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What Is Enlightenment?
Dakini
Veteran
We talk about Enlightenment a lot, but how clear is our understanding of it, really? Some expect it to be a state of bliss. Others say "all" it is, is the falling away of illusions, cravings, and grasping. (Easier said than done.) Seeing the world as it really is. Some think it may be accompanied by extrasensory abilities, like past-life recall or omniscience. What's your take on it?
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Nirvana was how things were. Then he saw that while nirvana was reality beings were suffering. Thus he taught the whole Buddhist path.
I view enlightenment as how things already are. It is merely getting rid of misperceptions, thus coming to directly touch what is already here.
So if one liberates themselves, they liberate the world. If one takes the dualistic stance of enlightenment, then one has a mistaken belief that enlightenment is something attained. But if one takes a non dualistic point of view of enlightenment, then enlightenment is already how everything is and rather we open up to what already is so.
Now both are valid positions on the matter and do not oppose each other. Enlightenment is sudden and gradual. It really depends on how you view enlightenment.
Also the definition of enlightenment from a Mahayana point of view is to directly perceive emptiness. This isn't necessarily nirvana. Enlightenment leads to nirvana or total cessation of all negative afflictions.
Hence all the language about cutting away rather than accumulating more.
Something to ponder. I've listened to way too many talks and books about the nature of enlightenment and this is the conclusion I've come to. But even amongst Buddhists there are various expressions of enlightenment and the path to full buddhahood.
In the early schools they emphasis becoming an Arhat, which is to attain total cessation and to end the kleshas.
As you can see there are millions of different ways we can frame a map towards enlightenment and even when enlightened there are various levels. So while I was asserting that enlightenment is how things already are it is also a developmental path as well.
One can assert the model set by zen or the ten ox herding pictures. In this model they take use of clear mind and that is considered the direct perception of emptiness, which leads to nirvana as the end goal. But even that path doesn't end in nirvana as the bodhisattva ideal is to surpass one's own nirvana for the sake of all sentient beings.
but thats another topic on its own.
We all have buddha nature or the potentiality for us to realize our buddhahood and manifest all the positive qualities of a buddha.
In a way we have to water those seeds in us already. The seeds of love, wisdom, compassion, equanimity, peace, joy, etc.
Thus enlightenment isn't necessarily something special. It is something we touch everyday. Just like we have moments of peace everyday. We just cultivate the good and wholesome, while learning from the unwholesome and bad.
It just comes down to kindness and the sure hearts release.
Even if one attains nirvana and becomes an Arhat, the world suffers.
Even if one abides in peace, look around the world.
How do you think the masters feel? They all weep inside and all while express peace and joy.
Why? Because it is the most compassionate thing one can do is to showcase ones own peace and joy and happiness so that it can leads others and in fact give others the chance to see the peace, love, and joy within themselves.
not only that. when one is peaceful, joyful and completely happy. then real work can be done to help others.
when we cannot even have a moments peace with ourselves how can we ever help others? we can only think of ourselves.
thus practice, ethics and meditation become the most compassion actions.
the worlds problems will not be solved if one attains enlightenment.
but instead of being a helpee. one can finally be a helper and healer to the world.
all the worlds problems start with our mind and end in our mind.
if it didn't then why practice? to attain peace for yourself? thats fine, but what about others? ultimately there is no abiding subject and object because they are all karmic projections from mind. but thats a hard pill to swallow for most people.
thus be utterly selfish and focus on attaining buddhahood as fast as you can for the sake of other people, which in turn allows for maximum peace and happiness for self.
sorry for thread jacking. my rant ends here.
if you're going to take a black and white stance while reading into whatever i write then you're doing yourself a great disservice.
in jack kornfields new book Bringing Home the Dharma: Awakening Right Where You Are, he talks about different masters in various traditions who were considered to be highly attained masters.
each one of them expressed their truth and wisdom differently. some expressed through mindfulness. some through peace and equanimity. some through political action. some through loving kindness. some through compassion. some through wisdom.
even in the buddha's time there were examples of individuals who showcased and excelled in various expression and embodiment of enlightenment.
but to be blunt. from a bodhisattva's point of view. and we're defining a bodhitsattva as one who has bodhicitta or spiritual ocd, all motivation is routed in full buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings.
a master in my humble opinion is one who knows the knowledge of suffering, the path leading out of suffering and the total cessation of suffering.
and from there how one expresses that peace is up to that individual mindstream.
please don't read into this as so black and white.
Any peaceful and joyful people are truly hard to come by. Maybe in some sense they are normal, but what truth they embody is certainly not a dime a dozen. It is rare and we should appreciate these people who are highly attained, and as we should all aspire to reach the same heights as they have.
On another level they are all just empty projections. Normal, peaceful, joyful are all projections of aspects ourselves. So if you want to see such a master as normal, then that is fine.
But others have different perceptions based on their karma.
Just saying
Blessings.
From my notes from a lecture by Stephen Batchelor:
The Buddha said Enlightenment wasn't about achieving a higher reality. It was about a shift in perspective, from delighting in one's place [meaning: one's status, one's everyday life, one's achievements and posessions] to awareness of one's ground [meaning: cessation of suffering, awareness of conditioned arising]. The stilling of inclinations, desirelessness, is Enlightenment.
If I thought I knew, I would miss an essential point; words and concepts are only fingers pointing at the moon.
All I can do is trust my practice and trust this ”I don’t know” and surrender to it completely.
Cut out all this pondering on reaching enlightenment, and focus on the practice!
Happy now?
Friend Sariputta, Nibbāna, Nibbāna is it said! What is this Nibbāna?
The destruction of Greed, the destruction of Hate, and the destruction of
Ignorance! This, friend, is called Nibbāna …
But, friend, is there a method, is there a way to reach this Nibbāna?
There is indeed a method, friend, there is indeed a way to reach Nibbāna!
What, friend, is then this method, what is then that way to reach Nibbāna?
It is, friend, simply the completion of this Noble 8-fold Way
2 other quotes that I like
"Enlightenment is the removal of wrong perceptions"
"Nirvana is simply the correct understanding of Samsara"
Okay my tiny contribution about the past life/psychic abilities is that part of enlightenment is experiencing the lack of linear time and space. Without linear time and space then of course you can appear psychic because it is rather fluid as to what happens in what order. Also likely to be considered bonkers.
Then if you add an experience of no one and nothing being separate along with the non-linear time then past/alternative lives make a lot of sense.
however we are trying to understand a 4 dimensional reality when we are a 3 dimensional object. Gonna be a lack of comprehension
Did the buddha talk about time? The notion of time is not only relational but it is a sense of urgency. We have no time! Well we'll have to find buddhadharma in our mindfulness and take the psychic thing as best as we can.
Nice quote, @seeker242
Thank you, everyone. Very nice thread.
Samsara is conditioned view of reality.
Was there a difference between what the Buddha taught is Enlightenment (falling away of delusions and attachments, seeing life clearly as it really is, an unconditioned view of reality), and what he experienced?
If the sutras are to be believed as his teachings, without outside cultural influence, we know he had spontaneous recall of past lives, among other psychic abilities, and that he gained an intuitive understanding of the workings of the universe, describing an elaborate cosmology. I'm not aware that he ever spoke of bliss, but it looks like at least a couple of the signs of a Kundalini experience were present. A dedicated and intense meditation practice over time can raise the Kundalini.
What do we make of the difference between what the Buddha taught and what he experienced as Enlightenment (according to the Pali records)?