New Age

Discussion of the nature of Ultimate Reality and the path to Enlightenment.
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Elizabeth Isabelle
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New Age

Post by Elizabeth Isabelle »

I've recently started taking Kundalini yoga classes (Scott, a long-time poster here, mentioned Kundalini once, so I looked into it), and I have started reading on the subject. Here is the gist of what I understand so far:

Yoga seems to be a central part of Buddhism. Kundalini and Quabala (Kabbala, or various spellings) both work with chakras, which I have always understood to be New Age stuff. Quabala comes from Jewish practice, and both Quabala nor Kundalini were considered secret practices within their religions, only taught to a few promising individuals.

Yogi Bjajan started teaching Kundalini openly in the US in 1969, against the wishes of his masters. I'm not sure how the Quabala got out. Yogi Bjajan went against the warnings of others to teach this here because he felt it was important for people to be prepared for the difficult times ahead - and because he noted that Americans had a heavy drug culture, and thought that the altered states they sought through drugs could be more healthfully achieved through yoga. Yogi Bjajan also prescribed a certain mantra to be practiced until the year 2013 - specifically, Sadhana Mantras for the Aquarian Age, so obviously some of these practices can just be made up - but I'm noting enough "coincidences" here that I wonder if the "New Age Movement" is actually ancient practices hidden and buried in old religions, or if this stuff was just made up. Although Dec. 21, 2012 is the end of the Mayan calendar, and there are many metaphysical predictions because of that, the year does not line up with the astrological ages although supposedly we are already in the "orb of influence" of the Aquarian Age.

Astrology is well known for being vague enough to be interpreted just about any way you want to interpret it, and I'm not so sure how reliable "secret society" information is - but Yogi Bhajan did say that the chakras don't really exist, that they are just a way of understanding the energy flow. "Energy flow" starts reminding me of Chinese acupuncture - so now I'm linking Chinese medicine, Indian Buddhism, Judaism, and wherever astrology came from. There were times that I believed in this stuff and times that I did not believe any of it. I'm sure that the power of suggestion/the placebo effect contributes to some of the perception of effectiveness and accuracy in the above, but the placebo effect is a real effect, but I'm not sure what else is going on with these phenomena.

Where did this "New Age" stuff come from? How do we know if this "secret society" stuff is for real or not? It does sound hoki, which - even if it is real, would explain why the information was not shared with the general public. You don't get the placebo effect if you do not believe in the placebo, and there may be many layers of reality that are similarly only true if you believe in them. If that's the case, then it may not matter if it came from ancient secret societies, so long as it works.
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Katy
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Re: New Age

Post by Katy »

I'm pretty sure the newage (rhymes with sewage) stuff came out of wicca, which Gerald Gardner pulled out of his arse. He claims to have learned it from his grandmother, but the reality of the situation is he combined Masonic Rites, with Alstair Crowley, nakid women and BDSM.

I'm not convinced that kundalini yoga qualifies as newage, as it's not, from what I can tell, "new" and I'm certain that neither the Quabala nor Yoga is "new" at all. I think what's really happened is a bunch of newagers have apropriated another culture's real beliefs and fuarsed them.

As an example, I read a book the a couple weeks back in which the author asserted that a belief in reincarnation was purely a newage phenomenon, which is clearly crap, but is the type of thing that gets believed when one starts selectively choosing what information to use.
-Katy
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Carl G
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Re: New Age

Post by Carl G »

Well, golly, Katy, that diatribe of personal opinion doesn't help. Or maybe it does. Maybe it points to the fact that there is no universally acceptable definition of New Age spirituality or religion. It's a catch phrase used by both proponents and non-proponents to serve whatever purpose. What references and features are included is pretty much up to personal preference, anyway. It's clearly an amalgam of various cross-cultural influences, any way you slice it, which doesn't in itself make it bad; after all, all branches of true knowledge emerge from the same root. Of course there are all degrees of fakery, self delusion and truth among the winding roads of this (and the pilgrimage of any seeker).
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David Quinn
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Re: New Age

Post by David Quinn »

Derren Brown has fun with a New Age female in this clip.

It neatly exposes the basis of nearly everything that passes for New Age spirituality.

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Katy
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Re: New Age

Post by Katy »

Carl G wrote:Well, golly, Katy, that diatribe of personal opinion doesn't help.
Which part is untrue?

Are you suggesting that Gardner's grandmother's religion and Masonic rites were the same coincedentally, and that as an additional coincidence Gardner was kicked out of the masonic temple at around the same time he published? That the phDs he claimed to have and were denied by the universities actually really existed? That entire sentences being pulled from Crowley and Valiente were just coincidence?

Or perhaps you're suggesting that Qabala is actually a recent invention despite being accepted as true by nearly all orthodox jews and referenced at the latest in the 13th century? Is your suggestion that yoga is new? Images of yoga positions are found in India in 3300 BC.

Surely you're not arguing reincarnation is purely a newage phenomenon?


I may have been snarky, but every sentence there is backed by fact.
-Katy
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Re: New Age

Post by Sapius »

David Quinn wrote:Derren Brown has fun with a New Age female in this clip.

It neatly exposes the basis of nearly everything that passes for New Age spirituality.

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How and why can people be mesmerized through mere suggestions?
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Re: New Age

Post by Katy »

Sapius wrote: How and why can people be mesmerized through mere suggestions?
If you want something badly enough, you may just pretend to get it. Most people are easily convinced of such things - look how many christians and muslims are in the world.

The reality of the situation is that I have quite a bit more respect for newagers than I have for Christians. At least they broke free from the original programming, in most cases. Even if they did wind up somewhere bizzare.
-Katy
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Re: New Age

Post by Sapius »

Katy,
If you want something badly enough, you may just pretend to get it. Most people are easily convinced of such things - look how many christians and muslims are in the world.
Right, but I was specifically talking about the Derren Brown type of suggestions, or say hypnotism. Yes, many can be hypnotized, even in groups, but very few can hypnotize. Why?

It is not that the group wants to, or pretends to do stupid things, or is it? So how are they so easily convinced?
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skipair
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Re: New Age

Post by skipair »

Sapius wrote:How and why can people be mesmerized through mere suggestions?
Words, voice tone, and body language affect the brain in amazing ways. If I say, "imagine a pink elephant", your brain automatically "sees" a pink elephant. All communication is manipulation. We are even wired such that a science (called NLP) can be made out of how communications work.
Elizabeth Isabelle
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Re: New Age

Post by Elizabeth Isabelle »

Sapius wrote:How and why can people be mesmerized through mere suggestions?
how stuff works, section 3 on hypnotism
Sapius wrote:Yes, many can be hypnotized, even in groups, but very few can hypnotize. Why?
With proper training, most people can hypnotize. Some people have a particularly hypnotic voice, which can make it easier for them to hypnotize others. Dan's voice is a good example, and I bet that when he speaks slowly and deliberately, people feel compelled to do as he says.
Sapius wrote:It is not that the group wants to, or pretends to do stupid things, or is it? So how are they so easily convinced?
In a way it is, and the success of a stage hypnotist depends on his selection of subjects. There is a certain look in the eyes of people who are more easily hypnotized, as these people subconsciously do want to do silly things, if only they had permission. A stage hypnotist will select a number of these people for the beginning of the act, and have them do simple things like allowing their arms to float up. Some of these people will just be good sports about it, and just pretend - but the hypnotist can tell by the responses who is just going along with it, and who is under. The hypnotist will pick the ones who are the most under to walk like a chicken, or whatever. (I can't link a reference, as I learned this in a class taught by a hypnotherapist).

I'd guess that the people who can not be hypnotized under normal circumstances are the ones who are the most attached to consciousness.

Abnormal circumstances where anyone can be hypnotized involve such things as drugs or sleep deprivation combined with conditioning. I don't remember exactly where I learned that.
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Carl G
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Re: New Age

Post by Carl G »

Katy wrote:Carl: Well, golly, Katy, that diatribe of personal opinion doesn't help.

Katy: Which part is untrue?

I may have been snarky, but every sentence there is backed by fact.
Oh?
I'm pretty sure the newage (rhymes with sewage) stuff came out of wicca, which Gerald Gardner pulled out of his arse. He claims to have learned it from his grandmother, but the reality of the situation is he combined Masonic Rites, with Alstair Crowley, nakid women and BDSM.
Gerald Gardner is the sole originator of the New Age movement? What evidence do you have that this is in any way factual? Wicca is only one of many influences from the East and West which are incorporated in one way or another under the umbrella, if you will, known as New Age. And certainly Allister Crowley, "nakid" and Bondage and Sado-masochism are peripheral to it, at best.
I'm not convinced that kundalini yoga qualifies as newage, as it's not, from what I can tell, "new" and I'm certain that neither the Quabala nor Yoga is "new" at all. I think what's really happened is a bunch of newagers have apropriated another culture's real beliefs and fuarsed them.
Whatever "fuarsed" means, again you include more diatribe than fact in your discourse. Old can be incorporated quite easily into what is new, not a problem. If anything, New Age is a synthesis of ancient and modern, aimed at self-transformation in the time of a perception of a turning of the Ages.
As an example, I read a book the a couple weeks back in which the author asserted that a belief in reincarnation was purely a newage phenomenon, which is clearly crap, but is the type of thing that gets believed when one starts selectively choosing what information to use.
True, but none of this constitutes a viable attack on the movement or path or on any but the least astute of its proponents.
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Katy
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Re: New Age

Post by Katy »

Carl G wrote: Gerald Gardner is the sole originator of the New Age movement? What evidence do you have that this is in any way factual? Wicca is only one of many influences from the East and West which are incorporated in one way or another under the umbrella, if you will, known as New Age. And certainly Allister Crowley, "nakid" and Bondage and Sado-masochism are peripheral to it, at best.
Wicca is the "foundation" that the newage movement was based upon, with the assertion that he was a part of an ancient lineage. People started pulling things in and adding them from other cultures until it got very muddled. Gardner published in '54 and '59 - and wikipedia says the newage movement already existed in the '70s from a '60s movement. It lists elements that go back further, but not as a set "culture" until Gardner published.

Gardner was pushing buttons. The Witchcraft Act was abolished in 1951, after last having been succesfully used to prosecute two women in 1944. He wasn't joining a movement, because much of what he taught would have been grounds for arrest three years before it was published. His button pushing opened the floodgates for a lot of other things that would have been taboo.
Whatever "fuarsed" means, again you include more diatribe than fact in your discourse. Old can be incorporated quite easily into what is new, not a problem. If anything, New Age is a synthesis of ancient and modern, aimed at self-transformation in the time of a perception of a turning of the Ages.
The topic started with an assertion that kundalini yoga was newage. I'm disputing that by stating that it's from 11th century India. If we want to talk about the newage movement's appropriation of older beliefs and ideas, fine. But let's not mistake one for the other.

Edit to add the original quote I was looking at:
Yoga seems to be a central part of Buddhism. Kundalini and Quabala (Kabbala, or various spellings) both work with chakras, which I have always understood to be New Age stuff.
-Katy
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divine focus
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Re: New Age

Post by divine focus »

The public "new age" probably started with Helena Blavatsky and the theosophical movement in the 1800's. All the hidden "mystical" cores of religions would be considered new age if revealed outside of the context of the surface religions.
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Dan Rowden
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Re: New Age

Post by Dan Rowden »

I agree with that. I think the Theosophical Society was a prime mover in the development and popularizing of the what we know as the modern New Age movement, despite its influences being complex in nature. But really I'm more interested in the truth value of New Age beliefs than in the nuances of its history.

And my spider sense is tingling! That avatar looks awfully familiar :)
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daybrown
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Re: New Age

Post by daybrown »

Just to throw a curve ball in. "New Age" is going to be soon confronted with some very ancient *data*. To start with, there is this website, part of a collaborative effort between the Brits and Chinese to put 100,000 jpgs of artifacts and texts recovered from the ancient Silk Road.
http://www.silk-road.com/newsletter/vol ... _bloom.php
There's also "The Tarim Mummies" by Mallory, and "the Mummies of Urumchi" by Barber. Down at the bottom of http://www.dc-pc.org/artifax/artifax.html (which has lotsa photos, so give a minute to load) we see frescos from what is now NW China of Aryan men in the 1st millenium dressed in Oriental clothes as Buddists.

Because of all the unrest in the Levant, Egypt, & Fertile Crescent, and because China is opening up, there's more digging than ever going on in the deserts of the Silk Road. There was quite a lot a century ago by the Brits, Germans, & French, and the above website draws heavily on what's in European archives.

If you took all the Levantine scriptures ever found, the Nag Hammadi, Dead Sea Scrolls, etc, you could put them all in a broom closet. You'd need at least an 18 wheeler to haul whats been found on the Silk Road, almost all of it before 800 AD. There's some stuff that even predates the Pyramids.

But to be more on point, the pre-eminent town, on the main central route, was Kucha, a few hundred miles NW of the Jade Gate. They left a lot of documents in Tocharian, the main language of the literate. By the 5th century, Kucha was like a college town with Buddhist, Taoist, Confucian, Zoroastrian, Manichean, and other more obscure scholars. Translating works between Sanskrit, Sogdian, Chinese, and Tocharian. They've found documents there in 20 different languages.

But Tocharian DNA comes from what is now Slavic Europe. Their ancestors were the Amazons, who started out with the first domesticated horses 6000 years ago in what is now Moldavia. And brought their European traditions with them. Barber shows that their wool has DNA from European lines of sheep. Woven in Twill, plaid, and even classic Celtic *Tartan*. Tocharian is the earliest form of the original Aryan language that we have. And in the 5th century, while European Christian monks were burning Witches and books, these Tocharian buddhist monks were making *copies* of what we now call "witchcraft".

Gardener may be full of bullshit, but there is a genuine source to look at. We all know the "Magi came from The East". Well, this is *that* East. In Tocharian, a person skilled in magic is known as a "wiccassi", the '-si' being the female suffix. They even found a woman buried in a coffin that was made a couple feet longer so she could wear her tall, black, conical, flat brimmed hat. Which would work fine at any Holloween ball.

The French have a translation of her "magic spells and herbal recipes". Some of which were written on birchbark. Birch dont grow out there. It had to be imported from Europe. They live in the desert, but write with a goose quill. There some scans online to look at:
http://titus.uni-frankfurt.de/texte/toc ... 01abrt.jpg
back up to the /t to see many more samples.
I note the wide horizontal lines, the thin vertical lines, and the oomlats. It looks like old Gothic.
http://www.oxuscom.com/eyawtkat.htm#fn2
Father= pater
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Re: New Age

Post by andy shaker »

Hello! That is fascinating! looking forward to learning more from the silk roads...

Thanks for those links.
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Re: New Age

Post by Sharly_Li »

I kinda look at the New Age being the Old Age but with a price tag on it. I think these beliefs have always been around.

The main problem i have with the New Age is that it seems most of its congregates are more drawn to the false sense of security and belonging it provides, rather than attain some deeper understanding of reality or oneself. ei: Angels are protecting you, love and light mantras, Space Brothers coming to save us, adorable Indigo Children saving the world, and this perception where if there’s a guru who sports a beard and has some weird "spiritual" name then he must know what he’s talking about. Everything becomes very passive, homogeneous, rigid and pretty much detached from logic.

Very little critical thinking is involved when everybody becomes obsessed with consensus only because they feel it substantiates what they want to believe in if everybody else does it as well.
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Re: New Age

Post by daybrown »

Oh, I agree that very little critical thinking goes on. Course, not much goes on anywhere else either. But there's a curious lack of warfare among the Silk Road independent city states. Part of that had to do with the problem a demagogue would have trying to rile up a mob or an army by claiming that he speaks in "god's name".

They didnt *have* an alpha male tyrant concept of "god" in Taoism, Confucianism, or Taoism. Nobody hadda pass a piss test of heresy to enter the sacred space of any of the Kuchan temples. I find the place so interesting because it is so much like our time. Kucha had sacred spaces for 22 religions. There were Aryans wearing Chinese wardrobes, and Chinese wearing Aryan outfits. Even to this day, musicians and dancers from Kucha still draw audiences in China. If you go there now, you'll see people who look Aryan enuf to pass without notice in any European city, but sounding like native born Chinese, which they in fact are.

When the Tang emperor Tang Tiazong sent Xuan Zang to fetch original Buddhist scripture in the early 7th century, Xuan went to Kucha *first*. The place was like a college town with Buddhist, Taoist, Confucian and western religious scholars translating original sources into Sanskrit, Chinese, Tocharian, Sogdian and other languages. Xuan spent several months there before trying to go on to India.

He reports BTW, how the Buddhist centers in what is now Afghanistan & Pakistan were already in ruins. Given the diversity he and the scholars he worked with knew, I can see why the hegemony claimed by Christianity and Islam didnt get very far. Until powered by the sword. The iconoclasm seen today by Moslem Jackasses goes back a damn long ways.

But with ref to critical thinking. Wallace in his anthro classic, "Culture and Personality" noted that when a system is on the skids, when people's coping skills dont work so well any more, they engage in "magical thinking". A term he coined. Thus we see the rise in wicca and Fundies awaiting the Rapture. You dont see much of this going on in China because they feel their power in the world increasing, and think they mite actually succeed at it. Nor do I blame the sytsem for trying to suppress the Falun Gong, aware as they are of their own history, and how often emotional movements got out of hand. The Red Guard being a more recent example.

Conversely, they give at least tacit approval to Confucianism, Taoism, & Buddhism, again aware of their own history, and what a small part these spiritual traditions played in the violence of their past. A lesson we mite consider, in contrast to the rise of Levantine fundamentalism.

I have a copy of the Maitreyasamiti Texts in Tocharian A. It was found by Taoist monks cleaning out a *Buddhist* temple. Moslems would've desecrated the place. In doing so, they discovered a false wall, and behind it, a library that had lain hidden for 1500 years. Its hard now to imagine what they felt. Jeezus kryst.

The text, which is a 5th century copy of a much earlier document, is a conversation between the living Buddha and the Gautamid Queen of Kucha. Much of it has to do with the appropriate way for her to perform what we now realize are indigeneous Aryan tribal rituals. They go on about this for some time. But unlike Moses, Buddha does not lay down the law, but instead they agree to go to the monastery at Sibushi, 12 miles north of town, to *consult* with the monks. In classic matriarchic fashion, an effort to reach consensus.

They also, interestingly, discuss the growing problem of what we now call 'mysogeny', and the "arrogant Sakyas" who turn out to be the same jackass warlords still running much of Central Asia. Buddha replies that not only was he born of women, but he was educated by them. And indeed, many of these ancient documents, if not most, were written in a female hand.

You can trace back the etymological, iconographic, and archeological roots of Aryan matriarchy all the way back to SE Europe and then to the Anatolian cities when agriculture began 10,000 years ago, but it is in these Tocharian documents that we see definitive *proof*. Women were remarkably powerful in what is now NW China. Several times the Tang dynasty was run by an empress. There were nunneries with vast tracts of land or other resources run by women. Widows and uncooperatve princesses moved to, or were sent to these nunnieries. And just as the clerics of Europe recorded contracts for the illiterate, so also in this region, but now by women.

And when the women ruled, we see the peace and prosperity, the literary freedom, and a somewhat multi-ethnic culture. We dont read much about the Zongnu (Mongols) or Tibetans because, at the time, they were savages. A well known tale is about a sage who asks if he should go see a Mongol Chief. He was told to bring salt. He'd taste better in the stew. It was said the Zongnu were such sons of bitches they could lick their own balls.

Nobody went to Mongolia. They should have. A long series of good years exploded the population, and then they exploded across Asia. Its kind of easy to argue that there is a genetic endowment that leads to the search for spiritual enlightenment. The Bagavad Gita tells Arjuna that some of what he sees are divinely created and animated forms that only exist as a challenge to the fulfillment of his Kharma. The description sound like the monsters in a video game. The Gita even calls them 'Avatars'.

The thing about an Avatar is, that while you can learn from one, you cant teach an Avatar anything. If you go to see one, be sure to bring the salt. Tocharian had words for "men" and "women" like everyone else. but they also had a special suffix "-os" which meant a "sentient being". The rest are all animals. But of course, like any other animals, its bad Kharma to abuse them.

No "New Age" message is going to change what they are. Often, as with the Mongols, all you can hope to do is get the fuck out of the way.
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Re: New Age

Post by autism »

Dan is right, technically the "New Age" movement started with Blavatsky and her Theosophical Society. The Indian yogi's as well as some Eastern Philosophers like Watts renewed it in the Sixties. In following decades it would be muddied by feminist politicos using it as leverage against the patriarchal religions. Hence, Isabelle <smile>

I've always been Christian but Church inactive since college. Like many in my generation I was fascinated with Eastern and Existential philosophy when I was younger and read moderately about it in college and afterwards. When I was sitting in jail in the mid Seventies with a few years to burn, I set out to correct my dissipation products, like curved spine and being out of shape, of my early life. I was 25 years old when I hit the Big House. I did all the normal exercise routines and they didn't correct my curved spine, so I had a friend send me a large illustrated yoga book. It was Satchidanada's "Integral Hatha Yoga" book. Yep, it straightened my spine as well as add an inch or two to my height. It also was an incredible form of exercise that energized and cleared the mind like no other. I would go on to do it on and off all my life, as well as other exercising...and dissipation! When I moved to Santa Barbara in '79 I stumbled on some Satchidanada devotees and discovered he lived here. I went to a few of his New Years retreats and later was married by one of his devotees. He died a few years ago. A truly great guru. Long live Swami Ji!

By the middle of my jail time (a year or so), I was getting to be quite the yogi. One problem in jail is the cell doors slamming and waking one up and then having trouble going back to sleep. I had started meditating just to see what that was all about, but mostly to go back to sleep. I read about Kundalani and started using that method in my meditation. It was the same as regular meditation methods but with a different form, mainly a structured concentration on the spine and head. Well, shortly after I started doing it I had a "nirvanic" experience where I felt the kundalani energy going up my spine to my brain and then out the top of my head with me following it..."out of body". When the energy was going up my spine and hit a lower chakra, I got a hard on faster than anytime in my life. Apparently it hit the sexual chakra and lit me up. It kept going and then when it hit the top of my head, as it was apparently leaving my head, I had the white light and bliss thing. It was an incredibly beautiful experience. Then I was floating around outside my body and it kind of freaked me and I went back. After that I could do it anytime I wanted but stopped after a few times and never did it again. Why? I really don't know other than what the fuck good was it me floating outside my body. As for the bliss, well, maybe I didn't think I deserved it.

As for the New Agers, I had an extensive discussion with them when I first came on the net ('96) in "Spirit Web" chat room. The good New Agers, like the good Religios, had the same problem...feminists! Yep, they were always trying to control things and bend them to their needs and wants. Truth and enlightenment were secondary. So what has happened is the good New Agers are independents and poor as hell while those out promoting it are usually feminists doing it for their ideological group which has lots of money!

Right Isabelle?

Tom
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daybrown
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Re: New Age

Post by daybrown »

Most people have always been nuts; its just that recent generations are progressively more so. There's a perfect storm of reasons, which many sense, which draws them into New Age mysticism to escape the mass insanity.

Not that they dont take a lot with them when they go, to a commune, gathering, or whatever.

The hominids were never a mass species, but evolved in small villages and tribes, and are not really equipped to deal with urban systems.

Hominids inherit instinctive behavior patterns the same as all other mammals. These patterns vary, and the inter-breeding that has gone on since leaving the village has resulted in a mixing of contradictory innate behavior patterns, so that no matter what people do, they are not truly happy, nor do they truly feel like they fit in.

The villages themselves always had elders, witches, shamen, & midwives who helped raise the kids of the incompetent because it maximized diversity- critical in small gene pools- and the kids mite carry resistance to plagues that sweep thru from time to time. They never imagined that their liberality would result in masses living in urban areas without what we now call intensive case management.

And- ever since the birth control pill came in, the teachers, guidance counselors, nurses, etc of the case management class have used birth control thinking they could teach the craft to the airheads. Unfortunately, they were wrong about that, and the client class has massively outbred them, and now case loads are going thru the roof. I know one social worker still at it at 69 cause they cant find anyone to replace her.

Moreover, since thee 1960s, the family farm has been replaced with agribusiness. The farm kids mostly moved to the city. Their organic methods were replaced with petrochemicals, and while the tonnage went up, the real nutrition of the food went down. Raising kids on sugar cereals, junkfood, and soda made it even worse, and while some of you are lucky, and rational anyway, we see billions who are not.

And it just keeps getting worse. Which is some try to leave for New Age Realities in their own heads.
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Sapius
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Re: New Age

Post by Sapius »

Elizabeth;
With proper training, most people can hypnotize. Some people have a particularly hypnotic voice, which can make it easier for them to hypnotize others. Dan's voice is a good example, and I bet that when he speaks slowly and deliberately, people feel compelled to do as he says.
Thanks for the ‘how things work’ and the explanations, but I did have a pretty good idea about that. What I was kind of trying to eventually get at is what you mention above.

IF, all it takes is proper training, then it could be the greatest tool to promote wisdom, isn’t it? So Dan for example may desperately need it in the name of wisdom and truth.

After all, it is believed that a sage could employ certain justifiable deceit for the greater good, so why not?

:D
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Re: New Age

Post by Elizabeth Isabelle »

Sapius, I would not call it justifiable deceit because it would not be deceitful at all. Using hypnotic techniques to promote wisdom would just be using hypnotic techniques to promote wisdom. When dealing with angry and violent people in person, I automatically use a hypnotic voice to bring in enough peace so that people can reason things out a bit better. I see nothing unethical about that.

It's kind of like asking if it is ethical for a surgeon to use a scalpel to do surgery. The scalpel, like hypnotic techniques, would be just a tool. If it is the best tool available for ethical work, then using it is ethical. If someone were to use the scalpel to rob a convenience store, then in that case using the scalpel would be unethical.

The tool itself is neither ethical nor unethical - it is just a tool.
Sapius
Posts: 1619
Joined: Mon Sep 17, 2001 4:59 pm

Re: New Age

Post by Sapius »

Elizabeth,
When dealing with angry and violent people in person, I automatically use a hypnotic voice to bring in enough peace so that people can reason things out a bit better. I see nothing unethical about that.
I can understand that. In this, you are however still respecting the others freedom of choice. But…
The scalpel, like hypnotic techniques, would be just a tool. If it is the best tool available for ethical work, then using it is ethical.
… I may not have any problems with cannibalism for example, so would it be ok for me to hypnotize you to step in my pot without a fuss.
If someone were to use the scalpel to rob a convenience store, then in that case using the scalpel would be unethical.
What if I belong to a group of gypsies?
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Elizabeth Isabelle
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Joined: Tue Sep 05, 2006 11:35 am

Re: New Age

Post by Elizabeth Isabelle »

Sapius, your second and third responses must have been sarcasm because I know that you have a better definition of ethics than "local mores."
Sapius
Posts: 1619
Joined: Mon Sep 17, 2001 4:59 pm

Re: New Age

Post by Sapius »

Elizabeth Isabelle wrote:Sapius, your second and third responses must have been sarcasm because I know that you have a better definition of ethics than "local mores."
Hahahaha... but they do contain some truth though.
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