The King and I - A Centenary Tribute to my Master

“Did you want something?” The words were said with a gentle kindness, but what took me by surprise was the person who had spoken them.

​“Oh, I’m sorry to disturb you, sir. I was just wondering whether there was anything I could do to help?”

“Come over here.” Dr King motioned to me to look into the shop window at Aetherius House in London where the covers of his books were fading in the sunlight.

“Can you make model books for me so that the real ones won’t be damaged?”

“Yes, I can.” At that point I had no idea how to make a model book, but I was surely going to find out.
“Good – then do that for me would you?”

“Yes, sir.”

Dr King walked upstairs to his office with two assistants, leaving me standing in the shop transfixed – this was my first direct assignment from the Master I had chosen to follow a year before. At the age of 19, I was on a summer break from my university and had decided to spend as much of it as possible working at the European Headquarters of The Aetherius Society. What I didn’t know when I walked through the shop door, was that Dr King had just arrived in London from Los Angeles where he lived, for a speaking tour.

After university I moved to London and became a schoolteacher until, at the age of 24, he employed me to work full-time. From then on I worked with him at an executive level, helping to run the organization he had founded internationally; co-authored his last two books; travelled with him in Europe and the USA on trips for both work and relaxation; and looked after some of his personal affairs. I am honoured to say that we became great friends, but I was always his disciple – as I still am today.

I discovered that he was everything he claimed to be and more. He was, I believe, of the same company as Sri Krishna, Moses, the Lord Buddha, the Master Jesus and the holy Master of Earth known as the Lord Babaji. I regard him as one of the greatest avatars ever to have walked our Earth.

This year we celebrate the centenary of his birth – on January 23rd, 1919, in the small village of Donnington Wood, near Wellington, Shropshire in England. His family later moved to Yorkshire where he spent most of his childhood. His spirituality was clear from the start, showing pronounced abilities in healing, prayer and the perception of truth.
He became a conscientious objector in the Second World War, despite being highly skilled in martial sports such as boxing, fencing and shooting. Instead he was a section leader in the fire services during the devastating and extremely dangerous London Blitz. His psychic faculties were put to good use identifying where bodies would be found beneath the rubble of fallen buildings after bombing raids.

It was after the war that he made a seminal and, for those days, very unusual decision. He turned to the study, and especially the practice, of yoga including its most advanced forms such as Kundalini, Raja and Gnani. When he practised yoga, he did so with total commitment – for eight hours per day for ten years. To enable this, he worked for a living in a variety of jobs including driving.

Anyone who applied themselves with such intensity to correct yoga practice would reap rich results. Because of who he was, these were all the more forthcoming. He started to realize some of his boundless inner potential, demonstrating such phenomena as clairvoyance, telepathy, astral projection, mediumship, invisibility, miraculous healing and even levitation. However, his goal was not the pursuit of these powers, but to gain enlightenment through the rarely attained meditative condition known in the east as samadhi.

By the age of 35, he had achieved this elevated state in which he knew and understood the nature of his and all existence. It was then that he was contacted by the Gods from space.

“Prepare yourself, you are to become the Voice of Interplanetary Parliament!” was the audible command he received from the cosmic intelligence known as the Master Aetherius. He was now ready to commence the mission for which he had come to Earth.

It will come as no surprise to learn that Dr King was ridiculed for his claims. This would still happen today, but nothing compared to the climate of social conformity which characterized 1950s Britain. His personality contained the rare combination of being both shy and fearless. It did not suit him to be in the controversial position he had been called to, but he accepted it unhesitatingly, appearing in the press, radio, television and at numerous public events. His hallmark was to unequivocally declare the truth he had experienced as far and wide as possible.

He acted as Primary Terrestrial Mental Channel, the main medium and point of contact for extraterrestrial intelligences upon Earth, from May 8th, 1954, to July 12th, 1997, the day of his passing. In that period, he received literally thousands of communications (transmissions) from the Cosmic Masters, mainly from this Solar System, but also from beyond it. These included some of the greatest teachings that have ever been delivered to Earth; and world-saving missions to be performed during and after his lifetime.

One thing he did not disclose fully and openly was his true identity. Just as some of the great avatars before him, he came from another world. He knew this, as did those close to him, and it was referred to in a number of transmissions, but he preferred to keep as low a profile as he could and was reluctant to promote himself unless he had to.
In February 1997, I was at the American Headquarters in Los Angeles when I received a call from Dr King who, now in poor health, resided at his small bungalow in Santa Barbara 100 miles away.

“Can you come and see me for about ten minutes?”

It was early one Saturday morning and I was due to run a ceremony in the Society’s Temple in LA that afternoon. Soon after that I was scheduled to catch a plane back to London.

“Of course, I can, Master,” I replied willingly.

After a drive in my hire-car of about two hours, I walked into his sitting-room to find him waiting in his armchair.
“Kneel before me.”

This was an extremely unusual thing for him to say. Normally, he did not like overt deference from those around him unless it was at a formal ceremony of one kind or another. He had even reprimanded me on one occasion when I knelt at his bedside to give him healing, and insisted that I adopt another less reverential posture.

“I am going to initiate you into a secret yoga practice.”

I eagerly knelt before him as he did so, and then sat beside him for a few minutes afterwards as he explained its purpose to me. I thanked him profusely, we hugged, and he sent me on my way so that I would arrive in time for the ceremony. That was the last time I would be in his physical presence, and I am sure he must have known it. His first words to me, when I was 19, had been to give me a task to perform. On this last occasion, he gave me a wonderful initiation.

In the vast expanse of the teachings and missions he left our world, there are numerous tasks to perform. Some of these are unique in their elevation; others are more lowly but still essential. There are also practices to learn and initiations to receive, some of which have never been given before, to empower our journey towards enlightenment.
Today we call this path, which anyone can take, King Yoga. Its rewards are immeasurable as you will undoubtedly discover if you do so. And one thing I would add: you do not have to have met Dr King physically to learn from him, follow him and one day, should you choose, to become his disciple too.
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