生命是自我淨化的火
你為什麼做你所做的？你為什麼要做任何的事情？這是為了經驗你沒有經驗到的自我的部分;點燃你的存在每個未被點燃的角落。當自我覺醒時，對經驗的尋求就停止，因為你不再需要經驗來感覺自己的完整性。因此生命是喚醒自身全部的存在感。
然而，我們懼怕生命的自由。我們害怕生命會讓我們經驗自己不想要的深度。這是什麼，不過是「經驗」我們所害怕的？這是什麼，不過是害怕「經驗」最終的背叛、最終的損失、最終的悲痛、最終的悲傷、最終的任何事情？如果你去到自己最終的盡頭，你會沒有擴展嗎？
人們著迷於他們想經驗的，以及他們不想經驗的;不斷尋求一種類型的經驗，而避免其他的經驗。這是我們對於想傳遞一切的生命的無止盡的控制慾。這對於內在事實不斷的塑造和再塑造是恐懼「生命的一切」。生命是整體性的，自我是整體性的，當你停止控制和塑造、追求和逃避，你讓那個整體性流過你。感覺那份整體性就是生命的全部意義。為了打破每個限制的錯覺，經驗你所是的一切的自由，就是生命的豐富試圖在我們內在打開的。
當你害怕生命時，你只是害怕淨化的火。你擔心你房子的邊緣將被燒毀，而它們會如此。這只是看你需要多少時間讓你超越對於每份經驗的恐懼的問題。為什麼害怕任何經驗的極端？如果連最強烈和急遽的痛苦，都被經驗為崇高的喜悅狀態，那麼你就成為了你所要成為的真正自由存在。在被攻擊時、如果喜悅能夠發生，那麼你就學會了轉化的藝術。你收縮之處，就是生命等待燒掉你的恐懼之處。如果你讓恐懼燃燒掉，負面性就會被化解。當沒有負面性留在你內在，那麼你就被淨化了。你讓生命對你顯示了自己的自由。
如果你還沒有意識到你更廣泛的客觀自我，你不能從氣量小的自我利益得到自由；你不能從都針對個人經驗的狹隘議程得到自由。你會保持被關在自我迷戀的監獄中。甚至對於開悟的追求都是對於想如何經驗自我的著迷。未覺醒的人追尋淺薄的短暫快樂作為經驗自己的方式。而覺醒的人享受自己純粹本性的崇高美。一個是短暫的，一個是永恆的，一種是基於夢的，另一種是基於現實的。因此，即使是對於覺醒的人，如果我們是來自於自我的意圖，那以特定的方式經驗自己的執著仍然是個監獄。
從更高的角度來看，偏好一種經驗，勝過另一種經驗，是束縛的一種形式。佛陀談到慾望是痛苦的根源。偏好、慾望、憧憬、嚮往、追求都有根在同一棵痛苦的樹。不斷努力去達成就是痛苦的形式，沒有達成是痛苦，在達成後害怕失去也是痛苦。如果我們能維持空和允許的基本狀態，那麼所有的經驗就會像風一樣自由的吹過我們。在我們的覺醒之中，當我們看到自己沒有因為任何經驗變得更多或更少時，我們就可以自由的去經驗任何的事物。
總之，我們的活動都集中在創造經驗來喚醒自我。然而，我們害怕允許生命就是給予我們任何形式的經驗。我們害怕生命的自由，所以我們執著於控制和我們的喜好。甚至當覺醒的人執著於經驗特定的狀態時，都是活在監獄中。主要原則是對於喜好維持自由，與成為空的，允許任何和所有的風吹過。在這樣的允許中，生命就會淨化我們，恐懼就會過去，我們就會回到單純的經驗狀態，而能夠經驗任何事物，或者也不需要去經驗任何事物。
~ Avalon
Life is the Fire of Self Purification
Why do you do what you do? Why do you do anything at all? It is to experience the un-experienced parts of self, to ignite every unlit corner of your being. When self is awakened, then the seeking for experience stops, because you no longer need external experience to feel your internal self. Life is there to awaken a filled out sense of our own being.
We, however, fear the freedom of life. We fear life will make us experience the unwanted depths of ourselves. What is it, but simply ‘experience’ that we fear? What is it, but the fear of undergoing the ultimate betrayal, the ultimate loss, the ultimate grief, the ultimate sorrow, the ultimate anything? If you have gone to the ultimate ends in yourself, have you not expanded?
People are obsessed with what they want to experience and what they don’t want to experience; constantly seeking one type of experience, and avoiding another. It is an endless excursion of control on ‘Life’ that wants to deliver everything. This constant shaping and reshaping of inner reality is fear of the ‘everything of life.’ Life is wholeness, self is wholeness, and when you stop controlling and shaping, seeking and escaping, you let that wholeness tear through you. To feel that wholeness is the whole point of life. To break out of every illusion of limitation, and experience the freedom of all that you are, is what the fullness of life is trying to open up.
When you fear life, you only fear the fire of purification. You fear the edges of your house will get burned down. And they will, it is just a question of how much time is required for you to go beyond every fear of experience. Why fear the extreme of any experience? If even the most intense and pure form of suffering is experienced as an exalted state of bliss, then you have become the truly free being you were meant to be. When in the midst of an attack, joy releases, then you have learned the art of transformation. Everywhere you are contracted, is everywhere that life is waiting to burn the fear out of you. If you let the burning of fear happen, negativity will dissolve. When there is no negativity left in you, then you are purified. You have let life show you back to your own freedom.
If you have not yet awakened to your wider impersonal self, you cannot get free from contracted self-interest. You cannot get free from narrow agendas all aimed at personal experience. You remain locked in the prison of self-obsession. Even the quest for enlightenment can be an obsession with how you want to experience yourself. The unawakened seek shallow transient pleasures as a way to experience the self. The awakened enjoy the sublime beauty of their pure nature. One is transient, one is eternal, one is based on dreams, one is based on reality. So even if the desire to awaken comes from ego intentions, then the fixation on experiencing yourself in a particular way is still a prison.
From a higher perspective, your preference of one type of experience over another is a form of bondage. Buddha spoke of desire as the root of suffering. Preference, desire, longing, yearning, seeking all have roots in the same tree of suffering. The constant effort to attain is a form of suffering, non-attainment is suffering, and the fear of loss after attainment is suffering. If we can maintain a basic state of emptiness and allowing, then all experiences pass through us free like the wind. In our waking, when we see we are not made more or less by any experience, we are thus free to experience everything.
To summarize, our activities are centered on creating experiences to awaken the self. And yet, we fear allowing life to deliver us ‘just’ any kind of experience. We fear the freedom of life, and so we hold onto control and our preferences. Even the awakened live in prison when they are fixated on experiencing a specific state. The main principle is to remain free from preferences and become empty, allowing any and all winds to pass through. In this allowance, life would purify us, fear would pass, and we would return to a simple state of experiencing, able to experience anything, and yet not needing to experience anything either.
~ Avalon