This is a great opportunity, Cindy. You are so lucky. You will be radiantly happy if you can absorb this analysis of the adaptive child that became your persona. If you can see it and say yes!, it will fall away like the booster rocket when it separates from the rocket itself and be supplanted by the true unborn non-adaptive ever-free you. It will convert your dualistic devotion to non-dual devotion.
You were born with the rare amazing gift of healing by God’s grace. When you discovered it you knew what very few humans know and you possessed a power that very few possess. You also somehow knew that it belonged to God and you became a devotee. It’s natural, of course, because God is the primary relationship of every human being, whether they know it or not. Luckily you know it. This devotion, which is actually God loving God through the Cindy instrument, doesn’t belong to you but thinking that it does, you honed and sharpened that power. Little by little, you adapted to the presence of God within you and maybe even realized that it was non-different from the Cindy instrument itself, which is the beginning of the downside of the healing power. Everything here has it’s zero-sum downside.
Remember, all this was going on in the Unconscious when you were young and extroverted, just out of sight of the innocent adaptive thinking/feeling entity. The mind is so extroverted and the psyche changes incrementally in such subtle ways that the childlike entity doesn’t pick up on it. Even if it senses it, it isn’t equipped with the objectivity required to deal with it.
At the same time, the whole point of our life on earth is to set ourselves free of the adaptive self with the knowledge “I am the non-adaptive ordinary unborn self shining as ever-full consciousness.” The adaptive child doesn’t know this fact because it includes its body/mind with its idea of itself instead of subtracting it, which is called discrimination. So the mind remains confused until discrimination happens, or not. This human child is not sure if it is an emotional entity, which is to say a material entity with spiritual inclinations or if it is a spiritual entity with material tendencies. It is living in a cloud of unknowning. We call it avidya, ignorance. The popular term is denial. It can continue for a full lifetime; the world is overstocked with white haired children, a consequence of affluenza.
Anyway, people need relief from worry. They need to be “healed.” And somehow, with the technique you developed, they are healed. But not for good because it comes from the outside…from the healer and the technique…not from within themselves based on understanding. The healing itself is only a coping mechanism. They tend to view the healer…or the cult leader, for instance…as the source of their relief, become attached and devoted to their great leader, not devotion for God. See the duality at play. And in so doing they reinforce their stance as an adaptive child and usually sell it to the world as a victim. Poor me, my momma this, my daddy that….etc. ad nauseum.
And from the healer’s side, he or she realizes his or her power and unconsciously (or maybe consciously) assumes a controlling role in the relationship. Mamma knows best. See the arrogance. Both don’t realize that the healed and the healer are only instruments of God’s will. As Krishna says in the Gita, “in whatever way you worship me, in that way I appear (as a healing experience, for instance) to make your faith strong. He doesn’t mean faith in the healing or the healer but trust in God, the force that gives birth to our bodies and delivers the results of our actions. The problem is transparency. The healer isn’t absolutely sure that the healing is all God. “God is my co-pilot” used to be a popular meme in the so-called spiritual world back in the day. Talk about arrogance. At least “I’m God’s co-pilot,” sounds a little better because it maintains the fiction that the healer is humble. If the realization that God doesn’t need a co-pilot happens, the adaptive child fades away and is replaced with a mature non-adaptive self-actualized adult. Wherever that person goes people are healed silently…the bus driver, the cashier, the shopkeeper…because God is fully in charge and the devotional power wakes up the devotional power in every living entity who fortunately happens to encounter the presence of that person.
It so happens that what doesn’t happen in a relationship is as important as what does. What didn’t happen with our relationship didn’t happen because your personal devotion for me, which is excessive, is dualistic. If it was non-dual, you wouldn’t make such a gushing ostentatious display of your devotion. We would both just know there is no difference between us, so there would be no visible signs of love apart from the normal courtesies cultured people express. Freedom is non-dual devotion. It is freedom from the devotee. When you calm down a bit you need to listen to my talks on The Yoga of Love and read the book. This whole business is laid out clearly there. If you did read it, you missed the message.
If your devotion morphs into true God devotion…as is starting to happen now because of this incident with Jack…you would will have a handle on the Duryodhana Factor. It will expose your dark side, which everyone but you can see. Chapter 11 in the Gita is about Arjuna’s failure to develop non-dual devotion when Krishna showed him that God is both good and evil. To accept it would have meant for him to acknowledge his own dark side, which was covered up with a lot of fancy devotion for his gurus, friends and relatives on Duryodhana’s side. He ridicules Arjuna for his “flowery” devotional speech in Chapter 2. All Arjuna wants is for his old friend to reappear and buttress inner child.
It’s painful to confront the darkness as you are now realizing. But God won’t let you make excuses any more so It caused you to actually question your devotion for Jack and voila!…a big can of worms. “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall…” The house of cards is falling down, as well it should. Thank God. Now it is important to embrace the embarrassment and convert the emotion into self-inquiry, meaning take a stand as What you truly are not the Who that loves (objects) too much, in this case Cindy’s adaptive child. “All the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty together again.” This means that when Isvara busts you into pieces, you better stay busted. There isn’t any healing because you weren’t sick in the first place. It’s an imaginary fall and an imaginary splatter. You’re good before, during and after.
Dualistic devotion conceals the dark side. It make the person feel virtuous, which they need to signal to others to convince themselves that they are lovable. It is highly performative and should be embarrassing. I don’t think you realized how uncomfortable it made me feel when you jumped in my lap at that satsang you know where many years ago. I don’t think you realized how it appeared. People rolled their eyes. I know you didn’t because you were so wrapped up in yourself you lost sight of the context. I didn’t want to scold you and embarrass you in public…because there was real devotion behind it and I could see how much you had invested in your devotion for the guru, which is not all bad. So I played along and let you act out.
I was luckier. Swamiji waited until there were two hundred people and I was stuck in the middle of the crowd so it was impossible to escape. Then with great contempt he violently shred my spiritual ego to bits. It was terribly painful but it only lasted a minute or two until he could see that I accepted it. It’s the guru’s job to point the problem out, which I’m doing now, and the disciple’s job to work on it. Dualistic devotion got you in trouble with Jack. It allowed you to idolize him because he brought you to me, so you didn’t ask questions. Probably you thought it was disloyal, a sign of distrust. In this world you need a healthy dose of distrust if you don’t want to be taken for a ride. It gave him an opportunity to take advantage of you, which he did even though he could see how much you were suffering. Do you think he was wearing the hair shirt while you were working to pay the pay the rent and put food on the table? No need to answer that one.
If you had seen me as a regular person, which I am, you would have exposed your doubts about the relationship with him to me a long time ago. I’m a good friend. I never tell a person what to do. I make suggestions, which are always helpful. Jack is not a bad guy. Like you, he’s been using spirituality to avoid his Duryodhana Factor, his dark side. He’s selfish and manipulative but he’s letting his good opinion of himself keep him from working on his bad values. Like you, he lacks true empathy. This is a delicate and important moment spiritually, an opportunity to take the bull by the horns and say, “I’m a mess. I need work. “Physician health thyself.” Luke 4:23. Jack has kept me at arm’s length. He hasn’t exposed himself because he’s not confident that he can handle the dark stuff. He’s managed to create the kind of life that allows him not to deal with his shit. But the chickens are coming home to roost. They always do. God is relentless. If you escape Him/Her a thousand times, He/she will get you on 1001. There is ultimately no escape.
Much love,
Ram
