A Sanctuary For the Enlightened

[seeker2011]

I resemble Curious Snowflake experience a bit.
I still judge, however much I dislike doing so.
My 'enlightenment' is more of a "discovering more than I should have ever asked for" sort of thing. Truth is what I sought, and truth is what I found. It just wasn't a very pretty truth....and I should clarify that with this: I have discovered a window through which I would not have looked had I not been so near a self imposed destruction that my "higher existence" had to step in and stop it. somehow. And my conclusion is that any "stepping in" of that higher consciousness can not not result in increased awareness of various aspects of existing.
So the struggle ensues, and drives me onward to an unknown (therefore frightening) future.

Thanks for starting this beautiful thread Psychoslice. I too enjoy reading the experiences of others. There are so many and they are al so different but yet so simular.

I don't feel comfortable with labeling myself as enlightened...for enlightenment was not my goal. Like Seeker 2001 I sought the truth. I sought a "way out". I have as long as I can remember a deep love for God. It does not stem from my upbringing as my parents were not religious at all and my sisters and brothers (7 of them) did not experience the longing and pull toward the spiritual as I did.

That said it all started about 24 years ago. Around the age of 27 I started to have mystical experiences...a light hit my forehead and on two separate occasions I saw white light flow from my stomach preforming miracles. Those experiences put me on a quest to find out how those things were possible.

Then in 2001, 1 year after my brother died Mediumship opened up to me and I started noticing people healing around me without me doing anything.
I heard that through meditation one could communicate with others that had passed over, so I went into meditation for the first time....and Jesus appeared to me. He asked me to write a book, I was given the Title and because I am not a writer to my question Where do I begin, I was told from the beginning. A time of spiritual teaching followed for about three years. When the book was done I went to bed one evening with a feeling of a question and the next day I woke up in bliss. I felt complete, I felt it was done. I thought: That's it! I was so excited that I ran to my book to share what I had found, but my mind was empty....no thoughts at all. In that moment I realized my true self to be one before thought...in the absence of thought. From that moment on, my search was over.

[psychoslice]

Originally Posted by CuriousSnowflake

I wouldn't call myself "enlightened" by any stretch of the imagination, but I would say I reside at a different place of consciousness from the average person. Enlightened implies some kind of end product, and I don't think there is any end to the Process except full loss of self and reawakening into Oneness, at which point there is no difference between "you" and everything else, which then puts you right back into the Cycle again, over and over endlessly. And that is beautiful, no?

But I would like to share my most powerful spiritual experience, the one that really put me permanently into this different place I mentioned. It happened in the oddest and (in retrospect) the most dangerous place you could imagine: while driving a car down an expressway at 70 MPH ('bout 105 KPH for you metric people)! I was listening to an audiobook of "Conversations With God" (a fave of mine despite his propensity towards conspiracy theories) and Mr. Walsch was going into one of his descriptions of Unity, and something about his words flipped a switch in my head. Not some little light switch, mind you. More like one of those big bracket things from Dr. Frankenstein's lab that you need two hands to pull and that throw off miniature arcs of lightning when it makes contact.

The state I entered was similar to an attentiveness meditation, but orders of magnitude clearer and more intense. I wasn't simply aware of myself, I was aware of everything around me as though it were all just an extension of my body. Me, my car, the other vehicles, the road, the air around us, the forest to either side of the expressway, all of it looked/felt/became something like a sea of stars held together by filaments of silver, and I could feel it all the same as I could feel my body. I felt the wind rushing past the car just like I would feel a breeze blowing through my hair. I felt all the moving parts of the car like I would feel my legs while running. And reaching my awareness into the forest was like diving face-first into a soundless explosion, for each expression of Life (of myself, really) there was a grand galaxy of Light, beyond my ability to describe here in any way that would do it justice.

At some vague level, I understood that whizzing along at over a mile a minute was not the safest or wisest place to have this experience, but I was completely unafraid at the time. The act of driving safely was as simple as drawing breath, for some part of me was still perfectly aware of the perceptual world. Yet I saw it as the point of view it was, and realized with some amusement that even if a semi wiped out in front of me, I would be unharmed. I was no longer a structure, but that which held the structure in it's form, and I knew (as amazing a thought as it was) that I could simply guide the structure as I wished it, even through other seeming-structures. In other words, I was quite sure that if an accident occurred, I would simply slip through it like wind through a screen door.

The intensity of this realization slowly faded, and I became more and more consciously aware of myself as myself. By the time I got home I was something like normal again, but it was several weeks until I came completely down of the high. Even now (and this was about 3 years ago) I can still feel this awareness at the edge of my consciousness, like a light shining just over my right shoulder. At any time since then, I can slip into this truer awareness with very little effort, but not quite to the same level as that first time. It really was a life changer, since I simply cannot see the world as most people do anymore. The separateness, the conflict, the fear, I see it all as the vast illusory game it is. I do not judge it, for life and existence is indescribably perfect just as it is. Yet I can see the dramas others create for themselves and laugh much as I do when I see the games of pretend my kids engage in.

Hopefully my little story will show someone a new path to the life they wish to create.

CS

Hi CS, reading your words took me back to my experience, i understand what you described clearly, and I have to say that was a taste of pure Essence, call it Enlightenment, Awareness, whatever, the label isn't important.

Like I always say, there has never been anyone who has been Enlightened, this taste of Awareness is beyond the mind body but experienced through the mind body, I know you know what i mean by that. Thank you for sharing such a wonderful experience, i'm sure it will help other.

[psychoslice]

Originally Posted by seeker2011

I resemble Curious Snowflake experience a bit.
I still judge, however much I dislike doing so.
My 'enlightenment' is more of a "discovering more than I should have ever asked for" sort of thing. Truth is what I sought, and truth is what I found. It just wasn't a very pretty truth....and I should clarify that with this: I have discovered a window through which I would not have looked had I not been so near a self imposed destruction that my "higher existence" had to step in and stop it. somehow. And my conclusion is that any "stepping in" of that higher consciousness can not not result in increased awareness of various aspects of existing.
So the struggle ensues, and drives me onward to an unknown (therefore frightening) future.

The discovery of what IS is just that, a discovery, we now realize that we are not just this mind body, that we can never die, can never be born, and that is all it is. We now just simply continue on living this life, we no loner are after anything to make this life better, after all what could possibly be better than realizing your true SELF. For me there is nothing else to do, but to set back and enjoy the ride, I don't need to go back to that experience ever again, the light has been switched on and it can never go out again.

[psychoslice]

Originally Posted by Shabby

Thanks for starting this beautiful thread Psychoslice. I too enjoy reading the experiences of others. There are so many and they are al so different but yet so simular.

I don't feel comfortable with labeling myself as enlightened...for enlightenment was not my goal. Like Seeker 2001 I sought the truth. I sought a "way out". I have as long as I can remember a deep love for God. It does not stem from my upbringing as my parents were not religious at all and my sisters and brothers (7 of them) did not experience the longing and pull toward the spiritual as I did.

That said it all started about 24 years ago. Around the age of 27 I started to have mystical experiences...a light hit my forehead and on two separate occasions I saw white light flow from my stomach preforming miracles. Those experiences put me on a quest to find out how those things were possible.

Then in 2001, 1 year after my brother died Mediumship opened up to me and I started noticing people healing around me without me doing anything.
I heard that through meditation one could communicate with others that had passed over, so I went into meditation for the first time....and Jesus appeared to me. He asked me to write a book, I was given the Title and because I am not a writer to my question Where do I begin, I was told from the beginning. A time of spiritual teaching followed for about three years. When the book was done I went to bed one evening with a feeling of a question and the next day I woke up in bliss. I felt complete, I felt it was done. I thought: That's it! I was so excited that I ran to my book to share what I had found, but my mind was empty....no thoughts at all. In that moment I realized my true self to be one before thought...in the absence of thought. From that moment on, my search was over.

Hi Shabby, that was so beautiful, I myself was always thinking about god ever since I can remember, and like you no one in my family was ever religion at all. This realization of our true SELF, it s odd because when asked what it was i can never put my finger on on, I can point to it with mere words but that's about it.

Yes I know what you mean by not feeling comfortable about labeling our self Enlightened, and again as I always say, we as the mind body can never be Enlightened, it beyond the body, but experienced through the mind body.

Yet another beautiful story, thank you for sharing Shabby, love the Psycho.

Originally Posted by psychoslice

Hi CS, reading your words took me back to my experience, i understand what you described clearly, and I have to say that was a taste of pure Essence, call it Enlightenment, Awareness, whatever, the label isn't important.

Like I always say, there has never been anyone who has been Enlightened, this taste of Awareness is beyond the mind body but experienced through the mind body, I know you know what i mean by that. Thank you for sharing such a wonderful experience, i'm sure it will help other.

Upon reading this and Curious Snowflakes post I felt a switch go on. I won't go into my own lengthy awakening experience but will focus on these flashes of 'realization' or 'cognition'. In Zen the use of koans stimulate these realizations. They make no sense to the mind as they completely bypass it to touch and enlighten spirit.
The same rules apply whether you are speeding down the highway at 70 kph listening to an audio CD or watching a bird or eating chocolate cake. At any one moment a realization can be triggered by seemingly trivial events. However the events resonate in a completely different way within you than is possible to conceive by the mind.
I have had the same experiences and they have lasted for a couple of months. I see them as a sort of turbo boost to help propel you to your next stage of being.

[psychoslice]

Originally Posted by Buzz

Upon reading this and Curious Snowflakes post I felt a switch go on. I won't go into my own lengthy awakening experience but will focus on these flashes of 'realization' or 'cognition'. In Zen the use of koans stimulate these realizations. They make no sense to the mind as they completely bypass it to touch and enlighten spirit.
The same rules apply whether you are speeding down the highway at 70 kph listening to an audio CD or watching a bird or eating chocolate cake. At any one moment a realization can be triggered by seemingly trivial events. However the events resonate in a completely different way within you than is possible to conceive by the mind.
I have had the same experiences and they have lasted for a couple of months. I see them as a sort of turbo boost to help propel you to your next stage of being.

Hi Buzz, yes the experience can last for however long, but the experience itself can never be what IS, many try to recapture this experience over again not realizing that the experience can never be what IS, once one has this inner Awakening no more needed to be done, for what else can be done?.

Originally Posted by psychoslice

Hi Buzz, yes the experience can last for however long, but the experience itself can never be what IS, many try to recapture this experience over again not realizing that the experience can never be what IS, once one has this inner Awakening no more needed to be done, for what else can be done?.

Yes...nothing can be added to that, that is why I smile when people say go deeper. Deeper than what? LOL

[psychoslice]

Originally Posted by Shabby

Yes...nothing can be added to that, that is why I smile when people say go deeper. Deeper than what? LOL

Hi Shabby, yes there are many who do say that there is more to be done, but like you my truth is that there isn't and that is all i can go on, for if I didn't it wouldn't be my truth.

[Xan]

Yes...nothing can be added to that, that is why I smile when people say go deeper. Deeper than what? LOL


Deeper into being IT more fully in consciousness. Deeper into purer expressions of it.

I also smile when people say there's nothing further to discover, as if we could ever be 'finished' here in this world.


Xan