--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Sharalyn" <homeonthefarm@...> wrote: > > > > To whoever wrote this: > > > you are an idiot - I did TM for 20 years, twice a day, every day - it took > > me that long to realize it wasn't the only game in town - stupid me. > > > > Stupid? > > I came to FFL today to ask a specific question and then get back out again, > but it was unavoidable to see a couple of quotes that peaked a reaction from > me, yours being one of them. I think you have missed the point, that just > because there are other "games" does not mean they would have worked for you > any earlier or that you would have even found them any sooner. > > Consider this: > > I had to do TM for 3 years before I quit smoking because it suddenly became > so repulsive that I had to quit. There are many methods to quit smoking but > over the 18 years i smoked I never found anything else that worked. > Furthermore, over the next few years, 3 of my non-meditating family members > died of lung cancer. So, who was stupid? > > I had to meditate for 5 years before I was smart enough to go from being a > drop-out to making an "A" in statistics class, and then to become the first > and only person in my family to get higher education, both a BA and a MA. > There are many colleges and learning methods, but none of them worked for me. > Today I am so well established intellectually that I could go to any school, > but do you think it would have happened, just out of the blue, merely an > accident of fate, that I suddenly got smarter, learned to concentrate, and > succeeded in school, or do you think it's more likely that I learned an easy > method, one that required no concentration or effort, called TM? Was there > any other "game" in town which I would have tried? Seriously unlikely. > > I had to meditate for 15 years before I got smart enough to be successful in > psychotherapy. I'd tried therapy a few times before and always quit within > weeks of starting. So where did the desire, determination, courage, and other > aspects of character come from for me to be successful? It certainly wasn't > just my therapist, or his methods, but rather despite them that I succeeded. > My relatives continued to live out what would have been my fate without > TM--they became alcoholics, drug addicts, and suicides. Some finally found > other games: AA, religion, prayer. Care to make comparisons in benefits and > outcomes? Do you think I would have been so different than the rest of my > family to suddenly "wake up" to discover any other system or to work at it if > it required more effort than TM? To think so is to think irrationally. > > I had to meditate for 20 years before I could bear to be in the same room > with my mother, to become loving, understanding, tolerant, and to overcome > the temper and other aspects of our family dysfunctions. The rest of my > family, including my son, are to this day still locked in those same > dysfunctions. Why was that I rose to higher planes when they, who could have > found alternatives, didn't do so? What made me grow so far so fast so deep > when they didn't? It certainly wasn't prayer or religion for some of them > practice that religiously. > > I will skip over what happened after 20 years except to say that I had to > meditate for 35 years to become so wise and compassionate that I developed > the ability to heal others. Healing is just common sense work when you can > see the laws of nature, but do you think I could see these laws of nature > without all these years of practicing TM? > > I have known that for years that there are "other games in town": Tolle, > Adyshanti, Amma, Peruvian Shaminism, etc. etc. etc. etc., including some very > enlightened people right here in Fairfield. (I know enough about these games > to have taught college metaphysics and Comparative Meditation Techniques.) > Most of them have enriched my life and my spiritual understanding but this > growth would not have happened had they been my original teachers. It took > years of meditating for me to open up mentally, emotionally, spiritually to > what they to offer. But of what value would they be if my consciousness was > not already awakened? And have you observed, who succeeds at these other > "games" better than former meditators? It requires an awakening to even be > able to utilize these other "games." > > But there is another point that one needs to appreciate to understand where > you are coming from. > > My observation is that there are 3 stages of gaining knowledge. The first > stage is blind devotion. (This is not a stupid stage, as many make it out to > be; it is a very healthy stage of purifying formation of character, > intellect, and spiritual growth). Where Maharishi's teachings are concerned, > we followed him because the message made sense. Unlike many other teachings, > his are orderly and comprehensive and they created a framework for us to > understand where other teachers are coming from. > > The 2nd stage is disillusionment when one learns his formerly idealistic > viewpoints aren't true, at least not true in the way he understood them, or > true as we imaged perfection to be, and he feels betrayed. It's something > like an teenager seeing that his Sunday School beliefs are too idealistic to > be workable in the "real" world. Historically, my observation is that many > people on FFL are still in stage 2--disillusioned, angry, resentful, and > fault-finding, still blaming others for what they perceive as failures. > > The 3rd stage is integration, a mature stage where one accepts reality for > what it is. Stage 3 is where one sees the world as a wholeness, where there > is no either-or, only appreciation for what IS. Stage 3 is full of gratitude > and appreciation, which, Maharishi has said, is a measure of enlightenment. > > Adyshanti said that when he first woke up, his first thought was that he was > in an insane asylum (because most everyone was irrational. (Google Ellis > and/or irrationality to see why he said that, for most people are > irrational). Byron Katie says that arguing with reality, you lose "only 100 > percent of the time." So why keep arguing? And Maharishi said, "The world is > as we are." I believe it took you 20 years to understand that there were > other games in town, but that doesn't mean that you are stupid or that TM is > a fraud. It simply means that it how long it took you to reach stage 2. As > you have quit doing TM, I wonder how long it will take you to get to stage 3? > (I don't care...its your business.But I wondered if my perspective might be > of value to you. Unlike me you may not have anything to compare it to so you > can't appreciate just how far the TM train took you before you understood how > much you had to have grown in order to have come to appreciate "other games."
Phew, I kind of really liked this. No messing around. Straight shooter. Just my type of person. Let's see what happens NOW! >
