Interview with Jacqueline Snitkin, former manager of East West Bookshop in Mountain View. Jacqueline now serves on the staff of Ananda Sangha in Seattle.

The original East West store in the 60’s was a Bay Area institution before Ananda purchased it. It was located on El Camino in Menlo Park for many years. Swami knew it well, and visited it when he spent time with his parents, who lived in neighboring Atherton. Virginia Sharfman, the owner, struck up a friendship and was very interested in the work Swami was doing, teaching yoga, meditation, and creating music recordings.

One day, she decided to sell the business, and offered it to us and three other spiritual groups in the area, asking if any one would like to buy and run it in the spirit in which it had started. She wanted to be sure it would continue to offer a wide range of spiritual books to seekers. Swami realized immediately that the store could be very effective for uplifting people’s consciousness to spirit and to God and said yes, after the others had declined.

The amount was so much, we didn’t see how we could possibly afford it [sound familiar?]. But a few Ananda members and friends stepped forward with loans and help, and miraculously, we able to purchase the store in May of 1980.

Meanwhile, ten months earlier in 1979, Ananda House in San Francisco was filled with 25 devotees sharing a beautiful mansion overlooking the Bay. I moved into the house at that time. One night, Jyotish Novak (who was directing our work in SF) approached me and asked if I would run a little bookstore we were starting in the city. Much to my surprise, I said yes. A few weeks later, Vasudeva Snitkin asked me to marry him, and (less to my surprise) I said yes.

Soon afterwards, Swami asked to meet with me. He asked if I could manage East West Bookshop in Menlo Park, instead. I had no desire to manage, but I knew it was my next challenge, and so I agreed. He also suggested, 6 months later, that Vasudeva join the staff. Our marriage was 6 months old and we were working "24 hours a day"—a challenge that we met and grew to appreciate more and more as our 13 years in the store went by.

When we first started, the world of metaphysical books looked so large to us. I had never picked up a book on handwriting analysis or numerology. I really only knew Christian mystics, Jung, yoga, and a few other topics. I remember saying to Swami, "We don’t know anything. How can we make this thing work? How will we ever learn quickly enough?"

I’ll never forget Swami’s response: "Make friends with your customers. Love your customers, and they will teach you everything you need to know." And remarkably, that’s exactly what happened. Helping customers to choose books also became an intuitive process, informed by gradually and steadily learning the inventory. And, importantly, by relaxing.

Swami was helpful with personnel issues, also. This was at a time in Ananda’s development when I was able to pick up the phone and ask him questions whenever I needed to. All the advice he offered I can remember to this day, and it has helped me in so many challenges ever since then.

Anyone who has worked with others will appreciate the difficulties. One staff member had fallen into a pattern of being negative, and not putting out full effort. I was upset and complained to Swami. He replied kindly, "It’s a matter of energy. Just give her lots of positive energy and open your heart to her." It was not at all what I expected to hear. Yet this advice succeeding in changing the situation more than I could have any other way.

Another time, someone wrote me a letter expressing extreme disappointment with me, and filled with criticisms. I asked Swami about it, and he said, "He just wants to be your friend, Jacqueline. Inside I felt, "You mean I have to love him, too?"

Before we bought the store, the former owner employed two folks who did book ordering. They left after we purchased the store, and started a metaphysical bookstore nearby. We were quite concerned about competing with people who had so much knowledge, compared to our own just-development understanding of the business.

Occasionally, they came in to the store to buy books from us that they knew were out of print. After musing on this, I did ask them to stop buying those books from us. They were agreeable. When Christmas was approaching, I found a way to reach out. We had to buy a minimum order of Christmas ribbon that was more than we could use in years. We called them to ask if they wanted to split the order, and they happily agreed. We also referred our customers to them when we closed for a week during Spiritual Renewal Week.

Little spiritual steps:

• I remember one day we put a small healing prayer box in the store for customers. A customer gasped in amazement, whispering to a friend of hers, "This store prays for people! Isn’t that wonderful!"

• For our first four years in the store, we didn’t really say that we were part of Ananda. We were a little shy about perhaps alienating other spiritual groups, somehow. Then, one day a customer came to me, and said, "I understand something now I didn’t realize before. You and Vas don’t take a lot of money home. You are running this store for a wonderful cause. I am very inspired by you and your group." It made a big difference to him. He saw us living our teachings.

• When I first came into the store to manage, I noticed that none of the loans to Ananda people had been paid off yet, even though we’d been operating the store for 8 months. I asked why. People replied, "That’s just our own people and family. We can put them off until we’re stronger." I said, "If you don’t treat our family well, how will you treat others?" So we started paying what little we could. We also started paying all our vendor bills within 30 days. And quickly, as we put our own house in order, the store became stronger financially.

Inviting authors and healers to speak on Friday nights greatly expanded our customer base and our experience serving the community. It was a challenge for many Ananda people on staff that we were hosting so many different types of people, on different paths. But to me, it was the same principle as carrying a wide variety of books. To anyone coming through the door, I would give loving, supportive energy, and through my attunement to Master, enjoy the commonality that all these spiritual teachers share with us. We were not there to "get" more members for Ananda. We were there to give people whatever might help them spiritually. And this is a theme that Swami has emphasized so much over the years. Forget yourself, serve others, and be ever expansive in your service.

That’s what we have to understand. It’s a process of being humble. In the heart. In the moment. And recognizing our kinship with everyone. It’s a balance between being centered in the self, but being open to another’s reality. It’s real exchange of energy and magnetism, from a centered place.

I remember one day a woman came into the store, very angry. She felt she had been mistreated by someone on staff. I needed to find a way to relate to her. I decided the best way was to be her friend. I said "You expect the people here to be saints already. But we have only signed up to be in the ‘Future Saints Club of America.’" She smiled a little smile. "I want you to know that we are very unhappy when a customer leaves upset." Gradually, she calmed down, and accepted my apology. If you can get on someone’s wavelength and relate to them where they are at, you can make deep connections with people.

In the mid-1980’s, we began to see some street people for the first time. One man taught me so much. He was not an alcoholic, but he was obstreperous, charming, a quick mind, belligerent. He would come in and panhandle the customers. And he would also speak with me and other female customers in the store inappropriately flirting. Vas would put him out for 3 months at a time. Then he would come back in. I would try to out-talk him, and move him out the door. But he was so much quicker verbally than me. One day I was at the shelves doing some inventory work. And I could FEEL him coming in the store. I prayed instantly to Master, "You have got to guide me. I want to do the right thing." Instantly, I felt my energy go from my head to my heart.

"Jackie, I’m back!" he said. I turned around and he was right there. I replied, "Yes. I see you are. And then, straight from the heart, I said, "And it makes me very nervous."

"Yeah, I know," he said and turned and walked out the door. After he left I burst into tears. I realized I hadn’t ever given him any energy that was real, until that moment. And that was all he was asking for. It was a powerful experience for me, something I’ll never forget.

What have I learned most from my experience at East West? That true friendship is an important priority in business. Every aspect of running a store that serves people is informed by keeping friendship a living reality. Applying solid success principles and making decisions from an intuitively-felt perspective, unite to create a vital, real experience for us and everyone we met. The heart and the head working together in the proper balance is what made the East West experience for myself and Vasudeva so valuable.