What Good Is Oneness?
What good is oneness if it still divides? If it excludes the acknowledgment of individual lived experiences? Then is it even true oneness?
What good is spirituality if it disconnects us from our humanity? From our shared job as stewards of each other and of this planet?
What good is non-dual realization — enlightenment — if it blocks us from learning about other people’s lives and about history and our patterns as a people?
How could Self realization not include any insight about the collective?
After all, we are the collective.
When we witness people saying “good vibes only” and “it’s all love and light” we are no doubt wise enough to see this is an infantilized spirituality.
But what about the deeper, perhaps more mature spiritual practitioner on the path?
When the spiritual community sees our Black brothers and sisters suffering, and says, “I don’t see race because it’s a construct”, or “I connect with people through their spirit, not the color of their skin”, or “the nature of reality is perfect just as it is, so there’s nothing to be done”, are we truly carriers of compassion and wisdom?
Or are we actually enforcing an entrenched privilege and separateness?
Isn’t this the dreaded spiritual bypassing? Something we catch ourselves doing with own personal blind spots, but now perhaps doing with collective blind spots?
On the ultimate level — the absolute level — yes, reality is perfection and everything is divinely flowing as it should. It’s all just happening; luminous emptiness displaying as form; God at play.
But the impulse toward wholeness expressing itself in the world cannot be contained to simply that level for long. It wants to find its way out into the world, on the street, in our homes and school and work and in our relationships.
With enlightenment, we wake up from the sense of being a separate self, and we awaken into our interconnectedness. Living this truth is a bumpy, messy, juicy ride.
So as “spiritual people”, may we be moved, rocked, shaken to our core. My we bypass nothing in favor of transcendent bliss.
May we expand our felt sense of what it is to be human.
May we be uncomfortable.
If we are a sincere spiritual explorer, we welcome being uncomfortable, don’t we? What could be more excruciating at times than the dissolve of the grip of identification with ego? With descending into the dark night and losing ourselves in order to know the one Self? Or the initial discomfort of leaning into the unknown every time we meditate, pray, chant, and land on our ass?
The rewards are great, aren’t they? The peace, the individual healing, the interconnectedness, the grace, the bliss of being awake to our true nature. Yes, yes. Oh yes, my friends. It is our birthright to spiritually awaken!
But this awakeness does not belong solely to you. It is a privilege to think it does. If this awakeness wants to be known through you as the individual, then sooner or later, we realize it wants to be known through the collective as well.
The evolutionary impulse is toward wholeness. A wholeness that includes.
After all, what good is oneness if it still divides?
Black Lives Matter. This is not a call for division, it is a call for unity, for humanity.
This is simple stuff. But it seems it needs unpacking for some.
You see, our world doesn’t respond as though Black lives matter. It responds as if Black lives matter less than white lives. Our world acts with hatred, ignorance, and greed. We respond with hatred, ignorance, and greed.
And systems are in place based on this habitually perpetuated consciousness of division and dominance.
So as you awaken to your true nature and to oneness, you are blessed. And you bless those in your life, you bless humanity, and you bless this wounded and beautiful world.
Within the non-duality of reality, or the oneness, or the “same taste” — as said in Dzogchen — there is distinction. There are human beings living very differently from you. And to not see this, my fellow spiritual practitioners, is still a form of duality. It is division, sneakily cloaked in apparent non-division.
This consciousness stuff is paradoxical isn’t it? But hey, I think we can handle it. I really do.
Let it leave us confused, curious, unsettled. Enlightenment is wrathful and continues to leave nothing undone.
It’s OK to be uncomfortable and to feel foolish as we listen and learn. There may be no apparent answers right now. Maybe there is simply a wide open space of willingness to learn, and to take in the experience of our Black brothers and sisters, of Indigenous folks, people of color, and all those who are marginalized.
To me, this is grace. This is love.
And so may we continue to open to the upheaval in this world in its infinite display, and to not turn away toward comfort.
If you have been traumatized/abused and it remains unhealed, no doubt it will feel overwhelming to open to the suffering of others. Go at your own pace. Find a qualified trauma therapist so that you can open to your own suffering, and in time you will be able to include the suffering of others and maybe even respond in ways that contribute. (resources below)
But why not get curious?
May we be open to the spontaneous action and response that arises out of clear-hearted awareness. This openness is holy terrain. And it is the fertile soil for collective healing.
May we speak up, stand up, show up, and love. I have a sneaking suspicion that’s what enlightened energy wants to do. It will be expressed in a myriad of ways, since, again, all beings are unique.
But the time for being silent about violence and hatred has long passed. With clear hearts and minds, a sincere spiritual practitioner’s actions and words carry power.
May all beings know peace, healing, and be free from suffering.*
*I’m aware I’m leaving out A LOT of the complexity of systemic racism, so don’t think that’s not lost on me. I’m doing what I can to speak a familiar language to those who might be able to start listening and start opening and start doing something.
“When I look inward and see that I am nothing, that is wisdom. When I look outside, and see that I am everything, that is love. And between these two, my life flows.” - Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
“…form does not differ from emptiness,
emptiness does not differ from form.
That which is form is emptiness,
that which is emptiness, form.” -The Heart Sutra
*If you’re looking to learn more about racism, a word of advice: don’t ask your Black friends to explain things to you. Anti-racism educators — who make a living teaching non Black people — offer a lot of info and insight:
There are SO many more. Google “anti racism educators”.
Buddhism and social justice:
https://www.lamarod.com
https://angelkyodowilliams.com
Trauma informed therapists:
http://juliebrownyau.com/dr-julie/
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists/bernie-soon-valley-village-ca/36414
Workbook on healing trauma: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MCXCHKG/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1
Here is a link with resources and science and mindfulness based info:
https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/antiracist_resources_from_greater_good#roots