As ever we have what we need at our fingertips. The growth of delusion and human frailty, alongside the possession of egotistical attributes mirrored back to us in the distorted looking-glass of the twentieth century have given us an awareness of self-or perhaps, better out, an overriding self-consciousness. This self has grown so absurdly large that only one possibility remains. Like a balloon overfilled with hot air, the ego must pop.

By ego I mean the delusion of self-identification, separation, and division. This fundamental delusion of humanity, which seems almost innate, underpins the acting out of hatred and violence from crossing interpersonal boundaries to gross atrocities, disrespect for the Earth, and human toxicity and dis-ease of all kinds.

Knowing the other as ourself, the earth and ourselves as not separate, the outward differences of race, nationality, and religion as embraceable rather than divisive, constitutes a spiritual revolution, a tsunami in awareness, a quantum leap in consciousness. Such a deepening in the fundamental understanding of humankind is the only way in which the modern world will rescue itself from the threatening, contemporary malaise of ignorance, complacency, intolerance, and darkness.

This makes a clear, serious, accurate map for human awakening a mandatory requirement for the salvation of humanity.

There is only one salvation. It is not through religion. It is not through opinionatedness. It is not through disagreement, nor self-direction, or ego-struggle, or seeking of any kind. Salvation lies in the sincere esoteric Truth of Reality, of understanding and immersing ourselves in Truth in devotion, surrender, and love.

Here we enter the clashing rocks of contradiction and paradox. For if to compose a map for the spiritual aspirant is mandatory, then so too is the organization of Truth-and, as any self-respecting mystic knows, the organization of Truth is anathema to Truth. Truth is vibrant, chaotic, unfixable, and disorganized. Religion and dogma are tidy, inflexible, fixed, and reliable.

So we have to teach Truth lightly, never try to close up the holes too much while always being thorough, leaving a little roughness, untidiness, some little imperfection as a concourse for illumination, never quite singing completely perfectly. The teaching of Truth is characterized by contradiction, spontaneity, the spiritual over the literal. I have added my own spice to this mix and it is that spiritual truths are in their own way exacting, not raggedy and open to dispute or to being molded to fit an egotistic appetite or tendency. I have reached the point where Truth is apparent to me, where those who speak Truth are appealing to me, while those who don’t are not. I am no longer, hardly ever, attracted to spiritual teachings. In the end Truth all sounds the same, so whether you hear it through Anandamayi Ma, Ramakrishna, or the yawn of my dog, Truth it is and Truth it remains.

In the realm of the opposites we are strangers to each other, varieties of humanity struggling to make it through our changing circumstances. In eternity, however, we have never not known each other. In spiritual understanding, we are intimately acquainted, empathetically and compassionately joined.

Only true awakening in the heart of collective humanity will result in the Eternal Truth being lived and in our future benefiting from this inherent peace, understanding, mutual tolerance, and celebration of each other in our diversity, in our variety, through the manifest multiple tastes of the Eternal Divine Person.

To be arrogant enough to create a written, spoken, or otherwise given transmission of spiritual teaching that will in any way cover the scope and range of the reality of Truth is arrogance indeed! As teachers we must be humble. We will never cover the ground, explore the range, or even in a broad sweep touch the edges of Truth. Over and above this, we may never have any particular or far-reaching influence whatsoever. We may simply survive in obscurity, inhabiting dark corners of human history, still murmuring about the Eternal with small voices that people are unable or unwilling to hear.

So why do it at all?

We don’t know. The teaching function is not given to all, even to those who have awakened in whatever way. All I know is that you enter the stream of Truth at whatever point you are bidden, in whatever way you are told, however Truth finds you. There is no response to, “This is not a good time, or “Why?” or “Could it be a bit later?” or “I have my child’s birthday coming up, how about Saturday?” or “Just one more relationship or year of making money,” or “Could we wait until I have fulfilled my desires?” Spiritual destiny demands your attraction, your complete distraction, and your constant remembering of the True Self. Spiritual capacity demands your full blossoming, your turning your face incontrovertibly toward the sun of illumination, your offering the fruits of your sadhana to all. Spiritual potential demands your journeying, your struggling and testing in the ordeal, facing the tests, the trials, and the suffering of purification in the flame of Truth, in the cloud of unknowing, in the waters of spiritual baptism.

Whatever you are and whatever I am does not matter in the end; we are all the same and the relationship between what we are and what we will become is unimportant in the great thrum of Eternal Nature.