From one perspective there is absolutely no need to practice. From another perspective, practice is essential. Why is it that both are true, and how do we keep from not deluding ourselves as to which is helpful at any given time?
So, let’s take the first perspective, which we could call the non-dual perspective. In any given moment we may really get—or “understand,” or “know,” or “experience”—that this is it. “This is it” simply means that this moment is already as complete, full, & sacred as it will ever be, no matter the content or intensity of the experience. It could be an experiential moment of complete agony or of subtle bliss. We could be experiencing a stream of petty thoughts or a gush of brilliant insights. We could be feeling deep love or intense self-loathing. It could just be the simplicity of sitting and waiting for the bus. No matter what we’re experiencing there’s a possibility that in any moment we give up seeking for something else to be the case. When that happens we are complete and whole just as we are, in that moment. There’s nothing else we need to experience, and the idea that there’s something we need to do, or practice, to make this moment any more of what it already is, is completely absurd.
But the fact is, we don’t always get that. It may always be available as a potential understanding, or as some non-dual teachers propose may always be the case (though I don’t like to speculate on what is ALWAYS the case). But if it isn’t the case in this moment, then the other perspective, that “practice is essential” must be honored. When I say “practice” I don’t really mean a practice of changing your experience. I mean a practice of opening to whatever experience is already there and remembering that there’s nothing more we need to do![1] Interesting this form of practice usually takes effort & courage, and sometimes a great deal of each. And like any practice the more it’s done, the easier it gets. This is the relative or developmental perspective. And it’s also true.
Then there’s a meta-layer to this whole exploration, between what I’m calling the non-dual and developmental perspectives, that is really important to highlight. In some ways we could think of it as the Middle Way between (and beyond) the two. And that is that depending on which perspective we are inhabiting—whether we’re in a non-dual moment where everything is completely ok as it is OR we’re in a moment of appreciating that there’s a process of opening more deeply, fully, and consistently to the moment-as-it-is—we are honest with ourselves about which is happening and we don’t try to solidify either vantage point.
What I mean by that is that we don’t take either the non-dual perspective or the developmental perspective as being “ultimately” real. We don’t even necessarily try to rank their importance—a common ranking in spiritual lives is that the “non-dual” is MORE REAL. The problem with that is that the non-dual perspective reminds us that the idea of something being MORE REAL is itself a dualistic moment. There’s no problem with ranks, or stages, as long as we don’t confuse higher stages for more ultimate realities. What’s ultimate in one moment is shown to be relative in the next and vice versa. And so this middle way is about noticing when we solidify perspectives on experience, and investigate that tendency as well. The moment that we open to what seems like a solid perspective, the apparent solidity starts to melt away immediately. If we can see it, then we aren’t exclusively identified with it. And there’s freedom.
FOOTNOTES
1. What’s really trippy to notice is that by opening to experience it very often changes the experience, and the sense of the “experiencer.” There’s a really amazing and rich paradox here about how when we don’t need to change the content of our experience it often creates the conditions for the content to change even more freely.↑
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