Hidden Journey: A Spiritual Awakening

Born in India where the Goddess was very much a present reality, Harvey describes some of his experiences in what, in effect, is an EHE autobiography. He was educated at Oxford—the youngest fellow ever to be elected. He spent his vacations seeking the Mother in Pondicherry, India, and found Her in Mother Meera. On one occasion, she gave Harvey and a friend an experience of the divine Light that they knew would change their lives forever. When he returned to England where he could not share his mystical experiences, he felt he would lose touch with the reality they conveyed. Similarly, he lived two lives when he became a college instructor in the U.S. Whenever he could he stayed near Meera or with her as a student, whether in India or Germany. Even writing an EHE portrait could not begin to do justice to what he experienced, and it certainly cannot be conveyed in an abstract/review. I can only give a general description here.

This book should be read by anyone interested in mystical EHEs. Not only is it filled with countless progressively more intense experiences of the Light, but there are numerous instances of guru EHEs associated with Mother Meera. She figures so largely in this book that it is as much about her as Harvey. The picture of Mother Meera he paints is very refreshing. Although often dressed in saris of various hues, much of the time she is in workclothes and boots, working in the garden, or with hammer in hand, constructing a new building on the property. She also did housework and some of the cooking. The types of EHEs described here, including the effects they had on Harvey in forwarding his spiritual growth toward union with the All, are mostly of the Eastern type. It is a feast of a book for a Westerner who has not been exposed to those searing, wondrous experiences simply to be able to read about them. But the agonies Harvey underwent in learning to surrender his ego to the divine is mirrored in many Western autobiographies, although perhaps without the multitude of experiences with which Harvey was blessed (and at some stages seemingly cursed). There was no way he could get away after that first initiating experience, though he found many ways of trying. At the close of the book he states: "Through Her grace, I have lived in my deep Self for long stretches of time and know it cannot die. Taken out of the world to be taught what I have related here, I have returned to the world to give and do what I can and am coming to know. Slowly and soberly, Her hope and Her joy in every activity" (p. 252).