I assume its obvious
Osho said that you are enightened when you can be aware of your body for 24 hours without interruption.
The question is, what is enlightement, and why does it matter?
Hi Roboto,
You may find this lesson useful:
Lesson 35 - Enlightenment Milestones
If you can tick the boxes in that lesson, then you are on your way.
Even if you can’t tick them, but you are reading this, then you are on your way too.
Enjoy!
Christi
maybe enlightenment is when you are aware of every-body 24 7
Or of the Self in every-body 24 7?
when you loose interest in knowing whether you are advancing or not in the path
when you are not seeking any spiritual progress …and sometimes your practices are far less than more
when your life is so ordinary
then maybe you are advancing
yes the self in all and all in the self thankyou
Then I’m almost there
Sey
Well, my path is based on not knowing; it is not obvious at all. How can you be absolutely certain that you are NOT enlightened? <-That is the elephant in the room we tend to overlook.
Perhaps we are quite afraid to admit that there is a remote possibility we are already enlightened, have always been enlightened. That a great deal of our apparent suffering is a byproduct of imaginary certainties, judgments, evaluations and conclusions formed in the past. Those certainties may comprise the boundaries of our comfort zone as well as the walls of our mental prison.
Keep the door open. For all you know, you could be enlightened because - really - you don’t know … do you? … Drop certainty. Pull up all anchors into the past… past judgments and assumptions. Realize that you honestly don’t know. You don’t know whether or not you are enlightened. You really don’t. That is the truth.
How would one know? The measurement, evaluation, judgment - this is time anchored mind content. Those mental fabrications lock one into the past like an iron chain. So just drop the certainty. The chains making one think one is not free are all in the imagination. “Certainty” locks one into illusion by obstructing present moment awareness. Be free of certainty. That is all. To drop certainty is to keep the door open to the possibility of enlightenment. Not knowing is freedom. At least it is for me.
love
parvati
certainty has its truths so to be free from certainty maybe denies a movement towards some forms of enlightenment .eg i know i live on globe not a flat surface this is a known known therefore my expansion into to this creates more expansion and so on ,truth for me has many levels sometimes they are prisons at other times keys to unlock the wonder i am moving into or outwardly moving towards , we are possible all enlightened in our time space and level we are on ,as a fragment of the whole to see the whole is impossible unless like arjuna we are given divine eyes, maybe for brief moments we engage and through yoga a form of union is achieved when knowing becomes more than being certain, but along the path to sure of certain things can help us realize all is possible and everything can exist somewhere and at some point in the infinity of time .
I think 99% of the world matches that description because they don’t practice or have not heard of enlightened, without being enlightened
That.
I am currently being influenced by Sri Ramakrishna, so:
“Lord - take both Thy Knowledge and Thy Ignorance and give me only love for Thee”
Sey
Hi Roboto,
Do you still seek and/or suffer (have problems, worry/anxiety, guilt, etc.)?
The Buddha said Enlightenment is the cessation of dukkha. Dukkha is often translated as suffering, but could also mean discontentment or dissatisfaction.
I happen to agree…that suffer ceases upon Enlightenment.
On the path to enlightenment, there is less and less suffering as one progresses so one can take huge risks, get more involved with life.
I’ve had a taste of heightened awareness, it was wonderful. If possible I’d like that to happen for 24 hours. Perhaps much more clearer and better. Its not an achievement, It’s a realization of what you have rather than a newfound ability.
Enlightenment is not a end goal in itself, It is perhaps the starting point. That we fools have taken to heaven. Once a man is aware, life truly begins.
One definition of enlightenment I like is to become suddenly aware of our true nature as what was always there but only experienced and thus realized now. This is also called awakening to who we really are, for the first time. For me this experience was filled with an overwhelmning bliss that caused tears of pure joy, graditude, reverance, humbleness and repentance for about two weeks. The overwhelmning bliss associated with true enlightenment is often an indication that contact was made with pure Reality, the source of who you are and, indeed, what you are, as well as the source, substance and reclaimer of the entire exanding universe.
And like Kentox says, this experience only marks the beginning of genuine spitituality, as the Bible says, “The gate to (this) life is narrow and the way that leads to it is hard, and there are few people who find it.” Most people don’t know it’s even there, within and enveloping each one of us and expanding out to all of existence. Thank God for Yoga and for all real paths to unity with ultimate Reality. Enlightenment isn’t the goal, Liberation is. But enlightenment is the begining. It is the entrance onto the “narrow path” that leads, ever so gently and subtlety, to Liberation or what I call unbroken unitive consciousness or oneness with Reality/God.
“When we have had enough of the pleasures and pains, the ups and downs, of the ordinary existence, we turn toward our final expansion and open to divine reality, which underlies and pervades all that is. Then we turn within, surrender everything, and reach the quiescent and transcendent ground of our being.”
I am no where near the goal, if there is any end on this journey, all I hope is that I’m on the right path, haha.
“If you love the sacred and despise the ordinary, you are still bobbing in the ocean of delusion.”
-Linji
Ordinary is beautiful. Who would’ve ever thought that
Jusmail, I agree with you whole heartedly. I used the above quote by the Yogi, Christopher Wallis, to illustrate why someone might initially begin a spiritual quest, rather than to illustrate a Yogi’s view of ordinary existence. I used it to illustrate why someone might begin to search for the true meaning of life, a search that might lead to enlightenment.
I see your point clearly though, the realized would see Reality in the ordinary as much as in the sacred. You have raised a good point
Here is another quote by the same author above(guess who’s book I’m reading right now?) that gives one of the best discriptions of an “awakening” I’ve ever read.
“When we glipse, however briefly, the magnificence of our true nature, we begin to inherit our birthright. The graditude that wells up in responce to the inexpressible sweetness of this experience of awakening is such that we can say nothing but 'I am so blessed!”
C. Wallis
I could not express the experience in words at all, but for the first two weeks afterwards, I felt those four words through many tears. If you are pursuing enlightenment wholeheartedly, I believe you already have the grace of God working on you and drawing you to himself.