Derek the truth tracker, or Meji and Ramji 6.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(artwork by Cornelia Forster from the website adhikara.com)

 

“ante scriptum” PS: for the other Meji and Ramji’s, search for Meji and Ramji.

 

Per email I informed James Swartz about the last move from my side in our conversation:

On Sun, Aug 31, 2014 at 11:02 PM, Hans van der Gugten  wrote:

Dear James,

I have added a number 5 to the series Meji and Ramji.
It is on my blog: hansvandergugten.nl/?p=3574

Yours,

hans
Already three hours later his answer arrived on the wings of the internet horses:

Hi Hans,
 
I understand that you are trying to repair what you think is our relationship and I am happy for you but I think you do not understand who I am and what I am about.  I don’t feel that I have a relationship with you. I know you don’t like the fact that as a Vedanta teacher I criticize Neo Advaita but it is my duty as a Vedanta teacher to criticize ideas that are illogical and inefficient.  If you were a fair minded person, you would weigh the few criticisms in the teaching against the other 98% of the teachings which are incredibly positive.  And you would be interested to see if the arguments I do give make sense.  Every statement is backed up with common sense logic.  I have received about four criticisms about my criticism of Neo-Advaita this year.  And I have received several hundred statements of gratitude from people who were misled by the Neo-Advaita teachings.  This is a purely personal issue on you part.  It has nothing to do with me at all.  99% of those who write discuss the teachings in a humble way.  They don’t have issues with me.  I am highly respected and well liked by many.  Why should I take notice of your issue with me?  I honestly haven’t thought about you since I saw you in Tiru the year before last.  I don’t think you are interested in the teachings for the right reason and I don’t think you are qualified to listen and assimilate Vedanta.  You are not a humble person like Derek.  There are plenty of other teachers around that you can go to, so I don’t want you to come to the classes this year.  I don’t think you will benefit.
 
James
Hart/Chieming, September 2014.

Dear James,

Thanks for your quick answer.
For sure we live in rather different universes. One thing is for sure: in both of ‘m English is understood, we have at least the knowledge of that language in common.

I am sorry that I did not let you know clear enough that I have not the slightest intention to come to your classes.
I considered writing this at the end of my text, but thought it to be superfluous.
And I didn’t begrudge my text a happy ending.
A better although less happy ending could have been: “I will not come to your classes anymore. Maybe we can meet fresh over a cup of chai one day.”
But you are not interested in what I have to say. Moreover I think that you miss what I am trying to express.

In your answer you pretend to know in advance that someone (anyone, me in this case) will not be able to benefit from attending your classes.
And even more than that: from any Vedanta teacher in the world.
This is not a slip of the pen, you wrote before this: “It is good that the neo-bashing chases  people away. If people are so sensitive to this kind of criticism that they throw the baby
out with the bath, they are not qualified for Vedanta.”

That it is your way of criticizing other teachers and teachings that is the issue at hand
seems to be a detail that has not yet entered your consciousness.
This is how explicit I have put this in words before:
It is really amazing to me that I am the first to write you on the subject of the way you criticize other teachers/teachings.
(Again, how explicit can I get: not the criticizing as such, but the fully demeaning way of making a fool out of many others, while at the same time relating it to your so called scriptural ‘qualifications’).
In your answer you in fact have invented a disqualification: the people that you have scared away successfully, due to them being over sensitive, are not qualified for Vedanta.
I bet this is a fully unscriptural novelty.

So it has never been and it is not about your criticizing others with arguments.

I only do remember that I once heard you explain why Mooji did not get the point based on one sentence in the very beginning of a book by Mooji that you had started reading.

Maybe I will look into your arguments one day and try for a clear reaction.

Maybe it is also an  idea to invite a bunch of what you call neo advaitas to come up with a reaction too. We’ll see what happens.
(For those interested now already, here is one of your texts on the neo’s).

And, by the way, thanks for unintentionally creating  a novel figure out of my friend Diederik, who you brought up as, in contrast with me, the real humble seeker who is most welcome in your classes. You called him Derek.
(Sometimes educators do strange things. This one of you reminds me of one of my mother.
After she had lost a son, one of my younger brothers, she was left with one child at home.
It was my youngest brother who was then ten years old then and he had lost the brother that was also his best friend. From being the smartest in the family he turned into a internally
grieving being with no way to express. He became ‘difficult’. And sometimes my mother,
from her desperate helpless state, would shout at him about his behaviour: Brammetje
would never do that).
In Europe, Derek is the name of a tv series detective, a tracker for truth.
So, I will address ‘Derek the truth tracker’ in a few open letters in which I will try to put in words what I have learnt the last decades about enlightenment, embodiment and how those two are intertwined in my experience. I’ll send you the links.

So, now for a more detailed reading of what you wrote to me:

Hi Hans,
 
I understand that you are trying to repair what you think is our relationship and I am happy for you but I think you do not understand who I am and what I am about.  I don’t feel that I have a relationship with you.

We for sure do not have a relationship. That is not just your feeling, it’s a fact.
Yet we seem to be relating of and on. In a variation on ‘I’m okay, you’re okay’ that is:
Something that you say plugs me in, something that I say plugs you in.
A difference between us, as far as I can see, is that I have the tendency to go into a inner search with this and after having found something new I share about this. And that you have excluded this road for yourself by creating a split between the Self and your little self.
We come from different traditions, that’s all.

Meaning also that I know very well who you are and what you are about.
And also I get a strong feeling about what you are implicitly doing when you say to me
“I think you do not understand who I am and what I am about”.
You try to make yourself a bit bigger to impress, it seems.
Seen through my eyes you are repeating something that your guruji Swami Chinmayananda once did to you when he found your behaviour too familiar.
I remember this from your autobiography: “I think you have the wrong idea, Ram,”
he  said icily. “I am not a person. I am an institution.”.
This statement comes from a Indian Guruji, in whose tradition a guru is kind of a untouchable hero, with all that goes with it like touching the feet of the guru etcetera.

I know you don’t like the fact that as a Vedanta teacher I criticize Neo Advaita but it is my duty as a Vedanta teacher to criticize ideas that are illogical and inefficient. 

Again, critisizing is fine. It was the way it was done that triggered something old in me.
That part has been seen. Still I don’ like it.

If you were a fair minded person, you would weigh the few criticisms in the teaching against the other 98% of the teachings which are incredibly positive.  And you would be interested to see if the arguments I do give make sense.  Every statement is backed up with common sense logic

As I said before, I will finally also look into those arguments. Which is your best text for doing this?

.  I have received about four criticisms about my criticism of Neo-Advaita this year. 

That’s quite a lot, given that writing feedback that might be received as hostile instead as just feedback, needs about a hundred times more courage then writing you about the euphoria of your last lecture. (My guess, but you get what I mean I guess).

And I have received several hundred statements of gratitude from people who were misled by the Neo-Advaita teachings. 

Wow. Also in one year?

This is a purely personal issue on you part. 

The intensity of my disgust was for sure related to a stored traumatic thing in my nervous system, as I shared with you recently. This part is seen and dissolving.

It has nothing to do with me at all. 

It has everything to do with you. A automatic unconscious habit is playing in you, producing this chasing away potential students of advaita vedanta all the time.

99% of those who write discuss the teachings in a humble way. 

Brava, that’s the way to do it! (Derek for President).
But, just to bring this to your attention again, I did not discuss the teaching at all.

They don’t have issues with me.  I am highly respected and well liked by many. 

I also do like you very much. And out of love, for you and advaita, I keep communicating.

Why should I take notice of your issue with me? 

You already did.  And the reason? We’re both sensitive human beings, with different loads of automatic unconscious patterns playing out. (I call this traumatic experiences stored in the nervous system, you call them vasanas maybe?).

I honestly haven’t thought about you since I saw you in Tiru the year before last. 

What a blessing.

I don’t think you are interested in the teachings for the right reason and I don’t think you are qualified to listen and assimilate Vedanta. 

Yeah, yeah. Hear, hear.I looked up this hang up of yours, the so called qualifications for enlightenment.
That brings up a interesting question: are you yourself qualified for advaita vedanta?
This came up after reading the following text, also from a article questioning neo advaita by the way:
The question of the aptitude or adhikara of the student is an important topic dealt with at the beginning of the teaching. The requirements can be quite stringent and daunting, if not downright discouraging. One should first renounce the world, practice brahmacharya, and gain proficiency in other yogas like Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga and Raja Yoga and so on (the sadhana-chatushtya). One can examine texts like the Vedanta Sara I.6-26 for a detailed description. While probably no one ever had all of these requirements before starting the practice of Self-inquiry, these at least do encourage humility, not only on the part of the student, but also on the part of the teacher who himself may not have all these requirements!
(From this page: http://vedanet.com/2012/06/13/misconceptions-about-advaita/).

You are not a humble person like Derek. 

James, I humbly yet totally agree with you on this one.

There are plenty of other teachers around that you can go to, so I don’t want you to come to the classes this year.  I don’t think you will benefit.

Tsja.

Greetingz,

hans

=======
James

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Ramji and Meji 1
Ramji and Meji 2
Ramji and Meji 3
Ramji and Meji 4
Ramji and Meji 5
Ramji and Meji 6
Ramji and Meji 7
Ramji and Meji 8
Ramji and Meji 9
Ramji and Meji 10
Ramji and Meji 11