An Advaita forum focusing on Realisation, enlightenment, non-duality, Real Love, peace, freedom, Your original nature, abiding naturally, the Oneness, the Noneness, and Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj.
Now you can receive for $40 a downloadable computer file version of the same 7-hour satsang that seekers receive when they visit for the Advaita Retreat with Floyd. You will be guided through the seven steps from identification with the false "I" to the Absolute (and beyond).
For more information or to order, click:
DVD or Downloadable computer file versions of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat
For more information or to order, click:
DVD or Downloadable computer file versions of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat
F.: Working recently with some persons who are involved in one or more of the various versions of “Twelve-Step Spiritual Programs,” two comments were heard repeatedly: (1) a plethora of references were made to “my Higher Power” and (2) persons spoke of “being in conscious contact with my Higher Power.”
Most all persons in such programs ignore the pointer in their own literature that provided their book’s last and final word on “God” which explains exactly what they have been referring to all along as the “Higher Power”:
“With few exceptions, our members find that they have tapped into an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a Power greater than themselves.” So that—an inner resource—is really what the founders of the original program were referring to as opposed to what their membership today mistakenly believes is a physical god.
Wait. Not a personal god (which, in their case, is believed to come complete with male appendages)? No. Therefore, any so-called “prayers” or petitions that they make are, unknowingly, nothing more than their talking in their sleep as they try to communicate with the Pure Consciousness within.
That fact is blocked from their awareness by their belief in a fictional outer resource rather than an inner resource, so they actually believe that they are talking to some physically present, material, male god. In the extreme (but increasingly frequent) cases, schizophrenia manifests as many claim that they not only talk to god but that they also actually hear god's response. Talk about duality!
Just as noted in the recent “Personality Trumps God” series, these in so-called “spirituality-based recovery groups” can also speak of their “conscious contact” with their totally-conceptualized god. (Their book says, “Why don’t you choose your own conception of God?”). "Choose a concept" = "Dream up an idea" = "Just make up something."
But the question that must be asked of those speaking of a duality-based contact (with an "A" talking to some "B") is this:
“What benefit could possibly be received from your conscious contact with anything if you are being driven by subconscious motivators (namely, the fears and desires and agendas of personality) which you have no consciousness of at all?"
How asleep the masses are to the functioning of the fiction-filled mind that determines thoughts and words and deeds, regardless of how much credit they give to an imaginary, outer resource or power.
And even when they have a rare glimpse of the fact that all of their religious work and / or spiritual work produces no consistency at all in doing what almost any conceptualized version of a god would want, they will blame themselves; or will become temporarily angry with god; or will blame god; or will claim that they do not have to understand the inconsistencies because their god "works in mysterious ways."
If you are among the masses who are lost in that dream, it is as if you are in the back seat of a car which is being driven by Person “A” while you are claiming that you only trust “B” to drive, even though “B” is in the back seat with you.
It is, in fact, as if you are claiming that “B” is really driving the car though anyone that can witness the truth can see clearly that Person “A” is driving the car. In this case, Person “A” refers to any and all persons / personas that are driving your every thought and word and deed while you have no clue at all in regards to who or what is really driving you.
Further, in this case, the car is your relative existence which is being driven by subconscious and unconscious influences, and “B” in this case is your “god” who is assigned to the back seat, who is not influencing where the car goes, and who has no control over when it goes or how it goes. “B" (a.k.a., "your Higher Power"), in fact, has no power at all.
Thus, persons can (and do, most publicly) make the claim that they are religious and / or spiritual, that they are “doing the work,” that they are godly and god-driven, and that they are seeking god’s will in their lives via "conscious contact with Him."
But when—for example—one of them gets in the face of another, screams in anger, and kicks items across the room, then it is clear that it is the Type Eight Personality that is driving their thoughts and words and deeds, not the god to whom they give lip service only.
By no stretch of any imaginings that persons can use to dream up a conceptualized god would there be a type of god that endorses such conduct. Or is there? Actually, a lack of logic and reason makes that type of god seemingly possible in their imaginings.
In the first part of the Christian Bible, there is an angry god. In the second part, there is a kind, loving god, but a god that is co-dependent. (You can make him angry or sad, or you can please Him and make him glad; thus, He actually has no power over His own feelings. How He feels is determined by you, so how could He possibly help you with the way you feel?)
So there are exceptions to the "always kind and loving" concept of God. Christians claimed that their god accepted the slaughter of 150,000,000 people in the "New(?) World" in order to activate the principle of "Manifest Destiny," claiming the slaughtered were "ungodly heathens anyway." It was a group of Christians in Germany who dreamed up the concept of “The Final Solution” and killed 6,000,000 non-Christian Jews.
Some Muslims are claiming that their God wants them to destroy those outside their religion (or those inside their religion but not in their sect). So, yes, the freedom to “choose your own conception of God” provides the leeway for personas to justify in the name of their God(s) anything inspired by their personas, be that loving and helping or be it fighting, raging, divorce, war, killing, and / or genocide.
In any and all such cases, however, the evidence is clear that it is their Highest Power—a persona / personality—that is the sole and ultimate influencer of thoughts and words and actions, always relegating what they claim to be their “Higher Power” to second place…or less.
Here is how far the delusion plays out and evidences the degree to which personas drive thoughts and words and actions:
A Spiritual One: “I am really afraid.”
F.: “Do you know the actual source of that fear?”
A Spiritual One: “Yes – it’s my fault because I have not being saying ‘The Fear Prayer’ enough.”
Spiritual One #2: “I have been fired from four jobs because of sexual misconduct, but you know what? There’s only God’s will. It’s all good.”
F.: “Do you know which persona is driving you into that level of self-deception and is inspiring you to put a ‘spin’ on every happening in order to justify your conduct in this relative existence?”
Spiritual One #2: “No persona is driving me. God drives me.”
A Spiritual One #3: “I’ve been going into rages quite a bit lately.”
F.: “Do you know what is actually driving that?”
A Spiritual One #3: “Yes – I haven’t worked the steps in a long time. I need to go back through the Work to get back in touch with God.”
Persons can and will talk all they want about their “Higher Power” and about “being blessed” and about “turning their will over to God,” but it is the will of the self (of the false self or selves) that will ultimately determine what they think and what they say and what they do.
The Realized know that there is no external, supernatural power at all and that there is no such thing as a dualistic differentiation between “higher vs. highest”; therefore, they also understand that there is no “A” that can be in contact with a “B.”
There is merely an understanding of the functioning of the totality and an awareness that there is nothing that has anything at all to do with what programmed persons believe to be “supernatural” and "higher than."
Tomorrow, though, it will be shown that there has been a history of persons who want more than conscious contact with a god or gods. There is, in fact, a long history of persons who have claimed that they have transcended the dualistic, subject-object arrangement of conscious contact with god and have actually become at one with God and are therefore gods as well.
Most all persons in such programs ignore the pointer in their own literature that provided their book’s last and final word on “God” which explains exactly what they have been referring to all along as the “Higher Power”:
“With few exceptions, our members find that they have tapped into an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a Power greater than themselves.” So that—an inner resource—is really what the founders of the original program were referring to as opposed to what their membership today mistakenly believes is a physical god.
Wait. Not a personal god (which, in their case, is believed to come complete with male appendages)? No. Therefore, any so-called “prayers” or petitions that they make are, unknowingly, nothing more than their talking in their sleep as they try to communicate with the Pure Consciousness within.
That fact is blocked from their awareness by their belief in a fictional outer resource rather than an inner resource, so they actually believe that they are talking to some physically present, material, male god. In the extreme (but increasingly frequent) cases, schizophrenia manifests as many claim that they not only talk to god but that they also actually hear god's response. Talk about duality!
Just as noted in the recent “Personality Trumps God” series, these in so-called “spirituality-based recovery groups” can also speak of their “conscious contact” with their totally-conceptualized god. (Their book says, “Why don’t you choose your own conception of God?”). "Choose a concept" = "Dream up an idea" = "Just make up something."
But the question that must be asked of those speaking of a duality-based contact (with an "A" talking to some "B") is this:
“What benefit could possibly be received from your conscious contact with anything if you are being driven by subconscious motivators (namely, the fears and desires and agendas of personality) which you have no consciousness of at all?"
How asleep the masses are to the functioning of the fiction-filled mind that determines thoughts and words and deeds, regardless of how much credit they give to an imaginary, outer resource or power.
And even when they have a rare glimpse of the fact that all of their religious work and / or spiritual work produces no consistency at all in doing what almost any conceptualized version of a god would want, they will blame themselves; or will become temporarily angry with god; or will blame god; or will claim that they do not have to understand the inconsistencies because their god "works in mysterious ways."
If you are among the masses who are lost in that dream, it is as if you are in the back seat of a car which is being driven by Person “A” while you are claiming that you only trust “B” to drive, even though “B” is in the back seat with you.
It is, in fact, as if you are claiming that “B” is really driving the car though anyone that can witness the truth can see clearly that Person “A” is driving the car. In this case, Person “A” refers to any and all persons / personas that are driving your every thought and word and deed while you have no clue at all in regards to who or what is really driving you.
Further, in this case, the car is your relative existence which is being driven by subconscious and unconscious influences, and “B” in this case is your “god” who is assigned to the back seat, who is not influencing where the car goes, and who has no control over when it goes or how it goes. “B" (a.k.a., "your Higher Power"), in fact, has no power at all.
Thus, persons can (and do, most publicly) make the claim that they are religious and / or spiritual, that they are “doing the work,” that they are godly and god-driven, and that they are seeking god’s will in their lives via "conscious contact with Him."
But when—for example—one of them gets in the face of another, screams in anger, and kicks items across the room, then it is clear that it is the Type Eight Personality that is driving their thoughts and words and deeds, not the god to whom they give lip service only.
By no stretch of any imaginings that persons can use to dream up a conceptualized god would there be a type of god that endorses such conduct. Or is there? Actually, a lack of logic and reason makes that type of god seemingly possible in their imaginings.
In the first part of the Christian Bible, there is an angry god. In the second part, there is a kind, loving god, but a god that is co-dependent. (You can make him angry or sad, or you can please Him and make him glad; thus, He actually has no power over His own feelings. How He feels is determined by you, so how could He possibly help you with the way you feel?)
So there are exceptions to the "always kind and loving" concept of God. Christians claimed that their god accepted the slaughter of 150,000,000 people in the "New(?) World" in order to activate the principle of "Manifest Destiny," claiming the slaughtered were "ungodly heathens anyway." It was a group of Christians in Germany who dreamed up the concept of “The Final Solution” and killed 6,000,000 non-Christian Jews.
Some Muslims are claiming that their God wants them to destroy those outside their religion (or those inside their religion but not in their sect). So, yes, the freedom to “choose your own conception of God” provides the leeway for personas to justify in the name of their God(s) anything inspired by their personas, be that loving and helping or be it fighting, raging, divorce, war, killing, and / or genocide.
In any and all such cases, however, the evidence is clear that it is their Highest Power—a persona / personality—that is the sole and ultimate influencer of thoughts and words and actions, always relegating what they claim to be their “Higher Power” to second place…or less.
Here is how far the delusion plays out and evidences the degree to which personas drive thoughts and words and actions:
A Spiritual One: “I am really afraid.”
F.: “Do you know the actual source of that fear?”
A Spiritual One: “Yes – it’s my fault because I have not being saying ‘The Fear Prayer’ enough.”
Spiritual One #2: “I have been fired from four jobs because of sexual misconduct, but you know what? There’s only God’s will. It’s all good.”
F.: “Do you know which persona is driving you into that level of self-deception and is inspiring you to put a ‘spin’ on every happening in order to justify your conduct in this relative existence?”
Spiritual One #2: “No persona is driving me. God drives me.”
A Spiritual One #3: “I’ve been going into rages quite a bit lately.”
F.: “Do you know what is actually driving that?”
A Spiritual One #3: “Yes – I haven’t worked the steps in a long time. I need to go back through the Work to get back in touch with God.”
Persons can and will talk all they want about their “Higher Power” and about “being blessed” and about “turning their will over to God,” but it is the will of the self (of the false self or selves) that will ultimately determine what they think and what they say and what they do.
The Realized know that there is no external, supernatural power at all and that there is no such thing as a dualistic differentiation between “higher vs. highest”; therefore, they also understand that there is no “A” that can be in contact with a “B.”
There is merely an understanding of the functioning of the totality and an awareness that there is nothing that has anything at all to do with what programmed persons believe to be “supernatural” and "higher than."
Tomorrow, though, it will be shown that there has been a history of persons who want more than conscious contact with a god or gods. There is, in fact, a long history of persons who have claimed that they have transcended the dualistic, subject-object arrangement of conscious contact with god and have actually become at one with God and are therefore gods as well.
Please enter the silence of contemplation.
SIX WAYS THAT SEEKERS HAVE REALIZED:
1. BY WATCHING the 4-Disk Video (DVD) Set, or the same retreat available as a downloadable file. Either will provide an entire seven-hour retreat / series of satsang sessions showing three seekers being guided through all seven steps by Floyd and can provide viewers with an “experiential,” step-by-step series of satsang meetings that will move the viewers from identification with the I to abidance as the Absolute and then to abidance as That Which Is beyond
Some seekers are already using the computer file version and the DVD sets for meetings in groups in homes, playing the retreat, pausing for discussion, etc.
To find out more or to purchase the DVD set or the downloadable computer file version of the retreat, click:
DVD or Downloadable computer file versions of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat
Option “A” is for the downloadable file version, Option “B” is used to order the DVD set for delivery inside the U.S., Option “C” for international orders.
For the download, Paypal will send me a notice that payment has been received and then I will send by e-mail the downloading instruction, password, etc.
[It is recommended that you watch the video with pen and paper in hand. Write whatever you need clarified. You'll see that there are constant reviews and you might find an answer later in the seven-hour presentation. Then, after you watch it all, there will be a common ground for discussion. Purchase of the DVD’s or the file will include the right to clarifications and answers to your specific questions via e-mail.]
2. BY READING these books in this exact order:
IT'S ALL BULLSHIT (And Why Knowing It Sets You Free)
SPIRITUAL SOBRIETY (Recovering What Religions Lost)
[Those two prepare the seeker to question it all]
THE MEDITATION GUIDES
[Provide a broad overview of the understanding]
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I DIE?
[Begins to free the seeker of body identification and the desire for body continuity]
THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS "PEACE OF MIND" (There Is Only Peace if You're Out of Your Mind)
[Shows the seeker how to be free of the subconscious motivators of the false content of the “mind”]
LIBERATION
[Shows the seeker how to be free of the subconscious motivators of personas]
THE ESSENCE OF THE TEACHINGS
[Provides the final preparation for the seeker to be directed along the “path”]
FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE (A Seven-Step Journey to Reality)
[Directs the seeker along the “path”]
CONSCIOUSNESS/AWARENESS: The Nature of Reality Beyond Self-Realization (Peace Every Day When Abiding as The Absolute)
[Allows the seeker to understand the functioning of the totality, the manifestation, and what is involved with the un-manifestation]
FROM THE ABSOLUTE TO THE NOTHINGNESS
[Provides the seeker the wisdom to understand the Noneness as well as the Oneness]
Purchase an e-Book now and begin reading it in minutes (except with e-checks that can take 7-10 days). Trusting our clients as we do, all e-Books are provided to you in printable form.
SAVE IF YOU BUY ALL ELEVEN AT ONCE:
(You may order the books one at a time or you may use the following link to acquire the entire 11-e-Book set on sale for $99 if ordered at one time with the “Buy Now” button below. For this option, there will be no download links provided; once the near-instant notice of payment is received from PayPal, your e-Books will be sent to you as e-mail attachments. All are printable for your convenience.)
1. BY WATCHING the 4-Disk Video (DVD) Set, or the same retreat available as a downloadable file. Either will provide an entire seven-hour retreat / series of satsang sessions showing three seekers being guided through all seven steps by Floyd and can provide viewers with an “experiential,” step-by-step series of satsang meetings that will move the viewers from identification with the I to abidance as the Absolute and then to abidance as That Which Is beyond
Some seekers are already using the computer file version and the DVD sets for meetings in groups in homes, playing the retreat, pausing for discussion, etc.
To find out more or to purchase the DVD set or the downloadable computer file version of the retreat, click:
DVD or Downloadable computer file versions of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat
Option “A” is for the downloadable file version, Option “B” is used to order the DVD set for delivery inside the U.S., Option “C” for international orders.
For the download, Paypal will send me a notice that payment has been received and then I will send by e-mail the downloading instruction, password, etc.
[It is recommended that you watch the video with pen and paper in hand. Write whatever you need clarified. You'll see that there are constant reviews and you might find an answer later in the seven-hour presentation. Then, after you watch it all, there will be a common ground for discussion. Purchase of the DVD’s or the file will include the right to clarifications and answers to your specific questions via e-mail.]
2. BY READING these books in this exact order:
IT'S ALL BULLSHIT (And Why Knowing It Sets You Free)
SPIRITUAL SOBRIETY (Recovering What Religions Lost)
[Those two prepare the seeker to question it all]
THE MEDITATION GUIDES
[Provide a broad overview of the understanding]
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I DIE?
[Begins to free the seeker of body identification and the desire for body continuity]
THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS "PEACE OF MIND" (There Is Only Peace if You're Out of Your Mind)
[Shows the seeker how to be free of the subconscious motivators of the false content of the “mind”]
LIBERATION
[Shows the seeker how to be free of the subconscious motivators of personas]
THE ESSENCE OF THE TEACHINGS
[Provides the final preparation for the seeker to be directed along the “path”]
FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE (A Seven-Step Journey to Reality)
[Directs the seeker along the “path”]
CONSCIOUSNESS/AWARENESS: The Nature of Reality Beyond Self-Realization (Peace Every Day When Abiding as The Absolute)
[Allows the seeker to understand the functioning of the totality, the manifestation, and what is involved with the un-manifestation]
FROM THE ABSOLUTE TO THE NOTHINGNESS
[Provides the seeker the wisdom to understand the Noneness as well as the Oneness]
Purchase an e-Book now and begin reading it in minutes (except with e-checks that can take 7-10 days). Trusting our clients as we do, all e-Books are provided to you in printable form.
SAVE IF YOU BUY ALL ELEVEN AT ONCE:
(You may order the books one at a time or you may use the following link to acquire the entire 11-e-Book set on sale for $99 if ordered at one time with the “Buy Now” button below. For this option, there will be no download links provided; once the near-instant notice of payment is received from PayPal, your e-Books will be sent to you as e-mail attachments. All are printable for your convenience.)
You may visit The Official Website of Floyd Henderson for information on each book.
3. BY ENROLLING in the Online Advaita Classes
For information, visit Information on the Advaita Classes on the Internet
To enroll visit Enroll in the Advaita Internet Course
4. BY ATTENDING an Advaitin retreat for satsang with floyd and being guided through all seven steps. For details of the retreats offered, please visit the retreat information site.
5. BY ARRANGING satsang by telephone in the U.S. or by Skype internationally:
Use the Contact link for details or for information on making arrangements for a session
6. BY ARRANGING for floyd to travel to your location and meet with you or your group. Use the contact link above to discuss details.
3. BY ENROLLING in the Online Advaita Classes
For information, visit Information on the Advaita Classes on the Internet
To enroll visit Enroll in the Advaita Internet Course
4. BY ATTENDING an Advaitin retreat for satsang with floyd and being guided through all seven steps. For details of the retreats offered, please visit the retreat information site.
5. BY ARRANGING satsang by telephone in the U.S. or by Skype internationally:
Use the Contact link for details or for information on making arrangements for a session
6. BY ARRANGING for floyd to travel to your location and meet with you or your group. Use the contact link above to discuss details.
