Dawain (22 at the time) was raised in the community of Avatar Adi Da’s devotees. This story takes place in 1994, in Adi Da Samrajashram, the Hermitage Sanctuary of Avatar Adi Da Samraj in Fiji. It is evening and Adi Da is sitting with His devotees.

I had been thinking for a week about talking with Adi Da. I didn’t have anything specific to say to Him, but somehow I felt it was necessary—that I needed to make myself completely available to whatever He might Say to me.

After awhile I approached and knelt down by His chair. He looked at me and then leaned forward, turning His ear towards me to hear what I had to say to Him. I spoke softly into His ear: “Beloved, you know that I love you more than life itself, don’t You?” That was all I had to say.

“It is straight between us, Dawain,” He said. “There is no problem between you and Me. You are a serious man.” And I dropped into His arms. I kissed Him and embraced Him. For awhile, I just held my hands to His chest and looked up into His eyes. I was kneeling by His right knee.

As it happened, my mother was sitting at Adi Da’s left knee. As I moved into adolescence, I had always been embarrassed to express my love and affection to my mother, especially around other people. It was part of my adolescence, part of not wanting to be seen as a child. I remembered speaking with her about it a few years ago, and she told me that my reticence [silence] hurt her. We had both cried, but I didn’t know what to do about it—I was just embarrassed to be seen relating to her lovingly.

My Beloved Guru, Adi Da Samraj, then began to speak to me about my relationship with my mother.

“You must love your mother, Dawain. You must accept her and not resist her. You must love her. Your mother is everything conditional. Your mother is the universe. You must love and accept her. You must be grateful for the sacrifice that she made to bring you here. If it were not for her, you would not be sitting her talking to Me right now. You must accept your mother. If you do not accept your mother, you cannot truly grow in My Company.”

By now I was weeping, and so was my mother.

“Your mother is a poor, suffering, mortal being like yourself. You must express your love for her and accept her love for you. You must support her and help her. You should be grateful to be here with her.”

When Adi Da would mention my mother, I would kiss her again and again, tears streaming down my face and tell her how much I loved her, and then I would turn my attention back to Adi Da Samraj.

“It is very important to accept your parent of the opposite sex. You cannot really grow in practice until you do. Men must accept their mothers. Women must accept their fathers. Your mother is the world, and your father is everything you do not know.”

Then Beloved raised His head and looked at everyone around Him. “If any of you on this Island are not straight with your parents, do not wait another day—make a telephone call in the morning and get it straight.”

He must have Spoken to me for about ten or fifteen minutes. When He had Given this Instruction, He said with finality: “And that is the Lesson for tonight.”

Beloved Adi Da began to Speak about other things, but remained where I was. Energy was pouring through my body. I kept weeping and kissing Him. I felt a total acceptance of my mother’s love for me and of my love for her, without any kind of self-consciousness or hesitancy.

In that feeling of love for her, I felt moved into my deepest feelings for Adi Da, truly sensitive to Him and his Great Heart-Feeling. I understood that when a man embraces this feeling-disposition, this love, compassion, and acceptance of his mother, and everything that his mother represents, he is purified and enabled to grow in Beloved Adi Da’s Company.