One of the more interesting things in this piece is his reference to a private blog group called Cult Bros which is a group of people who grew up in the Movement:
"for many of my friends who have left, their relationship with home is a fraught one. Somewhere on the Internet there’s a listserv or private group blog called Cult Bros, where a group of Gen-Xers and Millennials who grew up in the Movement air their grievances. I’m not a Cult Bros member myself, but I can anticipate their conversations — they’d be familiar to anyone who grew up in a community defined by certain dogma, religious or otherwise. There’s the resentment of the years spent trying to be perfect little yogis, frustrations over growing up in what can be a very socially conservative environment, anger at the time and effort and money spent working toward the unattainable goal that is world peace with very little payoff. There’s questioning of the traditions we grew up with, the means to this impossible end — the pujas, the mantras, the jai Guru Devs, the Golden Domes, the yogic flying. Questioning all of the Hindu mythology that’s wrapped up this thing we were told was not a religion. Like anyone from anywhere, the Cult Bros are trying to come to terms with their home." ________________________________ From: "TurquoiseBee turquoi...@yahoo.com [FairfieldLife]" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> To: "FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2014 5:46 AM Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Growing Up TM From: "Michael Jackson mjackso...@yahoo.com [FairfieldLife]" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> https://medium.com/the-archipelago/growing-up-in-utopia-8102f58dfcbc Growing Up in Utopia When your family and friends want to save the world by meditating, you can sometimes feel out of place in small-town Iow… View on medium.com Preview by Yahoo I couldn't read this piece because I couldn't get past the first paragraph. Whatever the author's intention in writing it is or was, his cluelessness in that first paragraph stopped me in my tracks, and kept me from reading any further: "I learned how to fly when I was 17. I’m not talking about a plane, and this isn’t some euphemism. 'Yogic flying,' which is basically meditation at the black-belt level, offers the potential of human levitation -- although in actuality it looks more like energetic, if not rather effortless, cross-legged hopping." This person (although his intention may have been to suggest the opposite) is IMO *still* suffering from the ill effects of growing up in an insane asylum. Bouncing around on one's butt and calling it 'yogic flying' is NOT 'meditation at the black belt level,' it's INSANITY at the black belt level. Try picking any town in America, walking along its streets, stopping people at random, and explaining to them, "I'm doing a survey. Twice a day I bounce around on my butt on big slabs of foam, along with other people who do the same thing because we are convinced that doing this will reduce crime, affect the weather, and create world peace. What do you think of this?" My bet is that you would get answers like, "Uh...sounds fine to me...good luck with that..." spoken over the interviewee's shoulder as they were edging away, watching you carefully and hoping that you weren't following them so that they didn't have to break into a run. See, this is the thing that makes interacting with long-term TMers on this forum so challenging -- they really have NO IDEA how insane they are, and how insane the things they believe are. For many of them, it seems as if it's been so long since they've actually talked with anyone who WASN'T indoctrinated with all of this cult nonsense they way they were that they've forgotten how these normal people think and act. They're used to interfacing with people who don't bat an eyelash when you announce to them, "Sorry...got to go...it's time for me to go fly now." Hint: That's insane. No one is "flying." No one has EVER "flown" in *any* of the TM "flying" halls. And no one ever will. Most people, told that this would even be *possible*, would react with either laughter or derision, and walk away. TMSPers reacted by paying several thousand dollars to learn how. Hint: That's insane. And it's as insane now as it was when you first paid those thousands of dollars. The only reason people on this forum and around you in Fairfield don't think so is that you live in an enormous insane asylum, in which the residents are reinforcing their shared delusions by pretending that they're "saving the world" instead of acting out less-than-sane fantasies. Some of these inmates who post to this forum get upset when I or Michael or Salyavin or Curtis point out HOW far away from mainstream definitions of sanity they are to believe that there actually IS such a thing as the 'Maharishi Effect.' I imagine that inmates in mental hospitals feel the same way when doctors and nurses point out that they're not *really* Napoleon or Jesus Christ. To these people I say, "GET OVER IT." Wake the fuck up, take a look around at international standards for sanity, shake yourself, and realize that if you actually believe that bouncing on your butt can be called 'flying' and that performing this bouncing is creating world peace...uh...you're INSANE. You're NOT "special" or "more evolved" or "10,000 X more powerful than lesser people," you're INSANE. It's OK to *be* insane, if your insane beliefs give you some sense of comfort and don't hurt anybody. After all, millions of people believe in an invisible man in the sky who watches everything they do, and as long as they don't get in other people's faces about it, they can be that insane and still be considered productive members of society. But ferchrissakes don't pretend that the things you believe AREN'T insane, and don't pretend to be outraged because other people point out the insanity. You CHOSE to be considered insane the moment you signed that check and paid thousands of dollars to learn how to 'fly.' Live with that choice now, and try not to pretend that you're still sane after having made it. Having made that choice makes you an outlier, an anomaly within human society. A nut case. 99% OR MORE OF THE PEOPLE ON THIS PLANET ARE GOING TO CONSIDER YOU A NUT CASE IF YOU TELL THEM YOU BELIEVE THAT BOUNCING ON YOUR BUTT IS 'FLYING' AND THAT IT'S 'THE BLACK BELT OF MEDITATION'. It's not. And no amount of claiming will ever make it so.
