--- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > --- In [email protected], "sandiego108" <sandiego108@> > wrote: > > > > --- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <no_reply@> wrote: > > <snip> My first two questions as your student are: > > > > > > 1. How do you know you're enlightened? > > > > These are excellent questions. In order to answer this > > first one, I have to ask you first, what do you mean > > by "enlightened"? I have written about this state > > experientially many times, but there is a great deal > > of confusion around this term, so I'd like to establish > > meanings first. > > Jim, you were the person who, only a few posts > ago, advised me to go back and read my TM Intro > Lecture notes. I don't have any; I threw away > all of my TM-related books and materials decades > ago. > > What I'm doing here is trying to get you to give > your *own* Intro Lecture. > > YOU are the one who claimed to be enlightened. I > would say that the onus falls on you to define > the term, not me. > > As you have said many times, I am not in a position > to define enlightenment at all, whereas you are. > > So, if you need a definition before you continue > your Intro Lecture, I suggest you present one. > That's what we all had to do when we were giving > Intro Lectures.
I don't know about presenting or continuing an intro lecture-- I thought that was to describe TM, and I am not a TM teacher... but OK- I define living enlightenment as having the simultaneous experience of deep, infinite silence, infused into every activity of life, sensory or thoughtful, while waking, dreaming or sleeping. I further define enlightenment as having the sense that I create my world, wholly and totally, including all of those in it (even though they may have the same experience that includes me) moment by moment. Also a subjective sense that I am always centered, in the precise center of my world. And that things always work out for the best, even though in the middle of something, it sometimes feels pretty dicey, but then as I wait and watch through a continuation of an experience, it resolves itself perfectly, until the next adventure, in which the dynamic repeats itself... Also much reduced fear-- Since there is nothing I feel I have to do anymore, other than the next obvious thing, there is no longer much to be fearful of, except possibly imagination. This includes no fear of death (As distinct from also having a strong love of life). That's all I can think of for the moment. Do you agree with this definition? > > > > 2. Is it possible that you are mistaken? > > Still unanswered. > Good question-- Is it possible that I am mistaken about being in a permanent state of enlightenment, that I have just defined? Nope- I just defined it based purely on my experience. kind of a set up- I defined it based on what I experience, therefore I am in the state that I just defined. How could I or anyone else be mistaken about that? So it kinda comes back to, once again, what we agree enlightenment is. Is it possible that I may wake up in the next 5 seconds and not be enlightened? I seriously do not understand the question-- what would I revert to? The process of attaining enlightenment involves the complete dissolution of any sort of artificial identity. So how do I get back to what I no longer am? Also this question seems to imply that enlightenment is a static state in which one either is or isn't. And it isn't a static state.
