Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 7, 2006, at 9:34 AM, TurquoiseB wrote:--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: On Mar 7, 2006, at 9:07 AM, TurquoiseB wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj wrote: Well then maybe you want to avoid Robert's books on VImalananda. I avoid books by Robert Svoboda period. I read one. That's enough for a lifetime. :-) I've never heard anyone say that before. Which one and what didn't you like? Don't have it handy. It was the Big Book O'Saturn, and was given to me by a friend with the *demand* that I read it. I kinda enjoyed the fable nature of how it was written, but it really wasn't my cuppa tea in the first place, and so because I kinda got roped into reading it I've avoided reading any others. I was mainly joking above. Yeah that book IMO is mainly for working thru Shani / Saturn issues. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 7, 2006, at 9:07 AM, TurquoiseB wrote:--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Well then maybe you want to avoid Robert's books on VImalananda. I avoid books by Robert Svoboda period. I read one. That's enough for a lifetime. :-) I've never heard anyone say that before. Which one and what didn't you like? To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 7, 2006, at 8:28 AM, TurquoiseB wrote:--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: On Mar 7, 2006, at 7:42 AM, TurquoiseB wrote: Not to mention judgmental, superior and, as I think Jim described so well, with a high degree of jerk-ness. I might add 'being a bigoted asshole,' but that's just me. :-) Well hopefully you'd have the common sense to read some of his teachings before jumping to hasty generalizations. Actually, based on the small sample you provided, I would not have any interest in reading anything else he's written on any subject. You might consider that next time you quote something that supports one of your own rather judgmental theories, and fail to notice that what you've posted is bigotry of the highest order.Well then maybe you want to avoid Robert's books on VImalananda. As I said before, if anyone will stretch your concepts, it's him--but that's definitely not for everyone. Neither is Aghora. It's certainly controversial. Uh...did you *miss* the following section, Vaj? "Why? Because most Westerners are asuras at heart. All the celestials, including the asuras, have to go somewhere when they fall down to earth. Many of the asuras--who are very fond of indulging themselves with meat, alcohol and sex, remember--have been born in the West, where they continue to indulge themselves. Occasionally one of them wakes up, a little; but because asuras are egotistical they conclude, as soon as they learn a little, that they know everything. Almost as soon as they learn how to meditate they start calling themselves gurus. But what do they really know of Indian wisdom? Nothing! They are still just probing our spirituality now. They will be learning spiritual things from us for the next 500 years. Even the dog of one of our Rishis could teach them for one hundred years and still have more to teach. Westerners are so far behind us in spirituality that to shine out among them is nothing." Note the careful use of the word "most" in the first sentence. Note also that the entire *section* is about Westerners as a whole. Only *after* this section does he turn from trashing Westerners to trashing his fellow Swamis. No I didn't miss it, but I tempered that with having somewhat of a broader understanding of Vimalananda than just these couple of sentences. Something a reader of your excerpts is not able to do.Not without using a web search engine or a library. also noticed he said "asuras at heart"--in other words, it's an overall tendency in our society and not necessarily mplying ALL westerners ARE asuras per se. But equally bigoted, superior and elitist. I guess my point is that you really don't seem to see that. Probably because you agree with it.As I already indicated, I'm looking at him from a broader picture--esp. as an Aghori whose nature is to shock. It's helpful I guess to understand what type of teacher Vimalananda is... You mean "bigoted jerk?" :-)No, that's not what I meant, as an Aghori. ...and also what the range of teachers can be. Anything from "bigoted jerk" to "knowledgeable," often with those things overlapping? :-)I don't perceive him as a bigot, but I do see how you are getting that impression. The most interesting thing to me about all this is how people react to someone who is different than their image of what a guru should be. That's really not it. I would've reacted the same to the bigotry in the passages you quoted *no matter who said it*. I had *no idea* who the person you were quoting was, and thus had no idea that you were even quoting someone you consider a guru. I just thought you were quoting a bigoted, elitist jerk. Still think so. The fact that you've now pointed out that he's a bigoted, elitist *guru* jerk doesn't change my opinion one way or another. :-)Then you might not want to take an Aghori as a teacher. If this pushed your limits, realtime exposure certainly would. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 7, 2006, at 7:42 AM, TurquoiseB wrote:Not to mention judgmental, superior and, as I think Jim described so well, with a high degree of jerk-ness. I might add 'being a bigoted asshole,' but that's just me. :-) Well hopefully you'd have the common sense to read some of his teachings before jumping to hasty generalizations.Uh...did you *miss* the following section, Vaj?"Why? Because most Westerners are asuras at heart. All thecelestials, including the asuras, have to go somewhere when they falldown to earth. Many of the asuras--who are very fond of indulgingthemselves with meat, alcohol and sex, remember--have been born inthe West, where they continue to indulge themselves. Occasionally oneof them wakes up, a little; but because asuras are egotistical theyconclude, as soon as they learn a little, that they know everything.Almost as soon as they learn how to meditate they start callingthemselves gurus. But what do they really know of Indian wisdom?Nothing! They are still just probing our spirituality now. They willbe learning spiritual things from us for the next 500 years. Even thedog of one of our Rishis could teach them for one hundred years andstill have more to teach. Westerners are so far behind us inspirituality that to shine out among them is nothing."Note the careful use of the word "most" in the first sentence.Note also that the entire *section* is about Westerners asa whole. Only *after* this section does he turn from trashingWesterners to trashing his fellow Swamis.No I didn't miss it, but I tempered that with having somewhat of a broader understanding of Vimalananda than just these couple of sentences. I also noticed he said "asuras at heart"--in other words, it's an overall tendency in our society and not necessarily implying ALL westerners ARE asuras per se. It's helpful I guess to understand what type of teacher Vimalananda is and also what the range of teachers can be.The most interesting thing to me about all this is how people react to someone who is different than their image of what a guru should be. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 7, 2006, at 3:08 AM, jyouells2000 wrote:If westerners are such asuras, why do modern gurus have to develop a following of western asuras and the bankrolls that they provide to even be heard in their homeland? Are *satvic* easterners more dense, than the asuras or what? Sometimes the smoke is really thick..First off, I don't think he is saying that westerners are asuras as a flat, generic statement--he's pointing out the mechanism by which *some* westerners--a handful really--are predisposed to flights of ego and premature claims.While I don't know if Vimalananda would say that his eastern counterparts were asurian incarnations (he might, I'm not sure), he certainly did NOT have much flattering to say of the first waves of swamis and yogis who came to the west. He really could be confrontational when it came to phonies and poseurs. He also equally used his realization and powers to the good when the need arose. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 6, 2006, at 3:11 PM, jim_flanegin wrote:--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: On Mar 6, 2006, at 11:56 AM, jim_flanegin wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj wrote: He's a good read, esp. if you're tired of the mamby-pamby new age schlock that passes as "eastern wisdom" these days. There's probably something in Vimalananda to upset just abut anyone. But Aghori tantrics aren't for everyone. Yeah, he comes across as a jerk to me. I don't know how valuable it is to judge a person based on a couple of paragraphs. depends on the couple of paragraphs. You apparently thought those that you excerpted were representative of this fellow.No, not at all. They were not presented that way nor were intended that way.It was really a comment on premature claims to enlightenment and his observation as to why that will begin occurring in the west--but you haven't responded with anything other than your aversion to him as a person. Suffice to say, if you had a certain way you pre-conceived how a "good" guru should be, my guess is, he would shatter that. I'm not thinking of him as a guru. To my way of thinking, whether a person bags groceries or is a guru makes little difference how I see them. As a person, and from the quotation, he seems like a jerk. Just not my style, that's all. Then, other than the human dimension, what dimension would you propose that people who are prone to premature claims of enlightenment incarnate from or from what karmic causes? To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 6, 2006, at 11:56 AM, jim_flanegin wrote:--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: He's a good read, esp. if you're tired of the mamby-pamby new age schlock that passes as "eastern wisdom" these days. There's probably something in Vimalananda to upset just abut anyone. But Aghori tantrics aren't for everyone. Yeah, he comes across as a jerk to me. I don't know how valuable it is to judge a person based on a couple of paragraphs.Suffice to say, if you had a certain way you pre-conceived how a "good" guru should be, my guess is, he would shatter that. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 6, 2006, at 11:33 AM, TurquoiseB wrote:--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Rick Archer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Sounds like Aghori Vimalananda had a bit of an ego too. Unless, as Vaj suggests, all of this was tongue in cheek, a joke. I'm unconvinced that's the case, but I dunno. My take is he was serious about Asuras incarnating in the west and only part of it is tongue in cheek--of course they are incarnating everywhere. And the part about people have a certain karma that draws them to phony gurus? I've not only seen that happen many times, I've seen people go like steel to the magnet of a phony guru--go through a nasty breakup with that guru, and then go right on to another! Even Svoboda apparently had a hard time sometimes knowing what was symbolic and what was not in Vimalananda's teaching. Sometimes ambiguous or moving or no reference points makes for a good teaching device--and certainly Vimalananda pulled the rug out from under many an ego.Did you ever hear the story about how Vasant Lad met him? 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 Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 6, 2006, at 10:20 AM, Marek Reavis wrote:Another take on Westerners seeking Indian wisdom was expressed more than once by Nisargadatta in the following way. He said that the Westerners had been soldiers in Lord Rama's monkey army; and that as their reward in assisting Rama in rescuing Sita they were reincarnated in the West where they could easily indulge their monkey desires -- lots of food, sex, and fighting. He said, however, that when the monkeys begin to tire of their reward, they come back to India in search of Rama. Nisargadatta said on more than one occassion that he preferred to speak with Westerners rather than with Indians because the Westerners were more sincere. Vimalananda said they thing he liked best about America was the rollercoasters. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' SPONSORED LINKS Maharishi university of management Maharishi mahesh yogi Ramana maharshi YAHOO! GROUPS LINKS Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fake Gurus and the Attack of the Asuras
On Mar 6, 2006, at 9:56 AM, Alex Stanley wrote:--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Always keep a light-saber handy. --- "It is no surprise that Westerners mainly find false gurus. When you have cheated your own guru in the past why should you not be cheated on now? You get what you pay for; that is the Law of Karma." "So why is this? Why do most of the people in the West want knowledge from the wrong motive, and get only cheats as gurus?" "Why? Because most Westerners are asuras at heart. All the celestials, including the asuras, have to go somewhere when they fall down to earth. Many of the asuras--who are very fond of indulging themselves with meat, alcohol and sex, remember--have been born in the West, where they continue to indulge themselves. Occasionally one of them wakes up, a little; but because asuras are egotistical they conclude, as soon as they learn a little, that they know everything. Almost as soon as they learn how to meditate they start calling themselves gurus. But what do they really know of Indian wisdom? Nothing! They are still just probing our spirituality now. They will be learning spiritual things from us for the next 500 years. Even the dog of one of our Rishis could teach them for one hundred years and still have more to teach. Westerners are so far behind us in spirituality that to shine out among them is nothing. It is child's play for our so-called swamis to go abroad and try to impress all the monkeys over there with their so-called knowledge. I can tell you one thing: A real guru will come to the Westerners only when they decide that they are ready for real knowledge, and they invite Shukracharya [rishi and guru of the demons]... ...They won't need to search for him; when they are sincerely ready he will appear. They are his disciples, he is responsible for them. It is a great blessing to be guru or king to a bunch of asuras, because you are in a position to improve them. Unfortunately they tend to fall back into their old habits very easily, since their innate natures cannot change. Even Shukracharya tires of them now and again. I call people asuras when even though they have the desire for sadhana they cannot seem to follow the basic rules of discipline. I am willing to try to help such people out, but most of them are by no means ready for spirituality yet and I grow tired, of them too." from "Karma" by Robert Svoboda detailing a conversation between the Aghori Vimalananda And Robert Svoboda That comes across to me as spiritually elitist ego chow, but I suppose it could also just be the paradox of Brahman. If you're not familiar with "Vimalananda" and his approach via Svoboda's rendering of his teachings, it might just seem bizarre. My guess is for most orthodox TMers / students of meditation, reading "Aghora" (the first work he wrote) will be a total mind-f*ck as it destroys some cherished illusions. It's one of the few books I've ever had to put down because I was laughing so hard. 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 Visit your group "FairfieldLife" on the web. To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
