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Yeah I always thought the only thing that was starting to look like hate was their attitude.
But I didn't like to say, only now that you mention it, that is where I've seen and heard and felt all the hate.
Because I have seen flaws and then chasms in this teaching and the organisations still surviving on its misconceptions I am hated.
that's what it has felt like for years, from people I thought were my mates. Their only loyalty to me as friends was through him.
Without that connection: nothing, or worse: hatred.
I hesitated to use the ugly word before but they use it so much that that feels like hate too.
Modified by Lp at Sat, Feb 24, 2007, 08:18:20
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Absolutely, LP. The more one gets involved trying to communicate with premies online, the more one feels their hatred. I've been there and done it. It's quite horrible, really. "Ex-premies are a hate-group, etc.," is now an engrained piece of the Prem rawat belief-system which is troubling because I'm personally accused of being a member/leader of said "hate-group." Rawat and Company have had nearly ten years of exes online to foster premies' mentality about us and their hatred towards us is quite palpable -- there's no question about it. They believe we hate Maharaji as much as they love him. Fact is, I don't hate Maharaji or premies. Hatred is such a strong, negative emotion that saps one's energy to such a degree that I don't have time in my life to allow that kind of feeling to exist inside of myself. I believe that kind of hatred that premies feel towards us is extremely detrimental to good mental health. Unless and until a premie involved in such a volatile belief-system snaps out of it and leaves Maharaji and the cult, I'm afraid there's just no talking to premies about anything resembling the truth about their Master. Evidence of that is the rambling, nonsensical stuff being written on Amazon by premies. It's quite sad to read their strange attempts to create their positive picture of Maharaji, when all they are doing is describing the destructive personality cult they are stuck within, and validating our criticism of the same.
Modified by Cynthia at Sat, Feb 24, 2007, 09:40:41
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Fact is, I don't hate Maharaji or premies.
Neither do I, & it's irritating to say the least when the cult officials try to make out that, I, & others like me, do. I still count 2 'premies' amongst my small number of real old friends. I put the word in inverted commas because in the distorted cultworld mindset they are both on the fringes now, which seems to mean to the handful of fanatics who keep the show on the road, that they're beyond the pale too, though not of course in the same bracket as the apostates who refuse to keep their mouths shut.
Nonetheless, they are both still believers, something which I used to find incredible, & had many serious nose to nose disagreements about a few years ago. Now I just throw in the odd sarcastic remark, on the extremely rare occasions when the shithead's name comes up in conversation.
Like everyone else in the real world, the rare times that we can get together are better spent catching up, than trying to exorcise ghosts.
I save that enterprise for here, because I happen to think it's important to counter the self-aggrandising Malibu mofo, as well as for other more personal reasons, mainly connected with the Socratic injunction to...... know thyself.
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I often read the 'discussions' that went on, on the old forums, in the years past but was too inwardly terrified to post.
This fear continues even when one is convinced one is right in doubting all the projected benefits claimed by followers and guru as emanating from the latter.
If I have ever shouted out something that was just a plain insult: and I can remember the first time I mentally grouped all followers into a group, and said something as if to them all while crossing the road around Oxford Street or somewhere.
I can't remember at the moment, I was with 2 or 3 of a guru's followers... early 70's..I blurted out...ah .."God, followers are so concept ridden"... yes that was it. I apologise for this sort of thing and say only in my defense: such things do get said in frustration at what is eventually the most painful wall I have ever come across.
It is a long time since I argued face to face with devotees. I used to when I still believed my social life was among them, even accepting that premie was a term that could be applied to me, before anyone thought of the brilliant idea of putting an ex in front of it. But I had to try, for the experience, my first attempt at internet conversation.
I want to say, really, that I don't want to insult them, down grade them and don't remember ever trying, unless as above I weakened and let my personal feelings show, and the sadness, anger or frustration of realizing that the person that I am speaking to cannot, in thought , cross certain borders. Anger, that is, not for the premie, but towards the person who has done this to them.
Tell them you are angry with guru Maharaji and the red flag is drawn. Then it is worse than trying to talk to someone behind a wall.
Because it is invisible and separates friends and lovers and because it has a mind of it's own, I'd give it a high rating in the world's saddest wall competition. Though , of course, it would not take top billings.
I envied those hardened old posters, so had to try a conversation or too. It was a stark reminder of the line in thought that is impassable.
I suppose the 'insult' is in the disbelieving act. The actual statement of disbelief before their ears or eyes is forbidden.
I remember the sentence being said to me. Guru Charanand and Ramanand:
"A devotee must never even hear criticism of his guru." I asked
"What then should one do if one stands before one who does this?"
"Fight them!" Indicated Ramanand, an old army officer, but Charanand toned it down:
"Defeat them in argument, you will have guru Maharaji's grace."
"Yes defeat:...by Maharaji's grace." said Ramanand.
"But if you cannot you must stop up your ears", one added , but I had turned away.
After that point, where being a non supporter is clearly established, they have been insulted to the point where now, no matter how many demeaning insults they shower, it can never equal the massive insult they have taken: when none was intended; other than to have the courage to speak the truth. Reduction to animals is a favorite. My short remarks were called barks.
I do not believe Maharaji is any of the implied titles of his books. None of them name him, not even the 'Possibility of Peace' is he. Not even a "Who", in the sense of the heavily loaded question. His words do not bring clarity but confuse. Any one who's got a mind could tell the difference berween those two.
These are not insults. None who walks on earth is the "possibility of peace". Though many are actively working on it. Perhaps it is in the use of "quotes" that the insult is taken. You have to be so careful. And I see an immediate insult to every single member of the human race to suggest that another is of a higher order, not to mention active manouvers to recruit more. To nay-say the claim, is to defend the human race, and reinstate the truth that every human being is of equal worth and if there is found to be a divine element in humanity it will be the commone share of every human being. None may say he is lord of another. I heard it on the wind.
But once it is implied that he is not these things: not any sort of lord or peace possibility: the sluice gate to put-downs is open.
It is the statement of this truth that enrages.
"He is not the lord. He has no possibility of bringing peace."
I have not insulted a single premie, nor if I was talking about anyone I know would they be offended, I know I'm not these things, we all know that. Same for me as my personal rules of observation, re: special-ness: 'either we all are divine or none of us are'.
Only if one says guru Maharaj ji is not those; do all premies seem to feel insulted, and a carte blanche to group and discredit an undefined and unknown world wide diffuson of people, who's one thing in common is that they no longer believe or accept these arcane ideas about guru Maharaj ji, nor are they prepared to sit idly by while those old followers we remember are clearly attempting to gear up to do the exact same thing; with even more access to technological forms of hypnotising agents for the input of similar, but edited concepts; then they feel insulted.
(When Maurice, Jeff and I were travelling in St. Thomas's christian villages in the South Indian Mountains, my main book, (thin), was Plato's Last days of Socrates .. I read and reread it .. Early 70's, I was as close to exing then..as ... ah.. but I had to go and sign up for more.)
Modified by Lp at Sun, Feb 25, 2007, 05:51:31
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Saddest and silliest. It just gets me sometimes, here from the other side, to see it daubed with krishna crowns and holy bathtub water.
"None may say he is lord of another. I heard it on the wind."
Me too.
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That should say:
"None may say they are lord of another.
Modified by Lp at Sun, Feb 25, 2007, 15:44:54
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Like everyone else in the real world, the rare times that we can get together are better spent catching up, than trying to exorcise ghosts. Yup, life's too short.
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I would guess that rawat's labeling of ex-premies as a hate group was deliberate. In a subtle, but deliberate way, he has given premies the go ahead to hate ex-premies. Since ex-premies are nothing but a "hate group", they are beneath being accorded traditional civility. He has made it into an "anything goes", us vs them. Rawat has only himself to blame for all of it. He did it, and as I said, it is my belief he thought it out and decided how best to damage those misguided, unlit matches. He has, as usual, kept his ass clean while at the same time unleashing his own feelings and hatred through the premies. Such classic cult behavior!
The harassment and terroristic threats directed toward specific people are much more overt, but rawat would deny all knowledge of such actions. That, of course, is crap. He finds many ways to spill his vile hate toward people who now refuse to kiss his feet and feather his nest.
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I would say that, that is pretty close to the truth from my observation. But how does he get them to only say that, like a tape recorder, maybe answering another question that was raised, there's some hidden hypnotic quality in the very notes themselves of arti, making peoples minds turn into plasticene?
It all comes out clothed in the verbal overcoat and cardboard crown of the time.
Modified by Lp at Sun, Feb 25, 2007, 06:00:05
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Well we are talking about people who have repressed all normal emotional development for (in most cases) decades. Anyone who says anything vaguely negative about Rawat becomes a 'legitimised' receptical for the premies' long suppressed fear and anger. Critics of Rawat become the image of premies that premies themselve can not otherwise dare face. There's nothing that can be done about this, it just means that there can not ever be any reasoned interaction between those who criticise Rawat and those who are in thrall to him. At least we heretics are mostly protected from the 'rage of the Rawat inquisition' - still Fakiranandis violence was warning about what really lay at the heart of the Rawat religion. Nik
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There’s a point that comes in a premie’s life, (hopefully anyway) when they first say out loud to themselves ‘Maharaji’ is a stage show, Rawat is a fraud.
That’s the point when the debris choking your river gives way and you get to ride the rapids. And it is in that moment, poised on top of the waterfall, that you can shade the sun out of your eyes, assess the course ahead of you and adjust the trim of your ship.
Strong emotions are like any drug. It’s like being under the influence - the way you think and consequently the way you navigate are affected by your emotions.
Once flowing, there is going to be turbulence, you can see it coming, that’s the rapids and all it takes is a glance behind to see your past self pickling in satsang to know how threadbare your craft is.
The sum is greater than it’s parts
I remember the time way back when sitting in a hall amongst the many of us in front of his Largeship – he was exhorting us to make a leap of faith – to trust in Him, cease and desist reasoning and just ‘feel’. And I decided to give it a go. Instant bliss. Oh my.
Fast forward a quarter of a century or so and there am I poised at the top of the waterfall. It’s like taking a paper bag off your head, and it is easy to see such things as what caused that experience, that it was so amplified simply because of the circumstance - the many of us.
Leaving premiedom involves more than leaving Rawat. It was more than easy to break whatever bond of loyalty I might have considered I had towards him – he had so profoundly and uncaringly lied to me. But there are real bonds of loyalty in friendship, and also simply in having shared the same fate with other people - I did not feel like disappearing like a rat off a sinking ship, what about the other passengers.
My need to get going was too great. Initially when I thought about my friends I just thought well they’re just going to have to come out of the Toad’s Well as well. …then I realised they might have their own ideas about that!
Indeed, should I jump up and down about it, they were going to want to jump up and down on me.
In the end it was easy to reconcile what I needed for myself with my sense of loyalty to my premie companions. Even if I could have, I had no interest in starting some mass exodus from the cult in any way whatsoever. What for, what’s the point.
And I had understood that the nicest thing that could possibly be there for that person who must walk the long and narrow bridge of reasoning that leads to freedom from Rawat and all of his ilk is a glimpse of that sunlit space ahead.
One thing I have heard said over and again about a spouse in a bad marriage is that having somewhere to go to makes it easier to leave.
This is not one person though. This is many people in one bad marriage, with all the subsequent amplification. And the sum is greater than its parts.
So I set my compass with the simplest of phrases – what is is. And I trimmed my sail for my own personal stability.
Do you laugh or do you cry – both will do. For the first time in my adult life I could answer that question what do you want to do without any confusion or doubt. It’s been a novel experience, and I am so glad, even though it was so painfully in the ‘better late than never’ category, to have regained a clear and present autonomy.
Modified by lesley at Sat, Feb 24, 2007, 14:35:01
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