I Asked Peter Ralston About Psychedelics, Here Is His Response...

[undeather]

9 minutes ago, Anon212 said:

That's not true bro, I'm pretty sure people like Ram Dass, Eckhart Tolle, Rupert Spira, Alan Watts agree on their spiritual viewpoints. They really do seem to fully agree with each other.

You mention 4 spiritual popstars and even those would not agree with each other frequently. 
Broaden your horizon. The spiritual beef about who is actually "right" has been going on since the old sages of the Indus-valley were dissing each other in sacred texts. Take one master out of each buddhist traditon (theravada, mahayana, zen, tibethan..) and it would end with a lot of bloody noses...
 

Edited August 4, 2023 by undeather

[Water by the River]

19 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

You will never get 100% agreement with spiritual masters. None of them even agree with each other. That's been my experience. I don't think I've ever found 2 spiritual masters who fully agree with each other. What does that tell you?

Hm... I do see if they point at the moon. And I know if they have seen fully seen the moon and know what they are talking about. Or not.

If they have fully seen it, they all align perfectly. The language and pointeres are vastly different, just take Buddhism pointing more from the Emptiness- or Madhyamaka side, and Vedanta pointing from the Eternal Consciousness side. But having seen the moon, one can tell if they talk and point to the moon.

Doesn't matter if they are dead since 1000 years...

Why is that? At the moon, all duality or concepts or pointers collapse. Since they all only have meaning because they have an opposite. And Reality doesn't have an opposite. Yet, it can be pointed to. And these pointers can be evaluated.

They disagree on relative stuff for sure, where they can be blatantly (!) wrong (see for example Zen at war, Victoria).

On the Absolute, they align. If they have realized it.

Water by the River

[Leo Gura]

15 minutes ago, Water by the River said:

If they have fully seen it, they all align perfectly.

That's just not the case.

15 minutes ago, Water by the River said:

The language and pointeres are vastly different

This issue goes beyond pointers, to substance.

[Leo Gura]

45 minutes ago, Anon212 said:

That's not true bro, I'm pretty sure people like Ram Dass, Eckhart Tolle, Rupert Spira, Alan Watts agree on their spiritual viewpoints. They really do seem to fully agree with each other.

I was exaggerating a bit. You can find some guys who agree -- especially if they are all from a similar tradition or school -- but you can also find lots of disagreement. Especially if you actually forced these guys to sit down and have a serious discussion about it between themselves.

Often the disagreements are buried and require a lot of experience to start to notice. If you're new to this work it all tends to sound the same.

Just as an example, if you ask Ralston about Sadhguru he will say he's not enlightened and that yoga will not produce enlightenment. Rupert Spira says that solpsism is madness. Ramana Maharshi says there are no others. Rupert Spira says consciousness is love, Ralston says love is just an emotion. 

So who is right?

Edited August 4, 2023 by Leo Gura

[Buck Edwards]

15 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Just as an example, if you ask Ralston about Sadhguru he will say he's not enlightened and that yoga will not produce enlightenment. Rupert Spira says that solpsism is madness. Ramana Maharshi says there are no others. Rupert Spira says consciousness is love, Ralston says love is just an emotion. 

So who is right?

You're putting me in a mindfuck now. 

 

[Leo Gura]

I once showed a video of Sadhguru explaining Mahasamadhi. Ralston said it was stupid nonsense.

Who is right? And more importantly, how do you decide that?

What happened to me is that I studied so many different gurus and traditions that their contradictions became unbearable to me.

Edited August 4, 2023 by Leo Gura

[Buck Edwards]

@Leo Gura this is a problem even with doctors and scientists. You're always going to be dealing with people with different beliefs and opinions once you have a bunch of them. This is not limited to spirituality alone, it's a universal human problem. 

Comes with the territory. The only thing anyone would need is just open mindedness. 

 

[Water by the River]

14 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

That's just not the case.

Then let me have the cases which you consider fully enlightened that don't align. I will try to align them and their pointers if the pointers are about the Absolute, and the examples know what they are talking about.

"Rupert Spira says that solpsism is madness. Ramana Maharshi says there are no others. Rupert Spira says consciousness is love, Ralston says love is just an emotion. "

I could align that. All 4 cases know what they are talking about. 

Spira: Solipsism from the perspective of an unenlightened separate self is madness. From the unenlighened mindstream Solipsism is just not true, because the "I" refered to is not the Absolute, or Impersonal Infintie Consciousness, Reality itself.

Ramana: From the Absolute perspective there are no others. But that needs Enlightenment, and a deep identity shift towards Infinite Impersonal Consciousness, Reality itself. If one is then inclined to talk fully from the Absolute Side of the street: No problem.

Spira: Consciousness is love: Ones True Nature, Impersonal Infinite Consciousness opens the mindstream towards love and bliss, or loving all that is and arises. Very clear once enlightened.

Ralston: Love an emotion in the meaning that some mindstreams show a little bit of it sometimes, others more often, the permanently enlightened mindstream needs that as basis to stay enlightened/awakened, but also produces that love as result of staying in ones nature on a consistent basis. It is a perspective on love as state that can dominate a mindstream or not.

Water by the River

[Buck Edwards]

3 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

What happened to me is that I studied so many different gurus and traditions that their contradictions became unbearable to me.

That's completely understandable and reasonable too. 

 

[Leo Gura]

1 minute ago, Buck Edwards said:

this is a problem even with doctors and scientists. You're always going to be dealing with people with different beliefs and opinions once you have a bunch of them. This is not limited to spirituality alone, it's a universal human problem.

Yes, of course.

And historically all religions have disagreed with each other.

[Water by the River]

3 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

I once showed a video of Sadhguru explaining Mahasamadhi. Ralston said it was stupid nonsense.

Who is right? And more importantly, how do you decide that?

On Sadhguru I have big doubts, yet I don't know him in detail. And even then: What is the big importance of Mahasamadhi? Is Absolute Reality not always already here eternally? 

[Water by the River]

5 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

What happened to me is that I studied so many different gurus and traditions that their contradictions became unbearable to me.

They align in the Absolute (by definition), if they have realized it. By definition, because there can only be one Infinite Absolute. And if they have realized, their pointers need to point in the same "direction".

They disagree on their understanding of the mechanisms of form/appearance. As is to be expected.

That is also a nice indicator to see if we are talking about the Absolute, or relative stuff... and that is where much of the confusion and perceived non-alignment comes from.

Water by the River

[Leo Gura]

@Water by the River I don't want to play games with you. If you are serious I suggest you study various teachers and keep your mind open to the idea that they might not all be pointing to the same thing.

That is the really juicy possibility. Your mind will tend to see what it is looking for. If you want to see sameness you will see it. If you want to see difference you will see it.

Edited August 4, 2023 by Leo Gura

[Water by the River]

1 minute ago, Leo Gura said:

@Water by the River I don't want to play games with you. If you are serious I suggest you study various teachers and keep your mind open to the idea that they might not all be pointing to the same thing.

That is the really juicy possibility. Your mind will tend to see what it is looking for.

I did Leo. For a long time. When they are fully enlightened and point towards the Absolute, they align. If they point to relative stuff, even the fully enlightened ones can disagree.

I know it is difficult to align all these traditions and teachers. I know what confirmation bias is, but I also do know what they are talking about. And if they are "there" or not.

Since you ask me to keep an open mind on that, I kindly ask you to do the same.

Water by the River

[Anon212]

@Leo Gura Fair enough, but often these guys can say stuff that's appropriate for a particular group of people at a particular time. For example, Rupert Spira might say solipsism is madness to prevent people from going insane, maybe he intuits that people cannot swallow something like that. Then again that's assuming a lot.

I do know more about Sadhguru because I have watched a lot of videos on him and not his YouTube do kriya yoga newbie stuff. If you look hard enough, he does admit the practice of yoga will not take you the deepest levels of consciousness but he didn't propose another "method". He has talked about karma, yoga, all of this stuff being more Illusion and I've also heard him say on many occasions that most teachers are not truly awake. So the persona he puts out doesn't represent his truest understanding and we can never know what his deepest understanding is if he clearly avoids talking about it EVEN in inner circles. 

So it makes sense when you say it's only possible to get it, if you get them talking to each other. The general ideas of consciousness, Infinity, Love and so on seem to be common among them. Actually, it's only Ralston (from the teachers I know) that doesn't talk about Love. I don't know the nuances.

At the end, I really appreciate Ralston, it's less "trust me bro" spirituality. He has taught me a lot about beliefs, stories, assumptions, and the art of contemplation. At the same time, Sadhguru seems to be extraordinarily powerful. If he does certain things, he can make your body shake viciously, release trauma and experience deep states of Love, Joy, Bliss and Oneness but they don't seem to qualify as awakenings for me. From all the teachers, sadhguru intrigues me the most. I have seen him make 1000 people go nuts by clapping once. There is something going on there.

[Water by the River]

1 minute ago, Anon212 said:

Actually, it's only Ralston (from the teachers I know) that doesn't talk about Love. I don't know the nuances.

Don't you see it in his videos (at least in some its quite obvious)? His state? The reason why he continues to engage with the topic of Enlightenment and the Absolute to "others"? Don't you think it would be easier for him to stay removed from the world in the bliss of his realization? Why doesn't he do that? Love. 

To stay remote, in ones own bliss, and not engage the ignorance of the world is the easiest thing to do at a certain point. But shortly after that point, you realize you are all beings. Literally. And that realization.... Love.

Water by the River

[Leo Gura]

@Water by the River All paths don't lead up the same mountain.

[Breakingthewall]

@Water by the River who are , in your opinion, a really enlightened masters?  

I copy this quote that you posted once. This one, for example. I used the translator so maybe it's not exact: 

I am the teacher, the pure and total consciousness, from where everything manifests. Pure and total consciousness is the supreme source, it has created the Buddhas of the three times, from it have emerged the beings of the three worlds and everything animate and inanimate. universe. [...] Pure and total consciousness has created everything and has created nothing. He has created everything because he has created his own nature, pure and total. He has not created anything because within him there is no need to create. When my nature is not understood and the phenomena that manifest from me become the object of judgment, desire and attachment give rise to the creation of a concrete vision, impermanent and destined to vanish like a magical apparition, and one becomes like a blind man who doesn't know what's going on. [...YO" "Since I transcend all affirmations and denials, I am beyond all phenomena. Since there is no object other than myself, I am beyond meditating on a sight. Since there is nothing to maintain apart from myself, I am beyond commitment to observe. Since there is nothing to seek but myself, I am beyond attaining the capacity for spiritual action. Since there is no place outside of myself, I am beyond a level of realization to overcome. As I have never encountered obstacles, I am beyond [all] as self-arising wisdom. As I am the ultimate unborn nature, I am beyond [all] as the ultimate subtle [true] nature." "I am called "the perfect condition" because everything is contained in me. I am called "the source" because the teacher, the teaching and the disciples arise from my three natures" "I am the essence of all phenomena; nothing exists that is not my essence. 

The masters of the three dimensions are my essence. The Buddhas of the three times are my essence. Bodhisattvas are my essence. The four types of yogis are my essence. essence. The three worlds, of desire, of form and also without form, are my manifestation. The five great elements are my essence. The six classes of beings are my essence. Everything inanimate is my essence. Everything that lives is my essence. essence. All habitats and the beings that live in them are my essence. Nothing exists that is not my essence because I am the universal root: there is nothing that is not contained in me. The unborn, the wonder of birth, and the manifestation of energy are the three aspects of the three masters: this is their condition." "As the three times, past, present, and future, reside exclusively in me, all the Buddhas are in the same condition: this too is my essence. As I transcend the dualism of subject and object, like space, I am all-pervading and I constitute the fundamental substance of all phenomena: my essence is pure and total consciousness, I, who am the source, dwell in the unique state, and in this same authentic condition the practitioners of the "four yogas". "Realize my nature, the supreme source that is pure and total consciousness. Teach that all phenomena of existence are only me! If you transmit my teaching, all your disciples will realize my nature and become this same nature. "If my nature were to compassionately show itself to the beings of the three worlds that have originated from me... Thus, I, the supreme source, reveal my nature, showing it to myself." "Nothing but this exists; none of the Buddhas have ever received a higher teaching than this from me, the source. Apart from this condition of equality beyond concepts, I myself, the supreme source from which everything arises, have no absolutely nothing to show for myself." "Listen! As all of you are created by me, you beings of the three worlds are my children, equal to me, the supreme source. You are me, inseparable from me, so I manifest to you and through the five masters of natures I teach the unique state of the five essences [of the elements]. I am the unique state, I, the supreme source: so are you, you must be sure of this!" 

Listen, Sattvavajra! I will show you your own nature. You are me, the source. I am and always have been pure and total consciousness. What is pure and total consciousness?" "Among all the things that exist in the animate and inanimate universe, there is not a single thing that has not been created by me, nor is there a cause that does not derive from me. So I am the essence of everything, and nothing surpasses me. I am superior to the three dimensions, to the Buddhas of the three times, to the Vidyadharas, to the Bodhisattvas, to the beings of the three worlds, to the entire animate and inanimate universe, because I am the doer of everything. , that I am the source, the pure and total consciousness, I revealed the teaching of the pure and total consciousness

[Water by the River]

Just now, Leo Gura said:

@Water by the River All paths don't lead up the same mountain.

Multiple Absolutes? The mountains are form/appearance appearing IN the Absolute. Even the formless realms still are arisings/appearances in Infinite Consciousness/Reality/True You.

Absolute: Oneness and Infinite? Or not?

But also yes: Many paths don't lead up to the mountain top (Absolute), but on other side-peaks (arising IN the Absolute, aka form/appearance/arising).

Or is there no Absolute in your view? Or several? 

Water by the River

[Anon212]

15 minutes ago, Water by the River said:

Don't you see it in his videos (at least in some its quite obvious)? His state? The reason why he continues to engage with the topic of Enlightenment and the Absolute to "others"? Don't you think it would be easier for him to stay removed from the world in the bliss of his realization? Why doesn't he do that? Love. 

To stay remote, in ones own bliss, and not engage the ignorance of the world is the easiest thing to do at a certain point. But shortly after that point, you realize you are all beings. Literally. And that realization.... Love.

Water by the River

You can say that but I don't know, again its assuming. It's a case of you don't know until you know and its seems you can never know where other teachers are really at, it's a lot of guessing. You can come with an innumerable amount of other reasons as to why Ralston chooses to teach. 

At this point, I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that there really is not authority to turn to. You can't know and can't ultimately depend on someone. It's nice and comforting to know that you can just follow a teacher and salvation is guaranteed (why not become a devotee to some guru?) But I guess that is where true spirituality descends into religion. So you can have guidance but in the end you're on your own and the only thing that matters is what you become directly conscious of...

BTW why do you put your tag at the end of the post?

Edited August 4, 2023 by Anon212