Copartner

…. this is the principle: To deem oneself exalted is to claim copartnership with God. As long as you have not died and become living through Him, you are a rebel seeking a realm for your copartnership. 
– Rumi, Mathnawi IV 2763-67. [In Chittick’s The Sufi Path of Love, p. 183] 

This pointer is the homework for our CSS group this week, and also the section of the reading that most speaks to what is going on for me these days. 

I recognize this here and now. “All” is recognized as God, awakeness, form with no substance. And yet, there is also a sense of a separate I here as a doer and observer. Sometimes, it is taken as more real and substantial. And when attention is brought to it, it is recognized as the same as everything else: Content of awareness. Awakeness itself. Form with no substance. 

Taking this separate I gestalt as real is to set it up as a copartner with God, and when it is taken as real it is identified with and taken as what I am, so “I” then appear as a copartner with God. Since it is a lie, it is a precarious situation, and it generates friction which invites attention and questions, which in turn may allow this to be recognized as it happens. (Friction between “my will” – stories of shoulds, and “God’s will” – stories of what is.) 

When there is this copartnership, there may be a sense of being one with God, a separate I (as doer and/or observer) one with God. And when the separate I gestalts are recognized as they happen, there may be a shift into oneness, God as all including any gestalts temporarily appearing. 

…………………..

Initial outline…

• rumi
  • co-partner w. god
    • when notice “all” as god + still a sense of separate I (doer, observer)
      • one with=a separate I one with God (mistake), and oneness = only God
    • notice the dynamics behind it + is it possible? what do I find when I look? 
    • practice: notice + notice the me+I gestalt as they are, happening w/in content of experience as anything else, no “I” inherent there