--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Alex Stanley" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter <drpetersutphen@> wrote: > > > > Agreed. But they can also function as a catalyst to trigger that > > recognition. And if you're going to be in bondage, being attached > > to saints ain't that bad! > > My favorite commentary on the nature of darshan was posted by Barry a > few years ago on FFL: > > http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/message/55423
Thanks for the reminder, Alex. I had all but forgotten about that rap, but still agree with what I said then. It seems a more pro- ductive way of looking at the phenomenon we call darshan to me. > Waking Down uses the term "transmission" to describe how that > awakening is propagated, and WD's gazing meditation is definitely > a darshan phenomenon. But, I love Barry's POV that darshan is a > process of the seeker recognizing what is already there and not > the teacher sending out magical mystical jeebus rays. If I didn't explain in the context of making the original post, I came to this opinion on my own, as the result of "getting darshan" from two people I'm pretty sure weren't giving it. Santa Fe has this wonderful tradition called the Lannan Lectures. A foundation was set up to bring the best and brightest lights in the world of literature and the arts to town and put them up on a stage to talk to appreciators of literature and the arts. Performing a "double header" at this series of lectures were Toni Morrison and Michael Ondaatje. There couldn't be two more polar opposites as writers. Morrison is a planner and a plodder; she spends a year plotting out and outlining her books before she ever starts them. Ondaatje, on the other hand, is by profession and nature a poet; writing just flows out of him, unbidden and unplanned. So to hear the two of them riffing off of each other's experiences of the writing process was pure magic for this writer in the audience to hear. But then a weird thing happened. When the talk was over and I stood up, I realized that I was high as a kite. Satsang high. Samadhi high. Having been to see a spiritual teacher with phwam! and having him lay hands on you high. And this did not compute. I'm pretty sure that Toni Morrison and Michael Ondaatje were not sitting up there on that stage "doing" darshan. And yet being able to sit in a room with them and feel their auras and imbibe of the thoughtforms of two writers who were far better at writing than I am seemed to have activated some of those same thoughtform circuits in my brain. That's when I came up with the recognition theory. I did a little reading and found that I was far from the first to have thought it up; it was clearly defined in a number of ancient spiritual traditions. So I started doing a Castaneda-like recapitulation and going back to examine the previous experiences of darshan I had experienced in my life and, in retrospect, found that the recognition theory not only worked for all of the spiritual teachers I have sat with, but also explained the darshan-like high I have experiences as a result of seeing some musicians perform. Whereas the "doing darshan" theory really didn't work for the musicians. So, using the Occam's Razor side of my brain, it is a simpler explanation than the "beaming darshan" explanation, and thus (IMO) a more likely explanation, Waldenesque, as in "Simplify, simplify, simplify." But I still go back and forth on this; it's not as if I'm completely sold out to either explanation. > I think having that perspective was a big help for me, because > when I was in the dark night of the soul, and the relative world > turned to ashes, not even my WD teacher's gaze could touch me. > With the perspective that this was *my* process, it was easier > for me to see the path turn to ashes along with everything else. Well said. Congratulations on turning a dark night into light. That's really where the rubber meets the road in my opinion. And where the fun lies...
