"O Man, What Are You Looking For?"

When it comes to “spirituality” and spiritual experiences, one man’s  experience of God may be another’s experience of Chi energies, a pineal gland orgasm, complete emotional openness, or many other types of experience.

For example, Muktananda speaks of the Self as witness consciousness.  But he also speaks of it as being a Blue Pearl (Turiya), within the other bodies seen as different colored lights (Physical, Subtle, Causal Bodies).  He was obsessed with spiritual experiences, visions, demons, kriya’s, Kundalini experiences, Samadhis, etc.  It is great entertainment, and those who follow Kashmir Shaivism  with its guru-fixation, mantra meditation will have years of spiritual visions, astral projections, various energy movements, bliss, etc.

But to what avail?  When all is said and done, what did he get out of his 50 years of practice except self-satisfaction that he understood the ontology of Consciousness of Kashmir Shaivism along with years of unusual experiences and interpretations of these experiences along philosophical lines?   I understand in the end he died of severe hypotension brought on by an abrupt withdrawal from Valium.

Rajneesh with all of his behavioral tomfoolery and hundred written books with hundreds of thousands of worshipping followers, himself was a drug addict which caused failing health and finally death.

Krishnamurti complained about his life in that he got cancer, which he felt he should have been sheltered from because he led such a “pure” life.  He also had a 30 year affair with his friend’s wife, and complained at the end of his life no one had gotten what he was speaking of.

Maezumi Roshi, a man I most admired, lost his credibility because of serial adultery with students through two marriages, and who got drunk one night, entered a Jacuzzi, fell asleep, and drowned.

Adi Da, Da Free John, a drug addict and sex-addicted narcissist, died of sudden cardiac arrest after a decade of Viagra abuse used to sustain his relentless sexual appetite.

Chogyam Trungpa drank himself to death, dying of liver failure before he was 50.

And on and on it goes from the Hari Krishna sect, to Ragneeshpuram, to the TM cult, dozens of suicidal, drug and sex addicted gurus with hundreds of thousands worshipping followers, not unlike groupies around musicians, sports celebrities, or movie stars, wanting to get something from the people they worshipped, whether love, sex, self-knowledge, energies, or maybe even happiness.

What are you looking for?

God? Sex? Love?  Self-Realization? Emptiness? The Void?  Bliss? Samadhi? A spiritual family?  Energies? Kundalini awakening? A Hindu or Buddhist, or Christian belief system?  A Muslim belief system?

All the human race is lost and seeking because they are locked into conventional belief systems, and political correctness, and enforced consumerism, such that 80% of their intellectual, physical, and spiritual potential is forever lost to them, denied by conventional belief and knowledge.

Yet, all is within you and far more than even these gurus attained, but can only be known if you earnestly explore your own Self, your own experience in your own way.  But so few have the courage to go it alone.

But, it is really important to break out of your present entrapment in the conventional, and that usually entails a few years of inner searching through reading the words of previous spiritual teachers.  I especially recommend self-inquiry, searching for the sense of I Am and abiding there, abiding in your sense of presence in your heart. At the same time, live in the conventional world as best you can.