TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
ANNOUNCEMENTS
1. [See the offer in gold text following this post for details on how you can watch a retreat on video which includes a detailed discussion of all seven of the steps on the path as used by Maharaj]
2. Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns. See the green text after today's post for the full meaning and implications of that.
3. A new video ("Number Ten: Awakening Together Satsang, March 2018") has now been added in the far right column of this page, offering the opportunity to view a recent 2018 satsang session with Floyd being interviewed by Regina and Jacqueline of "The Awakening Together Group." (See the details in the blue text after this post.)
4. I have only two remaining paperback copies of the book co-authored with Mark Houston, A Twelve-Step Journey to SELF-Transformation, a potentially-effective gift for someone struggling with an addiction to alcohol (or to anything else, really). The book lists for $19.95 + Priority Mail shipping. To purchase, you may use the donate button at the top right of this page and include a note that the $27.60 is for the Twelve-Step book. Regrets to international visitors but this is only available within the U.S. because international shipping rates are prohibitive and time-consuming and cannot be tracked.
The point in this series is that the non-dual message has long been widespread but has seldom been understood either then or now.
To continue:
THE NON-DUALITY MESSAGE AS OFFERED IN FILM
Today:
“Inception,” “The Game,” and “The Legend of Bagger Vance”
“Inception”
[Leonardo DiCaprio’s attraction to non-dual messages is evidenced in the fact that he played the lead in both “Shutter Island” and “Inception”]
One reviewer wrote:
“ . . . The seemingly complicated premise of dream-stealing is intertwined with the journey of the main character Cobb. The main storyline centres on a deal that Cobb strikes with Saito, a powerful global businessman which leads to Cobb performing the task of ‘inception’ (the implanting of ideas in others’ mind so that they imagine it to be of their own creation).”
“ . . . The task takes Cobb and his colleagues deep within multiple dream-layers in order to manipulate another man’s mind.
“ . . . The film employs the genres of sci-fi, psychological thriller, film noir and heist in order to raise questions about narrative seduction, mind control, dreams, and the power of the unconscious” while addressing the question, ‘What is dream and what is reality?’”
The film asks, “Although it seems easy to distinguish dreams and reality, how do we know that there is just one ‘reality’, or that our notion of reality is just an elaborately designed, prolonged dream?”
That “was posed a long time ago by René Descartes, who suggested a form of radical scepticism about the nature of reality.”
To help grasp the message offered in the film Inception, consider this exchange from an Advaitin text:
Disciple: “What then is the difference between the dream and waking states?”
Master: “Both are only mental and illusory, only the waking world is a long drawn out illusion and the dream is a short one. This is the only difference and nothing more.”
“The Game”
Three concepts repeatedly targeted by non-dual messaging are obsessiveness and the desire for control and the desire for the power to be able to exercise that control in all cases.
In “The Game,” all are at the forefront.
One reviewer shared this about the lead character:
“Nicholas Van Orton is a rich man in obsessive control of his life. The movie seems to be about how an egomaniac is reduced to humility and humanity . . . or, maybe that's just a trick on him. The movie is like a control freak's worst nightmare.”
Orton’s brother gives him a birthday present called “The Game," operated by a shadowy outfit named Consumer Recreation Services. The present never quite declares its rules or objectives, but soon Van Orton finds himself in its grasp, and his seemingly ‘orderly’ life becomes unmanageable.”
“Soon everything starts to fall apart. His pen leaks. His briefcase won't open. Wine is spilled on him in a restaurant. He is trapped in an elevator. The level of chaos rises. He finds himself blackmailed, his bank accounts are emptied, he wanders like a homeless man, he is trapped inside a cab sinking in a bay, he is left for dead in Mexico. Of course many of the physical details of what happens to him are implausible or even impossible, but so what? The events are believable in the sense that events can be believed in a nightmare.”
In the end, it can be seen that far too many humans assume ego-states, that far too many allow their egotism to drive their every thought and word and action, and that humans usually misinterpret and exaggerate all of ‘the hardships they’ve endured.”
Ultimately, with those who entered the loft, Maharaj was simply going about the business of
(1) trying to strip away all of their egotism-driven false identities (both assumed and assigned in cultures; of
(2) trying to eliminate their suffering-and-misery-generating drive to obtain power; of
(3) trying to strip away their desire to control which drives their desire for power; and of
(4) seeing things - both relative and supposedly noumenal - in a proper perspective.
Shown too is this:
Sometimes cultures support the egomaniacal “monsters” they “create”; other times, they turn on them eventually and wear them down and crush them. (How often has it been seen that some elevated to the supposed status of “greatness” end up seeing the masses turn on them and try to bring them down?)
In the end, it can be seen that all of the "stuff" - whether deemed to be phenomenal or noumenal - is actually just much ado about nothing and amounts to nothing more than one big joke in which "Mother Nature" is constantly giving humankind a tweak on its nose.
“The Legend of Bagger Vance”
One writer described the film as a story about “a depressed World War I veteran who finds his authentic self during a golf tournament.”
At one point, Bagger Vance says, "Inside each and every one of us is our one true authentic swing. Something we was born with. Something that's ours and ours alone. Something that can't be learned. Something that's got to be remembered."
It is explained that the vehicle for the depressed lead character’s transformation “is the game of golf where he becomes one with the game.” Included is the non-dual message that being at one "is only possible when one sets aside ego and the constant desire to win.”
[Alert: Some have complained that the movie is far too invested in “popular spirituality” while others have complained that "there's an effort to mix religious and spiritual messages."
Steven J. Rosen in his book Gita on the Green postulated that the plot of this film "is loosely based on the Hindu text the Bhagavad Gita, where the Warrior / Hero Arjuna (the model for the film’s character R. Junuh) refuses to fight. Krishna, Rosen said, appears as Bhagavan (Bagger Vance) to help him to follow his path as the warrior and hero that he was meant to be" - a message which only reinforces the notion of assuming "good" false identifications to replace "bad" false identifications.]
To be continued.
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Here, with those who are still driven to talk about "God," the "Son of God," the "Holy Spirit," "Buddha," "Krishna," etc., etc., etc., the invitation to them is to view those as verbs, not nouns.
THE EXPLANATION
If looked at as nouns, they point to illusions and are, therefore, a total waste of time to even discuss; if looked at as verbs which are resulting in certain sane but rare behaviors among humanity, then they are worthy of some attention during the relative existence.
Meaning? There are members of certain groups who say things such as "My concept of God in the past was of a weak God, an absentee God, A Santa Claus-type God, a mean, punishing, vindictive God, etc. Today, I am in close contact with a loving and caring God whom I worship and praise and glorify and give thanks to."
The reply to that usually goes like this: "If you are in contact with a God that wants to be worshipped and praised and glorified, then you're dealing with someone like yourself - a narcissist - and hanging out with narcissists will never bring an end to your narcissism (that narcissism evidenced by the fact that you think you are "godly").
Next, in the phrase 'loving and caring God,' any supposed God that truly had her or his act together would tell you that the totally irrelevant part of that phrase is 'God' and that the only part that is relevant is the "loving and caring" part.
"That is, a non-narcissistic god / goddess would say, "I care not an iota about being worshipped and praised and glorified by you or anyone else. How arrogant and insecure and needy would I have to be to want that? Forget the man-made, dreamed up noun 'God' and focus on the 'God as a verb' understanding and then go forth and let loving and caring be verbs - not adjectives - and let them generate the act of love and the act of caring and let those actions manifest through you."
Yeshu'a (Jesus) and Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis were spot on:
"No one shall ever see 'the kingdom of heaven.' It is within"
--Yeshu'a (Jesus)
and
"Heaven and earth shall fade away."
--Yeshu'a (Jesus)
and
"Heaven and hell are not geographic places
but are states of mind, nothing more than
concepts dreamed up by men."
--Pope John Paul II
"There is no hell."
--Pope Francis, the current pope
in an interview with journalist Eugenio Scalfari,
a writer used by the Pope to issue off the record
teachings which become a part of the Papal Magisterium.
[That said, would that the popes who have shown the courage to reject a core concept of their dogma - namely, "hell" - would find the additional courage required to question the very existence of their institution in light of the centuries-long cover-up of their history of raping children and in light of the mental and emotional and psychological scarring of billions of their members past and present.
And that need for courage also applies as questions need to be asked about why so many other sky cults are still being supported and allowed to continue to exist as well. When certain types of programming and conditioning have been shown to blind the masses, they should end. Will they? Not likely. Why?
Because what the masses think and say and do is most influenced by the international crime families which hold sway over the masses as criminals conduct their planet-wide operations. What are the major international crime families and which are the most influential and have the largest memberships?
The Mafia / La Cosa Nostra; the Catholic Church (with it 1.2 billion followers) whose Vatican Bank worked for decades with the Mafia while laundering mob earnings (for a 15% all-profit charge by the Bank); Protestant and Evangelical Churches (with over 1.2 billion followers) like the one I was raised in where the youth director molested and sexually assaulted young girls; big business which has long created environments in which people have been abused; powerful political bodies like the U.S. Congress, etc., etc., etc.)
With all of those crime families, neither the followers nor the leadership ever voluntarily step down or shut down their criminal activities. Be they gangs, organized crime families, religions, big business, politicians, etc., they all want control and they all want power and they all want money, and nothing internal will interfere with the driving forces at play.
The masses must demand that all those in charge must step down and their groups and institutions must shut down, and there's the real problem because the continuation of their crimes are enabled not as much by the people running such crime organizations as they are enabled by the masses of people who - wanting some perceived "payoff" - remain involved with them and give them money and support them and aid and abet the continued existence of those criminal enterprises and thus facilitate the ability of church criminals and political criminals and other types of criminals to continue to commit their crimes.]
Here's
the direct link to the VIDEO VERSION
of the "Awakening Together" satsang session with Regina and Jacqueline referenced earlier, 18 MARCH 2018
If preferred, here's
the direct link to the AUDIO VERSION
of that session.
