Grace and I joined the intensive group Claudio called SAT in the Fall of 1971. He is a teacher who draws upon all major spiritual traditions, integrating their practices with work to gain clear understanding of the shape of our egos and means of overcoming negative traits.

With sixty others, we dove into an intensive three years of “working on ourselves”. Weekly meetings on Thursday nights; sessions with pairs and threesomes of members following indications; weekend retreats with spiritual masters, including the Tibetan Buddhist Tarthang Tulku, Rabbi Salman Schacter, the Tantric teacher Harish Johari, the Vipassana insight meditation monk Dhirivamsa, two Scientology teachers who’d left the “order”, the psychic Bob Hoffman, and others.

Claudio offered a banquet of learning designed to force each of us to find her/his own way onto a unique path of evolution. He taught the Enneagram as a pattern for perceiving both our egos and the way out of their limitations.  (This nine-pointed figure derives from a Sufi order in Afghanistan and was adopted by Gurdjieff and his followers. Claudio gained new knowledge of it in the Arica program led by Oscar Ichazo.)

Claudio’s web site

Perhaps there’s popcorn in the bag. Much later in life Grace created the popcorn as entree dinner for those nights when she couldn’t think what to fix. A big bowl of popcorn and olive oil, humus, soft goat cheese, and balsamic glaze to dip in. A salad and olives on the side. Fresh fruit for desert.