Another perspective on spiritual growth

[Guest guest]

I wonder whether focusing on spiritual growth sometimes means coming up

with measurements and concepts that keep us very busy, keep our minds

and bodies focused on striving. In this way, we get caught up in the

struggle, the battle, and tend build up very complex and seemingly

insurmountable obstacles. It is all very interesting, but I have a deep

sense that it is missing the point. Just as with any other activity,

striving for spiritual growth can be taken over by our clever minds and

made into a distraction or diversion.

 

I cannot cite scripture or the words of any masters or gurus, but my

sense is that the essence of spiritual growth is to shed (or perhaps

shred!) our beliefs and concepts. This would include the concept of

spiritual growth itself. It seems false to think that some things are

more spiritual than others.

 

This notion of "moving ever forward" spiritually is, for me, a myth. It

is anything but smooth and blissful. It is literally mind- and

earth-shattering, sometimes just agonizing. It is really much more of a

"dropping off" than a "growth." And this "dropping off" is

indiscriminate -- it takes the good along with the bad. It simply

demolishes everything in its path. Just when I think I've gotten through

a major demolition, another, even deeper one, begins. "It" continues its

nasty work. It does not care. I am not at all sure I am doing any

growing. If anything, I am shrinking. The sense I have is that "it" is

shrinking me, and I have very little control over the process. At times,

all that is left is blind faith, and even that is sometimes difficult to

maintain.

 

I don't mean to paint a completely bleak picture. There have been many

times of wonderment. I feel great peace and happiness much or most of

the time. But I cannot deny the rest, and wanted to add it to the

discussion.

 

Love to all,

Mark

[Guest guest]

"There is actually neither dvaita (duality) or advaita (non-duality)"

 

~Ramana Maharshi

 

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[Guest guest]

Well said, Mark,

 

Reminds me of this fabulous quotation from Sri Poonja:

"You are ripe for enlightenment when you want nothing else. In order to be

born as a baby you have to spend 9 months getting bigger and bigger. For

enlightenment you have to get smaller and smaller until you disappear

completely."

 

Best wishes,

 

Dennis

[Guest guest]

advaitin, "Dennis Waite" <dwaite@a...> wrote:

> Well said, Mark,

>

> Reminds me of this fabulous quotation

 

Namaste,

 

Or to ponder over Pascal:

 

"Man is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness from which he

emerges and the infinity in which he is engulfed."

 

"What is man in nature? He is nothingness in regard of infinite,

everything in regard to nothingness. He is in the middle between

nothing and everything. Since then people speak about the two

infinites, the infinite big, the stars, and the infinite small, the

atoms."

 

"Let us weigh the gain and the loss involved in wagering that God

exists. Let us estimate these two probabilities; if you win, you win

all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager then, without hesitation,

that He does exist."

-- Blaise Pascal, "Infinity - Nothingness," from Pensées (also known

as Pascal's Wager)

 

[Apparently mathematicians are having a good time proving/disproving

the wager!!

 

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pascal-wager/#5

 

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theism/wager.html ]

 

Regards,

 

Sunder