Enlightenment from 30,000 feet

[winterknight]

This is a 25-minute video I made giving a high-level overview of the search for enlightenment. Hope you find it interesting and useful.

[Not sure how to embed videos but if someone wants to tell me, I'll alter my post to do that. EDIT: got it, outlandish!]

 

Edited December 17, 2018 by winterknight

[outlandish]

You can just paste the video URL in the text editor, rather than as hyperlinked text. That will make it embed.

[winterknight]

3 minutes ago, outlandish said:

You can just paste the video URL in the text editor, rather than as hyperlinked text. That will make it embed.

Thanks!

[Igor82]

@winterknight Great video! Thank you for explaining this. Really interesting about aligning with desires, although would not the mind use this against me? Let's say that I want to be brutally honest with myself about if I want to know the truth or not, what indicates that the mind is simply not just trying to trick me to leave the path?

[winterknight]

8 minutes ago, Igor82 said:

@winterknight Great video! Thank you for explaining this. Really interesting about aligning with desires, although would not the mind use this against me? Let's say that I want to be brutally honest with myself about if I want to know the truth or not, what indicates that the mind is simply not just trying to trick me to leave the path?

Don't worry about the mind tricking you like that. If you are honest about it -- if you admit "I want to leave the path" -- you cannot be tricked, and in fact this admission is in fact part of the path.

This is why honesty is such a highly prized virtue in all the traditional mystical paths. Honesty starts with yourself.

[Tony 845]

@winterknight  what are you're thoughts on kundalini? I'm currently going through kundalini, when Kundalini awakens does it guarantee enlightenment? Great video BTW

Edited December 18, 2018 by Tony 845

[winterknight]

15 minutes ago, Tony 845 said:

@winterknight  what are you're thoughts on kundalini? I'm currently going through kundalini, when Kundalini awakens does it guarantee enlightenment? Great video BTW

Thanks. Don't know a huge amount about kundalini, but from what I've read, it can be useful as a tool to quiet the mind and glimpse the Self, but it is not a substitute for self-inquiry and/or surrender.

Edited December 18, 2018 by winterknight

[Tony 845]

@winterknight do you know anyone who does? 

[winterknight]

1 minute ago, Tony 845 said:

@winterknight do you know anyone who does? 

Nope, sorry. But I know enough to say that the point is that you can do all the concentration-on-chakras and energetic work you want; it might be useful to prepare the mind, but in the end, you will have to get beyond that and turn the mind to the Self, which is beyond centers and energies.

[Tony 845]

@winterknight what technique did you use to attain enlightenment may I ask? 

[Angelite]

@winterknight I've tried the self inquiry some time ago with non_nothing but it didn't work for me because I already know the answer. Haha or maybe because I am impatient.

But ok. I will follow God's guidance and have faith

[winterknight]

2 minutes ago, Tony 845 said:

@winterknight what technique did you use to attain enlightenment may I ask? 

Well there is really no such thing as "attaining enlightenment" actually, but what "I" "used" is what I mention in my video: an intellectual framework, psychological work, and self-inquiry.

[zambize]

48 minutes ago, winterknight said:

Thanks. Don't know a huge amount about kundalini, but from what I've read, it can be useful as a tool to quiet the mind and glimpse the Self, but it is not a substitute for self-inquiry and/or surrender.

Can you be specific in what you mean by surrender?  Are you just talking about trying to maximally surrender to the moment during meditation, or is there more to this?

[winterknight]

7 minutes ago, zambize said:

Can you be specific in what you mean by surrender?  Are you just talking about trying to maximally surrender to the moment during meditation, or is there more to this?

Surrender means giving up all desire for things to be different than the way they are. As a path to peace, it should be the case not just during some formal meditation period, but during every waking moment. Just give up all desire, and therefore give up all thought.

Of course, such profound surrender is not entirely possible to do deliberately. So the seeker surrenders as much as they possibly can, and then Grace happens and does the rest.

[DrewNows]

Awesome summary thank you! enlightenment in a nutshell? I liked the part about self honesty regarding  alignment of desires and actions

Edited December 18, 2018 by DrewNows

[seeking_brilliance]

1 hour ago, winterknight said:

Surrender means giving up all desire for things to be different than the way they are. As a path to peace, it should be the case not just during some formal meditation period, but during every waking moment. Just give up all desire, and therefore give up all thought.

Who does this? If there is no thinker of thoughts, how does one give up anything? There are thoughts of giving up desire... so it seems. And a self only appears in thought... 

Is the point of your answering something like this not so much to tell 'us' what to do/not do, but more of programming thought by positive/negative input? Thought communicating with thought, so it seems? But can thoughts be influenced, or do they arise exactly as they do? 

[winterknight]

17 minutes ago, seeking_brilliance said:

Who does this? If there is no thinker of thoughts, how does one give up anything? There are thoughts of giving up desire... so it seems. And a self only appears in thought... 

Is the point of your answering something like this not so much to tell 'us' what to do/not do, but more of programming thought by positive/negative input? Thought communicating with thought, so it seems? But can thoughts be influenced, or do they arise exactly as they do? 

As long as you consider yourself a seeker, you must practice, and practice with effort. Even knowing theoretically that you are not really a seeker, that there is no thinker of thoughts, there is no real effort, and that thoughts arise "exactly as they do" -- that intellectual knowledge is insufficient until it is directly recognized beyond the intellect.

So surrender is one key practice -- it's a choice between it and self-inquiry, which are anyway two sides of a coin -- recommended to those who consider themselves seekers. In the end, the very ideas of surrender and the one who surrenders themselves are surrendered, of course. But the seeker cannot do that voluntarily. It just happens.

And when it happens, it will then be clear that there was no such thing as anyone who surrendered or who needed to surrender at any time.

Edited December 18, 2018 by winterknight

[zambize]

I watched the video, and I loved it.  It did touch on a lot of topics that you've already touched on in say your AMA thread, and I think you've even talked about sounding like a broken record. On that note I think it would be cool for you to go more in depth in a video or thread on psychoanalysis or therapy or whatever you call it.  Great video, hope in the future you can cover more topics

[winterknight]

22 minutes ago, zambize said:

I watched the video, and I loved it.  It did touch on a lot of topics that you've already touched on in say your AMA thread, and I think you've even talked about sounding like a broken record. On that note I think it would be cool for you to go more in depth in a video or thread on psychoanalysis or therapy or whatever you call it.  Great video, hope in the future you can cover more topics

Thanks! And good idea on the therapy video, will definitely consider that.

[purerogue]

Good video , want to say that it might be helpful to rise awareness when you are doing this and self inquire should be done in quiet mind, like you give this  question on who am I to subconscious and let it repeat this question without actual voice asking in your head at the same time trying to locate, or just focus on certain area of body, brain.