Forget about Enlightenment

Discussion of the nature of Ultimate Reality and the path to Enlightenment.
Locked
User avatar
David Quinn
Posts: 5708
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 6:56 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by David Quinn »

samadhi wrote:David,
samadhi: All you seem capable of is a blanket dismissal. Your unwillingness to quote and critique, which might lend a semblance of credibility to your words, exemplifies a lazy, dismissive attitude that bristles with hostility when challenged. Like a dog, you piss on everyone around you to let them know they are impinging on your territory.

DQ: It is completely beyond all that. I know you're a fan-boy of Adya and it is understandable that you would react to my criticisms of Adya in a defensive manner. But all I can do is call it as I see it and hope that you can awaken to the larger perspective that I am depicting.
I have no problem with your not liking Adya. He isn't for everyone and certainly not for you. My problem is that your criticisms do not actually address anything he says but either his looks or your overall impression that is no different from simple prejudice. Like saying he is "too emotional." All that does is reflect your own feeling you get from listening to him. But you won’t say that because of course it would contradict your "man of logic" façade. All I am doing is pointing that out. Unfortunately a "man of logic" cannot see his own emotion. It takes someone else to do that for him.

You’re misunderstanding me. I cannot begin to describe just how small Adya seems to me. He is like a mosquito or a gnat. The thoughts he delivers are the thoughts I had when I was a teenager, the same thoughts that I now see as being very limited and naive.

For me, rejecting someone like Adya is like rejecting the doctrines of the Jehovah's Witnesses or the Ku Klux Klan. It is not an emotional rejection, but simply a recognition of their limitations.

samadhi wrote:
Now you could analyze Britney's songs and say, "Oh, that is a nice drum-fill there", or "She puts an unexpected little twist on the melody here", but it still won't hide the fact that it is generic, formulaic pop produced for the large lucrative market of insecure 14 year-old girls.
Yet he gets results. Something else you don't want to look at.

14 year-old girls would also say that they get results from Britney's music. Her music works for them. Given their lack of mental development, it doesn’t really mean much.

samadhi wrote:
sam: Confrontation is not the only way to understanding, nor is it a very productive way, generally speaking. I'm not saying it can't work, given the right temperament. But your idea that everyone must be confronted is simply that, your idea. It is a strategy, nothing more or less than any other strategy. Simply because it might have worked in your case does not justify you going around and beating everyone up. You cannot force anyone to give up anything anyway, what needs to be left behind must always be surrendered willingly. People are not stupid. They will see what needs to be surrendered in good time when they are ready and engaged. Someone who is not ready to surrender will not be any more ready no matter how much you confront them.

DQ: While that is true, it would still be nice to see these gurus make at least some attempt to open people's eyes to the deeper issues of the ego, instead of sweeping it all under the carpet and pretending that there are no issues at all.
Please. It isn't his job to fix you. That's your job. And his approach isn't to look at each character flaw and throw it in your face. His approach is to help you see what is already present and doesn't need fixing. Once you see that, what needs changing, changes by itself.

I'm talking more about opening people's horizons and encouraging them to see the true extent of the ego problem. Most people find this alone to be confronting. Yes, it is true that each individual has to do the work himself, but he cannot begin to do this if his guru keeps shielding the full extent of the problem from him and telling him that nothing’s amiss.

samadhi wrote:
One can see the consequences of this in your own case. For example, in previous posts you have mentioned that you believe humour, emotion, the feminine, etc, are part of "human nature" and have no connection to wisdom or ego. This is a standard viewpoint which comes straight out of the generic guru's textbook. Instead of helping people to face up to these deeper egotistical issues and deal with them properly, the generic guru instead encourages his followers to erect mental blocks and push these issues out of mind and out of sight. This is not healthy, in my book.
Okay. You and I have a basic disagreement about emotions and their place in what it means to be human. For you they seem to indicate some flaw or hindrance to awakening. For me, emotions are what makes a human being human. It doesn't mean the expression of hatred or rage are part of awakening. It means that humans can feel the whole range of emotions including those that lead to division and separation. On awakening, those emotions which express division and separation no longer have an ego to fuel them. Love, compassion, caring, the feminine as you call it, are all more available, not less, because those emotions are no longer hamstrung or manipulated by the ego.

These feminine emotions still require the existence of division and separation, even if it is simply to overcome them. If there was no division and separation to begin with, then none of these emotions could come into play. That is why the Buddha taught that love and hate are both part of the same samsaric wheel. Love and hate depend on each other, and feed off of each other.

It is similar to the way that Mother Teresa needed poor, broken-spirited people in order for her compassion to come into play. If there were no poor, broken-spirited people to begin with, then her compassion would become superfluous. It would be robbed of the very fuel which sustains it. And interestingly enough, her Christian teachings encouraged the kind of passive, helpless mindset which so easily leads to poverty and broken-spiritedness in the first place. Her attachment to compassion literally helped to create the very problem that she believed she was addressing.

samadhi wrote:
sam: Women and the feminine is your kick and something for you to deal with.

DQ: It is everyone's kick and something that everyone who is serious about giving up attachments and becoming wise has to deal with. But don't look to Adya and his ilk to help you in this. You will only draw a blank.

sam: The feminine is part of human nature. You don’t give up human nature to remember who you are. In fact, you don’t become less human, you become MORE human.

DQ: One could just as easily rationalize murder and rape on the grounds that they are also a part of "human nature".
They are a part of human nature but a part that feeds the ego based on division, separation, greed and domination. Love, compassion, caring, etc. do not do that.

That is what the generic gurus say, but they are misguided. Love is always an attempt to bridge over division and separation, and thus is still based in the ego.

Because the enlightened sage never experiences division and separation in the first place, he never requires any emotional bridges to be built over them. In truth, he is too pure for love, just as he is too pure for hate.


samadhi wrote:
People who use such phrases are simply trying to justify the things they are attached to. It is little different from saying that some behaviours are "Amercian", while others are "un-American".
Attachment is about ego. Sure, one can be attached to love as a means to feel better or even to dominate someone (although love in that sense is a manipulation, an appearance that plays on another’s emotion and not what is commonly referred to as love at all). When attachment is involved, the emotions can become more about manipulating than about a genuine expression. But without ego, such emotions don’t disappear, only one’s need to manipulate them to some other end. A genuine expression of love is not about attachment or ego. If love were not possible without ego, enlightenment would be worth precious little.

Enlightenment is far, far greater than love.

samadhi wrote:
What people need to grasp is that the feminine, along with emotion, humour, compassion, and yes, the masculine as well, are all part of our egotistical nature and need to be dealt with on that basis.
You need to point to someone who actually teaches this besides yourself. I have never seen compassion, for example, associated with the ego. Yes, there can be attachment, practicing compassion out of a desire to create, preserve or promote an image. It doesn't mean compassion itself arises out of ego.

From the Tao Te Ching:

When the great Tao is forgotten,
Kindness and morality arise.
When wisdom and intelligence are born,
The great pretence begins.

When there is no peace within the family,
Filial piety and devotion arise.
When the country is confused and in chaos,
Loyal ministers appear.

-

Therefore when the Tao is lost, there is goodness.
When goodness is lost, there is kindness.
When kindness is lost, there is justice.
When justice is lost, there is ritual.
Now ritual is the husk of faith and loyalty, the
beginning of confusion.

Knowledge of the future is only a flowery trapping of Tao.
It is the beginning of folly.


samadhi wrote:
It is impossible to be truly serious about eliminating the ego if one can't even recognize the sheer extent of what's involved. Gurus like Adya are preventing people from addressing these issues properly because he is narrowing their conception of the ego to include just a few obvious egotistical traits, while excluding the rest.
No, you will never find Adya talking about compassion as an expression of ego. That's because it isn't. If you say it is, then tell me who else teaches that. If you can't point to anyone, why should I believe you in contradiction to my own experience and that of all teachers who have come before?

What is compassion, exactly?

samadhi wrote:
sam: QRS does have a thing about emotion (the feminine, etc.) and the "need" to get rid of it that, as far as I can tell, has no basis in enlightenment teaching. I don't know where it came from.

DQ: It certainly has no basis in the bland, generic speech that usually passes for "enlightenment teaching" these days. But it's there in most of the major works nonetheless - the Dhammapada, Chuang Tzu's and Lao Tzu's writings, the various sutras, various Hindu works, and so on.
Do you want to talk about the Tao? Chuang Tzu? Have at it. Do they reject emotion? Then please show it. Time to put up or shut up.

From Chuang Tzu:

- When the mind is without care or joy, this is the height of Virtue. When it is unified and unchanging, this is the height of stillness. When it grates against nothing, this is the height of emptiness. When it has no commerce with things, this is the height of serenity. When it rebels against nothing, this is the height of purity.


- To harmonize with men is called human joy; to harmonize with Heaven is called Heavenly joy.

For him who understands Heavenly joy, life is the working of Heaven and death is the transformation of things. With his single mind in repose, he is king of the world. The spirits do not afflict him, and his soul knows no weariness. With his single mind reposed, the ten thousand things submit ‑ which is to say that his emptiness and stillness reach throughout Heaven and earth and penetrate the ten thousand things. This is what is called Heavenly joy.

Heavenly joy is the mind of the sage, by which he shepherds the world.


- A little while ago, when I went in to mourn the death of Lao Tan, I found old men weeping for him as though they were weeping for a son, and young men weeping for him as though they were weeping for a mother. To have gathered a group like that, he must have done something to make them weep for him, even though he didn't ask them to weep. This is to hide from Heaven, to turn your back on the true state of affairs and forget what you were born with. In the old days, this was called the crime of hiding from Heaven.

Lao Tan happened to come because it was his time, and he happened to leave because things follow their course. If you are content with the time and willing to follow along, then grief and joy have no Way to enter in. In the old days, this was called being freed from the bonds of God.

Though the grease burns out of the torch, the fire passes on, and no one knows where it ends.


- Beasts that feed on grass do not fret over a change of pasture; creatures that live in water do not fret over a change of stream. They accept the minor shift as long as the all‑important constant is not lost. Be like them and joy, anger, grief, and happiness can never enter your breast.

In this world, the ten thousand things come together in One. If you can find that One and become identical with it, then your four limbs and hundred joints will become dust and refuse; life and death will be as day and night, and nothing whatever can confound you.

Since the ten thousand transformations continue without even the beginning of an end, how could they bring anxiety to your mind? He who practices the Way understands all this.


- You should find the same joy in one condition as you would in any other and thereby be free of care. But here you are, when certain things take their leave, you cease to be joyful.

Though you might experience joy on occasion, it will always be fated for destruction. Therefore, it is said: "Those who destroy themselves in things and lose their inborn nature in the vulgar may be called the upside‑down people."


- When a man does not dwell in self, things spontaneously reveal their forms to him. His movement is like that of water, his stillness like that of a mirror, his responses like those of an echo. Blank‑eyed, he seems to be lost; motionless, he has the clarity of water. Because he is one with it, he achieves harmony; should he ever reach out for it, he would lose it. Never does he go ahead of other men, but always follows in their wake.

samadhi wrote:
Most importantly, it is there for anyone who has the courage to open their eyes to Reality. Like humour, emotion is always triggered by illusion and always tied up with attachment and ego. This is something which is obvious to the mind when it becomes enlightened.
Well, here I am, open my eyes. Where is the teaching that humor or emotion are to be abandoned? You keep repeating it but when I ask you to show it, you do a lot of hand-waving and little else.

I’ve already showed how humour and laughter are egotistical responses to oppression, that they act to release the ego from tension. The reasons I gave are simple and direct. If you understand the nature of the ego, then you will have no trouble understanding these reasons very clearly.

samadhi wrote:
But, of course, people instinctively become emotional about this kind of talk and don't want to know about it. This is where the generic gurus come in, to soothe them and put them back to sleep again.
Well, I want to know about it. Show me. Let's look at the Tao. How about this:
The Master views the parts with compassion,
because he understands the whole.
His constant practice is humility.
He doesn't glitter like a jewel
but lets himself be shaped by the Tao,
as rugged and common as stone. (v 39, Mitchell trans.)
Hmm, compassion. Surprised?

That particular translation diverges markedly from most other translations, so much so that one has the impression that Mitchell has just made it up.

samadhi wrote:
sam: I’m not saying he teaches trying not to struggle, or even not struggling. Struggling and not struggling is the duality which humans find themselves in. They think if it’s not one, it must be the other. That is the turning of the wheel itself, chasing answers within a duality. There is no “the way” to it. There is “your way” to it. He doesn’t encourage you to struggle or to not struggle, only to do what you do without the idea of getting something in return.

DQ: What about emotional rewards, good relationships with people, love, mental peace, good conscience, the blisses involved in being aware of the present, etc? Are you telling me that the people who attend Adya's lecture's aren't seeking these things?
Everyone wants to feel better, okay? That's not a bad thing, it's just the way things are. Everyone comes to an enlightenment teaching wanting to feel better and end their suffering. That is where you start. When there is some understanding, one realizes enlightenment is not about problem-solving, feeling better, or in your case, either attaining some kind of perfect logic or getting rid of emotion. It is about what is prior to all that. It is not about a future moment but about what is being overlooked in the present moment. Struggle is invariably about the future, getting something that isn’t here in the present. But you can’t struggle for what you already have. Nor can you stop struggling if you think there is something you need. Adya teaches the direct approach, what you already are right now. For some, that's not enough, they want something else. As long as you think you need a brilliant mind infused with impeccable logic to attain enlightenment, struggle will be part of your path.

Not at all. You are speaking out of ignorance here. The importance of logic is that it can unearth the deeper aspects of the ego which need to be addressed and eliminated before struggle can cease. What Adya teaches is a false peace based on the blocking out of these deeper aspects. It is a band-aid solution, at best.

But it is a win-win situation for the cunning Adya because he knows that the process of blocking out can achieve temporary periods of peace and he knows that when these peaceful periods come to an end it won't be seen to be his fault. In other words, a student can quickly achieve periods of peace by this "direct approach" as taught by Adya. However, no one can block out deeper emotional realities forever and sooner or later they will burst through. But it won't be seen to be Adya's fault when they do burst through, nor will it seen to be the fault of the teachings. No, it will be the student's fault for not meditating well enough, or not having developed enough good karma in the past.

It is similar to the dynamic observed in Christian fundamentalism where a devotee might pray for a miracle cure for a friend’s disease and if the cure doesn't materialize the fault will lie with the devotee for not having enough faith. In this way, the ministers are able to side-step the blame for their dodgy teachings. Virtually the whole spiritual industry runs on this dynamic.

samadhi wrote:
sam: Enlightenment isn't a bargain, it is not a prize you get for following some rule someone tells you. Struggle is more obviously about getting something. What do you think you’re getting that isn’t already here?

DQ: Freedom from egotism and delusion. For most people, that is definitely something which is not already here.
Egotism (which is delusion) is here because that is what you see. As long as you see yourself as an ego, you will act as an ego.
Not so. A person can still act egotistically even when he isn’t seeing himself as an ego. The ego is like an iceberg, with most of it extending down beneath the awareness of most people’s minds. If this deeper part isn’t brought to the surface and dealt with properly, it will still continue to fester away and influence that person’s behaviour, regardless of what he happens to see within his awareness.

Simply imagining that one doesn’t have an ego isn’t enough. That’s just wishful thinking. One has to roll up the sleeves and put in the hard work to eliminate the ego properly. That’s if you’re serous about wisdom.

-
clyde
Posts: 680
Joined: Wed Sep 13, 2006 3:04 pm

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by clyde »

David Quinn wrote:What is compassion, exactly?
Are you certain that you studied the teachings of Buddha and consider him a "spiritual brother"?
mikiel
Posts: 588
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2007 9:27 am

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by mikiel »

David Quinn wrote:
mikiel wrote:David:
"I agree that becoming enlightened is a transformative process, one that completely changes the nature of one's experiences and consciousness. But in truth, this is just the start of the long road to perfection. The habitual and instinctual delusions that have been accumulated not only from decades of own ignorant lifestyles since birth, but also from millions of years of evolution, have yet to be dealt with. It takes a lot of time and effort to eliminate all of these bugs from the system."

David,
You are welcome to speak for yourself (your "truth"), but it is presumptuous to project your conceptual ideal of perfection onto others as part of your concept of enlightenment.
My "habitual and instinctual delusions"... the whole egocentric conditioning program, "popped" in '94 and left "me" free of all delusion.

And yet I have noticed in your posts that you have anger issues, that you quickly become short-tempered with those who challenge you.

I've also noticed that your speech, particularly about spiritual issues, is very scripted and mannered. Reading one of your posts is like reading a generic Hindu text. It is as though you have to put on a mental uniform in order to talk about these things. You don't seem to have the freedom to talk about Reality in a natural manner, or to be able to describe it in a thousand different ways. This suggests to me that your understanding is compartmentalized and doesn't really impact on the emotional part of your existence.
---------------
m: I get that you don't like my style. It takes all kinds, and no one style is the standard for all teachers. We are as unique after as before awakening.
You may not know much about "radical honesty" but it has been a guiding principle in my life for a long time, and it has become even more "radical" since my awakening.
When confronting deeply entrenched egocentricity, such as you display, btw.,the most compassionate approach, in my experience is not sweet talk but "brutal honesty"... a "no holds barred" approach to "wrestling ego to the mat" as a method of helping the egocentric one being confronted through the suffering their baggage, like your extremely judgemental attitude, brings on, for you and those you judge so harshly.
-------------

So I think you still do have quite a few bugs to eliminate from the system.
---------
m: Since you are obviously deeply and harshly judgemental and far from elnlightenment yourself, I must take your criticism with a grain of salt.
--------------
Of course there was preparation. 25 yrs of daily meditation, an hour a day. Two months of sitting 8-12 hrs/day. A near death experience. (Dunno if you read any of my site... Journey to Awakening... of Joel's site equating enlightenment to this same selflessness I have experienced since awakening.
When the "bubble" ("me in here... not-me out there") finally "pops", the delusion of separation from the Divine is gone, and Unity in Identity with Omnipresent Consciousness (by whatever name) is the result... the permanent estate of 'conscious unity.'

It doesn't concern me whether you believe this or not , but it is universal Truth among all "enlightened ones." Just FYI, whether you "get it" or not.
I'm wondering whether this "popping" was really just a mental skill that you suddenly acquired of being able to thrust your consciousness into the narrow compartment of your spiritual understanding and thereby freeing yourself from your unresolved emotional issues by way of distancing from them. In other words, the emotional issues are still there, but you able to block them out (at least occasionally) by isolating portions of your mind into separate compartments.
-------------
Here again you are making judgements base on no knowledge of my "popping" at all. It was the end of "my emotional issues"... and the end of the illusion of personal identiy.
I suggest that until you can honestly say the same that you quit projecting your own emotional issues and ideals of "perfect enlightenment" on everyone else.
---------------

I see this characteristic quite a lot in spiritual gurus and their followers, particularly in the generic ones. A person has a sudden insight or experience of unity, diligently cultivates the re-experience of it via meditation and sets up home in it, falsely believing that this is enlightenment. Although this behaviour is contrived and infinitely removed from true wisdom, he is able to find support for it from the many generic spiritual texts that have been written by gurus who themselves have fallen into the same trap.
-----------
You are full of more negative judgement against "gurus" than anyone I have come across. Sounds like you must have "surrendered" to a guru who turned out to be highly egocentric and abusive. Just a guess, btw., not presented like "I know you better than you do" as you come across.
No, I am not angry, even tho it may sound that way to you.
I will share (again, as I've done on another thread somwhere?) my favorite quote from (I think) the most intelligent integral philosopher ever. He is not enlightened, btw, but spent 13 days in a state of epiphany, as he describes in "One Taste." (I've had several personal conversations with him.)
So this is a very eloquent description of my preferred "style" of confronting egocentricity as a teacher"
Wilber:
---------
" If you want encouragement, soft smiles, ego stroking, gentle caresses of your self-contracting ways, pats on the back and sweet words of solace, find yourself a Nice Guy or Good Girl, and hold their hand on the sweet path of stress reduction and egoic comfort. But if you want Enlightenment, if you want to wake up, if you want to get fried in the fire of passionate Infinity, then, I promise you: find yourself a Rude Boy or a Nasty Girl, the ones who make you uncomfortable in their presence, who scare you witless, who will turn on you in a second and hold you up for ridicule, who will make you wish you were never born, who will offer you not sweet comfort but abject terror, not saccharin solace but scorching angst, for then, just then, you might very well be on the path to your own Original Face."
----------
-
Hope this clarifies your misconceptions about me.
(Hey... I'm the expert on the subject... :)
michael
brokenhead
Posts: 2271
Joined: Mon Aug 07, 2006 8:51 am
Location: Boise

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by brokenhead »

DQ wrote (of Mother Theresa):
Her attachment to compassion literally helped to create the very problem that she believed she was addressing
.
It's sophistries like this that make the things you propound suspect. Why would anyone want to espouse a philosophy, which, when extended logically, leads to inane conclusions like this?
User avatar
Shardrol
Posts: 237
Joined: Wed Oct 26, 2005 12:08 pm
Location: New York, USA

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by Shardrol »

samadhi wrote:[to Mikiel] I think it's great that you're here. I find it ironic and amusing that on a forum devoted to enlightenment, you go unrecognized. Maybe that shouldn't be surprising. In any case, I hope you continue to stop by and share your rare and valuable perspective.
People who believe themselves to be enlightened aren't exactly thin on the ground in this forum. There are always a few around. But why do you take Mikiel's (or anybody's) word for it?
User avatar
David Quinn
Posts: 5708
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 6:56 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by David Quinn »

clyde wrote:
David Quinn wrote:What is compassion, exactly?
Are you certain that you studied the teachings of Buddha and consider him a "spiritual brother"?
It is one of those words that can interpreted in a wide variety of ways, just like "God". I have my own understanding of compassion, which I believe accords with the Buddha's understanding. But I was asking for samadhi's understanding, which I suspect is very different.

-
User avatar
David Quinn
Posts: 5708
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 6:56 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by David Quinn »

brokenhead wrote:DQ wrote (of Mother Theresa):
Her attachment to compassion literally helped to create the very problem that she believed she was addressing
.
It's sophistries like this that make the things you propound suspect. Why would anyone want to espouse a philosophy, which, when extended logically, leads to inane conclusions like this?
Why do you think it is an inane conclusion?

-
clyde
Posts: 680
Joined: Wed Sep 13, 2006 3:04 pm

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by clyde »

David Quinn wrote:
clyde wrote:
David Quinn wrote:What is compassion, exactly?
Are you certain that you studied the teachings of Buddha and consider him a "spiritual brother"?
It is one of those words that can interpreted in a wide variety of ways, just like "God". I have my own understanding of compassion, which I believe accords with the Buddha's understanding. But I asking for samadhi's understanding, which I suspect is very different.
Fair enough, but what is your understanding of compassion?
User avatar
David Quinn
Posts: 5708
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 6:56 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by David Quinn »

mikiel wrote:
David Quinn wrote:And yet I have noticed in your posts that you have anger issues, that you quickly become short-tempered with those who challenge you.

I've also noticed that your speech, particularly about spiritual issues, is very scripted and mannered. Reading one of your posts is like reading a generic Hindu text. It is as though you have to put on a mental uniform in order to talk about these things. You don't seem to have the freedom to talk about Reality in a natural manner, or to be able to describe it in a thousand different ways. This suggests to me that your understanding is compartmentalized and doesn't really impact on the emotional part of your existence.
m: I get that you don't like my style. It takes all kinds, and no one style is the standard for all teachers. We are as unique after as before awakening.

It is the lack of uniqueness which worries me. Conforming to generic patterns isn't exactly a sign of uniqueness.

You may not know much about "radical honesty" but it has been a guiding principle in my life for a long time, and it has become even more "radical" since my awakening.
When confronting deeply entrenched egocentricity, such as you display, btw.,the most compassionate approach, in my experience is not sweet talk but "brutal honesty"... a "no holds barred" approach to "wrestling ego to the mat" as a method of helping the egocentric one being confronted through the suffering their baggage, like your extremely judgemental attitude, brings on, for you and those you judge so harshly.

I wasn't referring to any response you have given me, but rather to some other people here - such as Ataxas, for example. Short-tempered responses occasionally peppered with abuse.

DQ: So I think you still do have quite a few bugs to eliminate from the system.

m: Since you are obviously deeply and harshly judgemental and far from elnlightenment yourself, I must take your criticism with a grain of salt.
An enlightened person isn't someone who ceases to judge, but rather someone who is able to judge truly.

mikiel wrote:
David Quinn wrote: I'm wondering whether this "popping" was really just a mental skill that you suddenly acquired of being able to thrust your consciousness into the narrow compartment of your spiritual understanding and thereby freeing yourself from your unresolved emotional issues by way of distancing from them. In other words, the emotional issues are still there, but you able to block them out (at least occasionally) by isolating portions of your mind into separate compartments.
Here again you are making judgements base on no knowledge of my "popping" at all. It was the end of "my emotional issues"... and the end of the illusion of personal identiy.

Are you married?

mikiel wrote:
David Quinn wrote:I see this characteristic quite a lot in spiritual gurus and their followers, particularly in the generic ones. A person has a sudden insight or experience of unity, diligently cultivates the re-experience of it via meditation and sets up home in it, falsely believing that this is enlightenment. Although this behaviour is contrived and infinitely removed from true wisdom, he is able to find support for it from the many generic spiritual texts that have been written by gurus who themselves have fallen into the same trap.

You are full of more negative judgement against "gurus" than anyone I have come across.

Thank you. It is important to keep one's standard's high.

Sounds like you must have "surrendered" to a guru who turned out to be highly egocentric and abusive. Just a guess, btw., not presented like "I know you better than you do" as you come across.

Good move, as it was a bad guess.

No, I am not angry, even tho it may sound that way to you.
I will share (again, as I've done on another thread somwhere?) my favorite quote from (I think) the most intelligent integral philosopher ever. He is not enlightened, btw, but spent 13 days in a state of epiphany, as he describes in "One Taste." (I've had several personal conversations with him.)
So this is a very eloquent description of my preferred "style" of confronting egocentricity as a teacher"
Wilber:
---------
" If you want encouragement, soft smiles, ego stroking, gentle caresses of your self-contracting ways, pats on the back and sweet words of solace, find yourself a Nice Guy or Good Girl, and hold their hand on the sweet path of stress reduction and egoic comfort. But if you want Enlightenment, if you want to wake up, if you want to get fried in the fire of passionate Infinity, then, I promise you: find yourself a Rude Boy or a Nasty Girl, the ones who make you uncomfortable in their presence, who scare you witless, who will turn on you in a second and hold you up for ridicule, who will make you wish you were never born, who will offer you not sweet comfort but abject terror, not saccharin solace but scorching angst, for then, just then, you might very well be on the path to your own Original Face."
----------

Hope this clarifies your misconceptions about me.
(Hey... I'm the expert on the subject... :)
What if the Rude Boy needs his own medicine? Does he accept it, or does he lash out defensively? What if he believes that he has already reached perfection?

-
mikiel
Posts: 588
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2007 9:27 am

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by mikiel »

m: "Hope this clarifies your misconceptions about me.
(Hey... I'm the expert on the subject... :)'

DQ:
"What if the Rude Boy needs his own medicine? Does he accept it, or does he lash out defensively? What if he believes that he has already reached perfection?"

"perfection" is a *concept* in your own mind... 'dude.'
Enlightenment defines perfection... not as the "perfect Buddha Nature" of your limited (and unenlightened *belief*, but as unity in Identity with the One in All. (Not the words... the actual experience... get over your judgement!)

Late nite musing... more later on your other misconceptions about me. (You still seem to believe you are the "expert" on such deluded teachers as mikiel. Never the less, I must pull rank on who is the expert on this guy... the "me" who was a fantasy all along.

What if... You think I need your superior "medicine" to fix what you think is wrong with me... and you, after all, turn out to be an arrogant asshole setting yourself up as a judge of my case... now before your court... as whatever elder you think you are by virtue of your founding or whatever... so I pesume... this website. ( I could be wrong about that... just that you seem to think you own the place and do have seniority here.)

Don't jump to the usual conclusion projecting that I am angry here... just because emotions are still a major issue for you. I speak truly that I have not experienced anger since my ego died in '94. You can think whatever you like about 'mikiel' as a false teacher and barf it all out here as your judgements... but I speak the truth about "my" (grok the quotes) liberation, and you continue to talk your personal shit about me as if it were more true than my testimony about "my" awakening.
This is actualy pathetic, as any "fair witness" (transcending personal bias/programing) can easily tell.
There is *no anger* in the above statements, tho you, in your pathetic personal egocentricity can not see that i tell the truth about "mikiel" and you only talk shit about "me" from your personal propensity for negative judgement. (radical honesty in action... no attachment... reach for it tho it is beyond your understanding.)

Of course, now you are certain of my anger. Still not true. See... I know this guy and you are only projecting your own pathetic inadequacies and beliefs about some far away ideal of "perfection'... perfect Buddahood. Get over it... is my advice to you from a very peaceful center of radically honest, late night advice. (after a great party, unlike you can imagine of an "enlightened one" in your little mind.)
"What an angry man" , as I know you think... but it is not true... just that you live so much in anger and negative judgment and project it all over this site. Not honoring the site subtitle at all!

Like I said... late night musing... probably repetitive... but my life is totally spontaneous... contrary to your egocentric judgement.

I will not be suprised if you have the power, and use it, to ban me from this site. Just as well, if you do, cuz, in that case, it's just your little "thing" here, and I'm active on a few other sites where it is not just a cult of personal judgement by the site "elders.'

Time for sleep. I think I will not edit this. Warts and all... as is.
mikiel
mikiel
Posts: 588
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2007 9:27 am

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by mikiel »

Wow! I wore out "pathetic" and the whole "anger" theme. That's what 5 beers will do for a guy like me.
No apaologies here, but the guy who wrote the last post was almost drunk.
Had a great time tonight tho and it is one big Lovefest with this community. What a celbration! ... not the greatest timing for a reply to high-horse david and his seering judgemental life...
but, what the hell... to late to erase it... I think... not being to smart about this cyber tech....

Goodnight all.
mik
User avatar
divine focus
Posts: 611
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2007 1:48 pm

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by divine focus »

David Quinn wrote:
divine focus wrote:Umm, I don't know about this...

Where else could it be?

Instead of trying, instead of doing, just be. The shift from doing to being is freedom. You already are! You can still do things, but do it from being. Being needs to be the focus.
The trouble is, if your mind is still spellbound by ego and therefore still deluded, then any attempt to just "be" within this state of affairs will only result in your remaining egotistical and deluded.

One cannot become enlightened simply through wishful thinking and pretending that one's delusions do not exist. That will only thrust you into a fool's paradise.

Blocking out realities and engaging in forgetfulness isn't enlightened behaviour. It is a contrivance, which has no connection to the consciousness and freedom of the truly-enlightened individual.

I would say that at least 99% of those who believe they are enlightened are living in a fool's paradise, and this includes most of the the gurus who grace our world.

-
The only way to be free is to just be within your state of affairs. It's not about blocking awareness of your reality but expanding awareness. When you take an objective stance within being, you can begin to see what is creating "delusions" and suffering. The "delusions" are actually real, because you are creating them within your freedom. Expand to the awareness of freedom and your experience shows you how it all happens.

There's nothing wrong with delusions. Freedom is not better than suffering. On a felt, experiential level freedom is better; but freedom simply is. Freedom doesn't look down at delusions as being less than. Within delusion there is freedom, since delusion happens within freedom.

There is no higher.
eliasforum.org/digests.html
User avatar
divine focus
Posts: 611
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2007 1:48 pm

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by divine focus »

David Quinn wrote:From the Tao Te Ching:

When the great Tao is forgotten,
Kindness and morality arise.
When wisdom and intelligence are born,
The great pretence begins.

When there is no peace within the family,
Filial piety and devotion arise.
When the country is confused and in chaos,
Loyal ministers appear.

-

Therefore when the Tao is lost, there is goodness.
When goodness is lost, there is kindness.
When kindness is lost, there is justice.
When justice is lost, there is ritual.
Now ritual is the husk of faith and loyalty, the
beginning of confusion.

Knowledge of the future is only a flowery trapping of Tao.
It is the beginning of folly.
Here's the same verses from TaoTeChing.org, which I find to be much clearer translations.

When the Way is forgotten
Duty and justice appear;
Then knowledge and wisdom are born
Along with hypocrisy.

When harmonious relationships dissolve
Then respect and devotion arise;
When a nation falls to chaos
Then loyalty and patriotism are born.



If we could discard knowledge and wisdom
Then people would profit a hundredfold;
If we could discard duty and justice
Then harmonious relationships would form;
If we could discard artifice and profit
Then waste and theft would disappear.

Yet such remedies treat only symptoms
And so they are inadequate.

People need personal remedies:
Reveal your naked self and embrace your original nature;
Bind your self-interest and control your ambition;
Forget your habits and simplify your affairs.
eliasforum.org/digests.html
samadhi
Posts: 406
Joined: Sat Dec 08, 2007 6:08 am

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by samadhi »

David,
samadhi: I have no problem with your not liking Adya. He isn't for everyone and certainly not for you. My problem is that your criticisms do not actually address anything he says but either his looks or your overall impression that is no different from simple prejudice. Like saying he is "too emotional." All that does is reflect your own feeling you get from listening to him. But you won’t say that because of course it would contradict your "man of logic" façade. All I am doing is pointing that out. Unfortunately a "man of logic" cannot see his own emotion. It takes someone else to do that for him.

DQ: You’re misunderstanding me. I cannot begin to describe just how small Adya seems to me. He is like a mosquito or a gnat. The thoughts he delivers are the thoughts I had when I was a teenager, the same thoughts that I now see as being very limited and naive.
Your need to disparage him tells me he is not small to you at all. You don't disparage what you don't care about.
For me, rejecting someone like Adya is like rejecting the doctrines of the Jehovah's Witnesses or the Ku Klux Klan. It is not an emotional rejection, but simply a recognition of their limitations.
Every teaching offers different things to different people. People get to choose what is appropriate for them. Disparaging a teaching because it isn't what you would offer is about judgmentalism, not limitation.
DQ: Now you could analyze Britney's songs and say, "Oh, that is a nice drum-fill there", or "She puts an unexpected little twist on the melody here", but it still won't hide the fact that it is generic, formulaic pop produced for the large lucrative market of insecure 14 year-old girls.

sam: Yet he gets results. Something else you don't want to look at.

DQ: 14 year-old girls would also say that they get results from Britney's music. Her music works for them. Given their lack of mental development, it doesn’t really mean much.
Notice that you are in no position to evaluate his results yet disparage them anyway. If someone says they are helped, what is that to you? Why the need to say, "yeah, but the help doesn't mean much."? Obviously this says more about you than anyone else.
sam: It isn't his job to fix you. That's your job. And his approach isn't to look at each character flaw and throw it in your face. His approach is to help you see what is already present and doesn't need fixing. Once you see that, what needs changing, changes by itself.

DQ: I'm talking more about opening people's horizons and encouraging them to see the true extent of the ego problem. Most people find this alone to be confronting. Yes, it is true that each individual has to do the work himself, but he cannot begin to do this if his guru keeps shielding the full extent of the problem from him and telling him that nothing’s amiss.
Focusing on the ego's problems isn’t what he is about. That is about psychology, building a better ego. His only question for the ego is, are you an ego? Dismantling the ego piece by piece is a useless exercise anyway. Each piece you dismantle is replaced by another somewhere down the line. Egos are good at that kind of thing.
sam: You and I have a basic disagreement about emotions and their place in what it means to be human. For you they seem to indicate some flaw or hindrance to awakening. For me, emotions are what makes a human being human. It doesn't mean the expression of hatred or rage are part of awakening. It means that humans can feel the whole range of emotions including those that lead to division and separation. On awakening, those emotions which express division and separation no longer have an ego to fuel them. Love, compassion, caring, the feminine as you call it, are all more available, not less, because those emotions are no longer hamstrung or manipulated by the ego.

DQ: These feminine emotions still require the existence of division and separation, even if it is simply to overcome them. If there was no division and separation to begin with, then none of these emotions could come into play. That is why the Buddha taught that love and hate are both part of the same samsaric wheel. Love and hate depend on each other, and feed off of each other.
You are talking about love in terms of a personal ego. Yes, the ego can usurp these emotions for its own agenda, it doesn't mean the emotions themselves are ego-inspired.
It is similar to the way that Mother Teresa needed poor, broken-spirited people in order for her compassion to come into play. If there were no poor, broken-spirited people to begin with, then her compassion would become superfluous. It would be robbed of the very fuel which sustains it. And interestingly enough, her Christian teachings encouraged the kind of passive, helpless mindset which so easily leads to poverty and broken-spiritedness in the first place. Her attachment to compassion literally helped to create the very problem that she believed she was addressing.
That's like saying Mother Teresa needed the suffering of others to be compassionate and then dismissing compassion as an outgrowth of suffering. Suffering exists. People respond. The response isn't the cause nor does it encourage suffering. The idea that without compassion people wouldn't suffer is about as convoluted and misguided a proposition as I've ever heard. This goes beyond blaming the victim, it blames the very thing that people bring to help others in their time of need. The ignorance of your idea is astounding.
DQ: One could just as easily rationalize murder and rape on the grounds that they are also a part of "human nature".

sam: They are a part of human nature but a part that feeds the ego based on division, separation, greed and domination. Love, compassion, caring, etc. do not do that.

DQ: That is what the generic gurus say, but they are misguided. Love is always an attempt to bridge over division and separation, and thus is still based in the ego.
Again, you are talking about personal love. Love itself isn't trying to bridge anything. Feeling love towards others on an impersonal level isn't about trying to get them to love you back. It requires no response nor does it attempt to guide any action.
Because the enlightened sage never experiences division and separation in the first place, he never requires any emotional bridges to be built over them. In truth, he is too pure for love, just as he is too pure for hate.
It seems the only love you can imagine is personal. There is a love that isn’t personal, that doesn't bind you to anyone and expresses itself without attachment or expectation.

In dream you love some and not others. On waking up you find you are love itself, embracing all. Personal love, however intense and genuine, invariably binds; love in freedom is love of all. When you are love itself, you are beyond time and numbers. In loving one you love all, in loving all, you love each. - Nisargadatta
sam: Attachment is about ego. Sure, one can be attached to love as a means to feel better or even to dominate someone (although love in that sense is a manipulation, an appearance that plays on another’s emotion and not what is commonly referred to as love at all). When attachment is involved, the emotions can become more about manipulating than about a genuine expression. But without ego, such emotions don’t disappear, only one’s need to manipulate them to some other end. A genuine expression of love is not about attachment or ego. If love were not possible without ego, enlightenment would be worth precious little.

DQ: Enlightenment is far, far greater than love.
Enlightenment is not a feeling. And if you are referring to the joy of being, so am I.
DQ: What people need to grasp is that the feminine, along with emotion, humour, compassion, and yes, the masculine as well, are all part of our egotistical nature and need to be dealt with on that basis.

sam: You need to point to someone who actually teaches this besides yourself. I have never seen compassion, for example, associated with the ego. Yes, there can be attachment, practicing compassion out of a desire to create, preserve or promote an image. It doesn't mean compassion itself arises out of ego.

DQ: From the Tao Te Ching:

When the great Tao is forgotten,
Kindness and morality arise.
When wisdom and intelligence are born,
The great pretence begins.

When there is no peace within the family,
Filial piety and devotion arise.
When the country is confused and in chaos,
Loyal ministers appear.

-

Therefore when the Tao is lost, there is goodness.
When goodness is lost, there is kindness.
When kindness is lost, there is justice.
When justice is lost, there is ritual.
Now ritual is the husk of faith and loyalty, the
beginning of confusion
.
The references have to do with customs. The Tao is beyond custom but it doesn't mean being kind to people is something the Tao rejects. It only means that kindness or goodness out of habit is a learned response and there is something that is not learned that offers more, not less.
DQ: It is impossible to be truly serious about eliminating the ego if one can't even recognize the sheer extent of what's involved. Gurus like Adya are preventing people from addressing these issues properly because he is narrowing their conception of the ego to include just a few obvious egotistical traits, while excluding the rest.

sam: No, you will never find Adya talking about compassion as an expression of ego. That's because it isn't. If you say it is, then tell me who else teaches that. If you can't point to anyone, why should I believe you in contradiction to my own experience and that of all teachers who have come before?

DQ: What is compassion, exactly?
The ability to feels another's pain and respond. The response isn't a strategy for your own aggrandizement, it is meeting someone else's need when your heart tells you that is the thing to do.
sam: Do you want to talk about the Tao? Chuang Tzu? Have at it. Do they reject emotion? Then please show it. Time to put up or shut up.

DQ: From Chuang Tzu:

...

- To harmonize with men is called human joy; to harmonize with Heaven is called Heavenly joy.

For him who understands Heavenly joy, life is the working of Heaven and death is the transformation of things. With his single mind in repose, he is king of the world. The spirits do not afflict him, and his soul knows no weariness. With his single mind reposed, the ten thousand things submit which is to say that his emptiness and stillness reach throughout Heaven and earth and penetrate the ten thousand things. This is what is called Heavenly joy.

Heavenly joy is the mind of the sage, by which he shepherds the world.

...
First, you need to reference your quotes.

Second, none of them seem to support your idea that emotion ends with enlightenment. If you don't think the "joy of heaven" is about love, what do you think it is about? Is there joy without love? What would that even mean?

Third, freedom from ego is not an inert state. None of the quotes come close to suggesting that it is.
sam: Where is the teaching that humor or emotion are to be abandoned? You keep repeating it but when I ask you to show it, you do a lot of hand-waving and little else.

DQ: I’ve already showed how humour and laughter are egotistical responses to oppression, that they act to release the ego from tension. The reasons I gave are simple and direct. If you understand the nature of the ego, then you will have no trouble understanding these reasons very clearly.
You've given me your opinion. The idea that all humor is about oppression is itself a joke. No teacher of enlightenment backs you up. So it seems to be your issue. Leave everyone else out of it.
sam: Let's look at the Tao. How about this:

The Master views the parts with compassion,
because he understands the whole.
His constant practice is humility.
He doesn't glitter like a jewel
but lets himself be shaped by the Tao,
as rugged and common as stone
. (v 39, Mitchell trans.)

Hmm, compassion. Surprised?

DQ: That particular translation diverges markedly from most other translations, so much so that one has the impression that Mitchell has just made it up.
Would you rather I talk about humility? Do you want a quote or are you beyond humility too?
sam: Everyone wants to feel better, okay? That's not a bad thing, it's just the way things are. Everyone comes to an enlightenment teaching wanting to feel better and end their suffering. That is where you start. When there is some understanding, one realizes enlightenment is not about problem-solving, feeling better, or in your case, either attaining some kind of perfect logic or getting rid of emotion. It is about what is prior to all that. It is not about a future moment but about what is being overlooked in the present moment. Struggle is invariably about the future, getting something that isn’t here in the present. But you can’t struggle for what you already have. Nor can you stop struggling if you think there is something you need. Adya teaches the direct approach, what you already are right now. For some, that's not enough, they want something else. As long as you think you need a brilliant mind infused with impeccable logic to attain enlightenment, struggle will be part of your path.

DQ: Not at all. You are speaking out of ignorance here. The importance of logic is that it can unearth the deeper aspects of the ego which need to be addressed and eliminated before struggle can cease. What Adya teaches is a false peace based on the blocking out of these deeper aspects. It is a band-aid solution, at best.
I understand your ideal is to reason your way to enlightenment. Have at it. No one here is discounting wisdom. But let's not pretend wisdom is all there is, okay?

Our difference also points up the problem with your confrontational style. No matter how much you are confronted, nothing will dissuade you that wisdom is all you need. So what is the point of confronting someone in this kind of denial? It doesn't work. Yet since wisdom is all you have(actually, reasoning by logic, is a more appropriate label to what you have), confronting people is what you do, you can't do anything else. You can't talk about humility, surrender, love, compassion, to reach people on another level. Thus anyone who uses another tool becomes deluded in your eyes. Your own delusion simply goes unnoticed and is thus projected. As long as your only tool is a hammer, everyone else's ideas will become your nail.
But it is a win-win situation for the cunning Adya because he knows that the process of blocking out can achieve temporary periods of peace and he knows that when these peaceful periods come to an end it won't be seen to be his fault. In other words, a student can quickly achieve periods of peace by this "direct approach" as taught by Adya. However, no one can block out deeper emotional realities forever and sooner or later they will burst through. But it won't be seen to be Adya's fault when they do burst through, nor will it seen to be the fault of the teachings. No, it will be the student's fault for not meditating well enough, or not having developed enough good karma in the past.
You project all your ideas on to others. Do you know anyone who Adya has helped? So why talk about them as if you do?
It is similar to the dynamic observed in Christian fundamentalism where a devotee might pray for a miracle cure for a friend’s disease and if the cure doesn't materialize the fault will lie with the devotee for not having enough faith. In this way, the ministers are able to side-step the blame for their dodgy teachings. Virtually the whole spiritual industry runs on this dynamic.
Rather than tell me how Adya blames people, why don't you show me? I have posted dozens of his dialogs with people (need a link? --> http://p088.ezboard.com/fponderersguild ... 1868.topic ). Yet the very quote from you above is an example of how you choose to blame others. So who has a problem with blame, you or him?
sam: What do you think you’re getting that isn’t already here?

DQ: Freedom from egotism and delusion. For most people, that is definitely something which is not already here.

sam: Egotism (which is delusion) is here because that is what you see. As long as you see yourself as an ego, you will act as an ego.

DQ: Not so. A person can still act egotistically even when he isn’t seeing himself as an ego. The ego is like an iceberg, with most of it extending down beneath the awareness of most people’s minds. If this deeper part isn’t brought to the surface and dealt with properly, it will still continue to fester away and influence that person’s behaviour, regardless of what he happens to see within his awareness.
Right, which is my point. The intellectual approach only goes so far. Then you have to abandon it. So why don't you? Apparently your idea is, "no, you don't abandon it, you do MORE of it." You keep thinking the intellect is going to uncover some undiscovered nugget that will give you the key. Has it worked? Do you really think there is some holy grail out there you are going to find with your logic? Have you ever tried the backward approach? Letting go of logic. Maybe it's time.
Simply imagining that one doesn’t have an ego isn’t enough. That’s just wishful thinking. One has to roll up the sleeves and put in the hard work to eliminate the ego properly. That’s if you’re serous about wisdom.
It isn't about imagining, and Adya does not suggest that it is. Nor is it about figuring it out with logic. Consider the backwards step. There is nothing to figure out. Just see what it is about the present moment that you find unacceptable, then ask yourself, is it true? Are you sure? Could you be wrong? What if you are?
User avatar
David Quinn
Posts: 5708
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 6:56 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by David Quinn »

samadhi wrote:David,
samadhi: I have no problem with your not liking Adya. He isn't for everyone and certainly not for you. My problem is that your criticisms do not actually address anything he says but either his looks or your overall impression that is no different from simple prejudice. Like saying he is "too emotional." All that does is reflect your own feeling you get from listening to him. But you won’t say that because of course it would contradict your "man of logic" façade. All I am doing is pointing that out. Unfortunately a "man of logic" cannot see his own emotion. It takes someone else to do that for him.

DQ: You’re misunderstanding me. I cannot begin to describe just how small Adya seems to me. He is like a mosquito or a gnat. The thoughts he delivers are the thoughts I had when I was a teenager, the same thoughts that I now see as being very limited and naive.
Your need to disparage him tells me he is not small to you at all. You don't disparage what you don't care about.

It is the fact that he is part of the generic spiritual industry which is the problem. While he himself is small, the generic spiritual industry to which he belongs is very large and sucks a lot of people into its fold. The negative result is that genuine spirituality is marginalized and pushed out of sight from society at large. That is why I speak against anyone who represents it.

samadhi wrote:
DQ: Now you could analyze Britney's songs and say, "Oh, that is a nice drum-fill there", or "She puts an unexpected little twist on the melody here", but it still won't hide the fact that it is generic, formulaic pop produced for the large lucrative market of insecure 14 year-old girls.

sam: Yet he gets results. Something else you don't want to look at.

DQ: 14 year-old girls would also say that they get results from Britney's music. Her music works for them. Given their lack of mental development, it doesn’t really mean much.
Notice that you are in no position to evaluate his results yet disparage them anyway. If someone says they are helped, what is that to you? Why the need to say, "yeah, but the help doesn't mean much."?

My love of truth demands it. I don't mind if people want to flock to gurus like Adya and gain benefit from him. What I do mind is people associating this activity with enlightenment, wisdom, truth, virtue, etc.

samadhi wrote:
sam: It isn't his job to fix you. That's your job. And his approach isn't to look at each character flaw and throw it in your face. His approach is to help you see what is already present and doesn't need fixing. Once you see that, what needs changing, changes by itself.

DQ: I'm talking more about opening people's horizons and encouraging them to see the true extent of the ego problem. Most people find this alone to be confronting. Yes, it is true that each individual has to do the work himself, but he cannot begin to do this if his guru keeps shielding the full extent of the problem from him and telling him that nothing’s amiss.
Focusing on the ego's problems isn’t what he is about. That is about psychology, building a better ego. His only question for the ego is, are you an ego? Dismantling the ego piece by piece is a useless exercise anyway. Each piece you dismantle is replaced by another somewhere down the line. Egos are good at that kind of thing.

Given that your understanding of the ego is very limited (courtesy of Adya and the generic spiritual industry), you are in no position to judge how it can be eliminated.

The primary aim of the generic guru is to lull his followers into a state of mindlessness and passivity so that they are forced to continue relying on him. Thus, it is in his interests to disparage the idea that the ego can be dismantled and that logic is useless to this end. It's all part of the scam.

samadhi wrote:
sam: You and I have a basic disagreement about emotions and their place in what it means to be human. For you they seem to indicate some flaw or hindrance to awakening. For me, emotions are what makes a human being human. It doesn't mean the expression of hatred or rage are part of awakening. It means that humans can feel the whole range of emotions including those that lead to division and separation. On awakening, those emotions which express division and separation no longer have an ego to fuel them. Love, compassion, caring, the feminine as you call it, are all more available, not less, because those emotions are no longer hamstrung or manipulated by the ego.

DQ: These feminine emotions still require the existence of division and separation, even if it is simply to overcome them. If there was no division and separation to begin with, then none of these emotions could come into play. That is why the Buddha taught that love and hate are both part of the same samsaric wheel. Love and hate depend on each other, and feed off of each other.
You are talking about love in terms of a personal ego. Yes, the ego can usurp these emotions for its own agenda, it doesn't mean the emotions themselves are ego-inspired.

Give me an example of any emotion, and I will show you how it is tied up with ego and attachment.

samadhi wrote:
It is similar to the way that Mother Teresa needed poor, broken-spirited people in order for her compassion to come into play. If there were no poor, broken-spirited people to begin with, then her compassion would become superfluous. It would be robbed of the very fuel which sustains it. And interestingly enough, her Christian teachings encouraged the kind of passive, helpless mindset which so easily leads to poverty and broken-spiritedness in the first place. Her attachment to compassion literally helped to create the very problem that she believed she was addressing.
That's like saying Mother Teresa needed the suffering of others to be compassionate and then dismissing compassion as an outgrowth of suffering. Suffering exists. People respond. The response isn't the cause nor does it encourage suffering.
Her Christian teachings serve to encourage passiveness and mindlessness in people, both now and in future generations, which invariably leads to lack of initiative, poverty and helplessness. She is like a heroin-dealer who works nights helping people coping with the effects of drug-addiction.

The idea that without compassion people wouldn't suffer is about as convoluted and misguided a proposition as I've ever heard. This goes beyond blaming the victim, it blames the very thing that people bring to help others in their time of need. The ignorance of your idea is astounding.
You're not aware of the deeper psychological forces at work here, and that is because Adya and the generic spiritual industry have closed your mind to their very existence. Again, it is in their interests to do so.

samadhi wrote:
DQ: One could just as easily rationalize murder and rape on the grounds that they are also a part of "human nature".

sam: They are a part of human nature but a part that feeds the ego based on division, separation, greed and domination. Love, compassion, caring, etc. do not do that.

DQ: That is what the generic gurus say, but they are misguided. Love is always an attempt to bridge over division and separation, and thus is still based in the ego.
Again, you are talking about personal love. Love itself isn't trying to bridge anything. Feeling love towards others on an impersonal level isn't about trying to get them to love you back. It requires no response nor does it attempt to guide any action.

So what exactly is love, then?

In dream you love some and not others. On waking up you find you are love itself, embracing all. Personal love, however intense and genuine, invariably binds; love in freedom is love of all. When you are love itself, you are beyond time and numbers. In loving one you love all, in loving all, you love each. - Nisargadatta

Alas, the act of “loving all” as depicted here cannot be done emotionally. Emotion is discriminative by nature.

samadhi wrote:
DQ: It is impossible to be truly serious about eliminating the ego if one can't even recognize the sheer extent of what's involved. Gurus like Adya are preventing people from addressing these issues properly because he is narrowing their conception of the ego to include just a few obvious egotistical traits, while excluding the rest.

sam: No, you will never find Adya talking about compassion as an expression of ego. That's because it isn't. If you say it is, then tell me who else teaches that. If you can't point to anyone, why should I believe you in contradiction to my own experience and that of all teachers who have come before?

DQ: What is compassion, exactly?
The ability to feels another's pain and respond. The response isn't a strategy for your own aggrandizement, it is meeting someone else's need when your heart tells you that is the thing to do.

You're description here is far too vague. It could just as easily apply to feeling the withdrawal pain of an addict and responding by giving him some heroin.

samadhi wrote:
The importance of logic is that it can unearth the deeper aspects of the ego which need to be addressed and eliminated before struggle can cease. What Adya teaches is a false peace based on the blocking out of these deeper aspects. It is a band-aid solution, at best.
I understand your ideal is to reason your way to enlightenment. Have at it. No one here is discounting wisdom. But let's not pretend wisdom is all there is, okay?

Well, this is the nub of the issue. In truth, wisdom is an all-or-nothing thing. You can’t be half-hearted about it. You have to give yourself entirely over to it or nothing will come of it. As Jesus said, "Those who want to be my disciples must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, but those who lose their life for me will find it."

A person cannot wake up from a dream if he is still attracted to elements of that dream.

Our difference also points up the problem with your confrontational style. No matter how much you are confronted, nothing will dissuade you that wisdom is all you need. So what is the point of confronting someone in this kind of denial? It doesn't work. Yet since wisdom is all you have(actually, reasoning by logic, is a more appropriate label to what you have), confronting people is what you do, you can't do anything else. You can't talk about humility, surrender, love, compassion, to reach people on another level. Thus anyone who uses another tool becomes deluded in your eyes. Your own delusion simply goes unnoticed and is thus projected. As long as your only tool is a hammer, everyone else's ideas will become your nail.

The trouble is, you can’t really achieve anything spiritually unless you eliminate all of your delusions and understand Reality perfectly. Otherwise, your activities will continue to be distorted and undermined by delusion. Things like humility, surrender, love, compassion, etc, can’t really be understood without a clear understanding and awareness of Reality.

samadhi wrote:
It is similar to the dynamic observed in Christian fundamentalism where a devotee might pray for a miracle cure for a friend’s disease and if the cure doesn't materialize the fault will lie with the devotee for not having enough faith. In this way, the ministers are able to side-step the blame for their dodgy teachings. Virtually the whole spiritual industry runs on this dynamic.
Rather than tell me how Adya blames people, why don't you show me?

I never said that. Re-read what I wrote and think about it.

samadhi wrote:
sam: What do you think you’re getting that isn’t already here?

DQ: Freedom from egotism and delusion. For most people, that is definitely something which is not already here.

sam: Egotism (which is delusion) is here because that is what you see. As long as you see yourself as an ego, you will act as an ego.

DQ: Not so. A person can still act egotistically even when he isn’t seeing himself as an ego. The ego is like an iceberg, with most of it extending down beneath the awareness of most people’s minds. If this deeper part isn’t brought to the surface and dealt with properly, it will still continue to fester away and influence that person’s behaviour, regardless of what he happens to see within his awareness.
Right, which is my point. The intellectual approach only goes so far. Then you have to abandon it. So why don't you? Apparently your idea is, "no, you don't abandon it, you do MORE of it." You keep thinking the intellect is going to uncover some undiscovered nugget that will give you the key. Has it worked?
Yes.

Do you really think there is some holy grail out there you are going to find with your logic?

I’ve already found it.

Have you ever tried the backward approach? Letting go of logic. Maybe it's time.

Ah, the generic teaching rearing its ugly head again. It is the generic gurus who want you to let go of your logic. That way, you cease to question them. It’s all part of the scam.

samadhi wrote:
Simply imagining that one doesn’t have an ego isn’t enough. That’s just wishful thinking. One has to roll up the sleeves and put in the hard work to eliminate the ego properly. That’s if you’re serous about wisdom.
It isn't about imagining, and Adya does not suggest that it is. Nor is it about figuring it out with logic. Consider the backwards step. There is nothing to figure out. Just see what it is about the present moment that you find unacceptable, then ask yourself, is it true? Are you sure? Could you be wrong? What if you are?
Again, it is in the interests of the generic gurus to encourage you to be passive and accept your current condition, without question. You really do seem to have accepted it all - hook, line, and sinker. What a good student, you are. Adya would be proud.

-
User avatar
divine focus
Posts: 611
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2007 1:48 pm

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by divine focus »

samadhi wrote:David,
sam: Where is the teaching that humor or emotion are to be abandoned? You keep repeating it but when I ask you to show it, you do a lot of hand-waving and little else.

DQ: I’ve already showed how humour and laughter are egotistical responses to oppression, that they act to release the ego from tension. The reasons I gave are simple and direct. If you understand the nature of the ego, then you will have no trouble understanding these reasons very clearly.
You've given me your opinion. The idea that all humor is about oppression is itself a joke. No teacher of enlightenment backs you up. So it seems to be your issue. Leave everyone else out of it.
He's on the right track here, but something does seem to be missing. He may be able to provide more insight on this for us as he grows and understands more.
eliasforum.org/digests.html
User avatar
David Quinn
Posts: 5708
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 6:56 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by David Quinn »

I am relying on people to work out the rest for themselves. It's not hard to do. All they have to do is think.

Again, while humour is a complex subject, as there are many types and variations of humour, the euphoric release that humour triggers is always a straighforward and simple process. It is always generated in the same way, always involving the same dynamic of oppression suddenly being lifted.

This is why it would never occur to a Buddha to laugh. Nothing oppresses him.

-
samadhi
Posts: 406
Joined: Sat Dec 08, 2007 6:08 am

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by samadhi »

David,
samadhi: Your need to disparage him tells me he is not small to you at all. You don't disparage what you don't care about.

DQ: It is the fact that he is part of the generic spiritual industry which is the problem. While he himself is small, the generic spiritual industry to which he belongs is very large and sucks a lot of people into its fold. The negative result is that genuine spirituality is marginalized and pushed out of sight from society at large. That is why I speak against anyone who represents it.
I don't think there's anything wrong with the "generic spiritual industry." There are always going to be more or less useful teachings no matter what you do. People start from where they are. That may be a teaching like the law of attraction. ( http://law-of-attraction-info.com/ ) That is what gets their attention so that is where they start. Not everyone is going to be interested in "no self," non-duality or A=A. People get to be interested in what they want and seek out who they want. Don't begrudge them that.
sam: Notice that you are in no position to evaluate his results yet disparage them anyway. If someone says they are helped, what is that to you? Why the need to say, "yeah, but the help doesn't mean much."?

DQ: My love of truth demands it. I don't mind if people want to flock to gurus like Adya and gain benefit from him. What I do mind is people associating this activity with enlightenment, wisdom, truth, virtue, etc.
Yet your love of truth doesn't demand that you actually verify any of your opinions. It seems to demand that you indulge them. How surprising.
sam: Focusing on the ego's problems isn’t what he is about. That is about psychology, building a better ego. His only question for the ego is, are you an ego? Dismantling the ego piece by piece is a useless exercise anyway. Each piece you dismantle is replaced by another somewhere down the line. Egos are good at that kind of thing.

DQ: Given that your understanding of the ego is very limited (courtesy of Adya and the generic spiritual industry), you are in no position to judge how it can be eliminated.
No one can tell you that, Adya included. If they could, someone would just write it down and start enlightening people. Doesn't happen like that, does it?
The primary aim of the generic guru is to lull his followers into a state of mindlessness and passivity so that they are forced to continue relying on him. Thus, it is in his interests to disparage the idea that the ego can be dismantled and that logic is useless to this end. It's all part of the scam.
This is why I say you don't actually know anything about him but simply indulge your prejudicial opinions. For instance, from Adya:
Q: It seems like there comes a point where in order to go further you need to have a teacher and there’s lots of people out there who present themselves as teachers and I have some concern about following a teacher who is authentic and produces results.
A: Don’t FOLLOW me. That’s really important. You see, the ball’s in your court. No matter who you listen to, the ball’s in your court. It’s ALL in your court. I don’t disagree with you in any way whatsoever that most people can benefit from a true teacher. Some people don’t need them but most can be benefited. But a true teacher is ONLY useful to a true student. And a true student isn’t a follower or someone leaning on the teacher as someone who can deliver them. So the attitude a true student has and the attitude of a true teacher must be an attitude that is ultimately the same. That nobody can give you what you already are. To me, a true teacher removes, is a demolition project. That’s what I am. I don’t give much. People think I give a lot until they actually take in what I’ve given them and then they realize they’ve swallowed something that’s much more atomic than they thought (laughter).

Because everybody is already THAT, right? It’s all one. Why don’t we realize that it’s all one? If it’s all one, fine; then why don’t I realize it? The only reason is that I’ve accumulated too much. I believe things that aren’t true and therefore I am looking through those beliefs and those ideas. So the true teaching doesn’t ADD to those, it takes them away. It brings us into insecurity in a way. More and more deeply into the unknown.
Now I'm sure you will want to spin that and I'm sure you can. After all, if you couldn't, you might be forced into saying, "hey, Adya isn't such a bad guy after all!" lol ...
sam: You are talking about love in terms of a personal ego. Yes, the ego can usurp these emotions for its own agenda, it doesn't mean the emotions themselves are ego-inspired.

DQ: Give me an example of any emotion, and I will show you how it is tied up with ego and attachment.
We did this exercise already. I don't deny that any emotion can be tied into ego. It doesn't mean emotion itself is about the ego. Anything can be abused, so what?
sam: That's like saying Mother Teresa needed the suffering of others to be compassionate and then dismissing compassion as an outgrowth of suffering. Suffering exists. People respond. The response isn't the cause nor does it encourage suffering.

DQ: Her Christian teachings serve to encourage passiveness and mindlessness in people, both now and in future generations, which invariably leads to lack of initiative, poverty and helplessness. She is like a heroin-dealer who works nights helping people coping with the effects of drug-addiction.
I don't know where this is coming from. The Buddha himself taught about caring for the sick and aged. You want to turn that into an ego exercise? Co-dependence? If your mother was sick, would you say, "sorry, mom, not my problem."?
sam: The idea that without compassion people wouldn't suffer is about as convoluted and misguided a proposition as I've ever heard. This goes beyond blaming the victim, it blames the very thing that people bring to help others in their time of need. The ignorance of your idea is astounding.

DQ: You're not aware of the deeper psychological forces at work here, and that is because Adya and the generic spiritual industry have closed your mind to their very existence. Again, it is in their interests to do so.
The deep psychological force at work is your need to deny compassion and call it that wisdom. Who knows what the hell that is about.
sam: Again, you are talking about personal love. Love itself isn't trying to bridge anything. Feeling love towards others on an impersonal level isn't about trying to get them to love you back. It requires no response nor does it attempt to guide any action.

DQ: So what exactly is love, then?
Think of it this way. The love of a parent for a child is not conditioned (ideally) by the child's actions. The parent does what is best for the child, that is their only concern.

If you are more Tao-minded, try this verse:

…

To those who are good (to me), I am good; and to those who are not
good (to me), I am also good;--and thus (all) get to be good. To
those who are sincere (with me), I am sincere; and to those who are
not sincere (with me), I am also sincere;--and thus (all) get to be
sincere.

The sage has in the world an appearance of indecision, and keeps
his mind in a state of indifference to all. The people all keep their
eyes and ears directed to him, and he deals with them all as his
children
.

(v 49, J. Legge trans.)
sam: In dream you love some and not others. On waking up you find you are love itself, embracing all. Personal love, however intense and genuine, invariably binds; love in freedom is love of all. When you are love itself, you are beyond time and numbers. In loving one you love all, in loving all, you love each. – Nisargadatta

DQ: Alas, the act of "loving all" as depicted here cannot be done emotionally. Emotion is discriminative by nature.
I think you don't quite get how emotion and non-attachment can co-exist.
DQ: What is compassion, exactly?

sam: The ability to feels another's pain and respond. The response isn't a strategy for your own aggrandizement, it is meeting someone else's need when your heart tells you that is the thing to do.

DQ: Your description here is far too vague. It could just as easily apply to feeling the withdrawal pain of an addict and responding by giving him some heroin.
As I said, the response isn't about your own aggrandizement. Either you know heroin is hurting someone or you don't. If you don't, then yeah, giving them heroin may indeed be your expression of compassion. Compassion is defined not by the act but by the intention to relieve suffering.
sam: I understand your ideal is to reason your way to enlightenment. Have at it. No one here is discounting wisdom. But let's not pretend wisdom is all there is, okay?

DQ: Well, this is the nub of the issue. In truth, wisdom is an all-or-nothing thing. You can’t be half-hearted about it. You have to give yourself entirely over to it or nothing will come of it. As Jesus said, "Those who want to be my disciples must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, but those who lose their life for me will find it."

A person cannot wake up from a dream if he is still attracted to elements of that dream.
You are being fundamentalist about it. Wisdom, yeah, good thing, you need it. But to make it all about wisdom misses something else equally important. Adya said it like this:
Because even the path which is the direct path … Direct path simply means what’s pointed to is already complete, whole and awake. That’s the direct path. Look inside yourself; see what’s already awake, that’s already whole and complete, already a done deal. Look and see; that’s direct path. Long path is try to become that which is already here (chuckles). It may work too; you can slip into the truth through any path and through no path. Doesn’t matter. But the element of devotion, devotion must come into the direct path where your humanness comes into a devotion, a love, a surrender to that which always is. That great mystery of your being that always is.

Because you can actually realize what always is, the awakeness that always is and still have your humanity not surrendering. A lot of it will surrender kind of by force. Awakening itself surrenders a lot of your humanity into the truth. But there’s also the element of real devotion and real love of the truth that’s realized, the great emptiness.

And so all direct paths are paths of wisdom, not intellectual knowledge. That’s the weakness of direct paths, because they are about wisdom, the mind thinks they are about knowledge. So very smart, bright, intelligent people get into direct paths. Have you noticed? You might be one of them. You’re probably a relatively smart, bright person. Bright people like direct paths. They’re intellectually sort of satisfying. Like “I’m not going to do the devotional thing because that’s just sort of illogical. I’ll do the direct path because that makes sense.” But that has a weakness because then your mind starts to think that your mind can actually know the truth.

So direct paths have a great danger also. Instead of ending up in wisdom, you can easily end up in knowledge, the collection of information, the great danger of any direct path. Wisdom means of course, realizing what you are. But all direct paths can also end in devotion, where the mind and the ego are in devotion to the truth that’s realized. If they don’t end in devotion, not in devotion to images, I’m sure you know I’m not speaking about that, but the devotion to the truth that’s realized, if it doesn’t end there, then you wind up with a split being. Part of you knows the truth and the other part really doesn’t want to have anything to do with it.

So even the path of wisdom ends in the path of devotion. Human nature surrendered to the truth that’s realized within yourself. Human nature surrendered to the beautiful expression of what’s so, what’s true in each moment. That the human nature actually wants what’s true in each moment, actually loves what’s true in each moment. It loves watching truth unfold in each moment. Not just the truth; the truth has always loved seeing itself unfold in each moment, but human nature actually enjoying the truth unfold in each moment without worrying about whether that truth is going to embarrass you, humble you, elevate you or whatever it’s going to do, without worrying about that. And this then becomes not so much just a path of wisdom, but actually a path of surrender of the human part of you in surrender to the truth that’s realized.
The trouble is, you can’t really achieve anything spiritually unless you eliminate all of your delusions and understand Reality perfectly. Otherwise, your activities will continue to be distorted and undermined by delusion. Things like humility, surrender, love, compassion, etc, can’t really be understood without a clear understanding and awareness of Reality.
You come to nirvana by way of samsara, you don't come to nirvana by way of nirvana. Life, illusion, is the teacher, not some ideal of perfection.
sam: You keep thinking the intellect is going to uncover some undiscovered nugget that will give you the key. Has it worked?

DQ: Yes.
If you're happy, great. Keep doing what you're doing.
sam: Do you really think there is some holy grail out there you are going to find with your logic?

DQ: I’ve already found it.
You've found something, I'll give you that. Just what you found is another question.
sam: Have you ever tried the backward approach? Letting go of logic. Maybe it's time.

DQ: Ah, the generic teaching rearing its ugly head again. It is the generic gurus who want you to let go of your logic. That way, you cease to question them. It’s all part of the scam.
See Adya above.
sam: It isn't about imagining, and Adya does not suggest that it is. Nor is it about figuring it out with logic. Consider the backwards step. There is nothing to figure out. Just see what it is about the present moment that you find unacceptable, then ask yourself, is it true? Are you sure? Could you be wrong? What if you are?

DQ: Again, it is in the interests of the generic gurus to encourage you to be passive and accept your current condition, without question. You really do seem to have accepted it all - hook, line, and sinker. What a good student, you are. Adya would be proud.
Lol. I accept that the fact that I can't figure it out. If you propose that your teaching constitutes "figuring it out," what can I say? As long as it works for you, go for it.
User avatar
Shahrazad
Posts: 1813
Joined: Sat Feb 10, 2007 7:03 pm

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by Shahrazad »

DQ,
This is why it would never occur to a Buddha to laugh. Nothing oppresses him.
With all due respect, a Buddha is boring as hell.
Steven Coyle

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by Steven Coyle »

Something may amuse him though.

I recall David Quinn 'Lol'ing' a few times.

For some laughter may also be oppressive?
Elizabeth Isabelle
Posts: 3771
Joined: Tue Sep 05, 2006 11:35 am

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by Elizabeth Isabelle »

Steven Coyle wrote:Something may amuse him though.

I recall David Quinn 'Lol'ing' a few times.

For some laughter may also be oppressive?
It is a horrible prison to be oppressed by laughter, but it can happen. That's how that snorting, gasping laugh that so many people laugh at happens. When one tries to deny his humanity to the point of not allowing himself to laugh, one chokes on the laugh that is determined to come out. The person may then feel awful, especially if people are laughing at his laugh that sounds so bad because he is trying so hard to suppress it.

I know, because I was not allowed to laugh as a child. I developed one of those horrible laughs. I hated being laughed at when I couldn't hold it in, and eventually learned not to laugh at all. A normal laugh came back the night my mother died. I didn't even realize it until someone else pointed it out to me, but I guess my subconscious knew that it was my mother who forbade me to laugh. It is more tragic when it is the self that refuses to allow himself to laugh.
Steven Coyle

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by Steven Coyle »

Did you find the same things humourous, both and after the tension and release episode?
User avatar
David Quinn
Posts: 5708
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 6:56 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by David Quinn »

Shahrazad wrote:DQ,
This is why it would never occur to a Buddha to laugh. Nothing oppresses him.
With all due respect, a Buddha is boring as hell.
Well, boredom is in the eye of the beholder, so your comment reflects more on your current state than on anything else. The prospect of Buddhahood is actually intensely interesting when you tune into it.

-
User avatar
Shahrazad
Posts: 1813
Joined: Sat Feb 10, 2007 7:03 pm

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by Shahrazad »

Well, boredom is in the eye of the beholder, so your comment reflects more on your current state than on anything else.
I thought that was a given.
User avatar
Carl G
Posts: 2659
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 12:52 pm
Location: Arizona

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

Post by Carl G »

So, you're just posting out of boredom, Sher?
Good Citizen Carl
Locked