Relationships with the ultimate, and inflation
In terms of avoiding or minimizing inflation, it is safer to actively explore the 2nd, 3rd, and zero person relationships with Big Mind (see previous post), and then just allow the 1st person relation to come and go on its own.
Inflation inherent in a sense of a separate self
Although even here, as long as there is a sense of a separate self, there will be some inflation, and it is good to notice it and take it for what it is.
There is a sense that I, as a separate self, have a relationship with God, understand something about God, or am someone who has glimpses of the ground of all existence. So I am special, different, am in a special relationship with God or existence, and so on. All of this is inflation. We take something that is inherently neutral, place a value on it, and take it as happening to a separate self.
It is inevitable, and happens all the time anyway.
There is a sense of a separate self, and with it comes an automatic sense of superiority and inferiority, richly diverse and with many different flavors. This form of inflation is just one of those, although it can be an especially nasty one, and annoying to those around, if left unchecked.
So what can we do?
Working with inflation
Again, we can work with it from the form and the emptiness sides.
From the form side, one way is notice and work with projections, and especially shadow projections.
From the emptiness side, I can find myself as headless and see that all of this is (apparently) happening to an individual who is inherently free from a separate self, and more precisely that it is really happening as awake emptiness and form, inherently absent of a separate I.
In both cases, we come to see that it is all inherently neutral, and only takes on significance, meaning, and a sense of importance, through our stories about it, and through believing in those stories.
Labels: 1st-2nd-3rd person, inflation, practice, projections, shadow