I heard J-R before I saw him. And I saw him in a dream…or was it?…something about J-R and me climbing many flights of stairs together past all kinds of rooms with karmic-like scenes. Shiny green chickens, for instance? Classic.

I saw him in that dream before I saw him in person. Almost as soon as I landed in LA, I connected with Friday Night seminars at Prana and in those days, the seminars were audio (remember cassettes?), rather than video (how about VHS, remember those?).

I had come from a group that turned into a cult with distorted messages like this one: if you take any time for yourself — movies, shopping, what-have-you — you have taken time from the group and from GOD. At Prana I heard J-R say on an audiotaped seminar, “Take care of yourself so you can better take care of others.” And I said to myself, that’s the guy I want to be around more.

It didn’t take long to meet J-R in person. I thought he looked a little startled when I approached him at Conference that year, and maybe he was, because I probably was still sloughing off energy from that cult experience. I introduced myself and told him my green-chicken-up-the-stairs story. I interpreted his attention as interest and after hearing my tale, he suggested I write it up and send it into the MSIA office.

Thus began many years of my devotion and adoration of this Chief of ours, our Wayshower who guides us up the steps of life into the holy being that each of us is.