With just a touch, a spirit is healed

Over the ages, many have held a mysterious power to reach into the heart and change a life

By LOUIS SAHAGUN, Los Angeles Times
First published: Sunday, December 17, 2006

If ever there was someone in need of good vibrations, it was Paul Ekman.
The psychology professor at the University of California, San Francisco, was as gnarly as an old oak, hardened by a lifelong struggle with impulsive anger.

All that changed one spring day in 2000 after a brief exchange with the Dalai Lama.

"He held my hands while we talked," Ekman recalled, "and I was filled with a sense of goodness and a unique total body sensation that I have no words to describe."

Now, the noted expert on human emotional expression understands what it actually feels like to be cheery and optimistic almost every day.

"If I was 30 years younger, I'd take it on as a scientific task to try to explain what happened that day," said Ekman, 72. "It was a great gift."

What is that gift?

Mind control? Charisma? A superhuman skill learned in some Tibetan Shangri-La? A touch of magic?

The Dalai Lama prefers not to talk of such things. "I have no extraordinary energy," he says with a dismissive wave his hand. "I'm just a Buddhist monk."

But some familiar with the Dalai Lama, and those who study religious figures, agree that every so often, people emerge who are perceived to offer proof of a higher authority, understanding or wisdom.

"It -- whatever it is -- can't be defined and is not to be confused with stardom or fame," suggested someone who knows a lot about both, Maria Shriver. "I think the Dalai Lama would say look within because it's in you, not someone else. It all comes down to whether you're open to being touched in your heart."

Shriver, a member of the Kennedy clan and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's wife, appeared onstage with the Dalai Lama in September at a conference in Long Beach, Calif., on women's issues. She also knew Mother Teresa and Pope John Paul II and said they too projected an aura.

In India, one of the most popular spiritual leaders is Mata Amritanandamayi, a Hindu woman who is said to impart divine energy with a hug. Over the years, according to her followers, the "Mother of Divine Bliss" has hugged more than 20 million people.

"Personally, I don't know what it is she has, but I don't think it's a scam," said Dara Mayers, who has written about her travels with the woman guru. "It reminded me a little of a quality I've seen in some performers and politicians like Bill Clinton, who is famous for making the focus of his attention feel like the only other person in the room."

What these special figures have in common is their effect on others. They are perceived as being able to bring people to a higher state of being through their example, teachings, sufferings or touch.

"These people are operating at a level most of us are not, and they're not limited by denominations. The spirit blows where it will," said Thomas Craughwell, a devoted Catholic and author of several books on saints. "We don't run into them very often but when we do, we're rattled because it's like a brush with the divine and because we want a piece of what they have."

That kind of talk makes some scientists uncomfortable but also hungry to know more.

Anne Harrington, a professor of the history of science at Harvard, still marvels at how her colleagues responded to the Dalai Lama during a meeting with him in India a few years ago.
"There was one physicist who, after a few days with the Dalai Lama, tearfully confessed his wife had cancer," she said. "He wanted a blessing. Specifically, he wanted a red blessing string for his wife."

Years ago, stories about the Dalai Lama's healing presence would have placed him squarely in Ekman's "Oh, give me a break" camp.

Now, Ekman wants to know how the Dalai Lama cured him literally overnight of a temper that had him in analysis for years.

In May, Ekman crossed paths again with the Dalai Lama at a conference in Illinois and popped the question: What is it?

"The Dalai Lama smiled and said there are things science can't explain, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't try to," he said. "The Dalai Lama also said, 'Maybe science will figure these things out, which would be very nice. Maybe it won't.' "