 Our Outer Journey to Awakening Community
Look at the hegemony, where is spirit? Within the hegemonic leaders, nowhere. Look at activism, where is spirit? And we get some answers - mainly concerning the planet understandably. Look at organisations for change especially within grassroots activism, where is spiritual leadership? And again we get no answer.
Can the spiritual world confront hegemony? Of course not. But could there not be spiritual presence? Out of awareness comes an understanding for a need for change but where does the spiritual world show that it is active in this need for change. Perhaps the spiritual world is hiding - spiritual bypassing. We have spiritual teachers telling us some version of the Age of Aquarius - it is all changing for the better - ride the storm. When we look, we can see the storm; can we see it getting better? Do we just accept the changing age with faith, do we continue with spiritual bypassing or do we consider some form of embodiment to help ride the storm?
So we gather around our teachers, we develop our paths - that is hard enough in this world, and we say it is OK to be detached because finding the path is hard enough. So instead of any Culture of Awareness impacting hegemony, we struggle to even develop a CoA itself.
Eckhart says we will go through a rough patch and get out the other side. zandtao has never felt nor seen the other side; he makes no attempt to compare wisdom with Eckhart but it is only in blind faith that zandtao can accept there being another side. Where will spirituality be on this other side? Being negative, maybe the destruction of the storm leaves the other side as a chance to start again?
When zandtao looks at his own spirituality he knows that it arose in "civilisation" - within this hegemony - within this system-of-accumulation. What happens to his spirituality if the other side is apocalypse? What happens to contemporary spirituality if the other side is apocalypse?
For the spiritual in the West do we begrudgingly but tacitly condone the hegemony, its system-of-accumulation, its oil wars and other defilements - Addon B - NOLINKYET as we find our paths? Yet perhaps the first quality that arises on the path is the radical love of compassion. Is this compassion only for relationships in daily life or is it also there to see the hegemony - develop the hegemony spiritually?
When considering the world and its hegemony some spiritual teachers actively encourage detachment from this compassion because it is so hard - IT IS HARD ENOUGH FOLLOWING OUR PATHS WITHOUT ALSO DEALING WITH EMBODIMENT. It is understandable as following the path IS hard enough, but can it be acceptable for those already following their path significantly to advocate bypassing? For each seeker following their path there becomes a new teaching from their own experience - understandable as giving back is a nature and duty of path. Perhaps this teaching reaches others through religious institutions or online. But step back, look at the teachings - isn't there a plethora (sometimes contradictory)? Or perhaps a better question - when we compare it with the impact of spirit on the hegemony do we need more teachings? Or do we need some form of embodiment that can help bring spirit to the hegemony and its peoples? zandtao does not ask this question of seekers whose priority is following their own path, but isn't this a question for those experienced on the path - where in this world is the most notable absence of spirit? In teachers and the availability of teachings or in the hegemony?
Is the path of the experienced to hide, focus on individual seekers and not consider path embodiment in hegemony? Being content with bypassing because of the spiritual joy? For those bypassing who try to bring love to Unity-consciousness is this enough? When we look at hegemony is this enough?
Instead of hiding, purpose needs to somehow find a way to shine in embodiment. Purpose loves consciousness - loving and evolving, where is this loving consciousness in the world? Lost? - as the West uses bombs and drones to destroy for oil - Addon B - Intro Vision. Purpose loves humanity - unity amongst humans, and does not want separation; love has no such separation.
As an embodiment zandtao first put forward pathtivism in his zandtaomed trilogy - the Manual. At that point he mainly thought of pathtivism as wise embodiment. Since then zandtao has found autonomy that immediately addressed a love-wisdom imbalance. Following that autonomy chose to address one particular embodiment - pathtivism as wise embodiment in the grassroots movement, addressed the lack of unity and prevalence of egoic ditthis in this grassroots activism, and worked towards increasing emphasis on radical love that has been lost in daily life - and lost in grassroots activism? Pathtivist purpose is a choice of embodiment that tries to bring love and wisdom to the movement, and with this love enabling activism we can maybe help reclaim our spiritual responsibility - not tacitly ceding it to the delusions of the hegemony's system-of-accumulation whilst bypassing when it might be unnecessary.
But pathtivism is not enough. We will consider how pathtivism might help progress but in the end we need far more - we need awakening community. And that awakening of community has to beging with the autonomous community itself - what the Buddha called Sangha.
Spirit in hegemony?
Let us step back and look again at the beginning of this chapter:-
Look at the hegemony, where is spirit? Within the hegemony itself, nowhere. Look at activism, where is spirit? And we get some answers - mainly concerning the planet understandably. Look at organisations for change especially within grassroots activism, where is spiritual leadership?. And again we get no answer.
Now for anyone on their path as autonomy, authenticity or any such path word step back and look:-
Look at the hegemony, where is spirit? Within the hegemony itself, nowhere. Look at activism, where is spirit? And we get some answers - mainly concerning the planet understandably. Look at organisations for change especially within grassroots activism, where is spiritual leadership?. And again we get no answer.
Whose responsibility is it to bring sila to daily life? Bring spirit to daily life? With his crossing of the threshold of autonomy zandtao answers "it is his responsibility to bring sila to daily life". It is with this intention zandtao began looking at pathtivism and zandbagging. Looking at embodiment.
Let's retrace where these considerations - sila to daily life - came from - the crossing of the threshold of autonomy. Prior to that his path had meant Buddhadasa Buddhism - following the Buddhist teachings of Ajaan Buddhadasa as his practice (MwB LINK). At that time he only saw Buddhism for himself - it seemed that was his path. In the writing of Viveka-Zandtao LINK there came a disturbance that he saw as some form of transcendence - later seeing it more accurately as crossing the threshold of autonomy. This autonomy became very important as it was necessary for zandtao to determine his own path - autonomy. In that path-directing he began with love-wisdom balance - Real Love LINK - a consideration of secular path? LINK. And all his earlier Buddhist practice and the changes made during autonomy led zeer-consciousness. And initially this book on zeer-consciousness was to include a chapter on embodiment as pathtivism but it became more and more - leading to this book on Awakening Community that feels more important than anything previously done.
sangha of the path
This consideration of embodiment comes from autonomy, it does not come from Buddhism, Christianity or Marxism - it comes from autonomy. Now the Buddhist term of Ariya Sangha has a description of stream-enterer rather than being a monk so when the Buddhist bows of the Triplegem - Buddha, Dhamma and Sangha. Is that important? Thich Nhat Hanh often spoke of the raft of teachings that take the seeker to the shore but once on the shore the raft if carried could be a burden. For zandtao there is an indication here that in autonomy it is not the practice that matters, it is the state of autonomy itself. Does this state of autonomy require the prior raft of teachings?
What if we could be allowed to use the term sangha as the community of autonomous, of stream-enterers, of those who have left the path behind, of those who have transcended. Could sangha be a term to describe a community of the path, paths that have led to this autonomous state from any diverse position or teaching? As the word is known zandtao will be addressing the sangha, not a collection of monks of one religion, but a collection of the autonomous - however they have followed their paths.
Now dear and respected sangha zandtao asks you to look again at how he began the preface:-
Look at the hegemony, where is spirit? Within the hegemony itself, nowhere. Look at activism, where is spirit? And we get some answers - mainly concerning the planet understandably. Look at organisations for change especially within grassroots activism, where is spiritual leadership?. And again we get no answer.
Sangha, is it not your responsibility to bring sila to daily life?
Sangha, some of you remain in the institutions of the religions whose practice brought you to autonomy. Is this comfortable? Is it bringing sila to daily life? Do you see your path in the workings of hegemony?
Who is to awaken communnity?
Apologies, dear sangha, but zandtao wants to bring discomfort to your life. Hegemony is taking us to existential threat, how does your autonomy feel about that, dear sangha of the autonomous? Zandtao does not ask how your institution or tradition feels about this, he asks your autonomy, he asks that autonomy which makes you part of the community of the path. How does your autonomy feel about the existential threats? Zandtao does not want to hear institutional dogma or justification, he is talking to the autonomy. How can your autonomy see that lack of spirit in hegemony and your compassion not weep?
It is you, dear sangha, who are here to awaken community.
Zandtao has spoken of bringing sila to daily life, sila will be a term he uses when considering the awakening of community. But to you sangha of the path sila is the way of life that nature has given the world to live harmoniously together. That way of life has no denomination but it has its own autonomy. It is not a set of rules or laws, it is perhaps a law that there is one way of life for all as nature describes. For those following this law there is no existential threat, imagine the harmony if hegemony were following this law. Dear sangha of the path, how happy would people be if their community were living by this natural law? Can we as sangha of the path begin to awaken communities to this natural harmony of daily life?
For those of us who have arrived at autonomy through a religious institution we know that our religions are not dedicated to this deep harmony in our communities. Whilst undoubtedly they bring some good to their communities, does this good negate the harm arising from the hegemony? Is the work of the religion ending existential threat? Is the work of the religion bringing spirit to hegemony?
Can we whose autonomy arose through religion and tradition join with other path-followers and establish a sangha of the path dedicated to building harmony in our communities through being dedicated to awakening those communities? Can we see a possibility that we as sangha of the path can awaken communities giving those people the strength to cope with hegemony and its existential threats? Can we not be dedicated to awakening community?
Can awakening community not be our embodiment?
embodyiing sangha
sampajanna-consciousness
leading to bringing awareness to community
In zeer-consciousness we looked at how awareness arises; and how, through the practice of releasing restrictions and holding space for consciousness, we could start to embrace Unity-consciousness developing the purpose of consciously loving and evolving consciousness. We might consider zeer-consciousness as an example of an inner journey. But from awareness there is another journey, the path takes - our outer journey - from awareness to embodiment; we might consider this our outer spiritual journey - a part of our outer societal journey as a whole.
Because our upbringing of conditioning and conformity focuses on the outer emphasising survival through self-esteem, as we mature and release conditioning and conformity it is quite natural to focus on the inner journey - that through conditioning might well have been absent - that possibly could develop from awareness to conscious purpose. Through our inner journeys we learn the importance of awareness - of our conditioned absence of awareness, and through our natural duty we then encourage the inner journey of awareness for others. Instinctively, as natural duty, this encouragement, deriving from our personal experience, becomes embodiment - part of our outer spiritual journey; helping others become aware is an embodiment as teaching - advising. This embodiment is a natural part of the path - as awareness arises we wish to pass it on - give back, but is this advice - passing on our experience - sufficient for our total embodiment?
No new work is required from our awareness to have the desire to help others become aware, we feel it as a natural characteristic of awareness. Once we start to become aware, we gain the fruits of that awareness and our spiritual joy wants to give it back - pass it on. It is perfectly natural to want to scream and shout at the world the wonders of the path, this might be considered a natural embodiment. Such instinctive evangelising is not necessarily a good idea as following on from first grace (Addon C) there is much to be learnt - however advanced that awakening (first grace) is; this instinctive evangelising has sometimes been called inflation and this danger is discussed amongst others here. At the same time we must know that individuals learn only when they are ready, and then it is their determination that teaches - guiding themselves to appropriate teachers or otherwise. How much is the instinctive reaction of evangelising for our own benefit? Given the plethora of wise teachings might we consider a change in what we choose as embodiment?
Introducing ego of bypassing for all
There is a bypassing ego that characterises the world, when we look at hegemony where is the path? Where is sila? Where is compassionate liberation? This is a spiritual imbalance - a spiritual disease in the world. And if a reader sees Ajaan Buddhadasa in this s/he is completely correct. In his teachings concerning Mindfulness with Breathing Buddhadasa speaks of 4 Dhamma Comrades - mindfulness, concentration wisdom sampajanna - arising through his meditation approach of anapanasati - MwB. Through institutionalism or otherwise teachings on the path have become imbalanced with bypassing and insufficient compassion as our world suffers from spiritual disease - lack of the influence of path. With his crossing of the threshold of autonomy zandtao then worked to overcome his own imbalances leading to zeer-consciousness but what was not present was wise embodiment. Because of this bypassing zandtao now asks that all seekers develop a balanced path that includes sampajanna leading to wise embodiment.
Previously zandtao has accepted bypassing as an ego as seekers learned about the inner journey in following the path. Previously he has asked questions of "more advanced seekers" as to why they accepted spiritual bypassing as a way of life, but now he realises that bypassing on any stage of the path causes personal imbalance - and contributes to spiritual disease in the world. This is why sampajanna is part of practice for all.
Embodiment
With the path comes embodiment but as with compassion we can observe that insufficient emphasis is placed on embodiment, this is because accompanying embodiment is often egoic attachment. For new(er) seekers understandable emphasis is placed on the inner journey of releasing egos attached to conditioning and conformity associated with upbringing, adding egos associated with new embodiment makes such release even harder and some teachers avoid these egos - even though as part of their teachings they would include detachment from new egos. But the path is not balanced without embodiment, and this imbalance is bypassing.
Sampajanna-consciousness
zandtao sees sampajanna as the consciousness that enables wise embodiment, unfortunately for himself this is a lesson he has just learnt and why pathtivism has caused him so much confusion - discussed later to help seekers understand wise embodiment and bypassing. Out of the path arises sampajanna, consciousness that enables wise embodiment. Let us consider the 2 themes of practice :-
Out of daily life and upbringing comes restrictions and through consciousness we can overcome these restrictions. If we do not include sampajanna in that consciousness then we can mistakenly include embodiment as egoic restrictions because it is not inner journey, this can cause confusion when we try to release them. With sampajanna-consciousness can come the balance on the path with wise embodiment.
Sampajanna-khandha
Khandhas are aggregates that make up our daily lives but there can be much ego in khandha. There is no I or mine in the 5 khandhas (a Buddhadasa teaching) helped zandtao understand sources of many egos, and now wants to recognise that there are egos arising from the consciousness that is sampajanna-consciousness; this could be called unwise embodiment. (Future question - how much of sampajanna-consciousness could be considered vinnana-khandha?)
Sampajanna as Practice
In recognising sampajanna zandtao could see an important change to his practice, when we bring in the skills and directions of consciousness such as love, compassion, mindfulness, concentration and sila we need to bring in sampajanna-consciousness - key understanding of this zeersight. For seekers focussing on the inner journey and seeking balance with embodiment might also feel the benefit of bringing in sampajanna-consciousness.
But having sampajanna-consciousness as a direction of consciousness also brings with it 2 dangers:-
 If there is no embodiment there is imbalance on the path
The seeker is at risk of becoming involved in unwise embodiment
This unwise embodiment is a particular issue in our system-of-accumulation in that the system has corrupted many of our caring professions so that choosing a caring profession does not mean that all your active time in those professions is actually compassionate - see Matriellez on teaching.
But henceforward we take the key understanding of sampajanna-consciousness as a direction of consciousness, and adjust our practice accordingly.
Sampajanna as atammayata
This change impacts on our atammayata. Once we recognise that sampajanna-consciousness is part of our consciousness and that wise embodiment is part of our daily life then our state of atammayata changes. Atammayata now includes sampajanna-consciousness, and in our practice we have to ensure wise embodiment and look out for the egos of unwise embodiment. Recognising these consequences means that we can maintain atammayata with wise embodiment.
Sampajanna-khandha egos
If we start with sila of the path bringing compassionate liberation then we have 2 important egos to consider.
Compassion ego
zandtao knows this ego well as teaching was his wage-slavery and socialism was his activism. bill focussed on actions following from compassion and socialism, and this ego was critical of those who did not bring such caring into their lives. But compassion is freedom from suffering for all, and while the caring would consider suffering his compassion rarely looked at the need for freedom. This is why it is best to see the sila of the path as compassionate liberation.
Was/is socialism free? In the times when socialism guided decision-making, how often was there an imperative within the decisions that infringed freedom? Certainly within communist countries there were infringements of liberty not always caused by that country. And with those communist countries coming out of the violence of a revolution there was much suffering. But then suffering through war is endemic within the system-of-accumulation - often exported away from the main hegemonic countries. Can violent revolution escape that suffering? Perhaps not whilst the global system is system-of-accumulation?
Freedom ego
This ego is particularly problematic, if we do not feel free then it becomes a priority. But freedom has 2 aspects - inner and outer, and in some cases such as libertarianism there is a focus on the outer; this outer focus is also problematic as there is much finance available for libertarianism as freedom from regulation benefits the system-of-accumulation greatly. But for freedom priority needs to address inner freedom - freedom from conditioning and conformity especially with those egos arising in upbringing. The greater feeling of freedom (joy/bliss) comes from the inner freedom, and this inner freedom brings with it a clearer vision (tathata) of infringements (government or otherwise) of outer freedoms. Having this inner freedom is also an essential part of tathata for seeing accumulation and seeing what activism is needed - see zandbagging pinned advice .
Another problem with this ego is that with its personal focus - the need for freedom - it loses balance and does not see the importance of compassion. This also brings it into conflict with the compassion ego that requires caring from all. With compassionate liberation there is a balance of both compassion and freedom that releases both of these egos.
Bypassing ego
zandtao considers this as an issue that arises from some teachers of the path as they legitimise avoidance or even encourage it. For some "wisdom institutions" there can be an issue with love-wisdom imbalance. Crossing his own threshold of autonomy zandtao worked on this issue - through the z-quest of Real Love; was this imbalance his own learning failure or an institutional weakness? In zeer-consciousness this issue is addressed through the 2 best books - unleashing love with Nicola Amadora "Love Unleashed" and/or through loving yourself with Teal Swan "How to Love Yourself".
As a direction of consciousness there is a need for compassion but if there is no desire to embody this compassion then why would it happen? Unlike Ajaan Buddhadasa not all teachers have sampajanna-consciousness as part of their practice so such embodiment does not necessarily arise through the teaching. There is a kind of closed teaching loop for some advanced path-seekers that comes from bypassing. From the path comes sampajanna-consciousness and to satisfy that drive there arises compassion that leads to teaching. In the teaching spiritual teachers recognise that restrictions arise with unwise embodiment, and as the first job of spiritual teachings might well be considered the releasing of conditioning and conformity that arises from upbringing such teachers avoid encouraging embodiment because of the egos that arise. Such teachers themselves might accept the bypassing ego of not encouraging wider embodiment.
zandtao suggests that teachers develop a practice of sampajanna-consciousness, encourage the love-wisdom balance of equanimity, and in so doing will promote wise embodiment. However if they themselves are bypassing then this develops egoic problems in their own embodiment of teaching. For how many teachers are there problems of being a cult? For how many teachers are there problems of abuse of followers? Quite clearly these problems stem from a sila problem but if their practice of embodiment lacks balance - seeing the limit of embodiment as teaching only, that could contribute significantly.
When we consider the culture of awareness (CoA) from the point of view of a new seeker then there is a proliferation of teachings and new seekers are confused. Whilst there are many paths up the mountain and higher up the mountain brings tolerance and understanding of this diversity, lower down the mountain where there are new seekers this plethora of paths can lead to a new seeker becoming confused. When you add in the spiritual paths of the religious institutions this proliferation becomes very difficult for the new seeker to navigate.
Consider mentoring as your embodiment - mentoring for practice and mentoring for change. Whilst there is a plethora of teachings, what is not present in the CoA is an emphasis on good practice - dedication to practice. Given our academic upbringings new seekers look to finding an appropriate set of ideas and ideals thinking that is sufficient. As already stated it is not the ideals that matter - many ways up the mountain, what matters is dedication to practice. A mentor is not necessarily interested in a set of ideals but is interested in promoting dedication to practice. Helping new seekers understand the need for practice-dedication is much needed in the current state of the CoA.
Where is embodiment most needed?
Place this plethora of teachings into the context of hegemony where the path is virtually non-existent, and we can begin to understand where embodiment is most needed. When we consider the tathata that is spiritual teaching in our current hegemony of system-of-accumulation, we have too much teaching and too little embodiment for change. When the path arises, in each new seeker there arises the awareness that society needs changing but that awareness does not transform to societal change. zandtao sees this lack of transformation arising as a consequence of the bypassing ego of the CoA, because advanced seekers become teachers and many such teachers avoid the need for societal embodiment as they have felt the benefits from releasing the restrictions that come from the conditioning and conformity of upbringing and their teaching focuses on that.
As mentors we can work with new seekers to help them find constructive mindful action to build change - whilst bringing balance to their paths and practice.
Immersion ego
It is aspects of this immersion ego that zandtao suggests the teachers are trying to avoid, rather than developing sampajanna-consciousness leading to wise embodiment many teachers suggest bypassing is the way forward for new seekers until they have advanced along the path. zandtao suggests that wise embodiment could help that advance but clearly recognises the importance of releasing the conditioning and conformity of upbringing.
What can happen with unwise embodiment is the compassion ego arising as the unwise embodiment sucks the new seeker into activism. When this issue is raised many teachers will urge detachment because they themselves have not focussed on sampajanna-consciousness. Accepting the advice the seeker draws in their compassion so rather than wise embodiment there is no embodiment, and given how much this happens we have the spiritual disease of humanity in which the path does not prevail in the global decision-making of the hegemony; the greed (and hate with war) of the system-of-accumulation dominates. When the freedom ego becomes active through freedom's embodiment there is the outer focus of freedom such as free speech but their embodiment is not balanced (in a similar way to the compassion ego not being balanced). Rather than these embodiments working together towards compassionate liberation there is egoic conflict as egos as usual choose their own exclusive egoic ways.
Whilst the sila of path brings out the embodiment these egos can drag the seeker out of path-alignment. Practice including sampajanna-consciousness can realign such egoic behaviour but the egos can pull the seeker deeper and deeper out of alignment into what zandtao calls immersion - out of alignment to such an extent that the seeker is immersed into their ego (compassion or freedom).
Boundaries
Dedication - Filter not Ego
There is one consciousness - Unity-consciousness - integrated consciousness; when we see with one consciousness we see with tathata - clear vision. So why does zandtao talk of directions and skills of consciousness - and now the new sampajanna-consciousness?
Because of dedication. One spiritual aim is 100% dedication to the path but it is important to be clear on what dedication is and how we focus it. As abidance it is one of the 8 core components of practice, and in zeer-consciousness "dedicated to practice" is one of the 5 chapters; dedication is core. But dedication can become imbalanced; how do we see this imbalance? Is it connected to ego?
Let us step back to our practice:-
We hold space for consciousness and that consciousness is Unity-consciousness. But different practices can lead us to dedication to an aspect of consciousness such as love as devotion or wisdom as in wisdom traditions. Or as discussed with the bypassing ego a focus on the inner journey where focus on the inner journey can be temporarily beneficial. Because of the mental focus we do not experience Unity-consciousness but see consciousness through a filter - love, wisdom, inner etc. This need not necessarily be an egoic focus although ego can easily be involved, so zandtao uses the word filter as distinct from ego when focus is beneficial.
But as seekers we need to be aware that consciousness that is not Unity-consciousness can lead to imbalance so if our path leads to a dedication that is focused on one aspect of consciousness such as love, wisdom, inner journey etc we need to be aware that balancing or integration will be required. In the case of embodiment it is quite natural for the journey to have been an inner journey and as such a rebalancing of our consciousness filters will be required - and to help with this particular imbalance zandtao describes sampajanna-consciousness. If we don't rebalance at the appropriate time restrictive egos and attachment become involved. Recognising the possible arising of filters leads us to an improved understanding of Unity-consciousness.
Integrated consciousness
Following the path leads us to an approach of integrated consciousness where there are no filters and we can see the way life is and the way life is for us - the seeker - without restrictions. Integration is often discussed in terms of ego such as fragmentation or the less intrusive releasing restrictions. But zandtao now asks seekers to consider a further aspect of integration - rebalancing because of a dedication filter. Even though zandtao has been discussing sampajanna-consciousness he did this with the purpose of integrated consciousness - Unity-consciousness; it is imbalance that takes him to these different aspects of consciousness - skills and directions - mindfulness, focus and embodiment and love, wisdom, sila, truth and creativity. And now sampajanna-consciousness - without sampajanna-consciousness zandtao has applied a filter (zeer-consciousness?) of consciousness concerning the inner journey. With sampajanna-consciousness zandtao is removing that filter and hopes there is a balanced approach of integrated consciousness that follows - both inner and outer - knowing, seeing, feeling and acting. With this Unity-consciousness zandtao hopes that there can be tathata - seeing the way life is and seeing the way life is for his seeking. Hopefully he can then live a balanced life of knowing feeling seeing and acting with the purpose of consciously loving and evolving consciousness.
Guidelines for Activism
Throughout the book on pathtivism (including the draft) there is much discussion of possible mindful action. Please take note of the following when starting activism:-
Be warned - pathtivism is a huge ask.
Be ready - there is a plethora of egos in activism already.
Adjust your practice for activism - sampajanna-consciousness?
Decide on boundaries
Decide on pathtivism?
Bring radical love to the activism
Culture of Awareness (CoA)
When zandtao says there is a plethora of teachings out there it might be considered a consequence that once there is awareness the rest is easy because of the plethora. This is far from the case, and it is important to understand that there are many restrictions to developing awareness. Try listening to the various awareness histories discussed at Batgap to gain an understanding of the magnitude of the task of coping with and transforming these restrictions.
zandtao discusses this problem of developing awareness as society lacking a culture of awareness; on this website zandtao’s writings include working towards overcoming these restrictions as a theme throughout. Fundamentally zandtao feels the lack of teachings is not an issue, there are plenty of books and websites - and there are also the established religions. However each path is individual, so studying traditions and reading about another's path can spark insights and path development.
There is only one consciousness - Unity-consciousness - an integrated consciousness but sadly our minds create filters or egos that prevent us from knowing, feeling and seeing this one consciousness and acting in an integrated way. These filters are an imbalance that can be counter-balanced but the purpose in this rebalancing is consciously loving and evolving this one Unity-consciousness.
As part of this integration there is both an inner and outer journey; these journeys zandtao is working on through zeer-consciousness and pathtivism. At present his dedication is towards the outer of pathtivism, and this zeersight discusses how a mental filter caused egoic attachment and confusion and how he adjusted his practice to release these egos. Given that pathtivism is asking seekers to choose an embodiment of grassroots activism there could well be a similar imbalance that they might need to address. Pathtivism is a huge ask given the plethora of egos present and manufactured in the grassroots movement, and if the seeker has focussed on the inner there will be a need to balance this filter; this zeersight addresses that.
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