Walking The New Age: Intuitive Path To Enlightenment

Enlightenment What does enlightenment mean to you?

Reflect and contemplate this question,

Because when you discover the true meaning of your enlightenment,

You see that it's just you coming home to yourself,

Or non-self.

When I connect and contemplate enlightenment,

I see a release of this world.

A release from gripping tightly to my experiences,

To the things that bring me sadness and joy,

Softening the hold and going deeper and deeper,

Until I discover and find and feel that I am awareness.

We are all awareness.

The one who sees,

Who feels,

Who witnesses our experiences here on planet Earth.

The suffering,

The non-suffering,

Just witnessing from a space of neutrality,

Equanimity,

And that is our enlightened self.

It is the merging of that awareness,

With our physical mind,

With our heart,

Our emotions,

And with our body.

Our experiences do not change,

But our awareness does.

Everything changes.

We become aware that we are aware,

And we rest in this solace of this knowingness within us.

This new field that becomes more powerful than the mind,

Than judgment,

Than the ego.

It surfaces,

It arises when we allow it to.

Key word here is allow.

I've tried fighting,

Forcing,

Creating,

Even accepting,

But allow,

That word allow,

There is power there.

There is kind of this soft,

Loving,

Joyful embrace,

That our enlightenment is here,

And we are allowing it to occur through a soft surrender,

And an intense,

Courageous commitment to becoming that truth that we are.

Many fears arise on the search to enlightenment.

For me,

My biggest fear was losing a sense of identity.

My connection to my wants and my things,

Specifically,

Is easy to let go of pain and suffering,

And identifying with those things,

But identifying with the goals and the dreams,

And the productivity while we're here.

Just often that hold and that grip,

I really feared losing who I believed I was.

But none of those things change.

They're all still here,

The suffering and the going after the goals,

And the joyful experiences.

We don't lose those.

We simply release,

Reliance on those for joy,

For creating happiness.

They still spark joy within us,

But it shifts into such a deeper joy,

In that when we produce and create and experience these blissful,

Joyful experiences,

We still receive that joy.

But when we experience suffering,

Sadness,

And hardships,

We still receive joy.

We do not become the suffering or the sadness.

We sit back in the seat of awareness,

And are aware that these are all experiences,

And that all experiences are really a gift,

Because we become aware that the awareness that we are is eternal,

And is not just in this lifetime.

It is this space outside of physical life,

So we know it is non-life.

So we know that when we die,

We continue to be this awareness.

And because enlightenment brings forth this awareness ahead of our experiences and our human condition,

The things that we are aware of become simply that,

The things we are aware of.

And without these things that we are aware of,

So non-life,

Non-suffering,

Non-joy,

Non-joyful experiences,

When we lose those things,

We come back to simple awareness,

That space of equanimity,

Non-judgment,

Non-attachment,

Beautiful resting space,

The fiery experiences of life.

We can truly appreciate them through these eyes of awareness,

Because without them,

Just being simple awareness is this beautiful blissful state,

But there is not a whole lot to be aware of.

There is gratitude for all experiences,

Great and small,

Things we perceive as negative or positive.

They are all miracles to be grateful for.

One major block I want to talk about for people on an intuitive journey of,

You know,

Whatever your practice is,

Reiki,

Shamanism,

Akashic Records,

Discovering the energy body,

Third eye activation,

Psychic awareness development,

Taking on the more mystical side of your spiritual journey.

I felt this contrast between the two of seeking the path of enlightenment and enjoying this path of intuition.

As I dedicated myself to this path of enlightenment,

I discovered that my intuitive path was essential in getting me here and is a great part of enlightenment.

As I opened up to Buddhist traditions,

I felt initially really disconnected from the teachings.

They felt like words,

And that only through strong,

Strong practice and belief in these words,

That eventually someday,

Through very hard work,

I would understand and maybe discover enlightenment.

And it just didn't resonate with me,

Because my intuitive path was bringing me so much joy.

And I dedicated my path to that,

To going deeper in my intuition and connecting with my higher self and receiving messages from my higher self and practicing becoming what my intuition was guiding me towards becoming,

Strengthening and allowing.

And then I hit this awareness that I'm always going to be wanting more.

And the path of intuition was gifting me with these beautiful insights,

All of these insights of my true nature,

My higher self or my enlightened self.

And I could see her and I could feel her and connect with her with that energy and that truth within me.

But I lacked an understanding of what it truly means to become enlightened,

To embody awareness.

And I turned back to Buddhism.

This was just my journey from here to there to here,

But very powerful.

I turned back to Buddhism and found that all of its teachings had come through in my intuition.

It was like this full circle beginning with Buddhism,

Not feeling in alignment with those teachings,

Going to my intuition,

Finding my own teachings from my truth,

My higher self,

And connecting to them with inside of myself.

And then turning back to Buddhism and seeing,

Oh,

This is the same.

These are all of the messages that have come through through my intuition.

How beautiful.

But I needed to discover those on my own.

There was just something that felt inauthentic to me about reading,

Studying and practicing based upon the Buddha and his journey.

I needed to discover my own journey for myself.

I needed the teachings to be known within me and not discovered outside of me.

And there are some beautiful things I wanted to share between the intuitive path and enlightenment.

And one thing is that we don't have to be afraid of losing our spiritual self,

Our spiritual practices,

Whatever they may be,

When on this path to enlightenment and becoming enlightened.

Because those practices,

That connection to higher self,

To spirit,

To spirit guides,

To the field of energy,

Is actually all in the field,

In the realm of human existence,

Of experiences.

And our awareness is still aware of these experiences.

I see these spiritual awakenings and connections to energy and intuition and inner knowing as an experience that brings joy.

Just like going for a run or sitting down to meditate or eating an amazing meal cooked by friends.

These are all experiences.

Whereas I used to believe that connecting to spirit,

My intuition,

My reiki and shamanism and soul records,

That it was this path or the path of enlightenment,

The path of Buddhism,

That they could not coexist.

That to become enlightened means we need to relinquish these practices.

But that simply isn't true.

Enlightenment is becoming the awareness and these practices are always here.

We always have choice.

That is the experience of life,

As we do have choice.

We never relinquish that choice.

We get to fill our days with whatever practices we choose.

Whether that's sitting and meditating for eight hours a day or working hard on our passions,

Connecting to our spiritual practices,

Connecting to loved ones,

Giving back to our communities,

Or giving to ourselves.

We do not have to relinquish or grieve the loss of any of those experiences that we feel enrich our lives and bring us joy that we're called to.

We're still here and we get to spend our time doing something.

And you still have choice.

For some reason I believed I would lose that choice.

And walking the enlightened path meant one would have to be just at peace all the time and giving fully from the heart,

From love.

And what that looked like to me was,

You know,

The sage walking around the heart open,

Releasing any connection to money,

To the material world,

And had to spread the teachings and share that love and that peace and that awareness.

That is not true.

Awareness is awareness no matter what it is aware of.

There is no right and there is no wrong.

That is the beauty.

In awareness we release judgment.

We become equanimous to all of life.

No matter what we choose to fill our days with or no matter what is thrown in front of us,

We will still be aware of what that is.

It is so simple.

Another beautiful discovery that came across on the path of enlightenment is the third eye.

And I had this moment of such beauty that brought me a lot of joy where I realized that the third eye is important on the path of enlightenment.

It is the merging of the awareness and the physical self.

How do we pull this awareness into our physical reality?

Well,

Through many spaces in the body,

But one very important one is the third eye.

To see our awareness,

To become aware of our awareness,

To mentally allow our awareness to penetrate this space of the mind as we disempower mental thought just a little bit.

And we bring to the surface the awareness that takes place through the third eye.

And I realized that my third eye has been trying to bring me to this space of enlightenment.

Through my intuitive connections,

Through my dreams,

Through divination and connecting to energy and spirit.

It is always connecting us to our enlightened self.

Because this is the same doorway where our enlightened self comes through into the physical realm,

Into the physical reality.

And when we connect to our intuition,

It's like the door has inched open to let a little bit of that light shine through and allow you to connect to it,

To see it.

And when you are enlightened,

That doorway is open fully.

So there is great value in your intuitive practices as they are showing you the way to your enlightenment,

To what your enlightenment looks like,

The quality of it.

What it really is can be accessed through that doorway.

And just through your own practices,

Your own spiritual practices.

We do not have to come to the Buddha's teaching.

How did Buddha do it on his own?

He went within.

You can do it from going within.

Enlightenment is here.

It is not outside of you.

We do not create it.

We do not become it.

We allow it.

And it is within everyone.

And when we allow our enlightenment to arise from within,

We end our suffering as we become awareness of all.

And we become grateful for this precious gift of life,

The contrasts of the light and the dark,

The highs and the lows.

We see and feel them all as gifts.

There is no wrong path.

There is only your path.

Trust in your path.

Don't get pulled into belief systems of others,

Into sacred texts.

Yes,

These things may support you and feel in alignment with you and then take them into your own when they resonate with you.

Because your inner being knows the path and knows the way back to your source and your truth to end your suffering and live within the light.

I hope you've enjoyed this talk.

Namaste.