This glossary offers meanings for key words as used in this book to provide a consistent, comprehensive language with which to understand imperience and the heart of consciousness. Because words can be used in many ways, endless confusion is possible—and this is magnified when the topic is subtle and intuitive. We need language to convey meaning and describe divinity, but even among religious traditions and contemporary spiritual authors, the same words are used in different ways. No matter how we parse the language, however, absolute truth doesn’t vary.
My concern with how we speak of this topic is less about getting the words right than getting the deeper meaning to which they point right. Words will not liberate the mind, but accurate understanding can be extremely helpful.
Absolute. Divine consciousness, God, nirvana, nondual oneness, Christ consciousness, Bodhicitta, unconditioned realm, the ground of all being. Absolute reality embraces the totality of relative reality and all that is. Absolute truth is true no matter what views, unknowns, opinions, theories, dogma, or words we use to talk about it.
Awakening. The process of enlightening personal consciousness by dispelling that which obscures the light of divine consciousness. Awakening conscious awareness empowers love, compassion, intuitive insight, and the ability to imperience the absolute (sometimes called the awakened state). In the relative world, we awaken from unconsciousness (sleep or delusion) to worldly (mundane) consciousness. In spiritual awakening, we awaken from worldly consciousness to supra-mundane consciousness, beyond the ordinary or relative view.
Awareness. The function of consciousness. Awareness lights up the field of knowing. With it, we are able to know sense phenomena as we perceive them; without it, we are not. Awareness is not the same as mindfulness, which is a factor of the mental life and always has an object. Awareness awakens directly from consciousness and lights up everything, including mindfulness, but it has no particular object itself.
Birth. The advent of a conscious being taking new form. In broader perspective, birth is the process of becoming refreshed and reformed, a continuation of life that follows the death of a being when its previous form can no longer sustain its life.
Compassion. The quality of consciousness willing to embrace all beings and conditions— particularly the most painful and difficult—with an open heart. Compassion is one of the most morally wholesome qualities available to human beings. Like love, the heart of compassion connects us directly with divine consciousness.
Concentration. The state of mind that is collected and focused, neither blurry nor dispersed. Concentration enables clear perception of rapidly changing objects on a moment-to-moment basis. With a singular, unchanging object, deep concentration can lead to exalted states of mental absorption, detached stillness, and cessation of thought. Concentration is a morally neutral mental factor that can be associated with either good or evil intentions.
Conditioning (mental). The way the mind learns to relate to what it experiences. Mental conditioning is how we recognize, remember, associate, and habituate our behaviors. It accounts for how we function in the world and construct our beliefs. Mental conditioning occurs so rapidly and automatically that we are generally unaware that it is happening. It is a survival tool of the brain because sentient beings need to be able to react in uncertain circumstances. However, we also must come to understand that much of this conditioning develops when we are too immature to make wise choices for ourselves. Conditioned mental habits generally begin with self-interest in mind, which later can hinder awakening conscious awareness. This is why the absolute—the ultimate freedom of mind—is sometimes called the unconditioned realm.
Conscience. The faculty of consciousness that discerns right from wrong, wholesome from unwholesome. The conscience speaks through the authority of divine consciousness as imperienced by personal consciousness. Its primary components are moral shame (knowing when we have acted wrongly) and moral dread (knowing when we intend to act unwholesomely). As the voice of divine consciousness, conscience is not subject to justifications or personal preferences. We have the free will to override our conscience, but doing so unavoidably adds to the suffering of ourselves and others.
Consciousness. On the divine (absolute) level, the nondual ultimate source of everything. On the personal (relative) level, consciousness is the light of awareness through which all perceptions are known, or seen, at the sense doors. It is like the sunlight that enters and illuminates a house. The less cloudy our minds are, the more the light of consciousness will shine in. Our capacity to know consciousness is imperience, since consciousness itself cannot be experienced objectively.
Contemplation. Deeply focused reflective inquiry into the nature of who we are, relatively and absolutely. Even though contemplation is primarily a mental activity, it is valuable in opening our umbilical link to intuitive wisdom and awakening insight into the heart of consciousness.
Death. The process of shedding the material aspect of life, the body, when it can no longer sustain the mind that inhabits it. At that time, the mind dissociates from the current physical form and reassembles itself into a new form of life based on its own conditioning. Death is one of the most important transitional moments of life since birth, and it’s highly advantageous to the continuing, living process to be as consciously aware as we can be. If we do not weigh ourselves down with fear and clinging when our minds need to jump ship, we can embody a far lighter vehicle going forward.
