Hands-down, one of the stickiest issues for me in leaving the cult of radical non-duality was the one of superiority…and of barely being able to tolerate ‘others’ who were not anywhere near a similar path. The notion that we were the “chosen ones” had not only been a very large part of the unseen, subtle indoctrination but one that was, quite literally, embedded in my bones over the course of my 20+ years at SAT (The Society of Abidance in Truth). This dynamic was not only endemic to this cult but is seen playing out, similarly, in much larger cults, such as the Osho cult. While certainly not stated out loud, it was deeply implied that we were ‘The Chosen Ones’…Narcissism at its height.

The Cult of Radical Non-Duality: leslieread.substack dot com/p/the-cult-of-non-duality

One of the biggest…and most fraught…downfalls of such arrogance is that this worldview lays the perfect ground for the justification of lies and deceptions. The fact that Nome and Russell Smith were/are serial liars is well known in the non-dual community. The entire set-up of the organizations at Nome and Sasvati’s SAT (Society of Abidance in Truth), Russell Smith and Helga Schleiter-Smith’s “Way of Sudden Awakening” and Candace O’Denver and Russell Smith’s “Great Freedom/Balanced View” were/are ALL based on lies, deceptions and the emotional manipulations of their followers.

These types of tactics are, in no way, confined to these teachers but are part of a broad-based aspect of functioning within many fundamentalist groups. The fact that these groups were/are “non-dual” is NO exception to this destructive and coercive dynamic.

One of the truly sad aspects, within my own experience, is knowing that there are, still, people at SAT who are subject to this arrogance of manipulation…some who are the very people Nome set-out to help: the Indians. Questions during Satsang by those who have ‘awakened’ (according to Nome’s definition) are staged and repeated by those same people.

To this day non-duality is hailed as the equivalent to the Teachings of The Christ and The Buddha whose teachings involved so much more than mere non-duality. In those Teachings there is a very definitive sense of right-and-wrong and ethical standards.

Many non-dual teachers, such as Leonard Jacobson, actually advertise their programs on this false equivalency to the Teachings of The Christ…as did my former teachers Nome and Russell Smith. I had to point out to Leonard, on one such thread, that The Christ nor The Buddha would have ever given a pass to such actions as described in this letter:
ASI LETTER (Assoc. for Spiritual ‘Integrity’) 03/06/2023 at the end of which is a link to a short recording (22 min.) detailing the occult controls over 4-generations of my family… to which Rick Archer said to just “walk away”…

dropbox dot com/s/hga3c7zpo1v973j/ASI%20Letter%2003%3A06%3A23.pdf?dl=0&e=1&fbclid=IwAR2hNCDCiHgzRQrXqce9WFFH5vgHGHoGlda3PUlGKT2n1qMuoFfoMadMbvs

The HUMAN side of this is that 4-generations of my family were involved in the fallout from the sweeping deceptions of these teachers. We’ve all seen that one can be awake to Wholeness and yet that, in no way, means one is free from shadow or is somehow a balanced and decent human.

When there is the arrogance of superiority there is no room for discussion.

“Non-duality has LONG had within its approach the trap of just another superiority view of “spirituality/being-ness.” Any “superior” approach, whether it’s Christian, non-dual, Buddhist, Hindi, Muslim, atheist, etc. has already chosen a slippery slope practice, and invites the opportunity for exploitation, control, judgement, and exclusion. If one hasn’t processed and cleared out their subconscious “psychological basement” of cultural, religious, and familial fear-based and limiting beliefs, one will be susceptible to being controlled or capable of being controlled by a variety of “monsters” in various religious, monastic, or political garb.” -Judith Froemming

While I absolutely agree with Judith’s statement there are many who become entangled due to the unseen and controlling mis-use of siddis (occult powers) which easily mimic The Divine. This was most certainly the case at SAT. One could have cleared out their “psychological basement” all-they-want and still get entangled with these unseen forces.

Mere non-duality is just that: it is wholeness. In the words of FaceBook friend Kim Rome referring to my description of ‘awake’ non-dual teachers she responded: “They are not awake. They are living in a transcendent reality that is marked by spiritual materialism and bypassing.” The depth of this statement is profound.

The Rush to Transcendence…and the existential consequences:
leslieread.substack dot com/p/the-rush-to-transcendence

In the Universal, on-going, law of as-above-so-below we are seeing play-out the arrogant superiority of fundamentalist, white Christian nationalism. So-much-so that the crosses being worn by all those in the Trump administration are beginning to burn-the-skin of those who wear them with the growing reveal of criminality, in many forms, but in a form most heinous: the cover-up of global child sex trafficking. Possibly the largest cover-up in the world of sex crime. ALL this emanating from the fundamentalist, white Christian nationalism as spelled-out, in its entirety, in the document: Project 2025 and carried out by the man-behind-the-curtain and architect of the diabolical family separations: Stephen Miller.

Project 2025:
static.heritage dot org/project2025/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf

A Message on Our Core Values:
leslieread.substack dot com/p/a-message-on-our-core-values

As with all forms of superiority this, too, will crumble under its own weight…as we are beginning to see with our own eyes.

Thank you for following my work.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions or comments.

Warmly,

-Leslie@ integrityintruth dot com
and on Substack:
leslieread.substack dot com/publish/home

Quote
Leslie Read
“They are not awake. They are living in a transcendent reality that is marked by spiritual materialism and bypassing.”

They're definitely not "awake," whatever that means, but neither is there anything transcendent about their state. The oceanic feeling is simply regression to infantile narcissism. Chapter 1 of Civilization and Its Discontents debunks the pretensions of mystics, whether eastern or western:

"Another friend of mine, whose insatiable craving for knowledge has fed him to make the most unusual experiments and has ended by giving him encyclopaedic knowledge, has assured me that through the practices of Yoga, by withdrawing from the world, by fixing the attention on bodily functions and by peculiar methods of breathing, one can in fact evoke new sensations and coenaesthesias in oneself, which he regards as regressions to primordial states of mind which have long ago been overlaid. He sees in them a physiological basis, as it were, of much of the wisdom of mysticism."

(Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, translated from the German by James Strachey, first published 1930.)

Interesting...thank you for posting this quote.

Bottom line, for me, with regard to *ANY* so-called "awakening": Does it make you a better Human Being? If it *doesn't* then what good is it??!

-Leslie

Right on!

You've described how I stopped believing in 'enlightenment'.

Too many corrupt gurus claimed enlightenment.

Their followers claimed these menaces to society were enlightened - that even their misdeeds were manifestations of 'crazy wisdom.'

If enlightenment can coexist with a guru's brutish behavior, its worthless.

If enlightenment (possessing 'crazy wisdom')
empowers the guru's destructiveness, enlightenment it is less than worthless.

Hello Corboy...

"If enlightenment can coexist with a guru's brutish behavior, its worthless."

Absolutely.

ESPECIALLY if that "brutish" behavior includes siddis (occult powers) which were *most definitely" part of Osho's playbook as well as the playbook of my former teachers.
Siddis (occult powers) are *very* real and go unnoticed by the onknowing recipient of such abject control.

In many ways these powers EASILY mimic The Divine. Here are some very apt words from Andrew Harvey:
"It is my belief that 90 percent of the so-called masters in the modern world are not enlightened at all but are in fact occult magicians. The occult magician will use his or her occult powers to ensnare the devotee in a posture of adoration by feeding them visionary experiences, which may seem to open things up for the devotee but actually keeps one dependent on the guru. It's a kind of drug pushing as dangerous on the spiritual level as cocaine or heroin is on the physical. Because people don't know the difference between the divine and the occult, nor how accurately the occult can mimic the divine, nor how easily occult powers can be cultivated by the unscrupulous and ambitious. They take these powers and experiences to be unmistakeable signs of divine presence and go on worshipping as divine these people who have, in fact, shown that they are neither good, nor kind, nor humble, nor generous."

How PERFECT is that description!! :)

Warmly,
-Leslie@ integrityintruth dot com

Quote
corboy
If enlightenment (possessing 'crazy wisdom') empowers the guru's destructiveness, enlightenment it is less than worthless.

Would it be fair to start calling it "the enlightenment scam"? The guru gets an easy life at the expense of his victims.

Hi daniel46,

In far too many instances it *would* be fair to call it a scam. A *deeply insightful* comment by FB friend David Bingham:

“…I would like to add that in this modern age the Neo-Advaitan tradition of the truth existing ultimately in the sphere of the non-dual (which is followed by so many, with so many esteemed teachers) is a deeply flawed model of understanding of the nature of the human condition and its relationship with the Infinite.
It is a form of understanding which has an in-built tendency to deeply exacerbate illusions concerning the experiences of life and in turn to generate rigidities around its interpretation. In doing so it has great potential to be harmful to the fundamental well-being of its adherents, all the more so because it dresses itself in the clothes of liberation. It is a false and incomplete freedom of the age.”

“…great potential to be harmful…” may be a vast understatement.

Warmly,
-Leslie@ integrityintruth dot com