I became quite obsessed with the book after buying the audiobook (read by Sir Ben Kingsley) for my girlfriend for Christmas a few years ago. That same year my sister gave me an iPod shuffle, which I promptly loaded up with my computer's music collection. But after a few weeks of listening to Sir Ben tell this wonderful story in the car, I erased all the music on my iPod and replaced it with all 18 discs of AoaY.
I don't usually walk around listening to an iPod. When I bought a Walkman in 1983, I found the act of walking around with headphones far too disorienting. But here I was walking around the supermarket, hearing about Mukunda's desire to run away and live among the Himalayan saints as I put discounted organic chicken breasts in a plastic bag.
Listening to the book multiple times, replaying my favourite passages over and over, triggered my cinematic aspirations as never before. I found a public domain copy of AoaY on-line, downloaded some free screenwriting software, and proceeded to pare the book down to a 100-page screenplay. After listening to the book for almost two years, it took me just a year to shape it into the story I was most interested in telling. I think it is pretty good, but have yet to hear any other opinions.
I had a lot of reasons for writing the screenplay, but I'm now most interested in making a film to popularize meditation among younger people. Yogananda's childhood in India is full of humour and wisdom. I could see this as an animated film as poignant as Kirikou and the Sorceress.
I have sent a copy of the script out into the world, but I know of at least one other person who has written similar screenplay. Given the popularity of the book, I can't imagine we are the only ones with this dream, that no one has tried to turn this book into a film before us. Perhaps there are legal issues too expensive to be worthwhile, but maybe, someday, Steven Spielberg or George Clooney will hear Ben Kinglsey read this wonderful book. Or maybe they will call me because they were given a copy of my script and they liked it.
While I'm waiting for that call, I will continue to teach meditation in community and private classes, keep a blog to teach people how to meditate in public places, and offer private classes on-line.
The instructional pages of this blog are designed to integrate with my upcoming teaching tool: a free app for iPhones and iPads. There are lots of apps with music and soundscapes to meditate to, but Taming the Mind Monkey is designed to teach users to meditate to silence. It should be available for download by next month.
I have been practicing and studying various kinds of meditation for twenty years, and teaching for almost nine. Since learning Transcendental Meditation a year ago, I have become obsessed with teaching 'institutional meditation'. Inspired by the work of The David Lynch Foundation, I want schools, businesses, professional organizations, etc. to adopt the practice of meditating twice daily, for 20 minutes each time.
I can think of no simpler way to make life better for everyone.
But you don't need the app to learn how to meditate. You don't even need an iDevice.
Everything you need to know, to learn how to meditate, is on this website, free to use and share.
Just view the pages in the order they are listed in the right hand column, starting with 'What is a Mind Monkey?'
Enjoy your life!
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