Bankrate: What is the single best thing that success has brought you?

Robbins: Luckily, success didn't catch up with me until I was old enough, wise enough, not to take it seriously. Those who do take it seriously pay with their souls. I mean, it's imperative that one strive to perfect one's art, one's craft, but fame and fortune as ends in themselves can be narcissistic toxins injurious to one's psychic health. Readings in Zen, Sufism, Taoism and Tantra, not to mention certain sound bites attributed to Jesus, doubtlessly helped guide me to those conclusions. A tiny bit I figured out on my own.

Having said that, I can't deny that success has its perks. It's afforded me greater mobility -- hitchhiking and Greyhound buses hold a minimum of charm when one hits middle age -- increased independence -- it's been a long, long while since I've had to answer to the neurotic whims of a boss -- and a generally more attractive standard of living -- nostalgia notwithstanding, a plate of fresh belon oysters at Le Dome in Paris is at least marginally more appealing than slops de la mer in a rundown rural love pad in Washington State.

Maybe the best perk, though, is the extraordinary people my literary success has permitted me to meet, some in person, many through the mail. The worst part is being physically unable to oblige those who express a desire to maintain a correspondence with me.

Bankrate: The MO that runs through all of your writing is the quest for higher consciousness. Have you achieved it, and if so, is it a happy place?

Robbins: A renowned Zen patriarch once wrote in his journal, "Now that I am enlightened, I am miserable as ever." No matter how high one gets, one cannot permanently escape the hassles and irritants of everyday living. The goal of enlightenment is not necessarily happiness or inner peace; the goal is to wake up. And waking up is harder than one might suppose, although it's as easy to come awake in a destructive era like ours as in eras of relative equanimity.

When one is fully awake, when one's consciousness is elevated, one views events from a wholly different perspective. Perspective is everything. When one can see existence as a grand and goofy and ephemeral show, a divine comedy in which even one's enemies play necessary roles, one can, for extended periods, float through life like a Ping-pong ball in a mountain stream. The ball takes some sharp knocks, but it floats buoyantly, fearlessly on.

Maybe my novels possess the capacity to subversively activate a reader's sense of wonder and point him or her in the direction of an undammed stream. On the other hand, maybe they're little more than raffish entertainments. That's fine, too, as long as I feel like I'm doing my part to keep the world lively and give it the flexibility to endure.

Bankrate: Looking back, what has been your biggest thrill?

Robbins: It's been my good fortune to enjoy a flyspeck of international acclaim, to hang with some big-time artists and performers whose work I admire, to track orangutans in Sumatra, raft Africa's wildest rivers, et cetera, et cetera. But overall, nothing has ever thrilled me more than watching a woman step out of her underpants.