In a luminous dialogue hosted by Zaya Benazzo, cofounder of Science and Nonduality, spiritual teachers Adyashanti and A. H. Almaas explore what it truly means to live one’s realization. Far from treating awakening as an endpoint, they illuminate the deeper, often overlooked dimensions of the spiritual journey—those of embodiment and actualization. Transcendence, they agree, may lift us beyond the egoic self, but it is only the beginning. What follows is the more subtle, intimate work of allowing realization to permeate our humanity, guiding how we live, love, and relate in the world—while not being of it. Scroll down to view the video.
Summary
What does it mean to realize our true nature? In a rich and wide-ranging dialogue, A. H. Almaas and Adyashanti reflect on this perennial question—not by offering fixed answers, but by opening doors to deeper understanding. While spiritual traditions often speak of awakening as a final destination, both teachers emphasize a more dynamic, unfolding view of realization—one that is both humbling and profoundly human.
Adyashanti begins by pointing out that "realization" is a word used in many ways, often with different meanings depending on the speaker or tradition. For him, true realization involves a fundamental shift of identity—a letting go of the rigid structures of self that normally define us. But that shift, he cautions, is not the whole journey. “Waking up is just getting your foot in the door of reality,” he says. The deeper work lies in integrating that awakening into every aspect of our life: into our thoughts, relationships, emotions, and actions, he says.
Almaas agrees and offers his own nuanced distinctions. Awakening, he says, is like waking up from a dream—it’s the recognition that reality is not what we thought it was. Realization, however, is deeper: it is knowing the true nature of reality and being that nature. But even this, he says, is not an endpoint. “Realization realizes further realization,” he says, borrowing a phrase from the Zen tradition.
True nature is complete purity, complete light, complete freedom. But reality can awaken to that or not because reality also appears as a condition of ignorance.
The conversation turns toward the lived, embodied experience of realization. Both teachers describe a kind of “downward movement” that complements the “leap” of awakening. As Adyashanti puts it, realization doesn’t just take us upward into clarity and spaciousness—it also descends into our humanity, putting pressure on unresolved wounds, old beliefs, and patterns. The light of realization can expose the shadows within us, prompting us to meet our deepest fears, insecurities, and limitations.
For Almaas, this descent is part of what he calls “actualization”—the process of realization becoming lived in time. He describes two intertwined processes that support this: clarification, which involves recognizing and seeing through old delusions and conditioning, and maturation, where the soul develops the capacity to embody deeper truth. Without this, realization may remain abstract or disembodied.
Both teachers underscore that honesty and love are essential in this work. Adyashanti speaks of “radical honesty” as a doorway: being willing to see where we are contracted, confused, or afraid—even after profound spiritual openings. And Almaas emphasizes the importance of the heart: not just the emotional heart, but the spiritual heart, which brings tenderness, intimacy, and compassion into the realization process. Without this open-heartedness, awakening can remain head-centered, lacking the warmth and relational depth that makes it fully human.
Ultimately, they agree that the path is not about perfection or becoming a superhuman. It’s about being deeply present to our own unfolding—meeting life, moment by moment, with curiosity, humility, and love. Each realization opens to another. Each insight invites deeper embodiment.
As one woman in India told Almaas: “After realization, you just drink it daily.” In that simplicity lies the quiet beauty of the path—not as a destination to reach, but as an infinite deepening into who and what we truly are.