FROM A SITE VISITOR: After 2 years of putting thousands of thoughts and concepts that were rising in what I then described as "My Mind" up against the question, "Is That True"? I started to become aware (none of how I am saying this is quite true, but language is by nature separating, I am seeing....) that nothing was true, and what I am NOT was clear. And now even what I appear to be, and what the world appears to be is okey dokey too, i just don't believe it anymore!
Anyway, my question is this. [The visitor at this point described her involvement in a quasi-spiritual religious group and revealed that she is beginning to question her attachment.] She continued:
Ego is really clinging here and I would love to hear your response to this. I googled [certain topics] and there you were! I am not a student of Advaita, but after this "experience" i describe above, I was given a book on advaita and it MATCHED totally with this awareness, now aware of itself, in this space here. So strange to try and language this. Coming from no spiritual path, I am finding language very limiting. PS: Loving your blog. "My" head just nodding, YES YES YES as I read and recognize truth. L.L.
F.: [Continued from yesterday] Note in the visitor’s e-mail how she shares the most critical prerequisite, the indisputable requirement, for breaking free of the hold of personas and beliefs that accompany fixation at the third step of the seven-step “journey” to Realization:
At the third step—the religious and/or spiritual step—no shift to the next step can happen unless it is asked, as she has asked, “Is That True?” Notice, too, in her e-mail that it was only after she began applying that question to each of her beliefs and ideas and concepts could she say, “I started to become aware….”
Few, however, will ever have the courage to ask that question because they are so deeply attached to their supposedly “good” personas that are supported by unquestioned beliefs; thus, it can be seen that the adoption of “good” personas actually proves to be a hindrance to continuing and completing the “journey.” Why?
(1) Because those who are convinced that their current practices and their cherished beliefs have made them “good persons” will not seek any further; and (2) because those who are sure that they have “gotten it” will be assured they need not question anything anymore and that they need not search for anything anymore.
In fact, they will be assured by their programmers that to so much as question any of an organization’s concepts and ideas and beliefs will guarantee disaster, just as religious programmers will assure their members that questioning any of their concepts or ideas or beliefs will guarantee eternal punishment.
That “Aye Aye, Sir!” mentality keeps persons fixed in the ignorance that results from a refusal to question the most nonsensical teachings and will assure that darkness will continue until the end of that manifestation.
If the words of the visitor quoted above had indicated that she was at the body identification stage, then pointers would have been offered to provide an opportunity to shift to the second stage. In her case, however, it was determined that she is at the third of the seven steps.
Thus, the suggestions that were offered were presented as an invitation for her to consider a shift to the fourth level. (She will be reading FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE as a guide to that fourth step, and then possibly beyond.) Part of the response to the initial e-mail follows]
F.: Hello. On the “journey”—which is a journey to nowhere since You Are where you have been trying to be and since You Already Are That Which You have been seeking—the terms “path” or “journey” are only used for the sake of pointing the way to Realization via seven steps that can shift you from identifying with the false “I” to abiding as the Absolute.
The third phase on the path is the spiritual or religious step. That is where [such religious and spiritual groups] can get you, but that is also where they will cause you to fixate. The third step is required, but it is not the end of the journey, contrary to what “they” will tell you.
What happens to persons who [join such religious or spiritual groups] is this:
1. Old personas that you were told were “bad” are merely replaced with new personas that you are told are “good”: “The Helper,” “The One Serving Others,” “The Spiritual Woman” or “The Religious Woman” or both, etc.
2. Old programming is replaced with new programming but neither reveals truth—both are sources of concepts and lies that are not based in Reality.
While 95%+ do not stay for even five years in such programs or groups as you’ve mentioned, for many it becomes their new monomania, there entire life. Some few others might eventually ask, “Is this all there is?” Maybe you are approaching that place?
Some see that the third step cannot be all there is. A few will complete the “journey” to Full Realization. I would never suggest to anyone that they should do this or should not do that.
The invitation instead is to question—which you are doing—and to see if indeed there is more than you've found so far and to see if what you have been told so far is really true. Eventually, if you complete all seven steps to The Great Reality, you will find that for a time you get “the more, the rest.”
Later, you might find that you “get” the Nothingness. You have likely worn yourself out by accumulating. Maybe de-accumulation can prove to be a more peaceful alternative. You are finding all that you are not. When you know all that you are not, then That Which You Truly Are will spring into awareness. Peace and Light, f.
THE VISITOR’S RESPONSE: Spectacular! Yes! All I was seeing was Ego's rebuilding new Egos that they found more acceptable....nothing internal. It was seeming crazy to me. I will take these thoughts I am attaching to into inquiry and they will be undone as the others have.
So simple. It is shocking to me that it was unseen before, but alas, it is sweet today to stop the rebuilding of self. Oh, and this 7 steps, I will read more about that on your website, as I am unravelling and sometimes feel "unguided", and that too is just a thought.
I love that you are in the world, Floyd and thank you again so much. Your words had me laughing out loud as they matched what I could not yet seem to articulate. Glad to get your books, too.
Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be concluded tomorrow)
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