The psychic I was going to meet on a smoggy Friday afternoon last summer, was considered reputable by Craig Lee a music critic familiar with the mystical world in Hollywood. My friend said the 71 year old man had a Phd in Comparative religion and was a disciple of the late Carl Jung, the famous psychologist.
" He spaces out sometimes but in a good way," my friend added. Even though this cryptic statement combined with the knowledge of the man's age, in my mind outweighed his otherwise impressive resume by eliminating the possibility of a coherent reading, I couldn't resist calling him. A crisp, clear, youthful voice identified itself as Michael Hughes. Adding to my surprise he informed me that,no, he did not work with the tarot. " I work with claireaudience" the alert voice explained, as the image of a bed-ridden old man dissolved before my very ears. An appointmet was set: $40. Hollywood. By the time I parked my car at the 1300 block of tanquil Spaulding Avenue, I had ran out of combinations matching the man's voice with his appearance. Still, the 6 foot tall man who greeted with a Hindu boe between two rows of red and yellow rose, was beyond all my expectations. Not introducing himself, his glassy eyes barely acknowledging my presence, he dissappeared somewhere to the back of the house where a phone was ringing. So I stood in the living room inhaling the sweet scent of incence.
Except for the incense, nothing else hinted at the owner's occupation. No crystals or candles, no statues of pagan gods or a poster with the tree of life, no pentacles. Not even a bust of Buddha. Instead, an oil portrait of a beautiful brunette smiling, a photograph of an older woman underneath it also smiling, an impressionist painting of what seemed to be a flock of swans in flight, the statue of a Greek or Roman youth with its hands missing as usual, black bookshelves full of Carl Jung volumes a few feet away from a disproportionately large khaki sofa. The home of an elderly bachelor. The reading was impressive. Simply by feeling a ring I have been wearing on my index finger for the last three years, Michael Hughes told me things about myself that only I knew. He also told me things that I didn't know.Some concerned my future and they later came true. But most where about my inner world, which I had tried to ignore, but which through my various crises, demanded my attention. I no longer consider this world an abstract theory. I no longer regard Michael Hughes an eccentric, an interesting character, a curiosity. He is a friend and a teacher. Every now and then we have tea and cookies and talk about books and the psyche, occasionally being interrupted by his army of cats. He is a modest man with a great sense of humour. My only homework, he often tells me, is to get rid off my heavihandedness and start enjoying. But what Michael Hilary Hughes tells you is nothing compared to what he does to you.After an hour of chatting, one feels an intense rush in the brain, as if it is about to explode. Suddenly, one feels drained, void and calm. The mind is emptied of perpetual chatter. What's more, it becomes impossible for one to think.Awake even, my dreams were so powerful and crystal clear that upon doing my work I continued to dream.A feeling of lightness and happiness replaces anxiety.
There's nothing striking in Hughes' appearance. In the street or the supermarket he could easily pass unnoticed. On a university campus one might take him for a retired professor or scientist, that is, if glasses, informal attire, snow white hair and beard fit the stereotype of a professor. what is striking about Hughes is his composure. From his speech to his movements nothing is exaggerated. He is very articulate but doesn't waste his words. He talks with authority without sounding professorial. There's warmth in his voice but no passion.He listens with interest but his replies are disinterested. He converses in a cold, objective manner but he may suddenly crack a joke or start laughing when a serious topic is brought up. He is polite without trying to impress one with his manners. Hughes and I are facing each other at his dining table. At its left, a photograph of a bespectacled and grave - looking Carl Gustave, Hughes' mentor and second most important spiritual influence after Sri Ramana Maharshi.
Michael Hughes doesn't feel comfortable talking about himself or his past. Seventy years worth of biography and only a few sentences can be extracted from the freezer. Born in Kansas City, brought up in Encino in the San Fernando Valley.Religion studies at the University of Chicago under the department's head Mircea Eliade.Explored meditation with Alice Bailey in New York.Went into real estate to make some money and retire. Married twice, "it's all so uninteresting". According to Hughes, we are moving out of the personality levels of intellect, sensation and feeling to the Transpersonal by means of our intuition.If we keep what Advaita calls self enquiry we arrive at the Divine and Monadic.Jung was the first scientist to recognize these deities or Archetypes as possessing an independent reality on which the ancient world's mythology was based.As we move on to the Spiritual Level we realize that it is we who are the deities. Jung did not reach this level. In 1932 when he visited Bhagavan in India he was not impressed by the Sage. Through Meditation we become nonchalant witnesses of all fiction as well as of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, the triangular eye on top of the $1, "the best symbol we have".
Yes, but what are the "Seven Planes of our Solar System?" I ask Michael Hilary Hughes, what is the Divine? He leans back on his chair and breaks into a long, hearty laugh.
Zorbas
Zorbas
888 in 1988 on June 28
