More on Emotional Satisfaction or Freedom
Last week’s article (http://acimmentor.blogspot.com/2017/02/emotional-satisfaction-or-freedom.html)
about the two possible approaches to spirituality and how one way to
characterize them is the pursuit of emotional satisfaction for the self or
transcending the self led to a lot of comments and questions that I will try to
clear up here.
(The article was a follow-up to two other articles I had
written on the same topic. Some of the questions readers had could be answered
in those earlier articles and links were provided in last week’s article. If
you still have questions I suggest reading those as well as last week’s article
for a fuller look at the topic).
The emotional satisfaction I wrote about in the last article
was not referring to what one seeks in relation to others. It was referring to
the desire for an emotional connection with Truth (God) that one would
characterize as “warm”. I was highlighting how which goal we pursue in spirituality
can often be revealed by the experience we seek. Many who seek to spiritualize
the self and its life in the world seek an emotionally warm experience. I
brought up how my wife finds my spiritual path to be cold and cerebral because
she seeks emotional warmth from her spirituality. She does not find me cold and cerebral. And she finds our
relationship emotionally satisfying. But she is also aware that our
relationship is not what would make her whole. She expresses her opinion on my
spiritual path as her own perception given her own goal, not as a judgment on
it or as an attack on me. So I do not take her comments personally or find them
offensive. As I wrote, I know her opinion arises because she has not
experienced liberation so she really does not know what it is I want. Our
relationship is fulfilling and harmonious to both of us because neither of us
asks the other to make us whole and we both respect the other’s spiritual path.
Even though our spiritual goals and paths are very different what we do share
is a relationship with the Holy Spirit (or what she calls her Higher Power or
God). And it is to the Holy Spirit we both turn, instead of to each other, when
we seek wholeness.
So as you can see emotionally warm relationships are not
only possible when seeking liberation but are the result of growing spiritual
awareness. It’s just that for those of us who have tasted liberation from the
self a warm emotional relationship with Truth for the self does not make sense.
In the last article I was not saying that you cannot have both emotional warmth
in the self’s life and to seek liberation from the self. I was saying that as spiritual goals they are mutually exclusive. If you want from Truth an
emotionally satisfying relationship for the self you cannot at the same time
want liberation from the self. Neither path is better or worse or right or
wrong. It’s just what you want and it can be helpful to know which you want as
you read something like A Course in
Miracles and its teachers. Your goal for yourself will determine how you
read ACIM and which teachers make sense to you.
As I mentioned in one of the earlier articles, even those
who seek liberation go through a stage of spiritualizing the self. It’s
unavoidable at the start because the self is all you know even if you have had
instants of liberation. The mind seeks to integrate the two experiences and it
takes a long time to accept that a unified mind is not the result of blending
the experience of the self with the experience of liberation from the self. A
unified mind is what is left when the self is dropped from the mind
(liberation).
Both paths are about avoiding pain. Those who seek to
spiritualize the self seek a less painful life in the world. And they will be
satisfied with that. Those who have tasted liberation know that it is possible
to transcend pain by transcending the self. They are not just pushed toward
liberation in the hopes of transcending pain. They are pulled toward liberation
knowing it is possible.
Here’s something I wrote that was going to be part of
another article but that fits well here:
The contrast between the experiences of Truth (liberation)
and not-Truth (the self) is always wondrous to me. I am always struck by how
completely unlike the other is each experience. And this contrast makes it so
clear to me why not-Truth can never satisfy. It is like craving steak and
having only apples available. The apples may be good as far as apples go, but
no matter how many you eat they will not satisfy you when you crave a steak.
The texture, taste, and nutrients are all wrong. And so it is with life in the
world. No matter how good it gets it is never wholly satisfying. There is
always a craving for the limitlessness and wholeness that only Truth can offer.
>>>>>
Do you want a spiritualized life in the world or liberation from the self? As a mentor of ACIM I work with students who want either. The goal is yours to choose. My job is to help you reach it faster and easier than you would on your own.Learn about one-on-one mentoring, how to send a donation for this blog, and about the books The ACIM Mentor Articles, The Plain Language A Course in Miracles, 4 Habits for Inner Peace, and Releasing Guilt for Inner Peace at www.acimmentor.com.
Comments
'Both paths are about avoiding pain. Those who seek to spiritualize the self seek a less painful life in the world. And they will be satisfied with that. Those who have tasted liberation know that it is possible to transcend pain by transcending the self'
when i experienced that miracle, i had been immersed in such great terror and pain and had just acknowledged to myself the futility of continuing to attempt to take away or absorb the pain of my nephew in his suicidal state. seeing that there was nothing i could do felt like it would tear me apart, then the words 'not my will be done but gods' went through my head and i flicked into the 'one song' experience. what im wondering about is, during those seconds there was no pain, only complete (as i would describe it) love and peace that encompassed all situations all selves all the time. strangely, there wasnt even compassion for any of the encompassed story of time and space, because there was nothing actually wrong to feel sorry for, not really lots of notes where when you step back you can hear the harmony in what seems like discord up close, or anything, but one song, no discord. and yet, i was still there experiencing no pain as a self. there was no interpreting going on in my head during the experience, no thoughts, but 'i' was experiencing it.
so, my question is, do you think i would call that a no pain experience only in comparison to the selfs usual experience?? there was zero conflict, nothing out of place. but its true the world kind of.. faded into the background, it lost all sense of being reality, but it was still in my awareness. this experience happened years after the sleeping dream where i did start to dissolve into the one loving light, then flicked back into my self in fear? of no self. (i didnt *consciously* experience fear of the oneness, that felt beautiful, but i felt fear of not being me anymore) so maybe my mind could extend that 'knowledge' of loving oneness into the waking experiencing?
on a funny note, i have bought 6 copies of 4 habits for inner peace cos friends keeps wanting to borrow mine, and taking that book back always seems unkind, laugh ;)
The self is the body and the personality and the story that you tell yourself about you being the body and personality. Transcending the self simply means coming to a recognition that it is not real. Your existence is eternal. However, you project that sense of existence on the self and confuse them. That's what you are sorting out - your existence from the self. When you have you can let go of the self without fearing that you will lose your existence.
Thanks for the plug, Will.
I do not have any plans at this time to put together another book.
I'm about eleven years into this and I'm still not on firm footing with the interactions going on with the different levels. Extension goes to the heart of that, the interactions, so I guess that's the difficulty. It may be that I cannot figure it out, it may have to be given to me.
Despite your best efforts to elucidate this topic of choice between the two types of spirituality with multiple articles, the topic remains incomprehensible to me. It could be because my own connection to Truth is so tenuous and ephemeral - I feel lucky if I can muster a drop of willingness just to keep going. It could also be that I don't see any concrete definition of a "warm" spirituality. For example, for one who has or wants a warm relationship to the Truth - what does that even mean? What does it look and feel like? Cherubs floating by? Violins in the background?
But getting back to the issue of choice. I would be interested in hearing from any readers who are aware of having made - or even faced - a clear choice regarding these two types of spirituality.
Three years later I experienced Revelation and higher miracles which took me out of the self. I transcended the self and experienced liberation from limitations and wholeness. Those experiences, sometimes by other names, were what I was always seeking through the self but could never find. I discovered that transcending the self brought me what I really wanted and what was far more valuable than limited, transient emotional "warmth". For many years I would sometimes go back to wanting to keep the self and have God love me as the self, but liberation from the self beckoned stronger. Eventually wanting emotional warmth from God, Which I came to call Truth, didn't make sense anymore and fell away.
Any student who feels "God is playing favorites" is missing the message of ACIM. God is in every mind so how could It play favorites? The correct response to "I don't have these experiences" is to be open and willing to have them.
i had the lowest self esteem, i had zero conscious trust in my own mind, i doubted myself in almost every part of my life, and saw myself as substandard. but then i started to open to the possibility that maybe life wasnt what i had thought it was.. that maybe there was some kind of spiritual reality that wasnt just mumbo jumbo that people used to try and feel better cos life was so shitty. around that time i was loaned a few books about synchronicity. the idea seemed both fun and helpful.. god or your higher self talking to you via the world around you. now, part of me still thought that it was probably something that only happened to 'special' people, and most certainly not to inferior me, but the books all said that this wasnt so. so i just said.. well, universe, if its real, can you show me? and youll seriously have to smack me over the head with it, cos i firmly believe in coincidence, youll have to prove its not just that, IF you actually want to talk to me as much as i want to talk to you. the latest book i had read was by an aussie woman and she had opened to this experience via synchro around canada. and that is when the weird stuff started happening to me surrounding canada. so weird i couldnt dismiss it as not happening, i wont share the stories here, i dont even know if what i AM sharing is helpful or hindering.
and now, maybe 15 years later, i can see my ideas around synchro morphed a lot, but it WAS always helpful, in the end. the communication aspect was real in that it helped me to start trusting, both myself and a loving source. it helped me to start knowing that i was worthy and juuuust maybe possibly lovable, laugh! (still got layers there, ho-hum, but like you said,, the ball had to start rolling somewhere, right!?!) and it helped me to start seeing (though i didnt know it was doing this til ACIM) that the lines of temperateness and differentiation between me and the world werent as solid or as real as i thought. like.. it continued 'working' and being helpful as i started to shift the idea i was communicating with a loving 'isness' outside of me, (i didnt know what it WAS.. my guides, god, the universe) to knowing i was communicating with myself. and, synchro happened in a BIG, beautiful way directly after the higher miracle experience, so i knew i could trust it and not write it off, even though i still didnt know what id just expereinced. and i reckon thats what helped open me to the kind of inner communication you, like me, really want.. the actual experiences of peace. i dunno, mate.. maybe youd also benefit from letting communication in via some side door too? it got the show on the road for me. else i would have given up on the course after a year i reckon.. but the synchro kept me going, plus it started me trusting in my dreams as another form of communication. weirdly that aspect worked backward in time, 'past' dreams began to lead me toward truth too. my deep apologies if this is out of line, will, or arrogant or inappropriate in some way.
'Sometimes students tell me that they just want to go off into a cave somewhere and commune with God for the rest of their lives. The Course tells us that that is a long way around to God, and it offers us a path to use right in the world that is a short cut. If you were to find peace by withdrawing from the world how could you be certain that you have really undone conflict in your mind? Conflict is not undone by avoiding it but by facing it, seeing its unreality, and letting it go. By engaging with the world everyday you confront your belief in separation everyday, and you have the opportunity to forgive it. Teaching in the world is the same process. Ideas rattling around in my mind are never challenged, but a soon as I think of writing or saying it “out there” my own mind is full of projecting how others might respond to it. Of course what I think “others” might say are really my own thoughts. Now I get to look at these thoughts that challenge the ideas I’m teaching. Some of them will help me hone the idea as I clarify it, others will help me see where I still have fearful or erroneous thoughts. Then when I do teach the thoughts “out there” I am confronted by opportunities to clarify, and hone, and overcome challenges presented by “others”. Some of the comments that seem to come from outside of me will go right by me, but the comments that bother me give me an opportunity to see why I agree with them on some level, and what I have to work through.'
so.. without even having had a response from will, im trying to see what it was. im worried about offending him. im worried that im being to big for my boots, lol.. giving help that is not needed or is unhelpful. and im worried that you will see my ego even more clearly liz, (though part of me knows that would be helpful, and its what i expect when we talk, laugh!) because i have noticed that the more i respect someone the more i care how they perceive me! i know ive been a fixer, and think i should get back in my box! but i pressed 'post' anyway, cos i decided that really it didnt matter anyway, and there always turns out to be something helpful, even if its just in forgiving some aspect in this mind. im still feeling confused about what i have to work through though. any clarification??
The Holy Spirit takes us as we are. Some have different religious back grounds than others and some none at all. He moves us in the direction that fits. Trying to be or trying to have the spirituality and beliefs of another person is foolish. You go where you are led.
All you have to work through, Hannah, is the belief that you have to be a certain way as a person to be okay with a god who sits in judgment on you.
You mentioned that Courtney felt your spirituality - which you characterized as feedom and liberation - was cold and cerebral. On what basis can she make that assessment when she has never experienced it?
im very in touch with the fear of my own judgement, which often tends to present as what i think others think of me, or what i think theyd think of me. and i know my intense judgemental-ism of others is just the flip side of this coin. oh BOY would i love to live without this denial of reality. and i know (will talk on thurs.. your weds, dont panic ;) your in for a lovely 'dream' discussion, mwahahahahaha) that now is the time, not once some 'task' has been completed, now is the only time to make the choice for Love. what feels bloody .. foreign? nigh on impossible?! is trying to bring 'god' into this.. which must therefor be great fear. so.. ive asked myself if im ready, and all i hear/feel is 'you betchya, you got you and you got liz.' and yet still all that is currently pouring out/in is support and love and easy choice for, well, Choice, laugh.. easy to drop whats not true.. with ONE experience standing apart from this. but even that feels like a gift, i know it IS. abandonment is the thing. i feel guilt for abandoning and 'creating' loneliness in others is real so i kinda.. know that all the other stuff must still be there, though as i said im finding it easy right now to see it as purposive to an insane mind. but ive been meditating on the two experiences of higher miracle and its making it easy to see all this stuff as a smokescreen to truth. ah, why am i trying to squish all this in here???! speajk soon. oh, just remembered another dream.. we totally got this. all it took was a simple flick of the wrist to escape the hungry dogs of fear.. oh BLOODY HELL... bahahahahahahaha.. still all synchro communicate-y. rereading your response to me makes me feel so happy. and a twinge of. um.. anxiety, bless you ;)
She does not delve into my spirituality or experiences. Very early on she asked me to stop talking about it because it scared her. So I don't discuss it. She only knows in a very superficial way what ACIM says. It scares her and her judgment is a way to hold it away from her. Of course I don't say any of this to her! I just stay quiet and let her share her beliefs and judgments.
Something about your words that act like a key opening a golden chest of treasure within.. ."After guilt all there is to do is acclimate to the Awareness of Truth". The simplicity is here when truly accepted. My gratitude beams.
acclimating to the awareness of truth sounds joyful. maybe a bit odd, but joyful!
Acclimating to the Awareness of Truth has the potential to be joyful. But first one must address their final fear of loss.
so.. this judgemental god then! is the looking at it and going mad without trust in truth like.. well. say the last five years particularly, where i got more and more harmful to myself, angry, physically and mentally abusing myself, as i became more honest about my motivations? i saw my manipulations, mistrust, judgement and hatred more and more clearly. cos that was like going mad, totally psychotic sometimes. i got less nasty to others as i saw it (cos i hadnt even know i was nasty to others before that, i thought i was pretty damn nice!) at least, in less expressing it outward to them. but i got muuuch nastier to myself. and i started screaming and ranting at god and at HS, now i think of it.. rather than always approaching them in my mind with a mask of 'oh look at us together like this, how holy am i being now, so sweet talking with this sweet god' and the rants would be telling god how very nasty 'he' was for not taking this nastiness away from me, for my own good and for the good of those who had to come into contact with me. and then id usually fall into self harm and/or smoking pot (marijuana) to 'ease the pain'. so. therefor.. that IS the belief in a god who judges me, right? i 'knew' god could see the nastiness as real and having real effects.. and oh.. it felt like punishment that 'he' wouldnt take the disgustingness away. 'he' left it with me, as i deserved. smoking pot almost always clicked me into study mode, id connect with a non judgemental part of my mind, and write and write. id study what i wrote the next day, and it was usually helpful. and i valued that, but it had so many other negative effects, on health and family connections and motivation for my worldly 'duties', that i still felt it, like the other self harm, was a punishment i was inflicting on myself. it felt like love WAS battling hate in me, and it was driving me mad, and i couldnt talk to my family about it cos they all said 'for gods sake, just stop studying that ****ing book' and i couldnt make them see that i was heading into this before ACIM came along, id just uncovered what was already there, and it provided me with the only relief i felt from my self hatred and fear, even though it was surely helping me to see what was already there!
but then i had the second higher miracle experience, and Knew deeply for a few seconds, laugh, that none of any of this had any effect on what was really true. so.. some of the madness started to ease out of my response to continuing to look honestly at my motivations. and i started communicating on your blogs rather than just reading them.
talk about rant.. its a been a while since i write so much i had to break it into two posts :D
Really, I think those that seek an emotional connection with a god really are not aware that there is another experience to be had. It's what I would expect if I had not experienced transcending.
Let me just share my process with undoing THE guilt. This all unfolded over about 30 years: First I read about it in ACIM and had no idea what it was talking about. Oh, sure, I felt guilt for things I'd done or still did. But I was not at all in touch with THE guilt. So I just let that go as I learned about other things and figured one day I would understand.
After about 15 years I got it intellectually. I could understand the whole connection to guilt, the ego, fear of God, etc. But I wasn't ready to look at it and when I tried my mind would skitter off onto other things.
Then came a time when I had reoccurring dreams, weekly at least, where either I had killed someone or I had helped someone cover up killing someone. I figured this was THE guilt surfacing. But I still could not look at it. My mind would still skitter away when I tried. I continued to grow my awareness of Truth.
Then one day I felt ready to look at the guilt. I felt like I was on a rope descending into a dark pit in my mind. The Holy Spirit was holding the rope. I realized I was ready because the Holy Spirit was real to me. But I couldn't find the guilt! I looked and looked, again and again. I was frustrated and asked the Holy Spirit if maybe I wasn't ready. And the Holy Spirit laughingly said, "I've been telling you that there is no guilt!" Ohhhhhh. Now that I could see that there is no guilt I was ready to undo my BELIEF IN guilt.
I began to get in touch with my belief in guilt. I could actually feel my fear of a judgmental god. The feeling wasn't new; seeing it for what it was, was new. I began to address it by comparing my experiences of Truth with this concept of a judgmental god. I did this over and over and over again, whenever guilt came up. The non-judgmental experience of Truth began to chip away at the idea of a judgmental god.
Then I began to see all the ways guilt showed up, some of them obvious, others more subtle. I continued to apply the comparison until it undid the guilt.
Then I wrote "Releasing Guilt for Inner Peace", which is when I consolidated all that I had learned.
So you see the Truth has to be true for you, for you to see that there is no guilt. And then you will be ready to undo your belief in guilt.