--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, gerbal88 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Vaj, TurquoiseB -- I "discovered" a.m.t. many years ago. I just > posted something there this week. It is a very sad place, but I > like the militant JW's snarrling at the door .... very apt. > > I read True Believer when I was at University. It still holds true, > especially when you find a group of "if onlies" like the couple of > mangy cats who emulate the character Danae at Non Sequitur. > > In the old days there it certainly brought out the worst in me (and > there was not just a little of that my any means). But, > interestingly, that also led me to take a look at that worst in me > and try to understand where and how it came to be. > > So, a.m.t., for all its cesspit qualities still managed to help me > learn something.
I could not agree more. It's like in Castaneda, when don Juan talks about the value of petty tyrants. Buddhism does the same thing. Those who push your buttons are to be thanked, for showing you where they are so you can work on them. That doesn't necessarily mean you want to party down with these people or have one of them marry your sister or anything, just that you can be grateful to them for showing you your own inner petty tyrant. I have found that I have learned as much from my own posts. Some years ago, I got into the habit of going back and reading the posts I had made over the last few weeks or months as if the person I was writing to was really myself. As if the insults I was hurling and the rants I was ranting and the silly advice I was giving was really to myself, not to the person I was ostensibly writing to. Weird, but really educational. > It _is_ nicer here. I have posted a bit at TMControversy and found > that the ever mangy Stein person has one of the lowest thresholds I > have ever encountered for intolerance of anything but the sound of > her own voice. What a peculiar person. Not gonna go there. Sworn off. > Maharishi started out with something, a very learnable, doable > way to achieve transcendence (although I think samadhi might be > a better term). He and his early followers put together a > "checking" procedure that is brilliant. It contains, as I am > sure everyone here knows, everything one needs to know about > learning/teaching this method. Again, couldn't agree more. Truly elegant software. > When Maharishi began to drift from what I considered the purity of > his own teaching, when I saw the first signs of his organization > deteriorating into little more than his goon-squad, I left and > sought spiritual development elsewhere. For me, possibly not for > so many, the Buddhadhamma (Thai Forest Tradition) has offered the > profound simplicity that supports samadhi. Well said. I can certainly identify with watching someone deviate from the purity of his own teaching. Been there done that twice in this incarnation. Fucks with your head. But, as you said about certain forums, things that do that can be really good for you in the long run, because they lead you to better ways of doing things. I think that it is Chogyam Trungpa's school that refers to themselves as the Path of Fucking Up. They honestly believe that they learn as much or more from their mistakes and misperceptions as they do from their "correct" decisions. > Maharishi's method of approaching effortless transcendence has been > of great benefit and, like a.m.t., I honour him for that. So do I. > Looking back many, many years now, I see Maharishi and what he was > doing in a light different from the light in which I saw him then. > It's interesting to talk about, curious to speculate about, but > there are, as someone said here, other, more worthwhile pursuits. > > Because I have been away from TM and Maharishi for so many, many > years, I wonder if you can answer a curiosity for me: is > his "movement" shrinking like an earthworm on a hot pavement, or is > there actually growth and vitality there? I live in a city of about > 4Million and there has been no kind of TM activity here (there > were 5 or 6 centres in the old daze) for at least 10 years. Can't help you. Haven't been around any TM activities for a long, long time. Don't know. Unc To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
