I got a friends invite recently from a fellow Zaadster.  He seems like a wonderful and sincere person, very spiritual like myself, although whereas i am more intellectual and metaphysical, he is more artistic/poetic (sure you can be both as well, like Rumi or Dante).  Anyway I have great respect for what he is doing, because i can see the spiritual light - at least from my cursory glance of his profile.  But i didnt accept the invite, for two reasons.

The first is that he has a huge number of people on his friends list, and that always majorly puts me off (i make exceptions with people on the Zaadz team who i have become friends with. so they really are my friends, like ~C4Chaos and Siona; altho,  being in the admin they would obviously have heaps on their friends list).

Also, I have the impression, perhaps a totally unfair and unwarranted one, that this person seems to have taken one or been given the role of some sort of guru, with a number of people gathered around him, and hence the big friends list (for more contacts).  And like i said, i support his sincerity, and i consider him a genuine persion and someone working for the betterment of the world, and perhaps an authentic teacher, but i myself am not into someone being the center of attention.

But this got me thinking, maybe i'm the same.  Maybe i've also unwittingly taken on teh role of guru of sorts (although i always try not to, because you can't be an authentic guru unless you are enlightened, and i'm certainly not enlightened; too much ego!).  So who am i to judge?

(note, in using the word "guru" in this context I mean someone who has a spiritual message or teaching or viewpoint which he or she gives out to the world without any financial or narcissistic motivation, whether it be through personal contact and example, or through writing books, blogging, websites, emails etc over the net.  It does not have to be guru witha  cpaital "G", i.e. authentic enlightened guru.  However I do believe that any guru or Guru (small or capital G) who charges money or who abuses their position for power or sex or emotional gain is an absolute fake and should be sterred clear of)

And that then got me thinking further, here is this gentleman, and here is me, and we are both in a  sense giving out spiritual wisdom to the world (being teachers).  So why don't we just join forces, and work as one?   Answer, we can't.  Each of us has a unique way of doing things, and a unique gnosis.  And this goes for everyone mind you.  So it becomes almost impossible to arrive at creative unanmity because each of our visions and creativite methodologies is so different, because we are still relative beings.  Or at least because I am.  My passion is with my work and what i am doing, just as his is with his work.  I have often wondered why all the spiritual people don't get together as one, and the answer is, they can't, for this reason!

Yet that can't be the whole answer, because even enlightened beings don't get together!  Ramnana and Aurobindo were only 150 km apart, contemporaries, yet neither met the other.  Everyone chooses to be isolated.  Why didn't Ouspensly join the Aurobindo ashram (he met Sri Aurobindo in the early days, apparently).  For that matter why didn't Gurdjieff?  Why didn't Meher Baba and The Mother work together?

Apart from that one single shining exception - Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, in this regard they are abnsolutely, totally unique.  For the rest, there may be an enlightened guru and an enlightened disciple - e.g. Ramakrishna and Vivekananda, but there is never a partnership of two very different individuals, working as one.  Except in that one instance.  Why?  I don't know.

And yet.  And yet....  maybe this will change.  Maybe it is already changing.  And maybe that is the new evolution the planet is going through.

My friend Mushin and I share a certain common spiritual vision.  We both reject authoritarian hierarchical spirituality in favour of a more egalitarian approach (that said, i would accept a hierarchy if it was of a genuine enlightened being, like Ramana or The Mother.  But not these intermediate zone gurus).  We both see the next buddha as a collective.  So different spiritual individuals, with very different personalities, can still share the same truth.  Perhaps Zaadz is proof of that.  So maybe this isolation that has ruled up till now will be healed, will be transformed, in the next collective buddha, the collective gbostic community. 

But until then, i have a lot of ego to transcend.

An interesting post on Open Integral the other day Personal reflections on integral  See especially the comments.  To me, this is what the Integral movement is or should be all about.  Not endless intellectualism or mental masturbation.

Recently I found out (through Open Integral) about a new Integral project, called Integral Praxis.  As mentioned in this blog I have been becoming pretty disappointed with the limitations of the integral movement, but the guys who set up this blog are very cool; they have a lot of enthusiasm and good will, the very best of what the integral movement (if there is one) at its highest represents.  So I was encouraged to submit an essay to them, which I did - it's called Redefining the Integral .  There's already some comments there (both pro and anti) so come along and join the fun!