Spirituality means living in a universe where we transcend all of our limitations. This is my definition. And there is a way to live that. We must begin to find the path to harmony with our Inner Being. That’s how, little by little, we’ll reach a certain level of maturity in mind and body that will enable us to experience our personal fulfilment to the full.
People tend to associate spirituality with religion, belief systems, gifts such as magnetism or mediumship, or traditional cults around the world. In fact, spirituality is none of these things! In this post, we will see that spirituality is a journey from the mental world to a world of the unknown, of the Inner Being. But in this realm of the Inner Being, all we have to do is ask, and we receive.
Did you know that there are two parallel worlds?
For me, there are two worlds in which we live: On the one hand, the mental or dualistic world. Here humanity believes in opposites, that there are contrasts between two concepts such as good and evil, peace and war, black and white. This dualism is a human construct created by the mind or the ego to bring order to the world around us. It is an illusion designed to create separation between us and our Source of life.And on the other hand, there is a world of spirituality, the realm of our Inner Being. He knows that there is no separation between us.
In the same way, we are all one. Consequently, in the world of our Inner Being, there is no fear. There is only love. As we become aware of this spiritual realm, we also become aware that everything we desire is already within us. This is because we are all connected to the Source, which is eager to fulfil our every desire.
How can we experience that duality does not exist in the spiritual world?
The mind cannot think without duality. Duality is the way we think. In silence, all dualities disappear. ~ Rajneesh
We can experience the magic of unity. I recognise that it can be difficult to imagine total joy and peace where time does not exist. Nor that we are eternal Beings. But this place of unconditional love is something we’ve all glimpsed. It is the same place where we experience the state of fluidity of our mind, also known colloquially as ‘being in the zone’. It’s where time stands still, where we feel joy and where everything flows effortlessly.
The most powerful tool for experiencing our uniqueness is through meditation. During our meditation session, we will go from the beta wave to a level of the alpha wave and even theta depending on our ability to relax. In this area of the brain, we will feel at ease without a name, without a body, without a face, without a diet, without a profession, without a culture, without a past or a future. We are just there as pure consciousness. This is how we realise that we are in the realm of unlimited possibilities.
Transcendence means going beyond duality. Attachment means remaining in duality. ~ Rajneesh
Meditation brings us into the present moment, allowing us to experience the magic of unity. It is only in the here and now that we can detach ourselves from the dualistic world of the mind and enter the world of spirituality. Unity has no opposites, time has no beginning and no end. The only moment is the present. And the present is eternal because it is all we have, this moment. This eternity is the reason why time can stop or fly away when our consciousness is focused on the here and now, because the magic of unity is the totality of experience, not the separation of hours and minutes. Finally, in this realm, there is no such thing as good and evil, peace and war, black and white.
Why is there this separation created by the mind?
When we arrived on this physical plane, we were pure, spiritual beings. We had no fear, only love. Over time, we have accumulated fears and beliefs from our society that limit us today in our evolution and in the fulfilment of our desires. Our egotic or mental part feeds and sustains itself thanks to these fears and beliefs that we have picked up along our path of duality. Those who came before us taught us to live in fear. We were told about the survival of the fittest, the victory of the most powerful and the success of the most skilful.
And so, throughout our lives, we have strived through our minds to be the strongest, the most powerful, the most skilful. These efforts have created fears in us, and worse, we identify with these fears through our mind! Over the years, we’ve had experiences that limit us in relation to our innate potential. Consequently, as long as we ignore the spiritual realm, separation will be our illusion. As long as a society sees itself as separate – a series or collection of separate units – it is living in illusion. Thus the degree of advancement of a society is reflected, inevitably, in the degree of its dualistic thinking. Social evolution is demonstrated by movements towards unity, not towards separation.
Why has the physical world distanced us from our spirituality?
Let’s take the example of the feeling of invincibility. Our culture sees feeling invincible as a narcissistic, egocentric and arrogant attitude. We learn from others to criticise ourselves for our fragility and weaknesses. This is how we create this feeling of vulnerability within ourselves. This habit of self-criticism that we are not good at this or that, develops in us a feeling of lack of confidence. As a result, lack of confidence becomes our reality. For our Inner Being, the spiritual part of us, feeling invincible is a sense of who we really are. In fact, when we were children, we didn’t feel this lack of confidence. We felt invincible. We didn’t shy away from anything and we felt that anything was possible.
A few years later, this world of duality came along. And so this feeling of self-confidence was eroded. Why did this happen? Because we allowed feelings of what others thought of us to predominate. We’ve let what others have reflected back to us as images and criticisms become our beliefs. Our Inner Being knows that we are naturally invincible. But because we cultivate the opposite feeling within ourselves, it is this feeling of lack of confidence that predominates. Our point of attraction is the fear of who we really are. And to top it all off, the Law of Attraction makes us experience the obvious, the reality of our fragility. This reinforces our belief in our vulnerability. It makes us relive over and over again the same scenarios of lack of confidence in ourselves and in others.
Why is it that our reality is what we experience, whereas spirituality is an abstract concept?
Personally, I believe that we create our reality! So if we are unbalanced by our way of perceiving life due to our beliefs and fears, the reality we experience will be different from what we want. For example, if we are negative, we get a lot of negative results. Similarly, if we believe everything that others suggest to us, if we follow the common emotion of the collective consciousness, we head towards the common stagnation of the mass of people.
When we think like the mass of people, we realise that what we want is not what we want. This is because there is a separation between what our mind considers possible to live and what our Inner Being thinks of our desire. Spirituality is the process of freeing the mind from its fears. But also from its worries and incessant thoughts. We have to learn to cross a river of consciousness to align ourselves with our Inner Being. This is how we can experience inner peace and bliss in everyday life. This is how we can experience that feeling of invincibility.
Why does living a spiritual life mean changing our paradigm?
The spiritual path involves changing our belief system, our perception of life. This requires a great deal of personal work and discipline. This is how we can gradually build bridges from our current beliefs and fears that deal with things we no longer want, to new beliefs and love that deal with things we do want.
What role does our Inner Being play in all this?
Our Inner Being is pure love. Love is the ultimate Reality. It is the only one. The whole. The feeling of love is our experience of the Inner Being. In all Truth, Love is all that exists, all that ever existed and all that ever will exist. So, as long as we are in judgement of ourselves and others, in fear of ourselves and others. And for as long as we live in hatred, jealousy and frustration. And as long as we are fighting, resisting everything the world throws at us, we are straying from the path of love. We stray from the spiritual kingdom. As a result, we are moving away from the spiritual work that would have enabled us to align ourselves with our Inner Being.
The Masters who have walked the earth are those who have discovered the secret of the absolute world – which is Love, and who have refused to recognise its physical reality, which is fear. The Masters are those who have chosen only Love. Even when they were killed, they loved their murderers. Even during their persecution, they loved their oppressors. This lesson of loving your enemy, to learn to leave behind the fear of the mind, is clearly stated for human beings. Its whisper could be heard from the highest mountain; in the darkest recesses. In the corridors of all human experience, this Truth resounded: The Ultimate Answer to counter the fear of our mind is through the Love of the Inner Being. The answer to duality is not awareness of our uniqueness.
Why is our spirituality the solution to a calmer mind?
I believe that the purpose of our spiritual journey is not to be afraid of our ego part. The purpose of our spirituality is to examine our thought patterns carefully. Then we need to purify them, to calm them down. Only in this way can we rediscover our true nature, our spiritual nature.
I would like to place a little emphasis here on spiritual work. It is we who must take the first step towards our Inner Being, even if it is there to guide us at every moment. All we need to know is that our Inner Being doesn’t go around saying: “Does anyone here want to be realised? Someone needs to transcend?” The Inner Being doesn’t whistle in the market place trying to attract customers. No, our Inner Being is sitting there passively waiting for us to go to him. He is patiently waiting for us to become aware of our desire to change the limitations of our mind and move towards our true nature. Part of our spiritual process is to reach out to him.
Why should our spiritual work be the awakening to our Inner Being?
I don’t believe that a saint or Jesus or even a great Guru will come to us and that by laying his hand on our head we will be cured of our mental limitations. I believe that the evolution of our consciousness is the result of a burning desire to change. It doesn’t happen by yawning at the crows. It happens through discipline. For example, the discipline to wake up early, to meditate, to read and write, to look within, to take time for ourselves and the discipline to control our thoughts.
But we mustn’t fall victim to our discipline by feeling suffering or resistance within ourselves. Similarly, we must not be afraid of our spirituality. This would mean that we were once again operating from our ego. Our discipline must be an activity of joy and well-being.
I would like to remind you that our Inner Being is only our guide to the good life. It does not choose for us. This is because we have free will. We have the choice to live the life pattern of our mind formatted by others. We also have the choice to harmonise with our Inner Being and live our truth.
How can we reach our Inner Being, our spirituality?
One of the ways of measuring our progress on our spiritual path is to feel within ourselves our capacity to feel good. When we act with joy, it means that we are aligned with the desire of our Inner Being. Everything we do when we feel unwell or suffering is the result of our actions in the mind.
Furthermore, when we awaken to our divinity, it doesn’t mean becoming something more than what we are. It means realising that we are already more than we ever imagined. We don’t become divine. We remember that we are divine.
This divine awareness accompanies us in a profound sense of freedom. It frees us from the chains of fear, doubt and self-judgement. It allows us to live our lives with authenticity, courage and grace.
In this realm, our inner Being will guide us to make choices that reflect our highest values. But also our deepest truths, our greatest dreams. So my friends, let’s awaken to our divinity, our spirituality, and embrace the light within us. Honour the sacredness of our Being.
That’s why I see spirituality as the journey of the mind towards the kingdom of our Inner Being.
I would like to thank Véronique Fuchs for her contribution to the writing of this text.