[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: We had this half of an American Gothic looking couple, the center chairmen, June and Tony. Tony went on to become a Waking Down teacher. He died suddenly a couple years ago. June is currently a Waking Down teacher.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
On Sat, Oct 22, 2011 at 11:46 PM, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stan...@yahoo.com wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: We had this half of an American Gothic looking couple, the center chairmen, June and Tony. Tony went on to become a Waking Down teacher. He died suddenly a couple years ago. June is currently a Waking Down teacher. You're kidding? Perfectly American Gothic Tune and Joanie? At no less than the San Francisco TM Center, one of the strangest collection of people. How can this be? Joanie had been a karate instructor for the Chicago Police Department (hard to believe). He was ever reminding me of the karma that would return to me when I let slip a good one at the TMO, about how it would return to me. They were so very pious. Or naive? Well, that adds to the One Went East, One Went West character of the CIC I was on with Tune and Joanie as the coordinators. We had to gay guys, an item, who were with the San Francisco Opera Company, a big mama street car dispatcher, a punk rocker who played his drums with appropriate sound effects during flying, a very loving couple, the husband was son of the owner of Clown Alley. A year after the sidhis? The gay item had gone off into rebirthing, the street car dispatcher went back into being a pro and shooting drugs. I guess it was just a matter of time that American Gothic would join the cats they tried to herd on their CIC. Did I mention the loving couple on the CIC got bitterly divorced about a year after taking the sidhis?
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
I thought there was no starting point or ending point. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@... wrote: I agree, but that was tartbrain - I was using his quote as a starting point. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: The movement belongs to those who move. Those who were stuck on the idea that the movement and the TMO were ONLY about the 7-step program were, well, stuck. I think M and TM were always a moving target about gateways to consciousness and purifying collective consciousness, via a lot of different avenues. BINGO ! The lazy ones refused to change and later, even to meditate. In fact many stopped TM because it brings about change. Can't have that.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
I lived there a bit, and later visited regularly, throughout the 70s. We may have crossed paths (Oh, were you the bastard that cut me off on the Ridge of Bell that fine spring morning, ha) Did my SCI at Cobb Mountain the summer or fall of '74. I remember sticking my thumb out at the intersection of Brush Creek Rd. and Hwy. 82 For a bit I worked in Smowmass but lived near town and thus I used to daily hitchhike down hwy 82 and back daily. (Hitchhiking is such a great thing, environmentally sensible, economic, sociable. Too bad it has met its demise.) And fall of 74, I was driving from SB MIU to FF, the grand migration. Stopped in Aspen for a day or so and saw old friends (one of which was also a TM junkie). (Hey, were that guy we picked up leaving town, ha) (And I had done six weeks at Cobb earlier that spring.) --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, seventhray1 steve.sundur@... wrote: Did not live there. My dad and uncle bought a condominium from the blue prints in Snowmass Villiage around 1971 or '72, and we would go out there once a winter to ski, and I would go out during the summer for various activities. We still own it today, but don't utilize as much, and because of the economy, the rentals haven't really been offsetting the annual assessments, so we are thinking about selling it.-that is, my sisters and I. I had many fun times there, especially in the summer. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@ wrote: You lived in Snowmass / Aspen? What years? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, seventhray1 steve.sundur@ wrote: Did my SCI at Cobb Mountain the summer or fall of '74. I remember sticking my thumb out at the intersection of Brush Creek Rd. and Hwy. 82 in Snowmass Colorado and hitchhiking to Cobb Mountain. Good times! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 3:40 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) I attended many course at Cobb, including my ?flying? block. My flying block had a lot of live wires. The cabins closest to the main buildings were given to married, senior people. They brought with them the proper mixings for martinis and had cocktail hour before time to do evening program. I went back for many WPAs and the men often flew on what had been the dance floor. That place had been a really hopping place for Summers and especially the weekend. The dance floor was on springs, and yes, in typical TMO style, Cobb Mountain had a reputation for lots of alcohol flowing, lots of extramarital sex. Back to my flying block. We had a fiddler from Boston. When our mommies and daddies went to bed we had hoe downs outside the main buildings. A couple times we woke up the sidhi administrators who told us to cut out the dancing and go to bed. Cobb Mountain was in typical decay and the cabins were drafty as heck. And yes, we were within something like 1,500 feet of the tree line so it got cold, even in Spring and Fall.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@... wrote: I lived there a bit, and later visited regularly, throughout the 70s. We may have crossed paths (Oh, were you the bastard that cut me off on the Ridge of Bell that fine spring morning, ha) It was a wild time for me, all those years. More likely I might have run into you in Ashcroft on the trail to the hot springs. But no telling if I was in my right mind, or on LSD. Make that waking state mind. Did my SCI at Cobb Mountain the summer or fall of '74. I remember sticking my thumb out at the intersection of Brush Creek Rd. and Hwy. 82 For a bit I worked in Smowmass but lived near town and thus I used to daily hitchhike down hwy 82 and back daily. (Hitchhiking is such a great thing, environmentally sensible, economic, sociable. Too bad it has met its demise.) And fall of 74, I was driving from SB MIU to FF, the grand migration. Stopped in Aspen for a day or so and saw old friends (one of which was also a TM junkie). (Hey, were that guy we picked up leaving town, ha) (And I had done six weeks at Cobb earlier that spring.) --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, seventhray1 steve.sundur@ wrote: Did not live there. My dad and uncle bought a condominium from the blue prints in Snowmass Villiage around 1971 or '72, and we would go out there once a winter to ski, and I would go out during the summer for various activities. We still own it today, but don't utilize as much, and because of the economy, the rentals haven't really been offsetting the annual assessments, so we are thinking about selling it.-that is, my sisters and I. I had many fun times there, especially in the summer. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@ wrote: You lived in Snowmass / Aspen? What years? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, seventhray1 steve.sundur@ wrote: Did my SCI at Cobb Mountain the summer or fall of '74. I remember sticking my thumb out at the intersection of Brush Creek Rd. and Hwy. 82 in Snowmass Colorado and hitchhiking to Cobb Mountain. Good times! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 3:40 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) I attended many course at Cobb, including my ?flying? block. My flying block had a lot of live wires. The cabins closest to the main buildings were given to married, senior people. They brought with them the proper mixings for martinis and had cocktail hour before time to do evening program. I went back for many WPAs and the men often flew on what had been the dance floor. That place had been a really hopping place for Summers and especially the weekend. The dance floor was on springs, and yes, in typical TMO style, Cobb Mountain had a reputation for lots of alcohol flowing, lots of extramarital sex. Back to my flying block. We had a fiddler from Boston. When our mommies and daddies went to bed we had hoe downs outside the main buildings. A couple times we woke up the sidhi administrators who told us to cut out the dancing and go to bed. Cobb Mountain was in typical decay and the cabins were drafty as heck. And yes, we were within something like 1,500 feet of the tree line so it got cold, even in Spring and Fall.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: You've got the timing wrong. I remember the first residence course I was on which had a governess, one of the first back from Switzerland. For what its worth, some recollections of the history as I saw it. Depends perhaps on what first back means relative to to progression of courses. I was on two back to back 6 mo courses, spring of 2006-spring 2007. There was a 6 mo course before us where, as I understand, some experimentation with sidhis was done. On my first course, we worked on yoga sutras amd sidhis most of the six months, more than the current standard fare, but flying was not done. And the CPs from that course were not govs and did not go back and teach prep sidhis. That happened for CPs in the course that ended spring of 77. We broke into teams of four, divided up the world (ha), though that went pretty smoothly, logically, and then went out and taught prep sidhha courses, and flew 2x in our group. From what I recall, MMY did not emphasize we were special or anything, but did emphasize to be one pointed. And simple -- a sidha leaves the table still a bit hungry was said -- and was a general theme of our activity, though sometimes more, sometimes less. And we were never told to be aloof. We blended in and became a part of the meditator community. Like a big group of friends. And we had some amazing CPs so humility was natural. We were much more on the level of the meditators than the prior org, in my view. Not like the four shanks of Regional past. Not at all the same gig or vibe. (And not like those sleazy state coordinators, :)) There were the famous superman posters were drawn up on that course (in suisse) and passed around. But we saw that as more of a joke. Back home, in the field, we focused on our program, and the teaching, which was wonderful, the CPs were great, but was more a gig to allow us to do our program. Which we were totally stoked on doing for our own personal benefit. Not a we need to sacrifice and save the world thing. And program in those days was great. Maybe because it was so new. And the whole thing was fun. I remember we got laughing so hard, the four of us up front during a group meeting that I fell off my chair literally laughing. The CPs were all part of that. There was a real group consciousness of laughter -- and respect between everyone. A very light atmosphere. In beautiful surroundings. And amazing people would emerge asking to be on staff, for RB and some course credits. It was a sweet time. It was odd a bit in that we were apparently the new organization, as state and regional coordinators were dissolved when we hit the streets. M wanted a very flat organization with only one level between him and the meditators and sidhas. So CPs and the community may have seen us as a new wave and attached whatever was in their heads to that. However, we were pretty humble and focused on our program, and getting the word out on this new knowledge, to make it available to all of the centers in our area. If anything we felt way unspecial and not up to the task we had been given. But things worked out. Wonderful support from all. People did lots of nice things to help the whole thing unfold. And we really tried to give back and give credit to the centers. We heard and saw some feedback where some CPs and all would make some superficial eal about this or that attribute of one or all of us. But it was silly, maybe unstressing sort of thing. We did not take it seriously. We knew we were yokels just trying to have a roof over our heads while we did program. Program was the ting --for our own unfoldment, not the world. Later it began to unravel. Lack of vigilence one of M's often used words of the time. Details are unimportant, but within 6 months, things did change. Not so much a being special thing, just the opposite but more incompetence, clumsy thing. Quite unspecial in that regard. Overall it was fun for all (or most) I think. Consciousness playing. Very nice report, much like I remember it also.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, pranamoocher no_reply@... wrote: Researchers discovered in the early 90s that Lenz in his craziness had actually became the first form of the humanoid known as Kenny G ...and his son [;)] Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. DAMM YOU PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools there (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations) will remind me now always of Rama(what a Lenz) and turquoiseb [:D] Jasmine Flower http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j58W1WjX9Ckfeature=fvst http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxSeKjGAeSI
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Buck dhamiltony2k5@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: So you keep talking about Maharishi in great analysis and detail to keep from thinking about how Lenz fucked up your head and heart? That's what it looks like. Freddy was exceptionally gifted and insecure. Probably suffering parental rejection, so he got together a few of you and made sure HE was the boss, HE was the Guru. You kissed HIS butt, but you get the picture- you lived it. Now instead of coming to grips with it, you deflect everything about Lenz onto Maharishi. Free clue: Grow a pair and start living in the present and/or see a therapist about the Lenz shit and clear yourself out. Its kind of pathetic to see you in this state, all blind to it and misguidedly throwing all of your pain on Maharishi. After all, Lenz was the mentally ill one, the crazy one, the one you can't grow past even now. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@ wrote: This is not a counter rebuttal, simply another view, a point for further discussion and examination. The tipping point was when a portion (I think it was 11.73% but others may quibble on this)of the full time community -- and some ardent part-timers, kept clung to the notion that M. and his TMOs were all about, only about, the seven step program for teaching 20 min 2x / day. A parallel is Apple and Steve Jobs. When he went more digital (i-tunes, i-phone) and creating superb customer experiences (Apple stores) etc, many of the faithful said, Huh, what does this have to do with selling Macs and What possible effect can a company with 3% market share have on digital music. Steve's vision was that Apple was a digital gateway company (or something along those lines with a core emphasis on superb design. Apple would not be the company with the largest market capitalization in the world (subject to check) and Steve Jobs would not be revered as the CEO of the decade(s), if he limited his vision to selling Macs. M. and his TMOs, in my view, were / are about being a Consciousness gateway org -- not limited to 20 min 2x, but having 50 product lines that enable Consciousness to shine in all parts of a persons life. Yet many whined, when will we get OUR old TMO back, 20 min 2x. When will M come to his senses and do what he is supposed to do, teach TM. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), The day? Organizationally? Turqb, it was in the Spring of '77 on a day when the whole TM teaching organization got overturned by Maharishi at the end of a huge governor (siddhis) training course in Switzerland. As the Maharishi was preparing to dis-band the course and have people (many of the active teaching organization at the time) go home, things changed from that point. Before this the organizational evaluation of how the movement was doing was in how the new initiations of new meditators were doing and also in the numbers of mediators coming to residence courses. In a meeting the whole hierarchical order of the teaching organization was sorted, turned out and replaced by 'teams' of teachers with Bevan, Neil and the Wilsons on top and everyone else spun off. After this re-organization happened the evaluation shifted over to being in the numbers of people going to group practice of the Siddhis. From this it then became about the numbers in group practice of TM-siddhis. The teaching organization and that program got lost from then. The physics discussion around the Meissner Effect had preceded that time. I was there and got to witness this happen. It was a time. -Buck Doug, I do think you have it right. I remember that time - I had already gone on an earlier 6 month course. Then this new group returned to the center and basically took over - simply
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Buck dhamiltony2k5@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: So you keep talking about Maharishi in great analysis and detail to keep from thinking about how Lenz fucked up your head and heart? That's what it looks like. Freddy was exceptionally gifted and insecure. Probably suffering parental rejection, so he got together a few of you and made sure HE was the boss, HE was the Guru. You kissed HIS butt, but you get the picture- you lived it. Now instead of coming to grips with it, you deflect everything about Lenz onto Maharishi. Free clue: Grow a pair and start living in the present and/or see a therapist about the Lenz shit and clear yourself out. Its kind of pathetic to see you in this state, all blind to it and misguidedly throwing all of your pain on Maharishi. After all, Lenz was the mentally ill one, the crazy one, the one you can't grow past even now. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@ wrote: This is not a counter rebuttal, simply another view, a point for further discussion and examination. The tipping point was when a portion (I think it was 11.73% but others may quibble on this)of the full time community -- and some ardent part-timers, kept clung to the notion that M. and his TMOs were all about, only about, the seven step program for teaching 20 min 2x / day. A parallel is Apple and Steve Jobs. When he went more digital (i-tunes, i-phone) and creating superb customer experiences (Apple stores) etc, many of the faithful said, Huh, what does this have to do with selling Macs and What possible effect can a company with 3% market share have on digital music. Steve's vision was that Apple was a digital gateway company (or something along those lines with a core emphasis on superb design. Apple would not be the company with the largest market capitalization in the world (subject to check) and Steve Jobs would not be revered as the CEO of the decade(s), if he limited his vision to selling Macs. M. and his TMOs, in my view, were / are about being a Consciousness gateway org -- not limited to 20 min 2x, but having 50 product lines that enable Consciousness to shine in all parts of a persons life. Yet many whined, when will we get OUR old TMO back, 20 min 2x. When will M come to his senses and do what he is supposed to do, teach TM. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), The day? Organizationally? Turqb, it was in the Spring of '77 on a day when the whole TM teaching organization got overturned by Maharishi at the end of a huge governor (siddhis) training course in Switzerland. As the Maharishi was preparing to dis-band the course and have people (many of the active teaching organization at the time) go home, things changed from that point. Before this the organizational evaluation of how the movement was doing was in how the new initiations of new meditators were doing and also in the numbers of mediators coming to residence courses. In a meeting the whole hierarchical order of the teaching organization was sorted, turned out and replaced by 'teams' of teachers with Bevan, Neil and the Wilsons on top and everyone else spun off. You got the spring of 77 and dissolving of the old orgs right. But Neil and the wilsons? in charge? I guess I didn't get those secret marching orders. I know the name, but Neil had nothing to do with our activities as guv teams of 4 in the field teaching the prep courses. The Wilsons, not sure who they are, however they surely were not someone the teams of guvs had anything to do with. (Were they students at MIU in SB in 74 -- was Signe
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
The movement belongs to those who move. Those who were stuck on the idea that the movement and the TMO were ONLY about the 7-step program were, well, stuck. I think M and TM were always a moving target about gateways to consciousness and purifying collective consciousness, via a lot of different avenues. Exactly. I was initiated in late 75, then in 78 I worked for the Movement in LManor, for $5 per month and an unheated cabin, just after it became a men's only facility, working in the kitchen and the A of E press for a year. We were hosting Guv training courses with the flying technique then too - lots of whooping and hollering! The staff meditators went on residence courses one weekend a month and normally had a 2x2 daily schedule, but the siddhis were taught in blocks then, and I wasn't selected for the first block. Came back to work for the Movement in mid 79 to mid 80, about 100 miles east of Kansas City, MO, building a 30 room residence course and flying hall facility, farming 14 acres of organic strawberries, and tending a 10 acre apple orchard and pressing facility next door. Got the Siddhis as work/study, with a $25/mo. stipend, living out of an unheated garage, and then a trailer. Didn't pay any taxes that year either...:-) Then one more time around 82, I went to work for the Missouri facility again, decided I wanted to be a teacher, applied for TTC, then took a much closer look at what the Movement was, and how different it was from where I wanted to be, so I left, and that was that. I continued to do the TM-Sid program for another 12 years, went on my last course in the early 90's - that big DC one, then did TM until about March of this year, when the practice just fell off and wasn't missed (though always available). -- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Buck dhamiltony2k5@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: So you keep talking about Maharishi in great analysis and detail to keep from thinking about how Lenz fucked up your head and heart? That's what it looks like. Freddy was exceptionally gifted and insecure. Probably suffering parental rejection, so he got together a few of you and made sure HE was the boss, HE was the Guru. You kissed HIS butt, but you get the picture- you lived it. Now instead of coming to grips with it, you deflect everything about Lenz onto Maharishi. Free clue: Grow a pair and start living in the present and/or see a therapist about the Lenz shit and clear yourself out. Its kind of pathetic to see you in this state, all blind to it and misguidedly throwing all of your pain on Maharishi. After all, Lenz was the mentally ill one, the crazy one, the one you can't grow past even now. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@ wrote: This is not a counter rebuttal, simply another view, a point for further discussion and examination. The tipping point was when a portion (I think it was 11.73% but others may quibble on this)of the full time community -- and some ardent part-timers, kept clung to the notion that M. and his TMOs were all about, only about, the seven step program for teaching 20 min 2x / day. A parallel is Apple and Steve Jobs. When he went more digital (i-tunes, i-phone) and creating superb customer experiences (Apple stores) etc, many of the faithful said, Huh, what does this have to do with selling Macs and What possible effect can a company with 3% market share have on digital music. Steve's vision was that Apple was a digital gateway company (or something along those lines with a core emphasis on superb design. Apple would not be the company with the largest market capitalization in the world (subject to check) and Steve Jobs would not be revered as the CEO of the decade(s), if he limited his vision to selling Macs. M. and his TMOs, in my view, were / are about being a Consciousness gateway org -- not limited to 20 min 2x, but having 50 product lines that enable Consciousness to shine in all parts of a persons life. Yet many whined, when will we get OUR old TMO back, 20 min 2x. When will M come to his senses and do what he is supposed to do, teach TM. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 1:03 PM, whynotnow7 whynotn...@yahoo.com wrote: The movement belongs to those who move. Those who were stuck on the idea that the movement and the TMO were ONLY about the 7-step program were, well, stuck. I think M and TM were always a moving target about gateways to consciousness and purifying collective consciousness, via a lot of different avenues. Exactly. I was initiated in late 75, then in 78 I worked for the Movement in LManor, for $5 per month and an unheated cabin, just after it became a men's only facility, working in the kitchen and the A of E press for a year. We were hosting Guv training courses with the flying technique then too - lots of whooping and hollering! The staff meditators went on residence courses one weekend a month and normally had a 2x2 daily schedule, but the siddhis were taught in blocks then, and I wasn't selected for the first block. Came back to work for the Movement in mid 79 to mid 80, about 100 miles east of Kansas City, MO, building a 30 room residence course and flying hall facility, farming 14 acres of organic strawberries, and tending a 10 acre apple orchard and pressing facility next door. Got the Siddhis as work/study, with a $25/mo. stipend, living out of an unheated garage, and then a trailer. Didn't pay any taxes that year either...:-) Then one more time around 82, I went to work for the Missouri facility again, decided I wanted to be a teacher, applied for TTC, then took a much closer look at what the Movement was, and how different it was from where I wanted to be, so I left, and that was that. I continued to do the TM-Sid program for another 12 years, went on my last course in the early 90's - that big DC one, then did TM until about March of this year, when the practice just fell off and wasn't missed (though always available). I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter.Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Ha-ha! It was always pretty rustic. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 1:03 PM, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@... wrote: The movement belongs to those who move. Those who were stuck on the idea that the movement and the TMO were ONLY about the 7-step program were, well, stuck. I think M and TM were always a moving target about gateways to consciousness and purifying collective consciousness, via a lot of different avenues. Exactly. I was initiated in late 75, then in 78 I worked for the Movement in LManor, for $5 per month and an unheated cabin, just after it became a men's only facility, working in the kitchen and the A of E press for a year. We were hosting Guv training courses with the flying technique then too - lots of whooping and hollering! The staff meditators went on residence courses one weekend a month and normally had a 2x2 daily schedule, but the siddhis were taught in blocks then, and I wasn't selected for the first block. Came back to work for the Movement in mid 79 to mid 80, about 100 miles east of Kansas City, MO, building a 30 room residence course and flying hall facility, farming 14 acres of organic strawberries, and tending a 10 acre apple orchard and pressing facility next door. Got the Siddhis as work/study, with a $25/mo. stipend, living out of an unheated garage, and then a trailer. Didn't pay any taxes that year either...:-) Then one more time around 82, I went to work for the Missouri facility again, decided I wanted to be a teacher, applied for TTC, then took a much closer look at what the Movement was, and how different it was from where I wanted to be, so I left, and that was that. I continued to do the TM-Sid program for another 12 years, went on my last course in the early 90's - that big DC one, then did TM until about March of this year, when the practice just fell off and wasn't missed (though always available). I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter.Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) The worst facility experience I had, in retro- spect, was probably at Poland Springs, ME. I got to see the balance sheets for that one after the course was over. The TMO paid something like $15 per night per participant for the room, and was supposed to pay something like $10 per person per day for food. They charged us a great deal more than that for the rooms, and actually (according to the financial records for the course) spent less than $4 per person per day on food. Half of the fruit served to us at meals was rotten. In Europe most facilities were acceptable, because they were owned (and thus maintained) by someone other than the TMO. The minute they started buy- ing their own places, however, all concept of maintenance or improvement went in the toilet and they allowed the places to slide into dis- repair and in some cases public health hazard status. And they could do this because they knew that no one would ever complain; the course par- ticipants were too spaced out and guru-whipped to even *consider* complaining.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
;-)... From: turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Wednesday, November 2, 2011 12:40:04 PM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) The worst facility experience I had, in retro- spect, was probably at Poland Springs, ME. I got to see the balance sheets for that one after the course was over. The TMO paid something like $15 per night per participant for the room, and was supposed to pay something like $10 per person per day for food. They charged us a great deal more than that for the rooms, and actually (according to the financial records for the course) spent less than $4 per person per day on food. Half of the fruit served to us at meals was rotten. In Europe most facilities were acceptable, because they were owned (and thus maintained) by someone other than the TMO. The minute they started buy- ing their own places, however, all concept of maintenance or improvement went in the toilet and they allowed the places to slide into dis- repair and in some cases public health hazard status. And they could do this because they knew that no one would ever complain; the course par- ticipants were too spaced out and guru-whipped to even *consider* complaining.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 3:40 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) I attended many course at Cobb, including my ?flying? block. My flying block had a lot of live wires. The cabins closest to the main buildings were given to married, senior people. They brought with them the proper mixings for martinis and had cocktail hour before time to do evening program. I went back for many WPAs and the men often flew on what had been the dance floor. That place had been a really hopping place for Summers and especially the weekend. The dance floor was on springs, and yes, in typical TMO style, Cobb Mountain had a reputation for lots of alcohol flowing, lots of extramarital sex. Back to my flying block. We had a fiddler from Boston. When our mommies and daddies went to bed we had hoe downs outside the main buildings. A couple times we woke up the sidhi administrators who told us to cut out the dancing and go to bed. Cobb Mountain was in typical decay and the cabins were drafty as heck. And yes, we were within something like 1,500 feet of the tree line so it got cold, even in Spring and Fall.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
...but somehow the TMO went 'bat-shit crazy' because you went over to work for Fred Lenz. LoL! wayback71: Richard, I doubt Barry will read or respond to your post. Barry reads every single post here, every single day. But I think Barry was active in the TMO for several years beyond 1972... Maybe so, but I just thought it was funny when Barry said the TMO went bat-shit crazy and then Barry went over to the bat-shit crazy Lenz. LoL!
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@... wrote: The movement belongs to those who move. Those who were stuck on the idea that the movement and the TMO were ONLY about the 7-step program were, well, stuck. I think M and TM were always a moving target about gateways to consciousness and purifying collective consciousness, via a lot of different avenues. BINGO ! The lazy ones refused to change and later, even to meditate. In fact many stopped TM because it brings about change. Can't have that.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
I agree, but that was tartbrain - I was using his quote as a starting point. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: The movement belongs to those who move. Those who were stuck on the idea that the movement and the TMO were ONLY about the 7-step program were, well, stuck. I think M and TM were always a moving target about gateways to consciousness and purifying collective consciousness, via a lot of different avenues. BINGO ! The lazy ones refused to change and later, even to meditate. In fact many stopped TM because it brings about change. Can't have that.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Did my SCI at Cobb Mountain the summer or fall of '74. I remember sticking my thumb out at the intersection of Brush Creek Rd. and Hwy. 82 in Snowmass Colorado and hitchhiking to Cobb Mountain. Good times! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 3:40 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) I attended many course at Cobb, including my ?flying? block. My flying block had a lot of live wires. The cabins closest to the main buildings were given to married, senior people. They brought with them the proper mixings for martinis and had cocktail hour before time to do evening program. I went back for many WPAs and the men often flew on what had been the dance floor. That place had been a really hopping place for Summers and especially the weekend. The dance floor was on springs, and yes, in typical TMO style, Cobb Mountain had a reputation for lots of alcohol flowing, lots of extramarital sex. Back to my flying block. We had a fiddler from Boston. When our mommies and daddies went to bed we had hoe downs outside the main buildings. A couple times we woke up the sidhi administrators who told us to cut out the dancing and go to bed. Cobb Mountain was in typical decay and the cabins were drafty as heck. And yes, we were within something like 1,500 feet of the tree line so it got cold, even in Spring and Fall.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
You lived in Snowmass / Aspen? What years? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, seventhray1 steve.sundur@... wrote: Did my SCI at Cobb Mountain the summer or fall of '74. I remember sticking my thumb out at the intersection of Brush Creek Rd. and Hwy. 82 in Snowmass Colorado and hitchhiking to Cobb Mountain. Good times! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 3:40 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) I attended many course at Cobb, including my ?flying? block. My flying block had a lot of live wires. The cabins closest to the main buildings were given to married, senior people. They brought with them the proper mixings for martinis and had cocktail hour before time to do evening program. I went back for many WPAs and the men often flew on what had been the dance floor. That place had been a really hopping place for Summers and especially the weekend. The dance floor was on springs, and yes, in typical TMO style, Cobb Mountain had a reputation for lots of alcohol flowing, lots of extramarital sex. Back to my flying block. We had a fiddler from Boston. When our mommies and daddies went to bed we had hoe downs outside the main buildings. A couple times we woke up the sidhi administrators who told us to cut out the dancing and go to bed. Cobb Mountain was in typical decay and the cabins were drafty as heck. And yes, we were within something like 1,500 feet of the tree line so it got cold, even in Spring and Fall.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Did not live there. My dad and uncle bought a condominium from the blue prints in Snowmass Villiage around 1971 or '72, and we would go out there once a winter to ski, and I would go out during the summer for various activities. We still own it today, but don't utilize as much, and because of the economy, the rentals haven't really been offsetting the annual assessments, so we are thinking about selling it.-that is, my sisters and I. I had many fun times there, especially in the summer. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@... wrote: You lived in Snowmass / Aspen? What years? --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, seventhray1 steve.sundur@ wrote: Did my SCI at Cobb Mountain the summer or fall of '74. I remember sticking my thumb out at the intersection of Brush Creek Rd. and Hwy. 82 in Snowmass Colorado and hitchhiking to Cobb Mountain. Good times! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 3:40 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: I worked on the Houston (Navasota, Grimes County) capital for room and board. And yes, shared an unheated cabin. Barhroom was the bushes outside. Yes, it gets cold in Texas during the Winter. Maharishi was absolutely right. The movement belongs to those who move large quantities of cash across national borders, undetected. I never went to any of the more modern TM hovels. I used to teach a lot of residence courses at Soboba (I think the name was) in southern CA, and attended many courses at Cobb Mountain in northern CA. The former didn't really have much personality, but the latter did. It had been some kind of camp or retreat facility before the TMO acquired it, and I found it charming, with its old clapboard cottages and rustic camp-era dining/meeting hall. Plus, the fact that most everyone was in a separate cottage made it easier to fool around on ATR courses. :-) I attended many course at Cobb, including my ?flying? block. My flying block had a lot of live wires. The cabins closest to the main buildings were given to married, senior people. They brought with them the proper mixings for martinis and had cocktail hour before time to do evening program. I went back for many WPAs and the men often flew on what had been the dance floor. That place had been a really hopping place for Summers and especially the weekend. The dance floor was on springs, and yes, in typical TMO style, Cobb Mountain had a reputation for lots of alcohol flowing, lots of extramarital sex. Back to my flying block. We had a fiddler from Boston. When our mommies and daddies went to bed we had hoe downs outside the main buildings. A couple times we woke up the sidhi administrators who told us to cut out the dancing and go to bed. Cobb Mountain was in typical decay and the cabins were drafty as heck. And yes, we were within something like 1,500 feet of the tree line so it got cold, even in Spring and Fall.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj vajradhatu@... wrote: You know the sad thing? It doesn't matter if the TM-Sidhi thing was when they went officially crazy (I too believe that was the major turning point). It doesn't matter if the research is bullshit. It' doesn't matter that Mahesh was never trained as a guru or shishya. It doesn't matter that he was making up it all along. What matters is that they've been able to keep up appearances. Their websites still look cool: esp. if you are wealthy or upper middle class person who gets lots of very nice catalogues. Their advertising looks on par with such high-end product lines, and thus geared to the Oprahs and the ladder climbers of this world. It speaks in their advert. language. And it doesn't matter if Mahesh was molesting his students: he maintained an impeccable stage persona, complete with make-up. etc. and that wonderful silk attire. And the most important part is that they have super-saturated the web with this air-brushed image and they've pushed themselves to the top of the search engines. If I search for anything remotely related to TM or TM org products - or just plain meditation - I'm very likely to have an advert. link to MUM.edu. They've played and paid the game of spiritual materialism better than anyone else. So that may be all it takes. People love their appearances. Thanks for your reply, Vaj. I cannot disagree with your assessment. One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how people can cling to beliefs and work tirelessly to preserve the appearance that they are true, long after other more reasonable people would have realized that they were not. But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. And the more sense of self importance one has about one's spiritual practices, the greater the tendency to cling to them. An *association* has been created, linking the practices to the myth that YOU are one of the most important people on earth. YOUR woo woo is just so much more woo than other peoples'. They may meditate, but you perform the *Sidhis*, and that's just so much better, doncha know...more woo. Once you've bought into this -- being one of the most woo individuals on the planet -- it's tough to let go of it. Especially if this sense of self importance is reinforced twice a day by being in a group of people who believe that they are equally important, and equally woo. So the clinging to appearances doesn't surprise me; that's just human nature. The surprise, as you suggest, is that those doing the clinging have been so successful for so long *at* preserving the appearance of rationality, despite the reality of their daily lives. They still sell the myth of 20 minutes twice a day while living a reality of several hours twice a day, and only in a group of people as special as I am, never noticing that they're being hypocrites by doing so. I think it's the never noticing that makes the TMO PR engine so effective. The people who write it really believe it. They believe it so thoroughly that they don't even recognize that their own lives and lifestyles make what they're writing a lie.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
On Fri, Oct 21, 2011 at 1:01 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.comwrote: Thanks for your reply, Vaj. I cannot disagree with your assessment. One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how people can cling to beliefs and work tirelessly to preserve the appearance that they are true, long after other more reasonable people would have realized that they were not. But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. You've got the timing wrong. I remember the first residence course I was on which had a governess, one of the first back from Switzerland. This was when the sidhis were a rocket ship for TM, which had already been described by Maharishi as the rocket ship to enlightenment. This lady acted like she didn't shit, let alone did it not stink. All, initiators, TMers, regarded her as though she was a body of light with flesh on top so we could see her. She never denied that she could fly, walk through walls, hear our very thoughts. She actually encouraged the awe about her. So did the other governors who came back.It appears Maharishi had really hyped the 6 month course participants up, not unlike the way initiators had previously been hyped up as being so very special in the scheme of manifest Creation. The Vedic Atom, including Michael Moore, came to our area next and they acted like they were God's gift. I got to see some tapes that were meant for initiators at a former ski chalet outside of Quebec which usually just ran ATRs. I guess they didn't have mere meditator tapes so we watched ATR tapes.Maharishi was hyping the initiators that they were God's gift and coaching them on how to act special so that all would pick up on their being special. I assume Maharishi pumped up the participants of the first 6 month courses to entice initiators to become governors and later TMers to take the arduous path of 8 weeks of preparatory courses in residence then 8 weeks of sidhi training in residence, a tough thing for a householder being not nickled and dimed by the local TM center, but pretty much fleeced of every penny they had. Indeed this one initiator couple pinned me down and told me that as initiators they were so much more deserving of taking CIC than I was, so I just had to go to the bank with them to get a check for the $6,000 course fee. Ballsy, eh? I now know that the experiences we TMers were fed were bogus, made up to get us to spring for the sidhis. Once again, before the woo-woo save the world thing started.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: On Fri, Oct 21, 2011 at 1:01 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.comwrote: Thanks for your reply, Vaj. I cannot disagree with your assessment. One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how people can cling to beliefs and work tirelessly to preserve the appearance that they are true, long after other more reasonable people would have realized that they were not. But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. You've got the timing wrong. I remember the first residence course I was on which had a governess, one of the first back from Switzerland. This was when the sidhis were a rocket ship for TM, which had already been described by Maharishi as the rocket ship to enlightenment. snip The Siddhis program IS a Rocket ship to enlightenment, without it, it could take a million years, with it, a mere 7 lifetimes or so, come on! ;-) (The devil is in the details).
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
The two FFL spiritual virgins posting to each other! Like two boys in puberty pretending to be men. Cute! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj vajradhatu@ wrote: You know the sad thing? It doesn't matter if the TM-Sidhi thing was when they went officially crazy (I too believe that was the major turning point). It doesn't matter if the research is bullshit. It' doesn't matter that Mahesh was never trained as a guru or shishya. It doesn't matter that he was making up it all along. What matters is that they've been able to keep up appearances. Their websites still look cool: esp. if you are wealthy or upper middle class person who gets lots of very nice catalogues. Their advertising looks on par with such high-end product lines, and thus geared to the Oprahs and the ladder climbers of this world. It speaks in their advert. language. And it doesn't matter if Mahesh was molesting his students: he maintained an impeccable stage persona, complete with make-up. etc. and that wonderful silk attire. And the most important part is that they have super-saturated the web with this air-brushed image and they've pushed themselves to the top of the search engines. If I search for anything remotely related to TM or TM org products - or just plain meditation - I'm very likely to have an advert. link to MUM.edu. They've played and paid the game of spiritual materialism better than anyone else. So that may be all it takes. People love their appearances. Thanks for your reply, Vaj. I cannot disagree with your assessment. One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how people can cling to beliefs and work tirelessly to preserve the appearance that they are true, long after other more reasonable people would have realized that they were not. But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. And the more sense of self importance one has about one's spiritual practices, the greater the tendency to cling to them. An *association* has been created, linking the practices to the myth that YOU are one of the most important people on earth. YOUR woo woo is just so much more woo than other peoples'. They may meditate, but you perform the *Sidhis*, and that's just so much better, doncha know...more woo. Once you've bought into this -- being one of the most woo individuals on the planet -- it's tough to let go of it. Especially if this sense of self importance is reinforced twice a day by being in a group of people who believe that they are equally important, and equally woo. So the clinging to appearances doesn't surprise me; that's just human nature. The surprise, as you suggest, is that those doing the clinging have been so successful for so long *at* preserving the appearance of rationality, despite the reality of their daily lives. They still sell the myth of 20 minutes twice a day while living a reality of several hours twice a day, and only in a group of people as special as I am, never noticing that they're being hypocrites by doing so. I think it's the never noticing that makes the TMO PR engine so effective. The people who write it really believe it. They believe it so thoroughly that they don't even recognize that their own lives and lifestyles make what they're writing a lie.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj vajradhatu@ wrote: You know the sad thing? It doesn't matter if the TM-Sidhi thing was when they went officially crazy (I too believe that was the major turning point). It doesn't matter if the research is bullshit. It' doesn't matter that Mahesh was never trained as a guru or shishya. It doesn't matter that he was making up it all along. What matters is that they've been able to keep up appearances. Their websites still look cool: esp. if you are wealthy or upper middle class person who gets lots of very nice catalogues. Their advertising looks on par with such high-end product lines, and thus geared to the Oprahs and the ladder climbers of this world. It speaks in their advert. language. And it doesn't matter if Mahesh was molesting his students: he maintained an impeccable stage persona, complete with make-up. etc. and that wonderful silk attire. And the most important part is that they have super-saturated the web with this air-brushed image and they've pushed themselves to the top of the search engines. If I search for anything remotely related to TM or TM org products - or just plain meditation - I'm very likely to have an advert. link to MUM.edu. They've played and paid the game of spiritual materialism better than anyone else. So that may be all it takes. People love their appearances. Thanks for your reply, Vaj. I cannot disagree with your assessment. One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how people can cling to beliefs and work tirelessly to preserve the appearance that they are true, long after other more reasonable people would have realized that they were not. But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. Barry, I really think that you undermine your point by exaggerating the positions of TB's. At least, I hope you are exaggerating it and that I am not wrong! I don't think most people going to the Domes really think that they are all that important on the planet. They may look down on other people and other meditation types, and probably belive that they are increasing sattva for the area and the world - so they do think they are on to something amazing. But, I still suspect that nearly everyone in the Domes is there mostly for working on their own Enlgihtenment, period. They want to get to CC or GC or just want to be good in the TMO eyes. World Peace is a side benefit, but not the only reason they are there. No, instead they want spiritual experiences, or a nap, or to be with other TB's. Self-importance is not the main issue, imo. Also, MMY was talking about World Peace as a result of doing TM from about 1970, right? Way before the siddhis. He tied doing TM twice a day to release of stress, better behavior, imporved health and world peace - kind of covering all the bases for reasons to spend time doing this. And we are all important to our selves, are we not? Very important, in fact. Nothing wrong with that. Maybe you mean that TB's get to be rigid and judgmental with an inflated sense of being at the Center of the best technique for evolution, which I think is different than self-important. And the more sense of self importance one has about one's spiritual practices, the greater the tendency to cling to them. An *association* has been created, linking the practices to the myth that YOU are one of the most important people on earth. YOUR woo woo is just so much more woo than other peoples'. They may meditate, but you perform the *Sidhis*, and that's just so much better, doncha know...more woo. Once you've bought into this -- being one of the most woo individuals on the planet -- it's tough to let go of it. Especially if this sense of self importance is reinforced twice a day by being in a group of people who believe that they are equally important, and equally woo. So the clinging to appearances doesn't surprise me; that's just human nature. The surprise, as you suggest, is that those doing the clinging have been so successful for so long *at* preserving the appearance of rationality, despite the reality of their daily lives. They still sell the myth of 20 minutes twice a day while living a reality of several hours twice a day, and only in a group of people as special as I am,
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Sal Sunshine salsunshine@... wrote: On Nov 1, 2011, at 2:37 PM, Susan wrote: But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. Barry, I really think that you undermine your point by exaggerating the positions of TB's. At least, I hope you are exaggerating it and that I am not wrong! I don't think most people going to the Domes really think that they are all that important on the planet. They may look down on other people and other meditation types, and probably belive that they are increasing sattva for the area and the world - so they do think they are on to something amazing. But, I still suspect that nearly everyone in the Domes is there mostly for working on their own Enlgihtenment, period. They want to get to CC or GC or just want to be good in the TMO eyes. World Peace is a side benefit, but not the only reason they are there. No, instead they want spiritual experiences, or a nap, or to be with other TB's. Self-importance is not the main issue, imo. That may be, Susan. But if so, things have changed since bouncing on your rear end for whirled peas has been presented, for quite a while now, as the main reason to come to the Dooms, keep up the numbers, etc. What you get out of it personally is not important and hasn't been for quite some time. Even personal comfort, health or the care of your children takes a back seat to this nonsense. Well, if care of your kids and health take a back seat, then I can only say the parents are nuts. I do recall back in the late 70's knowing of a couple with a young baby. They had returned a year earlier from a 6 month course and believed that doing their full siddhis program was more important than anything in the world - holding a job, eating with family, etc. So, twice a day they put the baby in a crib in a room, closed the door and went to another part of the house to do program for 2 hours!! I hit the roof when I heard that. I always assumed that they had taken it all too literally. Who would treat their own newborn that way? In fact, I don't really know what type of people now head to the Domes each day out in FFld. After all these years, if people still have such little common sense, then I have grossly overestimated the mental health of the remaining TB's. I thought this type of thinking was long gone. Has that changed? How refreshing if it were so. Sal
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Sal Sunshine salsunshine@... wrote: On Nov 1, 2011, at 2:37 PM, Susan wrote: But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. Barry, I really think that you undermine your point by exaggerating the positions of TB's. At least, I hope you are exaggerating it and that I am not wrong! I don't think most people going to the Domes really think that they are all that important on the planet. They may look down on other people and other meditation types, and probably belive that they are increasing sattva for the area and the world - so they do think they are on to something amazing. But, I still suspect that nearly everyone in the Domes is there mostly for working on their own Enlgihtenment, period. They want to get to CC or GC or just want to be good in the TMO eyes. World Peace is a side benefit, but not the only reason they are there. No, instead they want spiritual experiences, or a nap, or to be with other TB's. Self-importance is not the main issue, imo. That may be, Susan. But if so, things have changed since bouncing on your rear end for whirled peas has been presented, for quite a while now, as the main reason to come to the Dooms, keep up the numbers, etc. What you get out of it personally is not important and hasn't been for quite some time. Even personal comfort, health or the care of your children takes a back seat to this nonsense. Has that changed? How refreshing if it were so. Sal imo what Susan is saying is that the majority aren't zombies for world peace, that even though they neglect their lives sometimes to participate in the Domes, it isn't about world peace, though I remember that topic from my Intro lecture in 1975. The dome goers think its the best thing to do for their evolution. You don't think so personally. Me neither, though I am probably clueless about some things that they know way more about than I do - It all evens out. Why castigate them? Who knows what is best for others? As a coincidence, the crime rate in the US has been plummeting and no one can figure out why. I am not saying it is the domes, but it does coincidentally track to what Mr. Tee-Em said about growing social peace. My take on it is I'm glad to have the reduction in crime and if it due to those folks in the Dome, that is great! And if it isn't, that's great too, as long as it keeps going down.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Tom Pall wrote: On Fri, Oct 21, 2011 at 1:01 PM, turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.comwrote: Thanks for your reply, Vaj. I cannot disagree with your assessment. One thing that never ceases to amaze me is how people can cling to beliefs and work tirelessly to preserve the appearance that they are true, long after other more reasonable people would have realized that they were not. But for me the tipping point into this world of clinging to appearances was not the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program itself but the rebranding of it in terms of self importance. That, essentially, is what the shift from You perform the Sidhis as a way to realize your own enlightenment to You perform the Sidhis as a kind of sacred duty, because by doing so you become One Of The Most Important People On Earth, one of the select few, the holy thud of whose butt-bounces can bring about world peace and an Age Of Enlightenment was. It was a radical shift into the world of self importance and the amplification of individual ego. You've got the timing wrong. I remember the first residence course I was on which had a governess, one of the first back from Switzerland. This was when the sidhis were a rocket ship for TM, which had already been described by Maharishi as the rocket ship to enlightenment. This lady acted like she didn't shit, let alone did it not stink. All, initiators, TMers, regarded her as though she was a body of light with flesh on top so we could see her. She never denied that she could fly, walk through walls, hear our very thoughts. She actually encouraged the awe about her. So did the other governors who came back.It appears Maharishi had really hyped the 6 month course participants up, not unlike the way initiators had previously been hyped up as being so very special in the scheme of manifest Creation. The Vedic Atom, including Michael Moore, came to our area next and they acted like they were God's gift. I got to see some tapes that were meant for initiators at a former ski chalet outside of Quebec which usually just ran ATRs. I guess they didn't have mere meditator tapes so we watched ATR tapes.Maharishi was hyping the initiators that they were God's gift and coaching them on how to act special so that all would pick up on their being special. I assume Maharishi pumped up the participants of the first 6 month courses to entice initiators to become governors and later TMers to take the arduous path of 8 weeks of preparatory courses in residence then 8 weeks of sidhi training in residence, a tough thing for a householder being not nickled and dimed by the local TM center, but pretty much fleeced of every penny they had. Indeed this one initiator couple pinned me down and told me that as initiators they were so much more deserving of taking CIC than I was, so I just had to go to the bank with them to get a check for the $6,000 course fee. Ballsy, eh? I now know that the experiences we TMers were fed were bogus, made up to get us to spring for the sidhis. Once again, before the woo-woo save the world thing started. I thank God A'mighty that I was spared the special teacher tripe on my TTC. It was just the quite reasonable, You came here to become teachers. So, what's keeping you? Go home and teach already. In everything Maharishi said there was the notion of specialness; we were special, the food was special, the toilet was special. If we had been infested w/ bedbugs, they no doubt would have been special as well. For myself I'm down w/ being as special as a bedbug. Unlike in other endeavors, in teaching TM the less one brings to the table the better. And bedbug status is just about the right level for effective teaching. But I did have similar experience w/ the ballsy types. Freshly minted governors rode into town, informing us mere initiators that they had been sent by Maharishi hisself to acquire magnificent architectural wonders that might serve as local Capitals for the Age of Whatever. When I pointed out to these jamokes that they had neither a pot to piss in nor a window to throw it out of they were not dismayed in the least. Around purity, I was schooled, the means would collect themselves. Alas and alack, the real estate agents representing multi-million dollar houses, and clearly not living the fullness of life, didn't quite see it that way. They wanted earnest money from two guys who would account themselves lucky to have a change of clothes. Real estate, one. Ritam, zip. Our heroes conveniently divined from the home of all knowledge that they should haul ass and find a more deserving locale for a Capital. For all I know they're still searching. Perhaps they found honest work. P Duff
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Maybe I've read the posts too quickly, but the only note of desperation I recall reading on this, was you, venting in many paragraphs, about how Oprah's underlings did not properly vet her about all the stories on the web which paint an unfavorable view of the TMO, and thereby allowed her to lend credibility to this organization by participating in a group meditation. Would you care to point out who is demonstrating the other behavior you describe above? Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened. But I can pinpoint its nature, and what was said -- and believed -- that caused everything after that point to be a loony bin. It's the day that Maharishi first tried to convince people that bouncing on their butts on slabs of foam in a big room full of other butt-bouncers could end crime, change the weather, and bring about world peace. This pronouncement almost certainly predated the term Maharishi Effect, which was invented later to glorify his pronouncement, and scientific data made up to make it seem true. But from my point of view the fact that ANYONE believed this spiel for even an instant signifies the phase transition point from relative sanity to total madness. Try it yourself by performing your own scientific experiment. Go out onto the street and pick someone at random, and tell them several things that you believe. First, tell them what you heard when you first learned TM -- that it was good for you, and that the deep rest enabled you to function more efficiently and with less stress. You will probably get a general agreement with this. Then say that it is your belief, based on scriptures and reported historical instances and such, that some humans can develop special powers and abilities (the siddhis) that others have not, and possibly even levitate. No one's likely to call you crazy for this, because it is after all a matter of belief, and is no weirder after all than believing in a heaven filled with angels playing harps or that Christ walked on water. But now tell them that you believe that a number of people as special as yourself generate so much Woo Woo by grunting and bouncing around on their butts on slabs of foam that THEY CAN CREATE WORLD PEACE, all by themselves, with no further action needed. My bet is that the strangers you've selected for this experiment are going to start edging away from you nervously, if not actually running down the street away from you. The very idea is absurd, and based on a level of self-importance that most people on the planet associate only with full-blown insanity. As I've said, I'd left the TMO before Maharishi ever started talking about this. If I'd still been there I would have laughed in his face and walked out of the room, never to return. So I find it difficult to imagine people listening to it and being SO self-absorbed and self-important that they actually bought it. The TM-Sidhis were originally introduced as a means to an end, a way to speed up the enlightenment process. There was not a WORD about what performing them might do for anyone else. That only came later, after a number of people had actually learned the siddhis and (surprise!) neither siddhis nor enlightenment had appeared. The whole original selling point of getting people to pay thousands of dollars to learn them had been revealed to be false. So Maharishi had to do *something* to try to get people to keep doing them, and to entice new people to learn them. Voila. The group consciousness thang. What began as mere pragmatism (finding a room somewhere and chipping in to get a discount on slabs of foam rather than each person buying some for their own home) was turned into an exercise in Woo Woo. Doing program in a group was presented as being Good In Itself. You were off the program if you *didn't* do your program in a group. Hierarchies were invented to make the butt-bouncers higher and more important than mere meditators. Dogma was invented about how powerful the
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@... wrote: You've got the timing wrong. I remember the first residence course I was on which had a governess, one of the first back from Switzerland. For what its worth, some recollections of the history as I saw it. Depends perhaps on what first back means relative to to progression of courses. I was on two back to back 6 mo courses, spring of 2006-spring 2007. There was a 6 mo course before us where, as I understand, some experimentation with sidhis was done. On my first course, we worked on yoga sutras amd sidhis most of the six months, more than the current standard fare, but flying was not done. And the CPs from that course were not govs and did not go back and teach prep sidhis. That happened for CPs in the course that ended spring of 77. We broke into teams of four, divided up the world (ha), though that went pretty smoothly, logically, and then went out and taught prep sidhha courses, and flew 2x in our group. From what I recall, MMY did not emphasize we were special or anything, but did emphasize to be one pointed. And simple -- a sidha leaves the table still a bit hungry was said -- and was a general theme of our activity, though sometimes more, sometimes less. And we were never told to be aloof. We blended in and became a part of the meditator community. Like a big group of friends. And we had some amazing CPs so humility was natural. We were much more on the level of the meditators than the prior org, in my view. Not like the four shanks of Regional past. Not at all the same gig or vibe. (And not like those sleazy state coordinators, :)) There were the famous superman posters were drawn up on that course (in suisse) and passed around. But we saw that as more of a joke. Back home, in the field, we focused on our program, and the teaching, which was wonderful, the CPs were great, but was more a gig to allow us to do our program. Which we were totally stoked on doing for our own personal benefit. Not a we need to sacrifice and save the world thing. And program in those days was great. Maybe because it was so new. And the whole thing was fun. I remember we got laughing so hard, the four of us up front during a group meeting that I fell off my chair literally laughing. The CPs were all part of that. There was a real group consciousness of laughter -- and respect between everyone. A very light atmosphere. In beautiful surroundings. And amazing people would emerge asking to be on staff, for RB and some course credits. It was a sweet time. It was odd a bit in that we were apparently the new organization, as state and regional coordinators were dissolved when we hit the streets. M wanted a very flat organization with only one level between him and the meditators and sidhas. So CPs and the community may have seen us as a new wave and attached whatever was in their heads to that. However, we were pretty humble and focused on our program, and getting the word out on this new knowledge, to make it available to all of the centers in our area. If anything we felt way unspecial and not up to the task we had been given. But things worked out. Wonderful support from all. People did lots of nice things to help the whole thing unfold. And we really tried to give back and give credit to the centers. We heard and saw some feedback where some CPs and all would make some superficial eal about this or that attribute of one or all of us. But it was silly, maybe unstressing sort of thing. We did not take it seriously. We knew we were yokels just trying to have a roof over our heads while we did program. Program was the ting --for our own unfoldment, not the world. Later it began to unravel. Lack of vigilence one of M's often used words of the time. Details are unimportant, but within 6 months, things did change. Not so much a being special thing, just the opposite but more incompetence, clumsy thing. Quite unspecial in that regard. Overall it was fun for all (or most) I think. Consciousness playing. This was when the sidhis were a rocket ship for TM, which had already been described by Maharishi as the rocket ship to enlightenment. This lady acted like she didn't shit, let alone did it not stink. All, initiators, TMers, regarded her as though she was a body of light with flesh on top so we could see her. She never denied that she could fly, walk through walls, hear our very thoughts. She actually encouraged the awe about her. So did the other governors who came back.It appears Maharishi had really hyped the 6 month course participants up, not unlike the way initiators had previously been hyped up as being so very special in the scheme of manifest Creation. The Vedic Atom, including Michael Moore, came to our area next and they acted like they were God's gift. I got to see some tapes that were meant for initiators at a former ski chalet outside of Quebec
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
It's always nice to put things in perspective. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@... wrote: Barry, I really think that you undermine your point by exaggerating the positions of TB's. At least, I hope you are exaggerating it and that I am not wrong! I don't think most people going to the Domes really think that they are all that important on the planet. They may look down on other people and other meditation types, and probably belive that they are increasing sattva for the area and the world - so they do think they are on to something amazing. But, I still suspect that nearly everyone in the Domes is there mostly for working on their own Enlgihtenment, period. They want to get to CC or GC or just want to be good in the TMO eyes. World Peace is a side benefit, but not the only reason they are there. No, instead they want spiritual experiences, or a nap, or to be with other TB's. Self-importance is not the main issue, imo. Also, MMY was talking about World Peace as a result of doing TM from about 1970, right? Way before the siddhis. He tied doing TM twice a day to release of stress, better behavior, imporved health and world peace - kind of covering all the bases for reasons to spend time doing this. And we are all important to our selves, are we not? Very important, in fact. Nothing wrong with that. Maybe you mean that TB's get to be rigid and judgmental with an inflated sense of being at the Center of the best technique for evolution, which I think is different than self-important.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Yea, I relate to your experience. I must have missed that part about trying to set ourselves apart. Like you say, it was a fun time. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Tom Pall thomas.pall@ wrote: You've got the timing wrong. I remember the first residence course I was on which had a governess, one of the first back from Switzerland. For what its worth, some recollections of the history as I saw it. Depends perhaps on what first back means relative to to progression of courses. I was on two back to back 6 mo courses, spring of 2006-spring 2007. There was a 6 mo course before us where, as I understand, some experimentation with sidhis was done. On my first course, we worked on yoga sutras amd sidhis most of the six months, more than the current standard fare, but flying was not done. And the CPs from that course were not govs and did not go back and teach prep sidhis. That happened for CPs in the course that ended spring of 77. We broke into teams of four, divided up the world (ha), though that went pretty smoothly, logically, and then went out and taught prep sidhha courses, and flew 2x in our group. From what I recall, MMY did not emphasize we were special or anything, but did emphasize to be one pointed. And simple -- a sidha leaves the table still a bit hungry was said -- and was a general theme of our activity, though sometimes more, sometimes less. And we were never told to be aloof. We blended in and became a part of the meditator community. Like a big group of friends. And we had some amazing CPs so humility was natural. We were much more on the level of the meditators than the prior org, in my view. Not like the four shanks of Regional past. Not at all the same gig or vibe. (And not like those sleazy state coordinators, :)) There were the famous superman posters were drawn up on that course (in suisse) and passed around. But we saw that as more of a joke. Back home, in the field, we focused on our program, and the teaching, which was wonderful, the CPs were great, but was more a gig to allow us to do our program. Which we were totally stoked on doing for our own personal benefit. Not a we need to sacrifice and save the world thing. And program in those days was great. Maybe because it was so new. And the whole thing was fun. I remember we got laughing so hard, the four of us up front during a group meeting that I fell off my chair literally laughing. The CPs were all part of that. There was a real group consciousness of laughter -- and respect between everyone. A very light atmosphere. In beautiful surroundings. And amazing people would emerge asking to be on staff, for RB and some course credits. It was a sweet time. It was odd a bit in that we were apparently the new organization, as state and regional coordinators were dissolved when we hit the streets. M wanted a very flat organization with only one level between him and the meditators and sidhas. So CPs and the community may have seen us as a new wave and attached whatever was in their heads to that. However, we were pretty humble and focused on our program, and getting the word out on this new knowledge, to make it available to all of the centers in our area. If anything we felt way unspecial and not up to the task we had been given. But things worked out. Wonderful support from all. People did lots of nice things to help the whole thing unfold. And we really tried to give back and give credit to the centers. We heard and saw some feedback where some CPs and all would make some superficial eal about this or that attribute of one or all of us. But it was silly, maybe unstressing sort of thing. We did not take it seriously. We knew we were yokels just trying to have a roof over our heads while we did program. Program was the ting --for our own unfoldment, not the world. Later it began to unravel. Lack of vigilence one of M's often used words of the time. Details are unimportant, but within 6 months, things did change. Not so much a being special thing, just the opposite but more incompetence, clumsy thing. Quite unspecial in that regard. Overall it was fun for all (or most) I think. Consciousness playing. This was when the sidhis were a rocket ship for TM, which had already been described by Maharishi as the rocket ship to enlightenment. This lady acted like she didn't shit, let alone did it not stink. All, initiators, TMers, regarded her as though she was a body of light with flesh on top so we could see her. She never denied that she could fly, walk through walls, hear our very thoughts. She actually encouraged the awe about her. So did the other governors who came back. It appears Maharishi had really hyped the 6 month course participants up, not unlike the way initiators had previously been hyped up as being so very special in the scheme of manifest Creation. The Vedic Atom, including Michael Moore, came to
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: I am not discounting your experience of shock. That would be very surprising to hear Japanese people sounding like her. And it could be that she had seen one movie of people speaking Japanese under subtitles and her unconscious mind was playing it back. But there was a feeling in flying rooms that some people were speaking in different languages and that was a reinforcement that we were functioning from a deep trans-personal level. He is a youtube guy faking it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2QaBsKuN34 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRR_gKFT6ds His Finnish sounds more like Samic...
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
What I've found interesting since starting this thread is that no one -- not even the near-professional apol- ogists on this forum -- have attempted *to* create a rational explanation for how bouncing on their butts creates world peace. uthfriend: A magnificent example of Barry's mastery of inadvertent irony, given his own gullibility about Lenz's feats, which he persists in maintaining many years later, even after Lenz's ignominious suicide... 1531-1575, Zen Master, Japan; 1602-1771, Head of Zen Order, Japan; 1725-1804, Master of Monastery, Tibet; 1834-1905, Jnana Yoga Master, India; 1912-1945, Tibetan Lama and Head of Monastic Order, Tibet; 1950- ,Self Realized Spiritual Teacher and Director of Spiritual Communities, United States. Frederick Lenz, a/k/a Zen Master Rama (1950 - 1998): http://www.ex-cult.org/Groups/Rama/
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Who knows, I might be a bunch of 9th century Samurai with Tourette's Syndrome. :-D On 10/23/2011 05:16 PM, turquoiseb wrote: What's the difference between someone with Tourette's Syndrome and someone spouting gibberish like this while practicing the TM-Sidhis? The Tourettes sufferers don't try to pretend that they're all special and cosmic for doing it. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Bhairitunoozguru@... wrote: On 10/23/2011 03:09 PM, authfriend wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltabluescurtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriendjstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. A number of Sidha's that I used to fly with including myself had these spontaneous Japanese sounding vocalizations. For some reason to me it sounded like a very old dialect. We sounded like a bunch of Samurai. :-D I wonder if anyone has ever recorded them and had a linguist determine if they were just sounds or actually language.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqtr_RvR3sY --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Bhairitu noozguru@... wrote: Who knows, I might be a bunch of 9th century Samurai with Tourette's Syndrome. :-D On 10/23/2011 05:16 PM, turquoiseb wrote: What's the difference between someone with Tourette's Syndrome and someone spouting gibberish like this while practicing the TM-Sidhis? The Tourettes sufferers don't try to pretend that they're all special and cosmic for doing it. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Bhairitunoozguru@ wrote: On 10/23/2011 03:09 PM, authfriend wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltabluescurtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriendjstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. A number of Sidha's that I used to fly with including myself had these spontaneous Japanese sounding vocalizations. For some reason to me it sounded like a very old dialect. We sounded like a bunch of Samurai. :-D I wonder if anyone has ever recorded them and had a linguist determine if they were just sounds or actually language.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
BTW-- nice projection on the naked thing The CP's were doing the original siddhis where anything and all reactions were deemed appropriate in terms of sounding like a zoo-gone-wild... I seem to recall the explanation in Helsinki 1978/79 was something like (paraphrasing) the animal values are coming out. I wonder if that was the official explanation for the zoo... :D
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@... wrote: The same thing was done when I did the sidhis in that hotel the movement bought on 11th street in downtown DC. No big deal - don't remember if all the vocalizing was still going on. The animal noises were the last reminicents from our lives in the animal kindom released.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: The same thing was done when I did the sidhis in that hotel the movement bought on 11th street in downtown DC. No big deal - don't remember if all the vocalizing was still going on. The animal noises were the last reminicents from our lives in the animal kindom released. I didn't take the TM-Sidhis until 1986, but from what I've heard, the ladies never did do much in the way of animal noises, just a lot of joyful whooping and laughing. Does that mean women never had past lives as animals? On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: The same thing was done when I did the sidhis in that hotel the movement bought on 11th street in downtown DC. No big deal - don't remember if all the vocalizing was still going on. The animal noises were the last reminicents from our lives in the animal kindom released. I didn't take the TM-Sidhis until 1986, but from what I've heard, the ladies never did do much in the way of animal noises, just a lot of joyful whooping and laughing. Does that mean women never had past lives as animals? On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. Some of the early lady flyers used to do a When Harry Met Sally every program through the curtain when we all flew in the MIU Fieldhouse in '78 It was met with great laughter. They were as nuts as the men. No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
(comment below...) I honestly think that's the day everything shifted over into total bat shit craziness. MORE bat shit crazy followed, such as being terrified to enter a building from the wrong direction and people paying a million dollars to dress in robes and crowns and call themselves kings of an imaginary country, but the phase transition moment for me was that day when Maharishi announced that bouncing on your butts on slabs of foam could bring about world peace. And people were so gullible, so guru-whipped, and so in need of something to feel self important about that they believed it. Another time that comes to mind and heart was at the beginning of my first AEGTC course. It was in the Biarritz area of France, in nearby Anglet and the year might have been 1976. It was the course with the fasting every month, the pure. cold, daily baths... Johnny Grey stopped by to inform the entire group of several hundred that all our ATR credit had been dissolved overnight many initiators confronted him as to the incredible unfairness and betrayal of this decision. I remember him saying as he was gesturing to his side, It's not a problem, it's just putting the $$ from one pocket to anotherwe are all together in this.. All the responses were along the line of that we-were-getting-ripped-off-with-sugar-coating-on-top.. C'est la vie..
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
I was just thinking of Kenny G the other day. I simply cannot listen to him and never have been able to, but because he has nice tone and technical ability I keep wondering if I am missing something. He does not play real jazz...he plays elevator music, hold music, music that bores me to insanity...he is missing the soul. I hope his son takes any talent he has and changes course. From: Bhairitu noozg...@sbcglobal.net To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Saturday, October 22, 2011 10:38 AM Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy In the 60's and 70's if you played a 13th chord some idiot in the audience would wander up and say you play too many dischords. The joke response among players was which chord do you mean: dis chord or dat chord. :-D These days that won't happen because the public's ears have been cultured and no longer here such harmonies as dischords. People like Kenny G had something to do with that. But he just sees what he does as a shtick which has made him a lot of money. Yeah, true jazz fans won't be listening to him and I'm sure he doesn't mind. Lawrence Welk had a reputation for hating jazz but after he passed on his daughters said he listened to it a lot. IOW, he maintained a persona for his audience that he disdained jazz because his audience didn't like it. He knew what might happen if he admitted that he loved jazz. Then we have the Lady Gaga phenomena. Some folks dont' like her music either but then she doesn't confess to just writing music but creating performance art and the music is just part of it. If the music is overbearing it will distract from the visual art. And Gaga had good musical training and knows exactly what she is doing. And if she has some extra help with that her PR people will make sure you don't know just as the Beatles PR people did a good job of that. But the latter is another issue that seems to ruffle feathers there. ;-) On 10/22/2011 09:13 AM, pranamoocher wrote: Yes, indeed. 'Twas the frizzy long hair and the Members Only looking jacket that triggered the FL-Kenny G comparison. No doubt, KG is a Lawrence Welk version of jazz, almost pure shmaltz. Blec! --- In fairfieldli...@yahoogroups.com, turquoisebno_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, merudanda no_reply@ wrote: Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] Except for the long frizzy hair, I'm not sure how anyone made a connection between Kenny G and Rama, but please don't make one with me. I, like most fans of real music, consider him pretty much the antithesis of jazz, and barely a musician. It's appropriate that his music has been relegated to musak, because that's all it was ever good for. You might tell the Chinese you know that admitting to liking Kenny G's music will get you banned for life from most jazz clubs in the world. :-) Pat Metheny explaining why Kenny G sucks: http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Cool experience about the Flying Sidhi. I remember one time after I learned the techniques and we were doing doing the program in the TMO garage that we lived in, on foam, in the rural Missouri countryside in 1980, and I just began talking like a roman soldier from antiquity (a true wtf moment). It wasn't clear enough to mean much of anything, but the feeling was pretty striking at the time, and felt real. Now it seems silly, but it did happen back then, so the experience you relate sounds credible to me - time and space do weird things during TM-Siddhis group practice. Powerful techniques. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
-- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@... wrote: Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. ME: I am not making a case that she was deceptive or practiced. She was under the conditions of trance which means that unconscious shaping takes place. Wouldn't it be much cooler if it really was a different language rather than gibberish? This is a huge reinforcement incentive. I've heard many different levels of skill at this in the flying room. I am not discounting your experience of shock. That would be very surprising to hear Japanese people sounding like her. And it could be that she had seen one movie of people speaking Japanese under subtitles and her unconscious mind was playing it back. But there was a feeling in flying rooms that some people were speaking in different languages and that was a reinforcement that we were functioning from a deep trans-personal level. He is a youtube guy faking it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2QaBsKuN34 --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: -- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. ME: I am not making a case that she was deceptive or practiced. She was under the conditions of trance Ah, yes, our old friend trance. Explains everything so conveniently while sounding so sinister. which means that unconscious shaping takes place. Wouldn't it be much cooler if it really was a different language rather than gibberish? This is a huge reinforcement incentive. I've heard many different levels of skill at this in the flying room. Right, it's all about reinforcement and suggestion. I am not discounting your experience of shock. That would be very surprising to hear Japanese people sounding like her. And it could be that she had seen one movie of people speaking Japanese under subtitles and her unconscious mind was playing it back. Yes, the unconscious (or subconscious), another great all-purpose explanation, or explain-away-tion, for any kind of unusual performance. But there was a feeling in flying rooms that some people were speaking in different languages and that was a reinforcement that we were functioning from a deep trans- personal level. He is a youtube guy faking it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2QaBsKuN34 Sorry, he sounds to me very much as if he's faking it. Curtis, I don't mean to suggest there's anything wrong with entertaining skepticism. It's just that the impulse to immediately stamp on whatever might be construed to have the potential to validate something as extraordinary gives me the giggles. I suppose I do somewhat the same thing with Bill Leeds's right-wing tracts and other silly rumors, hastening to check Snopes.com for evidence that they're bogus. But at least belief in those kinds of things can have a really negative effect in the real world.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
On 10/23/2011 03:09 PM, authfriend wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltabluescurtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriendjstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. A number of Sidha's that I used to fly with including myself had these spontaneous Japanese sounding vocalizations. For some reason to me it sounded like a very old dialect. We sounded like a bunch of Samurai. :-D I wonder if anyone has ever recorded them and had a linguist determine if they were just sounds or actually language.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: -- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. ME: I am not making a case that she was deceptive or practiced. She was under the conditions of trance Ah, yes, our old friend trance. Explains everything so conveniently while sounding so sinister. I am using in the sense that is widely accepted in physiology where the unconscious mind is more fluid. I compose music in that state. There is nothing sinister for me. It would only be sinister if you needed to make a big distinction between the state in meditation and what is refereed to as trance. which means that unconscious shaping takes place. Wouldn't it be much cooler if it really was a different language rather than gibberish? This is a huge reinforcement incentive. I've heard many different levels of skill at this in the flying room. Right, it's all about reinforcement and suggestion. Are you saying these conditions are absent in a group practice like flying? It exists in every other social interaction. I am not discounting your experience of shock. That would be very surprising to hear Japanese people sounding like her. And it could be that she had seen one movie of people speaking Japanese under subtitles and her unconscious mind was playing it back. Yes, the unconscious (or subconscious), another great all-purpose explanation, or explain-away-tion, for any kind of unusual performance. Would you prefer the home of all the laws of nature? This is a speculative area for all of us. Do you really find that term more precise and useful? But there was a feeling in flying rooms that some people were speaking in different languages and that was a reinforcement that we were functioning from a deep trans- personal level. He is a youtube guy faking it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2QaBsKuN34 Sorry, he sounds to me very much as if he's faking it. Perhaps he was not as good as the chick you heard. Perhaps you just shaped your memory a tad to connect it with what you were hearing. This is a well known phenomenon and has been experimentally proven again and again. We suck at making the kind of comparison you were describing, matching a language you don't know with sounds that you associate with it. Or do you believe she really was speaking Japanese? You seem resistant to other explanations. Curtis, I don't mean to suggest there's anything wrong with entertaining skepticism. It's just that the impulse to immediately stamp on whatever might be construed to have the potential to validate something as extraordinary gives me the giggles. Oh stop. The chances that she was actually speaking Japanese was the long shot and you know it. Don't put this on me, like I am not just going for the most obvious explanations. I suppose I do somewhat the same thing with Bill Leeds's right-wing tracts and other silly rumors, hastening to check Snopes.com for evidence that they're bogus. But at least belief in those kinds of things can have a really negative effect in the real world. That was cool. Yeah, similar. But the things I mention would be the kinds of things you need to eliminate to find out if she really was speaking in a different language spontaneously. It would be an important step in the direction of something other than known psychological phenomenon manifesting in a group setting. I don't think either of us has much money on this race but it was interesting to discuss. I have read analysis of speaking in tongues, a phenomenon I have witnessed. It is very similar to vocalizations in flying and had many of the same group support dynamics.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
What's the difference between someone with Tourette's Syndrome and someone spouting gibberish like this while practicing the TM-Sidhis? The Tourettes sufferers don't try to pretend that they're all special and cosmic for doing it. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Bhairitu noozguru@... wrote: On 10/23/2011 03:09 PM, authfriend wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltabluescurtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriendjstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. A number of Sidha's that I used to fly with including myself had these spontaneous Japanese sounding vocalizations. For some reason to me it sounded like a very old dialect. We sounded like a bunch of Samurai. :-D I wonder if anyone has ever recorded them and had a linguist determine if they were just sounds or actually language.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: What's the difference between someone with Tourette's Syndrome and someone spouting gibberish like this while practicing the TM-Sidhis? The Tourettes sufferers don't try to pretend that they're all special and cosmic for doing it. Heehee. Says Barry, so desperate for a putdown he didn't bother to read what he was commenting on. Par for the course with him. But then he tells us he's perfectly comfortable with being wrong, so I guess he really doesn't care how dim-witted he makes himself look. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Bhairitu noozguru@ wrote: On 10/23/2011 03:09 PM, authfriend wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltabluescurtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriendjstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. A number of Sidha's that I used to fly with including myself had these spontaneous Japanese sounding vocalizations. For some reason to me it sounded like a very old dialect. We sounded like a bunch of Samurai. :-D I wonder if anyone has ever recorded them and had a linguist determine if they were just sounds or actually language.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: snip which means that unconscious shaping takes place. Wouldn't it be much cooler if it really was a different language rather than gibberish? This is a huge reinforcement incentive. I've heard many different levels of skill at this in the flying room. Right, it's all about reinforcement and suggestion. Are you saying these conditions are absent in a group practice like flying? It exists in every other social interaction. See the words all about? They're key to interpreting my sarcasm. I am not discounting your experience of shock. That would be very surprising to hear Japanese people sounding like her. And it could be that she had seen one movie of people speaking Japanese under subtitles and her unconscious mind was playing it back. Yes, the unconscious (or subconscious), another great all-purpose explanation, or explain-away-tion, for any kind of unusual performance. Would you prefer the home of all the laws of nature? This is a speculative area for all of us. Do you really find that term more precise and useful? Did I use that term, Curtis? snip Curtis, I don't mean to suggest there's anything wrong with entertaining skepticism. It's just that the impulse to immediately stamp on whatever might be construed to have the potential to validate something as extraordinary gives me the giggles. Oh stop. The chances that she was actually speaking Japanese was the long shot and you know it. Don't put this on me, like I am not just going for the most obvious explanations. For crap's sake, Curtis, I was telling a little anecdote about an experience I had on a WPA, not trying to make a case for anything. Stop reading into what I wrote. Look at what I said immediately above again. It's the knee-jerk Uh-oh, I better jump in here and debunk this right away reaction I find so amusing. It's like somebody flung a heap of catnip in front of you. You simply can't resist.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@... wrote: Cool experience about the Flying Sidhi. I remember one time after I learned the techniques and we were doing doing the program in the TMO garage that we lived in, on foam, in the rural Missouri countryside in 1980, and I just began talking like a roman soldier from antiquity (a true wtf moment). Naah, you must have seen one of the documentaries the ancient Romans made about the conquest of Gaul or something and replayed from your subconscious what one of the soldiers they interviewed who had participated said. ;-)
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: Cool experience about the Flying Sidhi. I remember one time after I learned the techniques and we were doing doing the program in the TMO garage that we lived in, on foam, in the rural Missouri countryside in 1980, and I just began talking like a roman soldier from antiquity (a true wtf moment). Naah, you must have seen one of the documentaries the ancient Romans made about the conquest of Gaul or something and replayed from your subconscious what one of the soldiers they interviewed who had participated said. ;-) No, he really was speaking in ancient Latin because he had contacted his past life.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
OK, then what is the difference between psychotic hallucinations and your witnessing Freddy Lenz's levitation? The psychotics don't try to pretend that they're all special and cosmic for doing it. :-) --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: What's the difference between someone with Tourette's Syndrome and someone spouting gibberish like this while practicing the TM-Sidhis? The Tourettes sufferers don't try to pretend that they're all special and cosmic for doing it. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Bhairitu noozguru@ wrote: On 10/23/2011 03:09 PM, authfriend wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltabluescurtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriendjstein@ wrote: snip On one small WPA I took up at the facility in Lancaster, Mass., one of the women kept vocalizing in what sounded like a foreign language. Didn't seem to be just nonsense syllables, it sounded very coherent, as if she was communicating with somebody. On my way home, at the train station my attention was suddenly caught by a conversation a group of Japanese people were having because it sounded *exactly* like the woman's vocalizations, same inflections, same pronunciation of the syllables. The woman in the flying hall was Caucasian and had told us at lunch that she didn't know any foreign languages. She was barely aware that she'd been making any noises. I don't know Japanese, so obviously I couldn't be sure she'd actually been speaking it, but the similarity to the sounds of the conversation of the folks at the train station was eerie. snip No analysis of speaking in tongues has been show to be a real language, Right, this didn't sound like any speaking in tongues I've ever heard (on TV shows about groups that indulge in it, I hasten to add; never heard it live). I would be very surprised to hear that flying gibberish was. It certainly astonished me when I heard the Japanese people talking at the train station. I heard a lot of it and there are parts of the brain that could generate a lot of seemingly coherent phrases that were not language. I heard some people doing it and it would improve over time, become more consistent and convincing. It is a skill that some comedians can reproduce very well sometimes. Sure, she could have been lying about not being aware of what she was doing when she'd actually been practicing it, or that she spoke no foreign languages. I got the impression she was quite sincere, though. I'm not insisting it was woo-woo, but you'd have to have heard it (and then heard some Japanese) to know why it was so striking. A number of Sidha's that I used to fly with including myself had these spontaneous Japanese sounding vocalizations. For some reason to me it sounded like a very old dialect. We sounded like a bunch of Samurai. :-D I wonder if anyone has ever recorded them and had a linguist determine if they were just sounds or actually language.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Who knows? It was a looong time ago. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: Cool experience about the Flying Sidhi. I remember one time after I learned the techniques and we were doing doing the program in the TMO garage that we lived in, on foam, in the rural Missouri countryside in 1980, and I just began talking like a roman soldier from antiquity (a true wtf moment). Naah, you must have seen one of the documentaries the ancient Romans made about the conquest of Gaul or something and replayed from your subconscious what one of the soldiers they interviewed who had participated said. ;-) No, he really was speaking in ancient Latin because he had contacted his past life.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
I think it would require 8000 'Guru Devs' in order to have a real World effect, then, they would actually be functioning from the 'home of all the laws of nature', IMHO. (And not just a faint awareness of it, which is significant but not enough in itself). --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: Just as a followup, I'd love to hear someone -- anyone -- try to make a rational case, based on real, accepted science, for how it could be actually *true* that a few people, grunting and bouncing on their butts in some padded room, could produce world peace. I don't think you can do it. What I expect those who respond to do is to try to trot out all the rationalizations for this bit of crazy trotted out by TMO Maharishi apologists *after the fact*, after he had already proclaimed it to be truth. The proclamation came first. And for most, that was all that was necessary. Whatever he said WAS by definition truth, because of the magic word Maharishisez. But, knowing that they'd now have to go out and convince sane people of the truth of this bit of insanity, then the apologists piled on to create rational-sounding explanations for the obviously irrational. The quantum bullshitters dug into esoteric phenomena that have no relevance to anything *except* on a quantum level and tried to use bullshit theory to baffle the easily baffled. Then the social scientists started to gather data, carefully cherry-pick and massage it, and make it look as if the results were actually caused by what they knew to be the real cause. And again, they knew this in advance, because of the magic word Maharishisez. It could never even *occur* to them that he might be wrong, or worse, bat shit crazy, because that possibility couldn't enter their heads. Therefore the proof that what he'd said was true MUST be out there, and it was their job *as* apologists to either invent it as quantum bullshit theories or prove it by faking or massaging data. I'd just like to see someone forget that all these apologetics were ever trotted out and try to come up with a rational, real-world-science explanation for how they think the ME could possibly work. No woo woo, no New Age BS, no quantum bullshit. Just everyday, accepted science. I wait with 'bated breath for your attempts. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened. But I can pinpoint its nature, and what was said -- and believed -- that caused everything after that point to be a loony bin. It's the day that Maharishi first tried to convince people that bouncing on their butts on slabs of foam in a big room full of other butt-bouncers could end crime, change the weather, and bring about world peace. This pronouncement almost certainly predated the term Maharishi Effect, which was invented later to glorify his pronouncement, and scientific data made up to make it seem true. But from my point of view the fact that ANYONE believed this spiel for even an instant signifies the phase transition point from relative sanity to total madness. Try it yourself by performing your own scientific experiment. Go out onto the street and pick someone at random, and tell them several things that you believe. First, tell them what you heard when you first learned TM -- that it was good for you, and that the deep rest enabled you to function more efficiently and with less stress. You will probably get a general agreement with this. Then say that it is your belief, based on scriptures and reported historical instances and such, that some humans can develop special powers and abilities (the siddhis) that others have not, and possibly even levitate. No one's likely to call you crazy for this, because it is after all a matter of belief, and is no weirder after all than believing in a heaven filled with angels playing harps or that Christ walked on water. But now tell them that you believe that a number of people as special
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@ wrote: I would not be so hard on the folks that bought in to this stuff in the TMO. Many had doubts but were afraid to voice them. We all have our stuff and we were young and devoted and I think this was a time when you were with Rama, who also had his own peculiar version of bat shit crazy crap. Absolutely. I'm just having fun seeing how a few people react to having their behavior described the way someone not part of the TM movement might see and describe it. My guess is that for many of them it may be a novel experience. Yep - we all became professional grade modifiers of what was really going on in the TMO. We got to be to be very very very good at knowing how to explain it all so as not to have people think you were all into something truly weird. Yup. And I'm certainly not suggesting that the Rama trip or other spiritual orgs I've encountered were free of this, merely that for them it never quite got to the point of absurdity like claiming that when we bounce on our butts we're creating world peace. What I've found interesting since starting this thread is that no one -- not even the near-professional apol- ogists on this forum -- have attempted *to* create a rational explanation for how bouncing on their butts creates world peace. Most have just gone the kill the messenger route and attempted to lash out at the person who pointed out (correctly) how absurd it is. In the Rama trip, about the worst I saw was an attempt to say that his frequent attempt to make predictions were always correct, the result of correct seeing or psychic abilities. Me, I didn't buy it, so I started writing them down, and then comparing what was predicted to how things turned out later. Turns out he was correct *at best* 50% of the time, same as if he'd flipped a coin. But I'd bet that if you asked most of his former students, they'd claim he was always correct. Another funny thing around him had to do with his freq- uent misspeaks. For example, he'd mispronounce someone's name (turning Jean Michel Jarre into Jarré), or misre- membering the name of a movie (turning Full Metal Jacket into Heavy Metal Jacket). The hilarious thing was that not only would no one ever correct him, they'd start pro- nouncing the name that way and calling the movie by that name themselves, as if his version was better. :-) People are funny. Having invested heavily in something or someone (especially when that emotional and intellec- tual investment is accompanied by a heavy financial investment), they'll tend to do almost *anything* to avoid dealing with the possibility that they might have made a mistake, or just been gullible. The only unusual aspect of that phenomenon in the TMO is *how long* many people have persisted in doing it, and how upset they get when someone points it out.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
talking about craziness --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, pranamoocher no_reply@... wrote: Researchers discovered in the early 90s that Lenz in his craziness had actually became the first form of the humanoid known as Kenny G ...and his son [;)] Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] talking about becoming official crazy Jasmine Flower http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j58W1WjX9Ckfeature=fvst http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxSeKjGAeSI
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
talking about craziness --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, pranamoocher no_reply@... wrote: Researchers discovered in the early 90s that Lenz in his craziness had actually became the first form of the humanoid known as Kenny G ...and his son [;)] Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] .talking about becoming official crazy Jasmine Flower http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j58W1WjX9Ckfeature=fvst http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxSeKjGAeSI SNIP
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@... wrote: So you keep talking about Maharishi in great analysis and detail to keep from thinking about how Lenz fucked up your head and heart? That's what it looks like. Freddy was exceptionally gifted and insecure. Probably suffering parental rejection, so he got together a few of you and made sure HE was the boss, HE was the Guru. You kissed HIS butt, but you get the picture- you lived it. Now instead of coming to grips with it, you deflect everything about Lenz onto Maharishi. Free clue: Grow a pair and start living in the present and/or see a therapist about the Lenz shit and clear yourself out. Its kind of pathetic to see you in this state, all blind to it and misguidedly throwing all of your pain on Maharishi. After all, Lenz was the mentally ill one, the crazy one, the one you can't grow past even now. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@ wrote: This is not a counter rebuttal, simply another view, a point for further discussion and examination. The tipping point was when a portion (I think it was 11.73% but others may quibble on this)of the full time community -- and some ardent part-timers, kept clung to the notion that M. and his TMOs were all about, only about, the seven step program for teaching 20 min 2x / day. A parallel is Apple and Steve Jobs. When he went more digital (i-tunes, i-phone) and creating superb customer experiences (Apple stores) etc, many of the faithful said, Huh, what does this have to do with selling Macs and What possible effect can a company with 3% market share have on digital music. Steve's vision was that Apple was a digital gateway company (or something along those lines with a core emphasis on superb design. Apple would not be the company with the largest market capitalization in the world (subject to check) and Steve Jobs would not be revered as the CEO of the decade(s), if he limited his vision to selling Macs. M. and his TMOs, in my view, were / are about being a Consciousness gateway org -- not limited to 20 min 2x, but having 50 product lines that enable Consciousness to shine in all parts of a persons life. Yet many whined, when will we get OUR old TMO back, 20 min 2x. When will M come to his senses and do what he is supposed to do, teach TM. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), The day? Organizationally? Turqb, it was in the Spring of '77 on a day when the whole TM teaching organization got overturned by Maharishi at the end of a huge governor (siddhis) training course in Switzerland. As the Maharishi was preparing to dis-band the course and have people (many of the active teaching organization at the time) go home, things changed from that point. Before this the organizational evaluation of how the movement was doing was in how the new initiations of new meditators were doing and also in the numbers of mediators coming to residence courses. In a meeting the whole hierarchical order of the teaching organization was sorted, turned out and replaced by 'teams' of teachers with Bevan, Neil and the Wilsons on top and everyone else spun off. After this re-organization happened the evaluation shifted over to being in the numbers of people going to group practice of the Siddhis. From this it then became about the numbers in group practice of TM-siddhis. The teaching organization and that program got lost from then. The physics discussion around the Meissner Effect had preceded that time. I was there and got to witness this happen. It was a time. -Buck because I'd already left before it happened. But I can pinpoint its nature, and what was said -- and believed -- that caused everything after that point to be a loony bin. It's the day that Maharishi first tried to convince people that bouncing on their butts on slabs of foam in a big room full of other butt-bouncers could
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, merudanda no_reply@... wrote: Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] Except for the long frizzy hair, I'm not sure how anyone made a connection between Kenny G and Rama, but please don't make one with me. I, like most fans of real music, consider him pretty much the antithesis of jazz, and barely a musician. It's appropriate that his music has been relegated to musak, because that's all it was ever good for. You might tell the Chinese you know that admitting to liking Kenny G's music will get you banned for life from most jazz clubs in the world. :-) Pat Metheny explaining why Kenny G sucks: http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@ wrote: I would not be so hard on the folks that bought in to this stuff in the TMO. Many had doubts but were afraid to voice them. We all have our stuff and we were young and devoted and I think this was a time when you were with Rama, who also had his own peculiar version of bat shit crazy crap. Absolutely. I'm just having fun seeing how a few people react to having their behavior described the way someone not part of the TM movement might see and describe it. My guess is that for many of them it may be a novel experience. Yep - we all became professional grade modifiers of what was really going on in the TMO. We got to be to be very very very good at knowing how to explain it all so as not to have people think you were all into something truly weird. Yup. And I'm certainly not suggesting that the Rama trip or other spiritual orgs I've encountered were free of this, merely that for them it never quite got to the point of absurdity like claiming that when we bounce on our butts we're creating world peace. What I've found interesting since starting this thread is that no one -- not even the near-professional apol- ogists on this forum -- have attempted *to* create a rational explanation for how bouncing on their butts creates world peace. Most have just gone the kill the messenger route and attempted to lash out at the person who pointed out (correctly) how absurd it is. In the Rama trip, about the worst I saw was an attempt to say that his frequent attempt to make predictions were always correct, the result of correct seeing or psychic abilities. Me, I didn't buy it, so I started writing them down, and then comparing what was predicted to how things turned out later. Turns out he was correct *at best* 50% of the time, same as if he'd flipped a coin. But I'd bet that if you asked most of his former students, they'd claim he was always correct. Another funny thing around him had to do with his freq- uent misspeaks. For example, he'd mispronounce someone's name (turning Jean Michel Jarre into Jarré), or misre- membering the name of a movie (turning Full Metal Jacket into Heavy Metal Jacket). The hilarious thing was that not only would no one ever correct him, they'd start pro- nouncing the name that way and calling the movie by that name themselves, as if his version was better. :-) People are funny. Having invested heavily in something or someone (especially when that emotional and intellec- tual investment is accompanied by a heavy financial investment), they'll tend to do almost *anything* to avoid dealing with the possibility that they might have made a mistake, or just been gullible. The only unusual aspect of that phenomenon in the TMO is *how long* many people have persisted in doing it, and how upset they get when someone points it out. I can only add that I think it becomes a lot easier to deify someone once they have died. With a little selective memory you can change all the craziness to wisdom and not have any more real life instances to rationalize. But then you lose the darshan, and that may be the point of it all - the boost in quieting the mind so you can notice what never changes. I don't know if Lenz had that, but MMY sure did even in the midst of his very human behavior.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: snip What I've found interesting since starting this thread is that no one -- not even the near-professional apol- ogists on this forum -- have attempted *to* create a rational explanation for how bouncing on their butts creates world peace. Most have just gone the kill the messenger route and attempted to lash out at the person who pointed out (correctly) how absurd it is. I'm going to attempt to lash out at Barry too and point out that while it's correct to say that the claim that bouncing on their butts creates world peace is indeed absurd, it isn't the claim that is actually made, and Barry knows this. He has grossly distorted the claim to *make* it absurd, so his demand for a rational explanation is disingenous in the extreme. (How badly he messed up the *history* is another issue for another post.) When the messenger delivers a false message, as Barry has done, he should expect to be killed (metaphorically, of course). Complaining about it as if it *weren't* to be expected is yet another layer of disingenuity. There's a perfectly good *metaphysical* explanation for why large-group practice of the TM-Sidhis techniques might foster world peace, and Barry knows this too. If he wanted to assert that the explanation is absurd because metaphysics, in his worldview, is absurd, that would be an honest comment on its own terms. Except that when you look at Barry's explanations for Lenz's various purportedly miraculous feats--levitation and golden light and so on--as taking place in an alternate reality, it's clear that Barry's worldview does *not* hold metaphysics to be absurd. So that wouldn't be an out for him. And he'd have a very hard time arguing that his metaphysical explanation for Lenz's feats was somehow better or more reasonable than the metaphysical explanation for why large-group TM-Sidhis practice might create world peace. At least there's a fairly detailed rationale for the Maharishi Effect, whereas his just flatly asserts the existence of an alternate reality in which some people can operate (himself included, of course)and others can't. And given that premise, it makes him look pretty silly when he mocks TMers' purported specialness. The attempt by TM scientists to come up with a quasi- scientific explanation for the metaphysical premise of the TM-Sidhis is a whole 'nother issue. I don't think any of us here are knowledgeable enough about quantum mechanics or string theory either to challenge their explanation, *or* to evaluate the validity of the challenges to it that have been made by the few scientists to address it. So that pretty much remains moot. Final point: As to why bouncing on their butts creates world peace is a gross distortion of the claim for the Maharishi Effect, both world peace and butt-bouncing are, according to the metaphysical explanation, *products* of practice of the TM-Sidhis. The latter is not said to be the *cause* of the former. The cause of both is held to be what TM-Sidhis practitioners do in their heads when they practice the techniques. 'Nuff said. Barry would like to claim a great victory for himself here as the exponent of rationality, but as is so often the case, when he wins, he does so only in his own mind, by cheating. And now he cheats again: In the Rama trip, about the worst I saw was an attempt to say that his frequent attempt to make predictions were always correct, the result of correct seeing or psychic abilities. Notice he doesn't mention Lenz's alternate reality feats. snip People are funny. Having invested heavily in something or someone (especially when that emotional and intellec- tual investment is accompanied by a heavy financial investment), they'll tend to do almost *anything* to avoid dealing with the possibility that they might have made a mistake, or just been gullible. The only unusual aspect of that phenomenon in the TMO is *how long* many people have persisted in doing it, and how upset they get when someone points it out. A magnificent example of Barry's mastery of inadvertent irony, given his own gullibility about Lenz's feats, which he persists in maintaining many years later, even after Lenz's ignominious suicide.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Wait, wait...I want to lash out angrily too, all TB bat-shit crazy, Supposedly Enlightened and obsessed with Barry (Yo, Turq, did I get all of my labels right?): Again, Barry ignores all of the glaring inconsistencies with Freddy and only mentions much smaller ones wrt Maharishi. My take is that Lenz has made Barry so confused, one minute calling him his favorite fair haired boy and the next castigating him or pushing his buttons, that Barry doesn't even know what to think about Freddy, as he has said here before. So he deflects it towards Maharishi. Barry's posts should be featured in Psychology Monthly, as examples of one messed up cult follower. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: snip What I've found interesting since starting this thread is that no one -- not even the near-professional apol- ogists on this forum -- have attempted *to* create a rational explanation for how bouncing on their butts creates world peace. Most have just gone the kill the messenger route and attempted to lash out at the person who pointed out (correctly) how absurd it is. I'm going to attempt to lash out at Barry too and point out that while it's correct to say that the claim that bouncing on their butts creates world peace is indeed absurd, it isn't the claim that is actually made, and Barry knows this. He has grossly distorted the claim to *make* it absurd, so his demand for a rational explanation is disingenous in the extreme. (How badly he messed up the *history* is another issue for another post.) When the messenger delivers a false message, as Barry has done, he should expect to be killed (metaphorically, of course). Complaining about it as if it *weren't* to be expected is yet another layer of disingenuity. There's a perfectly good *metaphysical* explanation for why large-group practice of the TM-Sidhis techniques might foster world peace, and Barry knows this too. If he wanted to assert that the explanation is absurd because metaphysics, in his worldview, is absurd, that would be an honest comment on its own terms. Except that when you look at Barry's explanations for Lenz's various purportedly miraculous feats--levitation and golden light and so on--as taking place in an alternate reality, it's clear that Barry's worldview does *not* hold metaphysics to be absurd. So that wouldn't be an out for him. And he'd have a very hard time arguing that his metaphysical explanation for Lenz's feats was somehow better or more reasonable than the metaphysical explanation for why large-group TM-Sidhis practice might create world peace. At least there's a fairly detailed rationale for the Maharishi Effect, whereas his just flatly asserts the existence of an alternate reality in which some people can operate (himself included, of course)and others can't. And given that premise, it makes him look pretty silly when he mocks TMers' purported specialness. The attempt by TM scientists to come up with a quasi- scientific explanation for the metaphysical premise of the TM-Sidhis is a whole 'nother issue. I don't think any of us here are knowledgeable enough about quantum mechanics or string theory either to challenge their explanation, *or* to evaluate the validity of the challenges to it that have been made by the few scientists to address it. So that pretty much remains moot. Final point: As to why bouncing on their butts creates world peace is a gross distortion of the claim for the Maharishi Effect, both world peace and butt-bouncing are, according to the metaphysical explanation, *products* of practice of the TM-Sidhis. The latter is not said to be the *cause* of the former. The cause of both is held to be what TM-Sidhis practitioners do in their heads when they practice the techniques. 'Nuff said. Barry would like to claim a great victory for himself here as the exponent of rationality, but as is so often the case, when he wins, he does so only in his own mind, by cheating. And now he cheats again: In the Rama trip, about the worst I saw was an attempt to say that his frequent attempt to make predictions were always correct, the result of correct seeing or psychic abilities. Notice he doesn't mention Lenz's alternate reality feats. snip People are funny. Having invested heavily in something or someone (especially when that emotional and intellec- tual investment is accompanied by a heavy financial investment), they'll tend to do almost *anything* to avoid dealing with the possibility that they might have made a mistake, or just been gullible. The only unusual aspect of that phenomenon in the TMO is *how long* many people have persisted in doing it, and how upset they get when someone points it out. A magnificent example of Barry's mastery of inadvertent irony, given his own gullibility
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Oh, and Kenny G hasn't yet put a dog collar around his neck and killed himself.:-) --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, merudanda no_reply@ wrote: Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] Except for the long frizzy hair, I'm not sure how anyone made a connection between Kenny G and Rama, but please don't make one with me. I, like most fans of real music, consider him pretty much the antithesis of jazz, and barely a musician. It's appropriate that his music has been relegated to musak, because that's all it was ever good for. You might tell the Chinese you know that admitting to liking Kenny G's music will get you banned for life from most jazz clubs in the world. :-) Pat Metheny explaining why Kenny G sucks: http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@... wrote: Wait, wait...I want to lash out angrily too But we've only been attempting to lash out, according to Barry. Do you mean you're *really* going to lash out at him rather than just *attempting* to do so like the rest of us? (Barry has a lot of trouble keeping his rhetoric under control, especially when he's trying to put over something he knows is dishonest.) , all TB bat-shit crazy, Supposedly Enlightened and obsessed with Barry (Yo, Turq, did I get all of my labels right?): Again, Barry ignores all of the glaring inconsistencies with Freddy and only mentions much smaller ones wrt Maharishi. My take is that Lenz has made Barry so confused, one minute calling him his favorite fair haired boy and the next castigating him or pushing his buttons, that Barry doesn't even know what to think about Freddy, as he has said here before. So he deflects it towards Maharishi. Barry's posts should be featured in Psychology Monthly, as examples of one messed up cult follower. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: snip What I've found interesting since starting this thread is that no one -- not even the near-professional apol- ogists on this forum -- have attempted *to* create a rational explanation for how bouncing on their butts creates world peace. Most have just gone the kill the messenger route and attempted to lash out at the person who pointed out (correctly) how absurd it is. I'm going to attempt to lash out at Barry too and point out that while it's correct to say that the claim that bouncing on their butts creates world peace is indeed absurd, it isn't the claim that is actually made, and Barry knows this. He has grossly distorted the claim to *make* it absurd, so his demand for a rational explanation is disingenous in the extreme. (How badly he messed up the *history* is another issue for another post.) When the messenger delivers a false message, as Barry has done, he should expect to be killed (metaphorically, of course). Complaining about it as if it *weren't* to be expected is yet another layer of disingenuity. There's a perfectly good *metaphysical* explanation for why large-group practice of the TM-Sidhis techniques might foster world peace, and Barry knows this too. If he wanted to assert that the explanation is absurd because metaphysics, in his worldview, is absurd, that would be an honest comment on its own terms. Except that when you look at Barry's explanations for Lenz's various purportedly miraculous feats--levitation and golden light and so on--as taking place in an alternate reality, it's clear that Barry's worldview does *not* hold metaphysics to be absurd. So that wouldn't be an out for him. And he'd have a very hard time arguing that his metaphysical explanation for Lenz's feats was somehow better or more reasonable than the metaphysical explanation for why large-group TM-Sidhis practice might create world peace. At least there's a fairly detailed rationale for the Maharishi Effect, whereas his just flatly asserts the existence of an alternate reality in which some people can operate (himself included, of course)and others can't. And given that premise, it makes him look pretty silly when he mocks TMers' purported specialness. The attempt by TM scientists to come up with a quasi- scientific explanation for the metaphysical premise of the TM-Sidhis is a whole 'nother issue. I don't think any of us here are knowledgeable enough about quantum mechanics or string theory either to challenge their explanation, *or* to evaluate the validity of the challenges to it that have been made by the few scientists to address it. So that pretty much remains moot. Final point: As to why bouncing on their butts creates world peace is a gross distortion of the claim for the Maharishi Effect, both world peace and butt-bouncing are, according to the metaphysical explanation, *products* of practice of the TM-Sidhis. The latter is not said to be the *cause* of the former. The cause of both is held to be what TM-Sidhis practitioners do in their heads when they practice the techniques. 'Nuff said. Barry would like to claim a great victory for himself here as the exponent of rationality, but as is so often the case, when he wins, he does so only in his own mind, by cheating. And now he cheats again: In the Rama trip, about the worst I saw was an attempt to say that his frequent attempt to make predictions were always correct, the result of correct seeing or psychic abilities. Notice he doesn't mention Lenz's alternate reality feats. snip People are funny. Having invested heavily in something or someone (especially when that
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Right, right, I meant attempting to lash out - it sounds more cartoonish and impotent, in-line with Barry's fantasies... --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, whynotnow7 whynotnow7@ wrote: Wait, wait...I want to lash out angrily too But we've only been attempting to lash out, according to Barry. Do you mean you're *really* going to lash out at him rather than just *attempting* to do so like the rest of us? (Barry has a lot of trouble keeping his rhetoric under control, especially when he's trying to put over something he knows is dishonest.) , all TB bat-shit crazy, Supposedly Enlightened and obsessed with Barry (Yo, Turq, did I get all of my labels right?): Again, Barry ignores all of the glaring inconsistencies with Freddy and only mentions much smaller ones wrt Maharishi. My take is that Lenz has made Barry so confused, one minute calling him his favorite fair haired boy and the next castigating him or pushing his buttons, that Barry doesn't even know what to think about Freddy, as he has said here before. So he deflects it towards Maharishi. Barry's posts should be featured in Psychology Monthly, as examples of one messed up cult follower. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend jstein@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: snip What I've found interesting since starting this thread is that no one -- not even the near-professional apol- ogists on this forum -- have attempted *to* create a rational explanation for how bouncing on their butts creates world peace. Most have just gone the kill the messenger route and attempted to lash out at the person who pointed out (correctly) how absurd it is. I'm going to attempt to lash out at Barry too and point out that while it's correct to say that the claim that bouncing on their butts creates world peace is indeed absurd, it isn't the claim that is actually made, and Barry knows this. He has grossly distorted the claim to *make* it absurd, so his demand for a rational explanation is disingenous in the extreme. (How badly he messed up the *history* is another issue for another post.) When the messenger delivers a false message, as Barry has done, he should expect to be killed (metaphorically, of course). Complaining about it as if it *weren't* to be expected is yet another layer of disingenuity. There's a perfectly good *metaphysical* explanation for why large-group practice of the TM-Sidhis techniques might foster world peace, and Barry knows this too. If he wanted to assert that the explanation is absurd because metaphysics, in his worldview, is absurd, that would be an honest comment on its own terms. Except that when you look at Barry's explanations for Lenz's various purportedly miraculous feats--levitation and golden light and so on--as taking place in an alternate reality, it's clear that Barry's worldview does *not* hold metaphysics to be absurd. So that wouldn't be an out for him. And he'd have a very hard time arguing that his metaphysical explanation for Lenz's feats was somehow better or more reasonable than the metaphysical explanation for why large-group TM-Sidhis practice might create world peace. At least there's a fairly detailed rationale for the Maharishi Effect, whereas his just flatly asserts the existence of an alternate reality in which some people can operate (himself included, of course)and others can't. And given that premise, it makes him look pretty silly when he mocks TMers' purported specialness. The attempt by TM scientists to come up with a quasi- scientific explanation for the metaphysical premise of the TM-Sidhis is a whole 'nother issue. I don't think any of us here are knowledgeable enough about quantum mechanics or string theory either to challenge their explanation, *or* to evaluate the validity of the challenges to it that have been made by the few scientists to address it. So that pretty much remains moot. Final point: As to why bouncing on their butts creates world peace is a gross distortion of the claim for the Maharishi Effect, both world peace and butt-bouncing are, according to the metaphysical explanation, *products* of practice of the TM-Sidhis. The latter is not said to be the *cause* of the former. The cause of both is held to be what TM-Sidhis practitioners do in their heads when they practice the techniques. 'Nuff said. Barry would like to claim a great victory for himself here as the exponent of rationality, but as is so often the case, when he wins, he does so only in his own mind, by cheating. And now he cheats again: In the Rama trip, about the worst I saw was an attempt
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Yes, indeed. 'Twas the frizzy long hair and the Members Only looking jacket that triggered the FL-Kenny G comparison. No doubt, KG is a Lawrence Welk version of jazz, almost pure shmaltz. Blec! --- In fairfieldli...@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, merudanda no_reply@ wrote: Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] Except for the long frizzy hair, I'm not sure how anyone made a connection between Kenny G and Rama, but please don't make one with me. I, like most fans of real music, consider him pretty much the antithesis of jazz, and barely a musician. It's appropriate that his music has been relegated to musak, because that's all it was ever good for. You might tell the Chinese you know that admitting to liking Kenny G's music will get you banned for life from most jazz clubs in the world. :-) Pat Metheny explaining why Kenny G sucks: http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
When he was in high school Kenny Gorelick used to sneak into the Doubletree Inn to hear the jazz trio I played in. Gotta say that he may have improved Musak a bit. Of course smooth jazz grew out of the commercialization of jazz in the 1970s with the CTI label. On 10/22/2011 07:42 AM, whynotnow7 wrote: Oh, and Kenny G hasn't yet put a dog collar around his neck and killed himself.:-) --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoisebno_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, merudandano_reply@ wrote: Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] Except for the long frizzy hair, I'm not sure how anyone made a connection between Kenny G and Rama, but please don't make one with me. I, like most fans of real music, consider him pretty much the antithesis of jazz, and barely a musician. It's appropriate that his music has been relegated to musak, because that's all it was ever good for. You might tell the Chinese you know that admitting to liking Kenny G's music will get you banned for life from most jazz clubs in the world. :-) Pat Metheny explaining why Kenny G sucks: http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, pranamoocher no_reply@... wrote: Yes, indeed. 'Twas the frizzy long hair and the Members Only looking jacket that triggered the FL-Kenny G comparison. No doubt, KG is a Lawrence Welk version of jazz, almost pure shmaltz. Blec! Good to hear. I was worried there for a minute. There is music, and then there is Kenny G. Even Rama had better musical taste than to like Kenny G. :-)
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
In the 60's and 70's if you played a 13th chord some idiot in the audience would wander up and say you play too many dischords. The joke response among players was which chord do you mean: dis chord or dat chord. :-D These days that won't happen because the public's ears have been cultured and no longer here such harmonies as dischords. People like Kenny G had something to do with that. But he just sees what he does as a shtick which has made him a lot of money. Yeah, true jazz fans won't be listening to him and I'm sure he doesn't mind. Lawrence Welk had a reputation for hating jazz but after he passed on his daughters said he listened to it a lot. IOW, he maintained a persona for his audience that he disdained jazz because his audience didn't like it. He knew what might happen if he admitted that he loved jazz. Then we have the Lady Gaga phenomena. Some folks dont' like her music either but then she doesn't confess to just writing music but creating performance art and the music is just part of it. If the music is overbearing it will distract from the visual art. And Gaga had good musical training and knows exactly what she is doing. And if she has some extra help with that her PR people will make sure you don't know just as the Beatles PR people did a good job of that. But the latter is another issue that seems to ruffle feathers there. ;-) On 10/22/2011 09:13 AM, pranamoocher wrote: Yes, indeed. 'Twas the frizzy long hair and the Members Only looking jacket that triggered the FL-Kenny G comparison. No doubt, KG is a Lawrence Welk version of jazz, almost pure shmaltz. Blec! --- In fairfieldli...@yahoogroups.com, turquoisebno_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, merudanda no_reply@ wrote: Kenny G with his son, Max G http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9KLAltIol4feature=related His music is noticeably quite popular in China. WOW PRANA (lol) hearing his Going Home often played at closing time at public places or at the end of classes at schools here. (Mass transit systems in Tianjin and Shanghai play his songs too when trains approach terminus stations ) will remind me now of Rama and turquoiseb... [:D] Except for the long frizzy hair, I'm not sure how anyone made a connection between Kenny G and Rama, but please don't make one with me. I, like most fans of real music, consider him pretty much the antithesis of jazz, and barely a musician. It's appropriate that his music has been relegated to musak, because that's all it was ever good for. You might tell the Chinese you know that admitting to liking Kenny G's music will get you banned for life from most jazz clubs in the world. :-) Pat Metheny explaining why Kenny G sucks: http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
For me it was sometime around '76. I was about to take my first siddhis course in Switzerland. Often I would get to Europe a month early to hike in the Swiss alps. So I was there early this time, too, and happened upon a course going on somewhere on Lake Lucerne. I remember a hotel and all the windows were papered over on the first floor . There was a small crowd of locals standing there and you could tell they were listening to something. I came closer and could hear through the glass total pandemonium, like a crazy zoo inside. The Swiss people outside were clearly distressed and wondering what was happening in their lovely village. Quite a far cry from the normal silence of meditation I was accustomed to teaching and participating in... At that moment I really started to doubt the blessed path I was on. I made a decision on the spot, out of my love and dedication to Maharishi, to continue no matter where the path led Another time in the late '70's, I was on some course with M. there. When he was leaving for the day, there was the normal line-up to give him a flower or get darshan as he was leaving the lecture hall. I knew where he was heading and picked a spot right by a door I knew went to his private area. He passed by me and the door was opened for him. I then heard him say, in a completely different tone, Close the door, close the door to his escort. It was a seemingly cranky and impatient, almost angry tone. I remember thinking, wow-- something else going on there than his normal enlightened persona
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Great reminiscence. This is something I like about FFL. Every once in a while some one 'who was there' will pop up and give an account of what they saw. Thanks for taking the time to share this. -Buck in FF --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, stevelf ysoy10li@... wrote: For me it was sometime around '76. I was about to take my first siddhis course in Switzerland. Often I would get to Europe a month early to hike in the Swiss alps. So I was there early this time, too, and happened upon a course going on somewhere on Lake Lucerne. I remember a hotel and all the windows were papered over on the first floor . There was a small crowd of locals standing there and you could tell they were listening to something. I came closer and could hear through the glass total pandemonium, like a crazy zoo inside. The Swiss people outside were clearly distressed and wondering what was happening in their lovely village. Quite a far cry from the normal silence of meditation I was accustomed to teaching and participating in... At that moment I really started to doubt the blessed path I was on. I made a decision on the spot, out of my love and dedication to Maharishi, to continue no matter where the path led Another time in the late '70's, I was on some course with M. there. When he was leaving for the day, there was the normal line-up to give him a flower or get darshan as he was leaving the lecture hall. I knew where he was heading and picked a spot right by a door I knew went to his private area. He passed by me and the door was opened for him. I then heard him say, in a completely different tone, Close the door, close the door to his escort. It was a seemingly cranky and impatient, almost angry tone. I remember thinking, wow-- something else going on there than his normal enlightened persona
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
BTW-- nice projection on the naked thing The CP's were doing the original siddhis where anything and all reactions were deemed appropriate in terms of sounding like a zoo-gone-wild... and/or a possessed insane shouting / it was uncharted territory for the notoriously- straight TM organization. kind of a private-let-it-all-out-time with direct contact with M. every day--- Age of Enlightenment techniques and all that And then along came mountain bikes and I found my own, if not eventually temporary, path. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Sal Sunshine salsunshine@... wrote: On Oct 22, 2011, at 2:26 PM, stevelf wrote: For me it was sometime around '76. I was about to take my first siddhis course in Switzerland. Often I would get to Europe a month early to hike in the Swiss alps. So I was there early this time, too, and happened upon a course going on somewhere on Lake Lucerne. I remember a hotel and all the windows were papered over on the first floor. Really~~papered over?? Were they all running around naked inside or something? (God forbid, considering who some of them were.) Sal
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
The same thing was done when I did the sidhis in that hotel the movement bought on 11th street in downtown DC. No big deal - don't remember if all the vocalizing was still going on. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Sal Sunshine salsunshine@... wrote: On Oct 22, 2011, at 2:26 PM, stevelf wrote: For me it was sometime around '76. I was about to take my first siddhis course in Switzerland. Often I would get to Europe a month early to hike in the Swiss alps. So I was there early this time, too, and happened upon a course going on somewhere on Lake Lucerne. I remember a hotel and all the windows were papered over on the first floor. Really~~papered over?? Were they all running around naked inside or something? (God forbid, considering who some of them were.) Sal
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Just as a followup, I'd love to hear someone -- anyone -- try to make a rational case, based on real, accepted science, for how it could be actually *true* that a few people, grunting and bouncing on their butts in some padded room, could produce world peace. I don't think you can do it. What I expect those who respond to do is to try to trot out all the rationalizations for this bit of crazy trotted out by TMO Maharishi apologists *after the fact*, after he had already proclaimed it to be truth. The proclamation came first. And for most, that was all that was necessary. Whatever he said WAS by definition truth, because of the magic word Maharishisez. But, knowing that they'd now have to go out and convince sane people of the truth of this bit of insanity, then the apologists piled on to create rational-sounding explanations for the obviously irrational. The quantum bullshitters dug into esoteric phenomena that have no relevance to anything *except* on a quantum level and tried to use bullshit theory to baffle the easily baffled. Then the social scientists started to gather data, carefully cherry-pick and massage it, and make it look as if the results were actually caused by what they knew to be the real cause. And again, they knew this in advance, because of the magic word Maharishisez. It could never even *occur* to them that he might be wrong, or worse, bat shit crazy, because that possibility couldn't enter their heads. Therefore the proof that what he'd said was true MUST be out there, and it was their job *as* apologists to either invent it as quantum bullshit theories or prove it by faking or massaging data. I'd just like to see someone forget that all these apologetics were ever trotted out and try to come up with a rational, real-world-science explanation for how they think the ME could possibly work. No woo woo, no New Age BS, no quantum bullshit. Just everyday, accepted science. I wait with 'bated breath for your attempts. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened. But I can pinpoint its nature, and what was said -- and believed -- that caused everything after that point to be a loony bin. It's the day that Maharishi first tried to convince people that bouncing on their butts on slabs of foam in a big room full of other butt-bouncers could end crime, change the weather, and bring about world peace. This pronouncement almost certainly predated the term Maharishi Effect, which was invented later to glorify his pronouncement, and scientific data made up to make it seem true. But from my point of view the fact that ANYONE believed this spiel for even an instant signifies the phase transition point from relative sanity to total madness. Try it yourself by performing your own scientific experiment. Go out onto the street and pick someone at random, and tell them several things that you believe. First, tell them what you heard when you first learned TM -- that it was good for you, and that the deep rest enabled you to function more efficiently and with less stress. You will probably get a general agreement with this. Then say that it is your belief, based on scriptures and reported historical instances and such, that some humans can develop special powers and abilities (the siddhis) that others have not, and possibly even levitate. No one's likely to call you crazy for this, because it is after all a matter of belief, and is no weirder after all than believing in a heaven filled with angels playing harps or that Christ walked on water. But now tell them that you believe that a number of people as special as yourself generate so much Woo Woo by grunting and bouncing around on their butts on slabs of foam that THEY CAN CREATE WORLD PEACE, all by themselves, with no further action needed. My bet is that the strangers you've selected for this experiment are going to start edging away from you nervously, if not actually running down the street away from you. The very idea is absurd, and based on a level of
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
This is not a counter rebuttal, simply another view, a point for further discussion and examination. The tipping point was when a portion (I think it was 11.73% but others may quibble on this)of the full time community -- and some ardent part-timers, kept clung to the notion that M. and his TMOs were all about, only about, the seven step program for teaching 20 min 2x / day. A parallel is Apple and Steve Jobs. When he went more digital (i-tunes, i-phone) and creating superb customer experiences (Apple stores) etc, many of the faithful said, Huh, what does this have to do with selling Macs and What possible effect can a company with 3% market share have on digital music. Steve's vision was that Apple was a digital gateway company (or something along those lines with a core emphasis on superb design. Apple would not be the company with the largest market capitalization in the world (subject to check) and Steve Jobs would not be revered as the CEO of the decade(s), if he limited his vision to selling Macs. M. and his TMOs, in my view, were / are about being a Consciousness gateway org -- not limited to 20 min 2x, but having 50 product lines that enable Consciousness to shine in all parts of a persons life. Yet many whined, when will we get OUR old TMO back, 20 min 2x. When will M come to his senses and do what he is supposed to do, teach TM. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened. But I can pinpoint its nature, and what was said -- and believed -- that caused everything after that point to be a loony bin. It's the day that Maharishi first tried to convince people that bouncing on their butts on slabs of foam in a big room full of other butt-bouncers could end crime, change the weather, and bring about world peace. This pronouncement almost certainly predated the term Maharishi Effect, which was invented later to glorify his pronouncement, and scientific data made up to make it seem true. But from my point of view the fact that ANYONE believed this spiel for even an instant signifies the phase transition point from relative sanity to total madness. Try it yourself by performing your own scientific experiment. Go out onto the street and pick someone at random, and tell them several things that you believe. First, tell them what you heard when you first learned TM -- that it was good for you, and that the deep rest enabled you to function more efficiently and with less stress. You will probably get a general agreement with this. Then say that it is your belief, based on scriptures and reported historical instances and such, that some humans can develop special powers and abilities (the siddhis) that others have not, and possibly even levitate. No one's likely to call you crazy for this, because it is after all a matter of belief, and is no weirder after all than believing in a heaven filled with angels playing harps or that Christ walked on water. But now tell them that you believe that a number of people as special as yourself generate so much Woo Woo by grunting and bouncing around on their butts on slabs of foam that THEY CAN CREATE WORLD PEACE, all by themselves, with no further action needed. My bet is that the strangers you've selected for this experiment are going to start edging away from you nervously, if not actually running down the street away from you. The very idea is absurd, and based on a level of self-importance that most people on the planet associate only with full-blown insanity. As I've said, I'd left the TMO before Maharishi ever started talking about this. If I'd still been there I would have laughed in his face and walked out of the room, never to return. So I find it difficult to imagine people listening to it and being SO self-absorbed and self-important that they actually bought it. The TM-Sidhis were originally introduced as a means to an end, a way to speed up the enlightenment process. There was not a WORD about what performing them might do for
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj vajradhatu@... wrote: You know the sad thing? It doesn't matter if the TM-Sidhi thing was when they went officially crazy (I too believe that was the major turning point). It doesn't matter if the research is bullshit. It' doesn't matter that Mahesh was never trained as a guru or shishya. It doesn't matter that he was making up it all along. What matters is that they've been able to keep up appearances. Their websites still look cool: esp. if you are wealthy or upper middle class person who gets lots of very nice catalogues. Their advertising looks on par with such high-end product lines, and thus geared to the Oprahs and the ladder climbers of this world. It speaks in their advert. language. And it doesn't matter if Mahesh was molesting his students: he maintained an impeccable stage persona, complete with make-up. etc. and that wonderful silk attire. And the most important part is that they have super-saturated the web with this air-brushed image and they've pushed themselves to the top of the search engines. If I search for anything remotely related to TM or TM org products - or just plain meditation - I'm very likely to have an advert. link to MUM.edu. They've played and paid the game of spiritual materialism better than anyone else. So that may be all it takes. People love their appearances. On Oct 21, 2011, at 5:30 AM, turquoiseb wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened. But I can pinpoint its nature, and what was said -- and believed -- that caused everything after that point to be a loony bin. It's the day that Maharishi first tried to convince people that bouncing on their butts on slabs of foam in a big room full of other butt-bouncers could end crime, change the weather, and bring about world peace. This pronouncement almost certainly predated the term Maharishi Effect, which was invented later to glorify his pronouncement, and scientific data made up to make it seem true. But from my point of view the fact that ANYONE believed this spiel for even an instant signifies the phase transition point from relative sanity to total madness. Try it yourself by performing your own scientific experiment. Go out onto the street and pick someone at random, and tell them several things that you believe. First, tell them what you heard when you first learned TM -- that it was good for you, and that the deep rest enabled you to function more efficiently and with less stress. You will probably get a general agreement with this. Then say that it is your belief, based on scriptures and reported historical instances and such, that some humans can develop special powers and abilities (the siddhis) that others have not, and possibly even levitate. No one's likely to call you crazy for this, because it is after all a matter of belief, and is no weirder after all than believing in a heaven filled with angels playing harps or that Christ walked on water. But now tell them that you believe that a number of people as special as yourself generate so much Woo Woo by grunting and bouncing around on their butts on slabs of foam that THEY CAN CREATE WORLD PEACE, all by themselves, with no further action needed. My bet is that the strangers you've selected for this experiment are going to start edging away from you nervously, if not actually running down the street away from you. The very idea is absurd, and based on a level of self-importance that most people on the planet associate only with full-blown insanity. As I've said, I'd left the TMO before Maharishi ever started talking about this. If I'd still been there I would have laughed in his face and walked out of the room, never to return. So I find it difficult to imagine people listening to it and being SO self-absorbed and self-important that they actually bought it. The TM-Sidhis were originally
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@... wrote: I would not be so hard on the folks that bought in to this stuff in the TMO. Many had doubts but were afraid to voice them. We all have our stuff and we were young and devoted and I think this was a time when you were with Rama, who also had his own peculiar version of bat shit crazy crap. Absolutely. I'm just having fun seeing how a few people react to having their behavior described the way someone not part of the TM movement might see and describe it. My guess is that for many of them it may be a novel experience.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
On 10/21/2011 05:18 AM, turquoiseb wrote: Just as a followup, I'd love to hear someone -- anyone -- try to make a rational case, based on real, accepted science, for how it could be actually *true* that a few people, grunting and bouncing on their butts in some padded room, could produce world peace. I don't think you can do it. I've always felt that the concept behind this was the one of the Kumbh Mela festivals in India that happen every 12 years. There you have a very large gathering of spiritual folks hoping to effect the world with their vibes. There is probably some science of psychics involving how a group can broadcast into the world some effect but the Dome hoping probably just benefits Fairfield and not much further with a softer environment. That it will create World Peace is only a fantasy. On the other part of your original rant: What I think we're seeing now are the dying gasps of movement which as predicted after MMY passing would have internal struggles for power. From traditional viewpoints MMY really didn't make acharyas who could have carried on a tradition. For instance Sivananda did have disciples who could carry on as gurus. TM teachers are not gurus but just machines to parrot some basic mantra meditation. There are definitely some doubts that MMY was an archaya himself and by the tradition had no authority to even make meditation teachers. One may not like the idea of authority or license but that is the way these traditions work. Where I was in the 1970s doubts began arising among teachers with the Age of Enlightenment courses. Some started paying attention to what Muktananda was teaching since he would answer questions MMY would not. I personally don't know of any teachers who left TM and joined his movement but I'm sure there were some. I did when visiting Amritapuri (Ammachi's ashram in Kerala) see a couple of TM teachers I knew from the 70s who had joined that organization. And regarding Muktananda there was fallout in his organization after he passed because of who he delegated to run it. Price hikes also disturbed teachers. Not so much the $75 to $125 one but the one to $400. I recall Charlie Lutes at a meeting for teachers in my area lambasting the price increase during a recession. Everyone felt that keeping TM affordable was important. And then let's not forget that many teachers were leaving their 20's behind, getting married, having children and could not longer play hippie in a suit to support a family. Many simply left TM behind and having suits some turned into yuppies. :-D
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@ wrote: I would not be so hard on the folks that bought in to this stuff in the TMO. Many had doubts but were afraid to voice them. We all have our stuff and we were young and devoted and I think this was a time when you were with Rama, who also had his own peculiar version of bat shit crazy crap. Absolutely. I'm just having fun seeing how a few people react to having their behavior described the way someone not part of the TM movement might see and describe it. My guess is that for many of them it may be a novel experience. Yep - we all became professional grade modifiers of what was really going on in the TMO. We got to be to be very very very good at knowing how to explain it all so as not to have people think you were all into something truly weird. What is interesting is that in the last few years people are much more open to this type of approach to life. The mainstream Presbyterian church near my house is having a large alternative medicine all-day fair soon - tables with tai chi, acupuncture, zen meditation, chiropractors, herbalists, yoga etc. It is a far cry from million dollar crowns and robes and rajas which will be suspect until about 50 years from now, when it will be a memory and a story told with awe about MMY's last wishes (that is if anyone is talking about TM 50 years from now). It could grow and gain momentum and seem pretty amazing and far out especially since no one will have actually been there to know how it all really went down.
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
turquoiseb: I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened... So, you know nothing about the TMO after 1972, when you got kicked out, but somehow the TMO went 'bat-shit crazy' because you went over to work for Fred Lenz. LoL! SNIP
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Richard, I doubt Barry will read or respond to your post. But I think Barry was active in the TMO for several years beyond 1972. My recollection is that Lenz/Rama came along around 1977-78 and attracted a number of west coast teachers of TM who at that time were feeling disillusioned by some aspects of the TMO. It was not all that uncommon to begin to have serious doubts and concerns in those years- especially if you were involved enough with the TMO to see the inside scoop on things. A lot of really good, smart people began to drift away. Rules and hierarchies began to form, some not very nice behavior was rather common, there was a mentality that the TMO was there to police it's devoted teacher. It got really odd if you thought for yourself about any of these changes. Despite this, a lot of really good smart people stayed with MMY, real devotees. Of course Lenz/Rama had to be about as strange as they come from what I've heard! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, richardwillytexwilliams willytex@... wrote: turquoiseb: I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened... So, you know nothing about the TMO after 1972, when you got kicked out, but somehow the TMO went 'bat-shit crazy' because you went over to work for Fred Lenz. LoL! SNIP
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
Researchers discovered in the early 90s that Lenz in his craziness had actually became the first form of the humanoid known as Kenny G ... --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, richardwillytexwilliams willytex@... wrote: turquoiseb: I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened... So, you know nothing about the TMO after 1972, when you got kicked out, but somehow the TMO went 'bat-shit crazy' because you went over to work for Fred Lenz. LoL! SNIP
[FairfieldLife] Re: The Day That TMers Became Officially Crazy
So you keep talking about Maharishi in great analysis and detail to keep from thinking about how Lenz fucked up your head and heart? That's what it looks like. Freddy was exceptionally gifted and insecure. Probably suffering parental rejection, so he got together a few of you and made sure HE was the boss, HE was the Guru. You kissed HIS butt, but you get the picture- you lived it. Now instead of coming to grips with it, you deflect everything about Lenz onto Maharishi. Free clue: Grow a pair and start living in the present and/or see a therapist about the Lenz shit and clear yourself out. Its kind of pathetic to see you in this state, all blind to it and misguidedly throwing all of your pain on Maharishi. After all, Lenz was the mentally ill one, the crazy one, the one you can't grow past even now. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, tartbrain no_reply@... wrote: This is not a counter rebuttal, simply another view, a point for further discussion and examination. The tipping point was when a portion (I think it was 11.73% but others may quibble on this)of the full time community -- and some ardent part-timers, kept clung to the notion that M. and his TMOs were all about, only about, the seven step program for teaching 20 min 2x / day. A parallel is Apple and Steve Jobs. When he went more digital (i-tunes, i-phone) and creating superb customer experiences (Apple stores) etc, many of the faithful said, Huh, what does this have to do with selling Macs and What possible effect can a company with 3% market share have on digital music. Steve's vision was that Apple was a digital gateway company (or something along those lines with a core emphasis on superb design. Apple would not be the company with the largest market capitalization in the world (subject to check) and Steve Jobs would not be revered as the CEO of the decade(s), if he limited his vision to selling Macs. M. and his TMOs, in my view, were / are about being a Consciousness gateway org -- not limited to 20 min 2x, but having 50 product lines that enable Consciousness to shine in all parts of a persons life. Yet many whined, when will we get OUR old TMO back, 20 min 2x. When will M come to his senses and do what he is supposed to do, teach TM. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: The sense of near-desperation with which some on this forum are hoping that Oprah is the new Merv and that TM is finally on the upswing again left me thinking about its past, and trying to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Many have speculated on this forum about what that phase transition moment was, the point at which it all began to unravel and go downhill. For many (including luminaries like Charlie Lutes and Jerry Jarvis), that point was the introduction of the TM-Sidhi program. Me, I have a different theory, and I'm going to rap about it in a little mini-essay today. Be warned...this may be a little long (although not the length of Robin's epics), and it may piss a few people off. But it's what I honestly believe. I cannot pinpoint the exact day or month or year in which TMers went officially bat shit crazy (some TM historian type here may be able to do that for us), because I'd already left before it happened. But I can pinpoint its nature, and what was said -- and believed -- that caused everything after that point to be a loony bin. It's the day that Maharishi first tried to convince people that bouncing on their butts on slabs of foam in a big room full of other butt-bouncers could end crime, change the weather, and bring about world peace. This pronouncement almost certainly predated the term Maharishi Effect, which was invented later to glorify his pronouncement, and scientific data made up to make it seem true. But from my point of view the fact that ANYONE believed this spiel for even an instant signifies the phase transition point from relative sanity to total madness. Try it yourself by performing your own scientific experiment. Go out onto the street and pick someone at random, and tell them several things that you believe. First, tell them what you heard when you first learned TM -- that it was good for you, and that the deep rest enabled you to function more efficiently and with less stress. You will probably get a general agreement with this. Then say that it is your belief, based on scriptures and reported historical instances and such, that some humans can develop special powers and abilities (the siddhis) that others have not, and possibly even levitate. No one's likely to call you crazy for this, because it is after all a matter of belief, and is no weirder after all than believing in a heaven filled with angels playing harps or that Christ walked on water. But now tell them that you believe that a number of people as special as yourself generate so much
