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To go beyond the self, beyond even its most intimate union with God, and this is where we enter yet another new life- a life best categorized, perhaps, as a life without a self.

Bernadette Roberts

But coming home that day, walking downhill with a panorama of valley and hills before me, I turned my gaze inward, and what I saw, stopped me in my tracks.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Before Hills Home Self Shop Track Tracks Turn
The onset of this second movement is characterized by the falling away of self and coming upon “that” which remains when it is gone.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Contemplative Fall Gone Life Remain Self
I went on to discover that in its deepest sense, the will is not primarily the faculty of desire for anything known, but rather, the desire for something unknown, animate desire for something that lies beyond ourselves, a longing for something we know is missing in us.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Desire Lying Missing Ourselves Something
In some ways, all our experiences of God are beyond belief, because all conceptual beliefs pale when compared to the experiential reality.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Experience God Reality Way
It can no longer be tested by any force or trial, nor moved by the winds of change, and at this point the self has obviously outworn its function; it is no longer needed or useful, and life can go on without it.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Function Longer Moved Needed Point Tested
When one is perfectly still-mind and body, silent and alone-there is no personality to speak of, thus personality is one’s unique way of expression, it is what others see and know of us, nothing more or deeper than that.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Alone Deeper Expression Nothing Personality Unique
My purpose here is to affirm that the unitive state is a hidden path in itself, a movement in its own right that ultimately leads to no-self (no true-self and no-union). In short, the unitive state is the hidden path to no-self.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Affirm Path Purpose State True Union
When there is no longer a cyclone, there is no longer an eye. So the storms, crises and sufferings of life are a way of finding the eye.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Cyclone Eye Life Longer Storm Suffering
Rather, it is for the hardy who have been tried by fire and have come to rest in a tough, immovable trust in “that” which lies beyond the known, beyond the self, beyond union and even beyond love and trust itself
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Beyond Come Have Immovable Love Rest Tried Union
…a point is reached where the self is so completely aligned with the still-point that it can no longer be moved, even in its first movements, from this center.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Aligned Center Completely Self Trials Wind
To be forgiven is not enough; we must put an end to the very need to be forgiven.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Enough Forgiveness Needs
This search for perfection – which is a search for divinity – is nothing more than the failure to accept our existence the way it is.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Divinity Existence Perfection Way
To go beyond the self, beyond even its most intimate union with God, and this is where we enter yet another new life- a life best categorized, perhaps, as a life without a self.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Another Categorized God Perhaps Union
This is the step beyond our highest experiences of love and union, a step in which self is not around to divide, separate, objectify or claim anything for itself. Self does not know God; it cannot love him, and from the beginning has never done so.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Beyond Claim Experience God Objectivity Union
I can only speculate why so little has been said of this breakthrough; in fact , I may never get over the silence on the part of writers who say nothing about this second movement.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Breakthrough Movement Nothing Second Speculate
But this going-out is an upheaval, a complete turnabout of such proportions it cannot possibly be missed, under-emphasized, or sufficiently stressed as a major landmark in the contemplative life.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Emphasized Landmark Major Possible Proportion Sufficient Under

To go beyond the self, beyond even its most intimate union with God, and this is where we enter yet another new life- a life best categorized, perhaps, as a life without a self.

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To go beyond the self, beyond even its most intimate union with God, and this is where we enter yet another new life- a life best categorized, perhaps, as a life without a self.

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Popular Authors

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