OK. I've had some chance to read a bit about this spiritualist concept of nondualism. It's much too spiritual for me, since I don't believe in spirits or anything of the sort. >8^)
But one question came to the front everytime I tried to read about it: Why do all these New Thought religions insist that their religious experiences always be _good_ or pleasant? They always talk about being at peace or "at one with the universe" or whatnot. I'm not a big fan of Christianity. But at least, there, when you encounter an angel, it can be very frightening, almost Lovecraftian... and there's all this lore surrounding not being able to look God in the face and such. I've had what I could easily call religious experiences (like the way time slowed to a crawl right before a car crash when I was in high school ... or the near catatonic state induced by Catholic Mass as a kid) and I'd say that maybe 2/3 of them were good or pleasant. The rest were frightening or anxious, especially the "gestalt-busting" ones that caused me to rethink my whole world view. This is why the New Thought religions, including nondualism, seem like advertisements for multi-level marketing schemes... like Amway. Become one of us and you, too, can own 3 mansions and a yaht! They're only one or a few steps more interesting than things like the "prosperity gospel" (http://www.ourladyofperpetualexemption.com/). Why would religious experience necessarily be pleasant or good? (Especially as a former libertarian, the thought of becoming one with he universe is horrifying... It's socialist propoganda! It's heat death! Run! Run towards your perverted individuality!) On 11/02/2015 04:17 PM, Rich Murray wrote:
I enjoyed Friam for a few years -- glad to see a few others have ventured into expanded awareness explorations, like Zen -- shared paranormal experience is core to conveying mysticism -- this is becoming more prominent in recent years with the proliferation of free video teaching, crafted to induce expanded states in the viewers -- just Google "nonduality" ... the style is to deepen the real-time process of intimate communication about moment by moment raw experience, while agreeing on shared positive goals -- this leads to viewpoints and vistas that completely shift and expand human experience beyond the usual limits...
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