The Difference Between Self-Improvement & Spiritual Transformation

How can you feel that your spiritual journey is complete? When you are enlightened? Is it when you feel that there are no more issues to work on? This deep meditative talk explains why the journey of self-improvement never ends and what a true spiritual transformation is all about.

Shai Tubali is an author, speaker, and innovator in the field of inner transformation and personal development. In his writings and teachings, he skillfully combines psychology, philosophy, Yogic traditions, and Eastern wisdom.

Transcript

Good evening.

It's very good to see you,

Very good to be with you.

I hope that this evening will be like,

I think it's the right metaphor for today,

Like entering the refreshing water of eternity.

The importance of satsang is the fact that very rarely in our life we have the chance to jump out of the stream of our thoughts and actions and busyness and reactions,

Dilemmas,

Small or big conflicts,

Sometimes small seem big.

When we are here we can tune into a timeless space that our mind can easily tune into,

It just needs the right focus and soon it is here,

It is always here.

This timeless space follows us throughout our day but we are just unconscious of it because the focus of our mind is turned to all those thoughts,

All those emotions,

All the daily trouble.

So before we are going to start our talk,

Today I am just going to give a long answer to a question I have here,

I think a question that concerns all of us.

Before that let's meditate and we will meditate in a guided meditation that I will later on explain why,

What's the point,

What's the meaning.

So let's sit comfortably and close our eyes.

And as we breathe slowly and deeply,

Slow down and tune into a state of meditation,

We will start by looking for our sense of self,

Our sense of self-existence,

The very basic feeling of I am here,

I exist.

It is possible that at the moment this feeling is quite small,

Like a seed of awareness,

This is perfectly fine.

Let's just look for this very basic feeling that we surely all have because all of our thoughts,

Feelings and actions flow from it.

And let's check where it is located in our body.

We may find it in our head somewhere,

The top of our head,

The forehead,

Maybe in the throat or the heart,

Our belly,

Our lower belly.

Whatever is the starting point,

That's perfect.

As soon as you have located it,

Just start breathing into that feeling in that area in the body.

And feel how the more you are breathing into that point,

The more the sense of self-presence spreads throughout your body from head to toe.

So that your sense of I am,

I am here,

Is gradually not only in that small area but feels the entire body.

So now breathe into this sense of self-presence that fills your entire body.

And then keep on breathing into it.

And let it flow also outside the body,

Just like a cup that is being filled with too much water.

Your sense of presence begins to overflow until it is not only in the body but it is also around the body.

As if you are now enveloping your body with your presence.

Now continue to breathe into this sense of presence and now let it slowly spread and feel the space above your head.

And even a far point in this room.

So that you are slowly feeling the entire space of the room.

Until this sense of I am becomes non-local.

Of course it is still connected with one body but not only.

Feel how you can effortlessly allow this expansion of presence.

Becoming so much bigger.

And then as you continue to breathe into this sense,

Let it flow through the walls,

The floor,

The ceiling.

So that it begins to cover every molecule in the air.

Every point in space.

And finally let this sense of I am reach so high.

As if it flows all the way to the edge of the universe.

As if there is not one point where you are not.

Feel how now this sense of I am is everywhere.

And now let it flow through the walls.

And now from this expanded sense of self.

Take a look at all the patterns that you have left behind.

All the things that worry your mind.

How do you perceive them when you are that expanded?

So although now we are slowly descending from meditation,

You don't have to squeeze the sense of I am back into your body.

Let this sense of expansion remain while you are slowly and gently opening your eyes.

Of course you don't have to open your eyes.

So let this sense of expansion remain while you are slowly and gently opening your eyes.

So the truth is that you are that big.

This is not an imagination,

It's not a visualization that is meant to make us feel really good about ourselves.

It is simply our true size that usually on a daily basis we obviously cannot contain in our mind.

And to a certain degree we also don't believe that we can be that big or function from this bigness or identify with it fully.

And because we don't believe that,

Even if we experience that,

Even if we get in touch with that,

We eventually shrink ourselves,

Bring ourselves back to a normal size that we and the society can handle.

And basically the entire spiritual journey is all about that.

All about returning to the true size of ourself,

Trusting that it is possible to remain like that,

To live like that,

And shifting our identity to that.

Being able to say this is what I am,

I'm not this tiny unit of body and mind that sits right now on the chair.

So this leads us to a question that I will read and then answer.

And this is all connected,

The meditation,

This opening and the question.

And when I finish answering,

Then you are most welcome to ask questions.

So this is the question,

Maybe you will find yourself in it.

I think it's everyone's question in a way.

I don't want to sound bitter or complaining in this question.

But,

But,

I feel like every day I start my spiritual journey all over again.

It's like I'm running in circles.

Yes,

There is more and more a change in my behavior and patterns,

But as a whole the journey feels endless.

It's like never going to end.

There is no end to improvement,

So when and how can you feel that your journey is complete and that you are enlightened?

Is it when I feel that there are no more issues to work on?

Wait,

It's a bit complex.

I will read it again.

I don't want to sound bitter or complaining in this question,

But I feel like every day I start my spiritual journey all over again.

It's like I'm running in circles.

There is more and more a change in my behavior and patterns,

But the journey feels endless,

Like it's never going to end.

If there is no end to improvement,

When and how can you feel that your journey is complete and that you are enlightened?

Is it when I feel that there are no more issues to work on?

That's a good question.

And to a certain degree it's everyone's question.

We are every day looking at our patterns and study them.

We study ourselves,

We learn how to become more sensitive,

More accepting,

More loving.

We learn to open our eyes,

To open our chakras.

And how to feel more independent,

How to be more in the here and now,

More mindful,

Less occupied.

You know what I'm describing,

Right?

If you are not here by mistake,

Like just saw that there was something here and that it's cooler than outside,

Probably you're identifying this description.

And obviously this thing feels endless.

And the truth is that it not only feels endless,

But it is really endless.

It really is not going to end.

There is always some pattern to look at,

Also always some leftovers of my relationship with my parents to resolve.

Always,

One can always learn how to love more.

There is no end to learning how to love.

Being more sensitive,

More compassionate.

And of course the question is,

Does that lead to enlightenment?

Does that lead to a state of completion that you can say you can stick your flag on the mountain top and say,

Okay,

Now I've reached,

I don't have any more issues.

No more mother,

No more father,

No.

.

.

All the hard work has been rewarding.

I don't believe that this type of journey could ever lead to completion.

And actually only when we begin to understand that this is not going to end this type of journey,

That we're beginning to consider what a true spiritual transformation is all about.

Because it's not about all this.

This is what we can call self-improvement.

That's one thing.

And self-improvement is very different from spiritual transformation.

And you can improve yourself endlessly without ever reaching spiritual transformation.

Of course there is nothing bad with self-improvement.

Self-improvement is not only not a bad thing,

But it is also essential.

We do need to improve our sensitivity to learn to be more loving,

More considerate,

To clear away certain patterns from our mind,

From our body.

But we shouldn't delude ourselves to thinking that this is spiritual transformation.

Or that this can ever lead us to a point of completion.

Because self-improvement is life,

You see?

Life,

It's our relationships where we train ourselves to constantly respond better,

Be more awake,

More understanding.

And this will continue until our last breath.

But if you're only self-improving,

You're actually getting this feeling.

It's like I'm running in circles.

You see a change in your behavior and patterns,

But as a whole,

You look into the future and you're asking yourself,

Where is that point?

We have this point,

We are here at point X and where we see,

We have this image of point Y.

And at point Y,

We are always loving,

Always beautiful,

Always wonderful,

Always compassionate,

Completely free.

And towards this point,

We are walking.

We are trying to reach that point.

But this point,

This self-improvement is exactly what it is.

It's self-improvement,

It's improving,

Which means that it's always better.

But it's never complete.

You understand?

So you are making it better,

But you can never finish.

And this is,

I must share with you,

I'm teaching for the 19 years,

Which is quite unbelievable that one can speak so much.

But after 19 years,

Whenever I point that out,

Point the difference between self-improvement and spiritual transformation,

It's always in a way,

To a certain degree,

Surprising.

It wakes us up from a certain movement in time.

And it's never too much to try to understand this difference.

Because in this difference,

Everything,

The entire secret of enlightenment is.

Enlightenment is not about the what,

What you change.

It's about the who.

So when I am caught in the trap,

In the endless circle of self-improvement,

I always try to correct,

To improve the contents of my consciousness.

You see,

I'm finding in my mind there are certain patterns,

Fears,

Desires.

I'm trying to reduce the desires and the fears,

To enhance my good thoughts,

My belief in myself,

My self-acceptance side.

This is self-improvement.

I try to change the contents of my consciousness.

But in spiritual transformation,

Listen to the word,

To the term transformation,

Transform.

It means that you become something completely different than what you are.

You are not who you are.

It's the certain identity that shifts,

That dies,

And that is replaced,

Or that is consumed by a higher sense of identity,

A higher you,

An expanded you.

So true transformation is that you are constantly growing in your sense of identity.

Your identity transforms.

Why is it so important?

Because who you believe you are shapes your entire mind,

And your entire emotions,

And your entire behavior.

You see?

If I think that what I am right now is a tiny shy that is certainly going to die,

That has some memories,

Some obviously traumas,

Some hopes and fears,

This changes or influences the way I feel,

What I feel that is important in life,

My meaning of life,

What makes me happy,

What makes me satisfied,

And also what makes me miserable.

But suppose I am realizing that all of this entire identity that I am this shy is wrong,

Then everything that is important to shy in his mind,

Everything that matters to this shy,

That troubles him,

That puts him in conflict,

All the memories,

All the hunting traumas and all that,

To a certain degree disappears.

It is like you are cutting the roots of a tree instead of cutting branches all day long.

But this is a very intelligent and powerful tree,

It is a tree that is nourished by your consciousness,

By your mind,

Your awareness,

So it has a lot of energy.

It can easily grow new branches,

What does it care?

That is why self-improvement is never reaching an end,

Because there is always something to improve,

There is always something to correct,

Some new problem,

Some new pattern that you are noticing,

And you keep polishing yourself,

Making yourself,

Trying to become like a shining diamond,

Only not knowing that you are already that diamond.

But to realize that you must make such a big shift,

Not trying to make the nonsense of the mind into a diamond.

We are trying to understand that the real thing that needs to busy us,

All the energy that we need to invest is in realizing our true identity.

Which means that at one level of consciousness and identity,

You have some traumas and memories.

At another level of consciousness,

You don't have them.

I am saying that it is really important to understand,

It is actually so important to understand that it means that perhaps you do need to clear away some traumas,

Just like you need to eat well,

To sleep well at night,

To go to a chiropractor and treat your body when you have pain,

Whatever,

Whatever,

Do some jogging,

Then you also need to treat some traumas.

Do you understand how I am describing it?

It is really important.

It is just something you are treating.

But the traumas for what you are,

They don't affect you,

They don't even touch your being.

They could never touch that because your being does not belong to time.

It has not changed.

It is not subjected to the laws of evolution.

Now,

The thing is,

Why am I saying that I teach,

I talk about that for 19 years,

But still because even when I say that,

For some reason it is received as an unbelievable thing.

Everyone says,

Yeah,

Yeah,

Yeah,

That sounds really beautiful,

So poetic,

But in actuality we return to identify and to say,

I had this trauma and this trauma is a part of me.

And we still stick into that story.

I use this metaphor of two very different metaphors.

One for self-improvement,

I call it the dirt truck,

Sideways,

You know,

Like the truck where you,

The very bumpy road that takes you really slowly to your destination.

But it leads you to only a certain point and has nothing to do with what I call the highway,

Which is the spiritual transformation,

Which is a direct way in which you move directly towards that which needs to be transformed in you.

It's not your patterns,

It's you.

Even when we begin to experience deep spiritual states,

We say,

I experienced silence,

I experienced light,

I experienced grace,

I experienced,

For example,

Today in the meditation,

I experienced my sense of self everywhere.

And we don't understand,

We didn't experience all these things.

This is what we are,

You see?

Light,

Silence,

This consciousness that is everywhere.

So when you begin to understand that all those things that you experience are actually moments that you're getting to know yourself,

That's a very different understanding.

Because experiences can come and go and they do come and go endlessly.

Okay,

I experienced silence and then I experienced noise.

I experienced light and then I experienced the darkness of my patterns.

So what?

You see?

That's endless.

There is no end to experience.

So in self-improvement,

We're just accumulating a lot of experience.

But we never become something else.

There is no earthquake that takes place at the core of our being,

At who we are.

And this earthquake can take place,

Sometimes it takes place just like that,

We don't know why,

But it takes place.

Only if our attention is placed on that.

And you once,

An awakened woman,

It's ridiculous actually to say an awakened woman,

Because if you're awakened you're neither a man nor a woman,

Clearly.

Which is quite a relief.

But how much fuss we sometimes make around being a man or a woman,

The identity and as a result all the feelings and the gender experience and values.

So I met an awakened being and she told me how she had been awakened.

She told me that she was dancing.

And in the dancing she entered a deep deep ecstasy,

It was such pure joy and bliss and self-forgetfulness and all that.

But then to her it wasn't enough.

While she was dancing like that,

She was there,

She then asked herself,

Yes,

But who is experiencing this dance?

Who is experiencing this place?

And as soon as she asked that question,

A sort of a quickening took place and she was detached from all that ordinary identity.

She realized,

Because what happens in spiritual enlightenment,

At least at the beginning,

Is that this sense of I am that we meditated on at the beginning,

Is attached to so many things around it,

It's like a sort of a magnet,

Things get attached to it until you can no longer see the essential thing.

You see,

You see only this cluster and then you say this is what I am,

I am this and I am that and I am those traumas,

This memory,

That relationship with my parents,

This relationship with romantic relationship,

This hope,

This desire.

But if you are beginning to ask,

And especially when you are happy,

She was doing it not when she was in misery,

But when she had no reason to ask question,

You see,

No reason to go beyond the experience.

When you ask,

Yes,

But what is experiencing,

What is observing through these eyes?

You are no longer in the realm of self-improvement,

You are beginning to take the highway.

And you,

In this question,

What you do is that you are disconnecting the I am from everything.

And at a certain point,

Cause this,

Just like the dirt truck,

It requires practice,

It requires attention,

It's not like a perfect magic instantly,

But there are major moments,

Major jumps,

But they don't feel like the dirt truck which is like moving in this way,

Slowly,

Gradually,

Eternally.

It feels more like a jump,

A jump,

A jump,

This is the highway,

It sleeps,

Not a process,

Very different.

So when you are beginning to focus on the owner of consciousness,

Not on the contents of consciousness,

At a certain point the I am becomes disconnected,

It becomes like a shining presence that is not connected to past,

To future,

Not even to present.

It's just pure presence,

And when that pure presence is revealed,

The first feeling that you have is I am free.

That's how it appears in our consciousness,

It's this recognition,

I am free,

I have always been free,

I don't need to go through all that process.

Yes,

My body,

My mind can go through that process,

No problem,

They will,

There is no need to interrupt,

To interfere,

But the body and mind,

They have their own,

They are a part of time,

A part of the process,

Yes,

But not you.

So you are realizing I don't need to go through all that.

Which means that you don't need to search anymore.

So when this question is asked,

When and how can you feel that your journey is complete,

And that you are enlightened?

What happens in the process of self-improvement is that a certain identity of a seeker begins to form,

I am a seeker,

I search,

I search,

I search.

Your true self has nothing to do with this seeker.

This I am has nothing to do with the search,

It's not searching.

So when you are realizing that,

Then you are no longer searching,

Because you are not going anywhere,

You are not a part of time.

So this is the first realization,

And at the beginning it's like you can find yourself dancing in the streets,

You feel so,

The stream of joy is actually endless.

Because you are realizing that you are really not going anywhere.

You don't need to correct anything,

To improve anything,

To make anything complete,

Because the search is never going to lead to an answer.

You were fooled by the way thought is made.

Always giving us a sense of moving from X to Y,

Always,

Forever.

And then from that I am free,

Just like we did in the meditation before,

You are continuing to expand.

It's like we are starting as a seed of consciousness,

It starts very tiny inside us,

And at the beginning it's a cluster,

Then as soon as it is freed,

It begins a journey of spreading,

Unfolding.

So a small The question is,

Do you believe that?

Or do you still say,

Yes,

But I still need to accept myself?

First I need to accept myself,

First I need to get over that trauma,

That abuse,

That violence,

And so on and so on.

All these conditions.

When you are beginning to shift in your identity,

You are realizing that one of the most precious things in the whole world of the New Age movement,

Self-acceptance,

Actually doesn't even exist on a higher level.

You don't even understand what they are talking about.

And actually,

Self-acceptance also doesn't have an end.

There is always something that is incomplete,

Imperfect about yourself.

It can always be better.

And when we say,

I accept myself,

It's just the opposite.

It's like creating a concept to cover up a pain or a sense of incompleteness.

Three,

Do you need to accept yourself?

So,

As I say,

It's not about giving up completely self-improvement,

It's not that we have created now a new enemy.

It's only saying,

Self-improvement has its part,

It only has nothing to do with spirituality.

That's the only thing we can say.

True spirituality is only about a gradual shift in my self-identity,

The expansion of myself.

Breaking free from identification.

It's always easier to grasp concepts like,

Be here and now,

Or be mindful,

Or accept yourself and open your heart.

Naturally,

This is far more common.

And that's why we have satsang.

To remind ourselves that there is the ultimate way that goes beyond all these concepts.

And asks the direct question.

Because when you are yourself,

All these qualities of being here and now and being mindful and loving and having your heart open,

This is all,

It's one package.

It comes with who you are.

Reviews

New concepts to ponder. 💚

Deep understanding here. I will listen again, there is much to learn. Namaste 🙏🏼

Sehr gut

A very clear explanation of the difference between improving yourself endlessly and realizing that you are free already. Thank you, Shai, fot this satsang.