Integration & Oneness
We’ve made it to the top of the scale! In theory, anyway. :)
Different people propose different ways to subdivide and order this 700-1000 “enlightenment” range. I think it is really interesting to explore, but most agree that the general gist of this range is Integration, Unity, and Oneness.
I can’t say I fully understand this stage, but I feel like I’ve had some glimpses of it and some understanding of it.
One thing people often say at this stage is that “everything belongs.” This can be hard to understand or embrace when you’re feeling stuck in suffering. I get it. But let me see if I can explain a little.
First of all, let me say that non-dual, “everything belongs” teachers are usually not saying everything is ok—as if there is no such thing as right and wrong, justice and injustice. They’re not saying, “Everything goes!” They say some behaviors are better and worse than other behaviors, but that there is a place for everything that is somehow good. You know, like,
“We are assured and know that [God being a partner in their labor] all things work together and are [fitting into a plan] for good to and for those who love God and are called according to [God’s] design and purpose.” Romans 8:28
The way I understand it best right now is that pain and suffering are our teachers and guides. They show us which way is down and which way is up. What to turn toward within ourselves and what to turn away from. You know, like the “gift of pain” we talked about earlier.
This doesn’t mean we are to always turn away from suffering, in ourselves or others, though. Suffering is a good teacher. And the closer we get to it, the more nuance it can teach us and the more compassion it creates in us.
It’s nice to approach it carefully like getting close to a fire, rather than getting in a fire. But even when we find ourselves in the fire of suffering, it doesn’t actually destroy us. A lot of times, when the Bible talks about “destroying with fire,” another way to translate that is to “lay bare.”
Suffering is often about stripping away the (good or bad) things we cling to that aren’t our truest sources of power or identity. The suffering is not the point—the point is what it does to us.
The suffering hollows us out so we may become instruments of peace, love, and compassion. Like a guitar or cello with only the thinnest, most refined shell remaining…and a wind, spirit, breath, creative life force, mystery, ruach moving through us.
When we have learned to let go of the stress, survival, force, ego self, we can give that to others, too. We can see where everything belongs in them and open a path for them to do the same. That is offering attunement, co-regulation, and compassion...healing.
There is a contagious quality in healing, just like there is in disease.
But, ultimately, we can only heal ourselves as we whole ourselves.
Oneness
This next bit, I want to offer with very little authority beyond how helpful it’s been in my own life, and so far, it has held up to the worldview of many I respect.
One day when I was in high school, I had this image of God pop into my head, and it has been really helpful and beautiful in my life ever since.
I was sitting on the kitchen counter talking with a friend. Somehow the question came up: If you had to try to draw God, what would you draw?
The first thing that came into my mind was that we are the body of Christ.
Immediately this image started forming in my mind’s eye… All the people who had ever lived flying together to form this one lumbering giant mega body. It felt too ominous, too superpower supervillain. That can’t be it, I thought.
And just like that, that image was gone, and in its place, this image of a single point of light started moving out into all directions into a void.
One of the most distinct parts of the image was that it was moving, growing into this ever-expanding fullness, like it was alive.
Oh! Maybe that’s it! I tried to draw it for my friend, but it looked so flat on the paper. I tried motioning with my hands. That worked a little better.
Eventually, I came across this image. It looked kind of like this...only moving, expanding, growing out in every direction.
A neuron in the Retina.
The way I interpreted it was that we could each be drawn in this same way as individuals—you know, like, we are created in the image of God. We are each expanding like this.
But that this was also an image of God. At this scale, we would each be represented as one of the paths of light expanding from the center.
In this way, we are all (like, all, not even just humans) connected and part of a larger whole. But we are also our own part of that whole, with our own expansion happening.
I later found a nice word for this, a holon. A holon is something that is simultaneously a whole and a part. Now, in my own language, I say we are One of One.
One of the most helpful parts in this understanding of things is the freedom it gives.
The way I see it, if we are living this life right, we are each feeling our way into the void, going somewhere no one has ever been.
This is why I see love as liberating—holding space for another to expand and follow their own path. We can offer each other hospitality, pleasure, comfort, and connection as we go. But there will always be some degree of aloneness we must embrace if we are to follow our own true calling into the unknown. (Yeah, that Frozen soundtrack…it’s actually pretty fantastic.)
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