Piercing conflict and ignorance with spiritual exploration.
The great yogis of Tibet often spent years in caves and solitude to pierce the world of illusion and the mind. Historians believe the Buddha left his home at twenty-nine and achieved enlightenment at thirty-five after subjecting himself to severe austerities and spiritual practices.
Christian monks, Desert Fathers, Hindu gurus and saints, and even Muhammad spent time in isolation receiving revelations and realization.
Is it necessary to withdraw from the world to awaken?
Is self-realization or enlightenment possible for a person living “in the world?”
In the Diamond Approach, we often refer to “being in the world, but not of it.”
The Diamond Path is well suited to those seeking to penetrate ego-identity, its veils of ignorance (illusion, maya) to behold the underlying spiritual ground of reality (true nature).
Being in the world, but not of it means we live our daily lives of work, family, and play, as we bring our realization into the circumstances of our lives to embody (actualize) our realization.
The intensity of the divisiveness and polarity in the world today increases the potential for ego-reactivity and spiritual and emotional suffering. We may feel like we want to leave this world, and withdraw to a cave for peace and solitude to support our spiritual practice.
Being in this world of 24/7 worldwide information-overwhelm and at the mercy of algorithms created to stimulate controversy and conflict adds fuel to the fire of reactivity. Many are feeling worn down with feelings of anger or depression or even apathy and ennui dominating their experience of being in this world.
The Diamond Approach offers the person in this world a precise and powerful methodology to penetrate the fog and confusion of the reactive mind. In-depth knowledge and understanding of the spiritual realm and its relationship to ego identity and activity provide an opportunity to, in a way, reverse engineer the process of ego development.
Being in the world, but not of it does not require a cave – either in the outer world or in our heart or mind.
Rejecting or insulating ourselves against the external demands to participate in the “dance of the dead” of this world will not serve the soul to be in this world, but not of it.
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