Enlightenment

Discussion in 'Religion, Beliefs and Spirituality' started by yogisuba, Jan 2, 2015.

  1. Blessings,
     
    Starting this New Gregorian Year I am doing a series of meditations on Enlightenment – that mysteriously simple subject/state/experience/process/? My hope is to gain some insight that will help me towards Awakening. I'm a householder wanting to wake up - whatever that means:}
     
    For the next week or so I will post one of my poems from my nightly meditations. I will expound on the poem in my Sacred Yoga Forum. Here is my first poem.
    __________________________________________________
     
    There's a lot of hang ups:
     
    How it should be?
    What conditions are right?
    What needs to be done?
    What to let go of – what to think/feel/etc?
    When is the right time?
    Where will it happen?
    Why?
     
    There's just the Here and Now -
    it really is that simple

     
  2. #2 yurigadaisukida, Jan 2, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 2, 2015
    To me, enlightenment is not a state. Which is why it cannot be obtained.

    It is merely the act of learning more and more as you journey through life.

    You never become "enlightened" only "more enlightened" over time

    Only in death do we reach true enlightenment. The end of our journey

    -yuri
     
  3. Enlightenment seems to be more the act of letting go of what we know, rather than just filling ourselves with beliefs and mental constructs.
     
    To feel lighter, to lighten-up, to let go of that which makes us heavy.
     
    Allowing things to be as they are, accepting them, creating a sense of space, living in the present, seeing it as it is. Letting go of that which likes to judge, to know, to make things to be in its own image.
     
     
    Right.
     
     
    Which seems to contradict your previous statement.
     
    How can we ever reach enlightenment when we can only become MORE enlightened?
     
    Of course, once the heaviness that is the physical has dissolved, if anything, we would become MORE of who we really are. The limitations placed upon us now removed. This would not be the end of the journey, but the continuation of it.
     
    For those who believe that life has more to it, they might find themselves experiencing themselves differently, remembering who they really are, not who they seemed to be in the dream we call life. I can imagine that would feel very liberating.
     
  4. I have no idea what true enlightenment is
     
  5.  
    And nor should you.
     
    Which does sound like the right way to go about realising it though.  :smoke:
     
  6. #6 yogisuba, Jan 3, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 3, 2015
    Blessings,
     
     
    I agree that Enlightenment is not a state, as it is so much more than just that, but I am not so sure that there is not something to be had when looking at Enlightenment as having some mental state, as in, clear, open, receptive, aware, and such. Or having an emotional state like joy, freshness, centered, balanced, etc…
     
    As for an act of learning more and more, that seems to fit, though, is there not some point when certain things, like the discursive mental chaos drops away or the incessant need to identify with things, react, and such. We can say we continue to learn more and more, but at some point there is a level of mastery and wellbeing that, while never ending, does have a sense of arriving, attaining. There is a point when the hungering and grasping stops.
     
     
    I agree that letting go seems to be a beneficial practice towards helping us Awaken, especially when it comes to beliefs, fears, unbalancing desires, anger, and so forth. Learning to let go of anything that agitates, clouds, stagnant, or disrupts in any way our minds is a good thing, as it invites peace, clarity, balance, and all the other good things that I believe many associate with Enlightenment. What I call, ripples of Enlightenment, as they seem to be connected to it, but not it.
     
    The Lighter thing i have always thought the same: to In-lighten ourselves is to lessen the baggage, the identifying, judgment, and concepts of self, among other things.
     
    As for the last things you have said, agreed: just being fully present and aware seems to be an essential ingredient of Enlightenment.
     
    Blessings Be...
     
  7. Day Two
     
    At first, I considered meditating on Enlightenment to be silly. It's not as if I expect to be Enlightened after this 7+ day meditation: I just yearn for it – whatever "it" means. So, what better way to get to know something than to think about it, study it, contemplate and meditate upon it, infuse ourselves as fully into it as possible. So here I am doing that, and here is one of the insights that arose in last night's meditation. I expound on this pithy poem in my Sacred Yoga Blog.
    ____________________________________
     
    Everything touched,
    be it with body or mind,
    has the seed of Samadhi within it:
     
    How could anything be boring?
     
  8. what if we are all actually enlightened but we have to realize we are enlightened
     
  9. #9 Tokesmith, Jan 3, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 3, 2015
    This...

    I find it odd that someone is trying to become enlightened. Understand the nature of the mind and enlightenment will follow.

    Although my use of I explains why I'm not enlightened. Hint hint....
     
  10. Your use of the term 'householder,' makes me think buddhism. Do you identify yourself as a Buddhist? Is it Buddhist enlightenment you seek?
     
  11. #11 yogisuba, Jan 3, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 3, 2015
    In my studies i have come across that belief from many different voices, my only question to this would be, would we say the same things if we were sleeping: "we are already awake, we only need to realize it?" If we are sleeping, then we are not awake. Being lucid of course, is retaining conscious awareness while in the dream, but is that awake: maybe? I don't know. The problem with analogies is that they don't quite take us all the way.
     
     
    Why is it odd to reach for Enlightenment? We seek out things all the time. If it is really what so many claim it to be, it seems like it would be the most desirable thing to seek.
     
    While i agree, there is an absence of personal identity, of me, self, when it comes to our idealized concepts of Enlightenment, even the Buddha, the archetype of Enlightenment referred to himself as "I" in some of his teachings. It would be weird in conversation to refer to this incarnation in the third person. The difference of course is the lack of attachment to the "I" as a permanent, unchanging, limited drop of water in the Ocean. 
     
     
    No, not Buddhist. I do totally love Buddhist traditions though, specifically the Lam Rim and Tonglen systems. I use the word householder because I am consciously cultivating myself while having a family and paying bills. It is just a fitting word. I originally came across the householder tradition via the Upanishads. I believe it is not just a Buddhist thing, but an Indian thing in general. My main influences are Christianity, the Occult, Yoga, Inner Martial Arts, Taoism, and Buddhism, with a splashing of Philosophy and anything else that enlightens the shadows of the mind.     
     
    What do you mean Buddhist Enlightenment? What kinds of Enlightenment are there?
     
  12. #12 Tokesmith, Jan 3, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 3, 2015
    Seeking enlightenment is like driving around and seeking for the car you're already driving.

    That's why it's odd.
     
  13.  
    Yet as you drive that car you still always know you're in one.
     
    You might be seeking to replace that car with a more luxurious model eventually. Something that still gets you from A to B, but does it in a nicer way.
     
  14. I get that the idea of seeking something we must already be makes no sense, it's as if we are here and there is something just over there we need to get to.
     
    I see it more like realising there is nothing over there, and what is noticing this isn't exactly here either.
     
    To be enlightened is what we are, and the moment we attempt to define what that is, how that is, we have created an idea about it, which is already not it.
     
  15. #15 yogisuba, Jan 3, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 3, 2015
    Day Three
     
    Every time I think i know what to expect, a whole new perspective arrives. I learned years ago to enter my Yoga rituals with openness. I use to be rigid, whatever my chosen meditation topic was, I would never veer from it. Then one day it all changed. I came into ritual with my intention, but something in my life was so overwhelming, that it took over my ritual. Since then, I go into a meditation ritual with an intention to focus on a specific topic, but always beginning the meditation with openness, allowing whatever to come, to come.
     
    This series of meditations on Enlightenment has been open-ended. I research as much as possible and then sit down, smoke some Herb, and listen. While I have many preconceived notions of what Enlightenment is, more times than not, I find myself in unknown territory.  
     
    I expound on the poem in my Sacred Yoga Forum
    __________________________________
     
    There's a tendency to think of Enlightenment from the mind's perspective,
    rarely giving thought to the Earth's perspective.
     
    How the feet tread lightly
    leaving no sickness,
    only fertility and life.
     
    How the animals come out of hiding
    feeling no threat within the Garden:
     
    No Separation.
     
  16. Blessings,
     
    I am loving this forum, out of the four forums I am reaching out to, this one offers the most intelligible and genuine conversation by far.
    I agree, it is like the fish trying to talk about the ocean it lives in. I guess it would be something like this, normally we are driving on autopilot and the seeking is merely in effort to become more conscious while driving and then working on deepening the awareness of driving via the sensations and such, before finally becoming the car: no separation. I don't know. That is why I am doing this meditation, to learn and hopefully experience.
     
    I hear that, "we are already Enlightened," so why seek, make an effort, and so on. Yet, while there might be some truth to that, in the mindset I currently abide in, that is not true. I agree it is not over there, up there, down there, in there, and so on, and yet, it is over there, up there, in there, and so on. If it is here, then it is there. What's the difference. Sometimes we need to step outside to experience what is inside.
     
    There are those that have had spontaneous Enlightenment, but it seems more times than not, there is effort, desire, hardships, and so forth involved. The Kundalini tradition I hail from, it's a process. Working through the different layers of our being, the different issues, blocks, mental obstacles, and so forth. Each effort strips away a layer until there is no layers, nothing but bare nakedness.
     
  17.  
    Right, but you're not stripping away to become enlightened, you're stripping away to realise you already are.
     
  18. The realisation of enlightenment is not a thought that you are enlightened, for if you think you are . . .
     
  19.  
    Agreed.
     
    Some of the things we strip away are the thoughts, judgments, expectations, concepts, and such. It is a process. I have been working at it for years and this mind is still dancing around like a monkey on meth. Thankfully, there is no deadline, no time limit, no pressure. I get to enjoy the ride in the car, so to speak:)
     
  20.  
    Nicely put.
     
    In stripping away we come into the present, for there is less and less to distract us out of it.
     
    I understand about the dancing monkey, but the mind is such a big part of this thing we call life. The ego, the interface between what we are and what we experience, has a reality all its own. While there is no need to invalidate it, or kill it as some have suggested, the ego will become part of the show so as to get itself out of the way. It is a collaboration not a battle.
     

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