Ever since donning the Captain America costume in 2014, Vishavjit Singh has been one of the most recognizable Sikhs in the United States. He’s created popular cartoons, he’s given a TEDx Talk, and his film, American Sikh, is the first Sikh story to qualify for an Oscar. I’ve had the privilege of knowing Vishavjit for more than a decade now. We both live in New York City, and he’s as sincere and kind as one would hope. He endeavors to live his life by Sikh teachings.
There’s also a side to his story that not many people know. Although Vishavjit grew up in a Sikh family, and although he keeps his hair now, there was a period of his life where he stepped away from Sikhi and cut his hair. Not many Sikhs are willing to talk about these kind of experiences — they can be hard and alienating, and religious people can be judgmental.
But Vishavjit shared this part of his story openly in American Sikh, and I hoped he might be willing to discuss it a bit more with me. So I reached out and asked, and Vishavjit agreed, noting that this would be the first time that someone would be writing about this.
I share a bit of our conversation below, with the hope that you might find it as interesting and meaningful as I did. I’m grateful to Vishavjit for being willing to share about his life so that we might all learn and benefit.
Simran: What was it that led you to initially cut your hair? How old were you? What was going on in your life? And what made it feel like the right decision for you then?
Vishavjit: I cut my long unshorn hair for the first time in my life in sophomore year at college in University of California, Santa Barbara. The biggest reason I cut my hair was my lack of genuine connection with Sikhi. I was born in a Sikh family, or, I should say, a family that identified as Sikh. But I did not have any Sikhi practices in my daily life. I went to a private Sikh school in India so I was familiar with stories from Sikh history. We went to Gurudwara for Gurpurab only.
Against this backdrop I moved back to the land of my birth after high school in 1989. First to the city of Los Angeles for a few months before starting college at Ohio State University. My months in LA were some of the loneliest of my life. I could not get a job. People stared at me out on the streets. Some mocked me and others called names.
The lack of deep connection to Sikhi and being ‘othered’ and verbally abused by fellow Americans created the conditions for me to decide to cut my hair. I did not share this decision with anyone until after I cut my hair.
Simran: What changed? When did that happen? How did you reconnect with Sikhi? What inspired you to start keeping your hair again? What impact did this have on your life?
Vishavjit: I experienced an identity crisis in college. I moved away from my Punjabi, South Asian, and Sikh heritage. One of the most fortuitous things that happened to me in college was I fell in love—With books.
I had never read a book for pleasure until then and started reading books across all genres. Through books I discovered amazing minds and thinkers. Aldous Huxley, Edwin Abbott, Oliver Sacks, Eli Wiesel, Judu Krisnamurthi, Franz Fanon, Alan Watts, Friedrich Nietzsche.
I found my first real connection with spirituality through Tibetan Buddhism, Zen Buddhism and Taoism via books. I started practicing meditations from these traditions.
I moved to Berkeley for graduate school and for a few months lived with my brother in East Bay. He was really immersed into Sikhi, and I had a shaved head, which shocked him a little. He had a cassette player that was always playing kirtan in his apartment. Even though I grew up in a Sikh family, the kirtan sounded a little foreign to me.
My brother asked me a few times to come with him to Asa Di Vaar kirtan at his local Gurudwara on a hill overlooking San Francisco Bay. I said no for a few weeks. One day I decided to give it a shot. I sat way in the back of the diwan far away from sangat and Guru Granth Sahib.
I don’t remember exactly when, but I fell in love with kirtan, despite not understanding some of the words. I started sneaking Kirtan cassettes to listen to in my car.
A year later I decided to earnestly walk the Sikhi path for the first time in my life. I was in my late twenties.
It took two years for me to grow my hair enough long to tie into a joora. I moved to the east coast for a job in 2000. I donned a turban for the first time in August 2001 while working and living just north of New York City.
We all know what happened a month later on September 11. I worked from home for two weeks and when I stepped out it was like all eyes were on me. Quite a few angry ones. Many fellow Americans took liberty to call me “Osama” and “Taliban.” Some told me to go back home. This went on for years.
Simran: Where are you now with your Sikhi? What keeps you connected? What feels special to you about Sikhi that you haven't found elsewhere?
Vishavjit: A few years later I fell in love again. This time with a Singhnee from the United Kingdom who I ran into on the streets of New York. Just over a year later we had our Anand Karaj in Punjab. I took Amrit two days before the big day, on the occasion of Shaheedee Dihara of Chote Shahibzaadey.
What keeps me connected and rooted to Sikhi is kirtan. Kirtan in all its vocal styles, musical range and accompanying instruments. The amazing thing about kirtan and raags is the incredible diversity of shabads that cater to the season, time of day, and the listener’s emotional status. There is a poetic universe in Guru Granth Sahib to connect to “The Force” also known as Ik Onkar.
I am not sure if I can really answer what I have found in Sikhi that I have not found elsewhere since I have not tried many other traditions and because my journey in this manifestation started in a Sikh family that guided me down the Sikhi path. The two other paths that remain close to my heart are Buddhism and Sufism.
One final thing I will say is that I feel a special connection to Asa Di Vaar by Guru Nanak Sahib. I will encourage everyone if they get a chance to experience it live first thing in the morning and to read about this ballad of hope and its translations.
Listening to kirtan is so easy today given the devices we all carry. But there is something magical about listening to live kirtan with sangat.