Live Again, for the First Time: Love’s Perfection in Ordinary Life
by Wendell C. Brustman, Ph.D.
Myrtle Beach, SC: AMB Productions, 2004
Reviewed by Kendra Crossen Burroughs
Thirty-six years after Meher Baba dropped his body, we have many books written by His mandali and other close ones from East and West who met Him, but only recently have we begun to see publications by a second generation of lovers who never met Baba in person. Apart from poetry, most of these are memoirs or collections of personal stories, or combine a personal account with an introduction to Meher Baba and his message.
Wendell Brustman’s book—published just before his death, at age 67, in August 2004—is quite different. It is perhaps the first work to present the path of Meher Baba through the author’s own perspective and in his own vocabulary, with little direct quotation from Baba, except in the appendixes. Wendell, who held degrees in psychology and theology, has produced a work of unusual depth and complexity, but this is not a scholarly study. It demonstrates how thoroughly the author has integrated Meher Baba’s message and presence, and with what originality he can articulate his insights, in a spirit of sharing rather than teaching or preaching.
The book is not for beginners. It assumes that readers “have obtained the new heart-based awareness operating system ‘software’ and have had it installed as an ‘upgrade.’ Not only has this rewrite by God enlarged the possibility for your intellect to be introduced to new programs, it has changed the mechanics. Everything is different.” You have begun to travel the path home, discarding what Wendell calls the “fragment-bound ego” in favor of the “provisional ego” dedicated to the Master, as described by Meher Baba. Old life has given way to a “wholehearted” New Life, in which the heart assumes its rightful place and intellect takes a subordinate role to Infinite Intelligence. The heart has become a furnace for consuming all your good and bad experiences in the fire of love. There is a willingness to face evil, to embrace without absorbing There is a willingness to face evil, to embrace without absorbing our dark side—which is God’s shadow—instead of viewing the world as split into black and white opposites. “Grace has acquired an earth-footing and will stay. The experience is even more enchanting and enlivening than falling in love because we find ourselves rising in love, and love is wrapping us in its softest garments. With Gene Kelly we can be dancing and singing in the rain, happier than when out in the sunshine. God has stepped up His lively presence, and we can discern it in the contribution of our own activity.”
I joked to someone that reading the book was like entering Wendell’s head, yet this is not an uncomfortable experience, because his house is in order. So unified is Wendell’s thought that one could even dip into the book at any point and not feel lost. His writing is aphoristic, so that almost every paragraph contains a concise thought to be pondered (a possibility facilitated by the use of key sentences set into the margins, similar to the design of Meher Baba’s Discourses). A few examples:
• The experience of the eternal Now is the sole meaning of knowledge.
• Gratefulness becomes the way we re-frame our life when unconditional love seizes control.
• Sin is God’s reminder that we are His.
• One of the secrets of prayer is to wrestle with God, hoping to win but willing to lose.
• The higher our self-esteem, the greater our tolerance for ambiguity.
• The God-Man has already objectively removed what we imagine we need removed in the moment of our awareness of the burden.
If you feel your concentration is not up for reading the entire text, at least browse; you will discover some fresh angles on life with Baba. Don’t be afraid of the book’s intellectual level—think of it as Wendell welcoming you to his Myrtle Beach bed-and-breakfast with a home-cooked meal for mind and heart. Enjoy such gourmet tidbits as the following:
“The world envelope is full of sounds that are not finished ‘sounding’ because they have not been sent into silence. This container is overly full of sound and itself needs to be swept clean of the pollution of that excess sound. We do our part well if we keep silence more often by being heartful in God, gifting all our unspoken words as our due for Him to swallow and make disappear. ”