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Good morning, Schalk -

     It was most kind of you to reply to my response.  I have enjoyed it and it has given me much to ruminate on.  Again, most kind.

     My response to this is very broad spectrum in that it's range goes from egoic, at which it takes the viewpoint of the individual named Erik and his perceived uniqueness, to Non-Dual at which it is just the Witness and all that is arising and falling within it.  Here goes:

Erik's view (physical view/earth-based)

     From my research and study into that which is uniquely human, (history, geneology, anthropology, psychology, sociology) it has come to my awareness numerous times that there within societies of all types exists charlatans and snake-oil merchants preying upon the ignorance of a perspective buyer/consumer.  Is it morally correct? Obviously not.  Ethically?  Maybe.  The merchant may be a very dilligent and work-oriented fellow.  What's more is that he/she may well indeed believe in his/her own product.  Hmmm..(Does Cohen believe in his product?  Do you know?  Can you prove that he does or doesn't?) It's very curious thing, but when looked at objectively and with no tinted glasses of fear or adoration, we see that in and of itself, the product is harmless. 

     So then we look at the other half of the equation; the purchaser, the client, the consumer.  Did he/she do his/her research?  Is the education of this person a societal responsibility?  An emphatic and resounding "NO!".  This is where I have a bit of a problem saying that this isn't government oriented.  It still smacks of telling me what to do.  It still rings of not letting me decide for myself what is right and what is wrong.  This smells like fear.  Fear is a very personal and intimate pathology.  It originates within the perceiver and ends in same said perceiver.  Fears, at a government level, are best dealt with lightly.  In other words, a government exists to protect the borders of it's citizenry from outside violence and invasion.  Within the citizenry, the government protects and upholds basic existential rights.  In other words, you are free to do anything you want and desire as long as it does not infringe upon the existential rights of another.  What a person is selling (from esoterica to toilet paper) does not infringe upon the customer's existential rights.  What the consumer purchases and again, believes about the purchased item can be both liberating and enslaving.  It is therefore in the consumer's hand of responsibility to become aware of the product and comparison shop for the best quality.  This creates competition and competition creates quality as well as security.  Supply is always dictated by demand and even then I am still able to be as frivolous and stupid as I want.  You yourself are allowed to pity my squandering or to exalt it.  You either agree with the good value I judged to find in my purchase or you find it repugnant.  Perhaps, better still you have taken to minding your own business and have a healthy level of apathy and could give a flying shit about what I buy!  That's the best scenario in my humble opinion.

     We are not here to hold each others' hands unless we want to hold your dang hand and you want it held.  You fly from, walk from or fall from the comfort and security of Mommy and Daddy's embrace to brave the world ON  YOUR OWN.  You came into it alone and in pain and you will leave it alone and in pain.  No one can share these experiences with you.  You alone are having them.....alone. 

Social View

     No charity, belief system, club, clique, or other some such social venue of gathering should be regulated by government.  Ever!  If there is enough collective and resonating concern within a common-thinking pool or body of citizenry about a common subject or collective action,  then they can form a non-profit regulatory commission or sanctuary or coallition for those that find guidance in such things.  And it is all guidance.  No dictates allowed here.  Again, absolute liberty and freedom.  I think this is a scary concept to a lot of people.  They seem fearful of the concept of "no one there for them but them".  No hand out.  No freebie.  No unending gratuity.  The whole beautiful mechanism of pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps and making something of your "self" seems rather daunting to more and more people.  Shame.  Because if you cannot handle absolute freedom in the physical and illusory realm, how the hell do you expect to re-cognize it as the always/already, ever-present, stateless state of your Being the Witness?!  Hmmm...  Quite a quandry, isn't it? 

Spiritual View

     As we can see, physical existence can be a scary and solitairy affair.  You come in alone, and you leave alone. No matter how many manuals of instruction or gurus, seikhs, priests, prophets, healers or other some such tell us about these very natural and very real phenomena, you still do it alone with no concept of what to expect. Nobody knows the punchline until they get there.  Anybody who says otherwise is under the heavy auspices and burdens of proof.  Build your bravery, courage and strength in this and you will be fine.  

     As is inherently obvious to me and perhaps to a lot of folks, belief systems evolved out of the very simple fear of death and the unknown.  What happens?  Where do I go?  Is there any residual existence with the name Erik at an individual level that passes on into a non-temporal and non-corporeally continued existence?  Does it matter?.......Does it matter?..........Hmmm....Egoically, hell yes it matters!  I am important dammit!  I learned some valuable things in my brief time as a body and I need to share them in a safe, cozy and secure environment with others that must know!  Why?..........Why?.........On the dark side of Pluto, what grain of sand knows of Erik?  What proposed entity of sentients on a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri knows of Schalk?  Why the hell would he care?  What bearing of importance do we have in the great scheme of things?  Very little.  So we look inside for comfort and reason.  Not outside.  We look inside into the places that are scarier than anything external for it is the familiarity with the fear on the inside which labels all external fears.  At first the stillness is disconcerting.  I read about it in books.  I studied. I listen to teachers.  I researched numerous sources that I purchased willfully of my own accord without any one or any thing telling me not to or to do so.  I bade purchase with the same unknowing about birth and death as the material that claims to know of birth and death and I did so with the comfort of knowing that I was free to do so based on what ever level of current understanding I had at the time.  Would I purchase some of this material now?  No.  I have grown and evolved and generally moved on from that level of understanding.  However, I was not guaranteed that what I read was significant, truthful, factual or relevant in any way, shape or form.  I relied on my judgement.  Not yours or anybody else's and yet I am by all means seemingly fine and generally unfettered without having to hold anybody's hand.  

     In short, courage, bravery, perserverance and the willingness to accept that not only are you nothing, you know nothing as well, are all that is needed to get through life.  Period.  There is nothing to know.  And if you don't get it?  That doesn't matter either.  Everything is exactly perfect.  Don't mess!

In Loving Abundance,

Erik 

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We the unwilling, led by the unqualified, have been doing so much with so little for so long, now attempt the impossible with nothing...

You make some great points Schalk.

I agree with you in particular on the following point: By moving the attention away from the individual to the group, a real danger arises for group-think. Notions that contradict the guiding voice of the collective (in this case Andrew @ EnlightenNext) can often easily be negated. If I argued in front of others in that group that Andrew was mistaken on a point I know I would have in a sense a dual hurdle [1) my point itself and 2) the trust people have in Andrew (which maybe is justified). Although, as integral teaches us the LL is always impacting our choices just probably to a larger extent in a community like EnlightenNext... but you can even feel that pull here and it is something we can now remain aware of. But it is true although I have a great deal of trust in Wilber (& I think it is mostly justified) I have no way of really knowing his interiors... as I'm not deeply psychic... so I could be wrong. On a side note I am deeply grateful for what he has done. But you point out and I think rightly, Wilber has brought to the table a lot of sophistication in the UR which isn't always so present with Cohen. So, warning bells go off for me too when I think about that fact. 

But now let me respond a little more directly to your comments. So, I am not here to really defend these guys..., I have a bit of a feeling in certain ways there is something a little "crook in Melswellbrook"  I too just want to know their intentions. But I also think they might have something to offer. So in 1) you raise the point that Andrew is pulling these tricks for profit...

I have no doubt there is a profit element to this. Which in itself I personally am not against so long as one is really getting something for the dollar they spend... and it ought not be simple emotional-boosting, as that is as you point out, in fact, doing a double dis-service when its under the label of spirituality. On one level, its taking advantage of others for profit by means of complex wordplay and on an even deeper level its going to further push ideas of spirit away from the mainstream (as it acts as another exemplar of lies and deceit within so-called spiritual communities). However, because I have never attended I can't comment on whether or not something really profound happens at his meetings that really is pushing spirit-in-action forward as he claims. So, for your first point I think I must remain mostly agnostic.

2) Regarding your second point about Integral offering truly novel things & EnlightenNext not offering truly new things. I agree, but disagree I think the point you raise about Ken grounding things in the 3rd person UR comes into play here. With Andrew I don't see him do as much of that. The magazine however has a really strong hermeneutical aspect to it they talk with many different people (a lot of which are respected academics) and they generate interpretations from the talks. There are not many truly new ideas coming from the magazine, but there is I'd say a good degree of synthesis going on (due to the vastly different kinds of people they converse with). And because Cohen is so central to this magazine I think it at least could be a partial reflection of his nature. So for me, I tend to think yes and no to this point. 

One final remark... the end of the talk I posted for you they talk about how they switched their method in 2001. (If there is anything actually going on that is worth our attention this is what they say is truly noteworthy). They say around that time they started to have experiences of collective consciousness; guided by the Kosmos or the impulse behind evolution. So that one has a direct experience within a kind of collective consciousness landscape of the desires of God to create the future. I don't know if I'm getting this exactly right, but I think that's roughly what they are saying. 

Anyway, let me know what you think.

B

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