Ever cracked an egg open on day eighteen to see what the embryo looks like? It’s a standard “experiment” in most college level biology courses. Under the microscope one can see the various organs developing – the palpating heart, the bean shaped stomach, and the labyrinth of blood vessels that connect them all. Back when I was an undergrad, my lab partner and I conducted the procedure. We watched in awe as the heart gradually came to a full stop, signaling the end of life, a grand finale we all have to face one day. I quickly took my right hand and placed it over the chick embryo, face down, and asked my partner to peek once more through the microscope and report what he saw. He said the heart had resumed its beating.

In American culture, we are bombarded daily with the marketing of innumerable products, television shows, and even people. These are pleasures that can be isolated, packaged, purchased and consumed at will in order to fulfill our every desire. Car dealers promise the pleasure of status; soft drink companies promise happy memories with good friends; make-up manufacturers promise sexual desirability. All of these promised results (if they ever happen) may certainly be pleasurable, but they are also often fleeting and misleading. By habitually satiating ourselves with purchased pleasures, we miss out on the fulfillment of other, more life-affirming pleasures. Pleasure begins with desire—one of the most powerful forces in human nature.

A couple of months before my Australian and European adventures during the summer and fall of 2007, I had decided on a whim to participate in a retreat at Amma’s ashram in San Ramon, CA.

For those who don’t know Amma, she is known as the “hugging guru,” and Indian woman who travels all over the world and gives everyone who comes to her ashram during her open visits a heartfelt hug.

The feeling a person gets from her hug is almost impossible to explain; it might be likened to how people who had their feet washed by Jesus must have felt, or those who heard dharma directly from Buddha’s mouth.