Who’s the “most spiritually” developed person in the public eye?

[Jahmaine]

Who do people think has developed the most spiritually and by what criteria? 

 

Not asking whether you think it’s important or not or whatever other irrelevant stuff people like to say when asking a question. It’s just an open question, I’m curious at what people think and why they think it.

[LfcCharlie4]

Any of: 

Rupert Spira, Francis Lucille, Adyashanti or Sadhguru (although he dumbs his teaching down a lot)

Quote simply they are fully self-realised beings who have realised the true nature of themselves, abide there and have integrated this into their lives. 

[Jahmaine]

How about Eckhart or Dalai Lama? Or Leo?  What do people feel like Leo would have to do to reach such a stage, he puts soo much effort in with these “advanced” techniques. Did everyone else just get lucky? Did they just get it quicker?

3 minutes ago, LfcCharlie4 said:

Any of: 

Rupert Spira, Francis Lucille, Adyashanti or Sadhguru (although he dumbs his teaching down a lot)

Quote simply they are fully self-realised beings who have realised the true nature of themselves, abide there and have integrated this into their lives. 

 

[Preety_India]

 

I would recommend these people. They have influenced me a lot. 

I look up to them 

Rupert Spira 

Adyashanti... Even his voice is spiritual lol. 

 

Eckhart Tolle 

 

Dalai Lama. 

 

I mean these people have done years of self awareness and meditation. 

I also periodically read Buddha's quotes and they are very spiritual and resonate with the wisdom of life. 

Lot of these gurus constantly appear on Oprah's channel OWN and they have their own YouTube channels as well. 

So yea you can read and listen to their podcasts in your free time. 

They are awesome and deeply spiritually gifted in my opinion. 

 

 

[traveler]

Levels of spiritual development is just a story. It's part of the game. Degrees of enlightenment is really interesting for the ego. The ultimate specialness. You project the need for specialness onto the "teachers," and see them as all knowing Gods amongst men. Separation at its finest form, tricky trap.

[LfcCharlie4]

@traveler Not at all, some people are genuinely awakened more deeply, and know their being more clearly. 
 

Watch a Tony Parsons video, and then go and watch a Francis Lucille/ Ramana Maharishi video you’ll notice subtle differences. 

@Jahmaine I think Leo has certainly had many many awakenings on his trips and what not, but I’m not at all convinced he abides there in his sober/ natural state,  could be wrong. 
 

im not sure “why”, I would include Dalai Lama, hut again like Sadhguru, he has to dumb most the teachings down as he’s such a mainstream figure. I also imagine being a monk for that long can create several shadow issues, such as sex. 

 

In regards to Eckhart I love him, I used to watch him everyday a couple of years ago and read all his books time after time, power of now was like my bible ? 

However, I do not feel hes as deeply awakened as say Francis and Rupert from what he says and what not. 
 

Those 2 go way deeper than Eckhart and kind of go beyond his message. Although I think he’s the perfect bridge into this work for the mainstream. 

[Leo Gura]

The mistake here is speculating about the levels of consciousnes of people you don't really know.

The correct answer is: you are just guessing. And that's a dangerous game to play as you could easily be wrong.

So be careful. You could really get screwed up that way by assuming too much. You are not in a good position to judge anyone's level of realization until you yourself are deeply realized. And even then it's tricky.

[Preety_India]

49 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

The mistake here is speculating about the levels of consciousnes of people you don't really know.

The correct answer is: you are just guessing. And that's a dangerous game to play as you could easily be wrong.

So be careful. You could really get screwed up that way by assuming too much. You are not in a good position to judge anyone's level of realization until you yourself are deeply realized. And even then it's tricky.

You can never find any person who is totally perfect in the whole universe. 

One can't decide the levels of consciousness. That would be like a judgement game. Also the people who appear highly conscious today might end up doing something low conscious tomorrow. Nothing is certain.

I understand that we can't use labels like "most spiritual" because that really doesn't stick but there is no other way of wording it. 

Following a guru begins with a certain level of trust which is necessary or else it creates an inertia of boredom, no anticipation, nothing to be excited about. 

It's a different thing  if the trust gets broken which should be accepted as the natural course of things.. 

Only hero worshiping is dangerous. 

But don't see the danger in following public figures who have displayed high conscious behavior and good quality teachings for years. 

 

Edited April 17, 2020 by Preety_India

[Salvijus]

2 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

The mistake here is speculating about the levels of consciousnes of people you don't really know.

The correct answer is: you are just guessing. And that's a dangerous game to play as you could easily be wrong.

So be careful. You could really get screwed up that way by assuming too much. You are not in a good position to judge anyone's level of realization until you yourself are deeply realized. And even then it's tricky.

Beautiful

[The observer]

11 hours ago, traveler said:

Levels of spiritual development is just a story. It's part of the game. Degrees of enlightenment is really interesting for the ego. The ultimate specialness. You project the need for specialness onto the "teachers," and see them as all knowing Gods amongst men. Separation at its finest form, tricky trap.

amen to that!

[LfcCharlie4]

@Leo Gura  Very true, although I feel there's obvious markers. 

The easiest one is those teachers who clearly haven't awakened to love. 

Even then it is a guess. 

But, I think you'll agree in regards to Love, many teachers either don't talk about it/ neglect it, usually as they haven't awakened to it themselves. 

[Barna]

I think it's a pretty useful question. We just have to utilize it in a useful way.

Comparing degrees of consciousness is silly when the ego turns it into a dick measuring contest. But this is not the only way to look at this question.

For example, if you want to find a new master for yourself, then it's pretty useful to ask the public's opinion. Because you can find new names that you have never heard before, or you can see some old names that you can see from a new light, considering other people's perspectives and arguments.

I have no idea which masters had the deepest realizations. I think you can't know that without meeting them face to face.
But you can see, even from videos, which masters have integrated enlightenment the most into their personality and into their teachings.
And I think the clear winner here is Adyashanti.

I've been in the spiritual search for many years, and for many years I didn't resonate with Adyashanti at all. I think he is like olives. Your taste has to mature to be able to like it.  

Edited April 17, 2020 by Barna

[wavydude]

What does it mean to be "more spiritual" ? I though that there's either realization of no self or there is not and all othere developments are within the person structure. 

[Leo Gura]

12 hours ago, traveler said:

Levels of spiritual development is just a story. It's part of the game. Degrees of enlightenment is really interesting for the ego. The ultimate specialness. You project the need for specialness onto the "teachers," and see them as all knowing Gods amongst men. Separation at its finest form, tricky trap.

Except there are many different levels of consciousness. There is an extraordinary range. Has nothing to do with specialness.

44 minutes ago, LfcCharlie4 said:

@Leo Gura  Very true, although I feel there's obvious markers. 

There are some markers, although they can only be really understood once one has awakened pretty deeply.

Quote

The easiest one is those teachers who clearly haven't awakened to love. 

Even then it is a guess. 

But, I think you'll agree in regards to Love, many teachers either don't talk about it/ neglect it, usually as they haven't awakened to it themselves. 

Even that is tricky because people understand love in different ways.

But I generally agree that Love is a very distinctive level of awakening which many lack.

It's also possible they don't talk about it so that you can discover it on your own because love can be a very misleading notion for the ego-mind. Talking about love makes people think love is a personal feeling or something like that.

[The observer]

9 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Except there are many different levels of consciousness. There is an extraordinary range. Has nothing to do with specialness.

this is only true when in duality by creating points of reference for the higher levels. levels only exist in gods imagination 

[Leo Gura]

4 minutes ago, The observer said:

this is only true when in duality by creating points of reference for the higher levels. levels only exist in gods imagination 

No

Consciousness is capable of being infinitely self-aware or not, and an infinite number of degrees in between those two.

Wherever you are, you're always at some level. You are closer to zero consciousness than infinity right now.

[mandyjw]

When sizing up teachers, don't just look at the teacher or what the teacher knows, look at the negative space in between or you might miss the whole lesson. 

 

[The observer]

9 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

No

Consciousness is capable of being infinitely self-aware or not, and an infinite number of degrees in between those two.

Wherever you are, you're always at some level. You are closer to zero consciousness than infinity right now.

ok but whos imagining the levels but consciousness? its one consciousness imagining zero to infinite levels 

Edited April 17, 2020 by The observer

[Leo Gura]

8 minutes ago, The observer said:

ok but whos imagining the levels but consciousness? its one consciousness imagining zero to infinite levels 

Oneness

Consciousness becomes more or less conscious, like how light can get brighter and brighter.

[electroBeam]

On a practical level, each teacher's level of realisation is relative to the unique self. 

Each of us are in parallel realities, communicating to each other from different dimensions. This is because the universe's structure literally warps based on our ego structure. We are all on earth, but earth is completely different for all of us. For some of us, the earth is even flat. Fundamentalists are living in a completely different reality to say Bill Gates. The earth being flat is not flat out false, actually its as false as the earth being round. What determines whether the earth is flat or round, is purely determined by ego structure alone. I'm not making a false equivalency claim, within certain paradigms and universes, the laws and structure needs to adhere to certain form and consistency, but such consistency and form exists for a flat earth. It existed in the Roman times and pretty much for most of human civilisation. The earth literally was flat back then, that was fact. Its not like it was round all along and they didn't realise it, no, rather the earth was literally flat, that was the truth, and the truth changed once people in the 1500s jumped to a different paradigm. When we discovered that the earth was round, that wasn't a discovery, but a change in ego structure, and a literal change in how the universe works. And it goes much much further than this. You're living in a reality so vastly different to your mother that if you ever shape shifted into your mother somehow, you would not recognise the earth, and go insane. 

And these distortions are so vast, that they even distort the level of realisation of a particular teacher. 

A teacher is not real, a teacher is completely imagined by You. Everything about that teacher's life, mystical experiences and teachings are completely imagined. And the level of realisation is also imagined. 

Its completely possible for a 1 teacher to be legit for 1 person, and not legit for another. That's because there is no objective reality. Objective reality is not true, and is relative to how you see the world. 

You're the one who makes up how realised a teacher is, and how much that teacher can help you in your spiritual journey. No one can really tell you how realised a teacher is, because they aren't making up how realised the teacher is, that's what you're doing. 

So when picking the best teacher, pick the one that that 'feels' the best, pick the teacher that reminds you most of why you got into this work in the first place. The one that makes you feel a knowing, a being, highest truth, and spirit. 

And the level of realisation of a teacher or teaching will literally change as you travel along this journey. That's not because the teacher is changing, but because your ego, and therefore world, is changing. This is a natural part of shedding the ego and egoic evolution. 

EDIT: to get a shorter version of the above, look at mandy's comment.

 

Edited April 17, 2020 by electroBeam