Tree trunks, Branches, Caterpillars and Our Own Dharma(s)

Wonderful! (0.00 / 0)

Wow! That was wonderful, Krishna. It is truly a blessing to read the description of Waking Down in Mutuality as a tree with a trunk and branches.  I have often been attracted to other spiritual teachings and try to bring them into my own unique understanding of Waking Down as a guide, but I almost never can fine another teaching that can hold Waking Down in that way.

I hope you have a great reteat at AMS.

Elijah and Driana are fine, just very busy as we try to get him in the school that best fits his needs.

Love and blessings,

Sheldon

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by: sheldon @ Tue Nov 03, 2009 at 19:37:55 PM CST

re: Wonderful! (0.00 / 0)

Thanks Sheldon, I'm glad you enjoyed it. My you find the perfect school for Elijah.
Much Love,
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Wed Nov 04, 2009 at 23:18:12 PM CST

[ Parent ]

dharma monkeys (0.00 / 0)

Hi Krishna.

Thank you for the illustration. I really appreciate the risks you take in declaring your own truth. I had a mixed reaction to your description of the tree, however. At first I loved the idea, and I could see myself as a happy dharma monkey living in that tree. I have a couple branches that I particularly like that I could envision in that tree. I hoped that such a tree would come to exist not just as Krishna's ideal, but as a well accepted part of WDM.
 However, although I liked this idea and most of what you said in your post (because it matches my own experience and my own desires), I have one mode or path  that I can't quite envision as a branch of this tree. I would call this mode "only don't know". I got this phrase from a Korean Zen Master who has passed on, but  wrote a book entitled "Only Don't Know". He would answer questions frequently with that phrase or say "Only practice don't know mind".
 This path or mode seems antagonistic to a lot of WDM dharma, and to other branches of your tree. Because of the "only" part. It makes me want to do some pruning of excess branches. Your model comes from an expansion mindset, this ODK model comes from a contraction mindset.  Most of us have a strong cultural preference for expansion; for growing, developing, learning, evolving, deepening, new and improved, bigger and better, onward and upward, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.  I want to get out my chainsaw.
 I love the WDM motto of "no unnecessary pain", but I long ago adopted a similar motto in my own life of  "no unnecessary teaching", I wear "doubt colored glasses" and I doubt almost everything that most teachers tell me. Sometimes not right away, but eventually. Thus, I try not to live by any instruction or idea that I have not experienced or  proven for myself. So while I don't want to live like a lone wolf all of the time, I also don't want to struggle with "second hand truth" that comes flying at me so fast in WDM workshops.
 I try to imagine what an "Only Don't Know" workshop in WDM might include or what an ODK teacher might say or do. Do you know a WDM teacher who even comes close to this ideal?
 The further I go, the less I know. I don't know, for example, if the "Transmission" really helps me evolve or anything. I know it helped me get to my Second Birth, but now what does it do for me? Does it help me?  I really don't know. Sometimes I miss it, because for one, it feels groovy, and also I know it acts as a catalyst, but to what end? Sometimes I think I would like to receive Transmission or sit with someone who does Transmission, but does not try to teach me anything. Just move on as if nothing happened. I would love to go to an advanced Mutuality workshop where the teachers say "We don't know what you should do, or how to advise you.  Lets look into it together and see what we discover".
 Shinzen Young says, (regarding subjects such as meditation and enlightenment), "To teach is to mislead people". He goes on to say that if you don't teach them anything, you fail to help them. I think you have noticed this problem yourself, haven't you? My life questions have collapsed into one simple question: What shall I do now? If I think too much about this question, then that becomes what I do. Thinking too much. So I prefer to answer that question by doing something. I can learn more by doing than by thinking about doing.
 Can I abide in the heart of consciousness while I go about my everyday affairs? Can I feel that connection to the eternal, the timeless, while "getting things done" in the ordinary world of time? What if people abide in That while asking , "What shall we do now?" What if you ask the question and just listen for an answer? Can you teach people that type of listening? Can you lay down your notes, outlines, and lesson plans? Can you let people just sit in this or another  question and see what arises?
 I know I must sound pretty egotistical to imply that I know better than teachers who have invested much of their lives in training and education in order to serve people in their spiritual unfolding through WDM. Maybe you address this issue in your workshops and hold a space for people for people to find their own way. I don't know. Things may have changed since I stopped attending WDM workshops.
I don't know if I have a better way either.  Most of what I do in this arena amounts to thrashing around, barking loudly. I would go further than Shinzen Young in his generalization and say that "To talk or write, or try to communicate through any words is to mislead people". I should know, I fuck up all the time.
 I have said most of this before anyway. Why do I keep barking at the moon?

Warm regards,

Bapa

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by: Bapa @ Mon Nov 09, 2009 at 07:13:23 AM CST

All teaching is biodegradable (0.00 / 0)

Dear Bapa,

I don't know about this "Only don't know", do you?

Things are not always as they appear.

Is it proper to burn a bridge that has been crossed?

If you are not sure if it will be of use, will you dare?
If you know that it is no longer of use, why would you bother?

There are some things that cannot be said until the time  at which there is no longer any reason to say them.

A man came into the Zen Center smoking a cigarette, blowing smoke in the Buddha-statue's face and dropping ashes on its lap. The abbot came in, saw the man, and said, "Are you crazy? Why are you dropping ashes on the Buddha?"
The man answered, "Buddha is everything. Why not?"
The abbot couldn't answer and went away.

I also have no answer.

Much Love,
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Tue Nov 17, 2009 at 00:13:34 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Zen in Buddhist Context is the Paradox of Both/ And (0.00 / 0)

Knowledge of Emptiness does not wipe away form. Wisdom does not eliminate the skillful means of Compassion.

According to the Great Vehicle of Buddhist Tradition that Zen is part of, The Buddha gave literally thousands of teachings covering numerous topics. If you read all the sutras of Buddha it would take years. It is said that Buddha gave 108 thousand different forms of dharma to meet the needs of different types of people.

Of course those who know, know that despite his words, he never knew anything, which is why he was free to teach. That much they know....

Is it proper to burn a bridge that has been crossed?

If you are not sure if it will be of use to others, will you dare?
If you know that it is no longer of use to yourself, why would you bother?

Emptiness and Form or Wisdom and Compassion cannot be cannot be divided.
The kind of "Not Knowing" of Buddha includes opposites.

To see this as a choice between knowing or not knowing is a form of clinging to the knowledge of "Only don't know," which is clinging to emptiness.  It is to know too much ( or too little). Knowing we don't know frees us to know many things without clinging to them.
If we deny knowing as a stance then this is to cling to the idea that now we "really know" that  "not knowing" is what there is to know, and we cling to that.

When this happens traditionally it is called "Zen sickness".

"Zen sickness" is extremely difficult to cure, because antidotes are discounted as "knowledge" so what can one say? Hence the abbot is at a loss. If such a "sickness" had been the realization of the Buddha even the word Zen would not have been spoken and the name Buddha would not be known.

For more I'd suggest: http://www.darkzen.com/Article...

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by: Krishna @ Tue Nov 24, 2009 at 14:13:50 PM CST

[ Parent ]

no real thing (0.00 / 0)

Hi Krishna-

Your story reminded me of another story I heard related by Alan Watts

Once there was an American tourist visiting a Zen monastery. He had preconceived notions that the Monks were very liberated from religious dogma, etc. So, much to his consternation, he witnessed the
monk who was showing him around, bowing and kissing the feet of every
statue of the Buddha they passed. Finally, after the 23rd kissing of
feet, he said: "Why, your Zen is not as liberated as I thought! I don't understand all this bowing to statues. You might just as well spit on them"

And the monk smiled greatly, a large missing-many-teeth smile, and said:

"Fine, you spits, I bows."

I would like to see that kind of open minded inclusiveness in WDM.
I don't intend to burn any bridges for myself here. I tried that already, charred them but they did not burn. As for burning  it for others, I doubt that I will have that much influence.  Anyway, I don't mean "only don't know" applies to every facet of my spiritual path. I just want to know only that which I really need to know. And to know it for myself, not believe it based on some  teaching or someone else's  authority.  When you say "All teaching is biodegradable" I think I get what you mean- that I can take what I need and discard the rest. But I don't look at excess teaching as simple excess I don't need. I find it distracts me, or even pulls me from my path. You raise a tricky question though, like what would I do with dharma that I find distracting and others find useful. I dont have an answer for that yet.
More to the point, the bridge you talk about depends on trust, and that bridge took more of a beating from my loss of trust than from my attempts to burn it. I see the lack of trust as a bigger issue than my preference for  "only don't know".
You know, I wrote a long email to explain my views on this, and while on my way to finishing it up to post it, life came along and "t-boned" me at an intersection. This event culminated in a shift in consciousness that rendered  my previous e-mail post as useless as pork chops at a vegetarian convention. I'll explain the circumstances without going into details.

I have a coworker at my job whom I have regarded as a friend for the past couple years. She got into a very serious conflict at work with our supervisor. She told me her version of the story, and I found out by doing some fact checking that my coworker had lied to me to keep me on "her side". Besides ripping a hole in our friendship, this lie triggered past memories/emotional reactions from other "betrayals", not only in general, for I have experienced many felt "betrayals", but more specifically some events regarding my oldest daughter. I went through a very traumatic period (over 2 to 3 years) in which my daughter, as a rebellious teenager got into several kinds of trouble and lied to me about almost every part of it.
Like my daughter, my coworker has a quick and creative mind, giving her a talent for lying. I tried many times confronting my daughter with some proof that she had lied to me, only to hear her invent some new lie, which quite often made rational sense, and cause me to doubt my "proof".
When I confronted my coworker with my "facts" in a long and painful conversation, I got a new back up story from her, very plausible on the surface, but no closer to what I considered the "truth". Still, I could not say with absolute certainty that I had the truth. I had to rely on little clues that gave me a gestalt of the situation rather than hard evidence.
Anyway, the events leading to my confrontation with this co-worker, the confrontation itself, and the after effects of my confrontation all proved very painful to me. The confrontation occurred at my work, and I felt like I had lost a good friend, and heaped more trouble on to some one already in very difficult life circumstances. I felt devastated, and I held so  much pain inside me that I wanted to break down and cry. But guys like me don't cry much, especially at work, so I went home with my pain.
This pain had different aspects which entangled me. First, the felt betrayal of getting lied to, and moreover "played" by someone I trusted. This brought up old pain from my past experience with my daughter. Then I felt the guilt over causing pain and grief to my co-worker. I felt guilt over my insistence on the truth. I always think of truth and honesty as the first step toward getting someone to stand in their own power and beginning to act responsible and with integrity. But can you love someone without insisting that they see the truth as you see it?  This question comes from the hard lessons I learned with my daughter.
So to sum up, I felt grief, guilt, anger, sorrow,  resentment, and fear. Yes, lets not forget fear, because this very complicated situation that my co-worker lied to me about did not get resolved in any way after my confrontation with her, but may take weeks yet to resolve. In fact my confrontation may have made things worse. So I had even more difficulty to look forward to- meetings, possible mediation, disciplinary actions against not only her, but possibly against me  also. I can't explain it all without going into very complicated details.

Anyway, at home with all my pain, what happened next?  I want to explain what happened next, but before I do, I want to ask you to do something for me, Krishna. Would you explain the core dharma of WDM to me? I assume I know the core dharma, but I don't know if I could sum it up very well. I would explain it as the three aspects of Waking + Down+ Mutuality, and the meaning of each of those aspects. But I don't know if that would sum up the whole core dharma of WDM. If you could give me an explanation or point to one that I could read, especially one that has a good description of Mutuality,  then I would like to see if a confluence occurs between the core dharma of WDM and my explanation of what happened next for me. I appreciate your indulgence.

Love,

Bapa

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by: Bapa @ Mon Nov 30, 2009 at 09:09:12 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Would you explain the core dharma of WDM to me? (0.00 / 0)

Well, right now I could point you to the glossary on this site:
http://www.mutuality.net/showD...

or to the Orientation course that is available through http://www.wakingdown.org/newc...

or there's the recent call I did:
http://awakenedmutuality.org/2...

Don't know if that's what you mean. It's certainly not something that can be summed up in a sentence or two.
I hope that helps.

Love,
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Tue Dec 01, 2009 at 00:55:36 AM CST

[ Parent ]

my seventh second birth (0.00 / 0)

Hi Krishna-
Thanks for posting those links. I listened to the teleconference call and found it instructive. I also enjoyed checking out the other resources on that site. None of it helped clarify to me, however, how or if the following experience corresponds with the "core dharma" of WDM. To continue my story:
Lying in bed the next day, I had some time to relax. What could I do with this pain? I did not see any way to escape it, because it tied to my responsibilities in life. But as I lay there, feeling the sheer unremitting pain of it, I also recognized that my body/mind lay in the midst of a surrounding field. In that field of silent space, no pain abides, and no memory. I listened for that silence. I felt for that space. I felt the contrast between that uncontained silent space and my contained body mind. something happened in that connection between the container and the uncontained. I felt my pain and thoughts and emotions projecting into that space, as if I existed as both  audience and projector, projecting my movie on a screen. But instead of my movie completely occluding awareness of the screen, the screen had a presence, a there-ness that my movie could not occlude. A transubstantiation occurred, and communion. I felt whole and complete, free of pain. I felt the bliss of communion and deep connection with the living field that enfolds me.
Then, instead of anger, guilt, fear, and the rest, I felt care and compassion for my co-worker, my friend.  I could now act from that standpoint rather than act from the painful emotions that I held earlier. I marveled at how much pain the living field had undone in me. I felt forgiveness as a byproduct, not that I intended or even considered forgiveness,. It just happened that I noticed I had no grudge or anger left in me. I simply had nothing to forgive. Has forgiveness occurred if you feel you have nothing to forgive? Sure, the reality of her lying to me still existed, but instead of pain, I could now feel gratitude because out of that experience  I now felt a deeper connection to that living field. I would not call the living field bliss, either. It has no qualities other than an active potential. It likes me. The living field  catalyzed a change in me, converting my pain into bliss, as a transubstantiation.I did not intend it or grasp for it or even have the idea that it might happen. I did not expect a "spiritual" answer to a very practical, entrenched in reality type problem. Really it reminded me of  the "turnaround"  in Byron Katie's Work, only I did not do the work.  I just got an answer to a question I did not ask. How would I feel without the stress and pain of that story?
I wondered how my life might have changed if I had learned this before. If I could have managed to make that same connection to the living field back when I felt the devastating loss, grief, and anger after my last WDM event. Also I had another experience of "felt betrayal"  just this past year and loss of a path and community and teachers that I had loved for over 15 years. The painful effects from that "falling out" made my WDM falling out look like a polite tea party. I almost wound up in the hospital the next day because of the after effects of that shock. Although both of these events hit me harder than this recent event with my co-worker, I saw no limit in what that living field could transform, only a limit in my ability to connect to it.
Krishna, this changes everything for me. Now I wonder, why didn't anyone in WDM teach me this? Not that you can teach it as a skill, but just like you have talked about it on your recent videos. It exists as an option, a possibility. Just for me to know that it can happen once, means that it can happen again. What a relief to experience that just once!  I wondered, did I just miss this lesson, in all my WDM workshops, discussions, and studies?  I experienced this "turnaround" as a "Great Relief". Did Saniels book with that title mention it?  I read that book at least twice and studied it with a friend in WDM, but I had to check the book again to make sure. No. Not there.  Who talks about this possibility in WDM?
 You have come of the closest of anyone I know in your recent postings and videos. I have you to thank for your recent videos on this topic for  motivating me to focus on that living field.
I know Bernadette Roberts talks about the transmutation of bad feelings into Unity consciousness, but she does not explain how it happens, really, she just mentions it as part of how the "self" gradually dissolves into Unity.
To me, it felt like WDM because the experienced shift in consciousness and perception felt so much like my second birth.  In fact, I remembered after I wrote most of this post that I had re-experiences of my second birth several times. I remember writing about my "third second birth" and my 4th second birth up to 5th or 6th- that happened over a period of months. I quit counting at some point (I like the sound of "seventh second birth" hence the name- more joking than serious) and they quit happening for the past year or so, but this one felt like another second birth that brought me not only into my body/mind reality, but also deep into the full catastrophe of my life in that moment. I don't think any of my previous second births have that same feeling of embodiment into the whole mess of life. Not just my own body/mind, but my entanglements/relationships/responsibilities.  This may explain why I asked you  for clarification about the core dharma of WDM especially regarding Mutuality. I don't remember ever learning this in WDM, except as part of your recent postings.
Maybe this has nothing to do with WDM. Maybe I've gone wacko. But I really feel this as an embodied realization, not as a movement away from my body, or my story, into consciousness.

I realize someone reading this might see irony in that I have complained so much about "too much teaching" and now I have changed to complaining "not enough teaching".  Still I would trade most of the WDM dharma I had to sit through for this simple lesson. After this turnaround, I felt caring, compassion, love, and gratitude. I always suspect people who say " I feel grateful for getting cancer" or having some other awful experience.  Now I have to step forward as one of "those people". I feel gratitude for this very painful experience and to the person who caused me to go through it. Without it, I would not have had that transformation occur, through communion, with that presence. I do not feel gratitude toward my terrible WDM experience and the other recent "betrayal" I talked about above, because no turnaround occurred regarding those events. However I do have to re-evaluate these experiences and all my negative assumptions in the light of this recent "turnaround". It takes away some of my assumptions about those events. I see my part of responsibility for the pain I went through.  I  have already done a lot of work in re evaluating my WDM experience, but I really, really, have a big problem reevaluating the other "felt betrayal" I described that almost landed me in the hospital.  This has very far reaching implications, and dangerous ones, if I forgive, then trust  people whom I regard as "clumsy with power". I remember skating on that thin ice with others  during my time as a devotee of Bubba Da Jones, and among proponents of "crazy wisdom". People get hurt so easily.
I have heard some new-age, lovey-dovey, hippy-dippy philosophy that life only gives you challenges that you have the ability to  handle at any particular time. I find life much more random and chaotic than that. I think life gives me, at random, much more than I can handle, and it does so over and over until what I can handle suddenly expands. And by "handle" I mean something completely different, but I have not found the words for what I mean. I guess I did not handle anything, but something outside of my bodymind in the form of the living field handled it. Maybe next time it won't handle it. I want to make a program of it, bottle it, package it, wrap it like a gift. I doubt that I can though.  I think Chuang Tse, in the following quotation,  expresses something aligning with my thinking without really explaining  it:

Those whom heaven helps we call the sons of heaven. They do not learn this by learning. They do not work it by working. They do not reason it by using reason. To let understanding stop at what cannot be understood is a high attainment. Those who cannot do it will be destroyed on the lathe of heaven.

Anyway, thanks again Krishna, for putting this idea of silence front and center in your resent posts to this site. What you called falling in love with silence I call letting the living field enfold you.
The uncontained  contains all containers. The Condition of all conditions.

Love ,

Bapa

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by: Bapa @ Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 09:26:14 AM CST

[ Parent ]

It's still Waking Down to me (0.00 / 0)

Hi Bapa,

I just returned from a four day senior teacher's meeting and/or retreat of the 10 elders of this work. After returning I can tell that the vision which I spelled out above of "trunk and branches" is my own way of speaking about the way the work is being held at the highest levels by everyone ( or at least very sympathetically encouraged). Each teacher ( including Saniel) might change an emphasis or a detail or two in my description, but it's not all that radical. I think that is important for you to know that. The nature of the teaching community has always been continuing to morph over time at the effect of Mutuality and The Living energies (or Energy) that animates (and is) these bodies. That is the Ultimate Teacher after all.

Okay now, about your reply and questions...

Thanks for describing your experience.  I really appreciate what you've written about it. Sounds like the most current of your endless awakenings.

You write: "Maybe this has nothing to do with WDM. Maybe I've gone wacko. But I really feel this as an embodied realization, not as a movement away from my body, or my story, into consciousness."

My own sense is that you are definitely not wacko and that this is an embodied from of realization. At it is Waking Down. That's how I frame it and live it. How you do is up to you.

I'm finding that in order to comment with any coherence and completeness I'll have to comment in  parts.

1) I hear you.

By and large, many WDM teachers have often emphasized "down" ( and embracing) and "mutuality" at the expense of Waking (and discrimination) , historically there were reasons for this.

The nature of the general teaching has always emphasized different aspects of the process at different times depending on what it appeared the most people needed at any given time and when books are written they reflect that emphasis.

This work started with transcendence, but Saniel Bonder saw that people jumped out of present experience and tended to use their realization as a means of avoidance or denial. So he emphasized "down" and embracing.

That does not mean that the teachers did not "know about" transcending. Being a "waking" type I have always tended to emphasize "transcending in place": that is embracing what is and transcending at the same time. This is also in "6 step recognition yoga" of Linda Groves Bonder.

I do hear you that much of the work in the past has emphasized the "down" and "mutuality". At the same time I've got to say that the "waking" was also there and there are plenty of testimonials for that as well. I've always wanted to emphasize waking because people tended to see Saniel's critique of the hyper-masculine dharma as a critique of all discriminating awareness, which it is not.

As more and more people are moving through the later stages of the process we are finding that the problem for the more mature folks is not about primarily in identifying with feeling ( they are pretty good at that) but in believing that there is anything beyond that. At the risk of speaking for others I'll say that for the Senior Teachers it is simply a very clear truth that there is way more to this process than the pain that some people think is the end to the road. Because we have become so good at helping folks to embrace their pain they seem to think that is all we and this process do. It isn't. For that reason the emphasis in how we teach is changing. There is really no longer any reason to be concerned that our work will merely help people to disassociate from their experience by awakening, so now in the teaching aspect we are leaning beyond this quite consciously.

We still will hold you in the deep feminine, but we will point you beyond this quite explicitly as well.  I always tended to do this, and I hear you that it was not always the case with others, so I do register that and acknowledge your criticism and questioning as valid. At the same time I must be clear that this has always been in the teaching so it's not something new per se, though as a matter of emphasis, I do agree with you.

2) To speak further about WDM I find its necessary for me to define what it is ( according to me).

As I said on the conference call (  http://awakenedmutuality.org/2...  ) "What is Waking Down?".
"Waking down" is a number of things.
- It is a teaching or dharma that was developed by Saniel Bonder (with others) in the early and mid 90's
- It's also an Organic Process. When we speak of "Waking Down in Mutuality" we are not just talking about the dharma or the teaching which is called "Waking Down" but also your own individual unique process that the teaching or dharma serves to catalyze and support.
- It's also a support system of teachers and mentors that use the dharma and respond to your unique process, paying attention to what is organically true for you and assist you in that.
- It is also the community of participants, in that sense everyone involved in this process is "Waking Down in Mutuality" itself.
All of those inform each other and are in relationship. None of them is entirely static, there are mutual framing and feedback loops between all of these.

3) The Teaching or Dharma is not just what you read or hear, it's conveyed in Mutuality.

As I wrote in the post above:  "...the core dharma is not the whole thing, it's just the start of the WDM process of living." and  "Different folks develop differently through the core dharma into their personal dharma..."
For the record: I never meant to suggest that the branches of the tree are or need be dharma or teachings from other traditions, although they can be. They are simply the way our experience of life is not contained within any one particular way of speaking about things as we continue in the 2nd life, they are "off the map".

It does not surprise me that by reading the core dharma you do not find the answers for what you experience now... it is not meant for that. It is a map that gets you to the town, it is not a map of the town.

If you wanted to understand Shakespeare and you didn't find your answers in a book on first grade reading then I'd ask you why you were looking there. I'd suggest you connect with a teacher at the University who knows Shakespeare. All of the teachers ( and most of the current students) know their first grade reading and have built on it to the point where it's just the means they use to communicate what is beyond first grade reading.

In the glossary of this site there is something I wrote:
Waking Down is done in Mutuality with the larger community so that actual comprehension of it is only possible in that context.
It is by nature an experiential teaching and it is not something that can be understood simply by learning the terms associated with the process. We suggest that you use the definitions given below as starting points for explorations in mutuality with others in the process. We especially encourage you to ask WDM teachers about their own personal experience of what you read here. In this way they can pass on to you what is in essence their unique oral commentary, one which eludes the written word and can put flesh on the dry bones of concepts. This is at heart a teaching conveyed in relationship.

4) The whole thing is Waking Down in Mutuality as Spontaneous Revelation.

For years Van Nguyen ( the senior most teacher in the work besides Saniel) has been emphasizing that the most potent forms of the teaching are not just what is laid out by the organization but the spontaneous revelation that this transmission and our awakening in it produce. That is Waking down! Your own confession of how you feel it to be your embodied realization speaks to this.
So the entire process is WDM including not having what you felt you needed in "WDM" as well as the spontaneous revelation of what you received that you clearly see as part of your embodied realization.

It's easy to blame the difficulties of our process on others, especially groups ( we all do it) but at a certain point it has to dawn on us ( and from what I've read you're examining this ) that this is our own process and no one else can claim to be able to give us exactly what we need all the time, and no one can relieve us of our own responsibility in it.  

It's easy to ask why we didn't get something when we now think we needed it. Maybe the easiest answer is just that, "Waking Down" as a community or even a dharma is not perfect and can't do everything for you all the time. It is also just as easy to say that it simply was not the right time. It happens when it's supposed to happen.

How you frame this situation is entirely up to you. I frame the entire thing as this is all my "Organic Waking Down Process" ( the second definition of WDM I gave above) or just "my process".
Why? Because it works for me.

Your disappointment, your spontaneous experience of transcendence us exactly the process that as a WDM teacher I am interested in supporting you in trusting.

The dharma and community are there to help support you in trusting that. We can't possibly "give" you what you need beyond that, no one can.

For more on this I suggest you read my essay on full enlightenment it goes into all this in more detail:  http://www.krishnasatsang.com/...

5) It's just a beginning.

It used to be that WDM was simply Saniel's work. The organizational aspect was his Non-profit "Ma Tam Temple of Being". He was head and center of the organization and the work. That was fine when it started, but the limits of it became clear to everyone involved, especially him.
Six or seven years ago It became obvious that way that the organization was structured was not conducive to unleashing the potential of what was possible for WDM as a work and the teachers as individuals, including and maybe especially Saniel.
The graciousness with which the old was undone and the new came into being was amazing.
About 5 years ago we restructured everything and pretty much started from scratch. The organizations are owned by the teachers themselves which includes ( but is no way especially) Saniel.
Mutuality is the leader, it is truly a different way of being together and we've only now begun to get our sea legs.
Some folks see Waking Down as it presently is as an incredible success. It has already helped countless people into an awakening which has changed their lives and as they go back into life they bring that transmission and awakening to whatever they do.
Some folks feel Waking Down is not yet complete because it needs to develop the forms ( beyond sittings) that people can plug into long after they have had the 2nd birth that can support them into their further awakenings. I tend to feel that way.
We've just begun and I'm glad for what we are now.

6) Finally... If I Can.

Since from you've posted previously you seem to have some Zen sensibility I suppose that I can be frank with you.

Sorry that you didn't get everything you felt you needed when and how you needed it, I certainly wouldn't say that you will in the future either.

If someone wants to be disappointed in WDM they certainly can be.
If someone wants to give WDM the benefit of the doubt and persevere they certainly can.
This is true of life itself.
The questions for me are, 1: Do they know that this is a choice? And 2: what actually is in their best interest?
For me, these are the only questions worth considering and the answers must come from you alone. Then you will have no one to blame or congratulate.

At the risk of sounding like I'm not taking your questions  seriously enough, I would humbly suggest that some ways of framing things are better than others, and they are all frames.

The Rollings Stones have a frame that goes like this "You can't always get what you want..." you know the rest.
It is as a good a commentary on "Trust in Being" as any I've heard. For me, in the end it all comes down to that frame, or none.

If we let go of all frames in this moment, there is nothing to say about any of this. What happened in your process is what happened, there is nothing to complain about and nothing to comment about, it is all just what is. Drawing distinctions between WDM and life is just another way of slicing up the air, all dharma is bio-degradable and this is all useful ( or maybe useless) nonsense.

For me Dharma frames exist to get you trust that you don't need any frame or rather that you can see through and use frames rather than be defined ( and confined) by them. But as soon as anyone frames things whether to question, or complain or praise I have to frame something in order to answer, that is compassion.
Really I don't know what anything is, and neither do you.

I'm really glad you like the videos.

If I can, I will love you and support you and meet you with whatever frame you bring, if I can.

Much Love,
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Mon Dec 14, 2009 at 17:14:42 PM CST

[ Parent ]

out of the bag (0.00 / 0)

Krishna,

I have read and re-read your last post several times and I have given it much consideration. Most of the time, I have to struggle for every little bit of clarity about my life that I attain. What I have to say next requires great clarity, and I have to admit, I don't feel fully up to the task.
First of all, thank you for your very thoughtful and thorough post, I feel welcomed and invited by you. I really, deeply appreciate your efforts here. I could continue this exchange by responding to several of the points you make in your post, but I find most of what you say very agreeable, and I feel compelled to express the reservations I still have about WDM, so I will just comment on that.
You say this in your post:
quote

"If someone wants to be disappointed in WDM they certainly can be.
If someone wants to give WDM the benefit of the doubt and persevere they certainly can.
This is true of life itself."
end quote

I guess I can agree with that, as far as "disappointment" goes. But I need to make a distinction here. Say you have a friendship with someone and you both agree to have lunch together at an agreed on time and place. Then you show up, but your friend does not. Your friend did not call you, but just no-showed. Based on the excuse you get later from your friend, and the length and quality of your friendship,  you may decide to end the friendship, or give them the benefit of the doubt and persevere. This gives us a good example of ordinary disappointment. But say your friend (or better yet, friends) offer you a service, and you pay your friends almost six hundred dollars to provide this service, and your friends try but fail ultimately to deliver this service. Then your friends avoid taking responsibility for this failure, believing that you got what you needed to get, and do not return your phone calls or respond to your emails. This scenario  comes close to describing the "disappointment" I still feel over my WSL weekend that Saniel Bonder, in an email to me, called "disastrous".

You know, I just got a little bit of clarity as I stated to consider whether I could benefit from working with a WDM teacher, and  whether I could do  another WDM workshop. I realized I still have not finished with that last workshop, over three years ago.

You ask these questions at the end of your post:
quote

"The questions for me are, 1: Do they know that this is a choice? And 2: what actually is in their best interest?
For me, these are the only questions worth considering and the answers must come from you alone."
end quote

1: Do they know that this is a choice?
The choice you refer to is whether or not to be disappointed in WDM. Yes, I made that choice. I see it now, although I did not see it at the time. I chose to "leave" WDM in disgust, anger, and the resulting grief and loss. I could have insisted on holding people accountable. I could have demanded a refund. I could have fought to make my own space in the WDM "community", if such a thing really exists.  I see it as my own fault that I handled it badly, instead of resolving it completely, one way or the other. But also, I think teachers have more responsibility than you indicate. I think the type of thinking you describe gives teachers a way of copping out, whether they do so or not. It gives teachers a way to avoid responsibility and accountability.   If they don't deliver the goods at a workshop, they can think that everyone got what they were ready to receive, and it they feel disappointed, that is their choice.

2: what actually is in their best interest? Is it in my best interest to continue working with WDM? Or should I pursue other opportunities for growth and evolution,  that meet my  standards of accountability?  That is the key question for me.
I think you imply something by your last posting  that applies to many other human endeavors: that the more you put into WDM the more you will get out of it. I get that, so I don't have the illusion that I could come back to WDM saying fix me, heal me, teach me everything I need to know, and expect to get my wishes fulfilled. No. I would have to come in ready and willing to undo the damage that resulted from my choices and the choices of others. Ready to ask for what I need and help change the things I see that need changing.

So let me start here, with an outrageous request. How about a refund? You know, I've never asked for one before, even for my Human Sun weekend. I would not ask if I thought I had gotten what I paid for. How would we determine that?  I know of no way, for my part,  except through my own perceptions, thoughts and feelings. I know I got Transmission, but what good did that do me? It all leaked into feelings of betrayal and hurt. I was, as Shinzen Young puts it in one of his talks, a "leaky capacitor" after filling up on Transmission. If I did get value from that weekend, it got buried in the avalanche of hurt feelings, and "unnecessary pain".  So now I see that- a) I never really completely "left" WDM, (otherwise why hang out here and post?) and b) I never really "left" my WSL weekend. Really! I feel a large piece of myself still stuck there, and now trying to get unstuck.  One way or another, I want closure. I realize you will probably say: No. No way. Impossible. Too much time has passed.  Out of the question! Still, I can ask. Even a weak move beats staying stuck.

I realize now that I may have unfairly used your quotes as you may have meant them only to apply to my last complaint about my not learning something essential in WDM. However I felt like it included the disappointment  I have referred to in other postings, (once as "my terrible  WDM experience") , without actually describing. I have the sense that you know me, and think you know the history I refer to. I apologize if I have made erroneous assumptions here. I see now that I got triggered by thinking about this event that I had compartmentalized. I never got over it really, I just put it in the bag I drag around with me. Sometimes something gets out of the bag and bites me in the ass.  Anyway, realizing that, I still want to send it, flaws and all.

Love,

Bapa

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by: Bapa @ Tue Jan 05, 2010 at 08:13:13 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Re; Out of the bag (0.00 / 0)

Hi Bapa,
You said: "I realize now that I may have unfairly used your quotes as you may have meant them only to apply to my last complaint about my not learning something essential in WDM."

Whew, glad you see that.

You also said:"However I felt like it included the disappointment  I have referred to in other postings, (once as "my terrible  WDM experience") , without actually describing. I have the sense that you know me, and think you know the history I refer to. I apologize if I have made erroneous assumptions here."

Yes this is a projection, you are assuming something that isn't really what I said or implied in my response. For the record, I honetly don't know who you are and I was certainly not referring to a specific event when I said that you get what you need.

"I see now that I got triggered by thinking about this event that I had compartmentalized. I never got over it really, I just put it in the bag I drag around with me. Sometimes something gets out of the bag and bites me in the ass. "

Thank you for the clarity, I'm gald you came to that and I appreciate you looking at this.

As for your sense of whose responsibility it is to know how you feel about things... this is all a bit muddy to me because it sounds like a very specific event in which you felt you didn't get your money's worth, so not stepping forward to express how you experienced things and not asking for a refund in that moment sounds like your responsibility to me.

Aside from this particular event  ( from what you've written) I really don't know that I'd agree with your accessment.
As a general principal this work is founded on doing coconut yoga and throughout the years I've seen teachers bend over backwards to apologize to people who were having all kinds of reactions that they were not willing or able to take responsibility for. To be clear, I'm not saying that WDM teachers don't make mistakes, of course they do. Yet my experience working with Spiritual teachers and groups throughout the years is that WDM does way more in the way of inviting people's feedback and apologizing and incorporating it than most groups or teachers would ever consider. In fact if anything, I sometimes feel we go too far in this to the point of enabling.
Sorry to have to be so blunt about it.

Maybe you thought that when you were corresponding with Saniel it was soemhow the same as corresponding with the Institute of Awakened Mutuality, it really , truly isn't. Since WDM was restructed 5 years ago IAM was formed and it has always been a WDM entity in itself.
When Saniel teaches at any of the IAM events he's hired to teach there as an employee, a much honered and loved employee to be sure, but that's it. Saniel is not the head of IAM ( or this work) and despite what people may imagine whatever correspondence you might have had with him, stays with him, he is in no way "in charge", nor is he consulted in the making of IAM policy or procedure.

So as for a refund,  that's not in my hands. Neither Saniel or I would decide that. I would contact IAM or the registrar of the particular event you attended to request that.
If you're not clear about who that would be email me and I'd be happy to  provide it.
I wish you well,
Love,
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Tue Jan 05, 2010 at 12:29:06 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Confidentiality (0.00 / 0)

To be clear, you did take my words to refer to something that they didn't.

Whatever anger you have about a specific experience you had at a specific event is not waht I had in mind when I worte and now that you've brought it forward, it is not something I'd want to comment on here.

Unfortunately confidentiality is a double edged sword, and sometimes I wish I could just lay everything out as I see it, but I can't ...and it kind of sucks.

We've brought the discussion from a conversation about the general frame of reference with which I hold this work ( and my life) to a very specific personal complaint you have about something that happened two years ago, over which I have no control.

Since it seems that you know me, you might just call me. but I cannot give you more than that here.

Love,
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Wed Jan 06, 2010 at 14:48:52 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Let Hertz put YOU in the drivers seat! (0.00 / 0)

Krishna-

I remember this commercial for Hertz rental cars that played on TV many years ago. It showed a convertible car moving along with no driver, then this man in a suit comes down from the sky, floating down into the drivers seat of the car, becoming the driver. A good model, I thought for ego or self identity, especially when noticing how the hurts (Hertz) in life, and the fear and anger that usually results, puts that self identity in the "driver's seat". In each moment, the self identity arrives, arrives, arrives, not ever really "there" but only always arriving.
I have spent so much time and energy wanting freedom from that illusion, thinking of that as the next step in my evolution. I held "no self" as a goal and practiced ways to bring it about, to somehow make it happen. I have dropped that quest recently. Somehow dropping it came about as a  byproduct of my recent awakening. That quest put me at odds with a part of myself. It put me into struggle, suppressing or avoiding manifest stations of self identity. Now I regard my self identity with more affection. I think of it as my "imaginary friend". My imaginary friend tells me the time has come to stop pondering and start writing up my response to your last 2 posts. Okay fine. Sometimes my imaginary friend has a good idea. Sometimes not.

You said this about Saniel:

"Maybe you thought that when you were corresponding with Saniel it was somehow the same as corresponding with the Institute of Awakened Mutuality, it really , truly isn't. Since WDM was restructed 5 years ago IAM was formed and it has always been a WDM entity in itself.
When Saniel teaches at any of the IAM events he's hired to teach there as an employee, a much honered and loved employee to be sure, but that's it. Saniel is not the head of IAM ( or this work) and despite what people may imagine whatever correspondence you might have had with him, stays with him, he is in no way "in charge", nor is he consulted in the making of IAM policy or procedure."

When I last corresponded with Saniel, on a similar topic to this one, he told me much the same thing. That he has entrusted the Institute with general policies and procedures. So I did not do that out of ignorance. I did that because I know a little bit about how power works. Power does not flow only according to policies and rules. I think of Saniel as a 500 pound gorilla. He does not have to sit on a committee, or have an official role in the Institute to have power. He made the Institute possible, and he could reduce it to rubble if he choose to. Just my opinion, but I think much of the authority of the Institute still rests on his shoulders.

I did not plan to ask for a refund when I started posting here. I just came around to that idea recently. I felt on this public forum that I had a voice that I did not have when emailing to the "institute". I felt a little bit empowered. Then I thought, what if people knew what Saniel said to me?  I felt even more empowered thinking I had a 500 pound gorilla in my corner, and I took that idea and ran with it.
Not one of my best ideas, I think now, and I feel a little guilty about it. I owe Saniel an apology because this does break a boundary or trust for my own self interest. I wondered about this when I did it, but I thought "I'm just using one word". Like that makes it OK. As if because I did not just copy and paste the whole email, that I did not break confidence.
No the correspondence I have with Saniel SHOULD stay with Saniel. Unless I ask for, and receive his permission.  Otherwise he can't speak freely or write freely without worrying about getting involved in all kinds of disputes. I can imagine people saying "Saniel said this! Saniel said that!" all the time. I wonder how often it happens.
So forget I mentioned Saniel. Cancel cancel! I fucked up. I'll apologize to him directly.

Now to the topic of responsibility. I think when I expressed my criticism, I kind of "shot from the hip" and you probably felt like my target. I meant to criticize an attitude or position that some people take. I don't mean to say that you have this attitude.  I have seen this attitude in other consciousness groups, and I see it permeating the whole New Age movement. I have seen it in WDM. I have seen it hidden behind phrases just like the ones you used.  I have a very high sensitivity or allergic reaction to the kind of avoidance of responsibility this attitude fosters. I assumed that people who read my emailed complaints about the workshop in question held that attitude, because I got no response to my complaints. I should have kept complaining until I got some sort of response. Then I would know, instead of just assuming. You tell me of  a whole different side of this, of  teachers who "bend over backwards" to address complaints. I did not get to experience that, so I'll believe it when I see it.
Anyway, enough about me. I think I have said enough for now. I know you don't want to comment on specifics, and although I don't know what you meant by "confidentiality is a double edged sword", I still want to protect mine so I'll leave it at that. I think I will contact you directly by email or phone to further this conversation, and also contact IAM, and see what options, if any,  I have for resolution.

Love,
Bapa

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by: Bapa @ Sat Jan 16, 2010 at 09:47:21 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Yes, contact me. (0.00 / 0)

So much of what you relate about what the institute is and how power works in Waking Down is based in assumptions that you have and I can see that I can't possibly convince you otherwise. It's at the point where all I can say is that you can believe what they want.
Being a member of the institute you might think that I might be in a better position to know how the "power" works here. You can believe whatever you wish but I assure you, and I say this with no disrespect whatsoever: Saniel does not run things here, period. Decisions are not run past him and whatever input he would choose to give ( and he is respectful enough of our boundaries to not give much ) they would be not amount to anything like what you are imagining. This is really a unique situation.
One of the hallmarks of mutuality has been the fact that the teachers in this work, especially the senior teachers can and do say "no" to Saniel and disagree with him whenever we feel to. He respects that, and respects us for being in ourselves enough to say "no' him, and we respect him for being the kind of founder who can see that others are his existential, autonomous equals. So we all respect each other and our independent decisions. That is mutuality.
Of course you are free you believe what you will, but it seems futile to have a conversation about it beyond this point.

Oh well...  

Love,
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Mon Jan 25, 2010 at 02:29:05 AM CST

[ Parent ]

do you understand me? (0.00 / 0)

Krishna-
I take it from your response I have not made my point clear about  Saniel. You argue your point from inside the box. The power I speak about, that Saniel carries, comes from outside the box.  Completely outside the organization.
Let me spell out a scenario that may clarify my point.
Imagine a scandal in the WDM community. Something really big involving teachers doing something wrong. Something huge. Forget about my problem. It does not rate. I mean something that rocks the community like the scandal with Eli Jaxon Bear and Gangaji that happened a few years back, involving both sexual and financial mischief. Perhaps even bigger than that though.  This WDM scandal divides teachers and students and the response to it does not meet most peoples expectations or restore their trust.
Then Saniel gets righteously angry with the institute (IAM) and repudiates the whole enterprise. He decides that it has too many internal problems and sees no way people will salvage it, so he disassociates from it publicly, and he starts a whole new teaching organization. Some of the teachers align with Saniel and the new organization, some of the students will also. Does IAM have a non-compete clause?  I doubt it. This further divides the WDM community and organization, resulting in its eventual demise. Thus, my description of Saniel as the 500 pound gorilla.
How does that strike you? It depends on some unlikely possibilities, I know.
1) Huge scandal, with teachers making big mistakes and not taking responsibility.  Possible or not?
2) Saniel repudiating the result of his life's work and starting to build a new organization. Very unlikely. Possible or not?
3) The resulting migration of teaches and students results in the demise of IAM. The likely outcome of the two above unlikely possibilities.
Possible or not?

You say this in your email:
"Of course you are free you believe what you will, but it seems futile to have a conversation about it beyond this point"

In everyday conversations with disagreements like we have here, I would agree with you. But don't we have another possibility here, that of Mutuality? In everyday arguments each side has the goal of convincing the other side of his/her truth. Lack of progress toward that goal makes the argument "futile". I have a different goal, so I do not see this as futile at all. I keep learning from this exchange. I have this goal: I want you to really hear what I have to say. To hear me. To see me. To understand me.

I feel like I understand you, but do you understand me? You live in a world that you have learned to trust. You trust the policies and rules and adaptability of the IAM. You see things in your work that reinforce that trust. So naturally you have belief or faith that the organization will continue to meet your expectations.

I don't have that trust. You may see my scenario as an extravagant paranoid fantasy, but I have experienced disappointments or betrayals of trust at that level and greater than that. I see those possibilities as real because I have seen it and experienced it- not from WDM but in other places. So I hold them as real possibilities for WDM. I don't want to win this argument in the sense of "you have to acknowledge these 3 things as possibilities".  I just want you to understand how I could think about and perceive life in just this way. Because I feel in this email exchange a little  like I felt two years ago. I feel unheard, and misunderstood, by your response. It feels like rejection.  I felt a little anger arising.  I don't hold any of the assumptions that you attributed to me!  I KNOW "Saniel does not run things here, period".  I KNOW "decisions are not run past him".  . I see all that as your assumptions about me. They all come from "inside the box".  And while you may know better than me how power works inside the organization, that does not help you understand how power can change things from outside, in a situation far removed from the kind of courteous  and civil disagreements that may have occurred in the past with Saniel.

Speaking of courtesy, now I look at this email and wonder if I can clean it up. Can I take more care not to issue blame or denigrate you? I would say this: when I use the oft used phrase "in the box", and "out of the box", I don't mean it to reflect superior, open minded thinking, as opposed to "in the rut" thinking. I simply mean you have trust, where I don't. Trust has advantages and disadvantages. I don't mean to put you down for trusting. In fact trusting in someone or someones has the power of making the object of your trust act more honorably. So I would not even say you make a mistake to trust. I have simply had the rug pulled out from under me once to often to trust at that level. I also don't want to put you down for not getting my point about Saniel's power. The possibilities I see may simply not exist for you. I don't find this exchange "futile" at all, but, in contrast, very instructive and helpful. Thank you for taking the time to respond.

I don't speak just for myself here either, but for others who have brought negative or challenging points of view to WDM, and have experienced something that feels like a  very subtle, or sometimes not so subtle, type of rejection.

Do you hear me?

Do you see me?

Do you understand me?

Bapa

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by: Bapa @ Fri Feb 12, 2010 at 13:10:08 PM CST

[ Parent ]

-do you understand me? (0.00 / 0)

Bapa,
Well it seems that you feel I don't, so in my book it doesn't really matter much if I think I do.
You say you feel that you understand me, but I certainly don't feel you do.
Honestly, at this point I'm not sure what the point of all this is.
I was not dealing with imaginary situations. I was addressing the real one that happened with you. At this point that you lay aside reality and bring in a hypothetical and I have nothing much to say about it really. I certainly can and think I do understand your distrust and your ideas of power, and in this case I don't share your sense of things.
You don't trust organizations. That's fine, I'm not the most trusting person in the world either, so that makes sense to me. As you said my experience in helping to create and maintain this organization has produced a real degree of trust. There have been plenty of scandals throughout the years and mutuality is what has got us (WDM) through them. We deal with all these things together. And our turmoil hasn't always been "civil", as you put it.  It has been at least as bad as the things you've mentioned ( with Eli)  and we've hung in and come out on the other end, wiser than before. It's true that I trust, but it's not true that I " trust the policies and rules and adaptability of the IAM." At least not in some abstract sense. Since I and the 3 other teachers  founded and have run IAM  I know that we are in mutuality with the rest of the teachers of WDM ( including Saniel) and I know how we do things. I know how we make decisions. It's not particularly "the organization" ( which is me and my friends) that I really trust, I trust mutuality and what it can do. But that's just me. It sounds like you don't, and I don't expect you to, that's understandable to me.
Okay, but now what? I'm not inclined to try to convince you of anything about this at this point. Is that rejection? I think not. I'm sorry that you feel it is.
This is not mutuality. It's just becoming an argument. If you want to be in mutuality with me give me a call and let's stick with reality about your own situation. I make no guarantee that you will agree with me or that I will agree with you, but I will hear you, beyond that I can promise nothing.
Krishna

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by: Krishna @ Sat Feb 13, 2010 at 23:38:23 PM CST

[ Parent ]