Enlightenment

An Eternal Now SG

A great (updated) article by Joan Tollifson.... oh and btw her new book is just released, have been waiting some time for it. Ordered. http://www.non-dualitypress.com/product.aspx?p=34f65bbc-5b97-4507-88ac-d828453094f3

Realization is nothing to be gained anew....Realization consists of getting rid of the false idea that one is not realized.

--Ramana Maharshi

That which is before you is it, in all its fullness, utterly complete. There is naught beside. Even if you go through all the stages of a Bodhisattva's progress toward Buddhahood, one by one; when at last, in a single flash, you attain to full realization, you will only be realizing the Buddha-Nature which has been with you all the time; and by all the foregoing stages you will have added to it nothing at all.

--Huang Po

Whatever needs change is a thought, an idea, a phantom....Even though you're full of desire to improve or change, really see that there is not now, nor will there ever be, a way out of what you are. You can never become what you already are!

--Karl Renz

Like the worms in the cow dung, the moment the cow dung dries they are finished, however much progress they have made.

--Nisargadatta Maharaj

Those who have great realization of delusion are buddhas; those who are greatly deluded about realization are sentient beings.

--Dogen

The discovery of truth is in the discernment of the false. You can know what is not. What is -- you can only be.

--Nisargadatta Maharaj

Enlightenment is not like a sudden realization of something mysterious. Enlightenment is nothing but awakening from illusions and returning to the reality of life.

--Uchiyama

What wakes up is still asleep. That idea of "awakening" makes you asleep, and what can wake up is still asleep. There was never one who was not awake and there will never be one who is awake. Both ideas make you asleep. Both come together and go together.

--Karl Renz

The surprise within the surprise of every new discovery is that there is ever more to be discovered.

--Brother David Steindl-Rast, Catholic monk

Many people who come to this website are searching for an awakening or trying hard to become enlightened. Stories abound about who is and isn't awake and how so-and-so went from being an ordinary person to being no self at all. We love to imagine that "enlightenment" or "awakening" is some magical event that will permanently erase all our problems and leave us forever after living in a state of bliss. Sometimes I am asked, “Are you enlightened?”

If I say yes, will that mean I am? If I say no, can you be sure I'm not? Where does this question come from? Are we looking for an authority figure who can give us all the answers, or a Magical Guru who will perhaps gaze into our eyes and zap us energetically, or some kind of Divine Parent who will love us unconditionally? If we believe that someone is enlightened, will we then believe that everything that person says is true? What are we really looking for?

It's very helpful to remember that “enlightenment” and “awakening” are both words. They get used in many different ways. Some say enlightenment is the absence of suffering, some say it is the absence of non-functional thinking, some say it is the end of identification with the thinking mind, some say it is the absence of ego or the dissolution of the separate self, some say it is the absence of any sense of agency or the falling away of the belief that we are the author of the thoughts and actions that arise. Some say it is the realization of Oneness, others describe it as the merging of difference and unity. Some compare enlightenment to lucid dreaming in the waking state and say that it is the abiding realization that all of consciousness is a dream state, including the entire movie of waking life and the whole spiritual search and the one who is searching. Some say enlightenment or awakening is an energetic shift, some call it a felt-sense, others say it is about seeing clearly, some describe it as an understanding or an apperception, some say it is an embodied realization or actualization of the truth, others insist it is always already the case.

Some imagine enlightenment to be a state of perpetual bliss, while others say it includes and transcends every state. Some insist that awakening manifests only as saintly behavior and is characterized by being soft-spoken, generous, kind, vegetarian and pacifist, while others insist you can be enlightened and still be an alcoholic, a meat-eater, a womanizer, a thief, a warrior, someone prone to angry outbursts, maybe even a child molester or a Nazi. Some say enlightenment happens suddenly and irrevocably at a particular time on a particular day, and that it is a permanent, final shift. Others describe it as a gradual unfolding. Some say that it only happens Now and some say that nothing ever happens. Some distinguish between “enlightenment,” “awakening,” “liberation,” “kensho,” “satori,” “mukti,” and host of other terms, and others use all these words more or less synonymously and interchangeably. Who has it right? Who is really enlightened?

Are there “enlightened people” whose every moment is entirely free from suffering, or from delusion, or from the sense of self, or from the idea of individual authorship, or from all egoic thoughts and behaviors? Are there “unenlightened people” whose every moment is totally consumed by these delusions and sufferings? Is this very idea of “enlightened people” and “unenlightened people” (or of solid, persisting “people” of any kind) perhaps an example of unenlightened (or deluded) thinking? Who (or what) is it, exactly, that would be enlightened or unenlightened?

We talk glibly about enlightenment without really knowing what we're even talking about. We seek it without ever stopping to really examine closely what it is we think we're seeking. Could whatever we imagine we are seeking be the very illusion that awakening wakes up from?

I would not say that I am enlightened, nor would I say that I am not enlightened. I don't find any solid, persisting, independent entity here to be one way or the other. Here / Now is ever-present. Sometimes there is enlightenment here and sometimes there is delusion here. Sometimes there are clear skies and sometimes it is cloudy and overcast. Sometimes there is the movie of waking life and sometimes there is the nothingness of deep sleep. There is no owner of these various experiences – none of them are personal. Unicity is all there is; it is everything. Unicity includes both enlightenment and delusion. Enlightenment sees unicity; delusion imagines separation. Enlightenment sees unicity even in delusion. Delusion is always seeking enlightenment. Delusion imagines that enlightenment is “out there” somewhere in the future.

Unicity includes every experience. It is equally present in the experience of being boundless awareness and in the experience of being a separate person. Sometimes teachers speak as the One Self, the bare being or impersonal presence to which we all refer when we say "I am," and sometimes they speak as apparent individuals. As Ramana was dying, he told his followers, "I am always here, where could I go?" He wasn't speaking as the apparent individual, who was obviously dying, but rather as unicity, the One Self. Sometimes when a teacher says "I," they refer to this One Self. Other times when a teacher says "I," they refer to the person. "I" as unicity have no problem with anything, but "I" as Joan have a problem with all kinds of things. Needless to say, using the word "I" in these different ways can easily create confusion and misunderstanding. Some teachers will say that enlightenment is permanent or that you never come out of enlightenment, and in saying such things, they are pointing to unicity or the ever-present Here / Now. But when people hear these statements, they often misunderstand and assume the teacher is saying that the person is completely and permanently beyond delusion.

Boundlessness (the Absolute Self) is always here, realizing itself in every possible form and every possible experience. All experiences (everything perceivable and conceivable), including all transformations, awakenings, delusions, and differences, are all within the dream-like appearance. Within the dream, it can certainly seem as if being awake comes and goes. And relatively speaking, we can certainly say that Ramana Maharshi was an enlightened sage and that Adolph Hitler was a deluded madman. But enlightenment sees Ramana and Hitler as two sides of a single coin, different but seamless and inseparable. And this coin is itself only a dream object. Enlightenment is not about “me” getting from one side of the imaginary coin to the other side and then staying there forever. Enlightenment is not the permanent absence of everything that is considered spiritually negative (pain, suffering, confusion, doubt, anger, addiction, the sense of individuality, and so forth), but rather, enlightenment is the absence of the one who cares about being enlightened.

Does enlightenment happen suddenly and irrevocably, or does it come and go? Is it an unfolding process, like a photograph slowly appearing in the developing tray, or like getting gradually wet while walking in a mist, or like a puddle slowly evaporating, or like an ice cube gradually melting until nothing is left? Is it like waking up from a dream and leaving the dream world behind completely? Is it a line in the sand like the day when an alcoholic takes his last drink?

Or are these various analogies never quite right? Can any “line in the sand” actually be found if you look closely? Is “the alcoholic” or “the ice cube” really a solid, substantial, independent, separate “thing” as language tricks us into assuming? Is there a common factor in every experience including dreams and waking life?

Enlightenment doesn't “happen.” It is neither gradual nor sudden, and what is realized is both ever-present and ever-fresh. It can appear gradual or sudden only in the story, where it seems (in retrospect) that awakening was either a shift that unfolded slowly over time or else a sudden and decisive event with a totally different before and after. But neither of these imaginations really captures that to which words such as “enlightenment” or “awakening” are pointing.

It becomes clear that any experience of awakening or enlightenment is a scene in a movie, an event in a dream. No one wakes up. Nothing changes. There is only Now. ”Transformation” is a thought-created story that involves imagination, memory, the concept of time, and above all, the illusory “me“ who is seemingly being transformed. But in fact, the ever-present Now is timeless, and there is no “one” who is evaporating or disappearing or getting clearer or more developed or more focused or more (or less) enlightened – this “one” is always only a mirage – it is an optical illusion produced by thoughts, memory and imagination accompanied by sensations and stories about those sensations – nothing solid, separate and persisting is really ever here to be enlightened or unenlightened or to evaporate or transform. And in that realization, the shifting experiences no longer seem personally owned, and they no longer seem to mean anything about “me” and whether or not “I” am enlightened or deluded. The search for enlightenment falls away. We wake up to Here / Now -- the ever-changing, ever-present reality.

The aliveness of the present moment becomes more vivid and more simple: the sounds of rain and traffic, the rise and fall of breathing, the smell of coffee, the gratuitous beauty of a flower, the horror and sorrow of a bombing attack, the thoughts and stories that appear and disappear, the awareness beholding it all. Just what is, as it is.

Even in the story of separation and encapsulation, unicity is all there is. The apparent forms are empty of solidity. Everything is one seamless and boundless whole. Nothing is personal. The problem of delusion is always imaginary.

So “enlightenment,” as I would use the word, is not an event or a special state or an experience that lasts forever, but rather, the word points to this ever-present, ever-changing, boundless Here and Now that is all-inclusive, the unicity that is endlessly realizing itself in everything, and from which nothing is left out and nothing stands apart. This is not something that “I” can possess or experience or lack.

When the mirage of being a separate somebody encapsulated in a bodymind seems real, we long for a way out of suffering and imperfection. But ultimately, there is no way out and no need for a way out. The one who seems to be trapped is only a mirage. The manifestation will always include both light and dark, expansion and contraction. They go together. The capacity for delusion and the capacity for waking up are both aspects of Totality, like the two sides of a single coin. In struggling to escape from suffering and delusion, we confirm the imaginary problem and the apparent reality of the one who appears to have this problem. The very idea that there are “enlightened people” who are totally beyond all of this only fuels the imaginary treadmill of dissatisfaction and seeking.

In the dream-like movie of waking life, there is the appearance of separate people. Consciousness is thinking or imagining that it is a fragment in a world of separate pieces. This imagination – all the characters and events that seem to be happening – are all shapes that boundlessness or unicity is momentarily assuming. But like a dream, these forms have no substance. Nothing real is ever being created or destroyed. Whatever can be attained can also be lost again and is always only a dream event.

Enlightenment is the openness that includes contraction, the wholeness that includes division, the oneness that includes multiplicity, the absolute that includes the relative. It recognizes that which is always already the case. Enlightenment is not about denying relative reality. It doesn't mean not going to the dentist because everything is an illusion. It simply means not mistaking the relative world for something absolute, and not making the absolute into a relative thing that can be possessed or lost.

There's an old Zen story about not mixing up relative and absolute. Before I took up Zen, there were mountains and valleys. After I began the practice of Zen, there were no mountains and no valleys. With enlightenment, there are mountains and valleys. Of course, reality isn't a linear journey with clearly delineated stages, and there is no one taking this journey, so don't take this story too literally. It's only a pointer.

The first “stage” is ordinary relative consciousness – the world as we think it is, a collection of separate, objective things , including “me” who is “in here” looking out an external world “out there.”

The second “stage” of no mountains and valleys is the discovery that there is no actual boundary between “in here” and “out there,” that everything is one inseparable whole, that there is no “me.” From here, it is seen that Hitler and Ramana are aspects of one seamless whole like the two sides of one coin. This is the realization of what is the same in every different experience. This is the Absolute.

But there is still a subtle duality, a denial of the relative and a privileging of the absolute. With true enlightenment, there are mountains and valleys again. There are infinite experiences, but there is no one left who needs to cling to the absolute or avoid and deny the relative world of ordinary life. Hitler and Ramana are aspects of one inseparable whole and we can discern a huge difference between them. There is only the timeless, ever-present Now and there is history, evolution, and planning for the future. I am boundless awareness and I am Joan. Both sides of the coin are true. Zen masters have called this "leaping clear of the many and the One" or “the merging of difference and unity.” The Absolute is not a rejection of the relative world. The Absolute includes the relative but isn't bound by it.

In enlightenment, there is no need to assert that mountains and valleys are One. It is clearly seen that they are “not one, not two.” There is simply this infinite present moment, as it is, without the need to grasp it with a concept. There is no longer a need to make sure that “I” am continually identified as “impersonal awareness” and not as the character in the story. There is no “I” to be identified as either one. There is the freedom to be no-thing and everything. And this freedom is not a permanent state that a particular “person” is always “in” for all time. That very idea is delusion.

Many teachers are in love with the story that they are enlightened, and they love to tell the story again and again. We hear about their walk across the park or the magical moment in their kitchen when their self dropped away forever. Enlightenment is portrayed as a personal experience, an achievement or a permanent state. But that is only a moment in a dream. Yes, in the dream-like movie of waking life, some characters do report sudden and dramatic transformations, and some characters are exceptionally clear and free of delusion, but there is no one to be permanently enlightened or permanently deluded. There is no one who is a caterpillar in one moment and then a butterfly in the next. There is no caterpillar and no butterfly. There is only unbroken unicity from which nothing stands apart. A true teacher will not be encouraging you to idolize or idealize them, but rather, they will be deflecting all your attempts to make them special and put them up on pedestals. A true teacher pulls every rug you try to stand on out from under you -- they don't keep handing you more and more rugs. Awakening has no beginning and no ending. There is no finish line. It is always Now.

Even after the rope is clearly seen to be a rope and not a snake, it can—in another moment—be mistaken again for a snake, and when that happens, the body responds automatically with fear, contraction and recoil. The snake is never real, but it can momentarily seem real, just as the “I” is never real but can momentarily seem real. Does there come a time when this mistake has been so fully exposed that it can never again occur in any way, ever? For whom does this question and this concern arise? Is there someone who makes this mistake and who longs to stop being a fool? We don't know what the next moment may bring. In any given moment, the mirage of separation may occur. But what can perhaps fall away is the need for this never to happen again.

For who is this “me” who must reach a state where the rope would never again be mistaken for a snake, where “I” would never again forget that there is “only unicity” and instead imagine that “I” am a separate somebody? If the boundlessness is momentarily forgotten and overlaid with a sense of “me” as a separate somebody, who cares? Can it be seen that there is no owner of this experience, that it is unicity itself appearing as this mirage of separation and encapsulation? Or does another story begin running, a story about the first story, taking delivery of it, as Nisargadatta used to say, thinking that, “I've lost my enlightenment and I have to get it back,” or, “I want to be done with this delusion forever.” Who is it whose self-image would be damaged if the story or the entrancement were to show up again? Who imagines that “I” could ever be perfect while “the rest of the world” is still deluded? Enlightenment is a great story, but in truly waking up, which only happens now, the dream characters and their dramas are seen clearly for what they are – imaginations that are nothing other than unicity itself.

But that doesn't mean all dreaming ceases. Dreaming is what consciousness does. And in the dream, the drama often seems real. Every imaginable feeling can arise in the dream. Who needs it to be any different?

There are certainly many characters in the movie of waking life who experience or manifest more or less stormy weather – more or less anger, more or less depression, more or less compulsive behavior, more or less upset. Such differences may have little to do with enlightenment and everything to do with genetics, neurochemistry, brain function, hormone levels, and conditioning. Some bodyminds have stormier weather just as some cities have stormier weather. It's not personal. And every character is nothing but a bunch of ever-changing sensations and mental images (some positive, some negative) appearing and disappearing in awareness. When I look for where this person called “Joan Tollifson” begins and ends, I find no beginning and no ending. When I try to grasp or pin down this “person,” I find only continuous change. So what exactly is this supposed entity who would be enlightened or unenlightened?

There no longer seems to be a story here that “I” am in need of some kind of awakening or enlightenment that I presently lack. There seems to be a natural interest here in clarifying confusion, seeing through delusion, and being awake. But there is no longer the sense that “being aware” or “be in the Now” is some task that "I" must do. There is no self-conscious attempt to keep remembering to “be identified as awareness and not as Joan.” There is simply what is, as it is. Here / Now is ever-present and ever-changing. It's very clear that all experiences and states of consciousness, by their very nature, come and go, and that includes enlightenment and delusion. A sense of separation can still arise, a tight and contracted kind of experience that involves defending “me” and “my” self image, being “right,” resisting, opposing, grasping or asserting -- feeling different and superior (or inferior and lacking), being angry or defensive or hurt. That kind of self-contraction can still arise. It is clear that no one is doing it. It happens out of infinite causes and conditions. It isn't personal. A natural interest in seeing through this habit and waking up from it also seems to arise here and can take various forms such as sitting quietly, going on retreats, or attending AA meetings. All of that also happens out of infinite causes and conditions. No one is doing any of it. Life is one whole undivided movement.

Being enlightened is not about being perfect and special and having all the answers. It is about not needing to be perfect and have all the answers anymore. It is about recognizing the perfection in imperfection and the extraordinary in the ordinary.

The only reality is Here / Now. As Ramana Maharshi expressed it so beautifully: “Experience takes place only in the present, and beyond and apart from experience nothing exists.”

Here and Now, there is no enlightenment, no delusion, no person to be found. There is only boundless being – the infinite present moment. There is no end to this boundlessness, and no end to this unfolding Self-realization.

Rather than trying to figure out if you are enlightened or if someone else is enlightened, rather than idealizing people or putting them up on pedestals and turning them into infallible authorities, rather than trying to duplicate anyone else's supposed enlightenment experience, I would suggest investigating what it is you are looking for, and whether it is actually absent here and now, and who or what would find it or possess it or lack it.

You may find that nothing is missing, nothing is broken, nothing is needed. There is simply this, as it is.