In search of the More

In the Western world, many of us are taught only one way of thinking about the More. The God of mainstream Christianity, Islam and Judaism is often presented to us as a supernatural personal being, a 'far away' creator God who exists 'out there', who is separate from his creation.

There are, however, many other ways of making sense of our experience of the More. In Eastern religions, the More is not thought of as a person-like being. It is seen as some kind of fundamental, universal Ultimate Reality, the infinite, unseen essence of everything that exists. And that Reality is thought to be the only reality there is. We and the Ultimate Reality are not separate, not different. We are both of one essence.

There are also non-religious ways of thinking about the More. Some see it as a deeper dimension of reality which permeates everything that exists in our world. Some see it as a benign universal spirit, force or energy which suffuses and lies at the core of everything. And some see it as a particular state of being which they regard as the highest dimension of our humanness - 'the further reaches' of our human nature as the humanistic psychologist, Abraham Maslow described it.

All of these ways of thinking about the More are attempts to capture something of the nature of the same sacred mystery. They flow both from our spiritual experience and from our fundamental human need to make sense of and find meaning in it. Attempts to grasp hold of the nature of the More are, however, fraught with difficulty. We may come to know a little of this other reality but it is essentially beyond our capacity to know it fully. It is 'something other', something beyond our normal human perception. The more we try to tie it down with our religious creeds and teachings, the more it eludes us.

And sadly, those creeds and teachings sometimes obscure rather than illuminate the ultimate mystery to which our sacred consciousness awakens us. All too often, we have used our our minds to create a god in our own image rather than trusting our sacred experience to reveal that which transcends all of our human ideas and concepts. The god we can imagine is always a god too small.

The truth is that there is no one right way of thinking about the More. There are no ‘right answers’, no ‘absolute truths’. There are only people like us trying to make sense of our spiritual experience in a myriad of different ways. Perhaps the reality is that there is truth to be found in all of these ways of thinking about the More. Perhaps it is both personal and impersonal, both within and beyond us, both of the same essence as humanity and yet ‘more than’ it.

What I have learnt along the way is the More is not a question to be answered, a puzzle to be solved, an entity to be defined or categorised. It is a mystery to be encountered, a reality to be embraced. And I have learnt that it is alright to sit with not knowing.

'I believe there is one river and that we need to... honor each ship that sails that river and each person who meditates upon its shores. Call this river the sacred, the supernatural, the spiritual realm, the dimension of Being, the deeper psyche, the higher self, the
farther reaches of human nature, or whatever you prefer. All
the names... are simply our feeble efforts to grasp infinity.'

David Elkins

Naming the More

Some of us speak of God or Goddess; some of Allah or Yahweh; some of Brahman, the Eternal Buddha, the Tao or the Spirit; some of the Holy, the Sacred, the Divine or the Transcendent; and some of spirit-force, of Isness, of the Source, of the Ground of Being or simply of Being. And there are many other ways of naming this sacred mystery. In this website, I will draw mainly on 'the More'. It is, I hope, a way of naming it that will speak to all of us, however we may make sense of 'the more' we sometimes glimpse.

In search of soul