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Deviate
newbie
Registered: 04/20/03
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Last seen: 8 years, 5 months
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Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment?
#19624375 - 02/27/14 12:37 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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So as I mentioned in another thread, my sadhana (spiritual practice) has boiled down to basically two things.
1) conscious breathing saying the words "Lord Jesus Christ" on every in breath and "have mercy on me" on every out breath.
2) self attention/self inquiry/placing my attention in the unmanifest which all appear to be same thing to me.
Now of course I still do my other spiritual practices like praying the most holy rosary of the blessed virgin Mary and as well as the Chaplet of St. Michael the Archangel but they seem to have lost a great deal of their significance at this point. I mean where I'm at now, prayer is prayer and which specific prayer I am saying doesn't seem important.
Here is what I have found. Self attention/simply placing one's attention on the unmanifest, on the very beingness that exists both prior to and simultaneously with the thought "I AM"is how one "bees" ( I am coining new word, it means to do something without necessarily expending any effort) enlightened.
Now what makes enligtenment so difficult and confusing is that we have all glimpsed a state of understanding, "seeing" (I like that term) that is much deeper and more profound than what is found when one simply places ones attention in the unmanifest. This leads one to feel that placing ones attention in the unmanifest is not enoughm that one must do something else to "get" enlightenment and this is how energy is fed to the ego and ignorance perpetuated.
So if enlightenment is as simple as being aware of the unmanfest, why does one not feel enlightened when they practice like this? It is because of our vasanas (mental tendencies). These must be burned away in order to reveal the ever present unmanifest in its entirety. It is possible to glimpse it before the vasanas are burned away but in my experience, trying to attain it before the vasanas are burned away only perpetuates ingorance .
When one places ones attention into the unmanifest rather than experiencing the bliss of the self, instead they experience the exposition of the vasanas (mental tendencies). One after another they rise up, make themselves known and provided one does not turn one's attention away, are burned up before the bright sun that is one's own being, consciousness itself.
Now gradually, over time if one maintains this state, after more and more vasanas (mental tendencies) are burned up, bliss begins to occur. This is the bliss of the Self that all the teachers are pointing to.
If I am right about this, it means that the enlightened state is well hidden in plain sight. We may enter into it several times a day and then quickly leave again not realizing that that IS the state to be aimed it, it simply doesnt feel as such because the vasanas (mental tendencies) must be burned away before it begins to take on the characteristics we desire and associate with enlightenment.
Does anyone get what am I getting at and think I am right about this? This also would explain why my zen book says that to sit in the Zazen position is enlightenment (the Zazen position is supposed to foster alertness)
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cez

Registered: 08/04/09
Posts: 5,854
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: Deviate]
#19624619 - 02/27/14 02:47 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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I don't think enlightenment is anything special, moreso just being present 
But I think your absolutely right about placing your attention in the unmanifest for being enlightened 
Eckhart Tolle illumines a variety of ways to focus on the unmanifest for bringing one's attention to the present.
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Chronic7
Registered: 05/08/04
Posts: 13,679
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: Deviate]
#19625513 - 02/27/14 10:39 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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I think your equation is pretty much right, although I tend to not use the word enlightenment as it can imply attaining some state that is not already here, I suffered a lot chasing that idea for a few years, thinking I was going to have an almighty once & for all 'enlightenment' experience that would end it all
I only mention this as perhaps you're going through the same thing...
I like the term awakening as when you wake up, just like when you wake up from your sleep every morning, you wake up to a reality that was already here, it's not something you built up & achieved in the dreams the previous night, it was already here all along but you dreamt otherwise
The unmanifest is the source of everything, you can't go wrong
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Icyus
KavitārkikasiṃHa



Registered: 11/07/13
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Loc: Inbetween.
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: Chronic7]
#19625531 - 02/27/14 10:44 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
The Chronic said: I think your equation is pretty much right, although I tend to not use the word enlightenment as it can imply attaining some state that is not already here, I suffered a lot chasing that idea for a few years, thinking I was going to have an almighty once & for all 'enlightenment' experience that would end it all
I only mention this as perhaps you're going through the same thing...
I like the term awakening as when you wake up, just like when you wake up from your sleep every morning, you wake up to a reality that was already here, it's not something you built up & achieved in the dreams the previous night, it was already here all along but you dreamt otherwise
The unmanifest is the source of everything, you can't go wrong 
Hehe... enlightenment is the rock you sit upon.. stop focusing on yourself. Be the rock. (Which in many ways is yourself, thus not contradicting "be yourself"..)
-------------------- And thus begins the reverse-fusing of our one-dimentional understanding, and adds ever-expanding perspectives, in depth and number; splitting our perception, and in so doing, seemingly irrationally, creates yet more one-ness, with all that ever was, is and will ever be, streching across the infinite, inunderstood concept of everything, percievable and not.
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Deviate
newbie
Registered: 04/20/03
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Last seen: 8 years, 5 months
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: Chronic7]
#19626936 - 02/27/14 04:04 PM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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Quote:
The Chronic said: I think your equation is pretty much right, although I tend to not use the word enlightenment as it can imply attaining some state that is not already here, I suffered a lot chasing that idea for a few years, thinking I was going to have an almighty once & for all 'enlightenment' experience that would end it all
I only mention this as perhaps you're going through the same thing...
I was going through that and I think drugs were to blame because that is how the glimpses you get of enligtenment often feel like on drugs. All of a sudden you have an enormous shift into a higher state of consciosuness.
Gradually through my spiritual practices I came to realize that enlightenment was more just a certain way of being than a big sudden attainment of some non ordinary state. I realized that I was capable of being this way, only it did not feel like enlightenment because of my vasanas which kept coming up and interfering with the peace I was feeling. Thats when I realized that the more I just kept on remaining in that state the more my vasanas would rise up and burn away and now i am feeling more and more peace every day and it seems like if i simply continue on like this, my vasanas will keep diminishing and i will be in that natural state of peace and stillness i have longed for so long. basically, i think you enlightenment is osmething you must gradually get used to in order for it to become enjoyable. i also marvel at how kind and merciful God is, for allowing me to go through this process so gently and gradually. he allows me to hang onto bits of my ego and i dont have to let them go until i am ready. of course there is also such a thing as "fierce grace" but I am not experiencing that right now, right now I am experiencing God's gentleness and respect for human freedom which is amazing considering all power and glory is his for ever and ever and yet he respects our freedom.
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Chronic7
Registered: 05/08/04
Posts: 13,679
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: Deviate]
#19629080 - 02/28/14 02:47 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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Yeah its an amazing process really, you get as much as you can handle, of both bliss & suffering
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lessismore
Registered: 02/10/13
Posts: 6,268
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: Chronic7]
#19629088 - 02/28/14 02:55 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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happiness is the true self
those seeking enlightenment shall never get there
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CosmicJoke
happy mutant


Registered: 04/05/00
Posts: 10,848
Loc: Portland, OR
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: Deviate]
#19629126 - 02/28/14 03:20 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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my spiritual practice has been get a job and live with right livelihood, take implicitly good care of my health, and to never lie and be truthful with my friends and be intimate with them...
strangely enough, i never have felt more earthy and grounded in my body, breathing properly, and free to be high, high, high after accomplishing those hurdles
-------------------- Everything is better than it was the last time. I'm good. If we could look into each others hearts, and understand the unique challenges each of us faces, I think we would treat each other much more gently, with more love, patience, tolerance, and care. It takes a lot of courage to go out there and radiate your essence. I know you scared, you should ask us if we scared too. If you was there, and we just knew you cared too.
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cez

Registered: 08/04/09
Posts: 5,854
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: CosmicJoke]
#19629930 - 02/28/14 10:26 AM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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Sse
Saṃsāra

Registered: 12/28/12
Posts: 2,769
Loc: Interdependent Co-arising
Last seen: 6 years, 9 months
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Re: Simply placing your attention in the unmanifest = enlightenment? [Re: CosmicJoke]
#19630894 - 02/28/14 02:24 PM (9 years, 11 months ago) |
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sounds good, hoping to better myself in the livelihood/health departments as well... things are definitely looking up
dunno if I will never lie, sometimes it's too much of a hassle imo, to lay out certain things in real order or as experienced... doubtful that they will be reciprocated/portrayed mentally/verbally as experienced/considered anyway. but I guess it depends on the depth of your story. I need to write a biography with an index that I can reference to cut and paste a well organized and thought out self-history. Complete with self-analyzation... then whenever the flow brings me back to laying out my events I can just point someone to the index... though I imagine based on past experience with attention span through these fragmented, told on the spot, without thorough recollection/addition, shortened stories; perhaps even less of the story would get through.
-------------------- "Springs of water welling from the fire" "Life may seem to flee in a moment, but when the mind is freed of the veil of ignorance, and illusion that comes between the mind and the truth, life and death are only opposite sides of the same coin - "water welling from the fire."
"Within us, we carry the world of no-birth and no-death. But we never touch it, because we live only with our notions." -Thich Nhat Hanh instant "Experience always goes beyond ideas"
Edited by Sse (02/28/14 02:28 PM)
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