Pathway 2: Establishing Right Relationship – Principles, Practice and Law

All aspects of life are part of a web of relationship.  Each part is connected to another part.  Nothing exists as an island.  Human beings are only just beginning to realise how literal a truth that is, as we grapple to understand and reverse the destructive impact of our actions upon the earth and each other.  The spiritual journey asks us to become systems thinkers, aware not just of ourselves, but of the ‘group’.

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As our consciousness grows, our decisions and actions occur within an expanded awareness of what constitutes the ‘group’: from family and friends, to community, to region, to all of life on earth including the mineral, vegetable, animal and human kingdoms and to those universal and cosmic orders of life beyond our planet.

The Challenge of Relationship

The spiritual journey is a group journey and has at its basis the principal of oneness.  This principle is often lost in the struggle to differentiate our selves from others, so that the process of individuation can unfold.  Consciousness requires contrast, but ultimately it must be shaped not just by what divides us, but also by what binds us.  This brings us face to face with the many aspects of paradox that are part of the spiritual path: we must be strong separate individuals in order to enter into strong healthy relationships; we must enter into the world with its many conflicts and dualities, in order to becomes one with Life, no longer torn by the conflict of the pairs of opposites.  The challenge is to enter into the part, without losing the whole; to be both a strong individual and a committed contributor to the group, both at the same time.

Ultimately, towards the end of the human journey, that capacity for synthesis becomes the platform or point of departure for a new stage of life, where at last, our realisation of the essential oneness of all life is complete.  Here is the true source of strength, love and wisdom.  Within this relationship, no part within the whole and no whole within the part is lost.