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rayuna
Registered User
(3/25/02 9:29 am)
Reply 		Meditation Group far from the Heart
Dear participants,

There is no guarantee at all that distance from MC ensures a hospitable environment. I've never made any friendships in the group, it's beyond superficial. Many fake smiles, "jai gurus", posturing, self-worth issues and serious, serious condescension.

There are a few true hearts, but I've seen people I know very well, including myself wonder where the divine friends are that Master speaks of so eloquently. And the same people just ignored by members in times of need. There's absolutely no emotional intelligence in lay devotees either, not only monastics.

This group follows Center Dept. with a vengeance. Cardboard devotees with plywood hearts, mistakenly believing this is Master's way. Same condescending attitude and chill factor toward newcomers. Indecisive, manipulative, humorless management council meetings. Socials (few and far in between) boring, rigid, uncomfortable events.

Two members of this group tried even to shut down a regular kirtan at another very sincere devotee's home, because they chant hindu and sanskrit bhajans! Center Dept. was contacted. The power of the bhajans ensured its continuation. Can anyone find a reason for SRF's obsession with the "Cosmic Chants"?

So much false humility too, hiding strong pride and superiority/inferiority complexes. It never felt real. There was hardly anyone there that I felt I could touch and get down into their heart and feel a bond. All my spiritual warrior, real friends are outside SRF. Everyone is so afraid in SRF of the rawness of living. It can get gritty, no doubt. There's the sublime too, but overemphasis on one side creates a HUGE shadow. And no one's even aware of the shadow.

shamila
Registered User
(3/25/02 2:47 pm)
Reply 		Re: Meditation Group far from the Heart
Rayuna,

That was my experience exactly, but you say it better.

chuckle chela
Registered User
(3/29/02 11:26 pm)
Reply 		Re: Meditation Group far from the Heart
Rayuna, I can only imagine how awful your experiences have been. Yikes, that sounds like the worst possible meditation group! You’ve given us a virtual catalogue of the problems that can arise. In my post about distance from Mother Center, I wasn’t just referring to mileage alone, but distance from the overarching rigidity.

But I don’t think meditation groups or temple congregations have to be the way you describe. The group I’ve been involved with for a number of years is far from perfect, but it’s also far better than what you’ve described. We’ve had some of the same symptoms you’ve described, and there’s plenty of room for improvement in our group, but over the years we’ve developed ways of working together, and those efforts are continuing.

I think solutions are possible, although possibly not always; nor are the solutions easy to implement.

Here’s a tentative beginning at some possible solutions.

The first thing I need to state is that some of the solutions will have to be initiated by Center Department (in the case of meditation groups) since the martinets will listen to no one else. And one of the messages Center Dept. is going to have to get across loud and clear to these martinets is that they have to start learning how to listen to others!

Interestingly, CD appears to be making a start with workshops on communication skills, but much, much work is required here. As you might expect, there is some resistance (“meditation is all you need!”). Learning how to overcome rigidity (a huge challenge in itself), learning problem solving, dispute resolution, and other communication skills such as empathic listening, non violent communication: these are some of the areas CD needs to help groups with. It will be interesting to see if these efforts bear fruit.

The almost unbearable rigidity that we experience at times may be a problem that is unsolvable. It stems, of course, from Mother Center, and is quickly sucked up by the fundamentalist types. The only way to stop that is for those who’ve been on the path a bit longer and have relaxed to tell the others to get a grip and chill out.

The lack of emotional intelligence is very real and also needs to be addressed. Again, another significant undertaking. The only point I will add here is that I’ve noticed over the years, as have others on this board, that many of us have had what you might call “spiritual selfishness” or “selfish seeking”: an obsession with getting techniques, results, bliss, samadhi, enlightenment--an obsession with “getting mine.” All as if God and Love were commodities in short supply. And then there’s very little room for caring about others, about giving, about empathy and understanding. I think we need to shift the focus from getting to giving. Perhaps then we can learn some emotional skills.

And I agree with you that “overemphasis on one side [the positive] creates a HUGE shadow. And no one's even aware of the shadow.” There isn’t going to be any real meeting of hearts until that awareness arises.

In thinking about how we can improve the atmosphere in groups, I’ve come back again and again to a book by Scott M. Peck called “A Different Drum: Community Making and Peace.” He defines community as “ a group of individuals who have learned how to communicate honestly with each other, whose relationships go deeper than their masks of composure, and who have developed some significant commitment to rejoice together, mourn together, and to delight in each other, make each others’ conditions our own.”

Peck outlines four stages that groups go through to achieve genuine community, and he argues that groups must go through all four stages:
1. Pseudocommunity (faking it, plastic smiles, “everything is fine”)
2. Chaos (trying to convert, arguments, differences now are out in the open, shadows are revealed)
3. Emptiness (giving up and surrendering one’s own ideas, preconceptions, solutions, the need to fix and control--sacrificing it all and realizing you don’t have a clue)
4. Community (sharing of brokeness, real listening and heart-felt concern for the other, establishment of a “safe place” for all who have unburdened themselves)

Many groups and temple congregations are, I suspect, stuck in pseudocommunity. They will never get beyond this until opportunities are given members to take a look in the corners where--omigosh!--there are some little and not so little shadows lurking. One of the challenges is that those in power who don’t understand the process and who don’t ultimately trust human nature (that we really are divine) freak out when they see or hear of the shadows emerging (like the leaders at Mother Center shutting down the SLCs?).

It’s a great book and he has lead hundreds of groups into establishing real communities (for those who are interested, he also outlines different stages of spiritual growth as well as discussing group dynamics in detail. He outlines the work of Bion and others that some will remember Vulcan referring to).

I think the sort of principles and skills Peck discusses in forming real communities will need to be adopted by our groups if they are to be truly effective and long-lasting spiritual centers which offer emotional and spiritual support. The work of establishing genuine dialogue will also go a long way in helping eradicate the uglier personality tendencies shown by those of us who adopt martinet-type postures.

Some of us have quietly been discussing these principles and their implementation in our own group (sshhh, don’t tell!). We’re just at the very beginning, and it’s going to be interesting to see if this works.




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