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Post by stardustpilgrim on May 26, 2024 7:09:43 GMT -5
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Post by andrew on May 26, 2024 12:16:54 GMT -5
I like it. But it's kind of extreme. I guess not many spiritual folks could have a gun pointed at them and experience that degree of surrender and gratitude. It's not a spirituality that could be wholly 'adopted' by many people...everyone's different...and yet many have found there's something to draw from in her work. There's a sentiment expressed that I find is very cool, a very deep and abiding acceptance of the unfolding. Doesn't leave much space for 'creativity' though.... I've never read Jeff's books, only seen his facebook posts. I like Jeff, but don't find much resemblance to Katie. Agreed. I went to hear one of her talks in Louisville many years ago and met her and her husband Stephen Mitchell, who is one of th best translators of spiritual literature put there.I found her to be quite effective in helping free people from the ideas to which they were attached. The 4 questions are something I have used to occasionally support close friends in the last 20 odd years. And what's interesting to me, is that with 2 of those friends, it was getting on for 20 years ago....and they BOTH remember it. In fact, one of them brought it up recently in a friend whatsapp group, and said that it had made a big difference to their experience all those years ago. I also used the questions last year with a friend who has been having marital difficulties. He was SUPER stressed about a situation. He's a very smart guy, an engineer. So I approached the issue, appealing to his engineer's mind. You see, I knew he wasn't ready to let go of the beliefs, in fact, just bringing the beliefs to the surface to talk about, was very threatening for him. So I said...'Okay, let's do a thought experiment. You aren't going to be releasing these beliefs, we are JUST doing a test'. And I spent about 20 minutes with him doing the questions, simply as a kind of 'experiment' for him. And after that 20 minutes, he was calm. I'm not going to say the beliefs had released....that would have been too much....but even just approaching it in the way we approached it, was enough for his energy to calm down. So I think it's great. BUT, speaking from my own experience, there is a flip side to it, and I'll offer an example. About 20 years ago, I was in a relationship, and I could sense that it wasn't right. But I didn't want to leave the relationship, in fact, I was scared to leave it. So I used the questions in such way as to try and keep me IN the relationship. In a sense, I was using the questions as a way to stop me facing a painful truth. In the end, I had to accept the painful truth. So I'm not going to say that I believe the questions are the 'be all and end all'. Every situation is different, every individual is different. But it seems to me that there is a context in which they can be very useful. |
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Post by andrew on May 26, 2024 12:29:11 GMT -5
I like it. But it's kind of extreme. I guess not many spiritual folks could have a gun pointed at them and experience that degree of surrender and gratitude. It's not a spirituality that could be wholly 'adopted' by many people...everyone's different...and yet many have found there's something to draw from in her work. There's a sentiment expressed that I find is very cool, a very deep and abiding acceptance of the unfolding. Doesn't leave much space for 'creativity' though.... I've never read Jeff's books, only seen his facebook posts. I like Jeff, but don't find much resemblance to Katie. Jeff is what Laughter calls "emptiness poetry". Very nice to the ear, seemingly very profound statements, very rich non-dual vocabulary, but the non-dual grammar is faulty, the logic flawed, contextual boundaries are ignored, and so the emptiness poetry is devoid of any meaning, there's no actual "there" there. It's what usually gets associated with neo-advaita. That's why neo-advaita has such a bad rap, I guess.
And giving her the benefit of the doubt again, I could compare what she says to what Abe say about contrast, i.e. that from the non-physical perspective you are looking forward to experiencing contrast, because it creates new desires which draw life force thru you which give you that feeling of being fully alive and so there's no guardedness at all about it because the purpose of contrast is understood. However, imagining Abe saying something like you are looking forward to getting cancer or your family getting bombed is absurd. I also don't see how that could even slightly represent the vibration or energy of love. That's just nonsense. The energy of love and the energy of getting cancer or bombed are nowhere close. And I'm also pretty sure that Niz and Ramana weren't looking forward to getting cancer. In fact, Ramana went straight for surgery and Niz repeatedly kept mentioning its painfulness. So what Katie says makes no sense, neither in the deliberate creation context nor in the liberation context. She obviously conflates these two contexts. And the result then are such "extreme" statements that you've quoted. Which reminds me of the Mckenna books. This gun story, that's self trying to impersonate Self, hence the inevitable context mix.
However, deconstructing thoughts can be a very powerful tool. And I'm sure it has helped a lot of people. But, like purification, that's working on the SVP. So again, not adding up.
Also, compare the inquiry she suggests to the inquiry Ramana suggests.
In summary, I can see some value of what she teaches in the deliberate creation context, but I see no value in the liberation context.
Now, from the big picture perspective, what Katie offers is a bridge and actually serves a very important purpose. Similarly to Osho being a bridge to Niz. A lot of people couldn't follow Niz because what Niz taught was too far out for the average seeker. But they could hear what Osho taught, because that was closer to home. However, Osho's teaching wasn't pure, so after a while, those seekers noticed that although they got a bit further on the path that in the end Osho's path wouldn't lead them to where they were actually heading. That was the point when they suddenly were ready to hear Niz and some left the spiritual circus altogether. ETA: The way she described her awakening in the other book actually reminds me of Suzanne Segal. Very similar confusion about real everyday life. The main difference though is that both were stuck on opposite ends of the emotional scale, Katie stuck on joy, Suzanne stuck on fear. Very interesting. I think I'm correct though that from your perspective, NO teaching offers any liberation value. Or has your position softened in such way, that you can say that you feel there is more value to Ramana's offerings than Katie's? If so, I wouldn't argue that. I really couldn't say which is better, and I love Ramana and Niz as much as I love Katie. In regard to the cancer/bombing stuff, there's a beautiful chapter (which I think is in 'Thousand Names') where she describes her experience of being blind. It's quite astonishing how she describes it, for example, when she falls over, she loves that the floor catches her. She embodies the idea that 'everything is happening FOR her'. In a sense, there is no contrast in her experience. She has transcended contrast. Which makes her very unique. And I don't believe that uniqueness is 'transferable'...our individual spiritual paths vary so much. With that said, I believe there's an essence...a sentiment...an energy....to what she offers that can be drawn from. I find it useful at times...and in those times, there is no room for 'Abe-Hicks'. Then in other times, I lean into Abe-Hicks. The only other thing I could perhaps say in regard to that, relates to UG. The idea that 'everything happens FOR you' is a beautiful story. I don't sense UG has that story (UG is unique too in his non-blinking truth lol). I mention this because I want to be clear that I'm not saying that Katie's spiritual path has no room for growth (nor would I say that about UG). I'm just saying that where Katie has 'plateaued' on her path, is unique, beautiful and useful for others. |
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Post by Reefs on May 26, 2024 22:28:21 GMT -5
Andrew, I’m halfway thru A Thousand Name of Joy. And I got the gist after just a couple of chapters, but kept reading. As promised, I’ll give you my take on the book and BK in general, based on first hand experience. The book is pretty easy to read. And if she interprets the Daodejing correctly or not is besides the point for our purpose here. She just uses each verse as a starting point or reference point to explain her own understanding. So I won’t address that. As already mentioned about the quotes you posted, she mixes contexts. This book is no exception. So this isn’t a context issue, this is a systemic issue. Chapter after chapter she keeps mixing contexts, and it is always the same context mix. Every single time. It's downright predictable. And it is also tiring after a while to read thru it. It usually goes like this: At the beginning of a paragraph, she says all the right words, makes all the right statements, profound statements, but then at the end of the paragraph, she says something that totally contradicts those previous statements and throws her actually understanding of those statements into question. That puzzled me a bit at first. Because there is some really profound stuff in that book that you can mostly quote verbatim on a forum like this one. After a while though, I figured it out what she does and why she does it. It’s actually rather simple: Her reference point is the still mind. Her reference point is NOT prior to mind. She is pretty clear about that in the book, actually. Which is why the non-dual pointers appeal to her but when she uses them she uses them from the personal perspective and therefore in the wrong way. And this is also why, I think, on the one hand, BK’s teaching is praised as freeing, but on the other it is declared as potentially very harmful. So it’s basically the same thing you usually see with a lot of neo-advaita teachers, i.e. when the wrong man (or woman) uses the right means, the right means work in the wrong way. It’s not that the teaching is wrong, it’s just the understanding of the teaching doesn’t go deep enough and so the application of the teaching is where it goes wrong. Now, let me spell it out more clearly what’s wrong with her teaching. The basic rule in the deliberate creation context is that what you think and feel and what is manifesting in your life is always a perfect match. So there are two indicators for your actual state of being, 1) the way you feel and 2) what is actually manifesting in your experience. Now, #1 you can lie about to yourself and others, #2 you cannot lie about, it is what it is. And because of the buffer of time, there can sometimes be some temporary incongruence. But also because of that buffer of time, you have a lot of leeway to correct your course without getting into any real trouble.
So let’s look at BK. She claims to see only the beauty in everything (thinking) and feeling this divine joy all the time (feeling) but then her health is a continuous mess (manifestation). Something not adding up here, you see. And so quite obviously, her manifestations indicate that BK is in denial about her actual state of being. Which brings me back to that chapter in the book you’ve mentioned where she talks about going blind. Abe would call that episode happy-face-stickering, which is the same as spiritual bypassing. If you would want to psychoanalyze it, you could say that she turned a blind eye to some aspects of her being, something she doesn’t want to see, which then manifested in actual physical blindness. Now you might argue, but she’s happy all the time. So what does the manifestations matter? That’s what she says, yes. She tells one story but her manifestations tell a different story, she’s actually talking quite proudly about taking medication and having surgery etc. all the time. So while her words and her story indicate a state of being of joy, her manifestations indicate the exact opposite. Now, here’s the most important point about blissful but sickly gurus: You can have cancer or go blind and then have a shift in perspective and be in joy and not bothered about it, even see it as a gift because it made you realize something profound, i.e. you can have cancer and be in joy at the same time. That actually happens. It's because of the buffer of time mentioned above. However, you cannot be predominantly - or in BK’s case, exclusively (!) - in joy and then have cancer or go blind at the same time. That’s illogical and doesn’t actually happen. Because the buffer of time doesn't last that long. So after a while, either you stay in joy and the cancer (a manifestation of the opposite state of being of joy) has to go and total health remains, or the cancer stays and your joy goes. But you can’t have it both ways in the long run. That doesn’t happen. Either way, your state of being and your manifestations will always come into alignment at some point so that your state of being is reflected in your manifestations and your manifestations reflect your state of being. The buffer of time sometimes doesn’t make that immediately apparent though. The reason why people might think that this actually happens and why bad things happen to good people is because they are out of touch with their actual feelings and therefore their actual state of being and therefore have no reliable reference point for the experiences they invite (or create) in their field of awareness. So my conclusion is that her idea of accepting and loving what-is is essentially just relabeling what-is. It’s all a mind game, basically. This is why you hear her mostly talk about how it’s all just a story, a dream etc. And we've all heard that before, right?
In summary, BK’s perspective is still the SVP perspective. Which is why what she says makes no sense in the liberation context. It’s also a purely intellectual perspective. Which is why what she says makes no sense in the deliberate creation context either. Sorry Andrew, I know you like Katie and seemed to have personally benefited from her teaching. I respect your experience and perspective, so I gave it a shot. But I’m not buying it, neither her teaching nor her personal story. Which doesn’t mean that what she has to offer has no value in general. It obviously does have value to a lot of people. But there are some serious flaws in what she teaches that will create a lot of confusion in the people who follow her teaching. As to your question about my stance re: the value of teachings in general when it comes to liberation, my stance hasn’t changed. So you could argue, from the big picture perspective, that my critique of BK is actually irrelevant and that her teaching is as helpful or unhelpful as Ramana’s or Niz’ teaching. Fair point. However, BK speaks from the SVP perspective, addresses the SVP and works on the SVP. While Ramana & Friends do not speak from the SVP perspective, don’t address the SVP (unless they do, hehe) and don’t work on the SVP. So in the liberation context, it doesn’t make a difference. SR is acausal. You cannot make it happen and you cannot prevent it from happening either. However, in the experiential context, it’s a big difference. One is about dreaming differently, the other is about actually waking up. Which is why one is focused on the dream character, the dream content, the dream story. While the other isn’t focused on the dream character but what is actual, making dream content and dream story irrelevant. That’s why you hear BK always commenting about dream content (usually intent to give it the most positive spin) but Ramana & Friends only talk about the Self, what is actual, don’t actually care about the content of the dream, usually don't even comment on it.
So the two teachings are worlds apart, even though there is some similarity in vocabulary and concepts.
ETA:
For those who want to take the easy route to dreaming a better dream, I suggest to follow A-H. For those who want to wake the hell up and take the most direct route, I suggest to follow Ramana & Friends. And for those who want to have a wild ride and a bit of both, I suggest to follow BK.  |
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Post by andrew on May 26, 2024 22:38:43 GMT -5
Andrew, I’m halfway thru A Thousand Name of Joy. And I got the gist after just a couple of chapters, but kept reading. As promised, I’ll give you my take on the book and BK in general, based on first hand experience. The book is pretty easy to read. And if she interprets the Daodejing correctly or not is besides the point for our purpose here. She just uses each verse as a starting point or reference point to explain her own understanding. So I won’t address that. As already mentioned about the quotes you posted, she mixes contexts. This book is no exception. So this isn’t a context issue, this is a systemic issue. Chapter after chapter she keeps mixing contexts, and it is always the same context mix. Every single time. It's downright predictable. And it is also tiring after a while to read thru it. It usually goes like this: At the beginning of a paragraph, she says all the right words, makes all the right statements, profound statements, but then at the end of the paragraph, she says something that totally contradicts those previous statements and throws her actually understanding of those statements into question. That puzzled me a bit at first. Because there is some really profound stuff in that book that you can mostly quote verbatim on a forum like this one. After a while though, I figured it out what she does and why she does it. It’s actually rather simple: Her reference point is the still mind. Her reference point is NOT prior to mind. She is pretty clear about that in the book, actually. Which is why the non-dual pointers appeal to her but when she uses them she uses them from the personal perspective and therefore in the wrong way. And this is also why, I think, on the one hand, BK’s teaching is praised as freeing, but on the other it is declared as potentially very harmful. So it’s basically the same thing you usually see with a lot of neo-advaita teachers, i.e. when the wrong man (or woman) uses the right means, the right means work in the wrong way. It’s not that the teaching is wrong, it’s just the understanding of the teaching doesn’t go deep enough and so the application of the teaching is where it goes wrong. Now, let me spell it out more clearly what’s wrong with her teaching. The basic rule in the deliberate creation context is that what you think and feel and what is manifesting in your life is always a perfect match. So there are two indicators for your actual state of being, 1) the way you feel and 2) what is actually manifesting in your experience. Now, #1 you can lie about to yourself and others, #2 you cannot lie about, it is what it is. And because of the buffer of time, there can sometimes be some temporary incongruence. But also because of that buffer of time, you have a lot of leeway to correct your course without getting into any real trouble.
So let’s look at BK. She claims to see only the beauty in everything (thinking) and feeling this divine joy all the time (feeling) but then her health is a continuous mess (manifestation). Something not adding up here, you see. And so quite obviously, her manifestations indicate that BK is in denial about her actual state of being. Which brings me back to that chapter in the book you’ve mentioned where she talks about going blind. Abe would call that episode happy-face-stickering, which is the same as spiritual bypassing. If you would want to psychoanalyze it, you could say that she turned a blind eye to some aspects of her being, something she doesn’t want to see, which then manifested in actual physical blindness. Now you might argue, but she’s happy all the time. So what does the manifestations matter? That’s what she says, yes. She tells one story but her manifestations tell a different story, she’s actually talking quite proudly about taking medication and having surgery etc. all the time. So while her words and her story indicate a state of being of joy, her manifestations indicate the exact opposite. Now, here’s the most important point about blissful but sickly gurus: You can have cancer or go blind and then have a shift in perspective and be in joy and not bothered about it, even see it as a gift because it made you realize something profound, i.e. you can have cancer and be in joy at the same time. That actually happens. It's because of the buffer of time mentioned above. However, you cannot be predominantly - or in BK’s case, exclusively (!) - in joy and then have cancer or go blind at the same time. That’s illogical and doesn’t actually happen. Because the buffer of time doesn't last that long. So after a while, either you stay in joy and the cancer (a manifestation of the opposite state of being of joy) has to go and total health remains, or the cancer stays and your joy goes. But you can’t have it both ways in the long run. That doesn’t happen. Either way, your state of being and your manifestations will always come into alignment at some point so that your state of being is reflected in your manifestations and your manifestations reflect your state of being. The buffer of time sometimes doesn’t make that immediately apparent though. The reason why people might think that this actually happens and why bad things happen to good people is because they are out of touch with their actual feelings and therefore their actual state of being and therefore have no reliable reference point for the experiences they invite (or create) in their field of awareness. So my conclusion is that her idea of accepting and loving what-is is essentially just relabeling what-is. It’s all a mind game, basically. This is why you hear her mostly talk about how it’s all just a story, a dream etc. And we've all heard that before, right?
In summary, BK’s perspective is still the SVP perspective. Which is why what she says makes no sense in the liberation context. It’s also a purely intellectual perspective. Which is why what she says makes no sense in the deliberate creation context either. Sorry Andrew, I know you like Katie and seemed to have personally benefited from her teaching. I respect your experience and perspective, so I gave it a shot. But I’m not buying it, neither her teaching nor her personal story. Which doesn’t mean that what she has to offer has no value in general. It obviously does have value to a lot of people. But there are some serious flaws in what she teaches that will create a lot of confusion in the people who follow her teaching.
As to your question about my stance re: the value of teachings in general when it comes to liberation, my stance hasn’t changed. So you could argue, from the big picture perspective, that my critique of BK is actually irrelevant and that her teaching is as helpful or unhelpful as Ramana’s or Niz’ teaching. Fair point. However, BK speaks from the SVP perspective, addresses the SVP and works on the SVP. While Ramana & Friends do not speak from the SVP perspective, don’t address the SVP (unless they do, hehe) and don’t work on the SVP. So in the liberation context, it doesn’t make a difference. SR is acausal. You cannot make it happen and you cannot prevent it from happening either. However, in the experiential context, it’s a big difference. One is about dreaming differently, the other is about actually waking up. Which is why one is focused on the dream character, the dream content, the dream story. While the other isn’t focused on the dream character but what is actual, making dream content and dream story irrelevant. That’s why you hear BK always commenting about dream content (usually intent to give it the most positive spin) but Ramana & Friends only talk about the Self, what is actual, don’t actually care about the content of the dream, usually don't even comment on it.
So the two teachings are worlds apart, even though there is some similarity in vocabulary and concepts. It sounds like you agree that it has value to a lot of people, but for those that are specifically seeking 'liberation' it could cause confusion. Let's say I agree it could do. Why do you believe confusion is a bad thing for a seeker of 'liberation'? What is your wish for seekers? |
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Post by Reefs on May 26, 2024 22:41:00 GMT -5
It sounds like you agree that it has value to a lot of people, but for those that are specifically seeking 'liberation' it could cause confusion. Let's say I agree it could do. Why do you believe confusion is a bad thing for a seeker of 'liberation'? What is your wish for seekers? See my edit above... ETA:
For those who want to take the easy route to dreaming a better dream, I suggest to follow A-H. For those who want to wake the hell up and take the most direct route, I suggest to follow Ramana & Friends. And for those who want to have a wild ride and a bit of both, I suggest to follow BK. |
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Post by andrew on May 26, 2024 22:42:15 GMT -5
It sounds like you agree that it has value to a lot of people, but for those that are specifically seeking 'liberation' it could cause confusion. Let's say I agree it could do. Why do you believe confusion is a bad thing for a seeker of 'liberation'? What is your wish for seekers? See my edit above... ETA:
For those who want to take the easy route to dreaming a better dream, I suggest to follow A-H. For those who want to wake the hell up and take the most direct route, I suggest to follow Ramana & Friends. And for those who want to have a wild ride and a bit of both, I suggest to follow BK. Direct route to what? Liberation? Or waking the hell up? Are you saying there's a difference? (That's pretty cool that my question was being asked as you were adding an edit...I assume you didn't add it after you saw my question? More psychic connection on the forum!) |
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Post by Reefs on May 26, 2024 23:16:01 GMT -5
Direct route to what? Liberation? Or waking the hell up? Are you saying there's a difference? (That's pretty cool that my question was being asked as you were adding an edit...I assume you didn't add it after you saw my question? More psychic connection on the forum!) Yes, I was adding it while you replied. Because I was afraid that it looks like I call Katie a dangerous fraud, but that's not my intention nor my take. I think she is genuine about her perspective. She is just a very popular example of a very common pattern which we could call "twilight zone spirituality", i.e. that zone or time between being done with the spiritual circus and the actual event of SR. I spend about a year or two in that state. Some people spend decades in that state. And there's nothing you can really do there. You cannot go back to the consensus trance, and you cannot pass thru the gateless gate either. So you are kinda stuck in a twilight zone.
And to understand my position you have to keep in mind 3 basic concepts: 1) You create your own experience. 2) SR is not an experience. 3) Suffering is optional.
This is why I often recommended in the past to not take this liberation stuff all too seriously. It's not in your hands. You cannot make it happen and you also cannot mess it up. Which is both bad news and good news. So just relax, it either happens or doesn't happen, it is not your responsibility. In the mean time, enjoy your life to the fullest here and now, take some time to smell the roses, instead of trying to meditate your way with clenched fists so that you can force your way thru that darned gateless gate. That will just add to your suffering.
So the best advice I can think of for seekers is to be brutally honest about their situation. That they already are what they are looking for. They are home already. That what they are looking for is their natural state. Natural meaning that that it cannot be lost, it cannot be acquired, no one can give it or take it away and you also cannot or have to earn it. All that is required is a conscious re-cognition of what is already just-so, always has been just-so and always will be just-so. That it is all just an error in perception that causes their suffering. In essence just a case of mistaken identity. And that all it takes is to correct that error in perception. Which can only does happen instantly. There is no process whatsoever involved. This is not happening in time. The natural state exists outside of time, prior to time. But that re-cognition involves a seeing with a different set of eyes. And so whatever they attempt to see or realize with their current set of eyes is bound to fail and only add to their suffering. And so from an experiential perspective, it's much better to teach them about LOA, inner guidance and alignment than non-duality. Teaching them about deliberate creation will help them become healthy, wealthy and wise. It's basically the initial steps on the yoga path and it will decrease their suffering greatly, even though it doesn't solve the core issue, i.e. you while you cannot find unconditional peace that way, you can at least find conditional peace that way. Which is better than all the other alternatives. Teaching them only non-duality will make them frustrated and often conceited and put them at odds with the other consensus trance peeps, i.e. it will usually only increase their suffering. That's why, in offline life, I only talk to people about non-duality who are ready for it. This kind of knowledge has to be handled with care.
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Post by andrew on May 26, 2024 23:45:16 GMT -5
Direct route to what? Liberation? Or waking the hell up? Are you saying there's a difference? (That's pretty cool that my question was being asked as you were adding an edit...I assume you didn't add it after you saw my question? More psychic connection on the forum!) Yes, I was adding it while you replied. Because I was afraid that it looks like I call Katie a dangerous fraud, but that's not my intention nor my take. I think she is genuine about her perspective. She is just a very popular example of a very common pattern which we could call "twilight zone spirituality", i.e. that zone or time between being done with the spiritual circus and the actual event of SR. I spend about a year or two in that state. Some people spend decades in that state. And there's nothing you can really do there. You cannot go back to the consensus trance, and you cannot pass thru the gateless gate either. So you are kinda stuck in a twilight zone.
And to understand my position you have to keep in mind 3 basic concepts: 1) You create your own experience. 2) SR is not an experience. 3) Suffering is optional.
This is why I often recommended in the past to not take this liberation stuff all too seriously. It's not in your hands. You cannot make it happen and you also cannot mess it up. Which is both bad news and good news. So just relax, it either happens or doesn't happen, it is not your responsibility. In the mean time, enjoy your life to the fullest here and now, take some time to smell the roses, instead of trying to meditate your way with clenched fists so that you can force your way thru that darned gateless gate. That will just add to your suffering. So the best advice I can think of for seekers is to be brutally honest about their situation. That they already are what they are looking for. They are home already. That what they are looking for is their natural state. Natural meaning that that it cannot be lost, it cannot be acquired, no one can give it or take it away and you also cannot or have to earn it. All that is required is a conscious re-cognition of what is already just-so, always has been just-so and always will be just-so. That it is all just an error in perception that causes their suffering. In essence just a case of mistaken identity. And that all it takes is to correct that error in perception. Which can only does happen instantly. There is no process whatsoever involved. This is not happening in time. The natural state exists outside of time, prior to time. But that re-cognition involves a seeing with a different set of eyes. And so whatever they attempt to see or realize with their current set of eyes is bound to fail and only add to their suffering. And so from an experiential perspective, it's much better to teach them about LOA, inner guidance and alignment than non-duality. Teaching them about deliberate creation will help them become healthy, wealthy and wise. It's basically the initial steps on the yoga path and it will decrease their suffering greatly, even though it doesn't solve the core issue, i.e. you while you cannot find unconditional peace that way, you can at least find conditional peace that way. Which is better than all the other alternatives. Teaching them only non-duality will make them frustrated and often conceited and put them at odds with the other consensus trance peeps, i.e. it will usually only increase their suffering. That's why, in offline life, I only talk to people about non-duality who are ready for it. This kind of knowledge has to be handled with care.
okay thank you for expanding/clarifying your view. There are always further questions that could be asked, but after sitting for a moment, in this case, I'm just going to let that little bubble of questioning subside, and move along. |
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Post by Reefs on May 26, 2024 23:54:07 GMT -5
okay thank you for expanding/clarifying your view. There are always further questions that could be asked, but after sitting for a moment, in this case, I'm just going to let that little bubble of questioning subside, and move along. It was a good discussion from my perspective. You actually helped me clarify some points about spiritual teachers in general and the non-duality circus in particular. So thanks for the chat. And feel free to ask, no problem. |
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Post by Deleted on May 27, 2024 10:43:12 GMT -5
I also had a positive experience with Byron Katie's technique. Of course, it's not something one can milk all the time for "results", but I remember one time when I applied her four questions, and it led to an insight. In this case I'd been believing something about myself that you might call "negative", and I saw that behind my actions was a pretty "positive" or decent character trait - and this little insight made me cry, which I don't do often.
This is probably a common theme, as many "negative" personality patterns, neuroses, or fears, are forms of something more positive, in disguise. In some cases maybe some people are just assh--s to the core, I don't know, but I don't think that's common.
The cases of "spiritual bypassing" I've seen would likely be helped by a technique like Katie's. People sometimes run/repress/bypass things that they consider "non-spiritual" and retreat to a world of highfalutin spiritual words and concepts.
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Post by andrew on May 27, 2024 12:33:05 GMT -5
One of BK's most persistent investigations relates to 'what is our business' and 'what isn't'. I find it to be one of her most useful points. Reflecting this morning on the differences in attitudes towards homeless people, in America and the UK. It's an interesting cultural difference. In the UK, the attitude towards homeless people, in general, is a bit softer. In my old town, I would often stop and talk with the homeless folks, and give a bit of money. I had no care how they spent it, if they wanted to get some booze or drugs...it's none of my business. To a great extent, homeless folks were part of the community, generally considered harmless. It was considered that, for whatever reason, at this point in their life, they couldn't 'function' in the way that broader society expects and demands. They can't get a job, hold a job, pay bills etc. Maybe it boils down to trauma they experienced. Maybe they are neuro-divergent. Maybe it's just their personality type. It doesn't matter to me, I have no lesson to teach them, and I accept them as they are, in their current homeless state of being. It's different in America. America values the idea of people 'pulling themselves up by the bootstraps'. The idea that 'we are all equally capable'. The idea that 'if I can do it, you can do it'. So homeless folks are treated as a sub-class of people that could 'choose' better, if they learned the 'right lessons'. As much as I love America, I find this a culturally immature aspect. Can we ever know what is going on with another individual? Is it even our business to know? How do we know their mental-emotional state? How do we know their traumas? How do we know how their brains are wired? How do we know where they are 'at' in their life path, and what is necessary for them to explore? If we can't really know, why teach lessons? |
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Post by laughter on May 27, 2024 13:00:06 GMT -5
I find this one interesting, and challenging. ''Sadness is always a sign that you’re believing a stressful thought that isn’t true for you. It’s a constriction, and it feels bad. Conventional wisdom says differently, but the truth is that sadness isn’t rational, it isn’t a natural response, and it can’t ever help you. It just indicates the loss of reality, the loss of the awareness of love. Sadness is the war with what is. It’s a tantrum. You can experience it only when you’re arguing with God. When the mind is clear, there isn’t any sadness. There can’t be.'' BK It's possible to feel a poignant moment as things change, especially as we witness the erosion of minds, people, places or things. Do we necessarily need a word other than "sadness"? I think not. But by the same token, I get what she's saying here, and its' related to what I wrote to SN about that ... "ache". |
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Post by andrew on May 27, 2024 13:10:34 GMT -5
I find this one interesting, and challenging. ''Sadness is always a sign that you’re believing a stressful thought that isn’t true for you. It’s a constriction, and it feels bad. Conventional wisdom says differently, but the truth is that sadness isn’t rational, it isn’t a natural response, and it can’t ever help you. It just indicates the loss of reality, the loss of the awareness of love. Sadness is the war with what is. It’s a tantrum. You can experience it only when you’re arguing with God. When the mind is clear, there isn’t any sadness. There can’t be.'' BK It's possible to feel a poignant moment as things change, especially as we witness the erosion of minds, people, places or things. Do we necessarily need a word other than "sadness"? I think not. But by the same token, I get what she's saying here, and its' related to what I wrote to SN about that ... "ache". Both poignancy and sadness are aspects of my experience, and I'm really okay with that. I've been a pet sitter that falls in love with every pet that comes under my care, and it has sometimes felt like my heart breaks to leave them. But when I've explored the spectrum of sadness closely, I can't deny that whether it's a moment of poignancy, or a outpouring of tears....there is slight 'sulk' involved. I have to slightly withdraw from the present moment, I have to 'compare', I have to create a slight internal story/sense of 'loss'. Again, to reiterate, I'm really okay with that, I am not Katie. But I like the way she challenges. Same with anger...whether it's irritation, annoyance, frustration or rage....it's just intensities of the same basic story of 'should' and 'shouldn't' |
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Post by laughter on May 27, 2024 13:13:54 GMT -5
Yes. That was her path and what she recommends. Many people have found her approach helpful. ATST I've met people who may spend the rest of their lives doing this without ever getting free. Yeah, at best it can free you from limiting beliefs, at worst it is just another form of mental kungfu that leads to spiritual bypassing. Here's from her website: What is the "you" that her four questions are directed at? What about realizing "your" true nature? Seeing thru the SVP? Does she address those issues?
If she doesn't address the SVP issue, then what she offers is just another form of self-help mixed in with a bit of non-duality lingo. Which would be the infamous context mix I mentioned earlier.
You can talk about self-help. No problem. You can talk about non-duality. No problem. But you cannot throw them together. They have to be discussed separately. Or else it's just identity poker, the false witness position. Which is the impression I got from her. I'll give her the benefit of the doubt though until I have actually read her book(s). We'll see.
Tolle sneaks this into Now with a single punchline in the context of writing about the (in my words) conventional state of mind as "madness". He wrote that (paraphrasing from memory) "as it is, 90% of human thought is negative, repetitive, and useless". So, now, what you say is true, and implicates RM's fake cop, patrolling the mall of the mind on his segway scooter policing any negative thoughts. Until Gracie visits, all witnessing is fake witnessing. But not all fake witnessing is created equal. Some of it can result in a sudden collapse of entire mind structures. The resulting mental quiescence is a space filled with opportunity. RM's self inquiry is a coin with two sides. On one side is the invitation to Grace, and there is always a thread of sincerity that runs through any tapestry of existential curiosity. Even Paul Blart's uniform. On the other side is neti-neti .. "who is it that has this thought?" becomes instantly clear in some instances: it is the imposter, the ego, the false sense of self. This can only be witnessed from the fake witnessing position, unless you want to account for the situation of a genuine existential insight short of SR. Seems to me that some of these might overlap with psychiatric/psychological insight. No reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater. As always, there is no hope for mind. I can see your clear bifrucation as potentially helpful, or potentially just another conditioned hitch someone might internalize along the way. |
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