I wanted to add to this discussion with a few thoughts. I am trained in psychology, computer programming, and the arts. I have watched several hundred hours of Mooji videos since 2008. I had one interaction with Mooji in the form of a letter that he answered on live broadcast around 2015, a very unsatisfying answer to me thanking him for freedom. It was a major let-down to see that he did not really care about the things I was telling him. I expected he would have responded very differently based on the kind of teacher I thought he was. I was not looking for something special, just a real human authenticity, like the kind shared between friends.
I think Mooji started with good intentions but has become corrupted by the fame, power, access to vulnerable people, and access to money.
His videos from 2008-2012 have a very different character and message. Back then he focused exclusively on the non-doul inquiry and asking profound questions like "can the seer be seen". His message had a very clean-and-free feel to it, no signs of corruption. Having dealt with a cult directly before learning about mooji, I tested his message and it rang true and allowed me to heal from some damage.
From my understanding he did not have a sanga back then but traveled from convention to convention and gave talks. His early talks were marvelous and had a rich authenticity, happiness and hope in them.
I felt that sometime between 2012 and 2014 he had his first fall from grace. It happened when the satsang gatherings started getting very large. His message become less powerful, his directions for seekers seemed to become deluded, and he started to look down on others more. He became offended in videos and started to ridicule people, if only in a passive aggressive style.
I would like to contrast this to the old videos of Papaji online who I believe to be an authentic teacher in his time. He was humble, did not perform for the camera and never knew his videos would be on youtube for the world to see. There is something simple, and quaint about a happy man sharing his wisdom with others (in the Papaji videos). He does not perform like a professional, often having real mis-understandings and confusions on camera.
I would frequently get frustrated with Moojis' message in 2013-2014 and would go on to watch many hours of Papaji and compare their ideas, teachings, style, and pointing effectiveness. I started to feel that Mooji was leading people on and creating a scene rather than pointing to the truth. I started to distance myself from him, but I did question myself wondering, if I was 'projecting' my own faults onto the guru, as had been explained by him many times.
His new messages started to say very different things from his original pre-2010 sayings. He developed spiritual materialism as some have pointed out. Specifically he says that 'people should feel something special from you, when you enter the room'
I believe he started saying this as a manipulative tactic to create a confirmation bias in weak minds. When they interact with people and they feel that 'regular people' can 'feel something special from them' it means they have met the abstract goal and are on the right path. But this 'feeling' can come and go at the drop of a hat, change of weather etc.
Based on other teachers and my own experience it is not necessary or desirable to seek outer confirmation of ones inner peace and contentedness. People may never notice a truly enlightened mind, and that other people are always free to think what they want forces followers to be overly self critical of themselves in relations with others. This ruins their confidence and creates a self-doubt and an overtly self-centered mindset "Am I glowing with the light of awareness yet?" This process is causing the individual to retreat into personal imaginary perceptions rather than real seeing of the freedom in life. Mooji says you are the awareness, you should glow for the others, causing people to put pressure on themselves to solve an unsolvable problem: you cannot control the views of others no matter how high your aspiration and vibration.
There used to be a message of freedom, but this spiritual materialism of places having special power, people having special power is not non-duality but a very old and tired form of myth and mysticism.
Things finally hit the fan when I encountered two great non-doul teachers with very different approaches: Paul Hedderman, and Tony Parsons. Both are strange people in their own right (not everyone likes them either), but they do non-dual teachings without leading a cult behind them. They openly criticize and speak against the style of Sanga that Mooji has created.
This brings me to my main thesis:
Mooji Sanga is Moojis personal cult and retirement plan. He created it from scratch as a means of securing a comfortable life for himself. It seems to have taken a turn for the worse, as some of his videos started to remind me of the film Fight Club when the original gang started recruiting more followers until everyone is blindly following an authority system they do not understand or take accountability for.
Finally, in 2016 I stopped watching Mooji after seeing him allowing people to worship him. after seeing a crowd of people reaching out to touch is garments, people falling at his feet and carrying on, I knew things were really done. This was not freedom but a cultural movement, a cult of sorts.
Most informal videos from 2016 and beyond show Mooji surrounded by mostly attractive looking European females who all look like they wash with the same soap and use the same hair products. When a whole group of different people look like they smell the same, you know something is up.
It was when I started noticing this female thing and that his messages were becoming increasingly distorted and changed from freedom to actually entrapping. He used to say "you don't need to know anything" and now he was saying that "you must know that it is true" and "you don't want it enough yet" and a whole mixed bag of negative affirmations. I could see in his videos that he was saying things to program specific females and to get them to think in certain ways.
I feel a little sorry for him, and that I don't think this is what he wanted. But I also hold him accountable, because this is not the truth he originally spoke of nor the freedom, nor the peace, nor the authenticity that he once had.
Instead of preaching the good news, he preaches an entrapping method of becoming confused with ones identity. He tells people they are something that they are not, and then asks them to demonstrate to him that they are what they are not. Nothingness and Consciousness and The Way may be real experiences, but they are not required by any means to live a happy life in harmony with ones surroundings. Instead of just pointing to basic fundamentals, he now leads people on a goose chase that only ends when they choose to give it up.
In summation, I am very sorry to be writing this, as I once admired the man. But now I feel it is time to discuss why so many people are seeing that Mooji has lost his touch and is probably doing more harm than good.
I think Mooji started with good intentions but has become corrupted by the fame, power, access to vulnerable people, and access to money.
His videos from 2008-2012 have a very different character and message. Back then he focused exclusively on the non-doul inquiry and asking profound questions like "can the seer be seen". His message had a very clean-and-free feel to it, no signs of corruption. Having dealt with a cult directly before learning about mooji, I tested his message and it rang true and allowed me to heal from some damage.
From my understanding he did not have a sanga back then but traveled from convention to convention and gave talks. His early talks were marvelous and had a rich authenticity, happiness and hope in them.
I felt that sometime between 2012 and 2014 he had his first fall from grace. It happened when the satsang gatherings started getting very large. His message become less powerful, his directions for seekers seemed to become deluded, and he started to look down on others more. He became offended in videos and started to ridicule people, if only in a passive aggressive style.
I would like to contrast this to the old videos of Papaji online who I believe to be an authentic teacher in his time. He was humble, did not perform for the camera and never knew his videos would be on youtube for the world to see. There is something simple, and quaint about a happy man sharing his wisdom with others (in the Papaji videos). He does not perform like a professional, often having real mis-understandings and confusions on camera.
I would frequently get frustrated with Moojis' message in 2013-2014 and would go on to watch many hours of Papaji and compare their ideas, teachings, style, and pointing effectiveness. I started to feel that Mooji was leading people on and creating a scene rather than pointing to the truth. I started to distance myself from him, but I did question myself wondering, if I was 'projecting' my own faults onto the guru, as had been explained by him many times.
His new messages started to say very different things from his original pre-2010 sayings. He developed spiritual materialism as some have pointed out. Specifically he says that 'people should feel something special from you, when you enter the room'
I believe he started saying this as a manipulative tactic to create a confirmation bias in weak minds. When they interact with people and they feel that 'regular people' can 'feel something special from them' it means they have met the abstract goal and are on the right path. But this 'feeling' can come and go at the drop of a hat, change of weather etc.
Based on other teachers and my own experience it is not necessary or desirable to seek outer confirmation of ones inner peace and contentedness. People may never notice a truly enlightened mind, and that other people are always free to think what they want forces followers to be overly self critical of themselves in relations with others. This ruins their confidence and creates a self-doubt and an overtly self-centered mindset "Am I glowing with the light of awareness yet?" This process is causing the individual to retreat into personal imaginary perceptions rather than real seeing of the freedom in life. Mooji says you are the awareness, you should glow for the others, causing people to put pressure on themselves to solve an unsolvable problem: you cannot control the views of others no matter how high your aspiration and vibration.
There used to be a message of freedom, but this spiritual materialism of places having special power, people having special power is not non-duality but a very old and tired form of myth and mysticism.
Things finally hit the fan when I encountered two great non-doul teachers with very different approaches: Paul Hedderman, and Tony Parsons. Both are strange people in their own right (not everyone likes them either), but they do non-dual teachings without leading a cult behind them. They openly criticize and speak against the style of Sanga that Mooji has created.
This brings me to my main thesis:
Mooji Sanga is Moojis personal cult and retirement plan. He created it from scratch as a means of securing a comfortable life for himself. It seems to have taken a turn for the worse, as some of his videos started to remind me of the film Fight Club when the original gang started recruiting more followers until everyone is blindly following an authority system they do not understand or take accountability for.
Finally, in 2016 I stopped watching Mooji after seeing him allowing people to worship him. after seeing a crowd of people reaching out to touch is garments, people falling at his feet and carrying on, I knew things were really done. This was not freedom but a cultural movement, a cult of sorts.
Most informal videos from 2016 and beyond show Mooji surrounded by mostly attractive looking European females who all look like they wash with the same soap and use the same hair products. When a whole group of different people look like they smell the same, you know something is up.
It was when I started noticing this female thing and that his messages were becoming increasingly distorted and changed from freedom to actually entrapping. He used to say "you don't need to know anything" and now he was saying that "you must know that it is true" and "you don't want it enough yet" and a whole mixed bag of negative affirmations. I could see in his videos that he was saying things to program specific females and to get them to think in certain ways.
I feel a little sorry for him, and that I don't think this is what he wanted. But I also hold him accountable, because this is not the truth he originally spoke of nor the freedom, nor the peace, nor the authenticity that he once had.
Instead of preaching the good news, he preaches an entrapping method of becoming confused with ones identity. He tells people they are something that they are not, and then asks them to demonstrate to him that they are what they are not. Nothingness and Consciousness and The Way may be real experiences, but they are not required by any means to live a happy life in harmony with ones surroundings. Instead of just pointing to basic fundamentals, he now leads people on a goose chase that only ends when they choose to give it up.
In summation, I am very sorry to be writing this, as I once admired the man. But now I feel it is time to discuss why so many people are seeing that Mooji has lost his touch and is probably doing more harm than good.