I'll begin with the type of introduction I would use at a party: I'm in my 40s, I live in Brooklyn, I work as a programmer, I have a kid and a cat, and I enjoy math and pinball. I was raised with a very atheist/materialist/scientific perspective.

I found my way here because of some powerful shifts in my awareness that started a couple years ago, which led me to search for spiritual traditions that could help me understand what was happening. It's difficult to express these experiences in words. I had very little knowledge of any form of spirituality when they started. It took many months of reading books and listening to podcasts and searching the internet for me to find my way here.

I find acharya's lectures very dense and difficult, and I often have to pause, sometimes for an hour, other times for a week, to research a term or look up a text. But I have learned a lot already and I know this is leading me in the right direction for now. I hope to eventually be able to contribute something back to this community, to honor what I have received.