SPIRITUAL MATERIALISM
Spiritual materialism is the process whereby we subvert the methods and effects of spiritual practice to the agenda and intentions of our conditioned minds in their relentless insecurity. It inspires us to guru shop; to accumulate a roll call of workshops and classes, satsangs and darshan attended; to master this yoga posture and that one; to perfect this breathing technique and the other; to attain this state of consciousness and that; to awaken this energy centre and the other one; to flit endlessly from one accumulation to another in pursuit of our noble cause. But is this accumulation of so-called spiritual skills any more meaningful then the accumulation of political power, or material wealth? Granted it is, for some, more exciting, and perhaps more rewarding. But does that have any real significance? Is it going to bring about an end to itself, for, surely, as long as we are still seeking, grasping, gathering, we are not at peace, we are not where we want to be.
The truth of the matter is that most of us do not want to be where we are. Perhaps we'd like to be nearer the heater, outside the door, in India, with the guru, in bed, in the Bahamas, on a Ducati, shopping, in a Ferrari, in the salon, onstage, in the White House, or boardroom of Allied Newspapers. How many of us are really happy to be where we are, to have only what we have, nothing more and nothing less; to do only what we do, and only in the place that we do it with the people that we are doing it with. Wouldn't that be great.
Is there really anything else of greater value than that? To be perfectly happy with what is, and remain so, as it inevitably changes. Do we believe that even though we don’t earn quite enough money, or have enough time to be with those we love, or don’t get enough fresh air and wind on our cheeks, that if we can only hold our feet on our head for long enough, or hold our breath for four minutes without dying, or get a fire breathing serpent to insinuate itself along our spine and into our heads, or to master the various levels of this samadhi and that, we won’t mind anymore that the roof is leaking, sex isn't what it used to be, the cars unreliable, the air polluted, war endemic, and exploitation ubiquitous. If we can just learn to walk on water we'll be ok. Where is the evidence? And wishful thinking is not evidence. Nor are opaque or poetic dissertations on the subtle structures of the human body, consciousness or reality, no matter how old and hallowed. They're hearsay, rumour, gossip. Noise.
So, we know the shape, size, location of bindu. Maybe even, just maybe, we’ve rolled the sweet flavoured ambrosia that flows from it around our tongue, not once but even, maybe, many many times. And, whats more we can do 108 sun salutations without dropping a single bead of sweat onto the floor. But there are people who own 100 bedrooms, who have a paper value of over £1,000,000,000. They are not happy either. They have things they don’t want, too high interest rates, inefficient housekeepers, and they don’t have things they do want: more time, more love, more peace of mind, happiness, and god forbid, maybe even, more money to help them to get it.
But can you get happiness, peace of mind, love or well-being. Can they be bought, borrowed, stolen, won, given, or earned? And i don’t mean fleetingly, but so that you never have to get them again. So that you never again want what you don’t have and have what you don’t want. Is love possible, is peace of mind a possibility, is freedom an option? Wanting and having are mutually exclusive. Wanting and appreciating are also. The actuality precludes the desire, and the desire precludes the reality.
So how do we let go of wanting, without running away from it? Only by seeing it for what it is, only by recognising the place that it has in our lives, actions, thoughts and hearts. Only by seeing so clearly and deeply into its presence, its modus operandi and its consequences, and thereby being so shocked, so appalled and so unwilling to sustain it any longer, that we are, without any action on our part whatsoever, no longer clinging to it. Only by feeling what it is doing to us, will we let go of it, without a thought, without hesitation, without intent, just as the hand that burns opens and the coal falls to the floor.
This we cannot do by setting ourselves goals and trying to reach them. No matter how subtle, how "spiritual". Any attempt to gain anything at all, even to gain freedom from desire, imposes our will, our imagination, our unconscious fears and assumptions, hopes and dreams on the actual reality of that which, independent of our productions (assumptions, expectations, hopes, beliefs etc), simply is.
If spiritual freedom exist it cannot be brought about by grasping, only revealed by clarifying those processes by which we obscure it. Only by doing to find out what is rather than by doing to gain anything: by practicing in order to let go rather than to accumulate: for relinquishment rather than achievement; for loss and less rather than gain and more. We practice only to no longer dream our lives away, or else our practice simply reinforces the dream into a nightmare while interpreting it inescapably as reality.
1990
Spiritual materialism is the process whereby we subvert the methods and effects of spiritual practice to the agenda and intentions of our conditioned minds in their relentless insecurity. It inspires us to guru shop; to accumulate a roll call of workshops and classes, satsangs and darshan attended; to master this yoga posture and that one; to perfect this breathing technique and the other; to attain this state of consciousness and that; to awaken this energy centre and the other one; to flit endlessly from one accumulation to another in pursuit of our noble cause. But is this accumulation of so-called spiritual skills any more meaningful then the accumulation of political power, or material wealth? Granted it is, for some, more exciting, and perhaps more rewarding. But does that have any real significance? Is it going to bring about an end to itself, for, surely, as long as we are still seeking, grasping, gathering, we are not at peace, we are not where we want to be.
The truth of the matter is that most of us do not want to be where we are. Perhaps we'd like to be nearer the heater, outside the door, in India, with the guru, in bed, in the Bahamas, on a Ducati, shopping, in a Ferrari, in the salon, onstage, in the White House, or boardroom of Allied Newspapers. How many of us are really happy to be where we are, to have only what we have, nothing more and nothing less; to do only what we do, and only in the place that we do it with the people that we are doing it with. Wouldn't that be great.
Is there really anything else of greater value than that? To be perfectly happy with what is, and remain so, as it inevitably changes. Do we believe that even though we don’t earn quite enough money, or have enough time to be with those we love, or don’t get enough fresh air and wind on our cheeks, that if we can only hold our feet on our head for long enough, or hold our breath for four minutes without dying, or get a fire breathing serpent to insinuate itself along our spine and into our heads, or to master the various levels of this samadhi and that, we won’t mind anymore that the roof is leaking, sex isn't what it used to be, the cars unreliable, the air polluted, war endemic, and exploitation ubiquitous. If we can just learn to walk on water we'll be ok. Where is the evidence? And wishful thinking is not evidence. Nor are opaque or poetic dissertations on the subtle structures of the human body, consciousness or reality, no matter how old and hallowed. They're hearsay, rumour, gossip. Noise.
So, we know the shape, size, location of bindu. Maybe even, just maybe, we’ve rolled the sweet flavoured ambrosia that flows from it around our tongue, not once but even, maybe, many many times. And, whats more we can do 108 sun salutations without dropping a single bead of sweat onto the floor. But there are people who own 100 bedrooms, who have a paper value of over £1,000,000,000. They are not happy either. They have things they don’t want, too high interest rates, inefficient housekeepers, and they don’t have things they do want: more time, more love, more peace of mind, happiness, and god forbid, maybe even, more money to help them to get it.
But can you get happiness, peace of mind, love or well-being. Can they be bought, borrowed, stolen, won, given, or earned? And i don’t mean fleetingly, but so that you never have to get them again. So that you never again want what you don’t have and have what you don’t want. Is love possible, is peace of mind a possibility, is freedom an option? Wanting and having are mutually exclusive. Wanting and appreciating are also. The actuality precludes the desire, and the desire precludes the reality.
So how do we let go of wanting, without running away from it? Only by seeing it for what it is, only by recognising the place that it has in our lives, actions, thoughts and hearts. Only by seeing so clearly and deeply into its presence, its modus operandi and its consequences, and thereby being so shocked, so appalled and so unwilling to sustain it any longer, that we are, without any action on our part whatsoever, no longer clinging to it. Only by feeling what it is doing to us, will we let go of it, without a thought, without hesitation, without intent, just as the hand that burns opens and the coal falls to the floor.
This we cannot do by setting ourselves goals and trying to reach them. No matter how subtle, how "spiritual". Any attempt to gain anything at all, even to gain freedom from desire, imposes our will, our imagination, our unconscious fears and assumptions, hopes and dreams on the actual reality of that which, independent of our productions (assumptions, expectations, hopes, beliefs etc), simply is.
If spiritual freedom exist it cannot be brought about by grasping, only revealed by clarifying those processes by which we obscure it. Only by doing to find out what is rather than by doing to gain anything: by practicing in order to let go rather than to accumulate: for relinquishment rather than achievement; for loss and less rather than gain and more. We practice only to no longer dream our lives away, or else our practice simply reinforces the dream into a nightmare while interpreting it inescapably as reality.
1990