More on enlightenment
Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 7:45 amChat yesterday once again centered around the notion of enlightenment. Even though I acknowledge that such a thing may exist, I still called the notion a mindfuck. I was asked to explain that, so the following essay.
Enlightenment...what is it?
Yes, I think there is such a thing as enlightenment, even though, to date, neither I, nor anyone else seems to have been able to define it. Perhaps it's like porn...you know it when you see it. The interesting thing about enlightenment is that it is only important to those who are attracted to it, and usually, what fuels that attraction is a judgement of self that self is somehow wanting, that self can be improved, or as some would have it, that self be eradicated.
Once attracted to it, it is as a Zen saying goes, like having swallowed a molten ball of iron...you can neither swallow it nor cough it back up and out. You are stuck with the notion. I think a similar thing happens to those attracted to the works of Castaneda - one gets the notion of becoming a sorcerer, a seer, a man of knowledge, a Nagual. That is, one improves.
I've referred to the process of seeking enlightenment, or being rather fatally attracted to it, to achieving it, as a mindfuck, because there is another way of looking at it. That is, to accept that the state of enlightenment exists (so far, only in literature in my experience), and rather than buy into the notion that it must be achieved (chase the carrot dangling from the stick), to eschew the whole thing. The mindfuck aspect of it is that it captures your attention, like any good con.
Enlightenment...what is it?
Yes, I think there is such a thing as enlightenment, even though, to date, neither I, nor anyone else seems to have been able to define it. Perhaps it's like porn...you know it when you see it. The interesting thing about enlightenment is that it is only important to those who are attracted to it, and usually, what fuels that attraction is a judgement of self that self is somehow wanting, that self can be improved, or as some would have it, that self be eradicated.
Once attracted to it, it is as a Zen saying goes, like having swallowed a molten ball of iron...you can neither swallow it nor cough it back up and out. You are stuck with the notion. I think a similar thing happens to those attracted to the works of Castaneda - one gets the notion of becoming a sorcerer, a seer, a man of knowledge, a Nagual. That is, one improves.
I've referred to the process of seeking enlightenment, or being rather fatally attracted to it, to achieving it, as a mindfuck, because there is another way of looking at it. That is, to accept that the state of enlightenment exists (so far, only in literature in my experience), and rather than buy into the notion that it must be achieved (chase the carrot dangling from the stick), to eschew the whole thing. The mindfuck aspect of it is that it captures your attention, like any good con.