naked, in a full lotus

‍ ‍‍  This is another in our series on decisions that have changed our lives. For previous installments, see here and here.

      Often in life, we have moments that create new pathways for us to follow. I'm sure you've had these moments. In a flash, we are suddenly catapulted in a direction that was not on our life map—or so we thought.

      Let me tell you about the moment when everything in my heart, mind and soul changed.

      I was happily and quite successfully working for a microbiology professor at Harvard in the Dr. James Watson Microbiology Department. I was just 20 years old and had secured the job of a lifetime. While there, I expanded my business education for free by taking classes taught by some of the world's greatest minds. I was deeply committed to my career, living in Cambridge, Mass., studying business, and moving into the next phase of my life.

      Little did I know a small dinner party would change my life forever. When I arrived at my best girlfriend’s apartment, a young man approached me. He told me he had just flown in from Hawaii and was heading to Amsterdam the next day. Throughout the evening, he never left my side. When I announced that I was leaving, he asked if he could come to my apartment and listen to classical music with me.

      I invited him back to my apartment, where for the rest of the night we sat quietly and innocently and listened to my favorite composers. In the wee hours, he left to catch a flight to Amsterdam and kissed me on the forehead. I was taken aback by his boldness but intrigued by his fascinating life.

      A few months later, I received a postcard from this guy named “Rick.” I asked my girlfriend, “Who is this Rick?” and she answered, “That’s the guy you met at the dinner party, remember?” “Aha,” I said. “That guy!” Thinking nothing more of it, I tossed the postcard in the wastebasket.

      That spring, a blue Volkswagen sedan pulled up to my door and out stepped “that guy.” He asked if he could crash at my apartment for a few days while he had some surf posters to make for a film he was working on. “Sure, no problem”, I answered.

      That night, he invited me to see the movie “King of Hearts” and have dinner with him. Afterward, we stayed up a while, talked and listened to music. When it came time for bed, I made up the sofa in the next room and bid him “good night.” The next morning, when I awoke, “this guy” was sitting on the floor in my bedroom, naked, in a full lotus, meditating.

      Instead of freaking out, I invited this deeply sensitive, spiritually evolved and stunningly beautiful man to join me under the sheets, and in that moment—that grand, wonderful moment—my life was changed forever. Fifty-six years later, we still do naked yoga every morning in our bedroom. We listen to classical music, and he loves to hear me play sonatas on my piano. Our favorite movie is “King of Hearts.”

      That one moment when I walked into a dinner party and met the love of my life, my spiritual soulmate, without an ounce of realization of any of it or what it was to be or who he would become in my future—I was clueless. When I asked Rick many years later “when did you realize that you wanted me in your life forever,” he said, “The moment I laid eyes on you that night in Cambridge on my way to Amsterdam at the dinner party. I told myself that when I returned, I would return for you.”

      So, my friends, life throws us these moments where, in an instant, the direction we are on takes a sharp detour. My greatest, most magnificent detour was the moment I saw this beautiful soul, naked, sitting on my bedroom floor in a lotus position, eyes closed, meditating, preparing for his asanas, and I said under my breath, “This is the one.”

     That was our moment.