Tony Moo

"...When Tony Moo was  32, he met a Christian mystic by the name of Michael who Moo asked to pray for him. He cupped his hands on Moo’s head in a blessing and they prayed together.

“I woke up the next morning and it was like a dimmer switch of sensitivity was turned up to ‘high’ setting,” recalls Mooji. “I was lying in bed, quietly noticing the sunlight pouring through a split in the curtains. It was as if I was seeing the sun for the first time. My heart was full of joy. There was a sweetness about everything that morning… it was more a feeling of inner aliveness and joy, like I was simultaneously seeing outside and inside. I felt extremely happy… I didn’t want this feeling, or this day, to end. I kept walking, feeling a little light-headed and full to the brim with joy...

Papaji began poking fun at my name. It was a girl-name, Tony.  The proper boy’s name is Toni. Amidst the roar of laughter…I began to feel a lot of resistance coming up inside. I tried to appear calm on the surface. Now anger and judgment joined in. There was a shock inside, a surprise that such resistance could be happening: such doubts, resentments, all coming in together to climax into a continuous ringing in my ears. Now I watched his lips moving, but could hear no sound. My mind had now shut off, leaving only this boiling resentment towards Papaji. It was saying: ‘You are not my master. What gives you the right to talk to me like this? I would only accept such words from Ramana himself!’”

In a blind rage, Tony Moo decided to leave Lucknow and never return...Suddenly, as he walked out, a shift happened.

“This huge cloud of anger and frustration, shame and confusion, vanished. For some time, how long I couldn’t say, I could not find myself. There was simply no reference or memory of ever being a ‘me’. I could see the body but I knew it wasn’t ‘me’. There was just space. My body was there, but that was not what I was looking for. I could not find a reference onto which I could hang something about who I am. I was nameless and formless. There was just an infinite expanse.”

~ Georgi Johnson