Okay, class, gather ‘round, gather ‘round. I’m about to teach you something. You paid for spiritual lessons, right? This is an online course. Today, we’re going to learn about spiritual learning.
What is learning where spirituality is concerned?
Let’s define spiritual learning as revealing more and more of the whole of a topic in increments using the language one is comfortable with. If that’s a fair definition, then we must see that when learning stops before the whole comes clear, dysfunction starts.
People being downloaded into computer tech as code is the same notion as aliens so advanced that they have become immersed in—and indistinguishable from—the physics of our universe, which is the same notion as the idea that enlightened people transcend to a higher vibration or lighter density. These notions are speaking to the same thing, but the first is mechanical (and being worked on), the second, hypothetical (and being worked out), and the third is a belief (and being worked at).
In the way we currently live our lives, we’d say that the third, the belief, is unhealthy because it is not experienced and, at present, is untestable. It’s simply taken on faith. From the ultimate perspective, however, all three are partial takes on death, transformation, and eternity, and when we remain partial people we become stagnant, which is unhealthy. The people who believe just get there first is all.
Now let us revisit the definition above. Specifically, this part: … using the language one is comfortable with. That hasn’t always been the case in American culture, and in other cultures still is not. Rites of passage into secret brotherhoods, for instance, were marked by symbolic death pranks. The point was to overcome your fear. Zen masters may whack you with a stick so you feel the unexpected jolt that takes you out of your head. Heck, only a handful of people wanted to hear what Jesus had to say. The rest were fine with him being tortured on a cross.
These days, we want to be coddled and nurtured in a soft embrace. We want to feel safe as we attain our mastery of whatever—or at least learn about it. No one should be abused, of course, but should we feel comforted? If we’re completely at ease with what we’re hearing, and what we’re hearing is the ending of the listener, then can we really be hearing anything unadulterated by our desire to translate to our comfort?
Well…? Actually…? Truth be told…?
It does not matter either way. The accent is on the wrong syllable, as it were, for if what we hear is uncomfortable, is challenging to the very core of us, then it might just be Truth. The moment we learn anything from Truth we are no longer hearing Truth. We are hearing ourselves regurgitate the knowledge we’ve gained.
Truth alone holds everything worth saying. But Truth does not want students, masters, or any form of regurgitation. In fact, Truth does not want, period. Wanting is what we do as spiritual students and masters and clowns. We want to gain, accumulate, and identify with knowledge. Truth is not knowledge, although it becomes that when it dies. Truth becomes us when it dies. And when we die to Truth we are no longer the accumulation of spiritual knowledge.
In Truth, there is no such thing as spiritual learning. If that’s uncomfortable to hear, don’t run from the discomfort. If it’s comfortable, it’s your voice you’re listening to. That’s only a lesson if you’re into the history of how unawake you are right now.
But seriously: Who wants to take that class?