There is a beautiful complementarity between allowing and owning whatever arises.

As awakeness itself, we already and always allow whatever arises. Shifting into finding ourselves as awakeness, there is a release of identification with whatever resistance there is to it. We can now hold whatever arises and the resistance to it, without blindly taking ourselves as either one. There is a passive allowing of it all. It is just a noticing of what is already and always here. (Although the shift into noticing it is often active.)

Yet at our human side, it is also important to actively own whatever arises. To actively become familiar with it, see that it is part of me, widen my conscious identity to include it, explore how it already shows up in my life, explore what it asks of me, discover how it supports the life of this human self, bring it into the active repertoire of how this human self lives in the world. This includes noticing a part of this human self that was already around, actively bringing it into my conscious identity at my human level, and actively exploring it in and bringing it into my daily life.

And as so often, there is a mutuality between the two. One supports the other.

Allowing whatever arises helps me more easily actively own it. I can release identification from any beliefs and identities that stopped me from seeing it as part of my human self, and I can now more wholeheartedly embrace it and find its gifts.

And actively own it helps me release identification with old beliefs and identities that previously kept it as “other”, which in turn makes it easier for me to find myself as awakeness itself, already allowing it all.

The allowing is the enlightenment part, finding myself as awakeness and everything arising to and within awakeness as no other than this awakeness itself. And the owning is the self-realization part, the healing, maturing and development of this human self.

Or we can say that the first is the Self-realization, and the other is the self-realization. It is the realization of the Self, as Big Mind, Brahman, the divine mind, or whatever fancy name we have for it. And it is the realization of the self, of the wholeness of who this individual self is and can be.

There are as many examples of this as there are experiences.

(more…)

The Republican Senator Larry Craig insisting that he is “not gay” reminds me of some of the flawed thinking about these things that seems to be out there.

The polarization into either gay or heterosexual seems, even on the surface of it, pretty suspicious. Why should it be either/or? In most of these type of cases, it is more often both/and.

This polarization and either/or thinking seems to be a product of taking on an exclusive identity as one or the other. I see myself as either heterosexual or gay, so then filter myself, and my impulses and attractions and even my behavior, through that identity.

If there is an attraction or action that doesn’t quite fit with my conscious identity, I can always dismiss it as something else.

These attractions are not really what they seem to be, or they are, but I can’t be the one experiencing it, so it must be somebody else. My actions are not really an indication of my conscious identity being too narrow. And, to prove it to myself and others, I may reinforce my identity as “not gay” even more.

And finally, these identities in general do not take circumstances into account. They assume that there is something inherent in our personality that is always that way, independent of circumstances, which again is a dubious assumption. In the right situation, I would guess that any one of us can experience and act either way, even if it doesn’t match our conscious identity.

It seems that it makes more practical sense to see all of us as bisexual, and what comes up for us, and is lived in our lives, depends more on circumstances than anything else… such as culture, subculture, who is around, and more.

Initial draft…. 

I listened to the authenticity program from To The Best of Our Knowledge last night, which takes an appropriately post-modern look at the cult of authenticity.

As with most things, it can be a useful idea/filter at times, but also creates some problems if taken as reflecting something solid or real inherent in the world.

What is authenticity? How does it look?

In a conventional sense, it means to be true to who I am, whatever I take that to be. It may mean being honest - in how I speak and live - about emotions, beliefs, my history, and so on. It could also mean being consistent over time, in terms of keeping my word, and staying with the same or similar beliefs and identities. Similarly with non-human objects, it may mean being honest about its composition, history, and so on.

That sounds good, pretty straight forward, and maybe even desirable to some extent.

But even scratching the surface of this, it all quickly breaks down.

• I can be honest with my experience as it is, here now, but it quickly changes into something else and never repeat.
• Emotions arise, here now, but they are nothing solid or fixed. They are in flux. My experience of them can be filtered in innumerable ways, and if they are not resisted they turn into something that I cannot label even if I wanted to. And I can express them in any number of ways, depending on how the experience of the emotions are filtered and how the expression of them are filtered.
• I can be honest about my beliefs. Yet these too change. And if I look, I see that each belief has infinite causes… family, friends, media, subculture, culture, evolution of the species, and much more. I can be honest about the beliefs being here, but they are not “mine”.
• I can be authentic with my identity, yet this identity is made up of stories, and they have infinite causes and are not “mine”. This identity, of this human self, is not created by this human self. At most, it is maintained locally by this human self, although it is really maintained by the whole of existence.
• I can be authentic about beliefs and identities, yet when I look I find that they are simply thoughts and have no reality or substance beyond being just an ephemeral thought.
• If I am to be authentic in relation to my culture, then which aspects of this culture, and from what time? Again, there is an infinite of aspects and flavors, and an infinity of points of time to choose among. Also, if I look at what is typically considered the most authentic parts of my own culture, I find that most or all of it came from other places, it was all imported at one point. Even if I find something that originated here, it has been influenced and colored by everything else.
• I can be honest about my experience, but this experience is filtered. I experience anger, have an identity as not angry, so it must be someone else who is angry. My authentic experience of myself in that situation is of not being angry, yet if I “own” that anger, then that is what is more authentic.
• I had an opinion in the past, but that was then. Beliefs, identities, interests, passions change over time. The person I was is not the one here now. Am I more authentic if I try to stay consistent over time, or if I go with what is true for me now?
• Everything has infinite causes and effects. (What is “mine” is not really mine.)
• Everything is in flux.

So it all breaks down if I take a closer look at it, which means two things. First, it gives me a freedom from the whole idea of authenticity, and also from ideas of solidity and consistency over time. And this is also a freedom to use the term authenticity in a conventional way, in ways that have a limited and practical function, knowing that it is nothing more than that.

- infinite causes, what is alive here now (always), beliefs (what comes out of), identity (what take oneself to be),
- mutability/change, always new/different (anything… ecosystems, food, individuals, etc.)
- own what is here (vs. disowning, denying, although if disowned, then that authentic)

The more I explore beliefs, the clearer the basic pattern and dynamics become…

• There is a belief in a story.
  • It is taken as somehow intrinsically true.
  • It is seen as reflecting something inherent in the world.
  • The grain of truth in its reversals are downplayed or ignored.
• An identity is formed from this belief.
  • There is an identity as someone having that belief.
  • And the belief itself creates an identity. (E.g. if the belief is that “people shouldn’t lie” then an identity as someone not lying may be created from it.)
• There is a split into I and Other
  • A split into right and wrong, true and false.
  • A split into a separate self and the wider world.
  • From this split comes a sense of separation, alienation, not being quite at home, unease, discomfort, and so on.
• There is a need to defend this belief and its corresponding identity.
  • There is a need to maintain the appearance of truth in the belief, and to ignore the grain of truth in its reversals.
  • There is a need to behave in accordance with the identity formed by the belief.
• Supporting beliefs are created.
  • A whole army of other beliefs is created and maintained to support and defend the initial belief.
  • These beliefs form a network of supporting beliefs
  • This network consist of groups that are relatively consistent among themselves, although they may not always be so consistent with beliefs in other belief groups. They don’t have to, since groups are often activated more or less separately from each other.
• Fear comes up, from a sense of having to defend a belief, identity and separate self.
  • This fear provides motivation for maintaining and supporting the initial belief, and its supporting beliefs.
• The body serves an important function with beliefs, in at least two ways.
  • It tenses up, and the breath often becomes more shallow.
  • It serves as a location in space for a sense of I, and the tense muscles provide sensations serving as this anchor.

(more…)

Often when I explore beliefs through inquiry, or am with emotions, I notice the shift from a sense of it being very personal to not personal at all.

It makes sense. When we believe in a story, it becomes our identity. I am wrapped up in the story, and become the story to some extent. And more than that, my identity becomes wrapped up in the whole conglomerate around the story, such as emotions created by it and behavioral patterns triggered by it. The stronger the belief and identity, the more it all seems intensely personal and private. If people or situations poke at it, there is reactivity. If people probe into it, there is defensiveness. And there may be an impulse to hide it from others and even myself. It is just too personal, too private, too sensitive, to allow it out in the world.

When this knot unravel, through inquiry or being with the emotions, or in other ways, the identification unravels along with it. Now, what used to appear so personal and private, is seen - and felt - as universally human, nothing to hide or protect, and not personal or private at all. Everything around it is seen as coming from merely a thought, and that is all.

Someone is receiving transplants for just about every organ and body part, in continuous rotation. He even receives a transplant for his head, which makes me slightly uneasy as I realize that there is no fixed identity there. Even the gender changes. It is all OK as he takes a research approach to it, studying the effects of the continuous transplants.

The little guy is having every part of him replaced, continuously, including the head and sexual organs. There is no fixed bodily identity possible. I am a little uncomfortable seeing this, but then realize that it is OK since he uses it as a research opportunity, including how it is to live with an absence of (an easily) fixed identity.

After waking up and staying with the dream, I realize that this is a very clear representation of my experience of myself… of seeing any identity in flux, always changing… both in terms of the conventional identity itself such as masculine, feminine, physical appearance, smart, not so smart, and so on, and in terms of the identification with any of these identities. It is all in flux. Nothing stays the same. And I see this here now, and also how it changes over a day.

I had this dream during our trip to Eastern Oregon, after we had spent our first evening at Crystal Crane Hot Springs in the desert near Burns, and sharing the facilities with a bunch of cowboys and gals on motorcycles.

I noticed that there was a continuous shift for me between having an identity as different from them (and experiencing separation) and finding a shared identity with them (no separation), and a slight discomfort in both cases… first, due to the sense of separation, then, due to finding myself as the same as someone I habitually have seen myself as different from. The discomfort in the dream was similar or the same as this one. A sense of having no solid ground to stand on in terms of identity. It fluctuates with the situation, and also in terms of what attention focuses on.

First, I see myself as a liberal city-dweller, different from these cowboys and gals in many ways. And then, I see how we are no different… we all enjoy the food, the water in the hot springs, good company, we all have hopes and fears, dreams and nightmares, we all take care of those within our circle of concern, we all do the best we can, we all try to live up to certain ideals and follow certain guidelines in our lives.

The essentials, the shared human qualities, are all the same. At most, it is only the superficial strategies that are slightly different, but even here not so much.

And in falling into this, and the sense of no separation, there is a slight sense of discomfort, of disorientation, since the old habitual identity has temporarily fallen away or far into the background of attention.

Whenever there is a clash between our stories about what is and what should be, or life and our beliefs, or circumstances and identity, what happens can be interpreted in two main ways.

First, from headlessness (Big Mind, awake void awake to itself), we are what arises, yet there is an identification with a story and an identity which does not fit what we find ourselves as. Of course, as soon as there is this identification, we don’t realize that we inevitable are what arises, but filter it through a sense of I here with a particular belief and identity, and Other out there which clashes with I in here. What arises is split into an inside and outside, and the two appears to not get along very well.

It is a comical situation, especially when we see this directly.

We have no choice but to become and be what arises, because that is what we are. We are this awareness and its contents, this wide open space full of the world as it arises here and now. Yet when this is split into a sense of I and Other, we are sometimes shocked by it and struggle with it, resist it in every way we are able, because it does not fit with who we take ourselves to be.

The other way to look at this, is through a more conventional view, taking who we take ourselves to be - a separate self, an object in the world, a small region of content of awareness - as real and substantial.

Here, we can also say that life shows up in a particular way that does not fit with our beliefs and identities, or rather the stories and identities we are identified with. But now, life reminds us of something in our human self that does not fit these beliefs and identities.

Our beliefs and identities has shadows, which is the truth in the reversals of the beliefs and ourselves as also what is outside of our conscious identities. And life reminds us of these shadows, which brings up discomfort, and a filtering of anything in our shadows as only out there and not (also) in here, in our human self.

Either way, a sense of resistance to what is is an invitation to find in ourselves what we see out there.

When there is resistance, or rather, identification with resistance, a taking of it as I, it is a reminder to find ourselves as headless and Big Mind. And it is also an invitation to find in our human self what we see out there.

The first invites Ground to notice itself.  The second allows this human self to become a little more part of humanity, to find our shared humanity right here in ourselves, and see that we are all in the same boat.

Both opens for some wisdom and a more open heart.

There is a seeing all as phenomena arising, inherently free from an I and Other, which in turn opens for natural love and compassion. And a finding in this human self any quality and characteristic I see out there, in others and the wider world, which opens for seeing myself in others and, again, a natural empathy and compassion.

Over the last few weeks, I have noticed (again) the sense of not quite belonging to any one group or place or role or position in life. And there are several good reasons for this.

First, it is that way, I assume, for all of us. As who we are, or take ourselves to be (this human self/soul), we are far too rich and diverse to fit nicely into any one group. Some parts of us fit and are nurtured and acknowledged, and other parts left out, or even apparently at odds with the orientation and culture of the group.

Then, for myself I see a belief in a story of being an outsider, and an attachment to that identity, which automatically comes up - at some point - when I am in any group, no matter how well the match is. With that belief and identity, I look for evidence to support it, and it also becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy with me acting as an outsider, which provides me with even more evidence for the initial story.

And finally, as long as there is a belief in the core story of a separate self, of an I with an Other, something will always feel off. No matter how good the situation is, how well it matches our beliefs and identities, there is a subtle sense of something being not quite right. There is a sense of not being quite at home. And when the situation is at odds with our beliefs and identities, it is obviously not right.

The sense of not quite being at home, of something being just slightly off, is only resolved when the story of a separate I is resolved, when the I with an Other falls away, revealing the utter simplicity of what is, arising as this awake void and form always and already absent of any I with an Other.

(more…)

I wrote about this earlier (as with so many of these topics), but it comes up again…

What I take myself to be, in my immediate experience, is how I experience Existence in general… the world, others, and even God.

If I take myself as an object, then that is how I see the rest of existence, including even God in some cases.

If I take myself as a particular identity, narrow even in human terms, then I tend to put others and Existence in general into equally narrow identities.

If I see myself as primarily human and anything in me as universally human, I tend to see others too as primarily human and what comes up in them as universally human.
If I find myself as soul (alive presence), I experience others and the world in general as soul (alive presence).

If I experience myself as timeless, the world appears as happening within the timeless.

If I find myself as void, then the same thing… I see whatever arises as awake void and form.

Of course, these have nothing to do with surface beliefs, those we play around with at an intellectual level… these are the deeper beliefs we operate from, those typically outside of our attention (including those held at the emotional level).

I talked with a friend yesterday about how beliefs seem to be created as protection… and it certainly seems true in several ways.

Ultimately, beliefs protect this separate self. They flesh it out, define it, create the boundaries separating it from the wider world, protect its identity, shoots down what puts these boundaries and identities in doubt, and do so as a continuous process. Beliefs protect the sense of a separate self against changing too much, and also from not existing (which is a very real threat, since it really doesn’t).

But what about that core belief of a separate self? Is that too a defense against something? I am sure there are many theories and models, and even accounts of direct perceptions, of how and why this belief forms in the first place (and sadly, I am not aware of that many of them). And each of these probably have some good points.

But to me, it seems simple: for most of us, when we were infants, everyone around us believed in a separate self. So we too, innocently, did the same. We too created a belief in a separate self, because that was obviously and clearly the thing to do.

So the primary belief in a separate self may have been formed since it was the thing to do. And the secondary beliefs (an attachment to any other story) aids in bolstering the primary one.

And it all comes from innocence. Although the results, in our own experience, may not appear so innocent.

Most approaches to discovering who (individual human/soul) and what (Ground) we are have a particular focus… somewhere within our levels of being, and often just aspects of certain levels. If they acknowledge other levels and aspects, and are transparent to them, it is easy to see the benefits… it allows for a more thorough familiarity and investigation with whatever their area of focus happens to be.

But what if they are closed to other approaches? If they don’t appreciate their contribution or validity? What if they, for instance, use a language that creates a ceiling, floor or walls blocking off other levels and aspects?

One of the practices I am involved (appears to) do exactly that. It is great for the centaur (body/mind) and soul levels, but closed off from the Ground, from what we are. It seems closed off from it in terms of their views of what is possible and how existence is put together, in the terminology they use (for instance “no separation” which assumes an I not separate from an Other), and also some of their practices (by all means not all… other practices can go right into Ground, into what we are).

It is an example of an approach that does not so much have a floor or walls, but do have a very obvious (to me) ceiling.

Although I know I am just coming up against my own beliefs and identities around this, it has been difficult for me to relate to. I want to stay involved, because their approach is by far the best one (for me) I have found at centaur and soul levels. And staying involved means that I have to face the friction between life and my beliefs & identities. I have to live with it, until it resolves one way or another.

One way of working on this is to explore the genuine gifts in their version of the ceiling… What are the genuine gifts there, for me?

I can easily find the same gifts there as for any approach that have a limited focus (which is all of them)… they focus on the centaur and soul levels, which means they become very familiar with that landscape… they can explore it in great richness and depth, which is obviously very valuable.

And what about their lack of transparency into Ground? That too is a gift, as it invites me to work with it… rephrasing (for myself) their words… It helps me explore that particular area in far more depth. It also means that I don’t so easily take that area for granted. I have to work a little more consciously at it.

Finally, the friction between their approach (what life brings up for me) and my beliefs and identities invites me to look at and investigate those beliefs and identities. I cannot pretend they are not there anymore. I have to work with them.

The initial gift is the same as if they were transparent to Ground. And in addition, there are two more that comes from the ceiling.

All in all, a pretty good deal…. if I stay with it, take the friction seriously and use it as an opportunity to see what is already more true for me, behind my surface beliefs and identities.

Just a quick summary of what I am exploring these days, as it happens in immediate awareness. What came out below is not very well organized…

• The Ground, here now, is the field of awakeness, of awake emptiness and whatever arises. It is inherently free from any center and any separate self. It is just one field, beyond and embracing seeing and seen, awareness and its content, this human self and the wider world of form.
• This Ground is is what is here now, for each of us, only absent of a sense of I and Other. Imagine the content of your awareness, and the awareness itself, as it is, only with a sense of I and Other subtracted from it.
• When there is resistance to Ground as this field, there is an appearance of I and Other.
• This happens when there is a belief in a story, when thoughts are taken as anything more than innocent questions, when they are seen as absolutely true.
• A story becomes a belief when another story is added to it, saying it is true.
• A story becomes a belief, also when it combines with a sensation. Sensation+story=belief.
• When a sensation is combined with a story, it gives a sense of a center located at a particular place in space, specifically at the sensation, somewhere within the physical boundary of this human self.
• This center also allows for a split of space, and a sense of I here and Other out there.
• This split allows for placing one end of any polarity here, somewhere in this physical body, and the other end somewhere out there in the wider world.
• This placing of ends of a polarity here and out there, is also how projections work. If, according to how I place a polarity (which in turn is decided by beliefs and identities), one end of a polarity should be out there, then when it arises, it is interpreted as out there. For instance, if I believe I shouldn’t be angry, and have an identity as someone who is not angry, then when anger arises, I have now choice but to filter it so it appears out there in the wider world, placed on appropriate targets (the ones I place it on may indeed experience and act from anger, which only makes them better projection objects).
• Any belief automatically creates resistance… to the truths in its reversals, and what doesn’t fit the identity that goes with it.
• The split of space allows for resistance to what is. It filters the appearance of what is allowed and not allowed into different locations of space… what is allowed appears to be in the region where there is a sense of I, and what is not allowed appears as if in another region of space. (What is allowed/not allowed is determined by beliefs.)
• The sensation a story is combined with serves as a base for a split of space into I and Other (providing a fixed point in space to define the boundary), and also for resistance to parts of what is arising.
• The sense of density, substance and reality of a sensation provides a sense of the same, of density, substance and reality, to the story it is associated with.
• If a belief needs to be amplified, it can be amplified in two ways. One is to amplify the sensation it is placed on, which in turn allows for a stronger belief, a sense of more substance to the belief, and a stronger sense of split between I here and Other out there. Another is to engage in and develop supporting beliefs.
• If a story needs to be combined with a sensation (to create a belief and a split in space), and an appropriate sensation is not available, muscles tense up to create appropriate sensations.
• A belief also amplifies tension, because it creates a sense of I and Other, and something to protect (a truth or an identity), which in turn creates mental and physical tension.
• Any belief creates a split in space, of something that is true here and false somewhere else, so also a sense of I and Other.

There are two ways to lose a belief, and they often go hand in hand.

One is through friction.

I have a belief telling me how life is or should be, and an identity telling me what I am and am not. In both cases, I split life right down the middle, allowing one region of the landscape and not the rest.

When life inevitably shows up outside of my belief or identity, there is a friction between my belief and life, which is experienced a uncomfortable… as stress, something being off, suffering, anger, fear, and so on.

This friction, if it continues, slowly wears off (and out!) the belief. Over time, constantly at odds with life, it has to go, in spite of even the most persistent resistance. It is just too obvious that life is more than my belief, and I more than the identity. My personality may not like it, especially at first, but there is not much choice there either.

The other is through investigation.

I notice the warning signs of holding onto a belief or identity (stress), I identify the belief or set of beliefs behind it, and investigate its effects, what would be without it, and the grain of truth in each of the reversals of the initial story. This too allows it to fall away, although it can be faster and less painful, even fun.

In the first case, I take the side of my habitual beliefs and identities, and it may be a drawn out and painful affair.

In the second case, I take the side of life inviting the belief to go, and it becomes more playful, have a sense of more ease, and can even be fun and enjoyable.

Although most of the time, there seems to be a mix of the two. There is the friction between life and belief, and the stress and resistance that comes with it. And there is the ease of the investigation, when that is finally engaged with.

When I believe a story, taking it as an absolute truth, my world is narrowed in as defined by the story. In a sense, I find myself on the inside of the story. Similarly, any belief creates an identity which defines who I take myself to be. And any belief also creates a sense of a separate self, which needs to be anchored somewhere - usually in this human self. So I also find myself on the inside of this human self. So there is a sense of a separate I, existing on the inside of this human self, inside of a particular identity, and inside of a belief in a particular belief about life.

As soon as I start exploring this, I find myself also outside of all of this. I am outside, looking in. So right there is some distance, some release.

And if there is a thorough and sincere exploration of what is already more true for me than the belief, it falls away… The belief in the story falls away. The identification with the identity it creates falls away. And the sense of a separate I defined by and existing on the inside of the story, identity and this human self falls away.

There is a taste of spaciousness, and even of Big Mind.

Now, I am that which all of this… stories, identities, this human self… arises within, to and as. This awakeness it arises within, to and as. This awake nothingness all things happen within, to and as.

Shadows of random beliefs and identities…

• arrogance > inferiority, stupidity, not knowing (even in a relative sense)
• knowing > not knowing (in an absolute sense, seeing all stories as only having a relative truth, and a relative sense, knowing that our relative knowledge is always limited)
• skilled > unskilled
• human > not human (leaving out the rest of the seamless field of form, and also awakeness and emptiness)
• separate self > no separation, and also absence of a separate self
• good > bad, evil (seeing both out there, in the wider world, and also in here)
• in control > out of control, and also absence of control
• masculine > feminine (and the other way around)
• awake > asleep (in any sense of the words, for instance seeing how the field of awakeness and form - absent of a separate self - naturally arises as both)
• deserving > not deserving (canceling each other out, as all of the other polarities do)
• civilized > uncivilized and also noncivilized (independent of civilization)
• good taste > bad taste (canceling each other out)
• healthy > disease, unhealthy, and also nonhealthy (being that which is independent of health and disease)
• thing > no thing (void, emptiness)

All of these beliefs and identities split the field, creating a sense of a separate self here and Other out there. When the shadow is seen simultaneously with the belief and identity, we notice the inherent seamlessness of the field… in a relative sense, finding both out there and also in here, and in a more absolute sense the one field, inherently neutral, and always and already containing both.

For a while, it takes work to discover this, and it may sometimes feel like more of an intellectual exercise, seeing it more than it is deeply felt and sensed. Then, it may become more and more alive and immediate… alive in immediate awareness even without much prompting, at least most of the time. Still requiring a more thorough exploration of remaining areas.

Initially, it may all feel like a big drama. We cling onto beliefs and identities, and experience what is outside of these as scary and undesirable (even as demonic, sometimes.)

Then, as we become more familiar with this landscape, the gifts of what was left out becomes more clear. What appeared as undesirable and even demonic is now revealed as pure gold. And then, as we get even more familiar with it, the inherent neutrality in all of it becomes more and more visible.

The beliefs and their shadows cancel each other out, as identities and their shadows do, revealing the inherent neutrality of all of it… the beliefs, identities, shadows, effects, and the ground it all arises within and as.

As I continue to work with projections and the shadow, many aspects of it become more and more immediate and alive as it happens. One way it manifests is having the shadow of a belief or identity come up along with the belief and identity.

A belief arises, and right there is the shadow of that belief. An identity arises, and right there is also the shadow of that identity. Or at least parts of the shadow.

So when arrogance arises, along with it arises inferiority, stupidity, not knowing, and whatever is left out from an identity which gives rise to arrogance. I see both out there, in others and the world, and also in here in this human self.

Together, there is a fuller picture, a wider embrace of what is. And it is all revealed as inherently neutral. The initial identity is neutral, what is left out is neutral, and the landscape (always) including both is inherently neutral.

Of course, our personality may not see it as neutral. It sees different parts of all of this as desirable or undesirable, mature and less mature, good or bad. But that too is inherently neutral.

As long as there is a sense of a separate self, I am self-conscious. And the stronger the sense of a separate self, the more self-conscious I am.

(For me, the sense of being self-conscious drops away when I am in nature, or do Breema, or am around people I am comfortable with. All situations that tends to reduce any sense of separation. And it comes more into the foreground when I am around people who are quite different from myself, or themselves are very concerned with holding up a particular image, or when I find myself in a situation that brings me outside of the boundaries of my habitual identities and how I define myself.)

Self-conscious in two ways

I am self-conscious in the sense that I am conscious of (apparently) being a separate self, and I am also self-conscious in the conventional way… conscious of how my desired identity fits with how I appear in the world… wondering how other people see me, if what I am about to do or say fits in with the image I want to build up for myself, and so on.

First, there is a story about a separate self. Then, this simple story is elaborated through various other stories about this separate self, defining what and who it is in the world. And there is a comparison between my stories of what should be, and of what is.

(more…)

So when we start letting go of some of the identities that I described in previous posts, what is left? What, if anything, is revealed?

For me, it has to with simply seeing what is already more true for me, in immediate experience, without knowing in advance what I will find or am looking for, and doing it for its own sake.

If I think I know what I’ll find, I am creating another box for myself. I have an agenda. Receptivity to what is really there goes out the window.

If I do it for some other motive, to find release, to get rid of discomfort, to get somewhere, then I am creating yet another box. Again, there is an agenda there. And again, receptivity - or even interest - in what is really there, goes out.

Thinking I know what to find, and doing it for a particular result, is just another way for me to limit myself, to box myself, life, existence, and even God, into a far smaller space than where it already is. It may look safe for a while, but is in the long run nothing but a dead end.

I think I’ll get something or somewhere by doing it, but all I am doing is boxing myself in. Staying put.

What it all comes back to, and down to, is doing it for its own sake. I engage in inquiry, for the sake of doing inquiry. I engage in headlessness, for the sake of headlessness. I am with experiences, for the sake of being with experiences.

And seeing all the parts of me that is not doing it just for its own sake, is part of it as well. Allowing even that. Being with even that. Seeing even that, as what is, right here and now. For its own sake.

In a previous post, I wrote about what we all probably go through in periods: a sense that all our work has had no effect. Old patterns come up, as before, as if nothing had happened. And this is another invitation to see our beliefs and identities… My work should pay off. My life should be getting easier. I should see progress. I should get somewhere. It is an invitation to see all of these, how one-sided, limited and - yes, even limiting they are, and loosen the grip on these beliefs. These too are boxes i try to put life and myself inside of, and life is far more than what can go inside of any box.

Not only do the old patterns come up as before, but my tools don’t work anymore either

Another part of this, which I forgot in the initial post, is that my tools don’t seem to work anymore. For instance, last night as I was falling asleep, there was a lot coming through, and a slight sense of uneasiness about it. I thought, well - I know how to deal with these things, and tried to be with it, allow it all including resistance, finding myself as headless, doing a journey (ala active imagination and process work) and other things. But nothing worked. Nothing had any effect. Tools that had been trusted companions for so long were useless. And here too, there is an invitation to recognize beliefs and identities… I know how to work with these things. I have skills that allows me do deal with what comes up. I know some of the secrets of the mind. I am familiar enough with the terrain so I can navigate it with more ease.

Boxes and what is outside

All of these are narrow beliefs and identities. Boxes limiting, in my own view, what life, and my life, is and can be. They create a boundary, allowing some things inside and putting other things outside, and then life brings up what is outside and it keeps knocking on our door. Reminders of the boundary, that it is false, and an invitation to see this and find ourselves as big enough to allow what is outside as well. It is an invitation for a wider embrace, partly in our conscious view, but far more importantly in the depth of our life, and in how we live our daily life.

Pure simplicity

Eventually, what is revealed is very simple… it is just what already and always is… life as it is. Revealed as inherently neutral, as simply the dance of life, of existence, of God, Brahman, Tao.

Absent of beliefs, of taking relative truths as absolute, and absent of identification with identities, it is revealed in its utter simplicity, simpler than what words have any chance of describing.

It has been very alive for me how I box myself and life in through beliefs and identities. I create a dividing line through life, and saying that this is true and ok and that is not (beliefs) and I am this and not that (identities.)

Since life is bigger than any box I try to put it and myself inside of, it will come knocking on the door. It wants to be let in, and ultimately, it invites me to allow boxes in general go… or at least the taking of them as true, and the taking of them as defining who I am.

When life comes knocking, when it shows me that my belief is flawed and my identity too narrow, and I resist and try to hold onto my beliefs and identities, there is stress.

The parallel is very close to having someone knocking at the door of my house that I don’t want to let in. I try to ignore it, I become agitated, tense, frustrated, rigid, angry, sad, depressed… there may even be a sense of being driven, hunted, haunted. At times, there may be a relief. Whomever is trying to get it is not there anymore, or at least has quieted down. But after a while, it comes back. The knocking is there again. And my stress is there again.

The only solution is to take a closer look at what is happening. Is this boundary, this idea that I take as real, really an accurate reflection of life, and of what may already be more true for me? And is this boundary, this identity I take as defining who I am, an accurate reflection of who and what I am, in my own immediate experience? Is there something that is already more true for me, if I am receptive to it and examine it closer? And is what I find closer to what life is trying to tell me about itself and my life?

Beliefs have their own shadows, and beliefs also create identities with their own (very similar) shadows.

The shadow of a belief is all the reversals of the thought or idea believed in. The shadow of an identity is anything that does not fit into the identity. And any belief creates an identity.

Say I have the thought that people shouldn’t lie, and believe in it.

The shadow of the belief is the grain of truth in each of its turnarounds, mainly that people should lie. Why should they? Because they do. And because people often have good reasons for it, at least as it appears to themselves. There are many reasons why people should lie, and even the gifts in it, and I can always find one more.

The shadow of the identity is the ways I lie. My identity is as someone who does not lie, so the shadow is the ways I lie in my own life. How do I lie? At one level, everything I say is a lie, or rather at best only a relative and limited truth. At another, more conventional level, I lie as well. I may come up against a threat to an identity, and come up with an (apparently innocent) lie to protect it. And I also lie to myself in many ways. I lie to myself when I believe in any thought, since I at another level already know it is not true. The list is endless, and here too, I can always come up with yet another example.

The shadow of the belief has to do with how I box the world in, and the shadow of the identity has to do with how I box myself in. And the two are of course closely related, just two faces of the same boxing in.

As the process of exploring who and what we are moves along, we get to more and more core identities… We come face to face with them, how they are all too narrow, their (mostly unpleasant) effects on our life and the lives of those around us, and the necessity of surrendering them.

Last weekend was one of those times when core identities came to the surface. I found myself in the midst of a judgment and irritability attack, where everything was a trigger for both to come up. Not only was I helpless in doing anything about it, it also seemed that all my work in the past was for nothing… that its effect was zero. I was back in the grips of old patterns just as before, maybe even worse than before. (This weekend, my partner went into something very similar.)

And this too can be seen as a deepening of the process.

It is a wearing off of core identities and beliefs… of an identity of wanting to get somewhere… wanting my practice to pay off… wanting my life to be good… wanting a sense of ease…

All of these identities and beliefs came up against reality, and lost, as beliefs always do. Reality always wins, hands down. Even if we try to hold onto identities, the inevitable friction between identity and reality makes them erode… it may be a painful process, and it may take a while, but they do erode… And we can make it a little easier by seeing what is going on, bringing the identities into awareness, seeing how they are too limiting, and consciously allowing them the freedom to fall away.

As soon as their is a belief in an idea… a thought, image, identity, perspective, view, framework… there is automatically a shadow. I want this to be true, not that. I want to be identified with this, not that.

My mind closes down, not interested in, or willing or able to, see the grain of truth in the other perspectives, or the limits to the truth and validity of my own. And my heart closes down, seeing them as Other, not able to recognize myself in them, not able to find our shared humanity, not seeing how we are in the same boat.

As ugly as it can get, there is also a beauty in it.

Existence is inherently neutral. Awake emptiness and form, allowing any and all perspectives, views, thoughts, ideas, identities, frameworks, theories, and yet not being touched by any of them. They all have a grain of truth to them, yet they are all incomplete, all missing out of something, all of only temporary, limited and purely functional value.

So when we take any of these relative truths as an absolute, we are at odds with what is. We are automatically up against the world, as it is, and this brings stress, dissatisfaction, suffering, a sense of something being off (we often think it is the world!), of something being incomplete.

And it is true. When we take a limited perspective as all there is, something is off, and something is incomplete. We are right in being dissatisfied.

The stress, dissatisfaction, suffering and everything else is not only a reminder that something is off, but an invitation to correct ourselves. To investigate. To see that what we took as an absolute truth is only a relative one, and that all of its reversals have a grain of truth in them as well.

And it runs through our lives all different directions and levels, from our conscious and apparently chosen views such as grand philosophical frameworks and religion, to our conscious identities, to the often more invisible worldviews of our culture, to views we wouldn’t be caught dead having but still do somewhere in a corner of who we are.

Derrida and others may see this in the grand scheme of things, in terms of philosophical and political and religious ideas. But do they see it in all the details of their daily life? Do they see it when their kids make a mess and don’t clean up after themselves. When their partner cheat on them. When someone… a friend, their kids, their parents, their academical opponent… says they are wrong, can they join with the person saying it and find it in themselves?

For many of us, it is easy when it comes to the big ideas such as religions, spiritual approaches and political ideologies. I can see how they are all relative truths. But it is far more difficult in my daily life. It gets far more gnarly and unpleasant when someone rubs up against deeply seated beliefs in me, especially those I didn’t even know I had, or don’t want to admit to being there.

Here is another way of talking about what I explored in the previous post:

Our three forms of identities are either/or, both/and, and none.

Our either/or identity: as we appear in the world to others

Our 3rd person daily identity, as we appear in the world to others, is generally an either/or identity. We are either male or female, 25 years old or not, Asian or not, Japanese or not, have black hair or not, is a computer programmer or not, and so on.

This is the identity which allows us to function in the world as a human being, differentiated from and identifiable among others.

Our both/and identity: our experience of our own wholeness

Our third person identity as we appear to ourselves, is an both/and identity, embracing the wholeness of who we are as a human being, recognizing any quality I see in the wider world also in myself. I am kind and cruel, honest and dishonest, masculine and feminine, industrious and lazy, and so on. No human quality is foreign to me. I contain multitudes.

This is the identity which gives us a sense of wholeness, richness, fullness, and connection, intimacy and recognition in relationship with others. There is no identity to defend here, because nothing is left out.

Our absence of identity: in our 1st (or zero) person immediate experience

In our immediate experience of ourselves, differentiated (and sorted out) from our 3rd person identity, we are a void… an awake void… an awake void full of content - and where the content itself is this awake emptiness. And this awake emptiness has no identity, it is free from any identity, and it allows any and all identities to arise as nothing other than awake emptiness itself.

This is the identity which gives a freedom from any identity, and also allows a fluidity among any of the 3rd person identities.

Together: either/or, both/and, and none

So together, there is our 3rd person either/or identity, which allows us to function as an identifiable individual in the world. There is the both/and identity, which allows us to find any quality we see in the world also in ourselves as an individual. And there is the absence of identity, which allows us to find ourselves as awake emptiness and form, inherently absent of any separate self.

Our either/or identity is given, or developed early on in life. Our both/and identity is discovered and explored as we mature into who we are, as an individual human being. And our absence of identity is discovered and noticed as we separate out our 3rd person identity (as a he/she/it) from our 1st (zero) person identity - what we are in immediate awareness.

Identities can be seen as having three aspects:

General face to the world

First, as being our face to the world, generally defining our third person identity as a he/she/it. These identities are mostly exclusive: I am man, not woman. I am Norwegian, not Swedish. I like ice cream, I don’t dislike it.

Embracing the polarities

Then, as being one end of a polarity, where the other end also has some truth to it. As an individual, we include all qualities and characteristics. Anything we see out there in the world, we are right here. We embrace all the polarities. I am man, but I also have feminine qualities. I am Norwegian, but as a human being I am far more universal than that. I like ice cream, but if I have eaten too much of it - or I am sick - then I don’t like it.

Free from identities

Finally, all identities are only relative truths. When identification is released from these identities, and they are no longer taken as absolutes, I find myself as this awake emptiness, and form as awake emptiness. There are no identities here, nothing that can define this awake emptiness (not even that term). It is untouched by abstractions, yet allows for the play of abstractions and identities.

All three together

In an absolute sense, I am awake emptiness and form, untouched by any identity, yet allowing the fluid and dynamic play of them all.

In a relative sense, I am a human being with several generally exclusive identities. And looking at it a little more closely, all of their opposites are true as well. As this individual, I am everything I see.

The gifts of each

The first type of identity allows us to function in the world. It is our passport identities, the ones that differentiates us - as individuals - from others.

The second type of identity allows us to not be confined to exclusive identities. It allows us to see ourselves in others, and others in ourselves - bringing a deeper sense of intimacy, recognition and connection. It allows us to embrace more of all of what we are, and to bring it out in daily life.

The third type of identity allows for a freedom from any identity. It is the awake void allowing for the fluid play of any and all of them, without being caught up in or confining ourselves to any particular one. None are fixed, none are absolute. They are just the temporary and shifting surface ripples of the time/spaceless awake emptiness.

I went to a headless workshop in Portland a couple of weeks ago. It was led by Richard Lang, who did an excellent job - making it simple, accessible, very clear, and doing it all in a very personable and heart-centered way.

One of the things that became clearer to me is how the headless experiments help us differentiate between our 3rd and 1st person identities.

Our 3rd person identity is how other see us. It is our appearance at different distances, our name, our age, occupation, and so on. It is our identity in the world, as a human being. It is ourselves, as a he, she or it.

Our 1st person identity is our immediate experience of ourselves, which is as no thing allowing all things, no form allowing all forms, emptiness allowing fullness, no color allowing all colors, no identity allowing all identities… or in other words as headless, as capacity for the world, as awake emptiness and its content (which is no other than this awake emptiness). It is ourselves as awake void and all forms as this same awake void.

When our 3rd and 1st person identities are confused, it leads to suffering. When they are seen as distinct from each other, there is clarity and a sense of ease.

When they are mixed up with each other, my first person identity tends to go in the background, and is sometimes not noticed at all. I take on the third person identity and become a thing in the world, up against innumerable other things. I am completely caught up in a world of desire, fear, longing, anger, sadness, loss, and much more.

When they are differentiated, I am awake void full of the world… I am free from anything happening, allowing it all, and everything happening is revealed as this awake void. And there is full freedom for the little one, this human self, to use the 3rd person identity to function in the world as well. Nothing is left out.

It is interesting to notice, in myself and others, the core identities we hold onto. The ones that seem so real, so obviously true, that we don’t even think of questioning them. And if the thought comes up to question them, or someone else questions them for us, our first reaction is to laugh and want to dismiss it. It seems too outrageous to even suggest that who we take ourselves to be, at a core level, is not who we are.

Beliefs and identities

Any identity is a belief or set of beliefs. We take an image, an idea, a thought, a story, as defining who or what I am, and more importantly what I am not, and then take it as real, as an absolute Truth, and living as if it is the Truth.

And any belief creates an identity. At the very least, it creates an identity as someone who beliefs that particular idea or story.

Any belief creates a split, and so tension and stress

Any belief also creates a sense of a split, it defines a particular area as true and anything outside of itself as false or not real (it boxes Existence in, and since all beliefs also are identities, we box ourselves as individuals in as well.) And a split creates a sense of tension, and of stress.

Even such an apparently innocent belief as “God is good” can be a source of stress. If God is good, why is that not my living experience at all times? What is wrong with me? How can I change it? Am I a lost cause?

Identities and shadow

An aspect of this split is the shadow. If a particular story or idea is true, then anything that falls outside of it threatens my belief in it.

I believe people should be considerate of others, so my own lack of consideration falls into the shadow. I am this and not that, so “that” goes into the shadow.

Identities and allowing some things as only second person

In other areas, the “that” may be perceived as good and desirable, so it doesn’t exactly go into the shadow, but is rather experiences exclusively as second or third person (we can say that the first person experience of it goes into the shadow.)

I believe I am (exclusively) a human being, so the experience of space is kept as third person.

I believe I am physical, so alive luminosity is second or third person.

I believe I am finite in time and space, so timelessness and spacelessness goes into third person.

I believe I am this personality, so awareness is seen as second or third person.

I believe I am form, so the void and formlessness is third person.

First person experience in the shadow, as a safeguard

For all of these, the first person experience of it goes into the shadow. And maybe for good reasons. It serves as a safeguard against inflation, adding the transcendent onto a personal identity.

If I take myself primarily as this personality (or this human self), and then add some of these qualities, such as luminosity, alive presence, of even infinite love, wisdom and compassion, then it may not look pretty. It is a bad case of inflation, of seeing myself as special, better than others, a chosen one, and all the rest that we may know from ourselves and also out there in the world.

As long as there is a strong (and unquestioned) identification with our human self, then it is healthy to keep a first person experience of these transcendent things in the shadow. We can still become familiar with it, even dip into a first person experience of it (or at least of no separation), and then return to a more safe second or third person relationship with it.

As the identification with our human self, or form in general, relaxes, softens, become more transparent, weakens, becomes more porous, then the first person experiences of it naturally comes more into the foreground.

Until eventually, usually after much work, the beliefs in any identity falls away, and whatever arises, independent of content, is just an aspect of the field of what is, absent of I and Other.

Selfless or Self

This is also why it may be safer to use a terminology of selflessness, rather than the Self, to describe Big Mind (Brahman, Tao, Spirit) awakening to itself.

As long as there is a sense of a separate I, we’ll take whatever can be seen as an “accomplishment” and add it to the identity of this separate self. We’ll do this whether we use the world selfless or Self.

But with “selflessness” there is at least a reminder built in.

Humility

Theistic traditions in particular emphasize humility to guard against this inflation. It is beautiful, especially in reading the writings of Christian mystics such as St. Theresa of Avila. There is a real sense of the differentiation between the personal identity and God, and then finally the falling away of any sense of separate self so there is only God.

A drawback here is that the apparent reality of the separate self may be emphasized in the process, and also that there is a strong identification with an identity as “humble”. In this path, those two are among the last identifications to be burnt through.

Our layers of identity goes all the way down, revealing nothingness, just like the layers of an onion.

The outermost layers are the lightly held preferences, the ones we are typically not much identified with, such as which sweater to wear today, which flavor ice cream, which movie to watch, and so on. There is an identity around these things, but it is not so tightly held. It is our superficial preferences about things not that important.

The roles we play in our life are a little more real and important to us, although there is usually some fluidity here: child, father, mother, husband, wife, lover, teacher, student, profession, and so on. It is possible to be strongly identified with some of these roles, but they are most of the time relatively fluid. We feel at home in several of them, and can shift among them as our situation changes.

We also have preferences that seem more real and more important than the flavor of our ice cream, such as ethics, norms, value systems, all our shoulds about people’s relations.

And our psychological identities, such as feminine or masculine, strong or weak, healthy or sick, outgoing or introvert, active or passive, and so on.

There are the identities we are born into, such as our culture, ethnic group, sometimes religion.

We are also (most often) born into our biological roles, such as sex and (visible) genetic ethnicity.

And then the identities that goes along with being a biological organism, such as mammal, human, wanting to avoid pain, wanting shelter, food and water, seeking safety and procreation, and so on. The basic survival identifications and preferences.

There are also many others, such as a sense of belonging… to a species, family, subculture, culture, bioregion, nation, continent, Earth, universe.

And then the core one: an identification with a sense of a separate self, of an I that has an Other.

More or less identification with the identities

Each of these are identities, the biological and psychosocial ones, the small scale ones and the larger scale ones. And there is more or less identification with each of these identities at any one point in time.

Exploring identities

As we start exploring these, for instance through a form of self-inquiry, we may see that the ones that were tightly held, that seemed so real, so beyond anything that could be questioned, even those are just identities.

They can be identified with to a greater or lesser extent, and when they are more lightly held, it tends to give a sense of more freedom. More possibilities open up. We don’t box ourselves in so much when they are more loosely held, when we release some of our identification with them.

A sudden shift (and convincing demonstration)

I remember one of my first mediation retreats where the pain in my legs grew more and more intense (and I stubbornly refused to get a chair.) At one point, the pain grew so unbearable that a sudden shift happened…

The pain was still there, as much as before, but there was no identification with that pain anymore. It just happened in space as anything else, and there was no identification with is so also no resistance to it. It happened in space, just as the clouds moving through the sky or the sounds of the cars swooshing by the center.

It was a dramatic demonstration of the struggle and drama that is experienced when we closely identify with something (I was this body trying to push away this pain) to the sense of ease and clarity when there is a disidentification with is (the pain and this body just arising in space as anything else.)

Even the identities that seem most real are just identities

It was also a demonstration of how even the identities that seems most real, most beyond anything that can be questioned, are also just identities that we can be more or less closely identified with.

Even my biological identities, or wanting (needing!) this and that, is an identity. Even the core sense of a separate self is an identity. And they can be more or less tightly held, more or less identified with, taken as real, substantial, as defining who or what I really am.

What we really are

As we continue to explore this, we may find ourselves as what is without any center or separate self. Just what is, the seeing and the seen here and now, as a field, inherently centerless and selfless.

Not bound by any fixed identities, any beliefs, any mind-made boxes defining who or what we really are. Just this field, arising as it does right now, inherently free from any identifications, and also beyond and embracing them all. Inherently free from, so allowing, any identities to arise.

No identity, allowing the fluidity of any identities

We are this field of seeing and seen, of awake emptiness and form, centerless and selfless, functionally connected with a particular individual human self. Our real identity is no identity, allowing any identity to come and go, fluidly, as it does anyway.

All the usual identities of our individual self is still there, all our preferences and the way our passport define us, but they are not taken as what we really are. They are identities used for purely functional and practical reason, for getting around and operating in the world, but they are not identified with.

We can say that in our deep, there is no identity. And this absence of identity allows any identity to arise, and it allows a fluidity of identities to come and go.

There is no core identity anymore telling us what other identities to allow or not. Nothing is excluded. Nothing is walled off. There is just the fluidity of what arises. And this is what always has been, we just didn’t see it when we were busy holding onto certain identities and fighting off other identities.

It is the freedom of the ocean which is formless in its depth, and manifests as form (waves) on its surface. From the formlessness of the depth, any form is allowed on the surface.

I live in an intentional community with several Breema practitioners, and am enjoying the nourishing, warm and human connections there. At the same time, I am about to go on a journey that I know will involve my death, and there is a sense of equanimity about it, an alignment with it, and also a knowing that there is no other option.

Arvo Part, Bach and several others of my most favorite composers come to our house in the form of one person. It seems that he is coming to stay for good. He has an instrument, acoustic and with several organic looking pipes sticking up form it. It can create the sound of any instrument, and the sounds of individual instruments and groups of instruments, including a whole orchestra. The sounds are not only similar to these other instruments, but somehow the actual sounds of the instruments.

The death theme of the initial dream fragment is typical these days, with a sense of death and rebirth at several levels and in several ways.

The composer who is a composite of my favorite composers (and all other composers it seemed), is similar to his instrument which is able to reproduce all other instruments. There is one which contains many, and the individuality of each is maintained, along with the infinite variety that emerges from the access to and interactions of all of these individuals.

It is also similar to a dream some months back of someone playing computer role games shifting into having access to innumerable characters at once, either as pure or as freely chosen composites with characteristics from many.

This is what happens when we explore and become familiar with more of our many subpersonalities and identities, release some of the blind and fixed identification with some, allow some that have been disowned, and find that they are each available in a more fluid and free way.

From being chronically attached to some, and equally persistently pushing others away, there is more of a free access to many of them… in their individual form, or as a combination of qualities from several. (I can’t really say that my life is a good example of this, but the possibility may be awakening in me.)

Identities can be formed around just about anything, including being “clear”, allowing what comes up to not stick, of having nothing to defend. And as with any identity, it gives a sense of I and Other, of boundaries, walls, hardness, and - yes - something to protect. I am this, and not that.

It is just another way to create a sense of a separate I, and of resisting being with experiences as they are. Or rather, it is the same as usual in terms of splitting the field into I and Other, and resisting what is. It is just another flavor, another take on it.

I have noticed this one come up over the last couple of days, where some people around me have been in bad moods, irritable and reactive. My response has been to go in the other direction, taking refuge in an identity as not that (at least right now), but it is really just another way of resisting experiences, resisting what is. Just another way to set up walls between I and Other, between I as this identity, and Other as experiences, people and behaviors that fall outside of this identity.

Noticing this wall and hardness, the sense of something to protect, the sense of the possibility of a fall, makes it easier to not resist the resistance. To allow that too to be as it is. And in this, “I” am no longer on one side of the wall and certain experiences and behaviors on the other, but I find myself as the space that the wall and both sides of the wall exists within and as.

There is a sense of release, of spaciousness, of allowing resistance and walls and defense to fall. There is a freedom to allow whatever arises to arise, independent on which side of the wall they happen to arise, to allow it as just aspects of the field.