• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Enlightenment, I don't get it

Windwalker

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Yoga and meditation practice. It just feels good. Makes me extremely calm. But I quit when I started having spiritual experiences.
Ah. You have an allergy to spiritual experiences? Bad experience previously? Bad association with some group in the past? I recognize that reaction from my own experiences when I first started meditation. But I pushed through and was able to move it beyond that association.
 

janesix

Active Member
Ah. You have an allergy to spiritual experiences? Bad experience previously? Bad association with some group in the past? I recognize that reaction from my own experiences when I first started meditation. But I pushed through and was able to move it beyond that association.
I've had some bad experiences(and some really good ones too, but the bad ones freak me out too much.
 

Windwalker

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I've had some bad experiences(and some really good ones too, but the bad ones freak me out too much.
It's common when you start to quite the discursive mind, the chattering monkey mind as it's called, that what is in the subconscious mind starts come into conscious awareness. There is a lot of "shadow" material down there, which everyone has. That's things we have repressed, pushed into dark corners and kept at bay through fear. It can be simple stuff from early childhood. But what we do is turn it into dark, fearful demons because we've unconsciously kept repressing it.

It can feel really dark and scary once as it starts to surface, and can manifest itself symbolically to us, like a "dark presence" in the room, sort of thing, or things like that. It feels external to you, because we have disowned that part of ourselves. We externalize it. That's actually a positive thing, because your conscious mind is beginning to feel safe enough to allow it to come up for you to face and heal it. Meditation, and other practices quiet all those constant thoughts, which are really nothing other than just distractions the mind creates to keep us from facing all that hidden stuff we fear.

Once that stuff is allowed to come up and be faced, you find it's not a devil at all. Rather it's simply a part of you that you locked away and turned into something terrifying, but in reality, it's just a hurt child that needs to be healed. Once that is embraced, we are able to let it go and the result is greater freedom, and most importantly, inner peace. And that frankly is the whole point of such practices: healing, and transcending the normal self-imprisonment that creates stress, anxieties, fear, and unhappiness. Or as the Buddhists would call it, "suffering".

So the point is, if you encountered that in meditation, that means you were making progress. A lot of people don't even get that far.
 

Hermit Philosopher

Selflessly here for you
So they say. I think I am fine being me.


Dear janesix,

I think it is wonderful that you are “fine” being you. And you are free to be just that if you wish, until the physical being of that you is no more. Then, those who believe that’s not all existence is about, would say, that too must be left behind. But one can cross that bridge (if it exists) when one comes to it. However, many who believe in it, wish to deal with it a priori - and that’s okay also. It’s a question of choice after all.

Humbly
Hermit
 

PearlSeeker

Well-Known Member
What would you loose if you become more unselfish, compassionate? Less self-centered, unchained from ego-desires...

Are you sure those things have anything to do with ego?
Yes. Ego ("I" in Latin) is the sense of self. This view of self can be identification of self as separated... or as a part of an integrated whole (as you said: the whole universe can be seen as one being). Paul of Tarsus for example talked about seeing others as limbs of the same body... That's why we can hear phrases like "false self" and "true self". Sometimes ego means the measure of self-importance, for example: healthy ego, big ego, inflated ego...

So I think loosing ego means changing view of self. Even the enlightened beings retained a thin I-ness.
 

Mariza

New Member
There is a lot that needs to be healed and restored on our planet and within our thinking too, yes ofcourse we are evolving and ascending , Creation is about expansion, not standing still and stagnant. Indeed our ego has served a reason, to experience seperation, Now we are returning back to Union, Unity consciousness. It has been prophesized in all religions, the end of the old world, the beginning of a new. I am sharing with you from My Soulheart this channel, there are many videos ad free about different subjects but basically to help navigate these BIG times of change! I hope it helps you to empower, heal and understand deeper your journey on Earth & 5th Dimensional ascension. With Love always, Mariza
 
Last edited:

SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
If it means "losing my ego", then I don't want it. Why would I want to do that? It seems to be a bizarre desire. Who doesn't want to be themself, and why?

Enlightenment isn't about "losing [one's] ego." It's about understanding what the ego is, how to manage it, what one is in one's true nature (which, incidentally, isn't the ego), and stabilizing oneself that being.
 

Martin

Spam, wonderful spam (bloody vikings!)
If it means "losing my ego", then I don't want it. Why would I want to do that? It seems to be a bizarre desire. Who doesn't want to be themself, and why?

"Ego" is how we interact with the world, so it has a necessary function.
So I don't get the idea of "destroying" the ego. Understanding what it is sounds useful, and perhaps then transcending it, or at least seeing it in a larger context.
 

SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
I remember going to my ex's house, years ago, shortly after I'd left him(I was picking up some things). He was living in his dad's house, and when I came in, he exclaimed very excitedly that he'd become an internet guru. He was so pleased with this, he didn't seem to notice that, while he had on a very nice fedora, the only other article of clothing he had on was his boxers.

It seems the ascended masters of the internet have a dress code they don't tell the common public about.

As your resident fashion icon, I have not qualms about telling the common public about my "ascended masters of the internet" dress code.

Paisley Speedos, argyle socks, and plaid shirts are currently the en vogue internet fashion when posting on the interwebz.
 

syo

Well-Known Member
If it means "losing my ego", then I don't want it. Why would I want to do that? It seems to be a bizarre desire. Who doesn't want to be themself, and why?
You are right. Enlightenment is know yourself.

Know yourself doesn't mean start labeling yourself with adjectives. It means know your body. Your body is all you have.
 
Last edited:

osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
What is it that has a love for waffles?

I myself love waffles. If you can locate the I by any other means than being the I then I guess that's what all the consciousness scientists are looking for. Or just how things are experienced.

But the ego is the arrogance of an individual I.

Any way you slice it it's no illusion.

Enlightenment is probably different for each individual. Enlightenment is inner peace, and supreme awareness. Humility!
 

SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
I myself love waffles.

Then by your own statement, the "I" yourself cannot be enlightened while it still loves waffles.

Enlightenment is an exercise in letting go of all attachments and conceptions. When you have done that your true self emerges.

Your "I" that loves waffles therefore cannot be your true self according to your own claim.
 

osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
Then by your own statement, the "I" yourself cannot be enlightened while it still loves waffles.



Your "I" that loves waffles therefore cannot be your true self according to your own claim.

Maybe love is not attachment nor must I conceive of it to experience it. Love brings freedom to me. So if I let go of all the definitions, and meanings associated with love, or anything else then my genuine self emerges and for me love would be the emergent thing.

I think love and attachment are not the same.
I mean I don't absolutely have to have waffles, but I love them so why not eat them when in the mood for them.

I'm not dependent on the waffles. If I craved them then that's different. That would be dependent. An attachment.
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
If it means "losing my ego", then I don't want it. Why would I want to do that? It seems to be a bizarre desire. Who doesn't want to be themself, and why?

I have been enlightened in one particular area (not religious) that i won't discuss on a public forum but i assure you that it has not stolen my ego. Far from it, it boosted my confidence, self worth, enjoyment of life but underneath that i am still me.
 
Top