| Religion & Spirituality Can Be a Trap |
| Baba Sri Siva Speaks: |
| "Once a man came up to me and asked for help. I agreed to help him because he was indeed deeply spiritual. All his life he has been meditating with some teacher or other. For the past two decades he has been meditating with a teacher. After all these years of meditation he was neither enlightened (or even anywhere near it) nor materially prosperous. To tell you the truth, he became a loser on both levels. |
| I took pity on him and told him that he must always have a reality check. I gave him some rent money and money for food for a month. The next thing I heard about was this guy went back to the old teacher and paid him the money that I gave him for some advanced mantra for immortality. The old teacher, although he had many mansions and several million dollars in the bank, was not ashamed to collect money from these poor people. Particularly their rent money and grocery money. |
| Religion and spirituality can be like an addiction. You have to be constantly on the watch. The man I mentioned above has lost all his ability to discriminate between the good and bad. I know that his life is never going to be better. I adore his devotion to his teacher, but unfortunately he has been hooked into a cult wherein the teacher only wants his money, his mansions, his Rolls Royces, Bentleys and Lamborginis. Not that the teacher should not have them but not at the expense of the rent and grocery money of poor souls. In this case both the teacher and the students are trapped. The teacher is trapped in his materiality and the student in his imagined spirituality. |
| In this connection I wish to mention another example as well. Once a man from Europe reportedly wanted to present a Mercedes Benz to Ramana Maharishi. Ramana Maharishi refused it saying that he was already in a "car" (body) and he didn't want another one. Apparently the Maharishi walked around the Arunachola hill either barefoot or with bad slippers and ruined his feet. Ramana Maharishi also thought that to have a second loincloth was a luxury and lived with only one loincloth which he washed and dried it on the rock. He hid his naked body behind a rock while the cloth was getting dried. |
| I have great respect for the Maharishi, but it is a little too much. About two decades ago, I was closely working with his energy. He came to me in a meditation and said that his path was wrong. He was sorry for closing the Caves of the Siddhas in the hill because the Siddhas affirmed worldly life – perfect immortal body, siddhis (super normal powers), etc. Traps apply to the teacher as well as the students. I see clearly two patterns. Preceptors, prophets, gurus who lived a thousand years ago or more were trapped in poverty. They confused poverty with God. The modern ones, whether they come from India, Tibet, or TV Evangelists are trapped in materiality. |
| The way out is moderation. Both the teachers and the students need God and money. But there should be moderation. I have no respect for the teacher/organization that takes people's rent money nor do I approve the gullible student who gives his rent money to the teacher and sleeps on the couch of a friend's living room. This is the reason why I teach the Prosperity and Enlightenment program. It gives you both worlds. I honestly want to see many people in this program buy a moderate house within a year." |
| Prosperity and Enlightenment Program Baba Sri Siva continues to accept applications into the P&E program. Participants around the world are receiving additional teachings and conference calls with Baba each month and experiencing accelerated changes. Please click here for more details and the sign up sheet. Any questions may be addressed to prosperity_enlightenment@vaaaksounds.com |