The religions and spiritual traditions that I am familiar with all promote cooperation and eschew competition. Cooperative activities, harmonious activities and thoughts are "spiritual" or "good" whereas competitive activities are "bad". New Age traditions are the leaders in the promotion of this zeitgeist. "Flower power" is a phrase that epitomizes this. Today's "cancel culture" is the inevitable result of this philosophy taken to the extreme.
I don't believe that I life filled exclusively with cooperation and harmony, devoid of competition and conflict, is a life worth living. Jesus pissed people off. He "came not to bring peace on earth, but a sword. He came to set a man against his father, and the
daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother
in law."
He would have been cancelled in today's snowflake America. Come to think of it, he was definitively canceled in the Jewish culture of his time.
To me, a spiritual life is a life that is lived in the spirit. To live in the spirit in any given moment means that I rest in the tranquil field that is the basis of all existence, regardless of the ephemeral content of my mind, emotions or body. Zen was developed by Samurai warriors.
Sunday, March 29, 2020
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Shangra-La
There is a place. I know how to go there, but I don't reside there all the time. It is a place of great love, peace and bliss.
I first went there in the summer of 1972. LSD showed me the way, but LSD is not the way. I sat on the grass with some bushes behind me, looking at the ocean waves. I was completely at peace, though up to then peace was not my way.
Three women walked past me. I knew their hearts, because we were one.
An hour before, I played basketball and hit every basket, made every pass, though I was a lousy basketball player.
Since then my basketball skills have gotten even worse, but I know that place, and my heart is pure. Skill is not important. Realization of oneness is important.
When I hear Krisha Das, I recognize him as a brother. We have been to the same place.
When I first went on a walk with the woman who became my wife, we did not need to talk. When I meditate with her, we are one in that heart of the universe.
I first went there in the summer of 1972. LSD showed me the way, but LSD is not the way. I sat on the grass with some bushes behind me, looking at the ocean waves. I was completely at peace, though up to then peace was not my way.
Three women walked past me. I knew their hearts, because we were one.
An hour before, I played basketball and hit every basket, made every pass, though I was a lousy basketball player.
Since then my basketball skills have gotten even worse, but I know that place, and my heart is pure. Skill is not important. Realization of oneness is important.
When I hear Krisha Das, I recognize him as a brother. We have been to the same place.
When I first went on a walk with the woman who became my wife, we did not need to talk. When I meditate with her, we are one in that heart of the universe.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Victim Hood
You have to take off the mantle of victim hood before you put on the mantle of power. President Obama did it, to his credit. Jesse Jackson resented this renunciation of racial victim hood, but perhaps he has since come to a higher level of understanding.
Women come forth to claim sexual abuse by various gurus. But when you ask them, "did he physically force you?", they say no. So you had consensual sex with a guru and it's his fault? These women are so fully identified with the role of victim that they do not realize that they already have power and responsibility just by virtue of being an adult. Powerful women are magnificent, and it should be the normal state.
Everybody has long, well-reasoned and tortured justifications for holding on to their victim hood, but you have to take off the mantle of victim hood before you put on the mantle of power.
Women come forth to claim sexual abuse by various gurus. But when you ask them, "did he physically force you?", they say no. So you had consensual sex with a guru and it's his fault? These women are so fully identified with the role of victim that they do not realize that they already have power and responsibility just by virtue of being an adult. Powerful women are magnificent, and it should be the normal state.
Everybody has long, well-reasoned and tortured justifications for holding on to their victim hood, but you have to take off the mantle of victim hood before you put on the mantle of power.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Mantra Initiation
Swami Satchidananda, the founder of Integral Yoga, says, "It is advisable to get the mantra [for meditation] through adepts who have already created that vibration in themselves, because they won’t give you just a mantra. When they give the mantra, they, also, infuse a little of the vibration into you. That is what you call ‘initiation.’ It is a completely different experience from what you read in a book. From a book, you get only the word; you won’t get the vibration."
Is that true? Well, I have a lot of respect for Swami Satchidananda. He is one of my main teachers (he died in 2002). Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was the other of my main teachers (he died in 2008), and he says basically the same thing. Even though I respect these two teachers very much, I am the skeptical, scientific sort, so I am not sure.
I do know that when I was initiated into Transcendental Meditation in 1973, it sure felt like there was a transmission of energy, as I immediately entered (what seemed like) a very deep state of meditation, but that could be attributed to my expectations. I suspect expectations are the main causal factor, and perhaps that is why Indian gurus propagate the story of "spiritual transmission" in initiation, to build up those expectations.
Is that true? Well, I have a lot of respect for Swami Satchidananda. He is one of my main teachers (he died in 2002). Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was the other of my main teachers (he died in 2008), and he says basically the same thing. Even though I respect these two teachers very much, I am the skeptical, scientific sort, so I am not sure.
I do know that when I was initiated into Transcendental Meditation in 1973, it sure felt like there was a transmission of energy, as I immediately entered (what seemed like) a very deep state of meditation, but that could be attributed to my expectations. I suspect expectations are the main causal factor, and perhaps that is why Indian gurus propagate the story of "spiritual transmission" in initiation, to build up those expectations.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The Science of Mind
I imagine a large transparent sphere. All the spiritual and religious traditions are on the surface of the sphere looking in toward the center. There is a tiny little black ball in the center called “The Truth”, and everybody has a different view of “The Truth”, but they are all seeing the same Truth. I have visited the site of the Science of Mind (a certain spiritual tradition that I have studied) observatory on the surface of that sphere and peered toward that little black ball, and the Vedantic site and the Buddhist site and the Taoist site and the Christian site, and even the Sufi site. I am certain that they are all looking at the same little black ball, but it looks a bit different when you look at it from those different angles. I have also discovered that there are lots of people at each site, a few of which are highly intelligent and many who are idiots. The descriptions of the intelligent ones all sound roughly the same, no matter what site they are at, while the idiots fight, defending their misunderstandings of their own religions.
It seems to me that most people think spirituality is about being good, moral, pure, kind, gentle and helpful. I don't believe that at all, because all of those qualities exist as one pole of a duality, and I don't believe that spirit lives in the world of duality. Rather, I believe that if there is spirit, then spirit has to transcend duality.
So Kali (a Hindu goddess who hangs around graveyards and adorns herself with a necklace of human skulls) and Lucifer (one of God's nastier angels) are portrayed as fearsome and even evil, yet they are divine beings. If God created the world, then God must have been the creator of evil, and what was there laying around to create it out of but himself? God is the source of duality, but transcends duality.
It is obvious that nothing in the world of duality can be infinite, omnipotent or omniscient, so a belief in spirit (or God) who has all of these qualities is inconsistent with a belief that "God is good". I don't believe that God is good. God must transcend the good-bad duality.
If God is transcendental, then any conception of God's nature will be a wrong conception. So the first line of the Tao Teh Ching says, "That Tao which can be spoken of is not the true Tao". And the Muslims forbid images of God and the Jews forbid speaking God's name and Moses got pretty pissed off about that golden calf, if I remember correctly. They all warn against the conceptualization of God.
A false belief that my essential nature (my Godness) is "of the world" of duality is the core essential mistake from which all of my suffering springs. The belief in the primacy of duality is the original sin. Remember that Adam and Eve "ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" (they fell into the duality trap), and that right there was the end of the good times.
Therefore, in my opinion, the job of a spiritual practitioner is to negate the false belief that duality is the fundamental fabric of existence. And that negation is the spiritual practitioner's only job. We should forget about saving the world... that's a mission dreamed up by a mind caught in the duality trap. I think that when we fix our false belief, our world will fix itself, or perhaps we will finally realize that there was never anything wrong with the world, only our perception of it.
I think the exoteric message (for the new students) of the Science of Mind is, “you can get what you want by praying in this scientific manner that we teach”. The esoteric message (for the mature students) is that this technique of meditation and prayer has as its purpose the negation of the false belief that duality is the fundamental fabric of existence.
It seems to me that most people think spirituality is about being good, moral, pure, kind, gentle and helpful. I don't believe that at all, because all of those qualities exist as one pole of a duality, and I don't believe that spirit lives in the world of duality. Rather, I believe that if there is spirit, then spirit has to transcend duality.
So Kali (a Hindu goddess who hangs around graveyards and adorns herself with a necklace of human skulls) and Lucifer (one of God's nastier angels) are portrayed as fearsome and even evil, yet they are divine beings. If God created the world, then God must have been the creator of evil, and what was there laying around to create it out of but himself? God is the source of duality, but transcends duality.
It is obvious that nothing in the world of duality can be infinite, omnipotent or omniscient, so a belief in spirit (or God) who has all of these qualities is inconsistent with a belief that "God is good". I don't believe that God is good. God must transcend the good-bad duality.
If God is transcendental, then any conception of God's nature will be a wrong conception. So the first line of the Tao Teh Ching says, "That Tao which can be spoken of is not the true Tao". And the Muslims forbid images of God and the Jews forbid speaking God's name and Moses got pretty pissed off about that golden calf, if I remember correctly. They all warn against the conceptualization of God.
A false belief that my essential nature (my Godness) is "of the world" of duality is the core essential mistake from which all of my suffering springs. The belief in the primacy of duality is the original sin. Remember that Adam and Eve "ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" (they fell into the duality trap), and that right there was the end of the good times.
Therefore, in my opinion, the job of a spiritual practitioner is to negate the false belief that duality is the fundamental fabric of existence. And that negation is the spiritual practitioner's only job. We should forget about saving the world... that's a mission dreamed up by a mind caught in the duality trap. I think that when we fix our false belief, our world will fix itself, or perhaps we will finally realize that there was never anything wrong with the world, only our perception of it.
I think the exoteric message (for the new students) of the Science of Mind is, “you can get what you want by praying in this scientific manner that we teach”. The esoteric message (for the mature students) is that this technique of meditation and prayer has as its purpose the negation of the false belief that duality is the fundamental fabric of existence.
False Self Concept
I got started thinking about the transgendered thing when a (male) friend of mine called me up a few years ago from Florida to tell me that he was becoming a woman. It suddenly struck me during that conversation how fundamental of a transition that is.
Spiritual practice (in my opinion) is about realization of my true self. My true self is not my body, not my mind, not my personality. (In Sanskrit they call this, "Neti, neti"... "not this, not that"). They don't really talk much about what the self IS, just what it is NOT, since if you try to put the self into words, you'll get it wrong, since it is beyond conceptualization, yet it is real. The Tao Teh Ching says, "The Tao that can be spoken of is not the true Tao."
One of the things we mis-identify with most strongly is our gender. So when someone becomes the opposite sex, they are going through such a fundamental breaking of that false identification. Probably in most cases they are just switching from one illusion (I am a man) to another (I am a woman), so it has no spiritual benefit. But a few might use the experience to break through to "I am not man, not woman. I am that I am."
Another fundamental transition in identity is when somebody who is overweight loses a lot of weight. I started dieting at the age of about thirteen, as a wrestler in high school (all wrestlers lose weight so that they can compete with smaller people, and thereby gain advantage). Then I continued ever since, whenever I get too fat. So, several times I have lost 20 or 30 pounds or so, and have noticed how huge an impact it has on my notion of identity. If you identify with your body, when your body changes so dramatically, it affects EVERYTHING. But I'm sure that's nowhere near the magnitude of a sex change.
Of course, one of the biggest false-identification destroyers (agents of Siva) is aging and the physical/mental changes that come with it. Then death is, of course, the ultimate teacher.
All of these obstacle destroyers are moving us inexorably toward enlightenment... which is the giving up of false identities.
Jesus said something like, "You must turn around and become like little children". Little children do not have notions of self. They are just here to play.
Spiritual practice (in my opinion) is about realization of my true self. My true self is not my body, not my mind, not my personality. (In Sanskrit they call this, "Neti, neti"... "not this, not that"). They don't really talk much about what the self IS, just what it is NOT, since if you try to put the self into words, you'll get it wrong, since it is beyond conceptualization, yet it is real. The Tao Teh Ching says, "The Tao that can be spoken of is not the true Tao."
One of the things we mis-identify with most strongly is our gender. So when someone becomes the opposite sex, they are going through such a fundamental breaking of that false identification. Probably in most cases they are just switching from one illusion (I am a man) to another (I am a woman), so it has no spiritual benefit. But a few might use the experience to break through to "I am not man, not woman. I am that I am."
Another fundamental transition in identity is when somebody who is overweight loses a lot of weight. I started dieting at the age of about thirteen, as a wrestler in high school (all wrestlers lose weight so that they can compete with smaller people, and thereby gain advantage). Then I continued ever since, whenever I get too fat. So, several times I have lost 20 or 30 pounds or so, and have noticed how huge an impact it has on my notion of identity. If you identify with your body, when your body changes so dramatically, it affects EVERYTHING. But I'm sure that's nowhere near the magnitude of a sex change.
Of course, one of the biggest false-identification destroyers (agents of Siva) is aging and the physical/mental changes that come with it. Then death is, of course, the ultimate teacher.
All of these obstacle destroyers are moving us inexorably toward enlightenment... which is the giving up of false identities.
Jesus said something like, "You must turn around and become like little children". Little children do not have notions of self. They are just here to play.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Spiritual Practice
It seems so simple to me. If suffering is due to attachment and aversion, then spiritual practice should consist of refraining from attachment and aversion. I think that's all the spirituality that I need to know. I don't need 10 commandments. I don't need four noble truths or an eightfold path or eight limbs of yoga or 14 mindfulness practices or 108 repetitions of a mantra. I only need to stop entertaining emotional attachment and aversion. When I catch myself in a state of attachment or a state of aversion, I just need to stop doing that. Incredibly simple. That's probably why people don't get it. It's too simple, so the mind tries to complicate it.
Okay, I know what you are going to ask. "How?". I contend that there is no "how". If you are holding a pebble in your hand, tightly grasping it, and I were to ask you to let it go, would you ask, "how?". No, you would just let it go. In the same way, you can let go of attachment and aversion when you detect yourself engaging in those processes. I think that asking the "how?" question is merely a way of avoiding the instinctual spiritual practice of letting go.
Asking "how?" is a valid thing to do for any action. But letting go is not an action. It is a refrain from action. In this case, I am refraining from attachment and aversion. Letting go of that pebble is a refrain from grasping.
Attachment and aversion come uninvited. I cannot prevent them from coming into my mind. But once they come, and once I recognize that I am occupied with one of them, I can let go of that occupation. Then, some time later they come again. Once I realize that I am doing them again, I let them go again, and again and again. It's a continual practice. It's my practice.
Okay, I know what you are going to ask. "How?". I contend that there is no "how". If you are holding a pebble in your hand, tightly grasping it, and I were to ask you to let it go, would you ask, "how?". No, you would just let it go. In the same way, you can let go of attachment and aversion when you detect yourself engaging in those processes. I think that asking the "how?" question is merely a way of avoiding the instinctual spiritual practice of letting go.
Asking "how?" is a valid thing to do for any action. But letting go is not an action. It is a refrain from action. In this case, I am refraining from attachment and aversion. Letting go of that pebble is a refrain from grasping.
Attachment and aversion come uninvited. I cannot prevent them from coming into my mind. But once they come, and once I recognize that I am occupied with one of them, I can let go of that occupation. Then, some time later they come again. Once I realize that I am doing them again, I let them go again, and again and again. It's a continual practice. It's my practice.
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