The time has come to move again.
For part 6 click here.
For part 5 click here.
For part 4 click here.
For part 3 click here.
For part 2 click here.
For the article that I wrote so very long ago, and for the first and potentially most enlightening part of the discussion click here.
And as always, enjoy and have fun.
April 20, 2007 at 3:35 pm
So, after thinking hard on whether to add a paypal donations button to Animam Recro, I have chosen to go through with it.
If you wish to make a donation to this blog, you can do so from the main page of the blog (ie. click home in the top right corner of the screen and look for the paypal donate button on the right). The donation would be in £GBP, not $US (currently the exchange rate is roughly 2$=1£).
Thank you.
April 20, 2007 at 3:35 pm
To Howard #6/406.
For your reference, Howard, I have not posted on this forum under any other personas – just Anonymous 6/376.
Your reply neatly illustrates the problem with formatory thinking and the mind behind it.
You use the word ‘verification’ as merely that – a word. As your level of being changes, so your verifications change. After all, your own inner world is becoming slightly different, so the chemical combinations with anything outside you, including ideas (such as Robert’s divinity), are going to be different too.
And verification is not either linear or black-and-white. In my experience it is cyclic, you are returned to the same spot – in familiar circumstances – again and again… and every time you return, the ‘verification’ is not quite the same as before. It seems to me that your understanding of ‘verification’ only works on the level of words.
And you are mis-understanding the steward comparison (deliberately?). The point is that we need to be convinced that Robert has swept all of HIS rooms clean – particularly the room containing identification with his sexual needs – before he can ‘mind’ ours – or put our evolution first, as you said. If some of the accounts in this forum are true, there indeed seem to have been many occasions when the two have come into conflict. And because Robert seems to have a conflict of interests, every student in the School experiences it too in some form or other.
Must you not be able to practice non-identification in your favourite ‘room’ before you can preach it meaningfully?
Have you ever thought why (about a year ago) two students of the ‘inner circle’ started selling vouchers for Robert’s events in return for sex? It was because they thought it was permissible, they were following the model they saw in front of them…
April 20, 2007 at 4:10 pm
Living the contradiction 4
—– SELF-remembering versus “love they neighbor”
Every spiritual movement is a reaction to what is there. So the focus on one’s own SELF in the Fourth Way is a reaction to the fact that the Christians (generally speaking) went over board with the idea that loving and caring for the people around them would get them into paradise.
Therefore the gods brought Gurdjieff onto the World-stage promoting, as he stated “You have to become a conscious egoist”. This is one of those contradictions that sheep never can live. Therefore most Fourth Way followers live only half of this Contradiction, and the Fourth Way has now an over population of Egoist who call this SELF-remembering.
Before these events in Egypt I was a good example of this mis-development. Loreta reminded me of the last lunch Cassandra and I had together with her before leaving for Egypt. We talked about our 5 years in India where RB had send us to open Centers. Cassandra told Loreta that at one point she almost died there and Loreta then said to her “Now in Egypt you will take better care” and before my dear Cassandra could answer I stated “We will do what is required”.
Its this spirit that is praised very high in the Fourth Way, they call it “Total dedication”, but in fact it is a lack of feeling based also on the nature of its founder Gurdjieff who was inhabiting a “King of Clubs” mechanism.
Loreta today said to me that for her it had always been clear that RB is also a King of Clubs who is trying to educate his King of Hearts and although I had never thought of that, many things suddenly made a lot of sense. For example, why he always painted the KOC as the main enemy? Simply because everyone is most aware of what is a large part of oneself. Also this explains why he surrounded himself with so many instinctively centered machines.
But what was so shocking that he obviously used the tragic events in Egypt for his promotional purposes and that he never expressed any emotions to me in this respect. On the contrary it was clear that my presence reminded his KOC of Death and that was the reason why he put me out for the stupid reason of not accepting his gift of a jacket.
As before I do not any less think that he is conscious, which for me means “to be a perfect tool of the gods”. But different than my naïve previous believe “that one has to follow anything what this messenger asks”, is now the understanding that the gods want one to become a “Conscious Egoist” and not just “Conscious Sheep”. Such a man is the tool, the channel, that the gods use to create a play that is full of Contradictions and that some can use to wake up.
As I stated before, it is clear to me that the play that is unfolding carries the message for those that can hear and do not only follow their momentum and fears, that it is time to start something new. Its as simple as that, no need to blame the past, RB, or oneself.
There is a total lack of compassion in Fourth Way hardliners inside and outside the school as one could also feel in the acidity of some comments on this Blog. For example today I was leaving Café Collage and Thomas Fenn met us outside. He was the last one who met all three, Daniela, Cassandra and myself together in Rome and even then asked me to lead a meeting, shortly before the death of Daniela and Cassandra. Now this evening he would not even respond to my Hello.
What made this lack of compassion particularly clear was when I send out a message to all my customers last week telling them what happened for me in the last 18 month and I got so many loving replies like the following:
“Kiran, I was stopped in my tracks just now this morning when I was reading unread emails and came across this deeply personal sharing from you. By now you may be in the joy state regarding the blessing of the time on earth you had with your wife, I hope so. I am glad you survived and are bringing your gifts more to the sharing arena with us who are being touched by your application of the many things you know.”
“Kiran. It is breathtaking and spiritually uplifting. I think that all of us on this email are lucky to be alive and practicing in the alternative medicine and spiritual spheres.”
“I am a firm believer in the eyes as being the entry to the soul. Your eyes show the kind of person you are, and I believe your eyes show honesty and integrity, as well as, a deep thinker and creative artist. I can’t also help but say, there’s a bit of ego left there, but it’s been calmed to the point of humility. Ego is not always a bad thing, and I think most outstanding creators of any kind need to call on the ego to accomplish their goal.”
“This was a moving and inspiring address. I hope you get the response that it merits and I am happy to hear about what you experienced since what you describe is part of my experience of life as well. Although I did not have to suffer through so much…”
And so many more of this kind, from people I did not meet once. And now the stunning fact is that I did not get one e-mail message from one of my hundreds so-called Friends in the FOF, that I was spending time with for the last 20 years, in the last 18 month…. Just ponder about, what this fact tells you.
Just as the devoted Christians loose themselves in helping others, the dedicated Fourth Way student is lost in his wrong concept of SELF-remembering that leaves no space for compassion.
Living the Contradiction also in this respect will only be for few, it needs courage, observation, thinking, being true to oneself and of course feeling. I know all this payment of Cassandra and Daniela was only to that end that some wake up and transcend Contradictions.
Greetings from Oregon House
You can e-mail me at Kiran@inergetix.com
Or you can see some more pictures here
http://www.beingpresent.net
April 20, 2007 at 4:15 pm
HC said:
“One doesn’t have to keep re-verifying it. If one feels the need to keep verifying it, it only means one has not really verified it to begin with.”
Reminds of a definition I once heard for the word conclusion: The place where I got tired of thinking.
April 20, 2007 at 5:45 pm
Hey lovely cyberseekers,
I too, have felt somewhat discouraged by the tone of the blog in general. Maybe it’s because I’ve been in a little slump…. Everything seems to coalesce in such amazing ways, and not all of them are joyful. It’s painful to see where I have failed to love and beloved.
It’s a bit stale by now but Howard, dear, don’t turn your circular reasoning on me and think I’ll belly up to your insulations that I’m being formatory. I’m not the one who belongs to a group claiming to “own” C-influence and the shocks they deliver. I know how the school defines formatory thinking and I think you’re swimming in it. You ain’t got nothing on my sweet mama.
Practical (6/382): “That is why this blog is so depressing. It is based on the assumption that because the Fellowship did not help some people in their search, that it cannot help anyone.”
If you have truly read my posts or many of the posts of people who have been in the FoF for ten, twenty years, and who are part of this discussion, I don’t think you would say that. I, for one, have never said that you can’t be helped by the school.
The problem is, and all you defending the FOF, please try to let this sink in… Be clear about what you’re defending! It’s not that the FoF isn’t full of wonderful, well-meaning people, or that there are some working ideas and aspects to the teacher and his approach to awakening, it’s that there are some very ugly aspects to his “system” which are incredibly painful to confront if you have the courage to leave. Practical wrote, “Why assume that students are so mindless they cannot take what is useful from the teaching and put aside the rest?” Fine, on the first part but consider this: What you are “putting aside” is ME and other’s like me; personally, what is being “put aside” is a totally inclusive relationship with my mama (and her community), what you are “putting aside” are all the living, breathing individuals who have left and been condemned, if by no one else, than by your teacher (isn’t that enough!?), as “food for the moon”. Sure, go ahead put it all aside. Cause I’ve had to put THAT painful untruth aside to live my life.
And for you non (in my opinion) non-dualists out there. Sorry, but I can’t apologize if you don’t get my complaints about what seems to me going from the frying pan into the fire. In the words of John Wheeler: “What I am is that pure, non-objective presence-awareness that cannot be doubted or denied. What I am not is the body, emotions, mind and — most importantly — a separate person or character created in thought.” That’s not helpful talk to me. It is, in fact, very dangerous talk to me. It’s the kind of talk that has allowed people for centuries to destroy, deny, and debase the bodies, thoughts and feelings of others.
I want to respect my self and others —in body, thought, heart and soul— I want to live a full life here and now. And that means looking at it all clearly and accepting that it’s all going down as it is in this body, with these thoughts and feelings …it’s in realizing that I can take responsibility for some small portion of how my life unfolds, and connect to the I Am that we are at the same time that I fearlessly dive into this experience of Being Human.
I’m tired of intellectualizing my life away. I want to live it.
Join me in NYC sometime and we’ll see if we can make the gods laugh in and through and with us….
love,
Jules
Julescaz(at)earthlink(dot)net
April 20, 2007 at 6:17 pm
Dear All,
Yesterday I’ve received a message from my close friend Kosta Dmitriev from St.Petersburg, which he sent to the students in Russia.
I thought that it was quite funny (if it wasn’t sad), and asked Kosta if I could translate it and post it on the blog, to which he agreed. If you have any questions, you’re free to ask Kosta directly, his email address is: shantiway@yahoo.com
To those who don’t know Kosta personally, I am pleased to tell that he is one of those handsome young Russian men who rejected Robert’s advances.
———————————————-
Dear friends,
Thank you very much for the time we spent together, it was wonderful.
As many before me, I decided to leave the school when I discovered the details of sexual ‘adventures’ of the teacher.
Of course, as everybody else in the school, I knew that Robert is a homosexual. So what? So many great people and even our friends were and are homosexuals, bi-sexuals, transvestites – nobody is shocked by this nowadays. Especially among the different kinds of ‘spiritual seekers’, where there are always many, let’s say, exotically oriented people. That’s not the case, as me and my wife too, sometimes doing such things, that… let’s not talk about it.
Back to business, here are the results of my observations and investigations.
The school as organisation and its exercises are intended to:
1.Attract sponsorship for the very expensive and exquisite erotic games of Robert and Co. Teaching payments are spent on expensive clothes, often made to order for the boys and the entourage; original Viagra pills which cost $50 per tablet (completely identical ones in India cost $0.5). Air tickets and 5-star hotels for the harem; fake passports which are bought from Italian mafia, for the especially treasured lovers from Russia, and of course, for the new centres in developing countries, where new ‘members’ (‘member’ in Russian is the same word for penis – Rita) are so cheap. Also, 5-figure sums for the lawyers and parents of some of the ‘woken up’ underage victims of the teacher’s ‘mischievous’ activities.
2.Cover up the very fact that those orgies are taken place just before and after the meetings and are the main interest of the teacher in his school and the reason for its existence.
The cover-up is necessary in order to prevent students from thinking about how the teacher was using his mouth just before he kisses their foreheads. Many wouldn’t like to think about it at all. Of course, there will always be those who will work with acceptance and continue to be present to any sort of madness. But most students would leave the school to be present elsewhere.
Robert is interested only in young men, only straight (otherwise it’s not such fun to ‘get’ them), usually in financial need, preferably spiritually unripe and, what’s called in Russia, ‘without a King in the head’, and with high level of conformity of behaviour. That’s it.
Yes, my friends, it’s all about ‘members, members and more members’. Preferably big in size and several at the time. But if only that was all…
The stories of the participants are beyond even the most perverse sexual imagination.
One student has almost chocked on the teacher’s penis while giving him a blowjob. He had to be rescued by his fellow orgy-participants from the unstoppable in his sexual urge teacher.
The ‘height’ of those stories is the ‘Fountain of Eternal Youth’. What do you think that would mean? Very simple. Students are pissing in the teacher’s mouth. One at the time, or all together. I asked about the next, you know, logical step… They said – yes! That step has been taken. Sometimes all would get smeared. And why? You won’t believe… Gurjieff ordered from the astral plane!!! In order to be more present!
It’s understandable that such moments of presence will never be forgotten. You’ll be in the third state without any effort, and maybe even beyond third state, as many afterwards live their lives, wearing ‘horse faces’ forever.
You will ask me, what makes these people do this?
It’s very simple, really: everybody does it, they say. It’s accepted behaviour. You know about ‘norms of group behaviour in the totalitarian sects’.
Strangely, but many continue to interpret what happened to them in terms of the enlightenment. As a special, mystical experience of presence, which they would not get anywhere else. And, at the same time, they hate Robert for what he’s done to them and cherish plans for revenge (usually blackmail of some kind). It’s understandable, because otherwise you’d have to admit that you’ve been simply ….. .
Some invested too much in the school, suffered, paid; some simply have nowhere else to go. Most students simply don’t know many things, despite the fact that all information is published on the Internet. And, except for the ‘special’ details, it’s known to the ‘old’ students. I didn’t know the details myself, so I was hoping that Robert’s ‘antics’ were simply ‘free love’ with a bit of tantra. But, according to the participants, the whole thing is completely rotten and Robert is a typical ‘post-traumatic psychopath’. Of course, you can continue as if it wasn’t true, but then you’ll have to pay him, and that is a question of moral standards which, as any case where one is trading one’s conscience, is deeply personal. For me, it’s simply too much. It’s your business now, think for yourselves.
I wish you with all my heart to wake up before, and not during, the time when you are asked to piss someone in the mouth, given the reason of working on the 3rd line of work.
Thank you. You are welcomed any time to call or to write me.
Kosta
April 20, 2007 at 6:50 pm
Howard:
“At the core of verification are two things: constancy, and trust. These attributes come into play after one has verified something. In the school one’s verifications are tested often over time… If one has verified the school is real there is a finality involved. One doesn’t have to keep re-verifying it. If one feels the need to keep verifying it, it only means one has not really verified it to begin with.”
Complete and utter horse shit, designed to perpetuate the status quo, and just another step in the cult dynamic.
And if you’re going to mention “being tested” let’s discuss “guru syndrome”. You know, where one starts a group for supposedly altruistic reasons. Slowly the power hungry and sycophantic followers huddle around the “teacher” supporting his image of himself, like worker termites having to roll the fat lazy Queen termite from one part of the nest to another. Eventually he, or she, begins to believe their own myth. Before you know it, it’s drug, sex and rock and roll (maybe without the rock and roll). I’ve known or come into contact with a few “biggies” as far as gurus in my life, and the VERY FIRST TEST they get as a teacher they invariably fail. They become corrupt, some quickly, some slowly, but invariably they do become corrupt.
This does not, in any way (to my way of thinking) negate the “rightness” of one’s path, including the FOF, but facts are facts. Just because the cop on the corner can directly and safely direct you to the grocery store you’re looking for, that doesn’t mean he isn’t also a psychopath who’s keeping children chained up in his basement.
Maps can be useful, but remember that the lay of the land can change fairly quickly, and there you are holding an obsolete map.
April 20, 2007 at 8:13 pm
#407 To Joe Average
Thank you, thank you, thank you! This letter is so complete and pentetrating, I will send it on to a few ‘committed FoFers” that I particularily care about with the vague hope that they recognize their situation.
Perhaps others would consider doing the same.
After this letter, all words pale, all thoughts that continue to defend the FOF and REB are just that.
Good Luck to us all!
April 20, 2007 at 8:35 pm
Suggest that current ‘FoFers’ read # 407 from Joe Average . And then re-read it.
It tells it all. What more do you need to know?
April 20, 2007 at 8:40 pm
Esoterica wrote, 6/404:
“This “Howard Carter” is putting the issues neatly and directly in front of us and argues them well. It seems that you cannot deal with it, because of course the matter of joining or staying in the FOF cannot simply be summed up as reducing the experience of students to wanting to be “special”…if that was the case, someone as smart as you would have left a long time before you did, yes?”
Esoterica, do I know you?
My post about realizing the fof is not “special” was just one note in a larger work, not the whole of it.
Looking over the posts of the entity calling itself “Howard Carter” is enervating. I find no humanity, no warmth, no humor, no concern for the suffering of individuals, no depth of personal introspection, no engagement with the larger world, and no great intellect whatever. It is the disembodied voice of a mind wholly controlled by dogma.
Burton’s mind-control cult of personal aggrandizement called the Fellowship of Friends is no longer of much interest to me–been there, done that, came out the other side.
So no, it’s not that I “cannot deal with it” but that I have no interest in doing so. I was an apologist myself for some time, maybe as adept as “Howard” at circular logic, and there’s no joy engaging in that world any longer.
I don’t see the fof as different in any substantial way from any other high control, high intensity closed group (see the brilliant Da Free John post above, for instance). I’m not very interested in what’s going on infof now; I’m sure I no longer know many people still infof these days; and I don’t really care what happens to it as an organization.
(Although I have to say I’ve gotten some really good laughs out of “The Sequence” posts. Hard to imagine a “practice” that would so decisively take me out of the moment I’m experiencing. The “discovery” of “ancient wisdom” just struck me as hysterically funny, like if SNL did a parody of cults. Can’t you see Bill Murray as the cult leader poring over cave drawings of defecating boars, divining great wisdom from the shit-drops?)
So no, I don’t think “Howard is putting the issues neatly and directly in front of us and argues them well.” These are not my issues, I don’t find any originality in his posts, and frankly they bore me. Just more intellect gone to waste rationalizing the guy who’s holding him a mental prisoner. You debate him if it’s important to you. (And would you mind not flaming me? Thanks.)
Thanks for reading
JoelF
April 20, 2007 at 8:41 pm
Howard:
Since you’ll do what Robert asks you to do, seeing as how he’ll never do anything to harm you, I respectfully suggest that if he asks you to place your penis in his rectum, you insist on wearing a condom. Otherwise you will likely contract herpes. I did. It’s inconvenient.
Please pardon my anonymity.
April 20, 2007 at 8:50 pm
To: Crouching Tiger, 7/2:
I wasn’t suggesting you are third pig, just putting two answers together as they were quite simliar.
As far and two “Inner circle” members selling seats at Robert’s meeting for sex; who said the inner circle is free of mistakes of judgment?
It is clear to many inner circle members, maybe two more now, that one can’t try emulate Robert in all ways, or at all times.
At the risk of incurring another “formatory” photo, I would say Robert is under different laws than students and one of the mine fields of the school is to know when to emulate him and when not to.
April 20, 2007 at 8:58 pm
White Knight #388, yes, and wasn’t there an earlier Kornfield book in which he went into these problems in some depth? Thanks for a lovely post.
Kid Shelleen #392, thanks, I remember that meeting also. lol. Stories, hopefully, will continue to come from all sides.
Joe Average #407, brilliant, thanks for taking the trouble. Yeah, I can see the twinkle in Margaret’s eye now. Did she ever tell you about the cult based on horse training? You gotta laugh, man.
April 20, 2007 at 10:34 pm
TO Howard Carter, 6/406
I am not use to send long post but this affirmation of yours changed that. I am not sorry nor proud… Just informative.
You write:
“At the core of verification are two things: consistancy and trust.”
In the world of science, it is well known that you work to verify WHAT you postulate or formulate as a theory.
It is simple:
Picture a hollow tube, you put something in the tube (your hypothesis)and you place the tube containing your hypothesis under different conditions.
What will you verify?
What you put in the tube!
Concerning the hypothesis and the conditions?
Will they be the same if you are a FOF Student or, as an ex., a Church of Scientology member ?
As a scientist, you record every possible (postulat, step, and so on) for you to validate or in-validate your postulat.
It takes time… we know,
but 20 and more years in the FOF is time enough!
Let’s be practical and FOF orientated:
In 1998, who did not see/read/verifyied signs of the possible fall of California (1998)?
Who did not see,
in the many signs,
an omen
and,
in the omen,
a very private relationship with Higher Forces, Conscious Influences guiding FOF members towards consciousness, creating the School, using Robert Burton as the main point of contact between the two worlds or realms?
Howard Carter, I do picture you as a “mature” FOF student and the 1998 periode is surely meaningful to you:
Did you see/shared signs ?
Did you make clear deductions/verifications then ?
What are they now, verifying/knowing what you know?
Any conclusion(s) ?
Interval: Funny quotes from students at that time, during a meeting:
“I can tell the grand son I don’t have:
“I WAS THERE WHEN IT DID NOT HAPPEND!”
“HERE IS MY TUNA CAN! WHERE IS YOUR HEARTH QUAKE ?”
This was the tragi/comic interval, here come the second part of this post:
Isn’t it so that most meaningful scientific discoveries came as “accidents” occuring in the tube or in the circumstancies it was put under ?
Do you think that spirituals beings, truth lovers and seekers, should be less rigorous than scientists to verify the “ideas” or record the “accidents” ?
Do you really propose “consitancy and trust” as tools for “verification” ?
When the School disgarded Mister Eckart Tolle (author of “The Power of Now” a book we were invited to book mark but not read!),
when the school labeled Adyashanty as ” B influence virus”,
was you not doubting the conditions with which you can properly study what you could put in the tube ?
When I was told a list of students attending a “B influence virus” was made, I was not that surprised (we are what we are and we mean well…) but when I knew Robert himself called some of the “dissidents” up, not to study, explore, investigate but to give them an ultimatum (you have to choose!), it was all very embarrassing.
The “Verification tool” the way it is proposed in the FOF, is, I am afraid, rethorical and marketting orientated, not a reality.
Someone suspected the FOF is a “monk way”,
not as a turn even, but as a starting point!
I surely failed myself working, with rigour, with verifying this hypothetesis :
Is the FOF a 4th way School… ?
Now, if I sincerely try to consider Robert as a leader of a Monk Way, I understand something:
He should not be there to convince his student.
He should teach what he has to teach and recieve support from them!
“Accidents” still need to happen because great discoveries are to be made!
Good luck to us all!
April 20, 2007 at 11:21 pm
#6 Ha-ha-ha! This is grrrreat! THAT’s what I want to hear. Tell me MORE! Tell me more what Robert does in his bedroom and how Girard curses on his computer and his wife. That’s what I am talking about!
Forget about all your alternative solutions, let’s talk BUSINESS here!
April 20, 2007 at 11:24 pm
BREAKING NEWS!!
4/20/07 Friday, 1:40 pm Central Time
MILES O’Brien reports by phone to CNN that an armed EMPLOYEE broke into a MEETING room in BUILDING 44 at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas and ordered everybody out of the room except one person. An E-MAIL was sent by Public Affairs to all employees that shots were fired, building 44 is in lockdown, employees have been evacutated and roads to it have been cordoned off. Building 44 is the communications center for tracking satellies, the international space station and the space shuttle.
Johnson Space Center is described as a secure complex which, nevertheless, has beautiful green lawns, fountains and a large park-like setting.
This is a real news story happening at this very moment with too many parallels to ignore.
April 20, 2007 at 11:25 pm
To Rita, 7/ 6
It was a long time we did hot have a “salty” view of Robert’s bedroom.
I turned into a voyeurist. Feels bad!
You introduced the translated letter with a “funny ” while a timid “sad” appeard between parenthesis right after…
The “SAD” deserves capital letters and should appear first!
Since someone introduced the exisitence of a blog similar to this one in Russia, for Russian, would you say more about this ?
It seems to me you are the “perfect” link.
We can only benefit from using more ways to inform and be informed…
Thanks.
April 20, 2007 at 11:33 pm
Hi Howie, me again.
When you wrote in post 341/6 -HC
“We understand, from several sources, that Influence C sets the curriculum and the teacher, as their intermediary, interprets their wishes”
Would this include Gurdjieff ordering from the astral plane through RB as intermediary that students should crap on Robert, “In order to be more present”?
Maybe you could submit your Willie to the teacher and tell us what you verify?
Ryan.
April 20, 2007 at 11:37 pm
#407 joe average
Thanks joe. Anyone in the fof who can read that letter and not have their eyes opened is in a hopeless situation.
“You are required to adapt to a complex, sophisticated technology of mind and emotion, through which you understand yourself and upon which you view the world.”
Chew up the map. Choke down the plug. Change the topography. Print out more copies and resume gnawing away, all the while pooping out paper turds for poor souls to follow.
April 20, 2007 at 11:46 pm
Donations anyone? Ridiculous!
May the sheik gets what he deserves! This is now no longer different than the Fellowship exploiting its members, now we have to pay you for showing us we were fools in the first place?
I thought the Sheik told us on page 1 he thought the FOF should be free of charge, but he wants to charge for his services–what is the world and this blog coming to?
Fed Up with all the BS!
April 21, 2007 at 12:21 am
Jules #5:
I worked in the office at Renaissance in the early 80s, and sat next to your mom for a while. Such a sweet lady, I remember her well. Didn’t see much of you in those days, but we met a few years ago at Burning Man. So, hi there.
You write about the non-dualist approach: “It’s the kind of talk that has allowed people for centuries to destroy, deny, and debase the bodies, thoughts and feelings of others.”
I’m not here to defend Wheeler or anyone from the non-dualist perspective, but it seems to me you’re throwing the baby out with the bathwater here. (coot made me say that!)
(aside to coot: maybe you do Frying Pan/Fire for Dummies?)
The idea the non-dualists are trying to get across, as I understand it, is that I don’t have to IDENTIFY with thoughts, emotions, body, personality, etc.–in other words, all that impermanent stuff that’s NOT my true nature. It’s not a license to deny, destroy or debase anything or anyone. In fact, it seems to me just the opposite, in practice. There’s an openness, a curiosity, a lack of judgment (not to be confused with discrimination, which is certainly encouraged), with respect to self and others.
I think it’s possible for any truth to be distorted, to be misinterpreted, depending on the hearer’s being, and this may be the danger you’re pointing to. But this danger is not unique to the Advaita tradition.
You also write: “I want to live a full life here and now. And that means looking at it all clearly and accepting that it’s all going down as it is in this body, with these thoughts and feelings …it’s in realizing that I can take responsibility for some small portion of how my life unfolds, and connect to the I Am that we are at the same time that I fearlessly dive into this experience of Being Human…I’m tired of intellectualizing my life away. I want to live it.”
Yes, beautifully put! And I don’t see anything there that would be at odds with the non-dualist approach. To “connect to the I Am that we are” is exactly the point, it seems to me.
Blessings and thank you for being here.
April 21, 2007 at 12:42 am
Verification has been mentioned a number of times recently. I wonder what it means?
In my early years in the FOF verification was strongly emphasised. Looking back on it, however, what was actually occurring was that I (and others, as far as I could tell) was trying to fit my experiences into the FOF and 4th Way concepts with which I was being presented, even if it meant adding to or distorting the actual experiences.
Verification was often connected to “third states”. For instance, I was sitting in a railway compartment and became intensely present. I looked around and saw that my fellow passengers were not very alert: reading newspapers, dozing, etc. Then, into my mind came the thought: “yes, I am verifying that human beings are sleeping machines!” But wait a minute – that’s not what I saw. I saw a particular group of people in a particular situation, most of whom were not very alert. That’s real enough. What’s not real is the mind adding the “verification” that human beings are asleep.
Similarly at RB events I would sometimes enter that very intensely present state. Then the mind would say something like: “yes! now I’m verifying that the school is real!”. But actually all that was happening was that I was being intensely present and the mind was adding its usual irrelevant commentary. No doubt if I was a Catholic listening to the Pope in St Peter’s Square and I entered the third state my mind would say: “Yes, the Christian religion is the only true faith!!”
Girard used to say that if you’re not verifying something in the present moment then you have no verification. In other words, memories of verifications are useless.
I would go even further and suggest to those who still find this concept alluring that you simply watch what’s going on in the moment and ignore the mind’s commentaries, even if they confirm RB’s teachings or whatever you want to believe. The “verification” is completely unnecessary. What’s actually happening in the moment is the only reality.
RB
PS thanks again to Howard Carter for having the courage to present the FOF hard line viewpoint in a clear and sympathetic way.
April 21, 2007 at 1:21 am
FedUp #20:
What part of VOLUNTARY do you not understand?
April 21, 2007 at 1:51 am
“Practical” (6/382), you ask many familiar questions – familiar to both current and former members. I hope you take the time to carefully read and think upon the comments made by “I’ll Give It a Try” (6/397) and how they might apply to your work.
To some of your questions, I would like to reiterate earlier postings as food for continued thought:
“FenceRider” (5/140)
The sex is not the issue for me. Without going into detail, it is the abuse of power, misuse of resources, continual excesses, stifling of open discussion, lack of compassion for the other side of the fence, encouragement of borderline ethics, poor judgment, unreasonable interpretations of events, and use of fear and unfounded promises to control others that are at issue. It is not the money. It is not on that scale. It is about what we support. It is about conscience.
“coot” (6/215)
Older non-leader student think what happens off-stage does not affect your “work?” Deadening of conscience does not affect your work? Does not apply? Two words: Brian Sisler and Kevin Kelly. You know. You know you know. And knowing, must finally “at long last” come to understanding that if price of FOF is allowing vulnerable to be preyed on for YOUR apparent progress, then there is no progress – only hole in heart.
The painful thing for me after all these years is the growing realization of the extent of RB’s depravity. I feel a deep sadness and a deep anger at the same time. However, I want to not allow this to taint the true and countless meaningful moments I experienced as a fof member (yes, including many moments with Robert). Believe me, I understand about not wanting to accept that this could be true and buffered the facts for many years – in and out of the fof. It’s a crying shame and I truly hope that Robert gets the help he so desperately needs.
April 21, 2007 at 1:54 am
To I’ll Give it a Try and Traveler:
No, I am depressed because all the ‘I’s, and everyone believing them, are clouding the main issue: are we present with every breath we take?
You have neatly dissected my post, and in doing so, have proved my point. You cannot accept that the school can be real for yourself or for anyone else.
We each see the world as we see it, and what we see wills it into being. For those who see it one way, the Fellowship is a mystical, transformative journey. For those who see it another way, it is a sorry joke. Who can explain why we see and love what we do? It is therefore best to refrain from judging, and to let the judging be done elsewhere.
There are many stories like the Emperor’s New Clothes that illustrate the folly of missing the obvious absurdities in front of one. There are also many stories to illustrate the reverse, about missing what is high and noble in front of one — the story of Jesus being the foremost.
On the last day of our lives do you sincerely think you will be able to say that you lived more truly than me?
Adieu bloggers… I am so fond of so many of you…
April 21, 2007 at 2:01 am
This message was written by an unknown author — ES
I am surprised at how many individuals have opinions on the FOF.
There seem to be a number of repetitive theme’s
1) IS R conscious
2) is the FOF a real school
3) is the FOF the only way
4) can one evolve with out staying in the FOF
In regards to #4 my opinion is yes former students as well as those who have no contact with the FOF can evolve.Consider what we know. Ouspensky left Gurdjieff. We do not know Gurdjieff’s teachers and why he left. Nicoll left Ouspensky. Collin continued after the death of Ouspensky. Robert was kicked out of Alex Horn’s group.In my opinion a student can reach a point where the correct action is to leave a teacher. There is no one answer.
Another opinion is R’s false propecy’s I consider it possible that R either intentionally or not is lying. There appears to be some outrage that R is not a nice man and those who seem to insist that it is important that one be nice in order to be conscious. I consider this a confusion of ideas. There are those that follow a spiritual path that embraces goodness. R has never taught this. In the early days of the FOF when I was a student R spoke of the neccessity of acting as a corporate executive and against “femine dominence” which might be construed as others ideas of what is good. I do consider that the FOF is indeed a preporitory school for the real 4th way which is work done in life. R fails to teach his students how to deal with the results of efforts, that is the experience of higher centers. I do not endorse his methods in this and believe them counter productive. In my opinion there are better models for a school than a rigid heirachy.
Fi\or the sake of arguement consider that If the FOF is a true school it is still not the same for each student. Some are ascending some are descending, some need to be in the school some need to be in life. I do not pretewnd to understand the scale of school on earth. The members of the Gurdjieff foundation are just as formatory in their claims to own the true liniage as the FOF is in claiming it is the only true school.
As for cost that is the single most ridicolous arguement. In “life” to attend a highly rated University to the level of recieving a Doctorate can easily cost $100,000. If those who are members of the FOF think they have verified the reality of self remembering and that the FOF can help create this in them then cost should mean nothing.
April 21, 2007 at 2:05 am
Fed Up Says: “Donations anyone? Ridiculous! May the sheik gets what he deserves! This is now no longer different than the Fellowship exploiting its members, now we have to pay you for showing us we were fools in the first place?”
LOL I knew it was just a matter of time before this exact sentiment was expressed. “This is now no different than the Fellowship exploiting its members” I hope you can see the hypocrisy of this statement. First you are willing to pay thousands and thousands of dollars year after year in order to buy yourself entrance to the FOF property and a status of a chosen saved one, then you blow up when someone suggests voluntary donations to the Sheik in any amount, should you perhaps feel you want to thank him for his time and server space. Because money is dirty, and should never be exchanged for intangible benefits, right?
April 21, 2007 at 2:09 am
Some fantastic posts recently, in case you missed them:
I’ll Give It a Try (6/397) carefully turns over every rock to reveal the unexamined assumptions that underlie justifications for remaining in the FOF.
Traveler (6/405) gives a well-reasoned response to Practical, including this excellent point:
“Isn’t it odd that, in the school, we are asked to examine our attitudes and see our mechanicality, but our relationship to the school and to the teacher is not included in that examination, as if it were something that is beyond investigating?”
Rabbi Burns (7/22): Points out that “verification” is merely the mind fitting one’s experience into pre-defined concepts.
Thanks for writing.
April 21, 2007 at 2:53 am
#20 Fed up…take a chill pill dude. No one’s demanding anything of you. Are you looking for a target for your animosity?
April 21, 2007 at 4:27 am
Hey, Fed Up (#20): Why don’t you LOOSEN up and WISE up!
And consider the following:
1. The FOF Discussion forum is already in its 7th incarnation and is only 1 of 27 other categories covered on the Animam Recro website.
2. Giving bloggers the opportunity to help financially with the upkeep of this site was not the Sheik’s idea, but was suggested by 2 other bloggers (#6/345 & 6/350). And even Martin from Berlin took some unjustified flak from another blogger who mistakenly thought he was “selling” 4th way ideas (and later apologized).
3. No one is required to log in or donate any money to continue viewing or contributing to this site. It is still free to all.
But I guess we already have your contribution (post #20), don’t we!
Why don’t you just sit down, loosen your underwear, and relax! And do your research before you go off half-cocked!
April 21, 2007 at 4:54 am
Dear Rita and Kosta,
Thank you for the letter and the translation. Well written and honest.
Have the students in the FoF signed an agreement of insanity? What is it going to take before normal, intelligent people, many who I have a high regard for, and have been friends in the past (until they stopped talking to me after I left) realize what they are paying for?
The other day I was stopped by a Green Peace person in the street and handed a brochure describing all the wonderful things these young (and not so young people ) are doing in the world to slow down the process of destroying nature , our natural resources and the environment we live in. They asked for a contribution. Did I give it? You bet I did! I thought of all the years of paying into something that was perverted at best and illegal at worst (a church using its money to perpetuate the leaders perversions and insatiable greed). At least these Green Peacers show something for their efforts as they work toward preserving (in whatever small ways they can) the environment for future generations.
And this guy RB calls himself a ‘teacher’ and suggests that he is preserving something for future generations. Ha, Ha, Ha!
Next time you go to a $125 breakfast or dinner with RB, and Dorian is carrying a cushion for Robert to sit on, think about it. Or when you are sitting there waiting for him to come out, and it is taking a verrry long time, think about it! And then think about the donation you made just a few days ago and how it is being used. Just listen to your conscience (the quiet voice that you keep overlaying and squashing). Wake up and listen.
April 21, 2007 at 5:18 am
This is a message directed mainly to students in centers around the world.
Dear Friend,
I write to you as Clara Elena Gutierrez de Haven, Girard Haven’s wife and a student. I am in no way writing as an official representative of the Fellowship of friends who I have left and Girard and I are in the process of separating.
I nevertheless know that I am responsible for having inspired a few of you to believe in the Fellowship because I believed in it and wish to let these inspirations go where ever else they need to go. Very particularly I address this letter to the students that joined while I directed the centre in Colombia and the students in the centres I visited with Girard in India, Kiev, Italy, Greece, Istanbul, Brasil, Argentina, El Salvador, Mexico, Budapest, London, any other I might forget and those few students at Isis that might have ever been inspired by me to continue in the Fellowship.
Please forgive me for having supported the Fellowship for so long and helped convince you that it was worth supporting it. It has taken many years for me to understand why it is not only not worth supporting it but it is harmful to each individual to support it, with the structures that it holds today.
It harms the soul to give itself up for other’s benefit at its own cost. It is an extremely defficient first line, very blind second line and third line has never really existed in the Fellowship of Friends because the Fellowship of Friends has never sincerely worked for the benefit of humanity. The third line has become an imaginary divinity called Robert Burton.
I do not wish any harm to any one or have any “personal” attacks but I openly question the institutional role of Robert Burton: the teacher of this school; Girard Haven: my husband and main supporter of this school; Mr. Braverman and every other student who continues to say that this is a conscious school working for your benefit and I state that they are lying to you and wishing to take money from you at your own cost.
Each one of them has their own reasons to keep the school as it is and they may be very valid reasons when looked at them from their point of view but they are no longer valid from the point of view of a School that presents itself as a conscious school in the fourth way tradition.
What “works” spiritually in the Fellowship of Friends today is, as always, every sincere effort that each one of us is willing to make. There is no question about that. What doesn’t work is that the teacher and many students in the establishment have stopped working on themselves and crystallized in a position that allows them to live a fairly comfortable life around Isis or in centres, protecting their roles or the monetary investment that they have put into the development of Isis and Oregon House.
Students who have lived here at Isis, for many years, have developed small and bigger businesses and live on providing the school with services, the students that come from abroad to rent or buy the properties they’ve developed, or selling the products they produce. While a great deal of this effort has been a sincere attempt to support a conscious teaching, a lot of it has now rooted on the instinctive centre disallowing many to push their work forward and question the Fellowship of Friends as a school or Robert Burton as a teacher. Most of us have gone about trying to transform what we don’t understand for too many years and have finally accepted it without seriously considering the issues involved.
The few other students that have painstakingly laboured in whatever area of the Fellowship to make it “work” are somewhere in the outskirts making their own businesses or working inside with enough limitations and conditions to not allow them to develop a serious and objective second line. The privileges abound and the so called inner circle keeps tight reigns so that they don’t loose power. Indeed, they have enough power to not give opportunities to anyone they don’t like without any objective guidelines.
I do not need to prove to you that the Fellowship has become big business because at Isis as much as in any centre the focus of our work has gone into how much more money we can give to support the school.
If I sincerely believed that this conditions were not harmful I would not be writing to you or on the Fellowship blog on the internet but I sincerely believe that it is harmful to each one of us individually and all of us as a school to support the money making institution in which Robert and his followers have turned the school into.
Besides being one of the strongest supporters of Robert’s teaching for the past seventeen years, you will also remember the innumerable times that I have questioned the lack of second line of work in the Fellowship and my husband’s statements that support consciousness without functions, which is the main ideological pillar to accept the Fellowship as it is, by granting a status of man number seven to Robert and justifying the greed and abuse of his functions, without questioning them.
The other pillar on which my husband stands and wishes others to stand, is his own very personal commitment because who, of any one individual can question another’s personal commitment? Isn’t his relentless commitment what each one of us has been so inspired by? Haven’t we all stood on his shoulders and deeply loved and admired his stoicism and commitment to Robert? Unfortunately, yes. We have stood on his shoulders to push him down as much as to push ourselves up, The main portion of the inner circle, continues to stand on those shoulders to keep the school running especially in these times of crisis, because they do not have enough substance of their own to keep it running, not the conviction nor the cause.
Is it really that surprising that Girard Haven would support the teacher at no matter what or whose cost so that at least one of his teacher’s prophecies could become true? Is it not perfectly human, no matter how mistaken it might be? Who would not have wished for that role or made that commitment? Is it not simply what any one else having been given that role would have done? But Robert has not done as much damage to any other student as to Girard himself. The damages are not only physical but emotional and intellectual and if you have any serious doubts, you can ask any one who trully loves him about the excrutiating price that Girard Haven or those around him have had to pay for it, without any conscious living in return. Being married to The Fellowship as some students proudly say about Girard, is no marriage at all, no life of its own and there is nothing noble about giving up one’s life to an imaginary role so that one does not have to face the simple facts.
Friends are not those that accept everything they see silently but those who are willing to challenge us at every turn and with no one else to question, no one in the Fellowship stands a chance.
It is not easy for a woman to stand against her husband on no matter what issue, but it is not against my husband that I stand. There is no love in sitting and watching Girard, Robert or any body else, take the lot of us and many more innocent than us, down this descending scale. Has it not crystallized enough that no matter how many or how much others have tried, it continues to descend? Has any dissent inside the Fellowship, ever been possible when people are not even allowed to talk?
If I sincerely believed that letting things be, would make anything better in the long run, I would have perhaps left quietly but I do not believe that. I have seen the way in which Robert discards people who are no longer of any use to him, including Girard.
I have spoken with many students who have given their lives to the Fellowship before leaving, and begged them to defend Robert so that everything I was seeing could be a mistake and they have consistently told me that they cannot “defend the undefendable” and that there is “no unconditional love in Robert Burton”.
I cannot continue to support the damage that Robert has put on Girard by placing him as his second man or the damage that Girard is placing on students world wide by placing Robert first at the cost of himself, his wife and his friends, disguised under a robe of stoicism and self sacrifice. Nor am I able to support Mr. Braverman and the continuation of a structure within the Fellowship that instills in each one of us the pattern that there are individuals better than any one of the rest.
Robert and Girard or Asaf and any travelling teacher that pretends to have reached some level of awakening and hence can justify his support for this school, or shows superiority to anyone else, are no better, not a hair better than any student or human being inside or outside the Fellowship of friends.
If we wish to develop ourselves more consciously as individuals or schools, it will not be by re-enforcing the old authoritarian structure that holds any man better than his kind or an institution that reinforces the hierachy that such patterns generate.
I am not writing as a member or even an ex member of the Fellowship of Friends but on my own name or the I that was there to meet students when they travelled two days or worked them, to come and listen to what Girard had to say. I stood by him and tried to meet your expectations of a beautiful awakening. It is mainly because of the immensity of your rather innocent devotion that I can no longer stand by Robert, Girard or the Fellowship even at the cost of loosing a man I love, or a highly cherished relation with my daughter and friends.
Who else but someone that loves him enough can really say these difficult things? Not one of his many friends have ever layed the cards out and the whole deck is falling out of our hands before anyone is willing to play the right card and stop this blatant cheating that the Fellowship has become.
If it is at my cost, let it be at my cost because I am more willing to pay that price than the other one of keeping silent. My daughter and the young people ahead are also at stake and they are learning to accept corruption as their main course, so much so, that they themselves have indulged too much in it already.
If I have stood for CHANGE and continuation of the Fellowship, it has been because if there are any real students or teachers still in it, we know that being human IS failing, acknowledging the failure, IS necessary and correcting the direction, IS the solution. Only people with very personal agendas can want the Fellowship to continue as it is.
I have also wished this option possible because I am not interested in destroying the Fellowship and abandoning those who have put sincere efforts into building it but no matter how much I have tried to address what I consider serious issues about our lives, I have consistently been silenced.
The totally inadequate response of the Fellowship to the blog on the internet, with cheats and lies, is a reflection of the inability of the Fellowship to respond with any integrity to sincere questioning and suffering.
My husband, Girard Haven, had very clear motivations to stop students from reading the blog, not because it is criminal as the Fellowship has made students believe, or because it wishes to harm anyone physically, but because it deeply questions the School and each of our lives in it.
By stopping students from reading it suggesting it is not worth doing so and standing on the love and trust the endless adepts have on him, he is keeping students world wide from thinking and deciding for themselves what is best for them to do with their participation or non participation in this school and I have to oppose him as his wife, as a student and as a human being. This inability to question the school is the frightning expression of his own crystallized self.
With this letter I am letting go of the ties I have established between each one of you and whatever connections you might have to the Fellowship, through me. Let it be known that nothing in me is willing to support the Fellowship of friends anymore, and you must do so on your own with wide open eyes and love.
I beg you forgive me for the length of my discomfort.
April 21, 2007 at 5:24 am
Fed Up (#20) writes:
“now we have to pay you for showing us we were fools in the first place?”
From the perspective of one who has been fully indoctrinated and come out the other side — Is this not the net result of the 4th Way in general, and the FOF in particular?
April 21, 2007 at 5:30 am
I would be happy to pay for the services of using this blog which is taking someone else’s time to keep going.
While it may not be a huge sum, it may be the sum that one values it by. The blog will not last long and it has already demanded much from the Sheik.
I do thank you.
April 21, 2007 at 5:47 am
Hey, Fed-Up, don’t be silly. Sheik doesn’t WANT to charge you, the blog is free to use. It was simply suggested here by OTHERS who feel that it would be just FARE to compensate his efforts in moderating all the stuff we write here. He doesn’t have to put up with this, you know. It takes time to moderate stuff, probably hours. He’s been doing it for long time already, selflessly, providing us with a place to talk openly. Now some people wish to thank him by sending money. Don’t you think it’s fare?
If it’s not cool for you – just relax, OK? No need to get enraged. You are not being exploited here, buddy. Keep your money to yourself, or donate to RB -it’s dealer’s choice.
If you’re fed up with BS – then don’t post it here.
April 21, 2007 at 5:49 am
Cathie (#21) writes:
“The idea the non-dualists are trying to get across, as I understand it, is that I don’t have to IDENTIFY with thoughts, emotions, body, personality, etc.–in other words, all that impermanent stuff that’s NOT my true nature.”
I raised this issue in an earlier post, but it seems there were no takers. Where is the evidence to show that our thoughts, emotions, body, etc are NOT our true nature? In other words, I would agree that our awareness is part of our true nature — but why any more so than our bodies? Why the separation between body and awareness? What if awareness arises in the same way emotions do — that is, from our bodies, in some combination of brain activity? I’ve read of scientific research that suggests this. If true, would this demean us somehow, or make awareness any less real?
I agree with Jules that describing our awareness as true nature and our bodies as not our true nature just seems like intellectualizing. In my earlier post, I said that my body certainly seems real to me. My awareness may have degrees, but my body is pretty constant by comparison.
Non-duality sounds like it is falling back on the old duality of “consciousness is not functions”: consciousness versus the body, emotions, etc. What’s wrong with the concept that we are physical beings, whose physicality includes emotions, sensations, thoughts, and, yes, varying degrees of consciousness?
Not arguing, just trying to convey how things seem to me these days.
April 21, 2007 at 6:10 am
I’ve seen many posts earnestly trying to respond, directly and point by point, to posts from (apparent) FOF members. If any member puts a question up here, there will be posts from people trying to be helpful, or at least responsive, often painstakingly so.
May I request the same from those who approach these issues from the perspective that the FOF is wonderfully valuable, real, and so forth?
For example, Howard Carter, I find your posts parry every statement in a manner familiar to almost anyone who’s ever been an FOF member, choosing one of the stock angles that have been used for decades to counter the various “I’s” that question the FOF line. The more pointed issues, without obvious counter-angles, are generally ignored.
Would you be kind enough to set those refrigerator magnets aside for a moment and respond to the following, without trying to be “right,” or to justify your continuing loyalty, and without worrying about whether your response risks altering your role as Defender of the Faith on this blog:
What would it take for you (and I welcome a response from any member) to come to believe that there are fundamental flaws in the FOF, or with Robert, that are serious? Could anything possibly do that? My thesis is that there is nothing that could do it, because you believe that the FOF is a conscious school with a conscious teacher and, accordingly, by definition the only flaws that could exist are in the student’s understanding. For example, is there any sort of behavior in which Robert might engage that you would see as good evidence that he is anything other than a great conscious teacher? So far, it appears that, whatever anyone says about his behavior, your response is, “Maybe so, but all that means is that he’s under different laws.” Are there any limits to your willingness to resort to this perspective? Are there any limits to the perspective that as long as you’re trying to be present, nothing else matters, and the more outrageous the behavior, the more grateful you should be for being shaken out of your sleep?
Thanks for your consideration.
April 21, 2007 at 6:33 am
Hello to all, and warm greetings to all I knew in the FOF, and thanks to the Sheik for shakin’ things up.
I joined the London center in 1978, and was thrown out in 1994. I promised myself that I would not say anything publicly about the FOF for ten years, and apart from papers subpoenaed by Abraham Goldman for the Troy Buzbee case (sealed in any event as part of the settlement), I kept that promise.
I spoke and wrote to others about what was happening in the FOF for a couple of years before I left, and finished off with the letter below. I offer it for two reasons. First, some of the content may actually help readers. Secondly, it is has receded into history, so to speak, meaning that it can help one see that these disturbances in the FOF arrive in waves, and I was a part of just one of them, and what is occurring now is just another. From Ronald Macdonald leaving with about one third of the members in the early 70’s, through the Samuel Sanders, Miles Barth, Troy Buzbee, and other cycles, to the present, the waves are a feature of the FOF. So, as you can see from the letter, I expected change, and I am sure the other particpants in previous waves did also. Robert is still there, only his appetites, always prodigious, have grown a bit. I cringe at some of the contents of my letter of thirteen years on, but what the heck!
I had to retype the whole thing, the original files are in a now-defunct program, so forgive any errors, but it is unaltered apart from typos. As before, I have no problem signing my name—Ames Gilbert
14 November 1994
Here are some thoughts I am circulating among a few friends:
There have been quite a few letters and other materials passed around in the last few weeks, and I have been responsible for some of this. I felt that spreading information was the most practical act of regeneration to counteract the crimes of closing down and censorship that have been taking place in the Fellowship, spreading light to counteract darkness. Because I have nothing to fear and nothing to be ashamed of, I have taken full responsibility for my efforts by signing my name to everything that I originated, although I also re-printed and circulated anonymous letters when I felt it was right.
You may have heard about the meeting last Saturday, led by Linda Kaplan with the help of Girard Haven. If you have not, I feel you missed an unusual happening, and I advise you to talk to someone who was there. I feel that we were all given a great gift, that there was a demonstration of the rigidity of the form and its mechanical response to what Gurdjieff called the sacred cry from below against the unbecoming manifestations from above. I also feel there was a demonstration that we all get exactly what we ask for. Some have asked for the courage to obey the Master within, our consciences. Others sought an important external role; they have been given it, and they demonstrate daily how they use the opportunity. Some wanted to give up all responsibility for their evolution to others; their wish has been granted. A few wanted to buy an insurance policy to heaven; they are comforted in their illusion. Some gave themselves unconditionally to support someone else’s vision, believing it to be noble. They are noble slaves. And I believe the majority of students have some or all of these aspects. They see some of the dichotomies, and are sincerely struggling to resolve the good they have verified with the difficulties they see. They want to stay positive and comfortable. I understand. I want the same.
You may not know that the next day after the meeting, Howard Kingston, Stephen Merryweather, Ramona Merryweather, and Emily Gordon were given lengthy leaves of absence from the school. Cynthia Kingston was asked if she wanted to take a leave of absence, and I was told to leave the school permanently. You may not know that the day before, James Battaglia was given leave of absence for distributing copies of a telephone conversation with Robert. If you wish to ask the others the reasons they were given for these actions, I invite you to ask them individually. The reason I was given by Robert via Peter Bishop was, “Ames does not understand the purpose of meetings”. I have been trying to make transcripts of some of the “exit conversations”, and these may follow in due course; they may help you see the situation in a new way. For me, these dismissals constitute crime by the organization against the school, and the crime emanates from the highest source of authority, Robert. If you have any doubts, please study the situation—and please tell me if you reach different conclusions. At any rate, for me it is right action and regeneration to expose these crimes, and others, and shed light on them.
The rest of this letter constitutes my personal opinion about the situation in our school. But, these conclusions are not pleasant! Please believe me when I say that I am writing from a good place, the best that I can find. I acted and continue to act according to my conscience, which I came to the school to learn to do. I am confident that when I decided to act, I was given the help that I needed and asked for. I am confident that this will continue. I do not claim to be right, only that I must act according to my conscience, no matter what the consequences, and that is the right way for me.
My own difficulties with the form began fifteen years ago when I was at Renaissance. Robert entered the bedroom of my good friend John M., in the London teaching house. Robert was nude, armed only with an erection and overwhelming psychological power. He told John that he was an angel, and that C-influence wanted John to have sex with him, that he should externally consider the needs of his teacher. As a result, my friend left the Fellowship in agony. But, I personally did not act. I abhorred what had happened, and yet justified it by telling myself that I was getting great benefit from the school, and that I was not personally harmed. And this pattern has repeated itself many times since: each time, though, I was left more distant from the form.
I feel that we are in the hands of higher forces, and that a great play is unfolding for our benefit. The play so far has been a mixture of hope and tragedy in the finest tradition. I have come to think the following. With the help of higher forces, Robert was allowed to start the school for reasons that from the beginning were not entirely altruistic, and this has spoiled the possibilities for him, and at the least delayed them for us. The average student, like myself, came to the school with a spiritual longing. We also came with psychological dysfunctions of varying severity, problems from our previous life that we had not resolved. And we dumped all responsibility for the answers we sought on Robert Burton. For most of us, this was not the careful, partial and temporary lending of will advocated by the system, but the giving of everything, including the individuality we are supposed to reserve to ourselves. Robert even told mothers to give up their children, and many did! I know how this can be, because I too gave up almost everything in the name of something higher.
To try to understand what is happening now, I looked at Robert’s past. According to my sources, Robert Burton was asked to leave Alex Horn’s school after eighteen months of work on himself. He was given the task of not sleeping with other men, and failed this task from his teacher. But, Robert is very intelligent and had learned the outward form of how to run a Fourth Way school from Alex Horn. He had enough theoretical material, he was mechanically a gifted teacher, he felt qualified to teach others. Perhaps he hoped, as ordinary educators do, that he could stay one step in advance of his pupils, in this case a spiritual step. And, because he was emotionally centered with chief weaknesses of dominance and greed, he saw the opportunity to have others support him materially. However, Robert from the beginning mistook the weakness of signals from his poorly developed conscience for impartiality, and then took this sense of impartiality as an objective indication that he was free from certain laws. Please understand that he carried with him the part that won out when he failed his task; he brought his weaknesses. And I believe he did continue to work on himself, but only in order to learn to intentionally use World 12 creative energies, which are accessible to everyone unconsciously.
However, he soon began to take advantage of the enormous accumulation of trust, power and money that came with the complete abdication of responsibility by his students. Each time he ignored his conscience, it became weaker, and Robert’s conscience became completely buried after about ten years. He started to explore new areas of power with complete impunity. He found that because of the blind adoration of his students, every action remained unquestioned, and in fact students eagerly leapt to provide explanations that defied commonsense. He found that every indulgence could be satisfied. Anything could be explained by appealing to the inexhaustible credulity of a group of people that deliberately trained themselves to excuse everything in the name of ‘crazy wisdom’. His instinctive center started to enlarge, as it perceived it had no limits, unrestrained by increasingly feeble messages from his emotional center. At this point, his psychopathic development was complete; he is now a part of a group of people who are often intelligent, personable, charming, charismatic—a typical cult leader. They just happen to be devoid of conscience. The intentional absence of precautions against sexually transmitted diseases is just one aspect of this. There are now thousands of people who have had direct and indirect sexual contact with Robert. The implications are horrifying.
With the acquiescence of Fellowship doctors, he became addicted to painkillers and to Valium, a drug that allowed him to maintain a calmness we mistook for spirituality. At some critical point (between 1979 and 1981, in my opinion), his emotional center lost all contact with his instinctive center, and started to starve. His conscience is now inaccessible to him; buried under layers so thick that nothing but melting energies from higher forces can penetrate. The ‘emotional’ and ‘spirituial’ energy we think we are receiving is now being emanated from his instinctive center, his new center of gravity. And, his instinctive center is addicted to unlimited sex, money, and power, so it works to attract these things to itself, day and night. We are seeing him possessed, truly a blind Christ.
However, Robert is a very clever man, and we are very gullible. Once his quiescent conscience was buried, he had lost his internal guide. Se he started to look for signs outside himself, and there are plenty of signs if one looks for them. This has become a major interest for him—you cannot have failed to notice. Now, no longer a teacher, he encouraged his students to start looking for a guide outside as well. And all the while, higher forces are indeed managing the play! They gave signs, not necessarily the right ones; the rightness depended on whether the higher or lower was looking at the time. Those students seeking something higher received beneficial shocks, as many as their being could use. Those seeking self-aggrandizement received confirmation of their sense of self-importance. And now we have an organization where conscience is credentialed, a religion or cult, alongside a school where, if one wishes, one can verify that consciousness cannot be credentialed. Ah, the sweet beauty of Howard Kingston’s photograph to us all! How can we tell if another person is a man number five? Why would we believe Howard? Why would we disbelieve him? And, how can it matter to anyone else but Howard?
Consider the current situation. We have Robert Burton, who celebrates his consciousness in outward displays—parties, announcements, even estimates of degrees (7.3 last month); we have Girard Haven who coyly announces last week that he is a man number five. We have a teacher who says he is needed to tell some one that he is, or will be conscious, and that consciousness cannot be achieved without his intercession. Robert claimed last week that we only achieve higher states because of him! And at the same time we have people genuinely trying to work on themselves, students that are making progress, who have verified that they are being helped, who are clearing away the rubbish of false personality from around their consciences. From time to time, some of them stumble across their conscience when it has grown too large to ignore. This is a critical point, and for me there is nothing more important in one’s evolution than what is occurring at this time. If we take Robert’s direction, that is, we accept his claim that he is the centrally important guide or permanent star in our spiritual firmament, then we must squash conscience. You might be interested in these words from Peter Bishop. Last Sunday, he delivered Robert’s message to leave the school. He was asked, “What is conscience?”, and replied, “Conscience is a collection of subjective I’s. If a student accumulates too much material there, he should leave the school.”!!!! Well, I say, on the contrary!! I say if we realize that there can be no external master, and that our highest duty is to serve the Master within, then we are finally safe, we have found what we are looking for! And certainly, we cannot serve two masters at the same time.
So here we are, in a marvelous situation. It seems higher forces used Robert to gather 1900 students together, for reasons not yet fully apparent, and the process affected and linked multiple thousands more. Robert withdrew from his conscience into his fantasy. Higher forces are now withdrawing their support for him. His play is being made manifest to us. Unfolding before our eyes, if we wish to see, is a play of epic tragedy, a lesson for the ages. We are seeing how power attracts the corruptible, and how absolute power attracts the absolutely corruptible. We are witnessing the absolute of corruption, and we must learn the lesson, embrace the pain, allow it to penetrate the very core of our being. Then, when we in turn are tested to see if we have learned the lesson, at those moments of choice when our fate hangs in the balance, we may be able to turn the powers offered to us and dedicate their use to higher service.
What now? If these theories have any basis in reality, we can expect Robert to become more and more frightened, because he has nothing real to retreat to. We will be able to feel the fear emanating from the center. For example, today (11/18) Michael Goodwin called ex-students in the area to tell them they were forbidden to cross the property to come to La Cucina, a public restaurant. Bizarre, and illegal! We can look for and expect the actions of a scoundrel, a psychopath. There are several possibilities.
Robert might announce his retirement, on his terms. This would be a slow-motion, but nevertheless large-scale looting of resources. Such a turn would make him conveniently inaccessible, even more unaccountable, but with access to the same large amounts of money, power and sex. Or, he might liquidate all the assets he can here, including the Ming furniture collection, borrow as much from his American students as their credulity, savings, and credit cards will allow, and abscond to Europe to reign in the relatively undisturbed feeding grounds there. Perhaps he will try to hold out, exhibiting increasingly bizarre and out-of-control behavior, by clamping down on all dissent, increasing his reliance on external signs, making more claims of near-divinity to bolster his weakening authority. If he takes this course, it will probably end in both external and internal tragedy. There are other options. Whatever happens, I think it will happen quite soon and quite quickly. The structure he has created is too inflexible, too fragile, and his compulsions too great to allow the present illusions to continue for much longer.
Friends, it is of critical importance for us and for him that we do not let Robert go on his terms. It would be the end of all possibilities for him; that is, he would have lost his last chance to ask for help from higher forces and from us. And, he cannot receive help unless he asks for it. Even the angels must obey that law. And for us, we would have no way to repay the help and high favors we have received, form him and from higher forces. This mess is not Robert’s alone. There is only one of him, and thousands of us. It is our mess, too, and each one of us bears individual responsibility for feeding his addictions. We dumped all our problems on him. We gave him our birthright of power and individuality. We gave him huge resources; our time, our money, our labor, our love, our obedience, and some of us, our bodies. He could not resist the temptation, and is corrupted. There have been many warnings. We would not listen. We swallowed a ball of dung because it was gilded with gold. We heard voices, our consciences, tell us something was wrong and getting worse. We pushed those inner voices away, and sinned by using those most precious and beautiful gifts, the system and the tools, to explain away the discomfort.
My conscience surfaced for what I intuitively knew would be the last time, a few weeks ago. I knew that if I pushed it under one more time, it would become so weak that it could not speak to me again. I knew this was my last chance. I am so glad I took that chance! And so, I appeal to your conscience. I do not advocate those in the Fellowship leaving, or those outside the Fellowship taking action, or indeed taking any particular course. I just appeal to your conscience. It will tell you what to do. When you obey it, you are obeying the only true Master, the Master within. Trust it, and you can make no real mistakes. And this is true even if, and perhaps especially if, everything I have put forward about Robert and the state of the school is mistaken.
I do not seek to destroy the Fellowship, as Robert and the hierarchy that support him claim. I cannot be a “traitor to C-Influence”, as Robert has claimed before, even if I wished to. Think of the scale—how could an atom betray a man? It is my school, too, and to harm it would be like cutting off my arm. But the form is crumbling, according to immutable laws, as energy is withdrawn from it. All external structures descend. That the body of the Fellowship is throwing out healthy cells in such numbers, turning on itself, is a signal of present and impending trouble. There may now be more being outside the formal Fellowship than inside it. And if my own actions, which are internal, are wrongly perceived as external threats against the organization, there is indeed rot, and the form is tottering.
For myself, I pray that we will bridge this interval in the octave of the school together. I pray that the affirmative forces that Robert represents can be harmonized with the denying forces that have arisen to meet it, that both “sides” can come to see that they are both necessary for a healthy future. If either of these forces overwhelms the other, the school will be destroyed. We know that there must also be a reconciling force. I pray that I can recognize it and align myself with it. I pray that Robert will ask for help, and allow higher forces to redeem him, and that he can rediscover his Self. I pray that when my tiny mite of help is asked for, that I will not turn aside. I pray that Robert will be able to resume his Path, that he will be able to see that his journey is by no means completed. Indeed, I feel that the longer we support what he has become, the further back on that Path he will have to go. I pray that we can continue the journey together, helping each other as we are able, learning to love and care for each other, able to explore our humanity fully, but fully understanding that we are alone and responsible for our Selves and to our Selves, and that our plays are in the hands of higher forces, not in the hands of an external teacher.
Whatever you do, and whatever you think about this letter, please heed James Battaglia’s splendid advice. Keep you eyes and ears open, and try to be in the moment. Please do not copy or distribute this letter, although you may let others you trust read it.
Sincerely,
Ames
April 21, 2007 at 7:23 am
To: Skeptical Optimist, 7/10
“Although I have to say I’ve gotten some really good laughs out of “The Sequence” posts. Hard to imagine a “practice” that would so decisively take me out of the moment I’m experiencing.”
It seems you may have been mis-informed about the use of the sequence. We in the FoF don’t use the sequence when we are present, just when we’re in imagination.
The purpose of the sequence is to evoke presence, while at the same time disrupting imagination.
I assume when you say “take me out of the moment I’m experiencing” you are talking about presence, not imagination.
April 21, 2007 at 8:07 am
Rabbi Burns (22)
Reminds of the joke in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon:
“There are three men on a train. One of them is an economist and one of them is a logician and one of them is a mathematician. And they have just crossed the border into Scotland (I don’t know why they are going to Scotland) and they see a brown cow standing in a field from the window of the train (and the cow is standing parallel to the train). And the economist says, ‘Look, the cows in Scotland are brown.’ And the logician says, ‘No. There are cows in Scotland of which at least one is brown.’ And the mathematician says, ‘No. There is at least one cow in Scotland, of which one side appears to be brown.’”
April 21, 2007 at 8:45 am
Howard Carter really Coward Harder, real FOF member, also known as Pinoccio, wooden puppet wishing to become real boy. Upon partial realization, relative awakening, to real boy, he meet with Robert Burden and is ‘exposed’ for what he really is: wooden object to be fondled and used for burden’s pleasure; nothing else. This is no fairy tale, possibly fairy tail, but more likely one aweful nightmare that lasts lifetimes for many like him. He is advised by Jiminy Cricket, his CONSCIENCE,
‘Let your conscience be your guide,’
but is this heard? Is this verified? I don’t think so (Si-Do or So-Di or Do-Si-Do or So-Di-So; most likely: Do-Si-Do-Si-Do-Si. That makes a sequence simultaneously with representing
begining of descending octave (x 3):
Do-Si-La-Sol-Fa-Mi-Re-Do
2, 4, 6, 8, who do we appreciate? What a dance!)
So maybe help is needed from Harder Gavin, the supposed man 5 pronounced by burden’s proof. But Harder Gavin is no more real boy than man in moon is made of green cheese, if such a thing exists at all, ask his wives and children. Harder Gavin will argue point, along with Coward Harder, to act as foil extraordinaire on this blog to bend the truth to FOF benefit, no matter what, due to desperation infinatuum. Woe unto FOF as deception continues. Law of Karma exists whether you like it or not or belief in it or not. Get ready for Karmic pay back like FOF never seen before. Or,
would you like to swing on a star; carry moon beams home in a jar; or be better off than you are; or would you rather be a….
mule? (or substitute your own imagination.)
Descending ever so slowly,
Coward Harder
April 21, 2007 at 8:48 am
Regarding post 7/20
Excuse me, but if the dishwashers at Isis can be compensated, than so can the Sheik. If people want to compensate him for his time than they will do so (I already have).
No one seems to have brought up the point that European students pay about 25% of what American students pay. Why the sliding scale???
Listen people, the only reason this blog seems a little unbalanced is because it hasn’t found it’s real “voice” yet. It will. Everyone please keep posting. There really is alot a being in the people involved in this and it’s only a matter of time before we
get ourselves organized so that we can really feed each other.
Wasn’t it about 15 years into the schoool that Robert was hosting “motown nights” (before my time). How does that correspond to awakening?
This “school” is nothing more than an interesting country club.
April 21, 2007 at 9:16 am
To Howard 412/7.
No more debate. You might consider comparing the state you were in writing this post, with the previous two…
To an outsider, in this one you seem very much closer to reclaiming your own real life, or responsibility for it. Now… if only you can bypass that “Robert is under a different set of laws” group of ‘I’s’!!!!
Good luck!
April 21, 2007 at 9:23 am
I felt compunction for flaming the Wheeler “dealers” here– sorry that was harsh…maybe you’re right Cathy, I’m just scared by how those ideas can be used to abuse (but I’m always open to a jam, Bman or Woman;).
Letting all the feelings surge through me without judging them is still a new experience. The anger helped me move past the inertia and sadness. Maybe that’s why anger can be so valuable–and necessary to control by those who don’t want us to move through anything.
Aloha Advaitas and Aspirants of all time and space!
April 21, 2007 at 9:24 am
This post is directed to those who find joy in both posting or reading sensationalized information about Robert’s private life; information whose only purpose is to attack his character and otherwise discredit him.
You must know that none of these reports posted have gone through any means, legal or otherwise, to prove their authenticity or accuracy. By life’s standards one has to go through many steps to prove an accusation about someone. Accusers would have to be sworn in (with the possibility of being charged with perjury if caught in a lie), deposed, cross examined, etc. before a jury could convict someone for a supposed crime.
None of these conditions of proof exist on this blog. To make matters worse, most of the material posted is of an anonymous nature, with no repercussions to the posters or readers and is submitted by people with a pre-existing bias against Robert or the school. In other words, with axes to grind.
I wonder how these joyful bloggers would feel if they were held to the standards they themselves have encourged and promoted?
How would blogger X feel if he/she answered a knock on the door and found a policeman staring back who asked the blogger to come with him to the station?
The blogger would ask what it’s all about and the policemen would reply that some people called the station saying that blogger X was doing “bad things” with other people in their apartment behind closed doors.
Blogger X would of course ask who these people are who were making these accusations. The policeman would reply he did not know because they called in from the “anonymous” line. The anonymous line! Surely you must know their names! No, usually they leave false names; you know, they don’t like to get involved once they make the claim.
As the blogger is led away in handcuffs he/she asks the policeman when he/she can talk to a lawyer. The policeman matter of factly states that the blogger won’t need a lawyer, as they have already been convicted. Convicted, how is that possible?
Well, unfortunately you were reported by more than ten people. If you were to have been reported by one to nine people you could get a trial, but ten or more and you’re automatically convicted. Why is that asks the blogger? Well, we figure ten people can’t all be wrong, so why waste the taxpayers money.
End of story, except if you buy into some Enlightened Beings suggestions that at some point in time we must suffer all that we inflict.
April 21, 2007 at 12:56 pm
Fed Up (20): Yeah, donations are voluntary and will not affect this discussion in any way. But thanks for you time to post that meaningful thought.
April 21, 2007 at 3:16 pm
Howard Carter 45, You did not read the stuff about cognitive dissonance did you? Look it up, and PLEASE listen to what the bloggers are saying about seeing what is in front of you! In FOF terms STOP BUFFERING! Has RB committed any crimes? Not perhaps in the legal sense, as we are all consenting adults, but in a moral sense he has, and because of our human failings and ability to explain away our actions to reduce cognitive dissonance, we have been reinforcing the corruption in him.
To be able to admit to this, you will have to undergo feelings of an incredible sense of stupidity, shock and horror at your gullibility, disbelief that so many of us could have been so hypnotized etc. etc…are you man enough Howard Carter? I only hope you have posted under a false name, as this may assist the process some small way.
Is RB delusional, a sex addict or both???
From wikopedia on delusion:
“Grandiose delusional belief – inflated worth, power, knowledge, identity, or special relationship to a deity or famous person”
About sexual addiction (from channel 4 health website):
“Achieving sexual gratification for a sex addict is like alcohol to an alcoholic, and as with any other addiction, the sex addict gradually moves away from what is classed as ‘normal behaviour’. The addict finds it harder and harder to control their addiction and regulate their behaviour and views himself or herself as an object merely having sex with another object. No intimacy is built and no friendship or trust is formed. Behaviour becomes obsessive, repetitive and habitual; achieving ‘the fix’ often begins way before the sex act.”
some excerpts on sex addiction from wikopedia:
“It is a secret.
It is abusive or degrading to self or others.
It is used to avoid (or is a source of) painful feelings.
It is empty of a caring, committed relationship.
Prior to acting out sexually, the sex addict goes through a period of mental preoccupation or obsession. Sex addict begins to disassociate (moves away from his feelings). A separation begins to take place between his mind and his emotional self.
Altered state of consciousness / a trance state / bubble of euphoric fantasized experience.
Sex addict is disconnected from his emotions and he becomes pre-occupied with acting out behaviours. The reality becomes blocked out/distorted.
Rituals are a way to induce trance and further separate oneself from reality. Once the addict has begun his ritual, the chances of stopping that cycle diminish greatly. He is giving into the pull of the compelling sex act.
The next phase of the cycle is sexual compulsivity or “sex act”. The tensions that the addict feels are reduced by acting on their sexual feelings. They feel better for the moment, thanks to the release that occurs. Compulsivity simply means that addicts regularly get to the point where sex becomes inevitable, no matter what the circumstances or the consequences.
Risk factors for the addict include unstructured time, need for self-direction and demands for excellence, because they all push the addict toward restarting the cycle.”
RB’s way of avoiding cognitive dissonance?
April 21, 2007 at 4:39 pm
To Howard Carter post 45,
funny post, WHAT YOU ARE NOW THREATHING PEOPLE TO WATCH WHAT THEY STATE ON THIS BLOG JUST CAUSE YOUR LITTLE FEELINGS ARE HURT. Seems to me your effords are in the WRONG PLACE.
Howard you are a product of brainwash and a not so bright one at that!
I’ll be more than HAPPPY to drop a box of kleenex off at the Pyle gate for you!
marys_angels@peoplepc.com
April 21, 2007 at 4:56 pm
I really don’t want to support the dialogue with HC as it is rather a downer. It feels like trying to talk intelligently with an aged aunt who just is incapable of going beyond her certainties and whose stories you have already heard many times.
I don’t understand the FOF’s stance or what they are doing. HC is a self avowed ’scout’ so one has to assume that he/she/they are reporting back to the establishment and have a brief to represent certain opinions publicly on this blog. HC and some other posters can be taken to be the voice of established interests in the FOF.
How dumb to incite rather than placate. HC, in his post 7/45 is effectively soliciting people to prove that what they are saying is true. I would ask what proof would suffice to give him cause to admit the truth of allegations.
Does RB need to be subject to criminal proceedings? Does the FOF have to be subject to another audit? Are sworn, notarized, statements from a certain number of people enough? How many is enough?
HC is making it far more likely that former and current members will group together and press home an attack that is currently just a threat to membership numbers. I do not think the FOF could sustain a series of law suits and if evidence was forthcoming that gave law enforcement a handle on this, and it was in the political interests of an agency to prosecute the cause of the FOF’s destruction, the FOF could suffer a mortal blow.
In the end it is this kind of thing that will destroy the FOF, not posts on this blog and HC is making it much more likely.
I am stunned by the ineptitude of these people. It really is shocking that the FOF should be so hamstrung by their reliance on RB, that they should be incapable of intelligent damage limitation.
It feels like a real F OFF situation.
April 21, 2007 at 5:01 pm
32# Elena;
I appreciated Girard as a man who wished to awaken, and I respected that (and still do). I will walk away from anyone who proposes to awaken, or Liberate me.
Robert did not make me do anything. Nor did Girard. I left house, home and family, the only family I ever had. The actions were my responsibility, no one elses. If my life as I knew it was ‘destroyed’, well, it may not have been much of a life to begin with. I joined the Fellowship because I saw that Gurdjieff had something that I too wished for myself. That was to be a free man. It was not consciousness, awakening or enlightenment.
I can only repeat what I said in a previous post. Sooner or later you will be pushed into a place where you have to choose. Either choice will mean suffering (Sophies Choice). All you have to ‘do’ is choose
Alexis
104# Yesri Baba:
You just had to be there.
April 21, 2007 at 5:06 pm
Howard, you’re starting to sound a bit too much like honest Abe. Your thinly veiled threats are beginning to motivate me to tell my own RB horror stories. Keep talking.
April 21, 2007 at 5:09 pm
Hey Ames and N. Love you guys.
April 21, 2007 at 5:26 pm
Dear Howard,
Before today your postings didn’t move me enough to write a reply, because I didn’t find a space for discussion with you. What’s the point in sharing one’s understandings with someone who ‘knows it all’ and gives predictable answers to everything? That to me is a comfort of having set belief system and, as I wouldn’t try to share my thoughts with orthodox Christians, Muslims etc. believers, I wasn’t interested in doing so with you.
A friend of mine pointed out to me that it looks like you get ‘kicks’ out of attracting reactions and attention to your persona, rather than investigating the truth for yourself. So what was the point in writing you? Until today, when I read your last message #45, which is worth commenting on.
As usual, I didn’t find a space for discussion there, so my only reply to your words is: what load of bollocks, man!
And I know what you are going to say if you write back. How sad.
April 21, 2007 at 5:35 pm
Dear Sheik,
Congratulations again for your initiative
(this blog as a result) and your consistancy!
Could you give us fresh information on the number of hits this blog is receiving?
Some will not fail making all kind of calculations and perhaps deduce that, by now, almost everyone in the FOF reads the blog!
On Robert Burton and us:
Let it not be the morality of a fish and nor the gratitude of a dog!
There are not “others”!
Much appreciation.
To the bloggers most fitted to deal with the net:
How is the Wikipedia situation going ?
April 21, 2007 at 5:42 pm
Dear All,
I want to express my view on the subject of non-duality.
Although I read Advaita writings for some years now (but only Adya, Nisargadata and Ramana, Wheeler just lately), I don’t know much about the tradition as such and I am not competent in discussing the subject ‘professionally’.
However, Advaita or not, what I got from John Wheeler’s pointing and from my own experiences and understandings is of value to me. The basis of my current understanding is that all I see, feel and think is happening within impersonal awareness. Obviously, there is a body and mind of Rita and the world around her which she perceives through her senses. Yet, all is happening within this awareness. It’s not ‘hers’ as it is ‘nobody’s’, it just is and the body and mind are one of its manifestations. With this basic understanding, one feels united and in love with what is, it’s just a reaction of the body and mind to this realization. So, the questions of moral character, of integrity and choices are taken care of naturally, because one can’t harm what is oneself. One can harm oneself and others if the realization of this unity hasn’t occurred yet.
(a girl passed by, wearing T-shirt with words ‘love peace unity’ printed on it)
Really, if this basis is understood, things are unfolding naturally. Maybe there’s more to Advaita, but for now this perception is sufficient for me to be and live without fear or any kind of ‘need’.
April 21, 2007 at 5:59 pm
I personally find it hard to believe what Kosta or Inner Circle say about RB.
I wish someone could SHOW me, prove me that it is true. Majority of students would LEAVE if they knew it for sure. Can someone take a camera or a cell phone to bring the evidence from his bedroom out here? If RB is only pretends to be a teacher but in reality is a psycho and a pervert – why not everybody see it this way? PROVE IT!
I was told that he is using sex not for pleasure but for getting fine energy and then transforms it into a conscious energy for a meeting or a dinner to ignite our Higher Centes. And that he does not force anyone to do it!
April 21, 2007 at 6:07 pm
Re Howard (post 45)
Howard why are you saying this? I’m baffled. If you’ve been in the FOF for 20 years you must have known about RB’s habits for a long time. If you have any doubts that this stuff is going on, just go and ask one of the hundreds of young men who have been or are involved. Many of them are quite open about it.
You appear to be reasonably intelligent. Either you’re lying or you have your head so far buried in the sand you wouldn’t notice if a rhino was crapping on you.
disappointedly, RB
April 21, 2007 at 6:27 pm
Re Sydney (post 26)
Very nice to hear from you Sydney – much to savor in your posting.
But the following is a bit odd : “As for cost that is the single most ridicolous arguement. In “life” to attend a highly rated University to the level of recieving a Doctorate can easily cost $100,000. If those who are members of the FOF think they have verified the reality of self remembering and that the FOF can help create this in them then cost should mean nothing.”
Sounds reasonable in a theoretical kind of way, at least for the giver of money, but it ignores the corrupting power of money on the receiver.
We’ve read here about numerous “teachers” who started well but were later consumed by the desire for sex and money. It seems like money is an early test for someone who considers him/herself enlightened enough to be conducting spiritual teaching. It starts with collecting money for reasonable expenses like renting a hall. Then the “teacher” collects enough money to support himself and his key followers. Then he starts living lavishly. Then he starts supporting his lovers. And so on. It’s a common story.
In the FOF it’s reached an extreme level where the desire to “shear the sheep” overshadows pretty much everything else.
By contrast, Adyashanti asks for a voluntary donation of $10 to attend a meeting and there are no complications, rules, strings attached, auctions, special donations. Plus, he is actually a much more effective spiritual teacher than RB at this stage. Maybe RB was effective in his early days, but he’s clearly running on empty now.
John Wheeler works as a technical writer and is scrupulous about only accepting money to cover expenses.
Nisargaradatta supported himself by selling cigarettes and refused offers from his US students to set up a foundation for him. He lived in a tiny apartment in Bombay till the end of his life. Clearly he was not corrupted by money or sex, and as a result his students could have a simple trusting relationship with him, based solely on effective spiritual teaching.
If only that were the case here!
RB
April 21, 2007 at 6:38 pm
Innernaut #36:
You write: “Where is the evidence to show that our thoughts, emotions, body, etc are NOT our true nature? In other words, I would agree that our awareness is part of our true nature — but why any more so than our bodies? Why the separation between body and awareness? What if awareness arises in the same way emotions do — that is, from our bodies, in some combination of brain activity.”
My first thought on reading your question was of William Blake and Walt Whitman, two magnificent, eloquent proponents of the idea that the body is not separate from the Soul–is, in fact, the divine expression of it. To this point of view I have no contradiction. It seems true for me.
Also, from the non-dualist perspective as I understand it, there is no separation between awareness and all that arises within it: thoughts, emotions, bodies. But there is a distinction between what is unchanging and undying, and what is transitory and illusory.
Maybe the fundamental question you are raising is, does consciousness arise from the brain activity in the body or does the body (and by extension, all manifest forms) arise from Consciousness?
I cannot prove it, but I think the latter. Although, on second thought, maybe both are true.
(coot, here we need “Chicken/Egg” for Dummies)
It may be that proof, in the sense of having scientific evidence, is unobtainable. I could stipulate that it’s all a product of brain activity, but this explains nothing. It is still an unfathomable Mystery. To enter into it, one needs to let go of the need for proof, or any notion of certainty. Proof and certainty are what the mind wants. But, marvelous as it is, the mind is only one facet of the totality of what we are.
There is nothing wrong with the concept “that we are physical beings, whose physicality includes emotions, sensations, thoughts, and, yes, varying degrees of consciousness.” I would just add the concept that this transitory physical being is at the same time an expression of, and a connection to, the Ground of Being (or whatever you call it–or don’t call it anything!)
But like all concepts, these are limited by language. Concepts can only ever point to Truth.
Idea for bumper sticker:
“Mystics do it in the body.”
April 21, 2007 at 6:43 pm
Innernaut Says: Where is the evidence to show that our thoughts, emotions, body, etc are NOT our true nature? Non-duality sounds like it is falling back on the old duality of “consciousness is not functions”: consciousness versus the body, emotions, etc. What’s wrong with the concept that we are physical beings?
As far as I understand at the moment, non-dualism is not about denying your body, emotions, thoughts as unreal and something to be looked down on and to be abandoned for a higher cause and for some abstract pure consciousness. Rather it is to be joyfully in the body, thoughts, emotions, live and breathe them fully yet know that these are NOT ALL that you are, you know, as in not attaching to them in particular, not taking my body and my personality as something that needs to survive forever, but rather taking them playfully and living through them.
It seems that defining your true nature as any one thing would be mistaken and limited. As I understand it, you are all that, and more, we are what all this stuff consists of. But now I’m speaking beyond my experience. So I’ll just add one more comment. It seems that religions are generally and exoterically concerned with achieving ‘my personal survival after death’ (including the FOF religion, e.g. Creating a Soul, The Prize is Eternity). In that sense, non- dualists seem kind of atheistic, but happily, rather than cynically so.
April 21, 2007 at 6:46 pm
In the early 80’s I didn’t leave when the Sanders case revealed information about RB’s sex life. Instead it created a feeling of sympathy for him. And I thought I was learning to be open-minded.
In the early 90’s, I didn’t leave when the RL and TB incidents happened, because I thought the school was working for me and I needed to go beyond feminine dominance. If I had seen the letter that AG just posted it might have made a difference, or if there had been something like this blog, but there was not, and my life continued in the school.
And then came the 30 works I’s followed by the “precious” sequence. It seemed like a strange way of being dominated. So what had worked for me was being undermined with new methods. Now there are reports of orgies. It seems like things are getting worse. I wouldn’t want to stay around and see how much worse things can get. Risky business.
April 21, 2007 at 6:48 pm
Howard Carter says: ‘…sensationalized information about Robert’s private life; information whose only purpose is to attack his character and otherwise discredit him. You must know that none of these reports posted have gone through any means, legal or otherwise, to prove their authenticity or accuracy.’
Life is not an artificial courtroom. There is such a thing as common sense. If very similar reports of Robert’s extreme behavior keep surfacing for decades from all these different people, it is simpler to conclude that there must be a fair amount of truth to them, rather than to conclude that there is a worldwide conspiracy spanning numerous people and years, whose only purpose is to discredit and harm innocent Robert.
April 21, 2007 at 7:03 pm
Re: Legal action against FOF –
“Sometimes the only way someone will respect you is if you sue them.” (Robert Burton c. 1992)
Thanks for the forum, Sheik.
April 21, 2007 at 7:15 pm
Hi, Howard,
You want proof… Do you know that a cel-phone VIDEO exists of what happens to people in RB bedroom?… No, it is not supposed to be a Teaching video, although you may accidentally learn something from it.
If “read” and “think” doesn’t work for you, may be “see” and “hear” will? Would you believe then? (Or you need “touch” ,”smell” and “taste”, too?)
There are many proofs out there, in fact so many – it’s not funny. People have been holding lots of disturbing things to themselves so far, for various personal reasons, and may or may not continue to do so. Time will tell. If you keep asking for proof – you may finally get it, I guess.
To me, hearing a disturbing story from dear personal friend is more than enough, no need for them to swear on the Bible. I don’t see why they would lie to a friend they know for many years. I don’t need to actually see it all to get proof.
One’s conscience is a very good guide, unless it’s totally numb of course.
And it’s not about “accusation”, but rather it’s about exposing lies, shedding the light on something kept in the dark, opening people’s eyes to something they buffer. It’s not RB’s private life only, it involves others, who are actually being emotionally and physically hurt, and lots of others who are paying big money for it and being repeatedly lied to and misled.
I wish you were as eager to find the proof for all the bizarre pseudo-teaching you’re now fed ( and eagerly supporting), for all these pre-historic off-the-wall-interpretations… Which proof do you have for this, Howard?
April 21, 2007 at 7:21 pm
To Sydney in post 7/26:
You wrote:
“As for cost that is the single most ridiculous argument. In ‘life’ to attend a highly rated University to the level of receiving a Doctorate can easily cost $100,000. If those who are members of the FOF think they have verified the reality of self remembering and that the FOF can help create this in them then cost should mean nothing.”
Yes, I know exactly what you mean. I struggled with the money issue for quite a long time, but after much soul searching I was able to look the other way as I paid my college tuition. Because it’s well known that university presidents and chancellors use that money for trips around the world with an entourage of sex partners. But that meant “nothing” to me because I received my cherished college diploma.
Anyway, just pointing out one of the many absurdities of your analogy.
If “cost should mean nothing,” why do you still have a bank account? A home with equity? A 401k? Why worry about retirement? Why not sign over all of your money today?
Rhetorical questions. You don’t take these actions because cost does mean something to you, as it does to all of us. Each of us here may disagree about the threshold, but I doubt that anyone sincerely agrees that it means “nothing”. Remember: The less money you make, the more the percentage of your yearly income that goes to the Fellowship. You make $50,000 a year, and you pay 19.5% of your gross income to the Fellowship, and this doesn’t include the hundreds of dollars that you might pay each month to attend Isis dinners and meetings. (See post 3/239 for a breakdown of these numbers.) Is that getting close to your threshold?
Even if it isn’t, see post 6/407 by Joe Average, and tell me you are still not concerned about the money.
April 21, 2007 at 7:40 pm
Dear Elena
I though I would add or elaborate somewhat on my recent comments to you.
Most of my long working hours are taken up by talking to clients on a global scale, most of the conversations are brief and to the point, so when I contribute to this Blog, which I do in the quiet moments during work it is unavoidable to carry some of my states into the writings. I neither mean to be blunt nor brutal nor indifferent to your feelings.
I could leave my contributions for my days off when I have more inner quiet and write something more elaborate and more in touch with you on an emotional level but the last thing I want to see on my days off is another monitor.
It is very evident that most of us take each others contributions out of context, this is unavoidable, as are the misinterpretations. So much is missing, the voice inflections, the gestures, the eye contact, the human warmth and empathy, and misunderstandings are bound to occur, and this is really unfortunate and sometimes leaves a bad taste.
I don’t know if this has made things somewhat less through a glass darkly..
Alexis
April 21, 2007 at 7:57 pm
Supporting Rabbi Burns’ comment, 7/58.
Let me tell a short story:
I was a very young student and I asked questions about the money:
- do we have to produce “papers” so that you verify the 10 or 12% are actually given ? (tax like!)?
NO! Your own conscience will guide you.
- Where do the money goes ?
The School and part is yours.
There is a beautiful property called Renaissance? You will visit one day soon…
- The Teacher ?
He recieves a salary.
- Do we know how much?
I do not know and it is not interesting.
We have such better subjects to discuss!
Would you ask your sport teacher, if you have one, how much he earns and what he does with the money he earns ?
At that time really I did not know this “reasonable” answer was pernicious…
For years, I did not dare to “touch” the subject ever again, even innerly.
Conscience was not supposed to be part of that game!
Even now, with all I know
(the 5 stars life style for himself and his enourage not really compensated by generous moves he does take, like helping some students facing financial difficulties)
I still feel unconfortable questioning but because I understand that the abuses are partially allowed by the money I contribute,
I can’t be indifferent any more.
To Confused, post 7/56
Photos of Robert’s bedroom activity?
You made the right choice with your name!
I can see you coming up, once one photo will be displayed:
‘It is not true, too hard to believe!
It is easy for anyone using well Photoshop to make a montage!
I guess Robert would have to let you in!
We never know, his fantasy/needs might push him in that diretion someday.
Standing place:150 Dollars.
April 21, 2007 at 8:13 pm
No more angles or questions are allowed at meetings. Why?
In Russia a male student openly asked about Roberts sex life. Nex the discussion list was shut down and the new format appeared with the quote cards.
Teaching payments? Membership payment more likely.
If one wants teaching that’s an xtra $60 per meeting.
Meetings: Not a clue what’s being taught anymore. Cave coppulation image: Guy -its done doggy syle, is the Steward
completing the sequence, woman is the 9 of hearts. The poop thing….. I realy dont get it
Still on the fence, but not for much longer
April 21, 2007 at 8:21 pm
Re: Skeptical Optimist 7/10
“Looking over the posts of the entity calling itself “Howard Carter” is enervating. I find no humanity, no warmth, no humor, no concern for the suffering of individuals, no depth of personal introspection, no…”
For all my lack of humanity I’ve not had cause to refer to any person on this blog as “the entity calling itself” – Be it Innernaut, or Elena, or No Person, or whoever I’m addressing.
And Joel, in case you’re wondering, no, we don’t know each other.
April 21, 2007 at 8:30 pm
Yeah Sheik, my voluntary donation is being sent next day delivery, sorry everyone, I did not read it was “voluntary”–guess I have been brainwashed by too many years in the FOF!
However, I am sure that the Sheik will assure us he will not spend the money for his own depraved, perverse, subhuman, extreme, etc. appetites (for cakes? or ???).
Nobody here could possibly agree that the money collected by donations is for the sheik to do what he chooses? right?
April 21, 2007 at 8:54 pm
Kiran #3 – wow man, you are scary! What the hell mumbo jumbo computer analysis therapy thing have you made up? Technically impressive, but looks like a load of baloney to me, in terms of real therapeutic value! Sorry not to be impressed, unlike some of your ‘clients’…why did you feel the need to post the glowing references to yourself? Even including the one about ‘humble ego’? And as for “Living the Contradiction also in this respect will only be for few, it needs courage, observation, thinking, being true to oneself and of course feeling” – that is so scarily esoteric teacher-ish! Don’t you realize we are unlikely to fall for that line again! I was right – you ARE hoping to start up a new ’school’! Watch out for the tendency to manipulate your subordinates, and remember to look for signs of power-crazed addictive behaviour, or is that what you are hoping to achieve to help yourself feel important? You seem to have left the FOF but have taken with you some of the hare-brained ideas with the idea of starting again. Just go the whole hog, and abandon the lot if you dare. Start from what you really know which, if you are truthful, is very little, and beware of falling into the same trap of reinforcing your sense of importance through joining, or in your case, setting up, some other cult or group.
Elena #32 – now you are making more sense! I hope your letter reaches all the current students. You have done what you can regarding the FOF, now get on with living and best of luck!
Innernaut #36 – good points, I would like to see the non-dualists in the throes of physical agony and ask if they still claim to experience purely “impersonal awareness” or whether they might feel that they are their bodies too at that point!? The implication that there is no responsibility or choice, everything just happens within this awareness I also find difficult to swallow. Same as you, I am don’t want an argument, nor do I really wish suffering on anyone, just discussing and exploring.
Coward Harder #41 – very funny!…I would rather be a pig.
I see said the blind man #49 – brilliant description of Howard Carter as aged aunt, maybe we should just treat him as one, be polite and humour him and he will perhaps come to see things differently in time. In a lot of ways I was like him, wanting desperately to cling to ‘reality’ as I saw it then, because it so badly threatened my identity. It has taken me a while to gradually see how genuinely corrupt the FOF really is. This blog has certainly helped.
Confused #56 – yes, I was told that story about RB needing the energy to evolve, kind of makes sense if you go along with all the other lies, that is why it is so difficult to admit you have been an idiot, all that time and effort you put into ‘verifying’ ideas, following the rules, now you have to go back to square one and start all over again – bummer!……but it’s really not a bummer at all, now you are free to really be what you are, find out and explore what you are and what’s going on, find out that you don’t know what you are and don’t know anything much at all really, but find out that it’s fine, and keep being wary of not falling in the same trap of conforming, keep following your own ‘inner pilot’…go for it!
Sheik – ’shake your booty!…you rule!’
April 21, 2007 at 9:17 pm
Wouldn’t it be great if the school could dissolve before Robert dies? The school created a lot of being in the time that it existed. Where are we at, 35? It also accumelated a lot of baggage and garbage. The community is in the same shape as our FOF relationships. When Robert falls away what a powerstruggle will appear.. All so civilizedly fought.. Going totally formatory.
A very dark place to be.
There’s still some time left. But I am not going to be around for those parts.
April 21, 2007 at 9:30 pm
Confused (56): “I was told that he is using sex not for pleasure but for getting fine energy and then transforms it into a conscious energy for a meeting or a dinner to ignite our Higher Centes.”
Please, C, apply some common sense. Does this not sound like a desperate attempt to justify/buffer some very weird behaviour? How would your informant know it’s true? Why would you believe it?
Try giving ten blow jobs in a row and see if it “gives you fine energy”.
Isn’t the sex addict explanation a bit more credible?
RB
April 21, 2007 at 9:52 pm
Confused Says: ‘I was told that he is using sex not for pleasure but for getting fine energy and then transforms it into a conscious energy for a meeting or a dinner to ignite our Higher Centes. And that he does not force anyone to do it!’
Dear Confused, you sound like a really nice and sweet person who is able to see things from a positive side and does not get distracted by gossip. That’s why I feel confident to tell you that I, too, have become a conscious being. When that happened, I discovered that Robert was right all along. As a conscious being I no longer indulge in ordinary sex, I have super-sex and transform this sexual energy into more consciousness. You are absolutely right. Since you already understand this, I will send someone to bring you to my room tonight so we can have super-sex together. I will help you ignite your higher centers through my emanations and you will be grateful. Don’t worry if it’s against your sexual orientation or if you don’t feel any such desire, those are all just I’s from your functions and belong to the lower self. I, in contrast, am really an angel, not this body. Yes, you’d better believe it, because it’s true. And I’ve received a communication from other angels in my room just half an hour ago: they told me that they wished the two of us to have sex. Let’s work towards our common aim, dear, to fulfill the wishes of higher forces. Just relax, let go of your body, I’ll take your pants down, here you go, and now I’ll suck you. It’s to create more presence. We all want to create more presence, don’t you agree?
Why do people choose to believe Robert when he talks like this? Because 2000 people have agreed to agree that he’s a conscious being and therefore anything he does must be right? Dear Confused, once upon a time all men agreed that it was OK and natural to keep other people as slaves. Does a majority opinion make a statement true? What do you think?
Confused says: ‘I personally find it hard to believe what Kosta or Inner Circle say about RB.
I wish someone could SHOW me, prove me that it is true. Majority of students would LEAVE if they knew it for sure. Can someone take a camera or a cell phone to bring the evidence from his bedroom out here?’
Which part exactly do you want proof for? How many people he has sex with at the same time? The details of whether they really pee on him? Is that why you would leave the Fellowship, if you had firm video-recorded proof that they really pee on him? There is already more than enough evidence that he abuses his position of power without consideration for his students as individuals, that he uses them as impersonal means for his gratification, that he is obsessed with himself. Some of his boys enjoy the attention and special status that being his chosen ones affords them. If you have not been able to see that, you must have buffered very hard. I suggest you start talking to people and asking them unpleasant questions.
There is nothing that Robert can do wrong if you believe him to be above human laws. If video material of his orgies actually appeared, I’m sure it would be reasoned away by true believers. It is not about the details of his sex life. It is about his personal integrity. How much do you know about Robert Burton as a person, what has been your actual one-on-one experience and interactions with him, and how much of what you know about what he is like comes from a myth that he creates about himself and lets his students repeat it?
April 21, 2007 at 10:21 pm
Dear Alexis,
I hope you never loose your love, I haven’t. But to love each other does not mean we agree on everything we each do at no matter whose cost.
If as you say, no one ever affected you why do you even try to affect any body else?
If you love only yourself, there’s no love.
If you love a few, there’s no love.
Love is willing to respond for each one of us, or it is not love.
If as a member of the Fellowship, anyone believes that they are not responsible for the 25 year old boy that comes looking for a school and ends up as a whore, then they are not in a conscious school but a brothel. I can do nothing against a brothel when people know that is where they are going but change the name and I’ll stop hammering.
“The Fellowship of Friends Brothel”, doesn’t it suit it well? It might even make more money than now!
If you think I am so naive to expect to ever be embraced by the Fellowship again, you are even more naive than I am. It is much better to be in your company that somebody else’s.
April 21, 2007 at 11:18 pm
In reply in Post #45/Discussion-blog #7 & all those to follow in the same ’spirit’.
It has been my observation that ’spirit’ is not ‘feeling’, ‘feeling’ is not ‘conscience’ and ‘conscience’ can only be wrought from personal experience, of which many in this blog have none concerning the target of their negativity and positivity.
The question of legitimacy has occurred and will continue unknown by those who have not braved to do it themselves (yet).
So far as Post #294 via Blog #1 and Post #6 via Blog #7 (a similar observation, also made by a Russian student). The ‘contents’ of Post #294 has been verified by one of RB’s closest and trusted people, who added that its ‘mood’ was a bit exaggerated, though its contents was/is all true.
I would advise all those participating in this blog not to address comments to HC: as I see it, his particular ‘entity’ is a deviation for you, a placebo for your own HC needing attention and a very poor ’symbol’ for your ability to speak through your conscience without having to be prompted by such an obvious ‘contradiction’ to do so outside yourself. HC stands for an affirmation within you, one of a false sense of chivalry, i.e., to save the woman from her pet dragon.
What you would rather tell RB, HC takes his place symbolically, i.e., sugar pill, not wise man pill. Do yourselves a great service and let this affirmation go…HC is a test between resentment and continuance: please do not resent him or praise him, continue without his need for the affirmations of your compliments and negative drama, i.e., Pain-body-food from your reactions to his particular level of being, tennis matches are not real, nor the ones running alongside the net, picking up the things that drop off the net, having not made it over everyone’s expectations of the players.
What you expect of HC, you yourself have yet to untie within yourselves…he is a symbol of a contradiction within you and all energy ‘directly’ addressed to him only stalemates your position of going beyond the symbols of contradiction and affirmations of that which will ultimately graduate you from spiritual schools on earth.
Love to you all.
April 21, 2007 at 11:55 pm
I was wowed when an old friend sent me this link a couple days ago. What an outpouring, to which I want to add my voice. I joined TCB in 1972 — 35 years ago! and left in 1992. I realized it is the first time since 1972 that there is an avenue for open communication between those who have left with other friends who have left and those who remain.
For many years now, I rarely think about Fof. But what an opportunity I sense to reflect on and share what has been learned from an enormous chapter in my life and to perhaps discover more in the writing.
First, I am deeply touched by the concerns expressed here, the soul-searching angst by the ‘newly departed’ and those considering leaving is particularly familiar to me and my heart goes out to you. I remember the turmoil leading up to and the confusion and disorientation that accompanies leaving.
One part of my story I would like to share is an experience I had a couple of days after I left officially in 1992. I was sitting in a meditative space paying attention to my breath & body sensations when I began to tremble uncontrollably all over my body. Although I had not been aware of it prior to this moment, I realized that I was terrified! Terrified! I was in a black swirl, falling through space in my mind, my emotions churning. It slowly dawned on me that I was terrified of losing my ‘contact with Higher Forces’, with my Self, as I understand it now. This state lasted for nearly 20 minutes and I emerged from it realizing that this unconscious terror was part of what had kept me in the school for so long, despite my rationalizations for staying.
It was only once I faced this fear that I could acknowledge to myself that the fueling of fear was one of the mainstays of FoF/RB teachings. I also learned later that this playing on unconscious fears is one of the hallmarks of cultic (mind enslaved) relationships. I began keeping a log of any and all conscious moments –moments of awakening, beauty, clarity — I experienced now that I was not longer in ‘the school.’ Happily, there were plenty of log-ins to make for several weeks until I had enough evidence to counter that deep fear that somehow my spiritual well- being was inextricably linked to FoF.
Another related story: I was a stellar student at least in my mind, haha — especially adept at not expressing negative emotions. At the ten-year point, due partly to the dissolution of my marriage, I ventured into a body/work therapy workshop (then forbidden),spent about two years occasionally pounding pillows in that work, protesting all the time that I had no anger! When I finally did get beyond my prodigous defenses and started to experience anger in myself I was amazed at how much about myself I had to discover. Gradually unfolded sadness and grief and fear and panic, a world of emotions that had been shoved underground for many years in the name of nonexpression…I was an actual feeling human being and what a world it was, what a wake up call to one who imagined she was quite awake.
These personal realizations about my own ’shadow’ or unconsious, forced a melt down in me around my love of the system, and I went through the despair of ‘leaving the system.’ But I felt tremendous responsibility for others, and spent a good part of the next ten years trying to make up for having helped to bring so many people into the fold — by talking to others, writing articles and running workshops to introduce people to what I had been learning about the effects of the unconscious, about emotions and the amount of emotional repression that is encouraged by the teachings. ‘Savior feature’ dies hard.
Anyway, onwards…
Today, I believe that growth of consciousness has different requirments for different people. Some need to stay in an abusive, restrictive environments, dysfunctional relationships or groups; some need to break out. Some need to divorce, some to stay married. Some to die addicted, some to go through recovery.
(I have watched my parents in a 60-year abusive relationship, riddled with alcohol abuse, which has contributed to my meditations on this subject).
These hard decisions emerge from each individual soul. I believe only each one can know whether it has taken courage and conviction, has been an opening, a step into deeper, unexplored, more expansive inner territory to remain — or if staying has been a hiding place, a refuge from the unknown, from scarey expansion and growth in ourselves. In any event, I think we do our best, we learn as much as we can learn while we live. I vote for more gentleness as well as courage in all this.
For what it is worth, I think this is the number one learned lesson of my FoF days: I believe I have been immunized against most fundamentalist thought. For some of us, it apparently takes many years (maybe a lifetime?) of commitment and passion to a system, relationship,or organization for it to build up enough psychic importance so that the ultimate disillusionment will BREAK DOWN the ancient mental/emotional tendency to grip onto a belief to ward off deep-seated anxieties (fundamentalism in my definition). Such beliefs become part of one’s very identity, one’s sense of separateness.
Through this deep dive into commitment to FoF (to me it was more intense than falling in love, I would call it a conversion experience) and the disillusionment that followed, I was loosened up from one more huge, but subtle block to the dissolution of my sense of separateness, a dissolution that often now opens me to the Beauty & Grace & Love inherent in my depths. I believe FoF experience has helped to break in me a long-held mental tendency to fundamentalist, mind enslaved thought, and that leaving helped give me the courage to face many difficult aspects of not only myself but of being alive.
Finally, and most importantly in all this, I want to share with you my how much awe and gratefulness I feel — most recently for Roger C (and his family)…. and Neal O. and Stanley R and Peter B. and Rosemary M — great soul friends, all who died as FoF members.
I also have deep appreciation for Kristina N and beyond all, my late husband, Dennis K, both who died as former members, DK by my side. These great beings have opened me, each in their own way, to the mysteries of death, what I understand now as the release of the soul from the body.
Through their deaths and my bonds with them, they have shown me that they live on, that the mystery of our connection continues — and that in/out group boundaries are irrelevant mind constructs that do not stand this final test.
Thank you to everyone who is letting their voice be heard through this amazing medium.
With as much love as I can muster,
Sandra
April 22, 2007 at 12:19 am
Robert Burton,the TEA-CHER or the CHE-ATER?
April 22, 2007 at 12:39 am
Inner Jewels (#44) wrote:
“Letting all the feelings surge through me without judging them is still a new experience. The anger helped me move past the inertia and sadness. Maybe that’s why anger can be so valuable–and necessary to control by those who don’t want us to move through anything.”
YES! This is a critical step in healing from the FOF mind-bender. Acknowledging how we feel without judgment or trying to change what we’re feeling.
See. Accept. Repeat.
April 22, 2007 at 1:06 am
Confused #56: A lot of intelligent people were had but not suck’ered, to expect all these people to be had again is your dilirium.
April 22, 2007 at 1:10 am
Hello.
This is such an amazing site!
The most interesting posts are those that are to the point and simple.
7 (6) in which Kosta simply tells it like it is is so refreshing.
7 (38) in which Ames simply and clearly tells the truth inspires me.
I sincerely hope that their posts enlighten those who are still within the cult walls justifying and believing lies that are obvious to any.
April 22, 2007 at 1:44 am
Dear Elena
Congratulations to your post #32
I would say this seemed to be inspired, the style that you present it, is nothing less than the Gettysburg address. The request that you make to all the people for who you were a third force to connect them to the school, to relieve you from that connection is very honorable and is in fact important as a invisible but never the less very real and strong bondage has to be severed.
This informational bondage and addiction is in fact more strong than any drug dependence and that is why for most it is so difficult to make a clear cut… they rather let things run out half-heartedly for example by not making teaching payments anymore than by making a single decided statement to that point.
I want to follow your example and also ask all the people for who I was instrumental to connect them to the school to release me form this informational link. This “giving-up” is just as important as a marriage vow, to the opposite effect. And of course at this point I certainly would have left the FOF if not RB would have released me, but believe me the last year I was simply to busy digesting the loss of my wife, my best friend and my family that adding to that the loss of a few dozens friends by leaving the FOF was simply not something that was too urgent then.
To all those who are still trying to gather the courage to make this step I can say that I verified Goethe’s advice also in this respect:
“Once you make a decision, Magic and Power moves to your aid”
There is nothing to blame, nothing to defend just the whole world to embrace in a new and amazing way, to merge into a new existence that would not have been possible without all that we have gone through.
My love to you all
Kiran
April 22, 2007 at 2:25 am
Howard Carter (post 45):
This is the silliest thing I’ve read so far on this blog.
You claim to be talking about “sensationalized information about Robert’s private life.” I’m sure you realize that NO ONE IS DISCUSSING ROBERT’S PRIVATE LIFE. This is NOT ABOUT SEX, and it is NOT A PRIVATE MATTER.
The personal accounts of experiences with Robert Burton are about his abuse of the power of being a teacher; his abuse of the trust placed in him by his students; his diversion of tax-deductible donations to an ostensibly non-profit “charitable” organization to his personal — and quite lavish — use; his use of the organizations resources to pimp for him and attract eligible young men to him for his uses . These issues have nothing to do with Robert’s sexual preferences.
And because these matters are inextricably interwoven with his fitness to be a teacher, they are PUBLIC, not private matters, within the community of those who are, and have been, members of the Fellowship of Friends. And to the extent that criminal activity is involved, they would be public matters for the larger society.
And as to your policeman-arresting-the-blogger/legal-standards-of proof scenario, surely you are not so naive as to think that people are just making this stuff up. No one is seeking to prove anything here; people are recounting their personal experiences. But I guess that would be incomprehensible to you, as open discussion is forbidden in the Fellowship.
April 22, 2007 at 2:41 am
Dear bloggers,
my intention was to come on and post another response to HC and so I will still carry through with it to some extent, but after reading the comments in this last section and seeing how insightful they are, and after reading Ames’ post and how it has all been said before ,and with so much clarity, I see that there is no need for me to remain stuck in this loop and I believe I will spiral out of existence in this form. Have enjoyed your company, and hope to see you in the fourth dimension.
Howard,
Two experiences to share. First as a teenager attending a youth meeting when a speaker got up and started to get very evangelical.He started waving his arms in the air and asked everyone to do the same,so I found myself uncomfortably doing the same. My friend gave me a wierd look and said “I’m not raising my arms just because he said to”. In that moment I felt intense shame at having so willingly given myself away to become a sheep(i’m a pig,no).The second experience was I think my last visit to the academy when I had offered to serve at a breakfast. I arrived just in time for the event and was met with this intense, identified energy and a maitre ‘d who told me to hurry and quickly put on this serving item. The “item” was extremely small and the body was extremely big and I had this picture of a rhino with a bikini stretched over it,so I protested but was eventually convinced to follow through with the octave but couldn’t help being penetrated by the absurdness of the situation,indentification and the school in that moment,and afterwards had a small wave of shame that connected me back to waving my arms about as a teenager.
You see,I had just given myself away again ,and my higher self saw that.The normal “balanced ” response to seeing that the slipper didn’t fit would have been to accept that I wouild have to serve without the “item” or some other alternative but the level of identifacation and feminine dominance that surrounds RB and the inner minions , and then ripples down the line,makes one realise that something is rotten at the core.Anyone who is a parent will tell you that if your children are displaying it, most likely it’s coming from you.
Also, in relation to working on will, you say that you have never placed a stop point as to how far you will obey RB.How will you ever develop will then?. The final act of creating will in an environment where you are asked to comply is surely to say NO.
Howard bend over
yes
Howard bend over
yes
Howard bend over
PISS OFF
Ahh, now you get it.
One last comment.I think you are stuck in family mode in relation to FOF.When I think of my mother and her responses to acts that people did around her.If they were “family” then they basically were a good person who had slipped up. If not family, then they were probably a bad person.All your defense of the school smacks of this.
If you want to dissect and convert this post to work language you are most welcome, but remember that FOF actually give you little or no information about higher self(start with intuition and move on from there)other than it’s out there somewhere.IT might just reawaken conscience.
Goodbye and have fun with your experience,sorry,work hard at your experience.
pigs no more
April 22, 2007 at 2:49 am
“If there is a theme to this journal it is that body, mind, and soul are not mutually exclusive.
The desires of the flesh, the ideas of the mind, and the luminosities of the soul- all are perfect expressions of the radiant Spirit that alone inhabits the universe, sublime gestures of that Great Perfection that alone outshines the world. There is only One Taste in the entire Kosmos, and that taste is Divine, whether it appears in the flesh, in the mind, in the soul. Resting in that One Taste, transported beyond the mundane, the world arises in the purest Freedom and radient Release, happy to infinity, lost in all eternity, and hopeless in the original face of the unrelenting mystery. From One Taste all things issue, to One Taste all things return- and in between, which is the story of this moment, there is only the dream, and sometimes the nightmare, from which we would do well to awaken” – Ken Wilber
April 22, 2007 at 3:06 am
Presence is the inner means of all Teachings, and Religions,
“A man should be willing to sacrifice his will to God’s, hold on to what brings
him nearer to God, and shun what places him at a distance from God.”
Al-Ghazali
There is nothing more mechanical that Imagination and Negative Emotions.
It`s Incredible the ammount of I`s. Almost All seems to me like a Elimination Process.
This Blog It`s an Enterteinment for the King of Clubs in us.
observe yourself.
April 22, 2007 at 3:15 am
Alexis 7/50:
“Robert did not make me do anything. Nor did Girard. I left house, home and family, the only family I ever had. The actions were my responsibility, no one elses.”
The really evil thing about having been subjected to thought reform is that the individual, looking back, sees a series of actions that she took and is prone to own up to them. However, she does not see that her choices were not truly free, but resulted from a compromised ability to choose.
We cannot choose freely when information is withheld from us. Who among us would have joined the Fellowship if we were told at the first prospective student meeting that the teacher was a single man pretending to celibacy while secretly seducing hundreds of young heterosexual men; that he was preparing for Armageddon by buying European art, Meissen teacups and Ming Dynasty furniture and storing it in a Versailles-like palace in rural central California; that if we joined and later decided to leave, it would be better for us if a millstone were hung round our neck and we drowned, because we had turned our back on the angels? More than likely, we would have left before intermission.
No one told us these things until our ability to evaluate them was impaired by our implementation of a technique >emanating from the same source
April 22, 2007 at 3:25 am
coot appreciate cool person jewels tuned out to be, thanks for cathie, sincerity of rita penfold, funny of o’poo, honesty of bruce, scale of joel, recent bone honest posts of various and mostly all. Interesting group we turned out.
Worry that most salacious of kinky sex stories may overstate case (as don’t know source), but that case need not be overstated to be already grotesque – for any person, much less a trusted teacher of most personal psychology of possible evolution. Break of trust. And heart. RB terrible role. Various Howard Carters have terrible roles. And the children of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab …
So catch you further down the trail, but for “be here now” are:
Five easy pieces:
coot thinking central lesson of FOF experience is beware of cult leader with small penis (but repeat myself).
From here forward phrase “sequence” (for those inner circle) is “assonance.” Consists of definite nine steps – first seven same, last one wipe poo-poo off.
Unalists and dualists need not be duelists.
Isis really Isntisnt.
Ridicule is only love left that dare not speak its name. too sad for words …..
April 22, 2007 at 3:38 am
Confused (56), it’s very hard to understand how you could possibly have read through all of the posts on this site and say what you’ve said. You demand “proof?” Don’t be ridiculous! Hundreds of FOF members have known what’s been going on for decades for an absolute fact, since hundreds have had sex with Robert. Do you think it’s all a huge conspiracy to sully Robert’s good name, and that we have nothing better to do than try to trick you, and get pure-hearted students to abandon their noble work? This subject has been discussed and discussed, on and on, year after year, decade after decade. Every ten years or so another few hundred can’t stand it any more and leave, and the ones who stay tell themselves that they stayed because they’re “real students,” and the ones who left were “fake students.” Anyone who doesn’t know by now that Robert is a smiling psychopath doesn’t want to know, but prefers the comfort of believing he is a “real student” in The Great and Only Conscious School. You sound distressed, but there’s a point at which I can’t sympathize any more with people who insist upon the right to be blind, lashing out at everyone who tries to speak the truth to them.
You don’t believe it? Fine. Pay your money, and wait. Sooner or later, it’ll all become clear to you. Dear.
April 22, 2007 at 3:41 am
Thank you Ames, for an extraordinary letter(7/38). I just wish someone had shown it to me back then. While I can understand Ames’ promise to not speak of the FOF for 10 years, I urge you all not to follow the example. Tell your stories. Tell them to your friends. Write them here. Do it now.
Despite what many may think, the history of abuse in the school is not so widely known. If you have spent most of your time in the school in Oregon House and kept your ears and eyes open, you may have heard quite a lot, but I can guarantee you that very little ever gets out to the centers around the world. Most students know little more than the sanitized version put out by the FOF itself to newspapers, that Robert is rarely intimate with his students and when he is, it is entirely consensual. There has been no television coverage, no books other than adulatory ones by current students, just a handful of newspaper articles from LA, SF and San Diego, most of them from the 1995-1996 period. Every suit by former students has been bought off, their silence insured. Even the Rick Ross site in earlier years only carried some tepid remarks from TE about being taught by Robert how to piss properly and Stella mourning her dogs. Not very compelling stuff. When Veronica posted the material about FOF student suicides, the name of Brian Sisler only created a ghostly echo for me. It took me days before vague memories surfaced of students murmuring his name in hushed conversation, shocked, tearful eyes, frozen faces. I tried repeatedly to get information from them about what happened as it so clearly overwhelmed them. As a group, and later singly, they refused to talk about it.
I was not in Oregon House at the time of the dramatic meeting in 1994. I heard rumour only that something controversial and quite out of the ordinary had happened. Despite asking many people I could get no real accounting. Finally one person described it as a bunch of people declaring themselves men number five at the meeting and demanding to be heard, while angelic LT patiently guided the meeting back on course each time. I was told nothing of the actual content of what these people said. Case closed.
There was a similar meeting in Russia, I think around 2000, when several Russian students asked Robert directly why he found it necessary to have quite so many young lovers among his students. They were, of course, also excommunicated after the meeting. The only reason I heard about that one was that one of the students involved managed to write about it to the former FOF discussion list before being expunged.
So please do not assume that everyone knows or that another old story will not help. It will. Robert has thrived on silence for 35 years. He is terrified of open communication. You will not “bring him down”, but you will help a few more people crack open their cocoon of buffers and rationalizations by the sheer weight of open testimony.
April 22, 2007 at 4:29 am
Dear Ames # 39
Thanks for the letter. It is nice to hear your voice after these many years. I remember when you left I was afraid to read any of your letters which a few friends wanted to share. Much like many fof students like
# 57 “Confused”, who keep denying the truth until one day it smacks you along side the head (reality hit) and you just feel sick all over.
Our friend “Confused” needs proof. Well, I would guess they are a female, or they would have proof a plenty if they were a young male student (or I am hearing that they do not have to be so young of late) regularly invited to cellar dinners and to Roberts bedroom by his personal pimp (no names mentioned!).
My dear # 57 ‘Confused”, it is ok, we all went throught the same panic -NO, NO, this can’t be true! Robert has sweet homosexual encounters with a few close friends whom he loves dearly- to give him a higher state. Right? Well,think again- how many ex and current students have to give you the gory details of his sexual exploits ,which , (as per Ames’ letter from 94) have increased to bizarre and perverted proportions with an additional 13 years to go unchecked.
You do not want to know the extent of his harem and how many male students in the community are affected ( yes many of them married- who cannot and will not talk about it except to very, very close friends- and even then rarely). Some can only talk about it now, after leaving the FoF, and needed time and even help to heal. Wake up sweetheart – this is your life.
April 22, 2007 at 4:50 am
Dear Sheik,
I suspect that you are only publishing 1% of the letters that you receive in praise of the FoF. I hope that you will at least begin to re-balance your blog by publishing this.
——————————————
As an advanced member of the FoF i must redress the balance that the weaker people who use your site have created.
The problem with so MANY small thinkers who write to you is that quite simply, they do NOT understand the FACT that Robert IS AN ANGEL and therefore far removed from the silly ideas of ‘good’/'bad”right’/'wrong’ ‘truth’/'lie.’
Robert simply can do no wrong. It was many years ago that Robert ‘opened’ me, both physically and spiritually. YES, he has enabled me to build my soul and truly appreciate how dead are the poor lost souls around me. How the rest of the world outside The Fellowship is a nightmare full of dreaming people living in their imagination.
If Robert called me to turn myself inside out and follow him into the fiery furnace I would gladly follow, knowing that he could save me.
SO MUCH complaining about sexual encounters! I was happy to share my body with Robert. Fourteen years ago he gave me his higher love, causing me to awaken with his beautiful conscious energy, just as I now share myself with the many women who are grateful for my spiritual fluid, my divine energy to help them awaken, divinity created by Roberts own divine energy still inside me. His golden fuel for eternity inside my soul.
Robert guides us to live with delightful presence. How can all those life people complain? They know NOTHING!
YES Robert shows us sexual and other excess but, ‘THE ROAD OF EXCESS LEADS TO THE PALACE OF WISDOM!’ An angel CANNOT spread disease.
Every day as I cycle to work, in and out of the zombies, past all those dead faces and eyes living in their imagination, 99.9% of the population just bags of bones that jostle around this ant hill of London, soulless people as in all the other cities around the globe, I give thanks! I sing a hymn of light for the Crouch End Teaching House and all the other Teaching Houses that ROBERT has founded around the globe.
Praise the Gods! Thank God for Robert!
If you care enough to repent your negativity, then email me and i will reply, once only, to help you back onto the true path, the path that leads to salvation of the soul,away from the bag of bones that is you! You have your chance, be strong!
highercourbet@yahoo.co.uk
April 22, 2007 at 4:53 am
To: Howard Carter
Well, you have confirmed my suspicions about you:
I believe you are planted by the FOF board to keep up a debate with Bloggers. They were hoping that the debating would be a distraction from bringing in information that sheds light on RB and the lie that exists today called the FOF. Well, sorry it is not working – because it is coming in, in bucket loads (past and present).
If you are on your own (which I really doubt), are you really that stupid? What hole have you had your head buried in?
April 22, 2007 at 5:17 am
To whoever it is responding by the name of Howard Carter in 7/69:
Joel F. is obviously describing you as “the entity calling itself Howard Carter” because there’s more than a little doubt that you exist as a single individual by that name. One theory is that you are a small group of people within the Fellowship who are working hard to counter the information being released in this open discussion.
Even if that theory isn’t true, you are still someone within the Fellowship who is working hard to counter the information being released in this open discussion.
But if the theory IS true, the next question is, “Why pretend?”
Maybe I missed it, or maybe your info is unlisted, but that last I checked the FOF list, there’s no one there by “your” name. Seems rather odd.
April 22, 2007 at 5:44 am
Sandra:
So good to read your post. For all the complicity we all shared in perpetuating the Fellowship, you were a real help to many — certainly, to me. Sounds like you’ve gone on to much better spaces.
Paul A.
April 22, 2007 at 6:07 am
Confused, I must apologize for my snarling post. My frustration was misplaced. Yes, you’ve been duped, but it’s not your fault. We’ve all been there. Now, you have to figure out the truth for yourself. We’re here to help.
April 22, 2007 at 6:18 am
Hello, my name is butterfly and I am a FOF member.
Many of my years in the school were very rewarding. some of the most memorable experiences were with other students, some of whom I found to be amazing people.The Sunday morning meetings at Apollo D’Oro, held outside when the winter passed, were some of the best moments.Listening to Jonathon Parks describe the last movie he had seen and draw parallels with some work idea and to Harry Chrisakis who always said something wise and worthwhile. The blue sky, the birds, sitting under the trees. It was springtime for Robert and FoFland.
There was and are a lot of intelligent people and some could speak eloquently, delivering great points. At the Wednesday night meetings there would always be some good angles. I remember Peter Ingle tell us how his hangers in his closet were all’facing’ the same way, but he could also say things that made great sense.
Then onto Apollo D’Oro. And dinner too. And then home.
These were the times I could best be at peace and self remember. But things changed, for reasons I came to accept, as I accepted many other things.I did not like change but I understood it was good for my development.
There used to be an on-line FOF list/discussion that helped, amongst other things, students in outlaying centres stay connected. It was closed down after a student told Robert of a perceived slight. The freedom to discuss together publicly, were taken away.
This blog gives us that freedom again. Freedom to see what I accepted in the past, from a different perspective. Perhaps Robert did not take away the meetings for my own best development, but just for more money. This blog is giving me the freedom to see how I was comfortably numb.
I am awakening in other ways. Some students are still ignoring Roberts behaviour arguing that it does not affect them personally, and that they can still get the benefits of the system. Self Remembering at any cost.
We believe in 9 lifetimes but make no mention of Karma. Are we not damning the very souls we are trying to make eternal. Conscience is ignored, its Christian feminine dominance. But is not Christ one of the 44, Buddha too? Is everything they said to be ignored.
I can see us now as a school of selfishness, emulating our teacher.
Honour seems like an old fashioned word, but with memories and no honour, how will we be judged?
April 22, 2007 at 6:20 am
Strange…
Howard Carter was not asking for proof, but somehow the “truth” (and we are left to wonder if this is the WHOLE TRUTH and NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH–I doubt it!) must be forced down his throat by some of the more adamant posters here.
I wonder why? What causes this infatuation with the gory details? Never been in an orgie perhaps? Too bad for you! They sure CAN be fun, (mind you, I personally would not want to be at the scenes described here, but, different strokes for different folks!).
If you have, you know that unless something really sick happens, you CAN WALK AWAY at any time!
Sex is a situation where it really takes two (or more!) to tango!!! Oh, and besides the Viagra pills, how much does it cost to throw these parties together? So what exactly is the problem here? Our teacher has an appetite? Good for him! What about you? Do you just masturbate a lot by reading this blog? Get real and mind your own bussiness! You are probably too afraid to have an orgie!
Oh yes, I forgot why i was writing, some of you want all of us to be very very upset about what is going on behind the big bad closed doors at the Academy. sorry! I cannot get riled up about it. And if we all must leave the FOF because of this, you really got me puzzled.
Has it occurred to anyone on this blog that most decent, “normal,” balanced folks in the FOF will never be part of the “depraved sex scenes” that are written about? Or perhaps they have their own, and they are not written about! Why not? Come to think of it, none of the actual participants are stating that they have…probably too busy recovering from last night’s heroic work efforts!
That only people who apparently need this “experience” have always been and always will be the ones going through this, the ones too impressed or cowardly to say “no” to the psychopath, sex addict teacher–but the truth is that contrary to the public poll on this blog, these are not kids!
Even Kostja was happily walking away from it and lived to tell about it! Good for you Kid!
And even Inner Jewels admitted to having a perverted thought now and again! I’d rather read about that!
I also heard a lot about the local hetero super active swinging scene-this sounds a lot more interesting! Can we get more details about this?
So RB is a psychopath sex addict? Good for him! At least he is true to himself! He does something about it and seems to have no trouble!
So why is it so upsetting to read about Robert’s exploits? perhaps if you wish your teacher to only read the Philokalia! We all know that can be a little dry!
Should all of this cause one to leave the school? probably not. Why should we?
Let the sleazeballs (if they are in fact sleazeballs) go through their sleaze (some of them certainly look the part!–no names here but you know who you are!)–and if it pays for their fancy clothes and position of bringing RB’s pillow, and being able to sell a few vouchers for sex with the more liberally minded girls, so be it–more power to them!
(for all of you gone for all these years, the girls here have learned a few things too!–the universe is not standing still!–wouldn’t you rather be around now than in the old days when any sex was banned? Bet you are Ames, Joel, Bruce and all you other old farts!)
And should anyone complain about the STDs? If you are so stupid to go through this shit unprotected, with all these sleazeballs all half a dozen together, you are simply asking for trouble! Who said you have to be naive to be on the Fourth Way? Has no one ever heard of herpes? LOL!
Also, even more, if it is really a high experience for some of them so much more the better! Keep going! If this is love, you WILL get more!
But in short, where is the beef in all of this? I just don’t see it. Call me stupid, call me dumb! Hey, just dont call me late for dinner at the Academy!
And don’t tell me to “wake up, Dear”–I am really trying!
LOL
April 22, 2007 at 7:18 am
Thank you to Somebody 6/#395 for the catch. Looks like many missed it so here it is again.
GIRARD HAVEN IS HOWARD CARTER
See Clara Elena’s post 6/#362 which has many specific references to Girard. Note also how Howie’s “friendly-FOFer-official-shill” style changed to “standard-Girard-speak” in just a few posts after the all the attacks in set 5 and early 6? Below are excerpts from Elena’s comment to HC/Girard from #362. There are many more references in her original post which is worth re-reading to see for yourself.
From Elena…
Why haven’t you reached consciousness then after not twenty but thirty three years that you’ve been living in it?
Here you keep trying to reinforce the same old stereotyped ideas into the few followers that may still be reading the blog …and …you, Robert’s faithful student. You, Howard Carter, who had to give up talking like a “Friend” because the “friend’s” personality and arguments were so easily toppled over …
Again, you’re only trying to reinforce the old mind structures with which you’ve held the Fellowship together at everybody else’s cost and sadly, even yours.
You misunderstood it wildly, my love. …and your discourse is meant to instill a particular kind of thinking in the students so that they continue to support Robert and the school and not decide for themselves wether what they are seeing is really worth supporting. They want to believe in you but you cannot be believed any more.
…Has it come back with vengeance against you and crippled you? Has, trying to recover not demanded to let it be? Are you trying to convince us or yourself in all your postings that it was worth it? …
Although only a few students come to your dinners, the rest of them trust that you’ll give them legitimacy although they can’t really bare you or your choices and when able, make fun of your repetitions. They know the double morality and standards that you have stood for in your role
After instilling all the thoughts students can have to feel comfortable where they are, as you have done for the past thirty three years, you also instill the thought that they are thinking for themselves, feeling for themselves and give them the confidence that they are following the school curriculum and will sooner or later graduate.
…or is it just that you are a “a friend” too? The “friend” “Howard Carter”: The Girard haven role, and the middle class honest student programming role? The RTs that you wish to address? You’re coming more together in your recent postings dear, only together in the fatal way.
I guess it is not tragic enough for most of your and the Fellowship supporters that the ear is deaf, an eye doesn’t see, half of the body doesn’t move or can stand erect and they’ll continue to support the unnecessary suffering until they themselves start falling apart, which by far they are.
April 22, 2007 at 7:19 am
Hey, I agree with Lust for Life (#71) with his message to Kiran: “Don’t you realize we are unlikely to fall for that line again! I was right – you ARE hoping to start up a new ’school’! Watch out for the tendency to manipulate ..” etc.
My bet is on Kiran, he sure has a lot nicer letters written about him than RB!
Kiran even got his website www,beingpresent.net to mirror teh FOF www,beingpresent.org–FUNNY!!!
Wish only we could see what everyone is up to a year or two in the future! But that machine has yet to be invented!
Keep LOL
April 22, 2007 at 9:24 am
First I would like to say that I have been deeply moved emotionally by many of the posts. I feel a great compassion and respect for those people who have had the great courage to move away from fear of retaliation and post their true feelings, observations and experiences. It takes great courage to openly talk about abuse. As a therapist, I know this from direct experience. There are also many who post in response to those who have been hurt by saying something like, “quit being a victim. You’re responsible for your own thoughts, feelings and actions!” To these people I would say, you obviously have no experience being a spiritual teacher and understanding the responsibilities that go along with it.
You obviously have never been formally trained by other spiritual teachers in a monastic setting and understood how to work with students. Many people do not understand the profound issues around transference i.e. transferring the unmet needs of childhood, such as those we never got fulfilled from mother and father onto the spiritual teacher. This is always a huge reality, always. It is unconsciously done by all of us of course. Anyone that argues this point, I would challenge that they have never acted as a spiritual teacher, and challenge their experience to speak on such subjects.
When students come to study with a spiritual teacher, there is always transference. It is different for everyone, of course. The teacher, who does not know what they are doing, does not know how to respect and work with the transference of the student, as Robert Burton clearly shows by example.
I see several themes in these posts:
1) People who have had their trust, misused and abused.
I notice many people discussing the work on the ego without really mentioning the need to surrender to Allah rather than a teacher.
2) People who feel taken advantage of financially, spiritually, ethically and morally.
3) People who try to give hope and help to others
4) Posts from the FOF written to tow the official line in some form
5) Arguments about what enlightenment means.
6) Discussions around the interpretation of the fourth way system. And what it really means.
7) I notice many people practicing or discussing self-remembering but no discussions on the importance of meditation.
9) People who drop into the post not to discuss their own personal spiritual experiences and how it relates to the experiences of others on the post, but rather, they drop in as a sort of arrogant observer, being sarcastic and making light of others situations. As though they are sitting in Hightower, looking down on others and saying, “How could you have been so stupid?”
10) Numerous reports about the sexual abuses done by the teacher
11) People who claim that even though the teacher might be deluded and have his own problems. They still enjoy the friendships of others who are spiritually minded and living in a community, but they believe they can continue to do the fourth way work on their own with the teaching. Even though they fail to realize that a teaching or Baraka is always influenced by the inner life of the teacher.
Here I will cite a quote by Merlin the magician to King Arthur, something that my spiritual guide told me before putting me on the path to teach. Merlin said, “You in the land are one. As you do well so the land shall do well with you. If you fail, the land will fail with you.” This is also restated in a sense in the Bible, in the book of Revelation. “When it says you shall know them by their fruits.”
Thus another theme I see in these posts, which I see as very positive. Are people who are beginning to question their verification, after all this time in the school. What have I realized? Have I awakened have I created the higher bodies? These are very important questions to ask oneself. As the Buddha stated, there is not much time, one lifetime is very short. So we must use that time, very wisely and very efficiently to work on ourselves. To have spent 10 to 20 years within a teaching and then to reflect on one’s insights is very wise. To ask oneself. Have I in fact been able to attain some of those things that the teaching claimed it could lead me to?
Before I go further, I would like to ask people to read this post of mine in a different way. The disadvantage of reading writing on the Internet is that there is no emotional tone within it. In other words, the reader always projects the emotional tone into the writing of a letter based upon their own views of what is the truth. So you may read this letter, and hear an arrogant tone or yelling tone or someone may hear a calm soothing tone. heheh. I understand I have tended to do this myself on many occasions with letters. So I would ask please that you might assume the calm soothing tone, the compassionate tone, because I have truly been moved emotionally by what people have written on these posts. And I wish and pray very deeply that all the people here are able to find a path back to their hearts. Maybe some already have. I clearly cannot speak for everyone but myself.
I would like to use the rest of this post, however, to express openly my own spiritual experiences, and I will do so in a way that will be extremely open and no doubt controversial to some of you. I in no way am attempting to proselytize or put myself in a position to lead others. I’m only going to relate my own experiences in my own knowledge. As a possible guide for others to reflect upon. To reflect upon other possibilities.
20 years ago I attended the first three meetings of the fellowship of friends, though I was at that time also studying with another teacher, who I later verified was in fact, using fourth way terminology, a man number five. This meaning that he had created what the alchemists called the To Soma Heliokon or the Solar Bodies. What the Kabbalists call the Mercabah. He had the astral mental and causal bodies.
At the time I had went to the fellowship of the friends. I did not have any verification of this within him yet. So I was still searching within many schools, and also investigated other Gurdjieff type schools. I had come away from being a Zen Buddhist monk for three years.
At the end of the third meeting with the FOF, I asked some of the members if they knew what the astral body was. I asked them if they had been taught how to create the higher bodies? For I had already been taught this and for no fee I might add. In fact I have always been taught for free. As the truth does not belong to anyone and it was Jesus who turned over the money changers tables in the temple and said do not make the house of GOD into a market.
When the members told me that they were paying 10% of their earnings and yet did not even know what the action of the astral body was i.e. They were not even learning how to leave the body consciously at night, in order to begin to activate the astral vehicle, I realized then that this was an incomplete teaching, and that there was something wrong with the founder. As I had investigated other teachers, schools and asked various direct questions, I have realized that very few fourth way teachers indeed have created the astral mental or causal bodies. In fact, I have met none to this day. Further on in this post I will discuss how one can verify whether or not a teacher has such bodies.
At the FOF meeting, I was also very much put off by the fact that they had to pay so much money for truth that I had received so often for free. I have nearly traveled around the world studying investigating various spiritual teachers, and while at times I have freely donated money called Dana in Buddhism, I was never told by a teacher that I had to pay or else I would not receive a teaching. This I believe is a form of spiritual extortion. I want to emphasize that I never paid any money. And yet I learned how to create the higher bodies and have done so. I am, what by fourth way definition would be called a man number five, though in the school I belong to this is not a big deal. It does not put me in a higher position above other people. In fact, to go higher on the ray of creation means to become simpler, more of a servant and less important to others. In our school, being a man number five or woman, number five for that matter just makes you feel more normal. More in touch with your own GOD and the heart. It doesn’t entitle you to special treatment by others. It is usually something that is not publicly discussed however, as one needs to keep one’s own spiritual development between their body and their God. Im sure just saying this will upset some people and its understandableas many people have a lot of dreams and intellectual theories about what it means to have the soul. I only discuss it openly here, in order to let others know that it is possible to do such work without paying extraordinary amounts of money or submitting to the sexual whims of a diluted teacher. It is also something that anyone can do, provided you’re willing to follow certain ethics, which are not followed by Robert Burton.
I would like to make some suggestions to people who are searching, who are suffering, who are looking for a change or more simply looking for how to figure out the truth within themselves regarding whether or not they should leave the FOF.
Here are some of the things I have been taught about the path.
First, I was taught the importance of verification. It is a tricky business, working on the ego, and one thing that I have come to understand as a therapist working with many people who have been damaged by spiritual work. Is that one must begin the path with a fairly healthy or normal working ego structure before they can begin to take the ego apart and dissolve it.
Verification to me is based upon a few things. 1st is what the person teaches consistent with what the ancient masters taught about the path? For example, The Bible, Koran, Mahabharata and other Vedas and sutras tell us that adultery and certainly to cause others to commit adultery is a great sin. I would assume that since Mr. Burton ignores what Jesus and other great Masters have said regarding numerous teachings on fidelity and continence, that he is a false prophet especially since he considers himself a man 7.3, just under Jesus who is a man level 8.
I was taught that it is important to have a good foundation regarding the understanding of the spiritual path. Based on reading the ancient scriptures, in other words, I was told to read all the foundational scriptures of the ancient religions to be aware of the path as described by the ancient masters. Reading gurus who interpret for us the scriptures is not a substitute for this. The Bible, Mahabharata, Ramayana, Koran, Egyptian book of the dead, the sutras of the Shakyamuni Buddha, and to study the writings of various Sufi masters and Buddhist masters. One must have a global view of the path of self realization and avoid reading New Age teachings whenever possible. I want to talk specifically here about two Buddhist scriptures.
First, the Vishuddhi magga.(In English: the Path of Purification.)
This is a 2000 year old outline of almost every possible state of consciousness that a meditator can encounter on the path. One of these sections is called; Purification by knowledge and vision of what is and what is not the path. Chapter 8 tells us about investigating the consciousness of others, which I will now explain how to do.
1st one must enter samadhi in meditation. Samadhi is of course the stillness and silence of the mind. Though there are 8 levels of this described by the Buddha as the Jhanas, arriving at any one of them will do. Arriving at a place where there is no thought and you are relaxed. Second, just focus on feeling in your heart your love for your Being, your love for your GOD. This cannot be done without a surrender to your GOD. After a while place a prayer into that silence not so much using words but the impulse or desire of your heart to find the answer of the question that you seek. i.e. What is Robert Burton? or should I leave the FOF? Next, wait patiently in the silence for the answer to arrive without expectations or ruminations. Just have faith in your own heart, in your own GOD and the answer will arrive. Provided you do not project thoughts into that silence. You will see the truth here, the truth relative to your karma and your silence. Follow it.
Another level of verification is learning how to leave the body consciously and praying and asking your inner GOD to show you, the essence, what is the truth of Robert Burton. Many teachers teach astral travel and it can be done even without the full creation of the astral body. The main point here is
no matter how asleep all of us may be at various levels, trapped within various levels of karma, there is a part of God that lives in the heart of everyone. Even the worst murderer. Everyone can tap into that, if you have faith in a quiet mind. Trust your heart, which is also the same as trusting your being, trusting God in the silence. Listen to the voice of the silence. I believe many who post on this website already understand what I’m talking about.
If one has a mental body created or a causal body created, which some of us have created in a previous life, you may be able to find a teacher who can show you how to reactivate those bodies. This involves eliminating a certain amount of ego. If you can reactivate your mental body you can also investigate the consciousness of Mr. Burton in the mental plane. Here you will truly see the reality of this man, who is a black magician.
I was always taught that the one we must surrender to on the path is our own inner god and divine mother not a human being no matter what level of their being. We must find the one who is within us.
I realize my post is quite long and I apologize. I’m almost done. The last thing I would like to address is sexuality on the spiritual path.
There is no stab that hurts more than the one of spiritual cruelty. Thus, the poor souls who long for their superlative perfection and for their spiritual Self-ennoblement suffer the unutterable on their journey, when they search for the Truth inside all of those famous spiritualistic schools.
Hence, there is no stab that hurts more than the spiritual stab. Ethics and morals given to us by the ancient masters were meant to help us to reduce our karma and become more receptive to the Being.
My friends, have you never read Leviticus? Where it says we should not expel the sexual energy.
In the 6 yogas of Naropa he is very clear that the loss of the sexual energy through orgasm harms all spiritual practice. The Dalai Lama, Muhammad, Buddha and others have talked to us about the importance of the conservation of sexual energy why? Because you cannot create the higher bodies without it. I know this as a fact because I have lived it. I lived in spiritual communities as a monk and expelled energy and attained samadhi but never created the higher bodies.
Have you ever noticed that there are no translations of higher Buddhist Tantras available? When I was in India studying with one of the Dzogchen Lamas and asked him why this was, he told me, “Look what you in the west have done to Tantra. You have degenerated it into something ridiculous.”
If you feel that the view and practice of Dzogchen (Tantrism) is quite simple, it is a sign that you have not understood it properly. It would be quite ironic if the highest of the nine vehicles, the Great Perfection, were the most simple. That would be very ironic indeed. – The Fourteenth Dalai Lama
The sexual energy is the philosophical mercury of the alchemists. It is the energy needed to create the material prima and make the philosophical stone. The Diamond soul. Regarding homosexuality. Have you not read what the ancient scriptures say about it? Read Corinthians 6:9-10
No homosexual can create the higher bodies because only a married male and female yogini in a monogamous relationship can do so. Let me explain why it is impossible. Chi is electricity is the hydrogen’s or Prana. It’s all the same thing. You can not run a current of electricity without the positive, negative and neutral forces. You cannot run a current with a + and +. Therefore it is against nature. You need the Yin and the Yang together to create the higher bodies. Have you never looked at the plates of medieval alchemy?
This is aside from the fact that no one can claim to be working on the ego without dealing with the issue around Lust. Has no one who defends Robert Burton ever read the scriptures on Lust? I notice you use the various scriptures on the website to promote self-remembering but self remembering alone will never create the body kasjdan. Or will one of you come forth and admit that you have created it and have verified it without Robert Burton? I’ve noticed in posts reports of the teacher always swallowing all sperm. Do you not know that the semen is a form of consciousness and that he is using them to awaken himself negatively? The white magician seeks to dissolve his I’s. Each I is like a bottle that traps a small fragment of consciousness. When the bottle is broken through comprehension, the consciousness returns bit by bit to the essence. Black magicians awaken the consciousness that is trapped within the I’s. Visualize little light bulbs. They do it through the practices of Black Tantra which involves the expulsion of sexual energy. This I have verified as my wife is a former member of the Satanic church and was a student of Anton LaVey. As well from studying with the shamans of the Amazon in Columbia.
As someone in a previous post said, not one person in 30 years has been said to reach a similar level to the teacher. DO you really think that the Masters of the internal worlds are so uncompassionate to all the rest of us as to only speak with Robert Burton? I feel sad for Burton, for the karma that he is incurring is mighty indeed. Karma, which is the law of cause and effect means that no matter how asleep you are the law always returns what you give. Do you really think the Lords of karma will only help those who come to the FOF? My consciousness having had the grace to experience the Masters of C influence as you call it, can tell you, There is more compassion, patience and help offered to other teachers and other schools. Finding the whole and complete is hard yes. But it is not impossible and it certainly is not exclusive to rich people. The truth belongs to everyone.
All my information is accurate and real. I can be contacted for any questions or requests for help with anything. I will do very best to help anyone who asks without asking any payment in return. Everything I give I give freely. respiau@comcast.net
May all who read this find peace and the capacity to follow their heart instead of their mind upon the path.
April 22, 2007 at 10:33 am
6/407 Joe Average
Very interesting to read that letter of the Ex-Student of Adi Da.
I asked myself, what did the members say, and how did the story go on with Adi Da and checked on the net. Well, the group has still 2000 members, the leader, a god like avatar is still living on his Fiji Island. He now is educating his student with fine art, for the good of humanity. The art he produces himself is not even bad, lots of naked female bodies on it of course. There are many rather professionally made videos from the group on youtube. People talking about how great it is to be near this godlike man …
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-7oa1itUSU
Compare with
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glKW3GguRB4
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I suspect that the FOF will also continue, whatever stories, photos of films appear on the net. It is said to run a dictatorship one needs at least 5% hardliners to support a suppressive system. I am sure there are enough of them out there. So do not wait for it to end or expect it to fall. Still I see the responsibility and the need to make inside information available.
Many years ago I came across a ‚Fourth Way’ group mainly situated in Sweden. It turned out it was started by an ex-student of the FOF, who had left in the seventies. It was a copy of the FOF. I think it was called Linbu. And here comes the interesting part. It worked for many years — at least as a “conscious school” for the members. They used the same ideas as the FOF, body types, deck of cards, C-influence and the teacher gave himself a number. Their shops, dealing with semi-precious stones were called Arcena (the Arena of C-Influence). Apparently the members had no idea about the origin of the ideas and the form of the school (Correct me if I am wrong). I am sure they verified C-Influence within there frame of thought and believed they are part of a conscious school. Maybe somebody knows, what happened to them.
Recently another Ex-Student started a new “conscious school”, something called “The academy of European art”. I would not be surprised if people there also deeply verify that they are in a “conscious school”.
There is a place for this kind of game and there is something in us wanting to play it. There are many self declared Avatars, realized persons, conscious beings or whatever out there. All their members ready to defend their teachers and special teachings at any price if contradictions appear.
I was very surprised reading the Christian mystic Theresa from Avila’s book “The inner castle”. How precise she described these group dynamics and aspects of feeling special 450 years ago was amazing.
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6/242 Mr SERRE Hugues
… it was an affirmation in me that I would leave only for another teaching worth more than this one, but not for nothing.
Thanks for your honest open posting. I think many of us have or had that affirmation. To value something more takes time and courage if everybody around you calls it “just B-Influence” and your own experiences, thoughts and feelings “just I’s”.
In the end we all have to rely on ourselves .
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6/384 You-me-us-they
Thanks for your kind apologies. I think the word donation triggered a wound in many person and lead to a little misunderstanding.
April 22, 2007 at 10:48 am
Dear Innernaut and Jules,
I don’t see awareness as something separate from bodies or functions. I guess we get entangled in words, and misunderstand each other (what else is new).
When it was pointed to me, it sounded somehow like a process of “separation” of what is permanent and unchanging in us from what is (obviously) changing all the time. It was an inquiry, a research, so to speak. The question was: who am I? Logical answer: probably something that is always there, something non-disappearing, non-changing – that should be my true nature, I guess… Because if it disappears – then I have to disappear too, right? But I exist and don’t disappear… So I looked for something that doesn’t disappear or change, something permanent in this mixed bag of things called me. There is nothing wrong with what is impermanent or changing in us, it’s all part of our nature, really. But in order to answer this question: Who am I? there was an attempt to find something permanent within us, if there was such a thing.
Our bodies, although are totally real, however are not constant. They renew most of their cells in period from 5 days to 16 years (except for brain cells). So in a way, 16 years ago you were a pretty much completely different body! (No wonder you looked younger.) And if you look at the pictures when you were a kid it’s even more obvious that this body on the picture and this body now – are very different bodies. So how can you place your identity in something that contains billions of dying and regenerating cells, something that pretty much replaces itself each 16 years? Again, it’s just a way to look at it, nothing wrong with the body – it’s part of our nature too – a beautiful, ever-changing part.
So are the thoughts and emotions – all are fine, all are in a way part of who we are. They are just non-permanent, ever-changing, that’s it. So if you place your identity in this particular thought – then who are you when the thought is gone?
Whatever is “real you” , or our essential quality, has to be there always, logically speaking.
The only “thing” that seem to be kind of unchanging – is this awareness or sense of living, aliveness. The same awareness was there when we were small kids, and it’s here now when we grew up. It’s there when we think, when we experience emotions, when we age, get sick, exercise or get fat. It seem to be the only “thing” that doesn’t ever change or go away. We don’t usually notice or acknowledge it because it’s so common, and subtle and so “with us” all the time. Could it be just a brain activity of some kind as you suggest? I really don’t know. I think scientists are not sure either at this point. But it is (whatever it is) the only unchanging principle I found so far about myself, it’s this alive awareness, and the rest moves, comes and goes, morphs and changes. I see this awareness in others, in everyone around, manifesting beautifully through their bodies, thoughts etc.
May be that’s why it was called “our true nature”, but who cares really what’s it’s called? Call it what you want: “life within you”, “the beloved”, “unconditional love”, call it “unchanging universal principle”… It was called all these names before, while it’s really nameless.
As Rita mentioned, this realization somehow brings freedom from questions and needs, something inside truly relaxes, as if a tight spring has been released, and existence become rich, engaging and deeply satisfying. Things are not taken personally in the way it was before.
When we talk about it – it immediately becomes intellectual, but so are words… However, for some people simple words did the trick and triggered a shift in perception. What’s nice is that wherever these words came from: advaita, non-dualism or whatever – they played their role and are not needed anymore.
Just like Rita, I don’t know much about advaita, didn’t study it (and are not planning to), and don’t follow it as a tradition. No interest, no need. I just live my life, with much enjoyment.
Someone here asked what happens in some extreme painful conditions. Although I only had moderate pains so far, I can say that simply pain happens, and there is awareness of the pain. It is not pleasant, and naturally there is an impulse to relieve pain, but somehow it is not “my” pain anymore, mind is not claiming ownership of it and starts complaining, blaming or whining about it like it did before in similar circumstances. It’s just seen for what it is and dealt with naturally, according to the common sense. Once it’s gone it’s quickly forgotten and other things that are unfolding are being experienced.
BTW, Jules – we are often getting together in NYC or close to it for a dinner. May be we can meet sometime if you would be interested. There is usually 6-8 of us, ages 29-40s and we like to have fun, love music, and nice conversations. We are not “advaita people”, just regular (nice) guys.
malaec@yahoo.com
April 22, 2007 at 12:11 pm
I think it may have been Gurdjieff who said something to the effect that … we only disagree to the extent that we do not understand each other.. if we understood each other we could not then disagree…
There is only one truth.
Make your aim to approach this truth, and from there, look again.
There is a time to choose sides, to vent, attack, defend, cherish, hold, drop. And a time to be beyond conflict.
And all this in the name of the Absolute?
Your choice.
Your time.
Always new.
April 22, 2007 at 12:17 pm
Fed Up #70:
I wonder why do you worry so much about donations to Sheik? I bet you haven’t even paid yet, but still worry about how he’s gonna use his money. Would you like a written agreement that Sheik would only spend money on charities?
You said: ‘Nobody here could possibly agree that the money collected by donations is for the sheik to do what he chooses? right?’
HA-HA!!! No comment here.
April 22, 2007 at 12:43 pm
dear elena
you are a star, a beautiful bright shining star that is a sincere and wholesome guide to others
long may you see the naked truth.
April 22, 2007 at 1:27 pm
I understand that the FOF does work for some people. So, let’s be supportive.
The same way I benefited, somehow undeniably, from my 17 year in the FOF
(Still “in” by the way but almost “in spite” of myself if you can follow what I mean),
the new turn my path seems to be showing is based on that, just like a land I can walk on. Some lovely comments have been made reflecting that possiblity.
Also, I understand it is necessary to express what we think “need to be said” at a given moment, meaning to express doubts and questions.
Could we unite the points of view with the simple trust the reader finds his/her way through all this, a way made of moments of inspiration, realisation and errors?
Demonizing, turning FOF in ridicule (too easy really!) or celebrating it like a devotee (too easy really!) would turn this discussion into mere entertainement.
Freedom is freedom for the FOF to exist and
Anti-cult campains are nothing but another form of inquisition… In that sense we have to defend the possiblity for the FOF to exist, maintaining valuation for our personal opinions.
On a large scale, we do not want to see a lack of choice of beliefs extablishing itself with the deseapperance of so called “minor religions”, do we ?
This blog is playing its role, a role we could not even imagine when it started, aprecious role actually. We have to keep it free from fanatism, pro or anti.
As other said: cool down, relax, keep focussing to the point and, I would add, enjoy your freedom of speach!
April 22, 2007 at 1:42 pm
One thing that we haven’t touched upon yet is the game aspect of this discussion.
HigherM (92) and NudaVeritas (106) come from the keyboard of the same author, yet the voices tell a different story.
We can have a normal, sane discussion for a week, then all in one day come new (slightly surreal) voices of LoL, Robert and the above-mentioned. Strange.
First one to develop a Dissociative identity disorder (split personality) is the winner.
April 22, 2007 at 4:16 pm
This risky behavior on the part of the harem concerns me. I sincerely hope that the participants of these ’so-called’ orgies are taking precautions. The easiest way to catch HIV-AIDS is through anal intercourse. I wouldn’t worry so much about the herpes, chlamydia, and a wide range of virulent bugs that come with the exploration into the anal area.
April 22, 2007 at 4:30 pm
O dear… HigherM. If this is not a fake, then you are someone who I know (various clues in your message made me think so).
What happened to you? You, so reasonable, sane, reserved, kind? Or was it always this bad and I just never saw this side of you? You sound like a evengelist, a preacher, a fanatic, almost a madman. In spirit of your message, I pray that your heart will open to beauty of life and you stop seeing dead bodies around, what a scary place you’re living in! Sending you my love.
April 22, 2007 at 5:05 pm
I’m having trouble with the idea of non-duality. I have not noticed any discussion of non-duality and the idea of death other than traveler’s noticing that it seems to be missing (7/60). It would help me to understand what this idea may be about if someone could explain this.
o How would one see the difference between the bits that may survive death and the bits that do not?
o Is there a conflict in agenda between these groups of bits?
o Is death something we have to prepare for or do we just cross that bridge when we get to it?
o And if we do need to prepare for death, how do we work with the bits that have no interest in this?
Thanks to anyone that can give me some insights into this.
April 22, 2007 at 6:11 pm
It looks like this blog is starting to appear from the outside to be a “meat rack” for up and coming “mini-gurus”. Pretty interesting.
I used to tell my two wonderful children if you can “see” someone’s “inner work” you can be 99 & 44/100% sure they’re full of shit. I still stand by that. My apologies to the .66% who are the exceptions, and that I’ve never met, and who are not on this blog.
I also believe that the more words one needs to explain their “way”, the less they know what the f*** they’re talking about.
Call me crazy (please).
Bruce
PS Hey Sandra, love to you.
April 22, 2007 at 6:42 pm
My name is Sydney Russell, I am a member of The Fellowship of Friends and I did not post message 26 on this discussion list. I would appreciate it if you would indicate that my name is being falsely used and remove the posting.
Regards,
S. Russell
Done. — ES
April 22, 2007 at 7:02 pm
Sheik, what happens when 2 or more people share the same computer? Often students (and ex-students) live together. My boyfriend and me share the same IP address, and when we had a bunch of visitors here they used my computer for reading the blog and possibly posting from this address under their names. So may be there are actually different people posting different things from the same place…
Just a thought.
April 22, 2007 at 7:11 pm
Hi Sydney. I wish I could reveal my identity to say a more personal hello, but I can’t at this time for social and professional reasons. I’m gratified to see that you, among so many, are thinking deeply about the ‘school’, the Teacher, the teaching and your relationship to it. Simply on the basis of your own soul-searching, it really shouldn’t be so surprising as you have said, that so many ‘opinions’ are being expressed about the FoF. Opinions aren’t bad things in themselves (unless you subscribe wholeheartedly and unquestioningly to the idea that opinions are ‘just I’s’ and so on that basis, are valueless). It is my opinion that well-considered opinions offer more of value to us than any alleged irrelevancy that may be ascribed to them, unless we choose to live alone, debrained, deboned, and dehumanised in the ethereal regions of the invisible inner spaces of ‘consciousness’. I suspect you agree in your own way, as evidenced by your willingness to read and respond to The Sheik’s blog with a word or two of your own. Thank you for sharing yourself.
I’d feel remiss on a blog, the majority of whose contributors have worked sincerely with Gurdjieff’s particular version of a gnostic dichotomy of consciousness and functions, if I didn’t give a plug and three cheers to the dignity and capacity of human beings. I feel it’s a good antidote to the over-emphasised ever-elusive chimerical monster called ‘states’ or ‘consciousness’, especially when pitted over and against devalued human ‘functions’. We possess the faculties of thought, speech, and language for very good reasons, I suspect, one at least being for the purpose of communication: we can share our thoughts and feelings with each other, we LEARN from our mutual exchanges, we are endowed with the capacity to create mutually beneficial relationships which spill over into creative activity outside our own limited spheres. The span of human history, the part accessible to us, which inspires or horrifies us, testifies to the intrinsic value of this highly interactive human exchange, and the necessity, dare I say, the preciousness, of this more than animal function (traditionally recognised as the chief characteristic that makes human beings in the Imago Dei, the image of God). That isn’t to say that all opinions are of the same value, of course. But I feel secure in not needing to belabour the point, since any reasonable person would understand this already.
Back to you, Sydney. You’re spot on. There are concrete problems with RB’s teaching. You rate his school as merely preparatory, your reason being that he doesn’t teach what to do with higher centres (I leave aside for now the question of whether or not higher centres really exist). You go on to say there are better models for a school than a hierarchy. I’d like to point out the connection you have made here (whether intentionally or inadvertently), between not being taught what to do with higher centres and your concern for the optimal model of the social organisation of a school. To repeat, you said that a rigid hierarchy is not the best model. I assume by the context, you probably mean not the best model for the expression of the consciousness that results from work on self-remembering. Your view that ‘goodness’ or ‘being nice’ is not intrinsic to consciousness or the exercise of it by a person possessing consciousness is key to the issue of social organisation.
The issue is not one of confusion or conflation of incompatible ideas, between consciousness and goodness, as you have stated, but one of entire disconnect between the two: between what is inner and the outer, visible and invisible, the soul of a person and its outward manifestation. Consciousness and goodness are not mutually exclusive ideas or the adulteration of a purer idea with a secondary or non-essential one. Again, you have intuited the real issue: what does one do with higher consciousness? especially relative to those who supposedly aren’t at the same level? This is the fundamental problem in the FoF, beginning at the apex of the hierarchy, in the Teacher and trickling outward and downward into the FoF social organisation.
I see your attempt to grapple with this issue. I think it’s too easy, however, to fall back upon the rote, taught response, resolving a dilemma too quickly for any learning to occur. You said: ‘There are those that follow a spiritual path that embraces goodness. R never taught this. In the early days of the FOF when I was a student R spoke of the neccessity [sic] of acting as a corporate executive and against “femine dominence” [sic] which might be construed as others [sic] ideas of what is good’. Why do you accept his teaching as truth? Because he said so? What if he had something different? And why must ‘others ideas of what is good’ be necessarily wrong or of no value? Why do most people agree that murder, rape, embezzlement, stealing, and manipulation and exploitation of the weak are evil? Is it because we know already in our heart of heart that they are, or do we see these things as not-so-nice, not-so-good, simply because we are stupid and just accept ‘others ideas’ of what is good or bad, which is what you seem to be implying? I think you should give yourself and other people more credit than that.
The necessity of goodness to spiritual growth or the growth of consciousness is a confusion of ideas? I would suggest that anyone who holds this view seriously can only have succumbed to a corrupted ideology or theology. I assume that from the few times I have met you Sydney, that you are far too intelligent and may I say, far too ‘nice’ to subscribe unthinkingly to this viewpoint. We have only to think about the self-serving kinds of people who stand to benefit from believing and acting according to this point of view. You will surely find them in the category of the reviled and for good reason: the narcissist, the criminal, the fascist dictator, the false prophet all see common morality as an obstacle to the fulfilment of their desires and plans. No one ever understands their true value, no one understands that what are perceived as injuries inflicted and crimes committed are not really injuries and crimes at all, but only seem so by the weak and the uncomprehending, by those who lack true vision.
Aside from the real harm perpetrated on other persons in the fostering of a so-called something ‘higher’, the scariest part is how the promulgator or follower of this brutal and mindless ideology is able to state quite succinctly and cold-bloodedly their insane truth as if it actually were true. The tragic irony is that these mindless antinomian a-moralizers believe themselves to be the strong and the pure since they brook no kind of ‘sentimentality’ from the feeble who still wear their hearts on their sleeves. I submit that these misguided ideologues could never have subscribed to such an absurd belief in the first place, certainly not persisted in it beyond an excusable period of ignorance and immaturity, if they actually possessed real strength of character, real consciousness, and real integrity or ‘unity’ of being.
All is not lost, however. It is still intact, somewhere inside and begs to be reintegrated, brought forth again into the light so that it can shine brightly in the soul where others can see it, plain, obvious, and simple. People can and do regain the ability to be human again, and are doing so, in droves. Being human does not rule out the possibility and reality of transcendent divinity. Don’t be frightened of losing anything real. After all, the lesson to be relearned is an elementary and a most challenging one. As a very highly regarded spiritual teacher once said: Love God with all your heart and all your soul and all your strength and all your mind and do unto others as you would have them do unto you. There is, I’m glad to say, having struggled 20 years to rediscover this truth, no esoteric hidden mystery about it, no secret special knowledge to be attained for very special people to impress themselves and each other with their spiritual prowess, no ‘My states are longer than your states’. There is living, and living with each other and acknowledging that we stand in relation to something far greater than ourselves.
A short word about external consideration, a term which outside of the Fourth Way has long been known under such names as kindness, thoughtfulness, graciousness, putting oneself in the other person’s shoes. I regret to have seen recently on this blog the original definition of external consideration transmogrified into ‘seeing beyond the machine.’ A most deplorable corruption and descent into meaninglessness. External consideration used to be the second element in a pairing of contrasting ideas: external consideration being the antidote to or result of working against the weakness of ‘internal consideration’. ‘Internal consideration’ or ‘inner considering’ meant that one was too identified with one’s own inner world, one’s own feelings, wants and needs, rendering one unable even to see and respond properly to the wants and needs of others. In other words, it was a recognition that we all tend to be damned conceited and selfish and that we ought to do something about it. We should stop flinching under every insult or imagined insult. We should learn to see beyond ourselves to the other person, not into the ether. Through external consideration, we can learn how properly to treat other people. External consideration until recently has not refer to the bogus unformulated concept of a mere looking out of or ‘going beyond the machine’.
I invite you all to move beyond the sterile concept of being ‘a machine’ and recommend as a healthy and vigorous alternative, that you try on ‘human being’ again for size. It may also be time for some of you to begin to deconstruct the Fourth Way itself, Gurdjieff, Ouspensky, Collin, the validity of the idea of a ‘conscious school’ and of ‘consciousness’ itself. I think a partial explanation of why so many students accept and defend the Teacher’s treatment of his students and their treatment of each other, is that a precedent for such behaviour exists in the tradition of the Fourth Way. We know Gurdjieff was not known for his ‘niceness’. He liked to step on people’s corns, didn’t he? and increasingly more often and arbitrarily. The laudable desire for and recognition of the need for discipline in a spiritual life, in any human life for that matter, can become overly externalised. The more externalised it is, the more one is convinced of the need for help from outside. At greater levels of external dependency, the religious force required to bring a sense of the sacred into one’s life in order to feel that one is spiritually advancing, can result, in persons of a particular disposition and level of emotional immaturity, to accept a less than perfect teacher who may use immoral or even brutal methods, whether the spiritually ‘educative’ attack be intellectual, emotional or physical. So, one hires a person to step on one’s corns to wake one up, or if one is truly desperate and dependent, one moves from allowing one’s corns to be stepped on, to allowing oneself to be sexually assaulted and one’s pockets emptied. In such a case, it seems to me that the genuine spiritual impulse for transcendence has been filtered through pathological and gullible elements in a person of relatively immature and undeveloped moral sensibility. This coincides with either a lack of ability to think clearly or the giving up of this ability over to the misguided authority in charge. A sadomasochistic aspect of the psyche wishes to subject itself to this particular type of discipline as well as to be the inflictor of it.
In closing, there may possibly come a time when one’s frame of reference will no longer be that of the Fourth Way, when for example, one does not back up one’s point of view based almost exclusively on the putative truth of what Ouspensky or Gurdjieff or Collin or Robert or Girard or anyone else associated with the Fourth Way tradition or the particular FoF experience have reputedly said or done, but from a lovely, new frame of reference. That takes time, isn’t necessarily easy, and is a process which unfolds individually.
I apologise for the length of this post.I just want to say that after having been away for many weeks, I came back to find that all was proceeding very well indeed and that there are some very strong, sane and loving voices speaking the truth that will set themselves and their and my friends free.
My very best wishes to you all.
April 22, 2007 at 7:35 pm
Joel, Helena and No person thank you for responding.
About religions. Is it Okay to make fun of other people religions (FOF, Islam, Christianity)? Does any one make sense of the Islam, which has a Billion (more of less) followers?
Joel: I am confused a bit
You said that you are not interested Infof (been there done that) but you have been posting here like crazy. Are you doing the blog in between cycling and kitchen so you can say about the blog been there done that too? If anything is important to you, you send us on a “link”; these links are they not like quoting conscious beings Infof? I really have hard time understanding where you are coming from or where you are going. What is your spiritual path? Thanks.
Helena: Did you want students in FOF to read the blog?
Kiran:
We were good friends once, I was at the “foundation party” for your house, helped to bury the “Self remembering” book in the ground.
Since you came back from Egypt I said hello to you few times but you ignored me each time, you walked by lifting up your head as if I did not exist. So I do not know where is your compassion. Your friends were trying to help you but you ignored them. So with Thomas Fenn, if you ignore people they will ignore you back.
Can you please tell me “why are you and Loreta wearing white cloths”? If you do not want to answer please say so. Thanks.
A word of advice for you is to stop preaching. We all know too much already.
Rita:
I was watching the photos from the east coast – John Wheeler. One of the photos was of you smiling. Now I know what was behind that smile.
Ames:
Can you please tell me in few words what did your conscience say before you left. What is your spiritual path now? Thanks.
Sydney:
Why do students in FOF have to pay Teaching payments and on top of that pay for meetings which teaches them about self-remembering?
April 22, 2007 at 7:36 pm
To The Sheik:
One possible explanation to the same use of a computer by different students is that different students in a teaching house are using the same computer. There are about forty students in the London center so it is not that surprising.
On Howard Carter,
If Howard Carter is one student, the relentlessness with which he is posting and the tone of consistent narrow affirmation of stereotype but very effective thinking within the Fellowship, can come from only very few students that have crystallized to see only one side of the coin and are unable to address other issues presented.
Most other students participating on the blog tend to break down in extremist positions by the pressure of the dissonance but Howard coolly continues to affirm his position under seemingly very reasonable thoughts.
Only students with a great deal of practice can do this and it would not be surprising if a few who trust each other and have acquired similar thought patterns and positions, were acting as Howard. The tactic being that since Mr. Haven asked students not to look at the blog, they need to show very few are actually participating. The different Howard Carters address different areas of opposition so that if one is subtle to breaking down the other one can pick up. It is possible that they are all sending their e-mail to one of them so that the Sheik does not observe different computers.
The sadness of the tactics is that there are many students in the Fellowship who have sincerely worked for years without having to crystallize, who have done as beautiful a job as they could and who are really what is precious about the Fellowship. The weakness in these students lies in that they are holding to their personal little self, their personal suffering and investment to not confront the overall effect of the Fellowship and its tremendous contradictions and the subtle but nevertheless huge damage that it is imposing on specific individuals in particular and all students in general.
The specific damages to individuals include
1) Those that have been sexually used and abused by Robert.
Of these, some have been too young to avoid the situation, others, much more dangerous and prevalent in the Fellowship are the men that indulge into having sex with a “conscious” being and at the same time cannot develop true marriages with a woman and jump from one marriage to the next.
These are men who held stereotype macho programming and Roberts second hand treatment of women reinforces their own patterns. It weakens their ability to develop their ‘manhood’ and allows them to simply discard their relationships protected by the overall attitude of “feminine dominance” that any lawful behaviour between a man and a woman might develop.
In general the men in the Fellowship have tended to become, either more “feminine” in the way they present themselves or extremely “macho” like, without either one being able to develop the female within himself or the male in their body. In other words, without being able to develop their emotional or sex centre, correctly.
2) The damage to the women who have beared with the phenomena of the Fellowship with a sincere trust on a ‘conscious’ being. Not one of them wanted to judge homosexuality and accepted it whole heartedly but still had to accept the effects of being put down as second class beings, who if, tried in anyway to challenge the situation were labelled to be under “feminine dominance”.
The main aim of Robert Burton’s teaching, the most prevalent idea current in the Fellowship of friends, is the freedom from “feminine dominance.” With it, ANY behaviour is condoned.
It is interesting that the positive side of freedom from feminine dominance is the possibility of a man going beyond the social realm into the family realm and holding both together while for a woman it means, going beyond the family realm into the social realm and holding both together. Traditionally this is the crux were both men and women cannot go beyond their programming. Men who cannot join both aspects tend to give up their families for a cause, be it money, power or other, and women, fall apart in their family dependence, without being able to extend themselves into the social realm. They passively accept what their husband struggles for.
These are some of the women in the Fellowship of Friends. Some of the others, are those who actively participate in the support of Robert and the form. They are male like. They have adopted macho attitudes and are willing to give up their marriages as much as the men, to support Robert’s cause: The divine, man number seven, and yet weak human being whose unlimited weaknesses they are willing to forgive so that they can express their “motherly” self. The “feminity” that they had to give up with their own private family.
These multiple failures are what is holding the Fellowship of friends together. Everybody’s integrity is filled with holes. Human holes and human struggles that are the struggle anywhere on the planet and that are not to be criminilized but need to be carefully examined and overcome especially those that have tended to become criminal as is the abuse of young men under a robe of legitimacy.
No matter how legitimate it looks, it is a very dangerous set up because it reinforces the weaknesses in men and women alike and is very far from making any one of them more conscious.
3) The damage to any one specific person who came to a school looking for consciousness and had to put up with years and years of transforming the contradictions at the cost of silencing his/her own consciousness, his/her right to think for himself, to be himself, granting only Robert the status of “being” by placing such a tremendous difference between his/her condition as man number one, two, three, vs man number seven. This has been consistently implanted by the few men that are allowed to speak in the fellowship, very slowly permeating the being of those who hear even if they don’t listen. The general acceptance of a dogma that subtly indoctrinates them and allows for the school, to turn into a cult.
4) The tremendous damage done to those men and women that have become so crystallized in their understanding, that can deal with no questioning and that are prooving themselves to be very dangerous fanatics.
It is not without great fear that I write what I write and the temptation to use a false name is great, but someone has to be willing to suffer the consequences of helping us heal from the great unnecessary suffering that the Fellowship of Friends and each individual inside of it has fallen into. If it were just real suffering, we would be correcting and continuing in short lapses of time while sincerely embracing each other and not falling apart.
I beg those of you that think this is a personal witch hunt against Robert or my husband Girard or anyone else in the Fellowship, deeply listen to what I am trying to say and move away from the witch hunt in which they themselves wish to indulge. They are not helping the objective, sincere and very compassionate questioning that The Fellowship of Friends requires.
If it has taken me much time to distill these understandings and have indulged in ridicule of the Fellowship, please forgive me and yet what is ridiculous about the Fellowship, doesn’t stop to be even if no one ridiculizes it. The inability of students to discern between real beauty and “made up” beauty is one of the damages the Fellowship has done on every one of us.
April 22, 2007 at 8:17 pm
Hello All,
Joe average #7/90, Here is the letter written about the St. Petersburg meeting that you mentioned. Please note it was originally posted on the fellowship discussion list. It is much longer even than this, but here are the pertinent sections.
“Dear friends, all who read this discussion list and
those who have received their personal copy.
Immediately, a lot of the things about our School
became clear and obvious.
Some are helpful and cannot not to be easily found
outside (that is, the students and their efforts) and
others proved their nature today at the meeting led by
Robert.
Many of Robert’s actions were earlier explained using
the idea of the machine being separate from
consciousness and therefore doing what it’s doing when
one is simply observing it.
However, who said it? Ouspensky said that even the
smallest change in one’s level of consciousness
changes the machine a lot. Its functions work better,
it’s usual I’s disappear and new ones appear. All the
ancient teachers say that an awaken being can be
recognized by his behavior. This behavior is based on
complete non-attachment, desireless and absolutely
equal attitude towards any object.
Today the meeting started with Robert’s words about
Influence C.
Then, a question:
“Robert, after watching recent videos I feel that our
School direction becomes more and more religious, as
you offer ideas which cannot be verified as clearly as
others. So, it involves belief, which is opposite to
the Fourth Way principles. For example, the idea of
Influence C working directly with us. What can I do
with it?”
It was asked in English and Robert made a mistake – he
asked it not to be translated into Russian and than
said that he didn’t like the question and wants to
skip it.
We moved further and he expressed his I’s about having
a little time and using our time wisely without asking
“wrong” questions. After a few of his angles a new
question asked:
“Robert, you pointed out that immortal Gods are
working with the School directly. Then, what is the
main reason that in these 30 years none of your
students became a fully awaken?”
This time Robert lost.
His calmness completely disappeared and he repeated
that the questions were wrong and not helpful. He was
touched. After a few words he said that he was that
one who was a fully awaken being. Then he added, that
the meeting at Apollo was also somehow strange and he
thoughts that it is a good idea to have a list of
questions before the meeting so he could skip wrong
questions.
Then we moved our usual way speaking about Plato and
Influence C. There were mostly Robert’s words and one
question about taking practical aims because awakening
seems to be too far. Robert spoke about using the body
for creating third state, developing Apollo etc. Then
he said about being present to the beauty of the room
and enjoying arts. Than he moved to the efforts to
separate from the negative I’s and I gave an angle
based on the teaching expressed:
“If one is consistently trying to separate from I’s,
keep the silence inside and separate from the objects
which come through the senses, one can come to the
realization of one’s true Self. And from here one sees
that there is no “Me” and “You”, no world, but just an
illusion, maya, and one is that very consciousness
that perceives it”.
The angle is neutral and there is nothing to add or
remove from it. It belongs not to mine, but to a
higher level of being. Robert looked up, said “Yes…”
and continued further:
You, I, real school, angels in the room, sleeping
machines and the other things that make this world
seem real and you as one of its objects.
Than, another question:
“Robert, why to you make your male students to have
sex with you?”
Robert was digesting for a while, but he looked ready
and gave a long thread starting with the idea of
people interested in other people’s sexual life and
little by little moved to Plato, Leonardo and
Shakespeare having sex with males. Then he said about
Sapho being a beautiful lesbian being. Then he said it
was the most beautiful part of his life. And what can
be more beautiful that being present to your lover?
Than he added that those males who were having sex
him, had a sex with an angel in the human form. We are
accustomed to the unconscious sex and he has conscious
sex.
Few more angles, one from the jack of hearts, so every
laughed and felt easy and than the angle that the
meeting was for some reason very different and strange
with too many wrong questions at it.
Than a poetic quote and the end.
It is 99.9% probable, that you will never see this
meeting, even though it was recorded.
At this meeting Robert betrayed himself.
All of my previous attitudes to Robert (which were
sometimes not easy to create after working at the
Academy and looking at him closely) are ruined.
The attitudes about the form of the School and not
expecting it to be perfect either.
All the Gurdjieff’s words appeared as alive:
Western art is totally subjective and based on
imagination.
Greek-Roman culture was that very culture which
brought more harm to the humanity
than any other.
Greeks destroyed the objective knowledge by their philosophy.
Romans destroyed human conscience by their behaviour.
It and many others things can be all found and understood in his “Beelzebub’s tales”.
And after that Robert’s words that he was not sure if Gurjieff was a conscious being at all and that Ouspensky did a mistake on every page of the “Fourth Way” to escape formatory thinking and that many
conscious beings were naïve saying different things
because Influence C kept they away from the truth.Recently he said that he might become a man #8depending on the hydrogen warfare.
Earlier, when he was giving his first meeting, he
said:
“It began in Russia, and it will end in Russia”.
When he was asked about the meaning, he replied that
he didn’t know, but these words appeared in his head
and he said them which gave him the creeps.
After today’s meeting it does seem to be true.
I guess, it would be useful for all of us have this
message printed in our Forum, but somehow this idea
seems to be a very naïve one
All these words are just I’s of this machine, but they
reflect other.
With love and friendship from Saint-Petersburg”
April 22, 2007 at 8:30 pm
Clarity
If all there is is Consciousness, if there is only Consciousness, then why or for what
are you still seeking? If there is only Consciousness then right now you must be That and
every thing else that appears in and as awareness must also be That, including any sense
of separate self. Any appearance of mundane, ordinary existence can be no less of
Consciousness than any appearance of unconditional love, wholeness, bliss, stillness,
silence or anything else. Does anything really need to be transcended,
found or let go of?
This is from:
http://www.nathangill.com
If you have some time have a look at the site of this guy. Very honest, very pure, beautiful food for the soul…if we have one.
April 22, 2007 at 8:36 pm
And here is an e-mail that came out a month or so later. I don’t remember how much discussion the petersburg e-mail generated, but things got heated enough to justify this;
“Hello friends,
The Teacher reminds us to be intentional when using the tool of e-mail. He asks that we avoid unnecessary talk and use this form of communications for true personality.
In particular, Robert observes that those of us with power features
need to be especially careful in our use of e-mail.
Robert further suggests that we can help C Influence with their
work by not using this medium for sharing insubstantial ideas”
April 22, 2007 at 8:45 pm
#77 Sandra C
I was hoping you might show up here eventually. At least so I knew that you made it out. I doubt I would have joined without having met you. I saw the weak side to the fof (not the criminality) within the first two years, that it was formatory devotional and not 4th way. I left after 4 years. With time I have been able to forgive you, myself and others who were so foolishly duped and who in turn took part in the duplicitousness. Ran into Edward H. this past January and we talked about you a little. He is well, more handsome than ever, and seems to have a good balance in his life. I’m sure he would like to hear from you. Send me an e-mail so we can reconnect, if you like.
Be Well
Steven Anderson (Portland 1974)
theplace@rockisland.com
April 22, 2007 at 9:15 pm
Sheik #108: “First one to develop a Dissociative identity disorder (split personality) is the winner.”
Another possibility presents itself in this thought-provoking article, linked on the animamrecro home page:
http://www.alterati.com/blog/?p=26
“Under these conditions, it becomes obvious that under each mask is just another mask, and so on, until we come to the abyssal Void itself. This Ground of Being exists, as the Buddhists say, beyond namarupa (beyond “name and form”). We learn that our game rules, social presumptions, and perceived realities are as much a virtual construct as anything in cyberspace.
“As the world stage and its play-acting become more obvious to more people, the jaded ennui and existential depression will eventually be faced, accepted, and understood. It will fall away as it too is rooted, not in the revelation of the truth beyond name and form, but in fearful attachment to the roles we play.
“Inevitably, the Internet’s MTV montage approach to reality selection will have far reaching results. First, no doubt, we will experience this liberation process as a plague, like some alchemical poison released just before the dross of life is transmuted into philosophic gold. This is to be expected when we learn to integrate a new level of perception. In time, however, we may reap the rewards of this digital revelation and role-playing may teach us how to swim in the deep waters of ecstasy, how to navigate the formless truth.” -Brian Corra
April 22, 2007 at 9:50 pm
To “unoanimo” in 7/76:
Nice post. I also suspect that ignoring “Howard Carter” is not a bad idea for many of the reasons that you state.
On the other hand, HC has provided some nice material for this discussion. Whoever HC is (one person? two people? a group of people?), HC has motivated many current and former members of the Fellowship to post some interesting comments to this blog that otherwise may not have been posted. If HC continues to inspire people to post, that’s a good thing. If HC’s intent is to dilute the discussion or provide a strong counterpoint, it’s not working. In fact, just the opposite.
By the way:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fellowship_of_Friends
Please see the post by Sheik in 6/344 and HELP! in 6/338 for more information about the FOF Wikipedia page. They are asking for help.
Someone is doing some outstanding work in literally battling the army of FOF-connected editors who are deleting sound and legitimate contributions to the page. One of the obvious tactics of the FOF editors from the very beginning was to write text that’s as lengthy as possible. This would result in pushing all content that criticizes the Fellowship as far down the page as possible, including the link to this blog. The FOF posters are writing wordy “essays” as opposed to writing concise, fact-oriented paragraphs that are more appropriate for Wikipedia.
Those trying to include pertinent facts and criticisms of the FOF are making heroic efforts (thanks from all of us inside and outside of the Fellowship for doing this), but it’s fairly obvious they need more help. The effort by the Fellowship representatives to delete their edits and posts is fairly relentless. It’s quite strange. You can view some of the actual names of those making these edits by clicking the History tab, and you can also view a fairly lengthy discussion about the page by clicking the Discussion tab. In fact, the discussion page and the edit page are a lot more interesting than the main page, because these pages reveal the amount of effort that FOF editors are making to delete any criticism of the FOF.
Now, the question that continues to pop into my head is, “Why?”
Why do these people feel justified in trying to delete all information that is unfavorable to the Fellowship? Now, they may respond by saying that they have a right to defend the Fellowship. But as an Anonymous poster wrote in 6/376, quoting from a Chinese proverb: “Only lies need to be defended. The Truth defends itself.”
The next question is whether these FOF editors are doing more harm than good to their cause. While on the surface it may appear that they are creating a nice bit of propaganda to attract new members, the amount of negative publicity that’s coming from the Wikipedia page is also interesting. For example, you can surf the dozens and dozens of pages on the Fellowship of Friends websites and see nothing about this blog or other criticisms of the Fellowship. But the Wikipedia page, no matter how packed with propaganda, still provides some nice links to this blog, and other sites critical of the FOF.
In the end, I see it as a net loss for the FOF censors.
April 22, 2007 at 9:53 pm
To LOL, 7/98:
Irony ?
If not, you obviously found the right Teacher.
By the way, the Academy,is, since quite a while, called Galleria. Just in case you received an invitation and never reached the place…
To Robert, 7/101:
Any recomandation(s) for those who might be interested in your teachers ?
Strange times!
Much love to us all.
April 22, 2007 at 10:13 pm
Robert (101):
I appreciate you taking the time to present your discourse, and your kind invitation to be of service to those who might be interested. I have no reason to doubt your statements about your experiences, or your sincerity.
But you lost me when you said “No homosexual can create the higher bodies.” I happen not to be gay, but I’m quite confident this statement is nonsense. If you believe that–and, even more, are willing to assert it as Truth–apparently because of a translation of a statement attributed not to Jesus but to my namesake, you missed a step somewhere along the line. I have a lot of respect for scriptures of all traditions, but this passage is as good an example as any of the limitations of attributing to scripture infallible truth.
April 22, 2007 at 10:49 pm
Dear Friend Flying Free
(7/31} “Have the students in the FoF signed an agreement of insanity? What is it going to take before normal, intelligent people, many who I have a high regard for, and have been friends in the past (until they stopped talking to me after I left) realize what they are paying for?”
Life for me, before the school was a little too tough. There had to be more than this? This couldn’t be all there was? I constantly had this shallow, empty feeling.
Then the FoF. Suddenly, I was part of something vibrant and magical. It became the reference point for every aspect my life for more than twenty years. It worked for me: self-remembering, the sense of community and the people – incredible people. And yes, I felt Robert had something special going on.
But I’m Old School, no way around it. Can’t connect to the new form. Can’t pretend what is happening isn’t happening.
So why the reluctance to leave? Why so slow to make the move?
I seem to be imploding. Not only do I have to confront my relationship to the school, but my relationship to myself. Where am I in all of this? Where did I go? And fear, where is all this fear coming from?
Maybe this is the process that other have spoken of. My world is small and the thought of becoming even smaller is scary. And there are many people I will miss so much.
And what will life be like post-FoF? So many of you seem to be happy, glad to be rediscovering yourselves. Not so sure about myself, though. Said I wouldn’t jump without a net. And so far, no net in sight and I’m teetering.
best to all
Cake
p.s. Flying, may call you up after one too many nights of vodka shots and trying to engage my dog in meaningful conversation. cp
And to Sheik, so many thanks for keeping the party going.
April 22, 2007 at 11:55 pm
What after the FOF?
I’m posting this in the hope that people leaving or contemplating leaving the FOF can see that there is plenty to do (not a series of impositions but an invitation to explore with fellow humans) when they have cut the cord. Everyone’s path will differ, but reading this brief summary of some aspects of mine may give encouragement.
When I got the boot from the FOF after sixteen years, I decided to try to rethink everything I had taken for granted, as best as I was able. From the start, I recognized that there were necessarily limitations to this process, starting off with the obvious, that here I was (and am) ‘swimming in the soup’ of the culture at large and the particular culture of the FOF, and it is nigh impossible to see outside the soup bowl. I felt I had done good work in the FOF trying to see the limitations of the general culture, and so chose to start with the FOF culture first. In one sense, this was de-programming, in no way different from the work taken on when joining the FOF or any other path of spiritual “evolution”.
Early on in my examination of the “wrongness” that caused me to leave, I could see that one basic precept to work on was the way the FOF culture separates the body from the mind. So, I set to work to re-integrate my body and mind, to start respecting and learning to love my body again, to see that the various centers permeate the body, and how the body in turn informs the mind, that they are one and inseparable. On the practical level, I threw some wild parties with plenty of dancing, then took workshops for people who recognized that they had fractured or remote relationships to their bodies. After some time, this led to the conclusion that separating the mind from the body was not only wrong work, but actually a form of blasphemy, the throwing of the gift of the body into the teeth of the giver, so to speak.
Then I examined my relationships to some of the exercises I had tried so faithfully to follow, that seemed to be the bedrock of the FOF and the Fourth Way. For example, one in particular, the non-expression of negative emotions. I realized early on that for most members of the FOF, including myself, it had instead come to mean the suppression of negative emotions. I found qualified fellow-travelers to help me release the resulting gigantic constipation in my emotional center; and I learned that the exercise should have been “The non-appropriate expression of negative emotions”, and that, as I had previously suspected from time to time, that the ‘negative’ halves of centers are valid, necessary and as perfect as their ‘positive’ counterparts. The suppression was another of the blasphemies (rejection of blessed gifts) taught by Burton. A side effect (everything is connected) was the re-establishment of friendly relations with and a deeper understanding of my instinctive center, the infamous enemy, the king of clubs.
The next belief I worked on was the idea that my present life was somehow lesser, somehow imperfect and needed correction, and that some reward lay in the future by denying myself the rich experience of living fully (and taking risks) now. I began by trying to accept the cards I had been dealt with, both physical and psychological, and making the most of them. Believe me, living life with maximum juiciness, and without worrying about accumulating spiritual points is like being reborn! I came to see that the idea of imperfection, expressed as ‘original sin’ or any other equivalent (Gurdjieff, Ouspensky and Burton were all raised Catholic/Orthodox, and it shows) thought pattern was just a part of the patriarchal cultural spasm of the last 5,000 years; the accompanying corollaries, that present sacrifice is necessary for theoretical future reward, and that external intermediaries such as priests or gurus are necessary between oneself and the godhead within, are equally invalid.
Now I was on to the next stage, trying to become an ordinary person again. No matter how it was presented (“We are not special, just lucky”, or, “Isn’t it amazing luck that C-influence has chosen us from among the millions to awaken”), the FOF culture told us that in fact we were special; I incorporated this message, as did almost every other member. For me, this one task is taking years (maybe a lifetime), and is a huge undertaking just by itself. One result of this work is the realization that ‘seekers’ in general are not special. There is nothing magical or superior about a seeker, it’s just the random assortment of genes or circumstances, and is no more or less necessary to the Lela, the dance, the play (whatever you want to call it) than the ‘banker’, the ‘tailor’, or the ‘candlestick maker’. I am a seeker, that’s the way I am, so I’m not going to deny or suppress it because of this realization, I’ll still seek self-understanding and enjoy the exploration, but it’s not important in of itself.
Next, I tried to examine the weaknesses that had led me to join the FOF so wholeheartedly, with particular emphasis on the relinquishing of responsibility onto Burton. For example, I took two workshops that dealt with the issues I had with my parents, one for my mother and one for my father. Each multi-day event in the hands of experienced leaders jolted me to my foundations, and I came to a whole new relationship to my parents, much more truly as an adult. The resolution of so much unfinished business also made me realize that this is some of what I had sought of the FOF, and enabled me to complete some more transitions from the FOF culture, and simultaneously from the general culture. Burton’s screwed up relationship to his parents makes the FOF the last place on earth to help in this area. This enabled me to do another related workshop to help resolve unhealthy dynamics between the sexes (another of the wrong results of general culture); now I have lessons learned I try to bring to my marriage.
Which leads me on to love. Back here in “mere” life, I have seen and felt far more love from perfectly ordinary people by the day than in most of the FOF over all the years. Truly, the FOF should be renamed the Fellowship of Conditional Friends! Here in “life”, a term Orwellian in its depravity as it has come to be used by the FOF, I have learned love overflows in abundance. Some is indeed also conditional (that is the human state), but plenty is unconditional, and comes from a multitude of surprising sources. In the FOF, I learned unending distrust; many tales were told of me and others and reported to Burton and acted upon in the most unloving manner. I came to see I could not trust people I had known for years, let alone Burton. So many ‘photographs’ used as weapons, not intended as help, leading to more distrust, the System misused by sleeping leaders to put people back to sleep, in fact to make them sleep more soundly. So now I am learning to simply ‘put what I have to offer out there’, learning to trust that the response will be rooted in the Intelligence in everything that is Love, as I understand the meaning of the parable, “Consider the lilies of the field…”
So, though there are some thoughts and practices above that might be helpful, I mostly offer encouragement. Personally, I felt strongly that moving on to another formal teacher/teaching (at least straight away) would not be useful; I looked for teachers in the people around me, and some experts in specific areas. I did not expect everyone to provide services for free. What I paid for, I considered in every case to be good value. But most of the time, there were lessons for the taking from the Extraordinary that is in every person, so I didn’t have to look far! This was true in the FOF also, by the way.
Finally, everyone who has left has had different experiences. I invite anyone who feels so moved to share what processes they have found useful on this blog; they could be valuable to others. And again, thank you, Sheik, for the forum.
With love,
Ames Gilbert
April 22, 2007 at 11:59 pm
Reading ‘Robert Says’ 7/101 puts me in mind of an aspect of our situation as former or soon-to-be former students of the FOF. It is reminiscent of the end of a marriage where you suddenly find that you are open to dating again and discover that things have moved on since your time. When you were married you had driven past queues of people outside the clubs on a Saturday nights thinking how grateful you were not to have to do that anymore; you walked past courting couples cooing like doves and thought how sweet, I had my share when I was young. Now you are alone again, you are more inclined to wonder how to get back into the fray and whether the experience of simple love is open to the middle aged.
I go back to the analogy of the end of a relationship to help understand what is happening as one begins to separate from and ultimately divorces oneself from the school, as it seems most apt. The parameters of your relationship have in both cases defined you, the choices you could make and your reasonable expectations of life. Suddenly, you are no longer subject to the form that gave your life shape and there is the risk that you ooze out a shapeless mess. I am sure people who have gone through the death of someone very close will have found themselves in a similar situation.
The crux of the matter is that previously you were contained in a fairly limited version of life that no longer exists and now the whole world is you oyster (please bear in mind that oysters can make you very ill indeed).
No matter how wise and true what ‘Robert Says’ describes might be, I have had my ‘master-devotee’ experience for the moment and am not going to jump back into bed with another mumbo jumbo merchant on the rebound. Let that experience be for the star-struck young things who are at the time in their lives for such things.
A profound realization is how common this all is; this is the kind of thing that has happened countless times before and will happen countless times again, just like love, no matter how much we personalize it. There is a very real risk that on leaving the school behind one may entertain possibilities that are just not wise at all and find one self drawn into a new relationship or series of relationships for the wrong reasons and with the wrong people. I mean wrong is the relative sense. As a mature ex-member of a cult one has a certain amount of ‘being’ but can still easily be seduced by those who are more artful. If we take one lesson with us it surely has to be that we were tricked and that we are the kind of people who are vulnerable to people like Robert Burton and institutions like the FOF.
I would warn my fellows who are contemporaries and alumni of the FOF from the same batch to be aware of (and beware of) what allowed them to fall for the school hook, line and sinker in the first place. Some of us might benefit from professional help. How about thinking about half your teaching payments for the next year as being due for this purpose? We will all find ourselves with much more time and more money to spend, which is something to look forward to with some apprehension. We will have to make decisions on our own and be responsible for the consequences.
The fence is a place from which you can derive some of the benefits from being part of as well as being independent of the school, but once you step onto the side of being independent you no longer have the support of the school. It is obvious, but not to be underestimated as a threat and as an opportunity.
In the FOF we have apparently been learning to anticipate the death of our bodies by investing in an awareness that is independent of the physical body. Well, this is a little test of that awareness. There is the danger that this awareness once released after the death of our marriage with the FOF will condense against another cold surface.
During my divorce I spent several days purposefully remembering my life from the earliest I could remember to the present moment. I looked at old letters, photos and souvenirs and thought on people I had loved and who had loved me as well as those I had wronged or who had wronged me. It put my marriage into context. My life was big enough to accommodate this experience and to anticipate a worthwhile future and even hope for more on the evidence of what had gone before.
The FOF is all about creating memories with no place for remembering them. My wish for those in the process of leaving, which includes myself, is that we should fit our experience of the FOF into our lives and in so doing, reclaim them. For years we have been told to do the opposite in order to be malleable, now we must take back what is ours and rediscover it’s potential.
April 23, 2007 at 12:34 am
Hey all you buttheads out there,
I am going to let you in on a secret, HC is one single person, not some group of people. It apparently does not take much to keep you idiots happy and busy. Just one person who does not lose his cool! Thanks HC for all your hard work–it is apreciated by many.
I happen to know who HC is, it is NOT Girard. And you folks will just never guess because you are too busy reacting and writing your shit.
You folks, sheik included, are just full of yourself, get your heads out of your asses and wake up!
Beavis.
April 23, 2007 at 1:46 am
HCarter #69:
“For all my lack of humanity I’ve not had cause to refer to any person on this blog as “the entity calling itself” – Be it Innernaut, or Elena, or No Person, or whoever I’m addressing.”
Point taken. Are you 1 person or a group?
LOL #98:
“wouldn’t you rather be around now than in the old days when any sex was banned? Bet you are Ames, Joel, Bruce and all you other old farts!)”
May seem odd to you young farts, but there was actually sex going on even then! But if you’re asking me if I’m bummed to have missed out on banging lots of women because I could have used my “role” to my advantage instead of being a “goody-goody”, then I’m at a loss for words to reply. I had other aims.
Chop Sticks #116
“You said that you are not interested Infof (been there done that) but you have been posting here like crazy. ”
You have a point.
“If anything is important to you, you send us on a “link”; these links are they not like quoting conscious beings Infof?”
It was just the one to the yezidi cicle story, wasn’t it?
“I really have hard time understanding where you are coming from or where you are going. What is your spiritual path? Thanks.”
My spiritual path is called “life.” Your welcome.
Hey Bruce, love your posts. Any idea how to contact MJahoda? Peace-out.
JoelF
April 23, 2007 at 2:07 am
Dearest SandraC:
So many years so many lives…
I have fond memories of you and JF leading the meetings in NYC. Gosh, we even smoked back then!
Sorry to hear of DK’s passing. We were friends back then and I guess I introduced D and J to the FOF…
But we digest, process, transform and move on.
My love to you.
April 23, 2007 at 2:13 am
“Earlier, when he was giving his first
said:
“It began in Russia, and it will end in Russia”.
When he was asked about the meaning, he replied that
he didn’t know, but these words appeared in his head
and he said them which gave him the creeps.”
This is a quote from Gurdjieff.
April 23, 2007 at 2:43 am
I fully appreciate that there may be more people using the same computer, yet, when two new voices enter the scene at the same day (coming from the same IP address), I become suspicious. Don’t worry, such comments will not be deleted.
I think that it is painfully obvious that some of the people writing here are taking the piss, or using other people’s names, or adopting fake personas with the aim of creating a negative image for the other side. While I do all I can to keep this minimal, a lot of it still gets through. So I am sorry to all those of you whose names have been used by other people, without your consent, against your wishes. I will try to battle this (and if you make me aware of any such behaviour, I will make other readers aware of it). BTW, HigherM is another one of those jokers (he isn’t who he is implying he is).
On the one hand, it’s a real bitch to those whose names get dragged around here (a lot of us are very glad for our anonymity, me included), on the other hand it creates a lot of fun (and detective work), trying to figure out who’s real and who’s not (eg. John, or Howard Carter). I guess that you will have to start having some fun, and take it all a bit less seriously. I will do my upmost to keep the discussion name-free, stress-free, and anonymous. I won’t always get it right. BTW, HigherM is another one of those jokers.
Butthead (129): I believe that I repeat myself, but thank you for taking the time to leave such a meaningful comment.
April 23, 2007 at 2:51 am
To Posting 101/7:
A reply and one kind word of advice.
To your question of “Or will one of you come forth and admit that you have created it and have verified it without Robert Burton?”
I can say this, that I have verified it without RB, way before joining the school, when I was around 13 or 14 years of age, now I’m nearly 40. Did I create it without RB? well that’s a bit silly, that’s like asking “Did you cut yourself without the knife?” or “Did you mow the lawn without the grass?” I can say that ‘it happened’ and continued to occur throughout my life so far, with allot of in between experiences, physical oddities, perceptions, energies, events, etc.
So there, in other words, Yes, there is someone who has verified their astral body without a fourth way school.
I liked your letter’s intent, its ’spirit’ to touch others with your compassion, yet I believe I can rightly say, based on its proceeding length, that your scholarly passion for esoteric justifications as to ‘how you see The Way’ overcame your initial intent to allow others ’space’ enough to be considered compassionate-able recipients of your ‘being’. Goethe once said, “If I had more time I would have written a shorter letter.”
I like that, allot…he’s spot on and knows the functions of the machine all too well, admitting truly that his presence is needed elsewhere than writing a letter, though a little slice will have to do to consider another’s need of a reply.
___________________
A kind word of advice ~ Just for ‘fun’ and certain ‘other reasons’, even if your name is ‘Robert’, make something else up, like,
‘Trebor’ or R or Rob… just for the sake of automatic associative stuff.
Be Well and thank you for a very interesting read…BTW, take a peek into “Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson”, i.e., Gurdjieff’s comment that “Your sexual fluids are your most precious possession.”
Now step back and consider this one line coming from such a being as George Gurdjieff, a man who ‘had it all’ forty times over, his incredible sufferings, transformations, teachers, travels, Ouspensky, efforts, etc… All seemingly ripe to be ‘drama’ consideration for ‘First Place’ status, yet, he chooses to say that, only that.
He also speaks about the scourge of self-calming (of which this blog certainly functions on a high level for many), etc. Too, he was planning to write a book called “The care and maintenance of the astral body.” – Perhaps his ‘being’ may help slim down your approach to this subject, which in my opinion, must be very not academic and important, rather, everyday life practical and verifiable in the tactile sphere.
Love to you all.
April 23, 2007 at 3:11 am
To Higher M (post# 92)
Hope you get some psychological assistance, you really need it. It might be very useful for you to contact some therapist that can help people who have been or still are part of a cult, to go back to normal. In any case, I wish you soon recovery, from my heart.
Shall I say that we met in South America fifteen years ago? Maybe not, as it is very hard to believe that you are the same shy, innocent guy who was looking for the Truth, travelling with Girard around the centres.
My suggestion, do not get back to me or anybody else in the blog, better use your time to look for help.
With much Love!
April 23, 2007 at 3:36 am
There is/was another Sydney Russell, long–time student, loved by many of us from the early days, perhaps one of the posts was by her?
#131: Thanks for the note, wish I could place who you might be.
#112: Hello, Bruce, back. I think of you often and have enjoyed your voice here.
#95: Paul, if you are who I think you are, I am so pleased to contact you here, for one regret that I have had was that once when you called me to try to discuss RB’s sexual overtures, I turned a deaf ear, was not ready to hear it, and I have wished I could have been there more to hear you. I appreciated your courage in even bringing up this then-very-taboo subject with me. So, thanks for identifying yourself and giving me this chance to tell you how that all settled for me.
#121: Stephen: I do remember you, looong ago and far away in a Portland coffee shop, the memory flashes. Hello to Edward H and thank you for bringing both of you back into my mind. I may send email as you suggest.
April 23, 2007 at 3:46 am
A few lines of Hafiz offered as a toast to the helpers past, present, and future:
Learn to recognize the counterfeit coins
That may buy you just a moment of pleasure,
But then drag you for days
Like a broken man
Behind a farting camel.
April 23, 2007 at 3:46 am
Hey Joel. He’s listed in Grass Valley.
April 23, 2007 at 3:56 am
Chopsticks asked (#116):
Ames, can you please tell me in few words what did your conscience say before you left. What is your spiritual path now? Thanks.
I assume you are asking in good faith, and I will answer likewise. I’ll be as brief as possible, but perhaps still longer than you wished. My conscience doesn’t speak to me in words. It is much more like a little flash of illumination, and I see whatever the situation is in a different way, which I have learned to trust is, for me, the truth. Learning to see this was my main education in the FOF and was mostly despite the FOF, in that I had to find out what were the voices of conventional morality, of my mother, what the neighbors might think, what Robert or Girard or fellow students might think (most ‘angles’), and so on, and disregard those voices—a very long process for me, I’m afraid, over many years, leaving the “small still voice”. Once I got the flavor, it became easier and easier to recognize. Nor has it ever let me down.
So, to answer your question specifically; at the time I mentioned in that letter, I was running up on Mt. Renaissance, not many I’s circulating, enjoying the breathing, grateful for my strong, well-functioning body, and I experienced the ‘flash’, and I FELT what it was like to be the lonely young man I had talked to a few weeks before, a South American in Burton’s entourage who had told me that he felt “like a slave” and that he had no escape from his plight. In that one instantaneous insight, I felt not only remorse (I even started crying as I ran), but certain that I was indeed connected directly to him and that I did have responsibility for his pain. That, Chopsticks, was it, best I can do in words.
I ran straight back home, and wrote down what I could of the experience.
The energy from the flash continued to fuel my writing for twenty minutes, and became a personal essay on how my contributions to the FOF enabled Burton in all his excesses, and the pain and blind alleys to which he was leading all the young men. I realized in the fullest way that because I lent energy to Burton and the structure, I was part of the input, and so inevitably I was responsible for the output. At the end of this, another flash; I have an obligation to do what I can to ameliorate the situation, that is, heal (regenerate) according to my power, within the structure. Another flash; to refrain from acting according to my gifts and power is a large ‘sin’ against myself.
So, that was it.
My spiritual path now? Partially answered by my post # 127. In no particular order, other explorations did include two sessions of magic mushrooms, and one of ayahuasca, years apart, which taught me what fragile, chemically controlled body/minds we have, and also new depths of ecstacy, gratitude and worship. A month after leaving, I spent three days alone awake continuously, fasting and meditating in the Yuba Gap (past the power station, quite remote), a quarter mile from James Battaglia, who was doing the same. This purged me of much turmoil and useless emotions connected with being thrown out of the FOF. A few months later, I spent many days and nights going through “a dark night of the soul”, in which, recorded in writing, I confronted many demons and dark parts of myself, and was shown (by grace) some hard, hard truths about myself and our situation.
I read the book by Satyam Nadeen, “From Onions to Pearls” and was deeply moved. I went to one of his week-end sessions in the Bay area (someone said he’s moved on now), and he helped me move much emotional shit in a huge catharsis, for which I was profoundly grateful. He also helped me see that my expectations for spiritual evolution were mostly imaginary, and were getting in the way of living a full life. He sent me on my way, neither of us expecting to see each other again, (which we have not), grateful for the insight that ‘I Am That’. With that insight, it is not necessary for me to have formal teachers or a teaching; I can find a teacher in the person next door at the moment I look. And I can, whether conscious or unconscious, provide the same service for others.
A conclusion I reached later: this was actually also happening in the FOF, but I didn’t recognize it fully at the time. I was in a school, separate from the cult of Robert Burton, and to an important extent, independent of Burton. My teachers were other students, often without them knowing. They provided the energy I enjoyed; theirs was the hard work. Externally, they built the vineyard (think about it, most of the external work was done by students long departed…). It’s true that Burton provided the initial vision, but the best, and for me, the most important, was the efforts, internal and external, of the rest of us. Burton turned into the uber tax collector, a vampire of the energies, and we let him.
Hope that answers (at least on one level) your questions. I’m sure it was more than you wanted, but that’s the risk you take!
Ames
April 23, 2007 at 3:59 am
Reply to Comrade 123/7
Comrade Says:
April 22nd, 2007 at 9:50 pm
To “unoanimo” in 7/76:
Nice post. I also suspect that ignoring “Howard Carter” is not a bad idea for many of the reasons that you state.
On the other hand, HC has provided some nice material for this discussion. Whoever HC is (one person? two people? a group of people?), HC has motivated many current and former members of the Fellowship to post some interesting comments to this blog that otherwise may not have been posted. If HC continues to inspire people to post, that’s a good thing. If HC’s intent is to dilute the discussion or provide a strong counterpoint, it’s not working. In fact, just the opposite.
__________________
Hello Comrade:
Yes, all that is obvious reason to see HC as a dutiful precursor to a good ole intellectual/emotional romp in the hay, yet, what about the starving cows in the field waiting for all that love making to finish before nightfall?
In otherwords ~
The “may not have been posted (if it were not for HC)” is moot and cannot be otherwise, yet, a refinement can be considered.
It could be said that all the games of tennis have been nothing but the pursuit of the ultimate racket, yet, the drama sure seems real, that is, outside the ‘truer’ pursuit of the ultimate racket there are thousands pursuing themselves and others ‘to win’, while the evolution of the racket goes unsung, so to speak.
Well, there you have it…It’s not the racket I was referring to when I suggested people stop writing ‘to’ HC (please read my post again)…
Rather it is the impetus, the kaffeeklatch behavior (within the form of the HC reply-blogs), which is an all too ’self calming’ virus among material & spiritually seeking people…
That somewhere hitting the target anywhere becomes more important than the aim.
Does ‘loosing one’s temper’ equate with ‘finding ones self’?
This is my only ‘wish’ concerning the ‘HC tennis match’~ To consider the ‘kind’ of energy invested towards HC, which simply, unconsciously, boomerangs back to the ‘player’, like in an ‘important’ game match-point, where so much ’sexual fluid’ is spent screaming, yelling, frustrated, efforting, concentrating and the like.
Everyone has the building blocks within them to become conscious in this one and only moment (There are no ‘many moments’, only intervals where we could not see it as continuous, an uninterrupted One.)
Whose burning your blocks when your not looking; perhaps this is how it is, that so many end up with half-villas and not the originally planned castle.
Certainly, something is happening here, regardless of the blog-forms ‘little details’. It is no mistake that the owner of this blog-site is ‘The Sheik of Inner Confusion’, i.e., the very ’state of affairs’ which gives birth to aimless blogging. The HC phenomenon reminds me of my story called ‘Spirit Bear Hunter’.
Spirit Bear Hunter
_____________________
One day a certain someone exclaimed he could attract ‘food to the table’ without actually going out and hunting it.
Many gathered round to see this claim come true and the ‘joking’ man became nervous, thinking to himself “Gosh, what a fix I’m in now, can’t tell the truth that I was kidding, so many people, certainly they’ll punish me harshly for this trick…gotta concentrate…”
So he did and did and did…for forty days and forty nights he concentrated, while all those round him (in the desert) also concentrated on his concentrations…
They sung, discussed, had visions, saw footprints, noises, even at times exclaimed they smelt ‘dinner coming’… though no Bear.
Until one early morning, on the brink of starvation and death, the Bear appeared…
right there in the middle of them all…
crawling, moaning, giving thanks to the spirit bear hunter, they reached out, right through the Bear…
Yes, the Bear did appear, one that the mind could eat, the one that the mind created and hunted, finally it appeared as an effect of a cause-offering to the mind having ‘trapping it, surrounded it’, yet, this was not the intention or was it?
Love to you all.
April 23, 2007 at 4:16 am
Dear With malice toward none, thanks for your question. (#111)
First of all, I think we can only guess about death, since those who really died didn’t come back to tell us, and whoever is alive can only guess. (RB has quite a story about what happens after death of a student/non-student, about Limbo and multiple chambers or – the Moon, but this never appealed to me somehow…)
At this point in life I honestly don’t have questions about death, simply because life is so full and satisfying. I don’t know for sure if non-duality actually focuses on this idea. From what I’ve read, non-duality is a very practical and concentrated way of pointing to the core of our being, it doesn’t seem to have much complicated theory or system of ideas. (it’s based on what I’ve personally read, it all was simple and brief).
From one point of view, why discuss something that no one really has any idea about? It’s like, let’s discuss dragons, their habits, their behavior, what do you think about them, where do they over-winter… Has anyone ever seen one? Or are we discussing some imaginary stuff?
So is with death… No one really knows, until they are, well, dead.
But since you asked about death, I’ll share my thoughts, which are – just thoughts, assumptions, creative imagination, because really – until I die I cannot tell much about it…
It seems that the impersonal life principle that is our essential quality is never ending. It’s like the electricity I once used as an example of a life force. With the death/destruction of the vehicle this principle should not disappear. It may stop manifesting in the same way through this particular body. The body obviously dies, with all it’s unique qualities as a specific life form. That we all saw many times. I think that what makes us alive, that principle, energy or life force, or conscious-awareness – never goes off, just goes to another form, manifests somewhere else, just like electricity would not be gone when the bulb burns out.
Again, I don’t really know about death, I just share thoughts on the subject.
The thing is, that what we truly are is impersonal, selfless. We are basically life itself, playing through this particular body. When you see and recognize this, you stop worrying about death in a way you did before. What’s going to die if you think about it? Not WHO you really are… What you truly are cannot die, because it’s life itself. But this little body-mind mechanism is totally mortal. This guy dies and gets recycled, I don’t think there are any hopes for him.
I think when actual death happens we will know for sure! There is no getting out of it!
I really like the analogy I’ve read in some non-dual books about the ocean and the waves. (This is an interpretation of it, more or less how I remember). Each single wave has it’s personality and uniqueness, and is still in it’s essence just ocean water. It may think that it is unique and separate and independent, but it is not, it is totally connected to the ocean and other waves. And the big ocean doesn’t care if one wave doesn’t know the truth of what it truly is. Wave’s ignorance does not diminish the greatenes of the ocean. When wave finally breaks – it returns to what it always was – ocean water. It’s shape and qualities are gone, but it’s essence as ocean water cannot disappear, it’s in a way immortal. And more and more new waves are being constantly created out of ocean water, each will have it’s unique expression, qualities and story. I always found it a beautiful analogy.
A little story about preparation: when I was preparing to move to Europe ( from Russia) I didn’t know what to take with me. But I wanted to be prepared so I packed my bags with lots and lots of household items. I had so much stuff with me… Upon arrival I realized that all these things are not needed here, either there is no use for them in Europe, or they are so readily available – there was no reason to drag them across the country. I should have just relaxed and traveled light. But I was so totally worried (identified) about my future life in Europe, I wanted to be prepared.
Well, until you get there, you really don’t know do you…
Dear friend, don’t spend your life preparing for death – accept a gift of life, enjoy it now as it is, be who you are, because this is truly a wonderful gift.
April 23, 2007 at 4:53 am
(116)
Elena: Did you want students in FOF to read the blog?
Dear Friend,
Of course I think it is important for all students to read the blog.
I only needed to read four letters to understand that I had a thousand questions many of which no one from the Fellowship has been willing to answer.
I have been in the school for many years not knowing these issues because you people don’t talk. Everything I have said is what I’ve seen. We never talked with Girard about the Fellowship. It was his “job”.
The facts do get covered by your silence and the pretty clothes and one continues to try to transform the difficulties without understanding why you are all so cold. We give each other kisses for seventeen years but never go beyond.
And if one does ask, then one is told that it was vanity that made Miles leave, that the sexual cases were just one or two, that there’s nothing to worry about.
The Fellowship is far crystallized because it has lived an unexamined life for too long. Robert Burton has crystallized and is hurting people. Listen to the tone of those who do defend him with conviction like higher M and tell me if the weaknesses in that man have been reinforced or weakened by being in the Fellowship. (It is not the courbet some of you are thinking, I hope. My friend Courbet was never that close to the teacher).
Do you really believe the formatoriness with which A friend or Howard Carter defends the Fellowship? Is that stand what you really want for yourself or do you actually have one that you can give, instead of just asking questions?
It is alright though if you’re looking for answers because we all need them.
You might loose a thousand students if you encouraged them to read the blog but if you were sincere about the measures that need to be taken to continue as a conscious school you would gain another two thousand or more. Many of you have the being. We have all suffered much. We have all given up too much and it is time to recover it.
Don’t be afraid of a surgery when it is needed to keep alive.
From one angle everything is wrong and from another, every thing can be repaired.
When I began writing on the blog, I felt it necessary to listen to it, just as I felt it necessary to bring Dorothy home when I saw her suffering. There is not much we can do to repair the suffering that has been done in the past, but acknowledging it, without fear or judgement is necessary to heal. And we can stop it. We can stop hurting people. We can stop hurting each other. We can stop any one’s excesses. Who ever it is necessary to stop, can be stopped. Without violence, without blame. Simply controlled. We all need to check and control each other because we are all weak and full of features as well as beautiful and divine beings. So we check what needs checking and encourage what is great.
How much longer do you really want to prolong the condition for yourself in which you cannot talk your heart to the people around you?
That you have to run around serving a man with severe addictions?
That you have to justify yourself because he is “superior to others”?
How deeply do you really believe that?
Do you not remember that the higher serves the lower and that the higher a man’s being is, the less he would undermine others? Separate himself with expensive clothes? Rigid forms? Very extreme and questionable stands?
When has Robert been open to you? Wide and generously open with his heart? To you? And not to a general public in a well set show? Firm with his love and not just a smile or a heart?
Can you really tell me that he has unconditional love as you would expect a man number seven to have? For whom?
April 23, 2007 at 4:56 am
Greetings, friends, new and old, from Asahi! So good to see all of you here.
Since departing the Fellowship, numerous wondrous changes have befallen me and I am now announcing that I am started my own school.
This is no ordinary school. We have 45 conscious beings working with us; a sequence that has seven, rather then six, steps, which takes you further, deeper and higher; and all the contradictions that you could ever want. Plus, lots of sex!
You can view my photo with my first student, Veronique, and the place where we live and meet, at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7933492@N07/
Please note that for a limited time only, we will meet or beat any teaching payment price from any other teacher by 10%. Details to follow!
April 23, 2007 at 4:59 am
Group myth 1: The Fellowship was something that started out good and true and right and wholesome and somehow along the way became corrupt or faltered or something.
Response to Group myth 1: The Fellowship was thoroughly, fatally corrupt from the very beginning.
(Which is not to say that all the people, or even most of them, were or are corrupt. The key thing is deception. The more innocent, naive and idealistic the person, the more manipulable he or she is, generally speaking. And deception works even better when people at all experience levels are led to disable their critical thinking faculties by “separating from the ‘I’s.”)
Foundation for response to Group Myth 1: Accounts of Bonita G. Discussions with Harold W. and the late Stella S. Discussions with the late Don B. Discussions with Jordan F-S whose whole family was in FOF in 1971. Discussion with respected student who left in 1971. Attendance sheet from 1971 showing the degree to which peoples’ attendance at events was monitored. Handwritten note in R.’s handwriting from period of silence stating “It is good when weak students leave as they are weight. It used to bother me but now it’s like a useless object being gone.”
According to people who were there, R. intentionally broke up almost all marriages and relationships of people who joined during the first two years. Someone knows the quantity of relationship splits; I don’t. The number I heard was in the 20s or 30s, a huge number in a small group.
In 1971, R. screwed Student #1 (female), who had separated from her husband after she had an affair with another FOF member. The day after, R. told her she hadn’t valued the experience of sex with a conscious being enough, and made a public announcement, reported in the Via Del Sol Journal, that he had been celibate since the beginning of the school. Her response was “why would he lie? It just didn’t make sense.”
After the end of 1970, R. began to require people to give him large amounts of money in order to continue to remain in the group. R. had been living at home with his mother and decided that people should give him money so he could get wheels, a VW bus. From dismissed elementary school teacher (March 17, 1967) to living with Mom at age 32 and giving tennis lessons at the Claremont, to conning Student #1, a woman older than he was who was obviously fascinated with him and was a married with kids in school. He soon monopolized her time 6 days a week. Go figure that one out. She’s married, she has responsibilities to husband and kids, but he monopolizes her time. The word parasitic comes to mind.
Anonymous 1971 defector, who knew nothing of FOF’s subsequent history, stated, “During the period of silence, R. would blow kisses to people. The ones he blew to me were contemptuous. There was something contemptible and contemptuous about him. I sensed in him a radical lack of integrity. My take on him was ultimately sociopathic. This was the social archeology of 1971 cognitively uncontaminated by anything that came later.
Don B. indicated that when R. used to park at Nut Tree he would take up three spaces so as to keep anybody from scratching his Rolls Royce. Classic narcissistic behavior immune from standards which apply to other people.
The thing I have never quite fathomed is that, if accounts of people without axes to grind are to be believed, R. was a popular and well liked elementary school teacher by both students and parents. How did he go from that to creating, in the FOF, such a hostile environment for children?
April 23, 2007 at 5:20 am
Thank you for the many great posts that are coming in.
As someone said: if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.
It seems we’re still far from the solution and need to keep looking at the problem so that it is fully recognised. But like any problem, there are solutions.
April 23, 2007 at 5:29 am
Definitions:
Sorry, I don’t remember where I got this information. It may be from “The Guru Papers”.
“In a cult there are few, if any constraints on the founder. They are the creator of the truth – through free rein – and are the actual manifestation. The leader is the main source. The leader is a Living God, or God’s unique vessel.”
“Followers have an internal cohesiveness and they actively protect purity from outsiders.” (We are elite!)
“Should the guru become paranoid, greedy or bored (as many do), they can get their disciples to do almost anything.” (Uh oh!)
“There is a belief that the Enlightened one is of a different order. They are beyond the foibles resulting from ego.” (Pedophilia is okay!)
“What grabs the followers is not a specific leader or ideology, but a configuration of emotions that is part of the state of surrender. This arouses intense emotion and there is extraordinary passion in surrendering to what one sees as a living god. They also withdraw from life and renunciate world views.”
“Even with the best intentions, assuming the role of spiritual authority for others, sets in motion a system of interaction that is mechanical, predictable and contains the essence of corruption.”
“Especially insidious are the images of superiority tied to the presumption of greater wisdom, moral purity or an enlightened state. It always includes renouncing self-centeredness. It also maintains that no ordinary person can know enough to take issue with beliefs.” (No questions please!) “There is a manipulation of fear and desire.”
This really helped me in understanding my involvement. I hope that it helps others.
Keep in mind that this is not a description of the Fellowship of Friends. Instead, it a description of any, very typical cult.
Peace & Love!
April 23, 2007 at 5:30 am
Hey Steve (6/281),
You describe a state of awareness and ask: “Is this essence manifesting?” Later you ask: “But isn’t this after all just another step on the way? Isn’t this a plateau where maybe we can rest a while before moving on? I don’t know.”
Join the club. I don’t know either! But not-knowing gets an undeserved bad rap. My late friend and mentor Jean Klein titled one of his many great books Open to the Unknown. We are desperately hanging onto the known, seeking security in the face of an unfathomable mystery. We want to know where we stand. So we ask questions like: Am I on the path yet? Am I enlightened? Am I in essence? Is this a plateau?
But what does this have to do with RIGHT NOW? Aren’t these scorekeeping type questions a little like asking: “Am I having fun yet?”
We tend to make awakening very complicated and confusing, but I think it is actually quite simple. Embrace life fully, 100%. Welcome what comes. Don’t escape, don’t refuse, don’t resist anything. Effort and struggle are indicators of resistance.
By not resisting I don’t mean we should meekly submit to injustice. On the contrary, we should face injustice, like everything else, head on. We might choose to fight or not; that’s not the point.
We want what we don’t have and we don’t want what we do have. Let’s turn that around. Why not want what we have and stop wanting what we don’t have? Does it take effort to do this? Some say so. I call it a great relief!
However, despite having been a student of nondual teachings for many years, I part company with those in the “neo-Advaita” crowd who say that all practice is unnecessary, or even harmful. There is a lot of pseudo-realization going on these days which amounts to little more than slapping on a happy face and shouting: “I’m free, I’m free!” IMO, most of these folks have just traded in one security blanket for another. They are afraid to truly embrace not-knowing.
I am a big fan of practice, whether it be self-remembering, mindfulness, self-inquiry, meditation, dancing, or whatever tickles our fancy. But let’s do the practice for its own sake, because we love it, not for the sake of some hoped-for results. If we don’t love it and are only thinking about what we are going to get from doing it, why do it? That’s just living in Becoming, not Being.
Hint: If it feels like “work” we’re still resisting.
OK, I’m off my soap box now.
Mark H.
mkhovila@yahoo.com
FOF member 1973-78
April 23, 2007 at 5:46 am
Reality is only agreement!
April 23, 2007 at 6:15 am
#135 When I read post 92 I couldn’t take it seriously. It had to be someone’s little mind game (as perverse as it is). I can’t imagine the existence of the kind of person who could write that in seriousness. It had to be some kind of dark type of satire, gone amok and on LSD with just a touch of psychopathology. No one could walk around like that, even in the FOF, without everyone wanting to beat the shit out of him.
April 23, 2007 at 9:06 am
JoelF (6/281)
Good to see you posting here! I still remember you leading my first prospective student meeting, when you were an “older student” of maybe a year. Obviously I was impressed enough to come back for meeting number 2. I always valued your insights and your sense of humor.
As to why many ex-FOFers don’t post under their own names, I suspect they don’t want to be Googled by employers or curiosity seekers. I handled it by using my initials and last name in my email address (see below). Other solutions might be to put spaces between the letters of your name or to spell it backwards (accompanied, of course, by: “this is my name spelled backwards”).
I have some questions for you and others such as, for example, my old friend Charles R. who were in leadership positions and stayed in the FOF for quite some time after RB’s abusive activities became known. What was your mindset at the time? Were you still thinking that he was a “conscious being”? Were you hoping to change his behavior? Did you confront him? I’m curious why you stuck with him as long as you did. I think a few words about this could be helpful to current and former members.
Mark H.
mkhovila@yahoo.com
FOF member 1973-78
April 23, 2007 at 9:20 am
#111 with malice towards none
Close your eyes and imagine you are god. Out of yourself create 1,000,000 gazillion things. These things are the bits that don’t survive you are the bit that does.
April 23, 2007 at 10:03 am
Regarding the despicable name-stealing: Yes, a very childish, creepy, dishonest, and criminal theft of identities. For those who do this, why do you do it? It helps no one. But helping must not be your aim.
There was a poster way back in Discussion 1, who took upon him/herself to change a personal factual story I had related on this blog, in this way potentially discrediting my story and attacking my integrity. When I confronted the person about this, s/he explained it away glibly as an attempt to communicate a message THROUGH ME and my story. What on earth makes people think they have a right to co-opt and USE other people in this way? I did not give my permission to be used as a vehicle through which this arrogant self-appointed angel could communicate.
Those who use these sorts of underhanded tactics do not speak well for themselves. Don’t be immoral sleazebags. Nothing justifies this. The end does not justify the means, and if your end does, the end must be foul.
My apologies Sydney, I thought it was you. And I repeat my fond hello. Used to be an active member of the London Centre some years ago. Enjoyed our time together in Amsterdam and hope you are feeling well.
April 23, 2007 at 12:09 pm
Robert7/101
Very interesting post and I agree with you in many of your points.
My own experience is that we all have an inner picture in our hearts about how a spiritual teacher and his or her teaching should be.
And if we hold on to that inner picture and compare, it finally leads to a teacher, that meets our highest expectations.
The best is just good enough and we are all worth it!
Greetings from Berlin
April 23, 2007 at 12:28 pm
Dear Sadra c (#77), I appreciate your sincere and moving description of a fascinating spiritual journey. I knew you and D.
I have questions: You write that the function of the grip to a belief is to ward off deep seated anxieties, and “such beliefs become part of one’s very identity, one’s sense of separateness”. Farther down you write “…taught of the mysteries of death…what I now understand as the release of the soul from the body”;
1) What do you consider wrong with separateness? Is it an illusion or belief that’s based on ‘deep seated anxieties’? What are those anxieties?
2) Do you mean to say that you believe that there is a soul and it somehow survives death? What’s the base for this belief and why is this one different than the ones grounded in ‘deep seated anxieties’?
(If there is nothing that survives death is a life lived fully less meaningful?).
April 23, 2007 at 1:33 pm
Bruce #149, Rita #110,
Regarding #92 HigherM; Bruce, there are many like him and in your time in the school there were many as bad or even worse. Remember the guy who was reported to have said that he would kill for Robert Burton? I heard a woman say she would die for him. And I know many who given the chance would express themselves in a way similiar to Higher M. The sad part of the story is that nobody would press this person to seek help as long as he acts normal. And would a RB’s school as it is now would want to ‘reform’ such an asset? To curb such a sickly devotion?
Yes Rita, I saw in him this madness and heard the underlying hardcore fundamentalism. Good manners, good looks & ‘making sense’ can hide peversions especially from naif eyes. We can send him compassion & love but hope he gets the straight jacket too.
April 23, 2007 at 3:20 pm
I hope you can have a look at this site, there are videos, audios and readings. Something beautiful can happen and may be after that you don’t need many more words.
No numbers, no sequences, no stuards, no lowers selves or higher selves, no short be or long be, not even medium be, no wordless breaths, no Isis or Neftis, no images, no form, no first bite or last bite….just the essential.
Girard why don’t you try to see what this is about, I am sure you’ll recognize something good in it.
From: http://www.theopensecret.com
Until your life is lost you will always wonder why . . .
for what you seek cannot be known, but neither has it ever been lost.
That is why there is nothing in The Open Secret message for the seeker to grasp and claim ownership of . . . no special states of bliss, stillness or presence are on offer.
The fallacy of the need to attain earnestness, acceptance or refinement of the body mind is exposed. You will not be invited to look within and discover that state of awareness which promises so much but comes and goes so quickly. There are no spiritual lollipops of any kind on offer here.
There is no compromise with the seeker’s need for guidance, process or teachings of becoming . . . nothing is for sale but the fairystory of the little “me” could expire.
The gift of being together in this palpable boundlessness is that already what you are is seen as wholeness, without expectations or demands. Confusion and resistance can dissolve in the light of openness and nothing will be left. Out of that nothingness emerges the indescribable fullness and wonder of simply being.
Tony Parsons – April 2007
April 23, 2007 at 4:37 pm
Lust for Life #71, regarding the Wheeler brand of Non-duality you write “the implication that there is no responsibility or choice, everything just happens within this awarness” is ‘hard to swallow’.
I would say this is an understatement; it is much more than merely ‘hard to swallow’; it is scary, it can quickly turn malignant. That’s the very type of thought & sentiment that gives narcissistic people like Robert Burton, Rajneesh-Osho, Jim Jones & all the like and their followers, the carte blanche to be demanding, abusive, exploitative & sliding in many cases towards criminality. There is no personal responsibility because they believe they are part of a supernatural entity, answer to a higher call, have to tend to ends that justify the means (such as secular or religious autopias). In RB’s case it is consciousness & C influence and please ignore the idiosyncracies of the particular mechanicality (the man behind the curtain).
Those Panpsychist mystics (believers in the world being all psychical, sentient or conscious), or what we agreed to call here ‘non-dualists’, should be hit many times over the head with variuos HigherMs and Rb’s excesses before realizing that those are the very consequece, the natural & logical conclusion of any eradication of personal identity, of separateness, of individuality.(And I could describe how it can also result down the road in concentration camps).
Wheeler like Non-dualists & No Person (#141) may express their credo in very sexy ways copying ancient sufi ecstasy with poetic imagery such as ‘every drop has the ocean in it’ and so on and so forth. It may be cute, uplifting, motivational and benign up to a point. It may even comfort some, the sort of comforting that a lovely almost illiterate babushka may feel when she brings her misery to the church and kisses the yellow idol of a Jesus; for awhile her suffering is aleviated by the ‘oceanic feeling’ of a merging with something greater than herself.
But this is a pseudo- solution for the masses and the feeble minded. And for those who need to feed on junk- psychology, on american instant & simplistic solutions. And there are many HigherMs and RBs that thrive in this soil with a bit more complex, baroqued spiritual systems that function in exactly the same way. The fourth way, particulrly RB’s 4th way is the same ‘all is consciousness’ or ‘all is awarness’ story told differently: the world of lesser laws (consciousness) is real while the world of the functions is less real when its experienced from the point of view of the higher world.
All religiuos sentiment is based on an escapism. Any form of religious superstition does more harm than good: it impedes openess, humanity & the progress of knowledge. And the individual is reduced, denied rights and has little chance to develope properly. In this context he is usually viewed as an abstraction (Wheeler;’…within awarness with no reference to a limited, separate person’).
The ‘Wheelerites’ seem to get high on the the idea of ‘all is consciousness’ and look at the world thru those supposedly uplifting (rosy) fixed glasses.
But I do appreciate Adyashanti; he seems to invite to a continuous, free flowing & conscientious self observation and practicing non identification without putting an idea or ideology up front like a carrot before an ass.
April 23, 2007 at 4:43 pm
The only people interested in using student’s names to discredit the blog is student’s themselves in the Fellowship who need to light the animosity against it.
It was very clear that the letter sent to students about five weeks ago stating the “danger” of the blog, with such stories, immediately had a negative reaction on everyone inside the Fellowship, myself included. If a friend had not insisted that I look at it more carefully, I would not have done so.
These tactics are no different to others they’ve used, like saying that people in the blog wanted to murder Robert and the lying and deceit that they keep falling into without being able to confront the issues and deal with them.
April 23, 2007 at 5:49 pm
Dear Traveler, I think I mentioned it before, but saying it again won’t hurt: I love your postings!
Dear Ames, thank you for sharing your experiences. It was very powerful for me to read of the moment your conscience woke up(#139).
Dear Cathie, thank you for the way you express your thoughts, elegantly and clearly.
Asahi (#143): good laugh, thanks!
April 23, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Thank you, friends, for helping me in my confusion.
After all your replies I run to my friend who is RB’s boy and begged to prove it wrong. He said: “It is true, but – so what?”
“So,- I asked – when we are waiting the beginning of the meeting Robert is not sipping a cup of tea and discussing his last details of “performance” with Asaf?
“Earlier he does but before the meeting – he sucks someone.”
I asked: “Why you guys not stop doing it all together?”
“Because we don’t want to go back to Russia” was his answer.
Here is where my confusion is:
Will anything change if EVERYBODY who are in the room waiting for the meeting to begin will know that? Or just a few ladies will faint and a few leave?
If people become slaves by their own will or stupidity – do they need to be saved?
Can RB still be a Conscious Teacher regardless his behavior?
If RB is “self-announced Avatar”, self-serving psycho and a pervert, tyrant, harmful or dangerous jerk – do we leave it as it is or DO something about it? What?
The sex might not be an issue – the abuse of power, the lies – are the issue. Now I need the proof of lies and the power abuse in my deep confusion.
It is not clear yet. Let us judge carefully. And please, don’t yell at me!
April 23, 2007 at 6:27 pm
Dear Unoanimo, thanks for your reply in post 140. I did re-read your post 76 this morning:
“What you expect of HC, you yourself have yet to untie within yourselves…he is a symbol of a contradiction within you and all energy ‘directly’ addressed to him only stalemates your position of going beyond the symbols of contradiction and affirmations of that which will ultimately graduate you from spiritual schools on earth.”
It rings very true to me. And after reading your thoughts and some of the other comments on this blog yesterday, for some reason “forgiveness” came to mind last night. Maybe it relates to some of what you wrote.
I sense that it’s our inability to “forgive” that keeps us attached to “issues” that we could otherwise leave behind. For some of us, that may be the Fellowship.
Like many other things, it’s a lot easier to talk about forgiveness than it is to be in the actual state of forgiveness. Part of what prevents us from being in the state is that we forget to direct forgiveness inward — toward ourselves. I often have the attitude that forgiveness is all about forgiving “them” for being a-holes, jerks, idiots, etc. But forgiving myself is more important than anything. (And, ahem, having a better sense of humor at times.)
Secondly, when we do feel forgiveness toward others, that’s a very good thing, but it helps to realize that others may not acknowledge it. If our “forgiveness” is simply an attempt to get other people to acknowledge it, it quickly becomes something else — maybe an attempt to “be liked” or “be understood”, or the seeking of some form of validation. But forgiveness is less an action, and more a state of mind and heart. And like so many other things, our friends, family, and colleagues simply may not see it, or they may not want to see it.
This is true with all of our “work” — including what we’ve been calling self-remembering, divided attention, and transformation of suffering, etc., or with any of the spiritual practices described in this blog:
“It”, whatever it is, is invisible.
And yet we often think that “it” can only exist if others see it in us, and we take great pains to make sure they see it. This is one of the dilemmas with all “religious groups” (not just the Fellowship): We make our supposed “efforts” based on a seeking of validation from others. We form our thinking around that. We form our opinions around that. But ultimately “the work” is something inside of us. It originates in us. It does not originate in a book. It does not come from Robert Burton, or Gurdjieff, or the Fellowship, or from any of the screen names on this blog. It comes from you, whoever you are. While our friends can and do help us at times, we ultimately are left only with ourselves. It can be no other way.
Incidentally, forgiveness is very compatible with keeping our eyes opened to the world around us, and not being naïve to the ways that people can harm us. That means being aware of the motives of others and acknowledging those motives to ourselves and — if we think it may help — to others. It can be done without negativity, anger, resentment, and bitterness. That’s where forgiveness comes in.
————–
From “A Song for Occupations”
There is something that comes to one now and perpetually,
It is not what is printed, preach’d, discussed, it eludes discussion
and print,
It is not to be put in a book, it is not in this book,
It is for you whoever you are, it is no farther from you than your
hearing and sight are from you,
It is hinted by nearest, commonest, readiest, it is ever provoked by them…
The sun and stars that float in the open air,
The apple-shaped earth and we upon it, surely the drift of them is
something grand,
I do not know what it is except that it is grand, and that it is happiness,
And that the enclosing purport of us here is not a speculation or
bon-mot or reconnoissance,
And that it is not something which by luck may turn out well for us,
and without luck must be a failure for us,…
-Walt Whitman
April 23, 2007 at 6:39 pm
Dear Butthead (129)
Isn’t there a suggestion in the FOF not to express negativity, or was that dropped along with the 4th Way? It’s odd how the really mindless, negative postings mostly come from FOF believers. I guess you don’t like having your cage rattled.
RB
April 23, 2007 at 6:43 pm
Dear # 126 ‘Cake Please’
and #97 ‘Butterfly Says’
Both of your letters touch a deep cord within that reminded me of the past struggles, confusion, anger and sadness that I went through before leaving the FoF. Actually it went on for about 3 years. I hear you both!
When I joined the FoF some 20+++ years ago, I too had become disenchanted with life, and needed something that would explain life and why I was here. I wanted relief and any help from the confused and unhappy life I was leading. And the 4th way system and friends of the FoF gave me everything I came for. Explanations, concerts, wonderful reading, friendship (that is what I called it then), a common ground to talk to all my fellow spiritual travellers . Yes, “Cake Please” you describe similar experiences to my own. It was not wasted time, nor was it a bad time. Living and travelling to many countries, meeting like minded people etc etc was all part of the gorgeous package. A wonderful dream that I did not want to wake up from. Robert ,at that time was almost irrelevant. My fellow travelers and I had built an ‘imaginary picture’ of RB as a teacher, a spiritual guide. It was what I and my fellow travellers really needed and believed in. We all came to a mutual unspoken agreement that we really had something special and RB reinforced and confirmed it in us all.
That was then.
Part of the maturation of a person (both chronological age, experience of life and spirituality) is to wake up from the dream, let go of it (as painful as it may seem at the time) and reconnect back to LIFE. Since leaving the school, there is only life to be lived. The Big Bad World out there is fabulous. The people in it are like you and me – all struggling, all trying to understand, all trying to keep it together, all experiencing their moments of joy, sadness, hurt, love etc etc. I cannot get enough of life. It is wonderful- everything happening around us, it is all flowing around and through us. And I have never experienced more presence than I have in the many, many , many months since leaving the FoF. That is because I no longer am a ‘special person’ and all those other guys out there are asleep and have no possibility. What a con game we were in. The kernel of truth is there in the 4th Way System – the rest was a dream (albeit really nice at times).
Your spiritual life does not end just because you leave the FoF. And friendship today – well it sure takes on a different flavor and meaning than what I thought it was in the FoF.
You are YOUR spiritual life. You are THAT. And you cannot deny your conscience any more.
It would take too many words and pages to begin this discussion and this letter is long enough.
“ Cake Please” Please call when you get tired of talking to your dog. Our door is always open. And yes, I am probably up the street from you. I would be happy to share my experience with you any time.
So, to my suffering comerados,
“Afoot and lighthearted , I take to the open road …. Henceforth I ask not good- fortune, I myself am good fortune … strong and content I travel the open road” Walt
I cannot help but print one of my favorite Walt Whitman Poems, which I read many times before leaving the FoF.
O ME! O LIFE!
O me! O life! Of the questions recurring,
Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish,
Of myself forever reproaching myself (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew’d
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me interertwined,
The question, O me! So sad, recurring- What good amid these, O me, O life?
Answer:
That you are here – that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.
With much love and respect to you all
April 23, 2007 at 6:52 pm
Ames:
My question to you was in good faith.
Thank you for your response.
Sydney:
Sorry I did not know it was not you.
April 23, 2007 at 7:05 pm
Rita #55 on non-dualism – beautifully distinguished. Also well expressed Cathie 59 and Traveler 60. And Coot (88) puts in perspective = “Unalists and dualists need not be duelists.”
Then four related questions are asked in post 111:
#1 o How would one see the difference between the bits that may survive death and the bits that do not?
Yesri Baba answers: Close your eyes and imagine you are god. Out of yourself create 1,000,000 gazillion things. These things are the bits that don’t survive you are the bit that does.
Non-dualism as understood here might state that the “bit that does” (survive) is ALL; the other bits whether imagined with closed eyes or eyes wide open are dreamt/imagined/seen/created from within THAT
o Is there a conflict in agenda between these groups of bits?
Of course – groups of bits are born and die – You do not…
o Is death something we have to prepare for or do we just cross that bridge when we get to it?
Yes/yes and no/no – if the bridge is really there, you have to cross it whether prepared or not; who can NOT work with their own understandings…
o And if we do need to prepare for death, how do we work with the bits that have no interest in this?
The same way you work with the bits and pieces announcing hunger, sexual urge and so on
It seems here that any true understanding of non-dualism undoes the questions. Which is not to say that there is something that could be called ‘true understanding’ about anything here. (Or that there should have been or could have been in the questioning). I am not sure of how this fits with other so-called non-dualists; but here – the very nature of non-dualism leads to (in sane moments) an intentional placing of self in a place of “I don’t know”. And the experience from here is that this is the place from which great swaths of understanding can occur – though out of that, again “I know naught”
So here I want to repeat what another (Rita) posted on the subject of her understandings of non-duality (and after saying she was no ‘expert’ on the subject) (coming from “I don’t know – but here is how it ’seems’?):
“Obviously, there is a body and mind of Rita and the world around her which she perceives through her senses. Yet, all is happening within this awareness. It’s not ‘hers’ as it is ‘nobody’s’, it just is and the body and mind are one of its manifestations. With this basic understanding, one feels united and in love with what is, it’s just a reaction of the body and mind to this realization. So, the questions of moral character, of integrity and choices are taken care of naturally, because one can’t harm what is oneself. One can harm oneself and others if the realization of this unity hasn’t occurred yet.
B
April 23, 2007 at 7:29 pm
Dear #97
I really ment to extemd my invite to you also – call anytime. I know you don’t have a dog to talk to like “Cake Please”, so I may hear from you sooner. I am up the street from you at OH.
Dear #143 Asahi. I can’t join right now- I am broke after many years in the FOF, but would you consider if I just became one of your sexy lady consorts. I really don’t care too much about the contradictions teaching ( I actually have a lifetime of them from my many years in the FoF), really I am only interested in the sex. Maybe you can consider a deep discount if I only participate in a partial package. On second thought, maybe you can pay me.
April 23, 2007 at 7:38 pm
I would like to chime in and ask Joel, Charles, Ames, Bruce, Sandra, and all the other older students who left long after they found out about RB’s lifestyle, what made them stay in the FOF and what it really was that made them leave after all that time…please give us your honest assessment if there was a part of you that did not want to work on yourself anymore.
April 23, 2007 at 7:47 pm
If the real Sydney Russell is out there, howdy to you from out here. Hope you are well.
Sandra #77, very interesting and heart-felt. Thanks for posting.
Bruce, thanks for the pointer, I’ll look him up.
MarkH #150, good to hear from you, too, and you seem well. My first 10 years infof I was pretty gung-ho, trying to be “perfect” and thinking I was going to be the next conscious being.
(an aside: I remember driving down to LA with RB early in my time infof, and him telling me that after Miles, it would be “my turn” to become the next conscious being in the fof. This comment paralyzed me, and I was unable to respond except for a grunt. I estimate this one comment, in my impressionable state, contributed to me losing about 10 more years to fof than otherwise might have been the case. Beware.)
The later 10 or so years I spent in New York City, kept my head down, gave up my “roles” infof, and gradually expanded my interests, particularly in publishing and connecting to many other Gurdjieff-inspired “groups.” I stayed away from California as much as possible, and “choose” to ignore whatever was happening there and with RB as much as possible. It took some time to be able to imagine leaving, between the attractions of the “community” and the “wall of fear” that kept me in the group, and which had been constructed within me. I didn’t have elegant rationalizations, I just avoided the whole thing.
When my wife and I moved to California in 1993 with our newborn son, I told her that it would mean me leaving fof, and it did. She left a few months later.
Thanks for reading
JoelF
April 23, 2007 at 7:57 pm
Veronicapoe #144, thanks for the “ancient history” post, and for debunking the myth. Did you see the post #102 about the group in Sweden? Might have been Bonita’s boyfriend, I seem to remember they had gone to Sweden.
Another side of this myth is that “the excesses have worsened, but we can correct the problem and make our school whole” frequently with plans to use the board of directors, or to discipline rb, or some other fantasy. Many such can be found on this blog, and the earnestness is endearing.
In fact, the nature of the group, as you point out, is corrupt. IMHO there is nothing to “save.”
Life itself is astounding, harsh, unfair, dazzling, lucky, ludicrous, shot through with everyday miracles, spiritual and otherwise, difficult, brutal, banal, full of dangers, replete with amazing people, hopeful, and brilliant. It’s no wonder we sometimes want to bury ourselves in a “community” that helps buffer the incredibly intense and relentless experience of being alive as an individual.
JoelF
April 23, 2007 at 7:59 pm
Re: #150 Hi Mark. I’ve had the same questions over time. Let me preface that I like and respect Charles quite a bit. I have occasionally ruminated about the fact that people who were on the upper end of the hierarchy in the FOF were staunch supporters of RB and the FOF during the various cyclical crises. I would occasionally internally, and sometimes externally judge these people for being so vocal about the crimes when they left and just as vocal about defending them when they were in. For me, I’ve come to the conclusion that we’re human. Being “in power” can be a distinct disadvantage in one’s work. You’re invested in the power, you’re invested spiritually, you’re invested financially- and we’ve all probably experienced this either in the FOF or other areas of our lives. It’s probably VERY difficult for someone who supported the status quo to look at themselves in light of their perpetuation of the whole gig. I had a hard enough of a time coming to grips with my own part of the play, that did NOT overlap into many people’s lives. I would think it’s incredibly hard to take a look at the influence, outside one’s self, that one is responsible for. At the same time I believe that the work we each have is EXACTLY what it’s supposed to be, whether it was defending RB within the school, or judging those who did the defending.
We can speculate, but we can only really know our own shit for sure, and probably RARELY for sure.
I look at my internal answers from 1985 when I left, and my answers now, and they don’t even resemble each other.
April 23, 2007 at 8:08 pm
hmmm and more of non-dualism from a posting above that one or more students think is the beginning of the end for FOF (ie. starts in Russia and ends in russia):
A question is asked in russian meeting:
“If one is consistently trying to separate from I’s, keep the silence inside and separate from the objects which come through the senses, one can come to the realization of one’s true Self. And from here one sees that there is no “Me” and “You”, no world, but just an illusion, maya, and one is that very consciousness that perceives it”.
As seen here, a question trying to verify all that non-dualism is about..
Robert looked up, said “Yes…” and continued further:
You, I, real school, angels in the room, sleeping
machines and the other things that make this world seem real and you as one of its objects.
Before this question were questions (see 118, David D) which Robert decided were “bad” questions and after was a question about Robert’s sexual predation (my word). And the posting intimates and many of us were around to see that this was when the meeting questions/angles started to be provided on pieces of paper for students to ask/give and the FOF form was shut down. So, via my perhaps delerious estimation, non-dualism begins to arise as FOF begins to fall. Of course no words are ever really true (or false!); nevertheless, I’ll stick with those for a while…
April 23, 2007 at 8:13 pm
and hmmmm – more…
What would non-personal conciousness look/seem/smell/taste/sound/be like?
How about non-localized conciousness?
April 23, 2007 at 8:13 pm
#167 While I try to make it a point to not explain my beliefs and decisions to anyone, in this case it seems harmless to answer. I left in 85, but I actually left a couple years earlier internally. I wanted to make my decision to leave not about money, so I decided that I wouldn’t formally leave until I had paid back a loan (with interest), and was current with the FOF financially in whatever way I was aware of. That was for ME, what I had to do. Having been in the frying pan, it was an excruciatingly painful place to be for a year or two. But evidently, that was what I had to do.
April 23, 2007 at 8:50 pm
Just imagine that one day you will spend all eternity in Paradise with people like Lust-for-life #71, LOL”100, Chop-Sticks #116, Butthead #129 …. All long time FOF students.
This all reminds me of the experience I had with my first girl friend, she was raised as a “Jehovah’s Witness” after she moved in with me her brethren were making Shit, Kaka in front of our door, but if you can do that on our teacher, why not in front of a former students door?
Just continuing to discuss if there is “Still value in remaining in the FOF” is a waist of time at that point… better discuss “How much will it hurt your soul to stay any longer”.
Greetings to all the shadows behind the handles
And to those who do not have the courage to express themselves
But don’t mind to read and to follow
Anyway I prefer to spend time on the moon with girls like Loreta , “no person”, Rita and Elena than in paradise with the above shadows.
Sorry for the different tone but I did not want to appear preaching, at least this time
Kiran
Enjoy my “Jews for Jesus” pictures from this weekend
http://flickr.com/photos/iloveyou2/sets/72157600108304437/show
April 23, 2007 at 8:59 pm
Story:
I returned to FOF after 13-14 year absence in Sept, 2003 and attended meeting with RB in NY about two weeks later. At that meeting, after being told of my return, RB quipped, “The school has its rudder back; we are back on course”. I think I mumbled under my breathe something from Lewis Carroll – “and the rudder gets mixed with the bow spirit sometimes…”
Couple of years later, I was kicked out for smoking – as Girard said, “interfering with Robert’s will”. Not that it mattered here, I had already planned to leave in about 6 months and my second sojourn in FOF was not so naive or ‘needful’ as the first; indeed, I felt I had just needed to verify a few ideas that had formed about FOF during my absence. No more rudder and no more mixing with the bow spirit (never did mix as some others did; happily I was never the type to be on RB’s sexual radar).
At any rate, that’s why the FOF is in such a tissy now – no more rudder. That’s my opinion and I am sticking to it….
April 23, 2007 at 9:43 pm
#111 with malice towards none – on death:
April 23, 2007 at 9:56 pm
To Confused, 7/160 and Chimes, 57/160
Someone (far earlier post) asked (not quoting word by word):
How many predictions will it take ?
How many abuses ?
And Chimes asks for “honest assessment” so it can be explained why those who left did it “long after they found out”.
I wish I had objective answers.
I can only be personal here:
the wish to free myself from “ordinary morality”, “ordinary sanity” (why do I admire Gurdjieff so much ?) and the deep recognition/acceptation that I value “ordinary virtues” (why do I admire Meher Baba so much ?) is “my” contradiction: I can admire opposites!
I leave the School at 10:00;
at 10:30, I am convinced I can benefit by giving it a longer try.
I trust Robert at 3:00pm,
at 5:00 he is a predator.
When you look at such a messy house, you just want to go for a walk !
Time passes (that never fails)and the mess seems to grow at the speed of the success of the FOF (more success/money/forces, more abuses).
When Chimes suggests the one leaving are not willing to “work” on themselves any more so any excuse will do, it might have some validity (the going for a walk!)
but it is too much of short cut and the condamning tone with which this words are offered simply generates fear.
If at least, dear Chimes, that realisation was clearly percieved!
It is not so… at least, not so easy (again because I do not want to exclude the possiblity).
Many voices expressing themselves here,
in this blog you should not be reading deFOF friends,
do show their willingness to continue “photosynthesis” light,
FOF or not
and they sound concern by the possible limitations a guide like Robert might impose.
Continue to be kind and above all, true to yourself.
April 23, 2007 at 10:05 pm
Duplicate post. Deleted. — ES
April 23, 2007 at 10:05 pm
#167 Chimes: Incidentally, “not working on myself anymore” had nothing to do with the decision to leave. Even asking that question that way reveals more about where you are coming from than an answer would assuage your curiosity. Keep talking.
April 23, 2007 at 10:23 pm
Bruce #173–thanks for your response. Not leaving for the money shows character. However, what made you really leave then? Surely you knew about RB and it does not sound you are the “sheep type”–thanks.
April 23, 2007 at 10:27 pm
I am sure most have read and re-read post 7- #115 but to those just joining the dialogue or the few who have skimmed over it i would just like to remind of its existence.
April 23, 2007 at 10:30 pm
re: 141 No person
“Dear friend, don’t spend your life preparing for death – accept a gift of life, enjoy it now as it is, be who you are, because this is truly a wonderful gift.”
Thanks for your thoughts. I don’t however see the contradiction between preparing for death and enjoying the gift of life. I actually see each endeavor enabling the other. I would wish your beautiful formulation to be true but it sounds too good to be true.
It seems that the great teachers/esoteric traditions of the past (Jesus, Buddha, Don Juan, the Sufis, etc) emphasize preparing for death; to live one’s life as if death is stalking one because it is. This does not mean worrying or obsessing about death. It just means for me finding out what one might be able to do in preparation and then doing it.
re: 151 Yesri Baba
“Close your eyes and imagine you are god. Out of yourself create 1,000,000 gazillion things. These things are the bits that don’t survive you are the bit that does.”
I think I may have exhausted the possibilities of drugs in the late 60’s/early 70’s but if I ever leave the Fellowship, that will be the first thing I try to re-verify for sure. Thanks for the flashback!
April 23, 2007 at 10:41 pm
Kiran, what’s with all the closeup shots of your face, time after time? What am I missing here?
April 23, 2007 at 10:58 pm
Hello, everyone!
I entered this conversation late; I am trying to find the time to give previous entries the attention they deserve, but there are so many! So, this subject may have been covered, and better, before.
My rhetorical question is: What is the nature of the acquiescence or permission that young men give when Burton demands sexual favors from them?
Most people defend Burton, and Burton justifies himself, by saying that the young men have given their permission freely. A necessary part of this defense is that the law says that they are of legal age to give consent (mostly true—the case of Troy Buzbee was an exception probably because Burton allowed his lust to overcome his need for a little basic pre-sex research). For a while, I used this argument myself. Here, in my opinion, are the fallacies.
The law can only be basic guidance. Different societies around the world have formulated their own laws, so the age and even the idea of consent varies globally, but we in the U.S. have chosen an age and embodied it into law based on custom and experience. It basically recognizes that before this age, most people are not qualified to make a sound judgment on their own behalf, and after this age, they are. But, of course, the law is a gross generalization. We can all find examples of precocious juveniles and adults who are irresponsible to an extreme. The law cannot take these into account. So we have to apply other factors to help us make a judgment.
To me, the major other factor is power, and the balance of power. It is a given, a presupposition, that people who enter agreements and relationships are empowered to do so. This means that they have roughly equal power. If not, there is coercion by one party, and some degree of force enters the equation. I’m pretty sure that most of us know this in ourselves, and have a flavor (we may disagree about degree) of what constitutes too much imbalance. We see this argument going on in society right now as to what constitutes rape, and most folks agree that because humans are sexually dimorphic, with the weight/strength advantage on average going to the male, the physical power imbalance calls for extra protection for the female. And so it goes with psychological power. Most of us are revolted by the bully, or the concept that might makes right, and we loathe someone taking advantage of someone else who has a degree of helplessness (unless one is a psychopath or sociopath, in which case it is silly weakness to be taken advantage of).
So here we have Burton, asking a young man to have sex with him. He chooses weak young men. He chooses vulnerable young men, who are perhaps here on questionable visas, have little money, and little wriggle room. Each of these young men has a choice, yay or nay. Each has ‘given up his will to the Teacher’. At the slightest hesitation, or even preemptively, Burton pronounces “C-influence wants you to have sex with me”, or “I am an angel, you must externally consider me”, or whatever. Heavy stuff! Often, the young man will be drunk. He may have been pre-pared by an older student (breakfast with Sheila G., anyone?) or another of Burton’s boys. And it is not as if Burton does not have charisma. He has tons, and can bring it to bear in an incredibly tight focus. He also has the support of the whole FOF, the permission given by thousands over thirty-five years. The entire culture of the FOF supports him and his actions; remember, the young man has deliberately thrown out the mores and traditions of the old “life” culture, and embraced wholeheartedly the new FOF culture (reprogrammed). And if at first the young man refuses, he is asked again and again, plied with wine and favors and flattery and the pressure from his peers. Who could resist? Few do. And who can blame them? Most in the FOF envy them, “getting closer to the Teacher”.
After saying “yes” there are many extra reinforcements. There may be actual pleasure (I am the last to claim that there is less pleasure getting a blow job from a man than a woman. I don’t know, but I can’t think of any reason why it would be the case. Same with prostate stimulation, and so on.). The approval of peers. The rewards, money and favors (though that may link into another disempowering pathology of Burton’s—the reduction of the young man to Prostitute, a negative archetype in our culture). The increased attraction to women in the FOF who want to bask in the aura second-hand. The sense of specialness and self-importance. And so on.
Who in his heart of hearts could claim that the power in this relationship is equal? It is manifestly not so. It has to be unequal to overcome the natural resistance of the young man (that equation thing again). Remember, Burton is not seeking homosexuals, he is seeking straights, because he enjoys overpowering them. But, I’m not getting into his pathologies or sexual practices here, just discussing the unequal power thing.
Any psychologist or psychiatrist worth his or her salt has studied human dynamics and power deeply. They know all healthy relationships are based on give and take, which is another way of talking about the distribution of responsibilities and power. But, all healthy relationships are based on roughly equal power and mutual agreements. It seems perfectly amazing that psychiatrists in the FOF have not stepped forward and educated the laity about the imbalance of power between Burton and his young men, for surely they have recognized it for what it is. But seems their consciences are quiescent, and they have to bear the consequences. The job of some of the psychiatrists and doctors in the FOF is clear; it is to prescribe Viagra and act as procurers for whatever other drugs and medicines are needed to keep the show on the road.
Now for the fair-and-balanced part, which concerns my personal history.
I am one of the young men that Burton chose, and I refused. That’s probably only because I misunderstood the situation, as the patient reader will see. I didn’t even know I was being courted, until things clicked into place, much later. When I joined in London (with my girlfriend, Frances) I was specifically told by Peter Bishop and Christina Neilson (soon to marry each other) that Burton was celibate. I also read it in the Via del Sol papers and in the Mt. Carmel Journal, which I bought complete back issues of soon after joining (still have them—waiting for offers!). So, I took it as gospel. (And imagine my shock when fifteen years later, Peter Bishop told me that he was having sex with Burton at the time I joined and asked that question!). Soon, I went to Renaissance. Burton was fascinated with King of Spades people at the time. I accepted an offer from him to stay at Renaissance, and the invitation extended to my girlfriend. He started bringing me over to the Blake Cottage to work on projects, like cleaning a fountain and polishing his silver, and took to watching me all the time, paying little compliments, and making pronouncements like, “You are on C’s (another King of Spades) ladder, but you are further along than him”, or “You have beautiful hands”, or “Negroes are a criminal octave”, or “C-influence wants us to become friends”, or “It is significant that you are the only person in the school born in the Southern Hemisphere” (which I was, at the time). I contributed nothing after he told me that being silent would be an act of external consideration to the teacher. So, I was muddled by the random pronouncements, but flattered by the single-minded attention.
Then he starts taking me on trips, and taking to holding my hand (and wiping it with a Swiss lace handkerchief when my nervousness makes it sweat mightily). Fine dining. Shopping. One day, a trip to L.A. and the Bel Air hotel. Colin leaves us to go to his room, bids goodnight. Burton tells me to sleep on the floor, near his bed. At dawn, I hear his voice, “Come here, dear”. I wake up and get up, dressed only in my underpants. Luckily, after a horrible night’s sleep on just some hotel cushions, I don’t have my morning woody! “Get into bed with me”. So, I do. His back is turned towards me, and I am having thoughts from a D.H. Lawrence novel—no kidding—about men mature and strong enough to hug and cuddle other men, to give strength and support in a totally non-sexual way, and pitying Robert who has no one because he is celibate and nursing his energies for higher work, and so on. I get into bed and put one arm around him, and hug him chest to back, but keeping an inch away lower down, sending warm thoughts and encouragement, drowsing off. After ten minutes: “That will be all, dear. Go back to your bed”. So that was that.
Then more trips, now with lots of “C-influence wants us to be friends”, but no more invitations for anything more. On one trip to S.F. Robert tells me that he wants me to have the orange Mercedes, go tell Kenneth. I go to the consigliore and main driver of the Rolls, Kenneth W. and tell him. He nods, then says, “Are you sure you can pay the price?” I am in shock. What does that mean? Mechanically, I say, “I don’t think so”. I take it as a gift and a warning (really, what could I possibly do to deserve a Mercedes, on any level?), and don’t pursue it (later I find out that the same car was given to a number of favorites in turn).
Time passes, and at the completion of the Academy, the downstairs rooms are ready. Burton asks me to move there. Now he is very, very insistent that “C-influence wants us to be friends”. I protest weakly that I don’t know how to be friends with him, but he says, “Yes you do, and C-influence want us to be close. Come and live with me in the new house”. I say, driven by something I can’t understand that says this is imperative, “No, I can’t, Robert”. He turns away with a cold, stern look. That’s it. I’m dropped. No more trips, no more energy, though a polite nod from time to time. The girls who fawned on me, invited me to dinner, praised how I read poetry before dinners, fade away. The guys who sit next to me and who ask me what it is like to be close to Robert, and can I share angles he has given me, cease to do so. I’m not “in”. I can’t understand it. I talk about it with a couple of older students. “You refused to go live with him? You idiot!” These students turn out later to have full knowledge, at the time, of what the invitation would have probably meant.
So, Burton’s overwhelming psychological advantage was balanced by something else in my case. In the scheme of things, something integral seems to be looking out for me. Some sense of knowing, including but larger than the instinctive center What made the difference? Did I refuse, not from knowledge of the situation, but because I was especially naive, and that acted as a sort of armor? Was there some knowingness that giving in would mean the death of something essential? Or is this just another way of describing ‘common sense’?
A couple of postscripts. I promised myself I would not mention the story to anyone (it wouldn’t lead to anything but gossip). A few months later, my friend John M. from the London center, referred to in a previous post, flew over to visit. One evening, he asked me, “Do you think Robert is a homosexual?” After I got over the shock, I said, “John, I have reason to know he is not. I’m not at liberty to tell you why, but I can assure you from my own knowledge he is not”. John left soon after. Burton had appeared in his bedroom in the London teaching house and told him that he was an angel and that C-influence wanted John to have sex with him. I heard the details about this eight years later, when rumors of Burton’s homosexuality started to circulate more strongly, and conversations ensued. Each time, I protected Burton’s reputation with the same patter, and I guess I was convincing, as I believed it completely myself. I cringe…
Years later, after I interviewed some of the “boys” to get first-hand information, it turned out that Burton probably wasn’t really even trying hard with me, or had in the meantime become quite pitiless. And it was certainly obvious they didn’t have whatever it was that I had, had no internal support. Some, more honest perhaps, admitted to losing their essential integrity, and were sad and lost. Some said, it seemed with an air of bravado, that it had been great, a huge aid to their evolution. I wish I could believe them, but of course, it may have been true.
So, to the young men facing the choice today or tomorrow, I paraphrase Ouspensky. He said one has to give up one’s will to a teacher, temporarily. He also said you have to retain common sense. He said common sense is the sense common to all centers. If the moving-instinctive center, the emotional center and the intellectual center all agree, that is common sense. Common sense is given to protect you until you can distinguish conscience. If common sense says, “No!” to a suggestion of the teacher, do not fall for the line that it is willfulness, or that C-influence wants it, or that it is good for your evolution, or that you should be externally considerate of the teacher. Run, don’t walk from that situation, preferably right out of the Fellowship.
To the young men who are hurting. There are estimates of a couple of million sociopaths just in the U.S. They all leave a trail of harm behind them. Seek professional help; there are many, many experienced counselors available, dedicated to service, who have made it their life work to try to clean up some of the mess sociopaths leave behind. Some will work for free if you cannot afford it. Do NOT go to psychiatrists or doctors in the Fellowship. They have already betrayed you and their explicit and implicit oaths to help you; they are partners in crime. The same goes for “older students”, especially those in positions of power. Get outside help.
Ames Gilbert
April 23, 2007 at 11:19 pm
#167 Chimes,
“…please give us your honest assessment if there was a part of you that did not want to work on yourself anymore.”
No, I think you might have this backward.
If I wanted to stay in a status quo situation and just coast, with plenty of “cover” from an institution and enfeebling “practices” (like “the sequence” or “non-identification” etc), and with no reason to ever confront the fixed and limiting beliefs within myself, I could have STAYED infof. If I really wanted to “work” I would have to leave.
JoelF
April 23, 2007 at 11:20 pm
Mark H.
I justed want to relate a memory of you, it may have occured around 1978. I was walking into one of those forlorn mobiles scattering the landscape in the “sticks” of Oregon House. You were sitting on the floor meditating and gave a warm and, it seemed, somewhat sly smile as i walked by. I rememember this, i believe, because it sparked a memory of recognition of the value of meditation that had atrophied during my time in the fof.
Meditation is a discipline i have returned to since and consider an invaluable practice. It is a labor of love-one of many.
It is good to hear you are doing well.
April 23, 2007 at 11:33 pm
Lust for Life (176): Beautiful.
And thank you so very much to all of you who made the choice to donate some money to the blog. I am extremely thankful. I don’t believe that I deserve any money for what I have been doing with the blog, or for (unknowingly) starting this discussion. But it will make my life a bit easier and make me able to spend a bit more time doing the things that I enjoy doing. No, I will not use the money for sex, drugs and other hedonistic drives, even though the option is rather attractive.
I guess that the donations worked more as a sign of appreciation than anything else, and it is a beautiful feeling to know that your best efforts are appreciated by other people.
So, once again thank you very much.
April 23, 2007 at 11:41 pm
We all play the sheep at one time or another, just as we all play the fool. My reasons were many, and mine.
April 23, 2007 at 11:45 pm
On Robert having sex right before the meeting.
I suddenly have a very vivid memory of a Sunday morning
meeting in the Galleria. Robert and the front row panel sat down,
and one could clearly see that RB’s fly was open. Wide open. Martha R, now Leila R, who was sitting next to him,cleverly distracted audiance and camera by pointing to the ceiling and then quickly warned Robert that his zipper was wide open!
And there we sit, in our Sunday best, paying good money,
trusting the teacher to inspire us while he just had/ performed
a good blow Job?
April 23, 2007 at 11:51 pm
RE Butthead #129:
WOW! You really know who HC is? Please take time, when you are not too busy reacting to this blog, and let us all in on your little secret, so you can keep us “idiots happy and busy”.
And thank you for your thoughtful commentary on the arguments posted here. It definitely clarifies for us your position on the issues. And you managed all this without loosing your cool, as evidenced in your final comment! Bravo!
And, finally, thanks for the compliment! Even YOU admit that at least we are full of OURSELVES.
Which naturally begs the question: “Then what are YOU full of?”
(But I think the word that applies here is the one at the end of your second paragraph. Thank you for saving me the trouble of repeating it.)
April 24, 2007 at 12:25 am
some more history …
Strange I did remember there were brave questions about RB&sex around 2000 and some Russians were immediately asked to leave but I completly forgot the main theme. It was an early challange of the “advaita” approach.
___________________________________
see the discussion list July 2001:
“From: “Vladimir Smirnov”
To:
Subject: [FoF] A message from Saint-Petersburg
Date: July 14 2001
Dear friends, all who read this discussion list and
those who have received their personal copy.
(Dane, Rulik, Girard, Synthia, Carlos, Thomas, Robert,
Rowena, Peter and Victor).
Thank you for your sincere help in the past and
understanding in the present.
Read the following carefully and use it to your best.
Recently when being in one of so called intervals when
the machine is stressed and trying to understand what
the next step is, something changed and a new teaching
appeared face to face.
The document which was sent to the list yesterday
contains the excerpts from it.
It is the teaching of Sri Ramana Maharshi, he is
probably a complete man #7 in our terms.
A man who experienced a state of objective
consciousness and after that spent next 50 years of
his life sitting near the mountain and teaching all
those who wanted to be taught.
The idea is to make efforts to keep your mind quiet,
separate from the physical objects, entering through
the five senses and ask every thought with words “Whom
is this thought for? Is it me? Who is this me? Who am
I?”
This very effort will bring one to the realization of
one’s Self. And this Self is GOD and it is your true
nature, for GOD is not outside, but inside of you.
The illusion arises because I (that is You) identifies
itself with the body, when at the same time the
Absolute is shining alone within one’s machine. (It
reminds Gurdjieff saying that higher centers are fully
functional and working, but one does not listen to
them).
Consciousness is not the functions, but they are
connected. As Ouspensky and Girard pointed, there is
no greater stimulus for the machine other than the
presence of consciousness.
If one identifies with one’s eyes, the objects become
real. Than the forces that make the machine work and
all its results become real. Its likes and dislikes
become real. You start acting. Success of it brings
joy, fault brings suffering. Understand the illusory
nature of things and your suffering goes away. It is
hard to separate from negative emotions, when you
believe into the reality of their subjects, but if you
remove the objects – you are free.
Buddha, Meher Baba, sufi masters and other great
teachers say that if you separate from this body and
all what it brings with it, you will come to the
realization that all the visible world is just an
illusion, maya, play of the mind, whereas the Absolute
is like on ocean where souls are like drops.
There is no me looking for God and trying to be
present to the world around, but there is a drop which
looks for the ocean, when it is already there, being
part of it. Read Rumi, Lao Tsu or Hafiz to understand
what this experience is like. It is that very state
where endless consciousness, unity, love and will
live.
When Jesus said “I am the Son of my Father and I am
Him” meaning that he is in the state where he
experiences himself as the Absolute, when he is the
Ocean and not the drop. It makes one compassionate to
look at the drops in the ocean and see how they
believe to be individuals.
Now, when having modern science and Rodney Collin
books, we can understand it with our intellect.
However, experiencing is not the intellect.
Here one can see that the system of Gurdjieff and
Ouspensky is just a brilliant package of objective
knowledge acceptable for western mind, because western
people are too much in “Me” to understand that there
is no “Me”. And self-remembering helps to understand
that there is no me, I’m just a point from which the
awareness comes and that’s it. From here we start.
Now, what the school and the teacher are for?
To create conditions and opportunities for those who
want. If one understands that one’s Self identifies
itself with the body and it is in the prison of the
physical world, one needs something, which will
destroy this identification.
Thus, one forgets about things that support the
reality of the sensible world and looks for something
which frees his consciousness. Gurdjieff was laughing
if hearing someone delighted with works of western
art, as he saw it as fully subjective. Real art, he
said, is created to help. It is based on objective
laws and contains within it a higher state (and not
the machine, but consciousness).
Immediately, a lot of the things about our School
became clear and obvious.
Some are helpful and cannot not to be easily found
outside (that is, the students and their efforts) and
others proved their nature today at the meeting led by
Robert.
Many things were earlier had to be adjusted to fit
into the picture. But for the last two weeks it seems
to become more and more clear that the essence of
attitudes is the same as of buffers. That is, if one
cannot handle something, one is forced to do something
with it. If you have no will not to express negative
emotions, you believe thinking that you are always
right or you have to use your king of hearts to help
you and create a working attitude. If your will is
strong, you simply separate from the machine and it
will separate you immediately from its senses, objects
they perceive, reactions to these objects etc.
If one is conscious, one simply becomes separates and
controls it, without thinking or feeling.
Many of Robert’s actions were earlier explained using
the idea of the machine being separate from
consciousness and therefore doing what it’s doing when
one is simply observing it.
However, who said it? Ouspensky said that even the
smallest change in one’s level of consciousness
changes the machine a lot. Its functions work better,
it’s usual I’s disappear and new ones appear. All the
ancient teachers say that an awaken being can be
recognized by his behavior. This behavior is based on
complete non-attachment, desireless and absolutely
equal attitude towards any object. The Master sees
everything including his body as a visible expression
of the Absolute while being himself united with IT
internally and invisibly. He is like a crystal through
which the light comes. This is called being objective.
Today the meeting started with Robert’s words about
Influence C.
Then, a question:
“Robert, after watching recent videos I feel that our
School direction becomes more and more religious, as
you offer ideas which cannot be verified as clearly as
others. So, it involves belief, which is opposite to
the Fourth Way principles. For example, the idea of
Influence C working directly with us. What can I do
with it?”
It was asked in English and Robert made a mistake – he
asked it not to be translated into Russian and than
said that he didn’t like the question and wants to
skip it.
We moved further and he expressed his I’s about having
a little time and using our time wisely without asking
“wrong” questions. After a few of his angles a new
question asked:
“Robert, you pointed out that immortal Gods are
working with the School directly. Then, what is the
main reason that in these 30 years none of your
students became a fully awaken?”
This time Robert lost.
His calmness completely disappeared and he repeated
that the questions were wrong and not helpful. He was
touched. After a few words he said that he was that
one who was a fully awaken being. Then he added, that
the meeting at Apollo was also somehow strange and he
thoughts that it is a good idea to have a list of
questions before the meeting so he could skip wrong
questions.
Then we moved our usual way speaking about Plato and
Influence C. There were mostly Robert’s words and one
question about taking practical aims because awakening
seems to be too far. Robert spoke about using the body
for creating third state, developing Apollo etc. Then
he said about being present to the beauty of the room
and enjoying arts. Than he moved to the efforts to
separate from the negative I’s and I gave an angle
based on the teaching expressed:
“If one is consistently trying to separate from I’s,
keep the silence inside and separate from the objects
which come through the senses, one can come to the
realization of one’s true Self. And from here one sees
that there is no “Me” and “You”, no world, but just an
illusion, maya, and one is that very consciousness
that perceives it”.
The angle is neutral and there is nothing to add or
remove from it. It belongs not to mine, but to a
higher level of being. Robert looked up, said “Yes…”
and continued further:
You, I, real school, angels in the room, sleeping
machines and the other things that make this world
seem real and you as one of its objects.
Than, another question:
“Robert, why to you make your male students to have
sex with you?”
Robert was digesting for a while, but he looked ready
and gave a long thread starting with the idea of
people interested in other people’s sexual life and
little by little moved to Plato, Leonardo and
Shakespeare having sex with males. Then he said about
Sapho being a beautiful lesbian being. Then he said it
was the most beautiful part of his life. And what can
be more beautiful that being present to your lover?
Than he added that those males who were having sex
him, had a sex with an angel in the human form. We are
accustomed to the unconscious sex and he has conscious
sex.
Few more angles, one from the jack of hearts, so every
laughed and felt easy and than the angle that the
meeting was for some reason very different and strange
with too many wrong questions at it.
Than a poetic quote and the end.
It is 99.9% probable, that you will never see this
meeting, even though it was recorded.
At this meeting Robert betrayed himself.
All of my previous attitudes to Robert (which were
sometimes not easy to create after working at the
Academy and looking at him closely) are ruined.
The attitudes about the form of the School and not
expecting it to be perfect either.
All the Gurdjieff’s words appeared as alive:
Western art is totally subjective and based on
imagination.
Greek-Roman culture was that very culture which
brought more harm to the humanity
than any other.
Greeks destroyed the objective knowledge by their
philosophy.
Romans destroyed human conscience by their behaviour.
It and many others things can be all found and
understood in his “Beelzebub’s tales”.
And after that Robert’s words that he was not sure if
Gurjieff was a conscious being at all and that
Ouspensky did a mistake on every page of the “Fourth
Way” to escape formatory thinking and that many
conscious beings were naďve saying different things
because Influence C kept they away from the truth.
Recently he said that he might become a man #8
depending on the hydrogen warfare.
Earlier, when he was giving his first meeting, he
said:
“It began in Russia, and it will end in Russia”.
When he was asked about the meaning, he replied that
he didn’t know, but these words appeared in his head
and he said them which gave him the creeps.
After today’s meeting it does seem to be true.
I guess, it would be useful for all of us have this
message printed in our Forum, but somehow this idea
seems to be a very naďve one J
All these words are just I’s of this machine, but they
reflect other.
If you wish, you can contact me at volodya@comset.net
With love and friendship from Saint-Petersburg,
Vladimir Smirnov
P.S. Practicing the method explained above gives a
very strange feeling that I’m addressing it to myself.
As if it is one big thing remembering itself in
different forms.
Quotes to Sri Ramana Maharshi:
1. What is the nature of the Self?
What exists in truth is the Self alone. The world, the
individual soul, and God are appearances in it. Like
silver in mother-of-pearl, these three appear at the
same time, and disappear at the same time. The Self is
that where there is absolutely no “I” thought. That is
called “Silence”. The Self itself is the world; the
Self itself is “I”; the Self itself is God; all is
Siva, the Self.
2. Of the devotees, who is the greatest?
He who gives himself up to the Self that is God is the
most excellent devotee. Giving one’s self up to God
means remaining constantly in the Self without giving
room for the rise of any thoughts other than that of
the Self.
3. What is the relation between desirelessness and
wisdom?
Desirelessness is wisdom. The two are not different;
they are the same. Desirelessness is refraining from
turning the mind towards any object. Wisdom means the
appearance of no object. In other words, not seeking
what is other than the Self is detachment or
desirelessness; not leaving the Self is wisdom.
4. What is release?
Inquiring into the nature of one’s self that is in
bondage, and realizing one’s true nature is release.”
April 24, 2007 at 3:12 am
To Asahi (143)
Brilliantly hilarious!
Thanks for the hearty laugh.
April 24, 2007 at 3:38 am
To everyone on this list, for or against FOF I highly reccomend 2 books that can help make more sense of this situation and perhaps help the healing. I work as a therapist with spiritually damaged people and Ive seen a lot ex-teachers. These 2 books are very helpful
1 – Halfway up the Mountain; The error of Premature claims to enlightenment by Mariana Caplan
2- After the Ecstasy, the Laundry by Jack Kornfield
Both of these books examine the problems within spiritual communities without taking a fanatical “there all cults” like stance and the chapter on transference in Halfway up the mountain is fantastic especailly for any of the aspiring 4th way gurus that might be here.
Blessings to all of you
La ella ha el Allah
(There is no God but GOD)
April 24, 2007 at 4:21 am
Sheik, see how the mind works, now multiply the “donations” a few thousand times–add to that the sincere flattery from the bloggers (let’s say triple it) and then pretend you are no longer confused…now starting to feel a little like a cult leader yet? Are you sure you are going to give the money to some Mother Theresa as is expected of you? Of course not, you know that these former intellectuals have given their pounds up freely for you to do as you please…is this really so different from a Robert Burton???????????????
April 24, 2007 at 5:00 am
To #154: Half Life
Thank you for asking. I hope you will understand that I don’t care to go attempt an exhaustive explanation of my current worldview, it would take too long, also I don’t know who I am addressing, I don’t know your language.
I will say that separateness is okay, but not if you are trapped in it and don’t feel connection, communion, love, beauty, a sense of ‘oneness’as a regular part of life.
Our little sense of self seems to be based on fear,anxity — ironically, fear of the vastness we can be.
Maybe this vastness can be called the ’soul’. Deaths of those close to me have increased my “faith” (substance of things unseen)that something of the essence of the dying person lives on.
Sandra
April 24, 2007 at 5:37 am
To #167 & Chimes:
This is a huge question. I can’t say that I actually know, but I will throw out a few things in response.
After ten years in FoF (around 1983) I ‘found out’ that RB was homosexual. This was a blow enough for me, after believing he was a celibate straight man and telling that to so many othrs! I also heard he was involved with one of his close students. I recall writing him a ridiculoulsly long letter — 8 pages, single-spaced, with tons of taboo questions. He called me when he received it. The unsatisfactory with him conversation left me knowing I could no longer continue in any kind of responsible position with FoF (directing NYC at the time). Soon afterwards, I did resign after 8 years of leading centers.
Ultimately, however, I could not focus on RB’s behavior as a reason to leave the school. And I don’t see how anyone who tried to live the teachings could either. Here is why: If you accept that you are asleep and this other guy may be awake, not just as an idea, but based on
years of experiences of altered states of consiousness in which you see, you really get it — what ‘maya’ means, what it means that we are characters in a play, all participants in a dream — it makes perfect mystical sense that this guy who has brought 1500 people together and held them together for 15 years maybe IS in a different state of consciousness. You all know the thinking: perhaps it is crazy wisdom, putting you to the test, on and on, all these explanations for his behaviour cannot be so lightly dismissed.
Therefore, coming to conclusions, judging, if you like RB’s behavior — was not an option for me, not an acceptable route for making a decision to leave. I could not have been in MY integrity at the time and done that. His behavior did bother me enough that I no longer wanted to be in an active role with regards to others, and I was disheartened enough that I didn’t want to do much of anything for the school after that.
My attraction to the school was initially and always at heart an attraction to The System, the amazing impact the ideas had on my sense of myself, my life, the world. I loved the system, I loved Gurdjieff & Ouspensky’s work.
So,what really put a crack in my relationship to the school were my sojourns into my own psyche, and I permitted myself these sojourns after I ‘found out’ about RB. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I began to question the usefulness of the system for my work. Among other things, I became convinced that for many people, myself included, the “nonexpression of negative emotions” was effectively a repressive silencer of conscience, a barrier to truly knowing myself. I also found that formal vipassana meditation was a helpful adjunct to my everyday efforts to be present.
I did run a workshop for interested students for almost 3 years in which I
tried to set up exercises so others could experience what I had been learning in the taboo environments of body therapy, meditation workshops, really scores of outside “B” influences were proving so helpful to me. I wrote some articles, I told people what I thought. I felt responsible for undoing some of the encouraging I had done to bring people into the school. I was not all that popular at the time!
As Bruce said (thanks for your great #170 post), the answers I have now don’t ressemble what they were when I left.
Finally, when my husband was diagnosed with cancer in 1992, I knew I had to leave. In my mind I told myself, “I have to take care of my own family; I can no longer afford to try to take care of my FoF family.”
I waited a month, then sent back my sapphire ‘marriage’ bracelet to RB (I could kick myself for that romantic gesture, it was a very valuable bracelet!)and told him I was leaving.
After leaving is when the trance really started to lift and the grieving set in. One Eastern teacher I read said that when a marriage ends, it takes half the life of the marriage for the ‘etheral bonds’ between the partners to dissolve. I considered the relationship with FoF similar to a marriage, and it has taken time for the bonds to dissolve. There is much more to say, as evidenced by these outpourings, but I will end there.
Thanks for asking & reading.
Sandra
April 24, 2007 at 5:46 am
to Isiswideshut #189
A correction – not in defense on anything or anyone but for the sake of plain truth.
I was at that meeting and saw it a little different. Actually when someone whispered to him that his fly was open he did a little intentional act: he turned to the student on his left and asked him to repeat what was said in his ear, and then he asked him to say it to the student on his right and if I am not mistaken he asked him to say it out loud too. He eventually fixed his fly, but the lesson I learned was that Robert did not have inner considering and instead he used this little embarrassing shock to create the state to the audience. People were laughing with him and not at him.
April 24, 2007 at 5:48 am
P.S.
Now I remember that the first non-official FoF book I read was Edgar Cayce — after Neal O died in an accident and I had some powerful experiences with him. When I asked RB about this hisexplanations were thin,weak, completely unhelpful. I thought he did not know much about this area and there was nothing in the system to help either, so I finally got up the nerve to turn elsewhere.
April 24, 2007 at 6:09 am
Dear Ames – #139
Thanks for your response to Chopsticks question. I hope for his/her sake it was sincere, and not a taunt. But reading your response, I can see that it wouldn’t matter to you if it was or it wasn’t. I knew you briefly before you left. I wish I had read your departure letter then (back in ‘94) with open ears and open eyes. But that is not the way life works, and it took another decade plus to wake up to reality. I certainly would enjoy a cup of coffee with you now.
April 24, 2007 at 7:36 am
Dear Innin, Thanks for the post #191, no matter how lenghty. I had no idea. Volodya was a very good friend of mine, we spent lots of good time together in ST. Petersburg when I was a director there. He was a very young solar-lunar guy with glasses, very smart and sweet, and he lived with his parents in truly horrible communal appartment with few other elderly strangers… When this whole “thing” happened in Russia, I was already residing in US, and it was presented to us quite differently (I didn’t get the chance to read the original on discussion group). I was told that a bounch of students got extremely negative, attacked Robert, and it was a process of crime. And they all got kicked out of school, and now smoke cigarettes and express negativity. (I really was told this AND COMPLETELY BELIEVED IT.)
Later I heard it many times, as soon as someone left – that he got negative and it was a process of crime. Friends told me that when it was my turn to be kicked out kicked out – exact same things were spread around… Extremely negative, and process of crime. So not true!.. But this is pretty powerful thing to say, isn’t it. Who wants to talk to negative criminals?
Shamefully, at the time (in 2000) I totally believed it, and easily renounced my friend (please forgive me if you can), and never ever contacted him again… I believed that he truly became extremely negative and criminal. I was not interesting in talking to him and asking what actually happened. Official version (A LIE) was enough for me then and fully satisfying.
I had no idea that this is actually what was asked at the meeting… Those were sincere questions, nothing was wrong with them. Where is the crime? Why can’t you ask this?
I see more and more that FOF is not about presenting the true story, it is really not. They present you with what they want to present you, just like the images for the meetings – often are altered using Photoshop to make them “fit”- all this to keep you under control. Lies, lies, lies. And buffers. I cannot believe to which degree I was actually brainwashed. It is very humbling to see it now.
In a way, it’s all funny and doesn’t quite matter now – I couldn’t obviously act differently then, otherwise I would have. I am just so happy for Volodya to stumble upon Ramana Maharshi back in 2000. I had no idea it was part of the mix. Good for you, Vovka!
April 24, 2007 at 9:07 am
Ames: Your contributions are remarkable. Remarkable.Keep telling the truth for all to hear.
April 24, 2007 at 9:15 am
To With malice toward none:
Last night I picked up Nisargadatta’s book from the shelf, and right on the cover there are quotes about death. How about that.
“The real does not die, the unreal never lived”.
“Once you know that death happens to the body and not to you, you just watch your body falling off like a discarded garment”.
“The real you is timeless and beyond birth and death. The body will survive as long as it is needed. It is not important that it should live long”.
Well, this is what the advaita sage said about death. I resonate deeply with the first statement – I do see that “unreal never lived”. My imaginary picture was indeed, completely imaginary. And also, what is real in us cannot die. Life continues, manifesting as a principle through myriads of forms, in an impersonal way.
Thinking about preparation for death seem very personal, as if some of this imaginary picture is hoping to continue in the afterlife, thinking what should “I” do to be prepared? How can it survive, really if it’s not real in this life…The body is mortal too, with all it’s beautiful qualities, features, talents, qualities. So who is getting ready for death and why? And what is that is going to die?
We are thinking so much about the death of the body. Of course, it’s totally understood and even justified. Body is important, it needs to be taken care for. It’s very scary to see others die. But are we the body? I mean -really, what are we?
The body started it’s existence as 2 different sex cells coming together during intercourse- but when did “we” started? May be when “we” were 4 cells, 8, 16, fetus, baby, 2-year old. We are not sure when. What were we before personality kicked in around the age of 3, before we knew our name and learned an identity, before our memory developed?
Most of my life I took it for granted that I am this body and a story I thought of myself. Just never really examined it, because that is what everyone seems to think about themselves. What a relief to see that this is not the case.
The way I understand death or life is more in terms of realizing what we truly are – the awareness, the very principle of life, and realizing the falseness of ego, or imaginary self created in the mind. So what “dies” upon such realization was actually never real, and what IS real can’t die because it’s life itself.
May be “preparing for death” means self-investigation and self-inquiry?
I like how Adyashanti commented on this Gospel quote:
“If you bring forth that which is within you,
what you bring forth will save you.
If you do not bring forth that which is within you,
what you do not bring forth will destroy you.”
He said something like: seeing consciousness as your true nature brings liberation, “saves” you, otherwise your unquestioned ego causes tremendous internal suffering your whole life and eventually “destroys” you.
Certainly we can argue about his interpretation, but for me it was very inspiring.
Much love to all of you guys.
April 24, 2007 at 10:18 am
Money Matters (195): I am afraid that I feel no shame, guilt, or confusion regarding the donations.
It’s a little bit sad that the only purpose of your comment was to make me feel exactly those emotions.
I can also assure you that personal attacks against me and hateful messages had more of an impact on me than the flattery.
April 24, 2007 at 11:13 am
Comment has been removed on request of the author.
April 24, 2007 at 11:19 am
I am falling out of love…
I always used to say that every student had some solar otherwise they couldn´t have joined.
I always knew that I was in a cult. I choose to, wanted the influences that the FOF culd provide.
I harvested the fruits..
Like a while ago the story of telling a friend who you wanted to become by being in the FOF and her saying that you already are that person.
Now it’s time to select the rotten apples out of my basket and go sell the nice ones on the market..
The FOF provided me with an particular experience of human existence that deepened my being and compassion.
When I started reading Gurdjieff I had a flash of recognition of how easily influenced I could be if someone pushed the right buttons.
When joining I naievely thought that I would learn control. It turned out to be a demonstration of being pushed.
And I am eternally grateful and venture out unto the unknown again for more human experiences.
April 24, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Pay attention,
to continuous observation Bonitas’ letter seems to have been changed at some points, starting from the sex thing and were the word in bold are. Also a part of it seem missing.
The letter circulated widely around ‘97. Needs to be checked out.
Fine observers will also notice that Bonita change tone, energy and ways of expression abruptly and the letter close is not natural.
Just a possible observation.
April 24, 2007 at 2:14 pm
Dear Innin (#191),
Thank you for posting Voloda’s letter. I remember him well, although I only met him a few times. I wasn’t at that meeting in St. Petersburg. There was a student there, Olia, whose husband was and is with Robert. She asked one of those uncomfortable questions and was asked to leave the school afterwards. What is incredible is that after the meeting Robert sent some people to the airport to get Olia’s husband who was coming from abroad, before she reached him and tell him that he can’t see her anymore, as she is not a student and is negative towards Robert and participated in the play of crime. I don’t know whether they met or not, but they separated and he still lives in Isis. Who is criminal in this story?
There is another story I want to tell, of my friend Ivan from Vilnius. We were attending perspective lectures together; and he had to come all the way from Vilnius to Moscow to do that. When I lived at Apollo, Ivan came there with his wife. A few days after his arrival he came to say goodbye to me. He had just met Robert who asked him whether he is willing to have sex with him. Ivan firmly said no to that and Robert then replied that Ivan is never going to be close to him anymore and his chances of evolution are now very slim. Still, Ivan left. I remember how much I cried that day. Ivan was a very close friend and although I didn’t care that time about Robert much (I came from Moscow where my centre director was much more important figure to me than RB. Also, to me work on myself was very important, as well as my friendships and my relationship within the school), I suffered Ivan’s departure and I knew that he was right in his take on Robert.
Altogether, I know only of 3 Russian men who said no to Robert. There must be more, but I don’t know their stories. I have so many friends who had sex with Robert and I don’t know any one who would do it for money in the beginning. I see how all my friends went there out of the naïve belief that they have to submit their will to the teacher. It takes a while for them to get corrupted or broken. I haven’t met any of them who are not traumatized by having sex with Robert, in one way or another. It really breaks my heart to think of the harm that was done to those men. Really, even when writing about it, the desire to ‘bring the bastard down’ comes back with full force, and I thought it was gone!
Dear Ames, thank you for sharing your amazing story. You are indeed incredibly lucky!
April 24, 2007 at 3:48 pm
Dear All and 126.
Why we are reluctant to leave….?
Great question.
Time is a factor and the moment when we have to go will arise.
If we will not act or are not abe to act something will tell us when to leave.
If I try to be in the moment then the moment tells me to make which decisions to make.
No worries, All will be as it supposed to be.
My task is to try to live without to much mind activity.
Love to all who are either, sitting, laying or standing.
April 24, 2007 at 3:55 pm
Dear Buthead,
Please read your post of 129 again.
It sounds that you do not want to be read. I skip unkind and negative posts. I miss consideration and politeness in yours.
If you were in the fellowship, you did not got the teachings of how to be considered and how to deliver photographs. If you are still in the fof…boy, that is not a good add for the fof.
Love to who ever is reading.
April 24, 2007 at 4:05 pm
Freud would explain the relationship to old memories
30/25/20/15/10/5/2 years ago that some Frogs on the block,
never made it to become Princes nor get free of the trauma
of being abused ???
It is possible that their life is so uninteresting that
ForF (Frog or Freud)
is the only way they can feel so sorry for themselves?
Get your life back, kill the dragon, swallow the frog,
become the prince you are destinate to BE.
kiss Loreta
loreta@inergetix.com
April 24, 2007 at 4:05 pm
Wooooooooooh Ames,
Keep writing. What a testimonial of your path walking through the fof , living your conscience (I question, I asked about many times in this blog)and then your surge, after the fof and what you found…
woooooooh
What an ispiration.
May many “in” and and “outies” read your emails.
Thanks.
April 24, 2007 at 4:15 pm
Here’s my story in relation to the FOF.
1. I was a member for almost one year, and this was some 10 years ago. It was a rich learning experience. I am convinced that without having passed through it many notions of the Fourth Way would have remained for me abstract concepts, mere letters on paper. I learnt about self-remembering, the three lines of work, the importance of regular meetings, discussions, exercises (like small aims, the looking exercise, the listening exercise); further about the importance of impressions, about art, classical music, flowers – refinement in general. About features, attitudes, transforming suffering, body-types, photographs etc.etc. I met many sorts of people, all of them fascinating. (I never met RB.) For all this I am grateful to the FOF.
2. What made me leave – was it accident, fate, C influence…? I don’t know. It matters more what took place afterwards. First of all I understood that I had been identified with the FOF, and that many people still in it were identified with it. This was largely due to that fear-instilling pernicious dogma that the FOF was the only school, and that one was doomed without it.
“Q. Can one be identified with a school?
A. That means losing the school. One can be identified with the school in many ways – by liking it too much, or criticizing it too much, or believing in it too much.” (P.D. Ouspensky – The Fourth Way)
“One has to form within oneself one’s own judgement of the esoteric. Ouspensky himself always told us: ‘You must not believe me. Observe. Prove or disprove what I say. You must come to your own conclusions.’ Easy acceptance on the one hand or negative argument on the other are equally resistant obstacles, each belonging to different types of people.” (Rodney Collin – The Theory of Conscious Harmony)
Even more important, after a period of questioning and doubt, I began – having continued to make efforts to work on myself, independently of any group – to receive every now and then such proofs of the miraculous (flashes of truth, if you prefer – and only flashes, I don’t claim more), that the following became clear to me:
a). that the Fourth Way IS REAL and IT WORKS;
b). that the FOF is NOT the only (true or supposed) agency for C influence; there are many groups out there, and Work is possible both in and out of groups.
“The Work is not a building, a place, a book, a system, dogma or tradition. The Work is something that lives in the hearts and minds of men and women – if they can find it.” (Maurice Nicoll)
3. To any ‘prospective student’ I would have said, until a few days ago when I discovered this forum, that it would be worthwhile to give the FOF a try for a limited period, maybe 6 months to 1 year. However, this was based on the assumption that the FOF remained the same as it appeared to me ten years ago. After taking note of the posts in this forum, I see that I’ll have to reject that assumption.
4. The FOF seems to be on a descending path. There used to be a lot of good in it, it would be sad if all that would have to disappear because of one or a few rotten apples. Can the FOF still turn around, or is it beyond redemption? Should the former apply, here’s my policy proposal, an approach of “abandon & reconstruct” in Ouspenskian spirit:
a). get RB fired or retired. Someone else, who has not lost all sense of conscience and integrity and common sense, could take over the chair, and regenerate the organization. Perhaps GH, or, if it should appear that he indulged in a Pilate or Eichmann role for too long, perhaps someone else.
b). get rid of the nonsensical ideas and dogmas such as that the FOF is the only authentic school, that one is doomed without it, the overdose of angels, numbers and other superstitions… Make clean with the past, recover the sound elements and build up on those.
5. Greetings to Cheryl, Philip and Dorian. (Mesaj pentru Dorian: fugi de acel om bolnav inainte sa fie prea tarziu. Regaseste-ti demnitatea, baiatule!) Cheryl, thank you for your advice, I never forgot.
6. It’s worth taking a(nother) look at message # 87/part 3 of this forum/from Innernaut.
A bon entendeur, salut!
Alice
http://alicelovesshakespeare.blogspot.com/
http://levelsofpolitics.blogspot.com/
April 24, 2007 at 5:07 pm
My ex-husband belongs to FOF and has since about 1988, I cannot believe that there are so many articles now on FOF I wish I had all these blogs to give to him back then. I am sure he is still in denial.
Thank you for having this forum.
April 24, 2007 at 5:08 pm
Here’s a bit of home movie starring Gurdjieff.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpALpgCIyxI
Consider, perhaps, while viewing, how you might react if this geezer propositioned you.
The appropriate soundtrack might be Steely Dan’s The Fez, by Becker and Fagen:
No I’m never gonna do it without the fez on
Oh no
No I’m never gonna do it without the fez on
Oh no
That’s what I am
Please understand
I wanna be your holy man
No I’m never gonna do it without the fez on
Oh no
Ain’t never gonna do it without the fez on
Oh no
That’s what I am
Please understand
I wanna be your holy man
No I’m never gonna do it without the fez on
Oh no
Don’t make me do it without the fez on
Oh no
That’s what I am please understand
April 24, 2007 at 5:09 pm
I was walking yesterday evening in Primrose Hill and Regent’s Park. I’ve seen many springs in many places, and I think that Spring in England is the prettiest in the world. I love the most those gorgeous chestnut trees and bluebells fields. All this beauty – just sprang out of nothingness…
I thought of death there, ‘the bits that survive’. Is my body not a part of the nature? My mind is not something that is formed by countless influences that came before me? What is there that is permanent in ‘Rita’? I see nothing.
Which exactly ‘bit’ would we want to survive? Our aging body? Unreliable mind? Influenced psychology? What do we call ‘I’? Is ‘I’ the life itself, consciousness that creates and sustains all? Can it die? Or the forms, appearances die in winter and are reborn with the spring?
We can learn all we need just by observing the nature, as we are part of it.
There is no more mystery in death than there is in life. ‘Sleep’ to me is just in perceiving life as trivial.
What is the point of trying to save ‘bits’ when there is ALL to which we can open and embrace? What is human life then if not a journey where one can recognize one’s WHOLE-ness? And act as a hero of a play one writes for oneself. All life then becomes a field of this heroic game – to be true to oneself – to ALL. Not a big task, really. Just natural, happy, free, like April’s blossom.
I guess this Spring makes me poetic…
I forgot to say thank you to Renald for sending poem ‘Ithaca’ to the blog, it is one of my favourites.
April 24, 2007 at 5:24 pm
To Sheik, 7/204, reacting on post 7/195
Welcome to the 4th way!
It is said (Ouspensy I think but not quite sure)
that a negative imput weight 10.000 more than a positive one.
Your experience of the few words from Money Matters can be seen as an illustration (verification) of this phenomenon.
The way I read post 195 was different.
Is it just because it is not addressed to “me”?
Is it because I am a FOF fence sitter re-considering the concept of payment as the FOF proposes it?
For some reason I understand what Money Matters is trying to put under light in a different way. Though, I do regret he is using the tone he is using.
Money Matters, tell me if I am “wrong” but allow me to re-formulate:
What happend to someone when he realises he is “important” in a given situation ?
What happend to someone when he/she understands money, beside power, can flow from his/her importancy ?
Are we not discussing here, among others valuable subjects, what happend to Robert?
One slightly different starting point though:
“voluntary” donations were never considered by Robert, if I understood properly the testimony of his very first student (and lover!) as it is given in Post 7/194.
This blog is still offering free use!
Also, big difference, Sheik is not introducing himself a “soul savior”, he is hosting/moderating a blog…
Unless the FOF can buy him (his importancy), which they might try to do (!),
we can count on his integrity and the way he enjoys his money should not matter.
Yet/but/though:
The way he will spend his money (just like the sport teacher I do not have analogy I used in a previous post)
might make a difference one day, if we find out he is abusing others with the donations he recieves/can get and then, we will be free to question him.
Yet/but/though:
If he is using the voluntary donations to refresh himself and do fun things, as he himself stated, including the word ‘temptation’,
we can only rejoice…
Sheik is aware and through you Money Matters, well doubble informed!
I am so fond of the way we want to care of each others!
As far as I am concerned, I am interested in the developments because I realy think Sheik entered a very peculiar set of circumstances by welcoming the Paypal thing…
Money is most of the time a “burning” subject!
Take care, be kind and above all true to yourself.
April 24, 2007 at 5:26 pm
A Russian writer, Pelevin, wrote on the subject of ‘saving personal consciousness’ in his excellent book “Chapayev and Void” or “Buddha’s Little Finger”:
‘-What are you afraid of?
-Death. No, not even death, but… I want to save my consciousness.
-…I didn’t expect that from you. It is as if there was a piece of newspaper lying under a lamp post and wishing to save the light that shines on it. And from what do you want to save consciousness?
-From no-being.
-Is no-being not an object of consciousness?
-Even if I am a piece of newspaper which thinks that it wants to save the light, it matters to me and it pains me.
-But the piece of newspaper can not think. There are just words which are printed on it: ‘I want to save the light of the lamp’. And next to that phrase it’s printed: ‘Oh, what pain, what suffering’.
And also:
‘-Neither you or me or captain Ovechkin have any kind of soul. It is the soul that has me and you and captain Ovechkin.
April 24, 2007 at 5:31 pm
hanks to all of you at ease enough with a keeboard to offer the many links on videos, photos, sites and so on…
The net can be really a wonderful tool for education.
I am getting a little addicted though
(I felt so good not having TV!)
but I gess that’s “my” problem!
Thanks, warmly
PS: Post 194, first student of Robert Burton did close in a brutal manner. It feels uncomplete… Is there, will there be a following ?
April 24, 2007 at 5:40 pm
# 195 Money Matters
Get real! What is your problem anyway? Make or don’t make a contribution, or stop reading the Blog, whatever. Nobody is forcing you to contribute to the Shiek – maybe you are still smarting from the zillions of dollars you spent on the FOF and can’t scream at RB so you give it a go on the Blog, directed at the Shiek.
Lets get one thing straigth – nobody says you can’t read the Blog or participate if you don’t pay (unlike the FoF).
Yeah, I know you are confused about the word “voluntary” after the misuse of the term in the FoF. You may want to look up the real meaning in the dictionary.
April 24, 2007 at 6:00 pm
Dear Elena and others,
Thanks for your letter. It is so practical and very clearly written for me. Thanks again.
Thanks to clarify about the letter not being from Courbet. That was a relieve to me as it gave me worry “I”s about his mental condition.
The aspect of unconditional love has pondered in me for months. Since the 6 left and I heard that Robert did not have any contact with them, no kind/ loving way of saying goodbye or as to talk the fof language, “to finish an octave”, with members who were in the fof for 12-30 years? I saw this as a sign and worried me.
Your letter prompted new questions:
1. What was it that got us in this octave? If we look back. What was it that attracted this karma to us? How to heal with this karma?
2. Why is it so much clearer for us now then 12 years ago when it was clear to Ames and his generation/
3. Why is it so hard to let go…why does it take so much time to digest and accept and move on?
4. Why did I not understand before that the expression of negativity was too extreme? Many emotions are very useful and needed for the body to stay reasonable healthy in a certain degree.
I know these question are to be lived and I will or as a dear friend remind me…live the mystery.
Love to all.
.
April 24, 2007 at 6:20 pm
Many thanks to Veronicapoe for the Bonita Hightower story.
It’s fascinating to see how the seeds of today’s corruption were there at the very beginning: lying about sex, demands for money, even phony predictions. It was much milder then though – I can’t imagine Robert turning down an offer of $4000 these days!
Bonita sounds like a sweet, honest lady, and she’s an excellent writer. More please!!
RB
April 24, 2007 at 6:29 pm
Dear Mark H and others,
About practicing and not practicing.
Do what you want in the moment and see when you try to go in either one or the other…it is called formatory mind. That is duality. Comparing apples and pears is duality. Useful think about it…sit for a while.
The American programming is doing. It is amazing how often Americans interfere with other peoples life thinking that they are doing the best in the moment.
Not doing is not good? Do I hear a parent or teacher’s voice? Why do we need those voices? Are we afraid of our inner silence?
What is there, when you do not breathe?
Will be continued.
Love from a sunny cold day with trees that are waving…to whom?
I do not know?
I do they know?
I do not know.
Love to all.
April 24, 2007 at 6:56 pm
For the confused, disillusioned, or trying to find themselves and their way in the whole scheme of things called FoF and the so called ‘teacher’ and ‘the work’. This may help or not help – whatever.
From Tony Parsons from AS IT IS (published 2000):
I used to believe that people actually became enlightened and that the event was similar to someone winning the jackpot in a national lottery. Once the prize had been won, the beneficiary would thereafter be guaranteed permanent bliss, infallibility etc.
In my ignorance , I thought these people had obtained and owned something that made them special and totally different from me. This illusory idea reinforced in me the belief that enlightenment was virtually unobtainable except for an extraordinary and chosen few. I compared my imagined inadequacies with the picture I held of whichever ‘spiritual hero’ I happened to be attracted to.
I feel that most people see enlightenment in a similar way.
Certainly there have been, and still are, many who seek to encourage such beliefs and who have actually claimed to have become enlightened. I now see that this is as pointless a declaration as someone proclaiming to the world that they can breathe.
Essentially the realization of enlightenment brings with it the sudden comprehension that there is no one and nothing to be enlightened. Enlightenment simply is. It cannot be owned, just as it can’t be achieved or won like some trophy. All and everything is oneness, and all that we do gets in its way by trying to find it.
Those who make claims of enlightenment or take certain stances have simply not realized its paradoxical nature and presume ownership of a state they imagine they have achieved. They are likely to have a deep personal experience of some kind, but this bears absolutely no relationship to illumination. Consequently , they remain locked in their own individual concepts based on their own particular belief systems.
These people often need to take on the role of the ‘spiritual teachers’ or ‘enlightened masters’ and inevitably attract those who need to be students or disciples. Their teaching, rooted in dualism, inevitably promotes a schism between ‘the teacher’ and those who choose to follow the teaching . As the following increases, so does the exclusive role of the master’s need to be enhanced.
One of the usual symptoms, when such a role has been adopted, is a clampdown of any admission or sign of ‘human weakness’. As the ‘specialness’ of the ‘master’ becomes more effective, and the demands of the followers become greater, so invariably do the teachings become more obscure and convoluted. As the obscurity of the teaching increase, so does the schism het wider, and many of the followers often become more confused and submissive. The usual effect on those involved can be unquestioning adulation, disillusionment, or an awakening and moving on.
Those who have fully comprehended and embraced enlightenment have absolutely nothing to sell. When they share their understanding, they have no need to embellish themselves or what they share. Neither do they have any interest in being the followers mother, father or teacher.
Exclusivity breeds exclusion, but freedom is shared through friendship.
April 24, 2007 at 7:02 pm
Dear All,
Isn’t it fun when you interact with a child and he tries to get something form you and you know its agenda already? Ever enjoyed these nteractions?
So it is with Kiran. We know his agenda and what he wants. He might be cute but he is no child and he has money that also means power.
Let him do his thing, but please do not help him to refine his methodes. Do we want to help him become another RB with many women on the moon? When he is improving his techniques like RB?
Have we learned something from the past?
Love to all. Boy this blog is getting so gooooooood. Woooooooooh.
O, Dear Sheik…forgot to thank you for your role which I am sure you were not aware of when you started this blog. Thanks.
April 24, 2007 at 7:04 pm
It was not my intention to create feelings of shame guilt, etc. in you, Sheik, just to have you and the bloggers realize that what RB does with the money he earns is his prerogative–after all without RB there would be no FOF.
Things could and can be different at any time. RB does not NEED the form of the school and could collect all the funds personally and do as he pleases with the money of all those willing to pay. Donations are voluntary also in the FOF. If you do not value the payment, you are free to leave.
The same for you. Your work, whether we like it or not, is now being compensated–how you feel about what you are doing is up to you, and what you do with the money is up to you. Just don’t buy too many little cakes!
April 24, 2007 at 8:31 pm
I have been reading this blog for weeks now and am both amazed and grateful. Thank you Sheik and all present and former FOF’ers for your sincere and enlightening contributions.
I joined the FOF in 1976 and was a member of the FOF for over twenty years. Leaving the FOF was probably the most important and difficult decision of my life. Living outside the feudal( and I mean this) wall of the FOF has brought me far more growth, regeneration and understanding than I could have ever imagined possible while in the FOF or at the time of my departure. I urge all students within (and without) the FOF to muster their courage and take the risk of challenging all their treasured and deeply programmed belief systems about life, spiritual evolution and awakening. It is possible, if we have a sufficiently deep and strong desire/valuation for it, to become neutral and to simply watch/observe what is unfolding in each moment without prejudice. True neutrality (non-identification) is quite an uncomfortable position to occupy, however, as we must leave behind all our fixed and safe notions of the way things are, and instead, live in that ruthlessly honest place of ‘not knowing’. If you can ‘really’ open yourself to view the world and the FOF through that lens, you will very likely see and experience many unexpected (and perhaps shattering) aspects of yourself, your friends, Robert Burton, and the form of the FOF itself. You will also almost surely discover some very unexpected and beautiful aspects of yourself and the larger world of ‘Life’ that will bring you tremendous hope and wonder. We cannot lose what is ‘Real’; all we have to lose are our illusions and smug certainties.
“The unexamined life is not worth living”. Socrates, spoken to his Jury
April 24, 2007 at 9:34 pm
My previous question (#37) remains unanswered, but I’ll try another one anyway.
Ames’ post 184 brought back vivid memories of Robert’s technique back in the Blake cottage days, when six or eight of us at a time lived there, sleeping on the floor, and were serially summoned to his bedchamber after he’d return from the Meissen Room with a few glasses of wine in his belly. But on a different subject prompted by Ames’ post, I remember back in those days, there were almost no African-American members. There was, of course, the humble gentleman who did all the upholstering at Renaissance (anyone know what became of him?) but very, very few others. Has that changed? Or has Robert’s view of racial purity been tacitly accepted as the Will of the Gods?
Just asking.
April 24, 2007 at 10:13 pm
I recently wrote to a student who was a friend of mine before I left the school.
I tried to share a video clip of Adyashanti with him. This is the reply I got.
This student is completely devoted to the school and works to exhaustion. He is very sincere, and honest.
Thought it could give a glimpse into the mind of a student.
Names were deleted to protect the innocent.
———–
Dear ____
I am glad to hear that you are looking again. I did watch the whole video but
to me it didn’t seem a whole lot different than other B Influence I have encountered while bookmarking over the years. For me, I find the sequence very practical and that I am the weakest link in the process; I don’t use it enough and with enough desire. Otherwise, it works consistently when I remember to use it. All the prior Schools did not deviate at all including the prehistoric Schools dating over 30000 years ago which is the oldest date so far detected. Also, I am not as concerned about the method or style. My martial arts background helped me to understand that the being of the teacher is more important than the actual style or techniques. For me, R has the highest being I have encountered and he continues to grow every time I see him. If I am a good student, he will lead me far but I feel ultimately the responsibility is on myself as it is my own being that suffers or profits. In addition, I am learning that you cannot be passionate about something until you take more and more responsibility for it. Most importantly I dare not lose the connection with Influence C. They are the miraculous. I feel like Galatea, the statue which was made into a real person by Pygmalion out of love. I am grateful that my soul is chosen out of luck to evolve in a School. Like I told you earlier, I plan to die in the School like Susan W, and Roger C.
In friendship,
April 24, 2007 at 10:55 pm
To Flying Free–I have looked up Voluntary in my dictionary. Thanks
It means ARISING FROM ONE’S OWN FREE WILL; WILLINGLY WITHOUT CONSTRAINT OR GUARANTEE OF REWARD
A donation to the Sheik, or 30 years of donations to the FOF–the difference is in scale and amount, not in principle…
April 24, 2007 at 11:02 pm
Regarding what in RB’s ‘boys’, and the rest of us suckers, blinded us to the fact that we were being sheep; basic psychology provides some insights into the strong social pressures for obedience and conformity. Below are some famous experiments which demonstrate how much we are influenced by others. Maybe our vanity led us to believe we were different?
Obedience:
Milgram’s electric shock experiments (1963)
Aim: Stanley Milgram was from a Jewish background he was interested in how easily ordinary people could be influenced into committing atrocities for example, Germans in WWII.
Volunteers: He decided to test ordinary Americans (over 1000 of them) from all types of backgrounds. They were told that the research was into the effects of punishment on learning.
Procedure: Volunteers were told to administer electric shocks of increasing voltage, up to 450V, to a ‘learner’ (actor) each time the learner made an error.
An ‘experimenter’ was overseeing the operation and dressed in a white lab coat. When the ‘learner’ started to make errors and the ‘teacher’ began to worry, the ‘experimenter’ reminded them of the need to continue.
Predictions: Milgram asked 40 psychiatrists to predict the results, they said that less than 1% would go all the way and that those who did would be psychopathic sadists.
Results: The psychiatrists were very wrong. Obedience rates were way higher. Two thirds of volunteers went up to 450V. No one stopped before 275V! These results surprised everyone, including Milgram. No one expected to find so many people prepared to give 450V shocks to a stranger!
Conclusions: Milgram’s work shows us how difficult it is to resist pressures from ‘authority’. The real ‘heroes’ of the experiment were those who had the courage to disobey!
Conformity:
Asch’s Visual judgement experiment (1951) showed just how easy it is to influence someone into saying something blatantly wrong!
Asch showed a group of people a pair of cards, one with a vertical line on, the other with 3 vertical lines of different lengths, one being the same length as the line on the first card.
Each test had only one innocent subject, the others in each group were stooges. When he gave the stooges a secret signal they all gave a predetermined incorrect answer.
The results:
74% of the innocent participants went along with the group and conformed, giving the incorrect answer at least once.
If you count all the trials carried out, 34% showed conformity.
Asch went on to test out different conditions on levels of conformity using the same set up. His method became known as the Asch paradigm.
Asch concluded that various factors can affect the level of conformity:
1. Three ‘stooges’ produced maximum levels of conformity. With very large numbers, conformity levels drop dramatically (perhaps the game is then too obvious!).
2. Just one stooge not going along is enough to dramatically reduce conformity levels.
3. Difficult tasks tend to lead to more conformity.
4. Ambiguous tasks tend to lead to more conformity as people may feel less certain of their own ideas.
5. Men may try to appear more independent because of social expectations.
6. Women tend to show more conformity than men do when their answers are said out loud, publicly.
7. Low self-esteem may lead to higher conformity. This reflects low self-confidence or strong need for approval of others.
8. Conformity rates are higher when people are attracted to other members of the group.
Zimbardo’s Prison simulation experiment (1971)
This experiment was designed to show conformity to social roles, this is an an example of normative influence. Volunteers were given authority and asked to act as guards over other volunteers who were prisoners.
Aim: to see the psychological effects of making ‘normal’, ‘good’ people into prisoners or guards.
Volunteers: 24 middle class, male college students, mentally sound in tests and no criminal records, were paid $15 per day and divided into prisoners or guards by the flip of a coin.
Procedure: Prisoners were arrested at their homes at the start of the study, blindfolded and taken to Stanford University Psychology Department basement, which had been converted into a realistic prison! From then on the volunteers were treated as prisoners by the other volunteers who were guards.
End of the study: The study was stopped after six days because the guards became sadistic and the prisoners became extremely stressed.
Not being in the FOF doesn’t mean we are no longer conforming or obeying, just the outside influences are different. This behaviour appears to be part of human nature because of a need to ‘belong’ and receive ‘approval’ from others (watch for reactions when fellow-bloggers acknowledge a posting!)
April 24, 2007 at 11:44 pm
Confused#160
Your question:
Can RB still be a Conscious Teacher regardless his behavior?
My question to you:
Does it really matter ?
Don’t you think that what we DO is a pretty clear indication of what we ARE ?
Perhaps it’s a naïve mistake from my part, but I would envision a conscious being to be able to achieve at least some of the following:
An extraordinary degree of humbleness and respect towards the rest of humanity,
And R has none being the high and mighty superior being that we know,
An exceptional level of unselfishness,
And R turned out to posses the most insatiable greed I’ve ever encounter in my life,
A talent to give and love, unconditionally
And R “gives” only after calculating how much he’s going to obtain in return
And “loves” only after calculating how much he’s going to obtain in return
The faculty to coalesce knowledge and level of being, translating his teaching in pure practice
“Controlling the Passions”… oh, really?
Complete freedom and detachment from all of earthly matters,
And R seems to be a complete slave of his many crystallized weaknesses , increasing vices and numerous manias
So, let’s assume that HE IS conscious, I ask you again, does it matter?
Did you come for the talk or for the practice ?
M.
April 24, 2007 at 11:56 pm
Money Matters (230): This is the last I will say on the matter of donations.
If you stop voluntarily donating to the FoF, you stop benefiting from it (being a member).
If you don’t vountarily donate to the blog, nothing happens.
Believe what you will, as will I, and everyone else.
April 25, 2007 at 12:15 am
I heard not so long ago about the octave which involved some professional managers in Isis working with the aim from the teacher to attract 10,000 students to the school. I remembered that it was around the same time when he first started to talk about “ten thousand fools”.
I wonder if anybody knows the details. Now it looks to me that he wanted to have 10,000 fools in the school. Not too flattering, is it?
April 25, 2007 at 12:32 am
#228. I also remember the days you are speaking of. I was a relative newbie in the situation. I remember sleeping on the floor of the “boy cottage” and in the morning hearing RB’s door open. I vividly remember keeping my eyes shut and thinking “please not me, not me today”. He would come out in his kimono and pick a boy, tap him awake with his shoe and use the “come here” finger gesture. I remember the feeling of my stomach falling when it would be me. I also remember, when it first started, wondering if I was the only one it was happening to, and what I did to deserve it. I also remember RB’s pimp at the time saying to me when I would stay at the lodge whenever RB was back that I owed it to RB to be there (the cottage) when he was at the ranch. I decided to move out completely. I thought at the time I was fairly sophisticated in life. I see now how naive I was. I also remember my ex-wife telling me (paraphrasing) that she understood that it was difficult for a male, but at the same time it wasn’t much different from what’s been going on with women for…ever. Sort of “welcome to the club”. Can’t dispute that either.
April 25, 2007 at 12:34 am
At the same time, I take full responsibility for my part. My own vanity and greed made it easier to put aside what my conscience knew to be correct. But at the same time, it is also true that using the idea that one has to “give up one’s will to the teacher” is, as I see it, a crime of a different order.
April 25, 2007 at 12:47 am
To mr. a (post 135)/ bruce /half life.
I will be brief!
Your little mails prove how far I have progressed in 15 years, (and how long you have stagnated mr. a.) All of you are still sleeping. Is it possible for me to awaken you AND give you life? Or are you already dead?
It is important to be both brave AND strong in the holy quest.
To grasp hold of the burning holy rod AND hold it fast.
Moonangels (post229) student is a fellow hero.
Listen, see if you can awaken!
‘Moral’ does not exist, forget your silly conditioned ‘morals’ – I CAN SIMPLIFY THE WHOLE OF THE FELLOWSHIP, EVERY SECOND OF ITS EXISTENCE, EVERY ATOM OF ITS BEING –
I can simplify it into TWO words – ‘EMULATE ROBERT’
but you just cannot believe that can you in your weakness? . . . . . . .
” It is easy to awaken a sleeping man, but the unheeding are as good as dead.”- Hakim Sanai
April 25, 2007 at 12:48 am
To Half-Life (post 157): I think Adyashanti and Wheeler talk of the same. I am really surprised that you can be that much “against” one and “prefer” the other… I think they talk pretty much the same. One tends to use slightly more words, talks about much interesting stuff, writes poetry, the other is more down-to-earth, uses less words, but relentlessly repeats the basic message. But the message is the same. You have added some of your very interesting thoughts and conclusions, connected the ideas to criminality, abuse and other very scary evil but I believe it’s just your creative thought, since there is nothing in these ideas pointing to such things. In fact (if I may say this) I have a feeling you may have missed the point…
I noticed that a lot depends on delivery – because we are all different, we relate differently to the same message stated by different “machines”. I for instance couldn’t connect to Cathy Byron at all, and had hard time relating to Gangaji. Not that they were “not right ” but their delivery was too “emotional” for me, I preferred it straight to the point, “cut the crap” kind of approach. So I felt as if Bob Adamson (he seems to be a Martial type) speaks right to my heart with his short simple statements , so is Wheeler, so is Nathan Gill. I also really enjoyed reading Tony Parsons. (Thanks guys for quoting him here!) Adyashanti is great too, in his beautiful way, and I have much appreciation for him.
May be, Half -life, you focus too much on your personal reaction to the messenger instead of the message. I think it’s a common thing. I did it, too. When I first saw Bob Adamson’s picture on his site – I didn’t like it, had judgment I’s and said: I am not going to read this guy, I don’t like his face…
There is also a little difference when we speak here of RB abuse of power and other unpleasant observed and documented FACTS, or when we make mean ASSUMPTIONS about others based solely on our judgment I’s, fears and imagination.
Much love to all of you.
April 25, 2007 at 12:59 am
Money Matters: “Things could and can be different at any time. RB does not NEED the form of the school and could collect all the funds personally and do as he pleases with the money of all those willing to pay. Donations are voluntary also in the FOF. If you do not value the payment, you are free to leave.”
As the Sheik said, the FOF and blog donation systems are utterly different. If you don’t donate to the blog you can still participate; if you don’t donate to the FOF you are ejected and labelled as “food for the moon” (whatever that means).
Many spiritual teachers have a completely voluntary donation system – so much healthier. It gave me the creeps to read about Robert pressurising Bonita to give him money by asking her how much she would pay for her soul.
The first part of MM’s quote above is equally puzzling – Robert doesn’t need the form of the school?? Sure he does if he wants to perpetuate his lavish lifestyle. MM, are you saying that you would continue to make donations if the school was closed and Robert retired with his harem to Palm Springs?
puzzled, RB
April 25, 2007 at 1:00 am
Money Matters #226 “…what RB does with the money he earns is his prerogative–after all without RB there would be no FOF.”
You are mistaken about one thing. The Fellowship of Friends is organized as a tax-exempt religious organization under U.S. law. The contributions of its members are not Mr. Burton’s to do with as he pleases. The fact that he does, in fact, do pretty much exactly what he pleases with them is part of the deception.
April 25, 2007 at 1:06 am
Response To SandraC #7-77
Sandra — you wrote
“These great beings have opened me, each in their own way, to the mysteries of death, what I understand now as the release of the soul from the body…..they live on, that the mystery of our connection continues…”
”
Don Birrell’s wife, Doris, died in 2005, and his sister passed-on soon thereafter. These personal losses sent him into a tailspin so severe that he could not move from his bed.
One night in June 2006, I felt suddenly compelled to dust off the paintings he had given me, which had yet to be framed. I had forgotten about them for several years, and how beautiful they were. In the same stack were fun photographs of Don and Doris, and Don’s pen & ink drawing of Doris watering her garden, which he had penned for the cover of her memorial service programme.
On that programme, Don had drawn “D’s Garden” with very dark shadows, which vibrated life; but Doris was a mere outline — a being of light. I wondered if had I noticed this at the memorial service? Simultaneously, Don’s energy illuminated the area above my dresser. I had been looking at Don’s photos and paintings while sitting on the floor, and now entranced, my gaze followed the swirling lights near the ceiling.
Don’s energy-mass commenced a transmission of vast love and encouragement, downloading magnificent understandings directly to my heart. Though elevated, I was not in a high-enough state to interpret the subtle meanings contained in the energy packets. The messages and implications vibrated within an umbilical funnel of lightening, which he sent charging into my upper chest. Astonished, I did my best to remain open — to receive the information for later deciphering. I rallied focus, and allowed my heart to be filled with the universal adoration he conveyed. His ecstatic expressions vibrated at a very high rate… but soon my heart overflowed from the energy-communique, and excess nurture spilled into the ether around me.
Recognizing my overloaded state, the energy being made a few more attempts to comment on the meaning of life with recognizably “Don-like” hummingbird movements, before sliding into another dimension.
Back to ordinary reality, sitting on the floor of my bedroom, I wasn’t sure what to make of the experience. It had only lasted a few moments. Now it was over. I speculated that Don was recovering.
The next morning, I took his two paintings to be matted and framed. Coincidental with my return from the errand, his son-in-law phoned to say that Don had passed-on the previous afternoon.
Lots of people have had similar experiences. Don didn’t believe in such things, but his light-being visitation made it unforgettably clear that energy survives the body.
April 25, 2007 at 1:29 am
Where are the flowers in this garden? I see the ravages of deer, rabbits, ground hogs, squirrels, insects, mold, and blight.
I see holes where tulip bulbs used to be.
I see flower buds cut off by razor sharp teeth. I see fruiting trees with their buds chopped off by grazing deer. I see the holes of the rabbits and ground hogs. I am miserable over the beauty that could have been, the harvest that wasn’t.
Tonight I saw the blooming forsythia above the rabbit’s den. All is not lost. The beauty which survives predation, ingestion and excretion is there to be acknowledged.
The flowers that grow should be acknowledged. Regret is a prenicious weed. Stop clearing away flowers to shed sun on your regrets.
April 25, 2007 at 1:45 am
#237 HigherM..
I’m trying to figure out what the “M” stands for. Surely you’re not alluding to Higher Man. Surely you are thinking of either misogynist, misanthrope, moron, malignancy, male prostitute, manikin, mindlessness, money hungry. Please enlighten us further with your magnanimous (and that’s NOT one of the possibilities) wisdom. I’m also happy for you that you have reached the level of development where you can accurately assess your own evolution. You must truly be “The Man”. You are unique in all the world. And thank you for gracing us all with your time.
April 25, 2007 at 1:49 am
Well anyway, does pompous little shit start with “M”?
And, oh yes, my advice to you…remember to wear gloves when you “hold of the burning holy rod AND hold it fast”.
I didn’t say what I really wanted to say because I don’t want to put the Sheik in a position where he has to censor my words.
April 25, 2007 at 2:10 am
Greetings to all,
I’ve been reading with great interest many of the postings. I’m amazed at the volume in such a short time. Obviously we have all invested much energy in the fof, and it has become part of who we are.
It’s great to feel once again the connection with all the beautiful friends I encountered over the years. My warmest regards to all you for participating here and for participating in the fof.
During the summer of 1977, I was travelling the Northwest by motorcycles with a friend, we were working migrant jobs, sleeping out of doors and reading “Be Here Now”. We had both read the book years before, but it seemed to be a good book to explore “spirituality” once again. Prior to beginning our journey I was examining the “I’s” and realized that I held an arrogant thought that there was no manifestation of C influence on earth at that time, I realized what an absurd thought that was since I had made no effort to verify that, in a world so large how could I possibly know such a thing?
During one of my trips back to Seattle by myself, my friend suggested I look for one of Ouspensky’s book since he was cited in “Be Here Now”. I found the Psychology, read it in one sitting . called the Seattle house and was in a prospective meeting within a few days. My feeling when I left that meeting was that I had found a safe haven from the harsh, cruel world, where I could interact with others on a much higher level, with less negativity. The simple idea of not expressing negativity was very appealing to me.
I visited Rennaisance, shortly after joining the school, and was convinced that I had found the manifestation of c influence I was looking for, it had all happenned so quickly, within a matter of months, that it truly felt miraculous.
I eventually went to live at Rennaisance for 9 months the following year, 78 through 79. I realize now that Robert had made subtle overtures towards me as I was being brought closer to within his presence. Abruptly, having nothing to do with these overtures, I wanted to take what I thought I had learned in the school up to that point back into “life”. I left Rennaissance and only visited from time to time thereafter.
After Miles left, which at the time I was unaware of the reasons, I thought hard about my involvement. I had always remained sort of an outsider, particpating in functions and meetings, but I was never privy to the inner workings of the school. I had not developed any close friendships just alot of casual friendships. So I decided to experiment and see what happens out of the school. Well , nothing happened, so after about a year, I simply realized I missed the fine impression of the students and the exchange of thoughts. I rejoined for another 6 or so years, left again for financial reasons in 1992 and rejoined again in 1994. I left for the final time in 2000.
I have no regrets about my time in the school. But it would have been better to have had a more open understanding of rb’s relationship to the fof.
Let’s face it, rb created a pretty good gig for himself, I give him alot of credit for keeping the fof going. But he has completely abused the trust instilled in him. I still believe in the idea of good householder, being a responsible person, to ones inner life and outer life. To take responsibility for what we see around us.
I commend the people who warned others of what they might be getting into. Certainly, if I had more information I would have left earlier and not returned. I think I learned the most valuable lessons early in my participation in the fof anyway.
It does sound as though the school has finally run it’s course. There is something not right with anyone attempting to defend rb at this time. And it is certainly a delusion to justify his behaviour because of who he claims to be.
My heart and well wishes go out to anyone that has been hurt in the fof and my apologies go out for not taking a more active role in understanding the inner workings of the fof and thereby enabling rb.
It is sad to see that such a noble experiment, by the people who have been in the fof over the years, has failed. But then, it is simply another process that has unfolded before our eyes.
I can only hope that the process comes to its final conclusion soon.
Only the fof has failed, we have not.
sheik: thanks for the venue
April 25, 2007 at 2:13 am
#241/Kathryn F.
Thank you for your courageous and beautiful account of your experiences continguous with Don Birrell’s death.
What has most surprised me is the overwhelmingly radiant joy of the dying or dead person’s energy, yet it is still recognizable as a unique, essential signature of that person: strong and vibrant, warrior-like boldness transmitted from one; delicate tenderness, a hummingbird pouring nectar into one’s heart in another; a joyful dance of liberating freedom from another, and so on.
April 25, 2007 at 2:17 am
I don’t believe that Higher M is a real person. He is too fanatical even for FOF student! Is it someone’s weird sense of humor?…
April 25, 2007 at 2:59 am
re: 203 No person
Very nice post. Everything you say or quote about what does not survive is exactly in line with what I have already come to understand personally. What does survive is not of the body including the intellect, emotions, gender, personality, thoughts, or anything else we can see or learn to see. I think the reason what survives death is usually described by an inventory of what it is not is because it is for the most part hypothetical. The only way it can grow into something that we can see or experience is by separating ourselves from the inventory of things that it is not. It needs this space to grow. This has to become a way of living and the life this way of living gives us is truly miraculous.
April 25, 2007 at 3:10 am
This may be getting a little boring for some, I hope not, but I’d like to address Rabbi Burns who questions if my donations will continue when RB moves to Palm Springs.
Let’s assume RB does move to Palm Springs and keeps a “blog” or weekly “YouTube video” meeting alive for the non-harem members (that would certainly include me!).
If I then choose to remain, I will donate, and if not, I will stop. If I believe it is too expensive for what I get, again I will feel free to stop paying. It is that simple. If he closes up the shop–there is little one can do about it.
The key is voluntariness and having made that donation not being able to put demands on the person or organisation that receives it.
Also to Cathie–the difference is possibly less significant than I think you believe. There are no regulations how a church is to actually spend its money such as what salaries people should get, correct me if I am wrong. Since RB is the founder and decisionmaker, he and the FOF Board of Directors decide–is that not how it works? We may like it or not how things are spent but this is just part of the package.
For example, I used to be “on salary” for almost 5 years and made around $400 per month. I agreed to that and while this was not a lot of money, I was always free to leave. Now I have a different job, I make more than $400 per month finally and make donations. Again, I agreed to this.
Some ten thousand former members have decided they no longer want to pay–they stopped, and those who pay keep it going–just like any other business.
Again, the form the FOF has taken is not a form RB requires for himself. He could give lectures and seminars like a lot of “teachers” out there. Charge $5,000.00 for an intensive two day “firewalking-sequence-instruction”, whatever–the ideas are endless.
The choice of form (church) has been made by RB and how and where the FOF exists in its present form is what you see, however this is not a requirement.
Just as Via Del Sol and the Farm is now Isis and the VW bus that Bonita donated for is now a Mercedes–things do change all the time. Thank Gods–imagine all those colorful VWs driving around?
I think however, that we have given little thought to the fact that although the names have changed a lot (Farm, Renaissance, Apollo, etc.) the form of having the school headquartered here in Oregon House, donations, etc. has not, but this can change at any time.
A few pages ago I read the interesting account of Alex Horn’s group in the 60s (David Archer link)–did you know that he required attendance–miss three meetings in a row and you are out! The FOF is not run like this–so much more liberty and tolerance.
I agree with the Rabbi that it would be tempting to have a “free” school but think again, being at a meeting with thousands more members that do not really want to be there? Payment after all is still a principle. (Ouspensky). What we are paying for to this blog is also our time and effort–remember payment comes in different forms.
Note, I am not against donations to the Sheik if he can collect them. Just trying to expose a few little hidden prejudices that have surfaced on the blog with respect to the money identification–still one of the main areas where we get hung up about.
MMatters
April 25, 2007 at 3:20 am
On Leaving An Esoteric School
Recently I have heard that several FoF students have decided to wait till RB’s life ends in order to ‘then’ leave the School.
In the words of an FoF student (one close to RB)…”Yeah, I know people who are saying that after RB dies, we’ll just bull doze the place under.”
Please take the advice I am about to give as an objectively verified phenomenon, true to all such ‘plans to wait for someone’s death in order to then truly live’, not from a ’self-righteous’ half, whereby it could originate from.
Do not cover up an ultimatum from your long lived with conscience with more time, particularly if its an old issue, which truly cannot be transformed indefinably. Spiritual schools are for graduation, advancement, not continuous struggle in order to figure out how to refine the struggle further (my opinion).
Leaving a spiritual school by Default does not count and only compounds one’s inability to reconcile the simplest of ‘feelings’ or ‘to do’. If you are having thoughts as the one I described above, then the decision has actually already been made, though some ‘other’ is living a painful self image lifestyle by not ‘doing’.
There you have it, you stand right there, one foot on the pillow, another on a ladder, this is identification with one of the oldest spiritual affirmations and relative awakening obstacles, the struggling-self, i.e., the taking of the test is always more exciting to complain about than the passing of it. Where are ‘You’?
Eventually, as Gurdjieff asked one of his ‘previous teachers’ what he had to do to go beyond his ’sticky, stalemated situation’; his teacher replied, “Leave all those who like you and that you’re comfortable with.” So, he did.
This is not to say, ‘Never again find any others who like you and visa versa’, it is the gesture alone that counted, one’s ability to leave a nest, a nest where the building of it has become so much more important than the eggs, that once hatched the fledgling can’t get over the high walls.
This happens to all spiritual seekers, even Gurdjieff, all of them had to leave the symbol of ‘family-dominance’. This only has to happen once in order to ‘fix’ a sense of ‘right’ in the participant, though not a moral right, rather, that gut-feeling-right, it is from that place our conscious individuality grows.
From that place, any further ‘group dealings’ will have a benchmark to be seen from, one gains real relativity, not from having thought more or ‘gone through allot’, rather from having lived ‘that feeling’ out into space, beyond the merry-go-round addictions of the mind.
Don’t let RB’s inevitable, physical death, take you to ‘heaven’, because it simply will not be afforded you…It will not excuse your pretenses. ‘They’ know our feelings, our ’sludge’, we are not really that clever…No action by Death will do you any favor that your being has not itself initiated in Life.
Love to you all.
April 25, 2007 at 3:27 am
There have been some interesting posts on death recently. From my perspective, the desire for immortality has a strong air of the instinctive about it. It’s ironic that the FOF is so focused on creating eternal life, and at the same time is rather hysterical about the “King of Clubs.”
Something to think about.
April 25, 2007 at 4:45 am
Re HigherM (237):
I can only assume this person is enjoying a joke by playing the fool, and every time someone expresses alarm at his/her antics, he/she chuckles and tries to figure out what other “shocking” statement can be thrown out here to get a rise out of folks. Remember, as Sheik pointed out, 7/106 came from the same keyboard, and Elena, to whom that post was directed, is anything but amoral. So there may be no need to respond by pointing out the obvious, that HigherM’s post displays a parody of the FOF student gone over the edge. FOF students may have some difficulties perceiving some things that seem apparent to me, but I don’t believe they’re the raving lunatics HigherM pretends to be.
Of course, I may be mistaken, in which case, I’m reminded of something Samuel Johnson said:
“BOSWELL: I added that [this] person maintained that there was no distinction between virtue and vice.
JOHNSON: Why, Sir, if the fellow does not think as he speaks, he is lying; and I see not what honour he can propose to himself from having the character of a liar. But if he does really think that there is no distinction between virtue and vice, why, Sir, when he leaves our houses let us count our spoons.”
— The Life of Johnson
(Better yet, try not to invite him in.)
April 25, 2007 at 7:35 am
In 1970, Bonita decided that the right monthly amount to have her soul saved by Robert Burton would be 90 dollars (see post 194/7). That’s 475 dollars in today’s value. Which also happens to be roughly equal to today’s minimum teaching payment. Thanks, Bonita.
April 25, 2007 at 9:25 am
A word to those who have children being raised in the FoF: (Yes, I know some join. They are naïve, as one would expect a young person to be).
For those children who will not join, what will be the legacy you pass on to them? They will have to explain to their friends and colleagues, or more likely, they will need to hide the embarrassing fact of their parents supporting the activities of a very strange person indeed, in a very strange social environment which caters directly or indirectly to his every whim.
Do you understand how carrying shame relates to self-esteem? Do you understand basic Human Psychology 101, which recognises how important it is that if at all possible, a child should be able to look up to his or her parents? Or do you want to load your ‘karma’ onto them as the gift of a loving parent? My own son is not about to volunteer any information to his new friends of his own parents’ involvement. There is nothing to be proud of her.
I don’t want to drag the names of people into this conversation without their permission. I want to say that if by chance, L. R. & R. R are reading this blog, I have never forgotten your exquisitely beautiful, innocent children, especially the little princess whom LR affectionately referred to as T—ny. When I think that this little girl and her brother will have to hide all the goings-on in the FoF from their friends or acquaintances (since the cat is indeed well and truly out of the bag and it’s loud caterwauling will not stop), it makes me shudder. Because if they find a way to rationalise it—or far worse–to justify it positively—it will be the worse for them and I would hate to see them morph into the persons that they would need to become in order finally to achieve this point of view. Not to mention that you discharge your burdens onto them, as RB has discharged onto his students, the difference being, that our children didn’t ask for it . . .
April 25, 2007 at 10:12 am
As the daughter of a long time student of the FOF and child of a former student, the FOF “has always been at war with” my conscience (not to be confused with consciousness). recently I have come to see a once student friend of mine be asked to leave the FOF for posting under her true name on this blog. it has completely isolated her from her once peers in ground zero which is remote to begin with (wonders if this is divisive) and caused a marital separation that would be unheard of continuing with such a traitor, between a man of such high merit according to the big B. I am appalled at the complete estrangement process she has had to suffer for her brutal honesty, as “big brother” can not allow such “thought crimes” to continue amongst his ranks. I have always gravitated towards the ideas of the fourth way but have always felt a pit in my stomach which I have called the institution surrounding these noble ideas most consistently “cultivated” among the FOF. imagine that point in life in which we all discover that wolf in sheep’s clothing. I have talked openly and honestly with those “students” who will break out of the formality and stop talking to me as if I were an idiot and rather instead as a young woman who has grown up in this “system” all her life. im not daft and I can talk the talk with the best of them. I listen too and what I’ve been hearing and witnessing of late is only jading my life’s position on the FOF even more. what I have heard and verified by the stories repetitions among different conversations with different people makes my conscience sick. I believe that the FOF has/is willing to overlook conscience for the so called crusade for consciousness when I feel there cannot be this separation. in my very bones and nature it makes me sick the corruption I see and hear of. and it really hits home when it affects someone so close to me that I will not isolate, but will learn the omissions that surround the falling outs with this good person. I see I have been lied to in a sense by those who are falling away from this person in that they will give me a reasonable sorry as to why they must leave this person and yet I know these are lies because the truth is too awful, too informal, and thus is my intelligence betrayed along with my friend(s). 1984 anyone?
a person on her path,
heather
April 25, 2007 at 10:29 am
Can all of these people be right?
Or is it my short sightedness?
None but the lonely heart?
There is charm that defeats death…
Robert’s School–a mystery on earth
Or is all of this a dream?
Lying awake at night…
Twenty years…
How to continue
Effort, more effort
Pushing through time and space
Another day is dawning
Self remembering
Still there
I am
Or am i?
No time to waste
Start a sequence now
April 25, 2007 at 12:05 pm
Dear Another Name and others,
I am willing to expose anything that helps students look at themselves, so don’t look if you don’t want to see it. The more I tried to cut this the longer it got.
I also thank you for your questions and the many angles you’ve given, consistently exploring. I was so identified with saying what I needed to say that I overlooked many wonderful posts. I see double, I mean, I have diplopia in my eyes so I have to limit the amount that I can read or write to avoid the headache that renders it impossible and I barely had enough “vision” to write and read what I did. Unfortunately it is probably true in the inner and outer sense of the word. I beg those of you who I hit in a “generalization” forgive me when it doesn’t apply.
It does feel that I’ve said much of what I had to say and the “low” is coming home. After a good battle, one is left with the dead and the victories hardly justify the losses.
You ask: “What was it that got us in this octave?”
I have already generalized too much so let me try to tell you what got me into this octave and listen to you when you’re ready to tell me.
Before joining the Fellowship, I had understood that the instinctive centre in life had much loved, but loved only a few with which it became identified. Great efforts were made with friends and lovers but the greed of the instinctive centre made me go through one failure after another. “ Life” is great at photographing one because everyone is in an equally greedy position, so nobody cares what you’re after and lovers, the more you love them, the better they are at knowing you’re just identified. (It’s no different in the Fellowship, that’s why Robert is so successful. He just has fun with our identification with him).
After twenty years of “trying” from the instinctive centre and getting hurt enough I was able to look inside and see that not one gesture had been free of something “personal”. I was able to recognise though that the effort had been “sincere.” It wasn’t the “sincerity” that was wrong, or the effort, just the me, me. So much beauty layed out for one or another lover, one or another friend but mostly just one or another karmic entanglement.
Then, after the “fall”, the long and shocking “fall”, what survived was the understanding that all the unnecessary suffering was necessary to understand that beyond the personal, there is love for people AND life. That negativity was a double sworded knife that always harmed one as much as the other person, or just one if it was related to things. That was four years before joining the Fellowship. So I tried to love and still failed and instead of hurting myself for it, I decided I was definitely rather inept at loving so I needed a conscious school to learn what objective love was about. I had found the workbooks and I was very exited about the perspective, so exited that when my husband stopped by with his new girlfriend a day after he left, I invited them both for coffee and kissed them goodbye!
Two months later I joined the Fellowship in London. To be honest I didn’t like it, not even the first day. But I thought I hadn’t come to judge anybody so I began transforming the judgements I had and think I’m still transforming them enough to know that it is really no body’s fault. We’re just so very inhuman.
What kept me wanting to “transform” for so long was that I thought one could never really touch the bottom of one’s compassion. And finally I saw that my compassion had become stupidity. For a long time, the terrible wish to be loved by Robert and accepted by everybody else, wouldn’t let go of me and I just kept trying. At the same time, I was not willing to accept any of it. Nobody accepted me, nor did I accept any body else. It wasn’t personal, I just couldn’t buy it. I am lying, one student always loved me, without conditions. I will miss her where ever I go. L.L.. The rest were kind to Girard’s wife and retrieved when he left. Of course, from one angle we just get entangled with our identifications. Many people were just there, but others were so painfully there. Robert especially. And I so strongly wanted to be accepted and acknowledged. One “heart” or one “opportunity” would have stopped me from writing against the Fellowship but I am glad to say that no body ever gave me the opportunity to owe them anything. If that is the price of freedom of speech, let me pay it gladly.
My husband married me, but he didn’t give me that opportunity either, he agreed with Robert that only he and Asaf and a few others had the right to give, and left me a couple of weeks ago as if he was leaving a public library. We went around the world on teaching trips, three days in each city and move on, and he made me pay for the medicine when I got sick because the money was only for his trips. They call it “consciousness”, “non identification.” “Love.” The functions of conscious beings are not to be looked at.
Somebody knew him better but I know him best. Does it hurt? Does it stop me from loving him? Is it love? You hate me for exposing him? The problem with public figures is that there’s nothing private about their lives but the feminine dominance of the community establishes what is appropriate. People give a damm that women are treated like third hand utensils in the Fellowship, but don’t you dare open your mouth against a man. I must insist, “half men” and “quarter women”, because if there were any unity in the Fellowship, we would not have gone through this torture for thirty three years.
I am willing to expose anything that helps students look at themselves, so don’t look if you don’t want to see it. My anger or hurt does not matter, it’s the facts that count. Most people around here seem to think that the only problem we have is Robert’s sex but the real problem is that the whole institution is absolutely rotten and people don’t want to see it. It’s not Girard or Robert, it is US, every one of us. If anything happens, my poor husband will be treated as if he were sick and people will continue doing the same they did for him, for Asaf. What is hell needed in hell for, when people are so happy making hell of their lives? Why don’t they just wrap it up, pay themselves off and go home where ever that may be?
It is interesting that having been given the slightest opportunity I would have worked as hard as any one of them. And I did, only that I chose my own octave and they just had to accept it. I adopted Dorothy because she was a student but it wasn’t an octave Robert had called for so it didn’t count. It is quite ironic to see them desperately concerned about it now that I’ve left. The speed with which they send out the four hundred dollars when I wasn’t even allowed to talk to them. But they are just hoping I don’t sue the hell out of them.
Basically what I’ve understood is that there’s nothing wrong with wishing to belong. It is the healthiest impulse that one can have, for one does belong. Being a part of this world is each man’s right and joy. Each one has everything of himself to give the whole. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to give that. No one can take away from one what one has to give, and no one can give anything but what is his own. There is no competition. No one is better or worse. We’re not “beggers” as some like to say in the Fellowship, we all are, and being is enough without having to prove anything. That is what the instinctive centre in life is so strong about: how much money do you have, your status, who “allowed” you, what did you pay to belong, only the Fellowship has this special quality that no matter the effort, you don’t count. Specially if you have a mind and a heart of your own.
Each play is written so that one can deliver what one came to deliver. In trying to stop one, others are pushing one towards it. Like trying to avoid death by going to a different town. In the end, it all works as it needs to work. Above the personal claims, the gratitude is to the Gods.
If I said I could continue with the Fellowship, it is because not one account is so strong to stop me from being open. At the same time, it is fine to accept that I am not willing to live in a place where a whole community wants to agree, that a rather questionable fellow, has the right to choose when, who, how and what everbody else can do or give. On the contrary, I’m quite willing to die for the knowledge that everyone has the right to give and receive.
Even the worst amongst us, those eager to put one down because they think it is just about the credit one didn’t get, want to participate and don’t know how. Where could they have learnt when even the last conscious school on the planet denies them the right to be?
My dear Another Name, forgive me for not agreeing with you or others here with the idea that negativity is necessary, when you’ve been so tolerant with mine. “Killing” degenarated forms, without physically harming anyone, is not negativity, just as screaming the pig out of the corn, is not negativity. “NO” to abuse, is affirming. Screaming the hell out of anyone when whoever it is, is crystallizing incorrectly, is affirming. Patting the shoulder is not enough when the snake has gotten inside.
Even in the midst of this pain, I leave the Fellowship with joy, because it was killing me. I would have gotten cancer if I had stayed.
It is a good thing that one doesn’t have to be liked by the Sheik to keep posting. “That” is what I am willing to pay for, “that” is what money is for when it matters to you.
It is also good to see that so many serious posts are coming in, more and better and if nothing else, the feeling of getting the puzzle of an important part of one’s life, relieves the anxiety. I thank each one of you for your effort and contributions.
I began writing at 9.30p.m and it’s 3.05a.m. There are no eyes left.
April 25, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Dear No person,
Thank you especially for your last couple of messages, very well verbalized.
Dear Half Life,
As one of the ‘Wheeler-dealers’, I agree with No person’s view that you must have misunderstood his message. The Lust for Life’s “implication that there is no responsibility or choice, everything just happens within this awarness” is his implication only. Of course, if you go along with this interpretation, as you did, it would indeed become scary. You then can imagine the further downward steps, like: “There is no personal responsibility because they believe they are part of a supernatural entity, answer to a higher call, have to tend to ends that justify the means (such as secular or religious autopias).” Further on, you envision ‘concentration camps’…I understand that you might be weary of any type of teaching after FOF, but I suggest checking whether your imagination doesn’t take you too far.
If you tried to look for yourself what Wheeler is pointing to, you might have discovered the fact that our nature IS an impersonal awareness. This realization brings not only freedom from the concepts about who we are or who we ‘should’ be, but also, as a result, one becomes naturally more loving, responsible, creative and compassionate.
You said that “variuos HigherMs and Rb’s excesses … are the very consequece, the natural & logical conclusion of any eradication of personal identity, of separateness, of individuality”.
Let me not agree, as those various individuals are the result of practicing ‘special-ness’, ‘luckier-ness’ and indeed, separateness, while Wheeler and Co’s messages are simple: there is an impersonal consciousness of which we are, individual body/mind, a part of. Where in this message do you see those horror stories you created? Where does it say that you are special, separate, better, enlightened – more than anyone else? Where do you see ‘eradication of personal identity?’ To me, this message is one of unity, love and compassion. And there is nothing ‘supernatural’ about it, only natural.
John Wheeler’s message is that after realizing ones nature as consciousness, the choices one makes spring out naturally from the sense of love which is inherited by all of us. What makes people to commit various crimes, IS the sense of separateness, of special-ness etc. Is Mother Teresa not an example of a great individual, although what she saw around her was only God?
To me, after you understand the fact of the underlying consciousness which creates and sustains us all, then you become a true individual, as your start seeing lovingly everything as a part of yourself.
April 25, 2007 at 2:48 pm
Again I want to thank the Sheik for his efforts and this very useful blog for all of us members and former members of the FOF.
I am in awe of many of the posts that have been created. Ames G. is very insightful and profound, in my opinion, and I really didn’t know he had so much to share before this. Sandra C. brings a depth of emotion that is always pretty amazing, and now, additionally she brings a broad understanding of psychological issues that are very pertinent to what we are all facing. Joel I have known since 1973 and I always appreciate what he has to say. I could go on and on but maybe more of that in later posts. Hi Bruce, Cathie, Don Juan, Mark H. Dick Moron, Mifis, Inner Jewels, Wake up little Susie, and all of my anonymous friends. I’m happy you’re here and I’m happy to be here, too.
Mark H. and later Chimes have asked to hear about how some of us experienced the period of time between when we first became aware of Robert’s “little secret” and finally leaving. It’s an interesting question and probably one that I should process through therapy, but I’ll give it a try as I am.
I found out about the fact that Robert was having sex with men in the Fellowship on January 13, 1982. Carl M., the FOF lawyer, and I were talking that day about a former student who was reported to have accosted some students in Marysville and said to them that Robert was a homosexual and was seducing young men in the school to have sex with him. We both, believing that this was a lie, and a continuation of the false rumors that many former students seemed to like to spread (this wasn’t the first we had heard about it, but we thought it was just more “false personality” trying to undermine the “school”) decided to report it to Miles. At this time I was the Treasurer and CFO of the Fellowship, Chairman of the Board, and met with and saw Miles every day. Before we met with Miles, Carl spoke to another student, who was also a lawyer, and said we were considering a libel and defamation suit against the former student for spreading lies. The lawyer student told Carl, “Well, truth is an absolute defense against libel.” Carl was incredulous and asked, “What do you mean?” whereupon he was told that we better talk to Miles about it.
For reference, Robert, at this time, and for many years, had been telling students that he was celibate and that he had given up sex for his students. I took that to be a rock solid fact along the lines of “Robert said it, I believe it, and that settles it!” (Howard Carter had nothing on me!) Carl M. was likewise convinced. Many people here have expressed how they were fully dedicated to the Fellowship, and I can see they were. I was, too, as much as I could possibly muster. At this point I had been in the FOF for almost 9 years. I had served in many centers, been a director, made teaching payments, gone on salary and been selected for a key position in the school. I was very happy with my life at this point. In 1979 after the death of my mother I had refused to go to her funeral (at the great consternation of my loving family, may they be blessed for not hating me, but instead, for lovingly accepting me back when I had finally escaped the FOF) because my brother, who was a former member would be attending. I was proud internally to be able to “hold my work” in such a trying circumstance.
We went to Miles’s caravan that evening before going to dinner at the Lodge. He and his wife Susan invited us in and we were served a good cabernet, as I recall (in my mind I’m there as I type this). We recounted the day’s story and asked him what he knew. He said the allegations were true, that Robert had had affairs with a number of young men, and that he, Miles had been working for some time with talking to the young men when they needed counseling. Miles and Susan seemed relieved to be able to talk openly with Carl and me after we brought the subject up. We had all been working together for months or years, with them knowing and Carl and me not knowing, but it took our asking to finally have the subject broached.
I was personally stunned. I just couldn’t believe it. Carl and I went up to the Lincoln Lodge for dinner. At that time there was a practice of having Margaritas with dinner. I had several. The dinner happened and people talked, but I was in my head. I somehow drove home to the trailer park on Rice’s Texas Hill where I had recently moved into a room in a mobile home.
In the morning I awoke with a strong hangover and called into the Ouspensky office to say I wasn’t coming in. Carl M. lived across the driveway in his own mobile home and I went over to talk with him. I said to him that I guess it’s all over and the whole thing has been a lie. He didn’t agree. He thought we should think about it. We began rationalizing how such a thing could possibly be. I remember that he had a little music box toy that had a clown on pins that danced to the tune of “Here Come the Clowns”. We were still inebriated from the night before and we were laughing sadly while watching the clown dance. “What the hell is going on?”
Then, somehow, the day passed. And then more days.
I came to realize that there was a secret “inner circle” of people who already knew about Robert. Some had known for years. They wouldn’t tell anyone, but, if you let them know that you knew, then they would talk about it openly. I told my closest friends about it, if they didn’t know. Soon there was a larger circle of people I could talk to about it. I went to many people and talked with them – I told them I didn’t like what I’d found out, that I didn’t understand it, and that Robert had been lying to us. Almost everyone I talked with said that they didn’t understand it either, but that they valued the school and what Robert was giving us, and that “in time we would know more.” In a way we all talked each other into believing that we couldn’t understand the obvious, that there “must be” a higher understanding that we would come to later, in our work.
I developed a kind of neurosis, whereby my “work personality” redoubled efforts to be a better and better student, while my “old personality” took on the role of provocateur by seeing and voicing the rational flaws in the Fellowship. I sought out students who were willing to question the school, but only to a point. When people actually would leave, I pulled back. Like poor Hamlet, I kept trying to find the perfect proof before I could pull the trigger.
Looking at it now I would compare it to those science fiction films where the all-powerful computer or robot is disabled by tricking it into processing an unsolvable puzzle. I was trying to understand a corrupt situation using the tools provided by the corrupt situation.
This went on for many years, through numerous twists and turns -the IRS audit of the Fellowship, the Sanders case, Miles leaving, etc. etc.
I would say the turning point for me was in the early 90’s when I read all the Meher Baba books. I found a system of ideas that were even more complete than the Gurdjieff one (not that I’m following that system – just that it is a beautiful exposition. I didn’t “interpret” it through Fellowship concepts, I saw its completeness unto itself.). Somehow that freed my mind to see that the Fellowship was not the pinnacle of anything, but just another system – and not a good one, as you can see by reading this blog. Also, more of my friends were starting to question and some to leave. I finally knew it was time to go. What a relief!
From that point it was just a matter of arranging my life to make it happen, which took another year.
I don’t know if these ramblings are of much use, but that was my experience, for what it’s worth. I hope it helps someone who’s trying to solve the puzzle – just remember that you can’t solve it by using the FOF concepts. You have to step away and look back to see the truth.
Love to you all,
Charles R.
April 25, 2007 at 4:25 pm
Money Matters #249: “There are no regulations how a church is to actually spend its money…”
Actually, there are. The earnings of a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organization “may not inure to the benefit” of any individual. Whether or not Mr. Burton’s extravagant lifestyle qualifies as a “benefit” is a matter of interpretation.
Also, the assets of the organization must be permanently dedicated to its exempt purpose. This means that if the Fellowship were to be dissolved, its assets (if any assets remained after discharging the debts) would have be “distributed for an exempt purpose, to the federal government, or to a state or local government for a public purpose.”
http://www.irs.gov/charities/charitable/article/0,,id=96099,00.html
April 25, 2007 at 4:33 pm
IS HE GUILTY OR INNOCENT?
If Robert is not an angel in the man’s body but a liar and a pervert – I don’t see why don’t try “to get the bastard”. If there are thousands of victims – if they file the case all together – wouldn’t that be enough to win the case? RB can’t pay off a thousand of people!
How can we leave our friends knowing that they are being brain washed deceived and abused???? Do you know what happens to the abusers in America??? Even if they survive the prison, their name is on the map for the rest of their life! Because they are a danger to our society, to our children.
How can we honest people let such a criminal abuser keep doing what he is doing???
If the reason to leave is not simply not wishing to pay teaching payments and not wishing to make efforts in the Work (which many current students still think why people leave the FOF)
Lets make the efforts to get the bastard! I am willing to pay my monthly donation to the fund for the lawyer instead of supporting this unheard of crime… It is much bigger than I thought! Thousands of deceived!… or are we just gossiping and whining?
April 25, 2007 at 4:54 pm
To MM, post 7/249:
You wrote: “Note, I am not against donations to the Sheik if he can collect them. Just trying to expose a few little hidden prejudices that have surfaced on the blog with respect to the money identification–still one of the main areas where we get hung up about.”
“Money Matters”, thanks for contributing to the discussion. You, and you alone, chose a screen name with the word “money” in it, and continue to press this issue, so (maybe along with the rest of us) you seem to be a bit identified and “hung up” with this topic, too.
ButI would choose the word “buffer” as opposed to “identification,” because there are more buffers related to money than almost any other issue concerning the Fellowship. When you investigate any organization, you start with the money… Where did the money come from, and from whom? Who has control over the money? What are they purchasing with the money? How much money are they spending? And are they spending the money in a way that people believe it is being spent?
Money is an issue that can make all of us uncomfortable, because the topic starts opening doors to other uncomfortable issues. In the context of the Fellowship, it begins opening doors to topics related to Robert Burton’s behavior. Eventually we are left with another unsavory topic — our own inability to open our eyes to how the money is being used.
I’ll just repeat what others have said above… There is no comparison between making voluntary blog donations to Sheik and paying mandatory sums of money to the fof. Your above posts recite the old party line that we’ve heard from the earliest days of the fof: that any attitude of skepticism toward money is a weak attitude — that it reveals one’s “lack of valuation” and “lack of character” and on and on and on. This always puzzled me, because we’re supposedly taught to believe nothing, to verify everything, and to adopt a skeptical attitude about our own natural or spiritual impulses. But when it comes to money — no sir, we can’t have any skepticism there. But skepticism (and this is an understatement) is one of the best tools we have for seeing ourselves and seeing the world around us. So maybe this is just more Fellowship-ese, but skepticism is where self-observation begins. It’s my personal belief that if we walk this earth believing everything we’re told, we will also start believing everything we tell ourselves. Awareness, Consciousness, Objectivity, Seeing One’s Self, Self-Observation, and most importantly Conscience – they’re all just words and pretense if we don’t accompany these words with a sincere and healthy skepticism, and if we don’t accompany these words with critical thinking.
We can try to avoid the issue of money, as you are doing with each one of your posts oddly enough, but the topic sheds an enormous amount of light on the unethical behaviour within the Fellowship. Dismissing any concerns as though they are irrelevant or “just an identification,” is simply a way of closing our eyes and sleeping comfortably.
When I first joined the Fellowship, I quit college and soon thereafter made the trip to Oregon House to go on salary. So the topic of “money” is interesting to me, partly because I immersed myself in the group without having first established a viable career. (Bad choice on my part.) Since joining, I’ve watched the “donations” slowly rise over the years until they finally plateaued about two years ago (but effectively supplemented by the large payments needed to attend meetings, dinners, and receptions, etc.). Despite the challenging position that I placed myself in, I gladly and happily wrote checks made out to the Fellowship of Friends. I saw it as an investment, and believed my money was paying wonderful returns, so I always had a good feeling when dropping the envelope in the mail.
So what changed my attitude?
Many things, but two factors have been the most important: 1) I gradually began to learn how the money was being spent (see several posts above and on previous pages), and 2) The size of the payments continued to increase to the point where I was paying anywhere from 20-30 percent of my gross income to the Fellowship. Now, I know many of you believe that a person with “integrity” would grind it out and stick with the program if they valued the work, but sorry folks, I think this is disingenuous. Fortunately or unfortunately, I did value the Fellowship, and in fact very much so.
The issue is not “money”, but the amount of money combined with the threshold that each of us experience depending on our personal financial situations. All of us, if we sincerely want to gain anything in our lives, realize wholeheartedly that we need to pay for it, that we need to work for it, and that we need to sacrifice to attain it. We work hard for our college diplomas, and we work hard so that we can afford to buy a house, and we work hard so that we can afford to buy a car, or any number of things. However, I think anyone who says there is no threshold to this is not being sincere. I personally believe that hundreds, if not thousands, of good people have left the Fellowship because the payments became too burdensome, and they were smart enough to figure it out and take responsibility for their own financial well-being and retirement in later years. Maybe no one ever leaves the Fellowship because of the money, as the saying goes. However, many people leave the Fellowship partly because of the money, and personally I admire each and every person who was able to make that determination early in the program. They listened to their intuition, and they listened to their common sense. They took responsibility for themselves and their own well-being. THAT to me is integrity, despite all of the so-called conventional wisdom in the Fellowship that states otherwise.
Now, about the “history of the fof” post in 7/194, there’s a short section about Robert Burton’s departure from Alex Horn’s group. Try reading between the following lines: “He also said that his teacher had increased his payments until he had had to hold down 3 jobs to be able to make the payments to be able to remain with his teacher. Then there had come a time when his teacher had told him it was time for him to leave, and go out on his own.”
Translated:
RB was asked to leave the group because he couldn’t afford the payments.
I realize that others have suggested that he was let go because of his predatory sexual behavior. That easily could be true based on everything I’ve seen of him, and everything I’ve heard, but I sense that money was also a big part of it. He was living with his mother according to Bonita. He had no car. He apparently had no viable career. And he could barely afford to pay for food at a restaurant according to Bonita’s story. Now, you may argue that Robert needed to work three jobs because Alex Horn was charging him 90% of his income or some such thing, and this could also be true. But the point is, it’s fairly obvious that RB reached his threshold. He tried working to three jobs to make it work, and I’m sure he started wondering, “What the heck. I’m working three jobs, and barely have enough time to meet with anyone in the group. I’m broke, I’m not eating well enough. I’m not getting enough sleep. What am I doing here?”
I’m sure that story sounds all too familiar to a huge number of former and current Fellowship members.
April 25, 2007 at 5:01 pm
Hello Innernaut: 7/36
You wrote: “Where is the evidence to show that our thoughts, emotions, body, etc are NOT our true nature? In other words, I would agree that our awareness is part of our true nature — but why any more so than our bodies? Why the separation between body and awareness? What if awareness arises in the same way emotions do — that is, from our bodies, in some combination of brain activity? I’ve read of scientific research that suggests this. If true, would this demean us somehow, or make awareness any less real?
I agree with Jules that describing our awareness as true nature and our bodies as not our true nature just seems like intellectualizing. In my earlier post, I said that my body certainly seems real to me. My awareness may have degrees, but my body is pretty constant by comparison.”
There’s a concept that we’ve stated in the Fellowship for a long time that “we experience higher centers” or that “we experience higher stated.”
But a few years ago I started believing it’s the other way around:
When we have a higher state, it is our soul experiencing our bodies.
And maybe both are true.
Wayne Dyer expresses this in slightly different words. He says we are not physical beings having a spiritual experience, but instead we are spiritual beings having a physical experience.
Best wishes,
Comrade
April 25, 2007 at 5:09 pm
Hello friends,
I just want to take this moment to say thanks to all of you for sharing your thoughts and feelings on this blog. I’m learning a lot from reading your posts, and I’ve had countless great laughs — nice combination. What’s more, you have sincerely done a great job of helping me to heal – that is, heal from my own inability to open my eyes for so many years. I hope the same is true for many others, both inside and outside the Fellowship. I truly believe that something special will grow out of this. I don’t know what it will be — not a school, not a group. Right now, it’s simply growing out of itself, like all of us.
My love to all of you.
—————————–
No one is undone by an action not his own.
-Epictetus
April 25, 2007 at 5:26 pm
I’m only just into reading 7/194 by Veronicapoe on Bonita’s entry into the school.
Wow!
It starts with a lie (Robert says he is asked by his teacher to go out and teach), a theft (Robert coopts Gurdjieff and Ouspensky’s hard work), drugs (Robert drunk, Bonita on mescaline – goodbye rationality and common sense), and Robert is actually “cruising” for a student to “get”.
All the earmarks of a seduction, huh?
Ouch! How do I get this venomous stinger out of my head and heart?
April 25, 2007 at 5:27 pm
Living the Questions (#227) — great post. It took me some years to remove the “grid” of the system that stood between me and life — a grid where each little box had a label for everything I saw and experienced. It creates the illusion of having an answer for everything. Much more fulfilling (and uncomfortable) to toss it aside and live life directly, without the illusion that “we know.”
There’s been more talk of Robert’s insatiable greed on the blog. It has only recently occurred to me that this greed extends to his desire for states — greed for “self-remembering.” “Self” is, after all, the first word in that term.
I have a friend who is addicted to running — she has had problems with depression, and the “runner’s high” with its release of endorphins seems to help keep her on track.
Is self-remembering similar? An addiction to a state and its corresponding release of brain chemicals (higher hydrogens)?
I am reminded of all this because in my experience self-remembering can be connected to something other than the pure desire for consciousness, and even wrong work. In Robert’s case, perhaps greed. In my case, it’s a little different — it’s spring here now, and spring is very beautiful in this part of the country. An explosion of flowers and greenery. For years, I would feel an intense anxiety during this time. I finally realized that I was feeling intense pressure to “take in impressions.” The fact that there were so many just overloaded me, and I found myself actually wanting spring to be over!
Just last week, driving down a particularly beautiful road, I started to feel that almost unconscious pressure to “take in impressions.” So I thought, screw this, I’m tired of being held hostage like this, I’m going to try and intentionally NOT self-remember. What happened? I actually felt GUILTY, even all these years after leaving the FOF. I have always maintained that if you can’t NOT do something without feeling guilty, then you aren’t doing it from understanding, but from a sense of obligation.
The part of me that’s writing isn’t scared of C influence or of what will happen if I don’t self remember, but there is still a deep seated part that is. (Probably the primitive, reptilian part of the brain stem.)
I suggest trying things like this with your favorite “sacred cows.” You might discover that you hold more religious ideas than you thought — ideas that you thought were based on cool, verified understanding.
Innernaut out.
April 25, 2007 at 5:47 pm
April 25, 2007 at 6:17 pm
Well it seems like Howard Carter has disappeared? Gee Howie (aka Girard, aka spokeperson for the FoF group of LT/EB/KB), where oh where did you go? I never read most of your postings because I was those postings at one time myself- it was too boring to read the same crap I also was indoctrinated with.
In the ‘box’ programmed thinking can only take you so far. Enjoy your life in the box.
Adios
April 25, 2007 at 6:18 pm
Dear Heather,
It looks like the hell is getting out of you (after beating it up so badly at my house yesterday and worse than I’ve been beating anybody else) not because you are defending me which I deeply thank and honor your gesture but because you are beginning to sound real, having something to say for yourself. As if you were at last getting a glimpse of your own ground. It’s what every friction is for.
It gives me great hope that at least the young people that have been hurt by the Fellowship will get the story straight and stop blaming themselves or anybody else. This is life kids, what you’re being given to transform and if you just trust yourselves long enough, it does not matter if everything else goes wrong. It goes as “wrong” as you can take it. “Live,” my love. It is worth it.
When we each chose the part in the play before we were born, it was because we knew our shoulders were wide enough, to carry the role. Maybe it’s time to celebrate your birthday! I’ll give you a call.
April 25, 2007 at 6:50 pm
Traveler #253: $90.00 in 1970 now has a 2007 value of $475.00? No wonder my $581.00 montly income makes me feel excruciatingly impoverished when I think about it. I couldnt rejoin fof if my life depended on it.
April 25, 2007 at 6:54 pm
Heather, thank you for expressing your views here, I read them with great interest.
The children of Fellowship members are victims and it is extremely important that their perspective be heard.
April 25, 2007 at 7:13 pm
Comment on post 7/231 on conformity, obedience and so on…
The observations/deductions/conclusions made via such experiements are precisely the material one can use to decide to join a 4th way school!
A way out from mere mecchanicality (human-non human nature) ?
I thought so for very long and,
I did learn a lot about “mecchanical” behaviour.
First of all, by being enabled to observe myself with specific tools
(separation and non expression of negative emotions being the main ones, at least, for me).
Now, I do find myself elswhere,
while the results of the experiments described in your post look as important as they were the very first day I started the quest.
Today: Same sense of urgency to be attentive, cautious and even the same tools
(observe, observe, observe…
Separate, separate, separate…)
but with this major addition:
out of the structure of the FOF, all this seems equally valid AND possible.
I remember saying to a friend of mine
(I had no doubts then)
that to be brainwashed was not the point.
Are we not under powerful mind control anyhow (TV, News papers, advertisements and what not!) ARE WE NOT ANY HOW ?
A cult like the FOF might just feet better my idea of what I try to be CHANGED into!
I must have fell out of love, like many others.
Because, no matter the many words, ideas and verifications I will use, it comes to this:
It does not work that well any longer…
Much Love to us all.
April 25, 2007 at 7:15 pm
dear poem (256),
I loved
Your post,
We should meet.
Sincerely,
verse
April 25, 2007 at 7:46 pm
PS: Regarding the questions about Bonita’s letter. I received a copy of this letter a number of years ago now, and it was in the form most recently posted (ie, the longer version). When I received it, it also ended in the same abrupt way.
April 25, 2007 at 8:11 pm
Thanks to Money Matters for replying so clearly and reasonably (249).
MM: “it would be tempting to have a “free” school but think again, being at a meeting with thousands more members that do not really want to be there? Payment after all is still a principle. (Ouspensky).”
The Ouspensky quote is frequently given and rarely questioned. But is it true? If I want a bottle of wine and go to a store I need to pay for it to receive it. OK. But what if a friend gives me a bottle of wine? Then there’s no payment.
Regarding more esoteric matters, I can pay by making efforts in a certain direction – meditation, the sequence, whatever – and there may or may not be certain results, eg a higher state. But also, higher states often come out of the blue with no apparent effort. I can make an artificial connection between the present result and previous efforts, but why?
To take this a bit deeper, who is making the payment? Answer: the imaginary me. Call it the steward if you like, but it’s still just a flimsy collection of “I”s with no lasting reality. Reality lies elsewhere, for example in awareness (if we take the Advaita position).
Do I have to pay for awareness? Obviously not – it’s there already.
It follows in my view that anyone collecting money (over and above expenses) for spiritual teaching is like a person selling a bottle of fresh air when all we have to do is breathe.
cheers, RB
April 25, 2007 at 8:28 pm
About the donations: if the Sheik starts raking it in via this blog (which I doubt is likely), how about him taking a cut for his efforts and setting up a trust fund with the remainder to help financially destitute students wanting to leave? I would be more than happy to put someone up for a while if it would help them, but have little to donate money-wise. It could make all the difference to someone who feels caught in the trap of the FOF, and give them a stepping stone out.
April 25, 2007 at 9:02 pm
NEUROSCIENCE SHOWS HOW THE MIND’S EYE BUYS BUSH’S LIES
A part of the brain is geared to brand loyalty, maybe even to death.
Long after revelation of the lies and futility of the Iraq war, a substantial-but shrinking-number of Americans still defend it.
The White House has to hammer back at opponents because it cannot admit a failure of this magnitude. Once engaged in a Big Lie, government leaders must plunge forward like all liars enmeshed in fabrications.
But what to think of the 41 percent of the people in a recent USA Today/Gallop poll who agreed that the United States “did not make a mistake” in going to war. (In early 2003, 75 percent of those polled were in the “no mistake” group.)
Why do individuals of any political stripe in pure folly stake out positions antithetical to the plain facts before them?
For all the explanations – psychological, philosophical, sociological, historical – contemporary science reveals an interesting clue in a mechanism of the brain.
Beliefs, it seems, can be hammered into a physical space in the brain, not just in the ethereal space of the mind, the nature of which remains mysterious.
Brain scanning technology enables researchers to “see” beliefs when brain cells light up. Neural imaging shows our reactions far more certainly than any lie detector. The research suggests that incessant propaganda can create a brain space that dominates the more discerning mind.
A study reported in the New York Times three years ago highlighted the science and its implications. Headlined “If Your Brain Has a ‘Buy Button’ What Pushes It?,” the story by Sandra Blakeslee told how researchers saw an artificially created brain space compelled a reaction.
Scientists scanned the brains of 67 people who drank two different, unlabeled colas. Both drinks “lit up the brain’s reward system, and the participants were evenly split as to which drink they prefered.”
Informed they were imbibing Pepsi or Coke, “…activity in a different set of brain regions linked to brand loyalty overrode their original preferences. Three out or four said that they preferred Coca-Cola.”
How about that? Brand loyalty has its own physical region of the brain. Madison Avenue shapes human physiology!
The hammered-in brain code – “Coke is the Real Thing” – overrode the less-loyal aspect of the brain – simple pleasure. Do we see here a root of the social automaton essential to authoritarian control?
Blakeslee reported that neuromarketing experiments “explored reactions to movie trailers, choices about automobiles, the appeal of a pretty face and gut reactions to political campaign advertising, as well as the power of brand loyalty.”
She quotes a letter to a Senate committee from Gary Ruskin, director of the consumer group Commercial Alert: “What would happen in this country if corporate marketers and political consultants could literally peer inside our brains and chart the neural activity that leads to our selections in the supermarket and the voting booth? What if they then could trigger this neural activity by various means, so as to modify our behavior to serve their own ends?”
Who’s going to stop anyone from doing what Coke achieved?
Imagine a political regime bent on making its message so dominant that it overrides rational – even self-preservative – considerations? Wouldn’t it be great to have brain area devoted to a political party? The party’s message – no matter how irrational – would elicit automatic acceptance. Soda is good. Coke is best.
Let’s visit th White House in 2004 where an unnamed staffer discusses the Bush administration’s approach to truth. Ron Susskind wrote in that year’s Oct.17 New York Times Sunday magazine: “The senior advisor says, boastfully: Guys like you are ‘in what we call the reality-based community’ – people who ‘believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernable reality. That’s not the way the world really works anymore. We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality…- we’ll act again, creating other new realities…We’re history’s actors…’”
History’s actors so far have brought to premature death more than 3,000 Americans, maimed thousands more and engendered the deaths of some 60,000 or more Iraqis in a “war” based on lies. By any account, they have greatly weakened the American military. (We now have Air Force enlistees training as truck convoy troops.)
Yet 41 percent of Americans still believe the lies, even defend them. Even the much derided myth that the 9/11 terrorists were Iraqis persists. They were Saudi Arabians, folks.
The White House gets away with this because advertising has taught politicians that they can, and science now suggests one of the mechanisms of their success.
Nations have Big Lies that mangle logic and language as surely as the Little Lie that one soda is more “real” than others.
Those Coca Cola neurons suggest propaganda’s power to impress irrational beliefs into the brain.
I did not take the time to pass this newspaper article on as political commentary. Do you have your ears on “Higher M” et.al., you knuckleheads.
April 25, 2007 at 9:20 pm
Hi Old doggy,
I like your gardening post. Are you a gardener? Isn’t it great that spring has finally arrived!
However, sometimes beautiful flowers grow on a toxic waste dump. Nice to look at the external beauty, but the foundation, the ground it grows on can be actually saturated with poison.
I think you need to see what’s underneath, because foundation, “soil” is important too, it affects the quality of what “grows”.
Unfortunately FOF, although appears as something very beautiful, refined and full of flowers and palms, smiles and external niceness stands on a very dark foundation of greed, corruption, betrayals, lies, abuse of power and prostitution, that’s is being deliberately hidden.
What kind of “harvest” can grow from this? Shall we just ignore it and keep smiling at flowers? May be it’s time to see what’s really up and replace some rotten soil in the garden…
The flowers are achnowledged all right. In fact – this all most of us did for many years – just looked at all the flowers! And smiled to each other! “Aren’t we lucky? Isn’t it amazing?”
It’s not about regrets – it’s more like a spring clean up. It’s positive, constructive, little messy – but it’s a promise of a new beautiful growth.
Happy gardening!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7783643@N07/sets/72157600076699962/
April 25, 2007 at 9:31 pm
TO # 256 Poem Says
Keep up the sequence. It is great brain activity.
If you try saying ‘blah,blah,blah’ it should work equally as well. It accomplishes one thing for sure, it does replace one set of ‘I”s or thoughts with another. It should work. After all there are alot of people around the world chanting, repeating the rosary,reciting scriptures of various kinds,or just moving about singing ‘hari, hari chrishna’.
But when you notice that it is all mind activity, and one feel good is as good as the next feel good, regardless whether it is the sequence, hari hari chrishna, forgive me father for I have sinned, or any other dogma, you may want to consider joining another ‘mind-head’ teaching that will fill that space in your head for a lot less money.
There is an excellent film you may want to see called ‘Bowfinger’ with Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy that might help!
Cheers and good luck
April 25, 2007 at 9:38 pm
All of us will do,
What we think we need to do,
And believe, what we think we see as true,
To find, what we think we need to find,
And protect, what we think needs protecting,
From those that we don’t think,
Think the way WE do.
April 25, 2007 at 11:00 pm
Hello Orlando. Good to hear your voice, and thanks for telling your story.
Bruce, you crack me up. Also, I like the brevity of your posts. Re: #243, how about “Higher Manslave”?
Innernaut, #251, yeah, I wondered about that too, thanks for bringing it up.
PaulA, weren’t you married to Lauren? If so, I remember you too, enjoy your posts.
Howard Carter: Are you still blogging? Are you sure we don’t know each other? Your thoughts sound very familiar.
Wasn’t Howard Carter the guy that discovered Tutankhamun’s tomb? Any significance there? I read “The Egyptologist” last year by Arthur Phillips, an interesting epistolatory novel in which HCarter is involved. You might like it.
Lust for Life #231, great post. We can’t be reminded of this often enough. “Difficult, ambiguous tasks carried out in a group of people to whom one is attracted” sounds pretty familiar. And yes, I’m like a puppy dog when someone pats me on the head for a post!
JoelF
April 25, 2007 at 11:12 pm
Dear Heather,
For your clarity, I left the Fellowship immediately after Girard sent out his e-mail, asking people not to read it because he had more important things to do. I left out of my own very free will. So don’t worry.
April 25, 2007 at 11:13 pm
The Work of Byron Katie has been mentioned a few times here. Since leaving the fof I have not had an appetite for “spiritual” work, haven’t joined anything (actually I’m still quite averse to joining _anything_).
Katie’s work is the only thing that’s attracted me, and I highly recommend her book, “Loving What Is.” Katie herself is an interesting story and quite refreshing personally–she comes to Marin usually once a year and gives away her “teaching” to anyone who wants it, although workshops and retreats do cost $$.
Katie maintains that we do not need “teachers” because we have everything we need to learn to get out of our suffering and fixations within ourselves.
Her method is incredibly simple and is completely contained in the worksheets you can download from her website. There are maybe 6 terms in her work that have a specific meaning, there is no “system.”
When I’ve applied her work I’ve found it to unerringly give me a new perspective and understanding, and to release me from some unconscious attitude or fixation I’ve been suffering from. Result is lightness.
For those still infof, the method has no taint of “b influence” (whatever that is) and is non-competitive with 4way. The entire “method” is contained in 4 questions you ask yourself.
Anybody wanna talk about Byron Katie?
Thanks for reading.
JoelF
April 26, 2007 at 1:01 am
Re: with malice toward none #182
Why seek to prolong through immortality something you are not fully participating in now? Isn’t the hoped for result of overcoming the fear of death an embracing of life?
Re: No Person #141
“Dear friend, don’t spend your life preparing for death – accept a gift of life, enjoy it now as it is, be who you are, because this is truly a wonderful gift.”
Lovely thought!
On behalf of some recent graduates, thanks for the ‘congrats’. We had a nice Bon Voyage dinner here a few days ago for some of the recently released. An attendee at your weekend with JW was there and gave us a glowing report of a weekend well spent. Hope to do something similar here in OH.
~Peter
April 26, 2007 at 1:31 am
Haeather writes:
“…recently I have come to see a once student friend of mine be asked to leave the FOF for posting under her true name on this blog.”
This is absolutely terrible, what despicable actions. Please give us more details–being asked to leave for a discussion board? Is this directly at RB’s bidding? I thought he was not interested in hearing about the blog.
Shocked and Very Upset
April 26, 2007 at 2:44 am
242 old dog
In this garden walks the gentle deer flush with life on the land that was her’s long before we imposed our views of beauty upon it.
254/255 a one two punch
258 Charles
Your ramblings mean much. Remember you riding your bike in the vineyard
How can something meant to connect us to the higher have brought so much suffering.
best to all
Cake
April 26, 2007 at 3:05 am
To #194/ veronicpoe post:
Since I was Bonita’s first student (Dec 1972) when she opened a center in Hawaii, I read this post with great interest — how fascinating to learn more details about FoF beginnings. Bonita comes across as a folksy, friendly person, so that for those who did not know her, you might be surprised what a heavy-hitter she was. “Madam Blavatsky” feature I recall her style being labeled by RB when he asked her to leave. (Once I remember being literally knocked off an ottoman I was sitting on by her staring at me.) She made a big impression on me and I am intrigued to her her story more completely.
I have never seen this letter before, having been completely out of the FoF loop now for the past 15 years. But , yes, it does not describe events through Dec ‘73 and indicated in the beginning, but stops somewhere in ‘71, I am guessing. If there is more to the letter, I would very much appreciate having it posted. — Thank you,
Sandra
April 26, 2007 at 3:16 am
I found this article in the New York Times.
If the last paragraph is true, it is a rather damming scientific refutation of the sequence and the idea that we can “conciously control” our thoughts.
From Article_Birds Do It. Bees Do It. People Seek the Keys to It_Note last paragraph….
A plethora of new findings, however, suggest that the experience of desire may be less a forerunner to sex than an afterthought, the cognitive overlay that the brain gives to the sensation of already having been aroused by some sort of physical or subliminal stimulus — a brush on the back of the neck, say, or the sight of a ripe apple, or wearing a hard hat on a construction site and being surrounded by other men in similar haberdashery.
In a series of studies at the University of Amsterdam, Ellen Laan, Stephanie Both and Mark Spiering demonstrated that the body’s entire motor system is activated almost instantly by exposure to sexual images, and that the more intensely sexual the visuals, the stronger the electric signals emitted by the participants’ so-called spinal tendious reflexes. By the looks of it, Dr. Laan said, the body is primed for sex before the mind has had a moment to leer.
Moreover, she said, arousal is not necessarily a conscious process. In other experiments, Dr. Spiering and his colleagues showed that when college students were exposed to sexual images too fleetingly for the subjects to report having noticed them, the participants were nevertheless much quicker to identify subsequent sexual images than were the control students who had been flashed with neutral images.
“Our sexual responsiveness can be activated or enhanced by stimuli we’re not even aware of,” Dr. Laan said.
By reordering the sexual timeline and placing desire after arousal, rather than vice versa, the new research fits into the pattern that neurobiologists have lately observed for other areas of life. Before we are conscious of wanting to do anything — wave at a friend, open a book — the brain regions needed to perform the activity are already ablaze. The notion that any of us is the Decider, the proactive plotter of our most lubricious desires, scientists say, may simply be a happy and perhaps necessary illusion.
April 26, 2007 at 3:42 am
Charles #259
Thank you for posting your story and for your kind words concerning my post. I just can’t believe how many of us never discussed these most obvious, painful things with one another at the time. Even now,with this forum, so many years later, I feel as if I had been released from a gag order which I was barely aware was still in operation.
I am so sorry to hear the story about your mother’s funeral. That must be a point of regret you have needed to navigate. (I always loved your brother and if you see him please tell him so, if you will). In my case, I did not attend the weddings of two of my three sisters, plus took no note of the birth of a niece and a nephew, “placing awakening above life.” When I left, we had a good amount of healing to do around my absence from these important events.
The FoF is still incomprehensible to me, not to mention my family in many ways. I noticed yesterday I was feeling low grade anger and in attending more closely to it, I saw I was being triggered by frustration about how much I do not know, how many questions remain unanswered about myself, my life, relationships, life in general. Maybe the question about why some of us stayed in the school so long after ‘finding out’ provoked this mood.
Anyway, I then remembered what I used to adore about the system & school. I used to say it this way: “The system answers all questions, and if it does not it tells you why.” (somehow I remember Tom E telling me that and concurring). Now I understand this quality I adored as the appeal of fundamentalist thought. In FoF it saved me from the anxiety and frustration of realizing how much I did not know, but ultimately prevented me from falling into that vast deep sea of unknowing that, when I can surrender to it now, opens to the very heart of a beautiful, dark knowing I long for most days.
Wishing courage to any and all who find themselves at that juncture, needing to step into the unknown — beyond the answers it has taken so long to master, the
ready, often subtle, often compelling, answers provided by the FoF training.
Here is one from those days that still helps me sometimes: What opens a door on one level, closes it on another…
Sandra
April 26, 2007 at 4:16 am
More food for thought.
Robert is quoted as saying on more than one occasion that when he has sex with another man, he is actually a woman, or something to that effect. This to me indicates a deep shame and inability to accept his own homosexuality — he must see himself as different than he really is in order to accept himself. So, he cannot even see himself honestly. Isn’t the first order of the 4th Way to “see yourself”? If he hasn’t even made it to this first basic step, what does that say?
April 26, 2007 at 5:08 am
“Robert treated us magnificently. He needed us because we, as conservative older people, gave the group a respectability that it needed, and he used us to full advantage.”
Don Birrell
April 26, 2007 at 5:12 am
Re: 98 LOL
Sweetie you’ve totally missed the point…
I personally would not have cared about the sex…… it was the use of his position and knowledge to exact gratification at the expense of the spiritual and emotional lives of his students.
Hi Bruce….
April 26, 2007 at 5:23 am
January 1982
Dear Robert,
For a long time we have felt the need to discuss with other sincere students the dilemma which our teacher is faced with concerning his private life and consequently some of our own dilemmas stemming from this situation and from our lack of knowing how to handle them.
November 29, 1981 at the Pomeroy House with a group of friends gathered together seemed an ideal time to open up the subject since it had become obvious that it was no longer a secret and also that several wonderful students were seriously considering leaving the school because of the inner conflects [sic] generated.
A sincere in-depth discussion ensued and the following is a summary of the feelings expressed by those present:
It was felt that we could accept the idea that a teacher has a right to his own private life as long as his actions do not negatively affect the lives of others. (Walt Whitman, Leonardo Da Vinci and others did not lead a school).
This situation within a school would not appear to be a sound note in the octave of developing a new civilization.
It is difficult to understand how these actions strengthen the whole or are right for the whole, even though on some level they may be right for the part.
It places people both presenting and representing the system in an awkward position in all areas including that of guiding children.
We all have too much invested in ourselves, each other and the school. This could also place the whole and/or the part in jeopardy relative to our income producing capabilities in life.
The credibility gap created when a teacher does not live his life according to rules he sets down creates a gnawing situation for students, making it sometimes impossible for them to feel the school is real and to be willing to devote their full energies to it.
We do not like to think of leaving the school as the only alternative. It is our school and we are concerned about it’s [sic] future. Work in this area may be connected to the teacher’s work in further [sic] his evolution and we have a role to play in that.
It seems important not to call a weakness anything but a weakness. It is the first step in being able to either give or receive help.
The teacher said that the school would become whatever the students make it. This seems to put the responsibility especially on older members to bring to light whatever their conscience cannot accept — a part of the principle of being true to oneself.
It seems the proper course would be to deal with this potentially troublesome situation from the “inside” which would reduce our vulnerability to damage from life.
A strong positive feeling of the phenomenal accomplishments of this school and our own development under our teacher’s guidance is prevalent among us and we would not wish to allow it to weaken through fear of making efforts toward possible solutions to the present problem.
The teacher may not be aware of how few students actually know about this area and also the amount of denying force it presents even to older students.
We ask you Robert, to consider finding new ways to modify this situation.
In our deepest friendship and affection, this letter has been endorsed by the following students:
Don Birrell
Doris Birrell
Lynn Pomeroy
Carolee Pomeroy
Roger Fitzgerald (Cavanna)
Pamela Fitzgerald (Cavanna)
Richard Anderson
Robert Egan
—————————————–
original contains recipient’s handwritten minor corrections to grammar and punctuation, together with the following notes:
nothing to respond to
no practical suggestion
unwritten “but”
April 26, 2007 at 5:30 am
Three months after joining this “study group”, a special meeting was called and it was announced that a woman who had left the school had committed suicide. This was seen as an example of what happens when students do not value the knowledge they have been exposed to. The school had become a lifetime endeavor! (Only for those who were strong enough to succeed.)”
Barbara Bruno Lancaster
April 26, 2007 at 10:32 am
I am going to weigh in on this “effort” theme running through a couple of the postings. This will be opinion based on observation. It may appear elementary to some. It may be wrong or i may state it unclearly. Never the less here it goes.
We enter a situation (a school, an ashram, a monestery, a challenging intense life experience) in a mentally and emotionally frozen state. We are presented with ideas and disciplines purported to help us out of our confusion. We apply them with intensity. We become “spiritualaholics” chasing states and experiences.
Unbenownst (is that a word?) to us there is a thawing that occurs and there is a connection made to who we truly are. The ideas and disciplines live on within us but are superfluous. Ironically, letting go of them allows for greater freedom though Zen masters continue sitting.
Down the road one may reflect on the process and see, somewhat, how and when certain benchmarks happened.
I would recommend the book “Dark Night of the Soul” by St. John of the Cross. Though written in religious language it is the best description i have seen on the process.
Perhaps others (hopefully better writers) would like to chime in on this theme.
April 26, 2007 at 2:24 pm
Hi Joel. I want to thank you for your book on body types which was useful for me to study when I joined the school.
Like you, I found Byron Katie’s method of investigation of my thinking very useful. It helped me to see the thoughts which caused me pain and suffering and to deal with them intelligently and in-depth, instead of just believing them and continuing to suffer.
I actually spent a few weeks a few months ago, writing daily thoughts which were bringing anger, fear or suffering of some kind and in the end of that period I found that none of those thoughts were true.
I used her method to work on my anger at RB and at myself for wasting so much time in pursuit of a mirage; my guilt about past events were I thought that I hurt someone; on my imaginary pictures of what I should be doing with my life; on awakening; on fears of various kinds and needs for relationships and approvals.
It did bring me an enormous relief and now, whenever I feel unwell in any way, I search my mind for a thought that causes it. I find that if it’s not PMT or some other physical condition, there is always a tiny thought behind any type of suffering. Then I simply ask whether that thought is true and of course it’s not. It brings immediate results.
It’s funny that you mentioned her name now, as just yesterday I picked up her second book ‘I need your love’ and enjoyed reading it, although I couldn’t squeeze relating thoughts of that kind out of myself, I think I worked them out for now.
April 26, 2007 at 2:30 pm
INSPIRING WORDS
THE ELUSIVE OBVIOUS by
Roger Linden
We have all had the experience of looking for something mislaid, perhaps our keys. We’re sure they were left on the kitchen table but they’ve disappeared. We search everywhere but they’re nowhere to be found. Eventually, giving up and sitting down, exasperated, to have a cup of tea we discover the keys. On the table all along, but somehow overlooked and thereafter assumed not to be there.
haveThe keys were not lost so hunting for them was pointless. The search for awakening is similarly futile. Most of us have heard and read more than enough times that we are what we’re looking for, but can’t deliberately let go of the belief that the holy grail of unity, of enlightenment must be something other, something extraordinary that is hidden but can be discovered given sufficient vigilance, seriousness and dedication. Unfortunately there always seems to be some lack in our commitment, some failing that constantly trips us up and reinforces the idea that we’re inadequate and that realisation is only for the very special few.
haveNothing could be further from the truth. In fact, nothing is hidden so seeking will never succeed. There were no ‘lost’ keys. All our years of effort inevitably come to nothing. In my own case it was 40 years before the penny finally dropped. The difficulty is caused by misinterpretation. From earliest childhood the notion has been reinforced that there is someone called ‘me’ located inside our heads looking out at a separate world. And we have arms and legs, thoughts, an internal monologue and our reflections in mirrors to ‘prove’ that we exist. They happen and they are mine so I must be real. Actually there is no separate ‘me’. It’s only an idea, a label used to identify what is assumed to be a central location within the body from which everything is experienced.
haveHowever, all experience must be conscious, nothing whatsoever can be known out of consciousness and moreover consciousness has no “location”. Actually it is consciousness that is mislabeled as ‘me’, for the idea ‘me’ appears in consciousness along with all else that is known and from which there appears to be a sense of separation. Consciousness is the knower (me), whatever is known and the process of knowing (seeing, feeling, thinking, etc.).
haveBut now we’re in danger of looking for consciousness which in thought is just another label and not a particularly helpful one either. It’s abstract and nebulous. There is a sense of presence of course, of being, of aliveness that is reading these words, seeing this page, thinking thoughts, hearing sounds, feeling sensations, knowing all that is known. It can’t be found because it isn’t an object. It is constant, unchanging, so familiar and ‘ordinary’ that it is overlooked in the search for something extraordinary. It is the elusive obvious, consciousness, and it’s what we are.
haveWhen the label ‘me’ falls away all that remains is ‘clear seeing’. Little old ‘me’ is revealed as all and everything—presence, being, awareness in which all of life just happens. All that was previously believed to be either outside the body/mind or inside and personal is now unified. There is simply whatever ‘is’. Any ‘experience’ is possible, nothing need be different. Life remains ‘ordinary’ yet when the strain of maintaining the false sense of separateness, ‘me’, dissolves, then what remains is tender joyfulness, wonder, unconditional love. This is awakening, realisation, liberation. The search is over.
April 26, 2007 at 3:07 pm
Discussion Parts #1-10:
You Are All Right.
April 26, 2007 at 3:14 pm
Dear Rita (#258), Dear No Person (#238);
I did not intend to vilify John Wheeler in my #157 post, though later on I mock ‘non-duality’ somewhat viciously, what I percieve to be its one dimensionality.
I wrote: “That type of thought & sentiment (i.e. of impersonal awarness) gives… narcissistic people the carte blanche to behave… ” & prepares others for subjecting themselves unreservedly to them or to the ‘impersonal aims’ they represent or that they have internalized. I probably should have made it clearer that I lump together in this all religions. I do not have assumptions in regards to Wheeler, he seems a pleasent person. I further write that religious exspressions & sentiments (‘non-duality’ included) are doing more harm then good but can also be benign. Hence-forth I’ll try to change the tone of my critique.
Thank you Rita for reading the post more carefully and responding to it in a calm manner.
Relevant here is Comrade’s #262; “awareness, consciousness, objectivity, self observation, conscience- they’re just words & pretense if we don’t accompany them with a sincere & healthy skepticism, and if we don’t accompany them with critical thinking.”
There is no need to read much to get the essence of a message and the worldview that is espoused. From Wheeler I read: ” life is simply a spontaneous expression within awareness.” He presents it to me as a truth, as a dogma? If I take it as a given, him as an authority not to be questioned it would be like putting on a certain colored glasses. If I take it as a revelation and suddenly I too have a similiar ‘oceanic feeling’ of mystical participation (Rita seems to attempt to describe that feeling in the ’spring’ post) I am hooked, converted, become a believer. There is no arguing with a subjective realization particularly when expressed with conviction. Rationality, critical thinking & reasoning are seen as foreign & exterior to the experience, are percieved as coming from the very ’separatenes’ that the thought-sentiment has just overcame; these tools are inapplicable by definition.
But if I do not have such an experience, I may want to look into it and see if this is a valid, valuable & accessible experience to me. So I can try to explore & experiment both subjectively & objectively experiences & claims of this sort.
Objectively or scientifically I can hook myself & others, for example, to a brain scanner & see what I learn about the relationship between thought, feelings & physiology (Yesri Baba’s #277). It may result in the slaughter of many ‘holy cows’ if the results are not ‘buffered’: I may learn for example how ‘big lies’, ‘little lies’ and irrational beliefs have measurable physiological aspects. As a result it may cool a bit my esoteric enthusiasm.
I may also look into psychological behavioral studies such as Milgram’s & Zimbardo’s experiments with obedience & conformity (see Lust For Life’s post #231); it is very apropo Innernaut’s (#266) internalised fear & guilt in regards to ‘impressions’ & ’self remembering’. The result may bring more insights: maybe I begin to suspect that the good feeling when I see thru the glasses ‘all is consciousness’ arises in me when I feel connected to others by an internalized sense of approval when I ‘think’ & ‘feel’ in that prescribed way; I feel connected to a special spiritual community. (This sentiment is widespread and a major motivator in our cult, that was already discussed alot here).
I may also want to experiment with my internal experience so I look for practices: meditation, self-remembering, non- identification, self-observatin, positive thinking etc. In the rare cases when the person’s conscience is healthy (but we have to go ahead with what we have), these experiences if they result in high states may tempt us to formulate ‘ideas’ & ‘relizations’ around them. In this case Adyashanti warns: “we can have many spiritual experiences, many deep insights, and still remain very attached to the experience of realization. In this sense, realizations themselves can become forms of addiction. Even deep & profound realizations can be co-opted by the mind & become objects of fascination…Realizations are often extraordinary & entertaining. Liberation is ordinary & thorough.” (If I qoute him it does not mean that I embrace everything he believes in. He, at least, does not tell me to put the cart of an idea or a sentiment before the horse of the experience).
So in the course of experimenting & experiencing I may not come up with a formulated worldview based on it. I may want to question my interpretations of the experience by continuing the activity of self observation (& non-identification, meditation & whatever has value), compare notes with others, and keep applying critical thinking even while giving myself entirely to the experience.
April 26, 2007 at 3:50 pm
I like the story (post#194) of the first student of RB, Bonita and to hear that he put her out after she wrote him that he was surrounding himself with “YES-Sayers”. This showed me that he has learned nothing in this respect in the last 35 years in that he still put me out after 20 years for saying NO to him for the first time.
I knew that you were out “If you did not put down your pants” for him, but I did not expect that you were also out if you did not put on one of his strait-jackets.
But even this weakness, I know, was built into his role that for some this would be the sign eventually to move on, as the Negativity of Alex Horn was the sign for RB to leave.
Anyway just as negativity builds your own prison so also this weakness put him in a strait-jacket as it must feel to be surrounded by his inner circle of YES –Sayers like Kevin Brown, Asaf Braverman, Yoad Rowner,Wayne Mott and Linda Tulisso.
But he has his steps to transform as all of us
Kiran
You can e-mail me at Kiran@beingpresent.net
April 26, 2007 at 5:11 pm
#293
What happened after this letter was sent? What did he say?
April 26, 2007 at 5:21 pm
kkeefe-murphy…I was hoping you guys would show up. Love to you and Murph the Surf.
B
April 26, 2007 at 5:49 pm
A Lover, thank you for #297 post. I’ve never read Roger Linden before, he expresses things in such a clear way. Very well said. Thanks.
April 26, 2007 at 6:01 pm
When we read a novel we suspend our disbelief so as to enjoy the story. This allows the writer to take us into a magical world – a world of symbolism, impossible powers, triumphs, imaginary monsters and angels. While we sit in bed and read – while we are in the state of suspended reality, life seems worthwhile and full of purpose and direction. Our hearts are full.
The novel allows us to believe many beautiful but impossible things (predictions, license plates, prehistoric sequences, eternal city of paradise, crystallization ear smoke, angels in the room, Egyptian connections, prehistoric sequences– the list goes on and on). And even if we don’t believe, we still let go just enough to become swept away.
We have suspended our disbelief so as to enjoy the possibilities offered and learn what Robert has to teach. The hypnotic effect is very strong when a group of people together try to be present, traveling in a trance like state, through the pages of the novel. No one wants to break the spell. The novel is too good and those that are not part of the spell become an obvious denying force. They must be moved aside, quickly, before they (like a virus) break the illusion. We learn to look away. They make us so uncomfortable.
Tulips, harp music, singing, palm trees, nice clothes, gentle wind, flowing fountains in dry air, sweet conversation, beautiful women and men, beautiful present eyes, sweet welcoming smiles, illusions of love, illusions of important work to do, all reinforce the story.
But reality, like the fly that keeps landing on your forehead while you read, keeps trying to pierce the spell. We absently brush off the fly and ignore the distraction. The story is too good. We avoid blogs where flies abound. We avoid some conversations. We find justifications that chase away flies. We hire professional exterminators. Those that notice the flies are labeled as lost. They are losing the novel.
For me the novel has come to an adequate completion. I see no reason to continue to suspend my disbelief. I no longer choose to believe the nonsense. It must have been a good novel to last 31 years! 31 years!- oh my, where did my life go? What work have I avoided? Why did I not put the book down? But the story was so good and it covered up the emptiness, the lack of purpose, the lack of belonging, the senseless struggles, all the things that I wanted to escape as a young man.
Now I just want to be simple, honest, unpretentious, loving.
That is enough. I do not want the constellations any nearer. The book was too long. I am tired of reading.
I am off the fence!
”Long have we lived, joy’d, caress’d together;
Delightful! Now separation – Good-bye my Fancy”….Whitman
FenceRider (a.k.a William Heinz)
wlheinz@comcast.net
April 26, 2007 at 6:10 pm
Just noting that despite in some cases decades of not being in the FOF, there seem to be deep currents of resentment still to be transformed.
It shows in the thinly disguised anger, judgment and hostility of a Bruce and Kiran, the somewhat repressed rage of Ames, the sarcasm of Joel and Charles R., and the terrible confusion of Elena.
On the other hand, where there has been true transformation, there is a quality of gratefulness–it shines through in the posts of Sandra, also Bonita’s letter had a remarkable quality to it in that respect.
In short, the work that needs to be done has not come to a halt just because we left the FOF…just observing.
April 26, 2007 at 6:11 pm
This is a short piece of an article on illusion of free will, that recently caught my eye. Lately there have been lots of new research in the area of free will, choice making, and consciousness, it’s really fascinating to see what is coming up. Still lots of unknowns, for example, there is no definite scientific answer (it seems) to “what exactly is consciousness and where it originates”. Some even say we’ll never know this.
Most of us are under firm belief that we have free will and can choose. Well, the neuroscience is proving that it might not be so… Which deeply shakes the very base of belief of who we are, of idea of wree will and personal responsibility for our choices, of how our society works, it’s moral codes, idea of “crime and punishment”, etc. It’s really fascinating research.
“…But of course we have free will, you might be thinking. You could prove it by, for example, choosing to raise your arm at some point in the next five seconds. Go on then. Done it? There, that was easy. Of your own volition, at the time of your choice, you moved your arm: QED.
But the American neuroscientist Benjamin Libet has shown that before every such movement, there is a distinctive build-up of electrical activity in the brain. And this build-up happens about half a second before your conscious ”decision” to move your arm. So by the time you think, ”OK, I’ll move my arm,” your body is halfway there. Which means your conscious experience of making a decision – the experience associated with free will – is just a kind of add-on, an after-thought that only happens once the brain has already set about its business. In other words, your brain is doing the real work, making your hands turn the pages of this magazine or reach over for your cup of tea, and all the time your conscious mind is tagging along behind.
It is as if, after years of driving around in your car, you discover that the steering-wheel is not attached to anything, and the car has been steering by itself.
Two neuroscientists working in Australia have taken Libet’s discovery one step further. They found that, when asking people to choose to move either their left or right hands, it was possible to influence their choice by electronically stimulating certain parts of their brains. So, for example, the scientists could force the subjects always to choose to move their left hands. But despite their choice being electronically directed, these patients continued to report that they were freely choosing which hand to move.
So not only is your steering wheel not attached to anything, but if your car was being steered by someone else by remote control, you would not even notice. Every time it turns left, you just move your toy steering wheel and think, ”Ah yes, I want to turn left.”
April 26, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Also observing that the VeronicaPoe postings about Don Birrell give a mere snapshot of a few thoughts or group of thougts that Don may have had at one time and takes matters out of context.
A letter written to Robert, a note about “respectibility” etc. Compare that to the wondrous story of Kathryn F. about his passing.
I am an old friend of Don and Doris and venture to say from direct observation that they deeply cared for Robert and the School in their way. There was a deep friendship between them and when Don was still at the Nut Tree many a lunch or dinner was shared. They loved Robert as a son but also as their teacher in many ways. They were wonderful students, beloved by all. They sent Robert deeply felt thank you cards and letter when they decided it was time to leave the Fellowship.
To reduce this to trying to give the impression that they were merely used by Robert to give the school respectibility is as phony as it is insidious.
April 26, 2007 at 6:26 pm
to Poem #256–nice hidden message!
April 26, 2007 at 6:33 pm
On being a “Yes man”–this is often a transparent justification for our negativity directed at those around Robert that support him.
We may not need to say yes in all situations — and just because students work in the school supporting Robert’s vision does not mean they are only Yesmen and nothing else.
The people listed in Kiran’s last posting have their own inner work well established–why try to detract from them.
The posting again shows us more about Kiran then about the students that he tries to put a label on.
April 26, 2007 at 6:53 pm
My friend had a conversation with a student at Isis who is (or was?) also a friend of mine. Apparently, my writing on the blog upset him to such extend that he asked whether I am not afraid to be run by a bus sometime soon…
Dear ….., I am not afraid. I am sure that you don’t really want my death, it wouldn’t solve any of the problems in the FOF or your personal issues with RB.
Last time we met and had a dinner, you were saying that your relationship with Robert was not that happy at all. I kept asking you that if you don’t like it, why were you keeping on with it? To which you had no answer, but instead got upset with me and tried to insult me by saying that I don’t understand the complexity of it, being so common and simple-minded. Well, of course I am. I think that possessing a talent like yours, is a great gift to enjoy and to share, and not everyone is lucky to have that. I don’t pretend to understand the complexity of your life. Whatever makes you happy: I hope you are…
It is sad if you feel contempt towards me – do you think that I lie in my writings? I never wanted to offend you or anybody else, but after years of silence and pretence I had to speak up.
I have great memories of you and I love you as a friend. To me, there are more important things in life than ideology.
April 26, 2007 at 7:07 pm
Dear Friends,
It seems to me that we need to get “synthetic” about this blog and start putting statistics out that can show some “proof” of what we are trying to convey so that it can go beyond our personal experiences.
One possibility is to start making a “common” document in which we state things in a more “organized” way.
I will suggest a list of things that could be included in the hope that others will add or suggest substractions because of irrelevance. I would also encourage both students who deeply believe in the Fellowship as it is, to state the positive aspects. We all can do both.
It seems one of the ways we could “work” with this is that after laying out the many different aspects that wish to be looked into, each person could add his own statement on the issue that he finds relevant, trying to avoid unnecessary repetition. Conciseness and “objectivity” will prove its effectiveness.
Another aspect of this document is the compilation of NAMES. It seems to me that it would be very effective if students could sign their name under the headline that they find pertinent to their play, since many of us have radical differences in our approach to the Fellowship as much as our different plays. Unfortunately it may mean disclosing your name on the internet but perhaps it is worth to do so for some that are seriously wishing to participate in this process. There may be ways of handling this by initializing your name only but giving very specific information on the time you spent in the school. I.e.:
E.H. Joined in March 1990 and left in March 2007.
Also, even if you relate stories that you know have happened without the actual names, yours or others, the stories will speak for themselves even if less effective.
It may also be necessary to use some guidelines here. Have. PS. Stand for, Personal Statement. TF. Told to me by a friend. LD. Legal document. And so on.
A great deal of the information for this document is already in the blog but I do not have the physical eyes to put it in the document. Some people enjoy doing this work but as much as possible if we could each try to put it in a more efficient form, the document will have better results.
The question will eventually arise of what is to be done with this document in terms of eventually publishing in a different form to that of the internet. Questions such as, what if such document makes money, who will it be for? Who will decide about further publishing? And probably a few more. Again I would suggest we try to “trust” some people. Perhaps a few of those in the blog? Rita Penfold? The Sheik? Keith? Another Person? Others? With an agreement that if there’s ever any money made from the document, it would have to be divided in equal amounts and sent to anyone who has included their name and information and keeps it updated on the blog after paying the work of any and all of those who were willing to care for such details at a reasonable, standard price for a similar job. Other suggestions are of course, welcome.
If others could also help me add general neutral descriptions of roles I would appreciate it. My eyes are definitely not in a condition to do a great deal of writing or reading. I often cannot do editing or corrections because the eyes are too worn out. Also, I am sure many of you have a better mind and experience to get this document properly organized so please feel welcome to put it upside down and backwards if you think it will be more efficient your way.
I thought of this possibility over night so it is rather cold and will need much correction but here are some areas that might work for all of us. It could be called something like:
The Fellowship of Friends Document
Compiled by some students still in the Fellowship and some ex-students of the Fellowship as of the 25th of April, 2007.
Positive aspects Negative aspects
1. Work on self remembering. Personal statement by: Elena Haven:
While this practice develops individual’s personal sense of themselves and can lead to partial development, unaccompanied by external consideration and other aspects of the system, such as non identification, lying, unnecessary talk and imagination amongst many others, it seems to strengthen egotism instead of consciousness.
2. Work on the non expression of negative
emotions. Personal Statement by: Elena Haven
While the practice of the non expression of negative emotions can lead to deep understandings in the development of non judgement and compassion, in the Fellowship it has been misinterpreted with the obligation of students to not question the overall practices of the Fellowship. The use of the positive aspect of the negative half of the intellectual center has been exterminated, expunged, unabling students to look at the negative aspects of the Fellowship Friends in their life as individuals and as a community..
3. The teacher
“Known” biography and other aspects.
The “known” Ministers. (It seems of serious relevance that the privileges of being a minister be considered. The avoidance of taxes, help with properties, etc. be looked into for a great deal of corruption has come about through it. Also a general description of what the role implies and students in it.)
The “Inner Circle.”
The Students at Isis
Students in Centres. Strengths and weaknesses as individuals and community.
This section on life at Isis may give us a wider view of the increasing decadence of the Church as the years have passed. The standards held in the different epochs seem to have changed radically with money being the most serious aspect of life at Isis in the last few years.
Living at The Farm
Living at Renaissance
Living at Apollo
Living at Isis
History of Legal Conflicts
Inner aspects of life in the Fellowship.
The use of money by the founder of the Fellowship. How exactly is money used? (Any information and actual account of aspects that students or exstudents know)
Sexuality.
The “Teaching” and actual practice of the Teaching.
Here it seems relevant to actually question why it is that Robert has never developed an all embracing system of his own and guesses from one idea to the next with the Ministers justifying this weakness with the idea that it is a “living exploration” for all of us to do together. Funny that this weakness in the teacher is where we ALL actually are called to participate while in everything else we are demanded to be excluded.
There are severe inconsistencies in Roberts teaching and the dogmatic indoctrination of people is more strongly felt as time goes by. The damages in the long run to people’s trust will be horrendous. So it seems this area is as relevant as any other and one to patiently be looked into, studying all the published material from Mr. Burton and his followers.
The non Practice of the Work.
The human and inhuman aspects.
The lack of a development of real friendship as a community with the development of subjective friendships similar to life: i.e. mechanical attractions and affinities.
The clear political stand of the Church to avoid assuming any responsibility for its members no matter how many years they have worked without health insurance or old age coverage.
(The aspect within this of “little and considerable” favors given by the teacher to his privileged students).
All of the above.
Students: (What seems relevant about these lists is that it seems very necessary to show that those students who have left were not just anybody insignificant who did not invest a lot of love, work and trust in the Fellowship, deep and serious commitments to be treated like a nobody who never existed and was of no relevance to the Fellowship. Everyone, each one of us, was relevant and here is an opportunity to let it be known).
List of students who held “official” positions in the Fellowship and left because of the inner inconsistencies
List of students with significant “roles” in the Fellowship who left because of the inner inconsistencies.
Clara Elena Haven: Seventeen years in the School. Joined in March 1990; Left in March 2007 because of the inconsistencies in every single area. Directed the Bogota centre in Colombia for four years. Bought a house in 1992 in Oregon House and lived in Isis for at least eight consecutive years. Married Girard Haven for four years. Travelled intensely as Mr. Haven’s wife on teaching trips around the world for four years. Took care of an 86 year old student with Alzheimer for two and a half years and is still doing so after leaving the Fellowship.
List of students without official or significant roles who left because of the inner inconsistencies.
List of students who left because of traumatic experiences with Robert Burton, the founder of the Church.
List of students who left because of negative experiences with students in the “inner circle”, “official roles” or conflicts with other students.
List of Students of the Fellowship who feel the Fellowship theories on “biological” families, seriously harmed their relationship with their families in general and children in particular.
Clara Elena Haven: When my younger daughter was eleven years old I left her with her father with whom we had separated for six years. I was very ill, physically crawling and needed a serious rest but one of the most mistaken reasons to leave her was the influence of the idea that we had a “biological” tie. It has been the greatest mistake in my life and one that has taken my daughter and I, eight years to slightly recover from after begging her in every possible way to forgive me. I cried every time I spoke with her during those eight years and she hated me for abandoning her. Similar attitudes were developed by me with other people in my family but not severely. It is extremely clear to me that the Fellowship does this to students so that all the money we make can be channelled into the Fellowship and not out of it. Just for this I would be willing to sue the Fellowship and no matter how much money they payed me it would never compensate the suffering that my daughter or I have had to go through. If other parents would like to file a joint sue on this issue I would be happy to go ahead with it and even on my own would like to speak to a lawyer about it if anyone knows one. As time goes by, the really dangerous issues about life in the Fellowship are beginning to surface. My e-mail is Ludoteka@world12.net
List of Children of Fellowship students. 1) Those who feel the policies of the Fellowship severely harmed their parents ability to assume their parenthood. 2) Those who feel the practice of the work in the Fellowship helped their parents assume a much broader, loving and responsible relationship with them. (I think my eldest daughter might be one of these. EH.)
Statistics of suicides in the Fellowship.
Statistics of people with severe illness who had significant roles in the administration or functioning of the Church:
Girard Haven: Stroke
Peter Bishop. President of the Fellowship. Cancer
Dorothy Beaulieu. Ballet dance teacher. Severe Alzheimer
Statistic of Students who have been recognized to have acquired a significant level of development by the founder in its (34?) Years of functioning: (Here it seems many male students have been privately convinced by the teacher that they would become conscious to strengthen their connection and blow up their vanity. Some might wish to share those lies so that we get a more objective glimpse of Robert Burton’s techniques).
Miles Barth – Left the Church in ……… with significant opposition.
Girard Haven – Still a thoroughly committed student in 2007
Personal Statements.
(I think it’s time for breakfast. One way I see of completing this document is that each students files in whatever statements he has to make and republishes the document. What possibilities do we have of having this document on a separate list adjunct to the blog but that won’t be clogging the blog with itself every time someone writes on it so that those that simply wish to continue with the blog statements can do so without having this document which has the potential of becoming tremendously long on its own. If there are students willing to go through the blog and adding statements from it on the document would anyone oppose such action? Does the Sheik or anyone else know of a way that this document could be put together in a reasonable way? Each time a statement is added, could it just appear in the blog under the headline it is trying to cover? And on the document as well?
Way beyond the aim of questioning the Fellowship, this document would have the aim to state that we have existed wether the Fellowship wishes to acknowledge our existence or not. Even if no one in the Fellowship ever reads this document, it seems to me it is necessary as part of the healing that ex students need to leave, for themselves. Other results would be secondary.)
Thank you everyone for considering this possibility. Clara Helena Haven.
April 26, 2007 at 7:50 pm
Not to be outdone by the some of the fabulous poetry on the Blog
I have taken the liberty of re-writing a few verses of one of my favorite poets Walt Whitman (forgive me Walt , for I have sinned). This is done for posterity (you know, for those who cannot understand Walt Whitman, and need to leave something for the Ark and future generations of the FoF)
SONG OF THE OPEN ROAD
Original poem by Walt Whitman
Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road,
Healthy , free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me leading wherever I choose.
Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good fortune,
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Done with indoor complaints, libraries, querulous criticism,
Strong and content I travel the open road.
DIRGE FOR A HEAVY LOAD
New version by Walle Whitless
Aloof and heavy-hearted , I travel the same old road
Unhealthy, penniless, the world closed to me,
The short brown path before me leading only where Robert choose.
Henceforth, I give Robert my good fortune, I myself have lost my life’s fortune,
Henceforth, I will live the illusion, postpone my life, need more,
Not done with explanations, illustrations and RB’s interpretations
Weak and unhappy, I have come to the end of the road.
April 26, 2007 at 8:02 pm
Actually Kiran you weren’t “out” if you didn’t drop your pants, you were just out of his “inner circle”, unless he had other uses for you. And by your statement about Alex Horn… you are basing this on uninformed second hand reports. Alex used negativity as his “way” right from the word go. It wasn’t something that just appeared. One pretty much knew from the beginning that was the way he worked.
April 26, 2007 at 8:09 pm
I hope that Scientific American and Michael Shermer will find it in their hearts to forgive me for copying this article from The Skeptic column in May 2007 Scientific American, page 30. Substitute a few words of work language and some names, and the shoe fits perfectly—on many levels.
Ames
Bush’s Mistake and Kennedy’s Error
Self-deception proves itself to be more powerful than deception
By Michael Shermer
The war in Iraq is now four years old. It has cost more than 3,000 American lives and has run up a tab of $200 million a day, or $73 billion a year, since it began. That’s a substantial investment. No wonder most members of Congres from both parties, along with President George W. Bush, believe that we have to “stay the course” and not just “cut and run.” As Bush explained in a speech delivered on July 4, 2006, at Fort Bragg, N.C.: “I’m not going to allow the sacrifice of 2,527 troops who have died in Iraq to be in vain by pulling out before the job is done.”
We all make similarly irrational arguments about decisions in our lives; we hang on to losing stocks, unprofitable investments, failing businesses and unsuccessful relationships. If we were rational, we would just compute the odds of succeeding from this point forward and then decide if the investment warrants the potential payoff. But we are not rational–not in love or war or business–and this particular irrationality is what economists call the “sunk-cost fallacy.”
The psychology underneath this and other cognitive fallacies is brilliantly illuminated by psychologist Carol Tavris and University of California, Santa Cruz, psychology professor Elliot Aronson in their book Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me) (Harcourt, 2007). Tavris and Aronson focus on so-called self-justification, which “allows people to convince themselves that what they did was the best thing they could have done.” The passive voice of the telling phrase “mistakes were made” shows the rationalization process at work. “Mistakes were quite possibly made by the administrations in which I served,” confessed Henry Kissinger about Vietnam, Cambodia and South America.
The engine driving self-justification is cognitive dissonance: “a state of tension that occurs whenever a person holds two cognitions (ideas, attitudes, beliefs, opinions) that are psychologically inconsistent,” Travis and Aronson explain. “Dissonance produces mental discomfort, ranging from minor pangs to deep anguish; people don’t rest easy until they find a way to reduce it.” It is in that process of reducing dissonance that their self–justification accelerator is throttled up.
Wrongly convicting people and sentencing them to death is a supreme source of cognitive dissonance. Since 1992 the Innocence Project has exonerated 192 people total, 14 from death row. “If we reviewed prison sentences with the same level of care that we devote to death sentences,” says University of Michigan law professor Samuel R. Gross, “there would have been over 28,500 non-death-row exonerations in the last 15 years …” What is the self–justification for reducing this form of dissonance? “You get in the system, and you become very cynical,” explains Northwestern University legal journalist Rob Warden. “People are lying to you all over the place. Then you develop a theory of the crime, and it leads to what we call tunnel vision. Years later overwhelming evidence comes out that the guy was innocent. And you’re sitting there thinking, ‘Wait a minute. Either this overwhelming evidence is wrong, or I was wrong—and I couldn’t have been wrong, because I’m a good guy.’ That’s a psychological phenomenon I have seen over and over.”
What happens in those rare instances when someone says, “I was wrong”? Surprisingly, forgiveness is granted and respect is elevated. Imagine what would happen if George W. Bush delivered the following speech:
This administration intends to be candid about it’s errors. For as a wise man once said, “An error does not become a mistake until you refuse to correct it.” We intend to accept full responsibility for our errors… We’re not going to have any search for scapegoats… the final responsibilities of any failure are mine, and mine alone.
Bush’ popularity would skyrocket, and respect for his ability as a thoughtful leader wiling to change his mind in the teeth of new evidence would soar. That is precisely what happened to President John F. Kennedy after the botched Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, when he spoke these very words.
Michael Shermer is publisher of Skeptic (www.skeptic.com).
April 26, 2007 at 8:15 pm
#289
“…opens to the very heart of a beautiful, dark knowing I long for most days.” Amen
The fruitful darkness. Thats where the light comes from.
April 26, 2007 at 8:42 pm
A special thank to Shelley Mitchell for the link leading to a short video. I went there and had a good laugh but not only…
This blog is vivid source for stimulations of all sorts, much discoveries and learning.
This is a thank you moment for the Sheik!
Congratulations for your success, Sheik, and congratulations to us all too!
Gratitude.
April 26, 2007 at 9:27 pm
ok, back again..
theme: springtime(responsibility, seeds, c-influence(whatever), karma, possibilities, strategy, direction)
on the other hand..
an important part of the school for me, i’m going to use school to signify that which rang most true for me within the Gurdjief-Ouspensky ideas, was that the school was an organic entity evolving itself,..yeah well, it definitely got stuck in adolescence…real school is our creation, you know maybe rb IS just saying, “hey the fof IS whatever you allow it to be, you want it different, well, think for yourself, just like i’m doing to lead the direction of the fof”.
At it’s most basic level the fof must be a representation of a microcosm of the usa, as opposed to the original concept of the “USA”, all institutions within any moment in history must represent a given characteristic of the culture and times while it is manifesting.
So, given what we see has occurred (as the previous post of the world political situation),
hey…ya never know. how does that song go “take back the night”
it’s been a blast guys, best party i’ve been to in a long time
April 26, 2007 at 11:01 pm
Howdy Charles, thanks for your thoughtful post. Guess I’m glad I stayed in NYC all those years!
Veronicapoe, thanks for more fascinating history. BTW, what’s the relation with Barbara Bruno?
What comes up for me from all the excellent recent posts by Veronicapoe, CharlesR, SandraC, the letters from Bonita and the Birrell group, is that it should be obvious by now that the fof was never anything but the vehicle for Burton’s self-satisfaction.
There never was a “golden age;” the fof did not “go wrong somewhere along the line;” “The teacher said that the school would become whatever the students make it” was always a ruse; and that the essential nature of the group, and the struggles of well-meaning students with Burton’s inconsistencies and criminal behavior have been the same right from the beginning.
This should also “wake up” (pardon the expression) the plaintive current infofs or recent xfofs with their fantasy plans to “make the school our own” and “set things right” that their cause is hopeless. Time to move on, folks.
JoelF
April 26, 2007 at 11:16 pm
Rita #296
Thanks for your kind words about “Body Types.” Hope you got some enjoyment from it.
(And a shout out to Susan Zannos, if you’re still reading. Nice job on your body type book, I admired it (from afar).)
Rita, it was interesting to read your experience with Byron Katie. I haven’t read her 2nd book, but I did attend one of her workshops and have watched lots of video of her working with people.
One thing I like about her method is that I can go as deep into the “story” I’m telling myself as I’m able. It leads me to the place I always thought I would get to through “non-identification” but which usually would result in dissociation.
By looking into the thought and the story that lies behind it, all kinds of associated assumptions I have, old beliefs, vanities and wounds from the past come to the surface.
By confronting this material I realize that I’m being driven by a lie that I’ve been telling myself for some time, maybe years or decades. The release from this cycle of inner blame, resentment, anger, and self-pity is quite remarkable.
The other part of Katie’s “teaching” I particularly appreciate is her good humor about whatever we find. She is remarkable that way (and the same in person).
I often use my bike rides to work on something that’s bothering me with Katie’s 4 questions, although I ought to be more careful because a couple of times I’ve found myself lying on the trail with my bike on top of me because of a lack of concentration on the world under my tires. But I usually end up bursting out in laughter while I’m lying there because it’s just pretty hysterical.
Anyway, thanks for your thoughts.
JoelF
April 26, 2007 at 11:34 pm
Innernaut, #266: “It took me some years to remove the “grid” of the system that stood between me and life — a grid where each little box had a label for everything I saw and experienced. It creates the illusion of having an answer for everything. Much more fulfilling (and uncomfortable) to toss it aside and live life directly, without the illusion that “we know.”
Yah, I’m down wid that!
I had a similar realization and, upon exiting, deep in my own “dark night of the soul,” took several years to eradicate the “system” from my mentation.
It was almost like learning a new language. But how revelatory the process was for me. I had the aim to express whatever I was thinking in a vocabulary that anyone could understand. If I could not do it, I assumed I really didn’t understand well enough.
This caused me a little grief with other xfofers who had recently left because I just refused to use ANY “work language” or concepts from the 4way or Burton. And I mean ANY.
But the effort was worth it for me. It gave me peace, didn’t “trigger” me back into the passive/dependent/infantilized/vain/superior “student” mind. It clarified what I really knew for myself. It allowed me to talk to people who knew nothing of the 4way. And it encouraged me to really experience the reality in front of me, instead of passing every experience through my 4way coder/decoder. Direct. Experience. Period. Very freeing.
Thanks for your post.
JoelF
April 26, 2007 at 11:42 pm
FOF Member for 32 years
1971-2003
What I’ve learned since then:
FOF is not the only way, nor the best, nor the fastest.
Innernaut#266:
“Is self-remembering similar? An addiction to a state and its corresponding release of brain chemicals (higher hydrogens)?”
Yes. Science tells us: we are hard-wired for pleasure.
Having been disillusioned by the mass of lies, criminal behavior, lust, greed, and so on, hidden deep in the FOF underbelly, which remains well-veiled from — well-buffered by — members, looking back we may forget why we joined, and why we stayed. Talking to Ramona recently, we agreed what an exquisite pleasure it was to be an “ordinary” member – the long, deep talks with friends; hugs and smiles; expansive intellectual discussions; emotional and physical beauty; incredible concerts; dances; dinners, wine, poetry; deep and poignant insights; lofty studies; adventures. How many times were we transported to other dimensions? Many…many…
But at some point, you can no longer condone, support, or buffer RB’s abusive lifestyle.
My husband and I got kicked out briefly in 1998 because we didn’t quit our jobs, sell our house, and move to the property during the “fall of California”. Relieved at being released, it also shoved me deeply into rumination on my many years as a member, and for six hours I hovered in a “long, slow, near-death experience” — retrospection of 27 years of membership at that point. Each person I had encountered in the FOF surfaced one by one, and the essence of our relationship permeated my understanding. Thousands of people known and loved, struggled with, appreciated! Toward the end of the cycle I realized, “What a fabulous place to have spent my life.” Unfortunately, we were given a dispensation, despite our lack of trust, and were reinstated as FOF members. Arrrggghhh. I would have to actually leave of my own volition, and that took another five years.
But the experience caused a realization that a life-time of encounters with others constitutes my real wealth. The accumulation of such experiences “coats our being bodies” — love, attention, energy, struggle, communication. In this respect, the FOF gave me what I wanted most: to remember myself in all sorts of circumstances. Unfortunately, many others were devastated by their association to FOF, more than we care to imagine.
At any rate, back in the FOF, quietly reading Lynn Andrew’s books on lucid dreaming and directed meditation, I discovered that dreaming was especially helpful at work. As a beginning computer programmer, I could drop into a dream state and see “objects” and “properties” as three-dimensional entities, figure out how to talk to them in code, get them to talk to each other, how and where to carve doors, or erect bridges, etc. The brain is a miraculous apparatus, with dreams and metaphors the language of communication between our ordinary states and cosmic, creative depths. I could pose myself a software conundrum before bed, and my brain would concoct brilliant solutions in dreams for me.
In 2002, I asked former member and good friend Michael H, ‘Where are you spiritually these days?’ He pondered for a while before calmly recounting some astonishing experiences and insights he had gained at a meditation retreat.
So while still a member, I signed up for a ten-day Vipassana retreat. I was fed, housed, and instructed without cost or proselytizing. I made more evolutionary progress in ten days than I had in 32 years in the FOF. And it was entirely free.
What I learned:
I do not need a teacher
I do not need to study any books
I do not need to go anywhere
There are many paths to enlightenment
We are proceeding to the best of our ability
For me, sitting quietly, “self remembering” – being mindful — constantly bringing focus back to the present, forgiving the drift of mental mechanics, returning to the present again and again and again, amassed attention to the point of lift-off.
Certain vibrations – thoughts – impressions – emotions — fragrances – music – sensations — set off sparklers — tiny explosions of joy — in every cell, sending rivulets of thrill throughout the body. These excited, zooming, rivers of specks, shift as suddenly and swiftly as a massive flock of wind-dancing crows in an enormous sky.
I verified a great deal of the FOF information during meditation, also zen philosophy, such as ‘the intellect is an organ which excretes thoughts’. It never shuts up. Never. Never. Never. Yak yak yak, yak yak yak. I experienced myself as a voluminous bag of vast, dark emptiness. Familiar solidity flooded with infinite openness, the body vanished.
I was reminded over and again that blood surges relentlessly, breath flows in and out effortlessly. While experiencing this continuum, it became apparent that emotions also have a circulatory system. Chunks of unprocessed impressions are pumped continuously for consideration and digestion. They persist until processed –- faced — accepted.
I learned that attention wanders aimlessly through available corridors of intellect, emotion, and bodily sensation; that the internal cinema is a non-stop show, shifting between re-living the past and concocting a phantasmagoric future. It is very creative and compelling, but no one is in control. Through the FOF experience, I already knew this to be true.
Staring at a huge mound of food I had served myself, I realized that I eat too much out of fear.
I learned that food isn’t as important as it has seemed. I can eat any kind of food. I can diet in any way. I don’t have to be so inflexible.
I learned that I am tired all the time because I want every moment of every day to go the way that I plan.
Anger
I learned that anger ignites a rarified fuel above the right breast, where a marble-sized spindle of energy gushes in a stream of jet-hot vapor, shooting vast quantities of energy in long, narrow, intense, wasteful surges. This is not a metaphor.
I aimed the gush at the person causing my anger, but she remained oblivious.
I learned that expressing anger hurts me more than the object of my anger, that it can keep hurting me for hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades. I learned that I can let it go, let it pass.
I learned that daydreaming is an anesthetic.
I found that my father loves only himself; I do not love anyone, not even myself.
All this inner material manifested simply because of attention directed to the surface of the skin. This simple technique lead to acute listening, not only to the body — the solid areas of tension and gross itches and stinging tears — but also to very subtle flows of energy and its meanings.
I investigated deeply bonded fears, anxieties and sorrows. With focused attention, memory motifs — patterns of decisions — connected back and back, until my life appeared as one long ellipse of repetitive spirals; but while simply sitting there, tangles of self-protective lies unraveled, invisible barricades crumbled.
Along the vapor-trail of life, twining vines of experience bloomed with globes of memory, my life’s harvest. Some of these flowering fruits were pleasant and fragrant; while others were low, sticky globs of remorse.
I learned it is possible to prevent myself from getting attached to what comes along. When I find myself dwelling on something, I can let it go. I learned that I am in constant flux in every way; that I can relax and enjoy the flow.
X-ray vision
I continued to meditate two hours a day after returning from the retreat, and during the next few months I experienced unusual side effects, including x-ray vision — seeing inside the body. My energy shimmered with refinement as I peered into my lap, which bubbled with black dots. Momentarily fearful, I released the anxiety, at which my gaze dropped through the skin and tissues. I saw a multitude of chakras rotating, from the base of the trunk to just above the heart. A long strand of spinning, moon-glow pearls, these vortexes are vastly different in size and color than the ones shown in diagrams, and there were more of them than are normally pictured. I hadn’t believed in them before; now I know they exist. Fear is a lock; detachment a key.
When Love Attacks
Another side-effect of regular meditation was a temporary lack of fear, such as when our neighbor’s three big dogs escape their fence. They have often threatened me with deep, low growls while tearing up my yard.
One day after the meditation retreat, the mastiffs occupied the front yard as I drove up to the house. To avoid a confrontation, I meditated in the car, humming with happiness, waiting quite a while before the bullies disappeared around the corner.
As I mounted the path toward my front door, the dogs bounded back to attack me, but this time with love! One incessantly licked my hands and face and moaned an urgent, loving hello, the second jumped and danced in joyful circles around me, and the third pawed at the front door, yelping a ridiculously pitiful, pleading desire for admittance…the three were ravenous to play, to lavish in an overflow of high vibrations.
During this same time period, whenever I walked around the neighborhood, cats would dash towards me every few steps, rub themselves vigorously against me and sonorously purr. People responded to the fine energy as well, sometimes just as dramatically. I have to mention that when not meditating regularly, cats are not compelled to me, dogs do not trust me, and the homeless curse me.
Lack of attachment is magnetic, even to animals.
Maybe RB has “super powers”, but — so do we all.
I emerged from my second Vipassana meditation course as if from the underworld, feeling as though I had been buried half dead from ten days of sitting in the dark, covered from head to foot with blankets, eyes closed, not communicating with the other human cocoons in any way.
Each moment is beautiful
Every day for the first six days, psychedelic swirls emerged wherever I set my gaze. For three days, the vapor drawings took the forms of bas-reliefs, visual art lessons from ancient China, Rome, Greece, the Mayans and Egypt… The well-spring-overlay of beauty continued through my waking hours. During the final three days I saw spirals, abstract swirls, and bubbles. The motifs surfaced in rugs, walls, stones, dirt, and bark. A display would float for a moment, disburse briefly, and re-materialize, always new or different. I did not attach to the visions, and they incessantly reminded me that each moment is beautiful and unique.
During this type of meditation, one builds an exquisite awareness of bodily sensations while amassing divine energy, which one may then manipulate at will.
Throughout the seventh day, I tossed handfuls of virtual fairy-dust through the surfaces of the skin anywhere on my body: discharging hot, playful particles of attention. The tiny glitter-bits kissed the surface, zipped through muscle, bone, and blood, and whizzed through the opposing wall of skin, zinging in joyful sparkles. Poof, poof, poof, along, around, throughout.
I could feel internal organs and processes; send energy, like warm honey, oozing slowly down from the top of my head, drenching every cell; meld a one-inch band of sizzling heat along all external surfaces; propel chi in any direction, at any speed, inside and out. I clearly sensed peppery, excited sparkles rotating in fleeting spirals an inch or two outside the surface of my skin.
But identifying with these yummy sensations is considered dangerous, and is certainly not the aim. In fact, doing so undoubtedly caused me problems following the first meditation seminar, after which an appetite for the highest vibrations consumed me. The real goal is to experience whatever the present moment offers and not to attach to anything, whether pleasant or unpleasant.
I have no doubt that RB is addicted to higher frequencies. But his acquaintance with higher states does not indicate the status of higher being. Rather, we are all higher beings.
After a second retreat a year later, I came away with a much greater understanding of my life, despite the pains and difficulties, or perhaps because of them. I could clearly see, hour after hour, day after day, how my current stupidities, meanness, and sensuality are predicated on incidents from long ago, as far back as childhood, and possibly even from before birth, these qualities having been baked into my DNA. Sitting for extended periods allowed the defensive outer layers of understanding to unpeel, revealing raw reality.
I saw beyond many attachments and identifications, and recognized rooted reasonings for decisions and incidents in my life, which have continued to resonate all these years with meaningful dissonance.
The body is a keyboard upon which mysterious fingers of reflection press, holding chords and playing melancholy melodies on heart, abdomen, arms and head. By listening to the clutching squeezes and their resulting sensory music, instead of endlessly replaying and repeating the memories and daydreams instigating them, the grip of those obscure fingers release, and the pressures lift. I could forgive all involved, including myself.
On Day Seven I was not in physical and emotional distress, felt peaceful, and good vibrations hummed vigorously.
That night I dreamt I was in a classroom where a fellow student was being administered an oral exam by an invisible instructor. The student responded poorly, flunking the test.
It was my turn to be questioned, but as I stood, the piano in the corner began to play itself with an insipid, childish tune. The keyboard was covered by a delicate veil, which I lifted, and sat down to play something better. My playing became more and more exquisitely celestial until all the students in the classroom sighed with approval and appreciation.
As I lifted my fingers from the keyboard, the piano continued to play itself with ever-intensifying beauty, until the magnificent melodies vibrated with such sublime transcendence that everyone and everything in the classroom dissolved in a shower of cosmic sparkles.
Once during the retreat, my entire body exploded into just such a vast expanse of stardust, extending forever in all directions.
We are the piano, which may play itself stupidly, or with music so divine it bursts the fasteners of space and time.
May you burst — with love and laughter — KathrynF
April 27, 2007 at 12:23 am
Flying free, you seem to think that HC is Girard.. I personally think that it’s Peter Ingle…
Karen
April 27, 2007 at 12:59 am
for some reason, all of these amazing stories and first-hand accounts have me thinking about the title of an old film: “The Gods Must Be Crazy”.
maybe the sequel will be: “The Gods Must Be Crazy if This is an Ark”.
April 27, 2007 at 1:19 am
Shelley Mitchell #267 – brilliant! Reminds me of the Southpark “Circle of Poo”!
JoelF #281 – “ooooze a good boy den! yes, YOU are!”
Regarding Byron Katie; she seems to be pretty much using cognitive behavioural therapy, an effective treatment for depression and life in general! Not to be dismissive, but there are so many self-help type gurus out there, I am rather wary! I guess we are attracted to what is needed at a given time but ultimately we are on our own, so any regrets or negativity about the past can be ‘transformed’ by using it to see a previously hidden truth about ourselves.
Innernaut #290 – interesting thought, but I guess we will never know, and do we really care anymore?
It seems paridoxically that we have a lot to thank the FOF for, if nothing else than to have a sense of fellowship with others via this blog. I am toying with the idea of suggesting a meet up for any other London based bloggers. Picnic in the park or something. Would there be any takers?
April 27, 2007 at 2:18 am
Don’t laugh….this was us, unless you identify more with the naked guy, and even he was an idiot!
April 27, 2007 at 2:38 am
I am a former studentand I posted earlier using Sydney Russell’s name because she was a friend in the 70’s and I have had no idea what happened to her and thought that it might elicit some information. I just saw her response and I am very happy she is still alive and hopefully well. I can be reached through (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StillPoint/.)
I apologize if some thought there was any deeper motive. Given the circumstances with the FOF and students and former students I did not feel comfortable inquiring straight forwardly.
Some of my own opinions.
What makes a school real is the consciousness produced by the School and its students. That the Fellowship is seriously flawed I don’t question. That my experience and efforts were real I also don’t question. I worked with many sincere individuals while in the FOF (1973-1979). Most of what I received was POSITIVE. If our being attracts our lives than I was exactly where I needed to be. Both those in the FOF and Those who have left need to return to the reality of verifying self remembering for themselves. No one appointed Gurdjieff a conscious person, or Ouspensky, Nicoll or Collin’s. If you cannot experience your own consciousness you are a fool to expect anyone to show it to you or to even confirm it. Believing that only Robert could appoint conscious beings is a major flaw in the Fellowship. This is one flaw even more serious than any sexual or financial misconduct. If Robert’s flaws where not obvious prior to the large expansion in the mid 70’s they did become so afterwards. I do find what has been stated about Robert’s sexual activities very possible. I was not ever approached so I cannot comment personally on it. I personally knew to different degree’s all the young men of his personal entourage. That he forced these young men in the early days I find more questionable as the individuals I knew seemed very eager to live with and travel with Robert. Being around Robert was not and probably is not particularly comfortable.
For myself personally I valued Robert as my teacher but otherwise felt he was a pain in the butt. I of course recorded this as my False personality reacting to being around him. I spent quite a bit of time with him at one point and found it emotional exhausting. He would arise early and often spend 10-12 hours a day or more working with students one on one. He never deviated from the aim of self remembering and always seemed to have a high level of attention. Much of what he taught could only be learned through personal experience.
Anything that happened after I left I know nothing about. Nor do I find the subject of much interest. As I stated in my earlier post where I misused Sydney Russell’s name my experience is that graduation is when one separates the teachings from the teacher. There is not and cannot be one answer to right action. I have studied the I-Ching for many years and this in its most condensed form its message-right action depends on the individual and the specific situation..
As far as Robert appoint Gerad the next conscious being. He is not the first to have been so appointed and may simply been the last. Gerad never had any compuction about speaking about the theories and ideas as if he had veified them. So what’s changed? Speaking from my own experiences higher centers can and in fact always do produce reactions in the lower centers that allow one to imagine that since one has had a genuine experience one is now conscious. Life is full of individuasl who have had such experiences. The FOF should have developed an indepth knowledge of the specific notes and experiences on the octave of transformation that produces man #4 and Man#5. . In the FOF actual experiences of steward and higher centers could force one to leave. Robert’s dominance feature does not allow space for any other individual views than his. This was not a subject Robert discussed that I can recall. The inability to control a reaction to genuine experiences of consciousness follows the law of three. The experience creates a result that can act as a conductor to any or all of the three forces. Thus an experience of higher centers can produce a denying force to continued efforts. This is because one experience or a series of experiences does not remove our false personality but blends with and creates new and interesting veriations.
I was deeply wounded by some of Robert’s teachings and school policies. I was surprised in my 40’s to not become a conscious being or to achieve the task set by C influence but a seriously wounded individual who had to go through a lengthy and painful process of destroying my old self, healing essence , spiritual regeneration and emotional and personal growth. A very real in depth study and verification of Rodney Collin’s 6 process’s.
Nothing I have experienced negates the objective truth of the system or the reality of self remembering. Anyone having an interest in the ideas is welcome to visit http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StillPoint/
discussion of the FOF is not encouraged or tolorated. I do believe this blog does do a valuble service and I thank those who have shared their experience, strenght and hope in surviving and recovering from their person experience in the FOF as well as those who may be present members seriously questioning their experiences.
Thank you
a former student
April 27, 2007 at 3:05 am
Just Observing…
Actually I’m ok with everything that has passed. If you read my previous posts I stated that things happened exactly the way they were supposed to. I’m, very happy with my life as it is now, and I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for absolutely everything that came before. Seemingly contradictory things can be true at the same time. I take responsibility for all my decisions, at the same time I think it’s also true that there’s some major karma to pay on RB’s side, of course I could be wrong.
On the other hand, Just Observing, you aren’t really just observing, you are soft peddling the usual FOF horse shit, with a slightly different flavor, but the shit is still obvious and it still stinks, whether it comes from a FOF shill or not. You can dress it in a Oxford suit, but shit is still shit.
April 27, 2007 at 3:38 am
I’m sure everyone here notices that the FOF shills appear. and then disappear, like a group of bad “I’s” that we’ve learned to recognize and ignore. As soon as we call them on it they recede and then reappear in a different guise. It’s entertaining, and it’s sad.
April 27, 2007 at 3:46 am
There never was a “golden age;”
Oh I guess you missed the “Days of wine and Roses”
I was there, it was great, but it didn’t last long and died with the sequence.
April 27, 2007 at 3:50 am
Just Observing 307:
many of us sent deeply felt thank you cards when we left, but this doesn’t mean we weren’t being used for whatever purposes rb had in mind. do you think that just maybe rb could use someone who loves him? i sense some sincerity in your post and i understand why the sentiment would be hurtful, but that’s what makes all of this hard. what we thought was love was something else.
April 27, 2007 at 4:09 am
Sandra,
Try Bonita here: hitower [at] post3.tele.dk
Joel,
Barbara Bruno’s account appears in a 1988 book called Cults and Consequences. The reference in her story is to the 1972 suicide of Lori F-S.
There was a variation on this technique in 1980 with the death of Raymond K. His death was attributed, in the Vine, to a failure to follow the “no swimming” exercise. It ought to be talked about, I think.
Just Observing,
The quote from Don Birrell was a direct quote. I don’t think it gives a false impression. It was what he said, verbatim. The story about 3 parking spaces also does not give a false impression. Nor does the story, not told, of how R. used to pour a glass of water slowly onto the floor at the Nut Tree. I’m sure the waitstaff suppressed the impulse to throttle him. And it demonstrates his own ability to deaden, or not feel, or dissociate from, the emotions of shame, guilt, embarrassment, humiliation, doesn’t it? One achieves the liberty, I suppose, to ignore all kinds of useful social codes by developing the ability to anaesthetize the shame and humiliation family of emotions. Which yields what? A personality in which narcissism can grow unchecked? A need to experience shame in other, shadow, ways–vicariously? Sexually? I don’t know. Certaintly it leads to nothing good.
Somebody 7/301:
I don’t know what he said when he got the letter. But the letter’s recipient made notes on the letter, corrected typos, and made the three comments reproduced at the bottom. Anyone ever seen those Renaissance Journal galleys all marked up? Same thing. I think it speaks for itself.
WHeinz: Congratulations, you got out. It’s a long road. You made it.
Elena: Call Ford Greene, a lawyer in San Anselmo, California. Hub Law Offices on Sir Francis Drake Blvd. A former cult member himself, Ford knows all about the Fellowship and may be able to help you.
Shelley: Puppetji was a scream!
April 27, 2007 at 4:10 am
Joel F wrote ‘This should also “wake up” (pardon the expression) the plaintive current infofs or recent xfofs with their fantasy plans to “make the school our own” and “set things right” that their cause is hopeless. Time to move on, folks.’
Old Dog asks: What is hopeless and impossible?
Is anything beautiful or significant possible? Absolutely not! Beauty if the impossible manifested.
Is anything thing which cognates, perambulates and mentates possible? I think not!
Even the twitch of a dog’s tail is beyond comprehension in it’s complexity. Impossible to fully conceive, or engineer.
The universe in all it’s iterations is the manifestation of hopeless impossibilities.
‘Hopeless’ and ‘impossible’ are the poorest of excuses. Time resolves all improbability into fact… Jack
April 27, 2007 at 4:27 am
Thank you Sheik,
you started something fabulous!
The truth about FOF and especially RB is starting to get widely known.
Please let us not stop the process!!!
Ex members, still members and casual observers dropping in with different types of contributions, sometimes nasty too…but what can we say, we are humans….Thank you.
To Fence Rider no more:
Congratulations!!!please do buy Champagne and celebrate with some like minded friends…you have just got out of PRISON!
Dear Clara Elena, I admire your courage to speak so openly, from where you are it takes amazing strenght.
Please tell Dorothy a friend sends love to her!
…and to the well known ex fof members contributing here, speaking the truth and really trying to help by speaking from their hearts: thank you!!!
NoName (for now)
April 27, 2007 at 5:09 am
Member 1978 to 1994
To Just Observing,
I, too, was a good friend of Doris and Don. In the fall of 1994 Doris called me to talk about the R.L. situation. They were intending to purchase property in Oregon House, but were having second thoughts. When this was brought to Robert’s attention he called them. According to Doris, he (RB) experessed negativity. They decided not to purchase.
April 27, 2007 at 5:14 am
321 Kathryn F.
As I read this post and just before going to the paragraph which begins ‘the body is a keyboard’ my bounding beautiful 3 year old daughter Sara Joy danced into my office and handed me her little accordion. We each in turn played some and danced to each other’s playing for about five minutes, after which she handed me the instrument and left. They sure have exquisite timing, these children.
April 27, 2007 at 5:27 am
Dear unoanimo re post 7/250:
‘On Leaving An Esoteric School’
and Dear All,
I haven’t posted for awhile but had to say I really appreciated your thoughtful words.
Even though I was sure that some students are committed for life to Robert, it’s just so WEAK – on so many levels.
So there is no easy, comfortable way to leave the school, but much drama and postponement is attached to the question of why some others, admired friends, are not also shaken. I was even a bit envious of their surety.
I have some years on me, and much to have forgiven in myself and others. There is no shame in following an idealistic road, and I have loved many and shared yearning along this way, FOF or non-FOF. I have always had to move on when my conscience and/or aim no longer
resonated with the influences in my life. It’s the “gut-feeling” you speak of, and no entity can promise us forever – no school, teacher, mate, friend, community, religion – this is real knowledge!
I exercised an abundant amount of caution when I left my 20-year investment in the FOF because I needed to be certain that all of my being was brought to this crossroad – MY being, and not again the cover of the group.
It finally comes down to making a choice, FROM being. That’s all.
I want to experience my own destiny, without fear. I trust completely that in this way it’s possible. In fear we are not supported on any level, most importantly in those most mysterious ways . . . .
Blessings and Hope,
from
April 27, 2007 at 5:41 am
I joined in Timbuktu center in 1991 and moved to Isis (at that time called Camelot) in 1992. My experience with other students had been very good. Many of the young women were very beautiful, and the older ladies paid very well. I worked in the vineyard, napping in the afternoons. The salary was low, but I made extra money by selling Fellowship gasoline and vineyard supplies to the locals. I made it clear to them that I despised them because they were “life”. I regret this deeply now. I realize that I should have despised them because they were ignorant redneck Yankee halfbreeds, not because they were “life”.
One day in the 1990s, when I was in the Ming House, sanding down the Chinese furniture, Robert came up to me and said, “C Influence want to suck you.” I said, “Don’t you mean: C Influence want you to suck me.” He repeated, “No, C Influence want to suck you.” “ “Well, if that is what they want” I replied.
Immediately I felt a supernatural force sucking me. I later became convinced that Liberacci was working with the School.
Another time, when Robert himself was sucking me, I asked him what was the meaning of his homosexuality. He replied, “mmmm mmmm mmmm”. I was shocked that this refined man and supposedly conscious teacher would speak with his mouth full!
After that, I traveled with him extensively, in his private jet, in the yacht, and eventually in the hot air balloon, where he would hold helium parties. I was given a position of responsibility and I was the one who purchased the animals for his private zoo. I became an international expert in zebras! I’m still very fond of those stripey lil fellas.
But the sex became more and more extreme. One time Robert tickled me until I bled. Then there was the nasal sex. He did not use protection, and I still have catarrh. Then there were the circle jerks, and the “shooting” contests. Man, those tapestries went through a lot of dry cleaning.
I felt that I had become a sex slave. In addition to Robert, there were the new Russian girls. How they cried when I told them that Robert used me for his evil purposes, it was a very good chat up line. To earn more money I provided services to some of the older male musicians, and I don’t mean page turning.
Robert’s teaching began to descend when his deafness became more pronounced. One day I confronted him and said to him, “Robert, I think that it is immoral that you use these young men for sex.” He replied, “Yes, I would like sea bass for the entrée tonight, dear.”
The final straw came when Robert simply cut me off and expelled me from the school, just like that. How can this be love if he can just cut us off like that? OK, I had just absconded with $200,000, his collection of ancient Greek jewelry and a Monet, but I thought that his love was meant to be unconditional.
My first years out of the school were very difficult for me. I met up with many ex-students but, to be frank, they didn’t pay very well. The out of court settlement from the FOF helped, I must say.
Eventually I gravitated toward Advaitic sex therapy and orgone generators. Like many ex-students, I am now grateful for my negativity. Although I bear no ill will to Robert, I was very disappointed that the letter bombs did not go off at the right time. I have not really thought about the Fellowship for a long time. It was someone else with my IP address who has been searching for “Fellowship of Friends” on Google twice every day for the last five years.
My advice to fence sitters is: come to me. I know many of you. I am a bit older now, but still in good shape and my rates are very reasonable, as many on this blog will confirm.
April 27, 2007 at 7:02 am
Dear:
Shelly # 267 and # 325 Lust for Life
Thanks guys. I peed myself laughing.
Close to the bone! You gotta look back and laugh. It is better than crying.
April 27, 2007 at 7:03 am
In reply to Clara Haven’s Post #311
Hello Clara and Friends:
I am going to try and make this as soft as possible, yet I am sure that it will create a few ‘tense’ moments of indignation and perhaps even an ‘aha’ or two, the later is my wish.
For starters, Clara, I would suggest you start with the ’symbolic’ level first, little details can move whole civilizations to alteration, although such nearly always make the ‘armor’ thicker, not more conscious: nonetheless, I am speaking to you, not the inherited Pain Body of Brazil.
So, please get rid of your married name and stick with your maiden one; I sense this little gesture will help you, far beyond writing allot.
Reading your postings… I see their ‘importance’, yet, going ‘under the carpet’ or ‘reading in between the lines’ I sense that their too long, boarding on some form of yearning or a stuck needle on a phonograph.
I understand you close. Belonging to only several of the beings in female bodies within and outside of the FoF, that have managed to ((not)) cover up your very dense pain-bodies with ‘too much to do’ or ‘3rd line role identifications’, you are right here, in plain sight.
Too, it is very possible, being mostly Venusian, you have temporarily inherited the untransformed ‘issues’ of Girard’s PB and especially Dorothy’s, since the elderly
are considerably powerful at impressing the the PB outwards, since they often have nothing left to loose or have, by default, lost their positive/negative-half-armoring which makes a war-hobby of the Pain-body’s ‘issues’. Please take a look at Eckhart Tolle’s section on Painbody. This too, is to say that the context of Brazil’s Painbody may come into play later or now as well.
The context in which you write is desperateness and needs a very specific focus, an aim that can show its results in very specific stages, little aims inside a big one, that can be ‘won’ regardless of the various stage and direction of the big one.
This ‘desperateness’ is no one’s fault, it is simply the ’spirit’ by which your particular Painbody ’sings’ from: for others, it is ‘enthusiasm’, ‘regard for justice and injustice’, etc. Energetic instruments that PB’s use to keep the world in the audience seat and not on stage.
I do not believe your last few lines are truly sincere (within the consideration of the in between the lines quest your really yearning for) I may be wrong, forgive me if I am off the mark ~
“Way beyond the aim of questioning the Fellowship, this document would have the aim to state that we have existed whether the Fellowship wishes to acknowledge our existence or not.”
This is simply a Venusian habit in action, covering up the larger picture of your possible spiritual reconciliation and progress beyond the FoF form, into your own internal FoF.
As I sense it, it is non-existence for you to stand up for others, to chisel so many of our names on granite, that, in the end , there’s no room for yours.
Get off the cross and ‘do’ something.
What you state as, “Way beyond the aim…” is exactly what is ‘way closest to your needs’. I would advise you to do the following.
Copy the entire contents of Blogs #1 – #7, highlight ‘the good stuff’ and send them to the Governor’s Office of Public Affairs, the FBI, Internal Domestic Issues Department, the CIA ‘likewise’, and the INS.
Then start your litigation case, all the while, serendipitously, start a book on ‘Cult Proximity, How to Notice Where You Are, though Think You’ve Never Been’.
This blog benefits more from your short moments of love and incredible possibility for deep sincere external consideration, more so than the complex Intellectual framework, a framework that is actually the very diagram needed by your internal world, applied consciously, to reconcile the Painbody’s unconscious living through/with your life.
It’s a complex issue: It has taken me several years to finally get a practical conscious grip on the ‘Once Upon a Time waking up to my Painbody’s ‘nature’…
Take your incredible desire to help others and help yourself first. By doing this, by shear conscious emanation, you will , as Rumi said “Help others you don’t even know.”
Love to you all.
April 27, 2007 at 8:43 am
Ex Fence rider/ William
Welcome out
other members will make themselves known to you descretly at first so be ready to recognise these secret signals; broad smile,open gaze,spark of higher self starting to manifest,emmense relief.
you may find it necessary to ease out gently by ,say,only doing 5 of the sequence and then maybe one less each day, until it’s just one —long—beeee…..
Bus leaves promptly, don’t be late
April 27, 2007 at 9:17 am
#304 to Fence rider
Dear William,
“Now I just want to be honest, unpretentious, loving”
You are simple, honest, unpretentious, loving;
that is why you did this choice of leaving.
One thing you are sure to leave with, is your heart.
you are courageous and I wish the best to you and S.
April 27, 2007 at 9:39 am
#304 Fencerider–this is about just wanting to be yourself, simple, honest, unpretentious, loving (your words).
Of course nothing in the Fellowship is contrary to those qualities, rather they are always strenthened and not opposed. In fact, it is of course our false personality that is making matters complex, false, difficult for ourself and others.
Where has your life gone in 31 years? Only you can answer that for yourself. It is certain that the Fellowship has not held you back from being true to yourself.
April 27, 2007 at 9:54 am
To Joel F #318 & 320:
While it’s clearly a laudable aim, don’t you think the idea that you’re going to experience reality ‘unmediated’ is a little naive? None of us can do without a grid for the intellectual part – it’s a bit like thinking you can walk by hovering two inches off the ground!! We DO need something to put our ‘feet’ on. In practical terms, better to find a grid that lends itself to being abandoned to that direct experience of reality more consistently. Some grids are more sympathetic than others. I think Kathryn F’s post #321 is a good answer in this respect.
But I guess from the tone of your posts you had a huge amount of ‘detoxifying’ to do so maybe this gives the occasionally rather extreme cast of mind!
As a current FoFer, I also feel that your description of the student mind as passive/dependent/infantilized is very accurate taken as a description of the Fellowship. However, I suspect that this kind of relationship to the Work is much more a product of Robert’s School than its 4th Way predecessors. I can only tell from what I’ve read about Gurdjieff and Ouspensky’s groups, but it does sound like they fostered more sturdy, independent individuals than is the case in the FoF – particularly amongst the male population. The ‘female’ psychological signatures I experience among Fellowship men is something I find difficult to come to grips with. Was it like this in your day?
And I don’t think it can be right to spit venom on our wish to remake the School into something more our own. I must admit there was a rather melancholy echo in the Birrell letter of people who tried and failed in earlier times… but we are still entitled to our shot! Maybe the climate will be more favourable.
To Lust-for-Life #324:
I am up for your picnic in the park idea!
April 27, 2007 at 10:55 am
I take issue with the notion that it was a false idea introduced into the school by Robert that the school is what we (the students) make of it.
Not only is this true for each person, it is also true as a whole. It cannot be otherwise. One’s experience will inevitably be the result of one’s actions, attitudes, and experiences, and in that they form the total in a dynamic group setting, each plays his or her part.
#304 Fencerider–this is about just wanting to be yourself, simple, honest, unpretentious, loving (your words).
Of course nothing in the Fellowship is contrary to those qualities, rather they are always strenthened and not opposed. In fact, it is of course our false personality that is making matters complex, false, difficult for ourself and others.
Where has your life gone in 31 years? Only you can answer that for yourself. It is certain that the Fellowship has not held you back from being true to yourself.
This is about Elena’s proposed project of parsing out each and every detail about the Fellowship. I wonder what the purpose of such activity may be, what use it is for example to know some person had a stroke or died of cancer. What counts is their contribution to others and the school, not some compilation of statistics.
It is not important who Howard Carter is and as everyone else is entitled to maintain his anonymity so there is no point in speculating. I can assure you all that the guesses so far have been 100% off the mark.
Of course Howard Carter struck gold after many years not giving up in his search for the tomb of King Tut–wonderful analogy.
Thanks HC for your contributions.
April 27, 2007 at 12:26 pm
A couple of things.
First, for those who have started contributing recently, people such as ‘Just Observing’ have been appearing at particular moments in the discussion, very rarely has there been any consensus reached between them and anyone else, mainly through their unwillingness to move even a millimetre from their current beliefs (they look for angles to argue their point, which is set in stone, rather than trying to understand where other people are coming from). You may wish to engage them in conversation, but I can assure you that everything you and they will say has already been said at numerous points throughout the discussion.
Second, the discussion is getting a bit bulky (lots of people contributing), it would be wonderful if you resisted the urge to write separate comments in reply to different people. If you could simply write one comment cut into separate sections, it would make all our lives much easier (and the discussion more readable).
Third, it seems that the discussion is becoming a great ground for advertising – we have Kiran here, A Former Student (326), non-dualists, and many others, all of them advertising through links. Nothing wrong about it, just think about whether the advertisement is relevant to the discussion, or whether it is just a way to attract people to someone’s own personal project.
Clara Elena Haven (311): I will be more than happy to start a new discussion board for this project if other people decide to join in with you. I will leave you and others to discuss the project here until you decide what to do next. I believe that using e-mail may be a good way to go about it.
Also, basically the same thing you are planning to construct is being done on the wikipedia FoF entry, there is a new and impartial moderator there who is doing some great stuff. If you wish to make a difference, starting there may be a good idea. (I know that wikipedia can be more technologically challenging than what a lot of you are used to, but it may be wortwhile to tackle that challenge).
Lust for Life (324): Maybe if you were to leave your e-mail address some people from London would get in touch with you.
April 27, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Just Observing (305)
I’m afraid I’m not nearly as impressed by your observations about some of these posts as you appear to be.
I didn’t find Bruce’s hostility “thinly disguised” at all; I found it unapologetically up front. Charles R. “sarcastic”? I found his posts painfully sincere, displaying the humility I always found in him. Does Ames have some repressed rage? Perhaps — I know I do, so I wouldn’t blame him at all if he did, although I found his posts remarkably dispassionate under the circumstances. These and other folks are expressing their pain, disgust, and at times (gasp) anger at having been gulled, abused, and played for fools, and they don’t mind saying they find ridiculous the rationalizing in which some continue to engage. And what of it?
While these people–every one of whom used his or her real name–have had the courage to display their feelings, for better or worse, you tell us nothing about yourself or your own experiences, but snipe from behind a tree, under an assumed name that oozes pretense. That your haughty pose of “just observing” is a farce is lost on no one; you plainly have your own ax to grind, but won’t cop to it.
You might prefer that everyone express gratitude, but their disinclination to do so by no means proves they have somehow failed to “transform.” This is yet more Fellowship malarky, yet another attempt to deflect criticism by disdainfully insinuating that all such criticism merely demonstrates a failing of the critic. Their posts demonstrate they have outgrown the need for good student pretense, while yours suggests you are still playing with the Fellowship pickup sticks.
You feel gratitude for the Fellowship? I have no problem with that at all–good for you! Just don’t expect any Evolution Points, or that we’ll read your posts and nod appreciatively at your keen photographic ability or level of being. We’ve moved on.
April 27, 2007 at 1:48 pm
There are a number of aspects of the school that appealed to me, or that I projected onto it.
1. The School was a real physical place, a reflection of the inner world of the members
2. During the time the property was Renaissance, we were creating a wonderful artistic, musical, intellectual, literary, vibrant community.
3. The School took wisdom from wherever it could be found.
I believed (hoped)that the fof would continue far beyond my life, as a place that had used all the spiritual teachings available to humanity, to sow the seeds and show the way , for a global regeneration. I had high hopes for the School!
The idea of the “Ark” was a great metaphor, it felt good and real to participate in a community where we were rebuilding the world to reflect a more complete human experience.
And on a very practical level, I envisioned myself in old age, 90+, living out the remainder of my years close to the property, where I would be surrounded by the love of my friends, and the years of giving and building the School would allow me to experience the richness of humanity at my doorstep, the music, art, craftsmanship, literature, stage, organic food, wine…all there imbued with a profound sacredness for this mystery of life..
We had undertaken a monumental challenge, not only were we in the process of self-regeneration, but that process was of necessity connected with the regeneration of earth. The School was born of an earthly metaphysical need, life itself was spawning its evolution before my eyes.
A daunting proposition for mere mortals, but the magical principle that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts would ultimately bear fruit.
April 27, 2007 at 1:54 pm
btw,
Is Miles here? does anyone know what he’s up to these days?
how about a New York/East Coast get together ?
April 27, 2007 at 4:21 pm
To Veronicapoe (and anybody else who knows this)
This letter #293 which was sent to Robert in 1982 seems to be a significant point in FOF history. According to the previous stories people who asked questions as such were asked to leave. But at the bottom of the letter we see neames of some current students. Roger C died recently in the school. So, what happened to them? Were they asked to leave or did they find an answer which was good enough to keep them in the school?
April 27, 2007 at 4:43 pm
Regarding Just Observing (#342):
What if everything related to one’s work, the school and the system has become “complex, false, difficult”? You’re right, it’s false personality.
William expressed the desire to be “simple, honest, unpretentious, loving.” You responded that “of course nothing in the Fellowship is contrary to those qualities, rather they are always strenthened and not opposed.”
Your response is consistent with a “good student’s work I” but in my personal experience it’s not consistent with reality. I left the FOF for the very reason that the worst aspects of my inner life were becoming increasingly “complex, false, and difficult.”
Whatever amount of false personality I had going into the FOF, by the time I left I had a whole lot more. It went by the confusing name of “true personality” or “work personality,” though. It’s a topsy-turvey world inside the school.
To say that “It is certain that the Fellowship has not held you back from being true to yourself” is presumptuous to the point of being insulting. When I was struggling to have the courage to accept that being true to myself meant leaving the school, a statement like this would have caused great agony as it stirred up the beehive of fearful and guilty attitudes. And not because some “real” part of me was scared that it might be true — but because my newfound hold on truth was so tenuous.
Good luck Fence Rider/William! We’re here if you need us.
April 27, 2007 at 5:09 pm
Dear “Just observing” (# 305),
For “just observing” you sure pack a lot of judgment… For myself, I decline the burden of work you have laid out for me.
Ames Gilbert
April 27, 2007 at 5:30 pm
It was recently announced by Yale University Library that among the papers they hold from Ouspensky’s estate was a sealed envelope on which was written : “Not to be opened until the year 2007”. This envelope was in fact opened earlier this year but received only limited circulation. I obtained a copy from a friend in the Gurdjieff Foundation. It consists of notes written by Ouspensky in the period between his renouncing of the system and his death. In some places comments had been added in pencil, in the handwriting of Rodney Collin. Ouspensky’s notes are below, with Collin’s comments in brackets:
THE FIFTH WAY
The 5th Way is the ultimate Way, the Way that includes and replaces all others. For a man number 4, still struggling towards his destination: the 4th Way. For higher man, the arrived man: the 5th Way.
Precept : We are awake already, but this is not fully realized.
(We are no different from Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed.)
Precept : Self remembering is unnecessary.
(What self?)
Precept : The non-expression of negative emotions serves no purpose and is in some cases harmful.
(Let them go quickly!)
Precept : Man is not a machine.
(A man is a man, a woman is a woman.)
Precept : Less effort, less effort, less effort.
(“Consider the lilies of the field…”)
Precept : Payment is unnecessary.
(Awakening cannot be bought or taught.)
Precept : Nobody is a conscious being.
(Or everybody.)
Precept : The seven “centers” are arbitrary intellectual constructs. In reality they do not exist. The purpose of self observation is to see that the centers do not exist and that we do not exist.
(The human body is just as it appears to be.)
Precept : Imagination and identification are like clouds crossing the sun.
(The sun is not affected.)
Precept : The body is vivified by the soul, and cannot exist without it.
Precept : False personality, true personality, the steward: all equally unreal. But false names are sometimes necessary.
Precept : Everything happens, including making efforts.
Precept : The Law of Three and the Law of Seven are intellectual constructs which in reality are sometimes true and sometimes false.
Precept : Consciousness is not Will.
(Will is an illusion).
Precept : Conscious influence contains everything.
April 27, 2007 at 6:17 pm
Does anybody know if we can copy Marlane Darsmann manuscript? I can not find her address as she used to live on Adeline street in Oakland.
Just finished her manuscript written between 1973 and 1983…so touching, nothing new. Tristan is Brian S, Maxwel is Peter B, Maud is Bonita, Rocky is Linda.
She writes very neutral and clear. Loyal and loving to Robert but her observations were not a beautiful story with palms and tulips and her conscience did not seem to be able to stay in the fof.
Her observations are so clear and her period of silence is well described clear and plain.
Beautiful story with the fact that what has been repeated in 1984, 1995 and now in 2007, is basically all the same. Really C and G and P and W and all of us, it might be a little worse now but I can not see it.
I am happy that it is a beautiful story for some people. For Marlane it was an incredible amount of suffering, hard work, sickness, poor, being raped and trying to transform….
Love, healing and joy to all of you.
April 27, 2007 at 6:17 pm
#304 William,
Yours was a deeply insightful communication. Thank you for sharing your thoughts – I am sure doing so is and will be helpful for many of us. I wish you the best of luck on the next phase of your journey. You have shown great courage, and that courage will be a significant ally as you progress.
Charles
April 27, 2007 at 6:46 pm
OP, it’s very unclear what you mean. But if you truly would like to meet Miles, i would advise that you not to let him know you had anything to do with post 347. You say the ark was a “metaphor”? remember the chosen ones huddling together in the winery’s fallout shelter? students on ships gathering paintings from europe? the fof bridging the interval for humanity while the rest of civilization perished and became food for the moon? the ark was no metaphor. it was a prediction by rb, and a central dogma of the group. it was a very effective method to keep people engaged. gotta love the technique.
Then you say “the School took wisdom from wherever it could be found” and that it would “ultimately bear fruit”. I’m at a loss for words on those statements.
Oh, wait…
To quote KathrynF: “Arrrggghhh”.
April 27, 2007 at 7:00 pm
Hello All,
A thought occurred to me last night that I want to share, for your consideration. Maybe it’s already been said, but here it is.
In the Fellowship you are required to give up your soul.
Why would I say that?
It is because of the Fellowship party line. Basically it says:
• that you don’t have a soul,
• that you have to create a soul,
• that you need a conscious teacher to create a soul,
• that you need a conscious school to create a soul,
• that you must be in your ninth lifetime to create a soul,
• that you must give up your will to the teacher to create a soul,
• that if you lose the school you can never have a soul,
• and other stuff along the same lines.
So, the first price of admission to the FOF is to leave your soul at the door. Scary, huh? And then you live your WHOLE LIFE in the Fellowship, without a soul (unless you are one of the “lucky seven”, whoever they may be).
So, when you see posts from folks like Howard Carter, et al, just remember that they don’t have souls, and you will understand where they are coming from.
Charles
April 27, 2007 at 7:00 pm
DESCRIPTION OF EVOLUTION IN SCHOOLS
The excerpt that follows is a condensation of a study by training experts of the important classified and unclassified information available on this subject.
1. Making the individual aware of control is the first stage in changing his being. A small child is made aware of the physical and psychological control of his parents and quickly recognizes that an overwhelming force must be reckoned with. So, a Man #4 comes to recognize the overwhelming powers of the School and the impersonal, “incarcerative” machinery in which he is enmeshed. The individual recognizes that definite limits have been put upon the ways he can respond.
2. Realization of his complete dependence upon the Will of Higher Forces as it expresses itself through the School is a major factor in the evolution of his behavior. The Man #4 is forced to accept the fact that feedback about his spiritual progress and the only social contact that he will get come from the very School to which he makes teaching payments in the interest of his possible evolution.
3. The awareness of the School’s exercises and recognition of his own dependence on the Will of Higher Forces result in causing internal conflict and breakdown of previous patterns of behaviour. Although this transition can be relatively mild in the case of people
with weak magnetic centres, it is almost invariably severe for the Faithful determined to evolve. Only an individual who holds his values lightly can change them easily. Since the School’s aim is to have its Students undergo profound emotional change, it forces its students to seek out painfully what is desired by the Teacher. During this period the Student is likely to have a mental breakdown characterized by delusions and hallucinations.
4. Discovery that there is an acceptable solution to his problem is the first stage of reducing the Student’s conflict. It is characteristically reported by Man No. 4 that this discovery led to an overwhelming feeling of relief that the horror of internal conflict would cease and that perhaps he would not, after all, be driven insane. It is at this point that he is prepared to make major changes in his value-system. This is an automatic rather than voluntary choice. He has lost his ability to be critical, which he confuses with the emergence of Higher Emotional Center.
5. Reintegration of values and identification with the System is the final stage in changing the being of the Man No. 4. A child who has learned a new, socially desirable behaviour demonstrates its importance by attempting to adapt the new
behaviour to a variety of other situations. Similar states in the Man No. 4 are observable. His new value-system, his
manner of perceiving,organizing, and giving meaning to events, is virtually independent of his former value-system. He is no longer capable of thinking or speaking in concepts other than those of the System. He tends to identify by expressing thanks to his Teacher for helping him see the light.
Evolution can be achieved without using illegal means. Anyone willing to use known
principles of control and reactions to control and capable of demonstrating the patience needed in raising a child can probably catalyse successful evolution in willing seekers.
Adapted (with a number of liberties) from a 1956 CIA report on brainwashing.
http://www.mindcontrolforums.com/ciabwash.htm
April 27, 2007 at 7:19 pm
Dear Unoanimo, (339)
Your post was indeed soft and did not create angry opposite Is. I appreciate the photograph on not dwelling on the pain any more and that last post was precisely about that.
It is fine if you don’t believe that the last few lines are not truly sincere because they may not be. If I were to say that the aim is to destroy the Fellowship of Friends as it is functioning today, it would be very easy for the Fellowship to act on its legal rights and destroy any enterprise, but the aim I don’t think is to destroy but to leave a serious enough document that will allow anyone researching on the FOF to find a compilation of testimonials that open their eyes before they join and a document that helps many of those inside to understand that it is not just a resented wife or resented students that are writing on a blog but many people who having been in the Fellowship and invested with as much love, money and energy as any of them are still doing, have had to move on because of the deep inconsistencies in the Fellowship or have been thrown out.
You question the intellectual framework that I have exposed and ask me to keep to the short moments of love. Is it because you’re not willing to look at the intellectual issues? Debate them? Isn’t only beauty what we think justifies Robert and the Fellowship?
The short moments of love get shorter and shorter as the process of leaving shows the responses from those in the FOF so weak and inconsistent and some of those out here, ask me to leave, without making a point of what they are objecting to. I appreciate your poignancy much more, at least we can debate. I must admit it has much surprised me that the intellectual framework seems to be much more easily understood by the young people of the Fellowship, Inner Jewels and Heather than many of the older students who have left or are still inside. The younger ones know it in their being, having grown up inside, that external consideration is not what the Fellowship is about and that that is really the only serious deep issue.
The intellectual framework I find is necessary to go beyond the pain body not only of each one of us individually but the Fellowship as a whole.
As for the use my names, I started using Haven when I started questioning my husband’s role directly because I am questioning it as his wife as much as an ex-student. It means something to me to come up to that relationship and in the end I don’t think it is that meaningless that Girard Haven’s wife states that the whole Fellowship is a “make up” between him and Robert and the rest of us have been conned. One of the problems is that things are not as simple or easy as they look and the Fellowship will continue to work as long as we think that the only problem is Robert’s sexuality and don’t take a serious look at the philosophy as much as the practices of the Fellowship.
I am also “pushing” for such a document because believe me, I do intend to leave the Fellowship and not be around to question it in five years or beyond. Hopefully not even one.
If you look at my long posts, you will at least find that I am not repeating the same thing in each one but looking at the Fellowship from different angles. And I have no intention of arguing with the Zorros, Howard Carters or Just observing for any further length of time whose arguments are so insubstantial and easy to topple over.
What the blog seems to be clearly stating is that The Fellowship today has no deep arguments to stand by or defend itself. No one inside today, seems to have enough being to stand for a great cause and they are trusting that they will be able to survive this blog because there are enough adepts wishing to continue the illusion. The many whose instincts have rooted in “life at Isis” are living on the good will of the adepts around the world. There’s no difference to me between that form of prostitution and Robert’s boys, and it is much more pervasive than Robert’s because it is not just one man but a whole so called “inner circle” that thinks that being able to go to a concert or watch ballet in the backyard of the brothel they support, is so “cool”.
There has to be more to a spiritual path than exploiting the good will of students that have never come to Isis or that at Isis have to transform the inner circle’s greed for comfort or a young generation of princes and cinderellas with as much naivety, vanity and stupidity as the old one.
The great aspect of the blog to me is that there are some truly serious people around working on dismantling the deep foundations of this very corrupted institution. What I am saying with this documentis that I wish to get off the cross and join an effort similar to what Veronicapoe has been doing and a few others because the wining will go nowhere when people are so enchanted by undermining the individual experience.
At this point, I do believe that statistics will do a much better job of questioning the Fellowship than any of my long reflections. It is much more impressive for anyone coming out of the cold to see that thirty or a hundred men are willing to say: “Having sex with Robert was an experience that damaged my integrity for many years. Forgiving myself for allowing it to happen seduced partly by my sincere wish to serve a conscious being and partly by the aura of privileges and forgiving others also for supporting that practice without the slightest questioning of it, has taken innumerable years. All this could have been avoided if I hadn’t been so young and the older people hadn’t supported it so convincingly.”
In the same vein I think the statistic of a few people willing to recognize that the ideas of the Fellowship about biological families damaged them and their families, even slightly, is much better than the pain exposed by one or a few posts, scattered around the blog.
The statistics of suicides, cancers, alzheimer’s and so on, are more blatant crystallized suffering than any of our mild complaints and so is the case with any statistics on any other issue.
I should have said, we need to get “systematic” about the purpose of our disagreement with the Fellowship and the issues are many, not just a few.
The effect of putting them all together in one organized document, letting go of all the unnecessary talk that I and others have indulged in on the blog, will prove much more effective than the cross.
I also believe that what we all have to come to terms with is that our “love” as much as our “ambition”, our deep beauty as much as our extended weaknesses have supported the Fellowship all along. That is what is so difficult to come to terms with. It is not that the love hasn’t been there in the marriages or in the Fellowship, it is that all the other features and weaknesses are also playing their part and no matter how much we sincerely tried, every one of us, including Robert and Girard, we did not have the being to make it more than a very sick, money making institution, pretending to be a conscious school and it is time that we recognize the decadence before we continue seducing and harming any body else.
I have had different aims in participating in this blog and not one of them has been debating philosophy of any kind. Such stands worthy and necessary as they are, give strength to the legitimacy of the Fellowship enterprise and take energy away from the aim to question it to the roots. If this is what this blog is about, let me excuse myself for interrupting you and move to the document that does what I thought the blog was about.
The most serious post I’ve sent is the first one written to Medusa in which I propose the game of changing and rejoining the Fellowship. I am that naive and have that much beauty inside of my self to believe that destruction is worse than cleaning up and moving on. I was sincerely naive enough to be much surprised that all of you, including the Sheik and any in life looking, didn’t just write, “I’m in.” But we do mature quickly when we expose ourselves so much and there’s no more hope for a better Fellowship, I just want to get what is worth into good householder and go.
I will definitely try to look more carefully at the Wikipedia as the Sheik suggests, but would still like to insist on an independent document from all of us that will come up where ever the Fellowship of Friends appears on the internet. If no one else wishes to work on it, allow me to try as time allows. The blog is not so long that I cannot slowly organize the different issues and yes, if you the Sheik, could possibly get the document going in another sight I will slowly fill it in with what seems relevant. If any of you wish to help with it one of the easiest ways to do so is titling your posts with the specific issue about the Fellowship that you wish to address.
I would also ask anyone who does not wish to be quoted in this document with their same fake name of the blog, to state so in the blog or send me an e-mail to ludoteka@world12.net
I leave you Unoanimo, to the CIA or FBI, you know much more about them than I care to explore.
Thank you for debating with me, you honor me with your sincerity.
April 27, 2007 at 7:34 pm
To post #7/326:
“I am a former student and I posted earlier using Sydney Russell’s name because she was a friend in the 70’s and I have had no idea what happened to her and thought that it might elicit some information.”
Using someone else’s name and typing words under their own name is not very cool. I thought your excuse was lame and your apology unconvincing. However, I do hope you manage to find a way to reach her if that indeed was your original intent.
April 27, 2007 at 7:46 pm
sorry, OP, didn’t mean to pummel your post. i can see you were mainly describing the mindset and the excitement that you and others had at the time. my first impression of your description was that it made things seem rather benign (it wasn’t), but i’m thinking that’s not what you meant. i did share some of your sentiments during that era. amazing the denial we were in, isn’t it?
April 27, 2007 at 8:23 pm
Try not tolerate gossip in yourself or others;
Jesus said “I would be pierced and I will pierce.”
All is about presence this is All and Everything.
April 27, 2007 at 8:32 pm
Remember yorself allways and everywhere, this is All and everything.
Have you Verify your own identification?
Are you Identified with your I`s?
Are you Identified with this blog?
We have here an oportunity for not become Identified with?
The struggle to resist small subjects of identification constitutes our real inner life
We are critical of others because we are disappointed with ourselves.
Knowledge cannot be a substitute for self remembering.
April 27, 2007 at 8:39 pm
Some thoughts on Innernaut’s post, #290, regarding RB’s apparent inability to accept his own homosexuality:
I think sharing some of ‘my little story’ and my observations on this subject may be illuminating. Let me preface this by saying a couple of things:
1) In my opinion, human sexuality is a very complex subject, and what I am offering is my experience and my opinions only.
2) I see human sexual preferences as far as male-female, male-male, and female-female attractions as a continuum, rather than as an AC-DC type of wiring. The majority of adult folks appear to be heterosexual in orientation, some are in the bi-sexual range, some are completely homosexual, and some go so far as to feel that they are in the wrong body (RB perhaps?), hence they may choose to cross dress or have their gender altered with surgery and hormone treatments. I view it as a sliding scale and we are all somewhere on the continuum. We are where we are partly due to our physical nature and our essence, and partly due to our conditioning and childhood/adolescent experiences.
When I joined the FOF back in 1976, I was in a loving relationship with a woman. We moved together to the West coast to be near the heart of the school and were greeted by a small group of older students from the inner circle, including our center directors, who informed us that we would have to end our relationship since homosexual relationships were not allowed in the FOF. We agreed to the task, as we both felt we had found a ‘real school’. It was a very painful and difficult situation for us both, especially since neither of us understood nor actually felt this exercise made much sense. I decided to go the Renaissance and see if I could speak directly with the teacher since he was offering one- on -one question/answer sessions at the Lodge at this time. I took my place in the line, and eventually got to ask Robert my question: “Why are homosexual relationships banned in the FOF? “ Robert answered in a very soft voice that homosexuality is cosmically wrong wiring and that it is a feature. He told me that homosexuality was my chief feature. I was in shock, as I had never heard of anyone working with homosexuality as a feature and I had been photographed by many older students as having a fear feature. I told him I did not understand and he told me just to work with it and we would speak more about the subject at a future time (we never did speak of it again, however).
I decided to do my best to work with it and so set the aim to make this a great study, both of my own and others sexuality. I began to observe myself and everyone else and it was quite fascinating to sit in concerts, meetings, etc. and just watch peoples’ sex centers manifesting and to observe my attractions, repulsions etc. Meanwhile, my partner and I worked very hard to transform our relationship into a deeper friendship, minus any overt sexuality.
About six months later, I became very attracted to a male FOF student and, when it became clear that the feelings were mutual, we became sexually involved with one another. After a few months, my new lover confided some very disturbing information to me about Robert’s sexual life. He said that Robert had made very strong and overt sexual advances towards him even though he had not actually had sex with Robert. He also told me that Robert was sexually involved with FOF male students fairly regularly. I could clearly see that he was tormented by the contradictions and pressure of his situation. Eventually he introduced me to one of the young men who was involved sexually with Robert; I listened to his story, which was quite disturbing and convoluted, as there was an apparent power struggle going on between Robert and the woman this student was involved with at the time. I was struck with how much integrity this student possessed and how much pain and confusion he was in, as he struggled to understand and take right action. I was stunned once again and could not believe that the Teacher would do this to any of his students, and I could not see how this situation could possibly further a students’ spiritual evolution.
As it turned out, both these young men left the FOF, both deeply wounded and in pain. Oddly enough, I stayed in the FOF, even though it was very painful for me to lose my relationship with this man. All I can say is, at that time I needed the FOF more than I needed to love a genuine human being. I was ‘in love’ with the idea of being in a real Fourth Way School and the FOF was offering me so much that I considered good and higher, that I simply could not deal with the contradictions at this time. So, I ‘put the issue on the back burner. I continued, over the years, to encounter strange stories of goings on with Robert’s sex life, and heard vague rumors of deeply wounded young men. I was invited to the Birell’s home to participate in a discussion on homosexuality, and I hesitantly agreed to attend, as I was curious and felt maybe I could open a few minds. I was shocked that they and others knew of my past sexual experiences, since I spoke of this to almost no one, and I also was angry that I had been conveniently branded as homosexual. It was a very strange meeting, and it was clear to me that everyone there except me regarded homosexuality as a ‘problem’. All of this madness I continued to buffer by saying that I was placing it on the back burner for further verification…yeah, I know, pretty lame! Like Sandra mentioned in post #289, I needed the security, special ness and the certainty offered by the Fourth Way via the FOF to bolster/buffer my weak sense of self and my fear of life, but it would be many, many years before I would be ready to come to grips with this aspect of my relationship to the FOF.
Finally, in the mid 90’s, the Troy and Richard Buzbee revelations lead me into a real, deep personal crisis and questioning of my involvement with the FOF. I entered a long ‘dark night of the soul’. I walked around the FOF property like a visitor from another planet, now seeing things in a new and more sinister light. I realized at a dinner with Robert that he was no longer my teacher and I had not trusted him for many years. As I left the dinner, he put his arm around me and told me that “He loved me”, which was quite bizarre since we had never had much contact during my twenty years in the FOF (I was one of the more low-vis students). I realized I was being manipulated, as my staying in the FOF was politically advantageous for him at this time.
I began reading many other spiritual writings and re-reading the Fourth Way workbooks, this time with a much more focused awareness. I went back to “In Search of the Miraculous” and discovered information that really cleared my mind (pp. 256-259.). This was the key, the missing information that I needed. It was Gurdjieff’s teaching on the nature and right work of the sex center as well as his explanation of what constituted ‘abuse of sex’. G explains that the sex center, like higher emotional and intellectual centers (all working with hydrogen 12), has no negative half. If there is anything negative connected to sex, then it must be wrong work of centers. G states: “ everything connected with sex should be either pleasant or indifferent. Unpleasant feelings and sensations all come from the emotional center or the instinctive center…. You must understand where lies the chief evil and what makes for slavery. It is not in sex itself but in the abuse of sex”… Abuse of sex means “the wrong work of centers in relation to sex, that is, the functioning of the sex center with energy borrowed from other centers and the functioning of other centers with energy borrowed from the sex center.”
I got it! This giant pain body that was accruing among so many young men around their sexual relationship with Robert was, by definition, “Abuse of sex”.
There can be nothing higher or ascending in this situation. It is cosmically wrong, not because of the homosexuality, which is actually quite cosmically neutral, but because of the ‘pain being inflicted and experienced’.
From this point forward, I was free to leave, and I did leave shortly thereafter. Thank Heaven. I now see Robert as being a pathological narcissist and one who has deep shame about his sexuality. I do not hold out much hope for his reformation, but I pray that the abuse will end one day soon, and the healing will begin in earnest.
April 27, 2007 at 8:41 pm
TO #349 Somebody says
You may not have been around for the earlier years (late 80’s and 90’s), but Roger Cavanna dropped out of sight of the FoF (while remaining a member), and stayed in the Bay area. During the 1998 prediction , he refused and had nothing to do with the directive ‘leave your home and business and move up to the foothills, so you don’t drown” . For most of us he was an ‘old time ‘ student who had a carpet company in the Bay area. Never seen. I was really surprised to see him show up one day at Apollo, and then more of him, until he and Pamela ended up building a house at OH. During that time he became very ill and as you know died shortly after completing his dream house.
I have always been curious as to ‘why’ he returned, got active, and then Pamela rejoined. She seemed such an intelligent lady, and very independent. And he was no slouch either.
I guess one could not know what went on behind the scenes unless you were to sit down with Pamela and have a chat.
April 27, 2007 at 9:01 pm
In response to Elena post #312 while I think there is much of value in your idea I would suggest using yahoo groups as the site provides areas to archive material, store files and search post’s for references.
I have created a group at the following address.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FOFdoc/
It is configured for open membership and post’s. If this agree’s with what you desire. Join and repost you idea. If you chose you can be a moderator.
All those who are former FOF members are welcome to submit their stories.
There are many post’s that have been published on this blog that seem appropriate but I think it is probably up to the original authers to repost if they chose. Yahoo groups offers a much more in depth ability to archive, file and edit material than a blog. It is also possible to add moderaters so if there are those who desire to help sort and edit material it is possible to do so.
Duncan
April 27, 2007 at 9:17 pm
To Just Observing:
re: #304 Fencerider–I just want to be simple, honest, unpretentious, loving.
Your response:
Of course nothing in the Fellowship is contrary to those qualities, rather they are always strengthened and not opposed. In fact, it is of course our false personality that is making matters complex, false, difficult for ourself and others.
Let’s explore together for a moment the concept that nothing in the Fellowship is contrary to those qualities. First, I agree that it is possible to be simple, honest and unpretentious in the FOF and that in many ways these traits are supported. I believe that I have made some progress in this area in the last 31 years and I am thankful to all of you for helping me with that.
I think it is a huge stretch to say that “nothing in the Fellowship is contrary to those qualities”.
Robert continually teaches that the members of the FOF have a special fate and that those not in the FOF are of little worth. Yes, he occasionally contradicts this but the overriding message is one of superiority. I heard him say something to that effect just a few weeks ago. I find the attitude of superiority (even if it is true in some minor ways) to be a rather dangerous concept and one that promotes an insidious type of false personality that isolates one from some of life’s most beautiful opportunities. Perhaps this attitude can be avoided but I would offer the observation that many students are to some degree caught in this illusion and the ones in the so-called inner circle are deeply under this spell. This is not an honest attitude.
Also, Roberts “life style” may help to free one from life’s feminine dominance by bringing into question the foundations of our attitudes towards right and wrong, but it also authorizes behaviors and attitudes that are contrary to simplicity, honesty and unpretentiousness. It is my observation that he risks everything that we work for to support his excesses. Would you say he is simple, honest and unpretentious? I personally would have a lot of trouble honestly explaining to my boss (if I had one) the value for the Fellowship of Robert’s true life style. I would have to leave out many details. Not that we would want to talk about these things – but the perceived need to keep this side of our life hidden is less than open and honest. The Fellowship clearly feels a strong need to keep this information protected as evidenced by the warnings from the Council and from the lawyers. This is not open and honest, nor is it simple. The contradictions foster complexity, justifications and dissonance.
There are also rather large financial requirements for being in the FOF and the pressure to participate in events is relentless. It is difficult to avoid feeling some shame when one is unable to do half of what is suggested. For those with families the pressures in multiple directions leads to, if nothing else, a complex, hurried life with a number of contradictions and in general a feeling of inadequacy. You might extol the merits of such a life – I think it has its purpose but that this purpose is time-bound and is destructive if it goes on too long.
I could go on with other examples of how simplicity, honesty and unpretentiousness are NOT supported in the FOF and I am sure others could also and probably do a better job than I have. For me, after so many years, I just want to try on a self image that is free from some of the attitudes of the FOF. I want to see just how simple and honest and unpretentious I can get and see how that affects my ability to be present. I want to feel free to explore sides of my essence that are not supported in the FoF.
I expect, based on my own experiences and the writings here, that there is something to be gained by freeing myself from some unnecessary laws. I also do not want to be saddled with the problems that I think the FoF will encounter at some point, based on its inability to use good judgment in planning for the future. Many that represent the FOF foundation are growing old and the young are not very supportive of them.
Finally I see no attitudes from Fellowship leaders that show a desire to change or any hope that ANYTHING of consequence can change in the FoF. It is all about accepting it as it is and understanding the value of all the silliness. This is not honest.
I want to try to think for myself, somewhat free from FOF dogma. If I find that I cannot find presence, simplicity, unpretentiousness and honesty outside, I guess you would let me back in, but I think we both know deep down that this is unlikely. I already know that I can find presence for myself and it is deepest when it does not come from any prodding or “shoulds” but evolves out of my own desire for that simple, honest state.
April 27, 2007 at 10:08 pm
To 326 A former Student and any naive reader who believes any of it might be real.
You’re a fake like John and the rest of students trying to “defend the undefendable.” Another Howard Carter in new wolf clothing, a Peter Ingle inviting to what sounds like rational discussion but you’re just throwing up in your own inability to defend your school with real being. You jump from one side to the other but I’m allergic to your tactics and recognize them a thousand miles away.
You call yourself A former Student so that you can pretend to be one but you really think we are naive.
Your tactics are cheap and stupid and by your mail you’re confirming that it was a student who posted as Sydney Russell to discredit the discussion amongst students. Now you’re trying to discredit non students to non students and students.
In the rest of your post you’re trying to give “positive” Is about the Fellowship and Robert, especially that particular line on his “ spending 12 hours a day or more working with students one on one,” you mean, giving or receiving blow jobs?
Not one letter or one person I know in the Fellowship after 25 years, has ever said Robert works one on one with any student. He hides behind them all and confronts their vanity with each other. He turns them against themselves so that he weakens them all. He’s used the best of them to make the school look real and the best of them have given into it because or their vanity and ambition. Wanting to be a conscious being is as dangerous a desire as any other.
Look at yourself and tell me if you’re not just another dangerous fake. The poverty of your post sucks. Get real and if you have nothing good to say for your school or yourself to which you’re willing to stand up with your name, shut up and keep digging the tomb of your brothel somewhere else.
April 27, 2007 at 10:09 pm
Regarding my last post, I would like to add a couple of clarifications. One, I am a woman, which is not entirely clear. Secondly, I have been happily married for over twenty-five years to a man I met in the Fellowship, and we have one lovely daughter, who is now an adult. He is and has always been aware of my sexual orientation and my ‘play’ in the FOF; he is totally supportive. I think this added information creates a clearer perspective to my post.
I also want to add that shame is one of the most debilitating of negative emotions if it is not acknowledged, processed and let go, and shame can cause terrible consequences such as severe depression and even suicide (adolescent homosexuals have one of the highest suicide rates). I would love to hear from some of the gay, lesbian and bi-sexual current students and former FOF’ers as far as what they have experienced and learned on this subject. The fact that none seem to have posted thus far may be indicative of the shame that is still so prevalent in our culture. It takes a lot of guts and inner work to go against Mother Culture and become who you really are without guilt or shame.
April 27, 2007 at 10:11 pm
OP #347: You took the words right out of my mouth. I was expelled in 1979 and spent the next, well, until this month believing that FOF was truly an ARK. Stated as you put it, it could have been exactly that.
Like others it was hard going about in “life” split in two. The pain was almost too much. Eureka! I found gold, and then lost. Who do you confide in? What psychotherapist would understand body types, alchemy, levels of being,
“only read those books which have not died with their authors”. Your being is refined by Bach.
I kept some sanity by beliving that in my next recurrence things would be different, but in the background would be a lingering thought–”moon food”.
I was shocked to hear about the descending octave of FOF which seemed to occur the same year I left. Robert couldnt make it pass his last interval. Too easy a life, maybe.
April 27, 2007 at 10:21 pm
I checked Wikipedia and noticed that there was no link to this site, so I added a link in the Criticism section. It was there for a short while, then disappeared. I don’t really know how Wikipedia works. Is there any way to ensure that the link remains? This blog is obviously an important resource for anyone interested in the FOF.
April 27, 2007 at 10:27 pm
Thank you to the people who replied to “Just Observing”, great job!
To Zack, post # 337, I do not understand where you are coming from. Your post/fantasy story is confusing.
What is your purpose?
Elena, just a reminder that we can only please 50% of the people we come in contact with. The other 50% will simply not like us. It is normal.
I see sometimes people getting mad at you.
You know you take a risk when you go public with your thoughts, nevertheless you have my admiration even when I do not agree with what you say sometimes.
Another thought:
Maybe 100’s of ex for members could participate in a class action lawsuit.
Maybe we can split the value of Isis, collections, etc. etc., to pay for the moral and physical damages we incurred.
Think about the damages for sexual abuse, the lies, the breaking apart of families, the mental illness and emotional breakdown that these actions caused in some individuals, etc., etc., (the list could go on and on…)
Would not be nice if RB paid us for a change?
April 27, 2007 at 11:05 pm
Old dog #332
Bow, WOW. That was awesome!
April 27, 2007 at 11:06 pm
of course I knew I would get the predictable reactions by posting…
first it proves the point, not only that there has been little transformation, but even worse perhaps, there is not even interest in transformation.
In the big picture it seems that what is complained about by some former members (a few advances of RB that were rebuffed, an uncomfortable truth ineptly covered by a lie about celebacy) is really all not such a big deal. If it was, they would have left immediately!
Bruce was a willing participant that now regrets and resents, Charles R stayed on more than 10 years after learning the truth (frequently on traveling teacher trips paid for by the FOF) and Ames was apparently relegated to the ranks of ordinary student, like so many of us are that are not in some power position in the hierarchy–BIG DEAL!
While some like Paul may call this courage, to speak out on a blog some decade later, it is of course far from anything like courage. It simply shows the pathetic nature of the posters.
The one thing clear is that the conduct that is complained of from Robert has NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with the real reasons for leaving. There is no logical relationship at all. The only explanation I am reading is that the posters thought it justified to no longer work on themselves. Needing someone to blame, of course it is the teacher’s fault. EASY EXCUSES.
Just observing.
April 27, 2007 at 11:55 pm
Unoanimo #339
Do you have any ways of describing “Painbody”.
Could it be said that “2nd state” is “Painbody”?
Or maybe “Puppetji’s” hand of history up our butts? (from you tube #267).
This is a concept important for me to understand.
April 27, 2007 at 11:56 pm
William Heinz:
You were always simple, honest, unpretentious and loving–that was obvious to anyone who knew you. You never needed to do anything to be that. There may be a lesson here for us.
Just Observing:
Many of us learned decades ago that absolutely anything can be defended in work language. Anything at all. It takes very little talent. As you may have noticed, you can do it in your sleep. And I don’t notice anyone other than FOFers wasting their time worrying about Howard Carter, and who he might be, any more.
Crouching Tiger:
I appreciate that you acknowledge the need to “abandon the system,” or leave conceptual grids behind, sooner or later, but the belief that it must be later rather than Now is precisely what keeps you a seeker rather than a finder. The expectation that a day will come when you will “crytalize”–the Big Bang theory of awakening–allowing you to then, and only then, set aside your grid is the great illusion. Robert’s stories of having “crystalized” on a particular day are self-serving nonsense designed for the credulous(does he still pantomime, fingers interlaced as he pushes his hands together, how his head felt when he “became a Man number 5″? It’s OK, I used to believe it, too.)
Regarding the feminizing of Fellowship men, the form of the Fellowship, at least as long ago as the late 70’s (I wouldn’t know before then), reflected the subjective notions one particular man happened to have about how he wanted the objects and people in his environment to look, from Architectural Digest-inspired wall sconces to men carrying little purses. And, of course, there has always been the strong inclination to ape the Teacher’s own manner, from that thing he does with his neck (you know, that little tic) to acting effeminate. I mean, let’s face it–it’s not a coincidence that, whatever else it may be, the Fellowship has always had a form that appeals to a gay man, populated by members who feel the need to act, in certain respects, like a gay man.
April 28, 2007 at 12:21 am
Zach, I could lose my job if I laugh like this…
Oh, man….
Love you, man…
April 28, 2007 at 2:20 am
Sheik #345: “… basically the same thing you [elena] are planning to construct is being done on the wikipedia FoF entry…”
It’s very hard to put anything in the Wikipedia article unless you can cite a “reliable, published” source. Anything critical of the Fellowship or its founder is quickly removed, including, as of today, the link to this blog.
April 28, 2007 at 2:35 am
Hey Zack,
Long time no see, I remember a meeting you led in Reykjavik, “Intoning the sequence in the first state” was the subject I believe, don’t remember much of what you said, actually it put me to sleep, but I do remember the Zebra. You may remember me? I was the other person in the room, after the meeting all three of us went to Reykjavic’s famous hotel, “The One Season” for higher impressions and fresh hay. I was surprised how much of it you ate and said, “Zack, that’s a lot of hay.” You said, “Yes” or something. I recall it vividly to this day.
Anyway, here’s my story as best as I can remember. I moved to Isis in ‘98, it was called Ices back then and I worked on the popsicle octave, making lollipops in the shape of foot long obelisks inside a giant freezer that had been traded for wine.
I remember vividly how each day I would wipe the ice from my glasses and peer out of the tiny hole in the wall and enjoy the beautiful tree behind the lodge. Everything seemed possible back then until the Russian boys began walking funny and complaining of frostbite, “down there” and the heating element in Robert’s cushion caught fire. The octave ended abruptly and I’m not sure why, but apparently Robert said there won’t be popsicles on the ark and students must unplug their freezers for 6 months to prepare for the pre-industrial age which was approaching.
I was moved over to the Academy, which was a lot warmer and was asked to feed the pedigree gerbils and keep a scrap book of newspaper articles about Liberace who Robert said was, “Another goddess in a man’s body, just like my mother”. After a few weeks of my overt obsequiousness, RB took a liking to me and it became my role to dress badly and follow him everywhere holding a huge ornate candelabra.
One evening, I remember it vividly, Robert came to my room, hit me with his shoe and said, “Dear, Liberace wants you to tie me to a chair, cover me with strawberry preserve and put a popsicle in my anus, it will help you remember yourself.” An emotion like love for Liberace flowed through me and I ran to the kitchen, picked up a huge quarter full jar of Jam, then discovered to my dismay upon opening the freezer that we were compleeeeeeetely out of popsicles!
I vividly remember how a few smirking Russian boys made uneasy steps toward the door as I stood rooted to the spot paralyzed with fear. After what seemed like a couple of minutes, but which as I later discovered had in fact been two minutes, RB came looking for me and told me, I had defeated the will of Liberace who was really cross with me.
Then like a flash of thunder it hit me, a hundred pieces of the dark fabric which had cloaked my vision were suddenly stitched together with the sharp needles of my memories and the cotton thread of my disbelief into an awkward and ill-fitting gown which I, yes I, was now forced to wear in public! I had been tricked. My years in the freezer, the innovative popsicle designs, the awkward mincing steps of my teacher, his chattering teeth and blue cheeks, the unmistakable smell of strawberries whenever he passed by, my higher love for Liberace. My world now splintered into a thousand icy crystals and melted away before my eyes, and that’s when I punched him really hard and moved back to Reykjavic, – It felt great and I’ve never looked back!
I have signed with my real name because it’s too cold for anyone to want to come and get me here in Iceland.
Snorri Hjartarson
snorri@finbogadottirandhiselves.com
April 28, 2007 at 2:50 am
THE CROSS OF CHANGES
The healing takes forever
for the disease has no cure.
Beneath each answer of reason
lies a layer of doubt
beneath that another.
The passionate wound while healing
refuses to close.
Close as we are to love
we continually turn away
our presence bleeding
unable to shoulder the weight
of the familiar
and barely able to bear
the cross of changes.
THE COLLECTED UNCONSCIOUS
I am alone
I am nothing.
There is a angel
of the double edged mind
stabbing me from behind.
Laughingly
she catches each drop
in the cup of everyman.
With silence as thanks
she drinks it down
and awakens.
April 28, 2007 at 3:03 am
What! Being referred to as grateful, as a good student, how much abuse can a person take here…
__________________
William #304: As you know, you have taken an enormous step. I hope you are relieved to have made the decision, sitting on the fence does seem to be the most torturous time, I hope you will find that it gets better and that you have support from others as you make the transition.
I still believe that only you — or anyone else wrestling with a similar decision — can know if staying in or leaving FoF is best for you. There seems to be an element of fate, mystery or destiny in some of the more important parts of our lives that overrides all our thoughts and plans… Maybe another response to a question asked here a few times: ‘why did you stay so long?’
Thanks, Joel for #320. I hated how rigid you were about rejecting any hint of ‘work language’, but I too welcomed the idea of at least trying to experience life not passed thorough system ‘decoders’ after all those years, very scarey and refreshing also. Still I find it difficult not to see body types (for instance)!
SandraC
April 28, 2007 at 3:16 am
Just Observing and Knowledge: You are such retards. I am glad that you came out at the same time (what a coincidence) to double the amount of retardation available to the readers.
Amusedly observing with much inherent knowledge.
April 28, 2007 at 3:47 am
#352 Is that you Ram?
April 28, 2007 at 4:14 am
#373..There is apparently no limit to how much of a self aggrandizing a-hole you can be is there (yet I wonder if you are actually RB- I can’t imagine who else could be this pompous and self important,… OK, maybe Linda).
I “acquiesced”, I wasn’t “willing”, and in fact RB and I got into it quite a few times over it, yet I DID acquiesce. As RB said…”higher forces wishes you to go through this turmoil” and “it’s the least you can do for your teacher”, etc. It was my stupidity, naivety, vanity and malleability that allowed me to acquiesce and put aside what I knew I should do, what I eventually did. This is what I take responsibility for. Willingness doesn’t enter into it. You, on the other hand, you silly little turd, are gathering some baggage that I can’t imagine a more deserving person should carry. You are, assuredly, exactly where you should be.
April 28, 2007 at 4:20 am
“the Fellowship has always had a form that appeals to a gay man, populated by members who feel the need to act, in certain respects, like a gay man.”
Gee, as a gay man I am truly thankful to the straight homophobe who wrote this post. It is interesting that the fof POPULATION, which is easily 90%, or more, straight, is largely responsible for keeping “the secret”, and at times encouraging (ie pimping) all those young straight men in potentially compromising positions. I know MANY straight members that did exactly that. When I first joined, my straight center director tried to pimp me. It this sick or what?
I never thought the fof had gay overtones, unless going to a concert, opera or ballet is considered gay, but I guess it would be to a culturally-challanged one such as yourself.
Mind expanding our minds and telling us excactly how members (” who feel the need”) act gay? Don’t tell me, I want to use my imagination…
April 28, 2007 at 4:32 am
I almost died laughing today….
Zach you are professional!
April 28, 2007 at 4:44 am
Regarding Marlane Dasmann’s book,
Maud is Stella, not Bonita.
Regarding copying the book: Marlane is trying to decide how best to publish it to the web.
Regarding Clara Elena’s proposal for a document: Yahoo! is probably not the best place for that document. Why? Complainers can get a Yahoo! group deleted. Best to have a moderated forum, like this one, for developing such a document. Sheik, is there a way we can post files to this blog (such as pdfs)?
April 28, 2007 at 4:52 am
Interesting to be called a retard by none other than the host of this forum. I am trying to share my point of view as are the many voices of discontent. The insults reflect more on the writer…thanks for the namecalling.
April 28, 2007 at 5:23 am
A History of the Fellowship? (#194)
Well, not really, it is a small part of the history of Bonita and a tiny, though very important, part of the history of the Fellowship. The Bonita story interests me because it appeals to several parts of me at the same time (lots of material for self-observation), as is usual with stories of this kind. But, as is the case with most kinds of personal stories, including mine, it is just Bonita’s. She may be telling the whole truth, part of the truth, or none of the truth. Of course, she may not know, herself. And some have noted that the story in of itself appears to be incomplete.
Nevertheless, in view of the fact that the FOF doesn’t want it, and others, to appear in the Wikipedia, it occurs to me that we could start a website called “History of the FOF” ourselves. We could invite anyone with a story, in or out of the FOF, to contribute. A moderator would be needed, and perhaps someone with enough history themselves to advise the moderator as to how the parts would most likely fit together (Oh, Stella, how we miss you!). There could be several ways of organizing the information; by year, by theme, by subject. The aim being to put some of this stuff in context, in a form not subject to attack by the FOF, but available to everyone. It would be invaluable for cross-checking and linking stories. It would even include archives of this blog, which presumably will last only until the Sheik gets tired of it. We could keep it high on the Google page ranks both by using it ourselves and by putting in the highest quality links we can find. And maybe one day someone could actually write a History of the Followship (With Lessons Learned). It would likely be much more interesting, truthful and useful than Linda T’s version (I was told that she was the official FOF historian).
It costs money to host a site, but it is possible the rest could be donated in kind? I myself would be willing, as a present to you folks, to pay the same $99 a year I pay to my very excellent hosting service for my business site…
All sorts of ideas are flowing. How about a contact directory? Is there a safe and secure way to do this? How about a place for folks to put forward their recommendations for further study, as has been done somewhat haphazardly in this blog? We’d need everyone’s ideas, and much technical input as well. (Though I designed, built, and run my own business website, it is not sophisticated, and this is the first blog I have ever read or taken part in; I am not qualified technically.) What can be done better? How would one organize an “historical database” and have it on-line? How about pictures? For example, I have hundreds from 1978 on, including stereos (3D), some of which I bet would be of interest to others and any Final Historian. How would one organize them into a database? How would one access pictures, stories, or documents that are of immediate interest to a searcher without having to wade through tens of thousands of no interest? Are there inexpensive ways of digitizing slides, photos, and negatives en masse that anyone knows of? And so on. Does this sound worth thinking about to any of you folks?
Ames Gilbert
I wrote this a few days ago, saw that others were thinking on the same lines (regarding a permanent home for some of this material), and refrained. But now it seems it might be worthwhile to put forward another variation that answers some of the potential problems (though it might raise others).
April 28, 2007 at 5:33 am
Hello Former Student who left in 1979 quite sattisfied with the Fellowship.
Question: If you left so long ago quite sattisfied what is your interest in an FOF group?
Are you trying to deviate people from this blog?
You just showed up and you’re already speaking for others?
“There are many post’s that have been published on this blog that seem appropriate but I think it is probably up to the original authers to repost if they chose”.
I’m afraid I think wide open eyes is right about you.
Please do not address me personally again. I do not trust you.
So long.
April 28, 2007 at 6:01 am
Dear No Name, (371)
Thank you for your encouragement and all those who once encouraged me, thank you. If I did not answer and at some point stated “no praise nor denial” and seemed arrogant, I am sorry. Please try to state simply, if I have hurt you or made mistakes.
At the same time, please bare with me. “No one knows the thirst with which others drink” and the times aren’t easy.
Elena
To Charles R. (356)
The idea in your post on “No soul” is beautifully put. It is the same phenomena of giving one’s self up to an authority of any kind.
Thank you.
There are so many posts that go to the point that it does not feel necessary to acknowledge each one of them. What we have to say is not beautiful but it is beautiful when people say it and even more so, when they say it beautifully. Thank you.
April 28, 2007 at 9:42 am
“The School, the system, a way, a path, is the torn one uses to remove the torn in one’s side that is Life. But, if you are not careful, you just might get two torns stuck in your side.” [This is according to the Buddha and spoken by Roger on more than one occasion.] [These torns are lodged in your side in that precise location of the abdomen where Jesus shows doubting Thomas the wound that He, Jesus, has in his side. Doubting Thomas does not believe the wound, nor the resurrected Jesus, unless he can actually touch the body and the wound. Silly Thomas does not see that the wound is in himself and that he could touch it all along and that he himself is the christ. Know that thou art wounded and twice wounded and take the appropriate action. Having torns lodged in this part of your body is very difficult to see and remove; get help.
See it depicted here:
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/v/verocchi/sculptur/christh.html
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/v/verocchi/sculptur/christho.html
Christ and Doubting Thomas
1476-83
Bronze, height: 230 cm
Orsanmichele, Florence
VERROCCHIO, Andrea del
(b. 1435, Firenze, d. 1488, Venezia)
Perhaps the most important work Verrocchio executed in Florence was a bronze group of Christ and St. Thomas commissioned for a niche in the east exterior wall of the Or San Michele in Florence. Executed between 1467 and 1483, the work is remarkable for its technical perfection, highly intellectual sense of
compositional design, and understanding of the subtle emotional nature of the subject.
Verrocchio's reputation was widespread in the second half of the 15th century and many well-known artists of the Italian Renaissance studied painting and sculpture at his Florentine studio. One most important of his students was Leonardo da Vinci. Raphael and Michelangelo can trace their lineage back to Verrocchio through their individual masters that were Verrocchio's students. Incidently, Verrocchio, who's name was adopted from his master, is said to literally mean 'real eye.']
April 28, 2007 at 9:51 am
Skeptical Optimist,
Glad you mentioned your need to completely release work language once you left FOF, as it has occurred to me in a similar way. In experimenting with new directions and attending a few “groups” when I became an ex-student of the 4th way I discovered several things.
First was that the study of oneself, primarily as a machine, had given me very good tools with which to analyse and evaluate other knowledge,especially ideas such as loss of energy in various forms.I found that I was able to bring a new understanding and intention and presence to old ideas I had met before the school and see the common thread.
At the same time, I also discovered that spending 15 or so years working with a system where nothing was real outside of what I could see and verify in this moment, and having the belief system that I was a machine,left me with basically the consciousness of a potatoe in other areas of development.I started down the track of viewing my awareness of me here being a tiny insignificant part of the greater me or higher self which was accessed through the subconscious and intuition. I sat in one particular workshop judging all the others for mechanical behaviour and at the same time realising that they had more access to that world than I did because I had spent all that time trying not to see such things.
Back to the drawing board, allbeit at a new level, and the realization that life experiences are the material,and that the only teacher is each individuals higher self, and the lessons are learned when one finally listens to ones intuition or conscience and no longer has to loop through that experience again.
This brings me to a comment that I wanted to make to the Blog in general.Many great ideas and thoughts on different lines of work and I do see the need to release the demons so that we can move forward. At the same time,there are those who do seem to be on a n immature witch hunt because FOF is not what it was promised.But neither are you.If Miles had stood at the gate when I was going to Rennaissance for the first time and tried to persuede me not to go in, I would have stepped around him. It served it’s purpose for me and I learned what I went there to experience and then moved on. You don’t successfully paint your ceiling from the top of the ladder, climb down , and then want to sue the company coz there was no warning sign on the top step(common immature american syndrome).If various older students had had their way then that particular school experience would not have been there for me so why would I try to stop someone else having theirs.At the same time, I despise whats going on and think it’s des cended big time .It’s a contradiction that we cant resolve if we are looking at it from the subjective viewpoint of conformity and morality.By all accounts it shouldn’t have existed when I was a student, yet it did me well.Would you deny me the experience of being a muslim female, or a catholic priest, or a red neck with 4 dogs and a gas guzzling truck also.There is no right or wrong other than for each indivdual. Sorry for the spelang. Perhaps when someones overzealous effort to shut it down( because they haven’t worked themselves out of that loop yet) succeeds, or it just dies a natural end because there is no money or substance,then it is no longer meant to be.thanks for listening.
April 28, 2007 at 10:27 am
Just a brief comment to the fool who is still going on about my use of Sydney Russell’s name. It served it purpose which was to let me know she is alive and still a student. She was a dear and noble friend and it was the best idea I had to find out if she was still a student of the FOF or even alive. I don’t know if it possible to inquire about students at all.
Several comments Joel made brought thoughts of my own experiences. One was about the “Dark Night of the Soul” the other about the work language. As Sandra C. wrote what attracted me to the Fellowship was the system of ideas. I had already read “In Search of the Miraculous”, “The Fourth Way”, “Meetings with Remarkable Men” and following Gurdjieff advice “Beelzebub’s Tales” three times when I joined the FOF in the San Diego Center in 1973. What attracted me to the FOF was the quality of new information presented at the perspective student meetings. The ideas about body types and the use of the deck of cards where completely new. I also met people very quickly at meetings which Robert led in Los Angeles with Miles, Helga, Stella, Harold, Gerard and Barbara. The energy at the meeting was very intense and the earnestness of the students contagious.
I left the FOF in 1980 at the Kensington House, not for any noble understanding but because a number of factors worked on me at the same time. One was the smoking exercise, one was a desire to play music, but perhaps the strongest was that my wife, who I had married under what I considered pressure from Robert, was pregnant and leaving and although I thought it was female dominance and had already realized we had no future and that Robert would support my decision to let her go I did want not a child of mine to be born without a father. Also Robert was away and when I went to Renaissance the only person available was Miles who really did seemed to be centered in the Jack of Diamonds. I was seeking help in finding a way to stay and he said it sounded like I would have to go, Thanks a lot Miles.
After I left I did return to music leading several bands ( Orpheus, Harlequin, Rebel Trucking Company, Scott Duncan and Shades of Blues) but did not achieve either monetary or spiritual success pursuing what I had imagined was my task ( an idea that came when I met Alex Horn, saw his play at “The Theater of All Possibilities” ) which was to set sections of “Leaves of Grass” to contemporary music. Instead when I had set myself up in what I thought was a workable situation with my own live/work loft/studio, music equipment, time, and money I descended into a deep depression, drug addiction, alcoholism and sexual addiction. This was for me a true dark night of the soul. This lasted several years and I began to recover in AA using a 12 step program. I found that the ideas of the system where as true and useful as ever but that I had to “give up the system” and recreate it in myself. AA has its own language which I learned I actually became a rather good speaker. I was active for several years IN AA, and NA leading groups. Just an aside some of those in AA and NA have more real spirituality than those in the FOF who imagine they are specially lucky to be Blessed boy did I have to give up my intellectual arrogance . My depression was severe enough to be disabling and I received disability. I went to training as a peer counselor for mental health and again needed to learn a new language to express the same ideas. After finishing a training program I did an internship at a residential Dual diagnosis facility and then worked there part time for several years.
This was a better period I had several jobs particularly as the door man at a blues club, bartender and playing guitar several nights a week in Blues bands. I was attacked and injured and unable to work so I returned to school. It took me 5 years but I received two AA degree’s with honors in Community Social Services and Substance Abuse Counseling. In my classes I again had to learn a number of languages or “theoretical frames of reference” but still nothing I learned invalidated the truth of the system. Robert is wrong there are not errors on every page of “The Fourth Way” and of course he is to arrogant to ever state the truth that Ouspensky never saw or wrote “The Fourth Way” but a woman did.
I am glad this blog exists as slowly reading through the posts I begin to remember some of the people who I passed time with in my youth. Now at the age of 56 when so many I knew have passed. I do not theorize much or question much. Life is simple. I have no question that I am a man #4 because my greatest reality is both that I can remember myself and that no matter how many times I have done so, how long how intensely I can totally forget again. I too feel great sorrow about what has happened to Robert and the fellowship. One time when I had an obviously improbable experience of imagination I imagined that on another time line Robert was what I imagined him to be and that his prophecies did come true. On that timeline the real Robert took his beloved students through nuclear war. I for one am glad he was mistaken and will work with this life as it is. A final thought- it is very simple yet apparently from the amount of theorizing some still feel compelled to excrete- everything is exactly as it is and needs to be- if you disagree or do not understand than it is you not reality that has failed.
Thank you to anyone who has read this rather lengthy post.
Duncan Shockley
A poetry selection for Sydney where ever she might be in memory of the times we shared reading Rilke.
DEDICATION
Ye wavering forms draw near again as ever
When ye long since moved past my clouded eyes.
To hold you fast, shall I this time endeavour?
Still does my heart that strange illusion prize?
Ye crowd on me! ‘Tis well! Your might assever
While ye from mist and murk around me rise.
As in my youth my heart again is bounding,
Thrilled by the magic breath your train surrounding.
Ye bring with you glad days and happy faces.
Ah, many dear, dear shades arise with you;
Like some old tale that Time but half erases,
First Love draws near to me and Friendship too.
The pain returns, the sad lament retraces
Life’s labyrinthine, erring course anew
And names the good souls who, by Fortune cheated
Of lovely hours, forth from my world have fleeted.
They do not hear the melodies I’m singing,
The souls to whom my earliest lays I sang;
Dispersed that throng who once to me were clinging,
The echo’s died away that one time rang.
Now midst an unknown crowd my grief is ringing,
Their very praise but gives my heart a pang,
While those who once my song enjoyed and flattered,
If still they live, roam through the wide world scattered.
And I am seized with long-unwonted yearning
Toward yonder realm of spirits grave and still.
My plaintive song’s uncertain tones are turning
To harps aeolian murmuring at will.
Awe binds me fast; tear upon tear falls burning,
My stern heart feels a gentle, tender thrill;
What I possess, as if far off I’m seeing,
And what has vanished, now comes into being.
April 28, 2007 at 11:20 am
In response to post #367 You state
“You call yourself A former Student so that you can pretend to be one but you really think we are naive.
Your tactics are cheap and stupid and by your mail you’re confirming that it was a student who posted as Sydney Russell to discredit the discussion amongst students. Now you’re trying to discredit non students to non students and students.”
I guess your Mom never called you Sunny ’cause You do not appear to bright.. Try using the link to go to the group I moderate. Look at my identity, my god! there’s a picture. What an idiot.
If your going to waste the imagination of a good conspiracy at least don’t waste the energy on someone who post’s a link to a site with 5 years of post’s in the archives and a picture.
I was a student from 1973 to 1980. I have no personal experience or contact with the FOF or students since I left. I was deeply wounded by Robert but not because he ever personally had sex with me. I have no reason why because quite honestly I really like having oral sex and have no compunction about homosexual affairs although it is not my preference. It is the homophobic ravings that demonize Robert’s sexual preferences that I think allow students to justify their continued support.
” In the rest of your post you’re trying to give “positive” Is about the Fellowship and Robert, especially that particular line on his ” spending 12 hours a day or more working with students one on one,” you mean, giving or receiving blow jobs?”
I would guess that some of the former students who were in the FOF earlier would attest to the fact that Robert would and did work actively with students sometimes much than 12 hours a day.
There were many wonderful people in the FOF and not all were fools. Robert did have a tremendous presence and spent much times with students. I worked as the M’aite D before the big expansion in the “70’s Roger Cavannah was ranch manager and Robert was often “in residence” at that time in an Airstream trailer. I either ate in, supervised the service or worked as a server in the “Meissan Room” many many times. Often I would have a glass of wine with Peter Bishop after dinner. I was naive because I never guessed that there was sexual activity going on. I believed Robert’s lies about abstinence and did my not altogether successful best to follow the guide lines.
I was saddened to hear of Roger’s passing. One time I was operating a back hoe and went into silence for 40 days. Roger often became very frustrated and had difficulty putting up with my having to write notes to communicate. I remember on the 40th day I was at the nut tree. I was leaving as Robert arrived and as we passed he said “goodness don’t you think you should start speaking “and I said “O K’..
To want to make everything about the FOF negative is misplaced energy. Nothing is all one way, everything is in transition, as the I-Ching teaches all is movement. That the seeds of corruption existed in the FOF from the beginning is probably true. But as I wrote in another post the reality of the school is in the consciousness of its students. This includes memories. Just as we need to try and remember ourselves. We need to remember and try not to distort the past.
I for one simply don’t have the being to comment on the FOF role in the play of consciousness on the planet Earth. I try and deal in reality’s. At present it has been the most dominant force in the spread of 4th way ideas in the last 25 years. Interestingly former students who are in the majority have no accreditation for the time. Each is forced to take what ever they can from the experience.
I choose to take self remembering.
Please forgive my running on. I find that reading these post’s evokes a lot of “I’s”.
Scott Duncan
April 28, 2007 at 11:42 am
Hi there ‘I’ll give it a try’ #375:
You make an awful lot of assumptions about my thought processes and position in relation to the School.
I don’t like the ideas about 9 lifetimes and future crystallization etc.., at least not in the way Robert uses them. They do not have a practical use for me. If you don’t have a grid that readily gets out of the way to admit the “Now” then what point is there in having it?
On the other hand, deceiving yourself that you don’t have a grid at all, or have somehow passed beyond the need for one is just garden variety spiritual snobbery/naivety. If you didn’t have a grid you wouldn’t be able to function in the ordinary “Fish&Chips” world at all!
April 28, 2007 at 12:47 pm
Sheik #381 and others – Why are you so mean to ‘Just Observing’ and ‘Knowledge’? When people are stuck in bigoted opinions and viewpoints, it’s usually because either they don’t know any better, or they are afraid to take the risk of exploring other perspectives. Challenging or vilifying them usually causes a defensive reaction and further entrenchment of their rigid beliefs. Why don’t we try the Hawaiian approach….
“Dear ‘Just Observing’ and ‘Knowledge’, I am sorry and aplolgise and I love you”
Any bloggers interested in picnic in a London park in a few weeks, please e mail me on lifereveller@yahoo.co.uk
April 28, 2007 at 1:08 pm
I opened up a new discussion board.
NEW DISCUSSION.
This discussion is therefore being closed, you will only be able to comment in the new one. Old comments will stay here.
June 5, 2007 at 2:31 pm
[...] For part 7 click here. [...]