These are two perspectives that, like two sides of a coin, are dependent on each other for their existence. You can’t be an “other” observer of self (outside looking in) without at times being a self-observing “other” (inside looking out). In the dual nature of the mental body, self cannot exist without an other, and of course, other cannot exist without self. The One Life path of paradox requires you to acknowledge your experience of feeling independent and separate while simultaneously acknowledging the sense of being One Life.

This notion of the observer as a tool to reveal your awareness has been discussed by many spiritual and psychological teachers. We use the term “awareness” here to mean the realization of One Life — or enlightenment or true nature of being. The question arises, however, just who is the observer? Is the observer biased or objective? Can the observer make valuable observations if it is not considered superior or enlightened?

All human thinking has a voice of some kind. Notice in you how this voice is usually present, commenting and evaluating everything. The moments when there seems to be little or no inner commentary are few and far between and seems to increase with more and more awareness. This voice is the observer viewing the self and the other. You function in the world effectively with relative observation, meaning comparing and contrasting one thing to another. To use the observer as a tool for revealing One Life, it first needs to have a view that is nonrelative, or absolute. However, that becomes a conundrum, as the voice of the absolute must be paraverbal. There are no words and no comparing or contrasting in the absolute. So the observer must actually have some other point of reference from which it can point to the absolute, One Life, but still have a voice in the relative world of opposites.