Amusing recollection. Back in the 90s in Botswana bill did an M Ed. Because of the investigative nature of the MEd, it developed into his mid-life review that restarted his path, rekindling the erratic bells and banjos meditation of upheaval, and uniting again with the reconnection to the Dhamma of the Muse of Wai Zandtao’s writing. Studying the MEd then led to gatekeeper incidents when he tried to develop a PhD at his MEd uni– gatekeepers allowed for MEds but built a PhD threshold. His MEd tutor thought bill’s interest in a PhD was just words; when he turned up at the uni he was an embarrassment as the guy hadn’t seen his seriousness. But he was eventually fobbed off on “some guy” who described his work as Hindu-Buddhist inclusivism; that dismissal severed any academic connection.
The advantage of his MEd was that it valued his teaching experience building on that experience through academic research to develop an academic contribution. Even though his Buddhist involvement was minimal at the time, bill was looking at mind for his PhD (minds are a significant part of what teachers work with in education) – he had to write a PhD synopsis about this mind and he recalls one person’s fascinated reaction at the scope. But the gatekeeper said he needed to do an undergrad course to learn the different theories of mind; that might have been a good thing to do just after upheaval but in bill's late 40s it was just completely upside-down. However it showed him what academia thought the study of mind was – a collection of theories of mind put forward by various people who had gained some sort of position.
Zandtao now sees academia as an integral part of his path if he had it to do again. As a meditation adviser zandtaomed's experience was limited only to his path - quite naturally, to be a better adviser he would need wider training so academic training in clinical and transpersonal psychology leading to clinical practice would now be a part of his work as kalyana mitta - spiritual adviser. Not in zandtao's lifetime  . Given the traumatic nature of patriarchy it is not sufficient for a meditation adviser to only have the awareness that is their path. Perhaps ina tradition there is greater experience passed on but not in zandtao's individual path?
Out of a seeker's meditation has to arise traumatic history - even if that trauma is gained in the most benign of families; without training in clinical practice a meditation adviser might worsen that trauma - training in clinical practice of course might not help. It is necessary to understand that well-being could be considered the first part of the path - the second being more spiritual, well-being must include some trauma work as must spiritual advice. Whilst it is possible that a new seeker seeks spiritual advice after they have processed their trauma gaining well-being, it is more than likely that a new seeker is somewhere along the spectrum that includes well-being and spirituality, and therefore spiritual advice would need to include advice on trauma and well-being. The downside of this new requirement (for zandtao as kalyana mitta) is that so little of psychology perceives the need to move towards the spiritual path - it appears to be mostly concerned with well-being; perhaps transpersonal psychology will recognise the full spectrum of personal development so including spiritual development.
Interestingly this reflection on mind has effectively turned out to be the study of mind that bill was proposing as his PhD (it fits in with some of what he recalls of his PhD synopsis) - without the requirement of endless references of the conditioned establishment. Zandtao now sees that there cannot be an academic way for people to see mind because of the conditioned world of academia. Mind can only truly be seen from beyond where the seeker is free from restrictions – in atammayata free from conditioning. Once we are beyond – free from conditioning, then we have reconnected with Source and gained autonomy. From that autonomy the seeker can see that the raft that was their practice (including mental practice) has led to this autonomy, and having reached that autonomy the raft can be let go, leaving the seeker free from restrictions. In spiritual liberation autonomy sees the raft, and is therefore free to see mind and its functioning.
To begin with autonomy has its reconnection with Source; given that zandtao’s practice (ZPAP) is based in Buddhism his reconnection with Dhamma gave rise to gifts which Buddhism describes as the 5 Dhamma comrades and tathata – his autonomy uses these gifts as he follows the path. At this point it is necessary to say that zandtao’s autonomy uses 5 Dhamma comrades and tathata because they are what arise from the practice that brought zandtao to autonomy - as far as he understands it another seeker's autonomy would use different “Source gifts” if their practice was different. His autonomy can only speak in terms of his practice because that is what he has experienced, but there are no reasons for different autonomies to speak using different descriptions of what arises with different practices. Whilst in this reflection mind will be discussed with a distinctive Buddhist flavour, the way mind is described need not use the terms and descriptions of Buddhism exclusively; the functioning of mind can be described by autonomies using different terms but the functioning will remain the same. Because of their restrictions to terminology academia and conditioned minds will see what zandtao’s autonomy uses and describes as one theory of mind and its functioning; likewise they would describe a different seeker's gifts as a different theory and functioning. But paths with autonomy will see this functioning in the same light. This very much fits in with that tutor's Hindu-Buddhist inclusivism; for the tutor (presumably) there are multiple theories of mind and its functioning, for autonomy there are multiple descriptions of the same functioning. Without the detachment of autonomy, how can this be seen? From the detachment of academia?
So autonomy reconnects with Source, Source then functions through the seeker as autonomy, and this autonomy sees the functioning of mind. From birth an individual is conditioned. This means that mind attaches to agreements that upbringing in society requires of it. Mind is constantly active suring up those agreements contributing to a person’s egos and personality. Through our conditioning we have the self of personality and egos, and what we have is ongoing mental attention that builds and reinforces these egos; this requires constant activity of mind based solely in doing the work of conditioning - instead of using mind for following the path.
This constant activity of mind at some point has a conscious choice to make, as individuals we choose to build and reinforce the egos of our upbringing or we choose the path. From birth we are conditioned to make agreements, but at some point in our adult life we have some sort of consciousness concerning choice – Eckhart calls this firstgrace. There is this natural way of growing, an egoic instinctive upbringing leading to a self that survives - nature's survival in society through some level of self-esteem, until we reach a time when we choose concerning conditioning (that includes reinforcement of conditioning by patriarchy). If that choice is not to accept the continuation of conditioning then we can release attachments to ego and autonomy can arise from the path. To reiterate:- to begin with there is this natural conditioning of upbringing leading to some level of self-esteem – as well as the patriarchy reinforcing that conditioning where it most suits it. As mature adults nature gives us all paths to follow that can produce global harmony, and at some stage we choose to follow them or not. If we choose to follow our paths, we choose whether to accept the egos of our conditioning. If we make the natural choice to follow our paths, then the conditioning gradually breaks down and we develop the autonomy that at its root says Source decides; we do have to be careful of attaching to new egos.
For zandtao these decisions by Source arise from his practice, so in the terms of his practice there follows a description in more detail of how the conditioned egos are broken down, how we follow our autonomous paths to enable Source to decide and to enable Source to evolve through our autonomy. Because the following is a description using zandtao’s practice this is essentially how zandtao built his autonomy. The details of his practice are only his way, and will be different for each autonomous path, but essentially what happens is the same – we choose to reconnect with Source giving us our autonomy and leave behind the conditioning that started with our upbringing - that has been reinforced within our society as patriarchal conditioning.
How do we build egos? Through the attention/concentration of our minds. In early upbringing we love our parents and what they want we give attention to so we build our personalities and egos around a combination of our parents’ personalities and egos. As we grow older our sphere of influence and conditioning widens into education and other socio-political spheres thus broadening our personalities and egos. Individuals as conditioned egos start into adult life and throughout adult life there is a constant direction to reconnect with Source, thus bringing enquiry and choice to the process of conditioning egos. For zandtao there was much luck because his conditioning of self was not strong; at upheaval when 23 he rejected the conformist middle-class lifestyle, he began questioning his conditioning beginning the process of breaking down the egos that gave him his personality and self.
In this last paragraph zandtao has omitted trauma presenting a benign representation of upbringing. In reality accepting the combination of personalities and egos of parents can be traumatic. It has to be recognised that parents are going to be conditioned by patriarchy, so in accepting their personalities and egos we are accepting conditioning that includes patriarchy. In other words our upbringing requires of us to reject the path of nature and compassion at some level, because the conditioning includes patriarchy. For different seekers this path rejection has to register as some level of trauma. In the above paragraph zandtao describes how bill's conditioning was not strong, this essentially means that he did not accept all that his parents said. Bill recalls a level of numbness associated with his upbringing, this is a form of trauma. Because he remained lucky in not accepting conditioning towards self-esteem he also suffered the various levels of trauma associated with not accepting such conditioning, the levels of trauma that arise from not having such self-esteem. Whilst zandtao considers that bill was relatively lucky in these levels of trauma, his upbringing was not benign, and overall he was far from trauma-free as evidenced by 13 years of alcoholism in young adulthood. It is worth noting that zandtao considers his upbringing lucky yet the upbringing led to 13 years of alcoholism. This is important to note when we consider why so many people do not follow the path choosing to seek success in society.
His practice gives more details in the way this happens giving a breakdown into the aspects of mind that are used and where and how egos are created. To begin looking at such details we start with the 5 khandhas (aggregates that make up our personalities); these are kaya – body, vedana – feelings and emotions, sanna – memories and perceptions, sankhara – mental operations, and vinnana the mental attention or concentration that is attached to each of the khandhas. Often these 5 khandhas are reduced to three aspects – body, emotions and mind, but for zandtao it helped to see mind as including sanna, sankhara and vinnana - helping zandtao see how and where the mind built the egos.
Using this terminology an event happens, and mindfulness processes that event. Through mindfulness paying attention vinnana attaches to that event but after processing the event vinnana is let go allowing the event to “fall away”. In this way an event happens, is processed and let go without there being attachment that forms an ego; in this way new events happen without attachment – no new ego, no new conditioning. For zandtao mindfulness, one of the 5 Dhamma comrades, uses concentration as attention, another of the 5 Dhamma comrades, so that no new egos and no new conditioning arise.
This is a small but essential piece of the practice – to help prevent new conditioning, but we need to fit that in the context of daily life. From birth bill was conditioned as is usual in any upbringing so by the time he was an adult his self, personality and egos had been formed through the khandhas. Instead of letting go of new events, to some extent bill took on the events as egos that his parents wanted – and then society wanted. Some agreements formed within the family were helpful but most were just accepting his parents’ values – their conditioning; some agreements formed in school were beneficial - eg learning such as reading that is not associated with social values, but other agreements were more concerned with accepting and becoming part of the patriarchy. In some ways bill’s choice in these matters were limited but what became clear at the time of upheaval was how little bill had invested in these choices. His egos that were part of the repressed middle-class conformist ego were very weak so as an adult at the beginning of his upheaval his path began reconnecting to the Dhamma rejecting much that was part of his conditioning. So in many ways he was lucky – although it didn’t seem so at the time. He had grown up in a secluded middle-class existence, obtained various qualifications that acted as passports to survive in daily life, and yet the conditioning that most people grew up and accepted without question he had rejected. He was open to new experience without having many of the egos forming a self and personality that were received (self-esteem), these egos were made by decisions that were not fully his own, and after upheaval he was open to make many decisions free from conditioning.
Whilst at the time bill developed an awareness that rejected conditioning, he had not learnt his practice. This meant that he was only partially following his path, had some autonomy but for a long while he also accepted new conditioning. In retrospective reflection zandtao sees this period of his life as a second childhood in which he gained experience but was developing new egos. For nearly half of this 2nd childhood bill was an alcoholic; so whilst he had awareness that rejected some conditioning, he had all the egos associated with this addiction that had built up from his first childhood.
During our lives we cling to egos. When we attach to events and cling to them as egos, they tend to “reside” in the 5 khandhas. Typically racism is an ego that we can cling to. There might be an event where a black person has harmed us; rather than attributing the harm to the causing individual we associate it with race – maybe our parents have also described situations where they are racist. Result is that we remember racism – sanna, we have a perception that black people will behave in a negative way – sanna. Under free and open awareness, when an event/situation arises we use mindfulness to evaluate the event and we try not to bring any egos to the evaluation. Events need to be evaluated by our mindfulness, our sila and the 4 brahma-viharas - compassion/karuna, loving kindness/metta, empathy/mudita, and equanimity/upekkha – avoiding bringing the egos formed by past events. There could be patterns of thinking that are restrictive eg “I have always thought this way so I will continue to do so”. Racist thinking is an example of that but there are many similar patterns of thought. Similarly we can react emotionally to like events; rather than treating an event as unique we might emotionally associate fear with an event involving a black man and then be fearful if a black man is present. Racism might reside in 3 of the khandhas. We can let go of egos associated with racism by mindfulness carefully evaluating with sila and the 4 brahma-viharas so that we can be fair each time.
Racism is clearly unfair, and prevents us from evaluating each event or situation without bias and attachment; equally it is easy to see that such egos can reside in the khandhas. But there are far more egos that are present, and we need to work at letting them all go. This is the work or practice that leads to following the path. It is not a belief system such as religion or codes of ethics as rules (eg commandments), but the work that is individual and applied to each situation. And what you find with this practice is that however you do it, it will reduce the egos slowly if your intent is serious. With the choices that arise with your autonomy you choose to let the egos go, thus freeing up your autonomy for improved choosing.
It is easy to say that ego is a problem but it is not constructive to leave it there. From birth we have collected egos into our selves and personalities, where would we start in letting go of ego? There needs to be a process whereby we recognise what egos exist and then individually let them go, and this is part of your practice. In his practice zandtao looks at egos arising as kilesa, upadana and inappropriate attachment to the 5 khandhas. Zandtao is now going to detail these lists but he notes again that this is not the only way to see egos; how we see egos arises from our practice and there can be many practices.
Zandtao’s detailed lists:-
1) Kilesa/defilements – greed, hatred and delusion.
2) Upadanas/clingings (from here) –
sense-pleasure clinging (kamupadana)
all views clinging (ditthupadana)
rites-and-rituals clinging (silabbatupadana)
self-doctrine clinging (attavadupadana)
3) Inappropriate clinging to the 5 khandhas - kaya – body, vedana – feelings and emotions, sanna – memories and perceptions, sankhara – mental operations, and vinnana the mental attention or concentration that is attached to each of the khandhas.
With lists such as these, a seeker is able to identify many of their individual egos, and once identified it becomes easier to release the attachment that clings to that ego.
In retirement zandtao developed regular meditation, and following his ZPAP practice he consciously released egos. Egos were also released unconsciously often through practices as described in the “INNER SEARCH” of the Manual; zandtaomed formalised this inner search as part of his Seeker Story. Following the path to autonomy is both reconnecting to Source (Dhamma) and releasing your egos; whilst a practice might initially be generic eg MwB, over time the seeker learns about themselves and learns how to release egos in an individual manner – this is the autonomy developing.
Zandtao’s autonomy sees these processes as bhavana – developing the mind to function as nature intended. Nature gave us minds to follow the path and develop autonomy that is in harmony with nature. Initially nature gave us conditioning to help us survive in adulthood, but then nature’s intention was that the conditioning would fall away with good use of mind. The minds that nature gave us are always functioning but they are not always functioning “well”. As our minds grow from birth, through upbringing they pay attention and attach to what our parents want – and what our parents want depends on their own history, upbringing and conditioning. As children we just accept this, and at some point in our adult lives we can begin to choose to change. Instead of our minds being used to support what our parents, upbringing and conditioning want, we can begin to choose what we want.
Our minds are always functioning, this is important to understand. To begin with they function in the way they were trained, but once we become aware we can choose our minds to function as following the path. Egos require attention to survive so our minds give those egos that attention, without that attention there is no ego. If we are not aware of the path how we choose is unconscious, but once we become aware of the path we can choose not to give attention to egos. If we control our attention in this way then we can redirect our minds to help us develop. For zandtao this redirection occurred as part of his ZPAP practice, so that instead of his sankhara giving attention to ego it released that vinnana that then became faith in the path. The functioning of the mind neither increased or decreased, it just became constructively redirected to follow the path; this improved functioning however appears very different - from the outside. There might be an inertial "dampening" concerning path and ego. Naturally we choose to follow the path but ego can block that following, the path focusses our attention on following the path yet our egos focus our attention on maintaining ego; this conflicting attention can simply produce inertia.
For zandtao this was resolved by embodiment, the Dhamma comrade of sampajanna. When awareness love and wisdom combine then something needs to be done – that needing to be done is embodiment or sampajanna. It is part of the improved functioning of mind to ensure that understanding and development always leads to action. The embodiment is the action, if the action results in constructive change that is a bonus; it is the embodied action that matters. It is the embodied action that ends the personal inertia. Early on the path wisdom, one of the 5 Dhamma comrades, might suggest a course of action, and embodiment would want to follow that course of action. Ego will create doubt in order to gain attention, the ego might say “what is the point? If you do this what meaningful change will happen?” The ego chooses to measure our development only by what is considered meaningful in society, and yet that society is controlled by patriarchy to avoid meaningful change.
The path is not measured by meaningful change in society, it is measured by autonomy and the embodiment of that autonomy. Zandtao presumes that if sufficient people are following their paths this will reflect in social embodiment, presumably that change is what nature designs as our paths. This fits in with Buddhist laws of dhammajati.
So following the path is essentially developing a state of mind that chooses to follow the path, and this state of mind is concerned with reconnecting with Source and ensuring that egos do not get in the way of this reconnecting; once there is this reconnection there is autonomy. Why bother doing this? Because it is natural it is the easiest and best way to be, and it brings the greatest happiness.
So why isn’t everyone following the path? As a person who is following the path, that is such a difficult question because it seems to make no sense not to follow the path. It would seem to make sense that as a child there is conditioning, and as soon as becomes possible as an adult you try to let go of the conditioning and follow the path. Given that is the happiest way it would seem to make sense.
But following the path puts the seeker outside of society’s conditioning values and conformity so this brings in fear; people following the path are not “normal”. At the same time the egos of conditioning in a sense have a “life of their own” that they cling to so the egos try to survive. For most people they live within communities or live lifestyles where this fear and the clinging of egos is enough for them not to want to change.
So what brings about change? Basically suffering. The state of mind that can be experienced as the inertial balance between path and conditioning (egos) starts to cause suffering – spiritual disease. This suffering becomes stronger than the fear of not being “normal”, they are experiencing “abnormal” suffering that is stronger than the fear that comes with the inertia. This suffering leads to a person becoming a seeker, seeking the answers to why they are suffering. Finding and following the path ends the suffering of this spiritual disease.
There is another aspect of suffering that can point to the path, and that is trauma. For many people upbringing creates trauma that causes suffering. Sadly for most people suffering from trauma their suffering does not turn them towards the path itself. For such traumatised people they seek only a level of “normality”, a feeling that they can live a life without the suffering of trauma. There is a different level of trauma that has its source in upbringing but shows itself as being unable to fit in with society – basically get enough money to survive by holding down a job etc. For these less traumatised people their trauma takes them only to looking for a state of well-being, and this state of well-being is basically a state of mind in which they have the discipline to hold down a job and get sufficient money to live a life within “normal” conditioned society. Spiritual techniques such as meditation are used to develop this state of well-being; perhaps the people who are teaching these techniques are following their paths but in terms of what they are trying to provide they fall far short of the path – perhaps because the traumatised person is not open to seeking the path.
And then there is the level of trauma that is “normal” in our conditioned society, it is experienced as “normal” and is not experienced as trauma. This is the inertial state of the conditioned mind that is afraid and conforming to normality, and has not faced the trauma that underlies their upbringing and way of life. They do not see themselves as living in a state of trauma.
Within this group of traumatised people there is a dynamic of suffering. On the one end there is the zero state in which their suffering nullifies the natural reconnection with the path, this is the inertia described above. But there is a dynamic level of this suffering that seeks success in the conditioned world as gratification, and this gratification is defilement.
We can consider there being four states based on this trauma and suffering although the numbers in the first state are very small:-
In this short clip Nicola Amadora discusses trauma and awakening - basically the second and first suffering zandtao has listed - talk and transcript. She talks of chicken and egg on the path of well-being and the spiritual path - trauma and awakening.
Zandtao was fortunate because the trauma of his upbringing led to minimal suffering. It was low level suffering in which he experienced childhood as numbness. This numbness led to alcohol addiction that contributed to his upheaval, and the beginning of seeking the path. Unfortunately some of the conditions for addiction continued after upheaval; even though his seeking had started, bill did not embrace the path until much later in life – post-retirement. Even during the drinking there was suffering as numbness, but the suffering did not go deeper than that. He experienced suffering in a relationship, and soon after that finished he ended his alcohol addiction because his health was also getting worse.
In these 4 sufferings there are two implicit spectra, the spectrum of seeking and the spectrum of normal activity. When talking of spectra we are avoiding discussion of a dual state. When seeking, people are somewhere between unawareness whilst living in some level of self-esteem, well-being as a combination of self-esteem and awareness, and completely following the path. One could describe well-being as "zero path" in the sense that spiritual tools are used with the specific purpose of surviving daily life – compromising with conditioning. As we move along the spectrum towards the path then people are increasingly mixing spiritual tools for well-being and as seekers following their paths.
On the spectrum of normal activity we have one end where there is zero interest in success in the conditioned world compared to 100% interest in the defiled success of the conditioned world. One could even use these two spectra as axes of human activity, sadly the graph of this human data would have most people situated near the axis of normalised activity.
Quest has taken over this reflection. What initially drove this reflection was the recognition that mind is active 24/7, and that it is not that mind becomes active as egos are released - consciousness as vinnana is released but mental activity is constant. From upbringing the attention of the mind is attached and creates egos. The level of mental activity is 100% even though that activity appears inactive in terms of the path. Following the path means using the mind to follow that path by releasing egos and not attaching to new ones. Our practice gives us the ability to use mind in this way by changing the way that mind is working as well as reconnecting with Source. Our practice allows Source to develop the Dhamma comrades (or however your practice describes the Source gifts) that can change the way mind is functioning. Our practice stops the conditioned mind with its attention on ego from blocking our reconnection with Dhamma.
Zandtao's  asked why do people not follow the path? What is it in their minds that prevents that following? Teal thinks of the prevention as resistance, and discusses the suffering arising from this resistance as pain and discomfort (see below). Isn't resistance what arises once there has been a decision to follow the path?
In answer to "zandtao's ", above zandtao wrote "following the path puts the seeker outside of society’s conditioning values and conformity so this brings in fear, people following the path are not “normal”. At the same time the egos of conditioning in a sense have a “life of their own” that they cling to so the egos try to survive. For most people they live within communities or live lifestyles where this fear and the clinging of egos is enough for them not to want to change." Is it enough to talk about fear and the egos' desires to survive?
Let's initially talk of the discomfort and pain, and zandtao will quote from Teal Swan’s talk with Kristina Mand-Lakhaini of Mindvalley – check the transcription here. “There's no reason to focus on self-improvement unless you're in some sort of unwanted state which means pain. Nobody goes towards ‘hmm I want something to change’ if they feel good where they are. So pain is what compels people into spiritual practice and self-help regardless of whether they admit to it or not. [2.07]”
Discomfort arises as the individual confronts their fear and overcomes the survival instincts of the individual egos. This discomfort will usually be counter-balanced by the joys of following the path, but such discomfort needs to be recognised especially at the beginning. And especially if the individual has conformed to family and society’s expectations.
“Pain is what happens when you're being prodded into that expansion, prodded into that growth and you don't go with it. So it means that you're in resistance somehow to that expansion for you personally and that is preventable.[3.08]” Pain can arise even if you choose self-help or the spiritual path because you are not being open and honest about your resistance. Is the individual fully committed to the choice? Resistant to the choice?
“What it is is that I want to give people let's call it the personal empowerment to be able to work with their own discomfort, and with the parts of themselves that may be in resistance. So that no matter what phase they're in life they can keep in alignment with that expanded place.” [3.43].
“Nobody goes towards ‘hmm I want something to change’ if they feel good where they are. [2.07]” Do people feel good where they are? To use the title of the podcast this requires an honest conversation with yourself. When people are suffering, they seek answers through self-help towards well-being and perhaps further following the path to autonomy. But for so many there is a stubborn inertia. Let us go back to the 4 categories of mind, trauma and suffering:-
From upbringing self-esteem in adulthood engages with society and its conditioning leading to a level of dynamism towards social success. At this stage some turn to the path because they see value in the path and no value in the success they have achieved - they find suffering in social success. For others their self-esteem leads to inertia as path and ego counter-balance each other. Whether an individual has been dynamic or has inertia, they must first address whether they feel good about themselves. Because of upbringing this feeling will depend on their success and whether they have dependents who require them to continue with a particular way of life - mainly family. Because of upbringing their self-esteem becomes linked to family and success, and this becomes their level of normalised suffering whether dynamically or in inertia. But given their upbringing there is usually no questioning of whether they feel good about themselves – expectations answer that for them.
The question of whether an individual feels good about themselves is avoided because of what is required of them by society – and worse by patriarchy. It might be reasonable to feel good about family but when patriarchy puts so much pressure on that family to conform to the profiteering of 1%-satrapy there is no honest conversation about feeling good in themselves. Upbringing leading to self-esteem has led to a new generation of conformed people who are not able to be honest with themselves because they are living for others as family.
Very few people become free from conformist requirements – family and society – to begin to be honest with themselves; this is the pressure that patriarchy applies. Whilst zandtao considers that as bill during upheaval he was lucky, the breakdown aspect of upheaval was painful. The changes that starting on the path made to bill’s life were strong and powerful, bill was fortunate that he had so little self-esteem and therefore so little was invested in the conformism his upheaval was leading him away from. Even though following upheaval bill chose the dishonesty of alcoholism, he was at the time free to choose. Fortunately at the time of retirement bill was free from conformist requirements and also had sufficient money to retire early. The way bill lived his life, he used to call it independent, enabled a lifestyle that was free of conformist requirements. Because he started on the path at upheaval he valued the path above all else – even though he made little attempt to follow it during his 2nd childhood.
In addition there is a glue that holds the connection between self-esteem and social success together, and that glue is conditioned love. Spiritual love or unconditional love arises from following the path, and it is often recognised following a failed romantic love – often romantic love is a conditioned love. At birth there is the spiritual and unconditional love of mother love that can hopefully incorporate the father’s love. But as the child gets older parental love takes on more and more a conditioned love – the parents bring in their own conditioning and pass that conditioning on to their children through the agreements they make. This is where the trauma arises. What initially started as mother love changes to conditioned love as parents follow what is expected in their upbringing ie the ancestral conditioning of their own parents; upbringing is passed on from generation to generation.
At this stage is where the trauma arises as each new child accepts the agreements willingly or unwillingly (trauma) or fragments their non-acceptance (greater trauma). Because of the conditioned love with parents the child growing into an adult does not see the trauma in their upbringing; it is all masked by what is perceived as love by the child growing into adult. But this masked conditioned love is also what fashions the child’s self-esteem, and that self-esteem is what the adult is equipped with in order to survive within society – or even use for social success.
So the child as adult takes into life trauma hidden by masked conditioned love for parents. But it doesn’t stop there as that individual then attracts a new generation of conditioned love – romantic love. Now this romantic love can lead to spiritual love and be liberating, but more often than not this romantic love reinforces the conditioning of the individual because of the person attracted in romantic love. Mostly individuals attract minds of like conditioning, a conditioning that is looking for social success. In the new generation there starts the unconditional mother love, but given the like conditioning of the new parents along with the wider family conditioning there will be the new generation of willing agreements, unwilling and fragmented trauma.
There are ways out of this cycle of trauma. For some the level of trauma causes suffering and the individual becomes a seeker of the path. For other individuals romantic love can open the door to the unconditional spiritual love of the path. But for most this level of trauma masked by parental love is sured up from generation to generation, instead of the trauma being suffering that leads to an individual becoming a seeker the trauma is disguised as an illusory parental love – and also disguised by the romantic love that becomes parental love in the next generation. This disguise is either the inertia of normalised suffering or gets transformed into dynamism of social success:-
The glue that maintains the normalised suffering – trauma – of accepted conditioning is conditioned parental love either through inertia or dynamically seeking social success. Zandtao described the suffering as normalised. Whilst trauma develops in this normalisation, the conditioned love also provides the skills and knowledge of patriarchy's infrastructure. Through parents and education upbringing contains facts and views that self-esteem can use to survive in society, what might be considered as society's normal infrastructure; without this infrastructure of agreements individuals with or without self-esteem would not be able to survive in society. If self-esteem focuses their attention on this infrastructure then the individual's life remains within conditioned society. If self-esteem ignores the choice to follow the path when it arises, then sadly for that individual there is no path. It is suffering that provides the impetus for making the choice, and if there is sufficient conditioned love sadly the individual accepts the limited life of normalised suffering.
As bill zandtao was fortunate enough to escape this glue (of conditioned love) because of his middle-class conformity, a conformity that typically middle-class included repression. Bill’s repression in upbringing (numbness) meant that he had the normalised suffering of upbringing but he wasn’t open to romantic love before upheaval. Instead of attracting romantic love his numbness through alcoholic addiction took him through uni and other times where romantic love might arise so that at the time of upheaval he completely lacked any self-esteem (including that from romantic love) that might have coped with the suffering. So fortunately upheaval took over, and he started on the path.
Maybe by being honest with oneself concerning the trauma in the 4 sufferings, more individuals can choose to become seekers when firstgrace arises?
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