--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Jason <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > In the 1950's, a few people in India helped Maharishi a lot > when he was struggling financially. > > Later on when Maharishi copyrighted the TM and started getting > millions of dollars, he ignored them completely.!! He never > even acknowledged those who helped him go to the west and > establish himself financialy secure. > > Both Deepak Chopra's father and Chopra helped Maharishi a lot > and yet in the end he kicked Chopra out.!! > > Perhaps both Bill Gates and Maharishi have something in common.
Exactly. I know that this thread was supposed to be a kind of "pity party" for Louis and all he's been through, and that we were supposed to express our compassion and our admiration of him "sticking to his principles" throughout it all. Ok, I *do* feel compassion for his hard times. And on some level I feel some admiration for him "sticking to his principles." I just couldn't help noticing that those principles don't seem to involve repaying the people who loaned him money or invested in his busi- ness ideas in the first place. The principles are more about "sticking to the purity of his vision." Well, I'm sorry, but I just don't respect that as much as TMers and other "spiritual" people seem to. And the reason is that over the years I've loaned money to a *lot* of people, *none* of whom ever repaid a dime of it. None of them ever *thought* of repaying a dime of it. They used it to pay for their courses, or their rent, or their business schemes that never worked out, or in one case, their women. And they thought of all of these things they spent the money on as an integral part of their spiritual sadhana, and thus somehow "off the books." The general attitude was that if it helps them pursue enlightenment (or what- ever their *personal* goals were), these are not "debts" that need to be respected but money flowing in from the universe -- an expression of "support of nature." Excuuuuuse me, but the money flowing in was an expres- sion of a friend trying to help them, a friend who did not have that much money in the first place, and had to do without a few things himself f*in order to* help them out. Not a penny ever got repaid. And not *one* of them ever felt bad about it. I think there is something *wrong* with this. I think that it's wrong when some meditator bums money to pay his rent because he's too "evolved" to work, and I think there is something wrong with it when someone meditator comes up with a get rich quick scheme and winds up defrauding a number of his meditating friends when the scheme goes belly up. Louis may NOT have had anything like this in mind; the whole problem may be that he wrote what he did without clarifying the details of these people who "backed" him who are now so unevolved as to want their money back. It could be a simple failure of language, and I may be up on my soapbox without cause. If so, I apologize in advance. But the whole schtick in this post was "principle," and I for one couldn't help but notice that the one principle that kept getting ignored was *paying back* the people who invested money. If it had been me, I would have gone wherever I could have found work and paid back every penny. *Then* I would have started over on some new plan. That's my definition of commitment, belief, trust, and how to deal with adversity. You can call me "non-spiritual" for feeling this way if you want, but that's how I feel. Principle is not found in the glorious plans one talks about or pitches to others, but in what one DOES when those plans some- times don't work out. > --- TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: commitment belief trust and adveristy > Date: Monday, August 25, 2008, 3:28 AM > > > I'm sure it is. Did your original investors not > getting their money back have any impact on *their* > families or *their* lifestyles? > > And again, your "funding" (theoretically, more > investment in your business ideas) comes through, > and the *first* you do with it is buy a house for > you and your family? While the question of how > much is left for the business idea or how much > goes to repaying your original investors remains > unaddressed? > > I lived in New Mexico for several years. Few people > know that Microsoft started there, in Albuquerque. > During my time there I ran into probably two dozen > people who still spit every time they hear the name > "Bill Gates" because he blew town and moved to Seattle > owing them tens of thousands of dollars, and in a few > cases hundreds of thousands of dollars. > > The richest man in the world has never paid those > debts. He has never even *acknowledged* those debts. > Bill Gates can give away billions of dollars to > charity for the rest of his life, but not one of > these people he left holding the bag are ever going > to have an ounce of respect for him. > > All I'm suggesting is that as things come around for > you and you start to get back on your feet financially, > you might want to put some thought into repaying the > people who invested in you earlier, instead of referring > to them as having "backed out on you." > > I'm sorry, but the almost complete self-absorbtion of > your post leads me to believe they might have had some > reason for doing so. Even if this is not true, the bottom > line is that if you still owe them money, you still owe > them money. > > They didn't *give* you the money, dude...they *invested* > in you. If you don't repay their investment, you can > write here all you want about how your vision helped you > through the struggle, but that's like listening to Bill > Gates spout bullshit about how he made billions by being > so smart, when in fact he got rich by bailing on his debts. > > * > >
