What is enlightenment?
First a caveat…
Everything that i say is from the perspective of this organism (with the vince label)
So, what is enlightenment?
It’s a story. An idea.
There are many variations of it, especially in the pop zen genre, but I have to say that I have no idea if any of them are accurate.
What I can talk to, is the experiencing that I call ‘waking up’, or ‘liberation’.
These terms obviously come from the analogy of being asleep or sleepwalking, and the analogy of being captive or being a prisoner.
So what is sleepwalking?
It can be described from two perspectives.
The first from the perspective of doing it.
The second from the perspective of observing it.
From the first perspective there is no alternative.
From the second there appears to be options.
If we go to a movie knowing that the story is fictional, we voluntarily suspend disbelief in order to share emotions with the plot. Here there is the option to do this or not. (to varying degrees)
A sleepwalker doesn’t have these options. They believe the plot to be real (actual) They are a prisoner to their beliefs. They take their beliefs to be facts.
The most glaring example of this is the belief that what we observe in ‘the world’ or ‘other’ people, is what is actual.
This, in spite of science of the brain/mind telling us that we really relate to an image that form in our brain.
“It’s really important to understand we’re not seeing reality,” says neuroscientist Patrick Cavanagh, a research professor at Dartmouth College and a senior fellow at Glendon College in Canada. “We’re seeing a story that’s being created for us.”
Most of the time, the story our brains generate matches the real, physical world — but not always. Our brains also unconsciously bend our perception of reality to meet our desires or expectations. And they fill in gaps using our past experiences.”
Just as we only know that we have been asleep when we wake up, we only know that we have been a prisoner of our beliefs when we are no longer captive.
When this happens we have the option to voluntarily suspend our disbelief for practical purposes, such as communicating with a ‘sleepwalker’.
So, the question is “Why wake up?” Isn’t the world ok with 99.9% of the population sleepwalking?
Over at LiberationUnleashed, there have been 2952 ex prisoners in the past 10 years. So if we say that there might be 10,000 awake being at the moment, then it is .1% of the population that isn’t deluded by beliefs. No wonder that there is so much shit happening.
A Stream-enterer (Sotāpanna) is free from:
- 1. Identity view (Pali: sakkāya-diṭṭhi), the belief that there is an unchanging self or soul in the five impermanent skandhas[4][5]
- 2. Attachment to rites and rituals
- 3. Doubt about the teachings
A Once-returner (Sakadāgāmin) has greatly attenuated:
- 4. Sensual desire
- 5. Ill will
A Non-returner (Anāgāmi) is free from:
- 4. Sensual desire
- 5. Ill will
An Arahant is free from all of the five lower fetters and the five higher fetters, which are:
- 6. Attachment to the four meditative absorptions, which have form (rupa jhana)
- 7. Attachment to the four formless absorptions (ārupa jhana)
- 8. Conceit
- 9. Restlessness
- 10. Ignorance