Unexpected Freedom

A Question of IdentityWe remain one with experience – not torn apart by acommitment to an image.Through abiding in the inbetween we discover a subtlekind of personal confidence. It is not ‘my’ confidence, becauseit is a confidence that belongs to reality. The sort ofinvestigation we are talking about, if followed, will undermineany views of ourselves that we hold too tightly. It can take usinto feelings of despair, of hopelessness and of inadequacy. Butit can also take us beyond the limited identities conditioned bythose feelings. The struggle of moving from finding securityin false identities into realisation of limitless abiding beyondpersonality is difficult. It feels like it will cost us everything.There should be no mistake about that. This is why we haveteachers and why we need to attend to their guidance throughthis process of transformation.Identity and PersonalityLast week a young couple who live nearby brought their nineweek-olddaughter to the monastery for a blessing.Observing this small being, there didn’t appear to be anysubstantial sense of a somebody. There wasn’t yet anyaccumulated perception of an individual differentiated fromits parents or the sensory world. Child development theoriststell us that it takes about seven years for such a differentiationto fully take place. This happens to correspond to the age ofthe youngest arahant recorded in the scriptures. Maybe beforeseven years of age, there isn’t enough of a somebody fortransformation of the mistaken identification withpersonality to take place.Learning to abide in awareness beyond limited personalidentity doesn’t mean that we are trying to get rid of ourpersonalities. That the Buddha taught anatta, no-self, doesn’t149