Many Paths, One Way – part 5
Renouncing the Sense of Separation
In this series of posts we are exploring the statement that there are many paths, but ultimately one way, which is renunciation. Renunciation is still a problematic word for Westerners because it does not carry the fullness that its Sanskrit counterpart, vairagya, does. Vairagya expresses a mature detachment that is not based in aversion or the polarities of moral and immoral, right and wrong. Rather, it is based in the freedom that comes from the realization of indivisible Reality – that there is nothing but Divine Reality, God. This is first an intellectual understanding attained through study of the revealed scriptures, combined with devotion to the Ideal, and spiritual disciplines. One first takes his or her stand on that truth and then realizes it over time.
Of the three basic and profound things to be renounced (ownership, agency, separation) the sense of Separation is the most subtle and the last to occur. The sense of separation itself is not only what prevents this union but also what makes relativity – the worlds of phenomena – possible. This sense of separation is described by various names: ego/ahamkara, anandamaya kosha/sheath of bliss, mulavidya/root ignorance, to name a few. The Panchadasi states that this demarcation between the relative and the Absolute is caused by the reflection of Consciousness in the gunas; if It reflects in sattvaguna the sense of separation is that of Ishvara, the Personal God, the sum total of all individuals in all realms of being. If It reflects in rajas and tamas, it has an individual ego that is primarily aware of itself in the waking state. As the divine Cosmic Individual, all realms and beings come forth; as the ordinary individual, jiva, it projects the waking state and dream state via individual mind. It is still the same Consciousness, only Ishvara is master of maya and knows everything, and the jiva is subject to maya and barely knows itself in most cases. The point here is that renouncing the sense of separation, then, means renouncing both individual and cosmic identities and merging in Brahman.
This begs the question: Does one truly want to realize one’s formless Essence? Do I want to be water or do I prefer to be the wave or even the ocean? Or do I want to sport as an individual or even a cosmic being? Do I want to be sugar (Brahman) or continue to taste It (Ishvara or Saguna Brahman, the Personal God)? It takes a sense of separation in order to enjoy an experience, and that confers greater and lesser degrees of limitation. Many years ago during a satsang, a student admitted to Swami Aseshanandaji, “I would rather taste sugar than be sugar.” Swami responded with a great depth in his voice, “Only those who have not yet tasted sugar think they do not want to be sugar.” In other words, only those who have not yet tasted Divine Bliss feel they would be missing something by being that Bliss.
Merging in Brahman is the final goal of those who seek formless Reality, who are finished with all limited desires and experiences and do not want to return to embodiment with its six transformations of birth, growth, disease, old age, decay, and death. Those who adhere to the teachings of Advaita Vedanta are generally in agreement with that goal. They are seeking videhamukti – freedom from all bodies. However, it should be admitted that some, perhaps many, who sincerely profess the teachings and truth of Advaita Vedanta still knowingly embrace the position of qualified nondualism, which is more friendly to form and to stages of realization. They may have a firm intellectual grasp that final merging in Brahman allows one to see all as Brahman (if one returns to ordinary consciousness) and confers unceasing and unimaginable bliss and indivisible awareness. Still, for whatever reason many may not be ready for that and accept the more gradual slope of purification, ripening the ego, and direct spiritual experience (which requires a separate ego until the final immersion) as their primary or interim goal. This may be true particularly for householders or modern vanaprastins who are enamored of the Advaitic teachings.
According to the Bhakti path, there are four liberations in form, among them sarupya, obtaining the same form as God. Such a state would require loving God with such one-pointed intensity that the world holds no sway and has lost its ability to distract the mind from the Source of Love – everything is seen as an expression of the Blessed Lord/Mother, even one’s ego, mind, and body. Here, the sense of separation becomes gossamer-like as in the Upanisadic story of the two birds in the tree, just before the bird of the relative self merges into the bird of the supreme Self. Such a ripened ego cannot bind the soul with karma, though the bliss of communion will hold that blessed soul back from immersion in Brahman.
Vedanta delineates two kinds of Samadhi, savikalpa, wherein one communes (as above) with Saguna Brahman, Brahman with attributes, through the purified mind and ripe ego, and nirvikalpa Samadhi, wherein all sense of separate identity is destroyed and Brahman alone is – indivisible, attribute-less, and blissful Awareness. Rare, or non-existent, is that person who can proceed straight to nirvikalpa Samadhi without the earlier communions with Saguna Brahman. This is a matter of qualification. As my teacher, Babaji has stated, “The Personal God, Ishvara, may not be the “goal” for an Advaitist, but It is nevertheless an important step along the way. In other words, and especially in this world, one needs friends in high places.”
The Yoga system explains these stages very well and shows how all our samskaras pertaining to the worlds and embodiments get replaced by samskaras of Samadhi in the various kinds of savikalpa (samprajnata) samadhis. What would those new samskaras be? Samskaras for concentration, for peace, bliss, for divine love, for wisdom, for formlessness. Before one can successfully renounce the sense of separation, one must get comfortable with formlessness. Consciousness does not need a container. Can we let the containers of body, mind, and ego go?
Ya dakam shuddhe shuddhama siktam tadrgeva bhavati
Evam munervijanata atma bhavati gautama.
As pure water poured into pure water becomes the same, so
becomes the Self of the enlightened ones who realize their
identity with Brahman! – Katha Upanisad
When practicing, renunciation is a quality of the mind. But when you have attained renunciation, you realize it is an attribute of the Atman. Atman renounces everything. -Babaji Bob Kindler
