Who Has Influenced Me The Most?

Throughout the course of my career as a radio and television interviewer, that began in 1972, people have regularly asked me which of the many people I have met had the greatest influence upon me. Who did I think was the most brilliant, the most enlightened? Who had the most important message? I can look back now and say that I have interviewed well over 1,000 people during this period -- all of them leaders in the field of consciousness exploration, metaphysics and human potential. And, clearly, no single person can possibly have the impact that would match the combined wisdom of all of these people. Nevertheless, there is one individual whose work I have found to consistently rise head and shoulders above the others. I am referring to Jean Houston.

Before I ever met Jean, while I was an undergraduate psychology student, at the University of Wisconsin, I was exposed to the brilliant book, co-authored with her husband, Robert Masters, Varieties of Psychedelic Experience. It was originally published in 1966, and undoubtedly on the cutting edge of a very important social movement within which I, as a college student, was embedded.

I first met Jean in 1973, in Montreal, Canada, at the annual convention of the Association for Humanistic Psychology. At that time, she gave a reading of a play she had written called Inside Out. In my opinion, it was a tour de force, brilliantly combining insights from literature, psychology and esoteric traditions -- in a way that other psychologists dared not to do. I was so impressed that I invited her to come to Berkeley, California, that fall to give another performance there. She did so on Halloween 1973, under the sponsorship of KPFA-FM radio, where I was producing the Mind's Ear series.

In the summer of 1975, just as I had completed writing my first book, The Roots of Consciousness, I attended a month-long program in New York state, with Jean, that she called "Dromenon." It was a total immersion into her world. It combined body movement, meditation and trance states, music, literature, philosophy, psychology -- and throughout all of this a deep sense of joy, punctuated with Jean's exquisite humor. Earlier in my career, I had studied psychodrama -- and had aspired to combine the fields of drama and psychology. In this endeavor, I discovered that Jean was already a grand master.

In 1977, Jean was elected president of the Association for Humanistic Psychology. That year, my wife to be, Janelle Barlow, and I attended the AHP annual conference and heard Jean deliver her presidential address in Zellerbach Auditorium at U.C., Berkeley. I remember it vividly because on the large screen behind the stage, Jean had projected one of the most brilliant pieces of art ever created -- The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymous Bosch. And, her oratory was a match to the artwork itself as she expounded on its relevance to our own day and age. To this day, I think it may be the finest speech I have ever heard.

For a number of years, as I completed my own doctoral degree program at Berkeley and fought other battles, I drifted away from Jean Houston's work, until about 1991 when I chanced upon some audiotapes from her new Mystery School. Listening to Jean once again, after so many years, awakened deep yearnings within me. For she has always had the capacity to touch that part of my soul that feels its own connection with the divine. I could refrain no longer and, at Jean's invitation, I began the process of reconnection -- attending her programs both in Colorado and in New York. By then, I was hosting and producing the Thinking Allowed television series. And, this new immersion in Jean's work was, for me, preparation for a series of new videotapes with her.

I attended Jean's mystery school programs for two years. My wife, Janelle, once described them as "the ultimate in adult education."

I could go on for a long time describing the many exquisite facets of Jean Houston's work: her many excellent books, her childhood relationship with Teilhard de Chardin, her friendship with Margaret Mead, her work with ex-president Jimmy Carter, her work in the White House with Hillary Clinton, her father's career as a humorist and joke-writer, her husband, Robert Masters' studies of the Egyptian goddess Sekhmet, the many friends I have made through Jean, her work with Joseph Campbell, her pioneering contributions to the psychology of the "inner child," her personal collection of antiquities, her library of over 30,000 volumes, her work with indigenous peoples around the world, the many topics she has explored in depth during her 21 years of Mystery School, etc., etc., etc.

But, as I think of my time with Jean, one numinous moment stands out for me especially that captures much of the essence of her work. It occurred one morning, in Mystery School. Jean had just delivered a lecture on the Kabbalah -- based upon the writings of Carlo Suares, author of The Cipher of Genesis. She was explaining the first Hebrew sentence in the bible, which -- when translated into English -- reads, "In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth." Her explaination showed that when examined letter by letter, the meaning hidden in each letter actually revealed the very process by which the world was created. During this lecture, Jean asked those present to pay utmost attention to her words. And, I found that I was listening fully.

After the lecture, I found myself in a most unusual state of consciousness. I was literally rolling on the floor in laughter. I could see that the creation of the universe was just about the funniest thing imaginable. Then, a few minutes later, I was in tears. For it dawned upon me that nothing could be more poignant than the love and generosity with which the creator was imbued. A few minutes later, I was rolling in laughter again as I transcended the sentimentality of my previous state and entered, once more, into creation itself as a cosmic joke. Again, however, in a few more minutes, I found myself in tears as I grasped the deep passion involved in the universal story. This continued for about a half hour as I alternated between tears and laughter. Eventually, Jean noticed this and walked over to me. She looked at me and winked. Then she said, "Oh, you're having an epiphany, eh?"

Nothing could have been more perfect than that moment.

In 1997, the Intuition Network presented Jean Houston with its "In Awe Award." That was the last time this award was offered to anyone. Needless to say, I highly recommend any of Jean Houston's program to those who may be reading this blog.