Spiritual Autonomy

The essence of spiritual autonomy is pure consciousness. We can test whether pure consciousness is becoming reactive through seeing our response to others. Do they ruffle our feathers? 🙂

The Buddha’s advice of free inquiry warns against blind faith, dogma and the trap of relying on external authorities. We shift from second-hand information – which is belief – to first-hand realisation that we are pure cognisance.

Believing others creates a fragile mental structure built on borrowed concepts. A belief is just an opinion we hold until it is personally verified.

Dogma closes the mind and prevents genuine, direct exploration. Relying on a guru or teacher can create an artificial gap between us and the truth.

Testing the Buddha’s advice turns spirituality into an empirical experiment, with our laboratory being to treat our own mind, senses and awareness as the testing ground.

Investigating reality is observing our thoughts and emotions directly
to see whether they are permanent or impermanent.