A.H. Almaas - Diamond Approach
A Summary by Gemini Ai
A.H. Almaas's Diamond Approach is a unique path that integrates modern depth psychology with traditional spiritual understanding to help individuals realise their "essential being" or true nature. Unlike many paths that present enlightenment as a static endpoint, Almaas emphasises an "endless enlightenment" – a continuous, unfolding process of discovery.
The journey towards being an essential being is not a linear set of prescribed steps but rather a study of an individual's lived experience of the world, driven by inquiry and love of the truth. It involves systematically exploring one's present-moment experience, peeling back layers of the personality (ego) to reveal the underlying essence.
Here's a summary of the core elements and a general progression of the process Almaas teaches:
Recognition of a Deeper Dimension (The Beginning of the Path):
The journey often begins with a sense or a longing that there's "more to being human," a spiritual dimension beyond the everyday personality. This can arise from an intense experience, a feeling, or simply a deep curiosity.
This initial recognition sparks the "enlightenment drive"—an innate pull toward understanding and realizing one's true potential.
Direct Encounter with Spiritual Reality (First Contact with Presence):
This is a crucial marker: having a direct, immediate, palpable experience of one's spiritual nature, which Almaas often refers to as Presence. This is not merely an intellectual understanding but a felt sense of being, consciousness, or spirit.
Presence is described as a living, conscious, self-aware, and self-knowing medium that is not physical, emotional, or mental. It can manifest as qualities like love, compassion, strength, joy, clarity, or even vast emptiness.
The Theory of Holes and Retrieval of Essential Aspects:
As the soul develops, it forms the personality (ego) by disconnecting from its Essence, creating "holes" where essential aspects (qualities like compassion, strength, value, personalness) should be.
The methodology involves rigorous (self) inquiry into present-moment experience, exploring the personality structures both cognitively and experientially.
By deeply investigating the ego patterns, one eventually confronts these "holes." Allowing oneself to fully experience the "hole"—the sense of lack, deficiency, or pain—without rejecting or trying to fill it from external sources leads to relaxation and spaciousness.
Through confronting and going through the "holes," the lost Essential Aspects arise spontaneously and are retrieved, allowing the soul to reclaim its innate qualities. This is a process of disidentification from pathological self-representations.
Integration of Essential Aspects and the "Pearl Beyond Price":
Realising and integrating individual essential aspects lead to deeper soul maturation.
A significant development is the realisation of the "Pearl Beyond Price," which represents the individuated soul. This presence is truly oneself, intimate and unique, yet free from the past and egoic conditioning. It embodies true value and fullness, transcending the selfishness of the personality. This is the Essential Identity.
This stage involves the dissolution of ego boundaries and the experience of "inner aloneness" – a state of being without ego, pure and uncontaminated, where one is simply being in the present moment. Paradoxically, this aloneness allows for authentic personal contact from Being to Being.
Nondual Realisation and Beyond (Endless Enlightenment):
Further stages involve realising the nondual nature of reality, where the individual self is recognised as not separate but rather a vastness and infinity that is the nature of everything. In other traditions, this corresponds to concepts like Atman, Brahman, or Dharmakaya.
However, Almaas emphasises that even nondual realisation is not the final endpoint. The "endless enlightenment" signifies that reality is far more alive and mysterious than any fixed map or concept.
The process continues as one learns to live and express this realisation in all aspects of life, not just to discover and abide in it. This involves discerning new possibilities and continuously unfolding into deeper mysteries and forms of freedom. It's about living a life faithful to one's true nature, with integrity and presence, even in the midst of ordinary life.
In summary, A.H. Almaas's path to being an essential being is a dynamic, inquiry-driven process of unveiling the layers of ego-personality through direct, experiential investigation of one's inner experience. This leads to the recovery and integration of various essential aspects, culminating in the realisation of the individuated Essential Self ("Pearl Beyond Price"), and then further expanding into nondual realisation and an endless unfolding of Being, where reality is continuously revealed and lived. It is a path of human maturity and liberation, where the psychological and spiritual are seen as inseparable.
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