Awakening Does Not Discard Self-Concept
Over the past year I have listened to many spiritual teachers describe what awakening is. While their general descriptions have often resonated with me, there are some elements that have not sat right with me. One of them is their dismissal of concepts (or more broadly, representations).
Awakening is beyond concepts in the sense that it is not just a conceptual understanding. However, it would be a mistake to say that it has nothing to do with concepts. “Transcend” or “beyond” does not necessarily mean “discard.” It seems a common error in spirituality to throw the baby (concepts) out with the bathwater (mistaken concepts).
Spiritual teachers often talk about “direct (awakened) perception” to mean perception free of concepts. However, is awakened perception really free of concepts? The recursive process of direct perception and conceptual understanding (Mounoud, 1995) has been happening before awakening, and it is implausible that awakening magically transcends this process. Instead, it would be a new recursive cycle: a new way of seeing the world, or more broadly, a new way of being.
Conceptual understanding penetrates direct perception whether or not you are aware of it. For instance, when you learn music theory and apply it to playing an instrument, you stop thinking about the theory while playing after some time. The theory has not disappeared, though it has disappeared from your consciousness. It has been integrated into your motivational-motor-sensory act of playing.
The dismissal of concepts often manifests itself as what Wilber (1982) calls the pre/trans fallacy. (I will talk about this fallacy in more detail in another post.) Many spiritual teachers speak of awakening as if it were a return to a preconceptual mode of being. Infants and awakened people are similar in that neither of them is under the illusion of the ego. However, they are free of the ego illusion for very different reasons. Infants, lacking conceptual ability, have not formed the ego. Awakened people, on the other hand, have formed the ego but seen through it, which requires (advanced) conceptual ability. Thus, it is a mischaracterization to suggest that awakening is a return to a preconceptual mode of being.
The Expansion of Self-Concept and the End of Egoic Overthinking
The core of awakening is the expansion of identity, which happens not through the abandonment of self-concept but through the refinement and expansion of it. There is a commonly held notion in spirituality that identification (i.e., self-representation) is a problem. However, the problem is not identification but exclusive identification (i.e., the finite self). It is through the identification of the infinite Self that your identity expands to embrace all as your Self and your motivation becomes harmonious (see Bergman, 2002, for a related discussion on the relations between understanding, identity, and motivation). Just as when you identify yourself as the ego, you feel and act as the ego, when you identify yourself as the Self, you feel and act as the Self.
The expansion of identity does not end thinking but ends egoic overthinking. When you believe you are the finite self (which includes the ego), you engage in constant scheming to protect and aggrandize it. But when you realize you are the Self, the need for constant scheming evaporates. Thoughts still happen, but without compulsion and urgency. Above all, the content of your thoughts becomes gentle and peaceful.
References
Bergman, R. (2002). Why be moral? A conceptual model from developmental psychology. Human Development, 45(2), 104–124. https://doi.org/10.1159/000048157
Mounoud, P. (1995). From direct to reflexive (self-) knowledge: A recursive model. In P. Rochat (Ed.), The self in infancy: Theory and research (pp. 141–160). Elsevier Science.
Wilber, K. (1982). The pre/trans fallacy. Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 22(2), 5–43. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022167882222002
I don’t know what it’s like to be awakened, since I’m not. It feels a bit premature for me to start discussing the nature of that. I can refer to Martinus, though, and he does talk about an experience of being without concepts. That’s supposedly a kind of direct perception of the ‘I’ or the ‘divine something’. There are no concepts or ideas in that — only light. And from what I understand, there’s no distinction between ‘I’ and ‘you’.
If that’s what awakening is, then it does sound like an experience of being without concepts.
The Pace, Energy and Beauty in Expressing This Truth blew me away, Thank You 🤍
The Subtlety of what You Write about is Felt Deeply in the Heart..🙏
There is nothing inherently wrong with any concept..We can use them..just like we Are Right Now. We Are Always Beyond 🤍
Love Your Work.
Love You
🤍🙏🕉