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by rramadass·7y ago·view on hn ↗
Nice explanation of the end goal of all "Spiritual" practices i.e. "freedom from ALL mental conditioning". The "Tantriks" come at this from the "negative" side of our psyche rather than through the socially acceptable practices. In a way, these practices are more powerful since "taboos" are psychologically deep-seated and hard to overcome.

A simple experiment that i often use to show people the power of mental conditioning is to lay down a picture of their favourite/personal god/deity and ask them to deliberately step on it with their foot (extra points if they do it with shoes on!). Almost everybody recoils and will not do it and the ones who attempt it (out of a sense of "need to win the argument in the heat of the moment", a classic example of ego temporarily overcoming conditioning) still feel bad about it for days afterwards until they do a "good deed" to balance away "the sin". It is illuminating when you think about it and brings home the point that "everything is in your head".

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Nice clue. BTW there also is a chemical way to overcome this. A person given a sufficiently strong dose of MDMA will probably pass your test easily with a deep profound feeling he is performing an act of worship normal people can't understand as he would perceive everything as a manifestation of love (the rational part of the mind does not get disabled however, so he won't go kill somebody out of love, it's not this dangerrous). As far as I know scientists are exploring the potential of MDMA to dissolve mental complexes and trauma.