Hotei Has Returned to the Market Place (Part 2)

mistaken for enlightenment, but it is really just a half-baked state. The trouble with the Absolute is it is relative experience. But it sure can knock your socks off!

THE RELATIVE IN THE ABSOLUTE

Sooner or later, if the human instrument continues to live, there is a coming out of the Absolute as this merging is actually just a relative experience. The upside of this experience is that free awareness may now be recognized as always already being present. This is good! The downside is that the “enlightenment” experience can easily be hijacked by the conceptual mind, and an “enlightened ego” is born. Not so good. This is where spiritual aspirants often become spiritual teachers, leap on their high horses and ride off in all directions proclaiming, “There is no one! Just One! And I am That!” And this is true. Sort of. Side ways. But not if you think about it or believe it.

Inspired to share their “enlightenment” with others, “No One” now changes their name from “Suzy” to “Ma Avidayananda,” starts having satsang, sits up front in the guru seat, and always has a dedicated student scurry off to pick up the big fat “donations” check at the end of their “I Am, There Is No Me” retreat.

The trouble with the bliss of samadhi is that eventually you have to go to the bathroom, eat breakfast, change the baby, or yell at the neighbors to shut up their stupid barking dog! That darn Relative has such poor boundaries! It just keeps intruding on the bliss of our enlightened state. If the whole universe would just realize how enlightened we are, it might start behaving appropriately. This can be a difficult time as something truly profound has obviously happened to us, but the universe doesn’t seem to care or notice. Enlightened egos just hate this! They can’t get any respect.

What often does begin to happen in this stage is that awareness becomes increasingly aware of itself as the ground of being and becomes less involved in seeking any identity in phenomenal reality. The drive to control and manipulate both ourselves and others begins to shift and fall away. It becomes more and more apparent, even to an ego, that “I” am not the doer, “I” am being “done.” Things happen, including “me.”

THE ABSOLUTE IN THE RELATIVE

Do shadows exist? Of course they do. I can see one very clearly right at this moment. There it is! Shadows appear in all different shapes, sizes, and shades. Without a doubt, shadows do exists!

And so do you!

But shadows do not exist by themselves. There are no independent shadows. They are totally dependent on something else for their existence. A shadow is a shadow of something else. Without that something else, shadows don’t exist. A shadow has no separate and independent existence. And neither do you. A shadow is totally dependent on something else for its existence. And so are you.

You, as a separate and independent entity, do not exist.

You! You are being used! You are being used by the infinite creative intelligence of the universe as the interdependent go-between of the Relative and Absolute! You are the timeless, nondimensional point where the Absolute expresses the Relative and the Relative returns to the Absolute. Behind you, vast emptiness. In front of you, the ten thousand things. No boundary, except you. Without you, nothing exists!

 No wonder you are so confused and dysfunctional! Just like Alice, in ALICE’S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND:

“WHO ARE YOU?” said the caterpillar. (This is the ultimate spiritual question!)

… Alice replied, rather shyly, “ I-I hardly know, Sir, just at present — at least I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I think I must have changed several times since then.”

“What do you mean by that?” said the caterpillar, sternly. “Explain yourself!”

“I can’t explain myself, I’m afraid, Sir,” said Alice, “because I’m not myself, you see.”

Yes, Alice, we do see.

An apparent “someone” in the apparent “Absolute in the Relative” knows exactly how Alice feels! “I can’t explain myself because I’m not myself” is the truth. (This article continues…)

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