Hello, I'm Yasmeen.
Many people have asked me, "How did this happen to you? What happened to allow Raman to work with you in this way?" To begin at the beginning I need to explain a little bit about myself.
For most of my life I have been very aware of Spirit, and very aware of my ability to be intuitive, to see things a little bit differently from other people. Over those years of my early life I had many experiences of seeing things that at times amazed me, but most of the time frightened me. I was often very frightened of Spirit as I was growing up. Many times I would call out to my parents and tell them there was someone in my room. I was seeing them very, very clearly, but everyone would tell me, "No, there's nobody there, you're imagining things." I would hear things and see a lot of things about people and get into a lot of trouble because I wouldn't think and ask if they wanted to hear. I would simply tell them what I saw. I learned, therefore, to be very cautious and careful about my spirituality and about my ability to be intuitive.
I am sure, looking back, that I realized Raman had been with me all through this life, and in other lifetimes as well. This has meant that I have recognized the energy that was always there, even though at times I was frightened of Spirit. Raman, and his energy, was always there looking after me. Through many experiences in my life, there has always been a sense of security internally, and very close to me, if not physically. When I realized that there were changes occurring for me in my life, I realized that this meant that something was different about who I was and I was not comfortable with that difference as I grew up. We always have a feeling of being a little different from our peers. For me, that feeling was always very exaggerated. It was very intense at times, and I would spend a lot of time trying to leave my intuitiveness behind and just be like everyone else. It never really worked very well though and I always felt unhappy whenever I did that.
In 1981, while living in Australia, I had a series of dreams for a whole month and they were very clear dreams of sitting on a very low bench, sometimes waiting for this man to come and talk to me and at other times he was already there, waiting. He would sit and tell me about who he was, and his history, and his connection to me and what that meant, and he would tell me about myself and my life and what my life was all about, and what I would be achieving, and some of my own history. That went on regularly for about four weeks and at the end of that month I forgot all about it. I'm not sure why, but I think a part of me consciously didn't really feel easy about accepting everything that had happened during that month.
I got on with my life and later became a mother and lived very normally.
At the end of August 1986 I woke up from a very clear dream. It was another of those dreams, where I thought, "Ah, this hasn't happened for a while." In this dream, I was told by two people with very, very clear blue eyes, dressed in very simple white clothing, on a very small boat on a reedy river, that things were about to start happening, so I was to get ready. I had a feeling of waiting and expectation, and I woke up feeling very comfortable about it and very curious, but also a little unsure.
During that time I got to know a woman in a small country town in North Canterbury, where I was living. We became friends and we started talking about things and, as often happened when I started talking about things that were spiritual or a little different, a lot of knowledge would start flowing out of me. Sometimes I knew that this was just my own common sense and insights, and at other times, I would feel as if I were being given information. This ignited her curiosity and one day she said to me, "I'm really interested in spirituality and I really want to learn to meditate."
I said, "Well, it's easy. I'll show you."
I told her how I had meditated when I was a teenager and hadn't known what it was until I was about twenty. I had thought it was just something I had done to escape. I found that it was something I could offer to her. So we agreed to get together and we formed a group of about six people who met together every week. The meditations were quite simple, quite relaxing, and there was always something that we experienced that we would sit and talk about afterwards.
On the third night that we got together, at the beginning of October that year - in fact it was a Wednesday evening - the meditation began, but I had a sense of apprehension. I was slightly uncomfortable, but I thought that was just how I was feeling. We began the meditation and I felt a lot of energy in myself, and for the first time, rather than monitoring how everyone else was doing, I became very absorbed in my own process. I went through a period of feeling that I was being sucked up off the chair by a vacuum and I had a lot of adrenalin, and heart palpitations, and gripped the chair to hold on. I really wasn't sure what was happening but I didn't like it very much. At the end of the meditation I didn't say anything to anyone, but one of the women asked me if I was all right because I had sounded as though I were breathing strangely. I looked at her and explained what had happened and that I was okay but the experience hadn't felt good. I continued to talk with everyone about their meditation and asked them what they had felt.
Halfway through discussing my friend's husband's experience of his meditation I felt myself drift away in mid-sentence and lost consciousness. About half an hour later when I opened my eyes and shook myself awake, I began talking to him again, finishing off what I'd been saying before. He looked at me and smiled and everyone else laughed. I asked why they were laughing as what I was saying was not particularly funny. They told me a man had been sitting there talking to them for half an hour. When I heard that, suddenly everything slotted into place and I couldn't deny what had happened. I had a lot of energy in my body. I couldn't sit still in the chair and I felt as if I wanted to go and do something physical, such as play a game of squash and run around the block.
As well as having a lot of energy I felt rather euphoric, but very disturbed at the same time. I asked them what had happened and they said that the man had told them about themselves and that what they were looking for was inside them; that they were to continue to look within for what they needed. I found it absolutely amazing. I was really stunned. I didn't expect it to happen and I didn't even really like the idea that it had happened to me. It sounded very New Age and I didn't see myself as that way inclined at all. So what began that night was, as well as meditation, the beginning of Raman coming along to talk to everyone and teach them. It wasn't just a meditation group anymore. After that, word spread, and people wanted to come and listen to him. It was about a month before anyone thought to ask him what his name was.
The experience catapulted me into huge growth. I went home to my husband of the time and he had something he needed to tell me. This precipitated an emotional process which turned my world upside down. For six weeks I did not know what to do. Then, one day I looked up and there was Raman, just standing, waiting patiently, smiling at me. I saw him and immediately said, "Help! What should I do? I don't know what to do here." He gave me some advice and I felt quite relieved, although a little unsure, and I did what he suggested. This worked out really well and I felt very relieved. The following week something else happened which I needed to deal with. I knew from what Raman told me that this was necessary if he was to work with me. I remembered he had helped me before so I asked, "Raman, what should I do?" He gave me some more advice which I put into action, and it worked. I thought then that everything was going to be all right and that he would always help me, so my panic started diminishing. However, the following week, yet again something happened and this time I didn't panic or get too upset but I said, pretty quickly, "Raman help me, what am I going to do here?" He turned and looked at me and said to me, very lovingly, "What do you think you should do?" I was so downhearted I didn't know what to say, so I repeated my request for his help. He repeated, "No, what do you think you should do?" I don't know how, but a solution occurred to me. He said, "Good. Go and do it." I was very fearful and very worried because I didn't believe that what I knew to do would work out, but I did it and it did work. The following week, yet again something crucial happened, and I thought I had better see if I could work it out before I asked him. When I thought of an idea I asked him if he thought it would be the right thing to do, and he said ,"Yes. Go and do it."
In this way Raman taught me to trust him to know that he would be there for me if I really needed him, but he also taught me to turn to myself, to really find out what I needed to do, to really trust my own truth, my own awareness, and I always knew from that point on that he would support me. Raman taught me to really understand what I was feeling and to use my intuition in a way that would allow me to understand people, to not take things so personally. This is not always easy and I've learned over these past years from working with him that growth is on-going, that there are so many layers and aspects to it, but he taught me some fundamentals and that self-reliance is very important.
I am human, like everyone else, though I've sometimes forgotten that. Like everyone, I experience difficulties every now and then, but I always know that Raman will be there to point me in the right direction. It took me four years to come to terms with the fact that Raman was in my life. There were many times I didn't want to be there for other people to talk to him. I felt that it was an unwelcome pressure. I would have preferred being a bystander rather than being the person in the spotlight. As I was quite reserved by nature he helped me to overcome some of that reserve.
In the early days I didn't have to do much about allowing him to be there. The feeling that preceded his presence was a warmth that I used to call my "pre-med". I would have a warning and then it would happen, and I really didn't have to do anything other than be there. After about four years I sat down to allow Raman to talk to a group of people. The music stopped and there were twenty people sitting waiting to listen to Raman and to talk with him. I could feel him nearby but the familiar feelings and sensations didn't happen. I got a little panicky and said, "Come on Raman, these people are here, I can't do anything." He said, in a way sometimes he does with me, sometimes with words and often just with energy, "You need to let this happen. Are you willing to surrender? Are you willing to work with me and allow this to happen?" I don't know how but I think that my anxiety about everyone's expectations caused me to erect a barrier. I've always had very strong willpower and I know I would not have allowed this to happen in the first place all by myself. So at that point I surrendered. I moved into a meditative state and Raman was there to talk to everyone. That set me off on yet another emotional process because I felt that I was going to have to take responsibility for what was happening as well. I was afraid of that because over the years some people weren't very kind and weren't very supportive; were very afraid. I lost as many friends as I gained and it's not always a very easy or comfortable position to be in. What really changed things for me was that I saw the changes that Raman helped people make in their lives and I knew that it was about personal growth and development, that Raman wasn't a fortune teller. He wasn't going to tell them the Lotto numbers; he wasn't going to reassure them that they were going to get the house they wanted, or that a man was going to come into their lives. He did, however, have a wonderful understanding of the needs that people had, and a wonderful way of really helping them to focus on what would allow the things they wanted to come into their lives. I began to grow in confidence because I knew that what he taught me worked, and when I saw it working for other people it wasn't very long before I said to him, "Okay I'm committed." From the moment I said that I was committed, everything happened very, very quickly. It was as though that was the magical word and many things started to fall into place.
It is always such a privilege for me to work with Raman, to really feel his energy. He's the most loving teacher I have ever known. Eventually I came to understand that there was some history. People asked me why I had been chosen to do this work and I could never answer them. One day I asked Raman this question. One of the things he said to me was that it was because of my nature, because of my personality, that I wasn't going to go ringing my own bell and blowing my own trumpet. In fact I would probably do the opposite, which made things just about as difficult as possible for him to make things happen. I had what he needed, but in addition to that, there was a connection. It was then that I learned about the lifetime I had had in Persia and when he had come and got me as a little girl and taken me into his care, and that he had taught me and that I had become an advisor after Raman's death to Cyrus the Great.
Raman lived for forty-two years in that incarnation. Through a period of his journey into enlightenment he ceased to be very external much of the time, but when he was, he was the most radiant energy, who was very valued. I took over a lot of the jobs that he had undertaken everyday. In this lifetime I came to understand that there was a long sense of connection, a long sense of energy that was very loving, and since that time I've come to know that there are many things that are important, that people learn to understand.
Raman's teaching me to work with my feelings, to understand my intuition, to understand my sensitivity and not be afraid of it, has been very important for me. I grew up feeling very confused about hearing people say one thing and yet feeling something completely different and not knowing what to do with it. I always blamed myself and so a lot of people at times probably believed that I was over-sensitive. My mother always called me highly-strung. I never understood what that meant except that I was probably very sensitive to things and was really overwhelmed at times by my insights and I didn't have the maturity, as a young child, to really understand them. Throughout the years there was a part of me that always knew that I could draw from something deep inside myself and that belief in myself is something that I've learned to develop in this life-time. It has been tested many, many times, and Raman doesn't always just provide the answers. People have said to me, "Aren't you lucky that he can make things happen for you, or he can tell you what to do?" The truth is, I seldom ask him. In fact sometimes I forget because I am so aware that I do need to do these things myself.
I am not a puppet for him and neither would he want me to be. When I'm clear with myself, when I'm in a really good heart space, then everything else works out really well. Now, of course, I'm even closer to him and allow him closer to me in those moments too.
This has been a journey that many have thought might be glamorous and fun, however, there's such a lot of my life that I don't experience. There's such a lot of myself and my time that I give up for Raman to be there to talk with other people. I do that very lovingly and very willingly and I am always aware that there is a need for a balance for me in my life. With this in mind, over the last few years, we've worked on creating some tools for people so that they may have access to Raman and his teaching, such as the CDs and the cards. There are other working tools and books that I'm working on with him so that there can be a better sense of access. I also believe that his knowledge, his wisdom really deserves to be there for people to see, and to know that when they learn from what he offers it will always reflect what is already there inside them.
He has taught me to understand that change is inevitable, that this is something that we really do need to learn to understand and work with. When we understand what is changing we can also direct it but we don't have to be a victim to it. That's rather reassuring, because it means that situations don't just happen to us but we can actually work with them and have some influence, and this is what Raman terms "free will". This means the Universe will always be there to support our best interests. Sometimes it takes us a while to know what those best interests are.
Over the years I have come to understand the journey that I took in my life was very different to most. From the age of twelve to sixteen my family and I lived on a boat and we sailed around New Zealand. I had correspondence schooling and it was during this isolated life that I learned to meditate. Floating along the coastline of Stewart Island meant there were not many distractions. I became very involved with the environment. In fact my dream was to be a marine biologist. That was a dream that I wasn't to realize but I would have loved to study Zoology and move into the area of whales and dolphins. These were often companions for me at different times, and they were amazing experiences. Those experiences, however, were far removed from those of most teenagers. Though I certainly loved magazines and music, I didn't go out to parties, or dress up and chase boys. That aloneness, at times, meant that I had only one place to go, and that was within myself. I see now, looking back, that it was a period of training. It was a time that taught me just to be still, just to be calm and just to go within. In this way I developed meditation as a matter of course.
During that time I also developed the ability to leave my body and to go and travel astrally. Some of the memories I have of that particular time are really very wonderful, very beautiful. I have become really aware of the interest that people have in this area of learning so that they can understand their own experiences. I've learned to work with my own intuitive ability to help people understand these things for themselves. Raman and I make up a team of working together, both in union, and on my own, to help and support growth. This is going to be a continuing journey. I'm here for as long as it is necessary and I know Raman is committed to working with me for as long as that is. I hope that by sharing my story I can help you to understand a little more about how this process happens, and that you can really find a part of yourself as well.
