Who Are You? The Spiritual Question of Identity

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"Identity" is what spirituality, in its depths, is all about. Often in teaching it is said, "'Who do you think you are?' is the most important question that you will ever answer."

Most are content with the "Sam Jones," or, "Mary Smith" on their birthcertificate or driver's license, but the enlightened seek, and find, much more. The first thing that we discover is that we are not bodies, but minds. Bodies have membranes (skin) that divide us from other bodies. But Mind has no such barriers.

Shortly after you realize that you are a mind, then, it is possible to feel, to know, that your mind is part of a much greater Mind. You know, with every fiber of your being, that you are part of a vast, illimitable, immeasurable Mind just as surely as a drop of water is part of the ocean.

This "oceanic" or "galactic" Mind is God, or Lovemind. This special knowing or awareness is called "gnosis."

This is the single fact that distinguishes an enlightened person from others. Her identity, her "secret" identity, is Mind, and Mind is infinite. It is God.

It is this immediate relationship with infinite interior Mind that allows her to say, "I am God." But this is not ego speaking, but the radiant and glowing Lovemind speaking through her. She is not at all claiming that her person has become God in totality, but, instead, because she is Mind, she is God in nature. For mind is the same nature as Mind.

So, you can still have the human identity. You can be the best husband, father, and friend in the cosmos, for now, you have recognized that you are a manifestation or "shining forth" of Love Itself. This tends at once to recreate you within as the very best human being, and to erase ego. So, the mystic's claim of "being God," or "Being one with God" is absolutely free of arrogance.

After her illumination-experience, the enlightened mystic truly feels that, "I am Mary Smith," is a lie; for that is nowhere near all that she is, has discovered her Self to be. This is why, in fact, mystics so often change their names. Most do not realize that even Jesus had a name-change, for when he was born, he was given the name, "Immanuel," and only later changed it to Yehoshua, or Jesus.

The practical effect is that the enlightened give up their old identities. These tend gradually to die away, and the new self forms within the Mind. This is the meaning of "being born again."

After rebirth, she is no longer exclusively the daughter of human parents, but is the daughter of God (Love). So, the enlightened is only "part human," for she is also "part Spirit." Her goal is gently, incrementally, to erase the human part (the "lower nature" is what mystics call it), and to become the very "incarnation" of Love or God.

Anyway, just a quick review of the reason that you and I were born, or created!:)
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