--- In [email protected], nablusoss1008 <no_reply@...> wrote: > --- In [email protected], nablusoss1008 <no_reply@> wrote: >> --- In [email protected], "Xenophaneros Anartaxius" >> <anartaxius@> wrote: >> >>> 'Most people find this much harder to do than the simple mantra practice; >>> so why bother? The answer to that question has many sides to it. I will >>> only discuss one here. But before I can do that, we need to first clarify >>> an even deeper way in which mantra and mindfulness are related. Because >>> mantra is a repetitive rhythm, it sets up periodic waves or vibrations in >>> ones consciousness. Let me try to explain this with a somewhat crude >>> metaphor. You are probably familiar with hand-held electrical vibrators >>> that are used for massage. Imagine the effect of holding such a vibrator in >>> contact with the surface of a pool of water. It would impart very regular >>> pleasing patterns of ripples throughout the water. Focusing on those >>> patterns of ripples could easily take you into a state of relaxation. This >>> is one facet of how mantra works. Its repetitive nature sets up rhythmic >>> ripples throughout the meditator's whole consciousness. The meditator then >>> focuses on the regularity of those ripples and rides them into deeper and >>> deeper levels of relaxation, concentration and integration. > > > > Xeno, are you a TM-teacher ? I ask because just as laudable the attempt > > from the above Buddhist to explain what TM is and how it works, anyone with > > direct experience knows the above is incorrect. But I applaude that at > > least he tries.
Well, this is not how TM was explained to me, but it is someone else's attempt to understand it. This idea is nice, but I would say the part where he says the meditator 'focuses' is not correct. Most people who have not done TM tend to make that error of assuming there is some kind of focus. Actually there is, coming back to the mantra, but the aim is to make any adjustment in meditation as non focused as possible to avoid concentration, which you learn how from checking. However the idea of regularity of the ripples riding inward seems a plausible description, but it happens automatically, not by focus. Another mindfulness advocate, Adyashanti also makes a similar error in describing mantra meditation (he does not seem to write directly of TM), yet interestingly when he describes meditation, it sounds nearly exactly like TM in being non-concentrative, relaxed, and letting go, just minus a mantra, and he does not mind if people are using a mantra, he does not seem to mind if people are doing different kinds of meditation as long as there are results. There is always difficulty describing a mental process that is entirely experiential. In 1955 MMY referred to TM as 'mind control' though of course he did not mean control by virtue of force, but by virtue of a process that allows the mind to naturally collect itself. On the outer level however, in the TMO today and of yesterday, we see a lot of practices of mind control - not meditation - but systems that attempt to force conformity to various kinds of behaviour. Reminds me of George Orwell's novel 1984 with far more than a passing resemblance. I have this idea that the 'purity of the teaching' is really just knowing how to completely let go, something every great spiritual sage seems to know, but strange to say, there seems to be a lot of structure surrounding getting someone to experience how. But another factor seems to arise in spiritual movements as a result of that necessity of some kind of structured teaching. And that is what I call 'purity of the learning'. Somehow, spiritual organisations deteriorate in a way that involves seeing learners as objects which must conform to a certain view of how they understand a teaching, and that view is the view that 'the management' collectively holds to be true. As time goes on, if the practice is working, people become freer on the inside, but find the environment of the spiritual philosophy becoming more and more rigid and irrational and controlling. This is what a lot of meditators feel about the TMO, TM is great but the TMO - yuk! At some point this process of increasing rigidity and control implodes into the central tenets and practices for which the organisation was created and they become corrupted. So far TM, which is so very standarised in instruction has escaped this process. The increasing focus the organisation has on the memory and person of MMY though I think is a danger sign. Look what happened to Jesus. We do not know what he taught exactly. We know how the generations that followed viewed him and his mission, and if you compare the remaining records of what he supposedly said with the organisations that exist in his name today, the discrepancy is incredible. It is said in the Bible that Jesus would baptise one into spirit, not water, as John before him. So what could that have been? Maybe something like TM. If that was there then, 2,000 years ago, it certainly is not taught now. Long gone. But you do see mini revivals of the idea with small splinter churches today that talk of Christ Consciousness, and practice meditation techniques, but you do not see this in the major churches where such ideas get crushed by management. I really feel the Catholic Church is a good model to view to how the TMO is shaping up and transforming over time. Now the Mormon church, which is about 150 years old, already has splintered into about six different sects. The movement was mostly monolithic when MMY controlled the reigns, but now that he is gone, when will the first schism happen? I certainly do not know, but I suspect it will be soon.
