Tag: gangaji

Gangaji is an American spiritual author, speaker, sometimes considered a lay or spiritual counselor, teacher or "guru". Since 1990, she has met with people in the U.S., Europe, and Australia, sometimes appearing with her husband Eli Jaxon-Bear, in what she calls an invitation to "discover the possibility of living your life in the freedom and joy of simply being." She and her husband live in Ashland, Oregon.

Gangaji, Antoinette Varner, was born in 1942 in Texas (USA) as Merle Antoinette ("Toni") Roberson and lived in the state of Mississippi until 1972, when she moved to San Francisco and started exploring her true being.

She did a stint of personal development training with a group called Arica which included "mantras, physical exercises, group processing of emotions" as well as dancing naked in an old mansion on a hill, took Bodhisattva vows and a Tibetan name of "White Tara, the female embodiment of wisdom and compassion", switched to Zen, practiced peer counseling, took Erhard Seminars Training, studied Chinese herbal medicine, took T'ai Chi lessons, leaned toward a Taoist understanding, took lessons in Chinese, taught dance, became disenchanted with Zen and everything Japanese, became interested in Vipassana and practiced sitting still but felt a dissatisfaction with one of her teachers, and came to peace with her mother as she was dying.

She marched for civil rights, protested the Vietnam war, met her current husband in Berkeley, tended chickens and a goat, got arrested for protesting at a nuclear power plant, spent ten days in jail, lived off the sales of marijuana crops, married her current husband in Hawaii twice - once in a church and again in a cave.

And after all that, she still identified herself as a sufferer and had a sense of something unresolved, something longed for.

Then in 1990, her second and current husband, Eli Jaxon-Bear, met Sri H.W.L. Poonja (Papaji) in Lucknow, India. Upon finding and meeting with this man, Eli experienced a spiritual awakening, and wrote to her encouraging her to come to India to meet Papaji. In April 1990, Eli returned to the U.S. to bring Toni to India to meet with Papaji. Upon meeting Papaji, Toni's quest for truth was fulfilled, and she realized the Self. Poonja gave her the name "Gangaji" after the river Ganga (Ganges), and then he asked her to go back to the West and share his message.

Gangaji is conducting Satsangs and retreats around the globe.

She is living nowadays in Ashland, Oregon.

Samarpan (Sam Golden) was born in 1941 in San Francisco into a catholic family. He was the sixth of eight children.

After completeing school, he attended a seminary for three years and discovered that priesthood was not the way the wanted to serve God.

He studied psychology and worked as a psychologist for a short while; he then worked with a gas company and later as a plumber, taxi driver and window cleaner.

In 1981 he moved to Oregon in order to be close to Osho who resided back then in his intentional community Rajneeshpuram. There he was given by Osho the name Samarpan (surrender).

He claims that in 1995, during a retreat with Gangaji, he had a realization of his true nature.

One year later he moved to Germany, where he lives near Frankfurt with his wife Marga.

Since 1998, He has been given satsangs and retreats in several European countries.

In 2018, he met Shivkrupananda Swami,and became a student of his, and he received a new name, which is Soham. He now teaches Samarpan meditation which Shivkrupananda Swami taught him. He writes about the effect of this encounter,

"I experienced a huge shift of consciousness since being with him. Swamiji has brought back from the Himalayas an amazing method for helping normal people like us who are living in society, to reach moksha, liberation, self-realization. This tool is called Samarpan meditation. He promises that everyone who practices Samarpan meditation will achieve their pure wish for liberation in this lifetime.

Some people have expressed a fear that my introducing Swamiji is a dropping of my responsibility to guide you home. Quite the opposite is the case. Sharing Swamiji and Samarpan meditation with you is the fulfillment of my promise.
I will be also there for you in this process."

He is the author of the book "Gluecklich sein in jedem Moment".