As spiritual practitioners, we can be slaves to the concepts we hold, just as regular folks are in their lives.
For example, if we believe (in the concept) that we need to detach from things/objects, because that detachment is the way to freedom, then we will also come to believe (in the concept) that things are bad, and should be shunned.
Just sticking with this example, in our relationship to things, what if I offered to you, the crazy notion, that things are holy!
“How can that be!”, you might think.
Stay with me on this one.
Say there is a garbage bin in the corner of your room. How the heck can that garbage bin, collecting your filth and waste matter, be holy!
Let us inquire into this diligently.
You clearly are seeing the garbage bin. And where does that seeing occur?
“Inside myself” you might say, “through my eyes”.
Ok, without that seeing, which is happening inside you, would you know of a garbage bin out there in the world separated from you? No, you cannot! The experience of the garbage bin is happening inside you.
Take another step closer.
What knows of the seeing of the garbage bin? Simple! You are just aware of the seeing.
And where does that awareness of seeing happen?
You pause, and notice that you can’t point your mind back to that awareness, but yet, you are aware of being aware.
Your awareness of being aware, in turn, is not separable from your awareness of seeing, and that, awareness of seeing is all you truly know of that garbage bin. And this is intimately close to you, and in fact, inseparable from the real you, which is the awareness that is aware of itself.
Isn’t that the experience of love? The complete lack of separation, the complete absence of distance.
The ordinary experience of the garbage bin is, in fact, an experience of love of your true nature.
And love, that is true nature, is sacred. Being as it is, One, without a second, unchanging.
In effect, the experience of the garbage bin, normally dismissed as an ordinary thing is, in fact, holy, sacred.
In turn, the experience of the world of things, is in fact wholly holy!
How to experience the world of things in this sacred, holy manner?
When we are mindful, which is to say, when we are more fully aware of all experiences, which is to say, when we rise to interact with the world from the awareness of True Self, then we begin to see the holiness of things!
“The face of God is upon everything.” This is a Sufi expression, of the experience of the world of things, for one who is fully awake*. Holiness. Everywhere. In Everything.
Love
Sundar.
* Awaken to your real nature now. Explore your real nature, and experience Enlightenment. The book, “Awaken: An Experiential Exploration of Enlightenment” offers a guided Self-Inquiry into the essence of existence.