Chapter 9: The Western Way The Western Way of Bodily
Self-Sacrifice Part I The conventional and traditional Eastern or oriental
ideal or path is a specific design for attention in the
body-mind. It is characteristically oriented toward mind, or
the subtle subjective realm of the interior self. And this
orientation itself is a direct result of a basic disposition
of recoil from the bodily self, its relations, and its
world. (Even the Buddhist schools, which reject the notion
that there is an ultimate concrete or substantial and
eternal inner self, retain the fundamental disposition of
recoil from the bodily self and its relations. The body, or
even the total body-mind and its experiences is interpreted
negatively, as suffering. Even the Mahayana ideal of
accepting birth as compassionate service to all beings in
order to awaken and enlighten them is based on this negative
interpretation rather than on bodily positive
enlightenment.) The conventional and traditional Western or occidental
ideal or path is not inherently founded upon or disposed
toward ultimate spiritual enlightenment or even a positive
philosophical interpretation of the body-mind and the world.
Rather, it is oriented toward bodily existence in the world
simply because it conceives of individual existence only in
the basic terms of matter, body, and outer-directed bodily
motivation through desire and will. The Western orientation,
or the typical orientation of “worldly” people and
industrial societies, tends to be precisely that which is
criticized and avoided in the Eastern path. Just so, the
Eastern orientation and tendency toward inversion is
criticized in the Western path (wherein recoil from this
world seems to reflect an attitude of fear, loss of nerve,
weakness, and abandonment of responsibility or duty, as well
as a refusal of the basic or given pleasures of
existence). The Way of Life, which I have Realized, and which I
propose, is founded upon equanimity, or prior transcendence
of any and all conceptions of a dilemma or inherent problem
of existence. Likewise, it is founded upon transcendence of
the mood of recoil from bodily existence, or preference for
confinement to the mental, psychic, or non-bodily illusion
of self. I call the Way that I Teach the “Western Way,”
because it is free of the disposition of recoil or
subjective inversion, and also because it is (not merely or
conventionally but positively) oriented toward (or, rather,
as ) the body and its relations. However, the Western Way
(in contrast with the conventional Western or occidental
path) is altogether a spiritual process. It is positively
oriented toward the evolutionary spiritual growth of human
existence, but its disposition and practice are oriented
toward Ecstasy, the spiritual sacrifice of the total
psycho-physical self, or self-transcending Love-Communion
with the Radiant Transcendental Being, the Divine Person,
Who is the Identity and Condition of all beings and
conditions. The Way that I Teach is characterized by the
practice of love-surrender, as the whole bodily being (or
total and single psycho-physical self), in all relations, to
the degree of Ecstasy, or Transfiguration and Transformation
by the Radiant Transcendental Being (even to the point of
Translation or Emergence, wherein the present body-mind is
forgotten or Outshined by the Radiant Divine). This Western Way that I propose is a new and radical
conception of human existence, practice, and destiny. It is
supported by many aspects of both the Eastern and the
Western traditions, but it is also critical in its
interpretation of those traditions. The Western Way is a
spiritual Way of Life-oriented entirely toward the
All-Pervading Transcendental Divine. However, it is founded
upon present Communion with the Divine, not any search for
or progressive attainment of such Communion. Just so, it is
based on constantly reawakened understanding and
transcendence of the habit of recoil from manifest and
bodily relations (which recoil produces the typically
oriental tendency to embrace a process of reductive
inversion toward bodiless and even mindless subjectivity).
Rather, the Western Way is established in the vision or
presumption of the human self as a psycho-physical unity.
The actual self is the total body-mind (not merely the
inward part-called mind, psyche, soul, or essential Self).
And the Way of Life is a matter of surrender of the total
body-mind-or whole bodily worship of the All-Pervading,
Total, and Transcendental Divine-to the degree of
Transfigured Ecstasy. The Western Way is not fulfilled in self-knowledge (or
the experience of internal states, mental quiescence,
psychic stimulation, soul visions, or essential
Self-Consciousness). The Western Way is fulfilled only in
Ecstasy, or self-surrender to the degree of
self-transcendence. And the self that is to be surrendered
is the actual and total psycho-physical self, or body-mind.
The process involves constant transcendence of the habit of
recoil, inversion, and the illusion of confinement to an
independent internal self. Part II The condition that is our suffering (and which is,
therefore, to be transcended) is not a fixed, objective, or
subjective “thing” that is the self or ego. Rather, the
condition that is our suffering is the habitual action of
self-possession. The action of recoil toward self (whether
bodily or internal) is always a form of contraction, or
withdrawal from the universal pattern of relations. That
action ultimately leads to disintegration of experience,
possession by illusions of mind, reduction of phenomena to
Chaos, and, finally, reduction of the dynamic self to
Zero. I have engaged the conventional patterns of both Eastern
and Western experience. I have explored the internal and the
external dimensions of our human possibilities. And I have
been Awakened from confinement to the problems, reactions,
illusions, and limitations of our yet self-divided and
unevolved humanity. I have Awakened from the separate
motions of East and West, and this Awakening established me
in the true Equanimity and Unity of the body-mind, so that I
have become moved as a single sacrifice in Love. The “I” that is each one of us is not merely a mysterious
internal self. The self or “I” is indeed mysterious-since we
do not ultimately know what it is – but it must be
understood to be not other than the total, obvious, and
dynamic body-mind. “I” is the body , or the total body-mind
process (whatever that is , altogether and ultimately). If “I” recoil from born experience and thus turn upon
myself like Narcissus, the body-mind contracts. In that
process, discomfort or dis-ease arises. The natural
equanimity of the body-mind is lost in self-consciousness. A
conception of dilemma arises, so that thereafter it is
always as if I am motivated by some yet unspoken problem and
toward some yet unrealized solution, happiness, or release.
Then I no longer conceive of myself in dependent
relationship with a universal Unity of relations. I am
constantly disturbed by my own search for a unity of my own
parts. I begin to feel homesick for the vision of unity,
equilibrium, harmony, integrity, beauty, peace, happiness,
pleasure, delight, and joy. In body and mind I am tempted by
brief and separate illusions of what I seek, but my constant
experience is deeply one of dreadful chaos, confusion,
disharmony, division, fear, sorrow, anger, guilt, remorse,
and torment. And the deeper I enter into the domain of self,
the more profoundly I suffer a vision of everything and “I”
reduced to Zero, Emptiness, and Changeless Disturbances
without the slightest trace of Meaning or Love. But it has been given to me to Awaken from this terrible
Script. And the Way of Life for Man has been clarified in my
heart. This dreadful destiny of recoil and self-possession
must be transcended. Every tradition of Narcissus must be
overlooked. We must be reestablished in the native
equanimity of fearless birth. This is the Secret: We are a
Universal Divine Incarnation. Every moment of recoil from the arising experience of our
birth is a recoil from Ecstatic Unity with the Radiant
Transcendental Being. The Law is this: “I” must surrender or
Love as the total self (the total body-mind) into and
through all relations to the point of Ecstasy, wherein the
total body-mind (relieved of recoil, contraction, and
self-possession) is Transfigured and Transformed by the
Radiance or Light that pervades the total world. And this
process of self-sacrifice, or self-surrender in God to the
point of Ecstasy, ultimately Outshines the experiential
body-mind (or Translates it into the Radiant Divine
Domain). To recoil and contract upon the body-mind is to move away
from the Ecstatic Vision of Unity and Realized Bliss. It is
to rush toward Chaos, Illusion, and the Zero of
self-suppression. The Way of Life is not at all a matter of
recoil, contraction, and suppression or division of body,
emotion, mind, or self. Rather, it is a matter of
love-surrender as the total self or body-mind to the degree
of self-transcendence, or Ecstatic Emergence into the Light
and Delight of the Spiritual Divine. Those who advocate the traditional ideal of soul culture,
or inversion toward psychic states to the exclusion of
physical states, base their enterprise on the observation
that we die – and, therefore, they accept only the ideal of
adaptation to that which survives bodily death (which is
called mind, soul, or essential Self). It is true that death
is not a terminal event. Only an aspect of the total being
is discarded in death. However, I have observed that merely
to die is not sufficient to become Free, Happy, or
Enlightened. In order to properly evaluate the processes of birth and
death we must transcend the tendency to recoil from mortal
experience, change, and death. Then we can observe that the
Law and Purpose of our existence is not merely to become
identified with that part of the self that immediately
survives death. That part of us that immediately survives
death is not itself our ultimate Condition or Destiny. That
inner part of the self that observes the phenomena of body
and mind is not to be identified as the total self, nor do
we Realize Enlightenment or Divine Truth merely by a
meditative contemplation that sees and hears and otherwise
experiences the internal structures of the body-mind. The
Law and Purpose of our existence is Incarnation, or birth as
the total psycho-physical self, until that self is
thoroughly Transcended, Transfigured, and Transformed
through self-sacrifice or Love-Communion with the Living or
Spiritual Divine. It is not merely some inward or subtle part of us that
survives death. To be sure, it is only that subtler part
that immediately survives physical death, but that subtler
part is only partial. It is not inherently Enlightened or
Completed, and it does not permanently remain independent of
embodiment. The subtler self is structured so that it
inevitably returns to embodiment, or the pattern of
Incarnation and Ecstasy, somewhere on Earth or in the
Universal Realm of Nature. Therefore, truly, it is not
merely a mind or subtle self that survives death. If the
total cycle is considered, we must say that a total
psycho-physical self survives the death of every
psycho-physical self-until Translation, or Emergence into
the Transcendental Divine Domain. We are reborn again and again. We are fitted to an
endless cycle or circle of manifestation. We may recoil from
this process, but in doing so we contract the self, forcing
it into self-suppressing patterns of chaos, illusion, or
exclusion. Recoil and self-possession, which imitate the
appearance of death, are in fact negations of Life. Only
transcendence of recoil and self-contraction (and thus of
fear, suffering, and nothingness) is the Way of Life. We
will inevitably return to states of body-mind until the
total body-mind or psycho-physical self is Translated into
Light. Therefore, only God-Love is the true practice of Man-not
self-protection, self-possession, and all the desperate and
self-deluding acts of Narcissus. We must thoroughly
understand our born circumstance and our ultimate Purpose or
Destiny. We must Worship the Living Divine Person in Spirit
and in Truth. We must, therefore, Worship God bodily-through
love-surrender as the total and inherently single or
undivided psycho-physical self. We must transcend the self
(or body-mind) through love, or expansion beyond
self-contraction, rather than submit to self-possession,
self-division, and self-negation. We must enter into the
natural Equanimity of Ecstasy in God. Therefore, instead of
recoiling from the pattern of relations and into the
illusions of self, we must surrender directly into the
Radiant Transcendental Being and depend on Divine Blessing,
Help, and Grace.
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