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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

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
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
Since the moment of self-consciousness comes to a permanent end – and a new journey begins- is such a decisive stroke or milestone in the contemplative life.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Contemplative Journey Life Permanent Self
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
This journey then, is nothing more, yet nothing less than a period of acclimating to a new way of seeing, a time of transition and revelation as it gradually comes upon “that” which remains when there is no self. this is not a journey for those who expect love and bliss.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Bliss Inspirational Life Love New Seeing
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
Spiritual life is like a moving sidewalk. Whether you go with it or spend your whole life running against it, you’re still going to be taken along.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Along Moving Running Spiritual Taken
The truest communication with God is absolute, total silence; there is not a single word in existence that can convey this communication.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Communication Existence God Silence Total
To be forgiven is not enough; we must put an end to the very need to be forgiven.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Enough Forgiveness Needs
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
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
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
Instead of the usual unlocalized centre of myself, there was nothing there, it was empty, and at the moment of seeing this there was a flood of quiet joy and I knew, finally I knew what was missing-it was my “self”.
BERNADETTE ROBERTS

Empty Flood Instead Missing Moment Nothing Seeing
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
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.

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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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