Jīvanmukti - Freedom While Alive
Like the simplicity of a child, true realization becomes your default state, not just an occasional experience. Jīvanmukti means freeing yourself of your separate identity; it is the unwavering experience of oneness with the Divine. There is no separation between you and That. Freedom happens without the dissolution of the body. You still function, but as God’s pure joy embodied as you.
Freedom in this lifetime — having the unwavering experience of oneness with the Divine —requires that we contact the joy within us and establish ourselves in that unconditional resonance. If you wish to live in that state of embodied joy, you must ask yourself this fundamental question: What am I looking for?
If we want to find freedom and joy, we must start by looking for it. Joy is not created by form, by anything we do, or by what is happening in our life. Although joy is not something that we can see in form or gain by possessing something, every form is the expression of the unconditional joy of being, which is God’s experience. We, too, are an expression of that same joy, so the experience of it is always available to us, just hidden from sight.
Generally, we are not looking for joy, so we don’t find it. Instead, we are perpetually looking for an escape from what confronts us every day — from our own limited state, and the resulting suffering, pain, and trauma we feel. We’re focused on trying to get out of that, rather than simply tuning in to the ānanda, joy, that is ever-present within us. Our sādhana, in its deepest, most powerful, simplest expression, should not be the attempt to free ourselves from suffering, but must be the diligent reaching inside to find that unwavering place of freedom called jīvanmukti.
As soon as we come to that subtle distinction the efficacy of our sādhana accelerates. Through the different aspects of our practices we peel away our misunderstandings, and we do that from our self-reflective capacity, which is Consciousness doubling back on itself (vimarśa). This is the dynamic interchange of the deepest core of Consciousness in us bouncing off its own limited form (which is us!), and off our limited understanding. This inherent capacity of Consciousness to know Itself, as us, is what propels the different stages of sādhana, so that unity can be revealed.
Who is Doing the Seeking?
What appears to be a dualistic dynamic taking place — we’re doing our sādhana — is, in fact, God doing as us, in order to reveal Himself in us, as us. There is a junction point in which there is no felt distinction between us reaching to discover the highest place within, and that highest place us absorbing us (Its own limited form) back into Itself. This is samāveśa, which is translated as both “penetration into,” and “absorption by.” We penetrate through the misunderstanding of duality, and through our tensions, patterns, drama, and all the limited desire that drives us crazy. This allows the magnet of Consciousness in us to absorb us back into Itself.
The experience of duality is not fiction, but we must penetrate through the appearance of duality in order to have the experience of unity. I often discuss the upāyas, the means of practice. Most people start their sādhana in āṇavopāya, the path of individual effort, then progress to śāktopāya, which focuses on experiencing life as energy. Both these upāyas are essentially dualistic, in the sense that we have not yet realized that we are being absorbed by God. That experience is what frees us from the idea that we are doing something, because the reality is that God is doing, as us, walking back home to Himself. Even the amount and type of sādhana we need to do is determined by God in the first place. Rarely do individuals receive the intensity of divine grace in which the “lights just go on.” Most of us have some work to do to live in freedom.
What Are You Looking For?
In our sādhana, the key is understanding that we discover what we are looking for. Think about this and observe what you focus on as you move through your day. Are you looking for a way out of your pain and suffering, or are you looking to discover the joy that always exists within? The diligence of that looking is what determines your realization. If you’re looking for the cause of your pain or tension, you will find every source that unease. But if you’re looking for the simple joy of life, that’s what you will find, no matter what is happening in your life.
My guru Rudi often talked about the conditions of life as “tests.” He taught that everything we face is the opportunity for us to use that situation to discover a deeper place in ourselves, rather than being caught in the circumstance, or in the tension. The conditions in our lives only determine our experience if we allow them to limit us — so our freedom is gained by using our self-reflective capacity to choose, in every moment, to look for joy.
I deeply encourage you to look for that joy in your life every day. Otherwise, your mind will find ten million reasons to convince you that there is something that is preventing your experience of joy. This is what the mind does, because that level of consciousness reflects a place in us that only seeks to perpetuate its own misunderstanding. Any authentic spiritual practice will automatically shine a light on your misunderstandings, so don’t get caught in the emotional or mental fluctuations that arise when doing sādhana. All that upheaval is just our consciousness, shooting up warning flares, so we can see what these tensions are, and can decide to look deeper than that.
Everything we encounter is trying to reveal the purity and sanctity of life. Yes, we will go through difficult times and we will feel some inner resistance. As Rudi said, “If you’re not meeting your resistance, you’re not growing.” But don’t get caught up in your resistance or in your own tension. When you recognize that sādhana frees you from this limited aspect of yourself, even your tensions and misunderstandings are a revelation. They are showing you, “Look where you’re investing your life force.”
Invest your life in freedom, in discovering that unconditional joy in yourself, and don’t stop until you live in the state of jīvanmukti. Bring to your own life the innocence and wonder that a child brings to every minute of their experience. As we get older, that exuberance is diminished because we become focused on trying to reshape our life instead of finding the joy that’s already present in each moment. Nondual Tantric practices remind us that we have been given this life in order to know ourselves and experience the joy of freedom.