ISE Inquiries

In the ISE Inquiries series, beloved teacher Diane Musho Hamilton explores the inner contours of the Unique Self, especially as it relates to issues of human suffering, compassion, and enlightened activism.

Diane is Genpo Roshi’s first successor in the Big Mind Process lineage, as well as a dharma holder in traditional Zen. She is also a trained mediator. Diane has taught at Integral Institute’s Integral Life Practice Level 1 and Level 2 seminars, and has conducted her own Integral Zen Seminar.

Unique Self, Compassionate Action 

"When we talk about Integral Spirituality, [we're not just talking about] our interior experience. It's got to actually translate into the world—it's got to translate in the way we walk and talk in the world, it's got to translate in the way we create community, it's got to translate in the way we create systems of government and systems of caring, and its got to translate in the way we reach beyond ourselves—into the Bodhisattva's Vow, the commitment to do whatever we can to alleviate suffering for all sentient beings." - Marc Gafni

No Self vs. Unique Self

Is there an equivalent to the Unique Self in Buddhism? Diane explores the concept of Unique Self in a Zen Buddhist context, which maintains that the closer we get to identifying something called "self," the more transient and impermanent that identity becomes. Much of Zen practice has to do with cleansing our illusions of a separate self—there is no fixed reference point upon which we can hang our hat, but instead a vast empty expanse in which interior and exterior phenomena simply arise, linger for a moment, and fade away. So how compatible are the notions of "No Self" and "Unique Self?" Watch and find out!

The Unique Shadow

"Unique Shadow" is a new concept in Integral evolutionary spirituality, and is currently being developed by Marc Gafni and Diane Musho Hamilton. Just as there is no light without the dark, and no darkness without the light, in the very same way there is no Unique Self without a Unique Shadow—which simply means those aspects of our experience, our manifestation, and our full embodiment in the world that have not yet been actualized. In other words, our Unique Shadow refers to those dark avenues of life that have yet to be lived, and by tracing our Unique Shadow back to its timeless source, we are led directly into the heart of this and every moment.

What About Suffering?

The observation that suffering is a defining texture of the human condition has long been a cornerstone of all the major spiritual traditions, prompting many to believe that taking up a spiritual practice will somehow alleviate suffering in our lives and in the world. Which it will—though maybe not in the way some might imagine. Tasting the infinite Absolute at the core of this and every moment, the world is seen just as it is: radiant, perfect, and whole—even where it is dark, flawed, and broken. But our experience of the relative world does not simply vanish in a puff of existential idealism—both the pains AND the pleasures of our daily lives are intensified, often to an unimaginable degree. Ken Wilber has used a phrase that perfectly conveys our relationship to suffering from the perspective of spiritual practice: "hurts more, bothers you less," which means that the more we free ourselves from attachment to either joy or suffering, the more we can contain and fully experience our joy and our suffering—that is, we no longer find ourselves in pleasure or pain, but rather find pleasure and pain IN ourselves, as we see that we are infinitely bigger than the vicissitudes of this or any other moment.

Unique Self and Activism

"There is no spirituality without activism." -Diane Musho Hamilton

At a certain point in any spiritual journey, the fruit of our realization ripens on the vine and drops effortlessly back to the ground, seeding future generations with whatever degree of love, clarity, and vision we've been able to glean in our own lifetimes. In many ways this can be seen as the pinnacle of spiritual development, the most sacred stage of our mystical maturity—reflected in Buddhism as the Tenth Ox-Herding picture or the Bodhisattva's Vow, and in Christianity as the Sacred Heart of Christ that is exercised as selfless devotion to the poor, the powerless, and the disadvantaged. After all, what good is your own realization if it doesn't help make the world a better place? How enlightened can you be if you can't express spontaneous kindness to a stranger at a gas station? If your spiritual practice does not directly translate to more love, more bliss, and more freedom in the world, does it really amount to anything more than self-absorption or inert navel-gazing? What good is Big Mind or Big Heart, if you don't also have Big Hands to carry your divinity back into the world?