The Markabah is a structure of essence composed of all aspects in the diamond form except that in this dimension each aspect appears not only clear, faceted, and precise but also as the very presence of pure pleasure. Each diamond feels and tastes like a wonderful piece of candy, with an affect deeply and pleasurably satisfying, a state of consciousness that fills the soul with a pleasurable bliss that penetrates and suffuses all of her field, filling all the cells of the body with a glowing and fulfilling sensation. Each diamond feels like a heavenly and full-bodied presence that combines the pleasure of the best food, the greatest sensual and sexual contact, and the utmost of a loving fulfillment. Each diamond is a different kind or flavor of pleasure, so we feel compassion as pleasure, as well as love, strength, truth, clarity, will, and so on. The Markabah is revealed as the body of pleasure, a body composed of the purest and most authentic pleasure, in various qualities and flavors. The Markabah thus discloses to the soul the truth about pleasure, happiness, and enjoyment. It is not only the presence of essence as pleasure but a faceted and precise presence, indicating wisdom inseparable from pleasure. The soul learns firsthand, through direct and immediate taste and touch, the eternal truths about happiness and bliss. She comes to understand that bliss is the inherent nature of essence, and happiness is what the soul feels when she is intimate with her true nature. 

The specific difficulty and the specific reaction for each point of the Keys to the Enneagram are determined by the delusion arising from the loss of its Holy Idea. The loss of holding is interpreted experientially through the filter of the delusion, so for ennea-type Two, not getting what you need from the environment (the loss of holding) is experienced as not getting your own way. The implicit belief that there is a separate you who can have your own way creates this sense, and the emotional state that accompanies it is one of humiliated castration. This state is the specific difficulty for ennea-type Two. Because of the belief that you can make things go the way you want them to, the loss of holding is experienced as an enormous blow to your pride, a deflating and humiliating slap in the face. This belief that it is possible to have a will separate from the rest of the universe is the pride of ego, and when it is deflated it feels like a castration, like your vitality and force are taken away, like what you are isn’t effective, powerful, or good enough. In the face of the loss of the sense of holding, your basic trust in the universe disappears. You come to feel that the universe is against you, or at least not with you, and so the specific reaction arises of willfully pitting yourself against what is. The specific reaction, then, for this ennea-type is that of willful action. This stance, which characterizes ennea-type Two, is one filled with pride and stubbornness in which you assert, “I am going to get my own way.” People of this ennea-type have a strong willfulness; it is important to them that things go their way and that what they make happen is important because otherwise, they feel castrated and humiliated. 

At the level of understanding the mind as a subtle consciousness, as an aspect of essence, there is no heart and no mind, there is only one thing. It is experienced as one consciousness with no separation of the centers. Seeing things as the clear mind comes from looking at things as mind, and seeing things as the clear nectar is taken from looking at things as heart; but it is the same substance. Taken as mind, we see it as awareness, as light, as consciousness. Taken as heart, we see it as love or joy. The awakened mind is clear joy when experienced in the physical heart. When freedom arises, the fulfillment is experienced in the heart. What is in the head or mind is the same thing that is in the heart, and feels like clear light or rich nectar and is the same consciousness. What we call love is the same as consciousness, but it is experienced in the heart rather than in the mind, in the chest rather than in the head. It is also the same thing as will, which is experienced in the belly. Essential presence in the mind is often felt as a diamond, and in the heart is often experienced as a pearl. It is the same consciousness, seen from an objective, clear conscious level or from a personal heart level. If it is perceived at a universal, objective level it is seen as diamond consciousness. In the heart it becomes personal presence, the pearl beyond price, and rather than being seen as consciousness it will be seen as love. 

This is part of the mystery of true nature, which appears as the ultimate mystery of the absolute. Experientially we recognize both pure awareness and the absolute as nonconceptual. Yet they are phenomenologically different. They differ as day differs from night. Pure nonconceptual awareness is clear, colorless, transparent light that feels like the coemergence of presence and absence. We see a vast expansive space, clear and colorless, bright and limpid. It is a space full of light, just like space in daylight. Yet, it is also a presence with the sense of solidity and fullness. In experiencing the absolute, we perceive a transparent and clear space, but dark, so dark it is absolutely black. The blackness is not a color, but the absence of light. In other words, nonconceptual awareness possesses light while the absolute is ontologically prior to light. They are both transcendent to being and nonbeing, but they differ in their relation to light. We can say that the absolute is the mystery prior to light, but at the same time the source of light. The first light that manifests in it is the nonconceptual light, pure awareness. In other words, both are empty of ultimate existence, but the absolute is much more empty. It is even empty of light, awareness, and hence can be experienced as cessation. Looking into pure awareness we see transparent and light-filled space, pervading all manifest forms, and constituting them. Looking into the absolute we first see darkness, but if we focus on it completely, our awareness spontaneously turns around and we find ourselves witnessing manifestation. We see the manifestation as possessing a ground of pure nonconceptual awareness, but this ground now appears as a manifestation within the absolute. 

Yes, so emptiness can be solid. Solid space is one of the experiences of space. Emptiness is an effervescent total nothing, complete lightness that sometimes feels like it is also solid at the same time. Completely light, completely not there, but at once more solid and substantial than anything else. That is actually the experience of the Absolute. Many people experience the Absolute as solid absence. How can absence—which means that nothing is there, everything has vacated the place, and even the place is gone—how can that be solid? Being and nonbeing are not separate, are not two realities but one reality seen in different ways. 

Also, why you love something is another factor. Usually, if your being is present while you do something you love, it does not have just to do with you; it has to do with something larger. The things that I read and study usually relate to my work. My reading is beneficial for the work I do and the people I work with. It is more beneficial for them than it is for me. But that usefulness translates into my loving reading these things. So it is a compassionate act, in a sense. However, the fact that I often learn things out of compassion and concern for others does not mean I am concerned and want to help others. The action doesn’t come out that way. It manifests as being really interested and liking to do it. So it feels as if it is for me. It feels like it is completely for me but at the same time it is not just for me. And when this is happening, I am not thinking whether it is for others or for me. That is what Being does when it is present—if you let yourself be Being, its very nature is a source of Love, a source of Compassion, a source of Intelligence, Understanding, Will, Strength, and all of the essential aspects. When we go into the area of seeking, we cut ourselves off from these things and we feel deficient. If we really allow ourselves to be and we learn to digest our experiences, as I said, what will develop, what will emerge and mature is the Personal Essence. 

Brilliancy is in some sense the source of all aspects and qualities. It is the presence of the aspects before differentiation. Its synthesis is primal and not created, spontaneously existing as the complete synthesis and unity of all aspects and qualities of Being. It is similar to white light, in the sense that all the aspects are like the differentiated colors that we see when we pass white light through a prism. In some fundamental sense, Brilliancy is related to the Absolute directly, to the ultimate condition of Being. The Absolute is actually the only other dimension of Being that feels complete in the way that Brilliancy does, that feels like it includes all the aspects implicitly. The Absolute feels as if it has everything in it, just as Brilliancy does. But there is a very subtle difference: The Absolute has everything in it virtually, implicitly, in potential. The qualities do not exist yet, but one feels no absence of any of them. The sense of completeness of the Absolute is implicit; it is not an explicit feeling or state of consciousness as it is with Brilliancy. There is completeness without the conceptualization of completeness. The essential aspects are still nonmanifest. You feel like everything is there when you experience the Absolute, but you don’t know what “everything” is. You can’t separate this from that—in some sense they are not there to be separated—because the Absolute is not a presence the way an essential aspect is. 

The Essential Identity is not an image or representation, nor is it dependent on an image or representation. One directly experiences presence by being presence. The Essential Identity is a definite presence with no boundaries. This is inconceivable under ordinary circumstances, in which we assume that we are a bounded entity. But imagine a radiant point of light, definite, precise and clearly differentiated. A point is nondimensional, without separating boundaries. It is the source of light, and it is the light itself. The radiant light goes on forever; it is not bounded by spatial distance. If we now imagine the light to be consciousness or awareness, then we have a very good impression of a definite conscious presence which is boundless. One experiences oneself as a brilliant point of light, conscious and aware. Since one is a dimensionless point, one feels singularly definite, but with no sense of boundaries. The Essential Identity feels like a concentrated presence, a precious and pure presence of consciousness, with the characteristic sense of self and identity. The sense of definiteness, singularity, uniqueness, and preciousness are so lucid and complete that it is not possible to appreciate without having the direct experience. Visually, one might see some beautiful image like the image of a brilliant star. But this hardly conveys the profound feeling of significance of the experience. It is an experience of pure consciousness, of lucid awareness and alive presence, in its most singularly definite form. 

So the first thing that needs to be penetrated and understood here, that needs to be given up and metabolized, is our notion of having an experience. Because as we enter the dimension of Divine Love, it’s not a matter of “Oh, here I am, about to have another experience, just like I’ve been having experiences all these years.” Maybe all your experiences have been like that so far on this path; perhaps you’ve had deep experiences of essence and being, and seeing the wonder and even experiencing divinity, right? So there you are, seeing God, or God talking to you or something like that. But to really go into the dimension of Divine Love is a whole different thing. It means this whole stream of having experiences is going to quit. It’s like there’s a program that’s been running in your operating system, which is self-registering: I’m having experiences of various things—now this one, now this one, now another one, and now this one. Right? And then it comes to the point where that program is going to quit. It’s not going to be registering any more perceptions. And the fear here is that there won’t be any experience if that quits. Or if there is experience, it’s not going to be mine.  It is somebody having an experience as long as the universe of consciousness is being funneled into a particular locus of consciousness.  It’s like the individual having an experience of the boundless dimension operates as a kind of sphincter, constricting the flow of universal consciousness into what feels like their own particular experience. But when that sphincter is completely relaxed and the funnel is dissolved, then there is only the presence that is there, which is universal consciousness, unconstricted. And at this level we recognize the quality of this consciousness as pure love. The closest thing we know to it as humans is love, though as I’ve said, this isn’t love in the sense of loving somebody. It’s consciousness, it’s light, it’s presence. 

We have also observed a whole family of prenatal structures that are imprints from early embryonic development. These generally take the form of tubes and bulges of various kinds and combinations, reflecting the morphology of these early stages. At the beginning the zygote differentiates and develops into three tubes, out of the three layers of the original disc. These tubes are dominant physical structures at a time when the soul is quite impressionable. The imprint of these prenatal tubes functions as a forerunner of ego separating boundaries. More accurately, the early tubular structure of the embryo imprints the soul with a form that becomes an initial body image according to which the sense of separating boundaries develops. This is, we believe, the reason that when we inquire into the ego separating boundaries we frequently find a structure in the shape of a tube along the body. The soul contracts and forms a tube, which sometimes feels like plastic, that gives her the sense of being an autonomous entity. 

A second related factor is that shutting down the flow of one’s essential nature often involves actual blocks in the flow of physical energy in the body. Awareness of these blocks might feel like contraction, denseness or deadness —“my heart feels like a stone; my legs feel like wood; my head feels like a bowling ball”—or even complete opacity to our experience which can manifest as an inability to sense a certain part of the body at all—“I have no legs; my heart is numb; my head is blank.” On a third, more subtle level, the block may be not so much in the flow of physical energy (which is of course never complete; blood flows, nerves function), but in the availability of parts of the body to awareness, or in the availability of the experience of essential presence in the body. Like a physical injury, the cutting or blocking of the flow of presence in the body causes pain, which is defended against in the normal course of conditioning, but the process of uncovering self-identity structures necessarily penetrates those defenses, and thus makes available the sense of pain resulting from what one can almost literally call a tear in the being of the self. We usually experience embarrassment and shame when we begin to feel a narcissistic wound. Narcissistic hurt is a doorway to the insight that there is nothing to our conventional sense of self, that it is fake. We may feel ashamed of ourselves, deficient, worthless, not good enough, “found out” in our unreality. We might feel unimportant and worthless because we are empty of anything real and precious. Naturally, we defend against this wound. 

When we realize the happening of all that happens, we see the magic and the power of true nature and we understand the question of action and activity. This mysterious ground, this empty presence, this spacious lucidity, this fullness that is at once nothingness, is not a static presence. It’s full of energy, full of life, full of dynamism, full of throbbing, orgasmic, convulsive movements happening all the time. This dynamism and power and force are what manifest each and every form, spontaneously every instant. This simple stillness full of graceful clarity, in its depth and silence, is gently and effortlessly manifesting everything in a process of effulgence and light. The enlightened view includes the process of manifestation, includes this constant effulgence that creates all the things in the world from the void, that materializes each thing from nothing. In that sense, reality is a wizard. Out of complete nothingness appears all that we perceive and experience. And it’s as simple and as easy as dreaming something. When you dream, you create a whole universe that feels like solid matter; people get hurt and various things happen, but it’s really not taking any effort. You are completely asleep, completely resting, and it is all happening. It is the same with Quintessence; it is completely still and silent, and at the same time it is unfolding everything with effortless ease and spontaneity. 

Experiencing the hurt for not being seen as a wound is not merely a metaphor. The student actually feels wounded, not only in the emotional sense, but literally, almost physically, as is clear in Nyland’s report. The wound feels like a cut in the chest, as a gash, as if one’s heart were physically wounded. There is the physical sensation of a painful cut, and this sensation of pain is inseparable from the emotional feeling of hurt. The emotion and the sensation comprise one state, an emotional wound that feels like a rip which hurts emotionally. This gash is not actually in the physical body; it is a cut in the shell, a rip in the structure of self-identity. The shell is beginning to disintegrate as a result of the loss of the mirroring. The wound is the sign of the threat to the cohesion of this structure. In fact, any narcissistic disturbance involves some level of breakdown in the structure of identity. Unempathic or insensitive responses from the environment affect the self like a stab of a knife. We actually feel stabbed, pierced, cut to the core. We naturally feel great resistance to experiencing this wound. We are terrified of falling apart, of losing the integrity of our sense of self, of disintegrating and disappearing. No wonder we feel we need mirroring for the preservation of the integrity and cohesion of this self-structure. The glue that keeps this structure together is missing at this point. This is literally true, almost physically true. 

Rachel is a young mother who is in a group and also does private work with the author. She has been having difficulty for some time as her one-year-old child starts taking steps towards emotional separation from her. She sometimes feels hard and rigid, which makes her feel strong and masculine like her father, or she wants me to support her when she sees me as the strong father. Her need for support sometimes manifests as powerful oedipal longing for her father, usually transferred onto me. Finally this investigation revealed a deep attachment to her mother, which manifests mostly as identification with some of her traits. Seeing through these identifications in a private teaching session, she starts feeling that she has no sense of structure. She feels jelly-like in her body. She has a strong judgment about this state, feeling it as a weakness, which explained her usual identification with the hardness of her father as a defense against this jelly-like state of no structure. As she understands the judgment she relaxes, but feels the need for a sense of structure. Staying with the state of no structure without reacting to it, she starts feeling firm and full. She feels present as a presence that is strong without being hard. It is a firm fullness that is alive and feels like her, not like her mother or father. Feeling her Personal Essence, she becomes aware that she feels in direct contact with me without the usual oedipal or negative feelings. 

As most of our case histories have shown, and as we discussed in Chapter 11, space arises most readily when dealing with body-image. Sometimes a person comes to experience space by considering other kinds of self-representations, but for most people it is confronting the “genital hole” that causes space initially to arise. This, as we have seen, is the experience of the genital area as a dark, empty hole, with no anatomical parts. The individual feels, and sometimes envisions, a lack, an absence between the thighs. The experience can be very definite and clear, with the boundaries of the hole clearly demarcated. It almost feels like a physical experience, even though the individual is always aware that the hole is not physical. The definiteness and clarity of the perception of the genital hole never fails to astound the person; it is always unexpected. Within the boundaries of the genital hole there is the sensation of nothingness, of voidness, of no existence. If the person senses or looks deeper, the nothingness deepens and expands. The hole expands into more of the pelvis and later into the rest of the body. Under normal circumstances, awareness of this hole in the unconscious body-image is defended against through many different means. 

We have described some of the somatic manifestations that accompany the appearance of space in consciousness, such as sensations on the top of the head and shaking in the body, specifically shaking of the spinal column. For most people the first sign that space is manifesting is the awareness of some definite sensation on the top of the head. It feels like a gentle tingling, or sometimes, as if something is brushing against one’s hair. If the person is ready for the experience, it will develop into more intense sensations at the top of the head which can sometimes feel painful. This will develop into the distinct physical impression of the presence of a hole on the top of the head, as if part of the cranium is missing. This is usually a gentle and pleasant impression, quite distinct and unmistakable. 

The obsidian arises in the morning meditation, but it is partially obscured. I experience it as a shiny black rock over the heart area. Awareness continues, a global holding of all content of experience. The presence of the nous feels like a gentle tingling filling the forehead. At some point, awareness discerns anxiety under the black rock, and some concern about my motivation being misunderstood. I recognize the concern is in anticipation of a public lecture I am scheduled to deliver at night. I am not used to giving public lectures, or holding public events. The anxiety and concern create a physical contraction that turns the blackness into a rock. It is like an obsidian diamond in the rough. Curiosity arises about the concern regarding motivation. However, investigating my intentions in giving the lecture, I realize I have no motivation. The spontaneous inquiry, which is an expression of the presence of the nous, reveals that my mind does not accept that I have no motivation regarding this event. So it projects some misunderstanding onto others. By afternoon I find my awareness inside the state of the black rock. It is a rock no more, but a radiant black crystalline nothingness, that feels like the very essence of the state of peace. Contemplating the mysterious peaceful emptiness I feel a complete aloneness, a total disengagement from everybody and everything. As the black faceted presence, I experience no concern in relation to anyone or any idea. I am a truth-consciousness, a presence totally independent from and transcendent to any relation to anything. I am the presence of total freedom from having to respond to anyone. Inner object relations are entirely absent, bringing a sense of complete freedom from all external relationships. 

If you consider the various activities that we do in the groups, you will see that they also involve the three elements. There are the small group meetings, which are oriented more towards the understanding. There are the meditations that you do yourself and, in the group, which are oriented more towards the being, the experience. There are other times, like Sunday afternoons, that have to do more with doing. Some people tend not to like Sunday afternoon because it feels like it goes against the grain, in a sense. But that is exactly what needs to happen. That is exactly the imbalance that needs to be corrected. You might not like it for a long time, but it is exactly the most beneficial thing for you. You will see that this perspective explains many things about yourself and many people. Usually, it is rationalized the other way: “I like to have more big group meetings because I like these insights, because that’s what is really important. The insights and the realizations and the connection are the most important things.” Of course, you think that way because your consciousness is imbalanced in that direction. Some people say, “No, we have to do things. Otherwise, it won’t work.” This may be true, but it might be the student’s position only because that is what he has always valued. Therefore, that student probably doesn’t need so much work on action. They need more in other areas so that their action becomes more truly attuned, more oriented towards the truth. 

Some people experience boundless love as arising within them, as loving light, as a softness that is a delicate presence. It feels like a golden white presence, soft and sweet, but not as intensely sweet as merging love. When it arises within, it is relaxing and brings an inner ease and a settling of mind and consciousness. While we experience it as love, we see it as light, a field of yellowish-white light, a delicate presence with a soft, delicate substantiality. In that quality of light, we recognize it is conscious of itself—pure consciousness that is awake and conscious of its nature. Others first experience it as arising around them in the environment. It bathes them, holds, caresses, and soothes them, as if a tender loving hand is touching them in a way that makes them feel love is present. This evokes a profound sense of holding that makes it easy for them to relax and surrender. Of course, others can experience this love-consciousness as both inside and outside, permeating and suffusing everything. When we are still experiencing ourselves as autonomous individuals, boundless love feels boundless and pervasive but not yet the nature of everything. It is similar to how most people experience inner space at the beginning of the inner journey; like physical space, it is everywhere, yet it is also separate from everything.

The issue of the extension object relation makes it very difficult to experience and integrate the Holy Idea of Transparency. Because of it, one either resists the experience or becomes attached to being an extension in a way that continues to support the personality. Holy Transparency means experiencing things without your personal mind. Then, as an individual, you are an extension of the universe, an extension of the Holy Truth—and not as a mental construct, not with an image in your mind that you are an extension of the universe. It is only as part of the extension object relation that one has an image of oneself as one side or the other of a merged relationship. After you work through the need to be the center, being an extension of the universe feels like a great relief. Needing to be the center of the extension object relation is a big job, since you are holding yourself as God. In the pure experience of direct union with the living universe, you know yourself to be completely supported, completely loved, completely held, and completely taken care of as a human being. The living consciousness of the universe is above you, surrounding you, within you, and you know that you are a part of it. This brings a wonderful sense of relaxation and joy. A sense of tremendous preciousness and value arises as you see that not only do you need the living universe to exist and support you, but that without you, that living universe would be blind. You are not expendable.

Attunement and compassion of this kind obviously requires a vision that reflects a deep understanding of true nature, of what a human being is, what the path consists of, and so on. But the capacity or element we are focusing on here is that of sensitive attunement. This is an expression of objective and essential compassion, the green diamond of the Diamond Guidance, which has a warmth and an acceptance to it inseparable from the precision and sharpness. It is not a matter of seeing your situation and feeling, “This is terrible; I’m going to change it.” It is a matter of seeing your situation and accepting that this is where you are. You take the attitude, “I want to know exactly how it feels to be here” When you are listening to a friend, you truly help him by being there, so that you step into his shoes and know as precisely as possible what it feels like to have the experience he is describing. It’s the same thing when you are inquiring into your own experience: You want to know just what it feels like to be exactly in the place you are in. You really want to understand yourself because you care. Most of us believe that there is little or no caring attunement available for us; we don’t feel that people have the true desire to understand us. So we put up our defenses to protect ourselves. We close ourselves down because other people want something from us or want us to be one way or another. It is hard to be open in such an environment. Similarly it is only when we recognize that our inquiry is motivated by a true desire to see where we are that we can let go of our need for self-protection. 

Upon waking up in the morning, I find my attention riveted by a feeling of hurt in the heart. The hurt is warm and sad. It feels like the heart is wounded in its very flesh. The hurt leads to a gnawing sensation in the mobius, the subtle center at the sternum. The gnawing is painful; it feels physically grating, but also emotionally difficult. A frustrated feeling has become stuck at the lower part of the chest, turning into a gnawing sensation. I feel all this mixed with the feeling of hurt and sadness. I contemplate the hurt, the sadness and the physical contraction. Holding all in awareness, while intimately feeling all of the nuances of the ongoing experience. The contemplating awareness embraces the content of experience with a feeling of warm kindness and with an attitude of curiosity, not knowing what the hurt is about, but interested to find out. The gnawing sensation responds to the motiveless inquiry, and begins to soften as the contraction at the mobius center relaxes, revealing an unexpected element to the sadness: loneliness. The hurt turns out to be the pain of feeling lonely. The feeling of loneliness wets the sadness with more tears, and the hurt expands into an emptiness underlying the sadness. Now it is deep, sad loneliness. 

I am telling you only one story about how this understanding might develop as we begin to see different views of how realization happens. Some teachings subscribe to the idea of cause and effect. Other noncausal teachings recognize that reality is beyond the question of causes and effects. As we continue, we will see that the notion of causality does not understand time correctly or completely. And further, it doesn’t understand the relationship of time and space and how those are the expressions of our being. Beyond seeing that realization is a dialectic interplay between the spontaneous arising of Being—which many refer to as grace—and individual action, there is much more to understand about how realization is uncaused. The understanding that realization has no cause continues beyond seeing that practice and realization are two sides of one process. The understanding of this question of causality or noncausality can bring a great openness, a great lifting of burden from our practice. When we say continual practice, we tend to think that we have to be continually practicing if we are going to be enlightened. And then we read the books that say that we have to practice for about fifty thousand lifetimes. And we think, “God, fifty thousand lifetimes of continual practice!” It feels like an impossibly heavy burden. So when you recognize that your enlightenment does not depend on your practice, when you see that is not how reality works, you might experience great relief. “Phew, okay, I’m not responsible for it. I’m not going to have to twist God’s arm so that he shows me his face. God will show me his face when he wants to.” 

We return to our example of working through the issues regarding the strength essence to illustrate the structural level of issues that expose the barriers to the soul’s liberation. As the soul begins to be open to her aggression and anger, and allows herself to feel strong, she may encounter new difficulties. Now she finds new and deeper barriers to experiencing the essential quality of strength, even though she can be somewhat open to anger and aggression. Continuing her exploration, the soul becomes aware of a sense of weakness, which actually feels like an identification with weakness that the soul is not able to transcend. Further inquiry reveals an image of being a weak person that has become part of the soul’s identity. This identification is not a matter of repression; rather, it is character and structure. Inquiring into this image, the soul may find that as a child she disowned her strength not only because of fear of others’ anger, but because if she had felt strong she would have felt able to stand up to her mother, and even to be separate from her. This insight might reveal conflicts around separation from her mother, a separation that is appropriate at a certain stage of ego development. 

First the sense of boundaries needs to go. Then there is just an overflowing. You are a fountain of love in the middle of an ocean of love. A person who has no boundaries is a fountain of love in the middle of an ocean of love. The fountain is the source of love. In addition to boundaries, there is another aspect of the personality that will go when universal love is realized. This is the identity, which is a sense of what it feels like inside, a certain taste, a certain quality. It’s how you recognize yourself. The personality not only separates, it gives a sense of identification. There is a sense of boundedness and a sense of identity. When you say “myself” you can recognize yourself. You have a certain quality, a certain flavor, a certain feeling. You believe that sense of identity, that air in the balloon with its helium, oxygen and nitrogen is you. Your ideas, actions, desires, judgments, rejections, acceptances and preferences are all attached to this sense of identity. It’s what you call your self, and it’s what you are most attached to. You think, “That’s me.” But if you are that, then you can’t be anything else. You can’t be essence, you can’t be love, any kind of love. You can’t be will, you can’t be any of those as long as you are attached to that quality which you think is you. 

No matter what we experience, even nonconceptual reality, the mind will try to define our identity according to that experience. The moment this definition occurs we are identified with a concept, and this concept can only be a memory. This is the usual knowledge of self. We are not saying that this pattern of development is not necessary, or shouldn’t happen. We are simply describing what happens. This is how the mind functions; we end up taking ourselves to be something according to the mind, and thus become identified with concepts of ourselves. This is the simple meaning of the idea that our identity is an expression of self-representations. When we are self-realized, we are aware of ourselves as completely pure, completely virginal, and completely new. We may say, “It feels like such and such.” We may conceptualize our experience. But if we take that description to define us, if we hold on to a memory to define who we are, then we will have lost our self-realization. So, even though the development of self-representations is a natural property of our mental functioning, it alienates us from our essential Being. Narcissism, then, is a natural and unavoidable result of identification with self-representations. 

No matter what we experience, even nonconceptual reality, the mind will try to define our identity according to that experience. The moment this definition occurs we are identified with a concept, and this concept can only be a memory. This is the usual knowledge of self. We are not saying that this pattern of development is not necessary, or shouldn’t happen. We are simply describing what happens. This is how the mind functions; we end up taking ourselves to be something according to the mind, and thus become identified with concepts of ourselves. This is the simple meaning of the idea that our identity is an expression of self-representations. When we are self-realized, we are aware of ourselves as completely pure, completely virginal, and completely new. We may say, “It feels like such and such.” We may conceptualize our experience. But if we take that description to define us, if we hold on to a memory to define who we are, then we will have lost our self-realization. So, even though the development of self-representations is a natural property of our mental functioning, it alienates us from our essential Being. Narcissism, then, is a natural and unavoidable result of identification with self-representations. 

Here one is objectively perceiving the totality of ego identity, and realizing for the first time that it is empty, unreal and, in fact, feels like images or thoughts, which it is. So not only one’s individuality, but the totality of the world that one has been familiar with, turns out not to have the reality that one believed in so unquestioningly. One realizes, for the first time, that the world does not have the richness and gratification that one always believed it had. The world of ego is as empty as ego. This is a stunning discovery for the ego, and shattering to some of its most basic beliefs. One can never forget such a realization. The usual experience of the personality is that one feels oneself as real, full and existing, and the world also as real, full and existing. The usual sense of significance and substantiality of the personality is experienced as continuous with that of the significance and absolute reality of the world that one perceives. But now one experiences the ego personality as an empty shell, full of greed, lust and desire for physical pleasure, comfort, security and power. And this state is continuous with that of the world, including the physical universe, as empty, flat and lacking any real significance and value. The material which has filled this shell in the past, all the past object relations, is no longer there. And the representational world is revealed in its true nature, as empty, as a shell covering a huge, infinite deficient emptiness. Just as the experience of Being finally exposes the self as a shell covering a hole, it now exposes the representational world as a big “cosmic shell,” covering a huge “cosmic hole.” This means that without the connection to Being the world we usually see is really empty, a cosmic deficient emptiness, covered by a shell, which is the content of the representational world. It is this experience that many mystics refer to when they say the world is an illusion. 

And yet what characterizes the actual nature of Brilliancy is its direct presence in the soul, which then manifests in the thoughts and actions of that person in the world. In the experience of the presence of Brilliancy, I experience myself not as a body with thoughts and feelings but as a palpable presence, as the very presence of some brilliantly luminous fluid. I am usually in touch with the body and its feelings and thoughts, but I am aware of myself as a sensitive fluid that pervades the body, and which feels deeper and more fundamental than the muscles and bones. And this palpable fluid, which is not really physical—even though it has texture and density like physical matter—feels like the presence of inner luminosity, like condensed brilliant light. This fluid light is so pristine, so immaculate, so true and absolutely uncreated or contaminated by mind or memory, that it has the distinct sense of being totally pure. The palpable fluid feels like the presence of purity itself. Brilliance and purity are two characteristics of the same fluid, just as pure water is both transparent and wet. We cannot separate the transparency and wetness in water, just as we cannot separate brilliance and purity in Brilliancy. The presence of purity affects the mind and the totality of consciousness by cleansing them of past experience, of all memory and past knowing. So I feel myself not only as presence that is purity, but also as presence that is virginal, open, and totally sensitive. I recognize this experience to be the prototype of innocence. I am innocence present as pure brilliance, where the purity is the same as innocence. It is like the innocence of an infant—totally open and present, with no mental baggage or premeditation. But this innocence is the presence itself, just as an infant is too innocent to know that she is innocence itself. It is so innocent that it is pure innocence. 

It is ordinarily difficult to experience and recognize the presence of this quality of our being, this diamond vehicle of pleasure, which we call the Markabah, for it is deep and expresses itself through many forms. The Markabah actually comprises all of the essential qualities arranged in a particular configuration, each expressing a particular flavor of pleasure or bliss. When we first feel it, we experience a presence of fullness or density—a rich, satisfying sense of being that is different from love or joy or fulfillment, though all are implicit in this presence. When savored and discerned directly, the quality that is in the foreground can only be called pleasure—a sweet, tangy, yummy pleasure that is at the same time sacred and profound such that it can easily be referred to as bliss or ecstasy. This vehicle has two modes, with one of them dominating our experience at any given time. The deeper mode feels like profound inner pleasure of many kinds, where the presence has the sense of fullness and richness. The other mode is experienced more as externally expressive, and it feels expansive and celebratory, like a happy celebration filled with song and dance. It is playful and light. Unlike the qualities we have discussed so far, we can feel the Markabah as either the full presence of the vehicle or as the presence of one specific aspect of the vehicle manifesting as pleasure.

There have also been jealousy and insecurity, relating to unconscious fear that others will enjoy the love of the divine being, that perhaps I will not stay faithful to it, and that I will miss it. I recognize this jealousy and insecurity as a reflection of my early experience, when younger siblings enjoyed merging love with my mother, and I felt alone and empty. I believed then that the loneliness was a consequence of my moving towards autonomy. The anguished feeling in the ego-line is this negative relationship, full of frustration, hurt, insecurity and guilt. I realize that this person feels like I often felt before Being began revealing its nature: insecure, helpless, lonely and alone, very sad, weak, without love or connection. It is surprising to see that, at this point of the unfoldment, this person longs for and loves only the absolute. This is amazing; the person of ego, when denuded of all defense and pretense, turns out to be a true lover of the Truth. It is a healing surprise. Contemplating my inner state, I experience myself as a thin film of the gooey substance of the personality, stretched over the tremendous presence of the absolute. Then I become aware of the world as a harmonious unity of all appearance, a oneness. I see all of existence as beauty beyond words, full of love and grace. But even this is only a thin skin; its substance, its inner nature, is the vast, completely black absolute. Through my turning towards the absolute, and loving it exclusively, risking the loss of the divine being and the unity of existence, the absolute reveals itself as the inner nature of this unity. The immense silence discloses itself as the self of the divine being. I recognize that what I love most is the essence of the divine, the very self of god. It is the divine ipseity, the self of everything: absolute blackness, complete annihilation, beyond being and nonbeing. 

You’re zeroing in by becoming specific. So now the feeling of the anger and what it’s about becomes very delineated in your body. That’s the way we get to the point. The process is partly a matter of getting more and more specific. The same thing happens when we’re going deeper in our essential realization. At the beginning, you say, “Well, I’m feeling present.”

“Good, what do you mean by feeling present?”  “Well, it feels like I’m here.”

“Well, okay, you’re here. What does that mean?” “When I’m here, it feels like something is here.”

“And what is this something that’s here?” “It feels like it’s me, and this me and the hereness are the same thing.”

“That’s interesting; be more specific. What do you mean, ‘me and hereness are the same thing’?”

“Well, it seems as though me and the fact of existing are the same thing. So me and the fact of existing are inseparable.”

“Be specific.”

“Oh, I’m existence.”

In this example, we looked more deeply into our experience; we went from a place of feeling just present to recognizing true nature in a particular aspect that is pure existence. How did that happen? By being specific. 

When we see the Holy Love quality of the nature of Being, we see its preciousness. Its radiant glory feels like a sunrise. Inferiority is the negation of this glory, and the specific reaction is an attempt to get away from that diminished sense of self. What is needed is to confront that part of our psyche rather than to run from it, so that we are not afraid to wake up to ourselves. As we understand it, the sense of inferiority develops not because you are a child, or you happen to have some defect in your body or some social lack in your environment. Its origin stems from the fact of not recognizing the precious quality of your Beingness, and this lack of recognition is universal, with very few exceptions. Even if you felt loved by your parents, for instance, they didn’t necessarily love you because they could see the preciousness of your Being; they loved you for what you did, how you behaved, whether you were smart or cute or pretty, and so on. Because the preciousness of your nature itself was not seen and loved, you would still feel inferior. There are, of course, more traumatic reasons why children grow up with the feeling of inferiority beyond the fact that their preciousness was not seen and held. Some children are mistreated, unloved, neglected, and so on. Any lack of holding—physical, emotional or spiritual—will affect the child in such a way as to engender a sense of inferiority. The child does not see that its soul has that innate, intrinsic, and fundamental quality of being the most precious and wonderful thing in the whole universe. The child loses this sense of herself, and part of the resulting sleep is identifying with the consensus reality in which the parents live. Later, you explain the feelings of inferiority with whatever means you can find, such as physical appearance, behaviors, intelligence, capacities, and so on, with children of different ages emphasizing different things. 

It is interesting that Mahler and her co-workers actually observe the manifestation of the Essential Self, understand it as hatching, which is birth, but still do not directly relate it to the sense of self. However, this is what often happens when an individual who does not conceptualize the existence of Being observes the manifestation of one of its aspects. There is recognition, but an inability to make the conceptual leap into the dimension of Being. The Essential Self is a central aspect of Essence, distinct from the Personal Essence. The Personal Essence feels like an individuality, a person, while the Essential Self feels like an identity, a feeling of self. The Personal Essence feels like “I am,” while the Essential Self feels like “I.” The Personal Essence has some sense of identity, but not as specific and distinct as the Essential Self. The sense of beingness, of the “am” is much more dominant than the sense of identity, the “I,” while it is the reverse for the Essential Self. The Essential Self is a very simple and pure sense of presence. It is so simple that it becomes subtle and difficult to differentiate from other feelings. It is not the usual sense of self that most people know. The usual self is only a reflection of the true self, and we will shortly discuss the relation between the two. What we are calling the Essential Self is not the same as the self assumed to exist in the early months of life by some object relations theorists, such as Fairbairn. Fairbairn’s self is an entity that is functional and psychical in nature, while the Essential Self is, rather, the presence of Being, in the aspect of identity. It is neither psychical, the way Fairbairn meant it, nor functional, the way he saw it.