This is an idea that I'm surprised didn't come to me sooner. For those of us who would like to be here but not engage in topics where GV comes up in one form or another, who really feel like we've moved on to whatever degree, or even feel some animosity, this is a space to start topics where automatically such references or discussions are off the table.

In return for this space, perhaps the Vaishnava topic area can be left alone for believers to take some shelter in. Fair enough? (If you want to discuss that as an issue, start a topic elsewhere.)

If we don't talk about GV here, what else can we discuss? Anything under the sun but dogma-based religion, ie religion that depends on an external authority or book or both to reveal or monitor spirituality. Mundane topics, political topics, fun topics, whatever strikes your fancy. The only rule, aside from our usual forum rules, is that we don't give the GV perspective, make GV based jokes, have GV discussions, or reference it in any way, shape or form.

I myself have already expressed my weariness of such topics or references, and it seems I'm not the only one.

And for those of us exploring a more intuitive spirituality, maybe this is a good place to talk about it without feeling like we'll be exposed to "but it says in scripture" arguments.

Let this topic be the only GV content in the whole forum. (Sorry but I felt I had to lay out the ground rules.)

A good initiative. While my own spiritualism is largely dogma-free, maybe it is not that for all. If anyone have noticed, I very rarely refer to any scriptures.
I have met persons on the net that have become more neo-pagan influenced, but often it ends up with either or. I don't know why it should always be like that.
Maybe it always ends up with this dogma, or that dogma, or anti-dogma?

In most discussions here, I find that I actually miss the "magic". Maybe it gets drowned by dogma? With magic here, I don't exactly mean spells and such, but rather the magic of life and existence. And that might for me also why I recject many westernisation of Indian faiths, since I often find them go dry (and dogmatic). Why should the magic have to go away?

I find myself over and over again working to reconnect to that magic. Sometimes it feels like many things try to drown it, destroy it.

The search for spiritual for me is exactly to get nearer to that magic.

Great idea. I see our Great Guy Meta Prabhu has already made a post.

Lately for the past few months I've been hanging out mostly on Cure (as in the band - The Cure - which is one of my favorite bands) boards. There is an "off topic" Cure board that is full of similar minded INFP left libertarians that I am right at home with. Even made some friends that I have met in person and will hang out with from time to time when I am in their parts of the world. Surprisingly it was in such boards that I met more people (read "as strange as") like myself than anywhere else.

If you go to my myspace - you can see the heavy Cure influence in the friends and comments sections! I have a mere 2 folks from GR You are all welcome, though. Almost all the friends and comments are Cure buddies.

Hello Pretty Face Matushka Preyo! Don't have a sad face smiley for the myspace buddies, i am sorry that i don't respond over there. I just don't like it (myspace) and the dogma just is too much. Nothing personal.

this is a good idea. My opinion in general is that people should keep their metaphysical beliefs to themselves, but most of us were trained in the opposite and it does get annoying at times, to read both the believers as well as non-believers postulating their respective dogmas , or dogmaless dogmas

Oh, that wasn't directed to you at all - I realize that your myspace isn't used very much. I was lamenting that more GR folks were not on my myspace friends.

Actually, I have to be careful what I do at myspace because I have a few Orthodox Christian groups/friends as well. Some of the bulletin stuff that I get (fun survey kinds of things) would be totally inappropriate if I responded, although I would like to a lot of times. Like I said, my myspace really has turned into a place for my Cure buddies more than anything.

It would be good if the situation was the reverse with most sections dogma free and 1 dogma section...LOL

This was more or less our idea when we created the GR subforums. There was this Vaishnava Topics section which was supposed to be a more religious one.

I guess we didn't realize how much we ourselves would be talking of religious matters. And above all, how many people with active religious beliefs would be joining GR.

I have to agree that I didn't imagine that GR would be at all attractive to many people who were still active Vaishnavas. Who knew? I'm happy to grant some space for their discussions but I've also been uncomfortable and worried that those members like Homer who left it behind would be driven out. Perhaps it's a signal to find some better balance?

In any event, I hope this will help even it up a bit.

I also don't really use myspace, though I have one there. I tried to keep it going but I spend most of my time here and at livejournal.

I think it's good to have various groups of friends and homes on the internet if one has time to keep up with them. I'm glad you found some like minded Cure fans.

i just like to talk about gardening, sex , and world history topics. which is confining

I find that the magic is under assault from two directions--the scripture/rule bound oriented and the purely scientific oriented. It's a wonder that any of us manage to trust our perceptions of it at all! One camp wants to tell us not to trust our limited material senses and the other camp says, well we agree that you perceive something but it's probably chemicals operating in your brain, not a real spiritual experience.

It's a wonder we ever learn to trust our sense of the divine at all!

At the risk of appearing to drag GV into the dogma free zone, may i suggest that Chaitanya's headbanging 'pastimes' may have been for the same reasons you outlined. And that he 'magically' disappeared into the Diety ( i say he escaped to run off with the Bauls or some similar group of gypsy types and his closest friends covered up for him.)

_

In one sense, both assaults are similar, in that they say - don't trust yourself, or your own perception, trust us!
They just give different reasons for it.

As for the chemical camp. Yes, sure there are chemicals involved. And they want to us to believe that somehow the experience starts with the chemicals. How chemicals can start an experience, no one have been able to explain, but then they say that chemistry is anyway so complicated so that we can never understand it. It is just like magic.
Of course the other camp says that the theology is so complicated that we can never understand it, and poof, that's their magic.

Both camps say - you can't understand it.
Isn't it funny?

Is there a gardening section somewhere?

There's a topic under hobbies, humor, etc., in the Life in the Mainstream area, near this subforum in fact.

I am mourning my little container garden, personally, because most of my plants require full sun (we had a sun drenched deck at the last place) and my new deck is all shaded. I miss my lavender plants!

Exactly. And beware of the motives of anyone who tells you not to trust yourself and your perceptions and can't offer any proof of their conflicting point of view!

amen !