In the opening pages of In the Shadow of the Flame: Three Journeys Margaret Croyden, a middle-aged New York City drama critic and college professor, admits having developed "a serious distaste for life." She has trouble connecting with others and struggles against bouts of anger and depression.
In the first part of Croyden's piercing memoir, which consists of three eye-opening journeys, she describes a 24-hour paratheatrical event conceived by Polish director Jerzy Grotowski. During her uncomfortable and physically taxing time in a forest with a group seeking to connect with each other and nature, the author experiences "a loss of hatred and envy and an appreciation of life and its possibilities." She also feels somehow linked with her Polish ancestors whom she had spent years trying to forget.
Returning from Poland to America, Croyden spends a weekend at the Catskills ashram of Baba Muktananda. In the energizing presence of this Hindu guru, the author comes face-to-face with long-buried memories of her father's sexual overtures to her when she was a teenager. Her encounter with this painful memory enables Croyden to intensify her inward journey of discovery.
In the last segment of this memoir, the author visits Jerusalem. There Croyden meets Colette, a spiritual teacher who sees it as her mission in life "to help others find their own path." Through a series of waking dream sessions and mental imagery exercises, Colette helps Croyden discover how to forgive her family and to move beyond the pain of the past. The stone of bitterness which has kept the author from savoring life is replaced in her consciousness with an image of a blue diamond from her waking dreams. This shining image becomes a source of renewal and self-esteem.
Croyden's spiritual journey shows how one woman was able to take the first steps toward wholeness and healing through acts of forgiveness and self-acceptance. Her memoir also reveals how in the divine scheme of things spiritual teachers are usually available at just the points in our lives when we need them most.