From: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Saturday, December 8, 2018 6:19 AM To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Subject: RE: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Omkara
>Evidently a lot of people feel this way also about meditating with the TM >group, not turning out for what was superradiance of the group. The numbers in >the Dome meditation are incredibly low now. When the domes were under construction, Maharishi said, “The time will come when I’ll want you to do your program alone, but for now I want you to do it in a group”. He also once said, to people who were complaining that they weren’t rounding enough on some course, “The time may come when I tell you to stop meditating altogether”. >Interesting to see how the principles of higher moral character that were the >communal experiment started at Amherst in ‘78 have been eroded and hurt in the >administration of it. For outsiders or people from away looking in on the experiment I recommend their reading "Greetings From Utopia Park" and listening to the NPR 'Fresh Air' interview of Claire Hoffman for insight to how it went. I don’t recall anything about “principles of higher moral character” in the air when we first came here from Amherst. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>, <r...@searchsummit.com<mailto:r...@searchsummit.com>> wrote : I appreciate what you’re doing with the group meditation thing, but I like meditating at home. I usually take a nap first, then just sit up and meditate. Times vary. Rick Archer Buddha at the Gas Pump https://batgap.com From: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>> Sent: Friday, December 7, 2018 9:16 AM To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Subject: RE: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Omkara Sounds like you are doing TM. You could even be part of a group TM meditation along with the Monthly Global Group Meditation that is facilitated by the TM movement. Is it the mantra or the way a mantra is used that is TM? In Nepal or back in the Soviet days in the Ukraine there was nothing individual about teaching them TM meditation then. Even in India today. The teaching would get hundreds of people in a room to initiate them in to meditation as groups. Nothing necessarily ‘individual’ about that other than how you use the mantra, the practice. For instance, I know someone, an old TM teacher/ governor, who got a mantra from Ammachi also in the process while Ammachi is giving darshan, with Ammachi giving a mantra to this person who was then given the same mantra as their original TM mantra as a 17 year old TM initiate. This person should not be in a group meditation programs with other TM’ers? Since the 1980’s quite a lot of TM teachers/governors have been seeing Ammachi and have gotten mantras from or mantas re-freshed by her. Some hundreds from Fairfield snf other TM’ers in the West. Quite a lot of who were on the IA Assembly. These people are not doing TM at the least in their practice and should be rejected from meditating with facilitated group meditations for infidelity? As non-meditators? . . ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>, <dhamiltony...@yahoo.com<mailto:dhamiltony...@yahoo.com>> wrote : Om, so you meditate with the TM technique. Generally this is the real asset the TM movement has, that the teaching of meditation as process itself is well done. Thorough enough to set people up even for a lifetime of transcending meditation. And then subsequently in life context along with their praying, chanting or simple silence. The way of perspective that Maharishi set it up as a tool it is a life skill. We have had people who we taught decades ago having contacted us in recent years expressing how appreciative they are to having learned it in their lives. For people who ask about learning to meditate I always urge them to take the TM course if they can. It is just very well taught and useful perspective on how to meditate in ways that other teachings can leave cursory. Jai Guru Dev Rick Archer writes: ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>, <r...@searchsummit.com<mailto:r...@searchsummit.com>> wrote : Yes, although I’m using Amma’s mantra, I do it TM-style. Rick Archer Buddha at the Gas Pump https://batgap.com From: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>> Sent: Thursday, December 6, 2018 7:48 AM To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Subject: RE: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Omkara Interesting. In practice, does your having previously learned TM inform how you meditate now? Use of a mantra, stance with or understanding of thoughts and such? Process? The module of understandings as meditation is taught in TM? Just wondering. Rick Archer writes: ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>, <r...@searchsummit.com<mailto:r...@searchsummit.com>> wrote : I’ve been using a mantra with Om in it (from Amma) for about 17 years now. So far no evidence it’s making me a recluse. This has been the most productive period of my life. Rick Archer Buddha at the Gas Pump https://batgap.com From: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>> Sent: Tuesday, December 4, 2018 9:21 AM To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: The Omkara Yes, Maharishi’s teaching around “omkara” in his coming to the West in the late 1950’s and 1960’s it seems was reactionary to what was seen then as the recluse Indian ascetic yogi’s cross-leg sitting chanting of “Om” all the time as some primary spiritual practice. His teacher Brahmananda Saraswati, Guru Dev, in the 1940’s and 50’s taught a nuanced cautionary teaching against using “om” strictly as mantra unto itself, that unto itself usage being different than its primary use employed within a mantra or sloca. (See http://www.lulu.com/shop/lb-shriver-and-translation-by-cynthia-ann-humes/the-sweet-teachings-of-the-blessed-sankaracarya-swami-brahmananda-saraswati/paperback/product-21350609.html ) However as result with a more strict push-back to the iconic by Maharishi teaching in the 1960’s West against what was thought of as meditation back then, this admonishment now remains within TM culture in a consequent type of a tru-believer fear of a usage of ‘om’ as a sound in contrast to “om’s” more general usage seen outside of TM (and also by Guru Dev) as being a booster otherwise to maha-mantras in meditation or chanting. With Maharishi this seemed a critique of a cultural idiom that happened in a period of time. Maharishi evidently felt he had a point to make using the platform he had in his time. Meditation it seems evident now is for everyone. Jai Guru Dev. In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com<mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>, netineti108 wrote : Anyone care to suggest why MY told us not to chant Omkara?
