Family and Renunciation (from Nauthiz)

Hi Nauthiz!

Thank you for elaborating your thoughts in such great details!

I agree with you at some level and I also disagree.

The attempts of family members to bring one back to the ego is a tool to become aware of the deepest wounds and hooks in the mind and psyche. An individual on the path is cultivating intense self awareness and will witness these attempts and the inner mechanisms happening within that react to them.

This can also be explained by saying that there is no separation. The family members trying to relate at an ego level are part of the Self reflecting Himself back to Himself and must be fully embraced until they lose all and any ability to trigger emotional/mental reactions. Walking away from family in the physical realm is fine, but one will have to face all patterns tied to family members regardless and clear the ancestral lines in the mental emotional and pranic bodies before full realization is possible.

It is in the nature of these patterns to wish to perpetuate themselves. This unconscious drive is present in the individual and manifests externally (as family members pulling one back to ego) as a reflection of this inner drive. If the inner drive is in the clear light of awareness, the outer attempts to bring one back to the pattern lose all power and become allies in the ascension process. They become allies because they are reflections of exactly that which is being dissolved and becomes a barometer of the dissolution of the patterns.

My point here is not to discuss the teachings of Shunyamurti/Sat Yoga as it is clear to me that there is universal wisdom in them. But then one might just take a good spiritual book to find the same wisdom. The point here is to discuss the behavior of Shunyamurti behind closed doors and behind the scenes and beyond the recordings that are made public (which are obviously crafted to make him appear as humble and pure). People who have experienced Shunyamurti's behavior in person report (myself included) that he crystallises the duality of ego vs family, rather than support the dissolution of these psychic ties.

You ask why asking financial support from family is out of integrity in the Sat Yoga context. If you decide to cut emotional and mental ties and patterns linked to family and stop relating with them, or if you pretend to do so, it is a contradiction to request money which represents an energy transfer. With all energy transfers come karmic ties. Demanding from his followers to cut all ties with family yet request money from them feels like a clear contradiction to me.

Blessings,

Namaste, Govinda. You make some good and important points, however I would like to comment on your statement "In my experience, friends and family who care about your soul will be very happy to have a relation with someone on the path to Realization." In my experience no family member(and most "friends"), even those who claim to care about my soul, has any idea about what I am going through. So often these family members want to bind one to being their subject in the family structure. Most(almost all) are utterly ignorant when it comes to ego, soul, and then Self realization. They claim to be wanting the spiritual evolution of the loved one, but they are ignorant to what that even means and most often have no intention to do the work themselves or even putting effort into learning what it means. These situations can and do evolve, but it can take time as you point out. The family connection is, for many, the egos strongest bondage. In doing the work the Self becomes more important than family and family for the most part, in their egoic ignorance, strive to keep their member in the subjugated family structure. Tough choices are made by those doing the work. This isn't always the case, and it doesn't have to be an end to the relationships, but often parents and siblings will claw at the individual attempting to pull them into "who they are"(Ego) and they think they are doing good but they are not helping(at least not in an overt way, they are providing a challenge to overcome w/in the person doing the Realization). They think it is out of love, but it is not. They probably don't know Love. So the family interplay becomes a primary field in the battle for Self Realization. This phenomenon is part of why the Bhagavad Gita takes place on a battle field between family members. The specific psychological troubles that continue to bind one to ego illusion are the ones that need resolution, but one does not need to heal all psychological problems to realize God consciousness. I can not speak to your claims of how Shunya operates, as I have not been to the ashram. I can testify however that everything that I have witnessed has had integrity and everyone at the ashram in the videos seems free and well. As far as getting money from family, well why shouldn't they support the evolution of their family member? And should the ashram not be paid? It is rightful for them to have phenomenal support, and in my case they have worked with me and what I can offer in exchange for the teachings. The teachings of Sat Yoga are sound, are backed up by the sages, and apply very well to the modern mind. So far as I can see they are doing great work, and Shunyas teachings are indeed extraordinary though I personally wouldn't claim them to be perfectly flawless, they reach many people at this critical time. That said I take the shared experiences of yours and others into mind, with an open mind as I proceed.

In adtn I'd like to agree that most of the problems that arise for the individual are within the individual themself. And so that healing process will take a course, different for everybody, but in many cases will include that distance you speak of.

~Nauthiz

I should note that nothing I am expressing here re family is anything I've learned through Sat Yoga, but is just based on my experience on my path, evolution, and study. I haven't heard Shunya talk about these issues, except in very brief and general statements online and they didn't point towards encouraging the abandonment of family.

Thank you Nauthiz from this very insightful comment.

Friends and family indeed have a power to maintain us in a state of bind with the ego self and similarly, when approached consciously, their reflection in our life has a power to free us from that ego. This is because they are great mirrors of the patterns and distortions that we need to free ourselves from. While it is easy to suppress or ignore an inner distortion, their presence in others often lead us to take distance. We often justify this position or distance by projecting the cause and source of the distortion fully on others and failing to acknowledge that this distortion has some roots within ourselves as well.

I also want to emphasize that the necessary detachment that you mention is an internal detachment. What it really means is that we must mature until we reach a place of emotional, mental and energetic independence from our friends and family. Having some form of human relating in that process is not necessarily a hindrance and, indeed, it can be an accelerator.

"Its not that you can't be in relation with them, it is that they must accept relation with you in your Realization process".

In my experience, friends and family who care about your soul will be very happy to have a relation with someone on the path to Realization. Sometimes distance needs to be taken for a while but it rarely needs to be a permanent shutting off of the relationship. It is very often the spiritual ego who identifies with new beliefs and as "someone on the path" which creates friction. With deep sincerity and humility all distortion in friends and family (and the corresponding charge in us) can be forgiven and the karma released. It is then up to them to decide how close or how far they want to be.

My experience at Sat Yoga Ashram has shown me that Shunyamurti suffers from deep unconscious wounds in relationship with his family and most likely his mother. He somehow believes that "understanding" of these wounds frees him, but understanding doesn't free at all. What is required is a re-living of the trauma in a state of true surrender and forgiveness. Due to this, Shunyamurti encourages putting blame on family members and creating of a negative charge towards the family. He encourages his followers to see family fearfully, as needy beings who will try to derail your commitment to God. Yet he encourages his followers to be dependent on their family financially and beg to them as much money as they can to support his ashram. The level of incongruence and hypocrisy is very high.

Ultimately, a spiritual leader has to heal his wounds towards his mother. Honoring and merging with the divine mother within is an essential initiation along the way which Shunyamurti has yet to open his heart to.