Well, 100 posts into this, I still don’t know if you’re enlightened.
What I have learned, though, is that I’m not even sure if **I ** am enlightened, and if I am, whether that’s a good thing.
I take enlightenment literally. Are you still made of protons and electrons? Yes, no not enlightened. Call me when you’re made of Photons. 
I read through the latest group of posts, and I am going to take some time to contemplate them. It seems that a few of you are really taking great intrigue into this, and so I cannot possibly express how intellectually stimulating this challenge is for me, and it is really getting me to question my being, which was exactly my intent! You can expect full responses in the coming hours.
Answer mine! Answer mine!
Liberal
It reminds me of this Zen saying by Lao Tzu-
However, if we are to believe this, then that would imply that all of our great teachers (who said quite a bit) did not know. Meanwhile, who knows how many teachers sat in silence, keeping their enlightenment secret to themselves?
Personally, I read it as simply a warning against false prophets whose ego is their pulpit. To shut down all discussion of theological and spiritual matters because to discuss them would be dooming ourselves to “not knowing”, I feel is a misconstruing of the heart of the message at hand here. Quite the contrary, I see no topic of discussion as being more consistently relevant and relatable than that of the nature of life and the mind/body/soul connection. Further, it would be oppressive toward the heart’s disposition to ignore its regular beat for attention.
Now if the Lao Tzu quote read like this:
This, I would totally agree with. He who knows… knows there is no need.
**cosmosdan **
Agreed. You can not judge by appearances, as you can never know, for certain, what exists underneath. It reminds me of the movie Contact, where a character asks Jodie Foster to prove her love for her father. In the movie, she plays at atheist, but this philosophical question seems to shake the foundations of her egoic mind, in that she realizes that some of the core aspects of existence, which define her being, cannot be proven. No matter in what way you try to express your love, no act, nor series of words can ever conclusively prove love. Likewise, you can’t prove wisdom (it could always be the ego shrouding itself in the appearance of wisdom). In a grander view, these are elements of the soul, the soul being an entity which also cannot be proven, yet these elements and the soul exists in everyone, and in everything. An interesting dichotomy indeed.
So my words of supposed “wisdom”, then, may be nothing more than intellectually-driven fluff… that is… to the receiver who perceives them this way (likewise, a dullard could say something fairly straightforward, and a wise person could interpret it with great wisdom as they could interpret lillies with great wisdom, as Christ did. Hence why I brought up the movie Being There, earlier.) It takes little investigation to discover that, in communication, it is entirely up to the receiver to give meaning to words and expressions, which may ultimately have had entirely different meanings when sent out; hence, mis(sed)communication. Stated bluntly: Words have no meaning until they are given meaning (replace “words” with “life”, “God”, or “time” for a little fun). This is why wisdom cannot be forced into someone. You must be wise to perceive wise words as being so. Sure, you could perceive “wise” writing as intelligent, articulate, logical, etc. But it follows, in order to perceive anything as intelligent, you must be intelligent yourself (to truly understand the intelligence in it), and in order to perceive anything as logical, you must be logical yourself (to understand the structure and formation of the logic, and what exactly makes it logical). So, it easy to see how this extends to wisdom as well. It is something like a catch-22 that we take for granted in the latter examples, but the former (wisdom) is hard to grasp because it “wisdom” is not a colloquial topic. Thus, in order to perceive anything as wise, you must be wise yourself (“wisdom” existing as a separate entity as intelligence, as I described in detail upthread).
This goes back to exactly the quote by Lao Tzu I referred to in my past post in response to Liberal. If you find that enlightenment invokes pride and accomplishment, then your enlightenment is the ego masking itself with the identity of enlightenment, which is not enlightenment. So I agree with you entirely.
I would also say that if you “refrain from making a judgment call” in all your experiences of life, then you may find yourself stumbling onto some wisdom as well!
I’ve read your additional posts and I’m ready to make a judgment call. My initial impulse was correct.
**lekatt **
Well, to begin, I would not break enlightenment down into “parts.” Now, you could have done this merely due to limits in language, in that you had some difficulty coming up with a better way to phrase it, and I would totally understand as this has been an issue which I have been battling with this entire time. The challenge that we face is that we are discussing a state of being which is ABSOLUTE in RELATIVE terminology.
But back on topic, I find that it is a fundamental obstacle to enlightenment when you are creating divisions within enlightenment. In this way, love IS compassion, and compassion IS enlightenment. Likewise, love IS enlightenment. Again, the colloquial use of the word “love” gets in the way here. So I will take this opportunity to discuss the idea of “love” in, what I perceive to be, enlightened terms, contrasting it with colloquial terms.
Love can be perceived to be the “full acceptance of.” This means that you accept the good with the bad, and embrace all of it with loving acceptance. You no longer judge, but understand a situation, or a person, for what it is, or for who they are. This means that you can love a situation or person if it, he, or she were to change (as it inevitably will, by law of life), or if it, he, or she were to stay the same (which is actually completely impossible).
Love is without condition, and therefore love requires no proof, no words, no actions, no phrases, no poems, no romantic actions, no commitment, no nothing. These sorts of expressions are sufficient, but not necessary, as in many cases these acts take place, but they could easily be the ego grasping futility at love in an economical, “what’s in it for me” sort of way. So these expressions may coincide with love in many cases, but we know correlation is not causation. In other words, there is no direct connection between what we might perceive to be objective “loving” acts, and unconditional “true” love.
The phrase, “I love you” is often seen as a benchmark in relationships. Further, we know that there are different “stages” in relationships, from dating, to boyfriend/girlfriend, to fiancé, to husband/wife. Yet, do these terms actually mean anything? Do any of these supposed advancements prove advancement of emotional commitment, or for that matter, any emotional commitment at all? In this way, is it not possible that someone who experiences love at first sight could be more emotionally committed to the other, than someone who is married? Thus, it is impossible to define love by level of commitment, as level of commitment could have many motivating egoic factors besides emotional love and commitment; social pressure, insecurity with self, and comfort with complacency, to name a few. So to make a distinction here; there is emotional (ie: soul, true) commitment, and expressed commitment. The latter commitment guarantees nothing, while the former cannot be expressed (as then it becomes expressed, which guarantees nothing!).
So then how can relationships exist? How can we stay committed to someone when love can be so fleeting and without concrete definition? To answer this question, we must examine what conditions must take place for unconditional love to take place. IE: We will negate the societal conditions which we find are normally associated with love.
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**No need. **(read: neediness, desparation)
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No dependency. (read: you are whole with or without the other person; the other person cannot “make” you whole)
Of course, I should make the distinction here, in case it is not clear, that I am talking about eliminating mental dependency, not physical dependency. If you can have physical dependency without the mental, and that would work. -
Must have free will.
To elaborate, unconditional love has to be a free choice. In order for commitment to mean something, the person who is committing must have the option to not commit, available at all times. If someone is forced into a commitment, then their commitment means nothing since it was not their 100% free choice. (Tangent: We see this problem arise when Christians try to talk their way out of the Free Will Problem; is it truly free will if you will be punished for not being a believer? I would say, undoubtedly, no: that is not free will. That is a gun to your head, where you have the free will to follow orders or be shot. No, not free will at all.)
Therefore, it seems that the best, most fulfilling relationship would be one that is open. Allow me to explain. In an open relationship, people have the option to relate with others of the opposite sex as they so choose. So, if they have this option constantly available to them, BUT they CHOOSE NOT to indulge, and stay committed NONETHELESS of the freedom to do otherwise, this is a statement of full commitment, and one which cannot be made in a marriage, where they have no such choice, and where so many other constraining factors come into play. In this ideal situation, you can be sure that the other truly wants to be with you, because they don’t HAVE to be, yet, here they are: with you.
Building on this, people who want to fully love and accept another must first come to completely and fully love and accept themselves. This seems selfish, at first, especially in a society which believes that true love means complete devotion to another. And perhaps true love does have this characteristic, but people have it backwards. They are dragging the cart before the horse. In this way, one must first come to terms with who they are, and fully love and accept themselves, before they can accept another. Refer to the shot glass/ocean metaphor upthread for an analogy which directly relates to this subject.
So then what about physical love, and the physical connections we make? Well, the fact is that they, too, are not necessary to demonstrate love. Love can be demonstrated, known, and felt, without any real demonstration. It can go unsaid, and be just as real, if not more real, than what is explicitly described, in songs and poems. This is the greatest beauty of love, in that it can exist anywhere you look, if you choose to find it. Or it can exist nowhere, since love is such a subjective thing, that one could have love slap them in the face, but they may never even know it, since they are not open to perceiving it.
cosmosdan
I’m glad you found your answer. But did you have any comment about the substantive part of my reply, and not merely my joke (in that a core part of my writing here has been about no judgment…)?
Does that mean you haven’t made any judgments about whether you’re enlightened or not.
cmyk
That is because it is not awakened in your mind, as it exists separate from your mind.
The conflict is that you are trying to use your mind to see outside of your mind. It would be like trying to receive a visual television signal with a radio. You can only receive it in terms of the radio. So in this way, if your tool is the mind, to which to receive enlightenment, you will be limited to the terms of the mind. So, the closest you can get is to *conceptualize *enlightenment, but the conceptualization is not the same as the experience. Likewise, another example: It would be like comparing a description of an orgasm to the experience of one. Futile, wouldn’t it be?
I agree, it IS “easy” to accept the “shit” in this world, but much more difficult to accept the “shit” in your own life. That is the challenge, the lifestyle I propose to live: Complete loving acceptance for the experience of the present moment, and the past which has led up to it.
It is a state of controlling the mind, knowing you exist without the mind, and that the mind is merely a tool for you to navigate through this existence, just like the body is. Here is a thought experiment: Imagine consciousness without the body. Easy, right? You’d be stuck in your head, and you could still think, right? But now, imagine consciousness without the body AND the mind. What’s left? You no longer have an ego, so you no longer have an individual perspective. So what’s left? I’ll tell you… the potentiality for anything.
You see, the mind and body are limiting in their nature in that they constrain your experience of life to their limits. They are relative. You could be relatively unintelligent, limiting your ability to conceptualize the world. You could have relatively poor eyesight, limiting your ability to see the world. Etc.
The body and mind also perpetuate the illusion of separateness. You perceive, through your senses, how things exist outside of “you”. Likewise, you think in an inner voice, thoughts that, seemingly, exist inside of “you”.
Now, conversely, enlightenment is the removal of such limitations imposed on the experience of life. In the present moment, in such a state, you come to know your oneness with all. Boundaries lift. Afterwards, in retrospect, you realize that what you normally associate with “who you are”, is exactly “who you are not” due to the temporary and constantly changing nature of such characteristics. So you come to be in touch with what exists underneath, the stage, whereupon the dramas of the ego take place, but which existed before, and will exist after, the existence of ego.
This state can be achieved in any number of ways, but there is one common thread: no-mind. Either the mind is distracted (by a mantra, counting rosary beads, intense focus on a candle’s flame or one’s own breath, the trance of a drum’s beat, etc) or it is consciously silenced without distraction, which may certainly take some practice.
When doing this, you may feel yourself as part of a grand flow, and, out of the silence, inspiration may hit you. In fact, it may hit you so fast that you confuse flow-inspiration as your own thoughts… and they are. You realize there is no difference. It is no coincidence that I use the same words here (inspiration, flow) as many musicians and artists. Their great work is likely, in many cases, coming out of the experience of no-mind! But they may not even be aware of this!
You see, in stillness, in silence, in nothingness, you set the stage for movement, sound, or something to pop into existence, respectively, in ANY conceivable way. You see, if your mind is constantly chatting with itself, you never allow this potentiality to build, so instead you keep this space filled with inconsequential, redundant thought, which prevents inspiration the necessary space to enter. But if you silence the mind, and open this space… now you could be onto something. This is where such phrases as, “Sleep on it” come from. This common colloquial idea is that, perhaps, if you calmed down a bit, the answer may just come to you. And very often, it does. Further, how many times have you had writer’s block, or something comparable, and so you go to do something else which may distract you from the problem at hand, and once you start doing it, a rush of inspiration inexplicably hits you? Now you know what I mean, as this is no-mind in little short bursts! Imagine the sorts of creative potentiality which could build if you took more time to allow it to develop!
On the outside, it probably hasn’t changed my day to day living much at all. I mean, if you looked at me, it is not as if I am in the full-lotus position, meditating all day. But on the inside, it makes all the difference. It is the “how” behind the “what”.
When I lose someone close to me, which will inevitably happen, I will accept it wholly, head on, and feel gratitude for the time I was given, by life, to have with that person. We always say, “He/she wouldn’t have wanted us to suffer like this!” and “What you are doing right now won’t bring him/her back,” but does anyone actually follow this advice? I would. I would not suffer. I would accept the absence of the diseased. The present moment is irreversible. It is here. It is now. You either accept it, or you lie to yourself, believing that somehow, if you struggle enough, something might happen which reduces your suffering. You cannot even conceive what it might be, but you hold out some illogical hope, when all along, your suffering will end once your mind quiets or moves on. Sometimes, it never does.
And you’re right, it is entirely at odds with human nature itself. This, again, is the concept of the “Fall” and “Original Sin”, the addition of the ego to the animal and the spirit. But once you combine all these three, as man has, you may realize that the spirit can control the ego. Once you do this (which I did as soon as I came to the realization that I was creating my own reactions to the outside events around me, that no outside event guaranteed any set reaction), **you are free.
**
cosmosdan
If I did make such a judgment, it would be on part of my intellectual, egoic mind, and would not be absolute, no matter how “sure” I were to sound. I recognize this. Which is why the Lao Tzu quote is so relevant. I understand the notion that if one were to say that they are enlightened, it may imply that they are not, because the device processing the thought construct, or the conceptualization of, “enlightenment”, cannot actually experience enlightenment.
But, in my comment above in regards to Lau Tzu’s quote, I feel I made an adequate commentary on the topic. Do you agree with the commentary I am referring to, and my modification of the quote which fits my philosophy?
Slight Hijack for a story:
Actually, I rather liked that quote, and easily have a practical application for it. I have 2 uncles (they’re brothers), and they’ve helped raised me since I was a child, and I love them both. However, I’ve come to realize over the years they do things differently. One I can ALWAYS turn to for advice. He will always tell me what I should try to do, and what I should strive to do. He’s a moral compass, and easily is able to tell me of options in any hard decision. However, he knows these things because he knows the Rules- he’s learned the rules, and he’s memorized the ethics and that sort of thing. He’s the guy that told me- “Don’t drink Beer! It’s wrong, and it’s bad for you. Don’t do it at all if possible, but if not, don’t do it before you’re 21!” Of course, at his wedding, I learned from his friends stories of how when he got drunk he would go around tipping cars over for fun. (O_o)
That blew my mind. As he never drank around me. And always told me not to.
My other Uncle is slightly younger. He’s aggressive and more belligerent than the other one who is more passive, and always tries to stick up for himself vs. ANYONE. But he comes off as angry and scary at times, when I was a kid.
He never gave me advice, and he never really tried to influence me by telling me what to do or what not to do. He just rather played with me, and helped me out, but I never really turned to him for advice.
One of my most vivid memories though, was at Age 16, it was new years eve, and I was home with him, and we were making snacks. I found a case of beer left over there from my grandparents, and I pointed it out to him. He shrugged and said, “yeah, they’re old though. I don’t drink them, and no one else does either really.”
I asked him why not, and he explained, “Well, when I drink, I became really angry and I think it runs in our family. So I didn’t really like who I was when I drank. So I stopped drinking. Do you want a Beer though, I won’t tell.”
And that just kinda clicked for me- I said no thanks, I’d rather have a coke, and he smiled and agreed with me. Since then, I’ve always been happier with my choice not to drink as I always think of him and his words (i’ve had alcohol, and realized I have a similar response to them, so I don’t drink, as I don’t like it either)
And since then, I’ve realized the two differences more and more in my 2 uncles. One will always TELL you the morally right things to do- because he knows it, and he WANTS to follow the rules, but more often than not the message gets blurred by his actions. The other- tends to be very rough around the edges, but he NEVER tells me what to do, rather he just SHOWS me through his own actions. I never end up going to him for advice, but rather just observe- What would HE do in those situations.
That’s sort of how I rule my life- I can always ask one uncle what to do, while I always go to the other, and just see what he WOULD do in that situation, and then I usually go with the actions. Actions speak louder than words, and I just really liked the above Quote, as that’s what it makes ME think of when I see it.
/hijack
I notice sadly you didn’t get to my questions yet from yesterday… 
There is no “should”, as there is no need. This is the nature of free will and enlightenment. So, there is no obligation, per say, but you have the freedom to assist others in any way you like. Ironically, you will likely end up finding yourself pursuing these paths because you need not seek anything for yourself. So the obligation to others arises due to no obligation to yourself. And so you take up the cause of your neighbor, knowing that when you do so, it is not because you have to, but because you choose to. Further, you will totally invest yourself in such efforts because you are inherently self-less by nature, and because you are living in the here and now, so your actions have your complete and determined focus.
But now I would go so far as to say that it is not a matter of caring about the other, or attaching to the other, but knowing that there is NO OTHER. The egoic mind is what perceives the illusion of the other, whereas the soul knows no separation. When you are living from the soul, only then can you truly empathize, can you truly love. Otherwise, such efforts are, under the surface, selfishly motivated deeds done in, in a round-about way, to fulfill yourself. The self, however, is not fulfilled by external stimuli, but, rather, in knowing that you are one with such stimuli, so, by this logic, you have been whole all along; it is simply a matter of awakening to this reality.
The here and now is here, now. It is not some future event which can be avoided, nor is it some past event which can be forgotten. Therefore, if you are seeking to avoid suffering, you must then indeed gracefully accept the here and now, whether it be in pleasure or in pain. This is not to say that you can’t have a preference, as obviously you would prefer pleasure over pain, but if pain is part of the present moment, you accept it unconditionally.
In this state of oneness, the sufferings of others, as well as their joy, is your suffering, and your joy. So your approach would be the same as when dealing with your own present moment experience, as I described it right above: Accept it if there is nothing you can do to change it in the here and now. But you are free to prefer that your fellow man feel pleasure over pain.
So if a family member is grieving, and it is within your power to bring that person out of grieving, you may want to do that. OR, you may see such efforts as futile in the same way that you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make them drink. In other words, it ultimately comes down to the other person to eliminate their own suffering. Certainly, you may be able to create a situation or scenario for them which may be conducive to their own clearing of mind, but it is their clearing of mind which is the key element here, not the conducive scenario. So, if the other person NEEDS YOU to feel better about themselves, then it is their state of not feeling whole on their own which is the obstacle, not your lack of being there all the time.
So then, in perhaps a more efficient pursuit of helping others, you may take to efforts to inspire others to inspire themselves; to show them, by way of example, that it is possible for them to take control of their own ego. In this way, I wholeheartedly believe this was Christ’s purpose. But one certainly cannot understand His message of silencing the egoic mind THROUGH the egoic mind! Hence, this problematic distortion of Christianity into a maze of arbitrary dogma and cyclical hypocrisy, when all along, a pure message exists at its foundation, one which is all too often overlooked by its supposed believers.
I think I may have adequately explained this just now, right above?
Ultimately, the sufferer is ALWAYS alone to deal with it, as long as they are suffering. The state of suffering is one characterized by loneliness, because suffering is of the egoic mind which perceives the human experience as being separate and detached from its surroundings; ie: lonely. Suffering ends once you know oneness as an alternative, and from then on are able to separate what is an egoic experience vs. an enlightened experience. Respectively speaking, you are able to differentiate what you are not vs. what you are. As Christ said, “Be in this world, but not of it.” It is essentially saying that once you understand the duality of the soul coexisting with the mind, you can have one leg in both realms, picking and choosing which experience you would like to manifest at any given time, for I will not deny that practical purposes often require egoically minded thought and experience.
Now of course offering sympathy to another might do something (key word: might). It may or may not cause a reaction which may or may not be an awakening to oneness (albeit short-lived perhaps). In this way, if you show someone true, unconditional love, this may be the little push that brings them to inspire themselves to become of an unegoic nature as well. Or you may simply be lifting their metaphorical heads above the surface, just so that they can sink back down again once you let go. At the end of the day, they need to learn how to swim on their own. Otherwise their temporary escapes from suffering can only result in a return to more suffering.
The only way to act in a truly self-less way is to fully love and accept the self first. It is simply a matter of becoming self-less before you can be selfless, and you cannot become self-less unless you fully love and accept the self for what it is. Anyway, here is an example of a truly self-less act in everyday life which may be relatable: Small girl begins to drown in a pool. Mother, who cannot swim, sees this, and WITHOUT THINKING, dives in to save her. During her poor attempts to keep herself afloat, she is able to position the girl to the side of the pool to safety. But now the mother is drowning. All of a sudden, she realizes what she has done, and her ego begins to panic. But, in the time of diving into the pool, she was completely self-less. Her soul would not have minded the death of her mind and body, as long as it was in an act of love. In this brief moment, she understood enlightenment. However, she did not consciously choose such a state of no-mind. It just happened.
Conversely, what I am advocating is a conscious choice of no-mind, where you will put others ahead of you because you don’t need to be ahead of them. They need it more than you. Hence when Christ said, and I paraphrase: “If somebody steals your coat, give them your shirt too.” Christ knew that the greatest gift is the act of giving, (since we are all one, spiritually, giving to another is actually giving to yourself, and depriving from another is actually depriving from yourself) and thus, if someone needs something more than you, even if it be earthly life itself, perhaps it would be in the greater good to give it. After all, the unenlightened will suffer in the moments leading up to death. You will not. And since you and the unenlightened are one, the only way you can prevent suffering in this moment of truth is to take the fall.
Of course, this is a very extreme example. As I was writing, I imagined a scenario right out of some Hollywood bank heist where the robber says he has got to kill a hostage. And in accordance with this, I honestly would be the first to volunteer.
So now it is probably clear that my philosophy is anything but selfish. Radically self-less perhaps? I would agree. 
That’s exactly how I would imagine an enlightened person to reason. Although, slight nitpick would be that suffering certainly does indeed exist, it is just that it is self-imposed.
The rules of life/God apply to everything. That is the beauty of it all. By becoming enlightened, you are not putting yourself outside the rules, but you are just of a greater awareness regarding the rulebook.
Humans, by nature, have the experience of Holy Trinity: Mind, Body, and Soul. In this way, everyone has the capacity for awakening, simply by realizing that the soul is captain of the life ship, not captive to Captain Ego. Now, I concede the possibility that the Trinity exists in different proportions in different people (further, I would posit that someone with a very weak mind may actually find enlightenment EASIER, but they may not even be aware of their arguably preferable state, since their egoic mind is weaker by nature, so they simply don’t know any better (or worse, as the case may have it)), but that is all up to subjective experience and certainly could not be proven (especially considering one whole aspect of the Trinity cannot be proven: the Soul).
I feel that I have addressed most of this above. But I do think that I should comment on the proposed advice you give as example.
In that statement, “Hey, I’m sorry about you losing your girlfriend. Bummer,” you are validating his egoic mind. Therefore, you would be helping perpetuate and rationalize his egoic thinking, which is causing his suffering. By pandering to his ego, you will be making his ego stronger. So what could you say then?
This is how I would imagine such a conversation to go. Let’s use your example of girlfriend dumps guy.
Guy: I can’t believe I lost my girlfriend!
You: Well, it happened. The past is done. We have to accept it. But here’s the question. Do you think you need her to feel whole?
Guy: Well yeah I need her to feel whole. She was my everything!
You: So then by that logic, you were empty before you met her.
Guy: Well, no. I was pretty happy, but then I got so much better with her, don’t you see?!
You: Did she make you better, or did you make yourself better in response to her?
Guy: Shwaaa?
You: I mean, if you found another girl who touched that same part of you which brought out such a strong response of betterness, what difference would it make?
Guy: No other girl could do that, she was the only one.
You: Do you actually believe that?
Guy: Well. No.
You: Couldn’t you imagine yourself being just as happy as you were with her, with another girl?
Guy: I don’t want another girl. I want her!
You: Don’t you think that to try to hold onto something that has already been lost as futile? Don’t you think it might be nice to appreciate the freedom you now have, which you didn’t have so much of with her, and wait for a new, perhaps even better girl, to take up the space which has opened in your life?
Guy: You don’t get it, she was amazing!
You: You don’t get it. You are the one who perceived her as amazing. Don’t you think it is possible for someone else to perceive her as something other than amazing? Do you think she, objectively speaking, is amazing? Can’t you admit that it is you, being in love with her, which is the amazing part?
Guy: Well yeah I loved her!
You: So the love is the amazing part, not necessarily her.
Guy: Well, yeah, love is a great feeling.
You: Well, so if you were to fall in love with another girl, wouldn’t that be amazing too?
Guy: Of course, but I don’t have another girl.
You: Yet. Maybe you should use this time to spend with yourself, enjoy your own company, and realize that you never needed a girl at all to feel love.
You see the difference here? The ego, when dealing in absolutes, is destined to fail. If someone says, “I am miserable!” it is very easy to get someone to see the illusion of their misery, as long as they are willing to see it. In the same light, it is also easy to get someone to see the potential for newfound love, again, as long as they are willing to see it. If talking through the illusion, which can be a time consuming task, is something you can do for someone, certainly do it. But don’t confuse this with talking UP the illusion, because that is often what people do with one another, which perpetuates the whole egoic cycle of thought.
RoOsh
Ask and you shall receive!
I’ll be getting to responding to your post tomorrow… You pose some intriguing questions. And as you noticed, it takes a lot of time to respond wholeheartedly, so I am about worn out.
Anyway, I did want to comment that I am quite fortunate that I happen to have absolutely no practical obligations at this time, as my place of work is temporary shut down for remodeling, and I have been feeling drawn to doing something like this for a while now.
So it seems, given the nature of the responses so far, that not only have I been given the perfect time to do this, but I have chosen the perfect forum. So I extend a thank you to everyone that has been involved so far!
I was thinking it spoke more to the issue of credibility. Look at it this way. If I’m K, then <>~K -> ~~~K, or ~K. Wouldn’t you have thought I would have been ~~K? Which, without any other context might be true. But keep in mind that a false statement necessarily implies a true statement; i.e., if something is false, then it must be true that it is false. Whether that necessity is metaphysical or epistemic, I will leave to the reader.
You’re a guest so let me explain something. The tradition here on the SDMB is that we try to stay on the topic of the opening post. To divert too much is called a hijack. Of course hijacks do happen and sometimes the person who opened the thread doesn’t mind so tangent discussions happen. All good. The title of your thread is Am I enlightened? It’s not **Let’s discuss a bunch of spiritual philosophies ** or Let Me demonstrate how much I know about spiritual matters
I don’t mean this to be harsh so please pardon my being blunt. In the OP you state
Yet in this post you say, If I did make such a judgment Don’t hedge, do you think you are or not? Your response to the “If you think you are, you’re not” point raised was in post 21
I don’t believe that does make the difference. Acknowledging that potential in others doesn’t mean we lack a prideful attitude about perceiving ourselves as enlightened. Referring to the egoic mind as if it’s separate doesn’t mean we are free from it’s grip.
I haven’t read all your posts, but I appreciate the experiences I’ve read. I understand the excitement of finding something that seems so meaningful. There’s a good reason we use metaphors like “seeing the light” and “waking up”
Discussions of philosophies and religious concepts are fun. I participate in a bunch of those here myself. In this case you made the thread about you rather than spiritual concepts in general. For that reason I’m refraining from general commentary and being more specific.
My own experience is that it’s easy to feel like some advanced spiritual being by studying and grasping different teachings. Moments of heightened awareness, insight, and understanding are all good. OTOH I know people who are very spiritual people who never study any of that. They have a very grounded sense of their connection to other people and the world in general and their behavior consistently reflects their inner spirit. The real test is as we go about our daily lives and interact with others. Some folks are easy to deal with, to show kindness and love toward. They make it easy to be benevolent. Others people and other situations are a real challenge. Aside from the discussions and our ability to quote spiritual teachers, that’s where the rubber meets the road and the reality of who we are is revealed.
I salute anyone who has done some work and decided to undertake the task of self discovery. It’s a worthy journey. Perhaps you’ll decide to become a member and I’ll see you around the boards.
Cosmosdan
Perhaps you view much of this spiritual talk as tangent issues. And I understand how you may be able to view it this way.
But I would delightfully posit that when discussing a topic as infinitely broad (literally read: INFINITELY) as enlightenment, there are no tangents, as long as it keeps coming back to the source. In this way, EVERYTHING can be related (literally read: EVERYTHING). We speak of an absolute which either encompasses ALL human experience or NONE of it (and skeptics will view it in the latter). In this way, doesn’t it say something how Christ is able to compare enlightenment to a mustard seed, the outlook of a child, poverty, riches, lions, fishermen, a sower, fire, death, life, birth, eating, fasting, division, sin, peace, war, the senses, what exists outside the senses, beginnings, endings, infants nursing, friends, enemies, pride… and the list goes on and on. And each time, it always goes back to His source: enlightenment.
You have quoted my OP in such a way that I don’t understand your argument, because, in so many words, it plainly expresses what you claim it does not:
As I have said above, what it means to be “enlightened” can carry “implications” over all human experience. If we are to “delve ever deeper” into the topic, there actually is no end, as there is no beginning. And if I am to allow you “to find logical holes in my assessment and philosophy of life”, then I should certainly go into great detail, particularly when asked specifically about certain points and related issues, should I not?
We agree on the latter argument completely. In fact, I have discussed it at length. However, as for the former point, let me say this: Suppose, for the sake of argument, that I am indeed enlightened. If this were to be the case, I would say with absolute certainty that: I am not better. I am not worse. We are all one.
Perhaps you should, and then you may see that we agree more than we disagree?
Referring back to my OP: “With all your help, we will dance a dance where neither one of us is leading, but which may create great beauty out of words, thoughts, feelings, and emotions.”
My intention with all this, as clearly stated here, is that we have a back and forth discussion on the matter, where nobody necessarilly leads. However, since I did start the thread, it is then presumable that I will be tending to it attentively, and posting often, as I have, and love doing.
Well, perhaps now you see that your general commentary would be more than welcome, in that it may be part of this dance of expression I make reference to in my OP. So dance away, my friend.
What about mine? Are you going to do me?