Newbie Here. What's The Purpose Of Enlightenment?

[WaterfallMachine]

So I've been reading the pinned posts and was rather confused about them. I've been meditating for 5 years, but barely in this perspective. I've spent a long time with simple breathing meditation, ate with mindfulness, walked with mindfulness, had everyday mindfulness pauses, hours and hours of  loving kindness meditation, used meditation for reflection, meditation for anxiety, meditation for self esteem, meditation for focus, meditation for patience, meditation for self compassion, meditation for jealousy, meditation for guilt, meditation for contentment, meditation for creativity,  meditation in nature, body meditation, sympathetic joy meditation, compassion meditation and so much more. 

I'm only first learning about it. I'm curious. I've read about this perspective before but I wasn't able to find much about it that had concise clear practical exercises to do it. It seems Leo's resources seemed rather unique to me in this perspective. 

If it's not to be a good person, then what is it? If it's not emotional mastery like I thought, then why? What is its use?

Getting ready for my mind blown. Heh. 

[WaterfallMachine]

23 minutes ago, Dingus said:

To find out who you are and what reality is.

Which only makes sense when you're beginning to suspect that something is off, that the answer may not be as obvious as it seems, that you don't actually know, and that you may be very misinformed indeed.

It's quite common for people to start pursuing enlightenment without really having a clue what it is or why to pursue it. It's not common at all for people to actually find out.

Hmm. Interesting. So you're saying I really have to do it to figure it out. I've tried an exercise for 20 minutes to have a mini exploration and I find that there's some sort of fear that I've been wrong all this time and some suspicion over what could be wrong in my beliefs. But also the idea is that it seems very obvious, but also not obvious if that makes sense. And recently tried a 10 day practice on this recently before meeting this site. I guess I'm pretty newbie in my experience so I guess I'll just see how it goes as time passes. I doubt I've reached any sort of major milestone really. 

Though, I was getting the impression that there was some sort of emotional benefit to this even if it wasn't a mastery from the small instances I've seen this type of thinking. If you have no sense of you or well, whatever that confusing mess of ideas is, isn't there a liberation from self esteem? That you don't have to be endlessly reminding yourself how good you are or how better you are because there is no you? So I was imagining some sort of lessening of fear towards things in life. Is that true? Or is it some kind of myth? Maybe a sort of half-truth?

And I was also getting some impression of greater kindness somehow? If you don't view yourself as separate from your surroundings, doesn't that allow for greater compassion to others? Hmm. Confusing. But I like confusing things.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 16, 2017 by WaterfallMachine

[Leo Gura]

@WaterfallMachine You realize, right, that death does not exist, life is a hallucination, and you are not you?

It's like you've been fishing in a pond for minnows and all the sudden you discover you've hooked, not just a whale, but the entire fabric of reality.

What is the purpose of waking up from a dream?

[Prabhaker]

47 minutes ago, WaterfallMachine said:

What's The Purpose Of Enlightenment? What is its use?

Enlightenment has no purpose, it has no utility, it is not a means to some end. It is enough unto itself. It is such a contentment, such deep satisfaction with oneself and the cosmos, such a strong let-go, that you don’t have to do anything. Just being is more than you can have conceived – the joy of just being, the blissfulness of just being.

Non-doing awareness has no function in the world but is simply a blissfulness, an ecstasy, a drunkenness utterly centered in the present moment… That is the whole idea of the Buddhas: to make you aware that something is hiding inside you. But because it is of no use, you don’t care about it.

The world consists of utility, and your consciousness is of no utility. You cannot earn by it, you cannot sell it, you cannot do anything by it. It is not a doing energy.

47 minutes ago, WaterfallMachine said:

If it's not to be a good person, then what is it?

Spirituality is not morality. Spirituality is not a question of morality, it is a question of vision. Spirituality is not the practicing of virtues - because if you practice a virtue it is no longer a virtue. A practiced virtue is a dead thing, a dead weight. Virtue is virtue only when it is spontaneous, virtue is virtue only when it is natural, unpracticed - when it comes out of your vision, out of your awareness, out of your understanding.

You can practice non-violence, but you will still remain violent, because your vision has not changed. A greedy person can practice sharing, but the greed will remain the same. Even the sharing will be corrupted by the greed, because you cannot practice anything against your understanding. 

[Shin]

Learn how to have lucid dreams, then realize than what you call a dream is as real as that thing we call "reality".

Talk to some Zen Masters and Gurus, look at their eyes, how they look at you.

Study nondualism teachings, and unconditional love.

If you do that, you'll know why.

Edited April 16, 2017 by Shin

[Benjamin Curtis]

                                        

[Benjamin Curtis]

                                                                        

[Prabhaker]

32 minutes ago, My_Name_Is_Mud said:

The "purpose" of awakening is to end suffering in yourself and others.

When Jesus was crucified , when Krishna and Mohammad were fighting wars and killing others. Were they not awakened ?

Edited April 16, 2017 by Prabhaker

[SOUL]

Enlightenment is like a light...hence why it's referred to as enlightenment. It;s a light for our consciousness.

What is this consciousness light useful to illuminate? Anything and everything.

You have already been accessing the consciousness light pretty effectively if you have done all those types of meditate work.

It doesn't have to mystified or be made esoteric, it's an innate part of our consciousness if we are simply aware of it.

 

[Be Yourself]

Mooji puts it very beautifully here

 

[LiakosN]

To realize what is not true. Basically you can have a hawk eye view of reality 

[Garuda]

To Know

[Ramu]

@SOUL You ARE consciousness.  Its not a by product of brain function, but that's something the rationalists will NEVER figure out.  Consciousness transcends brain and body.  Consciousness is all there is.  Everything else is Maya.

[Vingger]

the purpose is to enjoy life

 

Edited April 19, 2017 by Vingger

[SOUL]

@Ramu You can believe any way you choose to from your own experience but the moment you project that belief onto others and tell them it's their way, too, it becomes dogma.

That being said I'm not sure what I said that triggered you, it's straight forward enough, is compatible with what you said and don't know why you felt the need to come at me about your issue with it.

Our consciousness gets 'dimmed' by the preoccupation with the temporal life, enlightenment is bringing back the illumination to our consciousness.

Ultimately the more deeper enlightenment understandings are ones that may be something a person can aspire to but this thread was started by a self professed "newbie" so I was addressing it in a simplified way.

I find that much of the more advanced enlightenment rhetoric can be kind of elitist sounding and very abstract so can be difficult for some to understand.

Seems like that issue with "rationalists" is something you may seek to let go of, I didn't intend to trigger anyone.

[Ramu]

@SOUL no, I wasn't triggered, but just felt passionate about the subject.  I've been rather preoccupied with the whole pre/post rationalist thing.  I appreciate being checked.  Thank you.

[SOUL]

@Ramu I can understand the passion. I also can understand the frustration with reductionist.ideas from rationalists.

It's a paradox in that just being in the now, allowing our consciousness to be filled with just being is something that a conditioned mind may understand in theory but cannot do....by just being, so simple, just being.

So a seeker will go through lots of studying, practices and deep understandings just to prepared the mind by undoing the conditioning so...they can just be. Haha.

Simple solution that often takes many complicated exercises just to be able to do the simple solution....just being here now.

Too often people will get lost along the way in all the concepts, ideas and understandings, too easy to get consumed by this technique or that practice and see it all as the way to achieve "enlightenment" when simply it's..... just be here now.

I also acknowledge in saying I am grateful and appreciate the graciousness of your words.

Edited April 19, 2017 by SOUL

[pluto]

To remember what you are and what you have forgotten.

[SOUL]

To forget what is believed in the mind so all that remains is what is so be it.

Edited April 20, 2017 by SOUL

[WaterfallMachine]

 

 

10 hours ago, Ramu said:

@SOUL no, I wasn't triggered, but just felt passionate about the subject.  I've been rather preoccupied with the whole pre/post rationalist thing.  I appreciate being checked.  Thank you.

Hi Ramu! What's this consciousness thing you're talking about? SOUL's right in that I'm a newbie and have no idea what in the world you are talking about at this stage. But hey — any resources I could go look for with this idea? Probably not a good idea to start something so advanced at the moment from the sounds of it but maybe when I get further down the line I can check it out.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 20, 2017 by WaterfallMachine