Click here to go to the next issue.

Wednesday, October 25


GLORIA

Lately this place reminds me of a halfway house where I did some
counseling training. They spent the entire group session doing
nothing but griping about each other. This one didn't do their
fair share of the chores, so and so played the TV too loud, that
one hogged the bathroom..it seemed like none of them could stand
each other and they all wanted the others to change. The only
thing they seemed to agree on was that they all hated the house
rules, but they couldn't agree on which ones to change. In a
moment of perhaps divine inspiration, the mostly silent
counselor finally said, "Okay, who wants to leave?"

Dead silence....

____________________________________________________________________________


GENE POOLE WITH CEE AND DAN

deep
profound
bliss
found
directly
inside

why waste time squabbling?

love, cee

----------

DAN: To futilely try to verify that there really is an outside
to me through the experience "friction".

---------------

GENE: Well observed, Cee and Dan.

There may be something more at play here, however. Please look
at these:

Double-binding as control-conditioning:

<http://www.geocities.com/HotSprings/Spa/2914/rtriggers.html>

We may be dealing with deeply disturbed individuals, who have
only a dim awareness of their dilemmas. They are reaching out
for help, and their words are actually an explication of their
deeply buried traumas. When seen this way, it all makes sense.
But that does not make the delivery of 'help' any easier. Only
if they can develop the ability to listen internally, will they
be able to understand the nature of the transaction which they
themselves initiate and then kill, over and over.

This is called 'paradoxical communication' and is central to
certain forms or manifestations of 'schizophrenia'.

It is the explicit attempt to implant double-binding, which is
the tip-off. Look for it. This is how victims replicate the
actions of 'their' victimizers, a cycle which is difficult to
perceive, let alone interrupt.

<http://www.geocities.com/HotSprings/Spa/2914/ritual.html>

The lengthy quote below, which is relevant to understanding of
this perplexing 'paradoxical communication', is from:

<http://www.esvce.org/esvce-97-1.html>

And clearly portrays the dynamic now in question, here in NDS:

"The role of paradoxical interspecific communication in the
development of family-pack hierarchical instabilities"

Joël Dehasse, DVM, Brussels, Belgium

"A hierarchical instability in a family-pack with the production
of canine competitive, irritation and territorial aggression and
the dog having access to dominance privileges has been called in
France and French-speaking Belgium a "sociopathy". This is a
pathology of the communications inside an interspecific system
consisting of the family members and the dog (hence the name
family-pack). The paradoxical communication (double bind) is
emitted by the owners. The paradox resides in the opposition of
cognitive and affective communications, for example an order to
be obeyed asked with an expression of fear (like the upper part
of the body bending slightly backward). The two communications
are expressed in the verbal conditioning queries and the
affective involuntary paraverbal attitudes in the same person.
The communication is losing sense. The dog is more sensitive to
analogical communication and is not fooled by the verbal orders.
The communication is not or badly ritualised and causes anxiety.
The double-bind may also be triggered by a false belief or a
misunderstanding of the communication proposal by the dog: a
lying-down-on-the-back posture to ask for caresses is
misunderstood for submission when the dog is expressing a
dominant behaviour; if still caressed after a misunderstood
demand to stop the contact (tense posture) the dog may express
irritation aggression that is once again misunderstood as
unpredictable voluntary hostile behaviour. The double bind may
be emitted by the same person or by two separate owners (split
up double bind). The double bind is causing intermittent
anxiety. The tolerance for the dog having dominant privileges
may lead to partial unstable dominance. The continual challenge
of the dog's dominant privileges may lead to aggression. The
rewarding effects of aggression may lead to hyperaggression. The
treatment is global (systemic): clarification and ritualisation
of the communications - suppression of the access to dominant
privileges - use of drugs able to alleviate anxiety, reduce
aggression and facilitate learning: mood regulatory drugs like
selegiline or carbamazepine, anti-anxiety drugs like
clomipramine, anti-aggressive drugs like risperidone. "

[endquote]

Above, the '... suppression of the access to dominant
privileges... ' refers to the inevitability of social or
'parental' control, always elicited by this sort of behaviour.
This is 'why' the 'hatred' of 'authority'.

Also, notice the specific mention of 'anxiety', which is a prime
symptom of 'double-bound' individuals.

And the entire reference is to point out, the similarities
between canine (pack) and hominid/human (tribal) behaviour.
Identifying 'as the body and the animal' is indeed appropriate
to such individuals; it is only to be understood just how the
current degree of successful compensation has been achieved,
which would call for congratulations, if not medications.

Here you will find a fascinating discussion of this 'dilemma',
from the POV of 'hypnotherapy':

<http://user.orbit.net.mt/abela/def.html>

_______________________________________________________________

SANDEEP AND ROYAL

ROYAL: In my association many years ago with a yoga group
operating under the auspices of Yogananda's SRF teachings,
enlightenment was propounded as the 'goal' of spiritual
endeavor.

SANDEEP: LOL.

That is pure and unadulterated baloney.

Ask them what is the goal of reaching that goal? And "who" is
supposed to reach that goal? For if you set up a goal, an
objective, whether profane or profound, there has to be
"someone" who is interested to reach that goal.

Secondly ask them how will you recognise that the "goal" has
been reached? After all the destination in a travel has to be
clearly defined in the mind or on a piece of paper, before you
physically reach there or miss your path and recognise that you
have missed it.

So what are the parameters of this goal?

I can only seek to find what I have lost, if I know what has
been lost. Otherwise how will I ever recognise it if I do find
it somewhere at some time.

For re-cognition, cognition is a must in the first place.

So if I "knew" the state of enlightenment, I will only get into
the song and dance of seeking it, if I have lost it.

That enlightenment which can be lost and recovered and lost
again, is not enlightenment, it's hilarity.

But if Consciousness or Jerry Springer or Micky Mouse or
Godzilla (or whoever is in charge) wishes to play the game of
hilarity through certain conceptual entities, then indeed
hilarity will take place.

Mind you Royal, yoga has it's tremendous benefits to the
psycho-somatic apparatus in a multidimensional manner and by all
means pursue that, if your natural preference is towards yoga.

ROYAL: Then and now I encounter people who say they are
enlightened, but who do not seem to exhibit what seems to me to
be enlightened behavior. But what do I know of enlightenment?

SANDEEP: That was what I was meaning in my earlier post, Royal.
You judge an enlightened person, by whether he/she fits in with
your "idea" of what enlightened behaviour is to be like. So
really what you are seeking(I was asking you the real need), is
the validation of your "idea" of enlightenment.

Have an "idea" of what enlightenment is about, any idea, makes
no difference, where is the space for anything to occur?

For all "ideas" are of the "me-entity".

ROYAL: It would seem the best way to gain enlightenment about
enlightenment would be from an enlightened being.

SANDEEP: Ahaaa.

Now we come to the real game. You believe, expect that
enlightenment or whatever can rub off, get transmitted, handed
over. So identify the enlightened being, locate him/her
physically and get to his/her feet and bang transmission will
take place.

Royal, when one cannot cause enlightnement to take place in
one's own conceptual body-mind complex , what enlightenment can
be caused by one in another conceptual body-mind complex?

I know jokers from the country where I was born and reside have
been coming by the dozen to your part of the world in the last
50-60 years, but take care about these, essentially con-artists.

ROYAL: But how does one go about ascertaining that those who
make the claim really are enlightened?

SANDEEP: There is and has been only one way. Get the "bug"
yourself.

And that you Royal can never make a mistake, ever. You may not
get what you hoped for, but you cannot make a mistake.

For example the time, money, effort that you may have spend with
these "con-artists", finally you realize the "con", and you feel
it was such a disaster of a mistake. Nothing of that sort.

Realising the falsity of false, you are on your way. Now whether
that realization takes place in 5 minutes or in 5 years, what
difference does it make?

ROYAL: Would I go to a doctor and not require some evidence that
he is indeed licensed? If I want to learn about something, am I
not going to seek a teacher who has mastered the subject?

SANDEEP: Sure. If learning "about" enlightenment is what it is
all about, by all means get hold of the particular theoligian
and check out the credentials of his/her theoligical
accreditions.

ROYAL: So, you see, when you make the statement, 'While any
claim to "enlightenment" is hilarious (who is left to claim so)'
-- I'm not really sure what exactly you are saying?

SANDEEP: Any affirmation, any confirmation any validation can
only be issued by a "me-entity".

The presence of "me-entity is the absence of that Which-IS(a
terminology being used for this communication).

The "me-entity" is nothing but an assumption of a sense of
"personal doership", a sense from which "seeking" is assumed to
be possible or that in fact it is needed.

That goals can be defined, paths towards these goals can be
located and milestones placed in position to ascertain spiritual
progress, all this in essence are the games of the "me-entity"

The hilarity is in the fact that the "me-entity" never exists,
is illusory.

But till the apperception, which can only be acausal,
non-volitional, takes place, indeed the lot of the "me-entity"
is suffering.

For all seeking , all doing is essentially round and round the
mulberry bush. Anything wrong with that? Heavens no.<s>

As I said, you Royal can never make a mistake.

The apperception of the futility of effort can only be total,
when all efforts have been exhausted, as Buddha found out. Till
then, play on.

ROYAL: Are you saying there's no such thing as enlightenment?

SANDEEP: Indeed, the state of "un-enlightened" and the state of
"enlightenment", both are occurrences within phenomenality and
thus illusory.

ROYAL: Or that all who have achieved enlightenment are no longer
among us?

Since phenomenality "occurred", nobody has ever achieved
enlightenment.

Yes what is popularly known as enlightenment or awakening has
non-volitionally "occurred" in thousands of conceptual entities,
through the history of mankind.

As of this moment, there are "living beings" who have seen the
hilarity of phenomenality.

I am told the NDS has a fair share of them, but don't take my
word (or their word) for it. LOL.

ROYAL: Are you saying there are no false Masters?

SANDEEP: Oh indeed, there are.

Totally appropriate, incidentally these con-artists. After all
to whom will the false seeker go to, except to False Masters.
Consciousness needs to cater to all tastes and fantasies, not
just ND "prattlings".

_________________________________________________________________

Aaron Ullrey mentioned his teacher John Grimes. John has
authored several books on Advaita Vedanta. His website is at

http://www.msu.edu/user/grimesj/

...

Here's a couple of links that will give you a taste of the
Vijnanabhairava. One is from Jaideva Singh's translation and
commentary and the other is a free translation by Lorin Roche.

http://www.digiserve.com/mystic/Hindu/Vijnanabhairava/index.html
http://www.lorinroche.com/1.htm


______________________________________________________________________

GREG GOODE

Last night ... We had another nacho satsang. Godzilla wasn't
there, he likes Tokyo better. Lots of people with cell phones
though, more per capita than anywhere else in the world. Funny,
in Hong Kong, Mexican restaurants mean a cantina/party/festive
environment, with Latin music, drinking, dancing, etc. So we ate
and adjourned to a hotel lobby in Wan Chai (home of Suzy Wong 40
years ago).

But if you can, e-mail me some guacamole sauce.

...

I'm teaching MS Word and other computer programs to the lawyers
and secretaries in our Hong Kong office. It's a big
international law firm I work for - home base in NYC, branch
offices in Hong Kong, Tokyo (Godzilla's home turf), Paris,
London, Frankfurt, Menlo Park CA, and Wash D.C. We are starting
to use Microsoft Word in addition to WordPerfect. We have
customized both programs to suit our company's needs, and are
starting to train the lawyers and the secretaries in the branch
offices how to use Word.

...

The term "enlightenment" has evolved and devolved in the same
way that "transsexual" has done. In the 1960's, "transsexual"
was for those who had gone through the long medical and
psychological process of changing their gender characteristics,
including hormones, silicone implants, all the way to the
sex-change operation. Nowadays, in today's trans-gendered
communities, the term 'transsexual' has slid, and now refers to
those who live as members of the other gender, 24/7. Surgery and
silicone are not necessary. So what do they call the post-ops
these days, now that there are lots of transsexuals? They call
them "sex-changes." I have had transsexual girlfriends, but
never a sex-change girlfriend....

...

Yes, Marcia, we do want our teachers to be above and beyond. And
lots of teachers like that vibe too! I've had teachers become
buddies. I've had other associations, mostly with wannabe
teachers, who don't want any part of you if they don't feel a
seeking, dependent, yearning energy coming from you to them.
They don't want to be buddies or peers. In my experience, most
of the best teachers (in any field) had no trace of
"teacheritis," that is, no trace of arrogance or wanting to be
the teacher.

W.W., I like the student-teacher flip-flop you point to. Some
spiritual teachers say that it's the student that creates the
teacher. As though the teacher doesn't exist but the student
does, and somehow the student condenses the teacher from the
ether of consciousness out of the student's own delusion. That's
teacheritis! And how could it be? They create each other. As
Gaudapada says, who is one of my favorite teachers, "The cause
is cause of the effect, and the effect is cause of the cause."

_______________________________________________________________

TLP

I actually know Harsha and live close by. Been to his house with
Ashok and other friends who are on the list here. Harsha makes a
great green salad and loves to cook for us. There is nothing
insincere about Harsha when he takes a few spoon fulls of garm
masala and turmeric and puts it into the slow heating "Stew"
(which has too many things to mention here). There is nothing
phony about Harsha when he dices massive amounts of hot peppers
and onions and garlic (which is about quarter of the stew) and
that is dumped in with the assurance that it will all turn out
fine. Does the kitchen stink when Harsha is doing his work. Yes,
but not of insincerity. You don't know Harsha at all.
_____________________________________________________________________

ANDREW, ROYAL, GLORIA

ANDREW: "I have reservations about telling of personal spiritual
experience in a public place. It has an air of saying there's
something special about *ME*."

ROYAL: But you ARE special! You, me, her, him, everybody and
everything IS special! All is a unique expression of the Divine.
All the same, but no two alike. Infinite variety.

"Personal experience is meaningless to anyone but the
individual."

Au contrair, mon ami. Has anything been realized BUT through
personal experience and sharing of personal experience?
Libraries are full of books filled with knowledge gained through
personal experience. Everybody who posts here does so from
personal experience. The problem lies, it seems to me, in
extracting the personal experience and sharing only the words.
Sterile sharings absent the meaning inherent in the experience.

It's much safer sharing just the words. No personal investment.
Sharing personal experience from the heart renders one so much
more vulnerable.

But then, I am still a child on the spiritual path. What do I
know? Just an offering for your consideration.

GLORIA: Dear Andrew,

Thanks for telling your story here. I don't think that personal
experience is meaningless to anyone else. There is a huge
difference between people claiming some superiority by the proof
of their credentials and simply stating this happened to me.
People can use logic and reasoning till the cows come home, and
it remains unconvincing without the sincerity from their
personally living that which they talk about. "No arguement"
will ever convince anyone of this infinite love you experienced
beforehand, and after the experience, "no arguement" is ever
needed. Telling does let others know what is possible, so much
is possible. People have a hunger for sharing authentic
experience that far surpasses our appetite for discussions and
debates. We are storytellers, we are our stories.

And your eyes do shine so with love...


__________________________________________________________________

MARCIA
I have been watching and wondering.

If what is wanting expression IS frustration and intolerance
then there is no way to express that civilly. Might not it be a
mistake to assume that it has anything to do with what is going
on here?

Frustration and intolerance is not reasonable. There is no
reason for them. Finding a reason to be frustration and
intolerant is already one step down the road. That step has the
name justification stamped on it.

I am not saying to not express frustration and intolerance. I am
only suggesting that to find a reason for them is already a
subtle form of repression. Express away and see what is behind
it. Moving forward by attaching the frustration and intolerance
to something only objectifies them.

...

What I was thinking was that when I am cranky, I find something
to be cranky about. The same thing does not make me cranky at
other times. But when I am being cranky, I am convinced that it
is the thing that I think I am being cranky about that is the
cause.

This is really probably simpler rather than more complex than I
am making it out to be. The kids know when to stay away from me.
But I will say my crankiness is because of something they are
doing. I think it is enough to notice crankiness without having
to find a reason for it. There is no reason for it because it
does not come from the reasoning part of me.

________________________________________________________________

ROYAL AND GREG
GREG: Welcome back! I was glad to see your e-mail this morning
(Hong Kong time). Which are you interested in,
dematerialization, enlightenment or both? Do you see them as
related somehow?

ROYAL: Your gladness warms my heart.

Twenty-some years ago, I strayed from the spiritual path. In
coming back, what can I do but relate in terms and with concepts
I learned then? Now I'm being presented with new terms and
concepts. Back in the 'old days', such feats as materialization,
dematerialization, healing, etc. were related as being aspects
of enlightenment. The search for the enlightened guru was
espoused as necessary.

Now, it seems, the Way of the Yogi has been discredited and
superseded by other 'ways'. Perhaps this is just my impression.
All I can say is I don't know. I know only that I feel this
yearning, that's brought me here.

_________________________________________________________________________


WHITE WOLF

Here is something I ran across during my daily time of Lectio
Divina from a great contemporary mystic and pan-cultural
non-dualist (Thich Nhat Hahn and Thomas Merton were Spiritual
Brother and two whom I regard as personal Root Masters). It
recalls to mind the songs of Mirabai and her devotion to her
"dark lord." I hope it brings you some Joy as it did me.

"We should in a way fear for our perseverance because there is a
big hole in us, an abyss, and we have to fall through it into
emptiness, but the Lord will catch us. Who can fall through the
center of himself into that nothingness and not be appalled? But
the Lord will catch us. He will catch you without fail and take
you to His heart." -Thomas Merton

...

How much difference is there
between a teacher and a student?
Every teacher is someone's student,
every student is someone's teacher.
Today I am you teacher,
tomorrow I am your student.

Teacher, student, student, Teacher,
I am you, you are Mine.

...

My first teacher was a saint of a man, an artist, a mentor, a
dear friend and my student. His name was Sergei Mihailoff. He
was a Concert Pianist and Composer and a student/amenuensis of
Sergei Rachmaninoff. At my first piano/composition lesson I
remember him telling me that there is no such thing as a
teacher. He said that in order for me to share music with him I
had to accept the fact our relationship was sacred. He said he
would know that he had fulfilled his commitment to our
relationship when I told him what he himself wanted to know. He
passed away in 1975, but he is with me always.

...

Yes, we are getting closer all the time it seems...

Favor and Disgrace are equally problematic Favor inflates the
ego and lifts you up above other Disgrace deflates the ego and
drops you to your knees Either one depends on the opinion of
others and causes you to depart from your center and so falling
return to world of duality and suffering

Jesus never claimed he was the Christ and discounted the
significance of the 'signs and wonders' (miracles) he performed.
Buddha was unimpressed by yoga and siddhis, ie., like the
ability to walk on water. Krishna admonishes Arjuna that what is
important is "devotional service." Buddha admonishes us to
Compassion. Jesus admonishes us to "Love our neighbor our
ourself." Present tense intentional.

Those who follow the Great Way Do not seek fulfillment of desire
Are not concerned with Enlightenment But serve or stand in
complete silence

They who but stand and wait, also serve.

If you are talking about the Way you may or may not be on it.
When you are on it, you become it. When you have nothing to talk
about When you are still, You are the Way.

Thus, Jesus said, I Am The Way.

what lies beyond...?

______________________________________________________________________

LARRY

There is a quote on the back of Ramesh Balsekar's _Your Head In
The Tiger's Mouth_ which got my brains a churnin'. The quote is,
"The created object cannot possibly know the Creator
Subjectivity." I think even Ramesh would disagree with this
because it implies a creator/doer. There is a way of talking
about self with and without quotation marks: no self and "no"
self. Here the "no" self is actually a me that is known but not
grasped. This seems like it could be dropped. There doesn't need
to be a me or an I that can't do anything. Of course, what
Ramesh means by Creator Subjectivity is consciousness. In other
words, everything. Emptiness presense is an aspect of
consciousness; it doesn't need to be me and all and everything
doesn't go around doing things.

______________________________________________________________________

ED ARRONS

The question that arose with me ... was whether the 'unlimited'
self as pure awareness, or the 'separate' body-mind self, can
really exsist as such. It seemed to me that ... it was not
possible; it had to be one or the other.

What is becoming evermore clear to me lately, is that there is a
Self which is neither and both. This is seen as a Self aware of
the *actions* of the body-mind which then temporarily identifies
with or becomes those actions...while the body-mind becomes
obscured, though not unreal. The artist and athlete 'losing' the
Self in their activity, comes to mind.

But the termination of activity, certain interactions, and
reactions can curtail this very awareness; this curtailment of
awareness narrows to a 'frequency' of inner sensation which is
identified as the body-mind self. The Self which notices this
interplay between awareness per se and its reformation as inner
sensation is the 'neither and both' self to which I referred.

An interesting point here is when the body-mind comes to a place
of stillness and disengages from its reference to linear
reality. Then the Self cannot see the body-mind, since it can
only see its actions in the linear realm. Thus the body-mind is
temporarily obscured and becomes the stillness. I think this
might be called samahdi.

So what is this Self that is neither pure awareness nor the
body-mind? It is the Self that functions in the world but is not
of the world.

top of page