Prem Doug tells this story elsewhere, but agreed that SN could publish it, as the sort of thing that might particularly interest our bloggers.
In 1979 I read Only One Sky by Osho. I was so moved that I literally jumped on a plane to Pune to meet this remarkable person.
At the Koregaon Park ashram were thousands of people who felt the same pull I did. Every morning we gathered in Buddha Hall to listen to Osho giving discourse. The topic in the last half of the year 1979 was the Dhammapada, the sutras of Buddha. Activities for the rest of the day ranged from meditation to psychotherapy groups, to musical and dance celebrations. One of the ashram residents that I had a strong connection with was Paritosh, who had studied under Carl Jung.
Everything at the ashram was a life changing experience, culminating in the ultimate life change, my death. Leading up to this, several key things happened. Osho communicated to me one very critical piece of information by saying, “If you can observe fear, how can this be part of you?” I also had several experiences where I was woken up in the middle of the night, sensing Paritosh at my crown chakra and Osho at the root chakra. They were pushing golden light from the base of my spine to the top of my head.
In December 1979, after four months in Pune, I became very sick with amoebic dysentery, food borne hepatitis A, and dengue fever. The physical body weakened to the point where all that could be done was to lie in bed at the hotel; there was no strength left. The state of weakness was very peaceful, with an awareness that death would soon come. There was no fear but an interest for what lay ahead.
With a calm mind, all of the events in life that seemed so important slipped away; they had no interest anymore. A realization came that the mind and body is one complete system, not separate.
Because of this weakened state, thoughts stopped. With the filter of thoughts gone, a greater level of internal awareness arose from the heart, heightening the perceptions of intuition, seeing, hearing and feeling. Even though sick with fever, pain and weakness, there was a wonderful blissful state where every breath brought something dynamic. Everything was so still. Each breath became more pleasurable and expansive.
Slowly a gentle shaking started even though the body was still. Memories came of having done this many times before, it was so familiar. Pleasant and loving feelings flooded my being. The shaking continued, I found myself looking down at this sick body, and started to laugh. Soon this body would end. The thought of letting go was pleasurable, as releasing all the entanglements of this life neared. This body was so dense, cold and heavy. It was good to let this go. My consciousness opened like a lotus flower, everything became vast beyond the size of this universe. Every part of the universe was part of me and every part of me was part of the universe. There was complete inclusion and acceptance. This was so far beyond any expectation, yet at the same time familiar, hence it wasn’t overwhelming.
Another realization came. Everything is known and there is nothing to learn. It was clearly understood that there is no heaven or hell. Life on earth is not a school, there is nothing to learn. Life on earth is just an experience. Nothing more.
Then, suddenly, the fierce grip of fear engulfed me. Suffocating, sticky, addictive, desirable, all consuming and compelling. The fear started pulling me into reincarnation, away from all the inclusion and expansive awareness. Aspects of this fear included desire, suffering and isolation. Identifying with the fear was dragging me back into an unconscious state. Watching this, Osho’s words came back to me: “If you can observe fear, then how can fear be part of you.” By observing the fear, I could see the separation between myself and the fear.
No sooner than starting to observe fear, its grip faded and disappeared. As the fear released, it was followed by despair, guilt, greed, envy and desire for another body. This too could be observed as external addictive influences. Soon all external energy stopped. The feeling of complete awareness of center returned.
My roommate was a nurse, she was with me as my body died. I watched her from a perspective outside my body, taking my pulse then dropping my wrist in despair. I could also sense her thoughts. She was stressed, not because of my death, but because she was faced with dealing with my body.
Looking at the body, what arose was the perfection of the life just lived. This life could not be described as pleasant, in fact it was filled with suffering and hardship. Yet it seemed so perfect as it was observed. Then other lives lived started to appear in a visual format. Each life appeared in a bubble, the entire life from beginning to end, in an instant, with awareness of every moment of that life as if it was just lived from birth to death. There were many lives, too many to count. Each life was perfect. Reincarnation is part of the human experience, but it is optional. Once I was aware of the addictions pulling me back to another life, then I was ready for what came next.
There was a shift and a slight movement. I did not go anywhere. Did not travel a thousand miles. It was the same place, yet different, less dense, more expansive. Everything was bathed in a golden light. There were many others around, all known to me, and me to them. My return was met with overwhelming rejoicing. I was home.
At the time I didn’t have words to describe the process, like dimensional shifts. I shifted, from the third to the fourth dimension as the life left my body, with ever expanding awareness that reached to the edge of the universe. Then shifted into the fifth dimension, where everything was illuminated, golden. Later I heard this was what the Tibetans call “The Land of The Golden Light.” Everything was absolute perfection.
A being came to me and asked me to return to the body that lay in the hotel room. My response was, “No! I don’t want to leave this wondrous place.” Then another being, or rather the persona of a man, seated at a table at a café, gestured for me to sit down. He introduced himself, “In my last life on Earth, I was known as George Gurdjieff.” I did not know the name at the time. He continued, “We need you to go back.” After my joyful reunion on this wonderful plane I was reluctant, but he asked in such a way, that I could not refuse. All communication was without words. A thought came to me, from another entity that had welcomed me back, “If you return, you will lose all memory of this encounter.” I commenced bargaining with Gurdjieff, “On one condition, that you don’t take this memory from me, that I retain all of this intact.” He could not refuse me either, and it was agreed to let me retain this death experience. Then he added, “This is the last time you will have to return, I promise.” I took great comfort in this.
As I was guided back, first into the 4th dimension, I could feel the expanded awareness shutting down. Then the re-entry into the cold, dense body. My roommate completely freaked out when I re-animated. The next thing I knew an Indian doctor was at my side, who had just walked in off the street. “I’ll take care of you now, I’m here to help you.” He brought me sugar water to get my blood pressure back, ordered some medications. He never asked for any money and I never saw him again.
I was very weak, but wanted to see Osho before I returned to the US. When I sat before him, he leaned forward and said, “You have done well,” followed by a smile.
The last day I was at the ashram, a German sannyasin came up to me and said, “Do you want to buy these three books?” The author of all of them was George Gurdjieff.
I have told this story many times to people I know, how to die consciously and return home. One of them was a doctor, a good friend. He had a deteriorating heart. I had told him a bit about my death experience. Then we were at his house having a dinner party, and he asked me, “Tell me again, how to die.” The house was full of people, but everyone left the room we were in, and I recounted the story in more detail. A few weeks later his wife called and told us he had passed. She said he was out working in the yard, laid down on the grass and died. He had a smile on his face. A week later I was asleep and heard him call my name. I sat up in bed, and there he was, all bathed in golden light, with a big grin. He was happy I could see him. Then I knew he made it home.
Prem Doug (aka Doug Flomer) was born in New York City. He came to Pune in 1979 and took sannyas from Osho, returning in 1980 and 1981. Once back in the US he met Samantha and gave her his copy of Only One Sky. They have been together for 33 years, now in the Pacific Northwest. Osho changed Doug’s life forever. Meditation has remained a way of life. Email dougflomer (at) yahoo (dot) com
Brave man to write such an article.
My God, one more story from Poona 1 days. It shows more about the psychology of Parmartha than of Bhagwan.
Indirectly, every story points out a simple effect:
It was a foolish decision to destroy Shree Rajneesh Ashram and go for building a city state and that too in United States of America.
I think blame for such blunder is less on Osho than on thousands of educated western disciples who could not see how unnatural it is to plant a mango tree in wine yards.
Maybe Parmartha can tell, which country will allow a foreign belief creating not just some kind of prayer room in two rooms flat but a city?
Shantam declares, “I think blame for such blunder is less on Osho than on thousands of educated western disciples who could not see how unnatural it is to plant a mango tree in wine yards.”
“Blame” is a word that Shantam overuses. In this case he wasted his time, not uncommon for him.
Osho, for a number of reasons, moved to the States. It was not a democracy. As in he did not ask his disciples, “should I do this?” – something he never did. So Osho had only himself to blame because he was a dictator, albeit a benevolent one, who called all the shots, including putting Sheela in charge. Jesus, this really sounds like worn-out subject matter. Just like this guy Doug’s spiritual fantasy.
Just like acid trips, most of us had them, and listening to people describe their amazing trips in this kind of spiritual fantasy story-telling is all very well, but a bit boring, no matter how far out it might sound to the teller.
Meeting Mr G for a non-verbal chat in Dimension X. The old guy would have torn such mumbo-jumbo apart. I do not buy it. Product of an over-active imagination, one that I recognize because I have one too.
This article is nothing to do with me, Shantam. Was a suggestion from someone within the wider SN collective.
You once again stray off topic. But for the record, I never supported any move from India, and thought as there was a need for a bigger ashram, and as many were getting sick in the place you so covet, then Osho should have gone, as he wished, to the Himalayas. If you have read Laxmi’s book then you will know why that did not happen, despite very great efforts.
The six acres of land in Koregaon Park would not be some place that now seems fought over. It would have been some bigger spread in sight of the Himalayas!
All these decisions were, however, nothing to do with Osho’s western disciples. Even the decision to sell Osho the idea of going to the States was from an Indian, Ma Anand Sheela.
While reading the story and bio information I wonder why Prem Doug did not visit Osho even out of courtesy, in Rajneeshpuram, Oregon, USA?
Your great master, who changed your life for better, is in your own country and you don´t even visit him; what kind of paranormal psychology is this?
You can ask Prem Doug by emailing him, his email is at the foot of his article.
Like many who I respect, for example the author of ‘Life of Osho’, Prem Paritosh, they smelt a rat from 1981 on, and quite rightly followed their inner intuitions, and never went near Oregon. When Osho started giving talks, for example in Greece and Nepal, and in Poona 2, then many, like Prem Paritosh, came back to him.
I liked the Red days when Osho was in Oregon. Trying to bring all that meditation and dancing etc. into the everyday modern world was the way to go.
Remember, the 80s, before the rave scene kick-started the nouveau psychedelic era, was a spiritual wasteland and Sannyas was pretty much the only alternative game in town.
Ok, it was a fascist regime but realistically, so were Pune 1 and Pune2 and Pune 3, just a bit smaller and more mickey-mouse.
The fact that he was deported from 21 countries showed one thing, that most commentators overlooked he was utterly desperate never never to go back to India and willing to try absolutely anything to avoid it. If you heard him in Crete,you knew he wanted to stay in the modern world 100%.
Going back to India was a bigger disaster that going to the USA. He ended up sanctioning utter nuage nonsense like colour therapy with idiots shining fairy lights up each others arses and insane mini-guru trips like Mongolian Plunging or whatever it was (where is it now?) etc.
Did you know that the day he died. the press release from Osho that was due out but cancelled was him slagging off Shirley Maclaine? That`s how bad things had got! Bit of a comedown from battling it out on the world stage!
And as a result of being forced back to India, he has even ended up on the official list of Indian gurus alongside all the other paedos and rapists etc.
Oy vey!
Yes, Frank boy, yes!
If only he’d stayed in Uruguay, he would still be alive, I guess.
It was a comedown, indeed! XXX
The same paedos and rapists he`d spent his life railing against.
“The same paedos and rapists he`d spent his life railing against.”
Yes, Frank, Yes.
Frank, that’s right; I heard that Osho never wanted to go back to Poona until the moment (in Sumila /Bombay) there was a warrant from the Bombay Police the night before he arrived in Poona, and he was advised to leave the Bombay jurisdiction immediately. So in that sense it was not his decision at all to be in Poona.
I am certain each one of us has our own experiences in our journey with the Master; wonder if that’s why such journeys are called subjective. Guess each one of us does not have the need or sometimes the energy to go into details.
Thank you, SN & Prem Doug for sharing this.
Our experiences are the same but different.
The first time I dropped acid, I died.
I was 16. My mum and dad had gone away for the weekend so there I was in the sitting room, with the TV on with the volume turned down and the Grateful Dead album ‘Live/Dead’ turned right up on the radiogram (that was multi-media entertainment in the pre-video age).
I watched in utter drop-jawed amazement as Jerry Garcia`s made-in-heaven guitar sound rang out from the beyond and sent synaesthesic vibrations from an alien dimension which impacted the ‘News at One’ newsreader`s head (Reginald Bosanquet?) with a sonic sandstorm of inter-galactic force that transfigured him into a multi-headed, all-knowing, all-seeing, ranting, raving, messianic psychopathic god of unconditional love.
It being Saturday afternoon, next up was `Grandstand`. The 1.20 from Haydock Park, to my amazement, was being run in exquisite ultra-slow motion by a heavenly host of beautiful unicorns ridden with unconditional love by wise multi-coloured leprechauns moving in infinite circles round and round what appeared to be the rings of Saturn in a time so slowed down that seemed to span a Blakeian eternity while the haunting tones of ‘Dark Star’ echoed with an unearthly perfection in the background..
It was then that I decided to close my eyes. I found myself in a sub-atomic world made up of an infinitesimal miracle of molecular and interlocking circles and spheres which shifted around ecstatically in unbounded multi-dimensional designs that fused all the known senses as well as thousands of unknown ones along with the perceived world, together with every artistic creation ever produced by mankind in a more-than-infinite multiplicity of universes.
I felt myself as one of these small circles which suddenly and gigantically silently exploded with exponential potential as its boundaries dissolved infinitesimally into an uncountable infinite sky of parallel universes made up of rainbow custard.
That`s when I realised: “I must be dead.”
There was no terror or shock involved, just a calm, matter-of-fact sense of profoundly deep reality, albeit paradoxically infused with total unbridled, unbounded and immeasurable ecstasy. I didn`t leave my body, but rather, kind of hovered around inside it, completely detached from it as it lay lifeless around me. I felt utter bliss to know that I would move on and out of the body shortly and the thought occurred to me that it would be good if it happened before my Mum and Dad got home and found a corpse on the sofa.
Finally, the thumping ecstatic rhythm of ‘Turn On Your Lovelight’ washed a wave of euphoric bliss over me that brought me plunging back to life on this beautiful planet like a member of the brotherhood of eternal love on a trans-universal cordless bungee jumping marathon….
My life had changed irrevocably.
I went for a glass of water in the kitchen, but I don`t think I`ve ever really recovered.
Lovely, Frank.
I can see you never quite recovered.
And how, and if, has the experience affected you in the long run?
Frank, good piece of creative writing. Can relate 100%. The other day, ‘Dark Star’ was playing in the garden, and it still sounds fucking fantastic. My favourite ‘Dead’ album is ‘Anthem of the Sun’…going molecular…best soundtrack along with…do not get me going.
Cheers,
‘Dark Star’. That was such a far out sound, that if my mum or dad or their friends were around I would take it off the turntable as I figured that they would suss me thinking: “Nobody could listen to that stuff without being completely off their heads”!
Mind you, as you say, it can still sound good straight all these years later. That could be because of irreversible neural damage, of course.
Oh well….
Simond,
I think any story, including your own life, is open to a wide variety of readings.
The past isn`t fixed.
A lot of people these days pass on their psychedelic experiences and other satori stories to back up their spiritual credentials in the present.
That`s just one way of looking at it, and in most cases I don`t go along with that at all.
.
So my answer to the question would be:
Its a spectrum that ranges from acid-casualty to mythical hero….
Frank, can I have your permission to use some of the above comment to use in a book I am writing?
What`s the book?
Hi Frank,
After a break of six years I have been persuaded to finish my third novel. It will form the third part of THE LANDMINE CHRONICLES.
I enjoyed your comment very much…really inspired. I could use some of it in a scene that takes place in the psychedelic sixties in my first book, ‘Mind Bomb’. The idea is that eventually all three books will be published in a whopping 1000 page tome, sometime in futureland.
Here is a link to the book in question, which features a scene with the Dead playing the music. Best version is on kindle, which you can download for a pound.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mind-Bomb-Revised-Luke-Mitchell-ebook/dp/B004QZ9WTU/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1469201811&sr=1-1&keywords=mind+bomb
Lokesh,
I have read ‘Borderline Dreamtime’ which I bought on Amazon a while back. I did enjoy it, which was a pleasant surprise as I almost never read novels.
Yeah, give it a go – I won`t be using it for anything – I`m sure you will rework it a bit anyway.
The deal is – when you get the movie deal – I want Leonardo DiCaprio playing me.
OK?
Cool, Baba. Last great novel I read was ‘Goldfinch’ – epic. I am a big fan of Irvine Welsh…’Skagboys’ one of the funniest books I ever read.
You`ll be disappointed then, that my only contact with Irvine Welsh was through the movies: ‘Trainspotting’- great, ‘Filth’ – terrible.
(Btw, I heard the sequel to ‘Trainspotting’ is being shot now with original cast).
I loved Prem Doug’s personal and beautifully written description of this fairly common experience.
Of course, the brain people are now trying to explain away such experience as purely a brain phenomenon. Whilst others use experiences of this type to confirm their beliefs in the spirit world or whatever.
I have no experience of an event like this, but I have had powerful dream and waking experiences of ‘out of body’. I’ve felt the fear and bliss that this and other commentators have alluded to.
Some commentators, after such an event, tell us how they no longer fear death, as if this experience has convinced them very deeply that there is no death. Others describe meeting up with their parents and loved ones who have already died.That has a great mystery and beauty about it, but is it wishful thinking?
I, for one, have no particular desire or need to meet up with any of my family or loved ones from the past. They are exactly that: from the past.
As to meeting Gurdjieff or any others, this is so commonly part of the story of experiences such as these, where we meet enlightened beings or close relatives who guide us through these realms and dimensions. I wonder how much of this is our mind creating a surer or safer reference point? And in doing so, does it matter?
The question for me isn’t really whether these are true or imagined experiences, it is how we act on them afterwards.
Doug provides a generous story of his friend asking about how to die, and how he appeared to help him. Lovely. Part of my mind nevertheless still wonders how much Doug and others create connections and coincidences and patterns, after the event?
And what if anything have I? How did an out-of-body experience help me? It added to the real knowledge that I’m not just a body, as well as grounding me. The grounding arose naturally as a way to contain my fear – in order to find my way back. Rooting my attention in the body keeps me out of too much trouble.
Living and dying to my beliefs and my relationships and having my dreams shattered and love stripped away, has played a greater role in transforming me. That’s where my passion lay, rather than in focusing too much on inner work per se.
The greatest gift of experience has been to see how unreliable it is. I doubt my self and any experience. I know how wishfully and deeply I yearn for security and safety. I continue to observe how dishonest I am. I continue to see how deluded I have been and how I love certainty and to know myself, as good, bad, etc. etc., or even to just ‘know’ myself at all.
That being said, this continuing negation of my past, as well my disbelief in anyone or anything does seem to keep me in check, somewhat.
It allows the present to arise, without so many obstacles of thought and emotion. And it is this continuing alignment of my mind to stay here and now that is a source of satisfaction.
Vicars for the attention of:
“Little Johnny was the son of the local minister. One day, his teacher was asking the class what the ywanted to be when they grew up.
When it was his turn to answer he replied, “I want to be a minister just like my father.”
The teacher was impressed with his determination and so she asked him why he wanted to be a preacher.
“Well,” he said thoughtfully, “since I have to go to church on Sunday anyway, I figure it would be more interesting to be the guy who stands up and yells than the one who has to sit down and listen.” ”
Osho
Ah, This!
Chapter #1
Chapter title: The Heart of Knowing is Now
Great post, Simond.
Gratefulness (inside) to that special thread topic issue has to be growing in me, like a plant this time – rather slow – and inter-dependent to the sharings of others like yours, Simond. Thank you for this, which I am grateful for, having been able to read it. And can relate to that.
As I can´t relate to this miraculously given picturing of some whole processings Doug is sharing here.
For me, for example, when small or major parts of the Soul are leaving the body, for example in shock, trauma, illness, experiencing violence, that process is really tangible, sensible – and maybe at times very horrifying.
More like a Bardo after a violently experienced death – then also in the time after (sorry if you feel that as exaggeration).
And it takes a long time, if ever, ´time to heal. And needs support, if that is possible. Or if it is ´allowed to heal.
Whereas, to reacall Pune times, when I caught mysteriously something like the Dengue Fever, right after a three weeks Intensive of an ´all-included´ Mammut Group, I remember having had dreamlike experiences very similar to what Doug is sharing with us here.
I felt I was ‘don’, so to say. And very easily ‘done’, just bliss or something similar, but there are no words really fitting either.
The Indian doctor I was brought to by friends, was a Master in His own right; never before and never after I met somebody (in the medicine realms) with the skill (wrong word, I guess, sorry), somebody handling with such sweetness and Love to call back Soul into Life in the body.
And even now, when I am writing that here, it feels he gave me a lifelong present; I can kind of recall that, beyond any sufficient description.
But rather as a way to get a bit ‘familiar’, if one can say so, with the vastness one is surely surrounded by and also part of.
Days later – these long decades ago – I was called forward to sit in the Darshan, and in quite another way to experience total Disappearance and total Presence – same same. To put it romantically – a LOVE Space beyond any borders. Home. ( The word ‘Death’, just doesn´t come up in these contexts).
However, it does come up in these other contexts I mentioned in the beginning, which are related to ´Soul-Loss´.
Tibetan Masters say there is a Bardo of Dying and a Bardo of Living.
So true.
As a small girl (like many other kids also in the West, Shantam Prem, if you don´t mind!) there was a kind of ´knowing’ of the Soul, being ´Home’ in a much, much broader way than education processes or ´family issues apparently could allow.
Fear (also fear of Death) came with the inter-relating (and in my case with abuse and experiencing violence).
To befriend that, a lifelong process.
And I really could relate to some you mentioned thereabouts, Simond. However, I am not able to follow you, Simond, in the kind of ´tabula rasa`, according total negation of the past. For me at least, it doesn´t work that way. And in the very present moment all past is included.
And, if I wouldn´t be stuck here and there, I wouldn´t be posting here at all, I guess.
With love,
Madhu
Simond’s describes Doug’s fantasy as, “this fairly common experience”. That’s a cracker. No doubt beaming in from a tea party in Gandharva, attended by Ivan the Terrible, Jimi Hendrix, Paramahansa Yogananda, The Invisble Man, Yeats, William Blake, Santa Claws, Joan of Bark and a whole lotta others. Hey, there goes a piece of Kennedy’s brain! Tea was served in tandem by Janis Joplin and Queen Victoria.
Simond’s decision to stay forever was vetoed, because he had a mission to perform on SN, which no doubt has something to do with his very deep closing affirmation to the nation: “It is this continuing alignment of my mind to stay here and now that is a source of satisfaction…I can’t get no…when I’m driving in my car and some man comes on the radio…telling me more and more, ’bout some useless information, supposed to drive my imagination…I can’t get no….”
Reckon you’ve been too hard on Simond there, Lokesh. Yes, he said Doug’s experience was “fairly common” when probably better would have been something like “various types of out-of-body, near-death experiences are fairly common, although Doug’s, if truly recorded, was definitely at the more ‘far-out’ end of the spectrum.”
But Simond was also duly sceptical, didn’t swallow the whole thing without close examination and, I really don’t see what’s so wrong with his final bit, ie: “And it is this continuing alignment of my mind to stay here and now that is a source of satisfaction.”
Perhaps it might sound, ironically enough for someone like Simond whose whole life seems up for self-questioning at any given time, a little ‘complacent’ to some ears, especially if one is looking to find fault, however small.
But I think his obviously – and perhaps unusually – sincere and deep self-searching and the clarity of his communication deserves more acknowledgement than to be pretty well rejected out of hand like that.
I was thinking to myself, why is SD so for him?
It’s so extreme, and I think you’re projecting your golden shadow on to him. I think you’re projecting, displacing everything that’s best about yourself, according to your values, not just mine, onto him.
(I can see myself in my late twenties in him, and I have come to terms with that younger me).
Arps, I think I might have more immediate ‘empathy’ for Simond’s posts as we share a considerable common exposure to a particular teacher, Barry Long. So I’m possibly able to more easily ‘get’ where he’s coming from.
That, plus I respect what seems obvious, his utter commitment to self-examination etc. in the light of all he’s been through and heard from various masters and teachers. He seems ‘on the cutting edge’ of something and (despite that “satisfaction” minor faux pas), no one can accuse him of complacency.
So I say, good luck to him, he brings something fresh and challenging to SN.
“his utter commitment to self-examination etc. in the light of all he’s been through and heard from various masters and teachers.”
That’s you, mate.
He’s committed to making himself the top of the pecking order here.
” “his utter commitment to self-examination etc. in the light of all he’s been through and heard from various masters and teachers.”
That’s you, mate.”
And that’s you, Arps and, with very few exceptions, I’m sure, pretty well everyone who posts and has posted here at SN.
“He’s committed to making himself the top of the pecking order here.”
Now that, I say, is just plain wrong, laughably so in fact. I don’t know (only you would), perhaps you feel in some way ‘threatened’ by him and/or what he says?
Lol.
The latter is a bit of an old saw, you know. You can do better than that.
Not tonight I can’t, Arps. I’m done for the day. It can be exhausting being a PR man, you know….
Also, as it happens, I knew Simond a bit way back in the 80s, we played in the same ‘sannyasins and friends’ cricket team in London! (Stop laughing in the back row, please!). So although I’m sure he’s ‘different’ now, in a way I trust what little I recall of him, as that small experience means he’s not exactly a total ‘stranger’, although our contact can be said to have been pretty superficial. Basically, I trust he’s ‘all right’.
(Simond, I’ll send on my bank details by email, ok?).
SD, you have a point. I found Simond’s opening comment amusing. Re-reading it, my comment was obviously made in jest. In my youth I was an extremely other- worldly kind of guy, extra-dimensional. Today, I am happy to say, I am quite the opposite, very down to earth. And thus the pendulum swings.
Transfer completed: £10,000,000.
Are you sure that’s enough to cover the costs of defending a self-satisfied gent, whose sole purpose is to climb up the greasy pole and get recognised?
Tell you what, extra bonus transferred of a few more £ and as an extra ‘thank you’.
Cheers, Simond, and thanks for honouring last Saturday night’s agreement. I knew that lottery win of yours would come in handy….
Your apparent soul searching and your attitude to yourself, your faux modesty, self-deprecation is a defence mechanism. You kick yourself first in the hope that if you do it no one else will.
“Your apparent soul searching and your attitude to yourself, your faux modesty, self-deprecation is a defence mechanism. You kick yourself first in the hope that if you do it no one else will.” ( Arpana)
You made a good point here, Arpana, although I´ve been not able to figure out whom in particular you are addressing here, with “your”…
Yet I know about such patterns from myself, sometimes rather subtle, sometimes gross.
Otherwise, the point you made made it clearer for me wherein my slight ´uneasiness´with Doug´s report is situated:
These big – call it spiritual collective waves – in spiritual scenes and gatherings in the 80s last century, reincarnation- identifications via sessions and then bragging about what kind of ´important´ role he or her had played in ancient times or whatsoever.
Then the next big wave,of the 90s, about the family constellation procedures and seminars, that seemed to be a ´must’ to attend urgently.
And to see that happening with loving eyes, as times go by, more like a kind of big wheel turning, see it, with loving eyes, instead of just degrading it as hindsight, or denying it, in the form of sheer mockery about it, goes through many ´ups and downs’ , at least on my side, and needs some deliberate effort for further understanding.
Anyway, it´s nice to be part of an SN orchestra with so many different tones.
As far as the ‘Death’ issue and dying processing issue is concerned, it might be true, that it is THE Issue.
And the SN presentation of Doug´s report has touched it in a way to respond to our (my) very own (issue), instead of looking at others’. That´s what I am receiving from this thread topic and the exchange. And the reading.
And some other memory came into my mind just now, from the simple but strong speech of the Dalai Lama. It was the reminder to treat anybody we meet as a stranger quite carefully, with an awareness this stranger might have been our lover, a friend or even a relative (mother, father) in ancient times and other lives.
That simply rang a bell, and same moment I knew how much I fall short in embodying that.
Madhu
P.S:
In Sannyas ´Kindergarten-Times´ in Osho´s garden, it was not a rare happening to meet each other like some long-missed family member, I remember. In disregard of what country somebody came from, what mother tongue he or she was speaking.
Sometimes in joy to meet ´again´, sometimes in clear-cut pain also…but that feeling of familiarity….
@Madhu:
“Anyway, it´s nice to be part of an SN orchestra with so many different tones.”
That’s why I appreciate Sannyas news. Sweet and sour, across a spectrum.
Simond, you do such a thorough job at post mortem-i-sing!
He does, Kavita !
Prem Doug, in his story, has forgotten to say about his mission in life. I am quite surprised because in all others that I’ve listened to, the person in question goes back to the body (unwillingly) to accomplish a certain mission.
Maybe GG was so drunk that he’d forgotten to tell him? I don’t know.
Anyway, I’ve enjoyed the reading.
I feel disconnected from everything I recall about Poona 1, everything is dream-like to me now.
Sounds as though what he writes of is very much part of his present, even if the experience was nearly forty years ago.
Arps says, “Sounds as though what he writes of is very much part of his present, even if the experience was nearly forty years ago.”
Yes, it does, doesn’t it? I suspect Dougie learned this transcendental approach from watching reruns of ‘All Our Yesterdays’.
A Russian voice calls from behind a velvet curtain: “Dougie Wuggie!” Mr G sticks his moustachioed shaved head round the edge of the curtain.
“Mr G! I haven’t seen you since I met you in the X Dimension…what was it, 40 years ago? You haven’t changed a bit.”
Mr G steps from behind a velvet curtain, bottle of Armaniac in hand, embraces old Dougie and says, in a Ron Hubbard voice, “You are a robot, my son. But if you sit down and sing a song with me over this bottle, all is forgiven.”
Doug breaks down and cries, blubbering, “!I…I…I…can’t believe this is happening.”
A very familiar Indian voice calls from behind the curtain….”Wakey! Wakey!” Osho takes to the stage, smiling behind a namaste. He lowers his hands and says to Dougie, “You have done well,”…”But”…
“But what?” stammers Dougie.
Osho smiles and hisses, “You missssssssed.”
In that very moment, Dougie awakens…to find himself talking nonsense on SN.
What will be the steps taken by someone in 20s in 21st century who gets some Osho book as gift or buys it second-hand and feels moved like Prem Doug?
This kind of questioning comes in my brain quite often. What I would have done now as 21 year-old student waiting for admission in university who just got Osho book during holidays?
If someone feels to run imagination over their question about their own life and has some inspiring answer, please write.
Frank & Lokesh, you guys take the prestigious SN ‘No-Trophy’ & SN, I’ll be waiting for my cheque (details in the SN inbox)!
Cool, babe.
I am not sure what place such peregrinations play in the psychology of men. But I am sure it is somehow to feel ‘comfortable’ when the grim procession comes near.
Assuming in some way we can end up living beyond time and space and plunged forever near some bright “dark star” then there really is no other moment than now, and no other place than here.
A preoccupying interest in what happens between life and death seems a process which simply reflects and continues to reflect a major fear of death (and being removed from the present moment) and therefore needs the real Gurdjieff encounter treatment.
As Lokesh says, somewhere the real Mr G would have given such stories short shrift indeed.
Glad that you find the time to switch in every now and then, Parmartha; feels like a cool breeze on a summer morning like this.
However, I know I am one of those who don´t really belong to that bunch of early Sannyas-friends, so to say, and sometimes not easy to feel that, and yet, believe it or not, we share some taste standards.
It´s quite difficult, I guess, not to get stuck in a permanent mental-loop about obvious shit that simply happened.
And who is it – here – who really knows if all would have been so totally different, if some Anand Sheela wouldn´t have been there, or some move of the community to US wouldn´t have been happening.
I suggest, nobody knows. (See Frank´s comment on ´ought´, ´should’, ´might´, etc. here, the other day).
It sometimes feels partly like seeing war-veterans who lost their case.
And if in nowaday´s times, a man of the calibre of Gurdieff, Osho, Ramana would be (or is?) happening, he would, I strongly presume, have another approach to the one known historically.
I am as well so often amazed when we come to know some hidden facts behind the former ´closets’, which make the views on the past very alive and ever changing stuff, to adapt anew.
That´s what I also love on SN folk news and chat-chat. Whereas on the other side I often recall the old lovable Pink Floyd’s “another brick in the wall” – and the reminder from the guys, what´s to be done to create some space to look through (walls).
Madhu
Searchlight casting
for faults in the
clouds of delusion.
‘Dark Star’
On the other hand, if Doug’s account is true then it’s as worthy of being communicated as any other significant life experience, perhaps more so than many others, bearing in mind its subject matter is way beyond the experience of most of us. And that ‘none of us is getting any younger’…
To read and accept such a story as genuine, or mostly genuine, doesn’t necessarily imply that one then has to become obsessed with it, letting it dominate one’s life. Or that it is ‘the last word’ on the dying process.
As you (and Simond) say, Parmartha, being here and now, implying a high degree of alertness to what’s going on in the psyche, is where it’s at, and that was surely the key to Doug’s tale as well.
The kind of experience of Doug`s is very far out to the everyday conscious mind, but to anyone acquainted with the dreaming mind (which is everybody to some extent or other) this sort of thing has more of a familiar feel.
It`s maybe surprising how many people have had far out experiences that could be the dream-mind breaking into the waking state. This is also a definition of insanity of course, but I also know very down-to-earth people, for example, who have confided in me, almost apologetically (not nuage nutters) that they have been taken up into spaceships by benevolent aliens etc.
As an oneironaut*, myself, I have run into Osho in the dreamworld a few times and would be extremely surprised if this had not happened to all on SN – just a question of remembering enough dreams.
I suspect that the idea of life after death comes from dreams, too, as dreams of the (especially recently) deceased are pretty much routine and regularly alarmingly or blissfully real.
Interpreting dreams in the old style psychological/therapeutic sense is one possibility but has to be taken quite lightly not to get lost in head-trips. That probably applies to other spiritual/past life/psychedelic visions etc. too.
Becoming familiar with dreamworlds has many other effects that are interesting. One thing that this does is loosen the sense of what is possible. You can familiarise yourself with associative thought, which is basically creativity, which involves sticking things together that weren`t together before, to make something new, which is what dreams do all the time.
Without it, we would probably be barking and howling in a cave somewhere. Certainly, poetry, music, lit., painting, spiritual discourse, meditations, theories of reincarnation, just to name a very few, could not have come into being without it.
Poor old Gurdjieff, tho`…
I imagine he must have been absolutely knackered when he got home to the Prieure at some ungodly hour of the night and ordered his boy to pour him a stiff drink.
“Busy night sir?” asked Fritz Peters.
“Yeah, had to astrally travel 40 years into the future to sort out some hippy whackjob with the shits who got his ass stuck on the bog in the bardo. I had to talk him back into his body. The twat tried to argue with me,nbut I pulled rank on him, and had to feed him some bullshit about this being his last life…oh well…job done…now where`s my bloody Armagnac? I`m absolutely parched….”
*oneironaut – A person who explores dream worlds, usually associated with lucid dreaming.
What? Like a Daydream Believer? Are you a Monkee’s fan? Or is it What a Day For A Daydream by Lovin’ Spoonful? I prefer Sunshine Superman by Donovan…as in relation to Dougie…you can just sit there thinking on your velvet throne, about all those rainbows you can have for your own.
Doug’s article is a mixture of what might be termed the ‘psychic dreamworld’ and his conscious awareness though. Or is that all included in ‘oneironautics’, Frank?
The “golden light” and coming across people from his life is familiar from many such accounts, even par for the course, as is the encounter with a ‘wise being’, “Gurdjieff” in this case.
But what impressed me more was the degree of control Doug exercised through his consciousness, as in:
“Identifying with the fear was dragging me back into an unconscious state. Watching this, Osho’s words came back to me: “If you can observe fear, then how can fear be part of you.” By observing the fear, I could see the separation between myself and the fear.
No sooner than starting to observe fear, its grip faded and disappeared. As the fear released, it was followed by despair, guilt, greed, envy and desire for another body. This too could be observed as external addictive influences. Soon all external energy stopped. The feeling of complete awareness of center returned.”
That reminds me of the sort of stuff in The Tibetan Book of The Dead and other such works on Death and Dying. I suspect that the sort of ‘result’ one gets (if I may use such a crude phrase!) hinges upon how one has lived, how far one has come along the consciousness trail, ie how far one has managed to live in the here and now as a way of being, a way of life.
Simple really…in theory….
SD, you ask:
” Doug’s article is a mixture of what might be termed the ‘psychic dreamworld’ and his conscious awareness though. Or is that all included in ‘oneironautics’, Frank?”
Sounds like Doug wasn`t exactly dreaming. His state sounds like a kind of vision which both encompassed everyday consciousness with dreamlike consciousness qualities too.
It’s a commonplace that dreams are made up from experiences that you have had in life, which is to say, roughly-memory (altho` I think that there is evidence to suggest that this memory also includes memory from the future).
Now, Doug was most likely aware of the Tibetan Book of the Dead world-view, had been exposed to the ideas around reincarnation and knew that Gurdjieff was a big cheese in the spiritual world etc.
Thus, the information found in his vision would have been perfectly accessible for the ‘author/director’ from his memory, which then constructed the data in such a way as to create the experience that he had.
His conscious mind was still functioning, and yes, this is “part of oneironautics” in two possible ways at least:
Firstly, as “lucid dreaming”, where you become aware that you are dreaming (or maybe dream that you are aware that you are dreaming).
Or in “double consciousness”, where you simultaneously experience yourself in the present location (eg the bed)nwhile still dreaming your dream.
I don’t know how many other variants of consciousness there are to be experienced. But conscious awareness can be mixed with dreaming. And then, your conscious awareness might just itself be a dream, too.
This is Chuang-Tzu territory, where he couldn`t work out whether he was CT dreaming he was a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming he was CT.
It`s a different way of approaching consciousness from the ‘points system’ you outlined where, like a would-be immigrant to Australia, you have to convince the authorities that you have the right credentials before they let you into Nirvana (or Byron Bay).
The rationale behind `lucid dreaming` is very much like that outlined in the Tibetan Book Of The Dead – you remain conscious even as the dreams and nightmares or the experience of the bardos -demons, wrathful deities, anger, lust etc. assault you.
I am a little sceptical about the ‘ultimate truthness’ of all this because it`s the old chestnut of: who is the entity doing this stuff? How do you know that the guy battling the demons isn`t just another dream-figure in the first place and this all is just another part of the dream – a dream within a dream where your fantasy-self or ego is dreaming that he`s awake?
That`s probably what`s happening with all these so-called awakened ones. What a nightmare!
What happens when it starts to wear off?
That`s when it gets weird, I guess….
“I don’t know how many other variants of consciousness there are to be experienced. But conscious awareness can be mixed with dreaming. And then, your conscious awareness might just itself be a dream, too.
This is Chuang-Tzu territory, where he couldn`t work out whether he was CT dreaming he was a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming he was CT.”
I’m no expert (believe it or not) but I’d say that this apparent confusion of consciousness and dreaming can be a bit of a red herring. Masters often claim to be aware, ‘awake’ while sleeping, and frankly, how can any would-be master who isn’t sure if he’s conscious or dreaming be the real deal?
Chuang-Tzu is reputed to have been a great master and if he was then I suggest his apparent ‘confusion of identity’ in the above quote you cite, Frank, derives from that state of being where normal boundaries of perception are dissolved and the ‘lucky one’ merges with all around.
In which case, “dreaming” would not be a literal description but a metaphor, poetry. IE, a different state altogether from ‘dreaming’ – although, like a dream, not one that lasts for long at a similar intensity, so I’ve heard.
The point being that all such ‘transcendent’ experiences/states of being are absorbed into the individual’s system so that he/she might live out their implications in the course of his normal life.
SD,
The barriers between “awake” and “dreaming”and “conscious” and “unconscious” are, I suspect, far more undefined than you are supposing.
Alan Watts put it well when he said:
“You see the problem is this; we identify in our experience a differentiation between what we do and what happens to us.
We have a certain number of actions that we define as voluntary; we feel in control of those.
And then over against that there is all those things that are involuntary. But the dividing line between these two is very arbitrary.
Because for example, when you move your hand you feel that you decide whether to open it or to close it. But then ask yourself how do you decide?
When you decide to open your hand. Do you first decide to decide? You don’t do you. You just decide. And how do you do that? And if you don’t know how you do it; is it voluntary or involuntary?”
This is what Chuang Tzu was saying in his butterfly thing, but in much fewer words and more beautifully.
What I would ask is, can you really find those boundaries between awake/asleep, conscious/dreaming?
If you look, you will not find them any more than you will find a line drawn around the middle of the earth called ‘the equator’!
What exactly do you mean when you say someone is “awake” whilst sleeping (which is supposedly different from all the rest who are just flat out snoring in the sack)?
Are they lucid dreaming?
Are they not dreaming at all?
Does it mean they can hear the telly from next door even tho` they`re snoring?
Are they liable to cock open an eye at any moment and say:
“Big Brother is watching you”?
It`s not at all clear to me.
Frank, although it seems to be the case that the boundaries between being asleep and being awake, unconscious and conscious, are hard to specifically determine, being on a continuum along which one may easily slip from one to the other, aren’t we talking here about relatively ‘ordinary’ conditions of the psyche rather than the ‘super-ordinary’ state of ‘wakefulness’ enjoyed by masters & co.?
And similarly for Alan Watts’s comments, which, while obviously valid, only apply to the realms of mind/will and the wonder of instinctive, ‘automatic’ physical actions. Which, of course, can themselves be a great teaching, eg the example he gives of one’s head suddenly turning, without apparent personal intent or control, and in any spontaneous reflex in, say, dance or sport, a perfect shot in tennis, for instance, done without conscious thought, leaving one with the question, “Who did that?!” (until the self/ego appropriates it for its own ‘glory’, as it were).
(Btw, I don’t see the connection between this sort of instinctive action and Chuang Tzu’s ‘butterfly’ statement).
The question really, I suppose, is what, if anything, differentiates masters’/teachers’/realised individuals’ state of ‘wakefulness’ (aka ‘total consciousness’) from that of the rest of us. That might answer your question about what being ‘awake’ while ‘asleep’ actually means, I think. No doubt you and everyone else here knows this, but I’ll have a go at describing it anyway, based on what I’ve heard (with some tiny vestige of personal – or, better said, ‘impersonal’ – experience, of which others, including you, will no doubt have had a fair bit more).
On the face of it, it’s blindingly simple:
An individual is totally conscious, awake, when (however it’s happened) troubling emotions and thoughts, hopes, dreams, fears, even physical ailments etc. etc. no longer exist as controlling influences, so he/she is free to just live in the simple state of moment-to-moment well-being, here and now. It seems that such an individual naturally grows in awareness, joy and impersonal love, with very little, if any, likelihood of ever losing this blessed state.
Then, perhaps it becomes a little more complicated…
So, while they outwardly might look just like (well, perhaps kind of!) anyone else, being totally inwardly free they also have clear access to many other dimensions of being, but most importantly, to the depths of Being itself, to the unbounded ‘No-thing’ which becomes their realised identity, replacing any attachment to the self of normal egoistic living, which has had to die, gradually or suddenly. It’s this state, or in glimpses or ‘versions’ of it, that gives rise to the wondrous “I am the butterfly, and it is I” of Chuang Tzu.
And in this state, the being, having been real-ised, remains conscious, awake, alert, not only while normally physically awake, but also while the body, the earthly vehicle of consciousness, gets its necessary daily rest and regeneration, just like everyone else’s.
And that’s about all I can say, especially as my bodymind is in considerable need of food and drink after all this demanding, ‘priestly’ work this evening (my God, what a way to spend a Saturday night!).
And yes, as they used to say in EST, mere understanding on its own is life’s booby prize….
SD,
I like those awakened consciousness superhero stories, too. Particularly the one about the normal-looking bloke who, behind the scenes, is a permanently awakened hero who is working tirelessly for the good of humanity – that`s a good narrative.
I am inclined to consider that they may have been dreamed up by ancient sages up in the Himalayas whilst quaffing a few cups of soma and coming up with better and better and more and more far-out stories: Yogis that fly thru space, visit other planets. Adepts that can be in more than one place at a time. Guys with only a loin cloth on that live for centuries. Saints that survive without food. Dudes that always appear at the right place and right time, centuries apart, to do their amazing stuff. Flying monkeys, geezers with multiple heads that can see in all directions, enlightened ones that are totally awake 24/7 etc etc etc…
After all, they pretty much invented the superhero genre with Hanuman predating Superman, Batman and Spiderman by 5000 years or so.
From my less exalted position of being a guy who crashes out every night, dozes during the day when trying to meditate and forgets where I`ve left my front door key and mobile phone, I am inclined to set the bar a little lower than eternal wakefulness. And who knows, with a bit of luck, maybe I might pull through on the basis of “only losers can win in this game”?
Before you scoff -
just two words:
Leicester City!*
*(Leicester City, an unfashionable football team who surprised everyone last season by becoming the English league champions).
Funnily enough, the man who runs a corner shop near Highgate tube station (at the bottom of Southwood Lane for any north Londoners here) impressed me yesterday afternoon as a possible contender, both in the relaxed-but-alert way he looked (while obviously hiding his true credentials behind casually reading a copy of ‘The Sun’) and in his closing remark, after a short exchange about the weather: “If my customers are happy, then I am happy.”
Might sound just a normal, ‘samsaric’ thing to say from a man of his calling, but, you know, it was the way he said it, while giving me an intent but friendly gaze…Mind you, having just been ‘acupunctured’ for the last hour or so I felt and no doubt looked like a suitable case for enlightened treatment….
Anyway, are you aware, Frank, that Osho himself declared that he was one who remained conscious, ie rooted in Being, while his bodymind was asleep?
Don’t know about Claudio Ranieri or Jamie Vardy*, however….
*(Leicester City football manager and one of their top players).
When the disciple is ready the master will appear…
I imagine that you are aware, of course, that it is common knowledge in highly evolved circles that Highgate tube station is a hugely powerful energy point situated right on the site of the crown chakra of London…
And those with highly developed meditative sensitivity, like you and the enlightened newsagent, can feel and experience the energy of the sun behind the sun there….
Frank boy,
Now, in Syria, the children hold photos of Pokemon in the hope they will appear and save them from the horrors of the war.
In the poorest parts of Thailand, the teenagers and kids, as well, watch super- hero films on tv in the hope that they will break out from the screen and fly away with them to a better place and life.
In the poor parts of the Amazon rainforest, the young girlshope and pray that a nice foreigner will come and marry them and take them to a better life.
In the more ‘evolved’ places, people hope that they will find a spiritual place where they will be free from anguish and unhappiness. And very much willingly pay somebody to take them: the enlightened!
So, it is a human thing to ask, wish and wait for help! Is it in our conscious, unconscious, supra-conscious, ass-conscious, or what?
Tan,
I think you`re right. Everybody wants to be part of a better story than they are in now.
The enlightenment story, where you get to a point where you don`t have a story at all is a very sophisticated kind of story altogether.
And if you think about it, it would have taken a lot of storytelling before someone came up with that. That story is only a very few thousand years old, max.
Humans had been around for literally aeons and aeons before that. Those early guys were happily staggering about for thousands of years worshipping big gods hidden in the mountains and the wind and so on.
Then was it Buddha – or someone a little before him? – who came along and said:
“If you drop your story then you become the big story which is everything and all there is!
And everybody went WOW! That`s a good one! Get that one down, we don`t want to forget that – everybody should hear that one!”
Frank boy said: “The enlightenment story, where you get to a point where you don’t have a story at all is a very sophisticated kind of story altogether.”
How true is that!
Osho himself couldn’t summarize it better!
Are we really evolving or is it the same shit, just a bit more sophisticated? I wonder…
Thanks! XXX
Frank says somewhere the Red period of Oregon was the right way to go in 1981 and seems to support this view by saying that Osho never wanted to return to Poona in 1986. This shows a lack of properly conceived logic. The two are entirely separate.
Osho had given major instructions in 1980 to find a more healthy place to carry on his work in India, not only more healthy for him, but for his disciples. The idea of going to America was Sheela’s. whatever you say, Frank, the evidence is that Osho did not want to go there, and resisted the idea for some time.
The view that somehow Sannyas had to move on is something you have reverse-visioned. Even if such an intercontinental move was appropriate for some kind of modernisation of Sannyas, which I don’t accept, then a much better destination would have been somewhere in western Europe. America was and is a remarkably uncivilised place.
It is certainly true that Osho never wanted to return to Poona in 1986, and his entourage certainly did not want to return to India – they were, after all, 95 per cent not Indians by that time. Dragging Osho around all those countries was totally unrealistic at that time, he was in the world’s eyes a convicted criminal and with a very mixed reputation. I said at the time no-one would contemplate letting him in once the USA had exerted their influence and power, as they did so blatantly in Uruguay.
From what I know from those close to these matters, Osho was not at all disinterested in being in India, not in Poona, but in the Himalayas. He had been real sick in Poona 1, and clearly it made no sense to return there, just on those grounds.
Big P,
What I wrote was:
“I liked the Red days when Osho was in Oregon. Trying to bring all that meditation and dancing etc. into the everyday modern world was the way to go.”
I was talking about myself, not attempting a historical post-mortem of the Osho movement, which I leave to those better qualified, like your good self.
@frank
25 July, 2016 at 7:02 pm
“The enlightenment story, where you get to a point where you don`t have a story at all is a very sophisticated kind of story altogether.”
Enlightenment is when one knows for certain there is no such thing.
Thanks for that, Parmartha (at 8.11 am), and some other response for the ‘Alphas’ here is in the pipeline…
Summer morning with a quite clouded sky here. Like any other day, bringing out the garbage, washing the dishes (and my body, and taking care of scars), never a routine.
Leaving soon, to get some greenery for the inside.
Outside – the gardening firm has been coming early. Nice. The plants or greenery here love it, a stress redemption – release sensible for anything and anybody.
Madhu
Perfectly correct. Madhu!
Again, the rapist alpha males of SN are beating their hairy chests and strutting about like rutting baboons called ‘Sigmund’ while they scuffle for supremacy and bananas and randomly mount the innocent lesser members of the troupe and violently thrust their idiotic ideas about “consciousness and unconsciousness” onto them!
The form-master, Mr.Parmartha, has attempted to restore order to the ancient history lesson but the utterly destructive behaviour of the baboons at the back of the class continues as yet another member of the fourth form who simply wanted to get on with his meditation homework has his head held down the toilet bowl as it is flushed by Swami Begbie!
Yahoo!
Fokyu!
Thanks, Anand Yogi, Fokyu too!
This’ll cheer you up anand yogi. Take your mind of all that strutting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLb1DH_XhEM
Again, the foolish baboons like Arpana fail to understand the truth as clearly stated by the 5000 yuga lineage of holy sages!
In the words of my sadguru, Swami Bhorat:
“Minds are as stupid as people who have them.”
I do not have mind!
Mind is gone!
Mind is nothing but a tool, and like Shantambhai,I have been beating the tool day and night with utter devotion and heroic disdain for the consequences for many years until finally it has withered away!
Yahoo!
Hari Om!
Beloved Parmartha,
Whatsoever may be the wishes of Bhagwan Shree and circumstances around, He finally returned to Pune. It is unavoidable and indisputable fact.
I simply wonder about your resistance to ignore this fact and take into consideration the last years of Osho and the life therein and thereafter.
One can say, you were not around Osho during the Osho phase; surprise is the mute silence of those thousands who have seen Master giving final touch to his work and creating a lifestyle which can live longer than his physical body.
Faceless frank has good memory and perfect writing skills, but even he ducks the responsibility.
Police officer asked Swami Santa, “When you were walking on the road, a man snatched gold chain from a lady. Can you describe the looks of the snatcher?”
Swami Santa: “Can’t you from my attire? I am a sannyasin. I look only inside.”
All the four periods of Osho’s work from 1970 were forms of dictatorship, as Lokesh and Frank often aver. Wonderful things happened within the field force of Osho’s presence, and also to me, but they were not because of the organisaiton, but in spite of it.
In the end, I grew tired of this sort of organisation, and decided to continue my love affair with the Master, but not dependent on his physical presence and being surrounded by the conformist behaviour to which the organisation tended.
Many things happened for me through this which would not have been possible locked within such an organisation.
I woke up at 5am one morning, driven to write the death story. It’s the only personal story I’ve ever written. Unusual for me, as I am a technical writer. Reading ‘Only One Sky’ was a life changing experience. I have read other Osho books and sat in discourse. But this first book I read had the biggest Osho impact on me. Especially discourse 6 which describes Latihan.
‘It Happened In Pune’ is my experience. Do not believe, do not disbelieve. Figure it out yourself. Up until Osho the Bardo was the only option. It was Osho who changed that, not me.
My relationship with Osho is private. My life is private. I interface with people every day in a quiet way, help when I can and never ask for anything in return. I’ve never participated in an online discussion before, and didn’t anticipate the story would lead to this, but here we are.
All I knew of life after death was what the Catholic church taught. When I arrived in Pune at 24 I was a novice to the mystic world and the terminology. I had heard about reincarnation, may have heard the term Bardo, but it was just a word without meaning. I knew nothing of Gurdjieff, until a week after my death when that German sannyasin offered to sell me the three books, ‘Beelzebub’s Tales’.
The reason I used the term “dimensions” is because I have no other words to describe such an amazing experience. The description I wrote is such a tiny fragment of what occurred, I wish I could do it justice.
Someone commented, and I’ve often wondered myself, why did Gurdjieff send me back? Now that I see this story has some resonance with others, perhaps just telling it is enough. I have told this story many times over the years in person, often to people who are facing death, and they found it of comfort.
If the story resonates with you, fine, if not, ok. Whether you decide to find out while still in the body or wait to the last minute is up to you. You will die, we all will. I suggest you keep your options open.
Very best to all of you,
Prem Doug
“My relationship with Osho is private. My life is private. I interface with people every day in a quiet way, help when I can and never ask for anything in return. I’ve never participated in an online discussion before, and didn’t anticipate the story would lead to this, but here we are.” (Prem Doug)
Thank you very much for appearing this way. And giving us all the honour of that – your response.
Especially your words above, I´d quoted again , touched my heart deeply.
Very best for you too, Prem Doug.
Madhu
All the best to you, PD. Yes, I do agree with Arpana, you are brave, thank you.
Prem Doug,
I have read your story with interest as I have had these type of ‘Out of the Body’ experiences myself. Unfortunately they are not real and you are deceiving yourself and others. The apparent inexplicable coincidences that are so persuading are also misleading.
When you say that you had never heard of Gurdjieff, that is probably not true. You may not consciously remember. But at sometime in the past you may have been browsing a bookshop or wherever and your subconscious noticed a book with the name, “George Gurdjieff” on the cover – not interesting enough to draw your conscious attention to it, but nonetheless an unusual name. And definitely suitable to be given to the character you encountered at the cafe.
If you told anybody at the time about your experience, then sannyasins are great gossips and word probably got to the ears of a swami with some Gurdjieff books he did not need anymore who saw an opportunity. He may have been told when you were leaving and, like we’ve all done, left things to the last minute to catch up with you.
People talk about their body being dead and brought back to life; if a body can be brought back to life then it was never really dead in the first place and any tales of the so-called ‘next world’ would have been created by their subconscious – however realistic they are.
When Osho said: “If you can observe fear, then how can fear be part of you?”,
maybe he should have said: “If you can observe bliss, then how can bliss be part of you?”
Gee whizz! Who said that writing on SN could not raise one’s level of consciousness? Dougie’s presence on SN caused me to have a premonition, when I wrote as a conclusion a few days ago, “In that very moment, Dougie awakens…to find himself talking nonsense on SN.”
Kabam! And here we have Dougie live on the site, lending deep insights like, “You will die, we all will.” Gulp! Quite a revelation, as I am sure you will all agree.
But hold on…let’s take a few notes here. Wasn’t the whole idea of Sannyas based around various ideas like…ehm…getting linked up with something that is never born and never dies? That which dies and lives, that writes and reads on SN will, of course, die along with the body but, and that is a big BUT, there appears to be a little something that is beyond the realm of life and death and doesn’t that little something have to do with that which bears witness?
Dougie suggests in the following conclusion, “I suggest you keep your options open”, that perhaps he might not be following his own apparently sound advice. Besides, it brings into question that which imagines it has options to keep open in the first place.
Madhu has been deeply touched by Dougie’s appearance. Encapsulated in the following: “Thank you very much for appearing this way. And giving us all the honour of that – your response.”
Unlike Madhu, I do not feel honoured to a lesser or greater extent than I do when meeting any of my friends, or lovely people who happen to spin into my orbit, by having Dougie here with us on SN. As far as I am concerned, Dougie is just another wee fish in the tank like we all are.
There is nothing in Dougie’s writing that strikes me as special. We all have stories such as his. Ultimately, it’s all in the mind.
Couldn’t you have read between the lines for the ‘spirit’ of the post for once?
Describe the taste of raspberries.
Lokesh,
I don’t know why Dougie’s writing has put you into such a spin? Your responses have been sharp, irritated and condescending at times.
What’s up? You’re beginning to sound grumpy and old and it doesn’t befit you.
If you want to be understood (as you clearly wish to be) you need explain a little more and allow others to do the same. Cynicism at others who don’t understand you, will just deepen your irritation. We ain’t all as clever as you are.
This passage makes no sense to me – can you explain again?
“But hold on…lets take a few notes here. Wasn’t the whole idea of sannyas based around various ideas like….ehm….getting linked up with something that is never born and never dies? That which dies and lives, that writes and reads on SN will, of course, die along with the body but, and that is a big BUT, there appears to be a little something that is beyond the realm of life and death and doesn’t that little something have to do with that which bears witnessing.”
You conclude, “we all have stories. And ultimately it’s all in the mind.”
Are you suggesting it’s all just imagination then? And therefore of no value? Why then explore, investigate and explain anything?
Simond, I do not feel any of the things you describe. My point is that Dougie’s story falls into a category that is viewed by many as being ‘spiritual’. This is so because it has hallmarks that exhibit spiritual behaviour patterns. I do not see this as having much to do with actually being spiritual, but rather acting and behaving in a way that the majority will view as being spiritual.
Osho loved the Zen approach. Everyday life is the path. Not much room for dreaming and a space that contains the universe for reality to enter. I see Dougie’s report as a spiritual fantasy and there is much in what he writes to back this up. It does not bother me at all. Neither does people’s gullibility. Meeting Gurdjieff in some alternate reality is bullshit. Kid’s stuff. Best I can do with such nonsense is laugh at the absurdity of it.
Of course, Osho at times encouraged such things. I watched people tell Osho they dreamt about him and he gave a knowing chuckle, as if he had been up to astral hanky panky. Maybe he was, but I kind of doubt it. His approach seemed at times to be an all-encompassing “it’s all good.”.
You request, “This passage makes no sense to me – can you explain again?” Simond, you are asking me to explain the meaning of what is inscribed on Osho’s Samadhi. He is supposed to be your master, guru, spiritual amigo or fuck knows what and now you are asking me to explain such a thing? I’m no one’s guru. I have always felt uncomfortable in the teaching role as far as spiritual matters are concerned. The reason for this is that I feel it incorrect to speak about that which I do not completely understand…yet.
So, just because you are such a sweet chap, I will say this much (please take into account the limitation of words when reading the following):
Through putting into practice certain meditation practices over the last 30 years I have become aware of the presence of something of a more permanent nature than the bodymind complex in which I currently lodge. Whether or not this certain something is my true nature and beyond the changes of life and death remains to be seen. Tell you one thing, though, I’m on the road to find out. Maybe you are too. Trust this has been of some help to you.
Thanks, Lokesh, your explanation is clearer to me now, words can be so easily misunderstood, which was the reason behind my request.
And I agree there’s something quite clearly beyond the bodymind complex, something that has been the focus of loads of confusion for me, as well as the source of a growing contentment. And it continues to be testing and challenging to live out this realisation.
As to the spiritual nature of Dougie’s writing, I understand where you are coming from. He, like many of us, has imbibed the jargon and theology of spirituality, as I too have. I try not to refer to these terms where possible myself. Sometimes it’s inevitable, or very difficult to avoid.
As to the experience of past life and whether it’s all a fantasy or not, I’ve found some of the encounters I’ve read of to be worthy of exploration. There are many where the subject has had little previous contact with spiritual teachings at all, from young children as well as adults.
As I indicated earlier, I don’t know the truth of them but think it is worth looking at regardless.
Once again, thanks for your clarifications.
Cool, Simond, good to hear from you. Past lives? A present life is enough to be going on with.
You might enjoy to read P.D. Ouspensky’s speculations on Eternal Recurrence, in which he speculates on the possibility of reincarnation in the past, which somehow made more sense to him than reincarnation in some possible future. The hypothesis is based on the idea that third dimension time lines bear little in relation to fifth dimensional realities where time lines converge…or something like that.
“Though adamant against ‘inspirazzione, intuizzione, imaginazzione’ in his pupils, he himself indulged a speculative ‘Eternal Recurrence’ paradigm which overcast his spirits. The Gurdjieffian ‘System’ – progressively reduced by Ouspensky to an intellectual construct and expropriated as teaching material – slipped finally from his hands. He died lonely, childless and disappointed. And yet, and yet…
Ouspensky separated from Gurdjieff. The ensuing polarisation was far from a philosophic abstraction. It affected many people’s destinies. It confronted them with hard questions and existential choices. It created a powerful current in which, despite turbulence, Gurdjieff’s Work has thrived. In the final analysis this is arguably Ouspensky’s essential, if unplanned, contribution.
From the bewildering historical canvas of human experience some lives stand out as notably unfortunate and pitiable. Yet, even of these, merely a fraction qualify as ‘tragic’. This emphatic adjective is licensed only by the totemic stature of an individual and the irony of his fate. Ouspensky once possessed such a stature. Sixty years after his death he remains – notwithstanding his frailties – a figure to be taken very seriously.”
Note the word ‘imaginazzione’. It signifies that we are often captivated by a force that can make us believe anything, such as meetings with Mr G in a higher dimension etc.
“Ouspensky died disappointed…”
He drank large amounts of spirits for years, all the way to his death. I have known enough people who have done that and they were all down and disappointed with life by the end. That`s what booze does – it depresses the central nervous system.
The problem may not have been so much to do with Gurdjieff – just Ouspensky`s own burnt-out chemical state.
Imv: Every life pissed down the drain might not be Oedipus Rex or Antigone, but it`s still tragic.
Let`s hope that his idea of eternal recurrence was just imaginazione otherwise the poor bugger will be out there staring bug-eyed into a half-empty bottle of vodka now and for all eternity!!
Yes, Frank, old demon alcohol. Kind of hard to fit such a booze-fuelled crash into some of the ideas he propounded.
Last night, was reading about how undeveloped personality will always seek the same life and the wheel goes turning round. Mr G said the only way to break out of the cycle is to nourish one’s essence.
The main way to do this being strict and uncensored self-observation that breaks down the false personality/ego, the detritus from which acts as a kind of psychological compost that nourishes spiritual essence, the determining factor for possible rebirth.
Lokesh,
“Kind of hard to fit such a booze-fuelled crash into some of the ideas he propounded.”
Actually, I find it quite the opposite. You mentioned ‘A New Model of the Universe’. I chanced to pick up a copy not long back. I had read it some 30 years ago but I wanted in particular to re-read the chapter on dreams. Reading the book, I noticed things that I had missed before. One was how much his experiments with consciousness were drug-related. He isn’t overt about it but if you read between the lines it’s pretty clear.
But it was the dreams thing that interested me, as some of his musings were different from the general trend of the time.
Yet, I found quite an irony in there: he was scathing about the psychoanalytic approach to dreams, which was on one level refreshing, yet it betrayed a certain dismissive arrogance that clearly turned out to be self-defeating.
His ideas about a recurring dream that bugged him show something: he documents a recurring dream he had about him being stuck in mud and being unable to move.
He explained this as being caused by the fact that he had his legs caught up in the sheets of his bed (how he managed to do this on a continuous basis is quite mysterious in itself).
It`s hard not to see this ‘interpretation’ as showing an almost laughable lack of awareness and high level of self-deception about his own feelings. Even an amateur dream interpreter or part-time poet ould have alerted him to the suggestion that he was being bogged down and paralysed by something in his life: difficult emotions and alcohol.
His ideas about getting away from negative emotions and replacing them with higher ones were unreal for him. nWhen he found out he couldn`t do it, he just tried to do it with booze.
So he ignored what was under his feet and continued in his high faluting flights about dimensions and universes etc. Like Icarus – there was only one way it was going to go.
Many thanks, Lokesh.
I have dipped into Ouspensky and Gurdjieff a very little, I did read ‘Meetings With Remarkable Men’, but in the most part these teachers passed me by. Perhaps it is because they were dead and perhaps too that their work was a tad intellectual for me.
I was always driven to find living teachers and far too focused on my unhappiness and confusion to follow the more esoteric of teachers.
Da free John was another I couldn’t relate to; it seems to be a matter of temperament and natural inclination that draws us to certain types of teachers.
As to past lives and reincarnation, or out of body experience – the theme of this thread – my interest now is vaguely academic rather than a needful one. As you indicated, this life is the most important.
Finally, on the subject of alcohol, drugs etc, it does seem a pattern that many so-called enlightened people have also been secret drinkers, or have even died as alcoholics: Alan Watts, Ouspensky, even our Osho liked a wee bit of gas.
The more I have looked at various teachers and the further you dig, the more frustrated, sad and even bitter they became. Look at both Krishnamurtis, for example.
Is it the nature and confusion as to their role as guides and teachers that led to their frustration? Is it the sense of hopelessness at how few people ‘got’ them?
Of course, the same sadness and bitterness and conservatism is often found in older people – I know how vigilant I have to to be to stop myself feeling hopeless sometimes.
I wanted to spell Ouspensky’s name correctly and came across a site dedicated to the man. I was surprised to read what I read and therefore found it worth sharing…also relevant, I thought.
I have read a lot of his work and find much that was of use. ‘New Model of the Universe’ is a great read and I have returned to it often as much that was written so long ago is still relevant today. Remarkable that a man’s life, so filled with tragedy, could have produced so much that I view as inspirational.
Great observations, Frank. In many ways, Mr O was a pioneer and in such a role it was inevitable that there would be mistakes. Same could be said for Osho.
Wise also to take into account the horror and social upheavals that were taking place in Europe and Russia during those times. It must have been difficult, to say the least.
Lokesh,
That`s right, Ouspensky had been through war, displacement and hardship such as I, born with a plastic spoon in my mouth, cannot really imagine. Trungpa, too.
Escaped victims of genocide, really.
To criticise all of them, including Gurdjieff, Alan Watts and of course Osho, is not to disparage their incredible contribution and intelligence, but to add to it by questioning the biased hagiographical mumbo-jumbo around them and getting ‘the full story’, which is always a better read than the abridged or censored version!!
Lokesh and Madhu reacting on Doug`s post; a clear demarcation between man and woman. I won’t say woman has heart, man has mind and therefore woman is better. I am not in the spiritual value trading business where one needs to pump the self-esteem of women, the biggest consumers of religious products.
Anyway, I wrote the mail to Doug and requested and suggested him to have a look at the comments and respond. Few hours later he did.
I think Lokesh is bit too harsh. Doug is not playing therapist or any kind of other public role. He seems to be happily married American and with some kind of spiritual experience in the background, he lives a holistic life.
It is good too that with his Samantha he did not go back to Bhagwan. Almost all the relations around Osho ashram were melted away.
Here is today’s main quotation from official Osho website:
“No-Thought for the Day
If you love, you will know that everything begins
and everything ends, and there is a time for beginning
and there is a time for ending,
and there is no wound in it.
One is not wounded, one simply knows the season is over.”
Shantam announces, “I wrote the mail to Doug.” I wonder if it might be the case that it never occurred to him that he is a reincarnation of His Holiness Shri Nosey Parkerji.
If somebody feels the need, Lokesh, learning to handle a flyswatter better or most efficiently, am I then allowed to recommend you at your Ibicenco place?
Madhu
Hi Madhu, I have no idea what you are talking about, which feels perfectly correct.
Much love. L.
Who knows, we see someday some certificate like this:
‘We, at Osho Superduperversity AG, Zurich, are pleased to announce Mr./Mrs./Ma/Ms/Swami………………………………..has completed three years course of theory and practice of Never Born, Never Dies Experience at our state of the art campus at Facebook.
Signature,
Dr. Banana Pineapple
Chancellor
“‘We, at Osho Superduperversity AG, Zurich, are pleased to announce Mr./Mrs./Ma/Ms/Swami………………………………..has completed three years course of theory and practice of Never Born, Never Dies Experience at our state of the art campus at Facebook.” ( Shantam Prem).
Not at all that bad for an introspective satire, Shantam Prem, to describe some mumbo jumbo in chat jungles wherever, not the least in chosen identities in our own scene.
AAP (augmented, anonymous personalities) feeling free to rate others…one moment in praise and contentment…the next moment degrading them.
´Empowerment´ by quoting whatsoever from wheresoever for whatsoever…and who cares about declaring a quote a quote? Is this satirical joke ‘homegrown’ in your own brain, Shantam?
And when, I am curious, do you personally know Dr Banana Pineapple? Have you applied yet on the form?
Monday morning, Bavarian sky´s opening the rain clouds. Sticky weather reports on all dimensions, also from the human ZOO.
In the animal ZOO, the gorillas are content, they had their bananas and more. And in the gorilla family constellation setting, it´s alright (for the moment).
Madhu
I have observed when ex- or present sect members of Sannyas quote Gurdjieff and Bros. or Ramana Maharshi and Sons they try to create an impression, just like young entrepreneurs who go for three weeks summer course at Harvard University.
In every social circle, few people always are smarter than others. This is more or less evolutionary process in every kind of spices.
I just wonder, if Gurdjieff, Ramana or Zen Toyata teachings were so powerful and life changing, what was the need to go to Bhagwan? I am not saying Osho as most of such people went to Bhagwan.
P.S:
It seems I have forgotten – it is Bhagwan or Bhagvan?
“I just wonder, if Gurdjieff, Ramana or Zen Toyata teachings were so powerful and life changing, what was the need to go to Bhagwan?” (Shantam)
Answer, I presume is quite easy, Shantam Prem. In former times (before ‘digital nativism’ flooded our brains and cut us off from all other senses and instincts too (more or less), most of us were inspired by encountering real people who had been attracted to the Master, and their authentic and often very loving and sensitive approaches to life, living and inter-relating; there was a kind of magnetic pull to go for the ‘Source’, so to say.
That covered some major part of at least some of the deep longings of my generation to get in real touch with a Living Heritage of some of the late Masters you mentioned. And maybe one can say first generation of fellow-travellers were very well educated people. And had an urge, tangible and sensible, to go inside and SHARE.
Then some that Satyadeva once called (maybe?) unavoidable ‘energetic deterioration-issues’ (?) which followed.
Which we are all part of too (when we are really present here in writing or reading).
Then, you write: “I am not saying Osho as most of such people went to Bhagwan.”
And the latter, as I perceive it, shows to me that you might be much less interested in adapting some teachings or inner processes for yourself and are more interested to have a political kind of discussion here.
As we are still in the topic thread shared by Doug, I would say that it would be really a pity if another quite essential topic is poisoned by ´political considerations´.
Madhu
Madhu, first part of your reply is really coming from heartfelt observation, last part is a product of woman’s mind.
Good post, Madhu.
What Shantam fails to understand is that it is a case of putting into practice what certain teachings have to offer. If you do not actually integrate such things into your life it is a complete waste of time and just another intellectual exercise to tag onto an ego that is already carrying so much superfluous nonsense.
Shantam is identified with politics. Unusual for a sannyasin because Osho made in perfectly clear that politics is about power trips connected with very low energy centres. Kind of obvious really. Shantam just is not open to seeing this.
P.S. for Shantam:
Rushing somewhere to post a ´selfie’ (wow, I´ve been there!) and distributing that to hundreds of facebook-followers in an instant ( I wouldn´t call them “friends”, sorry!), shows by the very name of it that it has nothing to do with some teachings of some of the Masters you liked to mention here.
However, each and everyone has to deal with the change, since quite a while, even sometimes as being taken hostage as a non-smartphone-equipped ´just passing by entity´.
And what sharing was, and is now, really needs to be looked into anew and intensely (my view is that some correction-adaptation is needed).
“I just wonder, if Gurdjieff, Ramana or Zen Toyata teachings were so powerful and life changing, what was the need to go to Bhagwan? I am not saying Osho, as most of such people went to Bhagwan.”
And I just wonder what the hell it’s got to do with you, Shantam, especially considering no other master/teacher holds the slightest interest for you, your primary focus being membership and executive control of a ‘spiritual social club-cum-free sex & marriage bureau’.
Prejudiced mind can never see the reality.
SD, check out which master has written this quotation. If you cannot find out the name, don’t feel shy to touch the feet of Shri Shantam for giving you a nice quotation.
You are quite an intelligent man but blinded by one’s own vanity. Find some spiritual psychologist nearby who works on your fetish with this or that master.
Matter of the fact is, people in all the ages have grown because of their interaction with fellow disciples and not due to Mammy And Daddy. In a way, we at sannyasnews are following the classic tradition of disciples-to-disciples brainstorming.
“Matter of the fact is, people in all the ages have grown because of their interaction with fellow disciples and not due to Mammy And Daddy. In a way, we at sannyasnews are following the classic tradition of disciples-to-disciples brainstorming.”
If this is generally true (and I dispute that it’s the whole truth), then you, Shantam, are an exception, as basically, with very little deviation, you have only been repeating the same old political propagandist stuff ever since you arrived here, a long time ago, essentially stubbornly refusing to modify your views one iota!
To further rescue you from your self-delusion:
All you’ve “grown” in is your capacity to create minor stylistic variations on the theme of repetitiously ‘groaning’ out your personal agenda, ie your capacity to waste your time and energy boring everyone here as you say the same things over and over again.
As far as you’re concerned, it’s not “brainstorming” at all, as you’re simply not open to anyone else’s arguments. You merely exploit the freedom at SN, that’s all.
Well, Shantam, I see it like this, if one wants/needs to invest in some Master it is their business. At least I learned from Osho/Bhagwan one has to be one’s own Warren Buffet towards getting out of business!
Kavita, this kind of language is my style.
As a man, though quite a feminine type, still as a man I think I have also learned from ‘Bhagwan Shree Osho Jain’ not to shy away to be a whistle-blower when market is being run by the bulls without eyes.
Investment in religious products is a very sensitive affair and I feel in my element to take political role when others want to play Mystical Brahmins.
Of course it is, but you miss the point. I/we here have had the whistleblower for our lifetime already; I am cocksure I don’t need one!
Shantam declares, “As a man, though quite a feminine type, still as a man I think I have also learned from ‘Bhagwan Shree Osho Jain’ not to shy away to be a whistle-blower when market is being run by the bulls without eyes.”
I suspect that his image of being a Resortleaks whistle-blower lies closer to home than it does with anything he learned from Osho. Most of our social conditioning is set firmly in place before the age of ten.
Perceptive comment, Lokesh.
“I feel in my element to take political role when others want to play Mystical Brahmins.”
I was pondering on this & then thought if ‘Brahmin’ derives from the Sanskrit/Hindi word ‘brahm’, which means illusion other than creator, and if Kshatriya (warrior) derives from kshetra (area/ property), then it seems OFI & you are playing the Mystical Kshatriya!
Then Swami Shailendra, Arun etc. are playing Mystical Vaishyas (traders), I’m wondering if Sodexco & the likes could be playing the Mystical Shudras (servers)!
Good analogy, Kavita.
More of an inference actually.
“Most of our social conditioning is set firmly in place before the age of ten.”
Yes, Lokesh.
And most probably you have included this or that Mr. or Mrs. Master or Headmistress and also you, me and everybody.
And once again you miss the point, Shantam, which is about your own deep-rooted tendencies that you mistakenly take for those of a free-spirited, ‘real’ Osho sannyasin campaigning valiantly against gross injustice (perpetrated – especially upon Indians – by white race crypto-imperialists).
Satyadeva, I will always miss that point which you have got. Truth is not like that girl next door in the suburb who one must marry otherwise chance is missed.
Of course you always miss the point, because if you ever were to get it your self-made raison d’etre would begin to crumble from within.
Homework:
Keep reading Lokesh’s post of yesterday, 2.19pm, second paragraph.
“Raison crumble with whipped cream and upside-down fruitcake with totally bananas melted minds imaginazzione ice-cream with a flake on top”
From the mystery-school dinners dessert menu.
Frank,
Have you come across ‘I Is Another’, by James Geary
and
‘Metaphors We Live By’, by George Lakof?
I think your most interesting comments about stories is along the same lines as their studies.
(The first is a great read, but I found the second more demanding).
Yes.
Metaphors rule!
“Raison crumble with whipped cream and upside-down fruitcake with totally bananas melted minds imaginazzione ice-cream with a flake on top”
From the Mystery-School dinners dessert menu.” (Frank)
Dear Frank,
Could you – on my behalf – ask for another kind of ´dessert´ after dinner today?
That would be so kind.
Madhu
P.S:
Your voice is just better listened to by the waiter….
Madhu,
I quite enjoy this dessert….XX
So the truth of your situation, Shantam, is this:
You have a vested interest in keeping yourself unintelligent.
No, dear one, I don’t consider you intelligent.
For me, Satyadeva, you are not more or less intelligent than Indians living in UK visiting home country in their Nike shoes and Bermuda shorts purchased from C&A.
That’s right, Shantam, never bother to actually look into what’s being put to you.
Including your supposed master…
As I said, that’s a great way to keep yourself terminally thick.
Congratulations!
Yes, Shantam, on that level I am the same as everyone else. I started to work towards undoing my conditioning from the age of 18 and am still working at it. One could say it’s a day-to-day thing.
I remember meeting an older Californian sannyasin back in Poona, must have been 1975. I was a young man. At one point I asked what he was doing in the ashram. He replied, deprograming my bio-computer. It was newspeak to me at the time, but I already understood what he meant.
It’s a gradual process. I can honestly say it helps lead a more peaceful life and understand better the people I meet. As I see it, this world is primarily inhabited by bio-robots. Most people I meet are mechanical. You have to watch out if they get out of control and turn violent. Somehow I manage to stay out of their way. For the most part at least.
Growing awareness of this robot culture we live in can at times be scary. On the other hand, being mechanical, it is also predictable and therefore you learn what to avoid.
Shantam says to SD, “You are quite an intelligent man.”
One day later, Shantam says to SD, “I don’t consider you intelligent.”
One could start to wonder who Shantam thinks he is, because whoever he thinks he is, he is not.
Lokesh, please don’t forget I was brainwashed by Osho from early youth and it was not a collective fashion in my part of the world.
So when I write, I use the similar technique: something today, something totally different tomorrow.
Only thing is clear, if you can see, there is a science behind the madness. No statement is perfect, it is valid only in a certain context. Out of context statements and we become members of Inner Circle!
Sheer sophistry!
Such self-contradiction might have suited Osho’s larger purpose, but practised by you, Shantam, it represents only a confusion that, once exposed, you unconvincingly attempt to rationalise to save yourself from embarrassment.
You failed there, I’m afraid. But, it wouldn’t be a surprise if you actually believe your own propaganda, such is the delusion to which you are so prone.
Next time, calm down before you blurt out such foolishness.
Satyadeva,
Why don’t you use your psychological skills on Arpana and Madhu or on the superior seeker like Lokesh? Be compassionate on others too and raise your level.
Wake up, Shantam!
Shantam says, “Lokesh, please don’t forget I was brainwashed by Osho from early youth and it was not a collective fashion in my part of the world.”
Shantam is, of course, delusional enough to actually believe he is being witty, when in fact what he is doing could well be described as being corny.
On the subject of brainwashing, Osho did in fact do a good bit of brainwashing. Old tactics like, tell a simple lie and keep repeating it and many will believe it. Yes, people are that stupid, and history shows it. Most of Osho’s brainwashing was of a benign nature, probably did some good. Some of it was harmless. Some of it wasn’t.
Shantam’s form of brainwashing, that he has been subjected to, from what I can gauge, goes back further than his time with Osho. He does not seem to be aware of such things. None of my business really. Depending what shocks life delivers to him will determine the level of his need to wake up to his brainwashing.
On that level at least he is no different from anyone else. The difference arises when you wake up to the stark reality that you need to wake up. Some don’t.
Who knows, Lokesh has spiritually woken up and is not corrupted like a village virgin, whereas Osho used his awakening skills to create a nightclub in Soho!
All people believe all kind of things about themselves. My personal belief is only and only Death decides how much awakened and enlightened one is.
The way Nature is, the result does not get published in any form. So we all have a freedom to live in self-styled awakening and dub others as sleepy ones, bio-robots etc.
Lokesh,
Shantam knows exactly who he is, unlike the western baboons of uncertain parentage found on SN!
Shantam stated clearly on Sannyas News sometime back:
“I am a sannyasin…but a Sikh sannyasin, and does not crave to be somebody else.
I am Shantam Iqbal Singh, and when the death knocks me down I wish to say goodbye with the customs which were before my birth and stay afterwards too.”
Does this show a person so brainwashed that he cannot see beyond the idiocy that was rammed into his brain at a tender age?
Does this betray the utter stupidity and total lack of intelligence that one would normally associate with a heavily anaesthetised slug with extreme learning difficulties?
No! Never!
It shows a man who is continuing the wisdom of his forefathers who, due to unswerving religious conviction, have refused to be dictated to by unspiritual goras who insisted they wear crash helmets, but instead availed themselves of half a hollowed-out water melon with a bit of coloured cotton wrapped round it and continued unfazed in the dissemination of the wisdom of mighty Bhorat!!
The goras of SN should be warned, before they enter battle with such self-proclaimed tragic heroes, that this is the level of intelligence that they are up against!
When faced with the vile duplicitous baboons who, in direct contradiction of Osho`s vision, took away his access to western punani in Pune, and stripped him of his exalted status of Hindi typist with benefits, which had brought him undreamt success with the slightly dim northern European girls who, out of boredom, had wished to experiment with a sexually-repressed sex toy, his heroic response was to flee his native country and to move to the spiritual wasteland of the West, sign on the dole and painfully extract his revenge by whacking himself off to Japanese zen porn and feverishly following Osho’s guidelines and doing gibberish every day for years on end!!
Every ejaculation that occurs around his keyboard is yet another blow against the evil empire of the Anglo-Saxon goras!
Every empty box of tissues from Lidl is a testament to his determination and his devotion to his end!
Yahoo!
Hari Om!
Yes, great yogi, you have covered everything to such an extent that you must have hair on the palms of your blistered hands.
All very well, Shantam, putting the death card on the table for back-up.
Brainwashing can take many forms. One of these is self-hypnosis. This is often based on repetition. Take yourself as an example. Could it be that you have brainwashed yourself into believing that you could do a better job of running the Resort in Poona? Nobody else believes that, but you certainly seem to.
Perhaps that is an avenue of thought you might care to explore and then, realising the fruitless nature of your activities, other than drawing attention to yourself, you might decide to stop wasting your time.
“All very well, Shantam, putting the death card on the table for back-up.”
To be true, Lokesh, I have not put death card to prove a point. Out of disillusionment to see double standards and double-talk in the church of Osho, I have question marks on every single religious figure’s public impression created by their faithful followers for centuries.
So in this inner churning, I create such kind of thoughts.
A child sitting before a Buddha statue was not feeling impressed by the statue. His parents were not pleased to see this disrespect for their family deity. Neither the child nor the parents were aware, this child was once Gautama The Buddha!
So this idea that all the great names of religions and spirituality have some kind of immunity in cosmos and will be free from life and death whereas commoners will go on rotating on their work shifts do not look impressive to me.
In my observation, I am not shying away from the fact Osho was a master but human being too. That human being, let us say Mr.Jain, was as calculative as any lower-middle-class Indian who wants to grow big in his business. Therefore I don’t think Mr. Jain or Mr. Mohammed have any immunity for any civil or criminal crime committed under their name.
Won’t masters be responsible for their followers’ blunders? British Law of Torts won’t apply in the cosmic justice?
I try to contemplate, nence some kind of preoccupation with life after death. Which in any way is one of the fundamental pillars of all the religions and no-brand religions.
Shantam, any religion, religious organization, cult built around a charismatic guru etc., no matter how it appears, is in fact bogus.
There is only one true religion and that is what takes place in the temple, shrine, of your being.
There is no need to be concerned about life after death. That will take care of itself when the time comes. What should concern everyone is life before death.
That is such a knowing, priest-like statement.
But is it true, or at least, does it have ‘the ring of truth’ for you, Arps?
Sounds accurate enough to me, although ‘formal’ communities do serve a certain purpose for a while.
Lokesh is a man of knowledge, not a man of ‘truth’.
This next is not taking a pop at Lokesh, but isn’t this one of those statements that ceases to be true if you say it?
Maybe it was true the first time, but being on repeat makes it a story???
To speak wisdom is not the monopoly of professional gurus. I have seen quite often, O fanatics freaking out when someone else says something remarkable. They will put it down by saying contemptuously, “But he is not Enlightened.”
It seems Enlightenment for new seekers is synonymous with Muslim prophet-hood.
Talking of which, I highly recommend viewing a docu titled, ‘A SINNER IN MECCA’. Fascinating insight into what Mecca is like if you are a pilgrim. What is even more interesting is the guilt-ridden gay film producer’s take on things…he is open and it is completely bizarre. They’ll probably put a Fatwa on him.
Arps, I don’t know if I mentioned it before but just for the record, my father was a minister in the north of Scotland for forty years, now deceased. My mother spent the last twenty years of her life as a nun in a closed convent. My mother also took a vow of silence during the last eight years of her life, which included not writing letters.
Now, taking those facts into consideration, it’s hardly my fault if I come across as a little priest-like from time to time, is it? Amen.
Lokesh, to be true it is a first time fact written by you about your parents.
If I am not wrong, years ago I have read about your mother being some kind of temperamental woman with “adventurous” lifestyle.
As I know you are a Sagittarius, it is difficult to ascertain whether you create facts or you state facts.
Great response. Good on yah.
I also think you’re more than capable of making a yarn like that up.
Arpana will be so pleased…now he has two vicars to admonish.
Just can’t wait to hear that Frank is also the son of a preacher man, and Shantam is the son of a Sikh minister.
Whilst everyone knows Satyadeva was a liberal Methodist cleric in a past life.
Hey, guys, now you know a bit more about my roots in the bonnie north of Scotland, do you really think I could make something like that up?
Here is a photo of my father, taken just after he joined up in 1940. My father saw a lot of action in Belgium and France and when he was demobbed became a very religious man. The war left him very bitter.
Lokesh, much respect to your deceased mother. May I request you to share her photo too of her Convent years.
I have deep, deep respect for Christian nuns. They are my true inspiration. I think none of them get the idea, “Now I should go in the market-place and give Satsang.”
Spot on, Shantam – in fact, they’re so worthy of “deep, deep respect” because…they’re just like you!
Suggested personal research angle:
Look up ‘The Madonna and the Whore’ syndrome.
Hi Shantam, I only have one photo of my mother as a nun. This was taken two months after she took her vows. I was sent the photo after she died.
Lokie, you resemble your mother a lot.
Yes, Kavita, you are not the first to say that I resemble my dearly departed mother. We both have that ‘peek a boo’ look. My mother was a troubled soul and I hope she found peace in the convent.
Yes, I am certain I cannot be the first/only one to see that & hope she did.
@Tan.
I am powerless to resist.
http://www.patersoncollection.co.uk/the-studio-1895-1948/
http://www.scottishhighlanderphotoarchive.co.uk/prints.html
http://vintagereveries.com/old-pictures-of-nuns/
http://www.britishbattles.com/crimean-war/sevastopol.htm
Now that is research, Arps!
Lokie, you scoundrel!
Lokie, now I am wondering how come you have such a striking resemblance to this nun?!
McLoke, is your dad wearing a kilt in this photo? I can’t identify it. Cheers!
Yes, my father is wearing a kilt. His regiment being the Gordon Highlanders. My grandfather was a Macleod and my mother a Gordon. I have some great photos of grandad and grandma somewhere. One in particular worth publishing on SN. Ah, here it is…
@ Arps,
What a fucking suprise. The Rev.Simond, Lokesh’s pet poodle, chipped in.
Simond,
As it happens, you are on the right track. On my mother’s side, I come from a line of at least five generations of C of E vicars.
I remember my mum telling me that there was one Sunday in the year when the vicar was allowed to keep the collection money for himself. Grandad used to pack in as many services as he could on that day, then he would drive to the next county, take his dog collar off and go on a drink and gambling binge. One time, he ended up in a bar-room fight with some guy who spilt a drink over him at a horse race and it turned out to be the bishop!
Then there was the time when his sister, Auntie Florence, who always wore purple clothes and swore like a trooper, broke into the vestry after robbing the DD box out of the chemists`, and drank all the communion wine, then decided to nick the gold crucifix from the altar. Grandad had to chase her all the way up the A1 and caught her just as she was trying to pawn it in a pawn shop.
I have had an abiding fascination with religion ever since.
After a hard day of striking the fear of God into his congregation, grandad would get home, sit back in his comfy chair, pour himself a large glass of sherry from a bottle that had been thoughtfully donated by a parishioner whose son had been in a spot of trouble recently, light a generous pipe of Bombay Black and reflect on his life as a man of the cloth:
“All in all, it`s not a bad job, really…apart from the fact you have to work Sundays….”
I do not have a lot of free time to spend reading this thread, so I look in when time permits. Your reaction to my story varied in response. The story was written with an affectionate heart to share an experience with a most beautiful, remarkable man. Just because he is no longer in physical body doesn’t mean I stopped loving him. Many of the e-mails I received and some of the comments here also transmitted this same affection.
In this forum some of the commentators were described as hairy baboons, reflecting the school yard quality of their comments. On the way to Agra Fort I stop at a produce vendor to purchase one orange, but end up with a baker’s dozen because the merchant doesn’t have any change for my rupees. My backpack full of oranges, I arrive at Agra Fort, to be met by a fast approaching troop of aggressive baboons.
As the dominant baboon with fangs exposed comes towards me, instinctively I gently roll all the oranges toward that alpha male. Chaos ensues in the fight for the oranges and I am able to escape unharmed. When at a safe distance from the troop I look back. The big male is staring hard at me. As I return his gaze I realize he is just protecting his turf and providing for his troop. Ok, I get it…but enough of this….
Best wishes,
PD
Prem Doug,
The hairy baboon comments come from our resident satirist.
Dougie, going by your taste in metaphors, I can say you would get on well with Shantam, one of the most respected commentators here on SN. I realise you are a very busy man, who has been touched by Osho, but, when you find the time, try to contact Shantam. He needs support.
Lokesh, I don’t think Prem Doug will stay long at sannyasnews. It will be a tumble wash at 75 degrees. Silk will become cotton. Cotton will shrink. Ego will get holes as most of us Indians have in our undershirts.
“It will be a tumble wash at 75 degrees. Silk will become cotton. Cotton will shrink. Ego will get holes as most of us Indians have in our undershirts.” (Shantam Prem)
The worst is that you may be proud of such stuff!
Shantam, I am hardly surprised. He is not called Prem Doug for nothing. In Scottish, the meaning of the name Douglas – Doug being the abbreviated form of Douglas – is from the Gaelic ‘dubhglas’ meaning dark water, dark stream, or from the dark river. Maybe he needs to lighten up.
Once I was approached by a Lebanese man. He said, “what’s your name?”. I told him, “Doug.” Lebanese guy: “We would never use that name.” “Why?” “Too close to dog.” I said, “Just take ‘u’ out and spell it backwards.”
After several thoughtful moments he muttered a stream of Lebanese colourful metaphors culminating with “infidel!” I rather prefer that meaning for Doug.
You appear to be getting the hang of posting here, Doug.
PD, now that sounds like as though that incident is a deja vu!
Lokesh has written, “My mother was a troubled soul and I hope she found peace in the convent.”
I hope this can be the enough reason for you and others to show respect for the people and institutions who created convent and monasteries. Those who have higher calling or troubled souls could get a healing touch.
Now tell me, as per your guess, how many people who came to Osho were not troubled souls? Those who have spent years in communes, like many of the contributors, were not of troubled souls?
Even if they were not, they have become troubled souls. Open heart surgery, chief surgeon dies, patients get stitched by drunkard janitors; all in the super speciality hospital…
World and its institutions are not as bad as sannyasins believe because Osho painted everybody in dark and grey.