Pranam To The Paw
File under: Notable Quote
This was passed along by a friend today. Advice for the seeker and the guru:
How Enlightened Are You? A Test
If you can live without caffeine or nicotine
If you can be cheerful, ignoring aches and pains
If you can resist complaining
If you can understand when loved ones are too busy to give you any time
If you can take criticism and blame without resentment
If you can ignore friends' limited educations and never correct them
If you can treat the rich and poor alike
If you can face the world without lies or deceit
If you can conquer tension without medical help
If you can relax without liquor
If you can sleep without the aid of drugs
If you can have no prejudice against creed, color, religion, gender, sexual preference, or politics —
— then you have almost reached the same level of spiritual development as your dog.
Labels: Notable Quotes
posted by guruphiliac @ 11:06 PM
24 Comments:
Strange how the "higher mamals" tend to exhibit the traits of these here so called gurus! Take my mule for example! The fellow has got hisself on quite a pedestal, tries to mount ever thing on four legs, and if he caint be in control of the conversations wont say nuthin at all!
I've been servin this rascal for a long time and have not risen above the rank of shit shovellor! But I have to say that my wifes poodle aint much better...
So...does a dog have a
buddha nature? ;-)
However, a dog is inferior to the spiritual aspirant in one very important way: the dog has no ability to give money to the guru.
Except that you're someone on the level of the Dalai Lama.
So yes and no: sure, you're at the same level as your dog and cat - but you still have a human's cerebral cortex.
What you've let go of, or gone a long way toward letting go of, is your ego.
So you've attained simplicity but you're not just interested in kibble anymore...
It's a total insult to equate enlightenment with animal nature!
Jody,U are playing with fire here with ur own soul,not to mention burning others in the process!
may sincere spiritual aspirant keep striving;undeterred by all these cowshit!
It's a total insult to equate enlightenment with animal nature!
Our animal nature is as enlightened as any other nature we may believe we possess.
What you've let go of, or gone a long way toward letting go of, is your ego.
Paul, think about it: who is letting go of what?
The idea of a separate ego which gets in the way of spirit is based on notions that have all but been disproved by cognitive science. In addition, it's clear there's more than one ego rattling around our skulls. It's more like a club of egos, all completing for satisfaction on the field of desire.
These are all neurological functions, as much a part of your body as an arm or kidney. There is no getting over them, because anyone deciding to get over is exactly what they think they'll get over.
It's not helpful to my mind to talk about the ego at all, because you immediately set up a split, possibly creating even more members for the club of us. Rather than singling out "ego," which in the West is the same as singling out our personality, perhaps we might try to be more mindful of ourselves, which has the effect of making us more aware of our automatic behaviors, including those we may want to change to make a smoother path through life.
Hi Jody - Language gets tricky in this area. I basically agree with you - didn't mean "ego" in any sense of contrasting it with a vaporous or otherwise ethereal "spirit."
By ego I essentially mean the feeling a person has of being more important than others - maybe even all others put together. (I develop the idea fully in my book; that's about as good as I can do for a thread.)
Of course the notion is so absurd that we don't say it out loud or even to ourselves. But that's the sense and feeling for ourselves that we have - an aspect of it. And that's how we often behave, accounting pretty much for the state of the world.
Btw, watch out for the "nothing buttery" fallacy or reductionism. Because, say, butter, is made up of atoms, we don't say "please pass the yellow atoms" at supper. Because experiences are based on patterns of brain wave activity doesn't make them nothing but patterns of brain wave activity.
Jody, I have always heard the talk about "ego" being equated with the self serving aspects of a personality, not the personality itself.
I have always heard the talk about "ego" being equated with the self serving aspects of a personality, not the personality itself.
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This is the cause for the confusion that prevails here in this blog many times. People who visit this space most of the times have strong biblical background but the blog owner jodi's target is mostly the advaitic gurus from the east or having atleast some eastern connection. The ego means quite differently from eastern to western culture.
The gurus from east or west, they all have egos and that tells why they carry a personality which is self serving. But the gurus targeted here in this space are mostly for the same reason such as self serving attitude and feeling holier than the rest.
While jodi advocates about inevitability of ego even if it is a guru, he also gets tied down with the biblical thought "gurus should be selfless(perhaps like jesus)". But as long as ego is accepted then whatever happened through the ego must be accepted however self serving it is.
Atleast stop expecting the gurus to behave as if they lost the self serving aspect of their personaltiy.
But the gurus targeted here in this space are mostly for the same reason such as self serving attitude and feeling holier than the rest.
Gurus are targeted here for one reason: they are presented to us as more divine because of their realization, whether by their own words and actions, or the words and actions of their devotees. I am faithfully aware of the fact that anyone who can talk is doing so by the agency of ego. I'm also aware that some gurus are in business to make a living, and therefore may sometimes appear to be self-serving. But when that self-service gets in the way of Vedantic truth, that's when I feel justified to comment and ridicule. I do not expect any guru to be selfless. I never have. I DO expect a guru to render nondual truth truthfully, and that means never allowing themselves to be put on a pedestal, whether it be of their own or their devotees' making, regardless of the utility such holds as a marketing and sales tool.
Jody - Oh... OK, I think I see where you're coming from and I'm with you. "Holier than thou" is a lousy place for people to come from east or west. And the whole "spirituality business," which includes the guru business, is repulsive to me too.
I like to think Jesus would have shared our sense of this. He's often portrayed as speaking against the "hypocrisy" of the scribes and Pharisees and of course there's the turning over of the table of the money changers in the temple.
Gurus are targeted here for one reason: they are presented to us as more divine because of their realization, whether by their own words and actions, or the words and actions of their devotees..
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Its not good to talk about a dead man but tell me, going by the principles of this blog, if Jesus had projected himself as 'holier than the rest', or his followers believe and project that way? He was not a vedantin and he probably died without a clue about non dual Truth but fact remains he always thought he was the ONLY son of god.
The idea is not to bring down the glory of Jesus but your reply will help the readers to understand your stand better.
fact remains he always thought he was the ONLY son of god.
That's no fact. It's historical speculation. I'm not convinced Jesus ever existed. But if he did, I'm quite sure we wouldn't recognize him if he punched us in the nose.
That's no fact. It's historical speculation. I'm not convinced Jesus ever existed.
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How well you protected Jesus 'the ONLY son of god' by denying his existence is noted. Going by that you should also consider, lets say, Adi Shankara, Vevakananda, Rama Krishna, Yogananda, Ramana, even Rajneesh have a speculative existence?
How well you protected Jesus 'the ONLY son of god' by denying his existence is noted.
You've got the wrong idea. I don't believe Jesus was the "ONLY" son of God, whether or not he actually existed.
Going by that you should also consider, lets say, Adi Shankara, Vevakananda, Rama Krishna, Yogananda, Ramana, even Rajneesh have a speculative existence?
Well, Shankara is maybe a bit iffy, but the rest of these lives occurred in recent history, although none of them have anything to do with Jesus. However, I can imagine Yogananda imagining he was an incarnation of Jesus.
Well, Shankara is maybe a bit iffy, but the rest of these lives occurred in recent history,
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The voluminous records available on jesus or shankara are the 'facts' we have to depend on to think that they existed. It applies the same to every other character in the list. Its all a hearsay and some perhaps material in the print. If you dont think rather cannot accept clearly that jesus or shankara really existed then im inclined to say the same with the rest you have been bickering in these columns. Whats the proof yogananda existed?
Have you seen him personally ? People must have fabricated some entity like that? Have you been doing some kind of shadow boxing with non existant characters?
Aren't they pretty much fictitious like the ego and consciousness and enlightenment we are fooling ourselves with ?
Aren't they pretty much fictitious like the ego and consciousness and enlightenment we are fooling ourselves with ?
There seems to be a realm of name and form within which we communicate. In that realm, some things have had and may still have existence, and some may be purported to have had existence but have not.
In terms of the construction of personal identity, regardless of the seeming reality of the body, the idea that there is a "holder" of consciousness is illusory. However, that doesn't mean this idea isn't useful. Indeed, practically everything we experience is predicated on it. Thus, the useful "fiction" of this idea continues to hold sway on a mass basis. We couldn't be speaking without it.
Agin you boys is talkin well above my own straw Stetson! Aint it amazin all the mischief sturred up by the followers of a fellow who never even existed as conceived by the followers their own selfs, ie Jesus?!
Back when I was witnessin for the Lord on the streets of Lufkin, Texas, I stopped a pretty young girl and asked her, "have you excepted the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour? Ifn not, mayhaps I can read you from John, cha[pter 3, verse 16..." Well after the little gal got over bein accosted by a 300 pound teenager wearin a string tie, she said, "I done asked Bilbo Baggins into my heart..." Her answer stunned me to the quick and I had to dig down into my paper sack for another doughnut! It was a turnin point for yours truly and within a month, I had put aside that street witnessin and gone back to the Dime Box Baptist church where all you have to do to be a good Crustian is show up of a Sunday and enjoy your fried chicken afterwards!
Awesome!
Just when i thought this is going to be yet another stupid test to quantify Enlightenment!
My cat is my guru. :)
That was lovely!
This reminds me of the sign at the vet's place "Its an insult to the dog to call a man a dog"
Serious scholarship in this area indicates that Jesus' existence is highly likely, but that we have essentially no historical information about him. The books of the New Testament are the faith documents of the early Christian church and not historiography.
The manner and time frame over which these documents were written strongly suggests a real historical figure around whom oral traditions developed that were eventually set down in writing.
Even just reading the New Testament is enough to give a sense of this. It lacks the tidy coherence of pure mythology or fiction writing.
Given the fact that even serious Christian scholars readily grant that we lack historical info about Jesus, I always wonder what the point is in debating his existence.
The basic transcript of this debate would go:
"I don't believe that some particular but essentially anonymous person existed in first century Palestine."
"I do..."
Certainly there's doubt that Jesus did not exist - I just don't see the point of the debate.
Seeing what his teachings have come to, the damage done by those who believe in him, probably the best thing someone who grew up loving Jesus can say about him is, "He never existed."
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