losing all and getting everything in return

the spiritual quest is not one of striving to bring about or attain truth, but of allowing truth to reveal itself as it already is.

one fundamental misperception we suffer under in the quest for spiritual realization is that enlightenment must be gotten, as if it were some kind of accessory that can be added on to pre-existing identity structures. in this fantasy we'd become supercharged versions of our same basic selves; new and improved in certain respects, but maintaining the same old foundational belief in our intrinsic being as existing separately from everything else.

in other words, we'd like to have our cake (holding on to our belief in separate selfhood) and eat it too (experiencing the clarity and peace of enlightenment). these conflicting drives can keep us in a potentially endless loop where seemingly sincere spiritual striving is sabotaged by the underlying fear of letting go of erroneous yet intensely familiar interpretations of reality.

often as spiritual seekers, rather than being willing to give something up, what we really want is to get more. this is simply an extension of the same impulse that tells us we need a newer car, bigger house, better hairstyle. the impulse to get more, to have new things - material or spiritual - is based upon a fundamental resistance to things as they are. this resistance is exactly what keeps us separated from the actual experience of enlightenment, which is nothing more than the realization of what we really are and the accompanying understanding that what we previously thought ourselves to be was a misperception - an illusion.

in a certain sense, realization comes at a price. we must sacrifice our illusory beliefs before the blinding veil can be dispensed with and things revealed as they truly are. in feeding our fantasies we remain blinded to the truth, but they have become so familiar to us that giving them up can be extremely difficult. the problem is that we have become so identified with the illusion that we believe it is what we are, and letting it go seems tantamount to losing ourselves - in a sense, dying.

gaining real spiritual insight involves a radical process of letting go, not necessarily of material possessions (that would make it easy) but of our very foundational beliefs about who and what we are. our mind-made identity is what's nearest and dearest to us. it's the hardest thing to give up, but it must be surrendered in order to break free from the trap of egoic consciousness. the very thing we'd most like to hold on to (or to be more accurate, what we most fear letting go of) is the very thing that's holding us back from enlightened awareness.

paradoxically, when we become motivated by enough faith and courage to let even our most foundational beliefs about self evaporate (in other words, to release absolutely everything by dying to our moment-to-moment conception of self as we know it), at the very moment when it seems we will indeed evaporate, die, and forever disappear into oblivion, our limited egoic consciousness dissolves into a larger awareness that acknowledges itself as inseparable from everything - as one with all that is.

using death to bring focus

here's a useful practice: picture yourself on your deathbed. the unthinkable is happening. life is coming to an end. a sudden clarity descends, and as you look back upon your days on earth you realize what truly mattered and what didn't. you remember what it was your soul yearned for, and - the mind's propensity to bullshit itself having finally run dry - you level an uncompromisingly honest assessment on your life.

did you have the courage to live as your heart directed? did you remember what truly mattered in the midst of daily life? were you able to sacrifice immediate pleasure for the greater good of yourself and others? or did you turn a deaf ear to your inner voice and lose yourself in meaningless distractions, petty squabbles, and selfish obsessions?

now rewind to this moment: here's your chance to live in a way that will enable you to die in peace, with no regrets. right now, and tomorrow, and the next day. these are the moments of your life; these seemingly disposable minutes are what make up your whole experience. every second matters; every breath you take is one breath subtracted from your lifelong quota.

this life is a chance given to you. immersed in it as we are, it's hard to see it that way. we get lost in the specifics of daily life. we forget why we came. but learn to take an elevated perspective, and the scattered pieces of daily experience will begin to converge into one meaningful movement; a movement towards the things you know truly matter: knowing yourself, leaving a legacy of peace and love in your wake.

perhaps you've never actually faced the fact that you're going to die. thinking about death is no morbid obsession; it's a valuable practice that can help you contextualize your life experience and center it on what is truly important. death in western culture is given an unfair rap, painted as the ultimate evil. but this is just another one of the misperceptions of a culture that views the natural as unnatural, and the unnatural as natural. death is not the end of anything; it's a transitional event - a step that can be taken in joy and gratitude.

if you're interested in facing the fact of mortality, sit down and close your eyes. breathe deeply, and for each long breath, imagine yourself aging one year. how long can you live? eighty, ninety, a hundred years? surely not more than a hundred and twenty! it's gonna have to come to an end sometime, isn't it? but now, while you're still here, why not use the time wisely? there's so much to learn - and not all of it will be discarded when you leave your body behind. this limited lifetime represents the opportunity to take steps that will reverberate throughout eternity.

when death implies victory

the ego wants external things as part of an unconscious drive to fulfill its inherent sense of lack. this feeling of "not-enoughness" is intrinsic to the ego, which in essence can be defined as a mechanism designed to perpetuate the non-recognition of formlessness as true identity.

there's a funny paradox here. the ego knows it needs something - anything - to bring about completion, satisfaction, rest, and it seeks it out in as many varied ways as there are forms in the world. it projects its need to identify with things onto anything, big or small, that seems suitable at the time. it comes from the assumption that if you put enough pieces of the puzzle together, finally you'll arrive at a complete picture and be content.

the paradox is that the whole reason behind the ego's drive to complete or save itself is its very own existence; when the ego comes apart, completion is realized as the natural state of being.

usually, when an organism is sick beyond its ability to repair itself, potential solutions are available externally and if applied correctly have the power to bring about healing and a restoration to the normal balance of things. the inability to find and apply the necessary external remedy results in death, which in this context implies failure.

in the ego's case - if for analogy's sake we take it to be a self-perpetuating psychological organism - the situation is completely reversed: what keeps it alive is the very act of unsuccessfully seeking out and applying remedy after supposed remedy (some of which may provide a temporary sense of completion), when the only real solution (de-identification with form) would bring about its death - which in this case would imply victory!

the ego is just that: an unresolvable need to find something that doesn't exist, the process itself of reaching out for more regardless of what one has, of wanting something different regardless of what is. what the ego seeks cannot be found because it wants something external to identify with that will finally make it complete. this is obviously impossible! what one is is what one is; it's already the case and doesn't need to be pieced together, found, thought up or somehow manufactured (through a spiritual practice for example) to be made real.

it's possible to be unaware of this reality, and what precludes that awareness are none other than the continuous ego-processes: self-definition through identification with thought and emotion; reliving the past and projecting into the future as a form of self-seeking; chronic resistance to what is, regardless of what that may be.

coming back to the puzzle image, picture a child confused into believing that who she is lies fragmented somewhere among countless puzzle pieces scattered across her playroom floor. her sense of desperation grows as she draws from one puzzle set after another (all of which have been confused into an unrecognizable mess), never sure if she's pursuing the right image but, in her panic, too afraid to stop her mad grasping.

imagine the profound relief, peace and joy brought on by the sudden realization of the simple truth: "oh my god! i've been playing with toys all along! i am already here, regardless of what happens to these puzzle pieces. they are irrelevant to who i am." now that the puzzles are no longer invested with the absolute seriousness of representing who she is, the child can actually enjoy them as they were meant to be - as games meant to produce joy, not suffering.

this is why we often hear about the response to spiritual awakening being a great, incredulous laugh. wouldn't you respond similarly if you suddenly realized you'd been seeking your identity in puzzles - toys! - when in fact the truth of who you were was always complete, readily available, obvious and infinitely simpler than the illusion you'd fallen into?