Andrew taught that there were two aspects of enlightenment. One of them was exactly as Ramana Maharshi described, timeless, changeless, always perfect, the unconditioned. Always the sense of no problem whatsoever. The other side was the evolutionary side, where we’re always in crises, the house is always burning down. Andrew declared he’d gone beyond most eastern teachers as they only taught the first side of enlightenment but not the second. But when he spoke about the first side, he was very much like those eastern teachers. When he spoke about the unconditioned, he didn’t speak about evolution, or change. When speaking about the unconditioned, he insisted from this perspective everything was always perfect, there was never any problem, nothing to do, nothing to become. Andrew taught both sides of enlightenment were important; both had to be practiced independently of one another. When meditating, there should be no thought of action or evolution. And when acting in the the world, one should participate fully, without any reference back to that experience in meditation.
When I picked up his book on Evolutionary enlightenment (as a former student), I found the parts on the evolutionary perspective difficult to read, and didn’t get far. But reading the beginning where he set out the unconditioned view, I felt myself sinking inside despite myself, feeling that spiritual experience, even though I didn’t particularly want to. It still had power over me.
I think Andrew had a genuine connection with that first side of enlightenment, the unconditioned. I think he was able to transmit it, and I think that gave him his power. But it wasn’t good enough for him, at least not alone. After all, what’s the good of powerful experiences if they don’t lead into action, if we remain selfish, if we remain divided and in crises as a species? What good are such experiences if afterwards his students still behaved in ways Andrew found annoying, that brought his attention to aspects of himself he was assiduously avoiding? It’s a tempting thought, and I certainly bought into it. But it was his use of the second side of the teachings that in retrospect seems to be where the mess came from, where he confused the evolutionary impulse with his deepest fears and insecurities, and that resulted in a community of terrified people trying to live up to and project a particular standard that by and large was the reflection of the neurosis of our teacher. On retreats, at least when I was a student, Andrew always started with the unconditioned. The first few days of a retreat would always be about meditation, about sinking into that place of meditation. Only when we were grounded enough in that view, would he go on to the evolutionary teachings, the five tenets, or whatever it was at the time. Ostensibly, this was because we needed to be grounded in the unconditioned view to have the depth of vision to explore the more advanced part of the teachings. In actuality, I think that meditation was necessary to make us malleable, to make it easier to manipulate us.
I don’t like the term “evolutionary enlightenment.” I’m not ruling it out. But most of the time when I’ve heard it used, it’s together with the assumption of an evolutionary wave of which we spiritual folk are at the edge of. The unspoken assumption appears to be, just by being aware of evolution, we are more evolutionary advanced. In my opinion, a friend of mine said it best (and I hope I’m stating what he said correctly) when he said he didn’t like the “evolutionary view,” but if we were going to refer to such then everyone and everything would have to be considered to be on the evolutionary edge.
Sunday, June 12, 2016
Thursday, June 2, 2016
On Love
Andrew didn't use the word "love" very often and
didn't seem to like it, even though when he was asked where it came in, he'd
say "at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end." At the time, I
thought he worried that using it would lead into a mushy feel-good approach to
things. He would also say that most people didn't know what love was, and he'd
say, "True love burns." He seemed to feel he was the only one who
knew what love was, and of course humiliating people, at least when he did it,
was an expression of this cosmic love.
Friday, September 4, 2015
Skype call with Andrew
I had a Skype call with Andrew a little while ago. This is my account of it.
The tenor of the conversation was friendly for the most part, and even during the periods of mild tension, it was still mutually respectful. We showed each other our pets, and I cradled my pet rat Chiska in my hands for most of the conversation. I felt warmth and affection towards him for the most part, and I believe he felt the same. To a degree, he freely admitted his mistakes, admitting that over the years as a teacher there was a huge amount of evidence that something was wrong that he ignored. He talked about being overly critical of other spiritual teachers and his own teacher in the early days, and of being naively ignorant of much of what was involved in being a human being and a teacher. There were some other things we talked about I don't recall, but there was a sense of agreement. We discussed treating people as means rather than ends.
I brought up some of the darker episodes I indirectly experienced as his student, the pseudo amputation of a finger of a fellow student, the formal women at the lake. He expressed remorse for these and acknowledged he'd done horrible things. When I brought up his lack of response to students since the first apology, he didn't respond, and I'm not sure that made it in. I didn't push too long on that; I'm not sure I'd want him to start writing letters because someone told him he should.
The major points of disagreement were two. The first arose when I asked Andrew what the so called "holocaust" was all about, why had he done all that. He seemed surprised that I would ask that question as though I didn't know, when he'd explained it so many times before. Then he gave an explanation he could have given 14 years ago--the formal students were stuck, we were happy with the way things were, he needed to put pressure on us to make something happened. I was genuinely surprised, although I suppose I shouldn't have been. After so much time has passed, after admitting to doing so much that was genuinely wrong and harmful, the story he tells about his basic motivation hasn't changed even a bit. I argued with him. I invoked the second tenet, and said it was impossible to reconcile this image of himself with the actions he performed, which bordered on sadism. I read the piece from my blog, "The Liberated Ego" to him. I don't think that helped.
The second point came up when he brought up something I'd written a couple years ago he said another student had shown him (it's currently on my blog under "Hold onto Nothing). He asked with concern if I really thought that he had orchestrated the breakthrough the formal men experienced and that nothing really happened. I was gratified both that he remembered that passage and that that point seemed to disturb him. While I qualified it a little, saying one couldn't literally say nothing happened, that there were shifts and various insights among everyone throughout our involvement with him, fundamentally, I was confident whatever happened was not the historical shift in consciousness he had described it as, and that he had orchestrated that event because he needed one. I also said I was convinced that as long as he held onto that conviction of a break through, that he'd never be able to respond to his former students,that he'd remain fundamentally unchanged. I reminded him I'd originally believed in the picture he'd painted myself, and I described the moment when everything deflated for me, when I realized that great drama between the impersonal forces of enlightenment and ego was all an illusion, how I was an actor in an imaginary drama in Andrew's mind. He of course confidently declared I was wrong. He said that two seemingly contradictory views were both true, and denying either was to miss the whole picture; it was true he'd made terrible mistakes and did awful things, and at the same time it was true a fundamental breakthrough did occur. I said that view was madness, and so long as he held on to it he would remain stuck. My response seemed to disappoint him, and he expressed regret that I viewed it all as B.S. I felt compassion for him, through much of this I was almost pleading with him, if he didn't face this, nothing was going to happen. But unsurprisingly we did not come together here, and we had to agree to disagree.
Overall, he's very much as others who've met with him have described him. On one level, he is looking into things, he is acknowledging the wrong he's done. On another level, he is fundamentally unchanged. And I believe Harry's post on Elizabeths' blog was perfectly on the mark; he's still holding on.
So I was satisfied with the call but not because of anything Andrew said. Going in, I don't believe I wanted anything from him. All I wanted was to say what I needed to say. I believe I did that, and as a result I feel unburdened. I feel I satisfied the contract I had with him from so long ago. While I found to my surprise I did care for him and I do hope he can open his eyes, at the same time what he does with what I told him (and what plenty of other people have told him as well) is up to him. People change when they are ready to change and not a moment before. And at this point, having said what I needed to say, until he responds it simply isn't my problem anymore.
I'm still fascinated with this phenomenon, that a human being falls in love with an image or an ideal representing love, and becomes blind to the real thing. I don't understand it, but I've seen, and even experienced it myself. I was unable to acknowledge the nature of the abuse I'd seen with my own eyes, until after I'd let go of the idea that I'd been involved in some noble struggle for humanity, and when I did, everything became clear. I hope Andrew may also eventually be able to let go of that idea. But in the mean time, I am not going to hold my breath.
Addendum:
There is something I forgot to mention which is significant. One of the issues I pressed Andrew on was my fellow student, who he had hand undergo a fake finger amputation. Of course the doctor was directed to end it at the last moment, but the student was emotionally shattered. He left soon after. When I pressed Andrew on this, expressed remorse. He said, "I lost a good man." Do I have to point that that man was never Andrew's to lose in the first place? But that's how he worded it. We were his, and he expressed remorse in "losing" one of us. I think that is also the source of his comment to me, "I'm sorry you think it was all bullshit." To me what that meant he was sorry that I did not share his vision anymore, that I was not part of his enterprise anymore, that I was no longer his. We no longer had a relationship. And he was sorry that was the case.
Wednesday, July 29, 2015
On "Evolutionary Enlightenment."
When I first began to become disillusioned with Andrew, I bought a copy of Martin Buber's "I and thou." My reasoning was that Andrew's teachings had gone badly off the rails, and I wanted something that came from a different perspective than Andrew's "impersonal enlightenment." While I had trouble understanding Martin Buber's work, I admired his spirit, and I still think Andrew's fourth tenet is potentially destructive.
In addition, after my experience with Andrew, I'm deeply suspicious of the view of evolutionary enlightenment, or the idea that we can be at the forefront of evolution, or that we can somehow consciously help it along. While I agree with Whitehead there seems to be a creative impulse underlying creation, as a friend of mine put it to me once, everyone is at the forefront of evolution. There is no select elite group. And while I can understand the desire given the destructive path humanity appears to be on to find a solution, the impulse we have as human beings to objectify an absolute perspective, to identify with it, to take pride in it, is frighteningly strong and immensely destructive in its potential. In the end, I think Martin Buber has the right idea. "God demands from us, therefore, the simplest thing imaginable – to be good – but we always tend to complicate it."
In addition, after my experience with Andrew, I'm deeply suspicious of the view of evolutionary enlightenment, or the idea that we can be at the forefront of evolution, or that we can somehow consciously help it along. While I agree with Whitehead there seems to be a creative impulse underlying creation, as a friend of mine put it to me once, everyone is at the forefront of evolution. There is no select elite group. And while I can understand the desire given the destructive path humanity appears to be on to find a solution, the impulse we have as human beings to objectify an absolute perspective, to identify with it, to take pride in it, is frighteningly strong and immensely destructive in its potential. In the end, I think Martin Buber has the right idea. "God demands from us, therefore, the simplest thing imaginable – to be good – but we always tend to complicate it."
Sunday, July 19, 2015
Hold Onto Nothing
(This piece was actually written a couple years ago, and is out of order here.)
Reading Simeon's account of his dinner with Andrew, what struck me more than anything was the passage where Andrew talks about the July 30 event.
“July 30th, 2001. . . . You left too soon, Everyone who was still there at that time saw the beauty and potential of this teaching become manifest in a way that left no room for doubt, and it's because of what happened on that day that I have no doubt that I brought something beautiful into this world, and that because of that, nothing will ever be the same. But without having the context of that experience, you can't possibly understand what I'm talking about.”
I wasn't there for the event itself. I was one of the last formal men, perhaps the last formal man, to leave before this happened. Towards the end of the "holocaust," Andrew announced this wasn't about coming through collectively anymore. We were all to meet with him and face him when we were ready one on one.
When everyone returned, he put them on an intensive retreat. It was, I think weeks of meditation and spiritual practice (and if someone who was there who was part of this could fill in the details, that would be great). Eventually he declared there had been a crack, some sort of fundamental awakening, the birth of a new consciousness, something had stabilized.
I believed this story for years after I left. I accepted that I had been inadequate, but that what Andrew was attempting to do was real, what he was attempting to achieve was real. Sometime after I left, for reasons unrelated to my prior involvement, I became viscerally aware at what a terrifying age we live in. We were, as a species, blindly exploiting the planets resources without regard to the future, and it seemed to me, and still seems to me, that there was little likelihood human civilization as we understood it would survive another century.
This vision terrified me, and at the same time, drew me back to Andrew's teachings. It was exactly then the journal published their issue on collective intelligence. And it seemed to me this was exactly right. The human species was fragmented. You had the scientists off in one corner who could see what needed to be done, but we didn't trust trust each other, coordinated intelligent action was impossible. Andrew's vision of a collective consciousness that transcended the individuals involved seemed exactly what was needed.
What eventually disillusioned me was I knew the teachings too well. The intelligence was supposed to endow the collective with a truly objective perspective, a perspective that transcended our tribal fear based view. And of course Andrew had always taught that the test of spiritual experience was not how extraordinary it felt in the moment, but how it manifested itself in the world.
And it became clear, that there was no such transcendent objective perspective making itself known at Foxhollow. My first clue was reading Craig's attempted take down of Susan Bridle's piece in What Enlightenment. While at the time I didn't share Susan's perspective, I could not help but admire her attempt to write candidly and objectively about her experience. And Craig's response was so cloyingly condescending, so disrespectful, it practically made me want to gag. And of course I knew a letter like that, a public letter in such a contentious arena must have been written with Andrew's close involvement, and no doubt the involvement of other high ranking students, after long careful deliberation.
And once this idea entered my head and I started to look, the fantasy of a great spiritual awakening manifesting a collective objective perspective that might save humanity, sadly, fell apart. Foxhollow was horribly dysfunctional. They couldn't even manage their own finances, and when things fell apart, there was the scape-goating and vindictiveness you'd expect in any human organization. Far from expressing a perspective that might conceivably save the world, my family collectively exhibited more maturity and better judgement than Andrew's project
And when I let go of the fantasy of a miraculous awakening, it was easy to see what had happened. There was a miraculous collective awakening because Andrew wanted there to be one. He didn't want the crises to go on and on, he wanted there to be a happy ending, and when the happy ending he envisioned proved impossible, he finally gave up and made up one. And of course we wanted a happy ending too, we didn't want to accept that our teacher who we identified with the highest impulses of humanity had collectively abused us over months for no good reason. All Andrew had to do was declare an awakening had happened, and we'd go along. He'd ask each one of us if it was real and to be honest. And in the unlikely event anyone had the independence to say they thought that yes, there seemed to be something, but nowhere near as earth shattering as Andrew claimed, they'd soon fall into a spiritual crises and wouldn't be heard from again. Andrew went into a fury when Mr. Lee's students told him politely that yes it seemed something had happened, but hardly anything unique.
So the great awakening happened because Andrew said it happened. And why would anyone disagree, or if they did, why would they stay? It comes across clearly reading Andrew's blog; there are accounts of an ineffable experience that fundamentally changed the world that no one can possibly understand who hadn't been there, and even those who had been there and left couldn't understand because of course the ordinary mind can't hold on to that which is transcendent. Forgotten are the early teachings that it's not the content of spiritual experiences that matter, but how we interpret them that is everything. Forgotten are the teachings that how awakening is manifested in time and space is the only thing that matters.
I still believe Andrew had a genuine awakening, that he did have a kind of spiritual discernment, that he was able to inspire and awaken others, and that he did actually wish to liberate people, to make them free. But the problem was he wanted to make them free, and in that freedom not to threaten him! He wanted his students to be strong and independent, and in that strength and independence, to freely support him 200%!
And of course that placed an impossible demand on his students. At least with a tyrant who demands nothing but self-abasement and devotion you can please him! You can humiliate yourself and at least he'll be happy. But Andrew wasn't satisfied with that. Letters where students talked about how miserable they were only infuriated him. No, he wanted, he demanded that his students stand proud and tall and independent, and in their independence to do nothing that might threaten his vision of himself.
Given that, it's surprising he had as much success as he did. Even during the holocaust, people did rise up in fits and starts, they did express a humanity and independence that was beautiful, that pleased Andrew when it occurred. In my case, I wrote a series of letters dissecting the men's pathologies, how we'd divide into groups and demonize one another in a raw ugly battle for survival. Andrew took what I wrote and blew it up and posted it on the walls, hugely approving. But what if I'd gone on to continue my analysis? What if it had occurred to me to question that maybe, just maybe, these pathologies were somehow connected to Andrew's teaching methods? I don't think he would have been so supportive then.
Understanding this clarified a mystery for me. As Andrew's student, we witnessed a reoccurring phenomena. Some student would rise up, show unusual confidence or independence or insight. They might even rise in the hierarchy. Then suddenly they'd have a crises, and they'd fall apart! It seemed in taking risk, they had exposed parts of their ego and limitation that they were fundamentally unwilling to face. Now I realized the explanation was simpler. Someone would rise, show some independence, and Andrew might be pleased, but he'd also be threatened. When that independence expressed itself in a way didn't like, he'd come down hard. Perhaps the student would make a genuine error, or perhaps they'd just do something Andrew didn't like. It didn't matter, as we all accepted Andrew's intuition as objective fact. And then the student would be put in the impossible position of having to either recant their own intuition and common sense, or their teacher they'd devoted their life to. It was no wonder under that situation so many cracked. The worst example of this I know of was a senior student and a leader among Andrew's students, someone utterly devoted to Andrew who I never heard say a critical word, who was taken down for no reason anyone has been able to explain, outside of Andrew's need to keep control.
When I realized this, it flashed into my head a cartoon that could have been drawn for the men's sauna room walls. In it, Andrew would be standing in the foreground addressing us as he often did, demanding, "Why don't more of you rise up and be leaders?' Behind him would be a guillotine and a basket full of heads.
So, during the "holocaust," I still believe he was genuinely trying to bring about an awakening; he was just doing it in a way that made his goal impossible, and squeezing the vice ever tighter when what couldn't succeed didn't succeed.
And finally, he gave up. His original goal, clearly stated, was for the formal men to come through not individually but collectively; he specifically wanted a collective response. And in the end he simply reversed himself, and he declared that each one of us had to reconcile ourselves individually with him.
Talking with Susan Bridle, she told me the same thing happened with the women. He'd pressured them for a collective response, but in the end gave up just as he had with the men. She told me in the end that was what convinced her to leave.
After the holocaust, something changed in Andrew. There was a very noticeable shift in the character of his writings, particularly visible on his blog. Beforehand, he had a certain unsentimental hard nosed realism. It was a quality that, even when he was misguided, I liked and respected. He told it like it was and didn't care what people thought. When Mimi asked him about Poonjaji, he said matter-of-factly the man meant nothing to him now.
Afterwards all that changed. Of course we all know about the miraculous spiritual reunion he had with his master, now safely dead and unable to impinge in any way on his fantasy. He wrote a weird maudlin letter to Stas from his dog. His posts on his blog waxed on about how wonderful his life was, how wonderful this awakening was. For a while I wondered if he'd always been like this and I'd just been too blind to see, but I don't think so. I think he genuinely changed. I think he cracked, in a way.
When Pete Bampton waxes on about his gratitude to Andrew for the great collective awakening, I can't find it m myself to be angry with him. I can't even find it in myself to be angry when he lashes out at others to protect it, even though I know it's wrong. I understand the impulse he's acting out of too well. He's doing his part as we all did collectively to uphold Andrew's fantasy. In the end, we were all actors, desperately trying to fulfill his play.
The ancient Hebrews taught one should never worship idols. Zen Buddhists have declared, if you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him. Great teachers declared that one should only trust that which cannot be touched, cannot be seen, cannot be grasped by thought. But most human beings are simply unable to do that. Most of us need to identify that which cannot be identified with something substantial, a person, or a doctrine of some sort. And when that identification happens, we defend it irrationally, compulsively, because we are convinced that attacks on that relative representation of the absolute are attacks on that which is the source of all value itself.
For most of us, we identified that with Andrew, which of course he encouraged us to do, assuring us that in this one instance it was correct to ignore the ancient injunction. Andrew, in turn, identified it with his own spontaneous responses. Now that that has finally broken, all he has left is that event.
If Andrew really wants to help others, he has to give up that fantasy there was some unique awakening, he has to give up the fantasy that all that nightmarish drama was somehow finally worth it. To my mind, that is only thing he can do to make amends; in liberating himself from that fantasy, he might help to liberate others too.
One of the earliest things I remember Andrew teaching applies now. In the end, there can be only one final reference point, one final principle that supersedes all others.
Hold onto nothing.
Hold onto nothing.
Hold onto nothing.
Reading Simeon's account of his dinner with Andrew, what struck me more than anything was the passage where Andrew talks about the July 30 event.
“July 30th, 2001. . . . You left too soon, Everyone who was still there at that time saw the beauty and potential of this teaching become manifest in a way that left no room for doubt, and it's because of what happened on that day that I have no doubt that I brought something beautiful into this world, and that because of that, nothing will ever be the same. But without having the context of that experience, you can't possibly understand what I'm talking about.”
I wasn't there for the event itself. I was one of the last formal men, perhaps the last formal man, to leave before this happened. Towards the end of the "holocaust," Andrew announced this wasn't about coming through collectively anymore. We were all to meet with him and face him when we were ready one on one.
When everyone returned, he put them on an intensive retreat. It was, I think weeks of meditation and spiritual practice (and if someone who was there who was part of this could fill in the details, that would be great). Eventually he declared there had been a crack, some sort of fundamental awakening, the birth of a new consciousness, something had stabilized.
I believed this story for years after I left. I accepted that I had been inadequate, but that what Andrew was attempting to do was real, what he was attempting to achieve was real. Sometime after I left, for reasons unrelated to my prior involvement, I became viscerally aware at what a terrifying age we live in. We were, as a species, blindly exploiting the planets resources without regard to the future, and it seemed to me, and still seems to me, that there was little likelihood human civilization as we understood it would survive another century.
This vision terrified me, and at the same time, drew me back to Andrew's teachings. It was exactly then the journal published their issue on collective intelligence. And it seemed to me this was exactly right. The human species was fragmented. You had the scientists off in one corner who could see what needed to be done, but we didn't trust trust each other, coordinated intelligent action was impossible. Andrew's vision of a collective consciousness that transcended the individuals involved seemed exactly what was needed.
What eventually disillusioned me was I knew the teachings too well. The intelligence was supposed to endow the collective with a truly objective perspective, a perspective that transcended our tribal fear based view. And of course Andrew had always taught that the test of spiritual experience was not how extraordinary it felt in the moment, but how it manifested itself in the world.
And it became clear, that there was no such transcendent objective perspective making itself known at Foxhollow. My first clue was reading Craig's attempted take down of Susan Bridle's piece in What Enlightenment. While at the time I didn't share Susan's perspective, I could not help but admire her attempt to write candidly and objectively about her experience. And Craig's response was so cloyingly condescending, so disrespectful, it practically made me want to gag. And of course I knew a letter like that, a public letter in such a contentious arena must have been written with Andrew's close involvement, and no doubt the involvement of other high ranking students, after long careful deliberation.
And once this idea entered my head and I started to look, the fantasy of a great spiritual awakening manifesting a collective objective perspective that might save humanity, sadly, fell apart. Foxhollow was horribly dysfunctional. They couldn't even manage their own finances, and when things fell apart, there was the scape-goating and vindictiveness you'd expect in any human organization. Far from expressing a perspective that might conceivably save the world, my family collectively exhibited more maturity and better judgement than Andrew's project
And when I let go of the fantasy of a miraculous awakening, it was easy to see what had happened. There was a miraculous collective awakening because Andrew wanted there to be one. He didn't want the crises to go on and on, he wanted there to be a happy ending, and when the happy ending he envisioned proved impossible, he finally gave up and made up one. And of course we wanted a happy ending too, we didn't want to accept that our teacher who we identified with the highest impulses of humanity had collectively abused us over months for no good reason. All Andrew had to do was declare an awakening had happened, and we'd go along. He'd ask each one of us if it was real and to be honest. And in the unlikely event anyone had the independence to say they thought that yes, there seemed to be something, but nowhere near as earth shattering as Andrew claimed, they'd soon fall into a spiritual crises and wouldn't be heard from again. Andrew went into a fury when Mr. Lee's students told him politely that yes it seemed something had happened, but hardly anything unique.
So the great awakening happened because Andrew said it happened. And why would anyone disagree, or if they did, why would they stay? It comes across clearly reading Andrew's blog; there are accounts of an ineffable experience that fundamentally changed the world that no one can possibly understand who hadn't been there, and even those who had been there and left couldn't understand because of course the ordinary mind can't hold on to that which is transcendent. Forgotten are the early teachings that it's not the content of spiritual experiences that matter, but how we interpret them that is everything. Forgotten are the teachings that how awakening is manifested in time and space is the only thing that matters.
I still believe Andrew had a genuine awakening, that he did have a kind of spiritual discernment, that he was able to inspire and awaken others, and that he did actually wish to liberate people, to make them free. But the problem was he wanted to make them free, and in that freedom not to threaten him! He wanted his students to be strong and independent, and in that strength and independence, to freely support him 200%!
And of course that placed an impossible demand on his students. At least with a tyrant who demands nothing but self-abasement and devotion you can please him! You can humiliate yourself and at least he'll be happy. But Andrew wasn't satisfied with that. Letters where students talked about how miserable they were only infuriated him. No, he wanted, he demanded that his students stand proud and tall and independent, and in their independence to do nothing that might threaten his vision of himself.
Given that, it's surprising he had as much success as he did. Even during the holocaust, people did rise up in fits and starts, they did express a humanity and independence that was beautiful, that pleased Andrew when it occurred. In my case, I wrote a series of letters dissecting the men's pathologies, how we'd divide into groups and demonize one another in a raw ugly battle for survival. Andrew took what I wrote and blew it up and posted it on the walls, hugely approving. But what if I'd gone on to continue my analysis? What if it had occurred to me to question that maybe, just maybe, these pathologies were somehow connected to Andrew's teaching methods? I don't think he would have been so supportive then.
Understanding this clarified a mystery for me. As Andrew's student, we witnessed a reoccurring phenomena. Some student would rise up, show unusual confidence or independence or insight. They might even rise in the hierarchy. Then suddenly they'd have a crises, and they'd fall apart! It seemed in taking risk, they had exposed parts of their ego and limitation that they were fundamentally unwilling to face. Now I realized the explanation was simpler. Someone would rise, show some independence, and Andrew might be pleased, but he'd also be threatened. When that independence expressed itself in a way didn't like, he'd come down hard. Perhaps the student would make a genuine error, or perhaps they'd just do something Andrew didn't like. It didn't matter, as we all accepted Andrew's intuition as objective fact. And then the student would be put in the impossible position of having to either recant their own intuition and common sense, or their teacher they'd devoted their life to. It was no wonder under that situation so many cracked. The worst example of this I know of was a senior student and a leader among Andrew's students, someone utterly devoted to Andrew who I never heard say a critical word, who was taken down for no reason anyone has been able to explain, outside of Andrew's need to keep control.
When I realized this, it flashed into my head a cartoon that could have been drawn for the men's sauna room walls. In it, Andrew would be standing in the foreground addressing us as he often did, demanding, "Why don't more of you rise up and be leaders?' Behind him would be a guillotine and a basket full of heads.
So, during the "holocaust," I still believe he was genuinely trying to bring about an awakening; he was just doing it in a way that made his goal impossible, and squeezing the vice ever tighter when what couldn't succeed didn't succeed.
And finally, he gave up. His original goal, clearly stated, was for the formal men to come through not individually but collectively; he specifically wanted a collective response. And in the end he simply reversed himself, and he declared that each one of us had to reconcile ourselves individually with him.
Talking with Susan Bridle, she told me the same thing happened with the women. He'd pressured them for a collective response, but in the end gave up just as he had with the men. She told me in the end that was what convinced her to leave.
After the holocaust, something changed in Andrew. There was a very noticeable shift in the character of his writings, particularly visible on his blog. Beforehand, he had a certain unsentimental hard nosed realism. It was a quality that, even when he was misguided, I liked and respected. He told it like it was and didn't care what people thought. When Mimi asked him about Poonjaji, he said matter-of-factly the man meant nothing to him now.
Afterwards all that changed. Of course we all know about the miraculous spiritual reunion he had with his master, now safely dead and unable to impinge in any way on his fantasy. He wrote a weird maudlin letter to Stas from his dog. His posts on his blog waxed on about how wonderful his life was, how wonderful this awakening was. For a while I wondered if he'd always been like this and I'd just been too blind to see, but I don't think so. I think he genuinely changed. I think he cracked, in a way.
When Pete Bampton waxes on about his gratitude to Andrew for the great collective awakening, I can't find it m myself to be angry with him. I can't even find it in myself to be angry when he lashes out at others to protect it, even though I know it's wrong. I understand the impulse he's acting out of too well. He's doing his part as we all did collectively to uphold Andrew's fantasy. In the end, we were all actors, desperately trying to fulfill his play.
The ancient Hebrews taught one should never worship idols. Zen Buddhists have declared, if you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him. Great teachers declared that one should only trust that which cannot be touched, cannot be seen, cannot be grasped by thought. But most human beings are simply unable to do that. Most of us need to identify that which cannot be identified with something substantial, a person, or a doctrine of some sort. And when that identification happens, we defend it irrationally, compulsively, because we are convinced that attacks on that relative representation of the absolute are attacks on that which is the source of all value itself.
For most of us, we identified that with Andrew, which of course he encouraged us to do, assuring us that in this one instance it was correct to ignore the ancient injunction. Andrew, in turn, identified it with his own spontaneous responses. Now that that has finally broken, all he has left is that event.
If Andrew really wants to help others, he has to give up that fantasy there was some unique awakening, he has to give up the fantasy that all that nightmarish drama was somehow finally worth it. To my mind, that is only thing he can do to make amends; in liberating himself from that fantasy, he might help to liberate others too.
One of the earliest things I remember Andrew teaching applies now. In the end, there can be only one final reference point, one final principle that supersedes all others.
Hold onto nothing.
Hold onto nothing.
Hold onto nothing.
Wednesday, July 15, 2015
Who is Andrew?
Andrew had a talent for inspiring both himself and us to conceive of the perfect human being. Not perfect in body or perfect in mind, but pure in intention, what a human being ought to be. He encouraged all of us to stretch, to imagine what was possible. Then he dared us to imagine it really was possible. Then he dared us to believe it was him.
And as he dared us, so he dared himself. He denied himself, he discovered a way to run away from himself, from the neurotic weak fellow he despised. He denied everything in himself but that perfect individual he dared us to believe in.
But of course the problem was denying that person in his mind didn’t actually make it go away in reality. All those neurosis, all those doubts were still there. And the more he worked to deny them, the more empowered they became.
And now, after more than 20 years of running, it’s all fallen apart, and he has to find himself again. Underneath all the ideas underneath all the denials, who is Andrew? Where is the person he was before he thought he was enlightened? For the first time, I think I might understand why it’s taking him so long; he has to find himself after hiding from himself for over 20 years. For the first time, I feel at least some sympathy for him.
And I feel like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. First I was awed by Andrew, the great and powerful, and I was scared by him, and I tried to submit to him. Then, when I realized he broke his word, I became angry with him, and I defied him. Only now has it begun to occur to me to wonder, who is the man behind the curtain?
And as he dared us, so he dared himself. He denied himself, he discovered a way to run away from himself, from the neurotic weak fellow he despised. He denied everything in himself but that perfect individual he dared us to believe in.
But of course the problem was denying that person in his mind didn’t actually make it go away in reality. All those neurosis, all those doubts were still there. And the more he worked to deny them, the more empowered they became.
And now, after more than 20 years of running, it’s all fallen apart, and he has to find himself again. Underneath all the ideas underneath all the denials, who is Andrew? Where is the person he was before he thought he was enlightened? For the first time, I think I might understand why it’s taking him so long; he has to find himself after hiding from himself for over 20 years. For the first time, I feel at least some sympathy for him.
And I feel like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. First I was awed by Andrew, the great and powerful, and I was scared by him, and I tried to submit to him. Then, when I realized he broke his word, I became angry with him, and I defied him. Only now has it begun to occur to me to wonder, who is the man behind the curtain?
He needed us.
One thing that was surprising to me in the wake of Andrew’s first apology was the discovery that Andrew actually needed us. That is something I never expected. He’d declared to all of us he’d come to the end of the path, the end of seeking, we might waver but he never would, he’d take his stand even if every last one of us abandoned him. And I believed him. I believed him even after I lost faith in him, as I began to realize what a twisted enterprise I’d been in. Even then, I assumed he’d spend the rest of his life declaring he was in the right.
That’s why the first apology was so surprising. Even when I was disillusioned with him, I never thought he’d back down. But he not only backed downed, he apologized, he admitted he was wrong. And as weak as his apology was, I’d never expected anything at all. It took every last one of his closest students to stand firm against him, but I’d always assumed he’d still be shaking his fist and taking his stand if every last one of us left. I was wrong.
And so it turns out, in the end, he needed us after all. He needed us to support him in his conviction, in his delusion, he couldn’t do it entirely on his own. In the past I’ve said he needed us to affirm him as a great spiritual teacher, and while I think that must be part of it, to be honest I’m not exactly sure. Perhaps as we looked to him to affirm are belief in the absolute, in the ultimate goodness of life, he looked to us for the same. He identified that goodness in his own perfect responses as a teacher, and so he looked to us to affirm that in himself.
I believe this is also related to why he treated so many of his students so badly. The enlightened individual, who Andrew pretended to be, needs nothing from anyone, and therefore can only give. But Andrew needed us to fulfill his delusion, and when we wouldn’t, when we couldn’t, he lashed out in rage.
It also means we were his enablers. While I don’t want to suggest this means we were equally responsible, and I certainly don’t mean to suggest he wasn’t responsible, this is, I believe, part of the picture, an aspect that’s needed to make sense of what was going on. He couldn’t do it without us, and when the last of us left, he fell apart.
Or maybe not entirely. Nothing is ever truly simple after all, and his most recent open letter suggests he’s still chugging on, there’s still a big part of his former self image he’s shoring up in spite of everything. But I never expected him to admit he was fundamentally wrong at all.
Looking back, there are other senses in which Andrew needed us. On a practical level, he needed us to produce his journal, edit his teachings, organize his retreats, and so on. These days when speaking publicly, he expresses his gratitude to his former guru and his former students, but of when I was his student, he was very explicit in saying he owed his students nothing. I think that was part of how he interpreted freedom.
And I believe he needed us on an emotional level. For me, there was a feeling of connection in living in the community, of intimacy and communication and joy. Leaving was hard; it felt like I was cutting myself off from a larger current, and it left a raw existential ache. I think many of this felt this, and I think Andrew did too. To me it seemed Andrew felt genuine anguish when someone who’d been a close student was in the doghouse, when they were withdrawn and no longer responding. Of course we were regularly told how, when some close student wasn’t coming through, how painful this was for Andrew, and it was implied we should feel compassion for him.
I still think he felt genuine anguish, even as it’s now apparent that more often than not paradoxically he was the one who’d engineered the circumstances that so pained him. Far from being a matter of the absolute, I believe his pain was stronger the more emotionally closer he was to the one involved.
At the time, Andrew taught how the enlightened teacher’s gut responses were aligned with Care for the Whole, how when they felt happy it was because the whole was benefited, and likewise they felt pain when the whole was harmed. But in practice, the teaching of Care for the Whole meant the reverse; if Andrew was happy, the whole must be happy, and if Andrew was hurt or wounded, it was the whole that was hurt. And this in turn was used to justify the cruel ways he treated errant students. What were supposed to be radical spontaneous responses out of the absolute to students’ conditions were often, in retrospect, more rightly seen as acts of an angry petulant child who’d been hurt; ironic given Andrew’s ridicule of the coddling of one’s inner child.
I have a memory of walking out the back door of the kitchen of Foxhollow to see Andrew coming up the path. This was one when of his committed students was struggling, and Andrew was upset about it. Seeing him approach, he seemed to have a troubled expression, so I asked him about it. When he said something about how it was going badly, I smiled and said, well, nothing to do but keep fighting. He smiled in return, seeming to appreciate my support.
How backwards that all seems to me now.
That’s why the first apology was so surprising. Even when I was disillusioned with him, I never thought he’d back down. But he not only backed downed, he apologized, he admitted he was wrong. And as weak as his apology was, I’d never expected anything at all. It took every last one of his closest students to stand firm against him, but I’d always assumed he’d still be shaking his fist and taking his stand if every last one of us left. I was wrong.
And so it turns out, in the end, he needed us after all. He needed us to support him in his conviction, in his delusion, he couldn’t do it entirely on his own. In the past I’ve said he needed us to affirm him as a great spiritual teacher, and while I think that must be part of it, to be honest I’m not exactly sure. Perhaps as we looked to him to affirm are belief in the absolute, in the ultimate goodness of life, he looked to us for the same. He identified that goodness in his own perfect responses as a teacher, and so he looked to us to affirm that in himself.
I believe this is also related to why he treated so many of his students so badly. The enlightened individual, who Andrew pretended to be, needs nothing from anyone, and therefore can only give. But Andrew needed us to fulfill his delusion, and when we wouldn’t, when we couldn’t, he lashed out in rage.
It also means we were his enablers. While I don’t want to suggest this means we were equally responsible, and I certainly don’t mean to suggest he wasn’t responsible, this is, I believe, part of the picture, an aspect that’s needed to make sense of what was going on. He couldn’t do it without us, and when the last of us left, he fell apart.
Or maybe not entirely. Nothing is ever truly simple after all, and his most recent open letter suggests he’s still chugging on, there’s still a big part of his former self image he’s shoring up in spite of everything. But I never expected him to admit he was fundamentally wrong at all.
Looking back, there are other senses in which Andrew needed us. On a practical level, he needed us to produce his journal, edit his teachings, organize his retreats, and so on. These days when speaking publicly, he expresses his gratitude to his former guru and his former students, but of when I was his student, he was very explicit in saying he owed his students nothing. I think that was part of how he interpreted freedom.
And I believe he needed us on an emotional level. For me, there was a feeling of connection in living in the community, of intimacy and communication and joy. Leaving was hard; it felt like I was cutting myself off from a larger current, and it left a raw existential ache. I think many of this felt this, and I think Andrew did too. To me it seemed Andrew felt genuine anguish when someone who’d been a close student was in the doghouse, when they were withdrawn and no longer responding. Of course we were regularly told how, when some close student wasn’t coming through, how painful this was for Andrew, and it was implied we should feel compassion for him.
I still think he felt genuine anguish, even as it’s now apparent that more often than not paradoxically he was the one who’d engineered the circumstances that so pained him. Far from being a matter of the absolute, I believe his pain was stronger the more emotionally closer he was to the one involved.
At the time, Andrew taught how the enlightened teacher’s gut responses were aligned with Care for the Whole, how when they felt happy it was because the whole was benefited, and likewise they felt pain when the whole was harmed. But in practice, the teaching of Care for the Whole meant the reverse; if Andrew was happy, the whole must be happy, and if Andrew was hurt or wounded, it was the whole that was hurt. And this in turn was used to justify the cruel ways he treated errant students. What were supposed to be radical spontaneous responses out of the absolute to students’ conditions were often, in retrospect, more rightly seen as acts of an angry petulant child who’d been hurt; ironic given Andrew’s ridicule of the coddling of one’s inner child.
I have a memory of walking out the back door of the kitchen of Foxhollow to see Andrew coming up the path. This was one when of his committed students was struggling, and Andrew was upset about it. Seeing him approach, he seemed to have a troubled expression, so I asked him about it. When he said something about how it was going badly, I smiled and said, well, nothing to do but keep fighting. He smiled in return, seeming to appreciate my support.
How backwards that all seems to me now.
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