GrandTrinity Posted May 19, 2006 (edited) Anyone really explore this? http://www.globalserve.net/~sarlo/Ratings.htm What is up with all the people with 3 stars!? How can I think this rating is legit when Master Chia only got 1.5 stars? Edited May 19, 2006 by GrandTrinity Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sean Posted May 19, 2006 Anyone really explore this? http://www.globalserve.net/~sarlo/Ratings.htm What is up with all the people with 3 stars!? How can I think this rating is legit when Master Chia only got 1.5 stars? Do you think Mantak Chia is enlightened? (Not baiting you, just curious). Sean Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Trunk Posted May 19, 2006 I like the splash that says "Now with 28.7% more credibility!" The guy has a sense of humor about himself and his site. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pietro Posted May 19, 2006 I like the splash that says "Now with 28.7% more credibility!" The guy has a sense of humor about himself and his site. I think is really good. I could find the link to the homepage of some masters I lost track off. Of course the rating are absolutely subjectives and should be taken very lightly. I like how he declare himself as a follower of Osho and then gives to Osho 3 hats, and to Jesus Christ 2 hats. I am pretty sure there are also some Christian saints with more than 2 hats, which makes the whole thing even more interesting. I also think that it would make sense to split the rating in two for each person (always complicating am i). Enlightenment Ability to explain. After all some teachers have reached a very high level of enlightenment, but have a real difficult in getting others at a similar level, while others are quite the opposite. Any thoughts? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sean Posted May 19, 2006 I also think that it would make sense to split the rating in two for each person (always complicating am i). Enlightenment Ability to explain. After all some teachers have reached a very high level of enlightenment, but have a real difficult in getting others at a similar level, while others are quite the opposite. Any thoughts? Heh, well I think an even more ideal setup would be to let the "public" plug in their own rating for any teacher and then have some space to explain their reasoning. Because I think for some people it can get even more complicated than level of enlightenment vs. ability to explain, it's also their ethical development and maturity (ie: are they exploiting positions of power), the order in which they present concepts, even their personality, etc. So allow me to use this as an opportunity to plug the fabulous Tao Bums Review Board as having the potential to be this very resource. Sean Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
cloud recluse Posted May 20, 2006 Ive got to say i really love Sarlo's site. I dont take the Rating aspect of it very seriously,in fact I ignore that alltogether,but I love it as a resource,as a source of info & gossip Sean,I must confess I would be delighted if Tao Bums Review develpoed in this direction Regards,Cloud. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sean Posted May 20, 2006 Sean,I must confess I would be delighted if Tao Bums Review develpoed in this direction Regards,Cloud. Just added some teachers. Check it out! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
GrandTrinity Posted May 20, 2006 I think Chia is pretty damn enlightened. I dont know. Maybe i have just been brainwashed by him? Anyways I intend to check out a lot of the people on this website and will get back when I weed through em all. Right now I am enjoying free nondual talks from Adyashanti the Zen dude on Video: http://www.adyashanti.org/index.php?file=watchvideo Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
neimad Posted May 20, 2006 I think Chia is pretty damn enlightened. I dont know. Maybe i have just been brainwashed by him? be very careful of chia..... potential megalomaniacs with massive swiss bank accounts need to be watched closely. he's not very nice to his staff either. have you met him? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sean Posted May 20, 2006 I think Chia is pretty damn enlightened. I dont know. Maybe i have just been brainwashed by him? Yeah, I don't have a clue (obviously) ... I guess I look at Chia almost like the way I look at Sonnon. They are teaching really cool tricks but are not really awake to the fundamental truth of Being the way someone like a Master Nan, Sailor Bob, Yogani or an Adyashanti are. I hope this doesn't sound rude or overly judgemental, I'm just using my own intuitive discernment to select my primary teachers. BTW, Adyashanti is great IMO ... really down to Earth. Cam and I are going to his two day retreat in June. Sean Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
GrandTrinity Posted May 20, 2006 I have not met Chia. I think that everyone has something to offer. I also think Chias system is very unique and valueble among the faiths and traditions of the world, he is only a small part of the puzzle but with Chi Nei Tsang, perhaps a big part...The mayans had abdomnal massage too, this is a practice which I think is very important to awakening. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sean Posted May 20, 2006 Sorry man, I'm not trying to dis Chia. I never met him either. And I agree that everyone has something to offer. I guess it just depends on what alchemically arises for you to complete in your destiny here as a human being. Since I was very young I have always been drawn to "ultimate truths". In a sense this is a type of imbalance that only the type of awakening that masters like the ones I named can help me heal. For others this won't work because they are not cursed with the same type of seeking-sickness as I am. Teachers and dharmas are like different medicines. In this way ranking teachers breaks down, like saying thorazine is better than tylenol. Really they are each unique medicines addressing different illnesses. Sean Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
GrandTrinity Posted May 20, 2006 (edited) No need to apologize! We should rejoice in this age of information where we have things like the Guru raiting service, too. Other than Adyashanti I enjoyed seeing how Eckhart Tolle is up there (cool to check out his website) his woman teaches a blend of Tai CHi Yoga and Qigong. I was reading before about a resort where they teach "Yoqiga" a combo of qigong and yoga. I seen this in a dvd also called Yoga Fusion...Yekta Zarrinkafsh..this African dance woman (just noticed how she moves the shen-dao or t5/wing point a lot). I think combining qigong, yoga, tai chi, lauphter, everything is enlightenment: non dual. Perhaps the problem arises when we try to bite off more that we can chew and forget that...all numbers are 1...son of air... this lady is cool, got 3 nuggets, has art, awesome meditation and singing on her site, realized: http://www.shantimayi.com/ This international org. looks reeeeeally cool: http://www.artofliving.org/ http://tara.org/ Awesome Buddhist readings from this lady, a woman buddicitta living in Marlyand! http://www.dharmaweb.org links to nice zen/dharma talks and stuff, much audio, where I foundL http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3618870a2180,00.html interesting article on the largest monastery IN THE WORLD! designed by the same artist who did the tallest http://www.gangaji.org/ Won 3 nuggets! (talks about nectar and bones) http://www.ammachi.org Amrita... http://www.advaita.org/ Ramesh...has FREE VIDEO/AUDIO http://www.neemkarolibaba.com/ Ram Das Guru, he is okay in my book, not too impressive! http://www.ramakrishna.org seems cool Ramana Maharshi we all know...has some videos at his site... Richard Rose http://www.tatfoundation.org I think he is pretty good. Nice to have western psych perspective... Sailor' Bob Adamso no thanks, this guy got 3 nugs, but boring. ... Edited May 20, 2006 by GrandTrinity Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
GrandTrinity Posted May 20, 2006 be very careful of chia..... potential megalomaniacs with massive swiss bank accounts need to be watched closely. he's not very nice to his staff either. have you met him? Massive Swiss account that might liberate the people if his empowerments are proven to work with empirical science? How was he "not very nice" to staff? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
neimad Posted May 20, 2006 Massive Swiss account that might liberate the people if his empowerments are proven to work with empirical science? How was he "not very nice" to staff? i suggest if you get an oppurtunity to meet with him you take it and find out for yourself. he is arrogant, struts around in either a suit or a pink tracksuit, is constantly on the mobile phone and treats his staff as if they are his personal servants..... very dismissive. when i look at him i think i can see $$$ signs reflected in his eyes. i didn't get a nice vibe from him, and the tao gardens themselves has a very very strange feel to it. thats just my own opinion though, please remember that. i don't take away anything from his teachings or methodology, it just never worked for me and what i want to get out of this life and i had a bad experience at the basic retreat i attended there in thailand (i actually left halfway through from dissatisfaction). but if it works for you, then awesome and go with it. just like you decided rmax don't do anything for you, yet i find it really quite amazing for myself. i see it working from the physical up through to the spiritual (like the up flow of our kundalini) and then i add some meditation and spiritual type activities to that and bring that down and through into the physical and i feel like i got the dual flow going on. i'm refining myself in both directions simultaneously and i feel like its a really balanced approach. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pietro Posted May 20, 2006 i suggest if you get an oppurtunity to meet with him you take it and find out for yourself. he is arrogant, struts around in either a suit or a pink tracksuit, is constantly on the mobile phone and treats his staff as if they are his personal servants..... very dismissive. when i look at him i think i can see $$$ signs reflected in his eyes. i didn't get a nice vibe from him, and the tao gardens themselves has a very very strange feel to it. thats just my own opinion though, please remember that. i don't take away anything from his teachings or methodology, it just never worked for me and what i want to get out of this life and i had a bad experience at the basic retreat i attended there in thailand (i actually left halfway through from dissatisfaction). but if it works for you, then awesome and go with it. just like you decided rmax don't do anything for you, yet i find it really quite amazing for myself. i see it working from the physical up through to the spiritual (like the up flow of our kundalini) and then i add some meditation and spiritual type activities to that and bring that down and through into the physical and i feel like i got the dual flow going on. i'm refining myself in both directions simultaneously and i feel like its a really balanced approach. Yes. I too think that 1.5 to Chia is a bit generous. I probably would give him 1 out of 3. But do pay attention that Chia consciously avoids to project energy. Essentially keeps his aura very near his body. Is a practice that yuou learn as an addendum to F3. But Chia made many important steps in the way tai ji has been spreading in the west. So I would not go less than 1 regardless of what energy might he have right now. Also the fact of treating people very briefly is, I gathered) an effect of a practice. If your mind is in your tantien you just don't play all those social games, and you end up being very direct. I do remember another person whose practice to keep the mind in the tantien was his number 1 practice and he was considered an asshole by a continent and a half. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
GrandTrinity Posted May 20, 2006 (edited) just like you decided rmax don't do anything for you, yet i find it really quite amazing for myself. I think Chia definetly deserves more respet than one star, I would say in my book he gets three even. Nobody is perfect! At least his teachings are based on the body! The rmax stuff did do some things for me, but not nearly what Chia did. I think becoming conservative in the arts of sperm has helped my mental energy hundred fold. On the other hand, I had to learn up to sealing the senses->congress to start really transmuting, his system really sucked me in, but thats fine with me! I concentrated on my lower TT for a loooong time thinking it was the stage I was at, cutting off the heart and brain, but you take the good with the bad. Now I can safely meditate on my heart and brain unlike most people. Perhaps these advaita teachers die young because they do not have the physical grounding of Chia, we'll see how long Chia lives... Compared to most of these advaita people I would say Chia will end up bein remembered for a much longer time than them. He gets three nuggets in my book, and I feel like that is the same as saying "a friend of the devil is a friend of mine" to quote the Grateful Dead. You see? thats fine with me because in order to see the nondual the duality must be transcended, Chia has heart the size of the world becuase he has the GUTS to connect with his heart so deeply and help people destroy their attachment to death (reminds me of Shiva). Edited May 20, 2006 by GrandTrinity Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Smile Posted May 20, 2006 I stopped paying attention to Chia after I learned he copies other people's books. Also, sending his students to take other master's classes to steal information. Most of his books are co-writen (read: writen by someone else and then Chia adds his name to them). Sounds like a money-oriented bussiness, that's all. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
turbo Posted May 20, 2006 You see? thats fine with me because in order to see the nondual the duality must be transcended, Chia has heart the size of the world becuase he has the GUTS to connect with his heart so deeply and help people destroy their attachment to death (reminds me of Shiva). Wow...you sound like a true beliver. Playing with energy, smiling to organs, fusing energies at the dan tien, etc do not lead to enlightenment. Sure it may take some spiritual progress or dicipline to get the stage where one has access to and even a bit of control over these energies, but this should not be mistaken for enlighenment. Powers such as these are offered on the path to enlightenment and are but a distraction to true enlighenment. A practitioner who engages in their use will not reach ultimate Samadhi and become liberated, the practitioner will develop stronger karmic knots and push themself further away from the final goal. As far as the Guru Rating Service goes, it seems like the ranking is based on the number of enlightened that the guru has produced. Whether or not that is explicitly stated, it seems fit with the rankings. I've never heard of anyone studying under Chia becoming enlightened. Then again there are said to be only a handful of enlightened since the buddha. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Pietro Posted May 20, 2006 As far as the Guru Rating Service goes, it seems like the ranking is based on the number of enlightened that the guru has produced. Whether or not that is explicitly stated, it seems fit with the rankings. I've never heard of anyone studying under Chia becoming enlightened. Then again there are said to be only a handful of enlightened since the buddha. naa. That doesn't fit. For example Gurdjeff did not produce, that I know of, any enlightened. And Osho would have produced more enlightned than the whole of christianity. The values are his individual judgment. Instead I would pay attentio to one thing: have you notice how few teachers out there are from taoism respect, for example, to yoga. I wonder if we could list them all. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
neimad Posted May 21, 2006 Playing with energy, smiling to organs, fusing energies at the dan tien, etc do not lead to enlightenment. Sure it may take some spiritual progress or dicipline to get the stage where one has access to and even a bit of control over these energies, but this should not be mistaken for enlighenment. Powers such as these are offered on the path to enlightenment and are but a distraction to true enlighenment. A practitioner who engages in their use will not reach ultimate Samadhi and become liberated, the practitioner will develop stronger karmic knots and push themself further away from the final goal. the scientologists (not that i am one of them) speak about the energy body as the "genetic entity". my take on the energy body, the one that the healing tao system works with, is that it's a bit of borrowed earth energy blended with a bit of cosmic energy (cosmic dust n all) and it's function is to regulate the physical matter body and hold it all coherent. then us, the soul or 'thetan' come along and inhabit that.... using the genetic entity to regulate the physical and give us a vessal to experience this dimension. playing around with the genetic entity energy too much is a trap, in my opinion. a distraction. it's just something we use temporarily to allow us a vessel to live in. we are so much more than that, and our true potential if we were able to begin to express would far surpess and of the little tricks we could hope to achieve with our genetic entity. the chakras, i think, are also just energy portals.... allowing us to bring into and bring out of specific vibrations of energy from the place where we are really residing. anyways i'm just playing around with some odd thoughts here. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
cloud recluse Posted May 21, 2006 (edited) Just out of general interest in things "culty",has anyone read FEET OF CLAY by Anthony Storr ? While theres been a lot of discussion as to why people want to be eager followers & "disciples",this book asks why someone would want to be a "guru".He identifies a kind of "guru-syndrome" revolving around a profound sense of abandonment & isolation,an inabilty to accept freindship & a fear of uncertainty.With this in mind,he critiques a few of the more famous religious figures,including Jung in that definition. Another good one that goes into the dynamics of the guru-disciple ego trip is DESTROYING THE WORLD TO SAVE IT by Robert Jay Lifton .This one concentrates on Shoko Asahara of AUM Shinrikyo,the happygolucky guys who Sarin-gassed the Japanese subway. What Ive got out of these two books in particular is a very interesting perspective on the craving to be a messiah,the craving to own disciples,to see your ego-image replicated in them.Guruism as a retreat from the unknown.The latter book by Lifton particularly looks at how 'guru & 'disciple' reinforce each other. Regards,Cloud. Edited May 22, 2006 by cloud recluse Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Peregrino Posted May 21, 2006 On that debunking note, Cloud, *The Jung Cult* by Richard Knoll is also excellent. Not that I think Jung's ideas are *completely* worthless (I'd be pseudo-triumphantly standing on a giant to say that), but there are definitely cultic elements in his organizations, and he did have something do with forming that cult of personality himself. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
GrandTrinity Posted May 22, 2006 Agreed. I am all about the fusing of these Eastern doctrines with Western science. What can be weeded out that is useful on a physial level? On a heart level? Whatever. On a mental level? sure...but on a scientific level it is all good. Nietche (hiwever u spell him) said "science is the tree of knowledge of good and evil" in the Anti-Christ. Take for example the TM movement, they are using science as proof their system works. I think this is on the right track. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mYTHmAKER Posted May 22, 2006 I think that what many of these gurus over-look is the difference between cultures... our western culture is so dramatically different than the oriental and indian cultures that many of these teachings come from. I hear 'masters' spouting off stuff they've read in ancient tomes, that has absolutely nothing to do with us, here and now. The truth is relevant in all cultures at all times. When one is in the truth whatever they say will affect us. So the ones you are talking about don't make the cut. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
