One of the challenges of progress on a spiritual path is the falling away of what has unfolded. In other words, our apparent gains can be lost again. Several times.
Yet surrender remains a key part of the process. We have to be willing to release the old so the new can arise. Then what is of value in the old can be restored in the new context. This means nothing is ever really lost but does have to be released periodically. Having vs Holding.
One of the big places this happens is with the stage changes themselves. While development of clarity (sattva) is progressive, when a shift in consciousness itself takes place, the context of self and experience changes. With it, all of our perception does too.
For example, if we happen to have had significant refined perception prior to waking, Self Realization itself will toss that all on the back-burner. As the shift is integrated, it will come back again. But depending on the dominant guna, it may come back as illusory.
The subjective experience of the various shifts can vary widely for a number of reasons. My point is that sometimes our history of perception falls away for a time with a shift. It can then arise again in the new context and be reintegrated.
Part of the Unity shift is surrendering Self Realization and whatever value of God Consciousness that had arisen. Same again with the Brahman shift. We have to surrender our enlightenment to transcend it. It is common for Brahman to arise in 2 stages: the first dominated more by the enlightenment that has fallen away than what is here now.
However, once Brahman is established, we have completed the stages of development in consciousness itself. We have even transcended consciousness. Hereafter, the development is on the clarity side, the refinement.
What this means is we no longer have to let go of the divine to continue. In Brahman, we’re finally in a place to know the true nature of the divine. And to have an eternal “connection”, no longer disturbed by growth.
But this does not mean surrender ends. It is in surrendering our relationship with divinity that the relationship itself becomes a surrender. Only then can we meet the eternal divine as that is it’s very nature, a perpetual surrender.
Davidya
Last Updated on June 16, 2016 by
Thank you, David. Right – the mind, even in its infinite cosmic momentum, is always satisfied, staying out of the way, that the surrender perpetually continues.
And yet, as you say, all of the dynamics of consciousness are now available [in Brahman]. There is no longer a gap to get from any A to any B, be it a molecular or cosmic or emotional or mental or time or space or consciousness gap – the knowledge comes, sometimes with a wait, and the bridge appears. For anything, and for everything. An endless journey literally as rich as anything we can imagine.
It is an exciting time – I ask myself, within the parameters of infinite surrender and the context of my personality, how can the use of the body and the mind be amplified through action, as to bring maximum benefit and enjoyment to all? 🙂
Thanks, Jim. Well put.
“Yet surrender remains a key part of the process. We have to be willing to release the old so the new can arise”
Surrender is confusing to me (as a yet unsurrendered being) … Namely, is it something that can be ‘done’, or is it something that is done unto, by the force that some call ‘grace’? (The latter is my current, mental-only understanding). Hope this question is clear …
Thanks David
Hi Amaryllis
Yes, surrender is a tricky one – certainly not something the mind can “figure out”. It is not something we do. Rather it is allowing, letting go, releasing. It is not a force (as that is a doing/ energy) but a relaxing.
Grace is always there. When we allow, we get out of the way of it.
But this isn’t blind faith. That comes out of mind’s beliefs. Surrender is being able to discriminate our higher nature and letting that come through. We’re letting go of our clinging to our lower nature.
Neither is it subjugation. That’s about control, the way to the dark side, Luke.
If you see a right vs wrong dynamic, then it’s ego and judgement at play. If you see a light vs dark/shadow dynamic, then you know it’s higher vs lower.
Ego doesn’t understand light, just right.