Breaking free

A glimpse is enough to initiate the Awakening process which is irreversible.
(Eckhart Tolle)

Breaking free of what exactly? Of the ego? The ego is us, how can we break free from ourselves?  Well, as it turns out, there are different degrees of freedom. We say someone is full of ego if everything is about him is oozing, ‘me, myself and I’. An ego is someone who simply cannot see beyond himself. Then comes the stage when someone becomes aware of his own agenda, and how it lines up or clashes with those of others. He can feel others, just as he becomes aware of his own feelings and thoughts. We may call this person, mature, humanistic, ethical, or spiritual, but just being considerate of others is not yet the stage of ‘breaking free’. Awakening takes place when we perceive first glimpses of Oneness. We become aware that our thoughts and feelings are just phenomena that are separate from the being experiencing it. We manage to step out of ourselves and can occasionally merge with the feelings, thoughts and experiences of others. This is the realm of mystical experiences that are hard to describe but for everyone who has experienced them, they quickly become a second nature. The last stage of freedom is when the entire ‘I-structure’ starts slipping away. Oneness becomes available almost at command. This is typically the stage when we call someone enlightened.

I send out a survey to some thirty long-standing spiritual friends and one respondent put Awakening in the following way: “There was not one singular Awakening experience for me. I was born Awake to more than my ‘singular’ self and perpetually throughout my life have experienced mediumship, multi-dimensionality, lucid dreaming, visions, clairvoyance and clairaudience.” That’s a classic case of ‘breaking free’, but there are countless others. In the survey we had many separate unitive experiences from experiencing synchronicity and angels, to practicing countless talents like the before mentioned example. This group is also full of empaths who can literally feel the energy of the environment and the people they are operating in. A common perception in this group is that they are being transformed by a higher Power. All it often takes is one unitive experience and a journey starts with a destination only God knows about. I also experienced what Eckhart Tolle concludes, once the genie is out of the bottle, you can’t put her back. A lifelong mission Home starts that can be delayed but never be reversed again.