meditation groups
Posted by:
inspector 8
()
Date: October 16, 2002 09:01AM
At my meditation group, after the meditation I casually mentioned that I had been "mad at the world" earlier that day, and that I'd decided to buy some (sheet) music about it. I MEANT to simply point out the futility, that I didn't know what good it was going to do (buying music, like burying my head in the sand), but at least I was going to have my own small world and space of beauty (music) --- even if the larger world around me was corrupt and a mess.
Very sharply, a woman we'll call "Glenda" (not her real name) replied, "Now why were you mad at the world on the day you're supposed to be sending peace to it?"
To explain: some man named James Twyman (I think he's an author with a website) had proclaimed this particular day a world-wide pray-for-peace day, and so Glenda assumed that we were all followers of her particular interpretation of James Twyman's suggestion to pray for peace.
I did not try to explain to Glenda that anger and hatred are somewhat different emotions --- or that anger probably more often stems from love than hatred, etc.
Nor did I point out to her that no one dictates another person's emotions or vibs. Emotions are and always will be free flowing, and somewhat irratic and unpredictable, and not necessarily explainable by logic.
In fact (on rare occasion) I've had very bad feelings before which I could no more explain through logic of any sort than they man in the moon, and yet later some disaster occurred which made me think I simply must have known something intuitively. We can't explain and justify our emotions or emotional pulls to other people and never should be expect to. They are ours alone.
Anyway I did decide (after she made her rude comment) to just maintain my calm and let this be HER issue. As if I was an emotionless robot (and also as if I owed her explanations, which I did not) I replied, "Well, because of all the things in the news, and the things that aren't in the news that should be in the news . . ." etc., to justify to her my admission as to why I had been "mad at the world" earlier in the day.
Also --- regarding James Twyman --- I am not at all necessarily "against" him, or his proclamations of "pray for peace" days. But also I hardly know this man, and have read none of his books or materials, and I find it very presumptuous for Glenda to take it on herself to assume we all have accepted him as our personal lords and saviors, or even our personal guidance counselors. She assumed this just because he had such an obviously good idea, to get a zillion people to simultaneously pray for peace. To presume we are all going to hand over our lives to his purported dictates, and not be "mad" on a certain day is totally absurd, and i think VERY cult-like: eg. now don't be mad on such and such day --- it's against the regulations.
Had I personally subscribed to his whole ideologies (and frankly, I am quite ambiusous towards him --- not knowing much about him how can I be otherwise?), then I MIGHT better understand Glenda's accusation. But even then she has put her own slant on what she THINKS he has called for (changing "pray for peace" into "don't be mad").
Also I find it interesting that I could have been mad as all hell and just not said so, and I'm sure that would have been perfectly alright with her. She was offended by the fact I admitted to my anger, not that I actually had been angry earlier that day.