Bajaj’s giant-sized protagonist Max Pzoras, shaken by his mother’s untimely death from cancer at the age of forty-nine encounters Viveka, a scantily clad East Indian food-cart seller whose experience living among yogis 20,000 feet high in the Himalayas intrigues him. Driven to make sense of his life and to attain what Viveka explains as the “un-born, un-aging, un-ailing, sorrowless, and deathless state” of immortality Max begins to investigate such a journey.
When he learns of a South American yogi living high up in the Himalayas who teaches a method of yoga that leads to the end of suffering, Max impetuously leaves his job to seek this yogi.
Gripped already by Bajaj’s gift as a story teller, this reader avidly followed Max as he confronted ordeals and disappointments bound to shatter many a spiritual seeker. Despite his focused effort to reach Nirvana, Max remains endearingly human. He might be living as the student of the great yogi guru Ramakrishna, but he is beleaguered by guilt for having abandoned loved ones in order to pursue his own goals. Starvation, intense cold, debilitating heat, exhaustion, fear, regret and anger threaten to overwhelm him as he continues his journey.
Driven by the belief that his purpose in this life is to lose himself within the divine, Max continues his journey, experiencing intense love of and union with all of creation as his sense of self dissolves and union with the divine consciousness consumes him.
The Yoga of Max’s Discontent is Bajaj’s brilliant and riveting meditation on the quest for spiritual insight and transformation. I couldn’t put it down.
No comments:
Post a Comment