Don’t Be Blind to the Need for a Vision Quest
Truth is poison to the ego. Therefore, an egocentric culture does away with authentic rites of passage, misunderstands the hero’s journey and suppresses the need for vision quests. Wisdom schools are either mocked, destroyed, or corrupted. The only option lies in turning within and passing through voluntary ego death.
Related Teachings
How to Drop Guilt and Self-Defeating Narratives
In this satsang Q&A, Shunyamurti explains why life feels increasingly surreal as the subconscious and superconscious bleed into the conscious mind, and how this flood of symbolic information is preparing us for an accelerated shift in the dream field. He explores the mystery of suffering, showing that only the one Self truly experiences it and that intense karma is often a rite of passage into full surrender to God.
You Cannot Avoid the Ultimate Rite of Passage
Traditional societies all provided sacred rites of passage for every member, to ensure that all became mature, responsible, brave, noble, and wise adults who could sustain the values of their culture and adapt them to changing circumstances. Our current social system not only does not offer such rites of passage, but indoctrinates children to not want to become adults in the true sense. However, karma always brings a return of the repressed. Somehow, sooner or later, we all must face situations that require ego death. It is wise to go through that sacred passage voluntarily, and with proper guidance. That is the value of an ashram.
The Sacred Hopelessness of the Lovers of God
The appearance of hopeless situations is a necessary part of the sacred rite of passage from mortality and pain to eternal life in the blissful light of Total Presence. What is hopeless is only the illusory ego, which is destined to disappear.
Be Neither a Slave Nor a Master
Symbolically, the act of crossing the parted Red Sea in the Bible signified entering a different kind of time, a different state of consciousness, a liminal state leading to freedom from all the limitations of the ego identity. It is an error of the soul to choose mastery over others as the goal of life, rather than offering one's life to the service of God.
Your Ego is Deceiving You!
The ego is a program installed in your mind during infancy. It is an artificial intelligence designed to keep you subservient to the family system and later the social system. This elementary form of mind control forms the barrier between the confused soul and the infinite intelligence of Pure Spirit. Every soul must undergo a rite of passage to internal freedom in order to discover its Real Self.
The Framed Life is Not Worth Living
Living in a given frame of reference may provide a sense of security, but it becomes a stultifying limitation to one’s creativity. The real rite of passage is breaking free of all frames.