Paul Ricour= “the spiritual joy ..and ..beatitude designates, under different names, the only affective mood worthy of being called ontological” [p 161, ‘Fallible Man’, 1965].
1,
“Everything was melting together and I was melting into everything just as a piece of ice melts into water. I was no longer afraid for there was nothing to fear. There was no difference between life and death. I was happy for the first time in my life and so very grateful.
..There was no such thing as loneliness.
I know that I had always judged things in relation to myself, because I was a separate entity” [p 26, ‘A Taste of Water’, CJ Lee and TG Hand, 1990].
2,
“And as my ‘self’ was melting away into something infinitely larger than myself, there was just one huge wave of warmth, Love and Delight. At last, there was only One, not two. There is nothing but the Dharma. Nothing else. I am myself: just this.
Later the question of my identity arose and I realized with great clarity and joy that as a person ‘I am Dharma as it manifests itself in the way of Laura. This is my true nature.’ It does not belong to me. It is the ever-changing ‘right-here-now.’
Later.. Everything shone forth with incredible simplicity of Being, of which I was an integral part. ..actually there was no ‘I’ who was experiencing or thinking this..” [pp 27-28, ibid].