reply to Malcolm's comment

To go to the beginning of this blog and an introduction to the Lifewave cult click here.

Malcolm made some good points in his comment on one of my posts. I replied to his comment but I didn't make a full reply because I was pushed for time and the comments section isn't the best place for a full reply anyway. So in this post I am making a fuller reply to some of the points he made.

Firstly I would like to say that I do believe that his enlightenment was the real thing, just the same as other people who in Lifewave were called Adepts. I also believe that the Lifewave enlightenment is the same as what mystics in different parts of the world have sought and sometimes found. So I'm not saying that his enlightenment is less than other people's enlightenment.

The point I was trying to make is that enlightenment is different from what we were led to believe. His account is valuable because no one else connected with Lifewave has given an account of what enlightenment actually is. That is why I was surprised by his account. Enlightenment seems to be to do with this material world. It seems to be about the perception of the material world, how someone relates to this world.

I expected enlightenment to be about some higher level of reality. I believed at the time that there are many levels of reality (Planes of Existence). There is the material world, which is the lowest level of reality. Then there is the highest level at the other end, you could call that God or Brahman. Somewhere in between is the level of the mind. These kinds of ideas are common in spiritual circles, in the Theosophical Society for example, and in Lifewave too.

He said that he didn't interpret what happened to him as merging with Brahman. However, I think that many people who have had enlightenment do interpret it as merging with Brahman, or union with God. Suzanne Segal seems to have had the same thing happen to her and gave a similar account in her book. She uses the word 'vastness' instead of Brahman or God.

On the 1meditation site they say this: "a desire to get beyond all separation and to merge with the cause of all things". What is the cause of all things? Some would call it Brahman, others would call it God. The Neoplatonists called it 'The One'.

It's a similar idea though. The idea that there is a universal or primordial consciousness and that you are part of it. You are not separate from it. I don't believe in this universal consciousness anymore, but I can see that people would interpret their enlightenment in that way.

Now I would interpret it as a shift in brain functioning. The brain can no longer distinguish between subject and object. Everything seems subject without object, everything seems to be part of you. Nothing seems to be separate from you. I think that ideas about Brahman, very common in Hinduism and New Age movements, derive from a misunderstanding and misinterpretation of this state of consciousness.

In one of my posts I copied-and-pasted something from a forum to do with the inner light. I thought that the writer (mungojelly) had a good understanding of what the inner light actually is. Malcolm replied that it didn't make sense to him.

What mungojelly was saying is that our brains create a model of our bodies and our environment. This model is updated by our sense perceptions. When we meditate we are focusing our attention on something - a mantra or the breath - and ignoring physical sensations apart from that. The model isn't getting updated in the same way and so the model starts doing unusual things.

The example that mungojelly gives is when the breath seems to turn into light. That seems to happen to people when they meditate on the breath, which is common in Buddhist circles. Eric Lerner writes about this in his book. I don't know how it happens with people who meditate using a mantra. I doubt if the mantra turns into light, or sound.

I understand that seeing coloured discs is common. Blue, golden or white usually. Then it seems you end up with an all-pervading white light. I used to think that this light was something spiritual in nature and divine in origin. Now I think that it is just something produced by the brain. That doesn't mean that it is valueless, it can help in entering different altered states of consciousness.

It's an interesting question as to why to begin with the light disappears when you focus your attention on it. That could be because if we turn our attention towards it we are treating it as a sense perception when it isn't that. We are updating the model and because the inner light doesn't derive from our senses then when the model gets corrected it is removed.

Malcolm said that he didn't think that Krishnamurti was as important in Lifewave as I had thought. He could be right about that. The reason why I thought Krishnamurti was important was for two reasons. First, an Adept had said in a talk that Ishvara (John Yarr) had sent someone to talk to Krishnamurti. This person told Krishnamurti that the Buddha of our age had now arrived and was teaching and enlightening people. He meant John Yarr himself.

The story went that Krishnamurti got angry with this person and told him to go. The Adept then said that it looks as if Krishnamurti is a very angry and dismissive man. It's not surprising that Krishnamurti got angry though, he was noted for hating anyone who set himself up as a guru. He was dead against gurus. He must have thought to himself 'Have they understood nothing of what I have said?' He said that he wasn't a teacher and had no teaching and no method (which seems to be not quite true).

The other thing is that when I was in Lifewave in Liverpool in the 1980s we had a little library of spiritual texts. I had a couple of books I didn't want so I donated them to this library. Some time after, one of the Second Initiates wanted to talk to me. He solemnly stated that one of the books was unsuitable so he was returning it to me. I said to him that they probably didn't want the book by Krishnamurti either. I said this because I knew that Krishnamurti hated gurus. To my surprise he said no, the Krishnamurti book is acceptable.

So I was intrigued. Why did Ishvara seem to like Krishnamurti so much despite Krisnamurti hating gurus? It could have been that John Yarr had sent people to talk to many spiritual teachers throughout the world, but it didn't seem that way. Krishnamurti seemed to be important to John Yarr.

Although Krishnamurti said he wasn't a teacher and had no teaching or methods, that's not quite true. Often teachers in the nondualist tradition say the same thing. It's part of their philosophy. If you read what Sam Harris has said about nondualism or Ken Wilber they do say that.

They have something called 'direct pointing' or 'pointing-out instructions'. This is where someone helps you to be aware of your inner consciousness. Then you can focus your attention on that as your form of meditation. I'm sure nondualists will say that I'm misrepresenting what they believe but the less extreme nondualists will accept they do have these practices.

According to Ken Wilber you establish the 'Witness'. The Witness will eventually disappear, and then everything you turn your attention towards will seem to be part of you. I don't know if John Yarr ever received or gave 'direct pointing' or anything like it, or if he just understood the principle and that was a big help to him in getting to enlightenment.

It would seem though that if you want this enlightenment then nondualists techniques would be a big help. It's found in the teachings of Ramana Maharshi, Advaita Vedanta and Tibetan Buddhists. Meditating on the inner light and sound, and entering the various altered states of consciousness is the main thing though. The altered state of consciousness called in Lifewave 'Second Initiation' or 'going beyond form' is what the Theravada Buddhists call the 5th jhana or the Sphere of Infinite Space. That's quite a high one but there are even higher ones.