UARELOVE
Some Vernon Howard quotes:
474. "The invented self is rudeness itself."
475. "There is a definite connection between mental sickness and bad manners.
Watch for the connection. As you mingle with people, watch how neurosis
frequently lashes out at people with contemptuous behaviour and outrageous
demands. The problem is that mental sickness never sees bad manners as
bad manners, which is what keeps it sick and bad."
476. "Unpleasant behaviour is sick behaviour. Few people want to think
about this fact. Unpleasant people are sick people. You know the thousand
varieties of unpleasantness including sarcastic accusations, delerious
demands, repulsive self-worship, a cold and hostile face. If another person
is unpleasant, realize that your wish for sunlight must have nothing to
do with his darkness."
477. "An inconsiderate person does not see how much unecessary work he
selfishly piles on others. Not seeing this fact, he hurts with unbelieving
indignation when told about it."
478. "People are surly and rude because their attention is locked in the
downward position. They have become what they have attended to."
479. "Plain and simple courteous behaviour? Self-centeredness never heard
of it."
480. "Courtesy can't be explained to a rude mind."
481. "Connect suffering with rudeness."
482. "If your behaviour is unpleasant, see that you have chosen midnight
over noon and see that you will stumble and fall in your own darkness."
483. "The only way to have good manners is to wake up."
JERRY:
So what am I supposed to 'do' with the insights quoted? It corners me
into self-centered behavior. Maybe it's elsewhere in Vernon Howard's writings,
and elsewhere within the sphere of your own intent, but I don't hear any
compassion for the mentally ill and those who behave unpleasantly. That
is more important than whether I personally am bent toward noon or midnight.
UARELOVE:
Jerry you have given a good description, of what makes Vernon Howard quite
different from all the other "Teachers" that I have encountered. As far
a being cornered that is very much a good description. However this being
cornered was so intensely magnified in Vernon Howards classes with Vernon
Howard there. And the being cornered and the apparant lack of compasssion
were related and part of the same Teaching device.
Most of the Teachers I have encountered do not speak with a threatening
tone. However Vernon Howard did. Arriving at Vernon Howards classes there
was the sense that one had been tricked. It is something like one thinking,
"Oh great I am going to now get a chance to attend the classes of the
Teacher who wrote these excellent books." And then one goes to the class,
and to get a better view sits in the front row and there is a lion sitting
there in the chair instead of a Spiritual Teacher. Or one might say it
was like going to a class and finding that one is caught in a web and
a spider is sitting in the chair. Vernon Howard was bizarre. I attended
his classes three times a week for three months in Boulder City, Nevada
around 23 years ago. At the New Life web site they have sound clips of
Vernon Howard. However they are not selecting any clips of Vernon Howard
screaming at the top of his lungs. Vernon Howard was very sucessful in
this cornering of the ego notion. So people in the class did not exhibit
self centered behaviour. It was sort of like someone having a hand gun
to ones head saying if you dare play even one of your little ego games
with me your brains will be on the table. So no one played due to his
tremdous ability to convey a sense of seriousness and threat.
I remember there was one odd women who had a few followers who came for
a visit to the class and she was told to raise her hand before speaking
she started to say "I resent...." Vernon just looked at her and raised
his hand, it was that "don't you dare" look. She did not go beyond the
word resent. She said only the two words. It reminds me of some kind of
power, some kind of siddhi maybe. Vernon Howard was truly amazing at conveying
that there is a rattlesnake in front of you and the only way to be safe
is to not play a single ego game now.
The lack of compassion for the ego notion runs throughout Vernon Howards
Teachings. The atmosphere was somewhat concentration camp like. One of
the rules upon first arriving in the class was I was not to speak to any
females in the class. If they approached me to talk I could respond however
I was not to approach them and speak to them. Why? Because that was not
the purpose of the class. The purpose of the class was not a social club.
I once asked Vernon Howard, "Is the purpose of this class to end the illusion
of the ego?" He asked me to repeat the question so I repeated it. Vernon
said "Yes. Well stated." The purpose of the classes were not to indulge
the ego, pretending such indulgence and play is actually a way to end
the ego notion illusion, as is so common in satsangs today. Vernon Howard
had zero tolerance and zero compassion for the ego notion.
Vernon once said: "God is a NO a thousand miles high." Vernon said a NO
a thousand miles high to the ego notion in every class that he gave. And
his don't you DARE play an ego game with me theme ran throughout his teaching,
and that Don't and that dare where a thousand miles high also. Regarding
your not hearing any compassion for the mentally ill etc. I never heard
any compassion for the ego notion coming from Vernon Howard. His way was
more like if one had a cancer to cut out the cancer. Not to coddle it,
no to nuture it, no to help it grow, just to cut it out and end it.
Compassion is a part of the ego dream. The Self is not in need of Compassion.
It is whole, complete, perfect and alone. There is no one whom one could
have compassion for.
Bhagavan Ramana once said referring to the Bodhisattva vow of not attaining
the final liberation until all sentient beings have been liberated: "It
is like saying I will not wake up from the dream until all the dream characters
have awakened from the dream."
Regarding compassion being more important than whether you are bent to
noon or to midnight. This brings up something significant about how one
approaches a Teaching. If I am studying Vernon Howard, as an example,
what matters is only if Vernon Howard finds being bent toward noon or
midnight more important or if he finds compassion to be more important.
Whatever opinions I may have have gathered have no importance, with this
one exception: it is good to be aware of any such opinions because then
I can make sure they do not influence the study. If one is not aware of
them then they will gather evidence to support their view. So it is good
to be aware of them and then to not allow them to influence the study.
One day at the Vernon Howard class a sign had been added and it said in
really huge letters: "If you know more than the Teacher what are you doing
in this class?" Where does one find aspirants who do not think they know
better than the sages? Such aspirants are so rare. This manifests itself
in so many ways, subtle, complex, clever intepretations. Thinking one
has discovered the "flaw" in a Sage's Teaching or some way to improve
it. Such people probably know better than to take the knife out of the
surgeons hand and begin cutting, trying out one of their pet theories.
However this same wisdom that lets them know better than to do that, does
not apply to their approach to a Sage's Teaching. This is because the
ego notion wishes to preserve itself and it has millions of such strategies
for doing so.
There was one form of self-centered behaviour that one could engage in
regarding the Vernon Howard classes. That is to leave them. That was an
option available to the cornered ego.
Vernon once said: "Everyone who leaves this class raises the level of
this class." Vernon Howard once said that "in some esoteric classes the
use of the words love and peace is prohibited"
Why this is: What humans call love and peace is not love and peace. Love
and Peace are ways that one could attempt to describe the Self. So instead
of focussing on a fantasy about love and peace, proceeding to end ego
notion illusion was recommended.
The web page for New Life Foundation (Vernon Howard) is: http://www.anewlife.org
Vernon Howard's body is no longer living.
If there is such a thing as a compassionate act that the ego notion can
do, the ego notion ending the ego notion would be that compassionate act.