tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post7718908513272787075..comments2023-09-23T07:59:23.522-07:00Comments on C-Realm: Mantra and CollapseKMOhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14742517570095417154noreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-56024437332475316722018-10-09T03:39:58.385-07:002018-10-09T03:39:58.385-07:00Healthcare system is often criticised for it being... <br />Healthcare system is often criticised for it being "efficiently" accessible only to an elite group of people. Swami, in his subtle form, drives his devotees to work for good and quality health care for all in an unbiased manner. <br /><br /><br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/notes/rahul-kavin/madhusudan-naidu-tells-us-about-swamis-explanation-of-the-concept-of-atithi-devo/133088114290796/" rel="nofollow">madhusudan naidu</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/notes/rahul-kavin/madhusudan-naidu-tells-us-about-swamis-explanation-of-the-concept-of-atithi-devo/133088114290796/" rel="nofollow">madhusudan naidu muddenahalli</a><br />rahulkavinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01179964860822605133noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-28203300952525377172018-10-09T03:34:41.996-07:002018-10-09T03:34:41.996-07:00The vision of Sai Baba has been to provide a holis...<br />The vision of Sai Baba has been to provide a holistic health care to all the needy people.<br /><br /><a href="https://preethamsai.blogspot.com/2018/07/madhusudan-naidu-fearful-or-fearless.html" rel="nofollow">madhusudan naidu</a><br /><br /><a href="https://preethamsai.blogspot.com/2018/07/madhusudan-naidu-fearful-or-fearless.html" rel="nofollow">madhusudan naidu muddenahalli</a><br /><br />rahulkavinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01179964860822605133noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-477774996159265442018-10-09T03:31:13.343-07:002018-10-09T03:31:13.343-07:00Learning is an ever-evolving process. Each and eve...Learning is an ever-evolving process. Each and every instance shapes our life in one way or the other. <br /><a href="https://saiprakashana.org/inner-view-by-sri-madhusudan-naidu-pb-english.html" rel="nofollow">madhusudan naidu</a><br /><br /><a href="https://saiprakashana.org/inner-view-by-sri-madhusudan-naidu-pb-english.html" rel="nofollow">madhusudan naidu muddenahalli</a><br />rahulkavinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01179964860822605133noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-20921593963462751172015-01-22T11:43:59.998-08:002015-01-22T11:43:59.998-08:00This is a very old post, but I'll comment anyw...This is a very old post, but I'll comment anyway.<br /><br />You made some interesting remarks but both you and the people responding have missed a very important point:<br /><br />different meditation practices lead to very different "places" physiologically speaking, even if some of the health benefits are similar.<br /><br />The most popular form of meditation these days is mindfulness, which is an attentional training practice that has stress-reduction as a side-effect. Even the people who promote the practice most vigorously agree that mindfulness can be learned from a book or audio file, so the findings can be applied to people who went to random "how to" webpages and learned it that way.<br /><br />Transcendental Meditation is a <i>resting</i> technique that has nothing to do with training the attention. You can make a good case that all the effects and benefits attributed to TM are due to the kind of rest it helps bring about, and nothing else. Even "enlightenment" as defined in TM theory, arises due to this form of rest.<br /><br />You mentioned research on pain. Both mindfulness and TM create a change in how people respond to pain, but the type of change pretty much illustrates all the other differences nicely:<br /><br />With mindfulness, you have trained your attention and simply do not notice the pain as much. It doesn't feel as painful.<br /><br />With TM, you've lowered stress levels, and long-term practice helps make your body more "resilient" to new stress (it reverts back to normal faster), and TM's effects on pain are simply that the brain doesn't have as great a stress response as before.<br /><br />And that is TM vs mindfulness in a nutshell:<br /><br />mindfulness gives you the ability to ignore, while TM gives you the ability to bounce back faster. <br /><br />Mindfulness practitioners simply rate the pain as being less. TM practitioners rate the pain the same as always, but they're not as overwhelmed by it.<br /><br />Mindfulness practitioners say "ouch" at a later point on the pain scale, while TMers say "ouch" at the same point as always, but might be willing to bear it a little more if the situation warrants.<br /><br /><br />And, getting back to that "enlightenment" thing, mindfulness practice disrupts some of the brain regions and interactions that give rise to "sense of self." In the long run, the "enlightened" practitioner of mindfulness has no "self."<br /><br />TM actually enhances "sense of self" by strengthening those same brain regions and interactions that mindfulness weakens and the "enlightened" TMer is simply someone who has an unflappable pure sense-of-self that isn't overwhelmed by stress.<br /><br />And this is a naturally occurring thing. Research on highly self-actualizing people like world-champion athletes, or award winning management, shows that they are more similar to the "enlightened" TMers than the non-champiion athletes who compete in the Olympics or the non-award-winning management. That unflappable sense-of-self is merely what naturally emerges in someone who is low-stress and able to handle stresses really well, whether they ever meditated or not.<br /><br />The ultimate example of what you fear might happen with meditation is the case of the Buddhist monk who had such little sense-of-self left that he was willing to burn himself alive as protest against violence against people... He stopped seeing himself as a person.<br /><br />The reaction of the enlightened TMer is along the lines of "dude, you're people too."<br /><br />So yeah, your concerns are warranted for SOME kinds of mediation practices, but not for others.Lawson Englishhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04896901983108581710noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-63933576474534221672014-06-11T02:47:20.309-07:002014-06-11T02:47:20.309-07:00Hi KMO, The last episode in the second series of I...Hi KMO, The last episode in the second series of In The Flesh was shown in Britain on Sunday and I've got to say, it's brilliant and genius. You're in for a treat (it might have gone out simultaneously in that America for all I know).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-44900134966922922252014-05-19T18:31:25.552-07:002014-05-19T18:31:25.552-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06885410038609827614noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-69039834862923521252014-05-19T18:29:22.612-07:002014-05-19T18:29:22.612-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06885410038609827614noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-66001428500762082332014-05-19T18:27:03.766-07:002014-05-19T18:27:03.766-07:00Thanks for this post KMO. I'm very glad as we...Thanks for this post KMO. I'm very glad as well to hear that you are exploring yoga.<br /><br />After several years of maintaining a daily yoga practice at home I would still often omit the time of meditation at the end of my active practice. I'd feel pressed for time. That extra 12 minutes slotted for practicing awareness of awareness...well, I knew that the active work would make me feel much better all day. It was enough.<br /><br />One day I confessed this to my yoga teacher and asked for her comment. Paraphrasing, she said the more you think you don't have time to meditate the more you could really use some meditation time.<br /><br />A year later I find that to be true for me. Meditation shows me my busy mind--a clamor of voices which comment on everything whether I want them to or not. And after a while the business dies down and there can be a peaceful quietude that develops. Literally my brain is simply quiet and for whatever reason that feels like a relief. It feels like my frayed, hyper-stimulated nervous system goes into repair mode. It's better than sleep because my mind is often just as compulsively busy in sleep as it is waking life.<br /><br />Regarding action: More action isn't what's needed. Appropriate action is more like it. How to discern that? Recognizing and calming compulsive thinking is a good start. It sure has helped me and gives me more to look forward to in the future. Whatever that looks like from the outside.<br /><br />-James SAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06885410038609827614noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-64686242407214476752014-05-18T13:01:07.041-07:002014-05-18T13:01:07.041-07:00I would like to follow your mantra content! Really...I would like to follow your mantra content! Really awesome content like-<br /><a href="http://www.elevatedglass.com/" rel="nofollow">buddhist mantra</a>Resume Writershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00147109149371263355noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-74510193894225801892014-05-07T21:22:45.513-07:002014-05-07T21:22:45.513-07:00Greetings, KMO!
Thank you for inviting my input o...Greetings, KMO!<br /> Thank you for inviting my input on this discussion. I must be rigorouly concise, as time is precious, and the next day begins all too soon.<br /> I consider myself an enthusiastic meditator, familiar with Asian traditions, but grounded in empirical western thought and a bio-physical paradigm.<br /> My first recollection of encountering the meme of meditation is of watching a TV show called "I Spy" in the mid-sixties, starring Bill Cosby and the late Robert Culp. They are in Japan, and encounter a Zen monk, an archer, who is portrayed as nearly super-human, and who comes to their aid in the climax. That character, and his remarkable practice, stayed with me.<br /> I have a practice today, nearly daily, of training my attention, that is, an innate but chronically under-developed capacity for mental focus. The locus of this focus is my internal state of autonomic arousal. The neurological substrate of this suite of capacities is, according to Dr. Daniel Siegel, MD in his audiobook "The Neurobiology of WE", centered in the medial Pre-frontal Cortex, located behind my forehead.<br /> The methodology for achieving this focus and elaborating the neurological substrate upon which it depends, is sustained use of a system of bio-feedback produced and sold by HeartMath, LLC under the name "emWave Desktop". I have used it consistantly for over seven years, with very positive effects. <br /> This technology facilitates a volitional modulation of my autonomic nervous system, specifically the ability to shift from the "sympathetic" mode of arousal to the "parasympathectic" mode of relaxation, and then to sustain that shift. Intentional adjustment of emotional tone to appreciation, affection, and gratitude, facilitate and support this process, with very rapid response to lapses in said tone being graphically and sonically communicated by the software<br /> As a former abuser of alcohol and diverse other intoxicants, this capacity for self-regulation without recourse to exogenous psychoactive substances has been transformative, to say the least, particularly in the domain of social intelligence. The neurological structures associated with these enhancements are known to a significant degree.<br /> No paranormal or supernatural interventions are necessary, and benefits accrue in direct porportion to effort, much like weight-training or any other discipline.<br /> That said, I can report with honesty that non-ordinary experiences have increased in frequency, well accounted for by straitforward expansion of the operational envelope of my brain/mind system. <br /> I enjoy a more compassionate relationship to fellow humans, including myself, and that altered state has gradually been integrated into a persistent trait. <br /> Readers are invited to ponder the implications of such a re-normalization in the context of the challenges evident to each of us, individually and collectively.<br /><br /> Good night, and Be Well<br /><br /> Jeffery D.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-62923225833110100302014-05-07T20:47:27.693-07:002014-05-07T20:47:27.693-07:00There's a clear difference between things like...There's a clear difference between things like alcohol, that are used to escape reality and deaden emotions, and psychedelics and meditation that cause a re-connection with a more holistic reality. Using meditation and psychedelics only as an escape happens, but it's pretty rare. Using them leads to *more* awareness of suffering, both internally and externally. Any expansion of awareness brings pain; we're enlarging our sphere of attention. It also provides a more lucid context from which to act. What will someone do when they go through that process? It's easy to get over-focused on the symptoms and distracted from the root, and those defending the system are very good at promoting that. <br /><br />Another problem with letting pain set the agenda is that since the cost of not taking action might be the death of millions of people, we're suddenly justified in forcing other people, or judging them harshly if they don't act. Derrick Jensen comes to mind. :) The truth is, no one is obligated to act, and we don't have the right to force them. And the attitude, similar to the much-maligned militant vegans, that we have a right, from our moral high ground, to judge everyone else based on their worldview is one of the biggest obstacles to getting anything fixed. Why? Because people instinctively resist forced change, and that resistance is *not* a function of that change’s legitimacy. I have a problem with the way many Collapsenics approach motivating change. They think if people are so deluged with negative data that they can’t deny the situation, those people will choose to live more sustainably. Not only does this wildly underestimate human denial, but it actually makes it *less* likely that those people will change, both because reality is too painful *and* because they’re instinctively resisting forced change. Providing a compelling narrative that Things Need to Chance is necessary, but not sufficient. Along with that we need to illuminate a future worth living and a path to get there that ordinary people will *want* to follow. That’s why I’m focused not only on telling my own story of sustainability, but also on taking the extra time to make that story more fun, sexy, exciting, and interesting that Default Reality. With such a weak competition, that’s not hard. And if it’s fun for me, I won’t burn out.<br /><br />How does this tie back into mediation and psychedelics? For me, both were the entry into a larger awareness of What Was Going On. With this awareness came more pain, but also more clarity about both How Things Are (seeing through media distortions, feeling my own pain masked by conditioned habits, etc.) and a inner space free of external distractions from which to organize a response. They broke the connection between Shit Being Wrong and Having to Do Something Right Now, which left me in a constant fire-fighting reactive mode from which a larger perspective is lost in the noise. They’ve taught me many things about my own consciousness and its foibles, and, by extension, everyone else’s. These viewpoints weren’t available to my previous scientific-skeptic-literalist-atheist worldview, because they exist in a space outside that domain. <br /><br />I don't find myself concerned that people will trip once and then think they're "done." The cracks in reality never fully fade upon return. "If you already started, you'll have to finish," irrespective of whether one's entry point it chemical or zafu-based. And while the Buddhist concern with intoxicants is well-taken, everything I've seen indicates that a combination of the two practices leads to the same result faster than either taken alone. If a substance gives us a clearer view of reality than we had sober, i don't feel it qualifies for that particular restriction. <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-24783007873779365122014-05-07T13:24:09.217-07:002014-05-07T13:24:09.217-07:00I made a previous comment, but it got messed up in...I made a previous comment, but it got messed up in the process. I would like it to go away so I can start over. If I see it, I'll delete it. If not, can the moderator do it? Thanks!<br /><br />ScottAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-88650704783889773622014-05-07T09:05:23.976-07:002014-05-07T09:05:23.976-07:00Hi John,
The feedback on episode 411 which got me...Hi John,<br /><br />The feedback on episode 411 which got me started on this topic came in the form of two private email messages. They were long, and I didn't respond to all of the points, so I did not include them in this blog post, but you can find the full text of those emails here:<br /><br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/c.realm/permalink/10152865864351777/" rel="nofollow">https://www.facebook.com/groups/c.realm/permalink/10152865864351777/</a>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-35187773331147270932014-05-07T09:01:31.240-07:002014-05-07T09:01:31.240-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.KMOhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14742517570095417154noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-75652269478329733032014-05-07T08:38:14.860-07:002014-05-07T08:38:14.860-07:00Hi KMO
I can't find the response to Podcast 4...Hi KMO<br /><br />I can't find the response to Podcast 411 that rejected Buddhist teachings since Buddhism was originally nihilistic. Having worked in India for many years and studied both Vedanta and Buddhism, I am afraid I don't understand the person's response.<br /><br />Siddhartha found the practice of vedanta had become too many meaningless rituals that gave him no meaning and that the rituals did nothing to reduce corruption of practicing vedantists.<br /><br />Martin Luther, a catholic monk, found that the practice of catholicism had become too many rituals that gave him no meaning and that the rituals did nothing to reduce the corruption of practicing catholics.<br /><br />Would your respondent also call Lutherans (or in fact all protestants) "nihilists" and reject their teachings?John Adamshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11077934049835388737noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8735739886019395087.post-83592285632195469612014-05-06T17:39:33.627-07:002014-05-06T17:39:33.627-07:00Once again you make some great points, KMO, and I ...Once again you make some great points, KMO, and I am so happy to hear you are getting a yoga practice. It has been key for me. Yes, I have struggled with this issue of whether or not my efforts on and off the mat are enough. It is helpful to have confirmation that the spiritual practices aren't totally useless, but it is also good to realize that action, when action is appropriate and timely, should be taken. It's sometime hard to get the perspective you need in every day life. "Oh, it's Monday. That means I need to do laundry and make the hubby his supper to take to work and after he is on his way....oh, what was that I was supposed to do...what was it I needed to call my congressman about? Or does that even make a difference? Should I go down to picket Walgreens for selling products with toxic ingredients, or are there even bigger fish to fry?" It gets confusing and I find myself getting depressed. So yeah, it's back to the cushion. One thing meditation does do is train your mind to be here and now. This is the only place real action can take place anyway, so it's the only place where saving the world occurs. When I can get back to that, the depression dissipates, and the mind clears. There is no spoon.<br /><br /><3 Lauren Laurenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06900696410485381344noreply@blogger.com