http://www.richardsylvester.com/page1.html

...and click the buttons "Book Extracts" and "Interview & Links".

As a result of two exceptional, brief moments in his life, Sylvester now doesn't experience persons, or any kind of separated things as real anymore. For him, there are still phenomenons, but without a person who perceives these phenomenons. He stopped his spiritual search, as now there is no one left who can search for anything. For him, paradise is here, as it has been always here, only it can't be noticed as long there is the jail of the illusion of the person.

Interestingly in conjunction with Bruce's work, Sylvester labels the oneness he experiences as "unconditional love".

Nice read, challenging, mind-boggling, funny.

Spooky

A number of years ago I was really into Advaita Vedanta.  I found that the guru I used to see and many other non-dual gurus aren't what they claim to be. Some of them contend that when your body dies your awareness merges back with pure consciousness and that's it. No focus 27, no disks, no nothing.

Fortunately, I eventually found a better way. Ramana Maharshi was one of the most well known advocates of Advaita Vedanta. One evening my spirit guidance showed me an image of Ramana sitting at one half of a table while wearing a business suit (when he was alive he wore a loin cloth).  At the other end of the table sat a lady. Ramana wore a business suit because he was being too conservative.  He didn't acknowledge the creative aspect of being. The lady in the image represented the creative aspect of being. They sat at halfs of the table in order to represent the proper balance between the manifested aspect of being and the unmanifested aspect of being (pure consciouness).

I'm open to levels of being I wasn't open to when I was involved with non-duality.  Once you open up to such levels of being, it is hard dismiss such levels as non-dualists tend to do.

A non-dualist takes one part of his (or her) mind, and focuses his attention so he is more aware than usual of the space in which everything takes place.  The reason he is able to be aware of something, is because he is aware of the energy of existence in an unmanifested way, even while it is manifested in a particular way.  This energy doesn't become non-existent, simply because it manifests in a specific way.  When it manifests in a specific way we can experience qualities such as beauty, happiness, love and peace. Nothing wrong with that.

It isn't pure consciousness that denies the manifested aspect of being. Pure consciousness is too fomless to do anything specific. It is simply aware. Only an aspect of mind can establish relationships and either in a faulty or accurate way come up with a viewpoint of what truth is (or isn't).

Richard Sylvester's association with Tony Parson's is mentioned, and Tony Parson's is one of the gurus who claims that your awareness merges back with pure awareness when you die, and that's it.

It is much better to contact your higher self, than rely on a guru who claims that nobody is here or there, yet benefits from other people.

Bets, that's a nice little story, and I have gotten similar messages, like "find your lost companions". It's to go astray and find each other again, isn't it? This is quite a game. But I don't want to play it for all eternity.

Spooky

Well suit yourself Spooky. Say goodbye to your disk, get involved with the non-duality circus, and try to think your way out of existence.

Sometimes I don't know why I bother. Nobody seems to listen. Perhaps there is no point in trying to share what you learned through years of experience.  Perhaps it is better to let people waste their time and find out the hard way. Their souls do after all have all of eternity to do so, despite what non-dualists state.

Spooky:

I take back that "Suit yourself" comment. Since you no longer believe there is a self to suit, it is illogical for me to make such a suggestion.

Here's a Zen koen.  Who/what is it that believes that there is no self to suit?

Why take it so personally? Doesn't it make your life more interesting?

Recoverer:

I think I'm well suited, from my education in philosophy I know this concept. The question is, could there be perceptions without a perceiver? Maybe, if we use another label for "perceptions", but it would be a very very different world. It's suspicous to me that Sylvester can behave (at least almost) like a normal guy, giving interviews and having meetings while in this state. There are other cases of non-personality persons similar to Sylvester and they are cared by psychiatrists.

Recoverer wrote: "Sometimes I don't know why I bother. Nobody seems to listen."
   You know Hesse's "Siddharta"? When Siddharta had been almost at the end of his path, he had to set free his rebelling son who won't take any education from him. Siddharta found, his son has to commit the same failures as he himself once had committed, but finally everybody will come together again in the great big river. Maybe it is so, maybe not. I listen carefully to you and take what I need.

Of course, Sylvester's view seems not to fit with RAM's and Bruce's and traditional western schools. But maybe I find a way to combine both views. Finally, all discs belong to a master disc. We don't know if it's an aim that they will once remerge totally with the master disc or not. And it is a question how a "resident member" of a disc feels like. We certainly have to think about what individuality and personality means when we think about those questions. I don't think we will continue for eternity as a person we now are used to be.

Believe me, I'll not go to meetings, I'll not spend money or devote myself to spiritual teachers. I'll just look what it is, and if it rings any bells within me. When I can't get something out of it I drop it. I become bored quite easily . And after what Sylvester said, he can't start a cult because he dissed the whole spiritual search thing as useless (except "making one's prison more comfortable").

Yes, of course you can't get a grip of someone moralically who claims "he/she" is not existant, there only is "this character" and things that are just happening ("it happened automatically" ha ha, that's a good substitute for "the devil made me do it"). Contradictions though speak for themselves of course.

As to what the caring about the world and other people belongs, I believe the first focus has to be on spiritual truths; I think that is in accord with the New Testamentum and certainly with gnostic scripture, and RAM said we have to build up escape velocity, meaning loosen our focus on the physical reality to a sufficient degree. As a side effect of our growing insights, our actions will change accordingly. There is no right action in the wrong spirit.

I keep your warning in mind.


Bets:

The extreme segmentation is a tendency of the modern times. Starting with Plato, accelerated by modern philosophers and, in recent times mainly by a world view inspired by the sciences of nature and engineering, this tendency has become such bizarre in some areas that it is to hope it will become obvious that this is just plane silly.
The natural and primal way of thinking and perceiving is in "entirenesses", "gestalts". Out of these entirenesses we can, if required, extract more specific details. This has led to the wrong opinion the details are the primary and we could rebuilt the world with those little elementar pieces.
However, the person or, more phenomenologic put, the personal situation is one of these entirenesses, a very special one. In order to have a rich view at us and our role in our environment, it's not needed to fall in the other extreme and declare the whole world to one. But it's interesting.


Spooky

Good post Justin:

Not all gurus are exactly the same. Some are unethical and dishonest with the people they mislead, some are dishonest with themselves about what they know, and mislead other people accordingly.  I know a few people from the group I used to belong to who became non-dual gurus.  When I knew them, they were nice people.  For whatever reason, they never got away from the non-dual approach. They deprive themselves accordingly.  I would have a hard time fitting into that old set of clothes.  

Non-dualists contend that they don't have to worry about things such as chakras and energy levels because they deal with higher truth, not illusions. The fact of the matter is that they haven't dealt with spirit realms and aren't qualified to speak about such levels of existence.

Beliefs can come in many forms.  If a person comes up with a way to believe that he or she doesn't exist, he or she might end up believing this is the case, even though his or her life shows something quite different.

If it is okay for each of us to exist to an extent where we can experience love, then perhaps it is okay for each of us to exist.  If we experience love and act with love, where is the problem?

SPOOKY:

I hear ya.

  Albert, i figure the only main difference between a fully liberated person like Yeshua, and those who aren't, is this:

  The former types spend every moment in viewing life/The Creator, others, themselves, and the process positively and with pure unconditional love. 

  They don't magically lose a sense of self, the "I" is still there, but the I only focuses on positivity, love, inclusiveness, and helpfulness, and disregards the so called material needs and wants of the little I, and totally focuses on helping all the other various I's within the Big I. 

  A clue to Richard's non full liberation is him not recognizing that even when one remembers and lives that Source Consciousness fully again, that there is still a need or desire within the little I...

  And that, as Yeshua so simply and beautifully put, is to live the Will of Source, which is to help uplift others, to help transform them to this Core truth, beingness, and experience. 

  Even then we have a "need" and a desire in the little i, but it's the little I in conjunction with Source, and it's not an emotional attachment need, but a whole being need and desire. 

 

  How much does one change when they have completed process, both a lot and yet not that much.   We still have our individual feelings, thoughts, choices, etc.   Or in other words, we still know ourselves to ourselves, unique, individual, and yet completely at One with the All and all that exists within same.

  They've just become purely loving and positive in nature.   Even when they are discriminating and seemingly "critical" (for Yeshua has criticized me before), the inner intention is positive and they still feel and think very positively of us, there is no emotional fear, one upmanship, dislike or repulsion involved like with most people's criticisms of each other, beliefs, or ideas. 

  Ironically, sometimes the more intune we become within ourselves, sometimes the more such intune Guidance energies constructively criticize us, especially when we are erring and know better. 

  For the immature and only so so mature cannot handle criticism, even more constructive and gentle kinds. 

  Who am i to speak on a process of which i have not yet completed?  Well i pretty much just parrot the words and teachings of one i know through repeated inner and outer guidance, has completed this process of full remembrance and living Sourceness. 

  Also, while this probably sounds egotistical to most here (why would it be when its the destiny of every child of Source?), i've been getting various kinds of guidance lately, both inner and outer, that its probable that i may complete this process in this life.   

  Hence, the closer one gets, the faster vibratory ones energies become, the more accurately, deeply, and holistically they can perceive the issues related to this very subject.   

  Yet, it is very misleading to self and to others, to label and think of oneself as "liberated" before one really is, and i will never do that.   

 

I see you know the tricks Recoverer   . Thanks for your posts dear friends.

I've thought about Sylvester, and have read another interview of him. I put aside his global claims (like "there are no persons" etc.) as these to me seem to be conclusions/constructions from his way of experiencing, and those claims, containing underlying truths (great pun btw) are not very fruitable I find.

I focused on passages where, to me, his way of perceiving the world, or his experiences, shine through. From this, I got the following impression:

It is a teachable, practicable mental technique. It is not such a deep alteration of experiencing as I first thought. In fact, I've been in such states many times, I only haven't noticed it due to Sylvester's style. When you're experienced in meditation, you might know this state: After a while of bodily relaxation, maybe a bit breathing exercises, and a bit thinking about your day, you calm down more and more and at some point you will become aware of your thoughts. You avoid to actively think, and then it appears as if thoughts arise and pass by. When you're good at this, you will not be affected emotionally or mentally by these thoughts. And this is the state, from my impression, which Sylvester talks about. We may call it maintaining a distance to your thoughts. It's not so easy to reach this state, but it's not overly difficult either. What's difficult is to hold this state for very long, and even more difficult when you return to daily activity.

The feeling which accompanies this state is just deep relaxation. It's very comfortable, like dozing peacefully.

Ironically, I once reached an even more comfortable state with a seemingly opposite method. At night lying in my bed, mind awake. In my mind I was guided by someone to a special place and it was a sort of great expanding of me. It indeed felt like a liberation (I admit this feeling was THAT blissful that I thought must be enlightenment). The next day that feeling was still there, but was getting weaker, so to hold it I tried some methods to make it stay, and one which seemed to hinder this feeling to decrease was to imagine I expand myself over the entire world, so that, in this imagination, my surrounding was part of "my" world. It seems like the opposite of what Sylvester told, but only at the surface. The point of it is not some vanishing or expanding of "me", it is the imagination of a great free space. It will make you less self-concentrated, irritable, and anxious. Not without reason Sylvester talked about the "jail" of the person, which is, in his opinion, the imagination of the person itself, I add: Not the person, but in which state the person is.

There are some similarities to the ego-reducing-work, but differences as well.  

And I remember too, I once had a mind-journey which I labeled with "the emptiness which is the fullness/richness", and another one where I had the impression I was a sort of knot, like a transmitter station, in a network, both experiences which remind of what Sylvester says. When I should give a Focus-Level number, both would be beyond F34, but I'm guessing here.

So, my conclusion for now is, Sylvester's writings don't give an insight into the truth, or what really is or so, but describe one of several consciousness states, which is reachable with training. When you're good in Bruce's techniques, you can playfully pretend Sylvester's claims are true, and I think you will get results. I recommend it for people who are over-sensitive, anxious, nervous. But don't believe in it like in "the truth".

Spooky

I say we're in a learning pattern and it is an illusion, but to not abide by the golden rule keeps one encased in this pattern. Non Dualism is ultimately what I believe. There is no good or evil outside of the learning patterns. I read this thread so I felt I should throw my two cents in. Every "person" gets there and it won't be because someone else told them what to do. The learning pattern is for Experience, trial and error.

Thanks for setting me straight on Non Dualism. I think we are a vast number of different dimensions of the same consciousness. But you know I have to admit that I just thought of that while reading your post  there Albert. I haven't really fleshed it out, so to speak. I think our goal here is to remember we are One, but I'm in no hurry to wake up alone, you know?

Quote Recoverer:
"What sense would the word "oneness" make if there was only one being? One being by itself is just one being by itself.  "Lonesomeness" would be a more appropriate word. "

Sylvester isn't talking about one being. "He" is talking about that there is no one at all. "This is all there is", meaning an emptyness which is full from which phenomena arise, only present, no time, no space, no one. The sense to be "me" "having" an experience or doing something having a choice in time and space is just a story emerging in oneness. Persons don't see through it, and when it's seen through then there is no one. He emphasizes that this is as well a story, as language cannot give a good description, but a story closest to "what is seen". So he'd probably say "There is no one who could be lonesome".

I have nothing against what Sylvester tells. It could be as he says. It sounds familiar to me, as some details he mentioned I've seen as well. For example the noticing of unconditional love as the fullness to go along with an expanded state rather than the contracted state of a person. I couldn't make sense of the term "free will" before I've read Sylvester's books, so accepting that choice is an illusion is not an issue for me.

I can recommend his books. His second one, "The book of no one" is not needed when you only want to have the basics, many repetitions, but one gets a better grasp of what is meant by reading it in addition to "I hope you die soon". If you don't buy what he's saying, well, then it's just an entertaining read, for me anyways.

Spooky

Hi Recoverer,
I'm pretending to be Richard Sylvester:

Recoverer:
1. We start out with awareness and the ability to create, without our ability to create being utilized.

R.S.:
No. There is no one. So no one started and no one has any abilities.

Recoverer:
2. At some point we learn that we have the ability to create, and make use of this ability so we have something to be aware other than nothingness.

R.S.:
There is no one to learn anything so there's nothing which can be learnt.

Recoverer:
3. We experience what we create, it comes from us, just as our awareness comes from us.  Therefore, what we experience is real even if there was a time when nothing existed in a manifested way,  because if what we experience doesn't determine what our reality is, then what does? Somebody's nihilistic theory? I think not.  Also, just because we can tune into the moment when nothing was manifested, this doesn't mean that the moments when the creative aspects of our being created what they created don't exist. If non-dualists such as Sylvester would give time to seeing what these other moments are about I would give more weight to what they say, but I have found that they don't.

R.S.:
There is no one, so no one can experience anything and no one can create anything. "Real" I call phenomena. Questions are asked, for example. There are stories, the story of time, the story of being a person. Persons perceive themselves to be in time. But there is no time. There are thoughts about the past and the future.

Recoverer:
4. If time isn't real in the way people think of it, then the moment when nothing had become manifest and the many moments when many things have become manifested, are actually one. This being the case, how can the reality of manifestation be denied?

R.S.:
There is no time, so there hasn't been any moments in the past. Of course, persons live within the story of time, but when the person drops away, all stories are seen through, and this is all there is. There's just oneness, phenomena arise. Nothing is happening though. There's no one there to whom anything could happen. There's only "is".

Recoverer:
If a guy like Sylvester actuall believes that nothing exists, then why does he even bother with talking to people? According to his premise, there is nobody to talk to.

R.S.:
Yes, there is no one who talks and no one who listens. There's talking and listening.

Recoverer:
I really don't see what value there is in telling people they don't exist, when they do in fact experience their life for better or worse.

The real R.S., quote:
"Yes it is purposeless. But so is everything else. Let's be clear about this, I can definetely confirm that you are wasting your time here. But of course you are also wasting your time anywhere else. In addition there's no you and no time which you could waste. So it doesn't matter. You might as well be here as anywhere else, but there's no choice about that. There is no possibility that this could be different to what it is."

Recoverer:
Often the non-dual approach doesn't help a person grow in love. Instead it gets people to believe that life is pointless and should be negated. Nothing is pointless when you live according to love. Rather, life becomes quite meaningful.

R.S.:
The mantra goes: Helpless, hopeless, meaningless. There's nothing to get, to learn, to achieve, or whatsoever. When the person comes back after awakening, you may be in the dark night of the soul. When the person drops away permanently, there's no one there to be bothered. All attempts to become an enlightened person are seen through. Instead it's noticed how awsome being is. The ivy climbing up the wall. A cup of tea. And it is seen that the emptiness in which all phenomena arise is full of unconditional love. A person never will be able to see this, yet might visit one guru after another to achieve full realisation. But the sense of separation will never leave until the person leaves. When there's no person, it's all just there. This is all there is, and it is sufficient.

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You see, debating about this is rather pointless. The Spooky-person has not dropped away, so I don't know if "it can be seen" or not. My point of view is, as long as there's a "me" we will never no the one and only truth, simply because when there's a "me", there's also a "there". Separation. Everything we know is our knowing. Every system we believe in is our system. What the truth is we don't know. Meanwhile, we do what we think is good, we believe what we think has to believed, we use the methods which we think are effective to let us lead a good, or even better life.

Spooky

Hi Recoverer,
when one makes certain assumptions, your way of thinking is logical. But only when these assumptions are not questioned.

Sylvester cannot be addressed by what you wrote.

Quote Recoverer:
"It is kind of contradictory when somebody says that reality doesn't exist in the manner we believe because everything is just a dream, because the very fact of how they make a comparison between a dream explanation and a non-dream explanation, suggests that they believe there is a level of reality other than a dream reality."

Sylvester uses dreams and dreaming to make some things clear, but not in the way you wrote. He says dream and reality is the same. Sometimes you dream, sometimes you're awake (in case of a person). What he calls his "awakening" is similar to awake within a dream realising that you are just a dream character within a dream- in his awakening experience for a moment "he" wasn't there anymore, so this character Richard Sylvester was just one phenomenon of many phenomena. Everything remained the same, yet everything was different of course.

Quote Recoverer:
"Perhaps, if a person chooses to view the World with the concept that the World is nothing but a dream he'll (or she'll) experience it accordingly, and if a person chooses to view the World as if it is a physical reality, he'll experience it accordingly."

Sylvester repeatedly says it is not a matter of choice. A person cannot chose to drop this very person. It happens or not. In fact, he says liberation is already there, only that persons don't see it, because due to that they appear to be persons, they see themselves separated, while they aren't, but this can only be seen when the person has vanished.

So, Sylvester doesn't divide the world into a real and an unreal part, but says there is "it is seen that there are no persons but only being"= oneness and within this, stories containing persons and the mind, so that, metaphorical, oneness prevents itself to be seen as such and instead it is seen that here is a person who perceives what is outside this person, therefore separation, while there is no separation.

Concerning spiritual seeking he says that nobody will ever become enlightened. Simply because as long as there is a person, there is separation and therefore longing for oneness and therefore continued search.

Spooky

An after thought to the post I wrote a few minutes ago.

One of the dangers in what people like Sylvester say, is that there is nothing we can do to become enlightened.

Without getting into whether there is such a thing as enlightenment in the way he speaks of it, I believe it is dangerous to believe that there is no form of seeking that helps us grow spiritually, because if there is one thing I found through my experience, it is possible to grow.  We don't do so by trying to negate our existence.  We do so by letting go of the limiting thought patterns that prevent us from living according to love, our higher self, our connection to the light.

I am certain that the light beings I communicate with aren't just some mere emptiness/illusion.  They are souls who have evolved so they can exist in a manner that is very significant and quite wonderful.  Not once have they tried to tell me that I don't exist.  They simply tried to show me how I can live more completely according to love.  They feel one with me without negating me.

Hi Recoverer,
so far, to me (as for every "person") it is an intellectual concept as other concepts are as well. From most spiritual concepts one can extract ways of living to grow spiritually. Sylvester's concept is indeed different as he says you can do nothing to be liberated from the person. He actually says that spiritual search, as well as psychotherapy is very effective, but it will never lead to an end of feeling separated because there is no method a person could use to get the person out of the way from seeing oneness. It's just a good intellectual point I find. I don't know if he's a fraud or not, and I'm not defending him, I just wanted to clarify what he's actually saying.
   His concept certainly stirs up many questions of what the "I", or the person is at all. It's unclear, although it seems to be so natural for everybody. Until you think about it. It's unclear to me as well if it's really possible what he's telling about "his" state.
   I think nobody stops searching because someone says you'll never get what you are searching for through this search. In this regard I'm the same opinion as Sylvester:
The search goes on until it stops. But nobody can make it stop.

Hi Alysia,
I thought of you recently what you would think of Sylvester's "oneness" story, as I remembered you always said that we're all one! (And I even have a bit like a deja-vu now, as I think I dreamt that you would post here in this thread)
   You're right, this is a huge thing we talk about, even when it is probably one the shortest theories of everything there are. It is possible to take some elements from other theories and embed them into Sylvester's theory. I think that's what we're doing anyway, we pick up something here and there and these bits then melt together into our belief system.

Spooky

This is one of those mobius-strip topics that I always end up getting swept away in.  There are people who claim that there is nothing, but it seems that as far as the "nothingness" goes, no one can claim that because it CAN'T be experienced.  If you experience "nothing" YOU are still THERE experiencing it.  "nothingness" would be total unconsciousness, which means you can't experience it, and therefore can't say that it exists at all.  Game over! lol.

As far as there being "one" thing as the ultimate truth - even if, on some level, there is "one" as the ultimate truth, I am still here as me, and *gasp* is that you there being someone else?  That is ALSO an ultimate truth, because it is actually happening right now.  I think that ALL of these levels can possibly exist simultaneously, with none being more valid and true than another.

Those who have experienced oneness with all things in situations such as meditation, out of body, or near death, have still come back to being THEMSELVES, separate and real, to tell us about that state of oneness.  They have perhaps changed or evolved, but they are still here.  Are you an I projections of the same consciousness? Possibly, but I can't say that it's "truth".  Are you and I actually YOU and I? That, I can vouch for.

Peace, friends (and there can be no "friends" without separation - the simple fact that there ARE friends shows that on some level this is "truth".) 

Oh, I most definitely agree that these states are real phenomena.  It's just that I feel that if this IS a real and true state of being, it obviously doesn't have to mean that it is the ONLY real or important state of being.  I don't believe these people are trying to perpetuate a hoax - real or not, I believe they most certainly believe what they've experienced is real.  What I try to keep in mind is that there are hoards of schizophrenics and such who also believe the spiders they see on the wall are real, etc. lol  Just reading Terrence McKenna's experiences with psychedelics and such is really eye opening in terms of what our own brains are capable of producing - experiences we can't even really imagine if we try.  Keeping that in mind, there are phenomena that really can't be explained away so easily - remote viewing, telepathy, verifiable communications, etc.  Just more reasons why I think that being HERE in THIS state is terribly fascinating. 

StarryEyedNoOne:

Excellent points.

Spooky:

Regarding Suzzane Segal, for a number of years she thought she was enlightened, had her supposed enlightenment confirmed by some gurus who are very clearly not what they claim/claimed to be, and eventually found that she had dissociative order due to repressed memories of when she was molested as a child. This is why she experienced a background of fear during the years of her so-called enlightened state.

One day while she was sitting in front of her followers, she moved down to the floor and sat with them, and stated that she was no longer capable of teaching them, because she found herself in a state of mind that was quite disturbing (I don't remember her exact words).

Regarding the gurus who authenticated her supposed enlightenment, one was Poonja (Papaji), a guru from India who claimed to be an enlightened disciple of Ramana Maharshi. Gangaji and Andrew Cohen, supposed enlightened disciples of Papaji, also endorsed Suzzane's supposed enlightened state.

Andrew Cohen's mother Luna Tarlo wrote a book called "Mother of God." She talks about how she was Andrew's disciple for a while.  She felt so graced to have an enlightened son. Eventually she found that her son wasn't the enlightened being he claimed to be. If anything, he was quite insidious.  He used to verbally and emotionally abuse her and his other followers.

Andrew Cohen was the first disciple Papaji declared to be enlightened. When Luna was in India she traveled around with Andrew and another lady.  Andrew told Luna and the other lady that they are enlightened. Neither of them could see that this was true. When Luna met Papaji, he also told her that she's enlightened. There was a European lady visiting Papaji at the time, and he claimed that she was enlightened. She was playing with her child who was an illegitimate child of Papaji. The reason Papaji had so many disciples that became gurus, is because all it took to become one, was to believe him when he told you that you're enlightened, even if your experience tells you a different story. I know a lady who was told by one of Papaji's supposed enlightened disciples that she's enlightened, she knew this wasn't the case, and she didn't take the bait. She has way too much integrity and honesty to do such a thing.

After returning to the United States Andrew Cohen got out of hand, and despite claiming that Andrew was enlightened in various ways, Papaji later claimed that Andrew "wasn't" enlightened. There are a number of other people who have become gurus after Papaji endorsed their so called enlightened state. Gangaji included. Eventually Papaji took back all of the endorsements. He said that he stated that they were enlightened because he wanted to get the leeches off his back.  He said they were supposed to point the way to Lucknow (this is where he lived), not themselves.

Such later statements are nonsense if you consider the letters Papaji exchanged with Andrew Cohen and what he told Luna Tarlo about Andrew and herself.  Papaji has contradicted himself several times when it comes to what enlightenen beings he has supposedly met during his life. None of the versions include Suzzane Segal's name despite what she claims.

Suzzane Segal also got her enlightenment supposedly confirmed by Da Free John (one of just many names he went by). Da Free John was one of the most scandulous gurus who occupied this planet. He claimed to be an Avatar, the World teacher. He claimed that there has never been a master of his level, and there will never be one again. In one of his books from the 80's he claimed that eventually all of the slugs of this World will follow him.  He died recently, and his proclamation was proven to be false. The same is true for his proclamation that he would be resurrected.  He lived on "his" Fiji island (guess where he got the money from) with some of his disciples including a number of his wives that included a former playboy bunny.  He became well know in the 1980's, because some of his disciples left him and let if be known that he forced his disciples to perform all kinds of sexual acts in front of him, regardless of their marital status.  Young attractive ladies had an easier time finding their way to his island than his other disciples.

Or in other words, I'm still waiting for Suzanne Segal's enlightenment to be confirmed.

I am familiar with the terms in the psychiatry manuals (ICD, DSM) called personality disorder, disscociative disorder and whatever. There is no category which fits to Richard Sylvester and Suzanne Segal. In her book, Segal describes her oddyssee from therapist to therapist, and what you say reminds me of those, to her, inacceptable diagnosis. She even said at the beginning of her book, that exactly this would happen: The pathologisation of "her" experience.

I really don't care for any guru's "verification" of enlightenment. I have read Suzanne Segal's book and it came over to me like a description of what she had experienced. Whether this "state" has to be called "enlightenment" or not I don't know. But what I do know is, we have to take it seriously. This book, to me, sounds as authentical as, for example, Monroe's books do. Despite the logical errors she made in the last part of her book. And as I wrote in respond to Starry, this kind of experience seems to be not a singular one, but perhaps inspired religions and spiritual movements. So we have to deal with this kind of experience.

If you have reliable infos about Suzanne Segal which go beyond her book you might post them here and name the sources, or PM me.

Spooky

Spooky:

If one thing is clear, she experienced a backdrop of fear for years. What does fear have to do with love and oneness? I'm not able to find all of the articles that spoke of her condition, but below is one of them. The Adi Da referred to is another name for Da Free John. The writer seems to believe that non-integration and enlightenment go together. I've found that the more I've grown, the more integrated I've become, yet I don't claim to be enlightened. This business of somebody supposedly being enlightened even though she hasn't dealt with chilhood trauma doesn't add up. If a spirit wants to move onto a higher realm, it needs to be free of the issues that prevent it from living according to love. That's afterlife knowledge 101 . Yet, people who haven't dealt with their issues claim to be enlightened. If thoughts of the vastness, oneness and not being defined inspire you that's great, but integration of the creative aspect of our being is required.

Anyway, here's a part of an article and a link:

"Part 6

Suzanne Segal died of a brain tumor in 1997 at the age of 42. Many have stated explicitly or implicitly that her experiences were directly the result of cerebral trauma. In the spring of 1996, the present book had been completed and Suzanne was offering her teachings to the public through weekly dialogues and a training group for her fellow therapists.

Very soon thereafter, however, she began to experience bouts of 'vastness expansion' in which the vastness would expand greatly upon itself. These experiences sapped her life and energy and brought great fear upon her once again. It brought also doubt. She began to judge what she had been saying or claiming to know. She thought her talk about the vastness was perhaps a defence mechanism to protect her from feelings and childhood abuse memories.

She had lost her connection to the vastness, had become disoriented, experienced dizziness and a general decline in health In February of 1997 she was diagnosed with a massive brain tumor. She died on April 1."

http://www.nonduality.com/suzanne.htm