Comments for First Enlightenment Experience: Page 1

Seeker: After re-reading your last post, I realized that I may not have directly answered one or two of your questions. First, you wrote, "There is still a you isn't there?" No. There never has been a "me." That was the illusion that collapsed on Aug 17, 1999. There is a body/mind with a name, but that is not who I am. Who I am is the cosmos, and the same is true for you, as well all other body/minds we call human beings. In Christian terms, "I and my Father are one" even though this body/mind is only a microscopic speck in the vastness of THAT.

I periodically speak to church groups about this issue, and I spend a lot of time explaining the nature of the separateness illusion. I begin by reminding folks that lines of longitude and latitude are ideas--that there are no real lines dividing the world in that way. I then remind them that there is no real state of Tennessee. That, too, is an idea. I proceed to the illusion of "hand," "wrist" and "arm." I show them that there are no real boundaries that separate these "things." The boundaries are all imaginary. I then have them open their mouths and investigate the boundary of "their body" in the open space between "their teeth." Then, I ask them to contemplate when the air they breathe becomes "them,"--gets internalized into their blood cells. I help them see that all of our usual thoughts about separateness create a powerful illusion of individuality. An automobile looks like a separate solid thing, but that is only because its rate of change is very slow. In fact, an automobile is oxidizing every second, and if we came back a few million years later, there would be virtually nothing left of the original auto--only a few scraps of glass. IOW, the universe is totally unified and "thingness" of any kind is an illusion. What we call "the universe" is dynamic, alive, intelligent, and conscious.

Another technique for helping people get a glimpse of the truth is to ask them to recall some vivid memory from childhood. Then, I ask them to consider whether "their" awareness of that event has changed in any way from their present awareness. Most people can realize that awareness has not aged with time. Awareness does not need anything or want anything and awareness is who we are. Awareness can see thoughts (an imaginary meta-world) or it can see the real world. Shifting our attention to what we can see, hear, touch, taste, or smell helps us to break through the illusory meta-world projected by our imagination.

If we break through the illusion of selfhood, nothing much changes except that we do not imagine that we are a separate entity. We know that we are "what is," and life becomes pretty simple. This body/mind enjoys designing and building homes, skiing, mountain-climbing, rock-collecting, going to movies, reading books, writing, teaching, playing in the stock market, helping people, sitting in silence, ballroom dancing, and hundreds of other things. These activities take place in a playful kind of emptiness filled with a lot of laughter and amusement. When this body/mind dies, who I am will not die because who I am was never born. Jesus Christ was talking about the same thing when he said, "Before Abraham was, I am." He knew who he was, but the same thing is true for everyone else whether they know it or not. Fortunately, the internet is helping more and more people wake up. When I first learned that it is possible to wake up, the only awakened people I knew about were dead people written about in books. Today, I know of at least fifty living people who are awake, and many more are waking up every day. The universe clearly wants to wake up to itself and is now doing so at a faster and faster rate. Cheers.

Wonderful experience! I'm glad I read it! I really appreciate your story and your following comments. I too find it wonderful... To become upset through egoic thoughts only to go, "Oh! It's just ego, ha!" and return to silence.

Seeker: Sure, this body/mind still has things it likes to do and wants to do, but everything remains highly provisional because it never knows what will happen next. Everything pretty much continues as before with one major exception; there is no seeking. There is also the understanding that who I am is not who other people think I am, but that's okay. That is what can be expected considering the way humans are indoctrinated.

To correct one minor point, I did not say that I am permanently enlightened. That was what I said I wanted when I was still seeking. After awakening from the dream of personal selfhood, I never had that kind of thought again. Any idea about a state of permanent enlightenment would be a story about an imaginary future of an imaginary entity.

Yes, I still think, but thinking is no longer a problem. Adyashanti has said, "Enlightenment comes from the neck down," and I would agree with that statement. The path to non-duality is a path that changes the locus of control. Most adults are jerked around by their incessant thoughts related to having a sense of personal selfhood. When we become free of those thoughts, and free of the idea that there is a personal self, there is a relaxation and feeling of contentment. There is no longer an individual entity that needs to be defended or improved, etc.
If someone were to say to me, "You are a stupid ignorant clown," I would be amused and probably say something like, "I couldn't agree with you more!"

Ego can still arise after awakening, but if it does, it is seen in a different way. It is like, "Oh yeah, the universe is egoing again," but there is no attachment to it, and it passes by like a cloud.

In essence, the path to non-duality is a path that leads back to a child-like state of mind that still retains the intellectual capacity of an adult. The body and mind become unified, but the mind then functions in the service to the whole rather than as a controller and generator of fantasies.

Because I spent a lot of time on silent retreats and walking in the woods while focusing upon what I could see and hear, I can now become silent at will. This is no big deal, and I'm sure that anyone who wanted to make a sufficient effort could learn to do the same thing. It is enjoyable and relaxing to periodically shift my attention to "what is" and let the mind go silent for a while. This, however, has nothing to do with enlightenment. Enlightenment is simply the realization that there is only oneness and that personal selfhood is an illusion. The universe, as manifested in a human being, pumps blood, breathes, regulates blood gas concentrations, secretes hormones, and thinks. There is no one doing these things other than oneness. At this moment I am writing a note to myself in a different form. The same awareness that is present and looking out of this body's eyes is looking out of your body's eyes, and this fact can be directly experienced through certain unity-consciousness experiences.

To leave the false consensual reality of the average adult requires that one shift one's attention to direct sensory perception rather than thoughts. Everyone already understands everything, but for that understanding to rise to the level of consciousness requires some psychological silence. Most people who follow this path get an initial glimpse of the truth (my glimpse was more powerful than most, but I had been deeply questioning the nature of reality for twenty years prior to that experience). Then, like me, they lose sight of it. That glimpse often propels them to keep searching for a way to get back to the truth. In my case, I had many types of unity consciousness experiences (experiences in which "I" wasn't there), but I always seemed to fall back into feeling like I was "in here" looking at a world "out there." Freedom came when I finally realized in some embodied sense that there was no one home. I saw clearly that who I was was "what is,"--the whole blooming thing. There had never been a "me." "Me" was a joke that the universe had played upon itself and "I" was the butt of the joke. LOL!

You asked why I took the trouble to write all of this down. I can give several reasons. First, I do it for you, because you are my own True Self. By writing about this perhaps I can save someone ten years of unnecessary searching. Second, I do it because it is enormous fun. And third, I do it for no reason at all. This is what I have to do; there is no choice whatsoever. It is the same with you whether you realize it or not. If you are a seeker, you are a seeker because that is what the universe is doing with the body/mind that you think of as "you." "You" have absolutely no say in the matter even though it may appear that you do. If you are interested in this issue, you might want to check out the spiritualteachers.org website. It is devoted to the non-dual path, and you would probably find the discussions on that board very interesting. Take Care.

What kind of purpose do you have now? What are your goals in life?

Now I understand that you freed yourself form the mind, but there is still something that keeps me thinking. You wrote, you became permanently enlightened. And you also explain that the enlightened state is not something intellectual, mental. But you still have thoughts in this state, don't you? I mean if you are in the silence, if you are The silence to be more precise, why did you write this all down? There is still a "you" isn't it?

Seeker: For me, freedom meant that all of my hundreds of existential questions were answered. I started off with about ten fundamental questions (Is there a God? What is the meaning of life? How did life arise in an inanimate universe? Etc). Later, I added a huge number of questions that were scientific in nature (what is a subatomic particle, really? What could explain the observer paradoxes in every field of science? What is time, space, matter, energy, etc? What is the difference between the quantum world and the macrocosmic world? Etc). Later still, I added hundreds of Zen koans and other meditation-related questions to my list of questions (What is samadhi? What is kensho? What is enlightenment? What is satori? What is the sound of one hand clapping? What was one's original face before one's parents were born? What is Mu? Etc). I spent twenty years thinking about these questions without ever finding a single answer. Then, I started meditating to alleviate some business-related stress. Five months later, I fell into deep states of samadhi, but I didn't know what it was; I only knew that "I" disappeared when in those states of unity-consciousness. A few days later, the enlightenment experience occurred that I posted on this website. That experience answered seven of my questions.

After that experience, I began going on silent retreats and working to break the habit of reflective thought. I had many more unity-consciousness experiences, and more and more of my questions were answered. The answers did not come from thought. They came out of silence and a direct embodied connection to reality. After fifteen years, every question had been answered, except one. I wondered how it was possible for me to stay in a unity-conscious state of mind permanently; I wanted to become permanently enlightened. On Aug 17, 1999 I was doing a solo hike on Mount Audubon in Colorado when I had a strange emotional experience. I was overcome with gratitude for everything I had experienced and I thanked God from the bottom of my heart. A few hours later I realized that my last question had been answered, but not in the way I had expected. I realized that who I had thought I was had never existed. The person with my name was a total fiction. There was no one who needed to become enlightened because there had never been a separate person. Selfhood was a monumental illusion. As soon as I had that realization, I was free. I understood everything I needed to understand, and I was filled with peace, joy, contentment, and deep gratitude. Nothing has ever changed since that day in 1999. Everywhere I look, all I see is oneness, and I am part of that oneness. Another way of saying this is to say that God is all there is. There are not two here. The world that most people perceive is a huge illusion. In truth, there is only "what is" and that is who we are. Who we are was never born and will never die, and these bodies are like rental cars being used by THAT.

The answer to the second part of your question is that learning continues forever. The truth is so deep and so profound that there is no end to what can be seen. Jesus said, "In my Father's house are many mansions." Most of those mansions are unimaginable, and one does not have to physically die in order to enter those spaces. The only requirement is silence; you can't think your way there. Cheers.

What do you mean by getting free? Are you free now? I thought being on Earth means still being in the learning process.

That sir was indeed an experience. I would ask how you could remember such details but of course, how could one forget? I would have called it a day after the phone call...