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The problem I had with TM/Siddhis program, 1974-90.... was that it produced in me a person that favored reclusiveness. I disassociated myself with all I came into contact with. Eastern thought promotes this... Western thought fights against it. Eventually.... as I extricated myself from the TM mantra, and the yoga sutras... I rejoined humanity, and began to rebuild personal relationships on a human level. I believe that God wants us to enjoy personal relationships, he wants us to care for and love each other, even though it is against our selfish nature to do so.
Great essay, once again, Laurie!
What helped me to recover? Ouch.. that was a painful time! Over 20 years ago.
Cult experts say to return to one's precult life, family and interests as a safety net from which to rebuild oneself.
Since I was raised in TM, I didn't have a precult life. Still, even those who are raised in groups have some personal interests that can be pursued upon departure.
Family is #1 for me. I delved into building community for my (TM born) children, while simultaneously obtaining a mainstream education that emphasized critical thinking.
My community and professional relationships were slow to develop, primarily because of my utter lack of social skills in creating meaningful connection with outsiders.
Also, I had initially expected that everyone was as honest as me (oops!), and was taken for a few rides because of my lack of Bullshit detectors.
Now, after 20 years post-TM, I mistrust my judgement of people. It takes me a long time to develop trust with another. Actions speak louder than words, and it takes awhile for true behaviors to reveal themselves.
Reading ALOT about mind control and recovery was helpful. The reading list on Rick Ross' website is a good start. I attended cult recovery therapy with a specialist. Like Laurie, I found validation and encouragement at the conferences for International Cultic Studies Association - and made friends with some amazing people!
Somethings continue to be difficult-- the delays in income production continues to create a juggle, my mistrust of own judgement with new friendships, ongoing family cult influence is a challenge, sometimes it's just plain old tiring to conduct life completely as a solo act (family of origin in cult).
On the other hand - those of us who survived without a psychotic break, are strong, true to ourselves, and have deep compassion for others' struggles. I'm grateful for my inner strength, and ability to see when others are bounced about seeking approval.
Religion? I avoid it. Am respectful of others' religious traditions and will attend their services with them, when invited. I try to live my life as a prayer - with integrity, volunteerism, personal responsibility/accountability, and compassion for others' challenges.
Getting others out of cult-think -- I've been an abysmal failure. Hire a professional!
I had success when someone else is already questioning their group (TM or other), I've successfully been able to both ask questions that help them to think for themselves, and explain the dynamics of their group manipulation.
I think some aspect of cult recovery will be a lifelong process, partially from mere experience of 'mind control', partially because I was raised that way, so that's my neuronal basis, and partially because I have ongoing family influence that touches upon my life and the lives of my children (thus I live far from family). There will always be cultural gaps, most noticeably for me with music and certain historical events. I tell my friends that it's because "I was raised on Mars." When I was totally cult-engrossed, I missed a lot of normal life input. Then when recovering, I was so busy working, obtaining and education, raising children, that I didn't have time to keep up with everything.
Now, I'm appreciative for each meaningful connection - and there are many! My close friends and coworkers can playfully joke about my cult background; they respect what it took to over come. And we have a non-cult basis of common interests, work ethic and friendships that established our relationships as reliable, caring and respectful. These noncult friendships with intelligent, accomplished others have been a great source of healing validation, but they took patience and perseverance to develop slowly. I avoid mean spirited and judgement folks.
Looking forward to hearing others' recovery tips!
g 
LGMarshall, interesting observations about reclusiveness and maybe that is something related to TMsidhi (I wouldn't know I never took the courses. But don't you think there is a constant issue anyway, between being involved in relationships and not? Discovering the monkish side of one's personality whilst being only too familiar with the more gregarious side? Rather like the duality of tendencies of masculinity and feminity? I have noticed these dualities fighting for ground over the years but have never ducked out of relationships, and raised a family too, despite being a regular meditator.
LG, strange, since you say that Eastern thought promotes “ reclusiveness”, that Indian and Asian families generally are a lot tighter than US families. They often live 3 generations in a single home and they take a great deal of interest in each other. Meanwhile in the West, after 2000 years of Christianity, alienation and depression resulting from it are a plague. Christianity is not being renounced here because of the influx of Eastern thought. Christianity and religion generally are being dumped because they are incredible examples of selfishness and because they not have the answers to modern problems. “If only I can believe hard enough in Jesus, I will be happy...” 
There is also a lot of monkish tradition in Christianity. In fact the only really interesting aspect of Christianity, aside from its tendency to create feelings of superiority and specialness among its evangelicals, is the spiritual tradition of hermits, monks, and “saints”. There is no greater example of selfishness is the history of the world that the Christian and Islamic zeal to convert others, meaning change and control others to fit an image these groups consider correct. For every person who has become more reclusive because of practicing one or another form of meditation, there are 10,000 Christians zoning out 7 hours per day on TV.
These comments link to "More Thoughts on Recovering from Transcendental Meditation", posted by me on 10/25/09. (Actually, I posted it on 10/27/09, but the computer program seems to have a mind of its own.)
Betty,
I'm not a Christian, so I wouldn't want to pose as an expert, but from what I know about the teachings of Jesus, the problem with the religion of Christianity is that it doesn't follow them. Didn't Jesus teach that all men are brothers, regardless of what they looked like or where they lived, and that striving for power in the material world was meaningless? This is obviously not reflected in history, but I think that the problem is that others interpreted what Jesus said according to their own limited understanding, or consciousness, if you will, and thus got it all wrong.
This year I had the worst complications from too much meditation and related practices that I have ever had in my life. I was actually quite scared at one point due to panic attacks, inability to concentrate, and mysterious aches and pains. It has taken many weeks to begin to recover, but what helped me get back on an even keel mentally and emotionally was two things. The first was a list of suggestions on a web site devoted to helping people recover from the arousal of too much kundalini. I don't have the address at the moment, but it was suggested by John Knapp in one of his postings this year. Thank you John! It helped save my sanity. It emphasises stopping ALL spiritual practices immmediately and getting grounded through regular physical and mental activity in the world with regular people. The other thing that made a tremendous difference was that I started daily volunteer work at a local non-profit organization. The vigorous, focused activity with mainstream type people has helped me to get back to a level of what TM calls "unstressing" that I can handle comfortably. I know that different people need different methods to recover, but this is what has helped me the most.
Other than dealing with my trust issues, I've found the disappearance of my sense of play (playfulness) very difficult to get back. As a normally creative person this has been crippling.
I thought about all the rituals and practices that I was part of that encouraged childlike abandon (to produce childlike obedience) and creativity. (i.e with TM: When flying was brought up on this forum the first thing that came to mind was jumping up and down on my mattress when I was little, and my sister giving me "planes", spinning me around.) The indoctrination that was a part of those experiences became attached to my playful nature and it has been difficult for me to separate the two.
Time spent out in nature has helped me regain a sense of awe and wonder, and nature has become my alter and temple.
Chuck:
Didn't TM help you out with the farming chores? If so, I assume you have continued on with the practice.
And what about the harmonious benefits of meditation on the cows and vegetables?
I've heard that TM practice by farmers produces some mighty fine farm products.
Little Sister,
Your statement is very astute! : "rituals and practices that I was part of that encouraged childlike abandon (to produce childlike obedience) and creativity..... indoctrination that was a part of those experiences became attached to my playful nature and it has been difficult for me to separate the two."
That may be true for me too.. and even for my daughter (she was 10 when we left FF). FYI, I have that challenge with "playfulness" too. Somehow it got lost through the cult-trauma-recovery. I don't just easily laugh aloud, even when I'm happy. I can laugh while working on a project, but I just don't know how to joke and shoot-the-breeze with playful sparring. It may simply be a social skill that I never learned, or may be something, as you suggest, that got left behind with the cult-think. After all, we (thought we) were so happy in our childlike naivete in the cult, all that "bliss" promised by MMY!
Oi Vey! Time for cult jokes now!
Where IS Chuck??
g
Gina, as for laughin, I must admit that as time has gone by I can't afford to laugh and hee haw like I used to did... The main two problems likely aint got a thing to do with TM or Mugharishi... Number one problem is the amount of split britches that occur with a good belly laugh. Momma don't sew much anymore and it aint that easy to find size 56 overalls... Number two problem with laughin hard is, I'm ashamed to say, the tendency to make soil in said overalls... 
LG Marshall expressed about a personal experience of reclusiveness stemming from the practice of the TM Sidhis. Paul Mason expressed his own view (based on basic TM practice for many years) of the possibility of finding a balance between "monkish" aspects of a human personality and socially involved aspects.
For some reason, this discussion this reminds me of an idea I've had lately: TM practice seems to me to emphasize a certain aspect or phase of the spiritual life (a.k.a., the life of prayer, life of the spirit, life of consciousness). It's the phase of deep relaxation. The practice puts complete emphasis on that.
Life can be compared with many things - and I suppose one of them might be driving a car. I was just recently thinking about how the motor sport called "drag racing" puts complete emphasis on one phase of driving: acceleration. A drag race takes place on a straight quarter mile of paved track, with the race car accelerating from a dead stop, and ideally accelerating over the whole distance.
That in itself seems like the opposite of sitting and doing TM. But the apoint of the analogy is specialization. Because in general driving - the kind that 99.9% of auto drivers do on a regular basis - acceleration is only one of the numerous aspects, skills, or requirements. But the special pursuit of drag racing puts complete emphasis on it. Perhaps we'd consider that to be neither bad nor good, but it is obviously a very narrow emphasis.
There are actually many different uses of the human mind, and many ways of meditating. So I think this is what my analogy means to say.
Since many of the other aspects of what TM was supposed to accomplish for people (complete good health - mental & physical, supporting career advancement, ending war, levitation, etc) have seemed difficult to demonstrate, I'm inclined to identify TM simply with what I know it does to me or for me.
How Did I Recover?
Prior to really breaking away, I found a more mainstream church (Unity) with lots of interesting people, classes and activities.
It was an incremental, and natural, stepping away, and it worked. The Unity church affirmed a similar spiritual belief to the TMO, but without a toxic guru or rigid cult-think.
Having found a saner spiritual home made exiting the TMO so much easier.
I'm no longer involved in the Unity Church but am grateful for the transition it provided me in the 80's,(and many other ex-TMers).
The one thing I learned is that rescuing a true believer is impossible and might even backfire, and instead help the TB to be even stronger in "the faith."
John suggested some time ago to state my own thoughts and leave it at that. Otherwise, just be there in case the TM facade crumbles.
"rescuing a true believer is impossible" - But perhaps the "true believer" is not quite what you think that he/she is. Perhaps they are attempting to forge a link with something that is bigger than themselves and that is their goal, however it is done. The way that the term "true believer" is bandied about here and at FFL suggests a belief of personal superiority in those who use the term, in effect making them the true believers.
All good points.
TM 20 x 2, as Paolo practices, does not appear to cause trance addiction nor dissociation problems.
For those who struggle with trance addiction from prolonged TM programs , Carol Giambalvo has an excellent site on cult recovery:
http://www.refocus.org/
And an especially helpful section on coping with trance states ("spacing out" as we termed it in the TM Movement).
This is for the "space cadettes" :
http://www.refocus.org/trance.html
g
Paul said: rescuing a true believer is impossible" - But perhaps the "true believer" is not quite what you think that he/she is. Perhaps they are attempting to forge a link with something that is bigger than themselves and that is their goal, however it is done. The way that the term "true believer" is bandied about here and at FFL suggests a belief of personal superiority in those who use the term, in effect making them the true believers.
I am certain that the ones I speak of are trying to forge a link with something bigger than themselves. I think they were misled. That doesn't mean that I am superior, being misled can happen to anyone. I have been misled myself.
I only am speaking of my personal experience with several people I know who have given their lives to the TMO and to program. I am sure that I am overgeneralizing when I use the TB shorthand. But the true believers I know question my life decisions all the time, but I am not allowed to question their decisions without risking them shunning me. I question the true believer who treats me like I am part of the "mud," and somehow defective because I don't share their belief. I question the true believer who shuns traditional medicine that actually can help them, in favor of untested and unproven "vedic" remedies. I question anyone who believes that all their decisions are in accordance with nature. I question spending 8 hours a day in the dome, in the hope of changing the world and themselves. Of course they are free to make their decisions as to the value of this lifestyle, but I am also free to believe that this lifestyle has damaged them and their relationships with others.
But yes, I do believe that some decisions are better than others.
Ruth, it would appear that unfortunately you have come up against some very desperate and ignorant people and that you are probably correct to disparage these people by calling them true believers - that is actually being very polite. It certainly doesn't sound like you are coming on superior, so please accept my apologies.
Thanks Paul. I hope I did not inadvertently offend you. I never have considered you in the category of "true believer." Your mind is too open for that and you certainly don't accept as gospel everything that MMY propounded.
Ruth, I remember very well a day when I told a man in Fairfield that the flying technique was nonsense. He said that it was my thinking that was keeping the world from going into the Age of Enlightenment, or something like that. This is a man whose wife set fire to herself soon afterwards. I experienced something similar to your experience when I stopped going to my Mother's church. I was 20 at the time. A glass wall formed instantly between us and never went away. I had become an outsider. It must be especially hard to go through something like that with a spouse.
I am a natural extrovert, but going on CCP and following the prescribed program of TM-sidhi would make a virtual monk out of everyone. I found it hard to come out of disociation once back into regular routine in mainstream society.
In FF, time would be taken to buy organic, make food from scratch, do sesame oil abyangas every morning, swish the mouth with sesame oil for 5 minutes, morning and evening, do yoga, rest and do breathing exercises before each hour an a half of program, prepare a thermos of Maharishi tea (specific for balancing the doshas) on which to sip during the day, etc, so ... how little time is left once all the prescribed practices are followed? I can see how easily these absorbed people's time and lives in FF, or left them with niggling guilt over the practices neglected when there were more pressing issues with which to deal. So how would one integrate into society with so little time? I remember a waitress in FF complaining about the TMers because of their special demands for warm water with meals, things on the side, items to be left out of dishes such as garlic or onions which were taught to be ragasic, etc. It seems that the practices as prescribed by the TM Movement and attributed to M could easily set people apart from the mainstream of society and eat up what little time they had available in which to participate in society.
Kate
The point of my post in this thread and in previous posts of mine is that - if we're not part of the TMO as such - then we decide what if any value the practice of TM has for us. Like all of you, I'm in the position that I can sit and practice TM if I want to, because I know how to do it.
So one makes some assessments as to whether doing TM benefits one or not.
Personally, I was never deeply involved in the "cult" aspect - hardly involved at all. I do admit to internalizing some of the hopes MMY and the TMO raised - but taking a "wait and see" attitude, I gradually became quite skeptical of these.
As to fitting into mainstream society: Of course, I see some necessities and advantages to doing so, to one degree or another. But remember that "mainstream society" in North America in our time has very much included beer & alcohol, fast food, consumerist aspirations, watching lots of TV,and being gadget-crazy. How mainstream can you be (or seem, to the people around you) if you, like me, have little interest in any of these things?
I've tried to choose a lifestyle that seems balanced and reasonable to me.
Whether or not it led to world peace, if TM had evidently fostered very successful careers for meditators - which would have indicated meditators were especially intelligent and skillful within the possibilities of mainstream society - then the TMO would truly have attracted large segments of society.
So, I'd say, what is useful is taking stock, making the best choices you can, deprogramming yourself naturally, and just living daily as best you can.
'So, I'd say, what is useful is taking stock, making the best choices you can, deprogramming yourself naturally, and just living daily as best you can.'
I'll second that. I grew up in a cult (not TM) and it wasn't the attempts to 'heal' that helped, it was the abandonment of those attempts--which is essentially accepting my past as ineradicable in it's entirety--which allowed me to move on.
Who knew? All the desperate struggles to escape, to 'heal' were the very things keeping me locked into place as a victim of my past.
I wish I could explain how this works, its a staple and truism of every bonafide helping profession, but I didn't believe it myself until I took the last ditch desperate measure of acceptance rather than escapism. It really is the key, and requires no external technique or teaching, though lots of those can be helpful.
Helen,
I agree! It's helped a lot to just accept the past as ineradicable. And it's been an interesting journey to find that coming out of the closet, per se, did not cause me to be socially labeled as a psychological leper, but rather others found the cult history interesting, and my background can serve to help others.
Who would've known?
Happy Halloween, all!
g
Yes, I agree Tanemon, Gina and Helen, that acceptance of one's past is the key. I've met many people with even stranger pasts and paths than what we experienced inside the TMO.
I think when I got over my anger and blaming, and started to appreciate the good I experienced in the TMO, I was finally close to being "healed" from my decade of affiliation with M.
In a public forum it is hard to talk about the benefits I experienced from my affiliation with the TMO, due to possibly influencing others to join, and I definitely do NOT want to do that.
However, in private moments of my own, I have found it helpful to acknowledge, yes, there was good. In a sense, that is forgiveness. Forgiveness of myself, and others.
Shanti
Perhaps TMfree ought really to be called TMOfree? Most times I check in here I see that people are expressing their dissatisfaction of involvement in the organisation, with all the promises, reassurances, explanations and predictions. In other words an organisation that took on the role of doing your thinking for you and left you to just be a unthinking loyal donor. For me meditating had the effect of exploring my own thoughts, my own life, my own dreams. How ghastly to be trying to live out the fantasies of an aging secretary in monks clothing surrounded by his bunch of colourless saps. I respect Maharishi for suggesting for people to meditate and offering an easy method. But had he retired when he said he would, in 1968, I suspect that not only would there be no TMfree nor any need to have a forum critical of him and his sycophants.
But I hear you guys saying 'accept the past', so okay!!! But what I mean to say is this, maybe just flush away the annoyance at all the rubbish nonsense predictions and keep with the stuff that brought that extra lightness to your step, if that was the case? But maybe some of you really do have issues with the meditation in which case this message is not for you.
Jai Guru Dev
Well spoken Paul!
Paolo,
IMHO, I don't think meditation per se requires criticism.
However, Maharishi's patented "Transcendental Meditation" (registered trademark) as promoted by various branches of the TMO and the David Lynch Foundation serves as merely an entree' vehicle to the TM Organization and all the cult dysfunction.
Therefore, I think we should criticize the marketed, trademarked "Transcendental Meditation" as it's currently taught with its seductive follow up programs.
Meditation, taking cat naps, or quiet reflection in small bouts is certainly beneficial - and a habit that probably many of us still enjoy.
Another forum could discuss the merits of different forms of meditation - e.g. Buddhist, Judeo-Christian, TM, dissociative methods. There probably are such blogs out there. If anyone finds one, please post the link here - am sure many readers of TMFree would gladly partake.
Personally, I prefer swimming, hiking, biking, quilting & occasional catnaps as my "meditation." If not raised in TM, I don't think I would have learned of my own accord.
g
Gina, you make a very good point. That the meditation is not being taught for its own sake but as an introduction to the wacky world of Wlodrop and it is such a shame. I would love to do something about. Do you know I sensed the movement was Maharishi-o-centric minutes after I was initiated. That seemed so strange considering how liberating meditating can be.
Although I have a whole load of interests outside of meditation, I don't think doing any of them instead of meditating would work for me. I work better knowing that at some point(s) in the day I am going to sit down let go of it all, if only for 20 minutes or half an hour.
I've heard it said that forgiveness is letting go of the desire for a different past.
Kate
As You Paul,I am a lover of meditation. For the time being i am supervising a young medical student who will finish a review on different meditationtechniques in a healthcarecontext as her final examen for MD. I am realizing that youth now are much more aware of risks involved in meditation eg groupdynamics, spiritual powergames, and cults thanI were. Thanks to the internet I think most Young people dont take any bullshit. Also now there are so many good different secular and non-secular meditationtechniques taught for very little or no money and without strings attached. To me the good thing MMY did was to introduce meditation in the west - and yes, as I see it his work was finished in the beginning of the -70 ties.
Bjarne:
Please pass this link to your medical student.
British Medical Journal analysis of various meditation methods, "cultic and noncultic"
Also states that TM research is with subjects who were selectively recruited, by researchers with a vested interest in demonstrating TM's superiority.
Final analysis is that all meditation is about the same:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov:80/p...les/PMC1125975/
g
Bjarne, the way I see it is this. Maharishi was probably more free-thinking most people I can think of. But like some other 'stars' of the sixties, by the 1970's he had bought into his own PR. I think he had been right to try and distil a technique of meditation for everyday people. However, after his rise to fame meeting with The Beatles in 1967, the attention increasingly focussed on his 'teachings', his philosophies and eventually his eccentricities. Had he retired as he promised, and left meditation to spread itself, it would have done, no doubt.
But, as it was we had the outbreak of the sidhi season, and many people became skeptical after hearing some of his eccentric pronouncements, and they turn to other forms of meditation, and avoid the TMO. This is a situation Maharishi created.
Thank You Gina! This important paper from the high impact journal BMJ will for sure be added to the review work of my student. I have nothing to ad to Peter Canters work other than we have to work to get to the truth about meditation in the context of medical research. Also I have nothing to add to Pauls statement other than MMYs statement on Mallorca 1971 about the Beatles. That "they were a setback for the movement", when I heard that in the lecturehall of hotel Samoa.....I started to doubt in my heart
Ah! Bjarne!
You were in Mallorca with my mother!!
You survived. She almost went nuts -- is still semi- nuts; no saving her.
Sudarsha was there too, as Maharishis assistant.
M told my mother to leave me at home (thank you, God!)
Small small world!
g
Ahhh.....the 1971 Mallorca six-month course----My ex was there at the Hotel Bahia.
That is where "the gods" appeared to him during January's week of silence. He started to violently tic, both verbally and physically. Twenty years later he was still ticing ("unstressing" in TM-speak).
The closest medical name for this brain-injured condition from which many rounders in Mallorca, and later Fiuggi, Italy, suffered, is Tourette's Syndrome. Fortunately, it is treatable, but with antipsychotic medications. However, like others, my ex preferred to suffer rather than to admit to an outsider that his guru's meditation course brought on a serious psychiatric condition.
Gina, was your mom at the Bahia Hotel? Just curious. . I was not, but joined up in Fiuggi with my husband. If you did not round, off-season Spain and Italy would have been lovely places to be! I was always sneaking off to town by myself, as I did not want to entirely miss the joy of travel. But saving your sanity was a good decision.
Greetings to Your mum Gina! Remind her of Hotel Samoa, Hotel America.....Jarry J....cold rooms in winter....chickens on thanks givin......it was so crazy. She will love it!
Hahah! So compassionate of Mahesh to ask Your mum to leave You at home Gina! And Karina I was spared from a major break-through at Mallorca haha thanks God!
Forgot - - -
Karina,
Ai! I do not know the name of my mother's hotel.
Good for you to escape to see a tad of the real Spain and Italy! Probably helped "save" you.
It is fun to see the world! Seeing the world, albeit partially through TM global eyes, is what saved me.
Maharishi told my mom not to bring (13 y.o.) me to Mallorca because I was hellion of a cult princess.
(the Olsen gals were "good girls." Whereas I was vocal about the dysfunction)
Sorry about your ex. You'd told me some of the stories with him. So sad.
So many casualties amongst the True Believers.
Oh btw, an anthology will be published in spring 2010 about adults raised in cults.
I contributed a chapter and coedited the entire manuscript. whew! Some of the other stories really make out histories appear benign... but all are important wake up calls.
Also at 2010 annual conference of International Conference of Cultic Studies Association,NYC, they asked me to speak at dinner presentation to 300 world experts.. academia, attorneys, psychologists, sociologists.
(double yikes!) Wish me luck-- and know that I'm speaking on behalf of all of YOU/US who lives/observed the insanity, and survived to tell the tales.
g
So funny....I too was in Mallorca in 1971, at the Hotel Karina.
Tanemon wrote
"As to fitting into mainstream society: Of course, I see some necessities and advantages to doing so, to one degree or another. But remember that "mainstream society" in North America in our time has very much included beer & alcohol, fast food, consumerist aspirations, watching lots of TV,and being gadget-crazy."
So unless vigilent, the Dharmalite/yogista scene is just an extension of the gadget mad mainstream, not a liberating alternative to it.
However, if you wanna see a version of "gadget crazy" take a look at *shit* marketed in the margins of various and sundry Buddhist magazines and Yoga Journal.
Yoganista practice has turned into a gadget nightmare these days--high fashion clothes designed to enhance the contours of the wearers ass (Lulemon), or (the logo label is placed in such a way that its right over the wearer's anus, and the stupid pants are cut just low enough to show off the obligatory tattoo (Prana pants are the culprit here), then there is the sticky mat, the Ayurvedic spices, the masala mixes for tea, the special music, etc, etc etc. Health clubs love the yoga classes because the yogistas buy lots of clothes which the gym can sell to improve cash flow.
My favorite power bike class was kicked out of a large room to make room for a friking yoga studio because the powerbike people didnt buy gadgets at the gym--we buy a few things then wear em out.
Kate wrote:
"I remember a waitress in FF complaining about the TMers because of their special demands for warm water with meals, things on the side, items to be left out of dishes such as garlic or onions which were taught to be ragasic, etc. It seems that the practices as prescribed by the TM Movement and attributed to M could easily set people apart from the mainstream of society and eat up what little time they had available in which to participate in society."
Here is a great red flag list of things to watch out for when assessing a potential partner.
http://heartlessbitches.com/
rant...dflaglist.shtml
If you scroll way down the list, take a look at red flags
#163 and # 168
http://heartlessbitches.com/
rant...dflaglist.shtml
Gina, Congratulations! The committee made a wise choice for a speaker. And, please, upload your speech on You Tube so that we can all hear it. And the book --- please post when it becomes available. I think a compendium like that would be an excellent resource in high schools. I don't know exactly where it would fit in, but certainly it would deserve to be there. I'm thinking of a friend from church who authored a mainstream marriage and family curriculum textbook. When published, I'll share a copy with him.
BTW, at Mallorca was also where my ex got romantically involved with a 16-year-old girl who was there with her Mom. (Yes, he was 25 and we were married.) Take heart, you certainly were not the only "hellion" offspring! Her mother was also too busy meditating to pay attention to her daughter, even though they had next-door rooms!
Gina, Ditto to what Karina said: Double congratulations! Please let us know the name of the book and when it comes out!
Karina, one of the "dirty little secrets" in the TM movement was the ungrounded and underground sexual behavior of the people in it. The "movement" never got a handle on people's sexuality. Sexual urges were officially repressed or officially non-existent, and people did all sorts of crummy acting out. (New readers to TMFB: Please see my posting on Sexuality and Sex Roles in the TM World from late 2008 or 2009. Click on "by Laurie" on the TMFB homepage, far righthand column). I never heard that bit before about your husband - sorry to hear about that.
Laurie, Yes, so true. Although celibacy was the rule, affairs on Teacher Training Courses were not unusual in the early days --- hence, the gender separation began.
IMO, that is why the South Fallsburg (New York) hotel was purchased. Prior to that, as you undoubtedly know, there was only nearby Livingston Manor, and men and women were there. On the course I co-lead at Livingston Manor I recall vividly that there was an affair going on between two course participants, one who was married. Her spouse was also there, so you can imagine the mess that created.
Soon after that, the South Fallsburg hotel purchase was complete, and women were siphoned off, and then it was "men only" course participants at Livingston Manor. Considering the usually very painful consequences of a romantic attachment while on a course, I actually think separation was a good idea.
From all the marriages and divorces with TM couples over the years, I would guess that the percentages are higher than a national average. In my experience, affairs were certainly part of the reason why. Sadly, so little morality was emphasized in the TM movement. Instead, one was encouraged to "follow one's heart," which all too often leads to relationship disasters.
1. Did you experience problems due to TM? If so, what were they?
When I was in Mallorca, I decided to stop eating for nearly 4 weeks, as an aid to the intensive rounding. All I had was water. I made a sudden decision to go home for Christmas and intended to go to Fiuggi, but never did. I basically fell into a major depression, gained 30 pounds, and didn't leave my parents' house for 9 months. I was 20 years old.
2. What helped you heal?
Probably the passage of time. I lost all of the weight I had gained, and enrolled in university across the country.
3. What didn't help you heal?
Secluding myself in my parent's house with no input from anyone. I believe psychotherapy would have gotten my life on track sooner.
4.What well-meaning advice did people give you that did not help you heal?
I didn't get any advice.
5. Have you ever successfully helped someone heal from their experiences with TM (or from some other group?) What specifically did you do that helped them?
I work as a psychologist and from time to time, help free people from addictive or destructive relationships. What I do is show them a path out, and support them along the way.
6. Have you ever seriously tried and failed to get someone out of TM (or some other group)? What did you do? What happened? What advice would you give to someone in this position?
Yes, sometimes I have failed. It's a truism that people have to want to change.
7. Anything else you'd like to share from your experiences?
After becoming aware of the fraudulent, exploitative and unethical behaviour of MMY and the TMO, I consider that they betrayed my trust in the most fundamental way. I would advise anyone getting involved with any kind of group or leader to constantly submit them to critical scrutiny as to their ethics, and to constantly evaluate their experience as well. Not an easy thing once you're deeply involved, I know.
MMY NEVER recommended going without food for 4 weeks!! That must have been your lame brain idea, I was in Mallorca and Fuiggi.
MMY also said, "I'm not responsible for those who fly on their won" (pre-siddhis, paraphrased).
Your comment is distorted and intended to inflict unwarranted damage on the MMY and the TMorg, also called 'calumny'. IMO.
Billy, MMY may not have recommended this particular mistake but he suggested so many other nonsensicals and set in motion so much corruption, who can keep it all straight?
Billy G and others,
Hmm... I cannot find the post by the person who fasted for 4 weeks.
At any rate, BillyG, part of TM's groupthink involved group involvement in other products and therapies, amongst the more "open minded" of devotees.
There was a period where many believed that fasting would help with spiritual and physical "purification."
Maharishi, likewise, never said people should be vegetarian, but that was generally encouraged. There were massive promotion of various multi-level marketing groups, from Amway, Shaklee to Spirulina, Aloe Vera and Melaleuca.
Other psychics, astrologers, kinesiologists and the like were/are frequently consulted and shared amongst the group.
M began his joytish astrology, gems and herbs (after earlier telling folks to avoid such occult therapies), because TM masses were indulging in such on their own. So, by creating his own brand, the money could stay w/ M's family.
As to fasting... my father also fasted on distilled water for 30 days, ostensibly to purify his body of the toxins that caused his arthritis. My brother and I remember vividly thinking he was going to die - his ribs poked out his back, he looked like a concentration camp survivor.
To my knowledge, Maharishi never taught fasting. But part of the destructive cult dynamic is merely following group think, along with magical beliefs and therapies.
My brother and I were encouraged to fast at least one daily daily while we were growing up. The longest fast I ever did was 5 days age 17.
There were also Philippine "psychic surgeons" that moved through the TM Movement.. and continue to do so. Andy Kaufman's biographical movie "Man on the Moon" depicts them. My mother toured/coordinated several Philippine "psychic-surgeons" travels as they traveled through the US, coordinating the patients through TM centers (Oh! Imagine that! TM movement used as a profit making springboard for a non-Maharishi groupthink). It was and is part of the group dynamic.
As you other comment, BG, "MMY also said, "I'm not responsible for those who fly on their own" (pre-siddhis, paraphrased)."... does that imply MMY WAS/IS responsible for those who fly in group? For the psychosis? suicides? financial losses and broken families? No Human can "fly" anyway! This paragraph is nonsensical from any vantage point.
The fasting story was one woman's story of her experience of TTC, & her painful cult recovery. An appropriate story, and no more a "lame brained idea" than that of butt bouncing on high density foam to bring about world peace, resplendent crops and economic prosperity.
g
I never said her story was 'lame brained', I said her idea to stop eating for 4 weeks was!!!
Maybe you should take a course on reading comprehension..... or are so jaded with your distaste of MMY and the tmorg it has damaged your ability to think objectively on this topic?
A number of us living in the Karina were fasting. We made no secret of it. To this day, I do not know if it was the fasting or the round-the-clock rounding that led to the breakdown I had subsequently.
>>>Your comment is distorted and intended to inflict unwarranted damage on the MMY and the TMorg, also called 'calumny'. IMO
You should re-read what I wrote. As a 20 year old, I suffered a 9 month breakdown following my participation in the TTC in Mallorca. I had no history of instability, and there was no drug abuse involved. Despite my suffering, I never once confronted the TMO, and never held them accountable. I never spoke a word of reproach against them.
It was only many years later through websites like TM-Free and Rick Ross's that I learned about the true nature and activities of MMY and the TMO. Apparently this was occurring at the time of my participation as well as later. Although my involvement and the damage I suffered was relatively brief compared to others here, I feel justified in believing my trust was betrayed and I was exploited. MMY and the TMO took my money and had no concern for my safety or well-being. Based on my own experience and that of others here, I would recommend that anyone avoid TM and the TMO.
Why did you go without food for 4 weeks? Did you have preexisting anorexia? Do you still have an eating problem or did that just commence with MMY and the tmorg?
BG:
Per above:
"There was a period where many believed that fasting would help with spiritual and physical "purification." "
It's probably safe to assume that Deborah fasted for the above reason. It was common.
g
Regarding fasting on Teacher Training Courses....
In my recollection, fasting on Thursdays was officially ENCOURAGED. I think that was a practice which existed for quite a few years during the 60's and 70's. Often juice would be left out for the "fasters." (Maybe it was also encouraged to save on food costs????)
In Fiuggi, Italy, in 1972, I recall many boxes of oranges, and especially blood oranges, being available for our consumption. Everyone was given a plastic hand-juicer to make their own fresh juice. It was understood that the incredibly delicious juice was for purposes of fasting, and not just for an in-room snack. (However, for the weaker souls, there was food available.)
From this it is not hard to infer that if fasting a few days is good, then fasting longer is better.
Billy G., I appreciate fully the value of skepticism, so keep asking!
The stories really are astonishing, and most of us here were not even around in the very, very early days, when things were even wilder and wackier.
>>Did you have preexisting anorexia? Do you still have an eating problem or did that just commence with MMY and the tmorg?
I have no experience of anorexia or weight issues. I am of normal weight.
>>"There was a period where many believed that fasting would help with spiritual and physical "purification." "
>>It's probably safe to assume that Deborah fasted for the above reason. It was common.
Correct.
BillyG, you seem determined to demonise me and my experience, as if doing so will serve to nullify the validity of my claims about MMY and the TMO.
Do you have children? How would you feel if your 20 year old daughter came home from a TM TTC and was so deeply depressed that she didn't leave the house for 9 months?
I remember 'fasting' for 3 days, but even then MMY recommended fruit and Yogurt as I recall, I wish I had done more.
Often times people who claim TM screwed up their lives had screwed up lives to begin with. Anything can be used incorrectly, even too much sleeping can be bad for you.
I get tired of hearing people dumping on TM and MMY for all of their problems. Dollars to donuts these folks had dozens of problems to begin with.....but if you wish to be seen as a lamb to the slaughter that is your business.
MMY NEVER recommended 4 weeks of fasting to my knowledge and I was at Mallorca and Fuiggi. YOU are responsible for that rather peculiar behavior which leads me to believe you have other issues as well that predated your involvement with TM.
Correct?
I do not recall whether MMY advocated long fasts, but I do recall that many people were doing it, once the long rounding began. If you read my earlier post, you will see that I do not know whether it was the fasting or the round-the-clock rounding that plunged me into incapacitating depression. Another possibility is having left the course so precipitously. Prior to this, I did not have problems with depression and I had no experience of fasting. I have also not had a similar experience since.
at the time, I took full responsibility for what subsequently happened to me, and as I said, never brought it to the attention of MMY or the TMO. No one ever did any follow-up or contacted me.
However, reading the numerous accounts on the web of others' unfortunate experiences with TM and within the TMO makes me realise that my experience was not unique, and very likely not due to my own prior defects. And if I did have pre-existing defects that made my later breakdown likely, did not the TMO have a responsibility to screen for this, to prevent harm?
Again, I put the question to you, how would you feel if it had been your daughter?
Deborah - what a horrible ordeal you went through for 9 months. Thanks for sharing it. I'm glad it didn't leave a lasting injury.
If my daughter had quit eating for 4 weeks I wouldn't blame Maharishi Mahesh Yogi!
Also--I recall people were flipping out all over the place at Mallorca. I imagine most of them were eating normally. My guess is that Westerners were temperamentally unsuited to prolonged deep meditation, and both MMY and the TMO did not expect this and at that time, did not know how to deal with it.
It was a painful exit for me, because I felt like I was caught between two worlds. Although I had left the TTC to rejoin the world, basically I had recreated the TTC in my parents' house, because all I did was stay home and meditate. Eventually I came out of my cave.
Examining the situation now, I think that my negative experience probably had a lot to do with having left the course so suddenly.
Prolonged meditative states produce excessive amounts of serotonin and dopamine (feeling "high" or "bliss consciousness")
A prolonged low protein diet - the vegetarian or no caloric diet (fasting especially) on those courses- alters brain chemistry, increasing susceptibility to suggestion.
Ketoacidosis from cellular breakdown of starvation, fasting, also alters brain chemistry - increased "visions" or psychosis, etc.
It is amazing that ANYone survived those days of the early prolonged rounding courses of 12 and more rounds per day, coupled with extreme dietary practices and limited contact with the outside world.
Psychologists who are knowledgeable about this neurochemistry can explain it better than I can.
When I've spoken to psychologists knowledgeable of such things, and describe the practices of my upbringing, they are surprised that I can think at all, and am not institutionalized (as many were).
Deborah, Laurie, Karina, BillyG, Bjarne, Sudarsha and others.. thank your lucky stars that you are not one of the many casualties of those programs.
g
BillyG. MMY did not only recommend fasting....he ordered it in combination with silence and extensive meditation at mens ATR at Tignes France summer 1975, when the age of enlightenmenttechniques were introduced. For one week we had no food ....only grapejuice. The whole ting was ended by eating a lot of icecream. Quite an experience. Also, what You might not know BillyG is that stopping eating is a major criteria for major deep depression. That might have been what You went through Deborah after Mallorca. So strong of You to take You through that episode with an intact life.
Well, thank you, Bjarne, but while I was fasting, I was high as a kite. As I'm sure you know,after a couple of days, you feel no hunger at all, and contrary to expectations, unless you are overweight to start with, you stop losing weight after the first week. I think I lost 12 pounds in total, after nearly 4 weeks.
It was only when I was home, I started to eat non-stop, and was plunged into depression. At times I felt I had made a terrible mistake in leaving the TTC, but could not get motivated to go back. So it wasn't the classic pattern of someone stopping eating as a result of black depression, eg, following a bereavement. And it wasn't the environment either; my parents were completely kind and supportive, and let me sort myself out in my own time.
I had planned to make TM my life but at Mallorca the cultic aspects of the TMO had become evident to me, and I knew it wasn't the right place for me, at 20 years old. It's possible that the subsequent depression was triggered by the loss of my dream, and a sense of being lost in the world as a result.
Just reread Your last post Deborah, and litterary tears came to my eyes. What a lifethratening "in between state" of major reactive depression it seem to have been. Some time You get out of such a state being a much deeper and compassionate being. This in my eyes is true spiritual insight and is never a result of extensive meditation. No credits to MMY all credits to You Deborah. Thank You for sharing Your experience.
Billy G. ---- Since YOU were also there, and lived through Mallorca and Fiuggi, perhaps you recall several rows of people in Fiuggi all with horrendous physical ticing, grunts and yelps?
Mahesh euphamistically called them the "Heavy Unstressors." Unlike Deborah, their injuries were extremely apparent for all to see. The course caused their brain damage. Obviously, those young students did not come to the course in that condition, nor did they have preexisting conditions to have caused that degree of nervous system dysfunction.
My ex-husband, one of those "Heavy Unstressors," went to see several doctors upon return, and his symptoms baffled the physicians. It was years later, still ticing, that he finally received an accurate diagnosis of a rare syndrome called Tourette's Syndrome. That "rare" syndrome however was not very rare in Fiuggi!
Many others, like Deborah, were damaged in a less visible way, but still injured. Do you deny that anyone was injured by M.'s encouragement of excessive meditation? If so, you are still in denial, IMO.
It took most of us many years to wake up to the reality of what TM rounding really did to our bodies and minds.
I know I am doing all that I can to "cult-proof" my kids from falling for some future guru. I can only barely imagine what Deborah's parents must have gone through when their daughter came home in such a different condition than when she left. True, some came back in OK, or even good shape. But search your brain with honesty, and surely you will recall other such cases when people came back home in very bad shape, and it took years to recover.
Billy G. I am also interested in hearing of Your personal results from doing the Siddhi-program for all those years.
You are citating MMY
"MMY also said, "I'm not responsible for those......"
Could it be this seed that was planted in our hearts all those years ago of "not taking responsibility", or at least try to, for other fellow humans wellbeing? Not being able to respond to other peoples suffering in my world is lack of emotional intelligence. In the real world, not being able to take responsibility is equivalent to being out of bussiness- no matter what field You are working in.
Actually, I experienced bliss consciousness like MMY suggested I might. The Siddhis came later after I had attended many rounding courses in Malibu, Asilomar, Squaw Valley, Humbolt, Humbolt, Mallorca and Fuiggi.
I didn't take the Siddhis until later in order to do program in the domes, I never practiced it for that long and don't do it any more.
You can't get blood out of a turnip, that's why most folks who claim TM *caused* their problems are smoking something (and probally were past drug abusers, LSD, etc.)
You'd have to take each case on its own merits, anyone who is borderline to begin with will inevitable go over the line with the least provocation......
"anyone who is borderline to begin with will inevitable go over the line with the least provocation......
BillyG"
I guess that's why MMY lost his mind and became a complete nut, he was borderline to begin with ... And it MMY's case it happened without tdoing he rounding, likely without even doing meditation. He went nuts strictly from believing the shit that drooled from his own mind.
Blaming the victim is common with the TMO and among TBs. They take no responsibility for negative outcomes. None. Zip.
You have a bunch of very young inexperienced young people a long away from home. You have a lot TMO indoctrination. You have intensive rounding. You have circumstances which lead to suggestibility. You have a lack of direction in what else you are supposed to be doing but a lot of rumor and speculation that was never shut down. MMY was responsible for these young people. It was his fault. And he abandoned them when things went wrong. For once I would like to see the TMO take a little responsibility for things that went wrong. They don't even take any responsibility for the student who murdered another student.
Rumors and goofy thinking still abounds amongst the TB and the TMO does nothing to quash these odd beliefs but contributes to them. Don't take anti-depressants. Don't go to the doctor. Don't see a therapist. If meditation is not working for you something is wrong with you. There is no question that is the position of the TMO and TBs.
Deborah, maybe your cold turkey leaving hit you hard but leaving may very well have been the best thing for the long term. The real problem was not having help exiting from the intense experience that you had.
You were not "defective" you were human.
The Gurus who take no responsibility...the story never ends. In the news recently is James Arthur Ray who sells pseudo-science from the book The Secret., and now may (hopefully) be charged with manslaughter.
Just last month at a Sedona, Arizona retreat, there were two unexpected deaths, and 19 hospitalizations, of healthy adults who were doing sweatlodge "purification" with the think-yourself-rich guru James Ray.
Like most gurus, he takes no responsibility for the deaths and injuries. When the trouble signs started in the sweatlodge, the leader said to ignore those who were obviously in great discomfort. Sounds all too familiar to me.
Sweat Lodge Death Investigation Turns to Self-Help Guru James Arthur Ray
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/
200...ry5378668.shtml
Actually, at the time I did feel that MMY and the TMO were not rresponsible for my difficulties subsequent to leaving the TTC. But there was a conundrum in place: at that time, TM did not attract solid, stable, conventional young people. It attracted people who were looking for entrance to the mystical realm, which some--many--had already sought via recreational drugs. It also attracted sensitive young people who were disenchanted with the status quo of materialistic Western life. As I said earlier, my thinking is that MMY did not understand the Western mind as well as he thought, and so did not preview the mass 'unstressing' that took place at Mallorca. What happened to me was just a part of that phenomenon.
For me, it was inevitable that I would leave the TMO once had I peeled back the layers of the onion in Mallorca and saw how conventional, conformist and dictatorial the TMO really was. I had already been meditating for 3 years and had seen no apparent benefits in my life. It had created a division between me and my parents, friends and the wider culture. My life was not moving ahead in any discernible way. I wasn't ready to make the sacrifices that life in the TMO required, due to my age. So after I left, there was a great sense of despair and failure, and the need to begin again, starting university at the age of 21, not at all the norm back then.
Later I was actually very surprised that MMY was revealed to have been so dishonest and unethical right from the start, because I had never questioned his integrity. But this was many years later, and life itself had made me cynical, so my expectations were no longer so high. Had I known earlier, I might have felt quite betrayed and hurt.
However, a part of me still dreams that it is possible to find an uncorrupt teacher, and I haven't abandoned that hope yet.
Remember that Joyce Colin Smith in her book, Call No Man Master, described how first Mahesh tried to take over the group formerly led by Ouspensky. Mahesh made it seem he was the one who had access to the real source of Gurdjieff's system.
Eventually Francis Roles, leader of the group figured out that Mahesh was trying to take over the resources of the Cole House group and gave him the boot. The guy was in the grip of greed and power lust from the beginning.
And..if you read Joyce's memoir, Call No Man Master, she tells how she was told one should not eat food immmediately before receiving diksha mantra. fast prior to being puja intiatiated by Mahesh himself. And the little weasel kept her waiting for that appointment--a serious matter if one has gone without ones customary breakfast-and then kept waiting.
Here is Joyce's first interview with Mahesh:"I felt it would have been better to keep silent in the presence of this undoubted guru. (Mahesh)questioned me. In five minutes he said: "I will initiate you tomorrow. You will begin to meditate and be happy. Come at twelve o'clock." "
"Someone took me aside and gave me instructions and information about the initiation. One must bring flowers and fruit. One should not have eaten food immediately beforehand. I went slowly downstairs to the front door."Next day:
"In the morning I went early to London. Mindful of the instructions, I ate no breakfast. I took with me flowers from my own garden, fruit bought at Victoria Station, the new white handkerchief which was a symbol of purity and innocence of intent, like the white scarves given and received in greeting in Tibet. And the equivalent of what would have been a week's salary if I had still been working as a journalist in Fleet Street. This donation was required from all candidates for initiation."
(By tradition, money is NEVER supposed to be charged for initiation. So the serpent of money had already slithered into the garden)
""(Someone tells Joyce)"You'll have to be patient. He has no idea of time. Some don't wait. Others do. It depends how much one wants to learn to meditate." (As though the damned guru is a child. Well, In India to keep people waiting is an assertion of power--it is a brutal assertion of rank and power.AK)
"Some time in the afternoon Maharishi emerged and beckoned me to follow him. We entered the long room where he had sat answering questions the evening before. The tall windows were now open to the afternoon sun. It was carpeted in green. Bright cushions were scattered about the floor where people had been sitting. At one end was a simple altar on which stood a portrait of Maharishi's master.."
After Joyce received her mantra, she writes
"Maharishi told me to "remain in meditation", and added that he would return later, "to check how you are getting on"."Joyce decribed spending the following hours in bliss. However, we must note she had immersed herself in occult studies and a trance method called Subud. So she may have already been especially suggestible. And having skipped breakfast and then obediently waited hours for a selfish schemining man who kept her waiting, prolonging her abstinance from breakfast into a day long FAST..she was yet more vulnerable and possibly in the grips of caffiene withdrawal.
"At last, I became fully aware of my surroundings again. I opened my eyes and looked at my watch. I glanced at the tranquil faces all around me, their eyes closed, their features still and relaxed. I got up quietly and went downstairs to the hall. Though I had eaten nothing all day, I had no hunger or thirst. A feeling of pleasure, lightness and satisfaction filled me. It crossed my mind that I felt as I remembered to have felt during a happy love affair of long ago: contented and carefree as one rose from bed, and full of simple and innocent enjoyment of all the things of the day and of the night. I felt as though I had been made love to with great skill and tenderness, and had slept and rested and woken up again. As though I had been cleansed and renewed, like a child. As though I were completely innocent."
Before starting for home, I spoke briefly to Johnson Bates, who told me that Maharishi would want to check my experiences the following day. "He has gone out now. He has forgotten all about you. Come in the morning."
Remember, MMY told her he would check on her. And..he did not. He left her like a hunk of abandoned luggage.
Now suppose you have a first date with a guy who is hours late in meeting you, is all charm when he finally arrives, caresses you into ecstacy--and then forgets you.
That lack of care for a person who has put trust in him was there at the very beginning of Mahesh's career, long before he struck gold with the Beatles.
Joyce, in her bereavement for a dead friend, her lost leader (Ouspensky) and her departure from the Subud community, was lonely and years of occult study had probably made her suggestible and that one day fast probably more so.
"He has forgotten about you".
People were just interchangeable objects to Mahesh.
Keeping people waiting was a test.
Anyone who said 'Screw this' and left, would not have been the human material Mahesh wanted.
By being thrilled and blissed out, Joyce missed the relationship context in which all this was orchestrated.
'He has forgotten about you.'
Her loyalty was unreciprocated, right from the start.
But..she came back. And paid a price similar to what has been reported here on TM Free.
Quotes are from Chapter Nine of Call No Man Master by Joyce Collin-Smith
TM's instructions are that one should always defer meals until AFTER meditation.
Worded thus (paraphrase): "you must meditate on an empty stomach so that your physiology is not distracted from digestion. The crude physical work of digestion could interfere
with the experience of transcending"
Also.. prior to meditation, on the empty stomach, we were taught to do a breathing exercise - pranayama.. first rapid then slow for a few minutes ostensibly "to exchange the oxygen around the brain, so your brain can be clear for meditation."
Actually, this causes an acidotic, high carbon dioxide imbalance state, for the brain (or is it alkaline? Bjarne, correct me please, if necessary).
Those who participate in TM's longer "Program" do mental trance exercises for 2-4 hours each morning on an empty stomach.
Then again in the later afternoon, for antoher 2-4 hours until mid evening.. thus supper not until close to 7:30 or 8 p.m.
Empty stomachs with hypoglycemic metabolism, then high carbon dioxide acidotic state from pranayma, followed by trance meditation practices -- create space-out bliss.
Felt great.
Natural heroin.
Some continue to run businesses and can more-or-less function...
just as Winston Churchill was a working alcholic.
However, most who participate regularly in the full "Program" of hours daily lose a measure of world functionality. They are not capable of realistically addressing life's problems, manage critical thinking, or be fully aware of their children.
Yet, many of these folks will continue to insist that "TM's programs work well" for them, because they are so tranced out and happy, that they do not acknowledge life's stressors.
Thus, the more difficult recovery.
These states do NOT necessarily apply to TM 20 minutes twice daily...
g
Deborah,
I think you had a lucky escape from a scoundrel who neither knew nor cared what he was doing to people. It is sad that the escape caused such a time of pain for you and it is to your credit that you managed to put your life back together.
With regard to your seeking another non-corrupted teacher I will quote Chogyam Trungpa, undoubtedly a man of many faults and corruptions but someone who did know what he was doing with regards to the meditative path:
“My advice to you is not to undertake the spiritual path. It is too difficult, too long, and it is too demanding. What I would suggest, if you haven’t already begun, is to go to the door, ask for your money back, and go home now. This is not a picnic. It is really going to ask everything of you and you should understand that from the beginning. So it is best not to begin. However, if you do begin, it is best to finish.”
McRishi's big con was that this meditative path was easy, simple and safe. Any good teacher would make the same point as Trungpa as anyone who has meditated for sometime is aware that there is a huge potential for casualties. India is full of holy fools who have lost their minds this way. Try something else, there are other ways to this goal, you have to be a bit deranged to begin this and simpler, safer ways are the sensible option.
RE AK's post about Joyce Collin-Smith's experience: that is what I find so fascinating about MMY. Right from the start, he was NEVER subjected to the standards that ordinarily constrain human interactions. He always got a free pass. He gave himself a title to which he was not entitled; he charged large fees for spiritual rituals; he advocated celibacy for Western householders, but violated his own religious vow of celibacy; he sold vedic flying without ever demonstrating it or providing proof of the efficacy of his techniques; he betrayed the trust of his followers in endless ways throughout his entire career. Yes, there were some lawsuits; yes, sites like this one exist, but by and large, he has escaped reprisals or disgrace, and died an incredibly wealthy man.
How did he get away with it for so long? Why did no one blow the whistle on him, eg, the skin boys in Mallorca who were aware of his sexual shenanigans? If someone has an answer to this, I am very interested.
Thank you, Helen, for your reply. I hear so much despair in your post, about the futility of ever advancing. I just can't accept that, not yet. Most of us on this forum are middle-aged, and we will soon be meeting the challenges of declining health and leaving this world. Seeing those I love become ill and die in fear, confusion and pain left a lasting impression on me. I think we can meet these challenges more effectively with guidance and training. So I haven't yet abandoned the quest for a teacher who is pure of heart.
(If anyone thinks I am being a board hog, I am sorry. I never had the chance to discuss these issues with anyone, especially my experience in the TMO.)
Deborah wrote: "Yes, there were some lawsuits; yes, sites like this one exist, but by and large, he has escaped reprisals or disgrace, and died an incredibly wealthy man.
"How did he get away with it for so long? Why did no one blow the whistle on him, eg, the skin boys in Mallorca who were aware of his sexual shenanigans? If someone has an answer to this, I am very interested."
Actually, he mainly got away with it in relation to his followers, while the broad public was probably aware of his existence for just a very few years (around the time of the Beatles' inolvement). I believe part of the answer as to "how he got away with it for so long" is that we Westerners did not know what to expect from "an Indian holy man".
There may well be something to the idea that people get the teacher they are ready for, the teacher that in a certain sense "they deserve". I'm not saying this in a callous or mean-spirited way. What I mean is that I doubt that many people in the West were capable of being more discerning or lofty in their standards in 1965, 1975, 1985.
The meeting of East and West is still reasonably preliminary, as far as real cultural understanding goes - and savoring each other's philosophical and spiritual ways and wealths is still at a tentative and very early stage.
Mistakes will be made. Chaulk it up to experience.
I wouldn't make too much of claimed differences between the eastern and the western "mind." Whatever differences there may be they are cultural. There is no evidence that we are made different and thus unsuited or suited to particular meditation techniques.
How he got away with it--in the societal sense at least:
My hunch is that MMY was gifted at targeting a niche group of people especially responsive to what he was peddling. And it does not put the blame on those persons to say this; forty years ago, in the West, India
was mostly uncharted territory and very, very few laypersons who were interested in pursuing the Hindu traditions had the background information needed to tell whether a supposed guru was genunine or peddling an Indian equivalent of Scientology (which, IMO is what Mahesh was up to).
That is why I speak as I do with gratitude for those who were the pioneer cohort of seekers. You went into uncharted territory, full of unmarked traps and pitfalls and because of what you suffered and your willingness to bear witness and create sites such as TM Free, my generation has resources that you lacked.
As for MMY, he ended up lonely, paranoid and from the description of it, a very unhappy man.
From the standpoint of cause and effect (aka karma) no one gets away with anything. He had a bleak point of view to begin with, as he always saw human beings as objects to toy with, hence his ability to keep Joyce Collin Smith waiting, then forgetting about her after promising he would check on her--the way a small child forgets a toy the moment the object it out of sight.
So..the guy ended up rich, famous, owned a castle in Europe, but wound up isolated and alone.
You cant spend 90 years giggling, lying, treating people like toys and end your life being able to love life, or love yourself very much.
That use and dispose mentality meant that Mahesh could never have a real friend in his life.
Narcissists have no friends.
>>very, very few laypersons who were interested in pursuing the Hindu traditions had the background information needed to tell whether a supposed guru was genunine or peddling an Indian equivalent of Scientology (which, IMO is what Mahesh was up to).
I recall reading that the Indians saw MMY as the equivalent of an itinerant backwoods preacher, whom no one with any degree of spphstication would take seriously.
"Most of us on this forum are middle-aged, and we will soon be meeting the challenges of declining health and leaving this world. Seeing those I love become ill and die in fear, confusion and pain left a lasting impression on me. I think we can meet these challenges more effectively with guidance and training. So I haven't yet abandoned the quest for a teacher who is pure of heart."
Yes Indeed Deborah! and I more and more believe life itself to be that teacher
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T...h?
v=TbH9O2jvjr0
Well, it is sad that not enough Indians who took Mahesh's measure bothered to pull his devotees aside and tell you, 'Your leader is a charlatan. He made a runner from India knowing that in his home country no one would take him seriously for a second. He isnt of the right caste to have recieved a full education or full initiation into the tradition he claims to represent.'
'And look at how he is operating in London. He went after you, he didnt try to care for the emigre Indian/Hindu community. He avoided our community because he knew we would see right through him.'
The problem is, many Indians feel conflicted about their country in relation to the West, especially Britain.
So they dont like to disclose 'dirty laundry' outside the family by talking about Indians who are victimizing non Indians by peddling fake Hinduism. To talk about this would be to make India and Indians look bad.
So, too often Indians keep quiet about this, dont disclose these 'family secrets' to outsiders, even when its an Indian who is screwing outsiders who dont know how to tell a genuine guru from a false one.
All too often Indians rationalize that if a person has good karma he or she will eventually find a genuine guru.
If a westerner gets entangled with a bad guru, so the rationale goes, it was the Westerners bad karma.
And..if any westerner dares to talk openly about imposter gurus he or she gets accused of slandering India's glorious history, blah, blah, blah.
Regarding other export guru, Srila Prabhupada, founder of the Hare Krishnas, one internet buddy who ised to be in ISKON and who had access to their press archives told me that Prabhupada hated the British for what they had done in abandoning Calcutta and used to say some very nasty things about Britain in private. This from a man who was enriched and supported by many British disciples, including some of the Beatles.
So it is possible that some Indians, some, not all, but perhaps some, may see it as a nice karmic revenge for former Western colonials to be fleeced and best of all, be tricked into waiting for hours fawning like peasants over a charlatan who would have been little better than one of many pavement tricksters had he remained in Allahabad.
That is why Agehananda Bharati insisted that to break the Indian code and access Hindu traditions that were undistorted by passing through the soiled hands of Hindu reform ideologues (Vivekananda) or dowrnight crooks (MMY and Muktananda)one had to 1) learn to read Sanskrit and its texts and 2) learn at least one modern Indian language so that one could read what was actually written in Indian newspapers and get a chance to hear what Indians actually were saying about other Indians--and what the actual chat was concerning gurus and imposters.
If you guys want some amazing perspective, please get and read a book about Mumbai entitled Maximum City by Sukutu Mehta.
http://www.suketumehta.com/
Mehta says in so many words that Mumbai, like India is a place that resembles a code that must be cracked. It is a place where no matter what you ask for, the answer is always 'No'. and you have to work to create a connection that turns the 'No' into a 'Yes'.
(Warning, there are horrifying stories in here and accounts of violence that are beyond belief. But
you are given a look behind the scenes that is indescribably valuable. Mehta risked his life learning some of what he shares with us.)
http://www.suketumehta.com/
The Indian physicians from my work are good friends. They are familiar with my family background of TM and Maharishi Mahesh. They also know my opinion of said background.
These Indians are Sikh, Hindu and Buddhist.
These educated, native-born, Indians state that Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was a laudable holy man who brought true spirituality to the western modern world.
One of these physicians was once a TM sidha who "hopped" about in FF's golden dome; she now returns to India monthly to visit the hospitals and orphanages which she supports from her medical work in the USA.
These are the opinions of the educated native Indians in my professional/social sphere.
Obviously our cross-cultural friendships continue, while we respectfully disagree on cult dynamics.
g
Oh, and the Indians that I know believe that the TM casualties (& the casualties from Ammachi's group also) are because of their own failings and lack of personal strength, direction and integrity.
This same rationale is used within any cult group.
It is fascinating to listen to these views from highly respected professionals & friends, native Indians, with whom I disagree on core tenants of coercive persuasion, seeking of social approval and cultic manipulation tactics.
These native Indians have a core tradition of a personal guru. Maybe that's analogous to an American Christian devotion to a minister or priest?
I cannot answer that question. But it's been interesting to maintain these Indian friendships, despite my (post TM) unwillingness to accept any human being as intrinsically holier than another.
g
A very strange development is that when Indians emigrate and form communities outside of India, it is often difficult for them to arrange for a genuine trained Swami to leave India, settle in thier community abroad and set up a temple/math/mandir--though in some cases, if the emigre community is large enough and affluent enough, this does become possible.
But what adds to the complexity is that there are subdivisions within the emigre Desi community based on the region within India one has emigrated from.
So a strange outcome is that to retain some contact with Hinduism, emigre Indians in the West often find themselves utilizing more readily available New Age fast food Hinduism lite, because TM, Muktananda's Siddha yoga (AVOID!!) Sri Sri Ravi's fake version of TM (AOL) and local Hare Krishna temples.
These jostle with more respectable entities such as The Ramakrisna Orders Vedanta centers, and Self Realization Fellowship centers (Yogananda).
Sikhs have been able to set up authentic gurdwaras with their own teachers but, in the West, they come up against a fake community that calls itself Sikh but is not--the group founded by Yogi Bhajan that has seeded some influential but controversial yoga teachers.
Sikhism, as created by Guru Nanak never included yoga, and the line of Sikh gurus ended 300 years ago when the last Sikh was tortured to death by the Mogul jihadist fanatic Aurengzeb.
From that time on, the authority of Sikhism is vested in its scriptures, the Granth Sahib, NOT in a living guru.
Yet many sincere young Punjabi Sikhs who are by themselves in the West and who are not fully aware of Yogi Bhajan's false credentials seek companionship and spiritual nurture via various Bhajan groups.
If you dont believe this and want to see for yourself, go to www.indiacurrents.com and look at the yoga spiritality calendar.
There are a few listings for the few authentic Hindu worship venues run by swamis, but along with that, you'll see a list of adverts that could be called cult central.
All too often Indians treat westerners like children.
They dont tell the truth about their charlatans in front of us, assuming we are too unevolved to be entrusted with such information.
This reminds me of one of the tragedies of the civil rights movement. Many people outside the black community risked their lives and reputations to assist.
It is a tragedy that the real leaders of the black community did tell their
allies from outside the community,
'Take a look at this person and this person. Do not trust these people. They say they are working for civil rights but they are not activists. THey are hustlers who ran games and rip offs in the pool halls in the alleys and on the sidewalks before it became fashionable to get into social justice.
'They are just jive artists who figured out how to put on a suit and tie. Dont let them run guilt trips on you, dont let them play the race card on you. Here are their names. Dont let them in your house, dont let them have any money, dont listen to their guilt trips.'
But...the black community like the Asian Indians, followed the destructive pattern of keeping quiet about the shabby behavior of its own crooks and failed to alert trustful outsiders.
So I consider both communities complicit in staying silent and not giving outsiders timely warning about the jive artists pretending to be gurus and social justice activists.
As a result many hearts were broken and many were turned off, either from spirituality, or turned off from social justice work..or both.
And..Ive lived through this kind of betrayal and paid a big fat psychotherapy bill as part of the price.
The thing to remember about Hinduism is it has no concept equivalent to the Christian and Jewish teaching to honor your neighbor.
Hinduism is, basically a caste or clan spirituality. You are taught to think in terms of what benefits your clan or caste. Anyone outside, and that includes non Indians--just doenst show up on the radar screen and isnt worthy of being warned of charlatan gurus such as MMY or the many others.
Again, I once wanted to go to India and remain fascinated by many facets of the culture.
But the underlying cruelty that runs through it chills me to the bone.
'I hear so much despair in your post, about the futility of ever advancing.'
Deborah, I quoted Trunpa, not as a counsel of despair but because the point he intended to put across is that there is no advancement in the spiritual path, there truly is nowhere to go.
The spiritual path is a slow disillusioning of the notion that there is any advancement to be had. The more stubborn, driven or pig-headed types like me take longer to come to this inevitable realisation and your involvement in education and psychology is as valid a path to this realisation as any other.
I completely agree with Bjarne that life itself is the teacher and good, honest, compassionate friends help immeasurably.
I want to share a little about the complex circumstances that led me to leave Fairfield and the TM movement in 1981.
In 1980, I worked at the SuperRadiance Art Glass factory for Sidha Corp. Int'l in Fairfield. I cut and carried glass. Later I worked in the packing & shipping dept., wrapping glass, sealing cartons, etc. Both of these jobs were very physical, and both were intellectually undemanding, which permitted me to talk to my co-workers as we worked. I was very fond of my Sidha co-workers, and we would tell each other our life stories, tell each other jokes, and even sing together as we worked. This combination of physical activity and socializing were a great pleasure for me, and I believe they helped keep me grounded.
Then I was switched to the office and the electrical dept. The office meant sitting all day and typing. No more physical activity, no more socializing. The electrical dept., while more physical, was socially isolated. I worked alone, and my supervisor was unsupportive.
Soon after I switched jobs, Maharishi visited MIU, and watched the "flying." Back then, there was lots of shrieking and babbling during flying. Maharishi said in dismay, "What's all this screaming about? Henceforth, flying must be in silence." So I was now also deprived of about 1 hour a day of shrieking, letting off steam, catharsis.
I started having anxiety attacks so intense that I felt I had to leave Fairfield. Today I believe that part of the reason for these anxiety attacks was because five hours a day of emotional outlets had been removed from my life.
I would like to hear other people's experiences of the "flying" hall. Did people scream? Or was it quiet? Does anyone else remember the new ruling coming down for silence? (Did all the TM centers throughout the world receive this new ruling, or just MIU?) Did other people have problems due to that? And what is the current rule on noise? Did the noise level slowly sneak back up again? Or is all silence?
Some fascinating and insightful posts here. I know that most of you have suffered more than I have at the hands of MMY and the TMO and so I cannot fault you for being consistently suspicious of any guru or anything that smacks of a cult. I can see that it is a safer position to believe that no path or teacher exists.
As I said earlier, my goal is to achieve some equanimity in the face of declining health, loss of power and status due to old age, and a death that might not be peaceful or pain-free. Given that my current levels of awareness and skill are not adequate to the task, what do you recommend?
Deborah wrote, Given that my current levels of awareness and skill are not adequate to the task, what do you recommend?
I think you could have as many answers as there are posters here. Most of us appear to be united on certain aspects of our past relating to TM. After that, it is evident that we have traveled very divergent paths.
In a way I think we all miss our youthful solidarity and comradeship that we once felt, and Laurie depicted so well in her above post. Ironically, that may be one of the big draws as to why we are coming together here at TM Free. Eh???
Personally Deborah I would recommend that You confront Your fear of disease and death by try working now and then at a hospice or old peoples house. Just might give You some peace and even some spiritual insights and joy in a very paradox way.
Thanks AK for insightful reflexions on India. I do not agree in all Your statements. Like Gina I also work with Indian colleagues in the west and they to seem very different in their attitude toward western pseudohinduism. I still like a lot to go to different places in India but realize I could not stay there all the time. I only survive due to my creditcard. Your statement "Hinduism is, basically a caste or clan spirituality. You are taught to think in terms of what benefits your clan or caste." is almost, in my view, indian genetics of groupthinking and survival strategies due to the revolving catastrophies and calamaties in that beautiful country. You will only survive being a part of a clan! The whole thing is very hard to understand for westeners. I recently read the book "Death must die" a diary by a western woman and her agony living for many years in India and her reflections on cultlife in first J Krishnamurti regime and later with Anandamayee Ma in her ashrams. Very much recommended this book....being a diary I find it very honest!
>>Personally Deborah I would recommend that You confront Your fear of disease and death by try working now and then at a hospice or old peoples house.
Thank you, but.....right now, my husband and I visit my father-in-law at his rest home; he is in the last months of his life, at age 83. Although the environment is not bad at all, and my father-in-law is not depressed or in pain, it is horrendously traumatic for me.
To be frank Deborah....in my eyes....what a great chance! He is teaching You something beautiful.....
The experiences shared on here show a group of great teachers. Thanks to all who've had the courage to share them. As someone who's taken care of the terminally ill and the dying I agree that spending time with them can be one of the greatest learning experiences you'll ever have.
As for the fasting:
As a former *cult hopper*, I've found that a large number of the groups I belonged to recommended fasting. The idea of cleansing and purification is a popular one. I have a vegan friend (with no spiritual agenda) who fasts regularly for *health* reasons.
In an initiation into a particular group I was told to fast for 3 days before initiation (there were rituals I also had to do repeatedly during those 3 days). The day of the initiation I was blindfolded and put in a room isolated from the other members of the group. I was to meditate until the initiation. I realized later that I had meditated for approximately 4 or 5 hours (no clocks or watches were allowed. It was supposed to represent the *timelessness* of it all.) So I was all tranced out for the big event.
The group was supposed come and get me and take me to the temple for the initiation. But willful me went alone and blindfolded to the temple myself, which of course led to a lot of laughter amongst members of the group. (It may also explain why willful me was the first to confront the leader and the first to leave the group.) I was then symbolically *flogged* (another *purification* rite, and no, it wasn't a hard, hurting flogging 
.) and then took a new name that only the members of the group would know.
After first telling this story to a friend, he remarked ,*Sounds like a hostage situation!*. Indeed. In hindsight it surely does. After I left, I was (of course) demonized and labeled *evil* and *wicked*. Though, a few members sought me out after I left.
As for the Indian Hindus I know that immigrated to the states , the majority don't follow any guru familiar in the states. When I'd mention a particular guru, they'd smile and say that they heard of them and that was all. They celebrate the holidays and worship the deities, but none of them advocated any guru whatsoever. Just sharing my experience..
-LS
Deborah --- I'm wondering, do have children?
Before I had children, and that was definitely on the outer fringe of the usual childbearing years, I had feelings very similar to yours. After having children, all those feelings disappeared.
It certainly may not be the same in your situation, but I do empathize.
This should be read by all...
http://www.leavingsiddhayoga.net....net/
secret.htm
No kids, just cats, Karina. This has worked well so far.
As to the benefits of being around people in the last stages of life, I'm sorry to say that the sight of people drooling and the pervasive smell of urine has done nothing postive for me.
'the sight of people drooling and the pervasive smell of urine has done nothing postive for me.'
And it is unlikely ever to do anything positive for anyone. I have worked with people facing death for the past ten years and wouldn't call it positive but would call it enlightening. It is possible to see past the horrors to the real person still there, knowing that we all end up that way, and acknowledge the real courage and fortitude that old people show in the face of death. Even those with fear still face it and the fear is as valid a response as any.
I think your current awareness and skills are adequate, they just haven't yet been put to the test. It's the testing that reveals the increasing awareness and skill, and when you're are ready to test yourself you will be surprised at what you can do.
I found AK's comments re India and the India's attitudes towards Westerners to be somewhat true from my experiences in attending the Silver Jubilee in 2006 for SSRS.
I'm not into his movement per se, but being a long timer TMer and having many friends who latched onto SSRS in the last 15-20 years, I found this a good excuse for me to travel abroad and experience India for the first time.
Needless to say, our tour guide after the celbration (a tour operation from New Delhi and the usual visits on a 6 day tour)treated all of us participants as "wealthy americans" who could afford to buy the goods being sold at the various tour stops we made and to give money to beggars and the like. While paying for Indian made goods was not objectionable, it was the spirit in which the tour guide mocked us for being "wealthy americans" and refused to attend to our various complaints or wishes while en transit, usually just placating our statements and merrily ranting on about the different sites we visited. He just didn't care what we wanted and his comrades on the other buses had a similar attitude.
It made it easy for me to glean how the Indian culture had ingrained in it a sense of saying yes but meaning bug off. This might be true of other foregin countries and their natives' attitudes towards americans and other foreigners, but seeing this firsthand in India made me realize how MMY could take advantage of the "wealthy americans" while ignoring the masses and issues in the movement.
Well, Helen, thank you for the vote of confidence but I am not calm about it at all. I know it's a long way off...my granny died at 100...but I still want to shape up.
Sorry IndiaNoMore! You never was in India. You were in a protected dollarguided tour - because that was what You asked for. Try listen to Gregory David Roberts author of the bestseller "Shantaram" about indian way of life and thinking. I totally admit that I also only am a western Saddhu with creditcard, but I give it a try. Same with working with dying and sick old people. You have to give it a try - its not the "easy technique of TM" You are so right Helen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P...h?
v=PoP5vvTU4oU
and please do not miss this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=w...feature=related
Bjarne!
How will I ever keep up with all your excellent book recommendations?!
Thanks! Tak!
g
'Well, Helen, thank you for the vote of confidence but I am not calm about it at all.'
Me neither, and I have yet to meet anyone who is completely calm about it. There is a good saying about courage, usually used by combat soldiers: Courage is not about being without fear, courage is about acknowledging the fear and doing it anyway.
The TV channel LinkTV has a new series on spirituality called "Global Spirit" and the first episode is with Robert Thurman, a long time meditator and one-time monk. He makes some interesting warnings on meditation and transcendence:
If you go meditate right away, as an ignorant person, you will [simply] deepen your ignorance!
Meditation is a neutral tool. It will heighten whatever your state is--whatever your understanding is--so that is what they [his teachers] would say.
But then, it's very interesting, you [the moderator] were saying about transcendence, because when I did get to the parts in my [meditation] books that my original teacher, an old Mongolian gentleman (who strangely lived in New Jersey, not India!)...when I got to the parts on Dhyana or Contemplation, I was into doing whatever Nagarjuna said (in the book). I would get into these abstracted states pretty easily actually. And that man [his guru] had a diabolical sense--I think he must have been clairvoyant or something--every time I would begin to "float out" of the world, he'd "show up", even if it was 2 a.m.! He'd say "why aren't you sleeping!?"; "You'd better come have some yogurt with me!"
Or if it was the daytime he'd say "let's go do some work in the garden--you're just sitting around!" And he would always interrupt me. And even when we got to the part of the text [on meditation] he'd say "you don't need that part and more study!"
And I think because I would have become attached to a kind of quietism--that I think a lot of Buddhists and a lot of spiritual people get into. Where they find the world "jangly" and bothersome. And then they withdraw into a place where they don't have to think about that. It's kind of like a "Prozac" [state of consciousness]. They get a lot of endorphins flying and they really "transcend".
And it isn't a true nondualism. There's no compassion in it. There's a self-centered, kind of narcissistic thing.
There's a great danger in meditation.
---------------
Robert Thurman, Global Spirit, The Spiritual Quest (LinkTV)
14:20
Thanks Vaj! If You link this interesting info to the letter from a Swami who left Baba Muktananda (Deborah´s posting earlier on this thread) on Muktanandas "enlightenment" it makes a lot of sense.
If You link this interesting info to the letter from a Swami who left Baba Muktananda (Deborah´s posting earlier on this thread) on Muktanandas "enlightenment" it makes a lot of sense.
I can't find the letter or the reference. Could it be in another thread?
BTW, the episode mentioned above--and all the episodes--are available for viewing (free) on the linktv.com website. No need to go out and buy a satellite dish! One of the episodes is actually on Unity Consciousness, but not a TM perspective.
Vaj! The link posted by Deborah. The swamis letter at the end.:
http://www.leavingsiddhayoga.net....net/
secret.htm
>>Me neither, and I have yet to meet anyone who is completely calm about it. There is a good saying about courage, usually used by combat soldiers: Courage is not about being without fear, courage is about acknowledging the fear and doing it anyway.
Some people are incredibly stoic in the face of pain and how I wish I was like them. I bow down in admiration of my CATS, who have variously suffered through heart failure, chemotherapy, open chest surgery, and disablement, wthout succumbing to depression or self-pity, always seeing the glass as half-full.
Vaj! The link posted by Deborah. The swamis letter at the end.:
http://www.leavingsiddhayoga.net....net/ secret.htm
Thanks.
Vaj quoted Robert Thurman as saying,"...There's a great danger in meditation...".
wtf?? spacing out for some is more than spacing out? its actually dangerous, like in the same category as walking through Baghdad at night, dangerous, or having a gun pointed at you, dangerous? Sounds like the fellow, whoever he is, doesn't know the meaning of dangerous.
He wouldn't be a Buddhist buddy of yours would he??
Hey Gang!
Wish me luck... am driving up to Sacramento.. was invited to speak on a panel about cults. My first time publicly speaking to an audience that are not already cult experts. A new community service venue? Stomach in knots. Maybe i should think the mantra to soothe myself? Or maybe a martini after returning home? Oh, for some soma or ojas.. maybe Raja's cup tea?
Hopefully the panel presentation will be recorded - If so, I'll request they place it onto youtube (thanks for youtube suggestion; was that Karina?) Update late 2nite.
g
Vaj quoted Robert Thurman as saying,"...There's a great danger in meditation...".
wtf?? spacing out for some is more than spacing out? its actually dangerous, like in the same category as walking through Baghdad at night, dangerous, or having a gun pointed at you, dangerous? Sounds like the fellow, whoever he is, doesn't know the meaning of dangerous.
You missed the point methinks.
His point was that meditation, unless followed closely by an experienced teacher is (as Thurman was describing in his own direct experience), potentially quite dangerous. Thus the descriptions, on this site, of TMers who were damaged by TM (and the stories of close students of Mahesh Varma who were also ignored and thus damaged). Haven't you been listening? Why are you filtering this out?
Probably ego (my guess).
Personally I found the instruction Thurman gave, as a respected Guru, very apropos, esp. in regard to the TM Enlightenment Mythos ("It will heighten whatever your state is--whatever your understanding is").
It IS dangerous to imprint people with ideas or models of "Enlightenment" and then to leave them to their own devices, seeking the carrot of their imprinted desires. It's not only a model for induced delusion, it's a model for insanity.
That's certainly my personal experience after hanging out with the so-called "TM enlightened"!
The sad thing is, they claim to walk on heaven, but preach delusion.
Very sad my friend. Very sad indeed.
'It IS dangerous to imprint people with ideas or models of "Enlightenment" and then to leave them to their own devices, seeking the carrot of their imprinted desires. It's not only a model for induced delusion, it's a model for insanity.'
Too, too true.
Traditionally meditation is taught only after the student has a solid grounding in the scriptures and has shown himself capable of making ethical decisions based on the teachings. The traditional vows which generally cover poverty, chastity and obedience function at least as much to keep the student safe on the path while he matures as to produce a particular code of behaviour.
Vaj, no you are not my friend. Please don't insult me by calling me such. It is hypocritical of you, and childish- stinks of phoniness almost much as you do. Of course if I had my head up my ass all the time like you do, I'd stink too.
Clue for Vaj: If you see the Buddha on the road, kill him.
Deborah, you asked how one can face death with equanimity. Everyone is different, but if it were me trying to develop a plan on how to face death with equanimity, here are some of the things I might do: Psychotherapy. Mindfulness meditation - Kabat-Zinn has a program for dying people which he writes about in his book "Full Catastrophe Living" - being careful to keep out of the culty end of the meditation. Join a support group for people taking care of older family members. Ask hospice workers how they deal with it. Go to a 12-step group for support if I have nutty relatives in my life, or have addictions - and keep out of the culty end of the 12 step program. Learn Re-evaluation Counseling - just take the beginning 8 or 12 lessons to learn how to do it, then drop out to avoid the culty end of R.C., and then do the technique (free peer counseling). Find a faith community I can agree with, and join, then go to or form a group that deals with issues of aging and facing death, or talk to the minister thereabout it (pastoral counseling). (I couldn't stand any religion, so I joined the Unitarian Universalists, who are Humanists and let you believe anything you want.) I hope some of these ideas help. I believe the Buddha said that all humans fear death.
Well, thank you, Laurie. i will follow up on your suggestions. Since I am a psychologist myself, I am not too sanguine about the value of psychotherapy in helping this situation. I don't fear death as much as illness, disablility, horrific medical procedures and the general degradation of old age.
Maybe in my next life I will evolve into a cat, if I manage to transit out of this one with dignity.
Deborah --- IMO, you got some great advice from Laurie. I too have personal experience with some of the groups she mentioned, such as R.C. (Re-evaluative Couseling by peers), and the 12-step program for co-dependents.
R.C. teaches a unique theoretical "unstressing" construct that you won't find anywhere else. However R.C. works best if you can find a group you feel sympatico with, similar age, etc.. For many years I belonged to a group that I really liked, but when I moved....well, I wasn't so lucky, as the activities were a long ways away from where I lived, fewer group choices, etc.. Even if you have had years of psychotherapy training, I think that you'll find that R.C. is very different, and can even be much more valuable than traditional counseling.
I've also been involved with hospice and a support group related to bereavement, and both are helpful. I liked Laurie's suggestion to listen to other's stories of dealing with dying and death. I wish I had known more about it before I was thrust pell-mell into being my mother's main caretaker at the end of her life. I truly wish I had been better prepared.
Gina --- How did it go???? Are you up on You Tube yet??
Let us all know!
'Maybe in my next life I will evolve into a cat, if I manage to transit out of this one with dignity.'
Dying is never dignified, due to the
'illness, disablility, horrific medical procedures and the general degradation of old age' that you mentioned.
If you could let go of the need for dignity and focussed on developing compassion and respect, for yourself as well as others, you might find the whole business easier to approach. I am not implying that you lack those feelings, just that the expectation of dignity is an unnecessary obstacle.
Karina, I have actually done co-counselling many years ago, with a psychologist friend of mine. We became closer friends, but it didn't actually help much. This type of thing is actually quite pricy where I live; a 5 day course running now is $1300.
And thanks, Helen. I guess I'm like the cowardly lion in the Wizard of Oz. My biggest obstacle is that so far, I haven't been ill, injured or even gone through childbirth. I haven't had to overcome physical pain.
Some people do manage the process of ageing, illness and death better than others, in my experience. But none so far has equalled the shining example of my cats. And you know what? What makes the biggest difference in whether a very old or very ill cat lives for a long time is the amount of pure, unconditional love they receive from their owners. The bond they share with their human companions seems to make them determined to live, and their incredible ability to live in the moment means they do not brood over pain or the future possibility of pain. And of course, they have no awareness of their own imminent death.
Karina asked:
"How did it go???? Are you up on You Tube yet?? Let us all know!"
Not on youtube. Not recorded.
The audience said the panel presentation went well. I was dressed in a nice suit, hair smoothed, calm professional.
The other panel members sounded dynamite!
This was good experience. Other than my closest of friends, I'm not accostomed to discussing the cult mind f**k, and the untangling of said mindf**k, with those who are not already familiar with cult psychology and neurology of brainwashing.
The purpose of the panel was more a cult-awareness, cult protectiveness focus.
So, others' experience of cult recruitment was of more interest to the audience. Since I was raised in TM, I'd never had the experience of being recruited. I could describe how we were taught to deceive "for the good of others" by explaining TM as non-religious stress release.. blah blah.. while we "really" knew that we were bringing them to enlightenment, a step off the wheel of karma, enlivening their finest connection to Being.. blah blah.
Thanks for asking. Coming out of the closet becomes easier and easier with time and repitition.
Maybe some day I can even confront David Lynch and John Hagelin!
HA!
BTW, Paul McCartney's son is now in Fairfield, Iowa. Preparing for a concert in FF. Am sure he's being welcomed with grand TM bliss warmth.
Remembering the days of beliving our self important was validated because we rubbed elbows w/ the TM celebrities (that was included in the talk too)
Nitey-nite,
g
'they have no awareness of their own imminent death.'
Yes, awareness is a two-edged sword, it always cuts both ways, something else McRishi neglected to mention.
Hi, gang. So two of you did Re-evaluation Counselling! So did I! That makes it 3 of us. Anyone else? When I lived at MIU, I actually taught stealth courses in R.C. I'd eat a quick dinner with a friend, then we'd go back to my room, stuff a sleeping bag under the door so no one could hear us, and I taught her R.C.! I believe there are even some RC teachers living in Fairfield now.
At the time I was teaching her, it was way "off the program." I started feeling guilty. (I was thoroughly brainwashed.) To punish myself, during the sidhis, I would think "counsel." Then I would change it to "cancer," which it sounds a lot like. Then I would panic that I was giving myself cancer, since whatever we thought while doing the sidhis manifested, of course. Sure they did. I was neither more friendly, compassionate, happy, had not the strength of an elephant, could see inside my own body and cure my own disease, see the motion of the planets, (I forget all the other sidhis)...yet I believed that I was able to give myself cancer. This was about the time I was having panic attacks from no longer doing physical labor or chatting during the day, on top of Maharishi's new ruling that all screaming had to stop, and "flying" had to be done in silence. (See earlier comments of mine, I think on this thread, about this.) It was a hellish time for me.
Getting back to RC, Deborah, I am pissed with RC for charging you so much for a 5-day course. (Maybe they are taking a lesson from TM?) Seriously, where I live, the course is given once a week for about 2.5 hours each class for about 10 weeks. When I went, classes were about $10 each. (1979). Also, sorry you didn't get any benefit from doing it with your friend. Did she and you take a class, or did you teach yourselves? I would have thought that RC would be helpful with things like the feelings that come up around death.
Deborah, another suggestion I can think of is to read the book "Final Exit" about "self-deliverance." i.e. about the choice to take ones own life at the end of life (and how to do it.)
'Deborah, another suggestion I can think of is to read the book "Final Exit" about "self-deliverance." i.e. about the choice to take ones own life at the end of life (and how to do it.)'
Yes, I can endorse that. In a paradoxical way my first reading of 'Final Exit' cheered me up enormously. Something to do with taking ownership of the problem lifted me enough to explore more practical ways of approaching death while still alive--it took the pressure off somehow.
Just keep plugging away, Deborah, you'll find something that works for you.
Gina, Thanks for the update. Was it a "Roundtable Discussion," which I know the Calif. Legislature uses on various topics? Or was it an actual committee hearing related to a particular bill? If so, I (and probably others) would be interested in knowing about any legislation being introduced concerning cults.
Thanks for going --- I'm sure that there were people present who knew of TM but did not realize the cult-aspect of the organization. I hope you got at least a few questions.
Specifying your wishes in an Advanced Care Directive (a legal document) might also set your mind a little more at ease, without taking the more radical approach advocated the above mentioned book.
Oh, yes, 'Final Exit'. I am on baord with that one. I have made my husband promise to do me in, if I am ever living in a way I would not choose, if I could make the choice. But then I started worrying about him on his own. Sadly, he is not completely convinced of the wisdom of a suicide pact like the Nimitzes had.
I read Ram Dass's account of his life following his stroke. Now, of course, he is cosseted and loved by many, and that may have something to do with his calm acceptance of being in a wheelchair. But irrespective of that, I am definitely not in the same place he is about disablility, etc.
Re the co-counselling: it just felt like we were going round in circles, limited by the boundaries of our own experience and knowlege.
Karina,
Answering your questions: "Was it a "Roundtable Discussion," which I know the Calif. Legislature uses on various topics? Or was it an actual committee hearing related to a particular bill? "
No bill coming up, that I know of. IMHO, there will never be such a bill in the USA. Many freedoms require much responsibility and vigilance of the populace.
A panel about Cult Evading was prepared as an educational venue for familes. The folks who planned this contacted the International Cultic Studies Association for some suggested speakers, and thus were given my name as one of many who were invited.
They provided us with questions/guidelines for us to address in our little shpiels, and then the floor was opened for questions. Prior to our panel, they had one or two day seminar with Janja Lalich (well published cult expert, you may google her).
The group seemed generally aware of the risks and facades of cults. Most in the audience raised their hands when asked if they had been directly or indirectly exposed to cult influence (thus they attended this presentation).
My personal story (that's what they wanted) was really not relevant to the cult seduction / evasion theme. My stories from nearly 5 decades of cult family influence only served to cement the importance of having one's antennas up when anyone makes grand promises.
g
Have you ever checked out "Sant Mat" or Sant (meaning Saint) Rajinder Singh?...they have some rather peculiar beliefs. Like for instance the story of "Kal"....
Personally, I think this group is rife with cultish behavior.
Does anyone have the program automatically start when just sitting in bed or when sitting alone in one's home? I have this much of the time and was even tempted this morning to let it go on. This scares me! Even though I stopped doing the program years ago, it is there and will continue unless I make an effort to stop it.
Anyone have this? I feel brainwashed. How does one become un-brainwashed? I thought I was over this but think maybe I have been doing part of the program without recognizing it, especially the part with the universe, etc. where I would feel out in it.
Vickie
>>Does anyone have the program automatically start when just sitting in bed or when sitting alone in one's home?
Yes, my mantra appears at those times. I resent this, knowing now what the mantra means, a sentiment I do not feel and never will. But to this day, I have never spoken it allowed, never shared it, and never would. Maybe MMY has the last laugh after all.
Vickie,
Per your question "Does anyone have the program automatically start when just sitting in bed or when sitting alone in one's home?"
Many others have complained of this experience also. Yes, it happens to me too.
The hypnotic trance methods that were used to instruct us, plus the thousands of repititions planted those images/words/sounds deep into many brains.
As one other "TM-kid" (now adult).. said to me :
"And what the f**K's up with this mantra in my head?! I cannot ever get it to stop!"
At the recent panel presentation (above), someone asked me what my mantra was.
Within myself I smiled because, like Deborah above, I couldn't bring myself to say it aloud for years.
Instead, i smiled at the person who asked and just said "ainga - there you just saved yourself a couple of thousand dollars."
How to get the mantra or AofE technique, or siddhis out of your head?? I think exercise is useful, having another thought to distract yourself. If anyone finds a truly successful long term solution - please tell me too!
g
"If you do fall into a dissociative state, bring yourself back with a sensory change. Pinch yourself. Rub your hand. Do something that will provide sensory input and break the feeling of being in limbo. Focus your eyes on something directly in front of you." -Margaret Singer, "Cults in Our Midst"
I found this very helpful. Another thing that works for me is to say "STOP!" and hold my hand out in front of me whenever a repetitive mantra or negative thought tape starts playing. Of course you can't do this at work or in public, so, I've learned to say it in my head, while pinching myself, etc. and then focus directly on whatever is in front of me.
This helps to break up that ingrained thought/mantra into little pieces. Kind of like scratching an LP (remember those?) so that it doesn't play anymore. Eventually "STOP!" replaces the mantra. I also have a couple of friends who found EFT extremely helpful. Hope this helps.
Vickie said:
Anyone have this? I feel brainwashed. How does one become un-brainwashed? I thought I was over this but think maybe I have been doing part of the program without recognizing it, especially the part with the universe, etc. where I would feel out in it.
Two ways I know that have worked are to:
1) cultivate another mantra you want to use and make the inner decision and acquire the inner belief that this mantra is now your mantra and that it will just come when you want it to.
The important part is to change your belief that the TM will come unbidded and replace it with your new belief. Once you do that, and practice it for a couple of weeks, it will change.
2) A friend of mine decided to take of an Open Presence style of nondual Buddhist meditation in which the eyes were partially or fully open. The object was awareness of breathing and or nondual compassion.
At first she had trouble keeping her eyes open and keeping the mantra from impinging on her new practice. Then her teacher, a very experienced meditator, told her 'you need to decide which meditation you want to do. TM is NOT Buddhist meditation.' Then and there she made the conviction to change. The mantra stopped immediately after she made the decision. It turned out she found the open eyed meditation much more integrative and balancing without the dissociative and withdrawal effects so common in TM.
The point seems to be: make the inner decision to change and consciously change your belief and replace it with something else.
I suspect one could also make changes with something like Neurolinguistic programming or EMDR, but an expert in those modalities could tell you better than I could.
There is a complex welter of sant mat lineages, some OK and some cultish as hell.
If you thought that tracing MMY's background was complex, this will really make you dizzy.
First,
Eckankar is a rip off of Sant Mat. Avoid.
Elan Vital (Guru Maharaji) was another
spin off. Avoid.
http://www.ex-premie.org/papers/...pers/
indian.htm
Descendants of Lalji
http://4d-don.blogspot.com/2007/
...successors.html
This teaching modified by Lalaji would come from a practice preached by the Bhagvat Geeta, using the techniques of Patanjali, as well as the lessons of Kabir and Guru Nanak Devji. The bibliography recommended is a book of Dr. Chaturbhuj “Yog Philosophy and Naveen Sadhana” - Sadhan Press (Dampier Nagar, Mathura - 281001 - UP - India)
They created a newsgroup on: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ra...mashramsatsang/
One thus finds the various influences listed by Madeleine (on Elodie's Blog: http://pourquevivelesahajmarg.bl...g.blogspot.com/
, an Indian Sufism which seized upon old hindu practices (yoga of Patanjali, Kabir, himself inspired by Islam, and Sant Mat, radhasoami or other (Nanak Dev. Ji and once again Kabir, Sikhism).
Professor David C Lane is a noted authority on this very complex movement.
Ive heard reports of a succession squabble in connection with a sant mat guru in Beas, India.
http://74.125.93.132/search?q=ca...e&hl=en&
ct=clnk
another link
http://74.125.93.132/search?q=ca...e&hl=en&
ct=clnk
The myth of the perfect masters lineage
http://74.125.93.132/search?q=ca...e&hl=en&
ct=clnk
Gina, congratulations on your successful lecture! And on your upcoming book!
To ?? who mentioned an interesting website about Max Flischer, I googled him, but couldn't find anything about him. Could you give us the url or something? Thanks. He co-led the Teacher Training Course I was on (the other co-teacher was our own Sudarsha!)
This might sound ingnorant or arrogant, but I cannot understand what the hell is so hard for gurus to stick within the bounds of ethics or propriety? Why can they not just honor their commitments and remain trustworthy? Others manage to do that. The mechanic who refrains from doing something to your car that will cause problems later so he will get more work; the therapist who doesn't exploit his patients sexually or encourage unnecessary dependancy, the priest who just ministers to his parish without taking advantage of the children in his proximity, the builder who doesn't cut corners but does the required job as expected...why are gurus so vulnerable to betraying their followers on such a grand scale?
There's a good book, 'Prophetic Charisma' written by psychologist and ex-cult member Len Oakes that addresses this very question.
Apart from all that, the seductions of power, wealth and the adoration of the masses also exert a pull. Revered as a god? Its the secret dream of many, I've toyed with the idea myself!
Deborah --- I think the saying is, "The higher the pedestal, the bigger the fall."
Gina, Thanks for the update. I'm so glad that there are outsiders who still have interest in "cults," even though the Hare Krishnas, and so many others, have fallen into disrepute decades ago. I feared that the subject is considered by many to be irrelevant now, but good to know otherwise.
I've found that often times people don't even realize exactly what a cult is, and how insidious it can be. For instance, I have an old friend (a single mom now) who was seduced (my terminology, not hers) into the Jehovah's Witnesses. That's a very cultish religion, IMHO. First the recruitment (right to your door!), then comes the breaking away from normal life.
My children no longer see her children, because the group isolates themselves so well. They don't participate in any holiday events, including even Thanksgiving! Things our families used to share, such as birthdays, holidays, or kids' performances at Christmas, or a baton performance in the 4th of July parade, etc., well, she won't go, or allow her kids to go and be with our family.
It has been especially hard on my children, as these were kids (another twin set) that they have known all their lives. But, of course, the mom does not recognize that her new religion IS actually a cult. Maybe one day.... I hope someday that the knowledge gleaned from cultic studies will be included in high school text books in the not-too-distant future. Most people don't have a clue. I can't wait to see the book you are involved in writing.
BTW, when you wrote, "driving up to Sacramento" to be on a panel, I jumped to the apparently incorrect conclusion that your presentation had something to do with the California Legislature in Sacramento. Oops -- my mistake. (Years ago I was involved in grassroots legislative lobbying, so I just assumed that is what you were doing in Sacramento.)
Anyway, thanks again Gina for all you do on behalf of all of us who suffered from the cult mentality, but aren't quite as energetic as you !
Hi Karina:
Thanks for your kind support.
yes, cults come in all shapes and sized. The "obvious" groups of the 60's and 70's, are more easily recognizable.
But there can also be cult like friendships, relationships, therapy groups. The point is as Shakespeare said "unto thine own self be true." If one knows oneself and one's desires, then the person is less likely to be swayed by the need for approval, validation or the need for connection to others - regardless of the cost.
As we all know, many left TM only to jump to another cult or guru.
In my case, I shyed away from groups, but fell instead for a one:one cult style relationship after my divorce. The high-high of being swept off my feet, and slowly twisted about. It was wonderful (just like living in a cult), and also repressive. Thank heavens that the fall from that got me into true psychological chemotherapy of cult recovery work. That was so necessary, to understand my own former emptiness, the need-to-be-needed and validated by an external person came from my own inner emptiness. No different than anyone seeking help and accidently falling for a cult.
Sorry about your friend falling for the Jehovah's Witnesses. As we know, there is great support and validation in such insular groups. That insularity also can create fear of the larger world.
FYI, my only brother is a devout Mormon, after our TM upbringing.
Brenda Lee wrote a book about being raised in a strict Jehovah's Witness family. She speaks about cult seduction and dynamics. When leaving the JWs, she was rejected by her family. Brenda also fell for a manipulative relationship, rather than another group. She initially wrote the book as a gift to her son.
http://www.outofthecocoon.net/
g
Karina, I'm sorry about your friend joining the Jehovah's Witnesses, and your daughters losing their friends. I've read several books by former JW's, and I agree, it is a destructive controlling group. There are also some good websites for recovering JW's. I also know someone personally who is struggling with recovery from J.W., and it's a difficult road, as her mother is always nagging her to come back to "the Truth"....
Deborah, re: an old comment of yours, No, I don't think you're hogging the board. That's what it's here for - for people to think and talk and re-evaluate and let off steam and recover. Write as much as you want. I enjoy your comments.
Also, Deborah, it sounds like you could have gotten some decent benefits from Re-evaluation Counsling if you had had a good supervisor. Ideally it's not supposed to go in circles. If you want, I can give you some pointers to make it work better.
I find that digging deeply into these memories of my days in TM and my days in recovery is bringing up a lot of painful and anxiety-producing feelings, that I am too embarrassed to share even here. Is anyone else having that experience?
Laurie, re the RC...I'm not sure why it didn't go anywhere. Maybe because we were both psychologists; we just cancelled each other out It definitely revealed our biases and blind spots. We were somewhat polarised politically as well.
Re the feelings these discussions are bringing up....Up to now, my TM experience has always been in the Too Hard basket; an experience that I could not evaluate or really process. An artefact of the 1960s-70s. I'm annoyed that I got sucked in because it really damaged my trust for good, which is not necessarily a good thing at all. My heart goes out to those who lost big chunks of their lives however.
Dude, this isn't the Come to Buddhism Hour on the TM-Free Blog, brought to you today by Vaj.
I get your point. We all get your point. Quit advertising please.
At first she had trouble keeping her eyes open and keeping the mantra from impinging on her new practice. Then her teacher, a very experienced meditator, told her 'you need to decide which meditation you want to do. TM is NOT Buddhist meditation.' Then and there she made the conviction to change. The mantra stopped immediately after she made the decision. It turned out she found the open eyed meditation much more integrative and balancing without the dissociative and withdrawal effects so common in TM.
No, no, no- "when you see the Buddha on the road kill him".
Deborah wrote: "what the hell is so hard for gurus to stick within the bounds of ethics or propriety? Why can they not just honor their commitments and remain trustworthy? Others manage to do that. The mechanic who refrains from doing something to your car that will cause problems later so he will get more work; the therapist who doesn't exploit his patients sexually or encourage unnecessary dependancy, the priest who just ministers to his parish without taking advantage of the children in his proximity."
Seems to me that North Americans and Europeans might have to develop an explicit code of ethics, or develop rules for spiritual teachers. That these might then be communicated to a spiritual teacher or guru as absolutes.
On the point of sex, "celibacy" refers to an unmarried status, and is therefore not necessarily the same as "chastity."
We can understand a teacher's or guru's desire to have sex - afterall, is there any here amongst us at TM-Free who has not had sex?
But I don't think any of us feel good about participating in, or enabling, the development of an organization that comes to function partly as a dating service for the guru.
Continuing on the Co-Counseling (RC) thread -- I found the TM concept of "unstressing" to be actually more expressed, in both theory and experience, in co-counseling. The skill of knowing just how to create the "balance of attention" that creates the safe space for a "client" (friend, family member, etc.) to unstress (cry or laugh), is a wonderful skill which I value greatly. Just last night, I used it with my 10-year-old son when he was upset about not doing well when trying out for a local basketball recreational team. At first he was extremely unhappy, ready to quit before it even started. After about 40 minutes of using co-counseling techniques, including allowing his tears to flow, then he was happy again, and enthusiastic about continuing with the basketball program. It was a huge turn-around in just 40 minutes.
Indeed, crying truly is "de-stressing" rather than the bad moods, and motor tics, that pass for "unstressing" and "something good is happening" in TM terms. IMHO, TM is rather worthless for dealing with stressful personal issues, but I found co-counseling is able to get at the actual issues. I am sure that professional counseling, with a good counselor, would do the same, but it is a wonderful feeling to be able to give, as well as receive, good counseling.
Gina,
Thanks for the ex-Jehovah's Witness link --- I did look at it. My friend went through a divorce (husband had affair, etc.) so she became very vulnerable to the JWs who helped her greatly at the time.
Now she is going through unemployment, having recently lost her job due to the recession. I think that maybe she is realizing that being a JW does not exempt you from all suffering in life. Now, I detect a little more openness to other people, as she has called me several times recently. I'll try to mention the website, and other material, if and when appropriate.
>>But I don't think any of us feel good about participating in, or enabling, the development of an organization that comes to function partly as a dating service for the guru.
Especially when coercion and exploitation of devotees' trust and vulnerability are utilised in the guru's sexual forays. Equally offensive is the hypocrisy of a guru who publicly preaches chastity as ideal, even within marriage, yet privately violates his own holy vows.
To my knowledge the Maharishi has never been found guilty, either civilly or criminally for any sexual indiscretions. A few *claims* here and there is actually par for the course for anyone in such a position with possible deep pockets for greedy attorneys.
The way you talk on this group you'd think he was diddling every boy and girl he could get his hands on...yet, where's the beef? Just innuendo from cry babies.
You sound like quite a cry baby yourself.
It is quite true that the Sexie Sadie of The Beatles' song of the same name has never been found guilty of any "sexual indiscretions". But if Maharishi was innocent of any of the number of accusations that have been levelled at him over the years, it is not clear why he didn't defend himself. After all, he was not slow to defend all sorts of other aspects of his teaching and behaviour.
Unfortunately he likely broke no laws with his "sexual indiscretions". That is not at all true with his other behaviors. He broke lots of laws and should have been brought to trial like any other criminal. This same holds true for 99% of all gurus, religious big shots, and lots of non profits. Why are they not held accountible? Money and power. In India it's money, power, and superstitious fear. Within the TM org the same holds true. Grow up Septic!
Okay, well there are numerous sorts of behavior (not just sexual in nature) that gurus affronted Westerners with in the '60s, '70s, and later. I believe a good share of the problem can be attributed to the fact that, in effect, they were the licensors of their methods, techniques and systems, and their disciples and students were the licensees. (Actually, I don't mean to be speaking so much in the legal sense as I am in a moral and "expectational" sense.)
If we in the West want to work with gurus from the East (and there may be some good reasons to do so), then maybe our reasonable expectations of appropriate behavior need to be made known at the beginning of the relationship and organization.
Is this workable, practical? I'm not sure. It's just an idea that I offer.
We were naive, as a culture, with regard to all this back in the early '60s. No need to remain naive, eh?
There will also be those who want their spiritual teacher to be a Messiah, just so they can have their own personal saviour. But I don't believe everyone wants spiritual teachers to have high standards. Actually I reckon there are those who set the bar deliberately low, thus giving themselves the chance to hang onto whatever vices they would otherwise have to let go of.
>>There will also be those who want their spiritual teacher to be a Messiah, just so they can have their own personal saviour. But I don't believe everyone wants spiritual teachers to have high standards. Actually I reckon there are those who set the bar deliberately low, thus giving themselves the chance to hang onto whatever vices they would otherwise have to let go of.
Very interesting concepts there! But I am not looking for either a messiah or a drinking buddy...just a teacher with useful knowlege to share and normal ethical standards; meaning, they don't behave in ways that would not stand up to scrutiny if uncovered.
Maybe all people You meet are your teachers Deborah. Some of them are just teaching You what NOT to do.
One wonderful incidence for the historic records just came to my mind. Bremen Germany 1973, I was doing rounding to get "enlightened" at the Frau Eickoff academy, where MMY had spent his silence periods at the end of the -60ties.
Now there was this wonderful friend of Frau Eickoff who took care of a lot of practical things, simply made that place function. He never meditated and frequently used his "stick" against lazy rounders who did not clean after their meals etc. to not increase their metabolic rate. Many got annoyed about his "unstressing". One day I asked him if he ever met MMY and he answered oh yes many times. Then why are You not doing what he says and meditate on a regular basis. He gave the following wonderful answer in bad english:"Ein Fuhrer this life....enough....ein Fuhrer enough, diesem liebe". He made me think, and taught me a lesson I appreaciated later.
Bjarne, my German is virtually non-existent so not quite sure what this man meant, can you explain please?
Basically, he was saying that one Hitler was enough in his lifetime.
One thing I found was that after I left TM I couldn't tolerate most workshops, teachers, gurus, classes, bodyworkers, even doctors. Once burned, twice shy. I did take a few Re-evaluation co-counseling classes after I left TM, but I had to drop out because I just couldn't stand anyone standing over me and saying they knew better than me what I should do or say or think, when I thought they were wrong. (Also, RC had gotten more culty by then.)
Since leaving TM, if I feel a teacher is making an error, if I don't speak up, I have an anxiety attack. I've walked out on church sermons because the minister said something that I perceived of as his announcing his personal opinion as universal truth. One narcissistic word and Whoosh! I was out of there! I can't stand bodyworkers (that's massage therapists, etc.) touching my body without asking permission since leaving TM - gives me anxiety attacks. I fidget if I'm at a workshop and they state "this is how to deal with depression." I raise my hand and say, "On what authority do you say that? Everyone is different. That works for some people. It doesn't work for me." Since leaving TM, if the group is not run democratically, I cannot tolerate it and I drop out. Or I am assertive and disagree, and often make myself an irritant (although sometimes a few participants tell me in private that I'm a good role model for going against the herd.)
About 15 years ago, I went to a woman's group at a local Unitarian-Universalist Church. Since it was my first meeting, I felt safer not talking the first time. The leader encouraged me to talk, saying, "You'll feel more connected if you talk." This was early in my recovery, so I lost my temper and shouted, "I have run many groups, and I would NEVER tell someone they should talk if they don't feel comfortable doing so." They politely asked me to not come back. (I don't lose my temper anymore, now that I am further along in my recovery.) A few months later I went to a UU workshop on career-changing, where the same person was leading the group. The leader said to do such-and-such an exercise. I heard the alarm bells going off in my head, so I said I didn't feel comfortable doing it. She said, "Oh no, do it, you'll feel better if you do." This time I smiled sweetly and said, "I'm not wired that way." She was shocked into silence, and finally said, "Oh."
I have discovered that there are a lot of flawed teachers in the world, but since leaving TM, I cannot tolerate them. I cannot tolerate losing my power again. Basically, since leaving TM, I've stopped going to workshops or anything where I have to give up my own conscience or judgment. After selling my soul to Maharishi, I get alarm bells in my head, anxiety attacks, when I sense leaders presenting their teachings and not giving me time to consider if I think what they say is true or not. My brain tells me it's safe to "take what I like and leave the rest," but my gut goes on "alert" and just can't tolerate the possibility of losing my soul again.
Anyone else have similar experiences?
Yes Laurie, for sure I can relate to a lot of what You share above. I dont think I was as seriously traumatized as some of the commentators on this blog. For one thing I was never born into a cultic thinking - quite the reverse. Another thing is that I never spent money on the TM-movement as I left it at an early stage in the seventies. I am still captured,in a wonderful way, in the "gating" that took place around 1970 in connection with the hippie way of behaviour. I cannot, and dont want to close that door of the Quest opened at that period. I met many fakes and a few, to me, spiritual inspirators, that I still respect. I dont think that "once burned - twice shy" will ever prevent You from being burned again. As I see it the main thing is to trust Your self and nothing else. Just as an example I will present a Guru seldom discussed on this blog that I, although I never met him, even today is an inspirator to me, and that is Poonja or Papaji. He lived an active family life and held important working positions in India society, and visited all known Gurus including MMY, whom he called a good businessman. He had two questions to all of them. 1) Have You met God? and if they said yes 2) show him to me. His emphasis was on trust in yourself. I have some good friends who knew him, and they definately seem to be in good contact with themselves. I would like to share a video with You of the first meeting between one of them, Gunnar Muhlman and Papaji:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=T...feature=channel
I would like to hear Your comments on this one, as it deals with trust in Gurus.In the aftermath of Papaji some of his followers, especially in the west, have set out as what I would call pseudoadvaitas. However, some of them are beautiful natural active people not wanting to sell anything
'Anyone else have similar experiences?'
You are describing my life for years after leaving my cultic family of origin. I have no easy answers, I felt that same horror of being pushed into a particular way of thinking and being and was quite agressive and obnoxious in staving off these incursions. It was very alienating and lonely but better than being drawn into someone elses reality bubble again.
It did get better for me as I learned better ways of standing up for myself and I got very good at arguing my point as I had so much practice. With hindsight I can see that this is a necessary process but it was quite dreadful to experience it for a long time.
There is no rule that you have to agree with anybody about anything, or that you have to belong to any groups at all or to define yourself by any common label.
All teachers are flawed people, just as we all are, the best of them do not pretend otherwise and can accommodate us difficult types.
I watched your Pooja clip as I once met Andrew Cohen, his student, and was horrified by his overweening arrogance even in his very early career. Poonja sounds quite sane, while Cohen has become the stereotype of an abusive guru with his own cult, by all accounts.
Another example maybe of the stupidity of the notion of person-to-person transmission. Cohen presumably listened to his own inner voice and it told him to claim god-like status and set up an abusive cult.
Exactly Helen! Quite tricky, this is what i mean by moneymaking pseudoadvaitagurus
UK article -
Ex-Scientologist sues the cult for loss of girlfriend and business
http://www.independent.co.uk/new...ml?
action=Popup
How lost loved ones, children, spouses, parents, siblings & businesses to TM? Too many to count. litigation material? shrug.
Wolves in Sheep's Clothing, Gingerbread house witch, Pinocchio's pleasure island, Demeter seduced by satan. Evil is, and always will be among us, dressed, "as the most beautiful angel from heaven"
IMHO, if the promises are grand, then beware. Be aware!
g
Correction... Demeter was seduced by Hades to his fiery realm inside Sicily's Volcano Etna (precursor to the Christian concept of Satan).
g
Oh jeez!
I shouldn't write ANYthing before downing my morning cafe'!
Demeter's daughter, Persephone, was seduced by Hades to his fiery subterranean lair.
Not that anyone cares.
My point remains: when anyone promises to solve all problems, take care of you, guarantees endless happiness, salvation, prosperity and social accolades, with one solution - use caution before proceeding.
This could be in the from of guru, political leader, relationship, employer, therapist or family member.
There are no easy answers.
I agree with Bjarne, each person we encounter can be a teacher. We may not have consciously chosen the lessons we learn(ed) from that particular teacher. Those lessons that we chose unconsciously may have been the most valuable lessons of all!
Paraphrase of a quote from Maurice Sendak "We make life up as we go." And hope for the best.
Best to all!
g
Sorry Gina could not resist posting this illustration to Your statement:
"Pinocchio's pleasure island"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=G...player_embedded
This connects, I hope, to the topic at hand, more thoughts about recovering from TM. This memory has been rolling around in my head for the past few days:
For some reason back in 1981 in Fairfield I had to talk to Bevan about something. He was something like Dean, President, or Chancellor of MIU at the time. I was wearing black wool pants, a gray angora vest and I think a cashmere white sweater. Also an inexpensive shell necklace a dear Fairfield friend had given me. (Sharon Travis/Sharon Jepson - anyone know her?) I was so scared to talk to him, because I felt my outfit was just borderline within the dress code, and I feared he was going to criticize me. (The outfit was "coordinated" not "matching.") Before TM I was the long-haired, no-makeup, no bra, unshaven legs, unshaven armpits, barefoot, long dangly earrings, embroidered blue jeans type, so my MIU outfit was quite a stretch for me, but maybe just not good enough.) Also, I was doing Re-evaluation Co-Counseling on the sly at the time, and I was convinced that Bevan, who everyone sort of presumed was enlightened, could read my mind and knew about this. So I was very intimidated by being around him. I think this incident speaks to the level of brainwashing I was under at the time. Ouch. Anyone else have any quirky memories they want to share?
"Anyone else have similar experiences?" asked by Laurie.
Oh, yes, my BS detector works full-force after TM. I realized however that there were some people who had their BS detector working at a earlier age than I did, but, I think, they were actually few in number.
I would guess that probably 90% of people under the age 25 have been sucked into some rigid belief system, be it religious, political, or psychological. Cornering "The Truth" is just how a youthful mind develops. As far as I can tell, it is nearly a universal stage of mental development. However, some get stuck there.
I feel sad about what so many of the Muslim youth are being sucked into now... I think with age there is at least a chance for greater wisdom, but no guarantee.
C'est la vie --- Let's forgive ourselves, and move on. As we all know, it could have been a lot worse.
Perhaps after centuries of organised religion people are just expecting to find the perfect religion. But with respect to Maharishi he wasn't offering a religion, he was teaching meditation. It was usually only those who attended his teacher training courses that got to share his religious thinking.
Personally, I was interested in Indianism and initially found Maharishi's modern attitude refreshing and useful.
But Maharishi succumbed to the adulation and his random thoughts became the basis of a New Age cult. Has people not clustered about him like popstar groupies perhaps things might have been different......
You always make me reflect Paul! Yes I will recall that my motivation for starting meditation was only to find a way of keeping the "Gate" open and go deeper, and there was a destructive behavior among the seeking youth at the time that had to be replaced to survive. It could have been Tibetan buddhism meditation, Zen - meditation or whatever. But TM was what was easily available at that time. Even when going on TTC 1971 was for deepening the exploration of meditation - it was not that I was attracted to MMY. However, meeting the charismatic colorful being at the age of 19 did fascinate me....
"I would guess that probably 90% of people under the age 25 have been sucked into some rigid belief system, be it religious, political, or psychological."
I went through exactly this starting at age 25. And (drumroll), I already knew as much as one could have known at that time about cults. A survivor of Jim Jones church came to speak at a social psychology class I took at university. Only reason he was alive was he had been told to stay in San Francisco, while his wife, kids and relatives all joined Jones in Guyana--and perished.
I began to meditate on my own and soon felt I needed help and was worried about being pulled into a cult. I was referred to our campus chaplain who had trained as a spiritual director under the tutelage of a celebrated Catholic priest.
Turned out my guy was narcissistic, failed to honor boundaries, used techniques of therapy but was not licensed to be a therapist. He got sudden celebrity due to a social justice crisis that hit our area and in the mean time, put legions of friends and admirers, including me, into his board of directors.
Only reason we didnt fuck was good fortune and fear on my part. A lot of inappropriate hugging and kissing, though. And this guy was married.
What angers me to this day I was warned him I'd been through an emotionally incestuous mess with my own father. The guy should have referred me to someone else, but he was too self centered to pay attention to his own countertransferance issues.
I repeatedly expressed concern about whether our work was in the service of god or not, but he kept reassuring me.
But..when I began to challenge him about some serious patterns of selfishness in his activism..bang, he suddenly stated our work had to end--and had the nerve to quote my own earlier misgivings back to me--misgivings he had ignored.
It took 6 to 7 years of real therapy and a lot of research before I understood how this guy had mishandled me and the situation and wrote him a tough letter in the form of what a clinical supervisor would have written, pin pointing all his areas of professional malfeasance.
He couldnt deal with it, but I felt Id written my own diploma.
But..that was part of the trouble, I knew about cults but not about one person psychotherapy cults. And I didnt know how to identify a guy who could hide his own narcissism so very well and create a collusive community of support. To this day he is still considered a saint among the social circle I no longer am part of.
And..part of how I ended his domination of my inner life was to exit Christianity. As he and I had practiced it, it failed to provide the insight tools needed.
Final note: I have a crummy feeling that at age 25, had I not crossed paths with this charismatic christian spiritual advisor, I could just as easily have gotten into a cultic mess with someone equally plausible who practiced from some different belief
system.
And..I might have had to find my freedom by exiting *that* belief sytem and going to an entirely different one to get the necessary outside vantage point--and insight tools.
The best we can do is offer quality information and *sanctuaries of support* for those persons who do stagger free from their ordeal and want help making sense of what they've been through.
Theres a cottage industry of guru apologetics in which blame the victim and excuse or pity the perpetrator is the standard mantra.
Survivors need to be warned about these shame peddlers, the ones who keep blaming our own craving minds and steer discussions away from the techniques used by and the social contexts that empower serial predators and charlatans who poison the well of spiritual quest.
I like this Sendak paraphrase:
"We make life up as we go."
It chimes well with a favourite of mine:
"Its a random universe to which we bring meaning"
Taneman, I liked your idea of having a written standard of behavior which we present to our Eastern guru. Perhaps one of the reasons I/we got sucked into MMY's world with such ease (and other Westerners get sucked into other Eastern guru cults with such ease) is because we Westerners have assumptions about what a highly spiritual person acts like, which we have gleaned from the Abrahamic religions. Things like: honest, humble, kind, gives to the poor, not manipulative, values people over possessions, etc. So when we met a "spiritual teacher" from the East, we assumed that he had the same value system.
But Maharishi never promised us that he was, or we'd become, more honest, humble, kind, give to the poor, less manipulative, more interested in people than in possessions etc. I don't think many of those things have even been "researched" by the TM movement!
Hmmm, let's see - I'm looking at a 1974 MIU workbook on the scientific research (sorry this booklet is so old - if anyone has newer info that disproves my theory please speak up!)
Here are some of the areas studied in the booklet where TM supposedly improves a person:
In The Psychological Area: increased intelligence & comprehension, decreased anxiety & depression, increased sociability & warm relationships, increased learning ability & productivity, increased respect, spontaneity & tolerance, reduced irritability, increased self-confidence & good humor....
Further, what MMY *did* promise us, rather than these "spiritual" virtues, were things like unboundedness, bliss, knowledge of all the laws of nature, immortality, supernatural powers, perfect health, etc. So the information was all there for us to see. I for one, was hoping, among other things, to increase my "virtues", Maharishi in plain sight promised me few of those, offered other things, and I managed to dissociate and not even notice that he was not offering me what I valued.
The organization that he left may or may not provide the promises he made, (I haven't noticed any immortality, knowledge of all the laws of nature, supernatural, etc.) and it is decidedly lacking in those Abrahamic virtues which he never promised. So why should I/we be surprised?
"Maharishi never promised us that he was, or we'd become, more honest, humble, kind, give to the poor, less manipulative, more interested in people than in possessions etc. I don't think many of those things have even been "researched" by the TM movement!"
Instead, he said TM was conducive to "all good in life." Leaving us to project onto that 'inkblot' whatever we felt were positive values and outcomes.
Interesting point, Laurie.
One caveat: I think it's not just the Abrahamic religions that value virtues like kindness, compassion, peacefulness, and humility. These are there also in the literature of Chinese Taoism and the Buddhist traditions.
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