Deconstructing the Mountain

[Guest guest]

On Thu, 10 Jun 1999 16:03:27 Greg Goode wrote:

>There are several popular teachers such as Nisargadatta and Byron Katie,

>who often speak from the Absolute (e.g., "In my world nothing goes wrong,"

>or "Honey, I am appearing as you!"), and who have given rise to a whole new

>style of "advaita talk" that is taken up by advaitic seekers.

>

>One of the disciples of Papaji of Lucknow, India, now himself a teacher,

>told me this: to avoid the appearance of identification with the ego, some

>of Papaji's disciples go into linguistic contortions to avoid using the

>first person pronoun. It has become known as the "Lucknow Disease." You

>can't even discuss a movie without the disease striking. This happened

>recently: Some of us in our weekly satsang were discussing movies.

>Someone said, "THE 13TH FLOOR was great." I said "I really loved THREE

>SEASONS." A friend said, "WHO loved it?" His girlfriend (not a Papaji

>follower) kicked him, saying "Honey!!" I asked him, >"Who wants to

know?"

 

Yes, I for one do not have much patience with such

linguistic faux pas and artificialities.

(as much as language is an artificiality on the whole.

Ouch, please don't hit me for that,

linguistics out there ).

 

Doesn't the neurotic and acquired avoidance of the

word I and me indicate that there really

is a whole lot of concern going on about appearances,

and outward "face" ?

 

And aren't such concerns just another set of

habit which should be relaxed in the due course of events ?

 

Thanks for sharing Greg.

 

Best regards,

 

Amanda.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Angelfire for your free web-based e-mail. http://www.angelfire.com

[Guest guest]

At 01:15 PM 6/10/99 -0700, Amanda Erhart wrote:

>Doesn't the neurotic and acquired avoidance of the

>word I and me indicate that there really

>is a whole lot of concern going on about appearances,

>and outward "face" ?

 

Yes, definitely! After all, it is the seekers who have this verbal

phenomenon. When the seeking stops, so does the phenomenon.

>And aren't such concerns just another set of

>habit which should be relaxed in the due course of events ?

 

Also agree. When mountains and rivers again become mountains and rivers,

we become free to use the label "I". The "who am I" reflex/mantra dries

up. After the mountains and rivers become what they already were, we still

use a label for a plate of tofu or a new pair of jeans. So why not a label

for the one who has to pay the phone bill?? There's no belief or fear that

this label refers to a separate entity that must be eradicated. None of

these things really disappears, because they were never independent things

existing in the first place. It is more like they are seen to be what they

always were - Consciousness (or whatever we are going to capitalize).

 

P.S. Amanda - after I finished the paragraph about mountains and rivers, I

saw that you titled your e-mail "Deconstructing the Mountain"!!

 

Regards,

 

Greg