Transcendent beings are on the path of enlightenment. How can they live in this world and be true to the path?
‘Spiritual elitism’ implies there are people who think they are ‘chosen’ and superior when it comes to being spiritual. It also implies that only the ‘select’ can access the spiritual.
Nothing could be further from truth! Every human being has the opportunity and ability to become spiritual – a being of light – during their living years on this earth. It is through consciousness and enlightenment that we can save our souls from this world and transcend into universal ONE-ness. The challenge is staying true to the light once we find it; for this world will do everything in its power to distract and divert us.
Me Culture
The greatest disease the world has ever seen is the ‘me culture’. Our current times manifest a rising summit of narcissism. Identification with the ‘outer shell’ of our self – complete fixation with our ego – gives us our material identity of ‘me’, which is the root of all worldly problems. ‘Me’ leads to division, discrimination, dysfunction, and ultimately destruction in and of the world.
Our spiritual journey begins with relinquishing the false notion of the individual self; extracting our being from the reflection of this illusory world; and distinguishing between unconscious, sub-conscious, and conscious mind as the foundation for true action towards becoming a transcendent being. The freed mind is the path to the soul.
Soul Consciousness
When we open our mind to the spiritual, we begin to understand we are more than the ‘shells’ of our physical bodies. We connect with the energy that makes our bodies live – energy from a ‘higher source’; from a universal singularity not bound by time or space; an infinite creative force existing in the present.
There are two elements to this universal energy: soul and spirit. They are not one and the same. Soul is instilled in the body to animate it and make it live; spirit is instilled within soul to enlighten it and separate it from darkness. Souls can be ignorant of the spirit within them.
When we talk of consciousness, understand that we truly mean ‘soul consciousness’. Anyone who makes reasonable effort can tap into consciousness of this world – mere consciousness is nothing more than awareness of life’s happenings. Some of us are so pre-occupied with satisfying the fantasies and needs of our egos that we seldom experience basic consciousness, let alone soul consciousness.
When we achieve soul consciousness we recognise our being as part of the universal energy – we no longer see ourselves as individual droplets of water but as integral with the ocean – we are not atoms, we are the entire universe. Thus, everything we do from the soul affects the universe.
Finding Light
Enlightenment occurs when our mind and our soul consciously receive truth of universal reality from the spirit. We see everything for what it really is. We recognise pure creative light energy of infinite good, and similarly we recognise darkness. But this does not automatically happen to all humans – we have to be actively receptive to it, and we start by deliberately opening our minds, then our souls.
As long as we remain immersed in the self-centred distractions of our ego, we will not achieve consciousness of mind and soul, and therefore we will not be open to spiritual consciousness.
Spirit is always here – when humans were first created by our fallen progenitors, the spirit was mercifully given to us by the ultimate creator. However, we are not always conscious of the spirit. Consciousness of spirit comes from soul consciousness, which arises from a conscious mind (unrestrained by ego-driven sub-conscious and unconscious interference). If we want to make positive impact on the universe, every thought, feeling, action, and reaction we make must come from a place of spiritual consciousness.
Transcendence
When we see the material ego-driven world for what it really is, we begin to transcend this life because we see our souls as different from this world. This is a disturbing experience, sometimes so unsettling it is often easier to just slip back into spiritual oblivion – after all, was it not said that ignorance is bliss?
If we can find courage to endure the farcical nihilism of this world, we can live in and through the absurdity. It’s not easy. Many of us might think the only way to transcend this world is to die in it so that we can exit and truly live in the spiritual. This is not the only way. We cannot prematurely terminate ourselves with the aim of extricating our souls from this madness. However, time will run its course and we will eventually pass from this world, hopefully in a state of true and deep spiritual consciousness so that we will never have to return to this place.
There is a way to live in this madness without being part of it. We can sustain ‘transcendent consciousness’ and to do so we don’t have to become hermits, monks, nuns, etc.
There is an approach we can all apply in this world: love one another (free of ego-driven desires) and treat each other as we want others to treat us (without conditional expectations). This applies to all life in the universe. Essentially it is living by the will of the ONE: seeing our soul as one with the universe, and thinking, feeling, acting and reacting with full spiritual consciousness at all times.
If we do good in and to the universe, the universe will do it back. This is the basic premise for the law of attraction. Light will bring more light. But light will not occur on its own – we have to be instruments of light and we have to take determined conscious action (mind, soul, and spirit) to illuminate the universe.
Michael Beaton
Author of Transcendence – A Search for Meaning and Hope: BUY HERE
Article published in Edition 61
