If you’ve been exploring spiritual circles for any period of time, you may get a little tired of hearing words like “unity”, “enlightenment”, and “oneness”. Ideas like “awareness” and “existence”. Not to mention all the oft-used superlatives like “extraordinary” and “astonishing”. The list goes on and on. Pick the theme of most posts on this blog. (laughs)
In “Questioning the Common Phrase“, Takuin explores why he questions such terms. How a person may be well read and have mastered the concepts of being one. But how that must be questioned and cast aside for one to actually be it.
Thinking “I am One” has NOTHING to do with being it. As I’ve outlined elsewhere, true oneness is several states of consciousness removed from an ego-driven state. It cannot even be comprehended by the mind as it is transcends even the mind of God.
One of the things that can motivate a review is concept fatigue. We reach a point where we begin to see through the ideas and reject them. We begin to outgrow the teaching we have so carefully studied. If we don’t see that right away, that old seekers restlessness arises and we tire of what once inspired us.
At that point, some people will step off the quest. They’ll find it pointless and let it go. Perhaps take a sabbatical. Or seek a better teaching. A few turn quite negative about the whole thing. But some will catch the drift of where it’s going. That there is something deeper to spirituality than a bunch of ideas, however enticing a teacher or teaching is.
That’s when some real magic can happen. Not being held so much any more, our house of cards can really crumble. Inquiry can go very deep.
While words can point you in the direction of what is true, in the end all of us must see for ourselves. But we have to look without glasses.
Davidya
Amazing, extraordinary stuff that is consciousness-raising, awareness-increasing, and leads to unity, oneness, and enlightenment. Haha!
But seriously, another good post. Knowing about something is different from living/being it, and not many people can make this distinction.
This post really sings to me. Thank you Davidya. 🙂
It’s interesting, at least on the level of mind, to see where people go at this point, forking off into a new direction. There are definitely a number of new paths that can be taken.
It seems that the magic you speak about has to do with a deeper falling away of mind and all our collected concepts, leaving us utterly empty of what understandings we used to cling to. It is this loss that is of tremendous gain…
The stinking Zen spreads.
Hi Albert
Yes, when you live in the mind as most people do, the idea of something that’s not a mind construct is a foreign idea. And an idea is another construct, which illustrates how it loops back on itself. (laughs)
Hi Ariel
Yes. I was reading someones waking process recently. They went through a whole monk thing, living in a group. Found themselves stuck and fell away from that and into another teaching around inquiry. That took them to a place where they could let go.
My own process was somewhat similar. Many years of meditation took care of much of the baggage. Roasted the seeds as it were. But it took a different kind of looking to take care of the sprouted stuff. To finish the job.
Well, it’s not so much that we necessarily completely empty it all out. Only that the grip the concepts held are loosened enough that we’re able to take a step back and see with new eyes. But yes, that loss turns out to be a major gain.
It’s one of the curious things about the path. Over and over we find we have to let something go. Give it up. Then what moves in to replace it trumps it exponentially.
We give up concepts for wisdom, ego for freedom, a story for bliss, pain for love, identity for unity.
Ooh – that stinking Zen. pee-eww. (laughs)
Not thinking about anything is Zen.
Thinking about Zen is stinking Zen.
Or am I being a stinker?
This is a great post, thanks.
The self went through all these stages to get nowhere; There is a moment of total giving up, total end of seeking, total knowing that nothing the I does can ever make any difference.
No theory in the world, no worldy knowledge can teach that. There is no you to be taught.
Chronic concept fatigue arises and the importance the ego thought it had in all this drops away.
x
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Hi Lune
Thanks for your thoughts.
Love the writing style and your blog. The name suits you, though in the curious way of the space, what is it that is suited? (pun intended, after the fact)
The blog without a name on the pathless path, writing what wants to be written…
Thanks for your compliments, when there was a personality who thought it had a say in these things, it could not decide on a name for its writings, so it did not give it a name.
Quite funny really,
in light,
Lune x
Yes, it is all very amusing.
When there was no longer anything with a name, my friends were amused by coming up with a new name. Fortunately, they lacked imagination and nothing stuck. (laughs)
The whole thing has a great sense of humor.