Here is another email to a friend.
I thought I’d try to pull together a lot of the things I
have said, while adding some new things to try to pull all of it together.
I’ll start off observing that it seems almost everyone who
believes their life has been turned around by a spiritual experience of almost
any type or religion asserts afterward that God was always there from the
beginning even if they had not discovered, known or experienced Him
previously. And it normally takes some sort of calamity or great
challenge to get us to dig deep enough or seemingly beyond ourselves and
uncover God and who we are in God. As such the rich man is often spared
the calamity and challenges sufficient to find and unite with God
(heaven).
From this I would ask, what is it that we find
when seemingly pushed beyond ourselves in calamity/great challenges that most
refer to as God? And my answer is the very image of God bestowed in us at
our core from which we were created, which is the part of us that knows,
connects to, and experiences God. Essentially, this image of God bestowed
in us is the intuitive knowledge that while we in some ways have a separate
identity as a person, absolutely nothing has an entirely separate
identity. Everything is defined by its relationship to everything else
and the Whole or Entirety.
The next question, might be why does it normally takes
calamity/great challenges/sometimes great love to push us seemingly beyond
ourselves sufficiently to try to live from this bestowed image? Why isn’t
that our default even in good times? My answer here is that when
evolution gave us awareness and thinking and thus the ability to view ourselves
as separate we mostly used this awareness and thinking to focus on gaining
advantages, including protecting ourselves and especially this deep core
of ours that knows we are all interdependent and thus vulnerable and
incomplete/insufficient separately by ourselves.
So our main priority became gaining advantages while hiding
vulnerabilities or weaknesses, and thus the world is probably run by peoples’
insecurities as much as anything else. Another angle is that our
existence includes a lot of unavoidable discomfort and pain of many varieties
culminating in everyone we love as well as ourselves dying. The purpose
of this suffering and discomfort (or at least opportunity from it, but I think
purpose of it) is to push us to come together to help and comfort one another
and look for solutions. However, more commonly people do everything they
can to avoid and delay the inevitable suffering which compounds it as well as
pushes it off on others who in turn push back in reaction and try to unload
some of their own.
It is only when we need something beyond ourselves, that we
cannot get by subtle to overt manipulation/coercion or when we can no longer
avoid or delay inevitable suffering, that we sometimes are pushed to our deep
core where we encounter the image of God, often with the help of a friend we
believe in to not use our vulnerability for present or future manipulation/coercion.
At this point sometimes we get enough of a taste of the image/Christ
within/source that we are driven to change our main motivations to living from
this image rather than protecting it. (Protecting it does not sound like
a bad idea and in theory it is not, but in practice when protection is
prioritized we end up mostly suppressing this part of our self by hiding it.)
Living from the image of God bestowed in us is the gospel
and very LIFE Jesus suggested we all follow him towards, in claiming our
destiny of uniting with the Father, who He is one with and we are called to
join. Individually and collectively embracing our inevitable suffering
from our internal and external reality/circumstances is embracing this LIFE and
the Entirety from which all things come. This sounds like a terrible idea
and solution and I must be crazy to suggest it, but is paradoxically the way to
what we are all looking for most – a meaningfulness, wholeness, generosity and
oneness that not only is divine but also feels divine. And it is what we
most celebrate and honor, whether that be a soldier’s sacrifice or a mother’s
or Jesus’.*
Over and over and over again we know at our deepest levels
where we honor and give reverence from that giving of one’s self for a greater
good without coercion is the only thing worth honoring or revering. When
doing so comes with such meaning and glory that it is also a privilege and
honor to do it that is the very process and definition of being resurrected
into a new creation in Christ (or the image of God). It is the way of the
cross or taking up our cross and following Him, which contrary to popular
conception has nothing to do with sacrifice except to dig deep enough and be
honest enough to become this new creation in Christ that rejoices in and can
see no way other than such giving and service. Now I am not saying many
or maybe any of us ever completely get there, but I am saying that our focus
needs to be on becoming that new creation and acting from it if we have any
hope of sustainably moving in a positive direction.
If that is the case though, why don’t we more readily do it
or at least do it consistently when we are down and out? I am mostly
going to leave this question for another time. For now I will just say
that even most places we are supposed to look will push us in mostly the wrong
direction as they try to share their own solutions that are mostly delay and
avoidance tactics for inevitable suffering and as they (often or normally
without intention) try to fit us into what they need rather than what we need
because they themselves do not know much of this LIFE Jesus came to share that
we all most yearn for. And when we are down and out and desperately
looking for solutions we have very little discernment on which solutions to
invest the initially small capacity we have to try something.
Weakness, vulnerability, and as the 12 steps suggest
powerlessness and unmanageability seem to be our problem and moving into those
things seems to be the wrong direction. However, we need to move into
them to find that they are the result of trying to avoid inevitable
suffering/discomfort and protect/hide our image of God deep within. Once
we realize this and hopefully get at least a faint glimpse of what LIFE might
be if we did not have to avoid and hide we can get to work on finding out.
In order to find out we first need to remove the things that
block us from our image of God within, and it will be good to recall that this
image is the knowledge that while we are in some ways a separate entity even
more so we are a part of everything else. As such any time we act in a
mostly selfish way that benefits us at the expense of others we are acting
against this image of God/Ultimate Reality that knows we are hopelessly united
with everything else. So we need to confess our sins to one another and
do whatever we possibly can to make up for them. Until we do so we will
likely be blocked from knowing much of our image because it will always be in
some way telling us we need to reconcile our past, present, and future with it,
and as long as we are unwilling to do that we are unwilling to know it and thus
God, which can be described as wholeness within one self and with everything
else.
It is important to note here that when trying to amend the
harm we have caused others we are not trying to balance what we did and what we
think the other person did and then amend any harm we did above what they might
have done. We are trying to amend any harm we did irregardless of harm
the other person did. However, the other person’s willingness to join us
in trying to each honor our deep inherent images of God will likely go a long
way in determining what type of relationship, if any, our newfound wisdom
percolating from this image wants to pursue with them moving forward.
Additionally, when traumatic things happen to us (which
starts from birth from the child’s perspective) we often react by hiding our
image of God to protect it, which is most hurt by such things, from our self
and everyone else. This of course makes us feel separate and lonely since
it is only at this image level that we can connect to anything beyond ourselves
or actually even with what we most feel to be our self. Here we need to
find ways to forgive, which actually means to heal from the trauma, while
learning from the wound how to wisely engage in current and future
relationships. The wisdom from our image as we heal will guide us on
those relationships and hopefully we will have the courage to follow whatever
the guidance is. Often it will come down to how comfortable we are that
the other person has the courage, commitment and wisdom to try to follow their
own image even if their success is sporadic.
I have previously discussed my own method for healing from
trauma at the end of the following blog post:
However, there are lots of therapy methods (which are beyond
the scope of this writing) or often an understanding spiritual friend, without
an agenda other than having the highest honor of someone sharing their greatest
pain while attempting to let it go, can provide much of what we need in this
regard.
To the extent we are successful removing the things that
block us from our image of God deep within (aka Christ within), we will feel a
wholeness and oneness that is too good for words. It is a perfect peace
from true communion. The closest I can get to personally describing my
experience of it in a way many people could relate to is that it is similar to
having the height of ecstasy of a great orgasm combined with the immediate
afterglow (where you feel at one with the other person and at perfect peace)
all at the same time.
Fortunately, that is generally fleeting (within a few
minutes to a few days) unless we learn how to live from our image of God within
or as I first heard from you, abide in Christ. Until recently I was under
the misconception (which might be a common misconception) that getting to the
unblocked communion was most of the spiritual quest and things would easily
flow from there, making living from that communion straight forward and
easy. Now it seems the next phase is every bit as challenging to navigate
well, although it is much different in that it is greatly enjoyable about 80%
of the time instead of about 5-10% of the time.
To differentiate getting to the image of God within (Christ
within) and abiding in Christ, I would say that normally getting there mainly
happens in what we might consider classical spiritual exercises, as discussed
above on getting unblocked, and abiding in Christ mainly happens in daily
activities of life, but often keeps the classical spiritual exercises
also.
So why if we have gotten unblocked is it still hard to live
from this new creation we are becoming or abide in Christ? I think the
main reason is that even daily activities seem and sometimes are dangerous or
potentially harmful to this image of God within that needs to manifest its
destiny of being a valuable and connected part of greater wholes. We thus
still want to focus on protecting it rather than living from it. Yet when
we actually do prioritize protecting it we end up mainly hiding, suppressing,
or otherwise avoiding it. Just as harmfully when we are busy avoiding our
own we normally have to do at least subtle things to avoid the same in others,
and when you add all that up we end up with the wordly state of affairs we
have. **
Thus, the lesson seems to be that as Jesus said, we cannot
serve two masters. We cannot prioritize both protecting our deepest self
that is our image of God and live from it at the same time. We have to
prioritize one or the other and whichever we prioritize is our marker for how
well we are abiding in Christ. At the same time it is unrealistic and
detrimental to think we will be all one way or the other or doing some
protection is a huge setback or even wrong. It might actually be wisdom
if it is part of the grand plan to live from it in a more important area or it
might be a small setback we can realize and learn from.
It is true that any communion, as discussed above, will
change us to some extent, but much of what I call our visceral beliefs (beliefs
underlying feelings) and emotional programming (how our feelings/emotions guide
our behavior and even thinking) based upon us being separate and needing to
protect, instead of being one, as a part of the body of Christ, will still be
present and it will take time and concerted effort to allow the new creation
into all areas of our life. And to some extent this is very fortunate
because it would not be fair to all our existing relationships to completely
change in a day.
Bill B., a mentor’s mentor, described something similar to what
I am trying to say this way. If you were dropped off in the middle of
rural China and
no one spoke English, you would be very hard press to communicate with the
people who only spoke Chinese. You could do a little though with gestures
and before too long you would pick up small parts of the language. After
months you might get pretty good at the language, but you would probably think
(and feel) in English still. At some point though if you were there long
enough you would even think (and feel) in Chinese. Our visceral beliefs,
emotional programming, and patterns of thought from them, are like that in how
they originate and propel protecting or living from our image. Where the visceral beliefs and our thinking
are based upon a separateness paradigm when trying to protect and a more
accurate unity with everything else when living from.
I think part of the reason I like describing or thinking of
living from my image, as abiding in Christ at the moment, is because it seems
to remind me to slow down some and not forget to rest in Christ or my image
along with acting from it. What seems to be becoming clearer recently is
that only my image can teach me how to abide or live in it and from it.
So when I discussed with you that I was having a hard time staying
grounded/connected while trying to act from my source that knows The Source of
everything, I think what was mainly happening was I would get started in a
fairly ideal way, but then forget to take the time to rest in my image also as
I was trying to live from it. And without this resting in it, and
continually or at least frequently receiving further guidance as I was in the
middle of an activity I would go back to prioritizing protecting and slowly
squeeze off my grounding or connection.
This is somewhat on topic and somewhat off topic, but since
it is something I am thinking of and something we discussed I’ll include it
here. Our consumeristic and capitalistic economy is built on the back of
and as an enabler of our tendency to focus on protecting rather than living
from our image. What I mean by this is that our capitalistic and
consumeristic economy is built on giving people things to use to suppress,
avoid and thus hide from the inevitable pain and discomfort in life, which keeps
their image hidden and them separated (and we are weak separately) and lonely
needing more consumption.
Actually, we could accurately say the same thing about much
of religion and its personal approach to salvation which seems safer and keeps
us separated and away from the real solution.
Neither is the actual problem though. The problem is
our tendency to prioritize protecting our image rather than living from
it. Both merely exploit the problem rather than be a helpful
solution.
If you are not interested or too busy with more important
things I do hope you will not feel compelled to respond. At the same time
I am always interested in your thoughts even if they seem to conflict or
contradict my own. My guess is if we explore our seemingly different
beliefs/perspectives they will be mostly consistent with some conflicts.
However, even if we find they do greatly conflict or contradict each other at
their roots, I would guess that we will each move a little closer to the Truth
as we explore the possible conflicts. I obviously wrote this with more
Christ and Christian language than I often use so that, if we want, we might be
able to more easily see where our differences are and if they seem
fundamental. I was still completely faithful to my beliefs/perspectives
at this moment.
* I am not saying anything new here when I say that our
troubles are caused by our attempts to avoid inherent pain/discomfort/suffering,
but we all seem to need to be constantly reminded, most of all me. The jumping off place for Buddhism are the
noble truths regarding this inherent suffering.
In Christianity, this jumping off place is the way of the cross or
taking up our cross, which is essentially accepting the pain, discomfort, and
vulnerability inherent in the LIFE He came to share with us. And of course neither religion stops there
and both say if we jump and follow where it leads we will find ourselves a new
creation that is exactly what we have been looking for and beyond our wildest
dreams all at the same time.
Unfortunately, being human comes with the capacity and
tendency to twist almost anything into a way to avoid life’s inherent pain, and
we have frequently turned all religions into ways to avoid this inherent pain,
which is exactly opposite their actual purpose and stated purpose. Instead of jumping and allowing God and the
process (religion) to transform the pain, we try to use the religion as another
way to avoid this inherent pain, which just postpones it, lets it build, and
pushes it off onto others.
**A lot of how we try to protect it is to try to get those
we interact with to all agree on a framework for life (religion/denomination/family
or workplace dynamics/etc), such that living from our image would have predictable
results/consequences. Unfortunately when
focused on making it safe in this manner we generally never come to full agreement
and thus never get to living from our image/Christ within/soul/etc. Furthermore, even if we did come to a full
agreement we might have lost God in the process because we would then have
removed the necessity of faith with our predictable results/consequences.
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