Elliot Benjamin Three Articles about Shambhala

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here is no way that I will proceed any further with Shambhala in regard to doing their higher level courses. I have learned that virtually all of my misgivings about Shambhala that I discussed in my Integral World previous article, as well as new alarming information that I have subsequently learned about, are all too real. This includes the violent and luxury living history of the gurus and Rigden kings of Shambhala; the esoteric and nonsense-filled (to me) content of their higher level teachings; the sexual abuse and violations committed by Shambhala teachers to their students; the apparent occurrence of violence in Shambhala on some occasions; and the extensive and intensive practice of prostrations, chantings, and mandalas in the higher levels of Shambhala, culminated by complete absorption of the guru into one's self identity.

After all these learnings, one may very well ask why I would ever consider doing anything further in Shambhala, at any level. And my answer is largely wrapped up with the beauty that I have seen in the free spirit of Shambhala, that has emerged in all its glory in many of the actual members of Shambhala, as evidenced in Project Sunshine. Project Sunshine is a wonderful and inspiring example of this, as is the courage of the Shambhala members who dared to publicly counter Lady Diana in her statement of criticism of Project Sunshine. These Shambhala members remind me of the genuine feeling of comradeship that I felt through my Shambhala levels, as we were all meditating and believing in the worthwhile goal of working toward an enlightened society. As I remarked above, I don't know how the higher-ups in Shambhala will respond to all that I have included in this essay. But if it turns out that I am still accepted in Shambhala, then I can see being open to continuing to engage in mindfulness meditation at Shambhala workshops, though not at the higher Shambhala levels. And who knows—perhaps all the courageous and honest communications of the participants of the Project Sunshine forum will significantly reduce the cult dangers of Shambhala so that in some future time, I could do yet another analysis of cult dangers in Shambhala and find that from my combined integral experiential and non-experiential perspective, that Shambhala has moved into the Neutral category, or perhaps even back into the Mildly Beneficial category. I am an optimist and idealist at heart, and I will therefore end this essay on this positive note.

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I felt that it was only fair to give Mipham the benefit of the doubt until and unless I saw anything more concrete and convincing about his purported sexual abuse. But it did reinforce for me why I was so diligent about listening to my gut level negative reactions at the Shambhala Taking Vows workshop to pledging to give my allegiance to the guru of Shambhala, as I described in my Part 1 article [1]. But the gates have now been completely opened, as I received the Project Sunshine Phase 2 final report yesterday

[www.andreamwinn.com]

and I am still shocked by what I have read. I don't want to go overboard in conveying all the gross and lurid details of Mipham's sexual abuse with many of his women students in Shambhala for a number of years, as you can read all about this for yourself [7], but I do need to convey enough about this to justify why I am writing this Part 3 essay on Shambhala.