The Myth:Awakening is a shift of perception, a mental-emotional acrobatic that leaves one refreshingly peaceful and delightfully uninvested in personal identity, but that has no impact whatsoever on the physical body.

The Truth: Awakening is a radical of shift of identity that leaves one refreshingly peaceful and delightfully uninvested in personal identity, but that has profound impact on the body (and ultimately requires collaboration of the body).

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A spirited controversy erupted this week over spiritual teacher Igor Kufayev’s commentary on his Facebook page (then reposted by Rick Archer at Buddha at the Gas Pump’s FB Page) about neo-advaita teacher Adyashanti’s most recent bout of a chronic illness that apparently emerged in the years after his awakening. In a nutshell, Igor Kufayev suggested that Adyashanti’s recent relapse of Bell’s Palsy was a part of a larger picture–that of the toll of post-awakening energies on the body.

Wrote Kufayev: “What…