TorquiseB writes: Snipped When you come into contact with the teacher's aura, the part of you that *already* has access to these different states of mind *recognizes* them in the teacher's aura. Seeing these states of mind in another "wakes up" the same states of mind in the seeker. It's as if the seeker had forgotten that such levels of being awake were available to him, but now that he's run into them, living and breathing and laughing in front of him in the form of the teacher, he realizes that the *same* states of mind are within him, and available if he just chooses to access them.
This is how I honestly think it works. I no longer believe in the "darshan" theory of empowerment. I think that that view, that the teacher "does" something to "cause" the awakening in the student, is completely understandable. That's how it *feels*, after all. You see the teacher and you get high. Therefore they must have "done something" to you. Why I prefer my "recognition theory" is because it puts the responsibility and the impetus for self realization where it belongs, in the lap of the *seeker*, not the teacher. It *allows* for there being a benefit in seeing saints and realized masters, but not in the sense that one goes to them hoping that they'll zap you somehow with woo-woo rays and provide a "hit" of enlightenment. If one operates under the assumption that the "recog- nition theory" adequately describes the mechanics of what happens when you sit satsang with or otherwise interact with a powerful teacher, you are less likely to fall into the cult ruts, projecting onto the teacher magical abilities to zap you into enlightenment. Or their negative counterpart, projecting onto them some ability to hypnotize large groups of people at will. Tom T: According to a friend who has a phd in cognitive learning the above has some validity. Those who have been on the path for some time and have done long times in meditation sooner or later bump up against the NOTHINGESS. Many just get scared and boogy others hang in and try to avoid the nothingness but kind of dance around it. If they hang in or through some other coaccident they eventually cognize this as the everything that IS. According to my friend, humans are put together so that they can only recognize something they have previously known before. Well nothingness is something most of us were not prepared for. Those who hang in sometimes just get it out of pure stubborness. Others get it from a teacher who is a living embodiment of the everythingess. Eventualy one can sometimes see that your experience is your understanding if you are willing to to just be OK with the nothingness. One time I heard Gangaji say, on a video, just be willing to be Nothing. That little mahavakya stuck in a loop that just kept going round and round for a day. All of a sudden I realized I didn't have to be willing to be nothing, I was nothing. Cool. Tom T To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
