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I Want The Knife…Please.

I was asked the other day by a dharma brother why I no longer hang out in Buddhist circles. In fact, most of the people I am closest to don’t. The reason is that while there are a sizable amount of people who get into Tibetan Buddhism from a magic/occult angle, most people approach from a meditation – psychology angle, or worse, a completely saccharine pseudo spiritual desire to be exotic. Those of us that approach it from the magic angle make the others uncomfortable to say the least.

The approach I took, and the teachers that I hold dear, have made my experience a little less like Kundun, and a little more like The Golden Child.

I thank them with all my heart. Strategic Sorcery would not be what it it without them.

Click Here to Leave a Comment Below 21 comments
M.G.

My problem with the Vajrayana – and this may or may not be a function of how it’s taught – goes more to its efficacy. After a decade of study under a universally praised master, I honestly couldn’t say my practice cut through my karmic obscurations. I’m sure other people have had different experiences, but I’ve certainly encountered long-time students whose experiences matched mine.

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    Ngawang

    I think that what makes the practices efficacious isn’t so much doing them precisely or blessings of the lama, though both of those things are necessary to a degree, but rather, the willingness to take a great big dose of Fukitol (http://awfulrowing.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/fukitol.gif) and throw yourself into the practice with wild adandon. I think the real point of the activity mantras or the prayogas is to extend the practice into every part of one’s life.

    Reply
      M.G.

      In my case the issue wasn’t lack of Fukitol, sonething I know a bit about, but the realization that, for me, the prescription was a placebo and better medications existed. You may have different experiences and reach different conclusions.

      Reply
cholwapa

My experience has been very different, in general but particularly in my heart sangha (the particular sangha I am most connected to/associated with) which is a significant number of people. But to be quite honest I have a fucking cool sangha. Several have been members of the (Caliphate) OTO, various hermetic orders and such. I have met several people who where guided by (or claimed to be= guided by) Hecate to be their. At the last public retreat I was at, I had discussions about: alien abduction, ceremonial magick, Lemurian Kabbalah, Entheogens (with a wide range of opinions on how useful they are on the path), how sex is innately virtuous (not talking about “tantric” sex here just plain old sex), moving the assemblage point, Integral theory and the pros and cons of Ken Wilber take on the same. My own involvement in other Magickal Practices is well known by older members of the sangha and some newer people if it has ever come up. In short I don’t make a big deal about it but I in know way hide it. Of course my own Root Lama knows and has even twice told other people that I am a magician. Even most of the ones that don’t have experience with other magickal/ pagan paths tend to be open minded and interested in other things.

@M.G. I’ve met Magickians, Sorcerers, Witches, (Yogis, Taoist, Sufis) , yada yade, who have been practicing 20, 30 even 50 years, some who studies under supposed western adepts such as Isreal Regardie, Grady McMurtry, Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki, Kenneth Grant, Gardener, Issac Bonowitz, etc) that range from pretty awesome to complete schmucks, many who could not even tell you if major karmic obscurations had been cleared because they weren’t looking. What I haven’t met are “adepts” of western practices, that can do the things I’ve seen some Lamas do. So clearly they work for some. I have had the good fortune to study with some living embodied beings who are truly extraordinary at a level I haven’t directly encounter outside of the Vajrayana lineages (inclusive of Bon within Vajrayana) with perhaps the exception of Pir Valayet Khan, and I have encounter extrodinary people all my life. But I am still a schmuck but I think I can say I am less of one now.

To be clear I am not saying that level of extraordinary can’t be found outside Vajrayana. I suspect it can but Vajrayana clearly has extraordinary in spades, and thus has to be said to have extraordinary efficacy at least for some.

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    M.G.

    I appreciate your input regarding your experiences. (I was actually in a pretty cool occult-y sangha for a while too. Lots of interesting and talented magicians there, some of whom may sometimes even show up on this site.) I have met some very highly realized lamas, and I don’t doubt that there are American practitioners who genuinely benefitted from their dharma practice, perhaps enormously so. My own experience, though not especially negative, was that the practices I faithfully engaged in for many years did not cut through my karmic obscurations in any real way, and were markedly less effective in that regard those I learned later on from teachers outside of the Buddhist tradition. So it goes.

    Reply
    NewbK

    Could the level of “efficacy” as you say be in relationship with the sect one belongs to, meaning Nyingma, Gelug, Sakya or Kagyu, and the connection one has with it ?

    Reply
      M.G.

      I’m hesitant to make generalizations regarding connections to lineages. (It’s not difficult to convince one’s self one has a deep connection to a spiritual lineage for personal or social reasons.) In my own experience, I’ve found no corollary between feeling an affinity for a teacher and spiritual community and actually cutting through karmic conditioning through their practices, nor have I found any corollary between perceived affinity or belief in a path and having powerful spiritual experiences with it, nor one between having such experiences on a path and becoming less neurotic through it. Others will disagree.

      Reply
    edgeofgrace

    ‘ What I haven’t met are “adepts” of western practices, that can do the things I’ve seen some Lamas do.’

    What level/type of things are you talking about, if you don’t mind me asking?

    Reply
      cholwapa

      glowing visible light, become translucent, put hand prints in stone (ok I only personly witnessed a thumb print) not to mention true telepathy where they new exactly what I was thinking even when I wasn’t physically before them (so they couldnt be reading body language or doing cold readings), and while I can say they “did” this but I have witnessed upside down rainbows during ritual activities. These only account for external things I can denotatively point at. No less amazing and far more important are the miraculous ways they organize life situations that drive home the teachings. I am not simply talking about syncronicities here because the handiwork of the Lama is clearly visible.

      Reply
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