This internal dying or death has two closely related dimensions of meaning. On the one hand, it is a dying of the self as the center of its own concern. On the other hand, it is a dying to the world as the center of security and identity.

These—the self and the world—are the two great rival centers to centering in God, and the path of transformation thus involves a dying to both of them.

The “world” to which one must die is the world of conventional wisdom, the world of “culture” with its preoccupying securities; and the self which must die is the self-preoccupied self. Then is born a self which is centered in God, in Spirit and not in culture.

from Jesus: A New Vision