You Can't Manifest Spirituality | On the Spiritual Nihilism of Richard Bach
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- Опубліковано 27 вер 2024
- "Illusions" presents one of the worst versions of toxic spirituality in the last 50 years. It's where the law of attraction crashes into the cult of irresponsibility. The fact that 15 million people have been duped by Richard Bach's nihilistic spirituality is a sign of how far our understanding of ethics and spirituality still needs to come.
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You may not understand in this lifetime but maybe, just maybe, you will pick this book back up in the future and suddenly have an epiphany. Until then try One, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, or The Bridge Across Forever. Richard Bach has changed a lot of peoples lives. You may be a smart and worthy person, but I think I will stick with the fictional character.
“If you will practice being fictional for a while, you will understand that fictional characters are sometimes more real than people with bodies and heartbeats.”
― Richard Bach, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah
WTF - I can't remember why I subscribed to your channel, obviously I thought you said something worth subscribing. The reason it sold millions and millions of copies is because it's an extraordinary book. It is fiction of course. If you truly dive deep into the nature of reality, we know next to nothing! We are on a ball in the middle of outer space and we don't know how we got here. Some become religious. Some become agonistic and others something in-between. All we really have are recipes. If you do x + y + z you get a computer, or car, or whatever. We really don't understand anything. We could be inside a virtual reality story, who knows. Most of the important questions become unfalsifiable. Illusions by Richard Bach, makes you question reality. Yes, books like the "Secret" have lots of problems. But whenever you read something or listen to it , you need to do your best to extract the important pieces. The placebo effect is absolutely mind blowing. Science is still trying to understand it. We have powerful minds. Some stuff you are going to hear is BS. Learning how to sift through the deluge of information to find the truth is one of the most important skills we can acquire.
Illusions by Richard Bach, it's a must read. Also, Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert A. Heinlein. Two of my favorite books ❤
I prefer absurdism myself. I'm free to believe the fact of my existence is absurd and meaningless, but I still follow my own moral code, which includes most of the rules which society has created.
“Amen”
I agree with this in general. I also think it's important not to hurt people. This book explicitly rejects that.
@@etiennetaylor 😂
A lot of the philosophies that emerged from 60s-70s' counterculture are very selfish and bleak---despite a positive, liberatory surface. "The Dice Man" by Luke Rhinehart is another example of a less spiritual "anything goes" philosophy. And then there was Burroughs and his bastardised quote "Nothing is real, everything is permitted."
The timing of your video is crazy for me. I read this book 15 years ago when I was in college and remembered really liking the idea behind the book but being disappointed overall but at this point I didn't remember why.
Fast forward to yesterday afternoon; I was going through my bookshelf to clean it out, came across this book, and on a whim decided to re-read it. It's very short, I could read it in one sitting, and again, I liked the idea of it and wanted to see how I felt about it at this point in life. I read it last night and I gave a real effort to see the point of what he was saying, tried to make sure I wasn't being closed minded or missing something, but ultimately it just felt really out of touch.
I wondered what other people thought about it so searched around for some reviews, then the algorithm served up your video in my UA-cam feed. I agree with a lot of what you had to say about this book. Personally, more than anything, I just feel disappointed in it. As a work of fiction this book could've been good, but it's overly preachy and too tough to separate its message from the fact that it's just a work of fiction.
That reminded of another book I thought was done really well which also could've been overly preachy but wasn't, Gilead by Marilynne Robinson. It's written as a message from a dying preacher, who is an elderly father, to his young son to help him remember him. The premise of that is really simple but it does seem like if anything it sets it up to be overly preachy but it doesn't feel like that at any point in the book. It's moving, complex, honest, funny at times, and deeply compassionate. Illusions is a few things but one thing it is definitely not is compassionate, and if you're writing this kind of book and you fail at that as badly as this book does, you've missed the mark.
I don't think I have come across your channel before but it looks like you've got some interesting stuff to check out, I've subscribed and I'm looking forward to catching up on some of it!
Thanks for tuning in. I am now wondering about other books I read in college. I remember Ishmael being hugely influential on me in my teens. I bet if I looked at it again now I'd be disappointed.
The therapeutic term for this kind of move is "spiritual bypass." I read Bach's book as a teenager and found it refreshing as an imaginative exercise, but ultimately less persuasive than Christian teaching (which bothered me in many ways)-- at least the bizarre concepts of the latter (3 = 1) still kept at their heart the idea that a real injustice, a real suffering (not Jesus pretending to suffer) HAPPENED. So much spiritual bypass occurs by denying real suffering and real injustice in the name of "inspiration" and "enlightenment," because accepting the role of attitude and belief usually ferments into the intoxicating idea that EVERYTHING is attitude (The Secret) and I am in complete control of events.
Thank you. That's what put me off the law of attraction, the selfishness and materialism thinly veiled in spirituality. I remember thinking that if I can manifest someone to fall in love with me, what if the other person manifests a different love? Or simply doesn't want to love me? Do they have a say?
Also when I came across the law of attraction I was mature enough to realise that some good things came to my life through difficulties. If I could, I would manifest those difficulties away but then I would have never experienced those good things.
Wow, man, it's been a long time coming, to finally see true Journalism hitting prominent figures on the net who just honestly need to be held accountable for what they say, where they get their data from, how they get it, etc. Thank-you so much for doing this, Scott!
Loved that book
As a kid in the 70's/80's - on military bases surrounded by evangelicals, Illusions actually was the first thing that got me out of that box. Some of it now fits with the output of the online "New Age BS Generator" tool, quite fun if you've never seen it. But --- a fact surpassing simple cynicism, you don't have to worry about the 15 million folks duped. They are dying off. Folks under 25 *do not* read anything longer than articles anymore. Period. And again . . . period. R.Bach won't get new converts.
Surprisingly not true I am 23 and work with lots of college age kids and multiple of them have told me they like to read for fun, and some of them bring books in the break room. A lot of them do use audio books however, like my brother listens to audio books at work and he is 26
I'm glad they haven't given up on books.
@Observer_Effect Good comment! My experience was very similar to yours! I read it the summer after I graduated from HS, when I felt very lost, and it gave me inspiration beyond what the childhood religion I was outgrowing could offer me. Sure, Illusions is mostly new age gunk to me now and it's good to call out its bs, because it can often set people astray. But maybe, MAYBE, there's something to be said about bad-messaging that can get you out of worse-messaging.
... until they get older.... such myopic thinking
The way you speak about this could lead one to think you didn't know this was a work of fiction. If you're really attacking a piece of fiction for the ideas it contains, you're on your way to crazytown.
People treat the "spiritual lessons" as non-fiction. That's a huge problem.
@sgcarney Sure, but that isn't an indictment on the book. If the majority of the world tried to extract absurd spiritual meaning from Harry Potter, are we gonna take that up with J.K. Rowling for having written an otherwise compelling but clearly fictional story?
Ha ha. This was required reading in one of my high school English classes. That was in the 80’s in public schools in Miami FL. I was a terrible student at the time so I don’t think I actually read it.
I encountered this book as I deconstructed from evangelical xtianity; it complicated and confused the journey with new age bs. Ugh. There are a million ways to be misled by "spiritual" teachers. I'm OVER it. #NoGodsNoMasters
I don't want to support the negative kick you've seemed to be on lately, but some context for this book. Illusions was published at the height of the Human Potential Movement in the '70s, and these beliefs were vanguard at the time. George Lucas was also inspired by the movement, and you can see it in the early Star Wars movies. I read Illusions in the summer of '90, after graduating high school, at a time when I felt hopelessly lost, and the easy answers of the old religion weren't doing it for me anymore. Illusions was a transition pill, giving me a new way of looking at things, when the more skeptical paradigm that later changed my thinking was not really available to me. So maybe there's something to be said for bad-messaging that gets people out of worse-messaging. I am not the only one who had this experience, either. It's like criticizing Freud because psychoanalysis still had a lot of patriarchal carryover thinking from the previous method.
Is that an excuse for Illusions? No, new age beliefs can be extremely toxic and damaging, especially because it isn't as easy to debunk when you transition away from traditional religion but are still stuck in the "Just world" theory and magical-thinking paradigm. But it is to say that maybe a more generous approach on your part is not a bad idea, because as faulty as some of the ideas in this book are, they did help millions of us. I actually happen to live fairly close to where Richard Bach now lives, and if I run into him, and it's not annoying to him, I'll ask what he now thinks about that set of beliefs, which I am sure he's at least partially changed his mind on.
P.S. Donald Shimoda wasn't shot on the head. He was shot on the chest, if memory serves.
I'm not on a negative kick. I expose the truth and sometimes that is uncomfortable for people who only want to hear affirmation. I've written a ton on the human potential movement. Also on the ancient roots of this ideology. Here's something you might enjoy: ua-cam.com/video/W8VQX1Y2_Og/v-deo.html
@@sgcarney Scott, I've been a fan for a while, the way you went after Huberman over and over seemed childish and was a turnoff, no matter how much of a douche he turned out to be. I almost unsubscribed. Then again, you'll either take the note or not, and it doesn't sound like you are. Cheers.
@@sgcarneyonly problem is, truth is relative.
Hmm. Wonder if he spent some time with the Synanon crowd.
The book teaches us about our perspectives and beliefs if you say your limited then you are everything is possible you have to believe in yourself without limitations this book is about quantum physics which is proving these theories to be true
The book is magical thinking.
@@sgcarney I agree my mentor gave me first Jonathan Livingston Seagull then illusions at 14 I didn't understand so much about then but now I do appreciate the lessons in the books
You want dangerous? Check out the Seth Material. Richard Bach was inspired by Jane Roberts’ work.
My comment was deleted 4 times: Again Your criticisms are valid and correct but aimed at the wrong place: this book just echoes old ideas from Eastern philosophies: like when Arjuna is told by Krishna that he should fight a war with detachment against his relatives because the world is a temporary illusion (what shocked so much when I was a teen).
It is only a derivative work that supports those ideas that claim to be non violent and end suffering, but they just perpetuate them blaming you as the source of your grief and pain.
How can't you feel your heart break when a child suffers, or a father suffers for the loss of their children? According to those philosophies that billions follow for thousands of years it does not matter.
It matters to me and to others too: ua-cam.com/video/kbqb4uK57Yg/v-deo.html
Hi Scott
Thanks for you amazing material. What is your opinion about the law of attraction? Is it real or just wishful thinking? Thanks
Wishful thinking. I DO think it is beneficial to have a positive outlook on things, but there is no physical law of attraction that acts like a force in the universe at large. If there were then the world would be a very different place.
@@sgcarney Check out the work of @mitchhorowitz6054
Honestly I think new age bullshit really had a detrimental effect on me up until a few years ago when I tried it enough that I finally was like nah this is all bullshit. Because for a while you try it out cause you’re like why not it seems to be fun and won’t have any side effects but it actually can for sure. Like Joseph Alai on UA-cam the manifesting teacher I think is just a total con man now he kinda reminds me of Joseph Smith. But I think he might kinda believe it actually somewhat, I’m not sure. There can be spiritual narcissists and other shit going on sometimes haha
The people who succeed in making millions selling flim flam ponzi schemes have every reason to believe that they manifested their wealth. But that doesn't mean they have superpowers, just that people love falling for false hope.
you have no idea what your talking about , I've been reading this book on and off for over 30 years. The story isn't really about religion its about doing and being who ever you want to be and to live your life in the way you want to live it. The book describes how no matter how we try to live ours lives there will be people that will never understand the way we live and will try to guide us away from our chosen path. hence what happens to Donald William Shimoda near the end of the book. If anything the book is about singular spiritualty and finding happiness and beauty in everything around us .
Wrapped in magical thinking the whole way through.
The real message is how to sell a lot of books by spilling the beans on the "wisdom" you obtained from a mysterious person. The book is a spin on gnosticism.
I don’t think that’s the essence of the book. It’s more like, u work on Theo problem that’s presented to u in this world from a more centered way. U can do that easily when u can start off with accepting reality and then taking responsibility. I think living from a place a surrender doesn’t mean u don’t take action. It’s more like, u accept and take action from a place of centeredness and not from a place of emotion. Hope it makes sense,
People get that it’s a work of FICTION, right?? Fantasy really!! Fun book about the nature of reality and the power of belief 😂 relax!!
The actual world is not as bad as people picture it in their heads. We do have some issues here and there, but overall our planet is a great place to be born.
Bit arrogant to blame the book because *_YOU_* interpreted it badly.
"Everything in this book might be wrong"
Did you miss that part?
I did not miss that part.
Limited Belief creates a block for what you want. I have been manifesting for more than 30 years based on Illusions. My bible.
See the movie The Men who Stared at Goats.
But it's fiction, right? The book is not claiming that this is the reality of our world? You must hate something like Warhammer 40k and everything in the grimm dark fantasy genre.
It's claiming that it's a parable. That it's fiction, but it's actually true.
@@sgcarney I see. I think I read this author's other parable type of self help spiritual book called kingston seagul or something. I don't remember it having any major problematic issues. It was kind of boring actually.
I can understand how these kind of books might be problematic. I was thinking you were one of those guys who thinks George R R Martin is promoting incest through his books.
Actually, "Johnathan Livingston Seagull." The author was raised in a religion called Christian Science that teaches that each of us can perform the miracles and healing by Jesus from the Bible. I was also raised in that religion, but am now an agnostic atheist
Man, I'm glad I'm not the only one that hates that book.
This video isn’t related to ‘investigative journalism’, it is your opinion and that’s all it is. We all have opinions of books we read and they may differ. Let’s just throw that out there…. 🤔
Ok. But it’s my channel. So I can put what I want on it.
This book broke me out of an oppressive Christian cult. It isn't a perfect book, obviously, but the line "everything in this book might be wrong" led me to question what other books were wrong. The idea that we could make any choice at any time was a revolution for me. I will forever be grateful for it, flaws and all.
There's no such thing as a dangerous book. There are, however, idiots that will interpret a neutral book dangerously.
I disagree with you completely. I read this book as a powerful argument for materialism against idealism and spirituality exactly because the spiritual nihilism makes you bad, unlikable and completely removed from empathy. In the shop with the guitar, the messiah played the most beautiful music, but didn't care, because anyone can do that, when people came for his help he didn't care, because anyone could help, and when he died, he didn't care because it ultimately didn't matter. The message is to realise that the teachings of the messiah sets you free from everything wonderful in life
After over 24 years of assessments and evaluations of abusers, drug addicts, repeat criminals, etc., zero have mentioned this "dangerous" book. Personally, I enjoyed it.
I don't think I claimed this book would make someone an abuser, drug addict or repeat criminal.
He's the Jonathan Livingston Seagull dude isn't he? I never liked that tho don't recall why.
He's the one.
Today Carney takes fiction way too seriously. Kidding aside, I haven't read it. So, have no opinion on it. Do find it funny you reject delusion whilst promoting the idea of placebo. An aside, our senses lead to perceptions, and they're faulty. As such, the majority of what people think is false. I don't just mean auditory or visual hallucinations which we all have. Nor do I mean cognitive distortions which we again all have. What I mean is that our perceptions of ourselves and the world around us are entirely made up in our very own heads.
What's in our conscious heads that is, is not the real world.
Justices does matter. I get that. But part of what you stated bothers me as it's very hypercritical. Am I to call you a bad person because you unknowingly caused the deaths of thousands? By simply engaging with the technology you have, you have caused death. You've also contributed to slavery and far worse. Which gets back to the argument in which you pulled from Mr. Bach. You're doing the same thing, but have yet to realize it.
Anyway, hope you're doing well brother.
Thanks. Feel free to read by piece on the placebo effect. Also, did I cause the deaths of thousands? Facts are hard to gather, but they DO matter. That's what this channel is about.
@@sgcarney There's a part of a debate from The Institute of Art and Ideas titled "Is our perception intrinsically biased? | Daniel Kahneman, Ellen Langer, Hilary Lawson debate" related to this.
Would take too long to defend my argument here.
Hi. First of all I just wanted to commend you on your work on the whole nutritional Snake Oil Cartel. Really glad someone is out there really asking the right questions. You kinda know you’re on the right path when those who are asked refuse to answer.
That said, I think you are right to say that Bach’s work should NOT be taken literally. But I believe it is positive if taken as metaphor, just like his book about talking seagulls. I think Joseph Campbell once said some people tend to call other people’s religion “mythology” and that the mythology one chooses to believe is called “religion”. All of it looked at this way can be quite powerful and beautiful. Like watching an eclipse. If you stare straight at it you will go blind. But if you poke a little hole in a piece of cardboard and look at it that way, I guess all you can say is Wow. Best wishes and keep going! Slow and steady…
Another comment you don't think creation is magical life is a 2 dimensional reality for you
In the book he doesn't walk through walls or through the earth and anyway why criticism if you can write a better book and sell more copies then do so
This book came out when I was in college. I was not impressed. For reasons that escape me now, I did enjoy Jonathan Livingston Seagull.
I guess I need to read that one too.
@@sgcarney A better source of wisdom is The Daily Stoic by Holiday and Hanseman.
Read- see A.Watts or Theo Fishers' WuWei..and become justamente only * normal*. 😁🤣🤭😏😉
in relationships it takes two to tango. If one goes back to the cheater you had it coming. Oh and most men cheat if given the opportunity.
Private life is private life. Dr Ronda P. is a colleague and is not going to be rude or disrespectful to him or anyone.
She asked questions and he answered.
You are not qualified to interview scientists about science and research because you are not a subject expert. Your questions would be at a science 100 level and it would not be educational to anyone.
Ag1 (is that the name) just read the label and be an educated consumer. AG 1 is not the only useless supplement on the market that is endorsed by scientists or doctors.
As a journalist you already made up your mind of who he is - you don’t need to tell me you knew him, what am I supposed to do with that information? oh…I see….you want me to be bias.
My two cents, keep your emotions out, your personal experience with him out. Let the viewer form their own opinion. Good luck with your channel!
“Oh, and most men cheat if given the opportunity”…… you speak for own experiences and warped view on relationships. I am a man and I don’t and have never cheated. It’s called having a moral compass 🧭
Jonathon Livingston seagull is about my most favorite book ever. ❤ I didn’t like his others much. The placebo effect is interesting, it does suggest the power of the mind is underestimated. You know about the fake knee surgery, right? It pretty much changed things as it proved that surgery didn’t work any better than the placebo.
I just did a whole newsletter on the placebo effect. IT was sham back surgery, not knee surgery that was studied extensively.
@@sgcarney I didn’t know about the back surgery. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12110735/ is the study on the knee one. I need your newsletter. I will click your link and try find it.
Or you can read it as a satirical look at spiritualism, which I did at the ripe old age of 15 decades ago.
I love this book, it's hilarious.
taken that way then you are all good. I don't believe that was the author's intent, however. (I feel the same way about the movie CATS!)
Christians: Only we have the true understanding and faith to see the Truth in the world!
Also Christians: Somebody said something different from what I believe! It's dangerous and the Truth is under attack!
I am free to make whatever decisions I wish *and so is everyone else*. I could choose to abandon my responsibilities, but then I'd probably be homeless pretty soon, and my kids wouldn't have a safe place to sleep and food to eat. Our choices reveal our values.
Extra thoughts for the Christians:
The Master in the story deals with some of the same Catch-22 Jesus dealt with. Yes, He could heal wounds and sickness and do other miracles, but that was FAR less important than the words and concepts he had to share. I first thought about that while watching The Chosen, and was amused to see it pop up in this book, too.
Jesus chose to spend his life traveling around as a homeless man with some close friends. He was not "responsible", and aren't we supposed to be like Him? =P
So, this is what happened when Huberman rejected you for a relationship. Commenting on fairy tales ....
What fable are you living in?