One & Many

This is something I haven't seen addressed by the different traditions, although I am not that familiar with them either.

Drop Big Mind

When God awakens to itself as Big Mind (in a human life), awareness functions in a deepening transdual way. We see that Existence is a seamless fluid whole, with no "I" to be found anywhere except as the whole.

At the same time, this particular Big Mind is obviously functionally centered on a particular human self. It receives sensory inputs through it and operates in the world of phenomena through and as it.

There is a sense of the seamless whole of Existence, experienced locally through a particular human self. And this appears to be the same whenever God awakens to itself as Big Mind through a human life.

There is a sense of the seamless whole, experienced anew through each awakening.

There is the One, experienced through the many.

This is what I in previous postings have called the small, local or drop Big Mind.

Ocean Big Mind

Beyond this is the Big, nonlocal or Ocean Big Mind, that which includes all of Existence. That which is centered nowhere and everywhere, including functionally at each living being.

This is the true One, beyond and including all the many local Big Minds.

Richness

Of course, this is just another way for Existence to experience itself in its richness. It may, or may not (I don't know) have full awareness at the ocean level. In any case, the richness comes through experiencing itself as local Big Minds, functionally centered on a multitude of sentient beings, and awakened to itself to various degrees.

One & Beyond

So when Existence awakens to itself as the small, local drop Big Mind, it may sometimes be helpful to remind Existence (by talking with its human self emissary) that although this is "it" in the sense of no separation and transdual view, there is still something beyond this. The drop view is not the same as the ocean view.

At the same time, there may be no hurry in moving beyond this. Maybe it happens automatically when the small self dies? I don't know. Existence obviously wants some forms of separation to experience itself more fully.

Bodhisattvas

I am also reminded of how bodhisattvas are described in Buddhism: as those who voluntarily and consciously maintain the last veils of delusion in order to continue to be reborn to help sentient beings. Maybe these veils are the ones holding back from an awakening as Ocean Big Mind, the thin veils separating drop from ocean Big Mind.