--- In [email protected], Vaj <vajradh...@...> wrote: > > On Mar 30, 2010, at 9:28 AM, tartbrain wrote: > > > It would be interesting to have a running commentary of this sort > > on personal, if not spacey, descriptions of experience. Perhaps > > have Curtis as a guest commentator on Bhudda at the Gas Pump. > > I find people on such lists are very attached to such experiences, > and thus very protective of them. There must be a lot of pride behind > them, why else would they be telling them, so frequently, to > strangers on an email list? Challenge those precious experiences, > even the non-experience experiences, and the rug you pull out from > underneath will be met with anger and derision. > > I mean if you were truly established in Brahman, what would there be > to discuss? (and yes I'm aware of the "I'm doing this for the > benefit of other shtick) :-)
This is an interesting point. At two points in my life I have lived in communities that had an active interest in Things Spiritual, and that sponsored yearly "Holy Man Jams." The idea was to put as many supposedly enlightened representatives of as many spiritual traditions as possible on one stage at the same time, and then sit back and watch what happens. "What happens" is all too often exactly what Vaj describes. People get into "ego contests" trying to "prove" the supposed supremacy of their view as opposed to the view of someone else on the same "enlightened" stage with them. All I have to say is, "WTF?" If these guys are so enlightened, to paraphrase Rodney King, "Why can't they all get along?" If these guys and gals are so fuckin' egoless, where is the seeming compulsion to prove their point of view "right" or "correct" or "more legitimate" coming from? IMO the vibe of someone trying to sell his or her POV as "supreme" or "better" than any other is unmistakable. And to be avoided like the plague it is...
