--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > I was wondering whether to post this next link, > because I'm pretty sure it will "draw fire" from > some who don't like to hear different points of > view on this subject of shakti vs. samadhi. It's > a talk from 1982, tape recorded and transcribed > by me, on this very subject. Some will hear it > as poppycock, and they are welcome to do so. The > teacher in question was FULL of poppycock, and > I doubt that he would be offended by anyone con- > sidering this particular rap silly or incorrect. > > On the other hand, he could DO all of the things > he speaks about in this talk, and we in the audi- > ence had sat in rooms with him experiencing them > for some time when he finally got around to giv- > ing this particular explanation. I remember that > it greatly clarified things for me at the time, > and explained what I had been feeling before > about the *difference* between the two energies > (shakti vs. samadhi), but never was able to pin > down clearly. Maybe it'll do the same for someone > else here. Maybe not. Anyway, here's the link. > The talk I'm referring to is the first one in > this story; the others are from different evenings > and about different subjects: > > http://ramalila.net/RoadTripMind/rtm03.html
For the record, before anyone leaps in and tries to diss me because of what this gentle- man says, I don't necessarily AGREE with all that he says in this talk, or any talk. I feel that I gained a great deal from sitting with him for years, and I'm grateful for that, but I disagreed with him at the time about many things, and I continue to disagree with him now. I made that abundantly clear to him, and to his credit he not only never had the slightest problem with my disagreement, he encouraged it. I miss that quality in some of the spiritual teachers I have met later. Back to the original point of contention -- IS it somehow "artificial" or a "dependency" to sit with a spiritual teacher to gain some per- ceived benefit from their energy, whether that energy be a lower-grade shakti or a high-grade emanation of samadhi? Well, duh...of course it's somewhat artificial. And yeah, in a perfect world it would be cooler if someone could just hand out a "cheat sheet" and tell his or her students, "Just do this -- follow each of these instructions to the letter -- and you will realize the highest enlightenment." My experience in life is that things just don't work like that. Some of the higher (*not* "better") forms of meditation CAN'T be taught in "cheat sheets." They can't even be taught in words. They can't be achieved via techniques. They fall into the category of what Vaj referred to as "pointing out instructions." You kinda have to be SHOWN these things, via transmission. When you are, you find that no words are necessary. No step-by-step instructions or techniques are necessary. The knowledge of how to "return" to the samadhi you are experiencing, how to "get back there on your own" is INHERENT in the experience of it. Having experienced it clearly, there is no need for further instructions on how to experience it again on your own. As *opposed* to some of the subjective experiences one has when exposed to the mystical kundalini or shakti. Those subjective phenomena are FUN, and can be very transforming, but you really *need* some outside catalyst to jumpstart them. And I think that the critics here who were ragging on the "shakti seekers" and the "empowerment junkies" who flit from teacher to teacher hoping for another hit, another jumpstart, were correct in ragging on them. It's JUST as possible to become a "shakti junkie" as it is to become a heroin junkie. Whereas -- the whole *point* of me writing all these words that no one is probably reading anyway -- it's very difficult to become, or to even *want* to become, a "samadhi junkie." Different order of experience, just as I said at the beginning.
