Non-dual awakening is the deep instinctive realization that all of life is One network, One movement of expression from a central Source that has come into form as multiple appearances. Each of us is an appearance that is unique and has its own dance to do in the world, but all of us are linked intimately through consciousness, vibration, and ultimately, love. Moments of awakening happen when consciousness wakes itself up in a human system, and the individual loses the felt sense of separation from all that is. remembering its primal source and connectedness with all things.
Politics, by its nature, is divisive, as are most systems created by humans. Minds have many perspectives on how the human community should be managed, each driven by personal and separate needs and desires. The mind functions through the measure of opposites – as soon as birth there is the appearance of two –myself and others. We decide what is good or bad, what makes us happy or sad, what is right or wrong, just as consistently as we live with day and night, light and dark. When we function through thought we are looking at opposites and deciding yes or no with every choice. So it is natural that in our human identities we choose sides and gather with those who seem most in line with our positions.
If transformation is the consequence of a true awakening of consciousness, this has to be a transformation of thought, a collapsing of the patterns of separation and division. Some people imagine an awakening to bring power and radical gifts such as psychic knowing or charismatic speaking or healing abilities. But these are only bi-products of energy changes that occur in a few who were destined to make contributions in these ways. These are not what awakening is about. Awakening is about a deep and humbling change in heart and perspective. When you know your connection with the whole you see how the mind functions through conditioning and blind spots. You see the limitations of your previous positions. When this happens your old ways of thinking become uncomfortable, even painful, and ultimately, they become irrelevant. You know you are part of a mystery, but you sense it emerges from a Source both loving and whole, without division or separation. You discover a part in yourself that recognizes everything in some illogical way is perfect just as it is.
But this is not perfection as human thought would define it. It is more like an underlying rhythm and evolving that has more wisdom than the human mind can gather. It is an intrinsic movement of wholeness, trustworthy like the movement of the planets and stars. Its source intuited but unknown, apparent but much more vast than the senses can perceive, going far beyond, in fact endless.
And then, after this awakening and this knowing, some of the old patterns of habit recycle. When we are able to see them we can wake them up, one by one, by meeting them with compassion and new insight. We can also see how others are stuck in their own patterns and beliefs through no fault, but due to condition and inborn tendencies they have not yet seen through. We can see how every experience we have shapes our minds and thoughts, and realize that our decisions about ourselves and about life emerge from the programming we received. Knowing this supports a new kind of compassion for the limitations and failings of the human species.
So how might awakened minds view political structures? They appear to be battles between beliefs and positions representing many life programs. An awakened person, who sees the potential for humans to live cooperatively and with compassion for the needs of one another, will want to support politicians who use their power to promote the health and well-being of the species. We see the build-up of arms and munitions as a kind of insanity in humans, a species willing to kill its own. We see the abuse of anyone as an insane and confused reaction to deeply internalized rage and suffering. We see those who are driven by greed as overwhelmed by a misplaced idea, one that places power and accumulation above a natural and heartfelt relationship with the planet and with others. We see the neglect and abuse of the planet as a blindness to the natural relationship of the human body to its environment.
When we drop down into our body, we notice a sensitivity to the feelings and vibrations of others who are suffering and we feel compassion, even when there is a knowing of the innate perfection of the universe. The one is not the opposite of the other. We live with the paradox that opposites appear but emerge from the One wholeness. We learn to listen to our gut about the authentic and unique movement called for in any moment, and on a good day we follow it.There may be moments we hold back, because our humanness has taken hold through an emotion or an old pattern has appeared. But our intention is to move from what feels True.
So this essay was intended to be focused on an election. How can an awakened person support a leader who creates division and encourages violence, who separates children from families, who deplores universal cooperation between countries, who ignores human pandemics and poverty, who uses his power to line his own pocket and who is so wounded in his soul and spirit that he lacks empathy and has no interest in hearing the heartfelt needs of those entrusted to his care? His behavior represents the human shadow in each of us and the shadow side of this country, founded on higher principles he may not recall, but principles that have never clearly been lived up to. Just as a spiritual awakening makes us see our own shadows, the current political picture has brought much to the surface that is the cost of a capitalistic culture. The opportunity here is for transformation – we cannot change what we cannot see is wrong. The first step is clarity. The next step is intention. Perhaps the next challenge is how we merge capitalism with democracy and with humanity?
If you are awake make a contribution to humanity. Take the time to vote for the deepest truth you know. Your candidate may not be perfect, but even a small step out of the deep sleep of our collective shadow is a step toward the light. We need to reaffirm our connection with the environment, our inter-relationship with others and our ability to move toward a common good.
We need to recognize that when the leader of a great country is crippled by ignorance and greed, enjoys the promotion of violence, and refuses to see the collective needs, it the great spiritual challenge of the country to wake itself up. Those who have faced these challenges within themselves need to support not what is perfect, which is not available in human form, but what is better and holds more positive potential for the spirit and the possibility of humanity. Our country was founded on the idea of a more perfect union, and today our world is struggling with ill health, on the physical, emotional, financial and moral level. A union suggests the wholeness that underlies the uniqueness of all.
Awakened people may have an acceptance deep within of the inevitable flaws in human thinking and patterning and even the suffering in the world, but still we need to move however we are able toward the awakening of respect for the planet and the god we know is present in all others. The gift of consciousness in a human body is the expression of what we call divine or sacred. Let’s not waste our opportunity to contribute to the whole.
Awakened Living Blog 