"Wonderful, Doc, I agree. Except I don't think we have to take it seriously or
unseriously or any certain way at all. Life is flowing along however we take
it."
Hey Share, this response of yours caught my eye, again, because it is a good
example of usurping Brahman. "Life is flowing along however we take it", is an
intellectual understanding, but it is not the experience of the seeker. So, to
say that the intention for spiritual liberation needn't be taken seriously by
the seeker, is basically bullshit. It had better be taken seriously by the
seeker, or else nothing permanent happens. No big deal, if nothing happens, but
it is simply a reflection of the seeker not being ready for a complete
surrender, not being committed to it.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <fairfieldlife@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Wonderful, Doc, I agree. Except I don't think we have to take it seriously or
unseriously or any certain way at all. Life is flowing along however we take it.
On Wednesday, October 16, 2013 8:53 AM, "doctordumbass@..."
<doctordumbass@...> wrote:
Xeno, you say that people stop short of enlightenment because it seems that
no progress is happening. And in the paragraph above that, you say that at some
point the words have to go. And yet it is the words, or the knowledge and
understanding that can help a person continue when all is flat and seemingly
non progressive. Even Maharishi's analogy of going around an iceberg, seeming
to go backwards has helped me continue. Am I a fool? Or am I persistent? Both?
And does it even matter?
The thing Xeno is talking about, is when all ideas, concepts, recited phrases,
etc. go dry. No more juice or encouragement from them. The seeker feels shitty
- end of story. This phase illustrates for the seeker, the futility of living
in the future, where we want to get enlightened, or in the past, remembering a
flashy spiritual experience. Even though the isolation one feels is the
strongest, yet, it prepares us for a final surrender, a shift of identity, away
from this isolated form. Whether, or not, a seeker decides to go through with
the whole enchilada, is an exact reflection, of the degree to which a seeker
takes spiritual liberation seriously.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <fairfieldlife@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Xeno, you say that people stop short of enlightenment because it seems that no
progress is happening. And in the paragraph above that, you say that at some
point the words have to go. And yet it is the words, or the knowledge and
understanding that can help a person continue when all is flat and seemingly
non progressive. Even Maharishi's analogy of going around an iceberg, seeming
to go backwards has helped me continue. Am I a fool? Or am I persistent? Both?
And does it even matter?
On Tuesday, October 15, 2013 10:06 PM, "anartaxius@..." <anartaxius@...> wrote:
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <fairfieldlife@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Dear MJ; Yes, working people back in that day of $3.35 an hour wages got a
great deal then. However it is true the conservative meditator I here speak for
feels deeply that people are not paying anywhere close to enough to learn TM at
$1,500. And, the slacker kids living at home with their parents neither too.
The TM movement could squeeze at least another thousand out of the new people
coming to our Peace Palaces. It is extremely important to have commitment from
new people as they start or you end up like some of the quitters we see here.
-Buck
I think you may be missing something Buck. I am meditating in my fifth decade.
Even after adjusting for inflation by current U.S. Government measures, the
price I paid for TM was less than US$500 in current value. To continue with
meditation, you have to have some kind of deep desire beyond simply thinking
that some mental technique is going to solve all your problems, because it does
not work out that way.
Something has to motivate beyond feeling better because some situations may
arise where you simply do not feel well at all, and one can go through periods
where it really does not seem to be doing anything at all. When somebody is
taught a technique I would say there is a 10 to 20 percent chance they will
continue. This happened in my family, and in the family of friends, and in the
few research papers that mentioned such data. It is not that people are
slackers. For one thing our culture does not support meditation that well in
spite of its being more in common awareness than previously.
Another factor is the illusions the mind has. It affects groups and groups
that teach meditation inevitably become weird in some way, particularly if
religiosity is a part of the philosophy of the group. TM has always tried to
hide its religiosity, but it oozes through the cracks so much you can almost
drown in it. People have very strong religious delusions and when faced with a
religiosity that is contrary to what they are emotionally programmed with, they
may quit just for that reason alone.
Basically you have to be kind of crazy to continue with meditation, there has
to be something that pushes you forward, something you sense behind the bizarre
character of the whatever system of 'enlightenment' you have fallen into that
seems somehow 'true'. It is not something that can be quantified. There is a
curiosity that one needs about this, not an entrenched belief that one is on a
royal path to a nirvana. No belief can stand in the face of this curiosity if
one is to 'succeed'; all beliefs will eventually be blown away. As Maharishi
said, words of ignorance to remove ignorance. All the verbal knowledge in the
movement are words of ignorance.
Rightly applied they may work for you up to a point, but at some point they
have to go, and it is up to the individual how they handle or fail to handle
the transition. Most of the people that want to help you along on the path are
going to help you fail because they failed to make that transition. I believe M
said at least CC was possible for everyone with TM, but CC is not
enlightenment. That means a lot of people are going to fail, and they will not
help you along your way; they will become an active force against your progress
unless you know how to brush them aside and stay on purpose. You are one of
those sorts that needs to be brushed aside. Maybe in years to come that will
not longer be true, but right now you are an anachronism.
People may stop short of 'enlightenment', short of awakening simply because it
seems progress is no longer happening - they may be right on the cusp. As one
Zen master said, you may not be aware of your own enlightenment. You may not
sense how close you are because everything seems flat, or simply have become so
saturated with the spiritual environment you can't stand it anymore and need a
hiatus for a while so what has occurred can sink in and gestate for a while
before you can again move on.
Remember Buck, the Meissner effect is electromagnetic; it is just a verbal
analogy that ties it with the supposed Maharishi Effect, the latter which has
no scientific standing outside of the TM movement's proclamations. Pushing
pseudoscience as fact does no service to meditation except in the minds of
idiots and the uniformed. It is not the money that keeps people meditating. For
the wealthy $1500 is pocket change, and they can discard meditation as easily
as a pair of shoes that do not fit. The movement has an elitist mentality, and
if it cannot appeal to the masses as it did in the 1960s and 1970s, it will
simply become yesterday's news, and some other system will for a time, perhaps,
find itself in the spotlight.
