Non Identification

Non-Identification

When one identifies, the Consciousness falls asleep. The vigil is lost; let us comprehend this.

Life is like a film composed of many scenes and frames. In no way is it advisable to identify with any scene, with any frame, with any appearance, because everything passes: persons pass, ideas pass, things pass; the whole world is illusory. Any scene of life, however strong it may be, passes and remains behind in time.

What must interest us is that which is called BEING, the Consciousness. There is the fundamental thing, because the Being does not pass: the Being is the Being…

When we identify with the distinct comedies, dramas, and tragedies of life, it is obvious that we fall into fascination and into the unconsciousness of psychological sleep. There is the motive why we must not identify with any comedy, drama, or tragedy of life, for however grave it may be, it passes. There is a common saying: “There is no evil that lasts a hundred years, nor body that can endure it.” Thus everything is illusory and passing.

In life, one sometimes encounters some difficult problems. It happens at times that one does not find the way out or the solution to the problem, and it becomes enormous, monstrous, gigantic before our mind. Then one succumbs to preoccupations and says, “How shall I do it? What shall I do?” One does not find any escape, and the problem becomes more monstrous, enormous, and gigantic to the measure that one continues thinking about it. But there arrives the day in which, if we face the problem as it is — that is, if we grab the bull by the horns — we see that the problem comes to nothing; it destroys itself by itself; it is of an illusory nature.

But it is indispensable not to identify with any circumstance of life. When we do not identify with this or that problem, when we remain alert, we discover our own psychological defects in the problem.

Normally one sees that problems obey fear; the I of fear keeps problems alive. One fears life, one fears death, what they will say, what they will think, the gossip, the calumny, misery, hunger, nakedness, prison. One fears everything, and because of this, problems become each time more insoluble, stronger.

In an economic problem, what do we fear? Ruin, or that we have to pay a certain debt — because if we do not pay, they put us in prison, etc. In a family problem, what do we fear? Gossip, viperine tongues, scandal, vested interests, etc. But if the I of fear is eliminated, everything vanishes; it becomes nothing.

If one never identifies with any event, problem, or situation, one succeeds in always being alert and vigilant. And it is in that state of alertness that one discovers his psychological defects. A defect discovered must be comprehended and then eliminated. The worst circumstances of life turn out to be the ones that contribute the most to our interior growth. In the most agreeable moments of life, our interior work usually yields less.

When one identifies, one does not identify the defect that is manifesting itself. Normally those defects are projected onto other persons; they seek within us that identification occur, so that we do not identify them — and thus we cannot discover them or eliminate them.

For the esoteric work, it is fundamental to initiate a stage of incessant struggle to not identify with any element, whatever it may be. If a person identifies, for example, with alcohol, he ends up drinking; if he identifies with gluttony, he ends up eating, and so on with each thing that comes.

An identification with an anger puts our Consciousness so deeply asleep that we could last for several days identified, without returning to the psychological work. It is necessary that we struggle at every moment so as not to let ourselves identify.

Why Do We Judge Others?

Now let us study this other aspect that impedes the awakening of the Consciousness. It is necessary to know that we really do not know ourselves, and that all persons in the exterior serve us as a mirror to see ourselves reflected.

If each time someone appears with a defect, we observe ourselves, we see that something is moving in us — that does not want us to observe it. For this reason, it reacts and tries to make us criticize what this or that person is doing, in order to put our Consciousness to sleep so that we do not succeed in discovering it.

At a given moment, what bothers us about someone is something we carry hidden within our psychology, and we do not like to see it outside; for this reason we criticize it.

In other reactions, we can discover that interiorly we have the defect opposite to the one we see externally. For example: if I see someone who is squandering his money, and in my interior I have the miser I, this defect reacts when it sees its opposite in the exterior. Then I feel displeasure.

The key to everything is always to direct the observation to the interior world — to see what we feel, what we think, what we desire, the way we are reacting, the internal chatter that takes place, etc., etc.

While one goes on observing the interior, he makes discoveries and can go on eliminating what he goes on comprehending. But if Identification occurs, the following step will be Criticism. As soon as we identify, we begin to judge the other person; we criticize the defect we have projected onto her. As a result of the foregoing, the Consciousness falls asleep, and the proper Critical Judgment is lost.

Critical Judgment is the capacity that the Consciousness has to comprehend its own defects, but that capacity disappears as soon as one criticizes the other person.

Let us reflect on this: if we do not know ourselves, how can we believe that we know others?

For this reason we judge any appearance or any action we see in others. But we must never identify with appearances, because appearances deceive. We look at a woman doing a certain thing and say: “Ah, that is a prostitute.” “That one is a who-knows-what,” “that other one is an effeminate,” “that one over there is such-and-such a thing,” “that other one who comes there is a thief,” etc.

But who is judging? If we observed the finger that points and the other three fingers that look toward the interior… It is our own I-s that are speaking outside what we have within.

We have to realize that what we are judging in others is a simple appearance. We do not know the psychological reasons that obliged a person to act in a certain form; we simply see an external deed and judge the exterior appearance.

Therefore, the judgment we make is a mistaken judgment, and what happens with that mistaken judgment? That judgment is a calumny, which ends up originating a bad relation between the judged person and oneself. In esotericism, what truly matters is the form in which we are internally related with one another; if I judge someone, I become his enemy.

But let us continue analyzing: when one criticizes a person and calumniates her, what has happened is that he has identified. He has lost the possibility of self-observing and self-judging his defect.

Self-criticism is fundamental. It permits us to see our own defect reflected there, in front of us, in the other person. If we become conscious that we have that defect, we can ask for its death, and there will be elimination of the same.

It is important to initiate a struggle to stop judging others; that fight is going to lead us to that which is called the Awakening of the Consciousness, and it is going to take place on two fronts:

• NON-IDENTIFICATION.

• NOT JUDGING others.

If we begin to combat these two errors, our Consciousness will not fall asleep. And we will recover the Critical Judgment. When one truly recovers the critical judgment, the whole world will serve as a mirror so that we can work upon our own defects. The death-in-motion will yield in an impressive form.

A person loses much time judging others. In the esoteric work, when one judges a Master, for example, the person remains stagnated. If we do not have the capacity to comprehend the acts of persons who are supposedly at our same level of consciousness or at an inferior one, much less can we judge those of Beings who have a superior level of consciousness.

Let us reflect on this:

• We do not know “ourselves.”

• We project our defects onto other persons.

• We judge the external appearances.

• Such actions do not really coincide with the judgment we emit.

• Therefore, we judge the actions of others mistakenly; we calumniate.

• The judgment we emit is, in truth, the very psychological defect that we have projected upon the neighbor.

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In no way is it advisable to identify with any scene, with any frame, with any appearance, because everything passes: persons pass, ideas pass, things pass; the whole world is illusory.