Beauty ＆ Pure 21

From that time onward he started to instruct me 
and after a few weeks he showed me a photograph 
of the Maharshi. 
There was an urgency in his voice as he spoke of him and he handled the photograph with reverence. 
I began to understand that there was only one ‘I’ and that it was in me and was everywhere. 

The Maharshi grew so much in my heart that I 
felt him nearer to me than my parents or my wife. 
He lived more vividly in me than any person I had 
known. After some time we received permission 
to write a Red Cross letter to our families and I 
used mine to write to the Maharshi and ask him 
for guidance. 

Then the war ended and I left camp. The desire to enjoy life sprang up in me again, I was strongly drawn to the spiritual path but even more strongly for the time being to a worldly life. I wanted to make money, to have power and fine clothes, to be important. 

In camp I had eliminated daydreaming as far as possible. When I went to bed at night I slept straight away. But now my nights were often filled with planning and scheming. 
A few years later, when I was in Europe and due 
to return to Siam on business, I wrote to Osborne, who was living at Tiruvannamalai, to suggest that I 
should break my journey in India and stay there 
for a few days. He at once wrote back arranging to meet me and conduct me there and inviting me to stay at his house. 
In Madras (Chennai) we hired a car and drove to Tiruvannamalai. It was an old car and I felt that I 
was being slowly roasted in the midday heat.