Category: Musings

Year Beginnings

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

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The very first sentence of the above has informed many things for me in this life. It has been a kind of a mantram for me. When I used to do team and personal development courses I found that detailed and impeccable attention to the start impacted outcome. When the balance was right things flowed well. On the occasions that someone messed with this preparation the course “went wrong”. A simple thing unbalanced at the start unleashed a chaos. People failed to appreciate this…The idea was to start “tight” and then allow things to unfold and expand. A natural flow, a natural mystic.

This year has started with a dream of an end, a death, my death. It has pointed at ancient Tibetan anthropology and legend. Of mild interest yes. Of real current world applicability to me, probably not. I do not move in circles where anything might be propagated. It is like a hint from an otherworld. It is very unlikely that Macron and the Dalai Lama have been discussing my future. Life on the compound will continue much as is. No biggie…

The surgeon was satisfied with his handiwork and I am due a follow up appointment with a different surgeon in March to discuss the cut and splice of my other leg. I have some ongoing physiotherapy. Aside from that currently the number density of medical appointments has fallen to a low. A bit of relative peace and quiet looks on the cards.

We have started the DIY tasks around the house and I have an exhortation to walk to help improve the use of my “new” bionic hip.

Maybe today I’ll try to use the sit on mower. This was prohibitively painful before the operation. If that works then we can save on the gardening fees…

The dreaming rate seems to have fallen from one every three days…to much a more sparse occurrence.

During the night I had a question:

“Is dreaming unidirectional? If I dream of someone do they dream of me?”

If you look on the internet you can find stoner questions. They ask things like:

“What do teeth taste like? Do everyone’s teeth taste differently?”

“If you have a Ph.D., does every meeting you go to become a doctor’s appointment?”

Far out man…

All that highfalutin stuff looks to be a simple curiosity to have a brief gander at and then move on…

The Not Invented Here Syndrome

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I’ll kick this off with a statement

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People are evangelical about the comprehensive nature of their self-diagnosed omniscience.

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They are convinced that they know best and seek to promote and otherwise sell their approach(es). After all education is a business and bums on seats keep the pennies flowing into coffers. Religion too is a business and the treasuries must be kept full. Politics too is a business. In all of these cash flow is important. Self-marketing is important for livelihood. One must strive for supremacy and market domination.

I have encountered and been repulsed by the not invented here syndrome many times which can be paraphrased,

“We know best, fuck off with your strange and foreign ideas!! We love Status Quo.”

I once met a young man who tried to persuade me that Vajrayana practice was very difficult, like scaling a cliff. It was very hard but promised high gain yet the risks of falling and getting very badly hurt were high. He was showing off a little. I thought to myself, “try the warrior’s path sunshine and that might change your attitude…”

It is all a bit cock wavy. “My path is harder and more macho than yours!”

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If you read and consider deeply the aphorism from the rule of the three pronged nagal above you can see that it is not facile or shallow. This insight comes from direct experiential contact with The VOID. It is a part of the inner subjective teachings of the Toltec schema. Perhaps akin by extrapolation to inner Kalachakra.

I have joked that I am a quantum yogi, in a geek-yogi superposition state. As such I am suspected by scientists and suspected by yogis because I not one thing or the other. I am not pure. Like the driven snow I am tainted by other thought forms. Yuk!!

I probably am quite well placed to do a balanced compare and contrast for many different ways of thinking.

Sometimes one needs more than verbatim translation to carry across meaning. People can argue when in fact they are in agreement.

They are just not willing to listen with an open mind and a willingness to find common ground…

The call of the soap box can be irresistible…

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Cockney have name like Treey, Arthur and Del-boy
We have name like Winston, Lloyd and Leroy
We bawl out YOW! While cockneys say OI!
What cockney call a Jack’s we call a Blue Bwoy
Say cockney have mates while we have spar
Cockney live in a drum while we live in a yard
Say we nyam while cockney get capture
Cockney say guv’nor. We say Big Bout ya
In a de Cockney Translation!
In a de Cockney Translation!

Smiley Culture

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A Shed Load of Rinpoche(s)

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Following on from my various dreams I have been looking at internet based information on Tulkus and Rinpoche types. The first comment is that there are shed loads of these. There seems to be a pecking order.

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In some circles it seems that their words are hung upon and that they may be put on a pedestal. On-line there is controversy about iffy teacher-student practices. This provokes heated commentary and in some cases attack. It seems very emotive.

Looks like a minefield to me.

Academic practice in the UK has changed considerably in the last few decades. In the past people used to get shit-faced drunk and there was “intermingling”. This is frowned upon these days. Though no doubt some non standard interaction continues. Many academics marry students…

If people want to check my academic credentials feel free…

Based on what I am reading it looks like a barge pole jobby. That is steer well clear…

I know that I don’t know but I am now less inclined to find out. I am not glamoured thereby.

Some Rinpoche dudes get to meet presidents of countries…

If you are famous and well known you can charge a few hundred dollars for online courses…

The comment that I have in general is that a lot of the teaching material on line is of a somnambulance inducing length. It would not pass muster at a modern higher education establishment. The presentation skills need polish and focus is better than rambling…

It reaffirms for me that “guru yoga” is dangerous both for the acolyte and the guru. It also suggests that the time for gonadal basal yoga is passing. That stuff is old…wrong century…

It has been interesting having a good read around. The “discussion” on line reminded me of the Sutra below.

This idealism in which people are deified and then crucified for their failings remains a problem not just in religion. A well loved star can be cancelled and lambasted on the whim of an allegation. The worshipper takes no responsibility for the down fall of the previously worshipped.

I don’t know what those hundreds if not thousands of Tulkus and Rinpoches are doing with their lives.

They can’t all be angels…

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The Sutra Preached By The Buddha On The Total Extinction Of The Dharma

(Taisho Tripitaka 0396)

The Buddha was silent, and made no response. After Ananda had repeated the question three times, the Buddha told him, “After my nirvana, when the Dharma is about to be extinct, the Five Mortal Sins will foul the world, and the demonic-way will flourish exceedingly. The demons will become monks, to spoil and wreck my Way. They will wear lay dress [rejoicing in cassocks] and multicolored clothing. They will drink wine and eat meat, killing living things in their desire for fine flavors. They will not have compassionate minds, and will hate and envy each other.”

“At times, there will be Bodhisattvas, Pratyeka-buddhas, and Arhats, who cultivate merits diligently and treat all beings with reverence; being the objects of the people’s devotion, they will impartially preach and convert. They will pity the poor and keep the old in their thoughts, and take care of those in poverty and difficulty. They will constantly persuade the people to worship and serve Sutras and images, doing all good acts that bring merit; their wills and natures will be kind and good. They will not harass or injure people, but sacrifice themselves to save others. They will not spare themselves, but will put up with insult, being benevolent and harmonious.”

“Should there be such a being, the gang of demonic monks will unite in hating him, slandering him and blazoning forth his errors. He will be expelled and banished; they will not let him remain at that place. From then onwards, they will all fail to cultivate merit according to the Way. Temples will be empty and desolate, and will no longer be repaired, but will be allowed to fall into ruin. The monks will covet nothing but material goods, accumulating them without distribution, not doing good deeds. They will deal in male and female slaves, plow the fields and plant them, burning off the mountain forests and harming all living things; they will not have compassionate minds. Male slaves will become monks, female slaves will become nuns; they will have none of the merit that comes from practicing the Way, but rather will be filthy and depraved, foul and turbulent; men and women will not be kept separate. The reason the Way will become shallow and weak, is all because of that type of person.”

Impermanence – Cop Out or Motivation?

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The trouble is you think you have time...

Siddhartha Gautama

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I have paraphrased here something I read in the Dhammapada. In this the notion that there is always tomorrow or mañana and demain is hinted at. People can put things off over and over. This especially  true of anything which is inconvenient. Even though they know that they need to address something they put it off. People can justify inaction to themselves rather than put themselves out or do something positive perhaps transformative. The safety of the unpleasant status quo of life is so tempting; the inertia of sameness is like a duvet. The fear of risk forbids any reward for courage.

It is evident that life is impermanent. Everyone without exception dies. Which means that allotted time is finite.

It is easy to fall into the trap of “hey man all is impermanent” and use that as a cop out for not doing anything. If nothing lasts, nothing matters, so why bother? If  all of life is an illusion then why interact, why take part?

It is easy to take an overly passive view on karma. If everything is pre-ordained and fated because of past actions why try to ameliorate? That is a gist of karma. At some stage you have to interact in a meaningful way to work with your karma and acquire karmic merit. You have to learn the lessons that karma has in store and which you have selected for yourself by your actions. Karma is there to teach. You need to learn your lessons otherwise you repeat your folly ad infinitum.

Impermanence teaches that you have little or no time in which to act and yet you must not be obsessed about result or outcome because these are not permanent or real.

It is easy to get the balance wrong and be overly dismissive and fatalistic or to try to force things to fit how you want them to be and thereby create more karma. If you put things off you are deciding so to do. Procrastination cannot work on karma.

You have no time, much less leisure than you imagine, so get busy but do so without obsession or desire for guarantee. Impermanence teaches that all forms of obsession are folly. It also teaches that you have little time to figure out what it is you need to learn and then to seek out those lessons.

In any given life, time is not a luxury which one in reality has.

Copping out because things are impermanent is copping out, it is a form or “reasoned” and “excused” inertia and avoidance.

Whereas impermanence might encourage you not to waste a single second of your allotted time.

Working with impermanence as a fact to acquire skill and discernment is a very profound and meaningful practice.

Impermanece teaches balance and the middle way.

Geocentrism and Perception

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For many centuries the powers that be and the so-called wise held a view that the heavens rotated around the centre of the universe, aka Earth. Looking out from Earth it was assumed that we were the very epicentre of all God’s creation. This understanding has been proven wrong by the use of modern electromagnetic astronomy. Yet people were adamant that the world revolved around them and any disagreement in public could be fatal, a taboo punishable by excommunication, shunning and execution.

This innate human tendency towards self-diagnosed omniscience persists to this day in various forms.

One could postulate that a self-centred world view is very common. This holds for institutions and individuals. Moreover a kind of gravitational attraction is assumed. Say for example you were a Harvard or an Oxford university you might assume that would be scholars of merit would be irrevocably attracted to you, both to share in your divine reputation and the chance to participate in highbrow scholarly intercourse. People see things from their own point of view. To some a “Hogwarts” school dinners form of collegiate catering may be attractive to others it is not.

Those with power and reputation might assume that this is attractive to others and these exert a quasi-gravitational pull. Moths are drawn to the candle flame. Seen from the inside one sees an attractiveness which externally may not hold. A self-centred perception may lack accuracy.

I have seen some of the mythos associated with a university I worked at briefly. It was held in high regard by some less so by me. My perception was based upon experience and not PR or mythos.

Some people are very corporate in their thinking. Imagining that some corporate or institutional identity is attractive. I once went to an Accenture “do” while I was a start-up founder with a lot of dosh in the bank. All the young guns were full of themselves and very Accenture on-board. All they could see were the internecine pecking order, rankings and power struggles. They knew best. They did not leave a good impression on me. I thought that they were a bunch of wankers. These ambassadors for Accenture left me thinking that the organisation was full of bellends. I wanted no more to do with it ever.

When you are caught up in an institution, church or cult it is very easy to become enamoured and imagine oneself the best thing since sliced bread. The group perception internally may differ significantly from that held externally.  For example other Buddhist groups may think that the Dzogchen and Bon influenced Tibetan Buddhism is bad for Buddhism as a whole. Although the Dalai Lama is arguably the most famous Buddhist one might question as to the type of being this attracts towards Buddhism. The difference between high Tibetan ritual and Thai Forest simplicity is marked. There is a cultural agenda in Tibetan Buddhism which extends past sutra and towards a national historical identity. I don’t know to what extent reflection is made. Evangelism of any kind suggests an imagined innate superiority of world view which must be shared with others. A similar story might hold for STEM advocacy in schools. Everyone must be blessed by the all-encompassing wisdom of the STEM doctrine and creed. All hail the standard model. Blessed be its name.

When you are within the encircled wagons out on the wild prairie armed with your trusty Winchester rifles, it is easier to kill the Apache. After all he is the ignorant savage and you are the God fearing pioneer enacting justified ethnic cleansing in the name of the Lord. It is your divine right to drive the indigenous off their lands. They need your conversion to go to heaven.

Humans can believe whatever it is convenient for them to believe and their ability to seemingly justify slaughter and murder to themselves continues unabated to this day.

When you look in a geocentric, self-centred  manner anything out there is an enemy to be conquered and slain. They must revolve around you or die.

Mathematically whether that be with spherical or cartesian coordinates perception starts at the origin, the self, which is placed at the centre of the world, the centre of the known universe. Many imagine that the entirety of creation revolves around them, their wants, their needs and their petty grudges and complaints.

Although historically Geocentrism has been determined to be inaccurate, a poor model of reality, many fail to see that their whole view is self-centred. Me-centrism. They fail to see that they too are old fashioned and archaic in their notions of world. This observation applies to even the most intelligent amongst us. Intelligence can confer a sense of entitled arrogance. Those on Olympus after all, know what is best for us plebs.

Many people whose perception is very self-centred imagine that it is right and dandy that this should be the case.

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Does the entire universe revolve around you, are you the very centre of all creation?

Are you the flame to which all moths are irresistibly drawn by your magnificence?

Planning for 2026…

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

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Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.

John Lennon

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Now that the enforced lunacy of the holiday season is over it is time to look forward to what to do in 2026.

I have just finished a plumbing job which I did not start before my operation. It was not complex. But like so many other things here legacy “solutions” can cause other problems. I have learned not to start “apparently” easy jobs when there might be a time constraint.

It is fair to say that one person’s bodge or short cut can evolve into another’s prolonged and frustrating nightmare when they try to clean up the mess and otherwise sort out the magnificent and “time saving” bodge job / cunning plan / clever work around.

I have now restarted the post-op DIY.

There are two pretty major things upcoming. Our application to be allowed to remain in France is one. If this is denied then our healthcare rights will probably cease. I would have to pay full whack for a second replacement hip even if I could get it done before I am booted out. It is up to the French government to decide if I am allowed to stay. It is not a given.

The second obvious one is if they think it is a good idea to proceed with my second hip replacement or not. I am guessing that this cannot happen before spring but might be possible soon after. We shall discuss this next week. I think I would prefer to get it done sooner rather than later.

We do need to downsize house. The outcomes of the above inform the decision about putting the house on the market.

I’ll speculate that I can do more DIY more easily than in Autumn last year. So we can tart the house up a bit.

We have made a provisional list of DIY and garden jobs. As spring kicks in stuff grows fast here.

I have two minor decisions.

Do I renew the blog plan or bin it and start a new one?

Do I renew by quantum optics patent, due May? I am not planning on trying to commercialise it. A renewal would cost the same as a couple of week’s grocery shop. It is moot.

It seems to me that the dreaming is quietening down.

All compounded things are like a dream, a phantom, a bubble or a reflection…

Best guess is that all the highfalutin stuff will fade away blown on a passing wind.

I am planning for a year with gardening and DIY and maybe another operation. I am setting my intent in that general direction. If we are due to get kicked out we will have to put the house on the market. I am / we are deciding what to do with the year.

It is not very complicated really…

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Curiosity Not Power

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I had a bit of a tough time with some hip pain during the night. I still can’t lie on the operation-scar side for more than a few minutes. But during the night I must have rolled over onto it and I awoke with some considerable pain. I could have taken some codeine and gotten up for shite TV. Instead I tried to ride it out. Which gave time for consideration.

I have a working assumption that my residual fate for this life encompasses not a lot more than gardening, DIY and a couple of hobby blogs. There remains little more significant for me to do. What I am interested in, is not an interest shared by many. It is largely curiosity driven on my part. There is no pecuniary worth.

Reflecting back one of the drivers for me has been the question, “is this possible?”. Once I have answered this question at gist level I am usually done, satisfied. I then get a little bored until the next curiosity arrives. I am certainly more interested in looking into things rather than applying them. Once I learned how the research grant application game worked and even managed to get a few quid, it was no longer as interesting for me. I was not motivated by peer approval. Yes at one stage it was a part of my job. I did not burn with passion and drive. I did not want to be boss nor some big cheese. I did have to adopt a defensive posture of sorts. I was not interested in fame.

From time to time I have found myself in situations where others may have deemed me to have some power, positional or by association. I was not interested in exerting that power certainly in a power over sense. I did not ever want minions. I was not ambitious about career advancement and could not really be arsed to apply for promotion.

Retrospect suggests that this orientation was ill suited to societal expectations. People did compete with me for power in some situations. They appeared to want something more than I. I never really got this drive nor was I overly anxious about protecting my “position”.

I guess basically I have not felt that gut wrenching insecurity which others appear to have nor have I sought to remedy it by some kind of external verification of validation. Peer related kudos is not important to me. I don’t need a tick or a gold star from teacher.

The most enjoyable part of doing a start-up was writing the business plan and then pitching it to see if it got funded. It did. It would probably have been better to simply stop the process there. Instead a company was formed etc. The proof of principle was done. In principle it was {is} possible to dream up a business plan and get it funded. It would have saved everybody a lot of hassle if it stopped there with no money changing hands. It would not however have put dinner on the table in 50 households.

In many of my explorations I am happy when I feel that I have the gist of it. There is no need to delve deeper into detail. A rough understanding of overall gist suffices. Once I have that I get a bit bored and repetition does not enthral.

So much is driven by an initial curiosity which can be quite quickly sated. The level of curiosity these days is rather muted. Perhaps I am jaded.

I have a notion that because people are fascinated by power and maybe lack power themselves they imagine that others are power hungry. This obsession with pecking order and power drives many behaviours. It is impossible to convince people obsessed thus, that it is not a major motivator for me. There are many people who are disinterested in power, they however may be disappointed in those who wield power. Many people want so badly to be big cheeses in some arena or other…

Yup where I got to in the wee small hours was that curiosity is more of a driver for me and that gist usually suffices…

Third Omen – Not Coincidence…Dreaming Symbol

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Last night just after dusk around 18:30 there was a large thud and a bang.  In the drive there was a small silver Citroen facing horizontally across. The car had hit the crash barrier and spun skidding over the verge and dropping about 1.5 metres THUD into our drive. The car was facing the steep slope and must have gone over the edge backwards. There was an animated young woman with dark hair and glasses talking to her mother on the ‘phone. She had a major fright.

It was getting a bit icy.

This is the third crash directly outside our property in a tad over six weeks!!

The odds on this are not likely.

It gets safer to conclude that this is NO coincidence.

She was unharmed and the air bags had failed to deploy. After a while her mother and another woman turned up. She was able to manoeuvre the car down the drive and onto some hard standing grass. It is there now iced up. Someone will come and pick up the abandoned car which is at least partially functional later today.

The sloping drive will be ice-rink-slippy until midday.

Three times now somebody else’s vehicle, state of awareness, has crashed outside our house, our view of the world.

This as dreaming symbols is suggesting that for person or persons unknown to us, their awareness, the way they perceive and align the word, has come to a sudden halt and crashed. Outside and near our house.

It was a bit of a car crash…

As the saying goes…

Is Knowledge Important ?

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“ The knowledge economy, or knowledge-based economy, is an economic system in which the production of goods and services is primarily driven by knowledge-intensive activities that contribute to the advancement of technical and scientific innovation. The key element of value in this paradigm lies in the increased reliance on human capital and intellectual property as primary sources of innovative ideas, information, and practices. Organizations are called upon to leverage this “knowledge” in their production processes to stimulate and consolidate their business development. This approach is characterized by reduced dependence on physical inputs and natural resources. A knowledge-based economy is founded on the crucial role of intangible assets within organisations as an enabler of modern economic growth.”

Excerpted from Wikipedia

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There are various schools of thought which suggest that in modern times knowledge is a key factor in economic success. That knowledge must be commercially exploitable and can include skills and artisanal know-how. As recent world events suggest, access to natural resources remains of high geo-political importance. Venezuelan oil being an obvious marker.

In my view this schematic is a tad idealistic, it does not mention socio-political barriers and vested interests. One might say that recent changes in US policy have moved away from the notion of a knowledge economy back towards gun boat aircraft carrier diplomacy.

Just like AI has been shown to hallucinate it is a moot point as to whether the so-called AI investment boom is also a group or herd like hallucination among humans. FOMO investments can have bubble-bursts.

The knowledge which has pecuniary value relates only to profit. There is little attention paid to altruistic knowledge. To live only for profit and gain is unbalanced. In the eyes of some there may be more to life and living than that. Not everyone agrees.

One could argue that I am an example of how the so-called knowledge economy failed to make use of a resource. It failed. I failed. Either way I am now retired and doing gardening and DIY.

“You lose what you do not use.”

Is an axiom which has perhaps wide applicability. Knowledge which is not applied and practised can no longer be recalled. The edge of its blade becomes blunted by rust. Slowly like an untended path in the woods it becomes overgrown, deserted and before long nobody remembers that it is there or ever was there. As an older person I have seen how scientific knowledge from many decades ago has to be reinvented because people cannot find it so easily in online search engines. Because search engines are now biased to the fee paying advertiser, much knowledge is now lost in far flung unvisited corners of the internet, there to gather spiders and webs.

It is reasonable to assume that whatever knowledge I may have will die with me. That may not be a great loss but it is an example, of how people may talk a good game. But when push comes to shove knowledge is rarely as important as self-promotion. There is nobody queuing up to learn from me. And by now I am too hermit-like to converse.

There is a danger that human evolution, despite all the advances in technology, is taking a backward step towards a new dark age. An age where image and sound-byte becomes a new Goebbels-reality. An age where short snappy mind numbing mantra replace thought and consideration. An age in which metrics and graphs bury substance and worth in cold clammy tombs. Bullet point thinking is not knowledge and not wisdom.

I think popularity and fame have removed knowledge and wisdom from the mantelpiece above our hearths. Shiny, flashy and chav dominate; viral despite COVID remains a term indicative of success.

It may seem strange but I think that the pool of available knowledge is actually shrinking, it is becoming more standardised and subject to peer approval. Loss of diversity is generally bad for ecosystem; it is an indicator of environmental decline.

I think that genuine knowledge is becoming much less important than claimed or asserted knowledge. The tendency is away from the unfathomable and profound towards the safety of the shallows and the common. I suspect that reputation has become more important than knowledge.

Once diversity has been lost it is very hard to replace. Same is not often best. Clone-think tends to be counter-evolutionary.

Once knowledge has been lost it is not easily restored. Value for money seems to be the main arbiter of which knowledge survives and is nurtured. There is a very short term outlook.

Sometimes we are so stubborn, adamant and omniscient that we can only learn through loss.

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“Only when the last tree has been cut down, the last fish been caught, and the last stream poisoned, will we realize we cannot eat money.”

Native American Proverb

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Spiritual Teachers and Gurus

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I’ll comment that on the internet there appear to be quite a number of these.

I do have a background in orthodox UK university based science education. Nevertheless because I do not have qualified teacher status I am not allowed to teach science unsupervised in UK state run high schools. I have previously set my self up as a private science teacher and there was some circumstantial evidence to suggest that I enhanced the achieved “A” level grades of my 1:1 students. They may have gotten more than that; 10-20 hours of 1:1 teaching in science might have had extra ancillary benefits. Only Ph.D. students have had that from me before. I was for a while paid to teach.

Pissing about on the internet this afternoon there are a number of opinions about what a “spiritual teacher” should and should not do. There are warnings about overly devotional guru-worship and falling into cult like behaviours. The first comment that I have about so called spiritual teaching is that it often appears wishy washy, hand waving and vague. There are many pushing their own agendas. Some sell books to advise on spiritual journeys and teachers; they include red flags. One of which might be having merchandise. There is a lot of self-promotion out there. The internet marketers have had an influence.

The second comment I have is that it is impossible to teach the spirit. It stands above and transcends human endeavour. To think you can teach the spirit is very up-your-own-arse ego. Spiritual teacher is an inaccurate and misleading term. A bad use of nomenclature.

“Hey man I am a very spiritual being…”

“Yeah right…”

There appears to be some backlash against Tibetan Buddhism and Vajrayana in particular.

My own view is that many are experiencing what might be termed sixth ray problems. Full of idealism and devotion they deify a teacher upon a pedestal and if he gets a collection plate out or waves his cock about, they are disappointed and crest fallen. Everyone likes to crucify people they have previously worshipped or deified. They don’t take responsibility for their own lack of discernment. Heaven forbid a teacher should smoke or drink! God does not do that though Jesus was a dab hand at the wedding bar with the wine {allegedly}.

The clergy have always abused power…Those drawn to it may have a predilection so to do. People who want to teach and be special may have very mixed motives. Monasticism encourages sexual repression and leads to deviance in some.

People also have prejudices…

In our time the plagues of immediacy, short attention span and having to be Insta-ready are extant. I don’t know if people can hack hard work and confrontation. There may no longer be any purpose in trying to help people towards liberation. The time may be entirely wrong. Humanity may need to fall deep into a quagmire, a doldrums of empty meaningless vacuous materiality.

The current blueprint for any would be teacher is to write a book, send it to Oprah, sell more books then set up a guru institute offering free ten day trials. {We are only taking credit card details so that your first subscription goes through easily. The subscription can be cancelled at any time during your ten day trial.}

My personal view is that the quality of much New Age guidance / literature out there is not high. If you look on YouTube it is even worse.

At the turn of the century there seemed to be a lot more New Age activity…It seems to be dying out. Physical new age, or as I call them hippie shops, are closing and disappearing from our streets. You can still buy crystals and tarot on line.

I know with a fair confidence that I am out of touch with the younger generations. They are alien to me as I perhaps am to them. I note fear. I note anxiety. I note fear of missing out. I don’t as yet see an upsurge in rebellion as to what my generation has inflicted.

Is there a need for “spiritual” teachers and gurus in our modern times?

Or do we just need more “nice” merchandise and antiseptic courses in Insta-ready locations?