So i guess everyone is leaving..?

Avalonslight wrote: Tella, you and I aren't going to agree on the point of banning people over disagreements, so let's not bother with trying to pretend like we will. It'll make both our lives easier, I promise.

I stand by my statement. Banning people over disagreements - however they're presented - isn't appropriate at this juncture. It's just my opinion, my two cents. Feel free to have your own, but there's no need to comment on mine.

I think that's because we disagree that its a ban on a disagreement, you believe its not appropriate to ban when someone disagrees, I feel that its appropriate when someone does it in a verbally offensive matter, not when they disagree peacefully. I agree they shouldn't be banned if they disagree peacefully.

Nami wrote:

Tellahane wrote: In what way are you feeling neglected specifically. What need of yours is not being met?

Well, we're left in the dark having to fend for ourselves. We are led to believe this place is going up in flames. This is supposed to be a church, a sanctuary. Right now, it's not. The new members aren't being talked to or helped. The novices aren't getting any help. Our spiritual needs aren't being met. All we've been told to do is shut up and wait. How are we supposed to be patient when we've been given no reason to have faith?

1. Stop listening to the rumors gossip is bad for your health in general no matter where you go.
2. The IP support team has never stopped working during this process if you need help with the IP I would be more then happy to assist you
3. Rosalyn and others have repeatedly offered their support of your spiritual needs in the last week or so I'm not sure again what needs aren't being met?

Nami and any other new comers,

If you have any questions, my skype and my email are in my signature. I will help as much as I can, based on the information which I have. And I'll do it as many times as anyone needs. I'm just an apprentice. I won't be able to provide all the answers. But I will do what I can.

Avalonslight wrote: Nami and any other new comers,

If you have any questions, my skype and my email are in my signature. I will help as much as I can, based on the information which I have. And I'll do it as many times as anyone needs. I'm just an apprentice. I won't be able to provide all the answers. But I will do what I can.

^ This. My contact information is in my profile. You can reach me here via pm, facebook, skype, whatever. I'm here to help.

Tellahane wrote: 1. Stop listening to the rumors gossip is bad for your health in general no matter where you go.
2. The IP support team has never stopped working during this process if you need help with the IP I would be more then happy to assist you
3. Rosalyn and others have repeatedly offered their support of your spiritual needs in the last week or so I'm not sure again what needs aren't being met?

Right, when I pm people and I don't get responses, my needs aren't being met.

I'm -not- listening to gossip. I'm saying that's literally all we have to go on.

And your list is very patronizing.

I don't want to totally derail this thread, but as a new person, I just wanted to quickly say I can echo most of what Nami has said. I may be having slightly different emotional responses to it all, but I can attest to there being lots of times what we're hearing as new people amounts to crickets chirping.

The only person who has done any direct, unsolicited, "Hey, you're new!" outreach to me at all is Brick. (Thank you, Brick!)

One person.

One.

Anyone else that I've talked to on here is because I made a point of hanging out in chat and getting to know people (I mean, other than a few replies to forum posts which were mostly people saying hi to my intro post). Everyone I met that way has certainly been friendly enough and several have been more than happy to talk to me about stuff and let me take up quite a bit of their time. I appreciate that, and I'm definitely not knocking those people like Steam and Ava who've been open to me bugging them a ton. Much love.

But the point is, if I wasn't much for hanging out in live chat and didn't make that extra effort? I'd have heard from...Brick..and no one else.

I'm not trying to say that's good/bad/whatever or I need more babysitting or look at me look at me or something. I'm just saying people need to understand that's how little direct outreach newbies are actually getting right now.

*EDIT* To be clear, by direct, unsolicited, I mean someone coming to me without me asking first by sending me a PM or messaging directly in some other way like, "Hi, welcome, here's what's going on." I don't mean someone made a forum post saying, "Message me if you have questions."

Any novices/members who read this, feel free to contact me as well.

I do my best to comment on every new person's post and acknowledge them, but I admit, sometimes people slip. I'm usually on everyday but I do have a full time job that may hinder me from getting back to you ASAP.

Like Ava, I'm just an apprentice but I am more than happy to help in any way I can!

Asakura Shoji wrote: The only person who has done any direct, unsolicited, "Hey, you're new!" outreach to me at all is Brick. (Thank you, Brick!)

No problem Shoji

I'm sad to hear that you, Nami, and other newcomers have felt a bit ignored. That's a failing on our part, and I'd like to apologies to all of you for that.

There's been an awful lot going on recently (I know everyone keeps saying that). But I'm not just talking about the arguments that you're hearing about. We've also been a little under staffed due to a couple of people stepping down from certain office's a while ago and those positions not yet being filled, our head of the welcoming party went on holiday for 2 weeks, and our membership application system was down.

As a result of all of this the Temple has kind of been running on a skeleton crew, with everyone taking on twice the workload they normally do, and so our communication and interaction with newcomers has been considerably worse than usual. I'm not trying to make excuses there, just trying to add a little context.

That being said, as Tella mentioned, the welcoming party have been issuing messages to all new accounts daily, and the IP team is still up and running.

I know Nami and I maybe didn't get off to the best of starts in our first meeting due to a little misunderstanding in one of the threads, but if you want to speak to someone Nami, then my pm box is open and I promise I will actually reply. A number of people have already reached out to me, and I've tried to help/inform as best I can

Same goes for you too Shoji, and anyone else (be they newcomer or seasoned veteran).

This isn't just a website, it's a church. It's a church that has forgotten it's a church and just focuses in the forum.

Frankly, I for one (a "newcomer" if you will) appreciate that the alleged ugliness of all this is being kept from my eyes. I don't see any value to following the rumor mill of it all, and don't expect any broad daylight fisticuffs would make any of us feel more secure or informed. If anything, it would be far more of a distraction than it already is. There have already been several related threads here in public view, each receiving 100s of posts, the bulk of which amount to speculation at best. Being remarkably interested in this Path, and mostly human, I find myself sifting through and digesting each and every unuseful post anyway, ignoring my outstanding need to set the forum aside and tackle Lesson 4 of the IP instead.

Someone created something remarkable here by founding a virtual Temple with membership in the thousands, and the value of that is clear in the passion and vested interest in the Temple's future, which this entire discussion exhibits.

He should be incredibly proud of all this. It is no small achievement. So his interest in ensuring a proper turnover in retirement is not just expected, but warranted.

In governance we do not declare a new nation-state to be viable until it has achieved three successful and peaceful transitions of power. Patience is paramount in such efforts. Airing out a full and transparent account is not.

There is not a single benefit to me, as a newcomer, to be privy to the higher level discussions in any of this, so long as at the end of it all I can login and get along with my training. If things deteriorated to the extent of a 404 Error when I hit my bookmark to come here one day, I would be sad, sure, but I could still get out of bed and function along my own Path anyway.

Even expending the energy in this post feels awkward for me. I have done so in a few other related threads before they were closed or moved out of view.

The bottom line point for me: thanks to EVERYONE involved, for it shows me that you all do care, but I won't stay up at night and speculate on what the rumors mean, for that is merely anticipating the unknowns of the future and what MIGHT be, and ignoring my opportunity in the eternal moment, NOW.

P.S. if you do not see a Lesson 4 post from me today, that is 100% on me, none of you, and I'd hope someone would notice and call me out.

Cheers