TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
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To review:
The discussion at this point in the series is now focusing on "The Most Influential Obstacles Of All" which have come via dreamed up myths and superstitions and via "religious" and / or "spiritual" sources, including religious and / or spiritual thoughts, ideas, concepts, notions, views, theories, inklings, perceptions, a.k.a., "beliefs."
The focus is also on this pointer:
Of the relatively few who do seek, almost all of them will seek in religious and / or spiritual venues, few understanding that realization can come without dogma, without continuous spiritual practices, and without an exclusive preoccupation with "the nature of reality and things noumenal."
Why is that significant? Recall the man who approached me after a talk and said, "I was abused as a child by a priest. I've done years of work to try to get beyond that, but where I am today is, I still cringe when people start talking religion to me. So my question is, have you found a way to guide people to realization and freedom without their having to buy into the dogma you talk about?"
That question made clear that I had not even reached the "kindergarten level of spirituality" which Maharaj condemned, much less the understandings beyond that which awaited. It was that question which would send me along a "different route" and would eventually lead me to the entirely different version of the Ultimate Medicine which is offered now.
REALIZING WITHOUT BEING FANATICAL ABOUT DOGMA
and
WITHOUT ENGAGING INCESSANTLY IN SPIRITUAL PRACTICES
and
WITHOUT A NEVER-ENDING PREOCCUPATION WITH THINGS NOUMENAL
rather than
RELAXING AND TAKING IT EASY
and then
ABIDING NATURALLY
and then
DANCING LIGHTLY THROUGHOUT THE REMAINDER OF THE MANIFESTATION
Maharaj’s version of the Ultimate Medicine shifted twice as his understanding of the Ultimate Sickness and its actual roots and what could and could not provide an effective treatment for the Sickness shifted. The first shift was away from (a) a version of the Medicine which was a religious / non-dual compound to (b) the use of a spiritual / non-dual compound. The second shift was from away that spiritual / non-dual compound version of the Medicine to (c) a psychological / non-dual version of the Medicine.
A spiritual / non-dual version of the Medicine typically involves “an Inquiry” into “the SELF”; a psychological / non-dual version of the Medicine involves an inquiry into “the self” (or, more accurately, “the selves,” the abundance of false selves which have been assigned and / or assumed as one's multiple identities).
That understanding of the actual nature of the Ultimate Sickness led Maharaj later on to advise seekers to stop reading the book referred to as “A Spiritual Classic” with its focus on “SELF-Inquiry” and to listen to his later talks which addressed the far-more-serious psychological problems of humankind which have nothing to do with a lack of expertise regarding "knowledge of 'The SELF'."
That is why he said, “Give up spirituality” and “follow your normal inclinations" and "forget spirituality." Focusing on the psychological roots of the Sickness, he said, “There is no such thing as a mind” and “I have no mind.” He advised seekers to go to the “no-mind” state, to reach a state of “zero concepts.” Why? Because the Ultimate Sickness is not about having too little religion; it is not about having a “spiritual malady” or a “sick spirit.” Humankind’s main problem, he came to see, is a mental problem marked by what he called “ignorance and stupidity and insanity.”
Religion does not cure ignorance. With few exceptions, it contributes to it. Spirituality does not cure ignorance. It can contribute to it. Nor can either eliminate the insanity of distorted thinking, delusions, personality disorders, neuroses or psychoses.
No, the problem with humans is not rooted in widespread agnosticism and atheism. Neither agnosticism nor atheism is widespread, evidenced by the fact that 97% of all persons claim an affiliation with one religion or another; additionally, the problem with humans is not rooted in their ignoring things spiritual. Millions upon millions are presently reporting, and reporting proudly, that they “are spiritual” or that they "are spiritual creatures presently having a human experience.”
No, it should be clear that the problem with humanity has nothing to do with too little religion or too little spirituality because both are plentiful - and have been for thousands of years - yet the problems of humanity continue. Obviously, therefore, neither religion nor spirituality nor any mythical procedure offers a solution or the answer or a cure or any effective treatment for what ails humankind.
And understand, Maharaj was not “anti-religion” or “anti-spirituality.” That is not the case here, either. It’s just that he came to see that both are irrelevant for those who are trapped in personality and misery and suffering and the “ignorance and insanity” of the Ultimate Sickness and who would be free of all of that. Thus, rather than becoming “anti-religion” or “anti-spirituality,” Maharaj became doggedly “anti-ignorance” and staunchly “pro-sanity.”
Therefore, his focus shifted from (A) pointing out to people that they were not spiritual and explaining how a SELF-Inquiry process could supposedly make them spiritual to (B) pointing out to persons that they needed to “forget spirituality” and focus on the planet-wide problem with the mind and with the false self / selves and the “ignorance and insanity” which are grounded in the mind. And that is why he shifted his focus from “SELF-Inquiry” to "self"-inquiry and why he changed his focus from “The Self” to “the self / the selves,” saying, “You need not know 'Who You Are'. It is enough to know who you are not.”
What greater insanity is there to think you are someone you are not or to believe that you are something that you are not? Those distortions and delusions are at the core of the duality-based ignorance and insanity which plague humanity and that is why those became the focus of Maharaj's version of the Ultimate Medicine.
One “non-dualist” said, “Once you start seeing this place for the madhouse it is, you can’t stop seeing it that way.” No argument there. Yet it is not as relevant for any given seeker to see the madness of the planet and the madness of “others” as it is to see one’s own madness.
Yes, the masses are indeed marching along in a long, “Night-of-the-Living-Dead” kind of crazy, zombie-like, sleepwalking line. At first they line up to follow their parents’ teaching (which are not really their parents’ beliefs at all but are actually part and parcel of the hand-me-down belief systems which they unquestioningly accepted and now pass along).
Initially, those currently among the sleepwalking, sleep-talking masses followed those before them. Then, they began moving along in that long line of unquestioning followers who came before them and continue their sleepwalking march now. But now they are the leaders passing on to those lined up behind them a set of belief systems which have nothing to do with freeing persons of the insane inability to differentiate between true and false. Instead, they are passing on what was passed on to them, namely, insane programming and conditioning which programs and conditions persons to not differentiate between true and false and to accept the false as true by virtue of blind faith alone.
Moreover, for persons to refuse to believe what is true will not make their foolishness any less a fact.
Steve Martin had a comedic bit he called “Teach Your Kid to Talk Wrong”:
“I got a great dirty trick you can play on a three-year-old kid. See, kids learn to talk from listening to their parents. So what you do is, whenever you’re around him, you talk wrong. So now it’s like his first day in school (and he needs to go the bathroom) but he raises his hand and says to the teacher, ‘May I mambo dogface to the banana patch?’ Hilarious!”
Now people laughed at that joke, but it’s not really a joke at all. It’s what happens all day, every day with sleepwalking, sleep-talking parents. It was noted that “it is not as relevant for any given seeker to see the madness of the planet and the madness of ‘others’ as it is to see one’s own madness.”
But to see the madness can serve the purpose of alerting persons to the pervasiveness of madness, and if they hear an example of ignorance or insanity, they might not relate to it exactly and say, “Oh my, oh yes, I said that exact same crazy thing.” Instead, they might recognize a general class of delusional beliefs or reasoning fallacies which they can relate to.
So consider some statements that have been heard here in recent months and years:
“No, your Grandma is not going to die any time soon. She helps so many people through her church work that God is going to let her live a long time.”
“So why did Grandpa die so young?”
“Well, we can’t know why God does everything he does. Sometimes God works in mysterious ways.”
“So did my cousin Suzy die from cancer when she was six because she was not doing good things?"
“No, Suzy was not bad. God just needed another little angel in heaven.”
But see, even children (with fewer years of programming, conditioning, acculturation, domestication, brainwashing, and indoctrination) have more sense than most adults. In the beginning, children question adult nonsense until pressured by adults to stop questioning anything. Now, a child-assistant who has helped out before on this blog will be called on again to assist with some examples, so . . .
“No, Suzy was not bad. God just needed another little angel in heaven.”
“There’s a God who love you unconditionally, but He will send you to burn in hell forever if you do not please Him.”
"We worship one Being of Ultimate Oneness, but that One Being manifests as thousands of gods and goddesses and they are incarnate within idols, temples, gurus, rivers, cows and other animals."
"You were born and you will die but you will come back to earth as a higher or lower form and you will do that many times. I’ve done it dozens and dozens of times”
or
“What we seek to attain is spiritual enlightenment and, with that, freedom from continuous cycles of life and death.”
“What we believe is this: the creator of the universe that we worship is the source of not only all good but is also the source of all evil, so everything that happens is actually His will.”
“Our Savior’s mother was a virgin” (a claim made by 22 other religions before Christianity).
“You will go into the fires of hell for eternity if you waste the seed by masturbating. Have all the unprotected sex you can have and then leave it up to God to decide if a pregnancy happens or not.”
“Males at birth should have some of the skin on their penises cut off and females should have their clitorises cut off.”
“I might appear to be standing here with you, but really I live outside my body in another place that is a field of Pure, All-Knowing Energy.”
“Each person is being guided by a sacred contract that our soul made with God before we were born when everything in each person's life was predetermined, including what kind of work we do; what our key relationships are going to be; and what our purpose for being born and living is supposed to be.”
"Love everything that is. If the Nazis threw your baby into a furnace, you should love that. If you are raped, you should love your rapist. Hell, have him over for dinner.”
“People with skin color ‘A’ are better in every way than people with skin color ‘B’.”
“A woman in our faith can only get into heaven after her husband dies. She will float by a veil and will stop when she hears her husband on the other side whispering the secret name he gave her when they married. Then she will know to pause at that point and he will pull her through a slit in the veil. And yes, while on earth, we wear sacred underwear which provide magical, protective powers.”
“Xenu was the evil dictator of the Galactic Confederacy 75 million years ago. He brought billions of people to earth, grouped them near volcanoes, and proceeded to drop hydrogen bombs on them. The souls of the dead people then had to watch a “three-D, super colossal motion picture” which gave them false memories of Jesus, the crucifixion, and all major world religions. These souls now negatively affect everyone who has not had them removed by our Church.”
Not everyone on the planet accepts all of those beliefs, but nearly everyone on the planet accepts one or more of those beliefs. Specifically, some 6.88 billion persons - the number presently claiming a religious affiliation - believe one or more of those concepts.
6,880,000,000 people. Any wonder that Maharaj's guesstimate of the number of persons who will ever Realize and be freed from the bondage of ignorance and insanity was raised over the years from 1 out of 100,000 to 1 out of 1,000,000 to 1 out of 10,000,000?
And that "religious and spiritual stuff" above is just the tip of the ignorance and insanity iceberg.
More on that tomorrow.
To be continued.
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