18. Impersonal Enlightenment
Q When you were just speaking about the impersonal view, I felt the power of seeing beyond the personal. It was almost as if my individual sense of self became diffused and I experienced the kind of transparency you described.
A That's good—beginning to awaken to emptiness or transparency, seeing through the personal dimension of our own experience, directly realizing that it is not "my experience" but the
human experience. That's the first step. But there's a lot more. Because when we become deeply established in that realization something unexpected begins to emerge in our awareness. Something that we were not looking for. It is the recognition of an enormous responsibility, a responsibility that is now ours simply because we have seen through the illusion of the personal. In fact, with the realization of impersonality, we suddenly experience in a mysterious way that the evolutionary potential of the human race rests on our very own shoulders. As overwhelming as it sounds, it's actually true. And even this is impersonal, because whenever spiritual awakening is genuine, this sense of an obligation to life itself is experienced in a way that is direct and profound. In this radical awakening beyond the personal—which I call "Impersonal Enlightenment"—the burden of the as—yet—unfulfilled promise of human evolutionary potential is felt directly and very
personally.
Wait a minute! How did we get from recognizing that most of what we experience is impersonal to discovering that the burden of human evolution is resting on our own shoulders?
Well, that's the way it works. It's just that few seekers get far enough to experience this directly for themselves. But if you do finally transcend the need to compulsively personalize all of your experience, this mysterious sense of obligation to an evolutionary imperative will begin to reveal itself spontaneously. It is then that you will discover what J. Krishnamurti was pointing to when he said, "
You are the world." That's when you recognize yourself to be the human condition
as a whole. And in that recognition, you automatically feel responsible for that condition because you are simply feeling responsible for your own self. It is just an inherent part of the realization that I'm speaking about—the realization of impersonal enlightenment.
So are you saying that I should try to feel more responsible for the evolution of the rest of the human race?
No. All I'm saying is that when your fascination with the fears and desires of your own ego burns away for real, when you experience that miraculous leap beyond the personal, to your surprise, what will begin to emerge within you is a deep and profound caring for your own Self, which
is all of us.
Can you describe what this feels like in your own experience?
Yes. There is a passion that arises from deep within—and I can honestly only describe it as a command from the unknown—that at times becomes an overwhelming roar. It is a power and a presence that feels infinitely conscious, a vast intelligence that is not personal in any way. And I know that until the day I die, it will never be satisfied. It can't, because until every human being has awakened, indeed, until each of us has reached our full evolutionary potential, it will not be enough. And of course, that's not going to happen—at least not anytime soon. But this passion is simply an expression of the awakened state. It is the evolutionary imperative becoming manifest. And it is totally impersonal and utterly choiceless. It's what the experience of impersonal enlightenment is all about.
What you are describing is compelling. But it's nothing like I've imagined freedom to be. Being inspired by a passion that will never be satisfied almost sounds more like a kind of bondage.
It is! But that's the whole point—it's what I call the
bondage of liberation, the bondage of liberation beyond the personal. You see, in impersonal enlightenment, the ultimate goal is not one's own liberation but the liberation of everyone else. It is not merely the attainment of personal freedom, which I call personal enlightenment. Of course, profound freedom, ecstatic joy, and deep contentment
are the by-product of a life lived in service of the evolutionary imperative, but they are definitely not the goal of impersonal enlightenment.
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