--- In [email protected], "guyfawkes91" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > I always laugh when I hear the words Maharishi and Management or > Vedic Management together. Maharishi University of Management is > something of an oxymoron, like "The Dick Cheney Institute of > Business Ethics" > > Who would want to learn management techniques from an organisation > that has gone from being top dog in spiritual development to being > a footnote in the wilder shores of nonsense? Only if someone wanted > to learn what not to do.
But if you think about it, that's kinda valuable. That's one of the things that has left me still curious about different spiritual trips after 40+ years of being around them -- watching them and seeing the things they do right and, possibly more valuable, the things they do wrong. One could create a viable (and valuable) spiritual movement just by watching what the TMO has done over the years, taking notes, and then avoiding *most* of the things they did. Same with quite a few of the other big spiritual movements. The educa- tional value of the organization is not limited to the things they think they teach, but includes the things that they *really* teach, personified in what they *do*. Having seen *what happens*, for example, when you allow a hierarchical structure to proliferate in your spiritual movement (with categories of students who are considered "lower" and "higher" and are rewarded for their "highness" with increased access to the teacher or with special privileges, I would turn and walk out the door immediately if I ran into a spiritual trip in which that kind of hier- archy was present. Having seen *what happens* when you show zero ethics when dealing with "them" (those who are not part of the group) and equally low ethics when dealing with "us" (those who are part of the group), I would have nothing to do with any group that doesn't walk its ethical talk. In short, the "negative teachings" wind up becoming more valuable in the long run, because they help you develop a set of "filters" with which to evaluate any new teacher or movement you stumble across. If you see a familiar set of behaviors in the new group or teacher, and you've seen *what happens* karmically as a result of that set of behaviors, you know not to fall for it again. In a way, it's like a film student taking the time to watch a few really *bad* movies. Watching only the classics will teach you things to do, but watching the bad ones will teach things NOT to do.
