Posts by casualmaker13

mistybison said:Reading through your posts, I get the impression that most of you view the spiritual journey as being synonymous with personal religion. If we were to set aside faith entirely—even one's own private beliefs—could we still speak of spirituality? What would a spiritual path look like without faith? Is it even possible for such a path to exist?

It’s just not possible. I mean, without faith, there isn't even a path to walk on.
I guess you have to ask yourself: who would bother walking a spiritual path if they didn't believe it actually existed?😁

Yeah.

Is there anything out there without God?

placidjackal36 said:Drug abuse, insurance fraud, screwing over patients—there's plenty of it out there. I could probably rattle off a dozen more, but honestly, I try not to get too deep into it. It’s better for my own peace of mind. 🙂

And you're spreading more misinformation.
The biggest scam facing patients comes from these so-called scientists and our own medical establishment, which ends up killing millions of people every year through their drugs and treatments. They just can't bring themselves to admit they're powerless against certain diseases, so instead, they run experiments on people—lying to them about being cured while actually shortening their lives.
I mean, nobody else kills that many people in a single year, not even the most hardened criminals.

placidjackal36 said:Actually, he's nowhere near that. What you just described is the most basic essence of pantheism, and honestly, that way of thinking doesn't even square with what humanity knows about the cosmos. Einstein thought along similar lines. Sort of.
But what Simon is getting at is way beyond that.

Well, in a way, it's just a search for meaning. If you look at it as a branch of philosophy—once you strip away all those other branches dealing with world structures, ethics, or politics—it's almost like a philosophically inclined faith.
But a lot of the stuff being churned out on this forum isn't even that; it's just plain old superstition, or sometimes even straight-up scams.

Man, placidjackal36... you're really acting like a big shot when you clearly haven't got a clue.
If there’s actually anyone on this board committing a crime, I guess it would be you.
You’re constantly peddling this pseudo-intellectual nonsense, lecturing everyone else with absolute garbage, acting like you know something when you’re miles away from the actual truth.🙂
Let me break it down for you:
-You’ve wandered into a section of the forum dedicated to spirituality, so all those "scientific" dogmas you love so much don't really fly here.😲
-With arguments this flimsy, you’re mostly just making us laugh. It’s pretty obvious you have no idea what you're talking about, yet you keep trying to play the genius, which honestly just makes me feel bad for you.😂
-Maybe take your "scientific facts" over to a different subforum where they actually matter. If you did, people there would probably worship the ground you walk on and stroke your massive ego.🙏
-By trying to act smart here, you're just embarrassing yourself and bruising your own pride.👎
Looking at your posts, it seems like you didn't catch a single thing Simon was trying to say. Even if you claim your IQ went up, you're acting like a total toddler in this conversation.🙂
Maybe think twice before you type next time.🙂

Ryan Wilson2 said:Oh please, I understand exactly how their minds work. They’ll cling to the label of "dogmatic scientific dinosaur" as their primary weapon when they try to explain away universal connectivity, simply because, hey, you supposedly admitted to it yourself.

Honestly, who cares how our little "man of science" thinks? He clearly doesn't get the subject matter anyway.
He acts like such a big shot over on the physics subforum where he's treated like some kind of genius, but over here, he's just struggling to keep up. I guess he still has a lot of lessons to learn and a fair amount of humbling to do before he can actually wrap his head around what we're talking about here.😉
Maybe he’s improved slightly, though; he isn't being quite as insulting or trashing everything that doesn't fit his specific scientific mold.
Anyway, he's making slow progress, I suppose.😍

Ryan Wilson2 said:Look out that same window and you will see that death is ever-present. Every single life form eventually ends, or survives by ending another. Death is the true universal constant that binds us all together. Does that necessarily mean we are obligated to celebrate Death?

I don't think death is the opposite of life at all.
Birth is just the starting line, and death is when this specific body stops working.
But life itself? That's eternal. It can't be destroyed.
The physical body is mortal, sure, but neither is life nor the soul.
Maybe death is only the opposite of being born.
The truth is, we've existed forever—long before we ever took shape in this particular body.
I guess some people just aren't aware of that, so they just lean on whatever everyone else tells them.
Some folks put their faith in priests, others in scientists, and some in just about anything else...
It really just comes down to what an individual chooses to believe.😁

Edward Foster57 said:So everyone has to help build your vision? Give me a break...
I’d much rather things stayed the way they are—where everyone works on their own vision.

Everyone's supposed to contribute to your vision? Wow...
I'd prefer it if everyone just contributed to their own vision instead of yours.

I'm not so sure about this idea of everyone just following their own little visions.
I mean, if some new rogue dictator decided his personal vision involved, say, wiping out your entire family and all your friends, I doubt you'd be feeling too happy about his "vision."😉

rustymaker5 said:The problem is that people have completely lost sight of Wholeness and replaced it with individualism—but I mean individualism in the worst sense of the word... we've forgotten that through our thoughts, our words, and our actions, we are actively constructing our own relative reality, yet we walk around thinking this reality is some external thing happening independently of us, as if we have no hand in it at all. It’s just this profound alienation from our true Nature, which most people aren't even aware exists...
Once we finally grasp that everything occurring—every single thing—was prompted and triggered by us, and that all events are essentially the byproduct of the combined consciousness of all people, then, and only then, do we open the door to real prosperity.
An individual can't just go out and change external events (since those things were built by all of us together, and none of us alone has grown enough in our own awareness to shift something that was collectively manufactured), so as individuals, we can only, and really we must, focus on changing our own internal experience. Only when every person works on themselves—in terms of ethics and realizing who we truly are by our very Nature—can we reach that critical mass needed for humanity as a whole to make an evolutionary leap forward...

That Wholeness is what some people describe simply: when a butterfly flaps its wings, the entire world feels the ripple effect. 🙂

Hey there! 👍👍👍

I mean, we’re all essentially one, just on this deep, invisible level that most people can't quite wrap their heads around. It makes sense why so many folks don't believe in God, or if they do, they picture some guy sitting way up in the clouds, judging us or handing out rewards. It’s this distant figure they have zero connection with—someone where you basically need a priest to act as a middleman just to handle your sins.
Most of these people just don't see the world for what it really is. I guess they aren't interested in taking the wheel and actually owning their thoughts, words, and actions. Instead, they expect someone else to step in and fix things for them, washing away their mistakes so they can go right back to making the same ones over and over again.
They don't seem to realize that we’re all building our own tomorrows. We actually have the power to change things, but only if we do it as individuals, starting with ourselves.
Honestly, they just need an awakening.
The more of us who turn inward and reconnect with the source, the more things start shifting in the right direction.
That's why it matters so much for us to wake up, work on our awareness, and finally take responsibility for how we show up. If we can focus on creating positive thoughts, emotions, and actions, we might actually build a better world—one that's actually a pretty nice place to live.🙂

shadowcobra13 said:Have you ever heard the story regarding the siddhis and how Patanjali acquired them?

Go ahead, lay it on me. I want to see if our versions match up.

Anthony Fowler83 said:No; but it’s the experience of a very, very good friend of mine. When it comes to spirituality, we don't deal in secrets or make-believe—we just lay it all out there. Hardly anyone believes us, honestly, except for each other, because we’re so transparent about our spiritual lives. And besides, there’s no need to invent anything when everything is already... well, quite incredible and entirely true!
So, the real-life story goes like this:
When my friend arrived for that final TM initiation, bringing flowers and other gifts for the figure in the photo (or maybe his statue, I can't quite recall), he was supposed to repeat some sort of incomprehensible oath to his initiator. Right then, he felt something invisible manifest in the room. It was buzzing—this intense humming that seemed to be clawing at his head, trying desperately to force its way in through his ears, his forehead, his nose... It felt aggressive. My friend instinctively recited a Christian prayer: "Lord, let nothing enter me that is not from You"—thinking specifically of the Christian God—and because of that, that furious buzzing kept hammering against his head, unable to break through.
The interesting part of the story is that the instructor here in the States noticed immediately that something wasn't right. But since my friend had already finished the courses and paid for this initiation, the instructor told him: "That should have been it; you should be initiated now. But I don't know why it didn't work for you; I've never seen that happen before. So, come back for the initiation a second time. You don't need to pay extra; we just want to make sure you are properly initiated."
It just goes to show, these American TM teachers really know exactly what they're doing.

Now that's an interesting one!
Since I went through the initiation myself, I don't remember any specific vows having to be recited. And based on what I've heard from a few friends who were also there, nobody else had anything buzzing around their heads.
Maybe there was just a fly or a bumblebee in the room hitting his head, or maybe your friend just has flies following him around everywhere.😍
I bet those church exorcists helped him out by casting out whatever was wrong, so now he's a true believer and has definitely found God.
That's probably why you never hear about people in churches having flies buzzing around their heads.😁

bluemason3 said:In TM, getting a mantra involves a traditional initiation process (you're offered fruit, you receive a mantra in front of a guru's picture). It’s a classic Hindu ritualistic initiation where someone acts on behalf of a guru to pass down a spiritual legacy. The way they twist the story to claim it's just a formal thing between a meditation teacher and a guru is just nonsense.

The research is questionable.

Most other groups don't feel the need for this kind of pseudo-scientific marketing, so they don't bother researching themselves.

It would be objective if, say, an independent institute studying social movements looked into how meditation affects crime rates. Instead, we have Maharishi's scientists at Maharishi's institute researching the Maharishi effect, only to conclude—using methods and projections known only to them—that crime has dropped, even when police statistics show it's actually higher than it was during the same period last year.😁

TM initiation is just there so you can get the mantra used in the technique. It doesn't require any loyalty to a specific religion or heritage that you don't even need to know anything about. What you're thinking about is a totally different thing.
If you were taken to a church as a kid and baptized, it doesn't mean you're a Christian, especially if you believe in Allah now.😍
Similarly, learning a certain technique doesn't instantly change your faith or your religion.
As for the research, well, all scientific research is subject to questioning, isn't it?
The only things that are truly questionable are those other techniques that haven't been sufficiently studied, which allows people to sell "foggy" techniques that are terrified of actual research that might expose them.
Since you clearly don't have a clue about these studies, maybe it would be better not to spread misinformation based on nothing but assumptions.
I get it, you probably wish the techniques you personally use had been studied too, because I can tell you're not entirely sure they actually work. But there's no need to be bitter about it.😉
If you're going to be interested enough to talk about it, maybe try to learn a bit more first so you aren't just talking for the sake of talking. It'll look better next time.🙂

bluemason3 said:Every religion with a heavy preaching or expansionist streak pulls the same stunt: they aggressively smear things they don't understand using heavily ideological stances, a mountain of prejudices, and incredibly childish arguments.

That applies here with TM when it's promoted through cheap tactics (like those highly questionable scientific studies or pretending it isn't a spiritual/religious movement), but this current take (much like plenty of other "official" statements from church sheep) is pretty mindless as well.

Look, TM is just a technique, not a religion or some organized movement. You should be mature enough to know the difference.
The fact that some people who learn the technique end up following everything else being pushed on them is a different story entirely, and hey, that's their own choice.
The truth is, this is one of the most heavily researched meditation techniques out there, with proven benefits documented in over a thousand papers.
Of course, people from other religions or those practicing different meditation/relaxation methods get jealous. They're envious because there's little to nothing scientific research on their specific practices, so they aren't even sure if they actually work or if they're just spinning their wheels.😍
As for objectivity, you could nitpick the objectivity of any study ever. Doctors study their field, scientists study theirs—if we went by that logic, everyone would be considered biased.

Casey Morgan26 said:Is this meditation practice actually as beneficial as all those "scientifically proven" studies claim, or is it just another massive scam?
I can't help but wonder why, in the West, there seems to be such an obsession with researching TM specifically rather than looking into other meditative traditions.
Does TM actually end up doing more harm than good?
And don't even get me started on the whole philosophy behind it... it feels like a twisted version of Hinduism, especially with their claims that Hinduism and all other religions are fundamentally flawed.

Look, if you're that terrified, maybe it's better to just stay far away from this weird stuff. You could always just grab your rosary, head to Mass, and then follow that up by seeing your doctor for a handful of pills. Then you'll be all set. 😍😂
You'll feel like a brand new person tomorrow! 😉

shadowcobra13 said:Just hoarding information isn't freedom, and that’s the crux of what knowledge actually is. Knowing is what liberates you. There is a massive distinction between collecting data and actual understanding. Learning is necessary up to a point, but eventually, you have to stand on your own two feet. No one can hand you a certificate of completion because, let me repeat myself, everyone's path is unique. If you spend your time following someone else's map, you aren't living your own life—you're just playing a supporting role in theirs.😉

To me, there isn't much difference between having information and actually possessing knowledge.
And as for the path? A path is just a path. You can hack your way through a dense forest and move at a snail's pace, or you can stick to a well-worn trail, or maybe jump on a high-speed interstate. Even if two people end up on the same road, their experiences and what they learn along the way will be totally different. They might not even end up at the same destination.

jademarlin26 said:Where exactly is the knowledge in what you're claiming? Where does it actually differ from simply taking someone's word for it?

Real knowledge comes strictly from experience and actual insight—you know, through doing the work on yourself. That's the only way you can actually verify if what you read in some book or heard from a guru is even true.
If you don't know anything, you can't confirm a thing.
If you don't know anything, you're just stuck in ignorance.
And if you don't know anything but you *think* you do? Well, then you're just living in a total delusion.

shadowcobra13 said:Look, sure, learning from others is useful to a point. But eventually, it just becomes a burden. You end up feeling like you're just a tiny cog in some collective identity. Everyone’s path should be untrodden because we are all unique individuals. Categorizing states of consciousness? Honestly, that's unnecessary if you're actually doing the work on your own consciousness. That's just ego stuff—trying to feel "accomplished" when you experience or imagine a shift, or just giving the mind something to play with.😉

I mean, states of consciousness are really just signposts along the way—they're there so you don't get lost and actually know where you're headed.
If you're just wandering through a fog, you could spend years drifting aimlessly.
Besides, they serve as a way to confirm you're actually making progress.
You could tell yourself you've reached the "7th stage," but if you can't actually prove it, that's just self-deception or plain old lying to yourself.
It's the same as "working" on your spiritual growth for years only to realize you haven't moved an inch.
It's like spending years looking for the ocean in the middle of Kansas; you're never going to find it there.
Knowledge doesn't enslave you—it sets you free. Ignorance is what leads you straight into an illusion.

shadowcobra13 said:...there aren't any foolproof recipes here. Experience is purely subjective and can't be transmitted with total precision; it's shared through analogies. The moment you try to grasp someone else's perception, you risk limiting your own, because expectations act as a filter.🙂

I don't know, I think there actually are recipes, written down by people who have been right there in those states themselves.
Beyond that, every book is basically a recipe. Everything anyone teaches you is a recipe, since they learned it from someone else, too...
That’s why you need practice and experience to let things finally crystallize.
I mean, you aren't limiting yourself as long as you stay open.
Other people's experiences are really just guideposts; you can use them if you want, or you can just pass them by.
If you start with zero knowledge, you won't even realize where you're headed or what's happening.
Ignorance is like driving through heavy fog in the middle of nowhere—you can't see a thing.
And these states of consciousness? They're defined by someone's vision and experience, which has then been verified by a few others who reached that same level.
You can choose to believe that, or you don't have to. It's up to you.
Look, you can tell what someone is capable of if they're in the 6th state of consciousness—things like being able to think anything into existence, being in two places at once, creating something out of nothing, walking through walls, being invisible, flying, and so on...
If someone can't do those things, then maybe they just aren't in that state of consciousness.

If we’re talking about differences, I mean, everyone is different. Every single individual is a total one-off; you won't find two identical beings on this planet.
But then again, maybe we're all just parts of one big whole that we came from and eventually return to.
I guess it really just depends on which angle you're looking from.