why we can never become one with the divine

Vic Shayne
author
The Self is a Belief: the idea that causes suffering

What does it mean when people say that we can become one with, or meld into, the divine? This is an intellectual idea borne of a lack of realization of what we are behind this facade of the ego, body, memories, and ideas. If a spiritual teacher talks about melding with the divine it’s time to find another guru — someone who actually has found what lies beyond all that most people believe is real.

Don’t trust what I am saying here, because who you are is for you to find out, not for someone, including me, to tell you. You are best served if you take my words to heart and test them. But you have to test them without the overlay of your egoic self, ideas, memories, assumptions, judgment, or knowledge, because these are the root of all our problems. Test what is written here fully to find the truth. Just observe the way things are, the way you think, act, and how thoughts are formed. See what lies beyond the sense of self. It may take many years, but you can do it if you are so inclined.

What we see when we look in the mirror or at others is a shell, an appearance. And when you consider who you are, beyond the body and image of a “me,” you discover that you are created out of layers of ideas. The person you take yourself to be is an accretion of thoughts. So you just keep observing it and each time your “eyes” adjust to a deeper level you go even deeper, and then deeper again. And again. Eventually there is nothing left of the self that you believed you were. And then what do you find?

If you have never done this then you cannot relate to what I am saying here. That’s okay. If you want to find out what it is like — if it is possible — to meld with the divine, then you have to go through these steps. At the end of the line, I have found that there is no more self, because it has evaporated completely and you find something quite remarkable: You cannot meld with the divine, because there is no more “you” that exists. Without a “you” there is no doer, and therefore no melder. You have never existed. Yet something still does exist. What is it? Who are you really, then?

Beyond the self, ideas, the body, the memories, the vast knowledge of the ages, the most powerful of experiences, and the feelings in your heart is a wave of reality. It is indistinguishable from its environs because there are no distinguishable environs. What is this totality of complexity and dynamism where all is no more than a singular movement? It is the divine, or consciousness, and because you cease to be then you find you are It. Have you melded into it? No. You have not melded, you have simply shed all of the layers that were not It. And you realize that without these layers you are It.

beyond the divine, beyond consciousness
If you go even deeper you will discover that there is not even the divine, because even consciousness gives way to a fundamental, ineffable nothingness that is without structure or name. This is the space that holds all that is, including the divine, God, gods, consciousness, language, myth, ego, thought, movement, life, and all else that can be named or described. This space never moves, never lives, never dies, and never changes. It is beyond all that we can describe or experience. It is the irreducible reality out of which everything springs into beingness. It is up to you alone to find out if you are this.