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What’s Enlightenment Anyway?
My post on punk rock yoga sparked an interesting line of conversation over on a blog called Gnostocosmosis. Author Joe Chip sums up our interaction around the subject of enlightment:
I commented with, “If it leads to liberation, it is a good thing, right?”
Tim’s reply: “I no longer accept that as a given. What’s liberation, anyway? Why should that be the end all be all?”
There’s no way I could possible answer the first question without being pretentious, so I won’t even try. As for the second question, “liberation,” whatever it is, may not be Tim’s priority, but isn’t it still the gold standard by which esoteric disciplines like yoga are judged? I am by no means an expert on yoga, but it seems that the answer is definitely yes.
I really like this question and I think there is a lot of meat to it. I guess I’m not saying that enlightenment shouldn’t be the goal. Really, what do I know about it? Not much. I guess I tend to catch myself when I start accepting something as axiomatic. Actually, it’s really hard to see it in my own thinking, which is what makes communicating with other people on these topics so fruitful. Because when you hear the things you’re used to saying or thinking coming out of somebody’s mouth, you hear it in a whole different way.
That aside though, I still stand by my original comments of:(1) what’s enlightenment? (2) why do we want it? And I’m not even sure - based on that - that I’m ready or ever will be to ask (3) how do we go about getting it? JP had a short but sweet post on this subject recently that fits well here:
Really, enlightenment, gnosis, “awakening,” etc. is completely pointless. All it’s good for is teaching you who you are, what you are, where you are, where you came from, where you’re going, and what birth and rebirth really are. It doesn’t tell you anything whatsoever about what to *do* with this knowledge. What you’re going to *do* with this knowledge is something you’re going to have to decide for yourself. This decision is far more difficult than the simple achievement of gnosis, and far more important.
Lots of ways we could pick this apart too, which I think would add to our conversation on the topic of enlightenment. Does enlightenment really teach you “who you are, what you are,” etc? Or does it strip those things away from you completely? Is it an additive or subtractive process - or do both meet somewhere beyond the dualities of language? If enlightenment itself really is pointless (which maybe it’s not - we could question that as well), and all that matters is what we *do* with the knowledge gained from it (or shed, perhaps, during it) - then aren’t we in exactly the same boat as we were all along? If that’s the case, then enlightenment doesn’t really help at all and it’s not the “gold standard,” so to speak. Because you’re still caught in the human condition, regardless (or not…).
Here’s another fun thought experiment with which to deconstruct the idea of enlightenment. Say you get enlightened. Cool. You’re enlightened. Congratulations. But what happens when other people can’t tell you’re enlightened? Does it diminish the “fun” of the whole thing when they don’t “respect your authori-ty” or will you be so beyond the whole thing that you’ll be like, “It’s cool man, I’m still enlightened. Whatever.”
Maybe I’m getting old and jaded now, but I’m really starting to lose sight of the drive towards goals like enlightenment. Too many things happen in my life that I just can’t figure out. There is simply no sudden slap you in the face solution that appears one day and fixes everything. But there are small moments - everyday gnosis, if you will - where suddenly you see the joy and the life and the beauty on someone else’s face. Suddenly you feel the sting of pain and anger. And the challenge for me has become to keep myself there, to not retreat reflexively into recursive fantasies of enlightenment, transcendence and other forms of abstraction. I want to feel what I feel, not rise above it or escape it or understand it. Cause I’ve tried all that, and let me tell ya: it doesn’t work. Liberation is a trap.
May 18th, 2006 at 5:59 am
If you believe and accept enlightenment, you don’t need to ask anyone else whether it is true or false, or whether you’ve done it correctly, or deconstruct it verbally; it will be like meeting your father in the middle of town.
There is no backward designing of the ineffable experience,
I have come to recognize that there is a very big difference between such experiences as reported by those who have gone through them and the disciplines of different schools which attempt to instruct persons in the areas of these experiences.
The problem is this. The disciplines generally trace their origins back to some individual who had deep inner experiences himself and then attempted to report or describe his own ineffable experience in the symbolic language of the world so that others might follow in his steps. Such persons attempt to report not only the nature of the experience itself but also the altered attitudes and viewpoints that come spontaneously to those who have had such experiences. What is important is that the enlightenment being described has come about spontaneously as a result of the ineffable experience itself. Because the school or cult which follows after such a person is based on the symbolic language he has used in an attempt to describe both the experience and the resultant viewpoint, the discipline that develops can be based only on symbols rather than direct experience. The experience is not subjective. The discipline then attempts to enlighten its members by instructing them in the attitudes and viewpoints reported by the original singular experience. Unfortunately the process doesn’t work since cause and effect have been reversed. A meaningful enlightened attitude comes about as a result of the ineffable experience, but instructing persons in such attitudes does not lead back to the ineffable experience. The process is not reversible.
I don’t know if this explains much about enlightenment. My own experiences have led me away from the tendency towards intellectualising the experience towards the pureness of the experience itself. But what do I know?!
JMHO
May 18th, 2006 at 7:20 am
Wow. I’m really disturbed now. Are you talking about “liberation” with a big “L”? Or little “L”? Because if liberation (with a little l) is a trap, then I’m done for.
I think the problem with enlightenment, liberation, etc. is partially based on what Gina described as the “ineffable experience.” The liberation trap seems to come from the codification, the lineage systems that vye for power, and in this day and age, the orientalist mass marketing of certain eastern religions and its associated mysticisms that essentially make it banal. To make it worse, the mass marketing aspects (yoga journals, designer yoga mats, assebly lines for anything and everything Buddhist, Hindu, and whatnot) are often in direct oppostion to the original belief anyway.
Anyway, I think the whole point of certain practices is to train you to recognize that your everyday life is filled with moments of hidden liberation - of that everyday gnosis that you’ve talked about before. That other big quest for Liberation, IMHO, is the marketing ploy.
May 18th, 2006 at 8:07 am
Very good points, Tim. I used to think “enlightenment” and “liberation” were goals, but now I see them as simply other tools in a growing toolbox for how to live my life. TWICALTRE–my acronym for “Take What I Can And Leave The REst.” I take from enlightenment, and from endarkenment. I take awareness both from liberation and from bondage to (false) self, even as I seek release from it as the 3rd Step Prayer of the Big Book of AA counsels recovering people to do. Everyday gnosis for me is the goal. Perhaps that is why I dream of living in a town or city that is clothing optional. I wish to be spiritually naked and honest and somehow I think that allowing us spiritual beings clothed in awesome skin with its attendant smells and earthiness can reconnect us to some of that. Liberate the skin from clothes, in other words. (But also return to the bondage of fashion for it does serve a purpose.)
As the previous poster suggested the whole liberation/enlightenment thing feels like a marketing ploy. I have been reading Pagan Bodhisattva’s take on Andrew Cohen which confirmed for me what I thought as I would pick up issues of What Is ENlightenment(TM)? magazine. Yet I also have to acknowledge that there is beauty and truth in this as well.
Basically, I’ve taken to heart that “I am the one I’m waiting for.” I am Neo from The Matrix as is everyone else on the planet, from Zhao Ying-Fun working at the Beijing Wal-Mart to Amartya Battacharya at the Bangalore Microsoft Call Center to George “Archon #2″ Bush to the esteemed Tim Boucher and back to my wondrous ass. Together we can, though frequently we’ll be working at odds with each other, and that’s just the beauty of it all. Somehow it all makes sense in its Alison Uondrland way. “It’s all good.”
May 18th, 2006 at 8:30 am
enlightenment can be described in some ways by what it`s not. it certainly isn`t authority over others. it isn`t success in business and it`s not a light shining out of your eyes that everyone else who`s on a “path” can see. sometimes enlightenment is painful and divisive and a curse, as those around misunderstand the attitudes of the enlightened.
too often in our culture there is this master/student relationship that allows the ego driven to learn some buzz-words of spiritual practice and then “teach” the next wide-eyed subscribers at the community center.
many who attain some enlightenment are oblivious of the fact. they just know they see the world in a different way and act differently because of it.
many confuse enlightenment with conscience, which is a religious construct, designed to set people apart from eachother and meddle in things like politics and business out of anger and resentment. this is the ego at work…….the opposite of enlightenment.
enlightenment is a form of understanding. in a.a. proponents are asked to make the distinction between the things that they can do and things that they can`t. the more we can make these distictions in our lives with humour and love, then we can make room for enlightenment.
maybe that`s it……….we have to keep the bed made in the spare bedroom and a place set at the table just incase enlightenment should visit.
May 18th, 2006 at 9:31 am
I used to obsess over the idea of enlightenment too. And I got to this point in which I realized it really was just a concept, pointing to a meditative state of being. Three books which really enriched my life, and really helped me gain some understanding on the nature of enlightenement were
1. Hardcore Zen : Punk Rock, Monster Movies, & the Truth about Reality by Brad Warner
2. The Essential Crazy Wisdom by Wes Nisker
3. Krishnamurti’s Journal
(Jiddu Krishnamurti was an embodiment of an ‘enlightend’ person)
May 18th, 2006 at 9:53 am
between robert anton wilson and alan watts and bill hicks and george carlin and richard bandler i gave myself the permission to be spiritual……….and laugh at things.
things feel lighter now.
May 18th, 2006 at 9:56 am
With all due respect, Tim, it sounds as if you’re rather young, rather confused, and of course inexperienced. Give it time. In the interim, try not to talk (or write) about any of this; truly, it’s unhelpful to do so. Best of luck!
May 18th, 2006 at 10:03 am
Oh, George Carlin is so depressing. He is a man in his 60’s obsessed with his own mortality. But Robert Anton Wilson is so amazing! His book Cosmic Trigger was the best. My favorite RAW quote is “If you think you know what the hell is going on, you’re probably full of shit.”
May 18th, 2006 at 10:28 am
Since the experience known as enlightenment/gnosis, etc. can’t be duplicated or shared among people, there’s really no way to pin it down. As to the whole “who you are, what you are, where you are” thing, it’s an old gnostic koan, sort of like the “what did your parents look like before you were born?” question used in zen to break people out of logical thinking. Doesn’t really mean anything beyond that.
I think that there’s a whole spectrum of experiences on the “enlightenment” scale, and that these experiences are super-deeply personal. Who can say whether or not he or she is truly enlightened? The only way to tell is by example, really, so maybe a good follow-up question is, what does an enlightened person act like? In my experience, if you ask a sincere seeker whether she has achieved enlightenment, she generaly will get all uncomfortable and won’t answer, or will avoid the question. In my experience, very few “enlightened” people actually advertise that fact.
What is it, though? Who knows? It’s a hot potato– catch!
May 18th, 2006 at 11:15 am
I wholeheartedly disagree. See my notes here:
http://www.timboucher.com/journal/2006...ords-are-meaningless-and-forgettable/
And this whole thing about accusing others of being young and inexperienced is exactly what I meant about people not being able to respect each other’s experiences. While I very openly am young and inexperienced and embrace it, imagine I sat here claiming that I know with absolute certainty what enlightenment is and that I have it. The same thing would happen. Someone would accuse me of being deluded and a megalomaniac.
Also, don’t people who are enlightened still get mugged and beaten up? Don’t they still get diarrhea? I think there is this notion that we have that enlightenment someone makes us into Superman or Neo. And I think pointing yourself towards that as a goal is most definitely a trap.
May 18th, 2006 at 11:19 am
I absolutely agree. But I would take it a step farther. When you codify it into a linguistic construct or a concept AT ALL, then it becomes a trap. Because you inadvertently pull in associations, subtext, cultural baggage and expectations about what it will be. When I say “Liberation is a trap” I mean then that the word and concept and desire to actualize that concept is a trap. But it’s easier, quicker and more thought provoking to simply say “Liberation is a trap.”
May 18th, 2006 at 11:21 am
yeah, that’s pretty lame. if tim shouldn’t talk or write about it, neither should you.
May 18th, 2006 at 11:51 am
Maybe the best thing to do though is to totally invert the whole thing:
http://paulinekilar.com/weblog/?p=179
May 18th, 2006 at 1:58 pm
A truly sad definition of “conscience.”
True conscience is not a social construct. I happen to agree with Gurdjieff who maintained that it was innate in humans but is often either buried or atrophied totally by surrounding life and “culture.”
Enlightenment without conscience is potentially dangerous to the self and possibly to others.
I hope that if I can achieve any degree of ‘enlightenment’ that conscience takes part in it.
May 18th, 2006 at 3:49 pm
conscience in the way we tend to understand it is the reason people argue and refuse to allow the experience of others to be valid. nobody knows what will happen next. conscience gives people the permission to do all the punishments that we witness. torquemada was a man so sure of his conscience that he would burn a man to death after practicing every depraved torture known to man apon his victim`s flesh, in the hope that that man would agree to believe what he did. we don`t have the political power to exert that pressure on others to conform…….but continue to strive.
enlightenment or conscience……….not both.
May 18th, 2006 at 4:39 pm
That’s funny, and all this time I thought enlightenment might have something to do with non-dualism.
I think this is absurd. What you are describing is not true conscience, it is a man’s warped version of “morality” (a thing in human behavior which is infinitely mutable given time, place and culture) telling him that torture of heretics is the “right” thing to do.
May 18th, 2006 at 5:32 pm
Aha Tim! Your further explanation of “liberation is a trap” makes even more sense. I wholeheartedly agree with you. In fact, that’s exactly what I was thinking.
BTW - I actually love talking about this stuff too. I love the community. Keep it up!
May 18th, 2006 at 5:40 pm
Who here has achieved enlightenment? Not I.
May 18th, 2006 at 6:09 pm
The problem is having a goal towards being enlightened.
One of my favorite Adi Da stories is the one where after he became “enlightened” he said he was going to “eat until he died.”
May 18th, 2006 at 6:15 pm
What does being “young” have to do with this? Are you trying to imply that one below a certain “recognized” age cannot have had experiences relevant to his own personal evolution? And who are you to deem any age as the right age in order to have certain experiences fulfilled?
May 18th, 2006 at 9:18 pm
david, you are correct in making the distinction about morality………..and this is what drives conscience. it`s about all of us watching each other. the ego says i`m the best and i`m gonna prove it, so whan it comes to morality/conscience there is that ego thing making us the very best at being good……….and who dictates the value of good in our society? the church. and the state sits back and allows the programming, knowing that it`s job is being done by the priests and ministers, long before the rules of law come into play.
david, if you have a definition of conscience distinct from morality i would appreciate the post.
May 18th, 2006 at 10:24 pm
Alistair, my previous posts already express my view that conscience is something which must be awakened in parallel with consciousness, that it is innate in people meaning pre-culture, pre-society, and even before language.
I think you’re simply using semantics for how you are deciding to combine your definitions and not make a distinction. Maybe it will help you understand by saying my view is explained far better by Gurdjieff who indicated that a human being who is not dead inside from surrounding societal garbage and total autohypnosis still has buried in his/her subconscious the properties of innate conscience which is not mutable as morality is and does not disguise itself in societal or egoistic norms of behavior. For an obvious possible example, Why did a few select German Christians in the WWII era hide Jews or resist the Nazis? The “morality” of their society dictated that this was wrong, and yet a few did so at great personal risk and some paid with their lives.
People’s true conscience in Western society can manifest as almost a neurosis, as that vague gnawing feeling that “we are not as we should be,” seen even in the most ‘accomplished’ people who appear to have everything modern life can give. It can also be awakened after commonly shared natural disasters and wars, although it gets buried again (witness America in the near-aftermath of 9/11, or after an earthquake) with the regular habitual hypnosis of life.
May 18th, 2006 at 11:02 pm
yes, again i agree. in small communities i saw a conscience that functioned. in times of turmoil there is a breaking of the trance of culture that allows some humanity to seep through but i would suggest that as turmoil persists we tend to see more mercinary tendencies emerge. new orleans was a good recent example of people behaving badly as time progressed in the crisis.
i believe that population density has a great deal to do with this dissociation that we experience. people in cities are overloaded with human imput and shut down the “hey, hello” reflex.
the higher values of the concience that you speak of works in small communities of around 100- 150 people max. after that there are so many creeping issues that the common bond betwen people starts to fray and strain and eventually break. then the bureaucracy moves in to create policy and law to replace the natural boundaries that naturally occurs amongst people who are personally familiar with eachother.
the idea of conscience that you refer to doesn`t scale up well. it is replaced by morality. that is my distinction with a difference.
a book was written some years ago called filters against folly which adressed many of these issues of social scale that we are facing in the urbanisation of our lives. i think the author`s name is garret hardin, but i`m not sure.
May 18th, 2006 at 11:17 pm
yep, i checked. filters against folly by garrett hardin. and regarding semantics and linguistics. they are tools of my trade. i take care to mean what i say and when i don`t understand a response i ask for clarification.
the conscience we are asked to accept in a modern technological society is morality. the glue that holds this firmly in place is consumerism and it`s inherent work ethic.
it is probably one of the great heresies of our time to challenge conscience as valuable in our society. right up there with isues of race. these are beautifully elegant self-censoring mechanisms. we cannot challenge the position of men of conscience as being anything but absolutely good.
i posted this here because i believe that the politically, socially and religiously correct thinking self-censors us into neat little boxes that we can`t escape without supreme effort.
i will go further here and say that as much as tim pushes the boundaries, at times, he tends to pick safe fights where he knows that he`ll live on.
we get bound up by our want to be good and be seen as good. it traps us in morality/conscience. it also makes us afraid to say what we feel.
May 19th, 2006 at 12:03 am
Funny, cause Adi Da was somebody I was thinking of when I was talking about this. I always walk by this Adidam building in Seattle and I always cringe whenever I see his posters talking about how he is an avatar of god. I mean, hell, maybe he is and I’m missing the boat, but if he’s enlightened, he still seems kind of creepy - or at least the organization around him does. I do kind of want to go check out one of their weird video screenings they seem to hold very frequently. But I distrust those people to high hell, simply for claiming they are enlightened.
I feel like if you were, you’d have absolutely zero need to run around announcing it.
May 19th, 2006 at 3:49 am
>There is no backward designing of the ineffable experience,
Thats fuckin great I love that quote
“reverse engineering God”
I have no right to speak this way but I think if you are free and at peace with yourself that is all you can wish for.
At that point you can be bound to samsara and be just another buddha on the road or become a bodhisattva and this is not just in buddhist terminology like you can sit on your little pillow and veg out or like do something, help people, create things, you know, whatever. It’s what you make of it…
I don’t think anyone that says they’ve been enlightened and starts a rigid dogma for ‘disciples’ is free, they have locked in on the Mammon archetype and they trap themselves in the same mentality they promulgate: ‘enforcing and indoctrinating and proselytizing’.
Freedom I think is really sayin, “I don’t need that shit”…
-tc
“I can see a felon wearin a blue armor coat
standin lookin violence and hittin wrong notes”
-hendrix
May 19th, 2006 at 6:13 am
a clear distinction must be made between a person who has an Enlightenment-experience and an Enlightened Person.
May 19th, 2006 at 6:51 am
distinctions are important. certainly if one has experienced enlightenment then it is simpler to find it again. like being staggered by the beauty of a field of flowers rising up across a hill or children playing in the school ground or huge flocks of birds flying as one in the sky, darting first one way then suddenly another, as if part of one bigger thing.
enlightenment comes and goes. it rises and falls. in some it`s dismissed and it`s back to the grind. to others the sound of children is annoying………..
enlightenment is a choice.
remember that you are alive.
May 19th, 2006 at 7:11 am
and i read somewhere that some feel that there is a neurological or neuro-chemical component to enlightenment and that some people are more disposed to having enlightening feelings. i`m sure there will a drug developed to stop it, if that`s the case……….
others have suggested that illness or trauma can promote the occurance of enlightenment experiences. this has been said about the developement of the shaman also.
and who`s to say what is a valid enlightened experience? i will leave that to the people who are still arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
May 19th, 2006 at 9:04 am
All that enlightenment means is to have knowledge. No one could make a vitamin pill out of ignorance and have it work. So everything is towards enlightenment, and that obviously, takes work.
May 19th, 2006 at 9:21 am
H.Prasad. What are you old, experienced, and in other words dead? (I’m probably older than you are but I percieve I have some light)
“With all due respect, Tim, it sounds as if you’re rather young, rather confused, and of course inexperienced. Give it time. In the interim, try not to talk (or write) about any of this; truly, it’s unhelpful to do so. Best of luck!”
Oh that’s a really enlightened way to be. Just knock em down, and raise yourself up subtly…oh yea, it works for you doesn’t it? BEST OF LUCK! IDiot.
May 19th, 2006 at 9:59 am
Best leave perceptions and perceive alone. For enlightenment is not for the unenlightened. It is truly for those who WORK at existence. Not for those who sss…quelch it.
May 19th, 2006 at 10:03 am
In unduly ways like I have been doing…oh but would I love to just crrrrush them!
May 19th, 2006 at 10:08 am
It’s like you Serpent coiled yourself up knowing that I was here, and came around waiting for me. Well, I’m not that pure yet. I’m still working on it. And I am getting better as, haha, you’ve noticed. After all you wouldn’t be coming around looking for me, now would you? if it wasn’t for this magnificent Christ you so hate, who now I have joined. Who is more powerful? He that is in me? Or you that is in the world? Hahahhaa.
May 19th, 2006 at 11:24 am
Thanks for the posts, Alistair. I think understand your position better now, although I’m not as pessimistic as I think you sound because ultimately our “conditions” can only be blamed for so much. Conscience is ultimately an individual matter and those who don’t take responsibility for their own won’t have it–as simple/difficult as that.
May 19th, 2006 at 8:08 pm
you bet david………i tend to be cynical because of the futility of what we want things to be like vs………..everything. i am actually an optimist though,i get up and go at things enthusiastically, to the best of my ability and realise that i can`t change the world. just the little bit i can reach out and touch.
May 20th, 2006 at 1:02 am
Sounds smarmy but I guess it may help -
Enlightenment and liberation are journeys not destinations. You don’t reach them. You keep reaching them. At least in my experience.
And to answer Mr. Chip’s question - yes I feel I have been enlightened and liberated in many ways. Sometimes I lose my way but never fear this lesson will repeat as necessary.
May 20th, 2006 at 1:22 am
Enlightenment reminds me of a story:
A bodhisattva is walking along to see the Buddha and he comes across a monk who is fasting and meditating under the open sun. The gaunt monk sits upon the rocky, broken ground and is covered in fire ants from a nearby nest. The monk pleads with the bodhisattva, “Please,” he says, “ask Buddha how many more lifetimes until I am enlightened.” “No problem,” says the bodhisattva, “I shall make an appeal for you when I see the buddha.”
He leaves the monk and further down the road the bodhisattva comes upon a man who is deep into his cups and dancing and making various and sundry forms of merry with his friends and female cohorts. The bacchnalian man asks the bodhisattva if he would do him a favor and also ask the buddha just how many more lives he must live until he achieves enlightenment. The bodhisattva, feeling particularly giving this day, agrees.
Two weeks later the bodhisattva returns down the otherside of the mountain after having visited the buddha. He comes upon the pious and austere monk. The monk has been exposed to the Hot Sun for days without food or water or rest. He skin is burned and shriveled and covered with bites from the ants. His ass is sore and his back is wracked with spasms. Through parched lips he begs the bodhisattva, “Did you speak to the buddha on my behalf? How much longer until I achieve enlightenment?” The bodihsattva gladly replies to him, “The buddha said only 5 more lives must you live - then you will be enlightened.” “Five more!” cried the monk, “it cannot be! Oh how I have suffered down this road.”
The bodhisattva moved on. In time he came upon the dancing man again. The man was still celebrating and the party ebbed and flowed around him. “How many more lives do I have to live, bodhisattva, until I am enlightened?” he asked when he finally focused his bleary eyes upon the newest guest to the party. The bodhisattva pointed at a leafy bush nearby and replied, “You must live as many lives as there are leaves upon that bush before you achieve enlightenment, dancing man.” “That’s all!?!?!” whooped the man and as he began to dance more enthusiatically he was enlightened.