Glass Yogis


Subject: Glass Yogis
From: Benjamin Samuels (madhava@sprynet.com)
Date: Wed Apr 12 2000 - 22:57:19 EDT


Interesting post, Bruce. Thanks for pointing me towards some interesting
discussion that took place before this banafish egg hatched. Seems some of
the topics really do go around and around like fish in bowl. Cecelia's post
that your message is in response to is familiiar to me as a perspective I
tried, with less success, to elaborate on when I joined. So let me take a
crack at answering some of the points you raise here.

> I don't think Yogic Philosophy or Advaita Vedanta or Homeopathy is the key
> to the Glass Family.
>
>
> I don't think Seymour rejects everything else (and everyone else) to try
to
> advance toward enlightenment.
>
>
> I don't think Seymour switches from one form of yoga to another like so
many
> brands of vitamins. I even don't think _he_ would assert he was following
> any particular form of yoga at any particular time. (The idea that he
> married Muriel to advance toward Go! on the Monopoly Board of
Enlightenment
> really seems a stretch.)

This mostly seems reaction against using the ideas in yoga philosophy to
understand the Glass Families. More fairly, maybe it was rection directed
towards certain excited voices. Yoga philosophy is a powerful mode of
thinking, one that Salinger was obviously quite influenced by. What is
meant by the *key* is a bit fuzzy of course, but should there be such an
unlikely thing except in our overexcited and joyful imaginations Yoga has
some good qualificatios for nomination. You say that you don't think
Seymour would consider himself a follower of yoga but I disagree. I think
Seymour would understand the yogic story of life and reflect regularly on
what spiritual progress he is making. I think he would be quite familliar
with all the vitamins and perhaps even take some, whether as a regular part
of his diet or not, and with what other dietary supplements you might have
to consult with his homeopothist to find out. I'm sure even his marriage to
muriel would have at some time or another crossed paths in his mind with his
conception of himself as a yogi.

In my travels through the archives I also noticed this posting made in the
same discussion by Scottie:

> I think yogic philosophy must obey the same sort of rule as faith
> in socialism. Anyone failing to respond to it at twenty has
> no imagination. Anyone still stuck with it at forty has gone mad.

As a yogi in my early 20's with definite signs of madness already setting in
I'm quite curious to hear more from him about this. What is it on the other
side that may still save me from this insipent madness?

Love,
Madhava

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