Institute for Real God Spiritual Fundamentals

The department provides detailed education about the process of tangibly connecting to the Divine Being for real: how it has been done traditionally, and how it can be done now. Topics include: the need for a moment-to-moment spiritual practice, and the need for a Spiritual Master.

• What is the nature of the Greater Reality? How do the various teachings and Realizations of shamans, saints, yogis, and Spiritual Masters relate to each other and to the actual nature of Reality? Is it actually true that all paths to God are equal? Or are there real differences among religions and Spiritual paths that are important for us to know about in order to find the most beneficial Spiritual means? What is the greatest Spiritual potential and destiny we can realize, and what means is available for realizing it? Why aren't such Spiritual means more generally known or more widely practiced?
  
  
• Tell me more about the tradition of genuine Spiritual Masters (Jesus of Nazareth, Gautama the Buddha, etc.), the different degrees and types of Spiritual Masters, and what the relationship with a living Spiritual Master is like.
  
  
• What are the elements of genuine Spiritual practice capable of leading to Spiritual Realization?

SF101: Secrets of Human Transformation — The impulse to change springs out of dissatisfaction and unhappiness. But what change is actually possible? And what bearing do approaches for change actually have on our happiness? In this course, we examine a variety of approaches to transformation, from Sigmund Freud’s psychotherapy, to Stephen Covey’s “7 Habits”, to the self-transcending God-Realization of the great Spiritual Masters.

SF102: The Life of Spiritual Practice: Habits of Highly Spiritual People — Perfect Happiness is possible through Spiritual Awakening from the dream of ordinary life. This course provides a picture of the Spiritual practice for Waking Up, in the form of seven habits.

SF103: The Need for a Genuine Spiritual Master — The reason we even think about a Spiritual Master is because we want to Realize Something Great Spiritually (such as Perfect, Eternal Happiness). And we have some sense – despite the neurotic over-emphasis of our "modern" time on individualism and anti-authoritarianism – that a Spiritual Master may (even these days) play a central role in the attainment of such a Spiritual Realization. Changing social views over the centuries change neither the laws of physics nor the laws of the Spiritual Reality; but they can rob us of opportunities without our even knowing it. The Spiritual Transmission of a genuine Spiritual Transmission Master is necessary for Spiritual growth and Spiritual Realization.

SF104: Primary Obstacles to Spiritual Growth — True spiritual life has always been a challenge: there have never been large numbers of genuine saints, yogis, or holy men and women in any given age of the world. But while some obstacles to spiritual practice have remained constant throughout the ages, others are unique to our own age. In some sense, we are born with three strikes against us (more, in fact). This course surveys some of the primary obstacles to spiritual growth. Significant spiritual growth can occur only when we have understood and transcended all the primary obstacles, whether they are set by culture, society, biology, psychology, or even conventional religion.

SF105: Spiritual Practice and Self-Understanding — The Spiritual Transmission of a genuine Spiritual Transmission Master is necessary for Spiritual growth and Spiritual Realization (see course SF103); but it is not sufficient. Many are the stories told of devotees who were in the physical company of their Master virtually all the time, but did not Realize anything great. (The brother of Gautama Buddha is a famous example.) The necessary complement to the reception of the Guru's Grace is the understanding of what is blocking it: in other words, self-understanding is necessary. In this course, we draw on Adi Da Samraj's wisdom, which makes clear that the ego blocks Spiritual Transmission; that the ego is an activity, not an inherent structure; that it is possible (with the help of the Spiritual Master's Transmission) to make that activity conscious and then, to stop doing it; that such self-understanding requires ever-increasing sensitivity and feeling-awareness; that ever-increasing sensitivity and feeling-awareness is dulled by every form of seeking (whether geared toward self-indulgence or self-suppression); and that, therefore, disciplines that counter seeking in all its forms are essential to self-understanding.

SF106: Spiritual Practice and Diet — The esoteric anatomy of a human being — the full body-mind of each of us — includes much more than the physical body, or even body and "soul". It is no accident that the Hindu tradition names the outermost (and most superficial) layer of the human body-mind, the annamayakosha, that is, the "food body". The senses associated with the "food body" are the means by which we are aware of the "material dimension" of the Greater Reality. That our sense of reality altogether is confined generally to the material dimension is an indication that, in general, we are only aware of this outermost layer of the human body-mind and its associated senses, and do not have conscious access to (or control over) the "senses" associated with the greater-than-material layers of the human body-mind. That the "food body" primarily is made of food should be a large hint to the role diet plays in confining our energy and awareness to the physical body. In this course, we consider the spiritually optimal diet, which minimally binds energy and attention to the physical body. We will take into account not only kinds of food but quality, quantity, and preparation of the food. We will discover that controlling the food intake of the body also makes the "food body" in its entirety — its desires, behavior, etc. — easily controllable.

SF107: Spiritual Practice and Emotional-Sexual Intimacy — That sex is an immense force in human life cannot be overstated. And the force of sex is only matched by the amount of misinformation about its relationship to spirituality. Notions like "to be a saint you must be celibate" or "a tantric Spiritual practice is a way to have your cake and eat it too" have a grain of truth to them; but to follow such suggestions without understanding the anatomical basis of such propositions and how exactly they apply (if at all) in our own case is to place oneself in the dark unnecessarily. This course examines the flow of energy in the human body-mind in the form of a circle, down the front of the body-mind (the "frontal line") and up the back (the "spinal line"). The same energy that is experienced as vital energy and sexual energy in the frontal line is experienced as "kundalini" as it turns upward at the base of the spine. The usual life — and most especially the usual use of sexuality through orgasm — breaks the energy circuit in the frontal line, so that the amount of energy that makes it through to the spinal line is relatively minimal. The spiritualization of the human body-mind requires closing the breaks in the circuit (whether through celibacy or a tantric practice), and mastering the conductivity of energy in the full circuit.

But there is even more to the story. Sex is anatomically rooted in the heart. Emotion and sexuality are two halves of a single coin. How we express ourselves sexually and emotionally are reflections of each other. Sex without love is cold and depraved. Love without desire is not yet full. Love-desire is a single force that is naturally expressed in emotional-sexual intimacy. Just as the circuit of energy in the human body can be broken by conventional orgasm, so too can the expression of feeling be reduced to something less than love (fear, anger, sorrow, etc.) through various oedipal rituals that express "you don't love me" rather than "I love you".Transcending those oedipal patterns is also an esssential prerequisite to the spiritualization of the human body-mind, and its full entry into the Spiritual dimension of the Greater Reality.

SF108: Spiritual Practice and Cooperative Community — It is no accident that Guatama Buddha included in His three jewels (triratna) not only the Buddha (or Spiritual Master) and the Dharma (or Teaching), but also, the Sangha (or community of Spiritual practitioners). Just so, Christian and other spiritual or monastic traditions make much of a communal circumstance for spiritual practice (such as a monastary or a convent). This course considers the viewpoint that the community setting is generally a more auspicious circumstance for Spiritual practice than a conventional living circumstance, and also even more auspicious than the traditional isolation of a cave, a desert, or a forest, for several reasons:

• First is the principle of "Good Company": we (and, therefore, our destiny too) are greatly influenced by whomever we spend our time with; hence we should spend as much time as possible in the company of the Spiritual Master and our fellow Spiritual practitioners.
• Second is the Teaching of the Spiritual Master, Adi Da Samraj, that the fundamental activity of the ego is the avoidance of relationship. While that avoidance plays itself out on many levels, it is most obvious at the level of human relationships. Cooperative community is an excellent discipline for cutting into the moment-to-moment egoic tendency to seek isolation and immunity.
• Third, the Spiritual Transmission of the Spiritual Master is greatly magnified in the communal setting. For example, walking into a meditation hall in which many practitioners have been "invoking" the Spiritual Master's Transmission feels like walking into a tangible Force Field. It is much easier to practice staying concentrated in and absorbed by that Transmission in such a setting!

This course explores both the benefits and the difficulties of living in cooperative community, as well as what form such an arrangement might take. A useful companion course is COOP105: A History of Cooperative Community.

• The Spiritual Master
• 1-2-3 God