Shaykh Burhanuddin Herrmann Transcript: Sufi Training, Healing Miracles, and the Uwaysi System

Shaykh Burhanuddin Herrmann Interview

Summary

The discussion explores Sufi spirituality as a path of direct experience, self-observation, devotion, and connection with the heart. It examines how ego, complaint, conflict, and life difficulties can become opportunities for responsibility, inner freedom, and growth.

Questions This Interview Explores

• How can someone experience the divine directly rather than merely believe in it?
• How can spiritual practice help a person take responsibility for their inner state?
• What is the relationship between the mind, the heart, and spiritual awakening?
• How can everyday difficulties and emotional reactions support inner growth?
• What practices can help calm the ego and live with greater peace and gratitude?

Key takeaways

• Spiritual truth must be discovered through direct experience rather than argument or belief alone.
• The ego creates suffering by making circumstances and other people responsible for our inner state.
• Self-observation begins with noticing small complaints before addressing deeper emotions.
• The spiritual heart connects us with life, love, devotion, and the divine.
• Anger, sadness, and fear can reveal unconscious patterns that need to be understood.
• Difficulties can serve as invitations to grow rather than evidence of divine absence or punishment.
• Learning to act instead of react brings greater freedom, happiness, and inner strength.

Transcript

Rick: Welcome to Buddha at the Gas Pump. My name is Rick Archer. Buddha at the Gas Pump is an ongoing series of interviews with spiritually awakening people. I’ve done over 500 of them now, and if this is new to you and you’d like to watch some previous ones, please go to batgap.com, B-A-T-G-A-P, and check out the Past Interviews menu, where you’ll find all the previous ones organized in several different ways.

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My guest today is Shaykh Burhanuddin Hermann. Shaykh Burhanuddin is a contemporary mystic of the ancient Sufi tradition, and he was called to that path at a very young age. Even before he was called to that path, he was a spiritual seeker who went through quite a few things in his search, which we’ll be talking about.

As a Sufi, he went through classic dervish training, which involved an intense daily practice of meditation and prayers under the direct guidance of his master, accepting his master’s instructions for inner and outer life, including raising a family, extreme solitary spiritual retreats, pilgrimages, and regular challenging tests.

Rick: Am I right?

Shaykh: Sure.

Rick: So what is that inner experience as understood by Sufism, and how does Sufism go about enabling people to access it? Again, that may be a broad question because there are very many different branches of Sufism, but Sufism as you understand and practice it.

Shaykh: Well, first of all, you have to understand there is an ego that is alive in us, and that is the shadow of your real self, let’s call it that. Once you start to observe yourself with intention—and that is the most important thing—you understand what your intention in life is, what the meaning is, why you are alive for yourself, where you want to go in your life, and where you want to reach in your life, in a way of speaking: the inner intention.

Reasoning Through Suffering and Personal Responsibility

One general thing is that everyone suffers; everyone lives under a certain confusion. The path is to reason through that confusion: What are the reasons for your pain? Then we go on. We look at anger, sadness, fear, and all those things, to really work through them. In that way, you learn to know that you are the source of your own fate.

One general thing is that everyone suffers; everyone lives under a certain confusion. The path is to reason through that confusion: What are the reasons for your pain? Then we go on. We look at anger, sadness, fear, and all those things, to really work through them. In that way, you learn to know that you are the source of your own fate.

God started the game; we call it the game of La ilaha illa Allah, the game of one source. In this game, you have two ways to play it. We call it the multiplayer mode and the single-player mode.

Rick: That sounds like video games.

Shaykh: Yeah, yeah, we have to find some words now. In the multiplayer mode, you are in a situation where you look outside of yourself and say, “I cannot be happy because my wife is not recognizing me,” for example. Or, “I cannot be happy because I am very sick,” or, “I cannot be happy because my situation in the flat is not good enough,” or, “I don’t have enough money.” This is the multiplayer mode, which means you make circumstances and others responsible for your own inner state, and also your outer state.

The single-player mode, the divine mode, is that you understand you are the source of what is unfolded in your life. What you are is what you attract. When you can take responsibility for that, when you understand it is like this, that there is no other possibility than this, then you can also act rather than react permanently.

What you are is what you attract.

In this acting, there is a power, there is self-empowerment, there is happiness, and there is joy. You have to accept that the truth goes against you in the beginning, especially. The real self in Sufism is the no-self. It is a no-self, a zero point. It’s not another self; it’s just no-self.

Rick: Kind of like shunyata or something in Buddhism, the emptiness thing.

Shaykh: Yeah, you could say that in a way. Emptiness is not an easy word because when someone hears “emptiness,” you think no one wants to go to emptiness.

Rick: That sounds not so good, yeah.

Shaykh: That is not really what you can intend for. So I usually don’t talk about emptiness because it is a full emptiness, so it becomes ridiculous to talk about emptiness.

Rick: That’s a good little phrase there: a full emptiness. There’s this thing in the Vedic tradition of purnavada and shunyavada. Shunyavada means sort of emptiness, and purnavada means fullness. It’s said that it has both those qualities. In a sense, it’s empty of content or concreteness, but it’s full of potentiality.

Shaykh: We can say it’s empty of you, it’s empty of drama, and it is full of bliss.

From reaction to responsibility

Rick: Yeah, nice. So how does Sufism help a person shift from multiplayer to single-player mode? Is it just by imparting an understanding, or are there some actual practices involved that help to restructure your thinking?

Shaykh: There are many practices in the system. Usually, we start by observing our complaints; that would be the first work. In that work of observing complaints, we suggest to people that they should concentrate on little things. The little things are what we don’t want to look at.

Rick: Like, give us an example.

Shaykh: Well, for example, it would be to look at the weather that disturbs you, or the coffee is cold, or the neighbor didn’t greet you as you would have wished. That would be a little thing, for example. Or just to realize how you feel physically inside yourself, just to connect to that.

We do not first talk about the big issues. In the drama mode, we always concentrate on these big things, like, “My relationship is a disaster,” or, “My profession is a disaster,” or whatever it is. We don’t go there. We go to the little things first.

If you learn to master the little things, if you can have this capacity to be tolerant and to accept little issues—that the coffee is cold and the weather is not as you like—and they don’t shake you permanently or occupy you permanently, that is a step. You expand somehow. You become a bit more capable of carrying yourself.

If you learn to master the little things, if you can have this capacity to be tolerant and to accept little issues—that the coffee is cold and the weather is not as you like—and they don’t shake you permanently or occupy you permanently, that is a step. You expand somehow. You become a bit more capable of carrying yourself.

Then we work ourselves through different subjects, coming to roles and all this stuff. At the more advanced points, we go to anger, sadness, and fear. Those are the protectors of the ecosystem, the main protectors.

Then we have, of course, certain kinds of meditations and certain kinds of singing. Singing is very important. We sing a lot. Everyone should follow a good way of eating, also.

In the Dervish tradition, we recommend to every man, especially, that he be able to cook, that he learn to cook. That way, the little one in him is not so dependent and doesn’t have to ask his wife always to be his mother. He can cook, especially when guests come; he is able to cook and say, “Okay, no problem, we cook.”

It should be more than just cooking pasta. Pasta every man can cook—spaghetti and tomato sauce. Every man can cook that. But we like that he can create a little more than that.

Then, to be conscious about what we eat is very important. We know now through science that the stomach is the second brain and has a lot of input into our moods and the ways we feel in life. So it’s very important to learn to cook.

Rick: Nice. I would definitely have to do some remedial homework on that. I make a good grilled cheese sandwich and I can bake a potato, but that’s about it. When I was a kid, I used to make cakes. I like that. Do you do the whirling in your order?

Shaykh: No, no. In my order, we don’t do the whirling. Even so, there are some whirlers, but it’s not actually what we teach.

Rick: Okay. One thing I read—I read an article that a friend sent me—and there was a quote from it that jumped out at me. It said, “Some spiritual paths are very focused on the mind, with practices aimed to clear the mental state, tame thoughts, and attain a calm equilibrium. These cooling meditative practices bring equanimity, tranquility, and clarity of mind. The mystical practices of Sufism are hot practices in that they are working with the heart and igniting the fervor of passionate wild love.” What do you have to say about that quote?

Shaykh: We can say that the center of our life energy is not in our head. You feel that when you have a headache, for example. You don’t call the ambulance and say, “I’m really in life danger.” But if you have a heart problem, if you have very strong pain in the heart, you call the ambulance because you understand that your life power is there.

So the heart—the physical heart, but there is also a spiritual heart—is the thing we concentrate on, and we try to be in connection with this heart, which means to be in connection with life.

Rick: That quote I just read kind of implies that it’s an either-or choice between having a quiet, calm mind, equilibrium, or having this sort of wild, fervent love. But don’t you think that one can have both, that one can have a sort of deep, peaceful mind and, at the same time, rise up in great waves of devotion?

Shaykh: Of course, there is no conflict between mind and heart. We have to understand how we bring the energies into the right position. Mostly, people, as we said before, worship their mind. It is the only thing about which they feel secure, that their mind is everything they have at the end of the day.

So it’s very difficult to let go of this mind and to understand that, actually, the reason for all trouble is in the mind. Where else should it be?

Of course, we have to work with the mind, and we have to find a way for you to understand, for example, that not thinking, or thinking less, is just an intention. It is not something that rains down from heaven.

Of course, if your center is the mind, it feels like you die when you intend to stop thinking. So it takes training to do that. It takes training to let the mind calm down and to understand that you can be happy.

The ego is a pain system; it’s a pain body. It needs pain to survive. So we permanently create structures and sentences in ourselves that make sure we always have enough pain.

To become aware that we want to be happy and, at the same time, we don’t want to be happy, this is a very important step. Not to play this game all the time with yourself, thinking, “Oh, I want to be happy,” but everything in your life shows that you create situations that produce conflicts.

The ego is a pain system; it’s a pain body. It needs pain to survive.

Rick: Interesting, that’s an interesting comment. Sometimes I get the feeling that people who like to argue on the internet are just trying to keep their ego alive. I know two people in particular who have been fighting with each other for about 20 years in various internet chat groups, pretty much ever since the internet started, and they’re still going at it.

It’s like this distinct feeling that it sort of aggrandizes, calcifies, or concretizes the ego and keeps it alive.

Shaykh: Yeah, well, I mean, the internet is a platform that is ideal for the ego to unfold. There is no doubt about that.

Rick: And I guess part of that fighting is the conviction that, well, I am right and you are wrong. So it kind of reinforces the sense of duality or separation, whereas, you know, if we could maybe see it from God’s perspective, there are all these different points of view, each of which has its validity in the big picture.

Shaykh: We have to accept that in the kernel of ourselves there is this law: “I am right.” It is a pillar of the ego system. You cannot think it away. You have to experience your non-importance. You have to go to the zero point, and that means that you have to calm down your drama.

That is not so easy because everything happens in the drama, and it is the pain machine that we need to keep going. That’s why we, of course, like to play the multiplayer mode.

So one of those fighters on the internet says, “As long as he speaks like this, I have to speak like that because I have the truth. I have to protect people, I have to inform them, I have to clarify things. I’m a fighter for the truth.” That’s what both of them probably think.

So that’s why we say in Sufism, “The other one is right.”

The other one is right.

Rick: That’s interesting. Yeah, there’s a line from Bob Dylan from one of his songs. He said, “You’re right from your side and I’m right from mine.”

Shaykh: Yeah, that’s nice.

Difficulties as divine invitations

Rick: I heard you say in one interview that Sufism regards difficulties and traumas in life as growth opportunities. These things aren’t just happening because God doesn’t exist or because God is mean or anything like that. They’re happening because, well, to take a metaphor, let’s say the mother is scrubbing dirt from behind the child’s ear, and the child hates it and is screaming and thinks the mother is punishing him, but really the mother is doing something to help him.

Shaykh: Right. All the divine invitations are usually through trouble, because trouble brings us down; it makes us humble. If we become sick, for example, it gives us a kind of humbleness. And if the wife runs away with another one, that also humbles us down, you know.

It is important that we understand that nothing—existence never is against you. This is a very, very, very big point to understand. But we are against existence.

So what we do with life is that we separate our life from us. We say, “I am very highly developed already, you know. I’m quite close to enlightenment, you know. But my life, my life, this is something else, you know. My life has some difficulties and this and that,” and we separate it.

But that is one thing you have to stop. Your life is what you are in every aspect. So what is fine in your life, that’s something you have worked on, and what is not fine in your life, that’s something you need to work on. So life is a must, you know, and one of many, yeah. But this is one big one.

Existence never is against you. But we are against existence.

Rick: Of course, even enlightened people can appear to have difficulties. Ramana Maharshi got cancer, for instance, but when you see the way he handled it, I mean, his disciples saw him suffering, apparently, but he would say, “I’m not suffering. How could I possibly suffer?”

Shaykh: That is the point: you can have a perfect situation outside, and you are depressed, and you can have a very difficult situation, and you are happy, because it is not the situation which makes it. It is your beingness which gives you the joy or not. It’s not from the outside to the inside; it’s from the inside toward the outside.

The body is something we have to accept: it falls apart in time. We cannot prevent that. And people like Ramana, of course, they were very special ones, and it’s difficult to speak about them—how they were, and why did he have the cancer, you know, when he was so advanced. I don’t like this kind of talking, because it is not appropriate.

Rick: Well, everybody dies from something, you know.

Shaykh: Yeah, everybody dies from something.

Rick: The whole history of humanity—every saint that ever walked the earth dies from something.

Shaykh: Exactly. But in our new world, it is always like this: when someone has cancer, it means he oppresses something, or he has some kind of hidden issues, you know. You know this psychology of the origin of sicknesses, no? And I find it very disrespectful to say that to somebody, you know.

Rick: It can be cruel.

Shaykh: Yeah, it can be cruel, and also it’s not appropriate. It’s not our business. At least it is not my business.

Rick: That’s a good point. And even if karma has something to do with it, I mean, who can calculate karma? You know, who can work out all the details of why something might happen to somebody? It’s really not within our human intellect’s capability.

Shaykh: Yeah, in Sufism we don’t go on about karma because it’s enough to be in the now, you know. It’s enough to look at this life. For a good reason, people cannot remember what has happened before this life, right? And those who can, or think they can, maybe they also wouldn’t really die for that, you know. So, a few people—if it is like this, it can be. But you see, if you don’t believe in reincarnation, you have an advantage. Because simply, if another life happens to you, you did your best in this one life, you know. And if it doesn’t happen, you also didn’t lose anything. The more intelligent position is to let those things out, you know.

Rick: Yeah, in other words, to just sort of not reach firm conclusions about it, but leave it as an open hypothesis.

Shaykh: Yeah, yeah. They rather complicate your life, you know. And most people I know have always been something very important in their past lives, and now they are just ordinary people, you know. So, there is no need for that.

Rick: Yeah, so you’re saying that Sufism doesn’t have any—what is Sufism’s perspective on either reincarnation, or what happens to people after they die, or where they were before they were born? Is there any kind of philosophy about all that?

Shaykh: Well, life has no end. The life which is given to us has no end. We are an infinite soul. We have life; we have been given life as an infinite soul, you know. So, we have been given an eternal life.

Rick: But a very temporary body.

Shaykh: With a very temporary body. And if that body comes back—if you come back on earth again, in this world, in this dimension, or not—that is not really important. You will stay alive. And there will always be a time for you, and there will always be a space for you. And then, according to your own development, you come closer and closer to the Divine Presence again, and one day you will dissolve back to the origin, you know.

Rick: And so you’ll then cease to exist as an individual, because the drop will merge with the ocean? Is that the idea?

Shaykh: No. There is a point where you give up individuality. Yes, because individuality is an illusionary state, you know. It doesn’t really exist.

There is, of course—we are talking now at a very high level, you know. Usually, those things we do not talk about in public, because it is not for everyone. We concentrate on the person who is in front of us, you know, and all those higher things, we keep them private.

Rick: Okay, well, let me just be private between you and me and 6,000 people who watch this. Because I was thinking of asking you about—we were talking about Ramana and all that. I was thinking of asking you what the Sufi understanding is of higher states of consciousness or enlightenment and things like that.

Based upon what you just said, I want to add the question of: can you totally merge with the universal and no longer have any shred of individuality, and yet be living in a body? Or if you’re living in a body, is there still going to be some remnant of individuality in order to function in a body?

Shaykh: Yes. As long as you have a body, this body, there is an “I am-ness.”

Rick: Has to be.

Shaykh: And this “I am-ness” travels with you as long as you have a body. That can be, at the end, even a light body, whatever it is. But this “I am-ness” is with you, you know.

Rick: Right. If you hit your thumb with a hammer, you’re going to know it. There’s a person there that feels it.

Shaykh: For example.

Rick: Okay. And how about the idea of higher states of consciousness and enlightenment and all that? Do you have a whole cosmology about that?

Shaykh: Sure, there is a cosmology. I don’t think it’s very different from other traditions. We have different names. We start with Nafs al-Amara, which means the critical self, the accusing self, which accuses everything.

And then we have Nafs al-Awama, the distinguishing self, which asks itself what a higher meaning in life is, for example. Then we have the state of Nafs al-Muhimma, which is the longing self. That is someone who is completely clear that he has to work in this life, an inner work.

Then we have Nafs al-Mu’maynad, which is the pacified self, and Nafs al-Kamila, and so on and so on.

Rick: So, for instance, you could interpret somebody like Ramana or Papaji or Nisargadatta or something like that, and there would be a Sufi name for the state that they had attained, perhaps.

Shaykh: Yes, yes.

✨ Awakening in ordinary life

Rick: I see. And you’ve been involved in Sufism for 30 years and interacting with probably hundreds and thousands of different people. What kinds of transformations have you seen in all the people that have gotten involved in Sufism? Do you see huge changes in people’s lives and personalities?

Shaykh: I have seen—and that’s a nice thing—I have seen many changes in people during the time we are working. And especially in the latest years, there is definitely an increase of awakening going on.

And also the interest, for example: when I started the work, the usual customers were people who had some drug experiences or some this, some that, you know, coming from meditation, whatever. Now I have just normal housewives with me, you know—I mean, in good respect.

Rick: Sure, yeah.

Shaykh: People from very common backgrounds, you know, like so-called normal people—positively normal people.

Rick: I know what you mean, yeah.

Shaykh: And they start to be interested, and that gives me a lot of hope and joy also to see that.

Rick: Yeah, I think that’s happening in all the systems around the world, you know. Back in the ’60s or early ’70s, it was the hippies that were getting involved in this stuff. And now you have yoga classes in the local YMCA, and, you know, people are—but that leads to the next thing, which is people start getting interested in spirituality in a deeper way, and people from all walks of life.

So, actually, that leads into a question I was going to ask you, which is: do you personally, or Sufism in general, have a view about the spiritual evolution of humanity and the expansion of collective consciousness? Do you see the world kind of waking up in a larger way?

Shaykh: Well, we have to see that, no? It is like a race, yeah? In our tradition, we know that there had been humanities before us on this planet, and they all failed, yeah? And now, it looks like that we are also on the way to fail, you know?

Rick: Possibly could, yeah.

Shaykh: But if we don’t wake up radically with our behavior toward nature, I mean, there is no doubt about that: we’re going to go into a very bad time.

But everything can happen, you know, Rick? Everything can happen, and if you have seen the divine power, you know, you have no doubts that everything can happen. So I would never take hope away from people, but I can also say it is urgent. And this is why we are doing what we are doing, and why I see other people doing what they are doing, you know?

And we just—even I’m the smallest particle, you know—but I have to try to do the work, no? To become a human, to have a day without conflict, and that’s what we have to reach. As a humanity, we have to become humans, and this would be the mission.

And we just—even I’m the smallest particle, you know—but I have to try to do the work, no? To become a human, to have a day without conflict, and that’s what we have to reach. As a humanity, we have to become humans, and this would be the mission.

As a humanity, we have to become humans.

Rick: I agree with you. I feel, and perhaps you feel as well, that this upsurge in interest in spirituality that we’re seeing around the world is kind of a response to the severity of the problem, you know, the direness of the situation.

And it’s not just that humans are thinking, “Okay, I’ll get involved because the world is in bad shape.” It’s more like the divine is impelling humans to feel that way, to arise in that interest.

Shaykh: Especially in recent times, I think that people can experience, or do experience, that the pressure increases in their lives, that there are transformations going on, that there are things changing, and we are facing this period now. This is clear.

Rick: Yeah, it’s kind of like you were saying earlier, when we were talking about how difficult situations are not just God—it’s not God being mean to us; it’s God trying to wake us up or teach us something. And so maybe, as humanity, we’re facing difficulties for that very reason.

Shaykh: Our life energy is very much locked in our wounds, you know. And that’s why we have to start there, you know.

In our system, for example, the first relationship we look to is the relationship between mother and father, you know, toward mother and father. And that’s a very, very important thing: that you come into peace with your mother, with your father, you know.

Rick: So is there an emphasis on respecting one’s parents, as there is in—

Shaykh: It’s not only respecting; it is honoring. Honoring them. And everyone has to honor his mother for a simple reason: she has been the door for your existence. And it’s not only to respect your mother, but to honor your mother, and to honor your father as well, because they have been the door to your existence, to our existence. And just to make this point, which is important, say, “Thank you, Mama. Thank you, Papa.” And I don’t know if you have children.

Rick: No, but I was one.

Shaykh: But you were one. And, yeah, so you had a mother, and maybe you can still feel the stream of love coming from your mother to you.

Rick: Yeah, I do. And even my father, who was an alcoholic and kind of a messed-up guy—in fact, my mother was in and out of mental hospitals—but it would have been hard as a child to feel that sort of love and devotion to parents who were so dysfunctional. Although naturally, I did love them, there was a lot of strife in the family. But, you know, 50 years later, I look back and the gratitude is much stronger, and I realize they did the best they could.

Shaykh: Yes. Yeah, that is the point. You know, we do not have to look further than the beginning. In the beginning, there is a certain reason why you have chosen your parents as you’ve chosen them.

Rick: Yes, I agree.

Shaykh: But if you look at yourself now, you’re a person who gives a lot to people, who does a lot of work to help other people live a better life or become more conscious. So something very good has happened in your childhood, there’s no doubt. Because if you listen to yourself, it could sound like you should be a wreck, you know—your mother an alcoholic, your father an alcoholic, your mother a maniac. How is it that you came out so well?

Rick: I said that to my mother one time. I said, “Mom, you know, I’m really happy with the way my life is going, so whatever you did, you must have done the right thing, and I really appreciate it.” And she really enjoyed hearing that.

Shaykh: Yeah, and one thing she did was to love you. In all her dysfunctionality, there is something which cannot dysfunction, and that’s the love of the mother, because it comes from her soul to your soul. And what happens in the ego mode is not the most important. So that dream is still with you, and you will see it when you come from this world. You may see your mother again, and you will understand that she was always there for you.

Rick: Well, you know, as I understand it, Sufism is very much about cultivating the heart, and it would seem that that would kind of start with your parents, because that’s your primary relationship when you’re young. And then it would go on from there; it would build upon that platform to other things—your spouse and your children, your larger society, your community, your whole world. But it kind of starts right where you’re born.

Shaykh: Yeah, that’s why it is so important to make the beginning good, and to look well at that beginning.

Rick: That’s a beautiful point. Now, at some point during this conversation, I want to talk about your personal life more and some of the experiences you went through. And I also want to hear some stories about your teacher, because I understand that your teacher was a highly revered and remarkable presence in the Sufi world, and I bet there are some interesting stories about them that you would enjoy telling and that people would enjoy hearing.

So let’s do both in the coming minutes. Talk a bit about your earlier life and background and some of the more significant milestones that you have experienced in your life, and also let’s talk about your teacher. We can do it in whichever order you wish.

Shaykh: Better you tell me.

The Seeker’s Journey Toward Sufism

Rick: Okay, let’s talk about you first, although I’m sure you’d want to put your teacher first. But I heard some interesting stories in your interview with Ian McNay on Conscious TV, and you were a seeker from an early age. You went to India, as you said earlier today, you met Krishnamurti, you were looking for a guru in India, and you went through all sorts of things. Talk a little about what you consider to be a few of the highlights of your search that led to your finding Sufism.

You had some kind of powerful personal experiences, some of which almost left you incapable of functioning in the world for quite a while. Let’s cover some of those things for starters.

Shaykh: Well, I was interested in spirituality at a very, very young age. I was about seven years old when I can consciously remember it. And when I was ten, the first book I bought was about Tantra. I had to bring my mother into the bookshop so that the guy would give me the book, you know. And I can’t really tell you why it was like this. This is something I can’t really give you a reason for, but it has always been in my life like that.

I started to practice yoga when I was ten. I got the book and tried to imitate the things as best I could. I also forced my mother to do yoga with me in the morning, but she stopped after she fell asleep and missed work once. So she gave it up.

I spent most of my days in the forest. Actually, this was my daily life. After school, the first thing I would do was go to the forest and spend my day there. As I grew older, I also stayed overnight very often in the forest. This was my home, I can say.

I became interested in Buddhism at a certain point. So I can’t really tell you why, but it was somehow coming to me. And I entered the school of the Karmapa, the old Karmapa.

Rick: Oh, yeah, Tibetan Buddhism?

Shaykh: Yes, it was Tibetan Buddhism. Even so, I was more attracted to Zen Buddhism, but somehow it went in this direction. And I met a lot of lamas and nice people.

Rick: In Germany?

Shaykh: In Germany, yeah. I was a child. They came, and I went there. But somehow I never felt really at home there. There was always something missing. But it was a nice time, and the meditations were also nice.

So I had always thought that my master would be more in that direction, like a yogi or a Buddhist. And when he arrived, I was simply overwhelmed. I would never have considered entering into Islam. This would have been my last perspective, but it became my first perspective, you see. So much for the mind. You see, love can change everything in one moment, and in my case, it did.

Rick: And what was this experience you told Ian about, being at a waterfall and then experiencing going off into the light and being told you had to come back and all that?

Shaykh: Yeah, I was in India when I was 18 years old, and I lived in the Himalayas. One day I went for an excursion up in the Himalayas, and there was this waterfall. Somehow, I felt that the waterfall would enter inside of me, and I got out of the body and moved up, up. I came to the divine presence, let’s say, and I said, “I want to stay here. I don’t want to come back.”

And the divine said, “No, you can’t. You can’t stay here. You have things to do, and there are people who need you.”

And I said, “No, no, there’s only my mother. There’s nobody else. She will take it.” I was somehow—I don’t know why I said that—but I tried to argue. However, there was no way, and I got sent back into the body, which was—

Rick: How long were you out of the body?

Shaykh: Well, it’s difficult to say, but—

Rick: How do you say?

Shaykh: Some hours, maybe. It’s difficult to say. It could also have been less. I don’t want to exaggerate, you know. It’s really difficult to say when it comes to time. But, yeah, I think it was maybe two hours or something like this.

After that, I went into three months of silence, which was good.

Rick: There in the Himalayas?

Shaykh: Yes, there in the Himalayas. I communicated with my friend who was with me by little notes. And to come out of the silence was a very difficult thing, in fact. I would actually have liked to stay inside, but it was stressful for the environment at a certain point. And I wouldn’t want to run around with a sign that said, “I’m in silence,” or something like this.

I understood that there’s also an ego part in it. I was saying, “Come back to being normal.”

Rick: In other words, the ego part would be, “I am the unusual yogi who stays in silence, and aren’t I special?” That kind of ego thing.

Shaykh: Not only this, but to force people to deal with you.

Rick: Inconveniencing others, yeah.

Shaykh: Yes, that is an ego part. Somehow, in me, it was this thought that I was now in the silence. I learned to enjoy silence, and it’s fine now. Now I’m just being with people normally.

Rick: Yeah, and I’m sure you realize now that silence can be there even if you’re speaking and doing things—this underlying, deep silence. And then you also said something to Ian about being in some really profound state for about three years, where people practically had to take care of you. What was that, and what shifted you into that state?

Shaykh: Well, actually, it happened through a healer whom I came in contact with. He’s a very controversial healer. His name is Stephen Turoff.

Rick: Oh, I heard that story. He was the guy who cut your mother open?

Shaykh: Right, right, right.

Rick: What a crazy story.

Shaykh: Not only my mother, but he’s a guy who cuts people open in general. You know, maybe Juan de Dios does that also. He’s one of the most famous. Now he’s in prison.

Rick: He’s in big trouble now, yeah.

Shaykh: He is in big trouble. He had been in big trouble before, and somehow he looks like he couldn’t learn. So now he repeated the trouble. But no doubt about that, he has great energy and that he is a great healer. But on the personal level, it’s also obvious that he has to have some work to do. That happens often with healers. That is a strange thing, but it’s like this.

And, well, in my case, Stephen Turoff was touching me very strongly, you know. And somehow I went out of myself, I can say. It was such a pleasant state that I stayed inside, and I could stay inside. But it was difficult to communicate, very difficult. Also, I could hear people’s thoughts and I could hear everything they said, and I could also understand. But the world I lived in was not the same world they lived in. So things appeared very different to me.

They appeared very different to me, and communication was not so easy. For example, my relationship to my body was also difficult. I was in a state where I didn’t really know: Is it cold? Is it warm? Even going to the bathroom was not always clear. So I was somehow too far out, you know, and the body was left where it was.

So I sat hours and hours on the sofa at home, you know, and my wife was very worried, of course. Many people were worried. They could also feel that it was not something terrible happening. It’s not crazy, you know; it’s not like I needed to be taken to a mental hospital. No one actually said, “Look, we have to take you to the mental hospital.” But I needed help. I needed help from outside.

Finally, someone called my master and said, “Look, Burhanuddin is like this.” And he said, “I have to come.” So I went there with some others. They basically brought me there.

This was a very strong period and also a very comforting period because I could understand that he saw me and understood me completely, that he was in the same world I was in. And it was one of the most beautiful periods I had with him.

So the first thing he said was, “I’m not going to keep you in the dargah, in the center.” So he put me in a house on the edge of the village. One reason was that I didn’t sleep during this period. I had—yeah, no, not at all.

Rick: For three years?

Shaykh: Not for three years, but for half a year, minimum, I didn’t sleep.

Rick: Let me interject a little question there. So when you say you didn’t sleep, was your body lying down, apparently asleep, but you were awake inside? Or did you not even lie down to rest?

Shaykh: I had some resting time, usually one to two hours, but not more than that.

Rick: And even then, you stayed awake or aware?

Shaykh: Yes, because I was all the time looking into the light. And if you look into the light, you just cannot sleep—at least I can’t.

Rick: Now, you know there is a thing where they say that you go through the normal cycle of waking, dreaming, and sleeping, but the inner awareness, or the turiya—the fourth state—remains awake. So there’s what they call “witnessing sleep.” Is that what was happening, or did you actually not enter into the sleep state in any way?

Shaykh: No, I didn’t enter into a sleep state.

Rick: Interesting. Wow. And so, let’s just recap this a little bit. You met with this very unusual healer who actually cut people open with a knife, and there’s a whole story around that. I don’t know if we want to take the time to go into it, but he cut you open and actually reached his hand inside your body and apparently held your heart in his hand, which seems very hard to believe. But I’ve seen things like that in the Philippines and so forth, and then that just completely blew you into a different state of functioning.

Shaykh: Well, he took my heart and he tore something out from my heart, you know. That was the main shock, actually, because I thought, “What the heck? Can he tear off my heart?”

Rick: Did you see him come out of your body with some physical piece of material, or was it more of a subtle thing?

Shaykh: It was more subtle, you know, and he threw it away. But he showed it to me in the bucket.

Rick: Did you end up with a scar or something where he cut?

Shaykh: Yes, you have a scar, yeah.

Rick: And you have one even now, a scar there?

Shaykh: No, no.

Rick: It went away? Okay.

Shaykh: It disappears usually after three days.

Rick: Since we’re talking about this, people are probably curious: “What in the heck are we talking about?” We might as well talk about it a little bit more. Your mother had uterine cancer, and he cut her abdomen open and put your prayer beads or something inside her uterus. This sounds outrageous, but I believe you. I don’t think he would make this up.

Shaykh: Yeah, well, well.

Rick: I don’t think he would make this up.

Shaykh: It happened like this, you know. I had a very long string of prayer beads, very long—like 1,000 beads, no? And he took all these beads into my mother’s womb, you know. Then he threw them to me and said, “Smell.” They smelled like roses, you know. And they stayed there for weeks and weeks.

Rick: And she was cured of cancer?

Shaykh: Yeah, she was cured.

Rick: Wow.

Shaykh: Yeah.

Rick: Amazing. And, just for people listening to this who think we’ve suddenly gone off the deep end, there are these—

Shaykh: Actually, to correct things, she didn’t have cancer, but she had a hole in the heart. And why he opened the belly, I cannot tell you, but he closed that hole in the heart.

Rick: Yeah. Sometimes people have that, and they have to have surgery to repair it. There’s a hole between the ventricles or something in the heart. It’s wild, but there are these things. When I was in the Philippines for nine months, there were all these healers in the Philippines who did something similar. There were a bunch of doctors with me, and I went once or twice just to watch it, but the doctors went for several months and stood around the table every day, watching these people closely. They were convinced that they were actually somehow reaching into people’s bodies and pulling things out.

Shaykh: Yeah, you have to experience it yourself. I mean, if someone puts an arm inside your body, you understand it.

Rick: You feel it.

Shaykh: It’s like that, you know. It’s not something you have to think about. It is very clear.

Rick: Is this person still alive?

Shaykh: Yeah, I think he’s still alive.

Rick: And do you regard him as a highly evolved person, or is this just some kind of weird psychic ability or something?

Shaykh: No, no, no, he’s definitely a very developed soul.

Rick: But in any case, it really threw you for a loop. It really shifted you in a big way. Do you see that as one of the most dramatic awakenings of your life, where that happened?

Shaykh: It was a very strong one, yeah. The first one, yeah.

Rick: And it took you three years to settle into a state. So what are some of the ways in which your master brought you down or got you integrated?

Shaykh: Well, by the help of my master, of course.

Rick: Yeah, I mean, did he tell you to do physical labor or eat heavy food? How did he get you through it?

Shaykh: No. First of all, he told me that I had to come back and that he would do it with me. And he said, “When you come back, you don’t come back to your old self, but you fill it now with reality. You fill the path with reality.” That’s what he said. And that’s how we tried.

Rick: It must have taken a while.

Shaykh: Yeah, it takes time, you know. And the point is, you never come back, so there is something that always stays where it stays.

Rick: Yeah, but you get used to functioning again in the real world. Probably you can drive a car and things like that.

Shaykh: Yeah, I function more or less.

Rick: You seem to be functioning okay right now.

Shaykh: You should ask my wife about that, you know.

Rick: Yeah. There is a thing you see sometimes where people who have attained a high spiritual state have a hard time functioning in the world. Anandamayi Ma, for instance, had to be fed, or Neem Karoli Baba would wander off into the forest if people didn’t keep an eye on him. They’re not quite so grounded in this world.

Integrating Spiritual States into Daily Life

Shaykh: But, as you say, the whole purpose of spirituality is not to become comatose or to get into some dysfunctional state, but hopefully to integrate it so that we can function in the world and yet be in a high state.

Rick: Yeah, and I presume your master was that way, right? And that’s part of the reason Sufism recommends having a family, isn’t it—to be more integrated and grounded in the real world?

Shaykh: Yeah, you’re in this world but not from this world, you know. That’s what we say in Sufism.

Rick: Sure. The Bible says that too: “In this world but not of it.” Jesus said that, I believe.

Shaykh: Right.

📚 The teacher and the path of love

Rick: Okay. How about your teacher? Tell us a bit more about him. It appears that he was a remarkable soul. Are there any interesting things that you would like to say about him that people would enjoy hearing?

Shaykh: Well, he was a lover’s master, you know, and we say there is an unofficial championship of lovers every year.

Rick: The Olympics of lovers, huh?

Shaykh: Yeah, and he definitely was the champion over decades.

Rick: Nice. Because his heart was just so expansive or great?

Shaykh: You know, to describe a master like this, we call them kings. There are, in every era, five kings present on Earth. Rumi said, “If you haven’t met one of them, you wasted your lifetime.” And I was more than blessed to meet him.

It was very much like meeting Jesus. Imagine those fishermen who met Jesus. They had families at home; they were not socially secure. And Jesus said, “Come,” and they dropped everything and came, you know. The same thing happened for us, for those who were ready to follow.

He took my life 180 degrees in every direction. I never wanted to marry, and I never wanted to be a father. And those two things were the first things he told me, you know. So that was already strong.

Rick: How many kids do you have now?

Shaykh: Seven.

Rick: Wow! Seven, that’s amazing.

Shaykh: Six daughters and one son.

Rick: Amazing. And what is their age range?

Shaykh: My eldest is now 34, and my youngest is 20, I think—or 19. I think she’s going to be 20 now.

Rick: That’s great. Congratulations.

Shaykh: Thank you.

Rick: Have you supported your family entirely through your teaching activities, or did you have some other sort of profession?

Shaykh: No, no. Basically, it was through teaching.

Rick: Teaching activities. Have your children taken to Sufism?

Shaykh: Some of them are closer, and some are less close, but all of them have been touched by it, of course.

Rick: Nice. They must have had a very nice family to grow up in.

Shaykh: Yeah.

Rick: A very spiritual family.

Shaykh: Well, you know, from a child’s perspective, it is not always so funny to have a father who’s never at home.

Rick: That’s true. You travel a lot.

Shaykh: So this was not easy for them. Now they’re older, and it makes it easier, but there were times when it was not easy.

Rick: There’s a verse in the Bhagavad Gita about the blessing of being born in a pure and illustrious family, and then it says that if you’re really special, if you’re really fortunate, you’ll be born in a family of yogis, although it’s much more difficult to attain such a birth. But anyway, that’s kind of what your children have done, I think—been born in a blessed family.

Shaykh: They have to see this interview, you know. They will like it.

📚 Khidr and the guidance of the unseen

Rick: Yeah, you can, yes. My friend in England named Fred, who sent some questions in, asked me to ask you about Khidr, K-H-I-D-R, who he said was sort of like a Maha-Avatar Babaji kind of figure, an advanced, eternally youthful spiritual being who appears to certain individuals. So I guess that’s something in the Sufi or Islamic tradition, this person?

Shaykh: Yeah, in our tradition, there are some people on Earth who are immortal, you know, and Khidr, alayhi salam, belongs to them. And Khidr means the green, the green one.

Rick: Green, like a frog, green.

Shaykh: Yeah, like a leaf.

Rick: Like a leaf, yeah.

Shaykh: Or whatever. Because when he appears, he tints everything with green color, you know. Everything appears green. That’s how you realize that he’s coming.

Rick: And like Babaji, he’s one of these beings that are said to— is he said to sort of look over humanity and guide its destiny, you know, like an ascended master sort of thing?

Shaykh: Yeah. Well, you know, this is again difficult to describe. There are souls and souls, no? And some are very, very, very high souls, you know. You would rather call them gods than just human beings, you know. And they exist and they are with us. They look after you, after me, after all of—after everyone, really. And they are great souls with different names and different traditions, and they keep their work as long as it is commanded of them, no?

Rick: Have you ever encountered one?

Shaykh: I have encountered the presence of Khidr, alayhi salam, two times.

Rick: Was it a visual experience or more just a feeling of presence?

Shaykh: No, it was a visual experience also.

Rick: Do you mind talking about it?

Shaykh: Well, you know, in general I don’t like talking too much about myself, and especially about what I have seen or what I have experienced, you know?

Rick: Well, don’t think that it’s about you, though. Let’s pretend it’s not about you; it’s about this being that you saw.

Shaykh: So, as I told you before, when he comes, you will experience green everywhere. Everything is tinted with that color, you know? And so it is a very joyful, very, very joyful thing to be with him because he is, of course, in a very high state. And always when you meet a person who is up, you know, who is really up, they’re very generous and they take you to their state, no? And they take things away from you—sadnesses, for example, anger, yeah, can happen. It depends on how much can be taken away, because not everything can be taken away. You need those things to work, you know? You need those things to develop yourself, no?

So there is no process by which someone brings you from being a very unconscious being—there is no possibility that you come from total unconsciousness to the highest consciousness in a jump, you know. That’s not possible.

Rick: Yeah, and also some God isn’t going to come along and do all the work for you. You have to sort of do your own work.

Shaykh: Exactly. And that’s part of the game, no? You must do your game.

Rick: Yeah. I wonder if there’s more I should ask you about that. You seem like it’s a private experience and you don’t want to talk about it too much, and I understand that, you know, because some things are just very tender and intimate, and it feels gross to bring them out in words. Am I right?

Shaykh: The thing is, look, what I experience is not necessarily going to be your experience.

Rick: Good point, yeah.

Shaykh: So you do not really benefit from the experiences of others, because the truth is not veiled. The veil is not on the truth. The veil is on you, you know? So that’s why you can hear the truth of 1,000 masters and it doesn’t unveil you, you know? Because you have to find your own truth.

And to find your own truth, you have to drop all the knowledge which you have read, which has been given to you from outside, and it must become your knowledge, you know? Only when you receive your knowledge directly, when it comes to you from above, from your soul to yourself, whatever—only then will that knowledge empower you and give you real trust in it, you know?

The veil is not on the truth. The veil is on you.

Rick: Yeah, no, that’s well put. It has to be a living experience; it has to be your experience. I think the reason we like these stories of saints and sages and enlightened beings is that they inspire us. You know, they give people a vision of possibilities—that one could actually rise to this state, or that such beings actually exist, you know? And it can be uplifting.

Shaykh: If it encourages somebody, I’m very happy.

Rick: Yeah, that’s the thing. It gives one sort of a goal to shoot for, maybe, and at the same time it also gives you a feeling that the world is full of mystery and beauty and blessings that we don’t see on the evening news.

Shaykh: Right.

🛤️ Entering the Sufi path

Rick: Yeah. Okay, so for people who wanted to get involved with Sufism, either as you teach it or in any form, you know, firstly, does that mean that they are becoming a Muslim? I understand that there are many Western Sufi groups that have nothing to do with Islam and say that any connection to Islam is irrelevant to Sufism. And secondly, what impact is that going to have on their own cultural heritage? Could you be a Christian, for instance, and at the same time be a Sufi?

Shaykh: Yes. You see, there is no force in the path. So you cannot force somebody into a religion, you know? That’s not a very wise thing to do. And everything comes by itself. Actually, when you love someone, you will follow him, no matter what he is or what he does.

Rick: Like you did. You just didn’t think you were going to be a Sufi, and then here you are.

Shaykh: Exactly. But, for example, in our tradition there is also a Hindu line, you know? For example, Irina Tweedy—you may have heard of her. She followed a Naqshbandi teacher, which is the same tradition, but there was a grandmaster in our chain, and he one day said that we would open it also to the Hindus, you know? So it’s the same training, it’s the same knowledge, it’s the same everything, but he told them to keep their Hindu beliefs or Hindu rituals, whatever—their social life as Hindus—but practice the Sufi methods, you know? And, yeah.

Rick: So let’s say someone is listening to this, and they live in New Jersey or Iowa or any place.

Shaykh: I like Iowa.

Rick: Iowa, yeah, that’s where I live.

Shaykh: Yeah, it sounds nice.

Rick: Yeah, it’s pretty nice. It’s really hot here right now. But let’s say they get inspired to become a Sufi. What practical steps do they take to get involved? I understand there’s something called dhikr, D-H-I-K-R, and there’s prayer and fasting and spiritual retreats and all these different things, but someone lives out here—how do they get involved? Can they do it online, or do they have to find a group someplace? I’m sure there’s something in Chicago or whatever.

Shaykh: It is better to be with a group, you know? It makes it easier. The most important thing is to find the Shaykh, you know? That is the main thing.

But in the Oasis system—that’s the thing I teach—it is free of all of those, you know? You don’t have to be in a group, you don’t have to follow a master. You do the work, which is described as self-observation about certain topics. You do a certain singing practice, you do a certain meditation practice, and that would be the beginning, you know?

Rick: So theoretically, you could learn that stuff online and then get a few of your friends, and then you have a little group.

Shaykh: Yeah, yeah, for example.

Rick: Okay. And is there some kind of network of Shaykhs so that if you want to find one, you could look it up or get in touch with you, and you would say, “Oh yes, there’s one in Kansas City, or there’s one here or there”?

Shaykh: Yeah, there’s a divine network, and it functions through your heart. You just make a prayer, yeah, that you say, “God, I really need a guide, and I would like to be guided on that path. Please open something to me.”

Rick: Yeah, there’s that saying, “When the student is ready, the master appears.” I’m sure you’ve heard that.

Shaykh: Yes, and I think it is the truth.

Rick: Yeah.

Shaykh: Yeah.

Rick: Okay. Oh, a question came in. Let’s see. This is from K.A.I.F. in Delhi, India. He asks, “Can you please talk about your experience of listening to or being with J. Krishnamurti?”

Shaykh: Well, I met him when he was very old and very sick already, in Switzerland. And I think he was…

Rick: Yeah, he had Parkinson’s, I think, or something.

Shaykh: Yes, he had Parkinson’s, and that was the most impressive thing, because he came up on stage and he tried to correct the position of his microphone. And he was trembling, really, really trembling, and the people wanted to come to help him. And then he made a move with his hands to say, “No, don’t come.” He closed his eyes and, for some seconds, he was able to bring the tremor down, the tremors down, and he could manage to fix the position of his microphone.

And you know, with Parkinson’s, it is absolutely impossible to control the tremor consciously. But he did it, and it was really, really powerful to see that. And there were, I think, 3,000 people in a tent. It was in a tent in Switzerland, in Salem.

And I was in a very ideal position, I can say, to look at him—not too far, not too close. So it was really, really nice. And the silence he produced, you know, was really impressive. I mean, the awareness, the attention he created, this focus, this concentration, you know, this was really, really impressive. And he was a very sympathetic person, a very lovely person, really. Yeah, a great man, no doubt. Yeah.

Truth, devotion, and service

Rick: Nice to have been able to meet him. I read an article that someone sent me about Sufism, and it said that there are seven main points to consider. And I don’t know if all branches of Sufism would recognize these points, but each of them is interesting, and I thought you might like to comment on them. The first is—I’ll just read them one by one, and you can comment. The first is, “Surrender to love.”

Shaykh: Okay. I wouldn’t agree with that, simply because if I say to you, “Love now for the next 24 hours, everyone,” can you do that?

Rick: Not necessarily.

You cannot. Okay, but if I tell you, “Be true with everyone for the next 24 hours,” you can do that. So the first thing is the truth. And then you become capable of love. The truth must come first, and truth has a sister, and that’s called love.

Shaykh: You cannot. Okay, but if I tell you, “Be true with everyone for the next 24 hours,” you can do that. So the first thing is the truth. And then you become capable of love. The truth must come first, and truth has a sister, and that’s called love.

Rick: That’s nice. Yeah, I mean, there are stories in the Vedic tradition about people who spoke the truth so much, so assuredly, that it got to the point where anything they said had to come true, because it was like reality conformed to their words rather than the other way around, because they were so consistent in telling the truth.

Shaykh: Right, and it’s just the one attribute everyone is born with, you know? You can always speak the truth. It doesn’t matter if you’re angry, envious, proud, depressed, or whatever, but the truth is always available to you at any moment of your life.

Rick: And how about qualifying that a little bit to say that you should speak the sweet truth? I mean, there was a story about Winston Churchill where he was at a party and he came up to some woman and said, “Ma’am, you’re the”—I can’t do the English accent—“you’re the ugliest woman I’ve ever seen.” And she said, “Mr. Churchill, you’re drunk.” And he said, “Yes, I am, but in the morning I’ll be sober, yet you’ll still be the ugliest woman I’ve ever seen.”

Shaykh: Well, there is a truth of the ego, and if you’re very identified with the ego structure, then you think this is the truth. And in that truth, you usually make others responsible for your condition. And then there is a truth of the heart, and that is a truth which doesn’t complain about or accuse others.

Rick: Or speak untimely to them, even if there might be something true about it.

Shaykh: Exactly. And it tries to respect others and to be friendly. Churchill could maybe say things we cannot. So some people can, and some people cannot.

Rick: He also enjoyed cigars, which I don’t think you and I do. The second point on that list is chanting the divine name. And I know you’re a musician; you actually have a musical group that you play with. And so I presume that chanting and singing is an important part of your path?

Shaykh: Yeah. As a musician, I’m doing a lot of things. But in the Oasis system, the singing is mainly what we try to do, or how I introduce it, through dhrupad. I don’t know if you have heard about dhrupad singing.

Rick: It’s an Indian style of music, right?

Shaykh: Yes, it’s the oldest school of singing in the world, let’s say.

Rick: I used to have some recordings in my music collection of dhrupad.

Shaykh: And I’m honored to be a student of a very famous and well-known teacher. His name is Ustadji Waseefuddin Degha. Dhrupad is a very universal approach to exploring your voice. Usually, when we hear our voice for the first time recorded, we think, “This is absolutely horrible. This cannot be true. This is not my voice. This cannot be how I sound to others.” And becoming friendly with your own voice is a very important point. So singing, this kind of singing, is a kind of meditation also. And it’s very liberating.

Rick: Yeah, and it’s a very universal practice. I mean, the Indians have their bhajans, and the Christians have their hymns. There’s something about it which I think stirs up the heart and stirs up devotion.

Shaykh: Of course, Sufism also has its own styles, like Qawwali music, for example. I don’t know if you know Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. That’s Sufi music. That’s very classic Sufi music throughout Pakistan, India, and all those areas. That is the main Sufi music.

Rick: It seems like a lot of the great sitar players were Muslim, like Ali Akbar Khan.

Shaykh: Well, actually, most of the great classical musicians are Muslims.

Rick: Yeah, there’s that tabla player. He’s the best in the world. What’s his name?

Shaykh: Zakir Hussain.

Rick: Exactly, right. He’s fantastic.

Shaykh: Yeah, and most of them are also in Sufism.

Rick: Interesting.

Shaykh: That’s nice.

Rick: Yeah, it’s nice to know. A third point on this list was working with your dreams, and it says that the ancient Sufis turned to their dreams for guidance, clarity, and wisdom. It was an important tool to help them on their spiritual path. The Sufi tradition has a well-developed philosophical psychology which includes dream interpretation. Do you concur with that?

Shaykh: Yes, at a certain point it can become important, but not in the beginning.

Rick: At a certain stage later on. And so when it does become important, why is it important, and how do you work with it?

Shaykh: Well, because it is called symbolic thinking. In dreams, you have a kind of symbolic thinking, and translating that into your daily life can help. C. G. Jung, for example, was working with those things. In Sufism, we have different categories of dreams. We distinguish different categories. The higher categories are important to tell to the Shaykh so that he can say something to you about them.

Rick: I’ve had some dreams in my life which didn’t seem like dreams because they were so profound. It was more like the innocence of sleep enabled me to enter into experiences which I wouldn’t have been able to have in the waking state. Do you relate to that in terms of having…

Shaykh: Look, everyone has experienced in his life a set of dreams which he can remember very, very clearly, even in old age; it doesn’t matter. And those dreams have been messages, of course, to you. They are invitations, divine invitations, because God has His ways of calling you or inviting you. Sometimes it happens through dreams, and there are teachings through dreams.

Rick: You’re more open in a way.

Shaykh: Right.

Rick: Interesting. Okay, the fourth point on this list is entering into devotion and service, and remembering God and serving others. The true practice of devotion is service. In India they call it seva. If you wish to serve the beloved, you must serve others. In selfless service, we begin to see ourselves clearly. The rough ego starts to become smooth, and we learn humility, tenderness, and love.

Shaykh: Well, servanthood, of course, is a big part. The highest spiritual state is a servant. What else should it be?

Rick: Do Sufis tend to get involved in service projects, like feeding the poor or things like that?

Shaykh: Yes, also. I mean, it is a usual thing that when you come to a Sufi place, the first thing is that they give you food, and they also give you a place to sleep, usually. I mean, that’s for certain.

Rick: Yeah, there’s that saying in India, “The guest is God.”

Shaykh: Yeah, yeah. And I would say that if you have ever been traveling in the Middle East or in Oriental countries, the hospitality is outstanding.

Rick: That’s true.

Shaykh: Like in the Ottoman Empire, for example, if you had built a house, the first house you would build would be for your guests, and then you would build a house for yourself.

Rick: Interesting.

Shaykh: Yeah.

Rick: I also experienced that. I was a traveling meditation teacher for several years, and I always loved the Jewish mothers. They were just so—they were like, “Oh, like I was their son,” and they kept giving me food and making sure I was comfortable. There’s something in that tradition that was very nourishing.

❤️ Rumi, tradition, and the language of love

The fifth point on this list is Rumi, the importance of Rumi. And I think Rumi is the most popular poet in America, I’ve heard that, or in the West, which is interesting because he lived hundreds of years ago. So for those who aren’t familiar with Rumi, do you want to say a few words about his importance and who he was?

Shaykh: Rumi was a Shaykh, no? He was a master, a Sufi master. And he also was a scholar. Many people don’t know that. He was a scholar in Islamic law, and that was his main function in the beginning. But then when he met his master, his second master, Shams al-Din Tabrizi, his career went very far down as a scholar.

Rick: Because he was so heart-oriented and less intellectual, is that why?

Shaykh: Shams al-Din Tabrizi was a very radical master. He was probably a Kalender, which means he was a wandering dervish. You can compare it to a sadhu in the Indian world. He was a guy who didn’t take much consideration of the sensitivity of his audience. So he would go very strong and very straight.

Rick: He would say controversial things.

Shaykh: Very strong, yes. So they asked Rumi to depart from him and not to associate with him. But Rumi’s answer was that he secluded himself for three months in one room with Shams al-Din Tabrizi, and they stayed three months in one room together. So he gave up every official profession, and he completely dropped his normal life, which he had before, to be with his Shaykh.

Rick: Well, there’s a saying that “that which is closest to truth lasts longest,” and Rumi has certainly lasted. And I’ve never been much of an appreciator of poetry, but having listened to several hours of Rumi over the past week while I was cutting the grass and doing things, I was listening to it in my headphones, and I thought, “Wow, I could really relate to it. It really moved me.” Beautiful.

Shaykh: Yeah, poetry—they say if the Koran had not been revealed, they would have taken the Masnawi as guidance.

Rick: The writings of Rumi?

Shaykh: Yes.

Rick: Yeah, yeah. I have a couple more points here to read on that seven-point list, but our friend from New Delhi asks another question here, so we might as well interject it. He says, “If this is not too intrusive, would you like to talk about the reason why Sufi teachers, including yourself, often dress and appear in a certain way, such as having a beard, a cap, a fez, and so on? Does this have a spiritual significance, or is it more just part of the culture of Islamic civilization?”

Shaykh: It is an expression of love, you know.

Rick: Respect for the tradition?

Shaykh: You just want to look like him. You want to look like the beloved one, and that’s why you see all the traditions; their clothes are very similar, no? And because the beloved one is one. So when you visit—if you would visit a king, would you come in the dress you have now, for example?

Rick: No, I’d dress up nicely, you know.

Shaykh: Exactly. So we are living in the presence of the king; therefore, we dress like we are in the presence of the king.

Rick: Yeah, so it’s a sign of respect, you could say. And it’s certainly not unique to Sufism. In every tradition, you can recognize a rabbi or a Zen monk or anything.

Shaykh: You can also recognize a baker and a policeman, you know.

Rick: Good point.

Shaykh: It is your dress which defines you to a certain point and gives an expression to what you want to express. So the Sufis want to express their love and their respect, their consciousness that a king exists.

Rick: Yeah, I once heard Maharishi Mahesh Yogi say that—in talking about monks—he was saying that, in a way, their attire protects them because it reminds them that they’re a monk, and it reminds other people that they’re a monk, and so it helps them to behave as a monk should behave. Whereas if they just went around in regular clothing, they might be less aware of the role that they’re playing.

Shaykh: And with the beard, it’s very easy also, you know. A lion has his hair, no? And it has to be like that.

Rick: In my case, I’m lazy; I don’t feel like shaving it.

Shaykh: No, it’s okay, it’s okay.

Working with fear

Rick: Here’s a question from Laura in Monmouth, Oregon. Laura asks, “Can you speak on fear or anxiety as it relates to awakening? For those that have experienced awakenings over the years, but are now in long periods of fear and anxiety, can you please offer advice on how best to work with this arising? Blessings, thank you.”

Shaykh: Okay, this is a good question because it’s a practical question, you know. So we have to understand that fear is a protector, yeah? It’s an ego protector. And usually it’s not easy to start with fear, you know. So the first thing is that whenever you have something which you don’t like as a feeling, as an emotion—fear, usually, we don’t like—the first thing is that you learn to honor it, that you allow it to be your guest and that it can be there.

Rick: Rather than fighting it.

Shaykh: Yes, rather than fighting. So that’s the first thing. When the fear comes, whatever it is, you don’t try to avoid it as much as you can, okay? If you run into a panic attack, let’s say, while you are watching your fear, then you stop it, you know? But the first thing is that you observe the fear. You just observe it and allow it to be there, as much as possible. And you just look into it.

When you look at something clearly, it shrinks. It’s like looking into fog. Let’s say fear is a kind of fog. If you keep looking at the fog, the moment comes when the sun grows stronger and stronger and the fog disappears, and you see the light. And this is what happens when you come out of fear. When you go through fear, when you pass through fear, you will see light.

When you have done that process one time, and another time the fear comes, it’s much easier to do the same thing. So it needs the courage to face it, to allow it to be there, to face it, and to honor it.

Rick: One thing Laura said was that she had some kind of awakening, and then the fear seemed to bubble up. In my experience, talking to so many people, I’ve often seen that pattern. It’s as if the ego begins to be threatened because an awakening has happened, and the ego maybe senses its impending demise.

There’s also this saying in the Upanishads: “Certainly all fear is born of duality.” Just like breaking the sound barrier, you go through this turbulence before you break through the sound barrier. I think that when you are about to break through duality back into unity, there’s a barrier of fear that has to be crossed, and a lot of people encounter that.

Shaykh: Of course, fear is the last barrier. What can happen to you if you are not in fear anymore? So the ego will do everything to hold you in fear. That’s why you have to face it.

In all these fairy tales where the young man faces the dragon, you think, “Oh my God, how can he face a dragon?” But he can. He can, and it is described. The young child who listens to those fairy tales gets this information: when you stand and face it, you can even win over a dragon, or even over the worst fear there is.

So fear doesn’t really exist. Fear is just something which is not. That’s why when you look at it, it will go. Then the mind wants to create it again, because the mind is the servant of the ego, right? You have to do it many times to become stable.

Rick: Yeah, you don’t just solve it in one session.

Shaykh: Yes. And once you do that, once it’s clear, there is nothing to fear. The only thing you have to fear is your own ego. And that is also not really something to fear. So what else is there to fear?

Death. Death is not something to fear, because death does not exist. Pain, yes, pain can be a fear. That’s why I always say the most important thing is research on painkillers, on good painkillers that do not dampen our consciousness, that don’t make us sleepy or dizzy. Pain shouldn’t be there. But anything else, there’s nothing to fear. What should we fear?

When you go through fear, when you pass through fear, you will see light.

Rick: President Roosevelt said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

Shaykh: Yeah, yeah.

Rick: Now, when you mentioned painkillers just now, are you talking about pharmaceuticals, or are you talking about spiritual painkillers in a way that—

Shaykh: No, no, on the physical level. When you have pain, that can be very strong sometimes.

Rick: Yeah, I mean, that’s a whole topic in itself, because in the United States we have this huge epidemic of addiction to opioids.

Shaykh: Yeah, that is terrible.

Rick: Yeah. We prescribe them much too generously, and people were given wrong information about how addictive they are, and stuff like that.

Shaykh: Right, right. Yeah, that, of course, is terrible, but that’s why I’m saying it has to be in good hands. It has to be in responsible hands. I mean, those doctors should really be punished, you know?

Rick: It’s happening, actually. The pharmaceutical companies are being sued for billions of dollars for misleading information.

Shaykh: Yeah, yeah.

Rick: Okay, so the last two of these seven points are actually quite interesting, and we’ve almost touched upon the next one, which is dying before you die. The explanation of it is that, to a Sufi, each moment could be the last, so it’s important to be present in all of life and to live as if you could die in this moment, with your heart pure, your actions good, and your relationships at peace.

Shaykh: Well, “die before you die” is the saying of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, and, of course, it has many levels. That’s a very high topic. The one you just quoted, let’s say, is the lowest level of that description.

Of course, the first thing which has to die is your own self, the false self, the idea that I’m the center of creation and that existence owes me, that everyone owes me recognition, respect, love, and so on. All these demands that we have permanently—they have to die.

That is a process, and when you do that process, it feels like you die, because you feel that you are the center. You feel that you have the highest, smartest mind in the whole universe. It’s not a thought; it’s an existential security that it is like this. You feel that when you step out of the house, the world turns around you and everything is you. You are in the center, right?

So this center has to go, and that feels like death. That’s not easy. That’s not something that happens from today to tomorrow. It needs practice, and it also needs guidance.

At the end of this process, we put people into seclusion. That is like going into your grave. Symbolically, it is going into your grave, and you stay there for a minimum period of 40 days. That’s extendable; it depends on the Shaykh’s expertise and judgment, and it can go up to years. It happened to many Shaykhs. They went up to years.

Rick: These days, do many people go through that sort of thing?

Shaykh: I don’t know. I don’t know.

Rick: I mean, your students, for instance—have you put some of your students in seclusion for a month or so?

Shaykh: We are starting now. We are starting now with certain people to do that. Yeah, we are starting now.

Rick: To me, that phrase, “Die before you die,” brings to mind the quality of surrender, because when you die, you don’t have any choice in the matter. You pretty much have to surrender to the process. You can fight all you want, but you’re still going to die. So if we have an attitude of surrender, perhaps then—

Shaykh: Yeah, of course, surrendering is an easy word to say and not so easy to do, right? Because what we have to let go of first is the mind, you see? It is the only security we have. It’s the only, absolutely only pillar we really believe in. To let go of that is not so easy.

That means that you have experienced some other states before that you can relate to. Otherwise, you go into the mental hospital, you know? If we throw someone into that, that is the path to the mental hospital. So it needs preparation, it needs practice, and, yeah, that’s how it is.

The divine feminine and the place of women

Rick: The final of these seven points is an interesting one. It’s to honor the divine feminine. Apparently, Sufism has always done this, and it’s an esoteric aspect of a religion that outwardly seems patriarchal. So what would you have to say about that point?

Shaykh: I really wonder where you got those seven points from, you know?

Rick: I can send you the article. It was an article about Sufism that a fellow in England sent to me. He wanted me to read it before the interview, so I’m just educating myself here about Sufism.

Shaykh: I mean, the Prophet of Sufism was a revolutionary, perhaps the first feminist in the world, in history.

Rick: How so?

Shaykh: Well, he made men equal to women, giving women the right to be heard and to have a voice. He said that women have the same right to study and that they can become scholars. They have the right to have their own businesses and professions, if they want, and so on and so on.

The first universities that allowed women to study in Europe were Turkish universities, for example, Oriental universities. They were the first. Years and years later in Europe, it was allowed for a woman to study medicine. But all that had happened a long time before in Islamic culture.

Women had always had a great input and a great importance—the greatest. It is written in the Book of Love, the Holy Quran, that paradise is under the feet of the mother. That means many things.

The Prophet was asked, “Who has the most right to your presence over anyone else?” And he said, “The mother.” Then they said, “And then?” He said, “The mother.” “And then?” “The mother again.” “And then?” “The father.” So three times the mother, you know? The mother is everything.

The love of women, the celebration of femininity, the grace of women, and respect for women are pillars—absolute pillars.

Rick: How did it get so turned around so that these days they don’t let young women study in Afghanistan and stuff like that? It seems like the whole thing got distorted.

Shaykh: Well, how did it come about that Christian culture developed atomic bombs? That’s one of the other questions, you know? There are many “how did this happen?” questions in this world, but we don’t look at that. We look at ourselves.

So I can ask myself, how did I end up where I am now?

Rick: And with six daughters.

Shaykh: Yeah, for example. So we stay with ourselves.

Rick: Yeah. I mean, every tradition gets distorted, and there are parts of it—that always happens.

Shaykh: Yeah.

Rick: So many horrible things have been done in the name of the beautiful traditions that started out so beautifully.

Shaykh: Right. Right.

🧘 Gratitude as a daily practice

Rick: A question came in from Omar in the United Arab Emirates. Omar asks, “What is one teaching that you think is essential to awakening, a teaching that one can stay with all day, like Ramana taught self-inquiry? What equivalent would the Sufis teach?” Thank you.

Shaykh: Very good question. Thank you, Omar. This is a good question.

Thankfulness. That’s the first thing you have to practice: to say thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, day and night. Even if you don’t feel it at all, it’s good to say it, and it will have a very, very strong impact on you.

Many times people ask me, “What is the most powerful mantra you could give me?” Usually I say, “Thank you.” That is the first thing.

If you can say, “Thank you, God,” that’s fine. But if God is a conflict for you, then there’s no need to say that. Just say, “Thank you,” for everything. Thank you in the morning to your mirror. Thank you to the people who are around you. Thank you that you can see, that you can hear, that you can smell.

If you don’t know what to say, write three things on a white piece of paper that you are certain to say thank you for. Then add another three the next day, and another three the next day, and so on and so on, and read them out every day. That is very, very important.

The ego lives in this consciousness that it lacks something, and that’s why it complains permanently. It wakes up with a “No.” It says, “No, it’s not enough. It’s not yet enough.” And the heart says, “Yes, it is. It is all there. It is enough.”

So we have to give power to the heart. Thank you opens the power of the heart. Very, very powerful. That should be his practice.

Thank you opens the power of the heart.

Rick: Okay, good. So, to cultivate a feeling of gratitude.

Shaykh: Right. Day and night, for the past, for your presence, for your future, for your mother, for your father, for your president, for your country, for the air you breathe, for the coffee you drink—for everything—you say thank you.

Rick: And how about for your car accident, or your cancer, or your child dying? How do you maintain that attitude if something difficult happens?

Shaykh: Well, we have to distinguish things. That doesn’t mean that you can be happy with everything. When your child dies, that’s not something you can be happy about. You don’t say, “Thank you that my child died,” but you can come to peace with it.

At a certain point, you understand that when someone you love dies, there’s always a very big lesson for us. The first one is that nothing is permanent here. We come, we go, and the people we love come and go as well. Therefore, in the end, also thank you for that.

But, of course, when someone comes and says, “My daughter just died two days ago,” I’m not going to say, “Okay, you’re not going to say thank you.” It’s not appropriate. But you don’t have to go to the most tragic things in your life and start to want to embrace them. Go with the things you can be at ease with, and step by step you understand that everything is coming to you for a good reason.

Rick: Yeah. There’s a story of a Chinese farmer—I just happened to reread this yesterday. Do you know that story?

Shaykh: That’s a Sufi story.

Rick: Is it a Sufi story?

Shaykh: Yeah.

Rick: You want to tell it? Why don’t you tell it rather than me?

Shaykh: No, you tell it. You speak better.

Rick: All right, well, you fill in the gaps if I’m leaving some gaps.

Shaykh: Okay, if you make a mistake.

Rick: Okay, so the farmer had this beautiful horse, and one day the horse escaped. The neighbors came and said, “Oh, it’s so terrible that the horse escaped.” And he said, “Oh, not necessarily. We’ll see.”

After a few days, the horse came back and brought another beautiful mare with it. The neighbors came and said, “Oh, what a blessing—you got this extra horse.” And he said, “Well, we’ll see.”

After a while, the son was riding the new horse, trying to train it, and he fell off and broke his leg. The neighbors came and said, “Oh, this is terrible. Your son broke his leg.” And the farmer said, “Meh, we’ll see.”

Then a war broke out, and all the young men were recruited to join the army, but the son wasn’t recruited because he limped from having broken his leg. Many of the people who were recruited ended up dying.

So we just never know what’s going to happen or what the implications are of anything that happens. Yeah, that’s a good one.

Shaykh: Yeah, that’s a nice story.

Rick: Yeah, that’s a good one. Everything God does is for the best. There’s a whole other story about that, where this minister was always saying, “Everything God does is for the best.” I’ll try to cut it short, but he ends up getting thrown in jail, and it seems like a terrible thing.

It turns out that if he hadn’t been in jail, he would have gone on a hunting expedition with the king and would have been taken as a human sacrifice. But that didn’t happen because he was in jail. So, all these great stories.

Closing reflections

Okay, so thank you. You have a website, no doubt, and I’ll be linking to that from batgap.com. If people go there, what will they find?

Shaykh: They find some information there, and they find the calendar of what I’m doing. They find some nice stories; for example, that story may be there. And they find a way to contact me, let’s say.

Rick: And do you have some webinars or something online so that they can work with you even from a different location?

Shaykh: Not yet. Not yet.

Rick: Okay, planning to do that?

Shaykh: Oh, yeah. You know, I’m pretty old-school here. I also like people to make an effort. If something is precious, you go to the source.

Rick: So do you travel around, or would they have to come to Germany?

Shaykh: I usually travel around the world twice a year, so they have quite a chance to see me close to them.

Rick: Okay, good. So your whole schedule will be on there and all?

Shaykh: Yes, yes.

Rick: Good. Okay, great.

Shaykh: Maybe in the future we may do a webinar, because now it’s 2019 and we have to sacrifice romanticism sometimes, too.

Rick: Yeah, get your 20-year-old daughter to help set it up.

Shaykh: Exactly. She’s always saying that to me.

Rick: Yeah, good. All right, well, it’s really been a delight to meet you and spend a couple of hours talking with you. I really appreciate the opportunity.

Shaykh: Thank you very much, Rick. It was very nice to meet you. Best wishes for all of you, for your platform, and for the wonderful work that you do. I’m very thankful to you also.

Rick: Well, thanks, and I’m thankful to be able to do it. It’s a privilege to be able to do this. I really appreciate it.

Shaykh: Yeah, thank you very much. I hope we can meet in this lifetime, also in person.

Rick: That would be wonderful, yeah.

Shaykh: Yes, that would be really wonderful.

Rick: Keep it in mind. Maybe we’ll have the opportunity.

Shaykh: Okay. Rick, thank you very much, and thank you to the team behind you also.

Rick: Yes, it’s quite a team: Irene and various other people that you can see on the website’s volunteers page.

Shaykh: Right, right, right. Yeah, thanks to all of them.

Rick: Before you disconnect, I just want to make a couple of concluding remarks. I’ve been speaking with Shaykh Burhanuddin Herrmann, and I’ll be linking to his website, as always. You have a few books that I could link to, but they all seem to be in Italian. Do you have anything in English?

Shaykh: Not yet.

Rick: Not yet, okay. Let me know in the future if you do, and I can update the page.

As listeners will know, this is an ongoing series. If you would like to be notified of future interviews, subscribe to this YouTube channel. You can also come to the website, batgap.com, and subscribe to email notifications. While you’re there, check out what else is on the website. You’ll see a number of things that you may find of interest.

So thank you for listening or watching, and we’ll see you for the next one. And thanks once again, Shaykh Burhanuddin. I appreciate it.

Shaykh: Thank you. Thank you very much. All the best to you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. See you. See you.