Forum member "spotless". Missing messages.

[Cleansox]

4 hours ago, Zork said:

@qofq

That means that Sportless has some advancement towards awakening but not the whole package and certainly not the authority to teach this stuff.

This sounds mostly like you are pissed on him. 

If @Spotlessis the one you have named earlier, his teacher seems to have delegated enough teaching responsibilities to him that one might interpret that as at least some level of skill.

Are there more to develope? 

Certainly, didn't Buddha tell that to his accomplished students (many left), didn't members of what is now known as Kashmir Shaivism discuss this with buddhists, 1000 years ago. 

 

But cannot this be said about most/all posters here? No matter the subject, there is more to learn? Health, martial skill, spirituality: We discuss it to the extent of our ability but it is hard to see that in relation to what we do not know/understand. 

 

My guess is that is somewhat implyed by @dwai with the stoning, in that these threads when individual or groups of members are discussed (often a good thing, to bring things up in the open) really easily becomes name callings and so on instead of focussing on the actual conflicts.

 

And yes, I thought that the post clearly directed at @Earl Grey, @freeform and @Walker(was it only me that interpreted it as against these three members?) was way below someone with spotless' age and experience.

 

Now, have I failed to annoy people? 

Please tell 😁

[freeform]

17 minutes ago, Cleansox said:

And yes, I thought that the post clearly directed at @Earl Grey, @freeform and @Walker(was it only me that interpreted it as against these three members?)

 

 

No - not only you

 

 

17 minutes ago, Cleansox said:

was way below someone with spotless' age and experience.

 

I agree - but I'm not surprised:

1 hour ago, freeform said:

Try to tell an 'Awakened' person that despite how it feels, they've not 'arrived'. This isn't 'it'. There's a lot more to transform... And usually, you'll witness a sort of uncharacteristic mental and emotional thrashing about and all sorts of conceptual gymnastics that attempt to dispute what you've got to say.

 

It's common.

 

I've seen the same scenario play through many times between my teacher and the 'awakened' ones brought to him for healing.

 

Suddenly all the untransformed parts start to rear their ugly head.

 

But sadly (and I'm in no way insinuating this is the case with Spotless) these untransformed parts have already been quietly at the helm but completely hidden from view - often in the form of abuses - abuse of power, sexual abuse, exerting unnecassary control over student's lives etc.

[anshino23]

41 minutes ago, freeform said:

This is the teacher's role.

 

Excellent point. One of the issues I ran into is that of teachers claiming that the lineage they are part of is flowing through them, but there's no actual exposition on this lineage - it's regarded as being purely a spiritual transmission and therefore it is subject to the higher beings and the teacher simply says that he or she is in contact with those specific higher beings through the higher realms and is taught continuously only through those realms - but does not have an incarnated teacher here on Earth. The teachings then are also just sponteanously manifesting from the teacher - but there's no clear line, and lots of different claims usually come up as to the nature of the lineage. Which makes it all that more confusing. 

Edited May 19, 2020 by anshino23

[dwai]

 

 

 

 

2 hours ago, freeform said:

Awakening is not the goal of spiritual practice. In fact, you can be permanently 'awakened' and still be a malevolent, deluded prick... Osho comes to mind. Several other gurus come to mind.

 

In a genuine, long-established, living lineage, awakening is one step along a very long path. It is not the goal. It isn't even necessarily considered as an achievement - it can happen by accident - and that's where it's considered a mistake.

Thought I'd highlight what I found interesting in your post

Awakening is the first step in the journey. What people call "awakening" is basically waking up to reality. Awakening does not equal liberation. For that, what we call "vāsanās" need to dissolve...at least the major ones. Minor ones don't cause big waves, just little ripples...can be entertaining.

 

But certainly, disappearing into a puff of smoke and light is not the goal of the spiritual practices either.  

 

But it is never a mistake. Nothing is a 'mistake' in the spiritual path...not when you factor in karma.

 

[freeform]

32 minutes ago, anshino23 said:

One of the issues I ran into is that of teachers claiming that the lineage they are part of is flowing through them, but there's no actual exposition on this lineage

 

It's tricky.

 

In Daoism, there's a very clear, almost bureaucratic understanding of lineage for that very reason. Your teacher has a name, her teacher has a name and a history and so on down the line. Is your teacher a lineage holder, a Tudi or Baishi? These are all clear-cut and physical. It's possible to do due diligence and check.

 

Of course, there is etiquette to follow. You need to approach the subject with respect - not just demand names and numbers. But genuine teachers will always be happy to talk about all of this.

 

But again - names and a traceable lineage - these days - is no guarantee of authenticity.

 

But then every practice has physically verifiable levels of attainment. If the teacher teaches Taiji then they should clearly be able to demonstrate the classically described skills - like - peng, lu, ji, an, cai, lie etc.

 

If they're a Neigong teacher they should be able to show their gong in some other way - whether it's a physical dantien, or Fa qi etc...

 

With spiritual teachers, it can be a little harder... but the teachers I know would never be annoyed if you respectfully approached them and explained that to really get into the process you need to see some evidence of their attainment. And in my experience, they'll be more than happy to help put your doubts at ease.

 

Assuming your intentions are sincere - being denounced for asking these sorts of questions is a good sign to get the hell out of there!

[freeform]

 

 

 

 

9 minutes ago, dwai said:

But certainly, disappearing into a puff of smoke and light is not the goal of the spiritual practices either.  

 

 

Ooof! A puff of smoke?!

 

Sounds like a terrible alchemy accident

 

 

 

 

 

10 minutes ago, dwai said:

But it is never a mistake. Nothing is a 'mistake' in the spiritual path...not when you factor in karma.

 

Not the Daoist understanding. The Daoist view of Ming is different from how you're viewing karma in this instance - there certainly are accidents, mistakes etc... Lines of Ming can certainly collide and throw you off course.

[Sebastian]

13 minutes ago, freeform said:

With spiritual teachers, it can be a little harder... but the teachers I know would never be annoyed if you respectfully approached them and explained that to really get into the process you need to see some evidence of their attainment. And in my experience, they'll be more than happy to help put your doubts at ease

Imo this is where it gets tricky, for spiritual assessment. Often what these Masters can demonstrate are various spiritual kung-fu, like knowing private things about you with their third eye. I’ve met teachers like this in Taiwan and it can be quite impressive, and chilling in an awesome way.
 

The issue with this approach is you might equate these super-natural powers as proof that they are enlightened - I did this myself for a while - but it could also be due to them having done a huge amount of Ming practices, and little Xing or virtue work.
 

Actually Damo Mitchell shared a few horror stories of this he experienced in China and he once told me he regretted never having met someone who displayed Ming and Xing in balance. 
 

So how can you judge who is a real spiritual teacher on top of their Ming level skills ? You can’t really, I’ve come to this conclusion  - you can only see as high as your level of development.
 

And virtue isn’t something you can demonstrate, like in a lab experiment setting. Personally I equate morality and virtue with spiritual development. I know some others might not, and see it as the ability to se spirits. But to me they go hand in hand. Because I’ve seen some “masters“ with all the super-powers you can imagine abusing students, in a demon or hellish sort of way. If you tell me they are spiritual, I might reply they are spiritually irresponsible, or spiritually immoral. And I think the adjective matters more than simply their ability to access the spiritual sphere.
 

In other words, it’s not your spiritual gift that matters, it’s what you do with it. Will you use your gift to light up the hearts of others, to help this world ? Or will you use that power to abuse others for sex, money or ego purposes ? That’s like taking the best part of you to do the worst to this world, it’s so sad.

I think this is why these arts are so dangerous. Often the people with some spiritual attainment use that to abuse their students or control them. Spiritually they have lost their attainment, they are leading others astray and committing the worst spiritual crime. And I’m speaking from experience having been involved in well disguised spiritual cults and the like.

 

So for the Ming stuff use the markers Freeform recommended, and as he said as you go higher spiritually from there, it gets murkier. How the Master conducts himself in private would be the most important, at least for me.

 

[Zork]

2 hours ago, freeform said:

I don't know if he's lying. I feel like he's not.

 

I'm genuinely impressed by his level of dedication to his art.

 

But awakening is not rare.

I wasn't saying that he lies. The comment is that he got deluded by a pre-awakening phase that he mistook for enlightenment.

He believes that he is enlightened/awakened.

On the third comment you made, i can only say that there are many types of awakening and Sportless does not talk about spontaneous cases but one induced by meditation and samadhi.

 

@Cleansox He is a clear case of someone that has not reached enlightenment and teaches people how to get there. His defense of the New Age movement didn't help him look good in my eyes either. New age has ended up as a "feel good" movement filled with faux spirituality. Which in turn has given birth to 20 year old yoga teachers*..... And made up yoga (and qigong) systems......

It took some of the teachings of the East and distorted them to cater for a mass market spirituality lifestyle.

 

*real yoga teachers should have a boatload of experience to deal with all the nuances of the practice. I would never expect someone to teach energy systems at that age.

[mla7]

Freeform,

 

Your take on what you are calling awakening is sort of unusual.  Maybe it would be helpful to clarify a few things around what you are saying?

 

First off, for the sake of this conversation at least, can we agree to call awakening arriving at a state of non duality that leaves a sort of permanent change in a person?  I think that that would be a pretty good rough definition.

 

And, assuming you agree to that definition, and also assuming I am getting your story right, are you saying you had a qigong teacher who ran some kind of medical qigong clinic who regularly treated people who claimed some kind of awakening?  It sounds like you have been involved in several lines of practice, if you don't mind me asking, where are you getting your view on awakening from? 

 

While I certainly can recognize that a lot of people claiming some kind of awakening are in fact experiencing some kind of mental illness it seems some people are experiencing the real thing.  Also, it seems to me that awakening (per my rough definition above) is basically the goal of practice.  

 

Do you agree with all this?  I am trying to get some perspective on where you are coming from.

 

 

 

 

[anshino23]

58 minutes ago, freeform said:

 

It's tricky.

 

In Daoism, there's a very clear, almost bureaucratic understanding of lineage for that very reason. Your teacher has a name, her teacher has a name and a history and so on down the line. Is your teacher a lineage holder, a Tudi or Baishi? These are all clear-cut and physical. It's possible to do due diligence and check.

 

Of course, there is etiquette to follow. You need to approach the subject with respect - not just demand names and numbers. But genuine teachers will always be happy to talk about all of this.

 

But again - names and a traceable lineage - these days - is no guarantee of authenticity.

 

But then every practice has physically verifiable levels of attainment. If the teacher teaches Taiji then they should clearly be able to demonstrate the classically described skills - like - peng, lu, ji, an, cai, lie etc.

 

If they're a Neigong teacher they should be able to show their gong in some other way - whether it's a physical dantien, or Fa qi etc...

 

With spiritual teachers, it can be a little harder... but the teachers I know would never be annoyed if you respectfully approached them and explained that to really get into the process you need to see some evidence of their attainment. And in my experience, they'll be more than happy to help put your doubts at ease.

 

Assuming your intentions are sincere - being denounced for asking these sorts of questions is a good sign to get the hell out of there!

 

Thank you - that makes great sense.

 

I think the evidence of their attainment thing could be misunderstood though - because transmission by itself is not necessarily a high attainment as I think you've brought up before.

 

So what would be a way of showing evidence of their attainment from a spiritual teacher?

 

I mean feeling a loving state or getting Zifagong by itself is something that can be stimulated through suggestion and the strong want of having something happen - often also accompanied by emotional fervor not only on part of the student in question but also all the other students - so there's like a group-mind resonance happening which makes it even more potent. At least that was my experience.

 

So as an example bunch of students Zifagonging around a room in front of the master - with the master waving his hands in weird ways or sitting still in supposed samadhi - but the development the students go through - not really anything, their health still declining, long-term health issues not going away through the practice, no real "gong" developed. When the master then works on the student one-on-one, nobody really feels anything, but he tells you afterwards, "thousands years of karmas have just been eradicated and pulled out of you and into my own body", which I then have to burn out through Tummo, etc. 

 

So yeah that on top of a bunch of experiences of Zifagong and then the belief that it's "divine intervention" or "the Divine Mother Goddess" working through you, so you feel immensely holy and blessed and like a wonderfully special and select individual. 

 

So it really is tricky IME. That's why I love the physiological attainments/milestones at each step of the way within an authentic tradition - because they can't be faked. 

Edited May 19, 2020 by anshino23

[moment]

49 minutes ago, freeform said:

 

Ooof! A puff of smoke?!

 

Sounds like a terrible alchemy accident

 

 

Not the Daoist understanding. The Daoist view of Ming is different from how you're viewing karma in this instance - there certainly are accidents, mistakes etc... Lines of Ming can certainly collide and throw you off course.

 

A whole picture view (whatever that is) versus one's current perspective will create debate.

[dwai]

1 hour ago, freeform said:

Not the Daoist understanding. The Daoist view of Ming is different from how you're viewing karma in this instance - there certainly are accidents, mistakes etc... Lines of Ming can certainly collide and throw you off course.

IMHO, karma supersedes ming. Yes, it might seem like mistakes and accidents can occur. But they're all rooted in karmic issues playing out, usually unbeknownst to the individual.

 

In manifest reality, Karma is the cause. In the unmanifest state, Karma is the seed of manifestation. So long as individuals maintain separate identification with mind-body-energy-whathaveyou, without realizing their true nature, karma holds its sway. That's why 'awakening' is so important -- because one cannot escape the influence of Karma without it. 

 

But it is also true that many people without a proper grounding in traditional training can have awakening experiences, and live off the memory of such an experience for as long as karmic influences continue. It is also true that some people, without any traditional training, can have a full and profound awakening to never go back to 'normal' again. One such person was Ramana Maharshi. But that too is a result of karma. 

 

For example? Can an enlightened person (complete awakening) not have human diseases? There are many recorded throughout history that have. I think the fallacy, a result of over-romanticized, over-mythicized literature about spirituality in popular (western) culture assumes that enlightened beings are "perfect" in material form somehow. By "material form", I  mean the body and its machinations, of course. Phenomenologically, we can attest to this fact in our experience -- whatever has a beginning must have an end. We observe that all the time. Why should the body of an enlightened person be any different? 

 

The other fallacy that drives such "rose-tinted" views of what enlightenment entails is the assumption that the body is the source of the person. That the person somehow materializes within the body and is tied to the body. So when the body dies, certainly that means that the person is gone...right?   

 

 

Edited May 19, 2020 by dwai

[moment]

Earlier awakenings, aquisition of powers, etc are not enlightenment.  They are ego challenges that need to be worked through.  No living person ( IMO) has ever fully understood karma.

[dwai]

25 minutes ago, moment said:

Earlier awakenings, aquisition of powers, etc are not enlightenment.  They are ego challenges that need to be worked through.  No living person ( IMO) has ever fully understood karma.

I'd recommend you start by reading the Bhagavad Gita  (and you too shall understand Karma) 

Edited May 19, 2020 by dwai

[freeform]

1 hour ago, Sebastian said:

So for the Ming stuff use the markers Freeform recommended, and as he said as you go higher spiritually from there, it gets murkier. How the Master conducts himself in private would be the most important, at least for me.

 

Yes - you're completely right. It certainly does get murky.

 

And in fact, I completely agree regarding conduct.

 

For me also, that's been the first and most important quality to look for - kindness and virtuous conduct. In fact, I much rather train with a teacher with a lower level of 'achievement' but higher integrity.

 

I look for moments when they don't need to be nice. Their conduct with waiters, members of the public, difficult students and so on.

 

Many years ago I saw Bruce Frantzis in a cafe... and I spied on him a little

 

Firstly he was talking much louder than anyone. And then he was rude to the girl serving him - he thought his meal was too cold and almost threw the plate to the waitress and demanded a new one - all without even looking up at her. I could see she was going red, and maybe holding back tears.

[moment]

7 minutes ago, dwai said:

I'd recommend you start by reading the Bhagavad Gita  (and you too shall understand Karma) 

 

And I respectfully request, that you should not be so sure of yourself. ( Such as thinking you know what I have or have not read, among other things.)  The first time that I read the Bhagavad Gita ( all the way through), I was ten years old ( I am now 68 yrs old). It immediately caused problems for me.  I at the time was being raised by fundalmentalist Christain Scientists.  I quickly realised that the Science and Health, The key to the Scriptures, was in many ways, an Americanised version of the Bhagavad Gita.

I stand my my earlier comment.

[dwai]

9 minutes ago, moment said:

 

And I respectfully request, that you should not be so sure of yourself. ( Such as thinking you know what I have or have not read, among other things.)  The first time that I read the Bhagavad Gita ( all the way through), I was ten years old ( I am now 68 yrs old). It immediately caused problems for me.  I at the time was being raised by fundalmentalist Christain Scientists.  I quickly realised that the Science and Health, The key to the Scriptures, was in many ways, an Americanised version of the Bhagavad Gita.

I stand my my earlier comment.

Experience brings about confidence.  

I didn't mean to be disrespectful towards you at all...

You were perhaps a bit premature in your reading of the Bhagavad Gita at 10 yrs of age. Try again...maybe it will be different this time.

Interesting on the Americanized version of the Bhagavad Gita. Can you share more? I'm genuinely interested. 

[freeform]

1 hour ago, mla7 said:

Your take on what you are calling awakening is sort of unusual.  Maybe it would be helpful to clarify a few things around what you are saying?

 

First off, for the sake of this conversation at least, can we agree to call awakening arriving at a state of non duality that leaves a sort of permanent change in a person?  I think that that would be a pretty good rough definition.

 

I do agree that my definition is somewhat unusual. It comes more from a traditional Daoist background - where in fact they don't really have names for these states - but they do have names for the people that achieve them (along the lines of 'saint/sage' etc)

 

I rather not make this too much about terms - I've discussed this at length in other threads - and I don't think it's that helpful.

 

So regarding what we can agree on. I liked Dwai's version:

 

 

 

 

 

2 hours ago, dwai said:

Awakening is the first step in the journey. What people call "awakening" is basically waking up to reality. Awakening does not equal liberation.

 

Even then there are some distinctions - experiences of awakening can cause a permanent shift... but there's also a permanent awakened state - as in you're constantly in this non-dual state.

 

But this is different from 'full enlightenment' - which as the name suggests, and from my perspective is the transformation of every aspect of 'you' into 'primordial light' or the light of Yuan Shen. This also happens to be a physical transformation - so when Dwai was teasing about 'disappearing into light with a puff of smoke' that's what he was talking about.

 

And yes - it is said that upon death a person who's reached this stage will transform into light at the moment of death (meaning no cadaver is left behind). The light created is said to usually be a light that floods an entire area for a period of time... usually along with a strong scent of flowers and so on.

 

A more "common" attainment (as in not common in the least!) is what's called the rainbow body - where, upon death, a kind of kaleidoscope of rainbows fills the sky and no cadaver remains (although some say nails and hair remain - not so important). This is one step removed from 'full enlightenment' as described above.

 

These are the descriptions of the final ascendence - but of course, there are some profound differences in people at this stage to normal people like you and I.

 

1 hour ago, mla7 said:

are you saying you had a qigong teacher who ran some kind of medical qigong clinic who regularly treated people who claimed some kind of awakening?  It sounds like you have been involved in several lines of practice, if you don't mind me asking, where are you getting your view on awakening from?

 

Yes - almost. He's an internal alchemy teacher in Asia. For a time he ran a free clinic treating mainly Qi deviations, meditation illnesses and so on. He used a range of approaches from acupuncture to qi emission to just talking or being present. He was well known in certain circles - and would often be treating well known Qigong teachers, Monks, Abbots, and of course self-directed practitioners.

 

1 hour ago, mla7 said:

While I certainly can recognize that a lot of people claiming some kind of awakening are in fact experiencing some kind of mental illness it seems some people are experiencing the real thing.

 

Slight misunderstanding here.

 

What I was trying to say is that awakening experiences in 'normal' non-cultivating people, tend to come along with mental illness... not that mental illness is confused for awakening (although of course that also happens).

 

1 hour ago, mla7 said:

where are you getting your view on awakening from?

 

Very much a Daoist paradigm - with maybe some influence from Esoteric Buddhism (but minimal).

 

 

[Sebastian]

11 minutes ago, freeform said:

And then he was rude to the girl serving him - he thought his meal was too cold and almost threw the plate to the waitress and demanded a new one - all without even looking up at her.

I recall Damo shared a dinner he had with a Chinese Master where the said “Master” threw the bill on the floor at the end of the meal and expected the waiter to pick it up in a defiant show of ego. Everything was going fine until then.... So it was totally unexpected and Damo was in sort of shock. 

 

Damo just stayed completely silent and quietly left and never spoke to said Master again. I can understand. His conscience reacted. But others who are only after power might view that as a sort of humorous or cool authority thing and still learn with them to gain the same powers. 
 

To me the things you wrote about, namely kindness to others, virtue, and conscience (in Damo’s case) are all close to the spirit or soul of an individual. This would be more the “hun spirit” in Taoism rather than the “Po” which ties in to our base and carnal desires.

 

I don’t proclaim to understand what happens after death, or to understand hun and po, but I know one thing.

What is light flies to the Sky, and what is heavy sinks.

 

After death, where are our lower emotions, base desires, greed, and ego going to go ? (Where is our Qi going to go ?)

 

And where is the Spirit of our being, the sum of all our good deeds, our love for others going to go ?  (Where is our shen going to go ?)

 

When you think about this deeply you might choose to focus on your cultivation differently. You might wonder what you can you do in this lifetime that will really refine your soul and spirit - and not just your Qi powers and sensitivity ? This doesn’t mean to say that all Qi practices are not useful, not at all. It might just mean to place your Qi development practices in the right context. They can be a very useful too in this regard.
 

I’m no expert and only sharing my own observations that I matured after some years, but the message I am sharing also comes from my teachers. They would rather you be decent human beings first than to try to be spiritual for the wrong reasons. And to them, doing no cultivation and being a good moral person is a higher achievement than being a fallen Qigong Master preying on the innocent. Of course the ideal is to be a powerful being helping others, and Qigong can be a tool for that. 

Just some thoughts.

 

 

 

[freeform]

1 hour ago, dwai said:

The other fallacy that drives such "rose-tinted" views of what enlightenment entails is the assumption that the body is the source of the person. That the person somehow materializes within the body and is tied to the body. So when the body dies, certainly that means that the person is gone...right?  

 

If this is an explication of what you think my view is, then I'm afraid you're misrepresenting it (again)

 

I think forcing my perspective into this 'consciousness materialises in the body' pigeonhole helps you dismiss the perspective I'm offering... you keep pressing this point repeatedly - and I keep saying that this is not the case.

[dwai]

 

 

 

 

9 minutes ago, freeform said:

 

If this is an explication of what you think my view is, then I'm afraid you're misrepresenting it (again)

Not you. Communicating on essentially a tone-deaf medium is hard. I was just making a point about a significant portion of the gen-pop  (was simply making some general points/like the Top 10 Greatest Hits sort of thing)...

9 minutes ago, freeform said:

 

I think forcing my perspective into this 'consciousness materialises in the body' pigeonhole helps you dismiss the perspective I'm offering... you keep pressing this point repeatedly - and I keep saying that this is not the case.

I certainly don't consider it a pigeonhole, though I'm not dismissing your perspective at all. I've been down this path before, and I think there's considerable value to it, up to a point. I think I've run into far more deluded, power-seeking people than genuine practitioners on this path though (and we've seen enough such luminaries on this very forum even, FWIW). The allure of power and siddhis is genuinely a dangerous thing. 

[freeform]

1 hour ago, anshino23 said:

That's why I love the physiological attainments/milestones at each step of the way within an authentic tradition - because they can't be faked.

 

This is a key strength of the Daoist approach in my opinion.

 

Self-delusion is so easy to fall into.

 

And it's for that very reason that many of the modern masters don't mention this stuff (or are willfully ignorant of it) - because suddenly their master status can be verified easily and quickly.

 

I'd rather be humbled - but know where I am - than to assume some haughty state but be deluding myself.

 

But when our assessment of our own development starts to influence our perception of ourself - suddenly there's a vested interest in being blind to the truth of this.

[moment]

1 hour ago, dwai said:

Experience brings about confidence.  

I didn't mean to be disrespectful towards you at all...

You were perhaps a bit premature in your reading of the Bhagavad Gita at 10 yrs of age. Try again...maybe it will be different this time. 

Interesting on the Americanized version of the Bhagavad Gita. Can you share more? I'm genuinely interested. 

 

I have read it since (and it was different) and will do so again, along with other great works in due time. As for the Science and Health, The Key to the Scriptures. It is the primary directive of the Christain Scientists (as to how one should perceive the Bible).  If you are interested, you should look it up.  I am going to tread a little lightly here, for those that need certain things now.  But, IMO, The science and health is a ragtag collage of parts of the Bhagavad Gita, with Jesus added..  Because of that, I see the S&H as a merely partial shadow of the great Hindu work.  I left the S&H behind a long time ago.

BTW,  I thank you for your civil discourse.

Edited May 19, 2020 by moment

[Sebastian]

Just a random idea to build on these tangible physical markers that Anshino mentioned that are so helpful.
 

Since we don’t have any like that for the spiritual sphere, maybe your family members can help set the marker for you. You might laugh and call it un-scientific, but your Mom knows you. Your grandma knows you. They know your evolution better than anyone, they are perceptive. 
 

For example you might think you have earned a spiritual black belt recently, but they might notice you lock yourself in your room a lot and have lost contact with the outside world. Instead of socializing like you used to, you perform weird esoteric practices instead. All you talk about is esoteric stuff.
 

Or they might notice you’ve changed in a positive way, your moods have mellowed out, you’re more helpful and patient towards others. It’s like you became a better version of yourself. You’re more sincere to them, they feel grateful for it.

 

Throughout my own cultivation path, I had many ups and downs and my family always mirrored them to me. Intuitively they knew if something was good for me or not.  This is the same if you bring a new girlfriend or boyfriend home — your family will always know if this person is the right one for you. Call it sixth sense I don’t know. Our dog would growl every time when my brother brought a strange girl home during his teenage years. She was into black magic and various devious things. Even your dog can notice a change in you.
 

In general I think we are more perceptive than we think as humans, and we should give more credit to others to reflect our own evolution, especially those close to us. I notice after a good Qigong session my son likes to come to me and cuddle, maybe because I’m more receptive and open to him at this time. So depending if he comes or not, I can see how I am doing.
 

I’m just trying to say that self-reflection is important too, if you’re going to dedicate a huge part of your life to this. And that family members can help in this regard. Instead of focusing on the Divine only, view them as the Divine and go from there. It’s more practical, and you might learn some things, while improving your relationship with them. 

 

[dwai]

20 minutes ago, moment said:

 

I have read it since (and it was different) and will do so again, along with other great works in due time. As for the Science and Health, The Key to the Scriptures. It is the primary directive of the Christain Scientists (as to how one should perceive the Bible).  If you are interested, you should look it up.  I am going to tread a little lightly here, for those that need certain things now.  But, IMO, The science and health is a ragtag collage of parts of the Bhagavad Gita, with Jesus added..  Because of that, I see the S&H as a merely partial shadow of the great Hindu work.  I left the S&H behind a long time ago.

BTW,  I thank you for your civil discourse.

I'd never heard of Christian Scientists before. Thanks for sharing. I'll look them up.