Forum

November 2023 TAT Forum


This month’s contents include:

Convictions & Concerns: The Role of Magic in Spiritual Seeking, by Isaac Hill.

TAT Foundation News: Including the calendar of 2023 TAT events and a listing of local group meetings and other activities led by TAT members.

Humor

Inspiration & Irritation

Reader Commentary: Do you consider thinking and feeling to be complementary tools or opposing activities in knowing yourself?

Founder’s Wisdom

A New Home for TAT update

Knowing by Identity

A Friday to Sunday gathering
November 10-12, 2023
TAT Center, North Carolina, USA

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Convictions & Concerns

TAT members share their personal convictions and/or concerns

The Role of Magic in Spiritual Seeking

Like Richard Rose, I have found the study of magic to be instructive in my search for Identity. I have also found it to be a topic that engenders confusion, misunderstanding, and even hostility in many spiritual circles. This is in no small part due to the dismissal of this ancient family of arts and sciences by the dominant paradigms of the Industrial West, the dogma of those secular religions of Materialism and Progress subconsciously ingrained in the psyches of this culture’s inmates. Other factors for the meager opinion of magic within some spiritual circles include the overwhelm caused by the high diversity of practices that constitute “magic,” the actual danger of some less savory and more intense forms of magic, the idea that magic is solely about power and control, and the idea that the true spiritual seeker mustn’t be sullied or distracted by such lower pursuits. In this essay, I hope to share with my fellow spiritual seekers the useful bits that I’ve learned over my years studying magic, to disentangle the subject, clarify what “magic” actually is, and to outline some various practices that could be helpful to the spiritual seeker. This could actually be a whole book, so I’ll really only scratch the surface of this topic here.

Firstly, what is “magic”? Miriam-Webster defines it as “the use of means (such as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural force.” That may be the officially approved understanding of magic, but many magicians find this definition severely lacking. The great German magician, Theosophist and medical doctor Franz Hartmann preemptively retorts in Magic: White & Black: “Magical power is not a supernatural power, if by the term ‘supernatural’ you mean a power which is outside, beyond or locally above nature” and instead defines magic as “The Highest Science, or Wisdom, based upon knowledge and practical experience.” This is a typical Victorian definition of magic, somewhat adapted in the next generation of occultists to be something more like “the science and art of causing changes in consciousness in conformity with will” as per Dion Fortune (G. Suster, The Legacy of the Beast). This definition of course leaves open the question of whose “will” is causing the changes. Contemporary occultist and author John Michael Greer generally agrees with Fortune’s definition but has also defined it as “the art and science of participation in the spiritual forces of the cosmos” (“The Way of Participation: A Response to Paul Kingsnorth”). Between all of these definitions, one can get a feel for what the term “magic” points to for those who use it to describe what they do. Magic isn’t supernatural, it’s working with the subtle, but still natural, network of relationships that structure the cosmos to manifest one’s will….

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~ Thanks to Isaac Hill, a longtime TAT member. Image of The Magician card from the Rider–Waite tarot deck by Pamela Colman Smith.. Comments or questions? Please email reader commentary to the TAT Forum.

TAT Foundation News

It’s all about “ladder work” – helping and being helped

Richard Rose, the founder of the TAT Foundation, spent his life searching for the Truth, finding it, and helping others to find their Way. Although not well known to the public, he touched the lives of thousands of spiritual seekers through his books and lectures and through personal contacts with local study groups that continue to work with his teachings today. He felt strongly that helping others generates help for ourselves as well in our climb up the ladder to the golden find beyond the mind.

Call To Action For TAT Forum Reader

With the intention of increasing awareness of TAT’s meetings, books, and the Forum among younger serious seekers, and to increase awareness of ways to approach the search for self-definition, the TAT Foundation is now on Instagram.

You can help! A volunteer is producing shareable text-quote and video content of Richard Rose and TAT-adjacent teachers. We need your suggestions for short, provocative 1-3 sentence quotes or 1 minute or less video clips of people like Rose, Art Ticknor, Bob Fergeson, Tess Hughes, Bob Cergol, Bart Marshall, Shawn Nevins, Anima Pundeer, Norio Kushi, Paul Rezendes, Paul Constant, & other favorites. (An example here is selected by the TAT member who volunteers to oversee the Instagram account.)

Please send favorite inspiring/irritating quotes—from books you have by those authors, from the TAT Forum, or any other place—to TAT quotes. If you have favorite parts of longer videos (ex: from a talk at a past TAT meeting), please email a link to the video and a timestamp.

Thank you!

TAT Foundation Press’s latest publications

Shades of Real: Poems in a World of Wonder

Shades of Real by Kevin Shuey is now available in print and Kindle versions on Amazon.com. Discover a captivating compilation of poems that gracefully ride the waves of each fleeting moment, inviting readers into moments of tranquil excitement and resounding quietude. Within these pages lie enigmatic verses that lead us to the very heart of our true selves, unraveling the profound mysteries that define us.

Please add your review to the Amazon listing. It makes a difference!

*

Pouring Concrete: A Zen Path to the Kingdom of God – Expanded Edition

Pouring Concrete by Bob Harwood is now available in print and Kindle versions on Amazon.com. Individuals who approach this book with receptivity and a readiness to scrutinize their culturally ingrained notions and convictions regarding the fundamental fabric of existence are likely to experience a multitude of profound insights. By embracing the diverse recommendations within these pages, one may unlock a series of existential revelations that have the potential to reshape their perspective on reality.

Please add your review to the Amazon listing. It makes a difference!

Random rotation of
TAT Foundation Books & Videos

Solid Ground of Being by Art Ticknor

Read more: Solid Ground of Being by Art Ticknor

 
 

2023 TAT Meeting Calendar

February Virtual Gathering: Saturday, February 4, 2023
April Gathering: Friday evening through Sunday noon, April 14-16, 2023
May TAT Talks online event: May 13, 2023 at 12 PM ET
June Gathering: Friday evening through Sunday noon, June 9-11, 2023
July TAT Talks online event: July 15, 2023 at 12 PM ET
August Gathering: Friday evening through Sunday noon, August 18-20, 2023
September Virtual Gathering: Saturday, September 30, 2023
October TAT Talks online event: October 28, 2023 at 12 PM ET
** Knowing by Identity: Friday evening through Sunday noon, November 10-12, 2023 **

See the November TAT Gathering page for more details and registration. Comments or questions? Please email TAT Foundation events.

Photo of TAT’s open door by Phil Franta

TAT’s YouTube Channel

Have you seen the TAT Foundation’s YouTube channel? Subscribe now for spiritual inspiration (and irritation)!

Volunteers have been updating the channel with hours of new content! They’ve also curated some great playlists of talks by Richard Rose, teacher talks from recent & not so recent TAT meetings, episodes of the Journals of Spiritual Discovery podcast, and other great TAT related videos from around the internet.

Featuring: Richard Rose, Bob Cergol, Shawn Nevins, Bob Fergeson, Mike Conners, Anima Pundeer, Norio Kushi, Paul Rezendes, Bob Harwood, Tess Hughes, Art Ticknor, Shawn Pethel, Tyler Matthew and other speakers.

This month’s video is Tess Hughes’s talk “Contacting the Inner Child” from the August 2020 TAT Virtual Spiritual Retreat.:

Local Group News

(Groups with recently updated information are listed first. Click the “read more” link to see a complete listing of local groups. )

 Update for the Online Self-Inquiry Book Club:
> The next book is The Most Direct Means to Eternal Bliss by Michael Langford. The plan is to read 2 chapters at a time meeting first and third Sundays rom 2:00 PM ET–3:30 PM ET:
– Chapter 3 – The Imposter’s Tools and 4 – The Desire for Liberation for November 5th.
– Chapter 5 – How to Awaken the Extremely Intense Desire for Liberation and 6 – The Awareness Watching Awareness Discovery for November 19th.
For more information on book club participation, see the meeting website (link above).
TAT Forum readers are welcome to drop in any time (invitation to Sunday meetings).

 Update from the Pittsburgh, PA self-inquiry group:
> In-person meetings 1st Mondays 2-4 pm Squirrel Hill Public Library meeting room. Monthly Monday evening meetings at Panera, Blvd of Allies in Oakland, near the college campuses.
> Online group confrontation and individual contributions every Wed, 8:00 pm ET via Zoom.
> See the e-mail link below for invitations to all meetings and to receive internal email announcements.
– Wed, Nov 1: Topic: “Day of the Dead, when the veil between the worlds is thin.”
– Sun, Nov 5: Online Book Club.
– Mon, Nov 6: 2-4 PM In-person monthly Pittsburgh meeting.
– Wed, Nov 8: Topic TBD.
– Wed, Nov 15: Lenny S. will host.
– Sun, Nov 19: Online Book Club.
– Mon, Nov 20: In-person Oakland Meeting: email for details.
– Wed, Nov 22: Guest Speaker TBD.
– Sun, Nov 26: Combined confrontation meeting with the Irish group 2-4 PM ET.
– Wed, Nov 29: Topic TBD.
> All Forum subscribers are welcome to join us.
Email to receive weekly topics with preparatory notes and Zoom invitations. Current events are listed on Meetup as Pittsburgh Self-inquiry Group and on www.pghsig.org.

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Members-Only Area

A password-protected section of the website is available for TAT members. (Note that there’s an occasional glitch that, when you try to link to the members-only area or a sections within it, you’ll get a page-not-found error. If you try the link a second time, it should work.) Contents include:

  • How you can help TAT and fellow seekers,
  • Audio recordings of selected sessions from 2008–2019 in-person meetings and from February and November 2021 Zoom meetings,
  • Resources and ideas for those planning a group spiritual retreats,
  • Photographs of TAT meeting facilities, the Richard Rose grave site, a rare 1979 photo, and aerial photos of the Rose farm,
  • Presenters’ talk notes from April TAT meetings in 2005–2007, and
  • TAT News Letters from 1996–2013 and Annual Retrospectives from 1973 thru 2011. The Retrospectives from 1973–1985 were written by Richard Rose and are replete with ideas on the workings of a spiritual group—rich historical content.
  • TAT policies, TAT business meeting notes, and other information.

Latest recordings:

TAT’s November 2021 online gathering, titled What Do You Really, Really Want From Life?: 3.5 hours of selected sessions.

In Thought, Word and Deed : 2.5 hours of selected sessions.

TAT’s August 2019 Workshop was titled Beyond Mindfulness: Meditation and the Path Within and included three guest speakers who each led separate workshops. The following audio recordings are now available in the members-only website area:

  • “Mindfulness. Is it just another spiritual buzzword?” with Bob Cergol,
  • “The Path of Direct Sensory Perception” with Bob Harwood, and
  • “The Art of Mindfulness is the Passion for Truth” with Paul Rezendes.

TAT’s June 2019 Spiritual Retreat Weekend was titled Between You and the Infinite. The following audio recordings are now available in the members-only website area:

  • “Coming Home (aka The End of Seeking)” by Don Oakley, and
  • “What’s in the Way?” by Eshwar Segobind.

TAT’s April 2019 Spiritual Retreat Weekend was titled Once in a Lifetime is Now. The following audio recordings are now available in the members-only website area:

  • “Recognizing the Human Dilemma” by Norio Kushi,
  • “Strategies for Self-Realization” by Bart Marshall,
  • Untitled session by Paul Hedderman, and
  • “A Session in the Now” by Paul Rezendes.

Please us if you have questions. (Look here for info on TAT membership.)

Amazon and eBay

Let your Amazon purchases and eBay sales raise money for TAT!

As an Amazon Associate, TAT earns from qualifying purchases made through the above link or other links on our website.

TAT has registered with the eBay Giving Works program. You can list an item there and select TAT to receive a portion of your sale. Or if you use the link and donate 100% of the proceeds to TAT, you won’t pay any seller fees when an item sells and eBay will transfer all the funds to TAT for you. Check out our Giving Works page on eBay. Click on the “For sellers” link on the left side of that page for details.

Downloadable/rental versions of the Mister Rose video and of April TAT talks Remembering Your True Desire:

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Your Contributions to TAT News

TAT founder Richard Rose believed that working with others accelerates our retreat from untruth. He also felt that such efforts were most effective when applied with discernment, meaning working with others on the rungs of the ladder closest to our own. The TAT News section is for TAT members to communicate about work they’ve been doing with or for other members and friends. Please your “ladder work” news.

Humor {(h)yo͞omər}

“One thing you must be able to do in the midst
of any experience is laugh. And experience
should show you that it isn’t real, that it’s a
movie. Life doesn’t take you seriously, so why
take it seriously.” ~ Richard Rose, Carillon

Robot Incident

One day a father brought a lie-detector robot home.

He asked his son what he was doing today in his friend’s home? The son said he was studying at his friends house. The robot slapped him.

He said, “OK, I was playing a video game there with my friend.”

”The father said, “When I was his age, I used to study a lot. I wasn’t like him.”

The robot slapped him too!!

His mother laughed and said, “He is your son, after all.”

The robot slapped the mother!!

*

From funny short stories with a twist. The picture comes from Xavier Caré on Wikimedia Commons.

In yoga pants grace (a haiku)

In yoga pants’ grace,

Silence reigns without question,

No tension, just pants.

*

~ Thanks to Dan McLaughlin. Image from clipartmax.com.

Séance

Why did the chicken go to a séance?
To get to the other side.

*

~ Thanks to TAT friend Steve. Photo by Pavel Danilyuk on pexels.com.

Inspiration & Irritation

Irritation moves us; inspiration provides a direction

What is the shortcut to spiritual awakening?

ChatGPT: There is no one-size-fits-all shortcut to spiritual awakening, as the path to awakening is unique to each individual. However, there are some general practices that can help facilitate spiritual awakening. Here are a few suggestions:

  1. Meditation: Meditation is a powerful tool for self-awareness and can help you connect with your inner self. Regular meditation can help you to quiet your mind, increase your self-awareness, and cultivate a sense of inner peace.
  2. Self-inquiry: Self-inquiry is the process of questioning your thoughts and beliefs to uncover deeper truths about yourself and the world around you. This practice can help you gain a deeper understanding of yourself and the nature of reality.
  3. Mindfulness: Mindfulness is the practice of being present in the moment and fully engaged in the experience of life. By cultivating mindfulness, you can develop a greater sense of awareness and a deeper connection to your inner self.
  4. Service: Serving others can be a powerful way to connect with your higher self and cultivate a sense of purpose and meaning in your life. By helping others, you can tap into your innate sense of compassion and connect with the interconnectedness of all things.
  5. Surrender: Surrendering to the present moment and trusting in the universe can help you to release attachment to outcomes and cultivate a sense of peace and commitment. This practice involves letting go of the need to control and accepting what is in the present moment.

Remember, the path to spiritual awakening is a journey, not a destination. It requires patience, perseverance, and a willingness to explore and learn.

~ Thanks to B.H., who submitted the question to ChatGPT. Image by Alexandra_Koch from Pixabay.

See next month’s Reader Commentary question related to the above response from the AI program ChatGPT.

Bagger Vance / Bhagavad Gita

~ Thanks to Mike L., who wrote that he was sending this clip from a movie he recently rewatched called “The Legend of Bagger Vance.” The movie is about a war veteran (Matt Damon’s character) who returns home from World War I to his hometown, a broken man. Prior to the war he was a famous local golfer. His character gets dragged into an exhibition match with two professional golfers and ends up meeting Will Smith’s character who caddies for him in the exhibition match. This scene starts at the beginning of the second round of golf when he’s 12 strokes back and has no hope of getting back in contention. I did a bit of internet sleuthing and apparently this is a retelling of the Bhagavad Gita. Matt Damon’s character’s name is Randolph Junah (R. Junah = Arjuna) and Will Smith’s character is Bagger Vance (Bhagavan = Lord Krishna).

Dealing With Feeling

It is staggering to realize how much anguish, resistance and thought activity can be produced simply from not wanting to deal with a certain feeling. The mind seems to believe that it has the capability to figure out how not to feel certain feelings, emotions or states by trying to eliminate or add elements to an equation it created itself.

This is a recognition that came out of a particular kind of mood, or feeling, I observed. The understanding was that it was not so much a predicament or a situation I tried avoiding; it was the sensations and feelings themselves. Allowed to pass without interference from mind, the feelings pass without contextual and conceptual thinking.

For a moment it can feel as if you’re naked – even irresponsible – when there are seemingly issues arising that call for attention. So often, however, it is just a matter of a fleeting appearance in consciousness that will not have that much of a bearing on psyche if left as is.

It would probably be of great benefit to me to actually take a pause and examine what’s going down internally, whenever the mind is concocting its stories and projections. I’ve seen Art bringing in a quote [from Korean Zen master Seung Sahn]: “Just don’t know”. I find it relevant in so many areas of life. It’s a simple one too, which mind doesn’t like.

~ Thanks to Andreas H. Photo by Andrew Neel on pexels.com.

Dale Carnegie’s Quotes You Should Know Before You Get Old

“Develop success from failure. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.”

“Two men looked out from prison bars. One saw mud, the other saw stars.”

“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.”

Please your thoughts on the above items.

Reader Commentary

Encouraging interactive readership among TAT members and friends

A reader wrote that what would make the Forum more interesting would be:

Hearing from people who are searching—and have questions instead of those providing endless advice and “answers.” What challenges they are facing. What their doubts and questions are. How they perceive their path is going. What they are doing in their lives. Where they think they will end up, etc., etc.

Can you help make the Forum more interesting?

The Reader Commentary question for the October TAT Forum:

Do you consider thinking and feeling to be complementary tools or opposing activities in knowing yourself?

Responses follow.

From Tess Hughes:

(What follows is an AI generated response to the Forum question! I think it’s as good as anything I come up with and it saved me the effort of writing it. I had written a few sentences, it took the idea and expanded on it. Astonishing!)

The distinction between thinking and feeling is often seen as a dichotomy in psychology and personality theories:
– Thinking refers to the cognitive processes involved in rational analysis, logical reasoning, and problem-solving.
– Feeling, on the other hand, refers to the emotional and subjective experiences that arise from our interactions with the world.
– Viewing oneself as a complete organism means recognizing that all aspects of our experience, including thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and reactions, are interconnected and happening within us.
– This perspective suggests that everything we perceive is worthy of observation and analysis, as it can potentially lead to a deeper understanding of ourselves.
– Breaking free from the constant cycle of thought-emotion-action requires becoming aware of the automatic and self-perpetuating nature of this cycle.
– Developing the ability to observe this automatic program within ourselves is a significant milestone in self-inquiry and personal growth.
– However, achieving this level of self-awareness and breaking free from automatic patterns requires practice and ongoing observation.
– One observation is just the beginning of the journey towards greater self-understanding and personal transformation.

From Patrick K:

I am going to pull a quote from Marcus Aurelius, “The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way”. I remember a guy in one of the zoom inquiry groups say something like that, and it rings true to me. The thoughts that keep appearing have a certain pattern and the same with feelings; I can’t bypass it, I need to go through it. Another quote which has weight for me is Ramana Maharshi’s, “Plunge the purified mind into the heart. Then the work is over”. So that suggests to me a purification process. How does one purify the mind? Firstly, to me that suggests that the work to be done is backing away from distractions, all the noise that can fill, charm, seduce, hypnotise, and worry the mind. Secondly, it suggests to me to witness the negative and positive beliefs that reside there from my conditioning, to get behind all that. Thirdly, it suggests to me that for real purification I need to be able to “define” the nature of my longings, I need to know what I really, really want: purification of direction. So in summation I tend to agree with Ramana, purification is the way. Ramana’s quote begs the question, “what is heart”? Is it humility? But don’t you have to have a raving ego to eventually know humility, like the opposite of two poles? What is heart, is it love? Ramana’s quote suggests maybe heart is inherent, love is inherent, I don’t know. He suggests that when the mind is purified, love/heart will be realised or can be realised if you plunge the purified mind into it, so that’s incentive enough.

From Sergio F:

Complementary. I could only think about them as ‘opposing’ if a selfish thought causes somebody to ignore a non-selfish feeling, or if a feeling arising from selfish or erroneous beliefs causes somebody to ignore common sense or relatively objective thoughts.

I believe that examining conflicts between thoughts and feelings is a great way to learn about oneself.

From Anonymous:

(FYI: In this instance happens to include sharing quotes attributed to Jesus/Bible, though am not specifically oriented to Christianity in a religious sense.)

When meditating once long ago there came an insight regarding “thought” that served meaningfully for me/this character … not sure if this would be useful or resonate for anyone else…

The insight was that when “Jesus” said: “Can ye not tell the difference between the living and the dead,” he was talking to us about our own “thoughts” (not other people).

The recognition at that time was that most/many human thoughts can be seen as analogous to ceramic seeds (as opposed to real, living seeds). They are “dead,” and Life/Truth would not spring forth from them. In that sense most thinking does not really serve as a means to see, know, connect to Life/Knowing OneSelf. However, watching and paying attention to feelings (“feeling” here not necessarily directly equivalent to “emotions”) can serve to distinguish the “wheat from the chaff” as it relates to thoughts. In that sense, while thoughts are still playing a big part in a person’s experience, thoughts guided by feelings (to discern between “living” versus “dead” thoughts), might be used as complementary tools in pointing in the direction of Self-Knowing.

From Doug D:

I consider thinking and feeling to be complementary tools in knowing yourself. My reasoning is that thoughts and feelings are both part of the experience of selfing, so neither should be ignored.

From Mark W:

I tend to think of thinking and feeling as complementary. I suppose I could think of them as contradictory in that I can’t seem to do both simultaneously. Nevertheless, it seems I need both to survive in this relative, mundane world as well as to see through my faulty beliefs as part of my subtractive path. This complementary viewpoint was confirmed for me when I realized I had spent 60-some years of my life mired in the quicksand approach of over-relying on logic and critical thinking in my spiritual search. Though neither complete nor perfect, the complementary approach seemingly has led to noticeable change.

From Art Ticknor:

I see two spots where the question of feeling vs. thinking come into play. One is when we ask ourselves, in self-inquiry, what we believe ourselves to be. The more sophisticated beliefs / conclusions / convictions, etc., based on what we’ve seen, read, or heard, that we’ve adopted from authorities, are less important in terms of what may be impeding our realization than the gut-level feeling-beliefs that are not always obvious to us but which are used by the mind’s machinery in producing actions/reactions.

The other is getting in touch with what may be our biggest pull toward Truth / Self-Realization: the feeling of nostalgia. To me nostalgia is the vibrational song of the élan vital animating this physical-mental manifestation, whose lyrics are “ye who are weary come home.”

From Dan G:

The problem I hope to solve by knowing myself is that I have no good answer to the apparent judgment of “life sucks, then you die.” Neither thinking nor feeling seem sufficient to become free of a body-mind in an insane asylum on death row. But, if escape is possible, more of both in service of trying to escape must be necessary.

Both thinking and feeling can be vehicles of “Light” as I dig out of my isolated cell. The more of my mental “prison life” I sacrifice for digging, the better the chances. I shouldn’t limit my tools to what I’ve been using. How do I find a part of me that’s not just more of this horrifyingly limited mind?

Thinking and feeling might both be tools from the nut house of doomed prisoners. Perception of the “Light” to dig towards hopefully comes from something realer in me. Maybe it’s when both types of seeking are going in the same direction—towards my deepest, truest, realest intuition—that the most progress can be made.

From Jerry S:

The question did not reference a third medium, that of visceral. Is my “gut-feel” when I awake in the middle of the night simply indigestion, an inconvenient and hopefully avoidable state that is to be ignored? Or is the experience a thing in itself, could it be some other part of me “speaking to me” in the night, as something authentic and to be listened to and felt, to be examined, that needs to unfold in consciousness. Not interrupted with the most applicable train of thought pulled out of my bag of past experience and memories, to be interpreted by some other part of the body. Can feelings likewise be isolated events, natural occurrences without interpretation but recognized for it’s own meaning? And can thinking ever be free of previous patterns, to solve problems looking forward without reference to past experiences or memories? What is the possibility to isolate and watch each of the three “media” as each a thing in itself, unfiltered or interpreted by the other two?

Tricky that the mind operates best through comparisons and contrasts, so how can it do justice to feelings or visceral effects?

From Michael R:

If I had to pick one thing that seems primary to knowing yourself, it would be attention. Thinking and feeling can both direct attention, and in that way they are complementary to knowing oneself. Thinking, in particular reason and rational thinking, can help provide checks and balances for feeling. Thinking can also be a catalyst for breaking down more deeply felt beliefs and false identifications. Feeling is often a more subtle and refined path to follow inward, but it is not without error and is not the end of the path itself. Just like thinking, feeling directs attention and this can be used to look inward. Much of our thinking and feeling directs attention outward, but with the idea of milk from thorns in mind these tools can all be used to direct attention inward. Feeling is a broad term, which some might associate with emotions. While emotions can tell you a lot about your personality, your ego and its reactions, these are grosser feelings that are typically self-referential. In my experience intuition is a subtler feeling, a kind of quiet-knowing, that likely has a better chance of directing the attention towards a deeper Self Knowledge.

Next Month

The Reader Commentary question for the December TAT Forum:

Do you agree with ChatGPT’s response to the question “What is the shortcut to spiritual awakening?” Why or why not? Is there anything it missed or a part it gets wrong?

Please your responses by the 25th of November, and indicate your preferred identification (the default is your first name and the initial letter of your last name). “Anonymous” and pen names are fine, too.

PS: What question(s) would you like to ask other TAT Forum readers?

Q: What are your thoughts on this month’s reader commentary? Please your feedback.

Richard Rose described a spiritual path as living one’s life aimed at finding the meaning of that life. Did you find anything relevant to your life or search in this month’s TAT Forum?

Rishikesh, on the Ganges River. Photo by Anima Pundeer.

We like hearing from you! Please email your comments, suggestions, inquiries, and submissions.

Sign up for notices of TAT’s four annual events and free monthly Forums by email on our contact page.

Founder’s Wisdom

Richard Rose (1917-2005) established the TAT Foundation
in 1973 to encourage people to work together on what
he considered to be the “grand project” of spiritual work.

Notes from a 1982 Winter Intensive, part 2

> Jan 10: Until this point, the entire morning was set aside for silent contemplation. The new schedule: morning meditation now from 6 to 9, with confrontation (self-inquiry questioning) from 9 to noon.

> Jan 11:

  • Have to have a dream then work determinedly to create it
  • The teacher must find his students; the students don’t know what to look for

> Jan 12:

  • If you were going into the egg business, e.g., you’d need a plan for starting out (purchasing, producing, selling) and detailed ways & means of implementing steps to build a lucrative operation
  • Need a similar type of plan for spiritual work

> Jan 14:

  • The success formula is very simple: Total commitment + direct all energies to ways & means (answers will come via intuition)
  • Zen: no dogma—just learn how to think
  • Approach to philosophy requires nonlinear thinking
    • Triangulation; conciliation of opposites
    • Intuition tempered by common sense
  • Creation formula: imagination + will + fiat, then forget
    • Surrender to that which is superior to us
    • Desire only that which is supposed to happen
  • Go into people’s minds through what’s on their minds

~ From Art Ticknor. Previous segment. To be continued….

Definition of Terms

Index of many of the key terms and principles in Rose’s work, with brief definitions, from Richard Rose’s Psychology of the Observer: The Path to Reality Through the Self by John Kent.

Jacob’s Ladder © 2001 Richard Rose. See this transcript of a talk on the topic by Rose.

Homing Ground Update

… A spot on earth where people can do retreats and hold
meetings; where the emphasis is on friendship and the search.

November 2023:

As we head towards the close of the year, October donations brought us to 14.2% of our 2023 fundraising goal of $15,750. Please keep TAT in mind if you plan on any end-of-year donations, and also remember that your Amazon purchases (like Christmas gifts!) can generate income for TAT if you use the generic link or any of the Amazon links on the TAT website.

Thanks to all of you for making TAT the extraordinary organization it is.

Sincerely,
Shawn Nevins

PS: Monthly contributions are a great way to support the TAT Center if making a larger one-time donation seems too much. If you’re so inspired, click the Donate button below, then check the box for “Make this a monthly donation” as in the example below:





Let’s bring this to life! “The job is upon us,” Richard Rose said, “and it is worthwhile.” To contribute to the TAT Center, mail a check made out to the TAT Foundation to:

TAT Foundation
PO Box 3402
Roxboro, NC 27573

Big checks, little checks, all are welcome. Or use the PayPal link above (though we lose 2.2% of your donation to PayPal fees).

* See photos and more on the Homing Ground page. *

Did you enjoy the Forum? Then buy the book!
Readers’ favorite selections from seven years of issues.
Beyond Mind, Beyond Death is available at Amazon.com.

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