What is enlightenment?
What is awakening?
And how would I know if I got there?
These are very essential questions on the spiritual journey and yet there are many different opinions and ideas about that and I think on the spiritual journey it can be quite confusing.
I know these are natural questions that came up for me when I began and so I thought I would share here my own perspective and the perspective from Dzogchen,
The Tibetan teachings that I share,
To give you a sense of their perspective on enlightenment.
So in these teachings there is a term called Rigpa and Rigpa is your primordial nature.
It's the open,
Clear,
And free,
Enlightened,
As it were,
Mind that is your true nature that is always here.
Rigpa is also,
Interestingly,
The recognition of that true nature.
So it is both the nature itself and the recognition of that nature and we could call then enlightenment the recognition of our true nature,
The recognition of Rigpa.
And this process can happen both suddenly,
A sudden glimpse of our true nature through a practice,
Or a sudden event like a near-death experience can cause a sudden seeing of our true nature.
Or,
More commonly,
It happens gradually through the practices that we glimpse our true nature through a practice and then the path is to learn to live from that awakened nature.
That as we practice these teachings over time we see our true nature as free and we learn to live there.
There is a final fruition of this path called the Rainbow Body and I think this is why there can be confusion because the mind can say to itself,
If I have not achieved a Rainbow Body then I'm not enlightened or I'm not there.
But in fact,
Enlightenment is this process of recognition and so I want to demystify here and assure the questioning mind that even small glimpses of our true nature are quite significant and a reassurance that every time we are glimpsing and seeing our true nature from the view of these teachings we are enlightened as it were.
I also want to point out here that I also want to point out the mind's tendency though to want to co-opt awakening.
So a mind that might claim I am awakened that certainly isn't it either and no teacher that I've ever worked with and I've worked with some very beautiful teachers I would say are quite enlightened or living from that enlightened recognition have ever claimed awakening.
So immediately we can know that if we want to co-opt,
If the mind or the ego wants to claim awakening then that's not it.
And at the same time there can be a sense of ordinariness with this recognition that we tend to dismiss the significance of the recognition.
So having confidence in the practices is also an essential part of the path to trust yourself and your own knowing not expecting enlightenment to be an extraordinary experience either that ultimately it's a shift,
A knowing,
A seeing,
A recognition that can be extraordinarily subtle and easily missed as well.
So I hope this is helpful and I wish you so many blessings on your beautiful path of awakening.
I truly believe that this is the greatest gift we can give ourselves and to the world.
It is the heart of the human journey and so I just am so grateful to you that you are on this path and celebrate you.
