The Eternal Perfection Of The True Self
(This is an excerpt from a University Of Metaphysical Sciences course at www.umsonline.org,
please feel free to visit the school website)
In Start Where You Are: A Guide To Compassionate Living (1994), Pema Chodron reminds us that the true Self is always perfect, and at the deepest level, there is nothing that we need to change about ourselves in order to awaken. The true Self is always awake. Chodron uses the metaphor of the true Self being the sun and all our addictions, fears, and identities being the clouds that pass by. Some clouds may be light and fluffy while others are darker and heavier. The sun may be blocked temporarily by these clouds so that we do not recognize the true Self, but the true Self is all the while unchanged. In the words of Pema Chodron, “…all the time our warmth and brilliance are right here. This is who we really are. We are one blink of an eye away from being fully awake.” (3)
There is a reassurance in contemplating the perfection of the true Self. Even if we do not view our egos, bodies, or the world in which we live as being perfect in our minds, there is an eternal perfection that is being expressed through each part of life. Swami Muktananda states, “The only one dwelling in this entire world is God.” Once one becomes tuned into the perfection of the Divine, there is a grounded peace that emerges. It has sometimes been likened to finally letting go after trying so desperately to cling to rocks in a river. Once we let go of our old perceptions of the way we think life to be and come into oneness with the Divine, we are amazed at the river we are a part of. We realize it was only an illusion that we were separate from this river of Life and that we had to protect ourselves from being swept away; for in being swept “away,” we are only swept into the Divine, our true Self.