The Path to Non-separation Key Terms
Equation
Equations are the meditational practices or contemplative instructions of The Path to Non-separation. They are composed of a series of elements, circumscriptions, operations, and superscriptions that function around and between elements to activate experiential existentials and operands. On the surface, equations are the linguistic representation of an identity structure. Under the surface, they are embodied revelations of how identity structures interact with one another to solidify your lived experience of emergent operands. See them as a row of elements and elementals that initiate psychological mechanical action processes that bring to life existentials and operands.
Personal
The Personal constitutes the first ten equations of The Path to Non-separation. When engaging the equations of personal experience, your goals are to first develop a complex ego, then to transcend it by locating the peripheral movement of awareness and the act of observing ego from a distance.
When embedded in personal experience you are living the egoic attachment to a Body-Mind that is an isolated and singular I or me. The body and mind feel separated from the external world. In more advanced personal stages, there is no distance from the me even when there is distance from the egoic stories that comprise the me.
Impersonal
The Impersonal constitutes equations eleven through twenty of The Path to Non-separation. The goals of mastering the impersonal include challenging your experience of being fully defined by your personal attachments, changing your dominant narrative so that identity stories are placed into a non-attached context, and learning how to live your life as non-autonomous ego action.
Living impersonally is the ability to register all personal experience as “not me” by locating the psychological space that exists outside of a contracted personal boundary. Experiencing events in a post-personal manner is to be unattached from personal identity stories that elucidate the ego. In the final stage of impersonal experience, you are able to transition from doing the living to being lived.
Transpersonal
The Transpersonal constitutes equations twenty-one through thirty of The Path to Non-separation. The ultimate goals of the transpersonal are the realization of the unity of source and evolution, awakening to a condition beyond a separate self, and coming to terms with a life aligned with the action and being of Non-separation.
Transpersonal experience ranges from your discovery of psychological space beyond impersonal boundaries and feeling the world inside of you to the fusion of all internal and external objects into a totality without a separate self and the egoic return to the world where you are lived as a spontaneous action of awakening.
Non-separation
Non-separation is post-awakening life in the world. It is the act of being lived as the experience of transparently fused identity structures (i.e. the fusion of source and evolution at one with ego fused with source.) As Non-separation, all egoic behaviors are generated as non-autonomous actions spontaneously aligned with the realization of awakening (i.e. existence.) The results of a Non-separative life are called Applied Awakening.
Circumscription
Most of The Path to Non-separation equations begin with a set of brackets that represents what’s called a circumscription. Circumscriptions are the encircling outer edge of an identity structure, both equationally and experientially. They are mental contractions away from the totality that manifest the condition for a separate self to arise. A separative identity structure cannot exist without the boundary lines of a circumscription. Elements with their descriptive elementals function within circumscriptions to create operands.
There are three types of circumscriptions; singular, paired, and partnered. Respectively, they represent one, two, and three circumscriptions in a single equation. When you encounter one or two singular circumscriptions inside of an original circumscription they are treated as sub-contractions within the initial contraction from the totality. When you see circumscriptions in an equation, you know that you are experiencing an identity structure still steeped in separation.
Situation
Situation is your inherited condition of having or being a Body-Mind. It is the baseline occurrence represented by the foundational element (i.e. Body-Mind: BM) in the opening equations of The Path to Non-separation. This original situation of Body-Mind is engulfed and sustained throughout the continuum of equational practices, eventually transparently blending into the background as awakening and re-emerging as the underpinning of the lived existence of Non-separation.
Attention
Attention is the position and directionality of awareness. It has varying degrees and modes with specific areas of focus. In The Path to Non-separation, attention can be directed toward non-attention, Body-Mind, or attention itself (i.e. presence). Attention on a life of non-attention is the origin of the embodiment of a complex ego. Attention on the Body-Mind is the first experience of being aware in the world. Attention on attention is presence, which is the experience of being identified with what is called the “third-object” (i.e. the third mode of attention), a precursor to the witness.
In early personal stages, attention is the unrealized experience of witnessing and observing. In later personal stages, presence is recognized as the witnessing attention of observing all internal and external objects from a distance.
Operation
There are eleven operations you practice in The Path to Non-separation. Operations are psychological mechanical action processes performed between elements with their descriptive elementals to garner the felt experience of an identity structure. As parts of step-wise meditational practices, they inform you how to maneuver mental objects that build more expansive identities as you apply the practice’s elemental movements. As you move from left to right addressing each elemental in an equation, you will arrive at an operation or operations to enact that create experiential existentials and first- and second-order operands.
Superscription
There are eleven superscriptions you practice in The Path to Non-separation. Superscriptions are psychological actions performed on individual elements rather than between elements. They are also known as “descriptive elementals.” Superscriptions are supplemental in nature, adding definition to their equational element. As elementals, they are the means to achieve specific existentials and are a part of all operands until the latter stages of transpersonal experience are reached. Superscriptions usually occur in tandem and can have operations occur between them.
Injunction
Injunctions are notational prefixes to equations that inform you of how many blocks, existentials, and operands are in an equational practice. They numerically label the psychological experiments you are performing to help you track where you are in the sequence-position of an equation. As you approach new elementals in an equational practice, the injunction numbers change to keep you properly oriented in regards to which existential or operand you are enacting.
Elemental
Every equation is composed of elements and elementals. An elemental is any individual notational character within an equation (with the exception of identity structures which are found as two-letter abbreviations within the equations and are instead called elements.) Elementals include the notational symbols for attention, circumscription, and superscription. From left to right in an equation, each additional elemental represents a new practice for you to experience as an emergent, more advanced, existential on the path to mastering first-order operands.
Element
There are thirty-one elements in The Path to Non-separation, starting with a personal Body-Mind (BM) and ending with the transpersonal experience of Non-separation (NS). An element is symbolized by a two-letter abbreviation within every equation taken from the name of the identity structure. A list of these abbreviations can be found in Preliminary 5: Equational Progression.
Early stage elements live within more advanced elements as the unseen underlying matrix of the foreground experience of an operand. This directional progression is referred to as “engulf and sustain.” Experientially, elements symbolize first-order operands of one-block equations or second-order operands of two-block equations. You will experience elements as identity structures.
Block
A block is an extracted section of an equation that, when practiced, induces a first- or second-order operand. There are one or two blocks in each equation that come in two different types. The first is an equational-block which is a block found in the foundational equation. The second is an operand-block which is the experiential result of practicing an equational-block. For equations with two blocks, you will illuminate the blocks by locating the full sequence of elements and elementals to left and right of the central operation.
For equations with one block, there is one operation that leads to the experience of a first-order operand (which is an identity structure.) For equations with two blocks, each distinct block has zero or one operation that forms the experiences of first-order operands. These first-order operands (operand-blocks) utilize the central operation to create a second-order operand (which is an identity structure.)
Central Operation
The central operation is the action you perform between two elements in a one-block equation or the final action performed between two first-order operand-blocks in a two-block equation. In equations with two blocks, the central operation is the point of division that creates left and right sides of the equation. These sections found on the left and right sides of the central operation are called equation-blocks. The central operation always results in the experience of an identity structure. There is a central operation in all but two equations.
Existential
Existentials are the felt experiences induced by your practice of a partial equation. They cannot be fully described by the equation itself as they are beyond linguistic contemplation and are always meta-equational experiences. Said another way, the equational notation must become first-hand experience to be called an existential. The addition of an elemental to a meditative practice manifests a new existential experience. Existentials are sub-experiences that accumulate to create first-order operands.
Operand
Operands are the experiential outcome when you master the practice of a block or a full equation. There are two types of operands called first-order and second-order. First-order operands are the summation of all existential experiences in a block. Second-order operands are the experience of two first-order operands enacting a central operation. First-order operands are identity structures in one-block equations and are partial experiences of a second-order operand in two-block equations. Second-order operands are always the felt experience of an identity structure.
Identity Structure
There are thirty identity structures in The Path to Non-separation. Identity structures are the internal and external experiences that result from a mastered equation. They are the conglomerate experiences of existentials or operands. Identity structures are resting places you feel as whole identities from which you can engage the world (excepting a couple of the latter stages.) Identity structures are called elements within equations. The final operand of each equation (first- or second-order) is the lived experience of an identity structure.
Micro-jump
A micro-jump is the identity shift you undergo as you leave a less advanced identity structure for one that has greater depth. It’s a leap into a novel subjective experience. To enact a micro-jump, you must embody a new subject that has the ability to see the past identity structure as an object. In The Path to Non-separation, you complete a series of thirty micro-jumps that terminates in awakening and an egoic return to the world surrendered to this awakening.
Third-Object
The third-object is the presence discovered when attention is placed on attention. It is a background presence that is aware of awareness. The third-object is named after the third mode of attention, a mode that comes after identity structures that enact attention on non-attention and attention on Body-Mind. The awareness of the third-object is a precursor to the witness. This awareness moves you to wider and wider perspectives until the boundary of awareness is found, a discovery that triggers micro-jumps to deeper transpersonal identities. Including the third object in the ego’s structure transforms a standard ego into a complex ego.
View
Viewing is another name for observing. It is the perspective you gain when identified with the movement portion of the witness’s observing of internal and external objects. It is important to remember that viewing is more than mere sight. Viewing is the post-sensory observation of thoughts, feelings, emotions, senses, and the external world. It turns all experiences inside of the witness into objects. Viewing is the receptiveness of the witness while encountering all that is arising “in front of” or “in” it. The ability to view begins with personal presence on attention (perception-viewing) and continues into transpersonal identity structures (observation-viewing and observation with holding).
Regard
Regarding is the view gained by the third-object when attention is on attention and Body-Mind. It is known as perspective-viewing rather than observation-viewing to differentiate the experiences of regarding and observing. Regarding is viewing from the inside out rather than the outside in (i.e. observing) due to the third-object interpreting itself as located deep inside of the Body-Mind, attention, and non-attention rather than outside of and at a distance from them.
Inquiry
Inquiry is the act of living as a question. To live as a question is to be embedded in continuous inquiry directed at the totality of personal or impersonal experience. The initial experience of Inquiry places you in a position outside of all that is personal. The second round of Inquiry puts you in a position to question all that is impersonal. The third level of inquiry provides a rudimentary understanding of the world living inside of you. Inquiry always offers an invitation to the third-object to replace it as the seat of identity, which is the formative action performed to discover the witness.
Complex Ego
Complex ego is an ego structure that includes the third-object. A standard ego is the normative two-component ego composed of statement and narrative (i.e. story and context). You will experience a complex ego when you connect as vectors the perception-viewing of the third-object and the two standard ego components. Three personal identity structures combine in a parallel fashion to reveal the complex ego. Complex ego is another name for the Personal Ego identity structure in The Path to Non-separation.
Vector
A vector is a stream of experience that occurs in mental space in parallel with one or more streams of experience (also vectors). When a vector arises, you experience it as a boundaried flow of content that can be tracked alongside other vectors. There can be two or three vectors represented in the notation of a single equation. Vectors are primarily identified with the “&” operation but can also be experienced in the basic activity between first-order operands.