Turq, I am unable to keep up these conversations in real time, but I have some
comments in the exchanges below.
--- In [email protected], turquoiseb <no_reply@...> wrote:
>
> --- In [email protected], "Xenophaneros Anartaxius" <anartaxius@>
> wrote:
> > Nice idea. I have never encountered this, although I have
> > encountered one teacher that could in the space of a few
> > days get a fair number of persons to experience a shift
> > in SOC, if only temporary, but it was not like a broadcast.
> > If you have encountered such teachers of the second kind,
> > do they have names?
>
> Yes, but they would do you no good. Two of the four
> I've met are now dead, and the other two I have heard
> went back to Bhutan, and are no longer working with
> non-Bhutanese or non-Tibetan students. They gave work-
> ing with Westerners a shot on teaching tours and
> (from what I am told) now prefer to work only with
> people who can make a longer-term commitment. They
> didn't like the "drop in" approach.
>
> > And what are the mechanics behind the ability to broadcast
> > an SOC?
>
> I have no earthly idea. I report only on my subjective
> experience of working with these teachers.
>
> > I am asking this because your description makes it sound like
> > a radio broadcast - a mental projection or something like that?
>
> Something like that. Or, as I have suggested in the
> past about "darshan," being able to put on a SOC so
> powerfully that others in the audience could be in
> the same room and somehow "recognize" in the teacher's
> SOC the counterpart of a "matching" SOC that was within
> them, just not realized yet, and as a result "access" it.
> That's a more "non-doing" theory, but this is pure spec-
> ulation on my part. I have no idea how it was done, only
> *that* it was done.
>
> > It makes me think of something like in old science fiction
> > movies (say 1940) where the doctor says "If I can just get to
> > the laboratory I can create a ray which will change his SOC."
>
> It sounds completely "science fictiony," until you have
> experienced it. Having done so does not make it in the
> least more understandable or less fantastic; but you've
> had the subjective experience.
>
> > With the material you presented here, it seems like you could
> > have just made this up.
>
> I could have, but I didn't. On the other hand, if it pleases
> you to consider it fiction, that is your right and I won't
> spend even the tiniest bit of effort trying to convince you
> otherwise. I don't understand it myself; I just experienced it.
> And clearly I'm not attempting to "sell" it to anyone, because
> as far as I know there is nothing to sell any more. You may
> treat what I wrote however you want. I wrote it because I ran
> into some old friends and we got to talking about this form
> of teaching (which we all have experienced), and that was
> fresh in my mind. I wrote what I wrote (as I often do) in an
> attempt to clarify *for myself* some of the discussions we
> had and the thoughts still rattling around in my head as a
> result.
>
> > It is a great story idea, but how could someone find out that
> > what you say here is real?
>
> Even worse, if you experienced it yourself, how could you
> convince *yourself* that it was real, much less anyone else? :-)
The reason I brought this up is what I experienced was different, at least in
the manner in which it arose. Prior to TM, I had tried various other things.
One of these things was a teaching environment in which a person's system of
belief was essentially in a situation where it would not work. It was
constantly under attack. Eventually, at least for some in this environment, one
would just let go, some obstacle or idea, or stress, whatever you want to call
it would blow off and there would be an experience of 'expanded consciousness,'
a feeling of great relief, a lot of bliss, a real high. Eventually the high
would retreat and experience closed down again, but it would last for several
days, and even after it closed down, one was not back to square one, one was
changed in some way, at least a small part of the experience remained.
Sometimes these experiences, once triggered this way would happen
spontaneously, completely unbidden, when taking a walk, or driving. Each time
it blew something off, and things felt freer afterward.
This is different than taking a drug for example. One can get high on a
psychotropic drug like LSD. These experiences can be fantastic. But afterward,
nothing remains, no growth, no feeling freer, no sense one's experience has
expanded in any way. Spiritual growth, if one wants to call it that and make it
sound like a progression, has a progressive quality to it unlike an artificial
chemical high that is induced, and then retreats. It is like the brain is
rewired in some way.
So, when I questioned the reality of what you said happened to you, about these
guys projecting an SOC it was because 1} My experiences opened in a different
way, and 2) the putting on of SOCs as if putting on a series of hats did not
fit in what I had either experienced before, or understood, from what I had
heard or read before. It is unfamiliar, so I have more questions about what you
experienced.
In your own words, how would you describe the experience you had with these
guys from Bhutan? I mean some detail of the experiences highlighted in the
questions following.
How long did it take before you experienced a shift in your awareness?
Did you have some idea, that is intellectual understanding, of what you were
experiencing at the time? Or did that come later.
How persistent was the experience, that is how long did it last?
Did you feel transformed afterward? Or did you feel you returned to your usual
SOC whatever that might have been at the time.
Since these guys were 'projecting' this, were you left with any ability to do
it yourself after you were out of their presence, like what percent of what
they projected, could you recreate, if any?
How many different SOCs did you experience? Did these correspond to the TMO SOC
scheme, or was it something less or more complicated?
After shifting out of one them into another, did you lose the ability to
experience what the other was like? This question is prompted by my experience
that when the awareness shifts, I only can appreciate the current live state,
that is, everything is experienced from the POV of the current state, and while
the memory of another state might be there, its essential quality is not.
Some states are more 'whole' than others, so when they go, if they go, it is
experienced as a loss, as if something wonderful is missing. If a less 'whole'
state is replaced by a more 'whole' one, and it seems to be stable, it's like
relief, that that previous state will not happen again. Eventually it seems as
if the differences that I call 'states of consciousness' become less and less,
as if these differences which seemed real in the beginning, were some kind of
aberrant thinking. I am not quite sure how to say this, but basically it is the
world is as I experience it. However I experience it at the moment, that is all
there is to it.
>
> That's the position I'm in.
>
> > Remember, walking the path is fine. We all do this. But the
> > idea is for the path to go away...
>
> According to whom? Not according to me. For me, the path
> is just for the walking, without any fixed destination or
> goal.
According to me. Maybe we are using the word path in different ways. We can
call our entire life a path. Whatever we do, whether we are ignorant,
enlightened, stupid, smart, this path is our entire life. The 'spiritual path'
I am calling a subset of this life path. The spiritual path is something we
make up when we get the idea in our head that there is something called a
spiritual path. It has a goal, and we do things in pursuit of this goal. The
problem with this path is it is illusory, but we cannot know this unless this
quest has a certain amount of success. Then we realise that this path does not
really exist, we had tricked ourselves into thinking it was real. This is what
I meant when I said the path goes away. Our motivation to follow it goes away,
even if we sense there is more to come, our approach to whatever that 'more'
is, changes. The life path, our whole life, that path, whatever we do, that
remains, at least as long as we are alive, and we can call it a path, but it
has no goal, it just goes on. If you want (especially if you have free will)
you can pretend any kind of subset to your life, and you can fix, temporarily,
a goal, like going to a blues festival, or having a cup of coffee.
Does that clear up the discrepancy between what I said and what you said, or
does that discrepancy remain?
> > ...and before it does, it is not all groovy and enjoyable,
> > some really difficult experiences can arise.
>
> Speak for yourself. Attempts to speak for everyone don't
> usually impress me very much. :-)
I said these darker experiences can arise. I am speaking for myself. They are
not guaranteed to arise. Maybe you never had any. Great. I have had some, I
have known a lot of people who have had rough experiences. I think they are
common, but not everybody has had them. I was speaking for myself and some
others. It was an extrapolation to speak of them for many, but it is logically
reasonable. But there is no evidence this applies to all.
>
> > Some day "maybe" we can "discuss" your "extensive" use of
> > quote "marks."
>
> Or not. I care as little about what you think of my writing
> style as I do what you think of its content. Really.
OK. I may be wrong in this, but I have the idea you are afraid to commit your
feelings to the particulars of your life, that you dearly like enjoyment etc.,
but that you don't want the possibility of the opposite, like grief, or
disappointment. You get a lot of flak on this forum, but you seem to kind of
side-step it. I think you put people off, keep them at a safe distance so they
do not entrap you. You brush off compliments and criticism off-handedly or by
attempting to put the encumbrance of the argument on the person responding to
you. Or it could be my surmise here is just wrong, and you are truly
unattached. But non attachment does not lead to disengagement nor does it lead
to not fully entering into the particulars of one's life - physically,
emotionally, intellectually. Non attachment enables you to engage more, and
more directly. And I am saying this so don't reply 'says who?,' assuming you
reply.
--- In [email protected], turquoiseb <no_reply@...> wrote:
>
> --- In [email protected], turquoiseb <no_reply@> wrote:
> >
> > --- In [email protected], "Xenophaneros Anartaxius"
> > <anartaxius@> wrote:
You added some additional comments in this post:
> > >
> > > And what are the mechanics behind the ability to broadcast
> > > an SOC?
> >
> > I have no earthly idea. I report only on my subjective
> > experience of working with these teachers.
> >
> > > I am asking this because your description makes it sound like
> > > a radio broadcast - a mental projection or something like that?
> >
> > Something like that. Or, as I have suggested in the
> > past about "darshan," being able to put on a SOC so
> > powerfully that others in the audience could be in
> > the same room and somehow "recognize" in the teacher's
> > SOC the counterpart of a "matching" SOC that was within
> > them, just not realized yet, and as a result "access" it.
> > That's a more "non-doing" theory, but this is pure spec-
> > ulation on my part. I have no idea how it was done, only
> > *that* it was done.
>
> One facet of this that most intrigues me, because it
> is such a "game changer" compared to almost all other
> descriptions of different states of consciousness, is
> that these folks had the ability to "put on" a state
> of consciousness *at will*.
>
> Think about that. The model most of us have been
> presented with along the spiritual path is that SOCs
> are "achieved" or "realized," but then you're kinda
> stuck with them. You "get to" CC, but you can't then
> put on the consciousness of normal waking state if
> you want to, say, for teaching purposes. Similarly,
> if you "get to" UC, you can't then "backtrack" during
> a talk on GC and temporarily "wear" that state of
> consciousness in order to model it or demo it for
> your students.
>
> These guys could. They could change states of conscious-
> ness more quickly than you can change clothes. They
> weren't "stuck in" *any* of them. I find that not only
> fascinating, but far more impressive than the traditional
> model of unidirectional, linear progression through the
> different states of consciousness.
>
> At least one of them spoke about this. In his opinion,
> all of these states of consciousness were *congruent*,
> meaning that they were simultaneously present at all
> times. You merely accessed the state you wanted. There
> was no "achieving" or "realization" needed, merely the
> decision to select from a "menu of available options."
This is the model I use, that all these states are congruent, but I have never
experienced what you are talking of here, that one can select them at will. I
have experienced a progression, and a falling back, and a progression, and
falling back less and so on. I have no desire to experience from a menu, just
the container of the menu. Has anyone else on this forum experienced what Turq
is describing here? I am still not convinced he is not trying to pull one over
on me. But I do know from experience that it is possible to experience a rapid
shift in SOC and have it shift back. If there is anyone on the forum in CC (as
in the MMY system) that would like to experience just waking consciousness
again?
>
> Clearly, these guys all believed in free will. :-)
>
> Please bear in mind that none of these people believed
> in the "seven states of consciousness" as presented by
> Maharishi. I'm using WC, CC, GC and UC here because that
> is how most on this forum think. The teachers I'm talking
> about would consider that model a gross oversimplification.
> Most were Buddhist, and believed more in its "ten thousand
> states of mind" (which is a euphemism for "lots and lots
> of them, possibly an infinite number of them" not a number
> per se).
I would agree that cutting up the consciousness pie can be done many different
ways. The phrase 'ten thousand states of mind' reminds me of the phrase 'the
ten thousand things' in Taoist literature, a phrase that means infinite number
of things, but maybe the Chinese had no word for the concept infinity at the
time, and 'ten thousand things' made do for that. The idea applies to the
fragmentation of experience into discrete entities.
