What may I do to increase my chances of reaching enlightenment?I’m not quite sure how to begin to address this subject because the possibilities of enlightenment are about as varied, as there are people on the globe. So, I’m just going to provide you with my personal experiences, writings, and ideas. I’ll also provide links to books and other websites that I’ve found interesting. I’m not going to go into the Vedic tradition or terminology (
How to Know God: The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali With that said, I’d like to mention the Vedic idea that those who are on the pathway towards enlightenment will develop the other psychic abilities dealt with on this site. The problem is that these abilities are often addictive and lead the student to indulge in them at the expense of continuing their development. I’m not trying to say that psychic abilities or OBEs are bad it’s just that they serve as distractions. I believe that all humans have the ultimate goal of becoming enlightened. It may take some much longer than others to reach that state. (Yes, I’m implying that we may be reincarnated repeatedly. Sorry if you don’t like that idea.) As my personal approach, I’m going to try to describe the steps to becoming enlightened based on western science and using simple language. By enlightenment, I specifically do not mean a politically liberal view of the world. I don’t mean that one subscribes to the Golden Rule or practices compassionate behavior towards his fellow man or even towards all creatures. To me, the elements of enlightenment are a deep sense of oneness, a lack of personal identity, an identification with everything allowing a level of insight that seems to be magical, and an incredible sense of peace which is so pronounced that the very presence of the enlightened one leads others to that state. (If you can think of others please email me.) In my reading, I’ve come to the conclusion that there are several pathways to becoming enlightened. The paths that I’ve found described the most are: 1. Becoming enlightened through intolerable circumstances 2. Becoming enlightened through living a simple and introspective life 3. Becoming enlightened through diligent study and meditation 4. Becoming enlightened through NDE 5. Enlightenment through divine intervention Taking these sequentially, both Eckhard Tolle as described in
The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment Herman Hesse describes a possible example of the second pathway in his novel, "
Siddhartha Even though I may have seemed to disparage various traditions above, that is not to say that practitioners cannot become enlightened through years of study in a particular tradition. Many individuals are successful in the traditions I mentioned above. If they were not, the traditions wouldn’t have lasted the centuries they have. Some unusual versions of the third pathway might be the Yaqui Indian tradition as taught by Don Juan to Carlos Castenada (
Castenada Reading List The fourth pathway is reported in numerous books detailing Near Death Experiences (for example:
90 Minutes in Heaven: A True Story of Death & Life. The fifth pathway might be said to encompass all of the other three and that would basically be true, but I’m going to limit it to those avatars born into an enlightened state. My reason for this is personal. I’ve had my own moment of Satori and it didn’t last the way I thought it should. Perhaps ordinary people aren’t prepared for such an experience and divine intervention is required for it to last. If that’s true, I evidently got what I needed from my experience. Satori may be described as the intuitive experience of the “oneness” of all. It is a Zen Buddhist term that refers to spiritual rebirth resulting in a complete restructuring of the individual’s relationship to the universe. It is usually achieved after an extended period of intensive preparation, but sometimes occurs spontaneously. It was the summer after I graduated from college when I was working for my father. I was waiting for graduate school to open the fall quarter and working for my father seemed a good way to earn some much needed funds. I was assisting him in the Kansas oilfields. The job involved numerous activities ranging from running heavy equipment to welding broken parts to running errands. It was mid-afternoon and the sun was shining on the dirt road I was driving the old Chevy pickup down. The roadside weeds were high and prospering in the summer heat. The old Chevy had a working radio (AM only) and I had it tuned to a station that played the popular music of the day. At a certain point in my drive, as the song on the radio mentioned the term “light waves” and the sun was shining through the dusty weeds and sunflowers on the side of the road directly ahead of me, I was struck by a peculiar feeling. It was exhilarating and so amazing that it seemed to make me short of breath. Suddenly, there were neither the weeds nor I nor the truck nor anything and anywhere else. Everything had fallen into a new order and there was only a beautiful and peaceful oneness. I’d been thinking about the fact that our perception is not real time. There is a significant lag time between the instant the light waves bounce off of an object and the time we actually become conscious of the object. This holds for all of our senses, so in a manner of speaking, we don’t directly experience reality; all is made up in our brains. Of course our brains also impose cultural, experiential, and evolutionary interpretations on the signals they receive. This line of thought along with the radio’s “light waves” and the light shining on and through the dust and weeds combined to push me over the edge into a moment of Satori. I was elated! It was true peace and I wanted it to last forever. The truck seemed to be moving in slow motion and I gradually drove it around a corner. Unfortunately, the “real” world was waiting around that corner and I slipped gradually out of the enlightened perspective. Once gone, the perspective was not available to be recaptured. I could remember how it felt and I could remember the insights I’d had, but I couldn’t regain the immediacy of the experience. I’ve got to state that my current understanding is far greater than it was at that time and the ideas I’d been thinking about seem rather obvious now, but the actual feeling of oneness! Ah, now that’s something else again. I’ve been searching for it ever since. Since I cannot, in good conscience recommend that you engage in intolerable circumstances such as drug addition, I’ve got no control over NDEs or divine intervention, and living a simple introspective life might take longer than you have, I’m going to try and provide steps you can study and meditate upon. I’ve found this approach useful, even though it has taken me about 30 years. Did I mention that I’m pretty slow? I can truthfully say that I’m enlightened, but only a little bit. Seriously now, my hope is that something I say will allow you to make a quantum leap in understanding and you will instantly move from your present state to one that is more advanced. It’s not necessary to move slowly through all possible stages. I believe that we can make a single step and come to complete understanding. It’s just that most people don’t believe that it is that simple. Gaining some insight into your own thinking process is very important. It turns out that your mind actively tries to prevent you from becoming enlightened. Here’s my thinking about this and some ideas relating to steps you can take to deal with the problem: Enlightenment: Living with your Ego. As I thought about it, the basic concept of becoming enlightened seemed to have a number of preparatory steps. Learning to live with our ego and it's tricks seems to me to be a necessary precursor that, at the very least, will assist us in living more peacefully: Enlightenment: Living in Peace. Here are two more essays which deal with similar subjects: Live in your Body Lightly and Problems Caused by your Ego. The above four essays cover much of my thinking about the precursor steps towards enlightenment. If one is able to keep peace with one's self, behave well towards others, and generally avoid conflicts with one's thoughts, I think that one is part of the way there. I'll deal with another aspect of enlightenment in the section of this site devoted to my ideas of the structure of the Universe.
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Buddhist terminology, Zen, Shamanistic or other traditional ways of speaking about this topic. In my personal opinion, the language used by each of these traditions seems to get in the way of understanding what is a rather simple human state. The student often finds that he has spent a tremendous amount of effort studying his tradition’s language and means of describing the world. The unwary student may actually confuse knowledge of the terminology for the actual state of enlightenment.
and
Dr. David Hawkins as described in
seem
to have gained their perspective through intolerable circumstances. Both report similar experiences of despair and hopelessness about their relationship to the world. Both report a sudden loss of consciousness and self and awakening to a totally different world where all is one. All differences are resolved since there is nothing which has it’s own identity. Many other writers have described sudden changes in their consciousness as a result of extreme misery brought on by lifestyles involving drugs and alcohol.
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Here his protagonist makes numerous changes in his life but finally settles for being a ferryman who rows people across a river. After years at this occupation, he reaches a state of enlightenment based on his knowledge of hard work and the goal of assisting his fellow men. I’m reminded of the sage who said, “Before enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water; after enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water. 
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and the way described in the book and movie, "
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and
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Many people who have NDEs return to life as completely changed individuals. Their degree of enlightenment seems to vary, but all have some of the elements detailed above.
