Knowing that you are the Absolute, is not about denying this human-animal. This denial seems to be a phase that many people go through when they start to explore their true nature. In fact it seems to be almost a necessary phase in order to truly acknowledge the Absolute nature of who you are. You go from believing that who you are is limited to this body, to seeing that you are not what you thought you were. You are the Absolute unlimited Emptiness of Life itself. Then the thinking creeps back in to start to call this new state of being something. It starts to limit it without even realising that it has created a subtle new limited identity. This is the superior and very special spiritual identity that denies the ordinary personal human stuff by saying that there is only the Absolute. Only certain peaceful relaxing experiences are considered ‘how it should be’, and any other experiences are considered ‘not it’.
Don’t get stuck in the Absolute. Don’t get stuck in this one-sided view. Don’t start to get comfortable in thinking that you know how it is and who you really are. This is only a new trick of the mind. Lose all ideas of even the Absolute, and whatever you have experienced in recognising that. Lose it all and keep losing it all. There is no need to keep chasing experiences of the Absolute, or reciting nondual concepts about the Absolute. If you really know yourself to be the Absolute, then you don’t need to keep reminding yourself of that. You can let it go and relax, knowing that it will never let you go.
Then it seems that you come full circle back to the relative. Back to the human-animal thing and all its foibles. Knowing that you are the Absolute is the freedom to fully explore, feel and experience this human-animal experience just as it is. Nothing is denied. Everything is included in who you are. There is no one special experience that is better than any other. Even experiences of recognising that you are unlimited, are sweet gifts, but are essentially just limited temporary experiences. The Absolute nature of who you are includes every single human experience as it is, without exception. This recognition does not fit into our ideas of how it should look like or feel like. It is rebellious, radical unlimited freedom despite experiences of feeling limited.
This article was first published in May, 2014
