{"id":3908,"date":"2013-02-09T10:30:42","date_gmt":"2013-02-09T15:30:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/?p=3908"},"modified":"2013-02-10T12:41:49","modified_gmt":"2013-02-10T17:41:49","slug":"what-is-your-path-to-enlightenment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/?p=3908","title":{"rendered":"What is your path to &#8216;Enlightenment&#8217;?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Let&#8217;s talk now in this space about &#8220;Enlightenment&#8221;\u2014this elusive magical mystical experience for which everyone seems to be reaching and for which everyone seems to have a yearning, and for which every one seems to be searching.\u00a0 And I understand the reasons for the search, because if we all were enlightened one presumes that our lives would be better than they are now, when we are presumably <em>un<\/em>enlightened.<\/p>\n<p>In addition, it occurs to me that if all of us were enlightened relatively quickly, the whole world would be different and we would experience life in another way.\u00a0 Presumably with less turmoil, with less stress, with less conflict, for sure, I would imagine, with less sadness and anger and less violence and much less of all the things that make our lives sad and disjointed and unhappy in these days and times.<\/p>\n<p>So humanity searches for Enlightenment and we have been searching for Enlightenment from the beginning of time, ever since we became consciously aware of the fact that it was possible to <em>be<\/em> Enlightened\u2014whatever that is.<\/p>\n<p>We have not only been searching for Enlightenment, we have been searching as well for a <em>definition<\/em> of Enlightenment, because we can\u2019t get to that destination until we know where we are going.\u00a0 And so the first step for most human beings has been to try to define what Enlightenment is, or what it looks like, or feels like, or tastes like, or what it is like to experience that.\u00a0 And then, after we have that clear, after we know what our destination is, then we can try to figure out what would it take to get from where we are to where we want to be.<\/p>\n<p>And there is this rush to Enlightenment that I observe that humanity, or a portion of humanity, is engaged in. And many say that they know how to get there and they know how to get <em>you<\/em> there. And so we see many, many \u201cPaths to Enlightenment\u201d that are suggested, recommended, created, expressed, experienced, shared, and put into the space of our collective lives. Masters of every shape and size and color have been creating a way to be enlightened for millennia.<\/p>\n<p>Paramahansa Yogananda said that he knew a way to Enlightenment.\u00a0 The Buddha said that he knew a way to Enlightenment.\u00a0 Maharishi Mahesh Yogi says that he knows a way to Enlightenment.\u00a0 Sai Baba says that he knows a way to Enlightenment.\u00a0 In their own way, Jesus the Christ and Abu Al-Qasim Muhammad ibn Abd Allah ibn Abd Al-Muttalib ibn Hashim\u2014Muhammad\u2014said that they knew the way to Enlightenment.<\/p>\n<p>Now the interesting thing here is that the followers of all of these Masters have insisted that their Master was right about that, that their way was the best way and the fastest way. Maybe not the only way, but the fastest way and, therefore, you needed to take that way. There was a great urgency. You needed to become Catholic or you needed to take Transcendental Meditation or you needed to learn Tai Chi, or you needed to raise your vibrational rate, or your needed to change your brain, or, for heaven sake, change <em>something.\u00a0 <\/em>And not <em>some<\/em> time, but <em>right now<\/em>, immediately, this <em>month<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>You needed to join this group or do that process or read this book or be baptized or be un-baptized or do whatever it is that you have been told by your particular master or monk is the fastest, quickest way for you to get to where all of us want to go\u2014which is the place called \u201cenlightenment,\u201d \u201cawareness,\u201d \u201chigher consciousness,\u201d or \u201cvibrational harmony.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The brain is now the latest path, the latest route, everyone is talking about. It is about moving your energy, your focus, your awareness, your presence, your essence, the vibration of Who You Are, from the brain stem to the frontal lobe. Many people are teaching this now. Many people are talking about actual science, physical science, brain chemistry, as a path to this thing we call Enlightenment.<\/p>\n<p>All of that is wonderful. That is just terrific, and it gives me great hope for humanity. But there is something we have to look at here. There is a pitfall here, a detour, a time-waster.\u00a0 And even a danger, if we choose to damage others with it. The danger of this business of Enlightenment is two-fold.\u00a0 The first danger is thinking that there is <em>something specific that you have to do in order to get there, <\/em>and that if you don\u2019t do that, you <em>can\u2019t<\/em> get there.\u00a0 The second danger is thinking that your way to get there is the fastest, best way to do it.<\/p>\n<p>And I want to pick up on that in my next entry. For now, what is your path to Enlightenment? Have you tried any particular path? What has been your experience?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Let&#8217;s talk now in this space about &#8220;Enlightenment&#8221;\u2014this elusive magical mystical experience for which everyone seems to be reaching and for which everyone seems to have a yearning, and for which every one seems to be searching.\u00a0 And I understand the reasons for the search, because if we all were enlightened one presumes that our [&hellip;]<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[156],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interpreting-conversations-with-god"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3908"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3910,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3908\/revisions\/3910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theglobalconversation.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}