118. The third eye: Chapter 17 - Life is, death is not

 

After reviewing life goals, let us consider the relationship between life, specifically birth and death. The true meaning of Hamlet's proposition, "to be or not to be, that is the question," lies in whether it is worth being born and living, or dying. This is referenced in the following line of the poem: "to die ‒ to fall asleep ‒ nothing more." Generally, life is paired with death, but in truth, the counterpart of death is birth. Life exists between birth and death. The purpose of experiencing both birth and death is achieved when we are able to truly experience life, or more precisely, whether we are able to live a complete, pure, meaningful ‒ primarily spiritual ‒ life. The beginning and end of our life are the two states, the two milestones that define the human tripartite composition: at the lowest level, our body; at the middle level, our soul; and at the highest level, our spirit. What do life and death mean on the level of our body, our soul (individual self), and our spirit (universal self)? Which state we choose to commit to, how we decide, depends on the free will and awareness given to us by the One.

1) When we live at the lower, bodily level, in our ignorance, we are only concerned with the life functions of our body and reproduction, often confusing reproduction with physical pleasure.

2) At the middle, spiritual level, our life is directed toward the spiritual realm, contrasting with the previous state, where the choice between the two paths (downward, bodily, or upward, spiritual) requires us to draw on our knowledge, awareness, and courage to choose the spiritual path. This is the stage of critical decisions, when we must decide whether we want to live openly and freely, or whether we resist life as individuals, afraid, defensive, suffering, living selfishly, creating boundaries, limits, and walls around ourselves, which we are capable of enclosing both ourselves and others within.

3) At the highest spiritual level, we say yes to life a hundred times, and never say no, because we have found our higher existence above life itself. As spiritual beings, we prepare ourselves for the fulfilment of time, the great journey, and so we do not worry about what tomorrow will bring. Whatever it is, we welcome it joyfully because we know that through our perceptions and experiences, we will grow richer every day, getting closer to our true state of being. We are no longer interested in yesterday’s memories, or in successes and failures, except to the extent that we can learn from them. We realize that our life is a singular opportunity, for which we receive the sacredness, including time and the other person, so that we can reach fulfilment, a complete life, and a return to the One. Every thought, word, and action of the spiritual person is about returning, the fulfilment of time. They also know that their allocated time is finite, and with each passing day, they are closer to the end, knowing also that they will come and go alone at the intersection of space and time. Our return is made alone. 

Every day, we decide what we identify with: for example, with matter (our body, comfort), with our defensive, fearful, and selfish individual self, or with our universal self, which is self-identical and willing to make sacrifices. Let us not forget that what we know depends on our partial or universal knowledge, the data stored in our memories and how processed they are, and the conclusions we draw. When we declare, "I know," we limit our knowledge of the world. When we declare, "I don’t know," our knowledge of the world expands. As we increase our awareness, we gain more knowledge of the material, spiritual, and intellectual worlds. We are often narrow-minded and limited because we think that what we do not know does not exist, for example, that there is no other reality beyond the perceptions and experiences provided by our five senses. This is the basis of individualistic consciousness. It takes courage and awareness to admit that what we do not know, we say, "I don’t know." Consciousness and knowledge begin with "I don’t know, but I want to know." 

In contrast to "I don’t know" is the "I believe," stemming from our ignorance. It is important to note that "I believe" and "faith" do not mean the same thing. When we say "I believe," we accept something that we are not convinced of, such as something we cannot see, hear, or touch. But if, for example, a religious dogma asserts that something exists, we believe it. In contrast, faith signifies self-awareness, consciousness, and knowledge, trust in our universal self, in the divine within us. In the first case, we place the solution, the connection, outside of ourselves; in the second, we place it within, inside ourselves. Universal knowledge and consciousness are always within us. External, individualistic knowledge and "I believe" are outside of us. It does not mean the same thing, for example, to say "I believe in God" or "I know God." 

The problem with the confusion between "faith" and "I believe" is that instead of seeking the inner connection, we look for an external "I believe" connection, such as God being “up in the sky”, and not within us. However, our Initiation Master taught us, "You are the light of the world" and "You are the salt of the earth; if the salt loses its flavour, with what will it be salted?" It is right to seek external solutions for external relationships, and internal solutions for internal relationships. Our response depends on what level of awareness we are at and what we identify with. On our spiritual path, we progress, for example, by realizing that the One is not "up in the sky," but within us. Our Initiation Master frequently refers to our universal consciousness and spiritual immortality in his teachings: "Whoever drinks from this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks from the water that I give them will never thirst." 

Self-awareness, the faith is nothing more than finding our true self, our universality. The opportunity, the potential, is given to everyone. Our universal self has been within us from birth; we just need to uncover it. We must shed the individual self that we have placed over it, parallel to our becoming adults. Our timeless existence must be reached in our life, at this intersection of space and time, in the middle. Awareness, recognition, and the vigilance of the universal self is what perceives meaning and makes it its own, determining its own meaning. Existence, universality, is not dependent on the death of the body. Whoever reaches this state of the soul has one foot here on earth, in time, and the other in the heavens, in space. Note: our consciousness is a combination of external, individual perceptions, experiences, and concepts, along with universal intuitive experiences. Knowledge can only be discussed if one knows oneself, which requires knowing the perfect truth, order, and love of the One. The concept is related to knowledge in terms of what idea we have about the One’s perfect truth, order, and love. 

The salvation of the soul from time, from the state of ignorance, is nothing more than shedding the defensive individual self and finding the self-revealing universal self, or the One. Those who do not hear the message of returning to the One within time remain in what religious language calls the "valley of tears." They are the living dead, the half-living, those who live for matter and die for spirit. Those who hear the message are able to transcend time in their lives (they reach the eternal reality, the only reality, space), unite the death and rebirth of their soul, and are able to move from time into space. They are the dead who live, who have died to matter and have been born to existence. Note: strangely, materialistic sciences often consider the soul as the function of the brain and the spirit as the activity of the nervous system.