We have an insatiable thirst for knowledge.

While our senses are constantly bombarded by visual imagery, sounds, smells, tastes and textures, we are not passive recipients of this stimulation. We are programmed to actively explore the universe.

We need to know. We need to interpret. We need to order.

In the early years, our quest for understanding is fuelled by curiosity. As young children, we explore the world of objects and emotions, which we begin to distinguish from ourselves and our feelings.⁵⁷ In time, the world that once fascinated us begins to threaten us. In trading innocence for experience, we discover that our early, naive passion for knowledge has been transformed into a driven, desperate need to map, and therefore control our environment. Curiosity has been replaced by insecurity as the engine of our quest.

Our maps of reality, our perceptions and theories, have a twofold purpose. First, they help orient us. We can situate ourselves in a complex world. Second, we are convinced that, if we can determine how the universe is constructed, then we can control it. We can control those factors that immediately impinge upon us, or, at least, we can control our reaction to them. [149]

Stages of Knowing

I am going to argue, in this chapter, that there are stages of knowing.

I will be contending that each of the stages represents a heightened awareness of what can be known, that is, an increasing awareness of and accommodation to Reality, to the Truth which lies beyond all truths, or partial perceptions of Reality.

I will look, successively, at hearsay, folk sayings, opinion, information, knowledge and wisdom.

Hearsay

Hearsay, like froth on the surface of the ocean, is the freight transported by eager conversational dialogue that trades in superficialities. The information thus conveyed is not necessarily based on fact, and is likely to be contaminated by our fascination with gossip.

Hearsay is restructured with each telling, as it is passed from individual to individual. It is unreliable as a source of knowledge, as a means of discovering what has happened, or what is happening.

Folk-Sayings

Folk-sayings take many forms.

Each family has its reservoir of folk-sayings.

Some parents are eager to convince their children that the world offers them unlimited opportunities for advancement. The world is their oyster. Other parents attempt to persuade [150] their children that the world is a dangerous place, and that people will deceive them. Sometimes this advice is based on personal experience. My maternal grandfather, whose trucking business was ruined by the depression of the 1930s, was loath to keep money in the bank because he was fearful that the banks would fail. Many of his generation buried their wealth in the ground.

Families share the folk-sayings of the tribes to which they belong, the sub-cultures as well as the macro-cultures.

Folk sayings are often expressed in aphorisms, nursery rhymes, fairy tales, sagas, and myths.

Aphorisms are pithy sayings that offer rule-of-thumb advice on how to manage one's life. They include, for those exposed to Western culture, such comments as, "Look before you leap," and, "A stitch in time saves nine".

Nursery rhymes are familiar to those who were taught them in infancy. Many nursery rhymes were disguised political statements, whose original significance has been lost, except to antiquarians, and historians interested enough to research their beginnings.

Fairy tales, some of which had a similar origin, are both a means of entertaining children and of instilling moral lessons.

Sagas are stylized narratives of national heroes, usually chieftains of tribal groups, or tribal confederacies.

The significance of myth, because it arises largely from the unconscious, is not as obvious as are the lessons to be drawn from fairy tales. Yet myth is enormously powerful, largely because we are unconscious of its effect. The more we [151] become aware of our myths--where we explore and question them--the less they influence us. Once we have pulled them apart, and laid them out, their power has largely dissipated.

Primitive beliefs, the myths of hunter-gather societies, are associated with sympathetic magic. Individuals, situations, and even gods, can be manipulated or controlled by magical words or actions.

The myths of the great agrarian civilizations of Mesopotamia and Egypt were well developed, exhibiting a distinctive cosmology. Myth succeeded magic as a means of understanding reality and ordering society. When rationality, or Aristotelian logic, replaced myth as the principal mode of thinking, of consciousness, and when the individual succeeded the community as the focus of attention, the subject of myth-making became the individual hero. The hero's journey represented the journey of the individual, rather than that of the nation.⁵⁸

Though our society has tended to be dismissive of myth, we have not lost our myth-making ability.

On the micro level, the power of myth is evident in the influence of cults, not only on the less-well-educated, but also on those whose minds have been honed by higher education.

Aphorisms, nursery rhymes, fairy tales, sagas, and myths--particularly myths--are perpetuated through ritual. Ritual celebration of a common history and shared beliefs bonds communities together.

The down-side of this process is that it distinguishes between those who are in and those who are out, between [152] those who deserve the flavour of the gods and those who don't.

Folk sayings exert a powerful influence over those whose aspirations they focus. They enshrine a range of insights. However, these insights, while they reflect shared perceptions, and thus elements of the Reality that underlies our culture-bound truths, are often discovered to be a amalgam of truths and error, and, on occasions, a reservoir of prejudice.

Opinion

Radio talkback personalities and TV journalists cultivate the impression that they are presenting us with facts, when they are offering us opinions. The more authoritative they sound, the more likely it is that they are short on fact and long on bias.

Facts do not come to us uninterpreted. Whatever is processed through our minds and hearts is filtered through our perceptions and past experiences. This filter is selective in what it accepts. It also gives a particular spin to what it allows through the filter. Most people are unaware of this process, and cannot distinguish between reality and their interpretations of reality. The more aggressive individuals are in expressing themselves, the more likely it is that they are blind to this distinction.

This does not mean that people are incapable of deliberate manipulation. There are those who sculpture the truth to convert others to their way of thinking because they want to enlist them in their crusades. They may do this with the full knowledge of what they are doing. Alternatively, they may be so convinced of the justice of their cause that they are unaware of the degree to which they are manipulating [153] others. They may be driven by their need to exercise power, by the lure of financial gain, or they may simply be overcome by the strength of their commitment. In the latter case, their passion may be sourced in either balanced judgment, or unconscious energies.

While we may be convinced that a particular ideology represents how things are, or offers the human community its best chance of improvement, we are often unaware of why we are attracted to it. Because the needs that draw us to these ideologies are mostly unconscious, we are often oblivious of what motivates us, of why we are fascinated by particular constructions of reality, and, therefore, of why we are so intent on imposing these constructions on others.

Be wary of those who dichotomize reality and proceed to reject one of the polarities of the dichotomy, people who say "It is not this but that". Reality is complex, and those who trade in simplistic dichotomies should be regarded with suspicion. It is more than likely that their reductionism serves the interests of a particular ideology.

More dangerous than those given to simplistic dichotomies, are individuals whose hypnotic articulation of ideologies, or mythologies, has the capacity to by-pass the critical intelligence of even the best-educated individuals in the community. This plausibility is increased where there is a communal pre-disposition to accept the energy that drives the rhetoric. As Jung argued, Hitler's harangues appealed, not only to the aspirations of a nation that had suffered humiliation and economic impoverishment since its defeat in the First World War, but also to elements of the national shadow that were lurking beneath the surface, and that found expression in the rhetoric and pathological drivenness of the Führer.⁵⁹ [154]

Opinion can be more persuasive than fact. As Robert Funk argued, knowledge appears to make no contribution to the credentials of an authority, for opinions, firmly held, expressed loudly, and buttressed by ignorance are quite adequate.⁶⁰

Information

We are dependent upon information for our day-to-day living.

Sometimes this information is of no great moment. We may want to know when the train is due at the station.

On other occasions, the information we are seeking is of greater importance. It would be to our advantage to know that we will be sacked if we do not apply ourselves more vigorously to our work. It is also critical that we are familiar with emergency procedures should a fire break out in our workplace.

Information concerning relationships is also important. For instance, if we were planning to visit someone from whom we have been estranged, we would want to know whether a visit would be welcomed.

Relational information can be either accurate or inaccurate. Mostly, because of an element or subjectivity in our appraisal of each other, it is a mixture of both.

In assessing the reliability of advice we are given concerning relationships, it is important to recognise a tendency to bias, to over-evaluation or under-evaluation of particular individuals. The former derives from the temptation to live [155] one's life, vicariously, through others, where, through a strange alchemy, their successes become ours. The latter is usually a consequence of envy, or jealousy, both of which are fuelled by a sense of inferiority.

We are also exposed to quantitative analyses.

Politicians and other interest groups seek to persuade us that their point of view is accurate and supported by the evidence. However, almost invariably, their selection and presentation of data is designed to support their rhetoric. They have chosen to highlight certain facts and obscure others. The spin-doctors have been at work to ensure that a particular position is viewed in the most favorable light. Negative elements are disguised by euphemisms, and facts or comments that could undermine their case are not acknowledged.

While the media poses as an honest broker of ideas and interpretations, particularly in news and current affairs programmes, it reveals itself to be no less biased than the politicians who self-interest it delights in exposing.

This bias may represent the political or moral views of its proprietor, its senior editors, or its advertisers. The editorial advantage enjoyed by radio and television presenters, who have often made up their minds on issues before the evidence is in, and who badger uncooperative interviewees, is obvious to the discerning. Their interest in ratings, and, as a consequence, job security and remuneration, is hardly a national secret. Furthermore, investigative journalism, like politics and the law, has a tendency to attract those with high levels of testosterone, which manifests in gladiatorial combat. [156]

Information, in the form of quantitative analysis, can be helpful at a practical level, such as when one wants to establish a small business. It is important for the novice entrepreneur to be aware of commercial, legal and financial realities before launching a new venture.

While we need access to information, the reliability of the information we receive needs to be carefully assessed.

Knowledge

Information shades into knowledge.

Knowledge is generally more significant than information. It covers a range of areas, including the full spectrum of academic concerns, from psychology to astrophysics.

Most who devote their lives to research have difficulty keeping up with developments in their narrow specialty. Each of us, however extensive our knowledge, is constantly confronted by our limitations. Even Polymaths are unable to comprehend the data available to them. It is impossible for any one person to know everything about everything.

This does not mean that we should not seek to integrate material from a vast range of disciplines. We need to do this; otherwise we will be lost in a confusion of voices.

Ken Wilber has attempted this sort of integration. Wilber argues that an "integral" approach, which brings together internal, external, individual and corporate dimensions of reality, and which takes account of levels, or depth dimensions of understanding, is essential to the further development of the species, and to the healing and survival of the planet.⁶¹ [157]

Wilber contends that his insights are merely "orienting generalizations", which are not to be taken too seriously.⁶² They are designed to help us make some sense of the overwhelming Everest of knowledge. The framework he provides needs to be filled out by others, whose expertise lies in specialist disciplines. These experts need the humility to listen to, and take account of, the insights of others, who offer alternative perspectives.

Unless we are willing to grapple with the complexities of the knowledge industry, and to synthesize the knowledge available to us from a range of disciplines, whatever meta-model we employ, we will not be able to use what we know to construct a better world.

To know is to experience some degree of security. Knowing provides us with rough maps of the territory. It is also life-enhancing. Our understanding is enriched, our capacity for ascetic appreciation is tutored, and we are offered tools for personal, social, political and ecological transformation.

Flatland

For some, the acquisition of knowledge represents the end of the line. Those who argue this way are concerned with breadth of understanding, with an encyclopaedic grasp of all known categories of knowledge, and often have little consciousness of the depth dimension of our knowing. They equate depth with quantity, rather than with levels of perception.

This myopia is a consequence of what Ken Wilber describes as a "flatland" mentality.⁶³ The explosion of knowledge that was characteristic of the twentieth-century, the challenges this new knowledge posed to old explanations, and the fact that the pace of life at which most of us were forced to live [158] allowed little leisure for reflection, hid the depth dimension from us.

From time immemorial, the world's philosophic and religious traditions have emphasized the importance of acquiring wisdom. Wisdom was seen to be superior to knowledge. It had to do with understanding what life is about and with the ability to live it fulfillingly, and for the benefit of oneself and others. In essence, wisdom was concerned with discovering how to live the deepest essence of our humanity.

Wisdom

While knowledge can be measured by its breadth, wisdom is measured by its depth.

There are two dimensions to wisdom. The first has to do with discovering what life is about and living it effectively. The second has to do with exploring levels of awareness, and the transformation of the self that this effects.

What Life is About

The first dimension of wisdom is concerned with discovering what life is about and living these insights.

This wisdom comes to us, rough-hewn, like seams of gold in quartz reefs. The precious metal is embedded in a mythological mother load. It was this wisdom that the Hebrew Psalmist aspired to, when he prayed: "Teach us to order our days rightly, that we may enter the gate of wisdom".⁶⁴ Similarly, Solomon is reported to have prayed, "Give me wisdom that sits by thy throne . . . that she may be with me . . . and she will guide me wisely in my actions".⁶⁵ [159]

This philosophical-ethical wisdom is not always personalized in this way. For example, Confucius, when asked, "What is wisdom?", answered, "To work for the things the common people have a right to and to keep one's distance from the gods and spirits while showing them reverence can be called 'wisdom'".⁶⁶ The Analects of Confucius have been described as practical, experiential, ethical wisdom, which does not attempt a speculative explanation of the world.⁶⁷

One school of thought has associated wisdom with moderation, with the ability to negotiate a middle course between extremes. Aristotle,⁶⁸ Siddhartha Gautama,⁶⁹ and such moderns as Charles Hartshorne, the Process theologian,⁷⁰ have argued for a middle way.

In most traditions, wisdom has to do with aligning oneself with the divine intention for humankind. This does not occur automatically. Discipline is needed.

In Hinduism, yogic practices are designed to lead the practitioner into conscious union with Brahman. These practices enable the individual to open themselves to the Divine.⁷¹

The word "yoga" covers a broad range of activities. It can refer to formal meditative disciplines, or to the contemplative spirit with which one approaches life. An example of the latter is found in the Bhagavad Gita, where Krishna seeks to instruct Arjuna. He points out that wisdom (buddhi) has to do with valuing things and using them for the purposes for which they were designed. Thus, when our actions are permeated by a buddhic devotion to life, they become a yoga, karma-yoga. As Wood explains, washing dishes with love is yoga, whereas what goes on in a washing [160] machine is not. Surgery performed merely for material gain is not yoga.⁷²

Sometimes this cleansing of our motives is seen as an end in itself, and therefore as the essence of wisdom. At other times, it is viewed as a preparation for future transformation. It was this view that Gregory of Nyssa articulated, when he commented that it is through purification that the Christian pilgrim attains their final goal, an uncluttered view of God, and a final unity with this source and ground of our existence.⁷³

A Twofold Knowing

This encounter with divinity involves at least two elements.

First, we are confronted with aspects of the self that we had not realised were part of us. We stand self-revealed. As Krishnamurti argued, it is this discovery of ourselves as we are, without any sense of condemnation or justification, which effects a fundamental transformation in what we are. And this is the beginning of wisdom.⁷⁴

Second, we find ourselves face to face with the Spirit, with that divine, cosmic Presence that holds the entire universe in a moment of creative fecundity.

A Single Knowing

While knowledge of ourselves, and knowledge of God, can be sufficiently distinguished to explore each separately, we should not be seduced into believing that knowledge of ourselves, and knowledge of God, are separate experiences. The two experiences are inextricable. They are two elements of the one experience. [161]

This helps explain why the Gnostic teacher Monoimus suggested that we look for God by taking ourselves as a starting point. It was his conclusion that when we do this we will find him in ourselves.⁷⁵ A Sufi saying, capturing the essence of this insight, argued that he who knows himself, knows his Lord.⁷⁶

Augustine, in his Confessions, concluded that if he quieted himself and withdrew his attention from all that distracted him; if he descended, meditatively, deeper into himself, he would attain to the Eternal Wisdom that broods over all things. Entering into the sanctuary of his soul, he beheld, with the eye of the soul, that Light Unchangeable that is the source of all true Wisdom.⁷⁷

On the other hand, the deeper our knowledge of God, the more profound our knowledge of ourselves. We know ourselves in the experience of being known and accepted non-judgmentally by God.

We can pursue this insight one step further. Meister Eckhart, arguing that our knowledge of ourselves and God is of a piece with God's knowledge of us, contended that we are caught up into God's knowing, into an aspect of God's omniscience. In one of his most famous paradoxical sayings, Eckhart suggested that the eye by which we see God is the same as the eye by which God sees us. Our eye and God's eye are one and the same--one in seeing, one in knowing, one in doing.⁷⁸ Divine Consciousness, the self-awareness of the Universal Mind, sustains the cosmos through a creative embrace. We are drawn up in to the slipstream of this Creative Consciousness, and know ourselves through participating in God's knowing of us. As Dr Radhakrishnan commented, those who have reached this level of awareness are acquainted with the fact that the Supreme is not an object presented to knowledge but is the condition of knowledge.⁷⁹ [162]

A Participatory Knowing

This twofold knowing, of ourselves and God, is a knowing that occurs, not through observation, but though participation. As Sri Yukteswar suggested to his disciples, wisdom is with the atoms, not with the eyes. When our conviction of the truth is in our being, not merely in our brains, we may diffidently vouch for its meaning.⁸⁰ Similarly, Isaac the Blind, one of the early Kabbalists of Provence, contended that the inner, subtle essences can be contemplated only by sucking, not by knowing.⁸¹ The same point was made by Rabbi Bunam, who commented that if he were to set out to give a learned and subtle interpretation of the Scriptures, he could say a great many things. He went on to add that, while a fool says what he knows, a sage knows what he says.⁸² Sri Aurobindo offered a more detailed explanation of this phenomenon, arguing that true knowledge is denied to our reason, which is a transitional instrument dealing with appearances. True knowledge arises when consciousness passes beyond its normal limits, and becomes directly aware of itself, and of the Power in the world, through experiencing identity with that Power.⁸³

The Source of Wisdom

To know God is to possess wisdom, or to be possessed by wisdom, wisdom being another name for God.

This identification is outlined with great psychological and spiritual subtlety in Paul's Letter to the Corinthians, where the apostle writes:

"Things beyond our seeing, things beyond our hearing, things beyond our imagining, all prepared by God for those who love him", these [163] it is that God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit explores everything, even the depths of God's own nature. Among men, who knows what a man is but the man's own spirit within him? In the same way, only the Spirit of God knows what God is. This is the Spirit that we have received from God, and not the spirit of the world, so that we may know all that God of his own grace has given us; and, because we are interpreting spiritual truths to those who have the Spirit, we speak of these gifts of God in words found for us not by human wisdom but by the Spirit. A man who is unspiritual refuses what belongs to the Spirit of God; it is folly to him; he cannot grasp it, because it needs to be judged in the light of the Spirit.⁸⁴

To Daoists, this wisdom is a form of intuitive knowledge, a knowledge of the Dao, of the universal Wisdom that governs the universe. Those enlightened by this wisdom do not need to talk about it. Those who know do not talk. Those who talk do not know.⁸⁵

Daoism suggests that we yield to, and flow with, the Reality, Dao, Spirit, or God we engage in this way. This is expressed beautifully in the paradoxical comment that a truly good man does nothing, yet leaves nothing undone. A foolish man is always busy, but does not complete what has to be done.⁸⁶

An Expanding Awareness

Contemplative experience involves the negotiation of a number of stages, stages that have been identified by all major religious traditions. There is a consistency in the outlining of these stages, in spite of the fact that they are [164] embedded in differing mythological frameworks. Few have outlined these stages as clearly and illuminatingly as Ken Wilber.

According to Wilber, the first level is that of the ego, the ego that is out of touch with its dark twin, its shadow. At this level, the ego expresses itself through a persona, or mask, which is constructed, consciously or unconsciously, as a means of engaging others, gaining acceptance from them, or of hiding the less flattering aspects of itself.

By integrating ego and shadow, we arrive at the level of the self. However, the process of integration is far from complete.

It is possible to live at the level of the self without being able to experience ourselves through our bodies. However, if we persist with the journey of self-discovery, it is not long before we become aware that the self is alienated from the body. Because the body is the repository of unrecognized and undischarged energies, once we begin to tap into these energies, we are alerted to the fact that we need to pay closer attention to our bodies, to dialogue with, and befriend them. This introduces us to the level of the bodyself.

Wilber goes on to talk about a range of "transpersonal bands", levels of transpersonal experience, that are a prelude to experiencing what he describes as Unity Consciousness, the sense that we are connected to all reality. Having reached this level of unity consciousness, contemplatives become aware that everything is connected to everything else.⁸⁷

This inter-connectedness is associated with a nondual awareness that takes us beyond the subject-object divide. This was well expressed by a great Zen Master, who, referring to his enlightenment, commented that when he [165] heard the sound of the bell ringing, there was no bell and no "I", just the ringing."⁸⁸

The feeling of the oneness of all reality, which is a correlate of nondual awareness, is described by Wilber as "One Taste".

Wilber, who explored this experience with mentors from a diverse range of meditative traditions, used a variety of approaches to explain the experience to the uninitiated. The task, of course, is impossible. To talk to people about what is utterly beyond the range of their experience is like trying to explain the Einstein's special theory of relativity to a five-year old. Nevertheless, in spite of this almost insurmountable difficulty, Wilber's explanations are credible. In one passage, which I found particularly helpful, he describes how he was introduced to the experience. It is from a published diary. He explains how he had been arrested by a statement of Sri Ramana Maharshi, that that which is not present in deep dreamless sleep is not real. Commenting on the fact that he had been meditating intensely for 20 years when he came across this statement, he went on to describe how his Dzogchen teacher, Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche, led him into the experience. He began having flashes of constant, non-dual awareness. A year later, during an intense eleven-day period, when the separate self seemed to radically, deeply, thoroughly die, the process matured. He didn't sleep during those eleven days, or, more accurately, he was conscious for eleven days and nights, as his body and mind went through waking, dreaming and sleeping. During this time there was only unwavering, empty consciousness, the luminous mirror mind, the witness that was one with everything it witnessed. ⁸⁹ [166]

Wilber argues that this One Taste is an experience, a state where everything in the universe has the same taste--the flavour of the Divine.⁹⁰

The implications of this experience-generated insight are profound. The Zen Master, Yasutani, drew attention to these implications in commenting that everything in the phenomenal world--the clouds, mountains, farts, urine, earthquakes and thunder--are all the Original face. Everything, good and bad, pleasant and unpleasant, constitute our perfectly-fulfilled Original Self.⁹¹

Furthermore, those who have reached this stage of nondual awareness argue that they sense no separation between God and themselves. Their experience of God has passed beyond the subject-object divide. They do not see themselves as separate from God. With Jesus, they are able to say, "I and the Father are one."⁹² This confession, contrary to what most people imagine, is devoid of hubris. However, it is almost impossible to explain what it signifies to those who have not experienced it.⁹³

In describing these various levels, Wilber argues that at each stage, as we descend, we first identify, then disidentify, with a particular stage, before we proceed to re-identify with the next level. In other words, as we proceed through the levels, as we descend, we identify, in turn, with each of those levels. We identify ourselves with that aspect of the self that resides at that level. This means that we identify, progressively, with the ego, the self, the bodyself, and finally, with the universe and with God.⁹⁴

A Caveat

The development of the self, what I had described as a descent into deeper, more comprehensive levels of the self, is [167] a far more complex process than might be obvious from my brief summary of Wilber's "Spectrum of the Consciousness".⁹⁵

More recently, Wilber, expanding his paradigm, and conceptualizing human development as an upward, rather than a downward movement, argued that we need to consider lines of development, as well as the levels through which development proceeds along each of those lines.

In The Eye of Spirit, he explains that his earlier model did not fully differentiate the various lines of development that progress through each of the levels. He argues that these different developmental lines include affective, cognitive, moral, inter-personal, object-relations, self-identity, each of which develops in a quasi-independent fashion through the general levels or basic structures of consciousness. There is no single line that governs all these developments.⁹⁶ His general thesis posits an overall spectrum of consciousness involving a dozen different lines, each of which has a different architecture, dynamic, structure, and function, and all of which are loosely held together by the self-system.⁹⁷

Wilber also argued that an individual's spiritual development can be represented by either (1) the overall, if complex, ascent of the self-structure, comprehensively and at different stages, along the various lines, or (2) by the progress an individual makes along a single, "spiritual" line of development, which, borrowing from Paul Tillich, he describes as their pursuit of that which is of Ultimate Concern to them.⁹⁸

This caveat indicates that different aspects of the self-structure, the different lines of development that Wilber identifies, may be regressed in relationship to other lines. In [168] other words, while some aspects of the self may be highly developed, other aspects, perhaps injured in childhood, remain relatively undeveloped. This arrested development may manifest in immature responses that appear to contradict the presumption that a particular individual has attained a comprehensive level of self-development. In this context, it also needs to be recognised, as Wilber has contended, that higher structures can be hijacked by lower impulses.⁹⁹

Wilber is also at pains to argue that those who are able to experience One Taste, have, in a sense, come home. This capacity has been within them all along. It represents their Original Face, their Ground Consciousness. They are, therefore, in no way superior to those who identify exclusively with the ego, in whom the Original Face is also present, but unrecognized.

Recognising the Wise

Those whose primary identification is with one, or both, of the wisdom levels exhibit a range of characteristics.

They live the moment. There is a spontaneity, though not randomness, about their actions because they are directly intuited. They are unhurried. They flow with their guidance.

Egoic needs rarely clutter their engagements with others. They live without attachments deriving from these needs. This does not mean, however, that they do not have commitments. They are compassionate and concerned with issues of justice.

They have a quiet strength, though this should not be taken to imply that they never express themselves energetically. [169]

They do not need to control others. They allow, even encourage others to be themselves. They have an ability to be present to others.

They are possessed of a gentle strength. They are impressive, but not intimidating. They are open and self-revealing. Though they rarely talk about themselves, they are able to be honest about their weaknesses. They don't need to brag.

They are transparent to the Divine. You can sense love radiating from them.

You can observe in them an oscillation and harmony between eros and agape, between an upward movement of desire towards God and a downward reach towards those in need. They do not sense any separation between themselves and others. They experience themselves as the other. What is done to others they experience as been done to them. This connectedness extends to every element in the universe.

They are aware that life is a mixture of bitter and sweet, of light and darkness, and they recognise both qualities in themselves. They are able to embrace these opposites and acknowledge a dimension of experience beyond good and evil. This insight is reflected in the comment of Chaung-tzu that those who want good government without misrule, right without wrong, do not understand the principles of the universe.¹⁰⁰ They recognise that light and darkness are the reverse aspects of the one entity, flip sides of each other, counterweights.

They overflow with gentle humour, which bubbles up from within them. This humour is born of the marriage of the secular and the sacred, and represents a fruitful interplay between the two. Sam Keen expresses this synergy in a beautiful passage, in which he comments that the sacred and [170] the profane, seriousness and humour, have been characteristic of the deepest spiritual traditions. Humour, parody, making fun of serious matters, are part of the dance of life, and help us avoid psychological rigidity, fanaticism and political tyranny. They prevent us from taking ourselves too seriously.¹⁰¹

Those who live the eternal Wisdom are refreshing springs moistening the parched landscape of the times in which they live.

Being Intentional

While growth is a natural process, the higher stages of human consciousness do not emerge as a matter of course. We need to decide to pursue the quest. However, the growth that occurs is a consequence, not of our effort, but of the interplay of the potential that resides within us and the grace that brings this potential to fruition.

It would be true to say that the Original Face with which we are born, the image of God in which we are made, the potential we have for experiencing life as One Taste, is overlaid, as a consequence of socialization, by layers of illusion and scarring that hides from us the fact that this pristine perceptiveness is natural to us. In our search we are not looking for something that is absent, but for something that is present, but unrecognized.

While we can perceive with the Eye of the Flesh, and can discriminate with the Eye of the Mind, we also need to discover that we have the capacity to engage reality with the Eye of the Spirit.

The search, in which we are engaged, over time, whittles away the passion that drives it. In the no-man's-land [171] between intentionality and discovery is a space in which we relinquish the active, compulsed dimension of the search, come to the end of ourselves, and open ourselves to the inrush of the Spirit. This experience is not an achievement of which we can boast. It is a gift. Nor is it something we possess. One precondition for entering upon the experience is that we relinquish the need to possess. In one sense, it is we who are possessed. This possession is not ownership, but communion. [172]

[ROI 149-172]