experience of P.B. came in 1977 while he was visiting my teacher, A
nthony Damiani, in upstate New York. Anthony had been devoted to P.B. since the
mid-1940s and drew a great deal of inspiration from him even though P.B. was ada
mant about not being anybody's "guru." P.B. consistently presented himself as si
mply "a writer and researcher, with some experience in these matters--that is al
l." But Anthony was well aware that P.B. invested the word "researcher" with a g
ood deal more meaning than most hearers were likely to understand.
In 1971, Anthony had founded Wisdom's Goldenrod Center for Philosophic Studies,
in Valois, New York. He liked to have pictures of saints and sages from various
traditions on all the walls, and he rotated them regularly. When P.B. first visi
ted the place and he saw his own picture on the mantle over the fireplace in the
meditation room he took it down immediately. He told us that displaying his pho
tograph was "inappropriate," and recommended that those of us who needed that ki
nd of inspiration should use a photograph of Ramana Maharishi instead.
P.B. stayed in the area for more than a month, and had at least one private inte
rview with each of Anthony's students. He never addressed us as a group and, to
my knowledge, did not address groups in his later years. His work other than wri
ting was solely with individuals, and he made it clear that he had no interest i
n having disciples.
In my first interview with him, I asked about how to cultivate and recognize inn
er guidance. He said there are two steps.
"First," he said, "you have to be able to make yourself completely humble. If yo
u can't do that, then it's a moot point: there won't be any guidance." He paused
long enough for me to realize that the humility he meant went much deeper than
I understood.
"If you can't do that," he continued, "then you need to be able to do nothing. D
oing nothing isn't the same as not doing anything. It's active, inwardly attenti
ve. You can go about your normal affairs, but you refrain from any decision or a
ction on the specific issue about which you're seeking guidance.
"There's no telling how long you'll have to wait. But if you do it right, then w
hen the guidance comes there will be no doubt about it. It will be vividly clear
. And the strength needed to follow it will also be there."
In the same interview he asked me, "What particular shade or aspect of the word
'truth' is most meaningful to you?"
By that time (nearly twenty-nine), I had pretty much decided that the word truth
wasn't a meaningful one for me. I could relate to the idea of "honesty," based
on reflecting on one's own experience and deepest desires; but "truth" seemed to
o much to ask. I could demand honesty from myself and others, no more and no les
s. Everyone had and was entitled to their own opinion. While I certainly thought
some opinions better than others (particularly my own!), I profoundly doubted t
he usefulness of the word "truth."
But as I sat across from P.B. with that thought in my mind, it seemed absurdly f
alse. The doubt lifted, and I heard myself say something that sounded much more
than just honest. It sounded like it came from a core of me that knew what it wa
s talking about. From that time on, I've had no doubt that the word does have ap
propriate content, and that understanding it is an essential part of being fully
human.
It was a simple question, about a word others--including Anthony--had used many
times. But in P.B.'s presence it took on a whole new dimension. Others who met h
im had similar experiences. I suspect that's part of the reason, as soon as P.B.
left, Anthony put his photograph on the mantle of the meditation room.
Sense Knowledge
A few years later, just before Thanksgiving in 1980, Anthony asked me if I would
 go to Switzerland to help P.B. with some work. P.B. had deliberately not publis
hed anything since The Spiritual Crisis of Man in 1952, although he had been wri
ting nearly every day. Now he was beginning to organize the work he had done in
the intervening years, and Anthony wanted to offer him some help.
In March of 1981, I arrived in La Tour de Peilz, thinking I was there to functio
n as a good editorial assistant. P.B. soon made it clear that "the literary work
," as he called his writing, had about the same status in his daily routine as a
tidy and orderly apartment, clean dishes, and good preparation of the freshest
possible food. Only after I was more or less up to speed on helping him on that
side of things did we spend time working on his writings.
For the first few weeks, I felt that I was not the best person for his actual da
y-to-day needs; and that probably was indeed the case. It took me a while to rea
lize that the point was much more that he was the best for mine.
I wasn't really aware of the extent to which part of me was reaching out to him
through the early weeks for some sort of "answer;" some sot of ultimate insight
that could be expressed in intellectual terms. As long as that was going on, thi
ngs didn't go smoothly. One of the first breakthroughs came through food.
He liked his fruit at the peak of ripeness. Most of what I served him was either
too green or too ripe for his taste. So one day I approached him with a basket
of fruit before serving any of it with lunch.
"Do you know some way of telling if one of these is just right?" I asked. When h
e answered yes, I was so relieved! Now I could be sure of giving him only the on
es he would actually enjoy! Then he said kindly, and with a smile, "I have to bi
te it."
I can't explain how, but in addition to being very funny, that remark brought th
e term "sense-knowledge" to a whole new light.
Going Deeper
Later he told me that up through publishing the writing of The Wisdom of the Ove
rself (published in 1943), he had been content to quote authority when he was no
t certain from his own experience about the truth of certain things. He had reli
ed, of course, on his own judgment of whom to take as an authority, but from tha
t time onward, he felt an increasing inner pressure to write only what he knew w
as true from firsthand experience (i.e., "research").
That process gradually identified the gaps in his own development. What had he a
lready written, for example, that he was not absolutely certain was true? Or wha
t might he be writing on a given day about which he had even the slightest remai
ning doubt?
Many writers may have been content in such a circumstance to admit that there ar
e some things they shouldn't write about. But in his case, it enabled him to foc
us and energize his efforts. His desire to know more fully, and to help others b
y writing more precisely and more clearly, came to its full strength. Part of wh
at this meant was that at the peak of his literary career, he began withdrawing
from the trappings, obligations, and privileges of fame to focus on filling thos
e gaps.
To my mind, this is the point at which he began to become a man difficult to wri
te about truthfully, and where his words begin to become priceless. He was no lo
nger interested in defending any doctrine, but only in what he could say with ce
rtainty.
"No one can explain," he wrote in his notebooks, "what the Overself is, for it i
s the origin, the mysterious source of the expanding mind, and beyond all its ca
pacities. But what can be explained are the effects of standing consciously in i
ts presence, the conditions under which it manifests, the ways in which it appea
rs in human life and experience, the paths which lead to its realization."
Nonetheless, because he considered it so fundamental to meaningful living, he wr
ote often about what he meant by the term "Overself." Here are a few of my favor
ites from the first volume in his posthumously published notebooks.
The point where man meets the infinite is the Overself, where he, the finite, re
sponds to what is absolute, ineffable and inexhaustible being, where he reacts t
o That which transcends his own existence--this is the Personal God he experienc
es and comes into relation with. In this sense his belief in such a God is justi
fiable.
The Overself is the point where the One Mind is received into consciousness. It
is the 'I' freed from narrowness, thoughts, flesh, passion, and emotion--that is
, from the personal ego.
Because of the paradoxically dual nature which the Overself possesses, it is ver
y difficult to make clear the concept of the Overself. Human beings are rooted i
n the ultimate mind through the Overself, which therefore partakes on the one ha
nd of a relationship with a vibratory world and on the other of an existence whi
ch is above all relations. A difficulty is probably due to the vagueness or conf
usion about which standpoint it is to be regarded from. If it is thought of as t
he human soul, then the vibratory movement is connected with it. If it is though
t of as transcending the very notion of humanity, and therefore in its undiffere
ntiated character, the vibratory movement must disappear.
It is a state of pure intelligence but without the working of the intellectual a
nd ideational process. Its product may be named intuition. There are no automati
cally conceived ideas present in it, no habitually followed ways of thinking. It
is pure, clear stillness.
P.B. is so difficult to speak about because, at least to me, he seems always tun
ed to the reality he describes in these writings. So describing what it was like
to be in his presence is like trying to describe what it is like to stand--or c
ook, or work, or shop, or eat, or think for that matter--in its presence. On one
hand, there was an ego, a highly individualized person, that I could relate to
(in his case a remarkably refined, sophisticated, educated, and gentlemanly one)
; on the other, there was simply no ignoring a pure, clear stillness in the pres
ence of which nothing--especially myself--could be seen in the same way as befor
e. The relationship at the more ordinary level was interesting enough; but it wa
s how he helped people discover themselves in that other presence that made him
so extraordinary.
The constant presence of this other "dimension" was sometimes exquisitely nouris
hing, sometimes terrifying. On occasion it made for an intimacy infinitely great
er than I have ever felt with any lover. There were moments when I knew his thou
ghts, felt at least some part of his peace, and he knew I knew and felt them. Th
ere were other times when it was painfully clear that thoughts or feelings I wou
ld have liked to hide were plain as day to him. How things went at any given tim
e depended on how much I clung to out-of-synch habits and desires, and how much
I could let them slip away and open up to the rhythm of that particular day.
He seemed sometimes amused by the process, at other times not so amused. But tea
rs came like never before when I first realized that despite his seeing all my f
laws he also saw something much deeper in me--something I had always hoped was t
rue--and that his bottomless love for it was always there. When I could love it
like he did, all the rest was forgiven, I don't mean he forgave me--there was no
sense of his having the slightest thought or feeling that he needed to forgive
me for anything. It was simply that in the light of that deeper something, so ca
pable and worthy of love, the rest is nonessential; the best was all that was re
ally worthy of attention, and it could be lived.
I write reluctantly and only because others have since told me they had the same
experience with him. At bottom, it says much more about him than it does about
us.
The Sage's Mind
One afternoon I asked him, "What exactly is it about a sage's mind that makes th
at mind so different from the rest of us?" It was one of many questions I asked
that he didn't originally seem to intend to answer. But I persisted and finally
he asked me, "Well what do you think it is?"
I said that I had never been able to believe that it could be omniscience in the
sense of knowing everything at once; but I didn't think it unreasonable to conc
eive that when a sage wants or needs to know, he could turn his mind toward it i
n a certain way and that knowledge would just arise.
P.B. laughed heartily and answered, "It's not even that good!"
"Well, how good is it?"
"It has really nothing to do with knowledge, or continuity of intuition, or freq
uency of intuitions. It's that the mind has been made over into the Peace in an
irreversible way. No form that the mind takes can alter the Peace."
"You could say it's a kind of knowledge," he continued, "in this sense. If the m
ind takes the form of truth, the sage knows it's truth. If it doesn't , then he
knows that it's not. He's never in doubt about whether the mind has knowledge or
not. But whether it does or not, his Peace is not disturbed."
I asked if that meant that someone could go to a sage for help and the sage woul
d be unable to help them. He replied that sometimes the intuition comes, sometim
es it doesn't; he explained that when it doesn't come, the sage knows he has not
hing to do for that person. The continuity of frequency of the intuitions has to
do with the sage's mission, not with what makes a sage a sage.
"You must understand," he said, "that there is no condition in which the Oversel
f is at your beck and call. But there is a condition in which you are continuous
ly at the Overself's beck and call. That's the condition to strive for."
As he spoke these words, he was the humblest man I had ever seen before or since
. For all the extraordinary things about him, all the glamorous inner and outer
experiences, all the remarkable effects his writings and example have had on oth
ers, that humility is what seems to be the most important fact about him.
It was the first key he turned when he turned his mind to write. And fortunately
for me and many others, it often sufficed for the door to open and let a sacram
ental presence illuminate doubts and questions common to us all.