There is a common belief among people on a spiritual path that our spirits are here to learn. There is no doubt that there are many layers or dimensions to existence, things only certain drugs, states of mind or awareness can even glimpse. However, at the very core of all of it is the one simple, pure unchangeable truth, and that is the oneness, God, spirit, love… the many names and attempts to nail it into a concept. This magnificent awesomeness is who we are at the very core. And it needs no lessons, it needs no upgrades, it is not here to learn… this I promise you.
We are not here to grow spiritually, our spirits already know everything. Our persona, our ego, our identity, whatever you call who you identify as – that entity learns.
I remember what it was like to hear such things and resonate with it but basically dismiss it because it had not altered me, I had not tasted it. Gnosis is the only way, and I don’t mean in a religiously Gnostic way, but in the core meaning of the word “to know”. Contrary to popular opinion there is only one way to know something and that is to experience it. Based on that, there are very few things we can say we actually KNOW. And even then, when examined many of those things turn out to be based on little more than air.
For instance, I used to know that objects, including me, are solid. They are not. All matter consists of particles and waves, not a lick of anything solid in anything anywhere. So much for knowing that.
That spirit is here to learn lessons seems a childish and convenient way of seeing things. Similar things are God personified with qualities like anger and judgment, and enlightenment seen as a floating state of an almost inhuman quality with the answers to all the universal questions and imbued with an unapproachable presence and softly spoken voice and no sadness or joy (that all sounds more like a high dose of Zoloft to me).
The possibility that we are here simply because we like it here seems impossible to the minds of the many. We come up with all kinds of reasons, and every religion has its reasons why we are here and this includes the spiritual movement.
Certain doctors, especially cardiac doctors, have reported on the near death experience phenomenon. That is a whole subject on its own but for the purposes of this post I can share that when people come back from death they say the same thing when asked why they turned away from the beauty, bliss and love they saw on the other side: Because this is life! Life, this body, is an extraordinary experience! Life allows me to touch, to love, to cry, to scream, to taste…
Or to quote The Matrix:
You know, I know this steak doesn’t exist. I know that when I put it in my mouth, the Matrix is telling my brain that it is juicy, and delicious. After nine years, you know what I realise? Ignorance is bliss.
~Cypher.
