James Ray Tragedy – Use YOUR Intuition
10.18.09
My home page: SpiritualShow.com
I’ve said this before and I think I’m going to start saying it more often, again and again: Trust what feels right FOR YOU, no matter what any guru or spiritual leader or anyone else says. Unless you are completely mentally unstable to the point where you are not able to think clearly for yourself, ALWAYS trust your own inner guidance above what anyone else says.
You know what is best for you, you are the one living in your body and you alone have the perspective that is YOU.
I have to confess that I have been thinking of wrapping up the show for a number of months now. I am waffling and undecided, because there are so many things that I love about hosting a spirituality show. The wonderful people I’ve connected with, the amazing listeners. It is such a joy to get a phone call or email or tweet from someone who says, “What you said or what your guest said today was EXACTLY what I needed to hear.” I love knowing that, even on a small level, I’m making some kind of positive impact in the world.
However, through my spiritual journey and through all the requests of people who want to be on the show, or people whom I approach as potential guests, and in my own studies and spiritual interests, I keep coming across this inconsistencies & hypocrisies.
Then I hear about the James Ray incident, where 3 people have died so far from their participation in a sweat lodge. I don’t know all the details, as I wasn’t there, but being a person who can read the warning signs you see on any commercial sauna you step into, I know that there are very obvious risks involved with a sweat-lodge scenario.
Personally, I’d never participate in a sweat ceremony because I prefer a cool climate and get sick from the heat. But a bunch of people paid James Ray thousands in order to participate in this event. I think it’s a little harsh that the media is calling him a murderer. I’m sure it wasn’t his intention to harm anyone, he just screwed up– big time. This post isn’t directed at James and whatever mistakes he has made. It’s simply that this situation has made it even more obvious how important it is for us all to understand that we need to take responsibility for our own lives and the decisions we make. No amount of criminal action against James Ray is going to bring those people back. Ultimately, whether those people made the decision for themselves or if they were blindly following what they were being told to do, they are the ones who are dealing with the consequences of those actions. (I don’t want to discount the pain of the families in this situation and it’s not my place to judge, I wasn’t even there)
But people also need to understand that we can’t put our faith into another person and expect them to lead us to greatness, nirvana, whatever your goal in life is. It is up to US to do that for ourselves, and while it can be helpful to have people motivating us and guiding us along the way, the only person we can really depend on to make a decision on our behalf, is US.
I don’t care WHO this spiritual guru is. I don’t care how famous they are, how many times they’ve been on Oprah, how many dozens of books they have, how many millions of dollars they bring in ever year, and how many celebrities they hang out with. None of them know enough about YOU to tell you how to live your life.
That’s not to say you shouldn’t study and learn from the people you admire. There is so much to learn out there, and there are so many wonderful and inspirational teachers who have helped many, many people. But they are human. Each one of them is fallible. Each one of them has days when they say things they didn’t mean to say. If you look closely at the personal lives of many people who we all look up to, you will see that even they are not everything they claim to be.
I keep wanting to say, that doesn’t mean you need to discount everything they say. It just means, THINK FOR YOURSELF. If something doesn’t sit well with you, don’t do it! If you disagree with something a teacher has said or written, it doesn’t automatically mean you’re not enlightened enough to understand. Seriously. Anyone who says that, notice it as a BIG RED FLAG.
It’s true, sometimes there’s information that we might not be aligned with at one point in our lives and at another time it will make perfect sense. But that doesn’t mean you were wrong to disagree from wherever you were at the time.
Yesterday, I had an altercation with a popular guru that left me in absolute tears. I was so upset, as I was shocked at the behavior of this person who I have admired and respected. This is the second such incident I’ve experienced, with two different very popular, very well-respected spiritual leaders. I will not mention names as this is in no way meant to tarnish their reputations. It’s just meant to show you that even the most respected, the most powerful, the most intelligent, well-connected, “spiritual” people have bad days and make mistakes.
That is why it is SO, SO, SO incredibly important that we take what they say and use what feels good and let go of the rest. When we put our faith in another human being (even if that human claims to be channeling a spiritual entity, talking to angels, God, or anyone else), we need to understand that we are ALL human. NO HUMAN IS BETTER THAN YOU ARE. We are all equal. Some people may have made better life decisions or be in a better place of influence, but that does not elevate them to the point where their teachings are what you should base your life on.
I send this message to you with love and respect. It is just so important to me that we all are able to experience the love and light that is available to us all. Just, please, follow your instincts and do what feels right to you. If your spidy senses start tingling and your BS detectors start ringing, take notice. Don’t ignore those indicators.
If God or the Universe or evolution or chance or whatever you believe is responsible for you being here… if that force wanted you to blindly follow what other people tell you to do, it wouldn’t have supplied you with your own instincts and intuition. That indicator system is within you for a reason. So use it:) (even if you think what I’ve written is complete crap, good, think for yourself and use your own judgment!)
Love & hugs! Thanks for reading, I’m so looking forward to your comments!!
My home page: SpiritualShow.com
Tags: guru, intuition, James ray, law of attraction, scam, spiritual, sweat lodge, trust
It’s wonderful that you’ve built an audience and are helping people with your radio programs. Maybe you could do a program about — not just following your gut and trusting you intuition — but actually doing your “due diligence” and practicing discernment in the spiritual path(s) you follow.
There are spiritual showmen (& women) out there, hypocrisy & inconsistencies between what they teach and what they do. But I see too many people give away their power by following someone or something because it sounds good.
A genuine tragedy happened at that sweat lodge, and I certainly don’t mean to suggest I’m laying any blame on the people who were injured or died. Anyone leading a sweat or any other program has responsibility to know what they are doing and not mislead people with their authority and experience.
It’s just that, until we take our own responsibility for the paths and teachers we follow, we won’t discern between those that will truly further us on our way and those that may cause great harm.
I’ll be interested to see where you go from here with your show. Wishing you the best, always. From my heart to yours ~ Mahala @LuminousHeart
Makes sense to me!!!!
But it would be a shame if you quit your show because of it 🙂
This is an awesome point, and very well taken.
The Men – Christ, Buddha, Lao Tzu – all stressed the point that what I do, you can do. They also said to find your own truth. This is THE point made by all teachers, seers, and adepts.
I’ve said time and again to people that You are the best self-help guru for You in the history of the universe. God gave you everything in the form of unlimited power. Guides can help to lead the way when you have strayed, but our intuition is Perfect Guidance.
30 minutes and a quiet room can be a life-altering event. I’ve learned more in 10 minutes of stillness than 5 years of study.
Such an excellent point. Thanks for sharing your insight 🙂
Thanks for adding your comment, I’m sure it will help a lot of people:)
LuminousHeart – I’d love to hear more about doing your due diligence. Do you have any suggestions on people I could speak with about this?
There are blogs and lists of cults for example, however, even finding something on a list of cults doesn’t mean you should discount them. The Unitarian Church is considered a cult but some, and I hardly believe they deserve that label.
Do you have any other suggestions on where people can research these leaders/teachers/gurus?
Thanks for commenting!!
As an addendum, I want to make it clear that I am not judging ANYBODY, because that is not my place. I leave that to God, because I hate to be judged. I read a little deeper into the situation and my heart goes out to all parties, James Ray’s included, because he had opened my eyes in the past and I feel that he is truly remorseful. I do not believe that he’s a hypocrite, huckster, or slickster.
That being said, it always remains on you. My hope is that more people become self-empowered and aware of the infinite power within them.
I totally hear you and it’s not my intention to judge anyone, either. James Ray included. I’m sure if he realized anyone was in danger he wouldn’t have continued the ceremony. I don’t believe for a moment that his intention is to hurt anyone, and I’m sure he’s completely devastated by what’s happened.
It’s just that this situation makes it so much more obvious how important it is for all of us to take responsibility for ourselves.
Whatever happens to James, whatever legal liabilities and punishments he has to deal with is not going to bring those people back. Ultimately, they took the risk and it’s very unfortunate that things ended in this way.
I so appreciate you providing a voice in this wilderness… where too many have conditioned themselves to evade self-responsibility.
It’s an old message yet still true… seek guidance within… the “Kingdom of God” is within! YOUR answers are NOT ‘out there’… they are always and all ways within!
I especially liked this line:
“If your spidy senses start tingling and your BS detectors start ringing, take notice. Don’t ignore those indicators”
LOL – Such terrific advice! Thanks!
–Mary K
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EXPECT MIRACLES!
Thanks, Mary:)
Hi again, finally getting back to you about doing your “due diligence” regarding teachers. I agree with you that cult-list sites are not especially helpful. But we have all of google at our finger-tips.
For example, type the teacher’s name into a search box and you’ll probably find bloggers who have written about them and their programs.
Type in the teacher’s name plus the word controversy and you may find a whole load of information.
Research triggers such as NLP, and learn about psychological marketing triggers too. They are being used extremely skillfully. (A good book for a starting point is Influence, by Cialdini)
Finally, I have to say, far too may people who are exploring spirituality are not using any discernment or healthy skepticism around the paths & teachers they’re following (and paying.) This breaks my heart because they end up chasing paths that will not benefit them. It also means the genuine teachers are not heard above the fray. A double loss.
Hope this helps! From my heart to yours ~ Mahala
I appreciate your perspective.
I agree, that ultimately, each person is responsible for their choices. In this case, this includes James Ray and the attendees.
I also believe that in any sort of “power differential” relationship, such as teacher/student, practitioner/client, parent/child, that the teacher/practitioner/parent AT TIMES has the greater responsibility. When a client comes into a state of non-ordinary awareness (altered state of mind through hypnosis, psychotherapy, bodywork, etc) that client MAY regress into a child self or some other self that is not a fully conscious and awake adult ego. With an aware ego self to be watching over the rest of the psyche, safety CAN possibly go out the window.
At a workshop I attended similar to James Ray event, I choose to take part of a process that dropped me into a very deep altered state. I connected to deep grief and pain and at one point I tried to pour my pain into a person nearby – my gut sense is that they didn’t know how to handle such powerful emotion and my intensity/insistence that they feel what I was feeling was strong. A guide in the form of one of the support staff at the workshop came over and she calmly talked me down. In the heat of the moment, I was angry with her, I thought she just didn’t understand what I needed. But in hindsight, she was right. It would not have served me, or the other man, as deeply to funnel my emotion into him. I am very grateful for this woman’s intervention.
These people at James Ray’s event, after such an intense fast and then sweat were likely all under some strong altered state of consciousness. These tools are meant to facilitate growth, not death.
In my opinion, James Ray was attempting to do something that is out of his league. He needs greater awareness. A good teacher will know/feel what is going on exactly for each student. The fact that Ray was unable to energetically track these people, that he did not know that some people were so close to death and he insisted on the dogma of “pushing through it” shows to me that someone gave him some guns that he does not know how to properly use. A master shaman knows you better than you know yourself…they are not there to be your god or guru but they are not going to let you die or deeply damage your body forever.
How could he know these people were so far gone? Like I said, a master teacher/shaman/guru/guide has such finely tuned awareness that they can know these things. They know that there is a beetle crawling between two cacti 45 feet from the left side of the sweat lodge.
Illusion (think The Matrix) can be very powerful. Just when I think I’ve found Truth, I later realize it is only more truth infused in illusion. In other words, the illusion loses power, more truth is able to get in, but the illusion is still there.
I wonder why the medicine men who taught James Ray the tools he has been using with him did so. How could they know he was ready to wield such powerful tools? Did they want something from him/through him for doing so? Maybe fame or riches?
I highly recommend reading the recent words of Arvol Looking Horse:
http://planetthrive.com/2009/10/sedona-sweat-lodge-deaths-arvol-looking-horse-speaks/
That’s an excellent point and I don’t mean to take the responsibility away from James Ray for the part he played in this. And it’s exactly because we can be so vulnerable when putting our trust in another person that we have to be so much more diligent in the process of deciding in whom to place our trust.
Just because a teacher is famous, doesn’t mean they are automatically worthy of our trust. Anyone who knows anything about internet marketing is aware that people deliberately place themselves in positions that make them APPEAR to be experts. That’s pretty much marketing 101. Just because someone has the appearance of being an expert, doesn’t automatically mean they really know what they’re talking about.
And James Ray certainly has some responsibility in this case, since the people were in his care at the time.
But the faith we put in teachers goes beyond the physical responsibility of making sure students are safe over a weekend. What about the teachers we put our faith in just through reading their books? Many people live their lives as if the words being spoken or written by these gurus is actual gospel.
I think that’s more where I was going with the personal responsibility factor. Of COURSE James Ray was largely responsible for the safety of his students.
But if someone hits a bike rider while driving his car and that person is injured, it would be the driver’s legal responsibility, yes. But if that bike rider was riding in an unsafe way, not paying attention, hiding in a blind spot, not wearing a helmet, etc, it’s ultimately the bike rider’s responsibility to look out for her own safety, because nobody but her is going to have to live through the physical consequences of that accident.