straight path
The Integral Way
The Six Essentials and Three Roots are the integral way our tradition introduces aspirants to the Straight Path: the knowledge of the Holy One through direct experience of the Holy One. Consider how the knowledge of God, as revealed in nearness through the patriarchs, matriarchs, and prophets, evolved into the knowledge of oneness with God through Yeshua. His gospel is the Straight Path. Evidence that he taught and demonstrated the Straight Path to God is everywhere in the gospels: The hour is coming when you will no longer worship on this mountain nor in Jerusalem...[but] in spirit and in truth (John 4:21,23). To hear his heart essence teaching—the entire Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) —dissolves the twoness of every religious situation: Give and pray in secret: Look through enemies into their humanity: Forgive to be forgiven. Yeshua’s radical demand of us is the recognition and realization of our innate oneness with God.
Self-Knowledge
One begins to hear the teachings of the Straight Path through self-knowledge. Yeshua insists on self-knowledge as the Straight Path to salvation when he reminds us that, The Kingdom is within you and it is outside of you. When you know ourselves, then you will be known, and you will understand that you children of the Living Father (Thomas, 3). Only when we know ourselves can we know God. Knowing God is not possible without knowing oneself. Self- knowledge is the knowledge of God. Some might misunderstand this as egotistical or narcissistic; in twoness, it certainly would be. A self that feels separate from others or their environment could not possibly imagine oneness with God. But even if heard at first in twoness, the lucidity of the Straight Path will swiftly correct egotism: One will recognize in any moment of self-grasping, fear, or desire, its cause in twoness. The Straight Path is the way of the Messiah—the Presence of Awareness—whose grace restores us to oneness in any moment we turn.
Experiencing With God
The integral way in the Straight Path is so simple but it requires deep and consistent practice. After we're comfortable in prayer and meditation, the focus inside is on nothing additional or imaginal: just the calm inquiry while praying or abiding that remembers to ask, Who’s praying? Who’s breathing? The answer is simple: God is praying: God is breathing. There is no other. And learning to trust and soak in this simple directness, opens the way to the Straight Path. Even when it's time to shift and focus outside, the focus inside for Straight Path practitioners remains throughout the day: Who’s seeing? Who’s hearing? Who’s speaking, walking, or doing? Again, the answer is simple: God is. There is no other. This focus inside fuses with anything outside. Our every activity that benefits others holds the opportunity to experience with the One: God sees through our eyes, God hears through our ears, and God answers prayers through us. Who we are in ourselves can integrate with who we are in the Holy One. By this Straight Path, we don’t have to wait to someday know God face-to-face. We can start today, where and as we are. We can see, hear, and feel with God. We can even know with God and in God that nothing can separate us from the love of the Holy One in Messiah (Romans 8:39).
Learn More
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5q-qRblV0M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsdewNgvrOI&t=285s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxMU_w_aQD4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsdewNgvrOI&t=558s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tqlfv3QnMFg