Friday, March 06, 2020

MAHARAJ'S FINAL PLAN: REALIZE WITHOUT DOGMA, WITHOUT CONTINUOUS SPIRITUAL PRACTICES, AND WITHOUT A PREOCCUPATION WITH “THE NATURE OF REALITY AND THINGS NOUMENAL”

Table of Contents

Today's Considerations
Recent Posts and Archives
Tools for Realization
Author's eBooks
Author's Paperback Books
Free eBooks

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. Some prefer paperback books even if they have to wait a day or so to receive it and have to pay more for a printed book and its shipment. Now, 10 paperback books by Henderson are in print and available in two anthologies through Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and over 40,000+ booksellers around the globe including in the Americas, Germany, India, Italy, Poland, Russia, China, Spain, Brazil and South Korea. See the end of this post in red text for details.

5. Would you like to have us send to someone as a gift from you a copy of any ebook in our inventory? See the offer in purple text at the end of this post.

6. You may click here to visit Floyd's bookstore
which offers both digital books and paperback books which deal with
non-duality, non-duality-based fictional adventures, recovery, financial sanity, financial planning, and more

MAHARAJ'S FINAL PLAN: REALIZE WITHOUT DOGMA, WITHOUT CONTINUOUS SPIRITUAL PRACTICES, AND WITHOUT A PREOCCUPATION WITH “THE NATURE OF REALITY AND THINGS NOUMENAL” 

[Continued from yesterday

Maharaj: "Only that person will visit this place whose virtue and sin have come to an end." 

In the previous post, there was a discussion of why Maharaj cared not a whit about sin and had nothing to do with those who were occupied and preoccupied with defining sin; nor with those who were obsessed with identifying sinners and then judging and criticizing and ostracizing and shaming them;

nor with those who were driven to punish - by mental, emotional, physical, and financial means and, yes, even by death - those who commit whatever is being defined as sin in any given culture at any given moment. 

Billions who are preoccupied with sin suggest that even “thinking” about sinning is a sin. See someone you find attractive and then suddenly there manifests a thought about having sex with that man or woman or there even manifests a physical urge to commit adultery with them?

That, according to those who consider themselves to be experts on sin, is exactly the same as having actually committed adultery. (The suspicion is that the thought only might feel far less satisfying than the act, but that might - as with all things dualistic - vary from one person to the next.) 

Maharaj found that the beliefs held among the masses regarding sin are illogical and incongruous - those beliefs being rooted in duality and judgment and arrogance and hypocrisy and personality identification and being a source of perceived separation as well as a source of fighting and punishing and killing and warmongering. 

He certainly held not one single view of sin which aligned with that held by the 97% of the people on the planet who claim to be affiliated with organized religion or by the millions who claim to be spiritual. So what was his atypical take on sin? 

Maharaj: “To take appearance for reality is a grievous sin and the cause of all calamities" (“calamities” defined as “disasters, catastrophes, misfortune, and tragedies"). 

Of the hypocrisy mentioned above, he said: 

“Discard all traditional standards. Leave them to the hypocrites. Only what liberates you from desire and fear and wrong ideas is good. As long as you worry about sin and virtue you will have no peace.” 

Obviously, sin being one-half of a dualistic pairing, if the concept of sin is to be discarded then so too must the concept of virtue be discarded. The former generates guilt and shame or a sense of separation;

the latter generates a plethora of false identities and their accompanying arrogance, conceit, haughtiness, pride, superciliousness, self-importance, and condescension along with a sense of being different from and better than and, therefore, a sense of feeling separate from. 

Of the role that personality identification plays in the concept of sin, Maharaj said: 

“Sin and virtue refer to a person only. Without a sinful or virtuous person, what is sin or virtue? At the level of the absolute there are no persons; the ocean of pure awareness is neither virtuous nor sinful. Sin and virtue are invariably relative” 

and 

“Why do you insist on polluting the impersonal with your ideas of sin and virtue? It just does not apply. The impersonal cannot be described in terms of good and bad. It is Being - Wisdom – Love - all absolute. Where is the scope for sin there? And virtue is only the opposite of sin.” 

He added: “. . . The opposite of sin which you call ‘virtue’ is only obedience born out of fear.” 

His considering hypocrisy to be insufferable (the display of which would result in one being banned from the loft) came with his understanding that neither sin nor virtue can "exist" without the other. He understood that one is forever mixed up with the other and thus “mixes up” the minds of those who believe in those dualistic concepts. 

Of “sins” and “virtues” and of “Sinners” and “Saints,” he said: 

“It is the mixing up the two that is so disastrous. Nothing can block you so effectively as compromise, for it shows lack of earnestness, without which nothing can be done.” 

Consider the point of this exchange: 

Q: “Are sin and virtue one and the same?” 
M: “These are all man-made values! What are they to me? What ends in happiness is 'virtue'; what ends in sorrow is 'sin'. Both are states of mind. Mine is not a state of mind.” 

Again, his counsel: 

“Discard all traditional standards. Leave them to the hypocrites.” 

So Maharaj understood that those who are embroiled in the sin-virtue debate and those who consider themselves to be firmly fixed in the virtue camp are the most likely to exhibit the trait of hypocrisy because hypocrisy is forever in the company of its first cousin virtue. 

As always, examples and illustrations are offered: 

“I am a strong Christian. I strongly believe in God, Jesus, and the Bible. I believe the fact that I’ve accepted Jesus as my savior will be my salvation. In that backroom or whatever it is when God confronts me with my sins, I do not believe any of the kills I had during the war will be among them. Everyone I shot was evil. I had good cause on every shot. They all deserved to die.” 

Those are words spoken by Chris Kyle, the most lethal sniper in U.S. military history with 160 kills confirmed by his spotter. (Kyle - labeled "One of American's Greatest Heroes" - actually claimed 255 kills in Iraq, a nation that the U.S. invaded on false pretext. The lie about the number of persons he bragged about killing would prove to be only one of the many lies which he was discovered to have told.)

Several years ago, while speaking at a political rally organized by a Christian coalition, the Republican candidates who were then running for the office of the President of the United States touted their virtues while citing their "strong Christian principles" and "the role that their virtues and principles will play in their governing style": 

Former Governor Rick Perry: "My faith has guided me for my entire life, and I don't suspect that's going to change.” 

Former Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal spoke of having hosted daylong prayer events in his state, as did Perry. 

Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush said that religion has been "an organizing part of my architecture, if you will, as a person and certainly as an elected official." 

Governor John Kasich said that his Catholic background pushed him to run for governor. "I got a calling, folks," he said, referring to Bible verses more than once. 

Senator Ted Cruz touted his strong, religious, fundamental upbringing. 

Former Senator Rick Santorum continued to tout his social conservative agenda, asserting that his Catholic beliefs have long been the guiding force behind his political beliefs and actions. 

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee noted that he is a Baptist minister and said that “spiritual convictions should certainly be reflected in one’s worldview, approaches to problems, and perspective.” 

Yet all of those who consider themselves to be highly virtuous and who tout their unwavering commitment to Christian principles are all, 100%, in favor of capital punishment. They are all in favor of state governments and the federal government continuing to have and to exercise the right to kill citizens whom they decide should not be allowed to live. They all bow down to their top political leader who has confessed to being a sexual predator. 

Nor do they question any of the illogical policies being set forth by the current White House Administration which has repeatedly expressed a desire to execute U.S. drug dealers and which is advocating for a new policy which will allow them to do exactly that, ignoring the relevant facts.

Here are some of the relevant facts being ignored.: 

FACT: 64,000 people in the U.S. died from drug overdoses in 2016.

FACT: That same year, and every year, at least 112,000 people in the U.S. die from obesity. 

The facts suggest that if there were truly an interest in "saving lives," then before going through all of the effort required for the federal government to be able to legally kill drug dealers, twice as many lives could be saved annually by establishing a new policy to kill waitresses and waiters and restaurant owners and grocers. 

When was the last time a waitress or waiter or restaurant owner or grocery store owner looked at a customer who was obviously obese and said, "Sorry, we can't serve you. It's obvious that you've already had too much." 

Waitresses and waiters and restaurant owners and grocers are enabling people with a potentially-deadly addiction, so surely those enabling 112,000 to die annually should be killed before the ones enabling 64,000 people with a potentially-deadly addiction to die annually. Right? Or is the whole issue based in - to use Maharaj's words - "ignorance and stupidity and insanity"?

Ironically, those former candidates for the highest office in the land mentioned above claimed to always behave properly as a result of always asking this question before taking action: “What Would Jesus Do?” 

Indeed. What would Jesus have done with Chris Kyle or those politicians? The answer lies in his past actions: 

When Jesus witnessed hypocrites inside the temple, he picked up a whip, walked into the temple, and began beating them, driving them all out onto the street. 

And what would Maharaj have done were he to have encountered those persons touting their virtuous beliefs and claiming they render them virtuous? The answer lies in his actions: 

When he witnessed hypocrites and attention-seeking egomaniacs inside the loft, he tossed them out onto the 10th Lane in Khetwadi. (Those who are so critical of Maharaj for that act should actually be complimenting him for showing far more restraint than did Jesus and for being far kinder than Jesus by not using a whip on those he cast out when they disrupted the satsang sessions in the loft.) 

Maharaj's point: virtue cannot manifest without sin; sin cannot manifest without virtue; and virtue cannot manifest without hypocrisy. 

Of possible interest to the student of non-duality: the word “hypocrisy” is derived from the Greek term for “actor” - literally, “one who wears a mask.” In other words, someone who pretends to be what she or he is not. 

What could possibly be more at the heart of non-duality than the rejection of acting, the abandonment of the habit of wearing a mask, the termination of pretending to be what one is not, halting the assumption of false identities, and bringing to an end all arrogant claims about one’s virtues? 

To be continued.

THE NEWEST OFFER:

Watch an updated seven-hour streaming video of a retreat with Floyd Henderson which can be viewed by anyone with internet access. (In this video, all seven of the steps on "the path" as taught by Maharaj are explained and discussed.)




If interested, click the button below to pay the fee via PayPal. You will then receive an email which includes the link for you to view the private, unlisted video via an arrangement we have made with YouTube, Inc. You do not have to have a YouTube account to watch this privately streamed video.

(If you do not receive the link promptly, your computer or email provider may have high filter settings. Check your spam and trash folders because some providers automatically transfer emails containing links to those folders.)

To access the seven-hour streaming video of a retreat and begin watching right away, click this "Buy Now" button:

Buy Now


Please enter into the silence of contemplation.

[NOTE: The four most recent posts are below. You may access all of the posts in this series and in the previous series and several thousand other posts as well by clicking on the links in the "Recent Posts and Archives" section.]


In addition to the five non-duality books made available without charge by Andy Gugar, Jr. (see “FREEBIES” above), you can now access nearly 3,300 posts for any topics of interest to you.

PAPERBACK VERSIONS OF SOME OF HENDERSON'S NON-DUALITY BOOKS ARE AVAILABLE

If you prefer PAPERBACK copies
of some of Henderson’s non-duality books,
10 of his books are available in PRINT FORM
(collected in two anthologies).

Links for ordering are below with
BARNES and NOBLE presently providing better service
than AMAZON
when it come to fulfilling orders for
paperback and hardcover books
as opposed to delivering digital books.


[NOTE: Wherever you live, you can search for the books below by title with booksellers in your country. With 40,000+ retailers distributing my paperback books, you may order from U.S. stores or you may find someone nearer to you.]



For NON-DUALITY AUDIENCES





The Advanced Seekers' Series (344 pages) is an anthology of four books that share Advaita-based, non-duality pointers that can guide seekers to abide as their original nature. Included in the anthology are



"From the I to the Absolute (A Seven-Step Journey to Reality");



"Consciousness / Awareness: The Nature of Reality Beyond SELF-Realization (Peace Every Day When Abiding As the Absolute)";



"From the Absolute to the Nothingness";



and



"The Final Understanding."


Order a PAPERBACK copy of The Advanced Seekers' Series&
from BARNES AND NOBLE by clicking here
or (sometimes less efficiently nowadays in terms of paperback delivery)
from AMAZON by clicking here.

Also for NON-DUALITY AUDIENCES


This anthology (438 pages) contains the six books that make up what has been called The Blissful Abidance Series for those seeking to live blissfully and happily for the remainder of the manifestation, including,

“What BLISS is and what BLISS is not”;

“There’s No Such Thing As Peace of Mind (There’s Only Peace If You’re ‘Out of Your Mind’)”;

“Liberation (Attaining Freedom from Personality via Realization)”;

“Freedom from Shifting Between States of Happiness and Unhappiness”;

“Why You Must Be Empty If You Would Be Full”;

and

“When REALITY Is Overlaid on the RELATIVE.”

Order a PAPERBACK copy of The Blissful Abidance Series 
from BARNES AND NOBLE by clicking here
or (sometimes less efficiently nowadays in terms of paperback delivery)
from Amazon by clicking here.

SEND A GIFT BOOK TO SOMEONE

To make an arrangement for us to send in your name as a gift from you any of our books to someone you choose:

(a) Visit www.floydhenderson.com

(b) Purchase the ebook you’d like to send.

(c) Contact us using the email below, tell us which ebook you just purchased, and provide the name and email address of the person you want to send the ebook to. (They will never be contacted again or solicited for any reason.)

Send your information to:
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 their god / their 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

or

You can click on the picture link which has now been added for video "Number Ten" in the upper right-hand column on this page.

If preferred, here's

the direct link to the AUDIO VERSION.

You may click here to visit
Floyd's bookstore
which offers both digital and paperback books.

Recent Posts and Archives

Tools Used by Other Seekers of Realization

WATCHING an Advaita Vedanta Retreat: Watch a Downloadable computer file version of the Four-Day Advaita Retreat (Downloadable on PC only, not Apple.)

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

ATTENDING an Advaitin retreat with Floyd and being guided through all seven steps. For details of the retreats offered, please visit the retreat information site.

ARRANGING a one-hour session via Skype or telephone with Floyd. (Skype is a free service.) Click the button to pay and you will be contacted to arrange a date and time for the call.

Five Free eBooks

Compliments of Andy Gugar, Jr.,
the following eBooks are available without charge for you or for friends:

I.
"GOOD vs. EVIL?" or "IGNORANCE, STUPIDITY, and INSANITY?"

The content of this eBook deals with one of the most common but erroneous beliefs that the non-Realized masses cling to and which they will fight about (and even kill over), namely, that there is a planet-wide duel going on between “the forces of good and evil” in the universe.

Either (1) the ancient view is spot on: that the "ills of the planet" are rooted in evil people, in people not being religious enough or spiritual enough, and are caused solely by bad morality; or, (2) the "ills of the planet" are rooted in ignorance, stupidity and insanity and "being good" or "being moral" does not put an end to ignorance, does not eliminate stupidity, and does not treat insanity in any way.

II.
"THE VISION"

Comments regarding the free eBook entitled “THE VISION”:

“My thanks to you and Andy.” – Andrew “Mac” McMaster

“Thanks so much for the book! And, by the way, it is brilliant and the most effective pointing that you have done. It has served to help clear the remaining blockages.” – Stan Cross

“Greatly appreciate having “THE VISION” added to my Henderson resource library that is situated on the right side of my bed for easy access! Eternally grateful for what was received and what was given.” – Robert Rigby

“‘THE VISION’ is such a well-written, condensed version of the Nisarga Yoga approach to understanding and enjoying Reality that I feel it can serve as a must-read ‘meditation guide’ for all earnest seekers.” – Andy Gugar, Jr.

III.
"Sapolsky, Maharaj, and the Non-Dual Teachings"

Dr. Robert Maurice Sapolsky is an American neuroendocrinologist; a professor of biology, neuroscience, and neurosurgery at Stanford University; a researcher; an author; and a Research Associate at the National Museums of Kenya.

There is much that a non-dualist or Advaitin or Nisargan can relate to by comparing and contrasting what Sapolsky reveals about the way certain troops of baboons live in Africa with the way that humans abide all around the globe.

This 152-page eBook catalogues the common, non-dual message shared by Sapolsky and Maharaj and reveals the ways that Sapolsky’s scientific research supports the non-dual pointers offered by Maharaj.

IV.
Seeking

In “PART ONE” it will be seen that most persons on the planet are not seeking, and most will never seek, but for those who are seeking, most will face several obstacles:

In “PART TWO” of this book, it will be seen why many criticized Maharaj for “changing his message in his later talks.” It will be seen that the changes were not about changing the message per se as much as about changing his methodology as he experimented with one version of the Ultimate Medicine after another in order to try to find an effective means for addressing the Ultimate Sickness.

He tried a religious version of the Medicine, a Spiritual version of the Medicine, and finally settled on a version which addressed to Sickness at its core . . . at the mental and emotional level.

V.
"THE MOST DANGEROUS BELIEF OF ALL"

“Dangerous” is a term that can only apply during the relative existence, but of those who do commit suicide, for example, how many shoot themselves in the foot over and over until they “bleed out”? None. They shoot themselves in the head. Why? In order to try to stop the noise - to try to stop the chatter of a thousand monkeys – to stop the noisy mind which is the area that stores the ideas, notions, concepts, mind-stuff, etc. which drives them into the depths of insanity.

And what are those ideas, notions, concepts, etc. called, collectively? "Their beliefs." The irony? They are not their beliefs at all. They are the beliefs of “others” that were set in place via programming, conditioning, etc. and which persons then think are their own.

And what are those beliefs rooted in, and what reinforces those beliefs and convinces persons that they are sacred and worth fighting over and even sometimes worth dying for? Blind faith.

This 337-page eBook discusses those issues in detail.

To read any or all of the free eBooks, please double-click the "FREEBIES" link at the top of this page