Bruce Joel Rubin was born in Detroit in 1943 and moved to New York to attend New York University Film School in the early 1960's. He first met Rudi when looking to buy a Buddha in Rudi's store. He had only five dollars to spend and there were not many choices in that price range. He fancied one tiny little one in a glass case but saw that it was broken and kept looking. When Rudi asked if he could be of help, Bruce explained his mission and limited resources. Rudi immediately took him to the glass case and pulled out the broken Buddha. Bruce said he had admired it but rejected it because it was broken. Rudi said, "Seek perfection in yourself, not in external objects." Bruce replied, "That's the best sales pitch I've ever heard," and handed over the five dollars.

Bruce carried that Buddha for a year and a half on a spiritual journey, hitchhiking around the world in search of a teacher. He spent months in many ashrams and met many yogis but did not find what he was looking for. When he returned to America, carrying Tibetan carpets he had hoped to sell for some Buddhist monks he had lived with in Nepal, he remembered Rudi's store and took the carpets there. Rudi asked Bruce what he had been doing in Asia and Bruce said he had gone to find a teacher. "Did you find one?" Rudi asked. Bruce shook his head no. "Well, I can teach you everything you want to know," Rudi said. It was a life changing moment because Bruce knew with his entire mind, body, and soul that it was true. That night friends he was staying with asked Bruce if he wanted to meet a girl. Fresh from his travels, he happily consented and they introduced him to Blanche, the woman who would, two years later, become his wife. Nothing since that remarkable day has ever been the same. Bruce and Blanche both became students of Rudi's and have been meditating daily ever since. They have raised two sons, five horses, five dogs, as well as assorted parakeets and love birds. In the midst of endless worldly demands they have sustained and nurtured deep inner spiritual lives that they have been sharing with students for over 25 years.