Sunmaster14

24 years ago, when I was 23, I travelled with my best friend to Amsterdam. We decided to try psilocybe mushrooms for the first time. At first we were enjoying the kaleidoscopic effects, but soon it got a lot deeper than that. As I was sitting cross-legged on a chair, I closed my eyes and felt a powerful pull towards a big black nothing inside of me. I knew it was decision time. Try and fight it to keep my identity intact, or let go and surrender to whatever comes. I let go. Soon, a massive energy started to build up at the base of my spine. Moving, contracting, expanding, growing and rising. I kept just witnessing in wonder. When the pillar of energy reached my throat, I had one more moment of hesitation (will it suffocate me if it goes through my throat?). Again, I decided to surrender and accept whatever comes. The next thing I remember, was this pillar of energy shooting up into my head and exploding in white light. It was as if I've been wandering through life in darkness up to that point, holding only a candle to show me the way. Now, everything, EVERYTHING was illuminated. Knowledge simply poured into me. Although a lot more information was "downloaded", what I managed to retain afterwards was enough to completely change my life. I considered myself an atheist up to that point, but afterwards I could no longer deny the existence of AllThereIs. Since I had no idea about what had just happened, I started diving into any book about spirituality, philosophy, religion, Self-Help, psychology, mysticism and and and. Concepts that would have been far over my head before, I could now understand effortlessly. Is this experience enlightenment? No, I don't think so. An awakening, yes, definitely. I spent the next 20 years feeding off of this experience, working on myself, my shadows and my relationships. I got married and established myself quite successfully in the material world by doing something I'm passionate about. But eventually I realized that this wasn't enough for me. The progress was steady, but it wasn't the main priority in my life. This changed when I started to practice Kriya Yoga every day. Personally, I think this is an essential component in my development. In terms of Spiral Dynamics, I would say I spent 20 years establishing a strong foothold at Yellow and now I'm starting to get more familiar with Turquoise. The Kundalini awakening was a peak experience which propelled me from Green to Turquoise, but I had to put in a lot of work over many years to reach Turquoise again. This is not to say that kundalini automatically awakens by using psychedelics. In fact, while I was experiencing infinite bliss, my friend had quite the opposite trip. He was holding on to his ego for dear life and was panicking. I had to force myself to "come back" and reassure him. You can not force Kundalini to awaken. Even if you practice kundalini yoga for many years, there is no guarantee. Kundalini has its own mind and agenda. If and when she comes, is on her own terms. You can lay the foundations for her by living in a certain way, but her appearance is ultimately down to her Grace and Blessing. Hope this helps.

No, it wasn't.

Less enlightened? Or do you mean fewer enlightened female teachers?

Ok, but awakening and enlightenment are not only restricted to religious communities. Traditional monastic circles may be biased towards men, but nowadays there are countless other sources of wisdom available to the honest seeker, male and female alike. The question is, if there seemingly are more females at the base of the spiritual quest, why are there predominantly males who emerge at the top? Do females get stuck somewhere in between? Seems unlikely. Are they prevented from going higher by society/religion/history? I very much doubt that. Are they more at ease serving All-There-Is from behind the scenes, rather than becoming leaders? I think there is some truth to this.

I never said I believe men are more non-dual than women. That would be silly. Nor do I try to push a gender agenda by creating neat and convenient boxes. My question arises from a simple observation, which can be verified whether you're male or female biased, whether you're on the red, blue, orange, green or yellow stage: The vast majority of spiritual masters/teachers are male. This has nothing to do with some kind of pride or sense of superiority as you're implying. I'm well aware that gender is transitory. I'm male today. I was and will be female in another incarnation.

That is true. The workshops or retreats I went to in the past were always prevalently more female than male, and out of my friends and acquaintances interested in spirituality, most are female. The historical issue as put forward by a poster here (women being ostracized by patriarchal societies) certainly played a role in all of this, but has so less and less in the past 50 years and in my opinion doesn't explain the male/female distribution in spiritual leading positions today. Not that I think there's anything wrong with it, or wish it could be any different than it is.

Yes, this makes a lot of sense to me. Thanks

Agree.

Where did you get this notion from? It's not like that on a biological level, nor on a psychological level. Do you mean strictly on a spiritual level?

Because I would look silly without them.

Sorry, I didn't mean you personally, I was speaking generally. I think a site such as this will attract mainly second tier thinkers, and thus should be pretty immune to baseless conspiracies and "green stage" gender social warriors. That's why I registered and why I felt save in asking my question.

If there is one place where we can have a rational, civilised conversation about controversial topics, I sure hope it's here! I agree that awakening belongs to everyone, but fact is that today's spiritual leaders and masters are predominantly male, and I'm curious to know why that is so. I need no woke gender drama and feminist conspiracy theories. I'm looking for the highest possible perspective.

@Proserpina yes, I believe this reasoning goes in the right direction. I think it's interesting though...of all the teachers and masters I've studied, only a handful were women.

Hi I'm pretty new to Leo's YT channel and forum, but not new to spirituality and psychedelics. While watching the Spiral Dynamic - Turquoise video, I was reading some of the comments. One in particular made me think. It was by a woman complaining about the lack of females at the higher levels. It was quite obvious that she was coming from a green perspective, citing some kind of improbable male conspiracy as a reason for this inequality. Still, it seems to be true that of all the turquoise leaders/gurus/teachers, perhaps 90% are male. My personal explanation is that maybe a male incarnation is more conducive to reach higher states of consciousness. Or maybe being male drives one to actively seeking these higher states more than being female. That, paired with the male tendency to "stand out" and be a leader (as opposed of the more female trait of working behind the scenes in a community), could be the underlying reason for it. Just an idea....a work in progress. Curious to see what others think.