Gurumayi's Love Attacks
File under: The Siddhi of PR
The militant SYDA faithful have taken up a smear assault against SYDA memoir-writer Marta Szabo:
Some anonymous blogger or bloggers have created a Blogger site to harass Marta Szabo, the author of "The Guru Looked Good" memoir/blog. They are calling it "The Guru Looks Good" (present tense). No comments allowed, they publish her personal contact details, it's just a sleazy attempt to scare her. She and her husband have both been getting hate email and brochures for their writing workshops are being removed from local shops, etc. It's the same kind of harassment SYDA has practiced towards any former follower with inside information who openly criticizes the org or the guru. They threaten legal action, but that's just empty posturing. What they are good at is underhanded harassment and personal threats whose sources cannot be traced. The org always denies any responsibility for it, saying it's overzealous devotees, but in the past those organizing harassment campaigns have been inner circle people who simply would not act without approval or direction from the guru.Welcome to the club, Marta. The internets are full of folks with the time on their hands to generate this sort of nonsense, some of whom get paid for it. Their attention is the measure of the truth of your words, not the indictment they're shooting for.
Labels: The Siddhi of PR
posted by guruphiliac @ 6:45 PM
33 Comments:
What a shame! we gave so much of our time and money to this sleazy guru and her criminal organization. Malti (aka gurumayi, aka God) orchestrated this kind of slander against her own brother, sister and parents. The orders came from her. We know, we were there. Now she is attacking Martha for writing her story. Gangster Malti (aka gurumayi) hasn't changed a bit.
Martha dear! hang in there.
All the things SY is doing to harass Marta and her husband will only accomplish the following
1) Cause former members to feel all the more certain that they were 100% right to leave
2) Invigorate former members to keep discussing the goings on.
Keeping a dignified silence is the best policy. As soon as SY threatened a lawsuit back in late July, the comments section on Marta's blog blossomed.
And, as former members continued to dialogue at an increased rate, they began remembering and describing things they had not recalled in earlier posts.
As a result, what was once a tiny David-with-a-slingshot blog has morphed into a support group whose members have left a brilliant testimony in cyberspace free for all to read.
If the SY folks had practiced nonviolence and loving kindness, things would have stayed nicely
quiet.
Bullying may, for awhile silence people within the controlled confines of an ashram or a gurus inner circle.
But bullying does not work in cyberspace---except to attract more readers from backgrounds and whom no guru can ever control.
How repulsive! Here's the note I just sent to Marta Szabo:
I thought your writing was calm and kind, and if you were unnecessarily harsh to anybody, it was your younger self. I've long believed that it's a sin to take advantage of someone's virtues, and these mean-spirited attacks are taking advantage of your brave introspection and your public honesty. Their behavior revolts me.
Those anonymous attacks against you have done more to give me a bad idea of Siddha Yoga than ten memoirs like yours would ever do. In your writing, I see your fellow ashramites as generally sincere and well-meaning humans who sometimes get caught up in all the things humans get caught up in. In their writing, I see enough venom and hostility that I can only wonder if you were too kind.
Regardless, please ignore them. I believe you are doing a service to the world, and especially to people who feel a pull toward gurus. Whether or not somebody chooses the path of a follower after reading your memoir, their choice will be a wiser one.
I also sent a note to the Siddha Yoga people, although I'm not expecting it to do any good. If that's all the spiritual advancement a decade or two in an ashram can get me, no wonder some people are suspicious of gurus.
Hi, I'm in touch with friends at the ashram and am quite sure that nobody there has set out to do anything to harm Marta. Aside from Ganapati's phone call regarding Marta's confidentiality agreement, whether or not they decide to take legal actions regarding that, the other mean-spirited blog and harassing emails are likely coming from the same one person who for years seems to be somewhat off his rocker, thinking that his intense devotion to Gurumayi should be expressed in warrior/angry/jihadist ways. Some people look for any excuse to fight. Hey, Siddha Yoga let everyone in the doors for many years -- what do you expect.
I can assure you that the focus at the ashram is on other matters, such as practices, study, and seva. I know that some people there do know about Marta's blog and a few have probably read it, but nobody is obsessing over it.
These ex-Siddha yogis sometimes seem like they're still looking for attention from the guru, even in the form of imagined harassments. Maybe someone who didn’t like Fred’s workshop is taking the brochures. It is very easy to accuse someone who is not part of the dialogue and to assume that every webpage that comes up has been personally sanctioned by Gurumayi. Sorry guys, you’ll also have to find the inner guru just like the devotees. Even if you project the guru as being mad at you, it is still your Self, which is what the Siddha yoga gurus said zillions of times.
I didn’t read anything so bad in Marta’s blog and didn’t think her chapters sounded vindictive. Petty, yes, at times. But also descriptive of special times, places and people for many who were involved with the path during those years. I think Marta has dished more on herself than on the path, which obviously, as a large organization that is made up of all kinds of people, had plenty of flaws and scabs to pick at, along with all the glorious spiritual transformations people experienced. If anything, Marta’s book reads more like a gripe Siddha Yoga would have about her for being deceptive and taking advantage of the kindness and support she received for so many years.
I don't believe the poster at 9/15/2007 9:57 PM. I know, in the past, gurumayi set up goon squads in several countries against her brother and devotees she didn't like. All the squads had a mean-spirited swami in charge and an unlimited budget (our dakshina money). She then personally directed them while the rest of the ashram and people in the centres remained blissfully unaware.
I doubt very much that "someone who didn’t like Fred’s workshop is taking the brochures." This is something gurumayi's goons would do. They have followed this same pattern since Baba's time. Why should they change now?
9/15/2007 9:57 PM
Actually, the person at 9:57 p.m. is probably the same person who wrote the blog "the guru looks good". Look at the thought patterns.
When Ramana Maharishi was told an ex-secretary had written a tell all book about him he asked someone to bring him a copy. As he read it he stated "oh my gosh this man does not know half of what i have done. We must bring him here and tell him the rest so he can finish his book. We can let him set up shop outside of the ashram so all the people can know."
***This is how a real "guru" acts...
John Christian
"spiritual citizens" wrote:
(Note: other than any accounts taken from Marta’s “The Guru Looked Good,” the quoted passages are from her stories, posted on martaszabostories.blogspot.com. If for some reason she edits or removes any of those stories, or even takes down the site, it does not matter because we’ve downloaded and saved these stories as originally posted.)
________
We have news for gurumalti and her goons. We too have downloaded and saved your blog on marta, should there be a need for it at some time in the future. :-)
Paraphrasing poster #4;
-we didn't do it.
-she was asking for it anyway.
where ever this blog came from it's just pathetic that anyone would bother to write it. get a life!
Where's Chuck?
Attention SYDA:
you have showed us your true colors (yet)again. I wish Marta would sue so this can all be made public.
Maybe Gurumayi and Ammachi should get together. They could combine both of their goon squads and penchants for harassing anyone who talks against them.
An excerpt from the Guru LookS good blogspot:
"The Master Disciple Realtionship -
In the West, most people do not understand the relationship between a true Master or Guru and the disciple. In Asia and India, where various traditions exist like Sufism, Hinduism and Zen Buddhism, it's more recognized and understood."
______
For one, the masters of yore didn't wear Armani, yearn for gold ornaments, swiss bank accounts or vacations in Monaco or on a private island in the Caribbean nor did they bad mouth their present or former disciples. In short, they didn't have an agenda in making dakshina a spiritual practice
They were genuinely interested in the upliftment of their students.
Take for instance Ramana Maharishi, Shirdi Sai Baba, the senior most Sankaracharya of Kanchipuram - Chandrashekar Saraswati. Did their students feel the need to expose them, like we do of gurumayi or sri sri ravi shankar or ammachi or the sai baba with funny hair? There is a difference, right?
John Christian said...***This is how a real "guru" acts...
John Christian
John I'm surprised you would be so hard on a good lookin' woman so many have been inspired by and had "profound" experiences with. Doesn't that mean she's a great and noble soul like Madharishi and Kracki Avatar? :)
Anonymous said...
Where's Chuck?
....................
Well, Neighbor, since you ask, I will tell you that I have been walkin on foot by the side of the road, side by side with my mule from my double wide in Dime Box, Texas to Lufkin to Nacadoches and back to Dime Box, draggin a 15 foot wooden crucifix. After my hands got splinters so bad I was havin trouble with the pain caused by grease from my fried okra, I roped the thing around my waist and dragged it that way, which chaffed my gut and my butt but left my hands free to eat with. I ended up nailin a pair of roller skates to the cross to help it roll better.
I saw many wonders and a mountain of road kill (mostly two old to fry). I saw a ground rattler that had half swallowed a big toad and the snake was literally hoppin down the road. I saw a buzzard with a 7 foot wing spread clutchin a rubber doll striped and naked as the day it was born! I saw an old boy walkin on the other side of the road with a blue jay in a bird cage! Made me wonder! I went through a hail storm that raised knots and all that time, the mule said nothin, just remained silent as a sage (except when passin gas or hee hawin at a filly in a field!).
Why, you ask, would a sane man do such a thing? Ask the mule, I was just followin orders!
In Asia and India, where various traditions exist like Sufism, Hinduism and Zen Buddhism, it's more recognized and understood.
It may be true that Asian cultures more highly value obedience to authority and following the group. It's at best an open question whether these are superior values, compared to the freedom and independence more prized in the US.
To say that obedience to a guru authority is more "recognized and understood" in Asia is to suggest that it's a superior style that we in the West simply don't "get." I don't buy it.
Re Zen: I can report that the very first time I had a formal interview with my Zen teacher, he made it absolutely clear that in his teaching he'd make mistakes, and that it was my job to see that and correct him; it was my job to believe in myself enough to not just attach to whatever he said. In this Asian (Korean in this case) tradition, blindly following authority is not considered so great.
That's just FYI, it's really not the point what the Korean tradition values. As soon as you start believing in something because it's valued by a "tradition," it means you've already lost your clear mind and independence and become a follower.
Stuart
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/socalled.htm
http://stuart-randomthoughts.blogspot.com/
But Chuck, what does it MEAN???? What a beautiful story, with its quirky twists and turns!
stuart said,,,It may be true that Asian cultures more highly value obedience to authority and following the group. It's at best an open question whether these are superior values, compared to the freedom and independence more prized in the US.
......
The american freedom of thinking is great, but it is not that they chose to be that way. It is just that america(USA) is still young and has not gathered enough dogmas of her own, unlike the ancient, dogma ridden countries in asia. Most dogmas in america are confined to the native indian reserves. The absence of dogmas can appear to be like some kind of freedom of individual thought and expression, but the nagging need to fall back on to some tradition is not totally absent.
The coastal california is the best example of people who are devoid of traditions, hedonistic to the core, but have provided enough space to the mushrooms of traditional gurus and their ashrmas across their coastline.
I would not rule out the chances of an ashram even for chuckji and his mule, somewhere in the frisco by the bay.
Most people in the west taking to eastern spirituality struggle between both freedom and dogmas and get finally get hit in the middle of nowhere. Like the rabbit which could neither run that way nor this way, but get hit in the middle of the road with the light on its eyes. Marta must have been one such individual, who could not decide for long between the borrowed traditional dogmas and her own independent thinking.
Perhaps that's too much typing, now time for me to do up a bit of my own tradition. Some fresh american "Captain Black' tobacco and the golden himalayan poppies, stuffed gently inside the chinese terracota pipe, soon all will go up in the smoke. My religion, that is.
Hey Chuck: Kreepalu's Austin hideout is spoiling TX's reputation - can you and the mule do something bout that man?
My mule can go where no man has gone before! He sends forth a mighty HEE HAW to confound the foolish Bugwans in Austin!
Marta wrote in her blog:
"In our workshops – where people write genuinely and personally about what has happened in their lives – we are very careful to keep the conversation on the writing itself, not to let it stray into questions (“Did you really steal that car??”), or chit-chat (“I saw that movie too!”), or suggestions (“You should really talk to that boss of yours!”), or even sympathy (“Wow, your brother was so mean to you!”). No, we stay focused on the writing as if it existed independent of the writer sitting across the room. Fred and I even go so far as to remind everyone in the group never to assume that just because someone has written about their divorce that they want to talk about it in the kitchen afterwards. Not at all. What is written is sacred."
Is this an excerpt from the upcoming book “Fred Looked Good”? Talk about thought police and cult controls! Yuk.
Talk about thought police and cult controls!
Talk about your complete misrepresentation of the aim and reasoning behind their instructions.
jody said...
Talk about your complete misrepresentation of the aim and reasoning behind their instructions.
Cool! Maybe I can get a job at guruphilliac!
Maybe I can get a job at guruphilliac!
Not with that brainwashed mind you won't.
Jody,
Check it out! Click the Link!
"The Guru Looks Good" has been taken DOWN!!!
Jody
Surprise - someone took this site down (or they were made to take it down)
http://the-guru-looks-good.blogspot.com/
Either way we have the blogspot all downloaded and saved :-)
What can I say to gurumayi. You cant bully people any more
It wasn't taken down. The correct URL is:
http://thegurulooksgood.blogspot.com/
http://thegurulooksgood.blogspot.com
That doesn't work either :-)
Yep. It's back.
Shucks.
Spiritual Citizens:
By posting Marta's email and home address that we can use to "help her in her healing" you have made it clear that your intent is to harrass and intimidate Marta Szabo and other SYDA devotees -- past and present.
By the way, one can flag this website so that Blogger is notified that the content is "objectionable" in some way, which is what I did, because what you "concerned" SYDA folks are doing is known as cyber stalking and it is illegal.
By posting Marta's email and home address that we can use to "help her in her healing" you have made it clear that your intent is to harrass and intimidate
This reveals the actual intentions of the SYDA goons in no uncertain terms.
Spiritual Citizens:
By posting Marta's email and home address that we can use to "help her in her healing" you have made it clear that your intent is to harrass and intimidate Marta Szabo and other SYDA devotees -- past and present.
By the way, one can flag this website so that Blogger is notified that the content is "objectionable" in some way, which is what I did, because what you "concerned" SYDA folks are doing is known as cyber stalking and it is illegal.
For anyone who tried to convince themselves that SY stopped its corrupt and malicious ways years ago, here is one more example of how incorrect that assumption was.
Nothing has changed, they're still the misguided and lacking goons they always were.
The "Lord of the Flies" clan comes to mind.
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