فصل 15

15

The Prince and the Pauper

Tutoring Alan Robertson really didn’t change my lifestyle all that much. We arranged our schedules such that whenever I went into town to teach, I would spend a few hours with Alan after class. We met in the president’s office at the old Santa Fe campus downtown near the university. We were quite the pair. Alan was a very successful, three-piece-suit banker, and I was a ponytailed yogi in denim jeans and sandals. I had no idea what to expect, but Alan turned out to be an exceptionally warm and open-minded person. He was also very grateful for my help.

This is not to say that there weren’t some awkward moments. The first culture clash was regarding payment for my services. I told him that I didn’t want to be paid for tutoring him. He insisted, but I refused. He went on to reason with me that he was a successful banker who was now president of a college, and I was a student living off a $250-a-month fellowship. That was true enough, and it was also true that I had spent everything I had buying the land and building my house. Nonetheless, I was tutoring him as an act of surrender to the flow of life, and I didn’t want to be paid.

In time, Alan accepted our relationship on nonbusiness terms, and we became good friends. Sometimes he would come out to my land to study, and we would take long walks together. He enjoyed learning about my unique way of life, and I enjoyed meeting the very special man behind the banker’s suit. A few times I even accepted his wife’s invitation to have dinner at their home. I began to see my entire relationship with Alan as another one of life’s magical gifts, despite my initial resistance.

Alan had progressed enough toward his doctorate to sit for his qualifying exams. He surprised me when he proposed that I go ahead and take mine also. I had no interest in doing so, especially since we had only prepared for two of my three major areas of study. But I surrendered to his wishes. I signed up to take the two exams we had studied for and planned to put the third off to another time—if at all. When I received notice back from the university, the administration had mistakenly signed me up for all three exams. Now what was I supposed to do, surrender to that?

I started observing myself to see why taking the third exam threatened me so much. I had no intention of actually finishing my degree, so why did it matter? What I discovered was that it was simply the fear of failing in the eyes of others. I knew that if I sat for my written exam in public finance, a field I was completely unprepared for, I would fail miserably. That prospect of failure disturbed me and set the inner voice on a nonstop dialogue about how to avoid the exam. What an opportunity to get rid of that part of me. I no longer saw the administration’s mistake as a problem. I saw it as a challenge to further let go of myself. So I decided to take all three exams and willingly accept the experience of failing the third one.

The first two exams went very smoothly. I had done a lot of work with Alan in these areas, so I knew the material reasonably well. As the day for the third exam approached, I strengthened my heart for the inevitable. I would march into that exam and willingly let a part of my ego die a painful death.

What ended up happening changed me for the rest of my life. The day before the exam, I allowed myself to pull down the public finance textbook for the first time. I took the large book outside and sat it beside me as I did my yoga. When I finished my postures, I felt quiet, peaceful, and totally prepared to face the next day’s ordeal. As if to examine the sword I was about to fall upon, I opened the book to an arbitrary place. I read both pages that appeared before me. I performed this ritual three times before holding the book up to the heavens as a sign of my willingness to surrender.

The next day, I watched closely to see what that voice would have to say. I was surprised to be feeling very peaceful about the upcoming event. After my morning meditation, I pulled down the book one more time and opened to an arbitrary page. It turned out to be one of the three places I had opened to the day before. I reviewed the complex chart on that page and put the book back on the shelf for the last time.

Later that morning, I parked outside the business school and meditated for a while before going in. I still felt very quiet inside. There was just a sense of peaceful resignation. I remember feeling I had passed the real test—I had proven that I was capable of deeply surrendering if life presented me with something I really did not want to do.

I went upstairs to the economics department, and the administrative assistant handed me the exam. As I took it from her hands, I glanced over the six essay questions of which I had to answer three. I immediately froze, and tears began to well up in my eyes. Three of the questions were exactly about the three places where I had arbitrarily opened the book the day before. I was stunned. I stood there for a long time unable to even take a breath.

How could this be? It had happened again. In the name of transcending myself, I had surrendered and willingly faced my personal fears. Then at the last moment, instead of certain hell, I was lifted up to heaven.

I went into the designated room and wrote and wrote. The seeds of inspiration were very fresh in my mind. I was even able to reproduce and embellish upon the chart I had opened to twice. I turned in the notebooks and headed home in a very different state of mind than I had expected. Driving to the exam, I had felt as though life was asking me to willingly let a part of me die that day. But now I realized that life was asking me to get out of the way and let her do her thing. I was so glad I had been willing to take that risk.

Days later I was called in by Dr. Goffman and complimented on the excellence of my public finance exam. This recognition from the chairman of the department should have pleased me, but instead it actually made me feel guilty. I recounted the whole story and asked if I had somehow done something wrong. Dr. Goffman got up, placed his hand on my shoulder, and told me to stop trying to be so humble. He then directed me out of his office.