the burden of self

Yet do not misunderstand my words, I did not say that you must desire to un-be,
 for that is madness and blasphemy against God.  I said that you must desire 
to lose the knowledge and experience of self.  This is essential
 if you are to experience God's love as fully as possible in this life.

  You must realize and experience for yourself that unless you lose self
you will never reach your goal.  For wherever you are, in whatever you do, 
or howsoever you try, that elemental sense of your own blind being
 will remain between you and your God.  It is possible, of course, 
that God may intervene at times and fill you with a transient experience
 of himself.  Yet outside these moments this naked awareness of your blind being
 will continually weigh you down and be as a barrier between you and your God..
. It is then that you will realize how heavy and painful 
is the burden of self.

~ the Cloud of Unknowing

art by Victoria Burns