Someone asked me how my experience compared to Bernadette Roberts experience. This was regarding her book "The Experience of No Self.
Below is my answer.
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I didn't read Bernadette Roberts till about 10 years ago, so I had already gone through hell years before. I lost all my so-called Christian beliefs suddenly when I went to college. It was hell because every reference point and meaning left overnight. It's hell because the void has no reference point and therefore no way out. This makes it feel eternal. I've heard the void described as blissful, but that was not my experience.
The only thing I had was common sense, which told me that what I was feeling could not be the final answer, as no one would want to live like this, suicide would be the best answer, and if this was correct, the human race would extinguish itself. So I went about trying to make a life worth living. Not easy with no reference point. It took a long time.
Since I could not live in a meaningless void I went looking for meaning. It took many years. Atheist for years, then agnostic, and then to a spiritual understanding of God. God had to be there because I was a created being. It just had to be a new God, a different God, or we could say, a new understanding.
Roberts did the same thing. I was a little disappointed with her because in the end, she clung to some of her classic Christian tradition, such as the Trinity. In the end she couldn't let go of everything, even if it was only an empty shell.
I totally agree with her that if you are feeling a sense of unity, then there must be a separation that feels unified. There is a step beyond that. There can't be any separation when "You are That." You know you are in essence That, while at the same time expressing That as the relative human appearance. It gives you the freedom to be the person you are, warts and all.
Being a human is God's problem, not yours. On the other hand, knowing the essence of yourself as That, what harm would you want to do?
6 comments:
Interesting post. What do think of her quote: "Remember: no-self is not God; rather, it is the gap between self and God, and the gateway to what is not only beyond the self, but beyond no-self as well."?
You loose the sense of an individual self. It feels like no-self. Both these experiences are in Awareness, the screen on which they appear.
In my terrifying void experience, there was no 'me character', no history, no thoughts, no memories, no others, no body. There was only awareness. But oddly, awareness was pure terror (which we know it isn't), so what the hell was that? Ah… maybe Christian language is useful ;) - I would call that hell. (BTW, I'm not, and have never been a Christian).
Re Roberts, I, too, have pondered her conclusions, which - not being a Christian myself - have never made any sense to me. In the end I Love these different lenses and formulations, because a slightly different sensory flavor is elicited by each view.
Ah, yes, "the different flavors." Seems to me that's why can learn from others, but to try and duplicate their experience can be fruitless. We can try, and perhaps get into a similar space, but then our experience will be slightly, or very different. When I used to read J. Krishnamurti I was trying to get to the space he was in to be able to say the things he said. I got into a lot of mystical experiences, but they were unique to me. What was most impressive about my experiences was the authority with which they came. It's an all encompassing authority that you can't, nor have the will to question. Solid as a rock. Just knowing that is there is reassuring. Certainly better than the void.
That is very well said Maury. If someone ever asked me, what's the one most fruitless thing a spiritual seeker can do? it is what I did, and what you allude to: trying to get into someone else's state/replicate their spiritual experiences. Yep, I spent a goodly amount of time down those rabbit holes {LOL}. On the other hand, while the mind/doingness was in control, it was the thing that seemed most alluring…
Yep, I did the rabbit hole dance.
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