On Jul 23, 2008, at 11:26 AM, curtisdeltablues wrote:
<snip>
For those who find belief in gods and goddesses untenable, there's
no
real need to cling to such stories. In terms of modern psychology
and
neuroscience it would be easier to say that certain sounds have
certain effects on the brain, which have the potential, over time,
to
awaken certain propensities in the brain and then for those changes
to be integrated into the human personality.
That may be true. I find it hard to believe that earlier cultures
were able to figure this out rather than just going with their
religious meanings in choosing sounds. It seems like a difficult
thing to test.
It is completely knowable in those traditions, albeit not through
conventional, scientific and materialistic means. But more simply,
different devatas had different personalities and those are the
qualities that naturally develop with mantra use.
That's why I like Swami
Rama's approach: it was practical and honest, without a need for
magical thinking.
I checked out his place in Honesdale Pa but never met him. I was very
afraid of meeting guys like him when I was in TM. I thought they
would put the "wammy" on me! I also thought that I was a special and
desirable human that other masters would want to steal from Maharishi!
Teachers had told me that other masters valued us and would be after
us. More "prison of specialness."
Wow, if you're not making that up, that pretty scary Curtis! I've
found quite the opposite to be true: TMers are viewed as naive at best.
My approach was quite different: it was clear that the TMO wasn't
being up front, forthcoming and (frankly), honest. So I went where I
could find all the answers and then some. Sw. Rama's center was an
important one--esp. since he was a student of Guru Dev's and he was
able to actually replicate samadhi in his students.
It was utterly refreshing to get the whole story and not some cosmic
rug salesman's hypnotic spiel. That's not to say that Sw. Rama didn't
have his dark side, he had a real creepazoid side as well.
