Just Go Up!

Until you reach the unison

This article tracks a long path of my personal growth and spiritual realization!

At birth, we were handed a set of rules including a language, a culture and a national identity. This is the way of seeing the world that feels complete because it is the only condition we know. We learn what is right, what is wrong, who is “us,” who is “them.” The world feels structured and well defined.

We are all born into a layer of the pyramid without knowing the pyramid exists. For a long time, I thought that layer was the whole thing.

Then life expands.

We started learning more knowledge and experiencing new cultures. We found how many different opinions are out there and how much division there is in the world. Companies sabotaging competitors. One industry lobbying against another. Nations threatening nations. Religions arguing with religions. The friction never ends.

Technology accelerates everything. All the news, scandals and conflicts are streaming into your pocket every minute. We begin to believe conflict is the fundamental structure of existence.

The Discovery of the Unison

Seeking a way out, I began reading the classics: Daoism, Marcus Aurelius, Plato, the Bhagavad Gita, the Bible and the Quran.

I expected to find more division, more “different” rules. But instead, I saw something relieving. Despite the huge span of time & distance between those authors, they were all taking different perspectives of the same truth. At the end of the day, they are all talking about Unison.

It’s like an airplane taking off on a rainy day. On the ground, the storm of human conflict is all you can see. But as you go up, eventually you poke through the clouds, and there it is: the sun. This is where all conflicts dissolve into one: Love.

The drawing of the unison

One day, this image appeared in my head:

At the very bottom are individuals, billions of us, each with our own beliefs, opinions, wounds and dreams. This is the most diverse level, the most chaotic and the most conflict.

Go up a level, and you have companies as small entities driving towards a shared goal. Go up again, and you have industries, which are alliances formed by many of the same companies to protect each other in the game. Go up further, and you reach nations, where many industries merge into one big piece. Go higher still, and you arrive at religions, the great frameworks humans have built to reach toward meaning and creation.

And at the very top, the single point where everything converges, is love.

How to use this pyramid as a map to guide humanity?

It is such a relief when I see the shape of this pyramid. Because it provides a foundation for humanity to unite.

Imagine if the opposite is true: at the highest level of human values there were 30 completely incompatible ultimate truths. Imagine if one tradition concluded hatred was the final answer. Another concluded domination was supreme. We would have no chance to unite as one.

Here is how to use this pyramid as a guide. At the level where we are standing, when two individuals argue, two companies compete and two nations posture, the instinct is to battle it out. But the pyramid suggests another move: change altitude and just go up.

If two individuals clash, step up one level. If they belong to the same company, alignment appears. If that’s not enough, go higher, maybe they come from the same industry, the same nation, the same religion and then you reach our shared desire: LOVE. Each step upward increases overlap, at some height, the categories that divide us dissolve into categories that unite us.

The conflict that felt absolute at one layer becomes contextual at another. Elevate the level, and what looked like an irreconcilable problem often shrinks into a detail inside a larger shared structure. The battle is not always resolved by pushing harder at the same altitude. Oftentimes it resolves because we climbed.

The Astronaut’s Dilemma

There is a known phenomenon among astronauts. When they go into space and look back at the Earth, this tiny, fragile blue marble without borders, they experience a profound shift in consciousness.

But many of them fall into depression after returning to Earth. Why? Because they have seen the unison, but they are forced to return to the division. They come back to the politics, the money, and the petty arguments, which all feel meaningless.

Living Between Two Worlds

So, how do we live? How do we keep from falling into that depression?

We have to accept the duality of our existence. Physically, we belong to the division. We are “trapped” in individual bodies, living individual lives. We cannot stay in total bliss 24/7; it’s impractical.

However, while our bodies are trapped in the division, our mind can build a higher connection to Unison. When you face conflict in your daily life, know that the conflict is just an illusion because we stayed at the lower levels. Don’t let the illusion take hold of you. While you can exist in the world of division physically, you can always elevate to the higher level and find alignment. If the other side could not elevate to the higher level as you did, then smile, leave and forgive them.

Would you like to live in a world where most people can align to this unison of LOVE?

How can we get our civilization there?