Dancing the Beguine

About the Book

This lifetime I'm dancing in a new direction--counterclockwise. My "turn" as the whirling dervishes say, has taken me down strange and bewildering paths. With my first spin, I survived the tension of growing up in a dysfunctional American family. I always felt unsettled and out-of-place. After several emotionally difficult years in college, I abruptly quit. Within days, I was hitchhiking from Atlanta to San Francisco. For no apparent reason, the morning after my arrival, I walked five miles to the top of Nob Hill. As an elderly lady was about to cross the street, she dropped a package. I picked it up and we started a conversation. I had no idea this woman was the Murshida (teacher) of a Sufi Order and one of the closest Western followers of Avatar Meher Baba. My spiritual search was over, and yet, my unwinding dance had just begun. In India, a year later, I met Meher Baba, my spiritual master. Since then, my life's dance has never been the same. The stories which I've written recall many dance partners, especially heartrending romances, as well as my uncanny and bizarre experiences. Dancing the Beguine: A Memoir of Unwinding Romance, a down-to-earth and breathtaking dance of love, celebrates my unwinding, my romance with God. It offers a fresh, and sometimes painful, glimpse into the issues of practical mysticism, reincarnation, marriage, and spiritual development. Ultimately, "Dancing" is about a lifelong search for love and its eventual discovery. In a literary format, this memoir appeals to a diverse audience.

About the Author

For most of his professional life, Gary Mullins, an educator, taught in several public and private schools in the southeastern part of the United States. Early in his life, after a series of strange events, Gary became involved in practical mysticism. Crucial to this unexpected change in the direction of his life was contact with an authentic Sufi teacher. There was nothing in his upbringing to suggest he would spend most of his life following a perfect spiritual master. However, after a trip to India, this would become the focus of his life for the next forty years. That experience led to more than a passing interest in astrology, reincarnation, romance, and spiritual development. Dancing the Beguine, a down-to-earth spiritual memoir, tells of a search for love and personal fulfillment. Currently, Gary lives in Smyrna, Georgia, with his wife, Amie.