My Life Comes Full Circle
By Ray Johnston
Meher Baba has been a touchstone for me since 1974 – an authoritative guide on my soul’s map during my almost constant travels.
I first learned of Meher Baba while driving across the U.S. from North Carolina to California in 1974, during what was the first of many, many trips across the country.
RAY JOHNSTON at Meher Mount to share his memories and insights for the film about Baba’s Tree. (Photo: Ben Hoffman)
I was traveling with a close friend who shared a copy of a book he had found in a used bookstore, Listen, Humanity. This book seemed like a travel guide for my inner journey as we rolled along the interstate highways.
Listen, Humanity by Don E. Stevens is a favorite introductory book on Meher Baba. It includes more than 100 pages of messages from Meher Baba.
Not long after we arrived on the west coast, I enrolled in my first year of college at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).
Southern California felt like the promised land for this small, southern-town young man, spiritual aspirant, and surfer from the east coast.
I knew life was about to radically change and for the better.
I Decided to Attend a Talk on Campus
One afternoon after classes, I read an announcement in the UCSB newspaper regarding a talk on campus that evening about Avatar Meher Baba given by one His followers who had just returned from India.
Remembering Listen, Humanity, I decided to attend.
That evening, about eight people gradually appeared in a small classroom to listen to the speaker, whose name unfortunately I no longer recall, present a Super 8 film of his recent visit to Meherabad, India (where Meher Baba’s Tomb Shrine is located). He spoke of spending time with some of Meher Baba’s mandali (close disciples).
I sat alone in the back of the room and remember little of the gentleman’s talk that night or of the film, although it had moved me. At the end of the presentation, the small group exited the room. I was the last person to leave.
On a Small Table by the Door Were Some Personal Objects
As I moved toward the door, there on a small table by the door, were some personal objects that had been brought from India. One of these items had been pointed out earlier as a sadra (a long cotton shirt) that Meher Baba had worn.
I had intended to move quickly out the door but paused briefly to look at the sadra.
AVATAR MEHER BABA’S sadra from the 1950s. (Photo: Ellen Kwiatkowski)
I caught a glimpse of the speaker standing alone, leaning against the classroom wall to the side, just watching me as I felt suddenly compelled to reach down and grab the sadra and lift it to my chest.
There was an immediate feeling of magnetism coming from the sadra. I was shocked at myself. Embarrassed. I was flooded with… with something!
I just held the garment for a moment with the man smiling at me from across the room, as though he understood what I was experiencing. I hurriedly placed the sadra back on the table and almost ran from the building.
That experience was imprinted in me like lingering images after staring at the sun.
Meher Baba As a Constant Marker for My Life’s GPS
For the past almost 50 years, as my travels increased and my spiritual aspirations deepened, Meher Baba continued to be a constant marker for my life’s GPS.
AVATAR MEHER BABA is wearing a sadra at a gathering with His followers in the 1960s. Photographed by Meelan. (©Meher Nazar Publications. Used with permission.)
At each important turn, He has played a part, created direct routes, sometimes detours – all usually without my knowing it had been done until I had reached my “destination.”
My destination this year in 2023 has been an unexpected return to Meher Mount as a temporary caretaker. I had previously lived here from 2002 to 2010, so when the opportunity to return arose, I did not hesitate to accept the offer.
CARETAKER RAY JOHNSTON (right) circa 2010 talking with board member Ron Holsey. (Photo: Stephanie Ervin)
Meher Mount has always been charged with Meher Baba’s essence. His injunction to “learn to love Me through nature” remains my innermost mantra.
In all my worldly wanderings, Meher Mount stands out as one of the most powerful touchstones to the Divine.
Earlier in April 2022 — before I knew I would be returning to Meher Mount as a temporary Caretaker — I had sat each day in the Lagoon Cabin at the Meher Spiritual Center in Myrtle Beach, SC (as I had in 1999) asking Meher Baba to illuminate where my life’s path should take me.
If One Travels Far Enough, One Returns
Within a few months at the conclusion of 2022, it seemed the road that stretched ahead had finally closed back upon itself. After all the earth is round, and if one travels far enough, one returns.
AVATAR MEHER BABA’S sadra in an archival box on display at Meher Mount. The painting of Meher Baba is by Lyn Ott. (Photo: Agnes Montano, December 2022)
The now familiar drive across the US eventually found me on the opposite coast in California temporarily residing at Meher Mount as caretaker once again.
I arrived at Meher Mount on January 14, 2023 – between the “atmospheric rivers” of storms sweeping across California.
I was overjoyed to find how updated, clean, and well-kept the property was, along with nature’s evident beauty.
Most importantly for me, the tangible spiritual atmosphere that is Meher Mount is as powerful as ever.
Just after I arrived this January, I noted something new, a covered display in the Visitor Center that had not been at Meher Mount during my earlier tenure.
When the cloth covering was lifted, I was immediately struck by the sacred object under the glass: Meher Baba’s sadra!
It seems I have come full circle on my journey, guided by Meher Baba and the magnetic qualities of His many expressions, once again for me in the form of Nature, Meher Mount, and His sadra!
Ray Johnston was a caretaker at Meher Mount from 2002 to 2005. After a year’s sabbatical in Africa, he came back to again be a caretaker from 2006 to 2010.
Ray has since returned many times to visit and help care for the property. “Meher Mount still acts as a beacon for me. I have visited places all around the planet that are places I plug into to recharge, to re-center, to reconfigure my life. But, there's no place like Meher Mount that provides that kind of transformational opportunity."
After leaving Meher Mount, Ray continued traveling internationally as a healer and teacher conducting public presentations and private healing sessions. He recently built a home on Isla Mujeres in Mexico.