Based on my observation there is a cistern of confusion that bedevils nearly every discussion concerning the unitive realization: mis-identifying the relative as the absolute.
Relative, of course, means that which depends upon another for its identity or pertinence. Martha is your aunt because she is your mother’s sister, and you are related to her because you are her nephew. The condition we call warm depends upon not being hot nor cold. You are you because, by definition, you are not I. The degree of light visible is relative to the degree of dark that might otherwise be visible.
To view a particular thing in relationship to some other things—the price of steak today is high, compared to the price of hog maws—is our “normal,” or at least typical, way in which we view everything. This is a mode of perception we have traditionally so taken for granted that it does not usually even occur to us to question it. But is relative perception the only perception available to us? Is there a perception available that does not depend upon a relative perspective? This might lead to another question: Is there anything that is not relative—that does not depend upon anything else for its identity or pertinence?
Apparently, we humans suspect that there is at least one thing that is not relative, because we universally have a word for it, which in English would be “absolute.” The very meaning of the word absolute is “not relative; not dependent upon anything else.”
The importance of this statement somehow seems to slip past our attention. The absolute is not the opposite of the relative. If the absolute were the opposite of anything, it would have to stand in a relationship to that thing. The absolute is not relative to anything, not dependent upon any thing for its identity or pertinence. If this were not so, it would—by definition—not be absolute, it would be relative.
To put it another way, the absolute is “beyond”—not confined to—any thing that is relative. (And since it is, by definition, non-relativity itself, all that is not “it” is, by definition, relative.)
And so, if it were possible to perceive in a non-relative way—to return to our previous question—we could (for lack of alternatives) say that it would be to perceive in an absolute way.
However, we are trained and habitually accustomed to perceive in a relative way. The very activity of thought is to interpret that which the senses apprehend by dividing the sense impressions into relative elements (the better to leverage one against the other). A non-relative viewing is entirely foreign to our customary thought process: in fact, to the relative thought of our personal individuality, it is fatal. Therefore, the thought-processing mechanism (which we collectively call the mind) guards assiduously against such an “unnatural” perception.
You will recall that earlier in this discussion it was asserted that at one point in the unitive revelation “only an intuitive connection can be made.” This intuitive connection, revealing the full dynamic of the absolute, is recognized by the reflective ego as the death knell for the presumption of individual personhood.
And the thought process is not entirely in error in arriving at such a conclusion. True unitive awareness—profound understanding of relationship regarding the absolute—cannot help but impact upon every idea of individuality or separability.
For that which is not confined to the relative (and all that is not absolute is, by definition, relative) is not confined to relative limitation. Put another way, an explanatory meaning that humans have given to the word absolute is “without limitation,” or “infinite,” in reference to space or time: not finite, not an entity, therefore not in relationship to things. Specifically, the dictionary renders “absolute” thus: “without limit or boundary, beyond measure or comprehension, without beginning or end.” In short, beyond—or transcending—anything that could be considered relative. Not surprisingly, the Infinite is another name for God. Organized religions hasten to tell us that we are not that. So does our mind. Both have a vested interest in that conclusion.
We all have a choice at any given moment. We can continue to perceive our self—and each and every thing that is “outside” of, or “around,” our self—as a separate entity, standing in relation to all those things we define as not our self.
Or, we can recognize that our relative perspective obfuscates the possibility of a perspective that is “without limit or boundary,” the perspective or perception of absolute inseparability. We are free, in other words, to remove the self-imposed limitation or boundary between our “self” and the “infinite,” at any and every moment.
In fact, the removal of this boundary is what has traditionally come to be known as enlightenment. And the effortless removal of this boundary is effected in the sudden, certain realization that such a boundary has never actually existed.
You (and only you) can see for yourself that this is so. To do so, you need to be willing to—at least temporarily, while exploring the dynamic—suspend your relative habit of thinking. At some point, you need to discern where linear thinking has reached its limit, and free the psyche to move from what it knows to what it does not know.
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