Monday 4 October 2021

I Was Not

 I am in two minds about posting this, but before I chicken out:

          From time to time I ask myself the question, "Do I wish to continue to post my writings?" My answer usually is in the affirmative, because I sense a need to talk, and to hear a response to my written musings. But my affirmative response is always alloyed with doubt. 

          Today, I experienced something new in my spiritual search, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that I felt something more intensely than I have felt before. It was initiated when I was studying some words which said, "It is not demanded of us that we always be in a state of the heart which grants us vision and self-mastery. It is only demanded of us that we know the state we are in. But this is difficult......"

          I paused in my reading and asked myself the question, "What state are you in?" It was as if I became stationary on an invisible ladder of time and state. Below me was an infinity of responses to that question; what I knew; what I doubted; of what had I been in denial about; what progress had I made; and so on, and so on. Higher on the ladder I saw a single response, that I do not yet know the answer to the question about my state.

          In that moment the question dissolved. I could not ask, because I did not know what or how. I saw so clearly that I knew nothing; that I was nothing; that I was lost. It was only the ego that enjoys or suffers the illusion of knowing that it is.  I can only say that I was not! My response to that realisation was unequivocal, and one about which I --- as a non-Christian --- felt no doubts; no shame. It was simply, Oh my God! Oh my, dear God!

          In that moment I felt completely and utterly empty. And that emptiness felt so utterly right, as it was always meant to be. I also realised that, with occasional enhancement by spontaneous intrusions of phrases and sentences from I-don't-know-where, my writing is largely about the mechanics of my search. They rely on memory, not direct experience. Those experiences I can barely, if at all, describe to myself. But for reasons that I do not understand, it seems to be necessary that I write it all down. What others make of it all, I don't know.


4 comments:

  1. Oh yes, please do write it down here.

    I closed my eyes and set myself the sole job of examining the state I am in. Other thoughts intruded, but as they did, I let them go aside. Suddenly, I realized that my state is one dominated by the ego saying that it is ok to set those other thoughts aside, for we can come back to them later.

    But then, what of that final imposed time of meditation. When the ego will say nothing. When we are certain of only one thing - there is no later for us. I realized that I will never be able to report back on my answer to "what state am I in" then. If I have to make a guess, it will be the state of emptiness. So, I will accept emptiness if it will give me a glimpse of that ultimate state. It cannot be a bad state to be in.

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    1. Hello Deanna,

      I agree: emptiness cannot be a bad state to be in. Think of all that space just waiting to be filled by good stuff, without the ego butting in.

      Thank you for your response.

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  2. Hi Tom,
    There aren’t any biblical references to modern day ideas of consciousness entailing the ego mind and soul only the divine heart believed to be a seperate substance of the body.
    Other states all referenced the bodily senses and so forth - know yourself. So, you say you have experienced something new spiritually ‘I am not’ .Fare be it for me say what that means to you except in a more general sense it’s regarded (as you’re most likely aware ) as an enlightened state in Buddhism. Then there is also the idea of your freedom to empty your essence in meditative preparedness for matters of the heart, that don’t necessarily have to follow suit. Best wishes

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    1. Hi Lindsay,

      Thank you for your response. On thinking about it - at some little length - I have decided that, rather than try to cram all my thoughts into a single comment, I would try to deal with certain issues arising from this experience in a separate post. So until then ....

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