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It's not a secret that Ginsberg studied with Gelek Rimpoche and the Jewel Heart sangha directly after Trungpa's death, and more has been written on this than I've summarized here (academically, I mean--anyone familiar with Ginsberg's biography knows he left Shambhala / Vajradhatu, unquestionably). I'd like to know what you have to say on this, if you're not doing damage control for Shambhala by inventing stuff. Pardon, but there have been a lot of trolls on this page lately, making an appearance to do some gaslighting, etc., and then disappearing just as quickly as they appeared. Hoping you're not one of them, as I've never seen you before...

You say he "definitely" "could almost certainly be characterized" as being "what could be" "back in" with Shambhala only a year before he died, and also that you know nothing of him ever having left in the first place. Hm.

I'm not familiar with any back "in-ness" with Shambhala on Ginsberg's part, nor is anyone else I know (authors of biographies of the man included). Would you be able to substantiate what you say? Ginsberg died in '97, a scant year after you say something...happened(?). Nothing I've heard or read suggests Ginsberg supported the Sakyong--indeed, by the time the Sakyong was installed, Ginsberg had only a few years left to live. It *is* a fact that Ginsberg was a member of Jewel Heart at the end of his life, and this is documented in biographies (like Barry Miles' biography); in addition, there are members of the sangha who tell personal stories of Ginsberg being at Jewel Heart retreats, sangha meetings, and so forth. (I've met some of these members personally.) Allen Ginsberg is known to have done Jewel Heart fundraisers with his friend Phillip Glass (also a JH member and American composer, and the person who introduced Ginsberg to Gelek Rimpoche). Ginsberg also lay on his deathbed wearing a Jewel Heart t-shirt, surrounded by chanting Tibetan monks, which I assume would have been connected with Jewel Heart, since the Gelugkpa sect (of which Gelek Rimpoche is a member) are known for their monastics, and there weren't really any monastics in Shambhala--still aren't. These details and more can be found, again, in the Miles biography, among others. Incidentally, the Miles bio can be found here: https://www.amazon.com/Allen-Ginsberg-Biography-Barry-Miles/dp/0753504863

I don’t think enlightenment is a useful word. Enlightenment implies that there is a goal with a permanent fixed state and fixed characteristics, and that’s the opposite of the experience that the word is intended to point to, at least in my opinion. Human nature tends to bring things to a fixed concept so we can understand it, and we use language to do it. The Stuff of Thought by Steven Pinker is a book I’ve recently started reading on this topic.

I have personally found a way of being in relationship to my own life that cannot be adequately put into words and has no logical or practical utility. I’ve come to understand that everyone has the potential to experience life this way, in the same way that I've come to know that everyone has the potential to experience love. It wasn't from listening to a love song, reading about love in a book, or from being told about love by my parents. It was from simply experiencing it. And experiencing love certainly doesn't make me special.

A very related note is the well documented link between dislocation and addiction, especially alcohol addiction. Bruce Alexander first noted this and documented first in a paper and then in a full book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Globalization-Addiction-Poverty-Spirit/dp/0199588716/ Of course there's trauma behind addiction.

I mention this because Chogyam Trungpa was forcibly displaced from his home and culture. He didn't join the Tibetan communities in exile in India, so despite having many social connections didn't have much personal support from equals and those from his own culture. He was an alcoholic. I think that's connected.

Dislocation has been normalized now - we regularly say goodbye to family and friends to go off to study and work. But it has a strong effect, and I think has contributed to people not knowing what a real community is.

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Despite CTR being a charismatic and gifted teacher, it's clear he had addiction (and trauma) issues. And that's part of the foundation of what created Shambhala. There have been no leaders of Shambhala that didn't have them. Like attracts like. Says something about who's drawn to Shambhala. And it's created a culture such that those dark places behind addiction have been made hard to talk about in the community.

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>I would be interested to hear from people here who were around between 1985-87. Was it known that he was married to these women?

I still don't know that. Are you sure he officially married them? That seems to be a word that people prefer to use in order to cast an immoral light on the situation. But I never heard the word "married" about sangyums before this group. I know that at least one of them said it wasn't sexual. I remember hearing that he was taking a number of consorts, who would, in turn, have a great deal of authority. That's not the same as marriage. I didn't know what to make of it. The only comparison I can think of is Gurdjieff's "rope", which I mentioned in another thread.

https://www.amazon.com/Undiscovered-Country-Spiritual-Kathryn-Hulme/dp/0955909082

So yes, it was known. But personally I was unable to find out much. I'd never heard any of the names. They seem to have all been young women who were either new or were children of practitioners. If you search you can find articles and news about the sangyums. It wasn't a secret. And later they seemed to take a more public role. I can think of a couple of things I've seen over the years, though I can't remember where I saw these. Maybe someone else will recognize them:

1. I remember seeing an article by Agnes Au. Shambhala Sun? I'm not sure. To me it read like a childish celebration of femininity. The kind of thing a 13-year-old who loves unicorns might write. But she had a husband and at least one child. I don't know what to make of that. But Shambhala Sun and Kalapa Journal both seemed to be prone to printing a fair amount of nonsense in the guise of "upliftedness" or "some sense of elegance" pep talks.
   
   
2. One of them had an interview, I think. I don't remember which one. She recounted how, at some kind of gathering, CTR was saying that the sangyums had authority over everyone. The Regent then said, "Except me." CTR responded that they had authority higher than the Regent, too. The sangyum in the interview said she felt awkward with the exchange because she had been babysitting for the Regent.
   
   That was my memory of the whole thing. I didn't know a lot. I didn't care a lot. I was a bit confused by the rumor that these young, new practitioners apparently had more authority than the board of directors. But odd news was not odd in those days.
   
   As for Leslie Hays, I'll have to wait until she gets herself a real website. I don't use Facebook and have all of their URLs in my HOSTS file. (Which is to say that no software on my computer can possibly reach Facebook. And that's the way I like it, since their spyware web bugs are on most commercial webpages.)

In case others aren't aware of the book Fallout," by Tahlia Newland (ex Rigpa) - I read it recently and found it very grounding for my own process. Now that I've been out of Shambhala for a few months, I seem riveted to following this sub and other outlets providing updates and reflections, apparently needing to work through my own painful reckoning over having been involved at all. I was never "all in" with sham, stopped before taking any vows, felt always at the margins, so I'm a bit surprised and curious that it's become such a thing for me. Like, what's up with that? Reading "Fallout" helped in that it describes a support group process that was formed in the aftermath of Rigpa revelations that seemed to be very helpful for those involved. It also seems that perhaps Rigpa had people at "higher" levels of the org who have been able to band together and support each other in a way that seems elusive for ex-sham folks.

I agree with the perspective now developing that Tibetan Buddhism is inherently problematic for all the reasons stated by others. Hopeful that we are learning things that will contribute to the larger efforts to acknowledge and respond effectively to abuse that is being enabled and excused by systems of all kinds.

I share the desire to warn about sham and the frustration over not knowing how to contribute to that effort, btw.

https://smile.amazon.com/Fallout-Recovering-Abuse-Tibetan-Buddhism/dp/0648513041/ref=sr_1_1?crid=24G9V6JPODYXF&keywords=fallout+newland&qid=1566944243&s=books&sprefix=fallout+newland%2Caps%2C219&sr=1-1

>you might want to look in to the history of John Welwood and understand the influence of Chogyam Trungpa on him, and on his conception of spiritual bypassing.

Yes John's book on SB is great! I have the audible version and find myself going back to it on a regular basis.

Spiritual Bypassing: When Spirituality Disconnects Us from What Really Matters

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https://www.amazon.com/Spiritual-Bypassing-Spirituality-Disconnects-Matters-ebook/dp/B003WUYPJC

Check out this book The Truth of Suffering and the Path of Liberation

It covers Chogyam's teachings on the Four Noble Truths in depth, touches on the 8-fold Noble Path but with less emphasis. A really good read.

You might enjoy this book by Ronald Davidson,

https://www.amazon.com/Indian-Esoteric-Buddhism-History-Movement/dp/8120819918

He discusses the origin of vajrayana buddhism in relation to the social and political movements going on in India during that time (700's to early 1000's). Sort of the gist of it is that the layout of the mandalas used in sadhanas was a reflection of the changing social order which was arising out of the social chaos -- if I understood correctly, strong central governments had fallen into a more chaotic state of fighting militias and smaller feudal kingdoms. I don't really have the scholastic background to judge the accuracy of his analysis, but it is pretty interesting.

In 1969 On Death And Dying by Dr Elisabeth Kübler-Ross started an industry. In 74 I picked up this little beauty.” American Book Of The Dead.” A western oriented manual by noted artist and legend EJ Gold. Now in 1964 this came out and it was a big deal https://www.amazon.com/Psychedelic-Experience-Tibetan-Citadel-Underground/dp/0806516526. I guess though that Carl Jung would have published popular material even earlier.
Got to be a interesting process for those guys in the Bardo