tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post2524786152618217794..comments2024-03-21T10:16:35.080-04:00Comments on Rituals of DisEnchantment: Lucid Memories, Chapter One, 3Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger45125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-82648490187628607892013-06-04T04:13:42.280-04:002013-06-04T04:13:42.280-04:00For what it's worth, Shree Muktananda Ashram h...For what it's worth, Shree Muktananda Ashram have just told me by email that Gurumayi is there now.Neil P.https://www.blogger.com/profile/02206884621954223246noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-42722680585559945342013-05-21T04:19:11.417-04:002013-05-21T04:19:11.417-04:00There has been a lot of talk about Gurumayi "...There has been a lot of talk about Gurumayi "leaving", but can anybody confirm if she has actually left SY? I was at Fallsburg in 2003 and she was still there then, but not taking an active role in the daily routine. Has anything changed since then?Neil P.https://www.blogger.com/profile/02206884621954223246noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-37882943561815579962013-02-11T21:34:36.694-05:002013-02-11T21:34:36.694-05:00I have dreams of Gurumayi and baba whenever I need...I have dreams of Gurumayi and baba whenever I need them to come to me. once Bade baba came to me too but I couldn't understand his accent LOL! Its Ok that I don't see the guru in her physical form anymore, maybe its better. In my dreams were alone and I dont have to share her with anyoneAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-20415739379664369562013-02-11T20:45:09.055-05:002013-02-11T20:45:09.055-05:00yes, but who are they?yes, but who are they?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-826888079918829882013-02-08T17:28:34.712-05:002013-02-08T17:28:34.712-05:00If you build it, they will comeIf you build it, they will comeAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-1778825625602546842013-02-08T15:53:47.866-05:002013-02-08T15:53:47.866-05:00... That night I had Gurumayi's darshan in my ...... That night I had Gurumayi's darshan in my dreams — profound dreams where I felt tremendous bhakti, devotion, throbbing through me. When I woke up, I knew that the power of studying the Message had drawn Gurumayi's darshan. I understood that this direct Message really IS, in its deep essence, the form of the Guru.<br /> <br />a devotee from California, USA<br /><br />Click here to participate in A Sweet Surprise 2013 satsang.<br /><br />http://www.siddhayoga.org/Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-25126637553771120882013-02-06T14:32:25.452-05:002013-02-06T14:32:25.452-05:00Potent, SeekHer, to encounter that harrowing Orwel...Potent, SeekHer, to encounter that harrowing Orwell passage here in this context. Such a haunted, tortured sadness comes through. It doesn't speak to anything in my life right now yet I feel an ache reading those words.<br /><br />The strength, clarity and emotion in your post is just as immediate and comes right through. A few sentences in I felt I might need to stop. Something unexpected triggered. But I kept going.<br /><br />I'm old school, preferring paper over pixels whenever possible. Something about holding the writing in my hands grounds the connection between me and the author. But what you say here reaches right out through the screen. I hear and feel it. Just wanted to let you know.<br /><br />L.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-54464322600157768742013-02-04T22:27:03.684-05:002013-02-04T22:27:03.684-05:00Well, Lucid's richly drawn, powerful accounts ...Well, Lucid's richly drawn, powerful accounts of his days in SY are stirring up a lot of memories and unresolved emotions here (as well as perhaps provoking two spontaneous self-exorcisms.) They've certainly stirred some long repressed conflicts back to the surface for me. I have tended to discount the long term psychic damage that abject surrender to another human being who is playing a divine role can inflict. At times I've almost sold myself on the idea that my 25 years "inside" were an amusing lark that reaped some blissful experiences along the way and a blog peopled with like-minded peeps who have kept me company on the long, winding exit ramp out.<br /><br />I recognize now that's denial and delusion. I've just finished re-reading Orwell's 1984 and it has been an odd synchronicity to revisit those pages and the memories that Lucid's narrative have provoked at the same time. The older I get, the more viscerally frightening that book becomes. And all the more so because Orwell's concept of doublethink describes the process we used to call "contemplation" only too well.<br /><br />Yes, I do believe that the ritualized and formal worship of the Guru that we were taught and enthusiastically engaged in (let's not forget those meditations practiced in groups and alone, wherein we "installed" the Guru in every limb of our bodies down to the cellular level) were the most dangerous species of black sorcery. But even that pales in comparison to what we were taught to do to our minds. On the organizational level SY suppressed, denied, erased and rewrote its past—from the non-existent unbroken ancient lineage, to Baba's supposed elevation to Guru by Nityananda, to his abuse of underage girls, to the succession struggle between Gurumayi and "the brother", to the fall-out from the New Yorker article and on and on. And on a personal level we all played along. Every doubt we harbored, every inconvenient fact we discovered, every disturbing personal anecdote we heard, everything that contradicted the official narrative of the Guru's perfect divinity and compassion were explained, and then explained away and forgotten, through the process of self-administered mind control known as contemplation.<br /><br />I was re-reading my earliest posts on this blog today and somewhere I wrote that I could never remember a single one of the 'amazing revelations' that came to me after countless hours spent walking and contemplating the teachings. Of course not, because I now realize that contemplation was most often reserved for those times when something impinged on the perfection of my Siddha Yoga world view, when some distantly threatening thought needed to be not confronted and resolved, but cornered, surrounded, subsumed and erased—and then forgotten.<br /><br />Please God never let me cede that level of control to anyone or anything ever again. Amen.SeekHerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08659121733477310544noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-71403078082681714912013-02-04T21:22:10.712-05:002013-02-04T21:22:10.712-05:00"His mind slid away into the labyrinthine wor..."His mind slid away into the labyrinthine world of doublethink. To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which canceled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it...too forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again, and above all to apply the same process to the process itself—that was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed.<br /><br />Even to understand the word "doublethink" involved the use of the word doublethink."<br /><br />George Orwell, 1984Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09102245386103369792noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-17672638543055931942013-02-04T20:22:03.690-05:002013-02-04T20:22:03.690-05:00As I work through many issues that did not get han...As I work through many issues that did not get handled during decades in sy, even though my 'ego got worked on' whatever that means. lol, I am impressed by just how destructive the experience was. Completely reifying childhood wounds. Ego busting as practiced in sy was deeply humiliating. For some personalities catastrophic to their healthy functioning. Not everyone had the same ego stength. All staff were hazed up the yin yang. The whole thing based on shaming and blame to get control. Then add covert manipulation of the mind alternating good and bad treatment. Why did I believe this was spiritually uplifting? It was a lot like est and scientology, boot camp. The breakdown of the ego to rebuild it. Loving only to enjoy reaction of removing that love. Triggering abandonment fears or night terrors of waking up in an infested jungle with very big cats or being born In a waterless region. DAMN STUPID GURU GITA! :-) Typo <br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-70809118724517949512013-02-04T19:56:10.870-05:002013-02-04T19:56:10.870-05:00In Jung's borderland construct, wouldn't ...In Jung's borderland construct, wouldn't you want to throw science into the mix?<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-87190113917889988972013-02-04T18:03:41.049-05:002013-02-04T18:03:41.049-05:00"...I WANTED to give those deepest levels of ..."...I WANTED to give those deepest levels of myself over to another's control...."<br /><br />".....So, no, when "Gurumayi" walked our dreams and spoke instructions and commands directly to our subconscious mind, it wasn't Malti Shetty doing that, it was the shadow side of an archetype that has existed throughout human history...."<br /><br />"...When we supplicate an archetype as we did in the Guru Gita, giving it full and abject and unconditional access to all levels of our being, we open ourselves to colonization by another entity..."<br /><br />I remember one darshan with baba where I stood there as our eyes locked and I energetically opened and gave him the deepest parts of myself, feeling that I had finally found someone I could trust completely, someone I could give myself to. It was like spiritual sex. And though I was in my young twenties, I trusted him much like a child trusts, for decades of dedicated involvement.<br /><br />My dis-illusionment began in '04 when I took my last intensive, knowing the shakti was gone. Marta's book, this blog and the LSY before it have helped me sort through the spiritual rubble.<br /><br />But there are still deep places of pain. I am not a victim of anyone or anything else. In the end, it was my own self betrayal. It was me giving myself to what I believed was a true guru. I wanted the "reward" of living in a state of constant and unbroken union with the Divine. You know, like we were promised. I wanted my life to count for something of spiritual value.<br /><br />What I now wonder is, was I a simple soul, only to be food for some bigger, more powerful soul? Think a sort of Nat'l Geo special on Spirits in the Wild. By our very nature, we get devoured by the bigger, more powerful. It's spiritual Darwinism. By being open and trusting, I by nature invited or invoked being colonized or perhaps in this case, devoured by a more powerful Essence? And thus Soul evolves. The collective soul, as well as my individual soul.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-13894458777571224642013-02-04T13:27:39.364-05:002013-02-04T13:27:39.364-05:00>>>"Basically its working therapeuti...>>>"Basically its working therapeutically, like exorcism."<<<<br /><br /><br />yes! exactly! exorcism.<br /><br />OS <br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-48674895682404006642013-02-04T13:21:24.124-05:002013-02-04T13:21:24.124-05:00On OS point about Lucid's evocative writing.
...On OS point about Lucid's evocative writing. <br /><br />I felt that at first also, almost triggering. I perissted although it was uncomfortable to re-awaken these memories. I am at a point in my road back to myself, that the me I am now is reading and seeing what I went through.Basically its working therapeutically, like exorcism. <br /><br />I think I spent all of my sy dissociated. The stuff that happened was so excrutiating being a zombie on japa and chanting and meditation was pain relief. <br /><br />Typo Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-78397071432943423392013-02-04T11:32:45.891-05:002013-02-04T11:32:45.891-05:00February 1, 2013 at 2:24 PM: "I feel as thoug...February 1, 2013 at 2:24 PM: "I feel as though I more or less outgrew rather than quit SY."<br /><br /><br />I hear you on this. Very similar for me. In fact, ironically, I think GM and I both started to check out around the same time – but it’s still somewhat a chicken or the egg question. <br /><br />Her “last talk” in 2004 was so empty and yet my reaction wasn’t disappointment so much as, hmmm. She offered nothing in that talk and I thought, Well maybe I don’t need anything. The feeling was mutual. (wink) <br /><br />From that point forward I still maintained my little puja up at home, still ran on the treadmill to the fast chants, loved reading Hafiz and Rumi and some of GMs early collections of talks but the only real draw for me in any of this was GM – I didn’t attend a center, didn’t have strong bonds with hard-core devotees (I had lots of friends who, like me, went to see GM when she was out on tour, but we were friends first, not through our connection to SY, I never made a lasting friend through SY, including GM!... and in time all of them, just as I did, “left”). <br /><br />Point is, it only naturally followed that GM's phase out would be in synch with mine. But at the time of course I didn't step back and call myself out on this like, "Hey wait a minute – this means nothing to you if she's not around? What does that tell you?"<br /><br />But the mind-fuck of the supposed “inner self”-focused practice juxtaposed with the guru-focused org was so circular. No, no, no, it’s about honoring your own self,… but yes that ability must be awakened and guided by a perfected living master. Amazing, isn’t it, to think that once upon a time these fallible, fractured human beings were put forward to us as representative of having reached “the goal.” And yet how grateful we are today to no longer be bowing down, literally or figuratively, to their dysfunction and instead tending to our own! <br /><br />When I discovered RoD and Marta’s blog in 2007-2008 it wasn’t so much a revelation as it was, Okay finally this all makes sense. Not that I accepted the whole thing in such a cavalier fashion at first. The grieving process was real, and long. But the thing is I was ready. And by that point SY I knew was dead and gone; there wasn’t anything “external” left to let go of, I just needed to take care of my own stuff.<br /><br />So yes, “outgrew” fits better than “quit” for me as well. My departure felt in many ways like an afterthought. <br /><br />Besides, it’s kinda hard to resign from a position that’s no longer available.<br /><br />LucidAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-72940909227020392362013-02-04T11:03:00.883-05:002013-02-04T11:03:00.883-05:00>>"So if your last post was a sign off ...>>"So if your last post was a sign off based on the belief that some new orthodoxy was being imposed here, rest easy"<<<br /><br />Dear SeekHer,<br /> no...not at all...I'm not holding any beliefs about what is happening here. I just didn't want to suddenly disappear without explaining that "Lucid Memories" is a bit too evocative for me...in Jungian terms..smile.If I check in, I read...I'm a huge reader. Some things I'd rather not stir up and invite back into my dreams. that's just my way...not making any judgements here. And, to Lucid, keep on....your writing is very powerful.<br /> <br />best regards,<br />OSAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-64974694645523126752013-02-04T10:30:10.215-05:002013-02-04T10:30:10.215-05:00Speaking of "guru's feet" . . . woul...Speaking of "guru's feet" . . . wouldn't you know it? There's even a FB page and tweets. Follow your guru on twitter!<br /><br />http://www.gurusfeet.com/guru<br /><br />http://www.gurusfeet.com/guru/swami-chidvilasananda<br /><br />http://www.gurusfeet.com/opinion/about-gurumayi#commentsAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-17231929080769291382013-02-03T22:01:33.320-05:002013-02-03T22:01:33.320-05:00OS
There is no collective trip here, and there ne...OS<br /><br />There is no collective trip here, and there never has been, just each of us trying to make sense as best we can out of what happened to us all. Perhaps, personally, I've just begun to formulate a theory about that, but it is only mine. Not only am I not asking anyone else to ascribe to it, I appreciate other and conflicting points of view. So if your last post was a sign off based on the belief that some new orthodoxy was being imposed here, rest easy. That is inimical to everything we've built together over the last seven years. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09102245386103369792noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-29406631791222287162013-02-03T20:56:04.076-05:002013-02-03T20:56:04.076-05:00>>"The Guru is an archetype, whether it...>>"The Guru is an archetype, whether it goes by that name or "Wise Man" "Teacher" or "Savior". I believe in the power of invocation"<<<<br /><br />Dear SeekHer,<br /> I found these comments on Jungian archetypes to be very astute and interesting in view of "Lucid memories". There's a entrophic pull going on here that feels very strange to me personally. Not so sure I want to take that trip...best of luck to you, Lucid. Your writing is very evocative. And thanks again, SeekHer, for providing an open forum for conversation.<br /><br />best luck to all,<br />OSAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-13510145188217696172013-02-03T19:47:29.288-05:002013-02-03T19:47:29.288-05:00Anon 12:56
Well, Freud's theories are already...Anon 12:56<br /><br />Well, Freud's theories are already in the dustbin of history--you might be able to find an unreconstructed Freudian analyst if you really searched, but I wouldn't recommend taking the talking cure from them. However, Jungian theory (as far as I understand it) is perfectly conversant with what I believe we experienced in Siddha Yoga. With Jung's idea of the collective unconscious we are already drifting towards the numinous, in fact, aren't we really talking about the "ground of being" under another name? And his conception of archetypes impinges on the sacred. I think Jung intended these constructs to create a borderland between psychology and religion, a place where neither could confidently assert its superiority, but rather each must submit to learning from the other.<br /><br />The Guru is an archetype, whether it goes by that name or "Wise Man" "Teacher" or "Savior". I believe in the power of invocation. When we supplicate an archetype as we did in the Guru Gita, giving it full and abject and unconditional access to all levels of our being, we open ourselves to colonization by another entity. That entity only superficially wore the name of Gurumayi, or Baba. So, no, when "Gurumayi" walked our dreams and spoke instructions and commands directly to our subconscious mind, it wasn't Malti Shetty doing that, it was the shadow side of an archetype that has existed throughout human history. <br />SeekHerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08659121733477310544noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-41005926222035834152013-02-02T15:20:04.315-05:002013-02-02T15:20:04.315-05:00"100,000 (more or less) pretty poor to middle..."100,000 (more or less) pretty poor to middle class, educated, cranky followers, I would have gone after a far, far smaller, more elite group who could grant me many more powerful options."<br /><br />But in a way doesn't that kind of describe the larger devotee fanbase, the major donors, and the inner circle? Maybe you've gotta have a mass following in order to attract a "1%". And let's not forget we're talking about a narcissist here. More is more.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-56980639989084098522013-02-02T12:56:25.387-05:002013-02-02T12:56:25.387-05:00Wow! SeekHer,
This is is unexpected. I agree tha...Wow! SeekHer, <br /><br />This is is unexpected. I agree that we were supposed to believe that the guru had these kinds of powers. But the actual power to animate within another's dreams, personally and by volition, is quite a power. It would leave Freud and Jung's theories in the dust bin. <br /><br />I recall that at darshan after a particularly emotional intensive during which she gave the 'touch', she said to me, "When did you come, I did not know you were here", my tears and mascara was still wet all over her skirt.<br /><br />I think charismatic charlatan...not cosmic superhero. Further, if I possessed such abilities I would not manipulate the woes and fortunes of 100,000 (more or less) pretty poor to middle class, educated, cranky followers, I would have gone after a far, far smaller, more elite group who could grant me many more powerful options.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-36357746098227605052013-02-02T01:15:20.632-05:002013-02-02T01:15:20.632-05:00Well, I do believe that Gurumayi penetrated Lucid&...Well, I do believe that Gurumayi penetrated Lucid's dreams, and mine as well, and those of many, many others. I don't hold to the idea that we were all simply good Freudians sublimating and projecting all the phenomena that we experienced in SY. I believe that shakti is spiritual power and tantra is the means to harness and wield spiritual power and that Muktananda and Chidvilasananda had, for a time, control of that power in the lives of their followers. They had control over US. Of course, we willingly gave them access to our thoughts and subconscious minds. Hell, that was the price of admission for disksha. Even to this day I have to admit to something like Stockholm syndrome when it comes to SY. I WANTED to give those deepest levels of myself over to another's control. In the end all that it took was the interloper capitalizing the world Self and convincing me that this was an inside job, after all. <br /><br />SeekHerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08659121733477310544noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-15204253160008256422013-02-02T01:10:57.952-05:002013-02-02T01:10:57.952-05:00Whenever the guru appeared in my dreams I believed...Whenever the guru appeared in my dreams I believed it was my higher self talking to me in symbolic form. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5794942461067348825.post-50831128290458162822013-02-01T18:57:36.653-05:002013-02-01T18:57:36.653-05:00Gosh SeekHer, I was not suggesting GM actually app...Gosh SeekHer, I was not suggesting GM actually appeared in Lucid's dream (nor does Moses or Jesus appear in fact in anyone's dreams actually, imo) rather in a more Jungian frame,I was suggesting his most inner being already knew that eventually the guru was unimportant...generous really?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com