Valeria Dubkovskaya - Nectar for Your Soul

The Indian philosopher Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (1914 – 2008) also enabled the wide spread of this illusion about people’s destinies.

In 1957, having undergone training in India, Maharishi created the worldwide Spiritual Regeneration Movement , and in 1958 began missionary work first in America and then in Europe. By the start of the twenty-first century, his Meditation Centers had spread throughout the world and his followers exceeded five million people.

What was the philosophy introduced by Maharishi to the Western World?

“Life is Bliss. Man is born to enjoy the grace of God. Just float in a stream of bliss and nature and this stream will take care of everything else.”

Of course, how could millions of suffering people not like such a philosophy? All that remained was to find this “stream of bliss,” immerse your head in it, and forget all about your troubles and sorrows, along with all your plans and responsibilities. The stream will take care of the rest.

Intentionally or unintentionally, Maharishi’s philosophy engendered the rise of the hippy movement, which took hold of the West during the 1960s. Hippies protested against traditional culture, called for peace and unity with nature, grew out their hair and wore ragged clothes, listened to rock-n-roll, smoked marijuana and engaged in meditation, sex, Zen Buddhism, and Taoism. Of course, they didn’t work anywhere and lived “in the stream of bliss and nature,” exactly as Maharishi suggested. But the word hippy only superficially resembles the word happy , and so the hippy movement, having exhausted itself, had already come to nothing by the 1970s; but the philosophy of bliss remained. And so, today 200 million drug addicts (according to the UN) are searching for the oblivion of “the stream,” which is carrying away not only happiness, but their very lives as well.

Over the loud choir of preachers suggesting the possibility of a Paradise on Earth it is almost impossible to hear the voice of German dramatist and philosopher Gotthold Lessing (1729—1781) coming to us from the depths of the eighteenth century:

“The primary reason for our dissatisfaction with life is the unfounded assumption that we have a right to complete and undisturbed happiness; that we are born for such happiness.”

Please read these words one more time: “…the unfounded assumption…” Where did Tolstoy, Ushinsky, Flaubert and other great minds draw their assumptions from, or, more precisely, assertions? Most likely from a great desire to be happy. Just as every man wishes to be happy, so that it was so easy for the sayings of these authoritative figures to pass on to their children and grandchildren… As a result millions of people in the world are absolutely sure that they are born to be happy. And because of this, they are in truth born bound for a completely different end: a collision of their false belief system with harsh reality, leading to stress, which is soon followed by depression and suffering. This is the source of Flaubert’s depression, of Gogol’s sad thoughts, and of the suffering of millions of people throughout the world.

So much suffering is produced by this one illusion! And so many more harmful misconceptions are firmly entrenched in people’s consciousness!

We are fully united in the conviction that it is not the harsh conditions of life that are themselves the reason for suffering, but our conceptions about what is good and bad for us and about how the world ought to be. This thought was clearly expressed two thousand years ago by the great Roman Emperor and no less great philosopher Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121—180). As he departed this life, he left to posterity not only a prospering and well-defended Rome, but also an entire collection of wise thoughts, which later formed a book by the title The Meditations . Here is an example taken from among them:

“Take away your opinion, and there is taken away the complaint, […] Take away the complaint, […] and the harm is taken away” [10].

And so, everything depends on our thoughts, on our attitudes towards the people, subjects and phenomena that surround us. It is precisely our thoughts, values and convictions, i.e. our worldview, rather than material conditions, that defines the quality of our life.

Another German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer (1788—1860), was among those who share the sensible beliefs of Gotthold Lessing. He writes:

“There is one misconception at the root of all problems – it is the belief that we are born to be happy.”

But Shopenhauer’s words went unheard; as a rule people only hear what they want to hear.

For this reason the ideas of their countryman Friedrich Nietzsche (1844—1900) received wide acceptance throughout the world. Among his ideas is the concept of suicide as an escape from difficult situations. He claims, that if happiness does not show its smiling face, we can quietly part with life, ridding ourselves of all stress and suffering in a single stroke:

“My death, praise I unto you, the voluntary death, which cometh unto me because I want it.”

The idea of suicide so attracted Nietzsche that he actually poeticized it:

“…Do I go out like a candle, which is not blown out by the wind, but palls, having spent itself; a burnt-out candle? Or in the end, do I blow myself out, so as not to burn low?”

Could even the great Nietzsche write in ignorance? And why not? Who added him to the list of great philosophers? This is unclear, but what is well known is that Nietzsche spent the last twenty years of his life suffering heavily from physical and psychological ailments. It was in precisely this period that he wrote his great philosophical works. What else can we expect from a man sick in both mind and body but hymns to death’s sweet deliverance? That deliverance, by the way, finally came to the philosopher in a psychiatric ward.

We have already noted the results of our own research regarding “spiritual questions” among our students. Their level of knowledge was nothing to scoff at. Now let’s take a look on the world level; what do people believe in and what do they know of the global questions regarding their existence? Let us begin our review in the Unites States, the country with the greatest number of universities scientific institutions and the greatest amount of financial investment in education. However, as it turns out, all these universities and investments are ineffective at enlightening people about the global questions of their existence. An analytical report from Gallup International paints a striking picture of American ignorance regarding what goes on beyond the boundaries of traditional science. The following results were received by Gallup as the result of phone interviews with 1,002 people over the age of 18 during June of 2005:

59% do not believe in extrasensory abilities;

68% do not believe in ghosts;

69% do not believe in telepathy;

74% do not believe it is possible to look into the future or the past;

79% don’t believe it is possible to contact the souls of the dead;

80% do not believe that souls are reborn into new bodies after death (reincarnation).

Only 1% of Americans simultaneously believe in all the above phenomena, and 27% do not even believe in one of them! And this despite the fact that all these phenomena are confirmed and proven by thousands of experiences and experiments and are written about in hundreds of books! But, as it turns out, people prefer comics, detective novels and trashy novels to such books.