For me there is often something rather discomforting about hearing people expressing extreme love and total reverence towards someone... when you don't understand or share that feeling. Some people find that attractive, they want to know , to find out and feel that 'love' and total respect for someone...maybe they're jealous or long to join the gang. Maybe I felt like a little of this as a 17 year old aspirant. I think nowadays more people just find it irritating or accept that these people are gaga about their religious leader but don't feel it's for them. I just watched the crowds faces on TV as they awaited news of the new Pope....a crowd of devout Catholics apparently totally impressed that they are blessedly witnessing the most divine moment on the planet. I can remember feeling that way too when Maharaji walked on the stage.

One thing that struck me in the 'Passages' clip was that Peter Lee and Ron Geaves both spoke in what I call 'premie-american' accents. I confess that always spooked me. My 9 year old daughter, who watches and admires a lot of American TV, has developed the habit (temporarily I hope) of prefixing sentences with "like..." I noticed that a lot of premies who felt they were in the 'in crowd' on the devotee ladder (during the 80's especially) developed this particular way of saying 'M'raji'...(despite being as English as tuppence) it's impossible to write this down onomatopeaically (spelling?) but it has a Californian twang and I think may originally derive from the way Marolyn said 'M'raji'. I suppose people felt that to adopt that accent somehow proclaimed the fact that they'd hung around 'the family' in Malibu or it just made them feel closer. Maybe it's more like 'M'rudgi' or 'M'radgee'. Why did I find that annoying? I suppose it was because it seemed to superficialise knowledge and 'being a premie'. It seemed false. Also what were people trying to get away from next..their English accents? My great uncle lived in the US since he was a teenager and died at 100 with an impeccable English accent. I guess he was proud of his roots, or should I say very solid in them.

It's easy to criticise now... from the outside looking back in at the premie world. These days I am disinclined to do so because a) I seem to have successfully passed through the 'resentment' stage of pulling myself away from Maharaji's orbit (as premies we were rather like satellites of Maharaji captured by his gravity) and b) I am more attracted to according people respect for their beliefs even if I consider them misguided. That way people respect what I say more and we avoid conflict. I also think that there is little that that should rightly be known about Maharaji-ism that is not now in the public domain. I don't think I have more to add. I think a lot of ex-premies feel the same way. Let Maharaji bring peace to the world if he can. Why not? For that matter let him bring 'peace' to mainly the Indian sub-continent if that's all he can do. Fine. Great achievement. He said it himself 'it's not for everybody'.

Personally I still find that doing the techniques can be quite relaxing and beneficial. For me it is quite a revelation that divorced from the whole association with Maharaji, the meditation can continue be a harmless positive thing. I continue to be passionate about inner peace and sunsets and music and love and all things inspiring...even the idea of God in a more cosmic sense. That original passion and childlike emotion has not been knocked out of me by having been cross and disillusioned with Maharaji. I feel actually quite happy that I have not thrown what I valued 'out with the bathwater' as it were.

The other day I had to go to hospital to have my heart checked. They told me I was as fit as a fiddle so I was very relieved and cycling home automatically found myself saying 'thank you' inside. I asked myself who did I think I was thanking? I have grown up taught to feel small and helpless compared to Great Big God and, as a premie always being preached at about how grateful I should be. Yet actually maybe I should thank little old me for once- I mean I know I'm here with a bunch of other folk but I don't know much else. So who else is there to thank? I feed myself - work hard - try to keep fit- successfully stopped smoking - take Omega fish oils every day. I think I should give myself a break - feel pleased with myself and maybe a little 'grateful' to myself. And not in an overly arrogant or humble way - just simple acceptance and pleasurable realisation that I can shape my world for the better. If fate decrees I drop dead tomorrow I defer to the greater power of nature or fate.

Am I grateful to Maharaji for anything? Maybe for indirectly passing on the meditation techniques and some good times but even then, it was also my constant efforts, sincerity and dedication that reaped results. I don't see that his supposed magic power or grace need have anything to do with what I experienced. I really don't. He was just one of many active influences in other words. Like many here I have also questioned that his influence was all beneficial and I've come to accept that he hurt me in some ways.

So I just wish premies came across as being as proud and happy about themselves and their achievements as they are about Maharaji's. I would find that more comfortable to watch than these videos where people appear to be really only expressing admiration for him - really putting him on a pedestal. I suppose I feel that as a premie I neglected so much of me in my eternal focus on Maharaji and doing what he wanted and said - which as we all know - in the seventies meant giving up a lot of ambitions, time, other aspirations and, at the end of the day..thinking for oneself. I really enjoy and value that so much now.