Fire of Transformation. Gora Devi
is it really possible to share everything in life, to love and help each other, overcome selfishness, have integrity in everything that we do and also be warriors of truth? Once again the revolutionary groups of 1968 used the outmoded Marxist ideology instead of creating fresh ideals for a possible new world.
Our house is very beautiful, big, with a terrace; it would be cheap to buy, because it's old and hasn't been renovated for a long time, but to us it's already a palace. There is a communal living room, seven metres long, in the middle of which is a decorous yellow brocade tent resembling a theatre stage, our magical show of life. Normally nine or ten people live here, all of us coming from different backgrounds, some involved in politics, while others are psychologists, students, a lawyer. We have open discussions about many things, mainly psychology and revolution and the future of our world. Recently I finished my exams at the University and I am now researching my thesis based on 'Utopia in the history of man', a subject very close to our own experience. We resemble a large, alternative family, looking especially for a quality of love amongst us, our greatest ideal. It is as if we are sharing in an important, historical experiment, unique, new, like explorers of a New Age. We cook vegetarian food, smoke dope, organize parties and workshops, and publish various underground magazines, all the time reading, writing, talking.
The house is not only close to the University but also to Brera and everything that happens there. So many friends come to visit us and sexual relationships are a very important means of expression, our discovery of freedom and love, of contact, union. Even though he knows I'm still quite an atheist, my boyfriend Giuliano has given me some Buddhist books to read, and I do accept that the rational, scientific mind isn't able to know the whole of reality, it can't explain feelings in the heart, can't explain telepathic communication. Science and technology have taken human beings far away from nature, linking people to a reality that is mechanical, robotic, without a soul. Our cities have become stressful and depressing places, people living in isolation from each other, captured by television and the mass media, busily engaged in the pursuit of material toys, like restless children never to be satisfied. In order to earn money, humans are devastating the earth, cheating other people, adulterating food, polluting the natural resources through a lack of awareness, poisoning themselves. In some countries on the earth people waste so many resources, while elsewhere other people still die from hunger; where has humanitarianism gone nowadays?
I know that what we are really seeking is a change in people's hearts, for a revolution of the soul of the earth, and that it is communities like ours which are spiritual research centres. I believe that it is now possible for us to change our society, but only if we create change from inside it, slowly, slowly, with groups of people beginning to live in a different way.
3 October 1970
I am considering the idea of visiting India in order to study Eastern philosophy for a while, maybe it can offer some different answers to the puzzle of life.
Giuliano explained to me that the East and the West have very diverse opinions about life. In the West people pursue all their desires thinking that to fulfil one' s desires will bring satisfaction, bring them happiness, whereas in the East people think that desire itself is the cause of all suffering and that peace and real happiness are only found at the end of desire, in Nirvana.
The author 1970
18 February 1971
I have completed my degree in philosophy and my professor had nothing but praise for my thesis about Utopia. Now I would like to organize an experimental kindergarten, because I believe that in order to bring about change in people it is necessary to begin in childhood, when ideas and feelings are first shaped. I no longer have any contact with the political groups, because they have adopted very violent tactics and I don't agree with that approach at all.
Giuliano has spoken to me about Mahatma Gandhi, the great Indian saint and politician, who defeated a mighty country like Britain through a widespread and well organized non-violent movement. Our true strength is spiritual and if we really want to achieve something we should become spiritual warriors because our true power is the power of a new consciousness. We must live truth and show it to the world. Our revolutionary spirit need not die, but we should be able to change reality with new tools. Violence is an old technique and belongs to the past.
10 June 1971
It's summertime again and once more large groups of people meet up in the various haunts in Brera, many returning from India, describing their encounters with Indian gurus and Tibetan lamas. I have met Piero and Claudio, two young men who became Buddhists in Nepal and when they recount their experiences to me I find myself beginning to be really curious about India.
We invade the little streets like a new tribe, with our guitars, posters, outrageous clothes, smoking joints together, similar to the ritual pipe of the Native American tribes. We talk endlessly about India as if we'd discovered a new planet, about our dreams, our longing for an authentic existence, for a distant, mysterious wisdom. Many people have taken LSD and tell of psychic, inner journeys, exploring the deep mystery of the human mind, infinite in its potential. It seems that LSD can open up certain areas of the brain which otherwise remain unexplored, resulting in telepathic, divine experiences, unknown beforehand. It's like sudden enlightenment, a new knowledge of oneself. One has to be ready to risk everything, to die psychologically in order to be reborn in to a new reality, like the hero prepared to combat any peril in order to discover the truth, willing to undergo all manner of darkness in order to find the light.
Conventional members of the public think we are crazy, addicted to drugs, but in fact we prefer to be outsiders and risk ending up in jail or prison, rather than be addicted to television and advertising. Regular society rejects the psychedelic drugs, but readily accepts alcohol, because alcohol makes one oblivious to everything, unconscious, just ready to buy the advertiser's products.
Our movement is becoming an underground organization, virtually secret because society at large is unwilling to accept us, but we work on with a growing awareness of the deep changes happening and the possibility of a different world. Some of my friends have gone to live in the countryside, discovering a simpler way of life close to nature.
I think we can only change others by offering an example. People criticize us, call us freaks, drug addicts, but the psychedelic drugs are a medicine for our minds, a cure against mental rigidity and hardness, they help us to discover our soul, our heart, blocked by the lack of pure love. We begin to feel that life is a cosmic film, directed by a divine power to which we have been blind for too long.
Sometimes I become afraid, doubts surface, I think I may go mad, but our so-called normal society seems even more insane. Most people take a powerful drug on a daily basis that creates a strong addiction: the television screen, nourishing themselves with contrived fantasies, useless panel games, sport. Some spend thousands on buying a couture dress or a car, while at the same time so many millions are dying in the Third World.
I want to take a risk, to go 'on the road', like a pilgrim, or a beggar. I am thirsty for truth and for real love, but at least at present my life is joyful, full of warmth and friendship, of human exchange, of adventure.
We move around the city wearing our beautifully coloured clothes, endeavouring to give a message to the people, a message of freedom and creativity, of fresh hope. We have plans to construct alternative villages on the planet based on universal love, practical steps, whereas in the past our political movement has just been an act of great passion.
Sometimes there are difficulties to be faced, lazy people in our groups, parasites, people who escape from the responsibility of life into morphine and other heavy drugs, but one day we shall overcome. I know that we are the pioneers for a new world. In the meantime we are learning to help each other, to share everything, money, a house, a job or a business, friends and love, much love, again and again; it's the discovery of a new solidarity, a new human cooperation.
Formentera, 4 July 1971
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