have you read this one astral7

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Sleepers Awake!
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A friend of mine once said that SRF is moving into its teenage years. For us, that means it is now time we learn how to become differentiated as individuals, to become aware of the ways in which we subject ourselves to the control of other limited human beings and use them as focal points on which our need-for-comfort fantasies can be projected. It is only natural in an imperfect world that we should be disappointed by our grandiose expectations. And the more idealisitic one is, the more one can become bitter upon recognition of unclean facts.

We all came to SRF for similar reasons. First, we were touched by many inner experiences and synchronistic events which made it clear that we had found a path back home. We recieved techniques and inspiration from our guru through an organization known as Self-Realization Fellowhip. Certainly many exisential needs were satisfied through what we've been given. And most of us, having a stupendous hunger for companionship (com pan = "to break bread with" , found satisfaction the moment we stepped onto temple grounds and dicovered hundreds of people who thought just like us. SRF became the family we never had, the home we never had. And year after year, ministers reinforced that sentiment with the ubiquitous slogan: "SRF is your family."

And then we woke up, like a character in a Kafka story, only to discover we had left one dysfunctional family to join another. Should we be angry?

I'll speak for myself. Of course I'm angry. Thoroughly pissed to the core that SRF, whose expressed purpose is for consciousness-raising, is controlled by people who are committing the most unconscious acts of hurt against its own members. Naturally, I've had some exotic ranting sessions..."The dirty f#$@ bastards!!" etc. etc. When I left the organization, it felt refreshing to be on the outside because, quite honestly, I felt I had become an incurable social idiot due to my association with SRF. I had become a disowned self, fearful of the world (God's world) and mistrustful of mine or anyone else's humanity (God's creatures). Later I was to hear comparative horror stories such as we're reading on this site. My heart was broken. "How could I have given my life to this?" I thought.

Behind all its calculated postures and saccharine smiles, Mother Center is hiding a huge shadow. Make no mistake about it. Attention must be paid. Unless this shadow is brought into the light, many more lives will be used up and tossed away without remorse. Principles are at stake. Do you think you can thrive in an organization which teaches the Truth but doesn't practise what it preaches? Do you think you will get to God by supporting hypocrisy? Did Jesus support the well-intentioned Phillistines? This, my friends, is a call to duty. If you believe in principles, you cannot allow abuses in your spiritual familiy any more than you would in your government. The founding fathers of this country wouldn't tolerate it. Why should you?

Anger and bitterness are not the goal. But they can be wonderful emotional tools to rouse us from the perils of self-denial. You have every right to be upset with Mother Center. They are conducting their affairs like a medieval feudal kingdom while the rest of the civilized world is making an attempt to adjust to the 21st century Dwapara Yuga. Shame on us if we carry on pretending not to see it.

Our guru was not fond of organizations. He viewed them problematically but as necessary hubs where truthful ideas could be disseminated. He put a lot of work into getting this organization off the ground. We can serve it and nurture it as he did. But first we must drive the money-changers out as Jesus did in the Jerusalem Temple. We must demand a full accountability of how it spends its money and a full disclosure of who is in charge and what they're doing. Think of the dangers in 200 years if SRF does get bigger and there are no checks and balances. No checks and balances in the Dwapara Yuga! Inexcusable.

Are we fearful? In membership, the organization called SRF is a piece of sand on the cosmic beach. You only fear it because you have made it powerful in your own minds. Suppose they do blacklist people. Do you want to give your remaining life to an organization who would be treacherous to its members, who would consciously devalue the rational queries of its members? I suppose what we fear are law suits. Through legal hired guns, SRF is certainly capable making its "enemies" bleed through the spiritual eye. Which makes me wonder: how did Daya Mata ever become known as the "Mother of Compassion"?

Are you, a child of the Infinite, willing to subordinate that miraculous faculty of reason given to you by none other than God, to surrender your perceptions, your authenticity, and your uniqueness under the pretense and fantasy of being loyal? If you were truly loyal, you would not have the heart to watch the "child" of our Master's genius be distorted by a bunch of uneducated, sheltered nuns with samskaric tendencies towards ruling over and attracting people who wish to be infantilized under the pretense of obedience.

You don't fear the organization; you fear what life might be like if you finally shed your dependencies and had to face life with nothing but your faith and self-realized convictions.

This finally, I realized, is the true source of my anger: that I had betrayed my own perceptions and my own autonomy when I became an obediently unquestioning little devotee.
Reason is our greatest survival tool. Yet I surrendered my reason and my perceptions. I'm mad at myself for this more than I'm mad at SRF for being stuck in the mud of archetypal stupidity.

SRF is a fallible organization which needs serious correction. But so do most institutions. We've naively expected (and the PR reinforces it) that SRF should be an organization which flies in the face of worldly standards, a supposed bastion of the dawning spiritual age, and an example of right living for the rest of the world. In fact, though the spiritual message of our guru is very pure, in many ways SRF has become as petty and worldly as any other organization out there. They've maintained their image as perfect angels who can do no wrong, and most devotees I know want to hold onto this infantile fantasy for reasons God only knows why.

The organization, like a calculator, is there to help us do the math. It is not a substitute for our thinking. And if a calculator is creating errors, isn't it foolish to go on using it just because its all we've got? Here's what I think: We could chuck the calculator and solve all the problems by ourselves; or we could have the calculator repaired; or we could continue using the calculator and ignore the multitude of errors it proliferates.

Likewise, in SRF you have 3 choices:

1) Walk away. Live with God in your heart. Maybe meet up other ex-SRF'ers.

2) Stay with the organization. But demand full accountability from the Board of Directors.

3) Remain passive and live your sadhana as a bewildered simpleton.

Okay, my @#%$-and-moan session is over....and boy did it feel good. Love to all. Even to those f#$@ bastards at Mt. Washington who have spoiled my infantile dream of utopia on earth.

I leave you pondering the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson:

"Who is he that shall control me? Why may not I act and speak and write and think with entire freedom? What am I to the universe, or, the universe, what is it to me? Who hath forged the chains of wrong and right, of Opinion and Custom? And must I wear them?"

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whether astral7 and I, in understanding and calm command
reach out and walk hand in hand

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