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Natural Liberation: Against the Fragmentation of
Self
In many of the spiritual traditions of the
world as they are practiced today much is made of the duality of light
and dark, enlightenment and ego, God and self. This can be very useful
concept for explaining our seeming irrationality, our lack of enlightenment.
As a paradigm of spiritual development it is possibly one of the
gravest errors we could make. Although in modern times this duality is
mostly internalized it is really no different from any religious or
philosophical concept that posits a separation between the absolute and
our self. In fact internalizing this duality may in fact be driving the
stake even deeper into real spiritual liberation.
The effectiveness of many of the systems of
control that have arisen in this post-modern era lies in the fact that
they are internalized. Fear is bred into us by the media and then used
to manipulate our actions at every turn. No one will vote for the rogue
candidate even though we all know he is right because we fear “the
other” might win. Few question the corporate realty of consumer culture
Christmas for fear of beings seen as a Scrooge while it is the Ebenezer
Scrooge’s of the planet who line their pockets from the holiday
consumption frenzy. Similarly it seems we fear positing that we are in
our totality God’s creation. Should we do this, we may be seen as
psychotic. This is no exaggeration. How would you react to me if I told
you I was God?
So let us consider the dualistic mindset for
a minute. Which part of me is not enlightened? How do I know? Is it not
true that, if there is a separation, we will now have to depend on
another to discern for us which parts of me are enlightened and which
are not? Have we not therefore already surrendered our spiritual
liberty? It seems surely inevitable that anyone no matter how well
intentioned is going to see the parts of us they like and agree with as
enlightened and those parts which contradict them as “the dark side”. Is
this not just a reflection of our internalization of the paternalistic
relationship we have with government and any other fear based
authority.
Our “dark side” only exits because of the
shadow being cast by the wall we have erected in our own psyche. This
darkness, no doubt, fosters evil, perversion and psychosis. What if
instead we were to bring the totality of our being into the light,
completely out into the open? In the light all that is within us can be
accepted and revealed. There would be no dark corners of our mind where
true abominations arise. To remove the dualistic power relationship in our
minds is to rob the food of poverty mentality, that weak self-pitying
dialogue that justifies our greed and hatred.
If hell is truly separation from God than is
it not the case that this concept of dualism is what creates and
sustains hell.
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