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Repetitive speech elicits widespread deactivation in the human cortex: the "Mantra" effect?

Heavy dosage of mantra, hours - long chant sessions may compromise one's mind.

And one's boundaries.

It may be preferable to have a reserved approach when drawing unproved "scientific" conclusions from a research.

What the article says, more or less is that mantras calm down the mind.

It is interesting to notice that quite a few gurus will quote "science" to push their ideas into people's minds. Same is a marketing strategy used by various MLMs and sellers of bogus health products and devices.

You don’t even need a scientific study to conclude that a calmer mind is more vulnerable to “suggestion”, especially when the mantra being chanted is from and may include the name of a guru. Not that meditation is without a merit — it does calm the mind; it is the “suggestion” that comes with it that is the red flag.

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You don’t even need a scientific study to conclude that a calmer mind is more vulnerable to “suggestion”, especially when the mantra being chanted is from and may include the name of a guru. Not that meditation is without a merit — it does calm the mind; it is the “suggestion” that comes with it that is the red flag.

I think that you do and that maybe it doesn't work that way.

TV ads seem to work fine when broadcasted in the middle of a horror movie. Actually, I'm wondering if they don't work better than ads popping up in the middle of a gardening or golf show.

My guess is that for "suggestion" to work you don't need calmness, you just need a means of grabbing attention.

This is why many ads display a product nearby an almost naked body.

SeePony Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My guess is that for "suggestion" to work you
> don't need calmness, you just need a means of
> grabbing attention.


The original purpose of meditation was to tame the unbridled mind.
[dharmakamata.blogspot.ca]

That is more than walking a mile or buying a refrigerator touted by a half-naked lady.

TV ads are basically meant to be superficial, there are also watchdogs to respect and obey. “Suggestion” in mantras and meditations is existential, beyond the grasp of the rational mind, unalloyed and absolute, that you may have to choose between that and your family and loved ones and your values. Not only it demands “attention”, it calls for a life-changing shift in your life. You’re comparing apples and the Universe.

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“Suggestion” in mantras and meditations is existential, beyond the grasp of the rational mind, unalloyed and absolute, that you may have to choose between that and your family and loved ones and your values. Not only it demands “attention”, it calls for a life-changing shift in your life. You’re comparing apples and the Universe.

I'm worried we lost track ...

Let's go back to the previous topic:

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You don’t even need a scientific study to conclude that a calmer mind is more vulnerable to “suggestion”,

Few points:

1. Comparing apples - advertisment / meditation is the tool/method. Not to be confused with the goal.

For example, if one would broadcast ads on the topic of the "absolute", you'd be surprised how effective and "life-changing" they would be.

But so are regular ads, many people work half of their life to buy the stuff they see on ads.

2. More "agitated" methods of influencing people seem to work quite well.

I would assume warrior cults use those. Also, gangs, dictatorships, maybe terror groups, or even churches etc.

The restless mind has strong desire or fear, which are obviously potential tools for control.

3. While it's obvious that desire and fear can be used to control, why is calmness the case ?

Maybe calmness is just what it seems to be : a means to optimize the functioning of the mind.

And the results depend on the object of meditation: if one meditates on the guru, one may become a good disciple. If one meditates on mathematics, one may become a good mathematician.

SeePony Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> I'm worried we lost track ...


I see. I apologize if I muddled your thought. This conversation seems to be getting nowhere, but here’s what I want to be crystal clear:

I’m more concerned with readers misconstruing the degree of “suggestion” from mantras and mystical meditation as equal to or the same of that of TV ads’ – it is not. It’s true, we are brainwashed all the time, inside or outside the cult, we choose our poison, everyday; but the poison from the cult is like instant death – far worse from just getting hooked into buying a crappy refrigerator from a half-naked lady. How could you feel short-changed by a half-naked lady? But being short-changed by an ugly and crazy guru? It feels like suicide.

I grew up in a cult (Science of Identity), and there are survivors like me that can attest that it takes years and years to get acclimatized back to society – the suspicion, bigotry, duplicity and hypocrisy inculcated in you have practically turned you into a zombie. The withdrawal is immense. Not only that, the hurt you’ve caused to people around can be irreversible. No one should be made to choose between a belief and a family -- try comparing that with walking a mile for a Camel.

Having lived the life in a cult, I could take the brainwashing society gives, it is obvious — even if it is shouted to me. The brainwashing cults give is far more sinister, more insidious, because it speaks of goodness, of “calmness”, of saving the world, of submitting to the will of God. It is not shoved to your throat, you would seek it, you would give up everything for it because it makes you “calm” and “happy”.

When our guru (Chris Butler) enters the room, we hit the ground in a heart bit. Believe it or not we do it in public. Some would eat the sand his foot had touched, were fed toe nails and drink his foot wash (not me), but respectable-looking yoga people did. Ask Tulsi Gabbard (she’s a hardcore), therefore, I’m betting she did. He would always push the envelope -- like order offenders to fast for six months for the slightest infraction, or fine $1,000 to redeem one's self.

I had taken the worst poison and have survived it. The poison society gives is nothing compared. I would love to buy that refrigerator from that half-naked lady, no matter how crappy it is, but I will stay away from that yoga, mantra meditation and all that “feel good”, vegan crap, and I suggest you do too.

Just try to be careful next time equating both. This site is meant to help survivors of cults and help create awareness of the danger of joining or getting hooked by their misleading methods and claims. Read through pages upon pages of testimonies about indoctrination and abuse. Do not, in any way try to make light of gurus’ crimes -- they are top of the chart, imho.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/24/2015 06:06PM by dharmabum.

A former member of Guru Maharaji/Elan Vital looked back on his meditation states while in that cult.

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http://www.prem-rawat-talk.org/cgi-bin/anyboard.cgi/forum?cmd=get&cG=8323930343&zu=3832383837&v=2&gV=0&p=

The Mind controlling the mind

When I really think about it, wasn't meditation and even the trancelike state of Satsang just one part of the mind trying to quiet and control another part of the mind? So even if the "control center"of the mind actually succeeded temporarily, and the struggle between parts of the mind subsided, then what? Well apparently and according to the Rawat dogma, somehow the beloved guru could cosmically notice your great effort and achievement and zap you with enlightenment. Or, in the case of Siddhartha, he fought within his mind for decades until he finally stopped struggling and just stared into the river. Sort of a surrender kind of idea; and then he was zapped by some cosmic force and entered into permanent enlightenment.

Either way, the mind can't just be gone and permanently put in its proper place as a subservient entity to some transcendental cosmic force. Its still the mind controlling the mind with the possibility of a very temporary state of mental exhaustion resulting in what could be called peace. Who's to say it didn't come from all that mental exercise and struggle? Sort of like a hard workout where afterwards you feel physically exhausted but enriched and content.

And then upon returning to the world post meditation, all of our repressed emotions are just standing by ready to pounce like a puppy let out of its cage. Thinking about it like this makes me remember all the times I was actually traumatized by Knowledge while trying to get to that perfect state that was promised to us all. There was definitely way more struggle than peace. Well the promise turned out to be a big fat lie along with all the peripheral sauce that was poured on top of it; Siddhartha, TM, Kung Fu, Autobiography of a Yogi, etc.

However, I do believe we can cultivate thoughts and feelings of appreciation, kindness, hope, and love. Maybe not permanently, but just by trying to keep a positive perspective, stepping more gently through life while trying to do no harm, instead of with reckless abandon. Even my dog feels love. And his natural default is a state of happiness; as long as he's fed and exercised.

This is part of a discussion here

[prem-rawat-talk.org]

Techniques revealed.

[www.prem-rawat-talk.org]

(Go to bottom of page with the blue border and click 'Jump to Story'.)

[archives.chicagotribune.com]

(Corboy muses, speculates)

Perhaps other sufi/guru groups use portions of the
this recipe??

One member of the prem rawat forum discussion had this to say.

[www.prem-rawat-talk.org]

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Joe ®

08/27/2015, 16:43:48
"....But in the back of my "mind" I always had this uneasy feeling that if this was "real" why can't we just tell people what it is? Also, I never understood why someone had to "be ready" to experience what was supposed to be the simplest, most natural of experiences. But we just swallowed it. To this day, I have never gotten a good explanation of why that was.

Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 09/28/2015 11:27PM by corboy.

Corporate Mindfulness is Bullshit

[hardcorezen.info]

Comments section always worth a look.

.Corboy note: My corporate healthcare provider offers classes on mindfulness
and yoga -- both for fees in addition to the butt hurting premium and out of pockets I already pay.

In a recent consultation with my treating physician, he mentioned those two classes as possible resources for me.

I stayed polite and said I was already taken care of thanks to learning and practicing both at my local Zen center.

Here is the punch:

A week or so later, my corporate health care provider mailed me an evaluation form by which to rate how my doctor had performed when I consulted him.

One of the questions on that form queried whether the doctor had mentioned the various "products"/classes that were available.

In other words, the corporate bean counters wanted to find out if their doctors were recommending (aka 'marketing') these corporate, for profit mindfulness courses and yoga courses.

my doctor has first rate credentials. He was lured way from a topflight medical school by this for profit HMO.

And he and the other docs (and family nurse practitioners) are expected to shill these for profit corporate mindfulness and yoga classes!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/02/2015 06:23AM by corboy.

Why bother learning about the careers of your teacher's teacher?

Because if your teacher was ordained by someone with an active addiction to alcohol, chemicals, sexual acting out, shopping, etc that means your teacher may have had to cover up and excuse this behavior as a condition of being ordained.

There is an adage in recovery circles that addicts do not have peer relationships; they engage nursemaids or take hostages.

Why?

Because, among other things, many addicts have charisma and immense charm. This attracts admirers who are often recruited as helpers and excuse makers. Possession of charm, charisma, eloquence can enable an addict to get away with
behavior that would never be tolerated in someone who is merely demanding and disruptive.

A student's sense of self will be eroded if he or she must make up excuses for
a teacher who repeatedly fails to be on time on time for a Dharma talk, yoga lesson, or practice discussion.

Here are just a few things that happen to active addicts:

* Many addicts have frail personalities, making it important for them to cultivate brilliance and charisma in years before they gain access to alcohol and other adult mood outlets (sex, shopping, gambling, etc)

As addiction progresses, the person isolates, becomes less able to cope with normal frustration and loses temper easily. Time and again, recovering addicts will tell how they must beware of hiding out at home all day.

An addicted yoga or dharma teacher will often become less available to students, will spend more and more time hiding behind an entourage of favored
students. Too often these favored, enabling students get ordained in the lineage. They are the ones who tolerate and make excuses for the brilliant,
addicted teacher.

* When an addicted teacher attracts more and more students, this creates exactly the social environment many addicts find most stressful. Layers of bureaucracy are put in place to shield this brilliant but increasingly fragile teacher. The ones who cooperate with this are the ones most likely to be ordained by the teacher.

The 'tradition' they are ordained into? Enabling addiction, covering up addiction and keeping secrets.

An increasingly fragile teacher will be less and less capable of
dealing with pain, frustration and mood modulation. Tiny frustrations will
trigger disproportionate fury or depression. The students will be blamed for this.

* Frequent illnesses, real (injuries from falling down stairs or in bathroom when drunk or stoned), stress ailments from imagined illnesses.

A faltering teacher who is increasingly intolerant of pain and frustration
will desire a frustration free personal environment - perfect meals, no
excess noise, room decorated in a particular way, luxuries, special car, etc.

* Constant demands or requests for money. This can strain the finances of
an ashram, dharma center or yoga school. It is an important precaution
to have financial transparence, refuse major gifts to the teacher by wealthy
disciples.

Students with self respect and confidence will desert. Students who lack self confidence will remain, creating a re - enactment of an ancient tradition.

The Ancient Way of the Addicted Family.

Eido Shimano Dai Bosatsu

[www.dharmawheel.net]

Chogyam Trungpa -- Alcohol

[www.dharmawheel.net]

Maezumi Roshi - Alcohol

[www.google.com]

(Note: the following applies if you are someone who is known to your friends, your family and your coworkers as kind, steady and reliable.

You are someone whose emotions fall within normal limits. As in you can cope with frustration or bereavement without damaging your or other people's possessions, you don't damage yourself or others in serious ways, you can, despite stress and sadness, show up and meet your work responsibilities and don't need to use excessive quantities of food, booze, recreational drugs or crazy activities to cope with stress, either.

If you are a steady person as described above and you dumped or disrespected by a guru, yoga teacher or lama, and you then are sweetly told your sadness is evidence of your own ego, and that you must learn detachment and non clinging -- Corboy advises that you do not buy this.

Here is my morning rant about the abuses of "detachment" when used against us by flakes in the yoga/dharma world.


Dumped by My Guru

[theyogalunchbox.co.nz]

Be cautious if you decide to do yoga. It isnt the yoga; it is the social milieu.

All too often the focus on 'detachment' is abused in these ways:

* Persons who are powerholders and who are immature at relationships feel entitled via 'detachment' to discard students with no more concern than one feels when jettisoning a toenail clipping. Detachment is NO excuse to pick up and drop disciples and students as though they are toys for the child-guru to play with.

* "Detachment" does not invalidate a student's valid human hurt when he or she is treated not as a person, but used and discarded as a object.

Immature persons tend to shift from seeming affection to cold disdain -- or abruptly disappear and cease to return texts, emails or phone calls.

This sudden, abrupt shift is not "skillful means." It is not "crazy wisdom" and it is not a "teaching lesson."

This is the tip off that the person is, at bottom, lacking in adult ability to modulate mood and emotion, unable to bear the difficulty of negotiating a gradual break in a relationship in such a way as to respect your personhood and your dignity.

To justify this in the name of 'detachment' is as untrue as it is cruel. In the yoga world and dharma lite scene too many children in teacher's bodies get away with it by invoking detachment.

Worse, this abrupt rejection may re-enact trauma one has incurred at a young age, when one's **age appropriate** emotional needs were spurned. When a childish guru treats your heart as a toy and throws you aside, then claims you are selfish to feel hurt -- this re-enacts trauma you've not healed from.

And this takes place in the context of yoga/dharma teaching -- a context where one dares to trust and hope one's heart will be respected, not toyed with.

In the yoga social milieu, 'detachment' is easily exploited by immature childish persons who are unqualified to have a teaching relationship. Such persons are also unfit to have erotic relationships with adults, and should, in an ideal world, not become parents, either.

The problem is that children in adult bodies can be quite charming and charismatic -- precisely because they are unburdened by conscience, and have a child's playfulness and lightness. If one examines their behavior carefully, one may recognize other instances of unreliability, aka "flakiness" -- such
as coming late to lessons, coming unprepared for lessons and lectures, asking in cute or pathetic ways for students to take care of their needs, (bring meals, laundry, service the car, saying "But I never said I was consistent, etc)

Another tip off: children in adult bodies find all sorts of ways to laugh away their lapses and fuck ups. They get the rest of you to laugh with them. Often someone who tries to call them on their shit will be made the butt of the unfunny humor.

Too many of these types become gurus, teachers, etc. That accounts for the very many harm reports that have been published on this message board in the past 12 years. Characters like this sense social scenes in which they can charm and distract others into excusing their misbehavior; the yoga and guru scene, with its tendency to invoke "detachment" is one such venue.

Dont let a child in adult's body who just happens to be called 'guru' or 'Yoga teacher' exploit 'detachment' as a way to scam you to distrust your valid
hurt and anguish at being used as an object.

That isn't yoga. It is anti -yoga. You will become yet more fractured inside.

No amount of bliss can compensate for this.

The yoga social scene and dharma lite social scene are full of this type of scam.

It benefits immature types who want to toy with people and dont want to face the risk of being called out on their exploitation.

The image of God playing (leela) with the universe and with all of us in it can also be exploited to justify this type of shabby behavior.

IMO, I dont want a God who uses us as toys. A child doesnt see toys as persons, but merely as extensions of self. The child will throw toys at the wall or into a corner when bored and when a new toy is proffered.

A child in a guru's body does the same use and discard to students.

You have a right to your hurt. Your pain, your anger, is your truth.

You are a person, a living breathing person
affected by human relationships.

To be scammed out of trusting your true emotions is the worst con of all. And it will bring no lasting peace.

At the very worst, disciples and students who have been hurt and then tricked ot use 'detachment' to disown their hurt will be very likely to shame newly harmed students to distrust their own pain.

That is how this toxic 'detachment' ideology (aka 'Its a teaching lesson') is
perpetuated from one cohort of students to the next.

The only beneficiaries are the people using teachers who dont want to be bothered with tiresome human emotions.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/28/2015 11:56PM by corboy.