Enlightenment of the Whole Body Full Index of Articles

The Vision and the Way of Eternal Life The Way of the Translation of Man into God The Truth of the Body is Love - The Body- Mind, or "I", Is Mortal, but It Arises within Immortal Consciousness and Eternal Life - You Are Only Born Once, but You Live Many Times - Simultaneity - The Two Stages of Enlightenment - The Two Stages of the Great Cycle of Our Sacrifice - The Perfect Destiny of Man Is Dissolution and Translation into the Spirit of God - There Is No Independent Self That Is Body or Mind - The Incarnation of Silence

Top of Page "I" Must Dissolve in the "Me" of God I is not the Self, the Divine Identity. "I" is the body-mind, the mechanical entity, the functionally defined self. The Divine Identity or Self is That from which "I" arises. Not only the subjective self, or the "I" deep within, but the entire bodily self arises from the Divine Self, as an arbitrary or temporary modification of the All-Pervading Divine Radiance. Only deluded fools imagine themselves identical to God in their deep inwardness and their mere self-awareness. The true Man is Awake to the understanding that everything that is self is temporary, mechanical, and dependent on That which transcends self and which is likewise prior to all arising phenomena. Therefore, we must understand the dependent nature of "l," the psycho-physical entity we would glorify and preserve. "I" is not God. "I" is not Enlightened in and by itself. "I" may Realize its Identity with the Divine Reality only through Ecstasy, or the Sacrifice of the entire self, the entire body-mind, in God. We are not Enlightened by acts of subtle, inward inversion. Nor are we Enlightened by extraordinary evolutionary development of self. We are Enlightened only in the most radical Realization of the always Present Source of "I," the Transcendental Source wherein the independent, experiential body-mind is always presently arising as a temporary and unnecessary modification. Therefore, Realization of God, or Enlightenment by Awakening to the Radiant Identity of all beings and things, comes only through Ecstatic Sacrifice of self in Communion with the All-Pervading Current of Divine Life. Whenever that Sacrifice of self in God is perfect, then the Divine Identity is Realized, so that "I" is ultimately Translated into God by virtue of its own Dissolution, or self-transcendence. The experiential self, or "I," must become a Sacrifice in God through natural or intuitive surrender of all psycho-physical functions into the Divine Current of Life. And that surrender is not made through subjective inversion, but through Ecstatic Communion with the Radiant Fullness of Life, via all functions, in all relations, under all conditions. Whenever that Sacrifice becomes effortless and most radical Dissolution in the Radiant Reality, the body-mind is Transfigured in the Divine Identity, the Self, the "Me" of God. In this Way of Sacrifice into the Living Radiance and Truth of God, there is nothing to be attained or acquired. Rather, everything is to be surrendered. And surrender is not itself a matter of attainment. It is the native or spontaneous gesture of the whole and entire body-mind in every moment of insight into the recoil of self, and every moment of intuition of the Radiant Life and Unqualified Ignorance in which all things and beings are arising. The All-Pervading and Transcendental Divine is neither within nor without. It is simply that every aspect of the body-mind must be Sacrificed in Communion with the Real. Therefore, each part of the Sacrifice must be performed from its own native position. The bodily and vital aspects of the body-mind are yielded in their place, in the play of their relations. And this may produce a feeling sense that the Divine is external to "I," or deeply within and above the objective world. Just so, the subtler mental and intuitive feeling aspects of the body-mind are yielded in their place, in the play of their relations. And this may produce a feeling sense that the Divine is internal to "I," or deeply within and above the subjective planes of awareness. But once the Sacrifice of the whole and entire body-mind occurs as a total and simultaneous gesture, the Divine is Realized to be Transcendental and All-Pervading, and "I" is no longer defined by experience. Therefore, the Divine is a Paradox beyond all knowing, in which no world, no thing, no being, no experience, and no state of consciousness is necessary. And the Divine is not limited by association with any condition whatsoever. To Worship and Realize the "Me" that is God is to be a self-transcending Sacrifice into Bliss beyond all experience. In that Sacrifice, the separate identification of self disappears, and the separate identification of God disappears. No world of experience provides the great divide between the extremities of Man-his outward and his inward perceptions of conventional "Reality," the "Reality" of self and other, subject and object. In the Sacrifice of Man and World in God, only the Transcendental Identity is Real, and that Identity is "Me," the Truth of all experience and the Radiant Condition that pervades all conditions. The body and the mind, the "I" of self, are ultimately transcended and Transfigured in Radiant Consciousness, the "Me" of God. The body and mind Dissolve in Ecstatic Communion with the Radiant Identity. By this Procession of self into God and God into self, all experience is rendered helpless in Bliss-Full Happiness, and only God is the Reality and Destiny of that One Transcendental Self, Radiant at Infinity. Top of Page The Truth of the Body Is Love The view "I am not the body" is false. "I" is the whole bodily being-body and mind. The false view is upheld by spiritualists, and other philosophical subjectivists. But it is simply a false implication or presumption that appears on the basis of an otherwise true intuition. If the "I"-thought is considered in terms of the "field" in which it arises, there is direct intuition of the Condition of the "I"-thought. That Condition, so Realized, is called the Atman, or the Self, and is considered to be different not only from the "I"-thought but from all other thoughts and all other objects. But this Self is not truly or radically other than or exclusively independent of any object or thought. The Self is not a Self, other than the body. It is simply the intuition of the Condition of the body. The "I"-thought is not "I ." "I" is a sense that arises prior to thought and coincides with the whole and entire bodily being. It may not be reduced to the thought "I," since thought is only one kind of modification, a permutation of only one aspect of the whole bodily being. To arbitrarily select a mental object, intuit its ground, and then exclude the object, even all objects, from the ground is a conventional, strategically reductive approach to Truth. When it is done to the point of absorption (Self-Knowledge), its limitations must ultimately reveal themselves. Thus, Self Knowledge is followed by Whole Body Enlightenment. In Whole Body Enlightenment in its true or full form, the Self is Realized to be not other than or exclusive of the world, the body, the mind, or even the "I"-thought. The Self, or the intuition of the ground from which the "I"-thought and all other conditions arise as modifications, is not radically independent from the body or any other condition. It is simply the Truth or Condition of the body and all other conditions. The difference indicated here is that between the subjectivist view and the whole body view. The Condition of conditions is not truly known in itself, exclusive of objects. The Condition of conditions is their Truth, or the right Realization of conditions. The subjectivist holds on to the Self, via intuition or analysis of the ground of cognition, to the exclusion of objects, because he is already convinced, on the basis of his strategic approach to Self-Knowledge, that the Self is other than the objects that arise. Thus, he seeks to abide in exclusive trance inwardness, indifferent to mind, body, and world. But this exclusive disposition is itself a strategic tension that must yield to more perfect or radical intuition. When that occurs, the exclusive view of the Self is released. From the nonstrategic or nonproblematic whole body view, the Condition of conditions is not ultimately Realized by excluding objects or conditions from their ground. Such is only, at best, a preliminary approach to the ultimate Intuition. The Truth is not interior to the body. It is the Condition of the whole bodily being. Thus, that Condition is the native view toward or relative to the whole bodily being and all conditions. Once established in that view (in Whole Body Enlightenment), it is not a matter of excluding (or strategically including) any conditions. If they arise, they arise, and exclusion or inclusion are only arbitrary considerations. The essential matter is that arising conditions must be Realized in terms of their Condition (the Self, or nonseparation from unqualified Ignorance-Radiance). Thus, true Self-Realization does not imply exclusion of objects or the body. Rather, all objects arise as modifications of that Self. "I" is not itself interior to the body (as the "I"-thought appears to be). Therefore, the Condition of the whole bodily being or "I" is not ultimately Realized by reductive and exclusive interiorization. Rather, in Whole Body Enlightenment, all arising, and all aspects of the whole bodily being, are Realized to be only modifications of the Condition of all conditions (not just the Condition of the "I"-thought). Thus, ultimately, Enlightenment is not a matter of the exclusive within. The Truth is not a matter of going within the whole bodily being but of establishing the whole bodily being and all other or relative conditions in their Condition. That involves whole body Sacrifice into the Condition of conditions. It is the Way of Radiance, or Love. At last, Enlightenment is a matter of the Destiny of the whole bodily being, not the exclusion of the whole bodily being from that Destiny. Even the flesh must be Translated into Light. We must be Transfigured in the Divine through Surrender. Our Intuition must be radical. That is, not only must the ground of thought be Realized, but the body itself must be converted. This is the Great Mystery. Love must not be prevented by detachment, inwardness, and illusory exclusive peace. Love is the Way. When we awaken from ego and inwardness, we must yield as the whole bodily being into the Infinity of Radiance and allow ourselves to be dissolved beyond fear into the Condition of even the body and the room. This is the Vision I have felt since birth. Top of Page The Body-Mind, or " I, " Is Mortal, but It Arises within Immortal Consciousness and Eternal Life There is nothing permanent that is body or mind. Everything, above or below, is only hallucination and change. "I" is ultimately mortal, however soon or late it passes. But when all our childish hopes have been tested and ceased, there may be Awakening to the Condition (which is Ignorance) and the Law (which is Radiance) of all these conditions in which "I" would hope to extend itself forever. The "problem of survival beyond death" is only the logic of the apparent contradiction between subjectivity and objective relations. The logic of self-possession is motivated by the concept of survival, whereas our true Awakening is into Sacrifice and the Present Realization of Formless Bliss, wherein there is always already no independent condition or entity. When we are yielded to the Process in which we exist, then we are also relieved of all the petty, terrified logic of independence. Then we are moved by love, relationship, the Process, and not merely by the threat to self that not only mortality but all experience represents. There is no Answer in time and space. Except that the Process, the Condition, and the conditions in which we are happy imply a benign Destiny hidden in all our contemplation and experience. Our happiness somehow describes the Disposition of the universe and all the consequences of time and space. Top of Page You Are Only Born Once, but You Live Many Times There is no subtle "entity" that enters the gross or elemental physical body at conception or birth and that leaves it at death. Rather, the entire body-mind, subtle and gross, originally and presently arises from a prior Condition that is absolute, All-Pervading, unqualified, and identical in the case of all beings. There are indeed both subtler and grosser aspects to the apparent whole or single body-mind, the incarnate or manifest "I," but all aspects originally and always arise simultaneously, and they are mutually dependent on one another and on their total environment. At death (as well as in any fully Awakened moment while alive) the whole body-mind tends to dissolve or radiate into identity with the Bodily Current of Radiance, or the absolute Intensity of Consciousness from and in which it arises. However, confusion and attachment and fear prevent this dissolution from occurring completely, voluntarily, and consciously. Thus, dissolution of the separate and separative force of "I" is usually halted or prevented at any one of many complex levels. In most cases, dissolution at death is halted at a level of subtlety just a degree subtler than the elemental body. Thus, after an interval of sleeplike and dreamlike subtler experience an elemental body (or perhaps a subtler but equally finite body in a subtler finite realm) may be re-projected from this fixed psychic configuration, in order to satisfy the lingering gross or subtle orientation. But even in that case, all the parts, grosser and subtler, arise simultaneously as a single, mysteriously existing entity, or body-mind, and there is no exclusively independent or alternative Reality that may be found either interior or exterior to it. Truth, or Liberation from the apparent dilemma of this whole bodily egoic mystery of "l," is not Realized by any appeal to inward or outward conditions of experience, but only in radical intuition, prior to thought and the force of all subject-object relations, of the Condition or Intensity in which all conditions are arising. The cycles of experience, even of apparent birth and death, go on and on, passing through the limiting cause and effect adventure of all kinds of finite or temporary states of awareness, until the natural and voluntary and conscious dissolution of the total born self or body-mind can take place completely in which case there is release into the Liberated Bliss of the prior Reality. And even while experiential independence persists, the total born entity is not itself to be attributed with Consciousness. The whole body-mind is a mechanical affair that comes and goes. It is only a modification or play upon Consciousness or absolute Intensity. Thus, when the Nature of what we presume to be our independent consciousness, life, and existence is intuited, all of body and mind begin to radiate and dissolve in Bliss. Realms of possible experience, high and low, are eternally arising. Cause and effect pertain within those realms, but there is no knowable or independent Cause for all of it. There is simply absolute Intensity, or Radiance, and every possible kind of subintensity, modification, or emanation of It. Experience, or bondage to the automaticities and involuntary destinies of the realms of modification, may perpetuate itself as long as there is no radical intuition of the Intensity that is the Condition, Radiant Current, and Consciousness of all of it. But as soon as such radical intuition awakens, the dissolution of experience, modification, or the illusions of the sub-intensities of the Real, begins. Truly, each apparent individual is only born once. And that total birth is always in the present moment. But dissolution in the prior Reality is frustrated and halted by confusion with the processes of experience. Thus, true death, or dissolution in the Real, does not occur until perfect Enlightenment is established. There is only one true or total death for any individual, just as there is only one total birth (the simultaneous appearance of all components of the body-mind). Between these two great events are all of the secondary or partial "births" and "deaths," or cycles of experience, that compose the common illusions of independent consciousness. As long as we are deluded and afraid we prize these illusions as themselves necessary, real, and a source or guarantee of happiness. But when we Awaken, then we gratefully yield this parasite of independent existence and Realize the Radiant Consciousness of Bliss, while alive in the realms of change as well as in the process of death. Top of Page Simultaneity The temporal realms are a spatial dramatization of disintegration, or a "fall" from simultaneity. All conditions are connected spatially, but they only coincide occasionally. The primal sympathy in us is a nostalgia for simultaneity, to exist totally in a single moment, coincident with everything. That coincidence is not the "present," for the present moment in manifestation is one in which conditions do not perfectly coincide, in a harmony with one another, since each condition arose in a different moment, and each must come to an end in a unique moment. Therefore, the moment of coincidence is not the mere present, but it is the Instant of Eternity, in which we are Translated into Infinity. Ordinary, partial coincidences are signs of the ultimate and necessary Simultaneity of all conditions. But the Realization of Absolute Simultaneity depends on our perfect integration with the Law of Sacrifice. Top of Page The Two Stages of Enlightenment Truth is not within. The root of inwardness is the world itself. Everything to be found within, and everything that is "I" altogether, is only a temporary duplication or mortal human reflection of structures that are universal and equally finite. "I" is the whole body-mind, not just the inward and self referring mind. And "I" is mortal, changing, temporary. The present body-mind, or "I," only characterizes a moment and a fraction of cosmic history. The world as a whole is the single and astonishing process. The self, "I," the temporarily independent body-mind, is not self-contained. It is a dependent expression, a playful duplication of the whole, continuous with the total pattern, and only partially awake, struggling toward self-sufficiency, obligated to self-sacrifice. There are two great releases in the life of the mortal individual. The first release is the recognition of the illusion of inwardness, of mystical inversion, of mind and knowledge. The path to inner glory, moving toward the independent root of freedom within, is the ultimate gesture of Narcissus. When there is awakening from childish fascinations, there is the confession: "I" is the body, the entire body-mind, inseparable from the greater play that is the whole cosmic world. "I" is not independent of any condition in the world. "I" cannot inspect, know, and differentiate itself from the existence of anything whatsoever. "I" may reflect or engage any condition in relationship, and so know about it. But "I" can never know what even a single thing is. Very Ignorance is the ultimate consciousness of Man, and that Ignorance may be felt to pervade the whole world as the Principle of existence. When all hope disappears, of salvation, release, or perfect knowledge through inversion of awareness toward the internal mind or self, then the first release comes. It is sudden freedom from all illusions, all of the madness of inward solutions, the entire flight from relational and bodily frustration and mortality. But then comes the dark mood of hopeless inclusion in the witless, mechanical affair of mortality and cosmic absurdity. A deadly order, a chaos of repetitions, duplications, and endings is everywhere seen by the clear and undeluded eye. Contraction upon the self, into within the self, is no longer possible. All subjectivity is renounced in recognition of the whole body-mind. Therefore, a second release follows that penetrates the dark mood of mechanical mortality. The second release is the whole Way of life or the sacrifice of "I," the whole self, the independent body-mind, into the unqualified Truth, Reality or Condition of the whole world. It is the passage from subjective inwardness to whole bodily release. It is the release of the gestures of self-meditation and self-protection into the degree or Intensity of Infinity and Infinite Feeling Consciousness. The way of inwardness is the way into consoling subjective illusions, reflections of the mortal brain-mind, fantasies of the nervous system. It is the mystical way of the salvation or permanent rescue of the independent self from mortality. It is an illusion at every stage, and a victory that dies in ultimate Nature like fleshes and all edible things. When the inward way of self-glorification is released in recognition of the whole self, then comes the second release, which is the whole life of sacrifice of the independent self. The first release is the surrender of time into space, inward into outward, left into right, permitting the balance or harmony of the dual mechanisms in man and the world. The second release is the every moment sacrifice of independent self, the whole body-mind, via the cosmic play of relations, into the Condition, the Truth, the Real God of all things and beings-thus permitting the intuition of unqualified, absolute Happiness. The way within is the inverted way, amoral, self-possessed, negative, turned away from all relations like Narcissus, essentially loveless, ultimately self-destructive, and strategically yearned toward what itself contains when all impingement is forgotten. It is the anti-ecstatic trend, the mad solution to fear. The true way is the way of the relational sacrifice of the whole self, the entire body-mind, into the Condition beyond fear or self concern. That way is the way of ecstasy, of self-surrender, of love, of life, of extension in the cosmos, of moral and responsible self presentation in all relations, of esoteric intuition, and of Translation into the Intensity of Real God, the Truth of the cosmos. When inwardness is undone in recognition of the lie, then self is confessed as the whole body-mind. And Ignorance is Realized to be the Condition of existence. This is the first stage of Enlightenment. When Ignorance is the State of mind, then the terrified and self-possessed visions of mortality and orderly absurdity also dissolve. The native disposition is intuitively felt as no-contraction and release of all independent forms and states. Sacrifice is Realized to be the Law of all spontaneity, the Law of the sudden astonishing arising of anything. In sacrifice of self, love is the medium, the human mood at Infinity. In love, unqualified Radiance may be felt to be the Principle of all manifestation. This is the second stage of Enlightenment. Therefore, one who is twice-released is yielded into the Realization of unqualified Ignorance-Radiance, the Truth, Condition, and Real God that pervades the world of countless temporary selves and incidents. In sacrifice of self, even while alive, we are not preserved. We are released from all illusions, all limits, all destinies of body and mind. We are released from all concerns for the destiny or continuation of independent self or soul, and "I" is Translated into the yet unknown Delight of the Radiant Consciousness beyond the human, the Earthly, the cosmic, and the separately manifested. Top of Page The Two Stages of the Great Cycle of Our Sacrifice The first Great Stage of the true spiritual Process is not a matter of inversion of attention toward subjective inwardness, or the concentration of attention on the phenomena of the nervous system and the brain core, to the exclusion of the extended body-mind. Rather, it is a matter of identification of the self with the disposition of the nervous system in its Native State, by relaxation of all contractions of the body-mind, or the recoil of the nervous system from the Infinite Life and toward self-possession and exclusive subjectivity. Therefore, the necessary confession, " `I' is the whole body," is not-as it would appear-the act of exclusive egoic identification with the physical body. Rather, it is the gesture of the heart, Awakened to the Truth and Radiance of Divine Ignorance. It is the liberated gesture of love, self-surrender, or ecstasy, wherein the disposition of the nervous system in its Native State becomes the disposition of the whole and entire body. The second Great Stage of the true spiritual Process is not the one of the ascent of attention toward superconscious fascinations of the nervous system, the brain, and the bodily self. Rather, it is a matter of the dissolution of the limiting force of the gesture of attention, which is the recoil of the nervous system toward self definition and separated experience. Therefore, the second Great Stage of the true spiritual Process is the one of the transcendence of all reaction, concentration, recoil, or experiential modification of the nervous system and the complex of psycho-physical individuality. It is a matter of the utter sacrifice of the nervous system, the "soul," or the individuated point of view, into the Infinite, All-Pervading, Transcendental Life, the "Holy Spirit," the "Breath of God." Thus, the Great Cycle of the Way of Divine Ignorance involves, first of all, identification with the "soul," or the disposition of the nervous system in its Native State, which is love. Thence, it is a matter of the sacrifice of the "soul," through love, into the "Oversoul," or the Absolute Personality of Life, which Pervades the nervous system and the entire World, even as the nervous system pervades the body-mind and grants the World the Mystery of conscious experience and the appearance of relationships between independently conscious entities. Only the psycho-physical Realization of the Free disposition of the nervous system, and subsequent surrender of the separated self into the Transcendental Disposition of the Life of the nervous system, makes experience a matter of Humor, or unfettered Bliss, relieved of illusions by the Wisdom of God. Top of Page The Perfect Destiny of Man Is Dissolution and Translation into the Spirit of God What the usual man primarily seeks is consoling bodily and vital states, in the realm of physical circumstances below love and responsibility. The less common but equally conventional man seeks consoling mental and psychic states, and would even attain a state of consciousness or mind that excludes bodily awareness and ordinary relational sacrifice. But the man of understanding, the devotee in the Way of Divine Ignorance, enjoys insight into the entire motivation that transforms life itself into a process that seeks to solve an inherent dilemma. He is consciously and intuitively responsible for his own primal self-division, his subjective "problem," and that responsibility is expressed through the life of love, or sacrifice, as a personal, moral, and higher psycho-physical discipline. Thus, for such a one, the Lawful life of love, or the single and relational force of psycho-physical wholeness, is the inherent nature of his existence, and it transcends and obviates the negative force of every dilemma or problem, and every interpretation of life as a strategy of solutions. Therefore, the man of understanding is always already awake to the certainty that the self or ego is the body-mind as a whole, and the true Destiny of the body-mind is in sacrifice rather than self preserving solutions to fear and mystery. Neither knowledge nor pleasure consoles him. But radical Ignorance and the native Radiance of existence are his Domain. Such a one is not ended by the disintegration of the body, nor preserved by the display of mind. Rather, he is the always present dissolution of the whole and entire body-mind in the Bliss of unqualified Consciousness (which is Divine Ignorance) and dimensionless Radiance or Glory. The Perfect Destiny of true Man is literal Dissolution and Translation of body and mind into unqualified or transcendental Ignorance-Radiance, the Radiant Transcendental Consciousness, which is commonly referred to as the Spirit of God. Top of Page There Is No Independent Self That Is Body or Mind The body-mind as a whole is not an independent self, nor does it contain such a self. When the subject-object illusions of the verbal part of the brain are released in whole brain, whole mind, and whole body awareness, no self or even body is defined by mind. There is not even any self that is to be sacrificed in ecstatic acts. The body-mind is inherently ecstatic, without center or limits in consciousness or space. This Realization is itself the primal and only true ecstasy. The ego is not within. It is the whole and entire body-mind. But the whole and entire body-mind is also not a self. It is non self, or ecstasy-undefined Ignorance-Radiance, or Love prior to knowledge and form. The whole mind is not merely the self-divided subject-object cell of independence that is the verbal mind. It is the whole and entire mind, the mind of the body as a whole. It is conscious, subconscious, unconscious, superconscious, and transcendental or non conscious. It is the body itself, rather than inwardness and mind. But even the body is only a dependent and nonseparation part or instant of a great process that stretches beyond visibility and form, beyond chemical and etheric forces, into the universal physics, of which even visible light is a solid part. The body is also absolutely that. In the Way of Divine Ignorance, it is not that the independent body-mind is sacrificed through acts of its own intention. Rather, there is simply the moment to moment Realization that no self exists or is defined, even though the body-mind persists. On the basis of this Realization-the Realization that the Condition or Truth of "I" is unqualified Ignorance-Radiance-the whole life expresses its own Condition or Truth in forms of love and transcendental happiness, until happiness itself dissolves the persistent forms. Then, by Grace, the illusory individual passes out of sight into the cycle of Divinity that is God to this world but only Bliss in itself. Oh friends, do not fail to mind me in and out. I am the sweetness, the taste of unmoral and unimagined Grace. I am beyond incarnation, neither here nor there. I am only for a moment-not merely to save you all, but all to warn and all to call to this Wonder that I am. And every one is as I am, unless they fail to love me. Top of Page The Incarnation of Silence Truth is in the moment, this instant in which there is no meaning, no cause, no implication, no necessity, no motive to any effect. The Radiance of Ignorance is the Reality, and all phenomena only test our Realization of the necessity and sufficiency of That. It is the Condition of all conditions. It is neither subjective nor objective relative to this moment. It is Only, and It is unspeakable. Top of Page Enlightenment of the Whole Body Full Index of Articles