The Unreasonable Nature of Enlightenment

so the unreasonable nature of enlightenment what I wanted to talk about was ego death the novels object very confusing same thing to talk about everybody interested in enlightenment hears about ego death but I wonder how many people actually know what it means so I wanted to talk about what I think and understand what I think it means what I understand and then it means and maybe you'll find that helpful I hope so but before we speak about ego death I wanted to introduce a different way as a way of thinking about spiritual transformation human transformation positive vertical transformation from a relative perspective or an absolute perspective so transformation from a relative perspective means I'm improving I stopped smoking I stopped drinking I get angry less I am Kinder and gentler and more generous I'm becoming a better person to learn to forgive myself and control myself and everybody tells me I'm improving and as a result life is getting better so that we could call that generally speaking relative transformation absolute transformation is uh is a huge non-linear leap of change that is always dramatic and much bigger than we ever imagined that it could be so enlightenment as I understand it is not about relative change even the relative change is a good thing it's a positive thing and something I think we all want to be busy with for our whole lives getting better all the time and improving all the time especially if we're interested in a evolutionary approach to life if we're evolutionaries we would like to at least think that we're constantly improving ourselves and developing ourselves and getting better whether that's actually true or not it's another question but it would be something that we would aspire to if we are evolutionarily oriented but an absolute transformation is is a non-linear leap into a completely different realm of being and knowing and existing and for the non-linear leap to occur which is called Enlightenment usually uh the ego's got to die sorry that doesn't work any other way and I wanted to try and explain what I think I understand what that what I think I mean by that so everybody can actually get a sense of what it actually means because to repeat the concept of the idea of ego death is thrown around maybe too casually by too many teachers and um I think it's confusing so I would say that except in the rarest of cases except in the rarest of cases of unusual realizers what we're calling the ego or the frontal cell doesn't die permanent death so if you meet anybody I think their ego doesn't exist you're probably wrong the proud of their ego is probably still alive and until ready to make all the problems that the ego does for us still but I think another way to understand what ego death is all about is to see it as a a moment or a long moment a period of time when we're calling the ego the frontal cell the personality the cell structure that contains our personal story comes to a halt and just stops completely it's a very particular kind of mind moment of trans Transcendence and then once again this moment of transcendence happens when the mind and the frontal cells the personality whether it's story it's a relationship it's conditioned relationship to past present and future usually it's painful relationship the past present and future and painful and conditioned relation to the past present and future comes to a screeching halt and it could come to stretching screeching health for one second or five minutes or ten minutes or a few hours or a few days but the leap the non-relative non-linear leap that gives rise to enlightened awareness and to radical transformation it happens when the excuse me when the Mind comes to a complete halt and temporarily the story our personal story my ego story my frontal personality story and it's relating this condition and painful relationship to past present and future ceases to exist even for a few moments so ego death it would be when is is when the ego usually temporarily subsides from the picture and even a brief mind moment of ego of the ego disappearing from existence dying disappearing can yield extraordinary landlocked and have extraordinary long-term effects on our souls and on our psyches and on our being you know I think that um what catalyzes the Awakening to enlightened awareness is ego death in some way shape or form or another it has to happen the menopause thinking about it excuse me and upon thinking about it giving it some consideration I realized that the ego dies in only two ways one of two ways the first is the best and the first is through these experienced of unreasonable happiness and unreasonable Joy unimaginable contentment it's possible to become spiritually completely overwhelmed with joy and lightness of being overwhelmed by a an intensity of Joy an intensity of lightness to be intensity of Bliss and happiness it's so profound so powerful that it literally stops the mind in its tracks and under the weight and intensity of this of this kind of joy and Bliss and happiness the Mind disappears and are this ego structure disappears under the weight of this Bliss and joy it just gives up it literally gives up it comes to its knees it just says I can't I can't survive the intensity of this happiness and when one experiences that one is that that much happiness and that much joy it was so much intensity when it really has no choice at a certain point but to give up which is the whole idea so ego death is when the ego which is the structure of the frontal cell mental personality with its story is brought to a complete halt it's a completely arrests itself and falls down to its knees and says I give up and whether this profound transformative experience of giving up or being compelled to give up by the intensity of the unreasonable happiness lasts for a few seconds or lasts for a few minutes or a few hours or even longer it doesn't really matter but the point I want to make is that ego death is usually a temporary event but if it's for real if it's if it's the real thing even a few seconds it'll change your life forever because a lot of people want to know does Enlightenment exist what is it and how do I attain it so I want to assure everybody it's real it does exist what the Buddha spoke about was real what Ramana maharshi was describing to us as all real and it's attainable for all of us the only way to reach that State of Consciousness is by getting to that point in our own Spiritual Development where we're compelled to give up to stop resisting to give in giving in means declaring wholeheartedly and helplessly not in my will but thy will be done I can't do this on my own I can't do this anymore I'm in your hands I'm Yours take me and so I think that um it's good to it's good to it's good to have a clear sense of what that actually means so we can know what we're aiming for here so the in the first in the first case scenario we're brought to our needs by the experience of unreasonable joy and unreasonable happiness and reasonable Bliss and ecstasy and to repeat it's an ecstasy that's so profound that we cannot resist it it overwhelms our self-nature self-structured to such a degree that we just feel compelled to give up there's nothing else we could do we have to surrender unconditionally erratically totally and completely because we have no choice The Joy was so intense we just had to stop and when we stop the Mind stops completely and it's these moments when the mind is completely come to a halt it's something profound it happens to us at a soul level that's called lasting transformation that's when we come back from the abyss I'm not the same person anymore we've seen something so profound so extraordinary so miraculous So Glorious that we can never be the same again it's it's choiceless and uh yeah it's choiceless so when we experience a non-relative but absolute shifts it doesn't matter how long it lasts but if we if we achieve a non-relative absolute shift we return from the abyss a changed person change in a profound way now of course it all depends upon how intense the experience was usually the more the more the greater the intensity of the experience of being crushed the more profound is is the transformation that results from it so just try to try to keep in mind here that um being a good spiritual practitioner meditating every day and doing all the right things that we think we should do if we want to develop aren't necessarily in and of themselves going to be enough because the only thing that's enough is what's going to bring us to into a moment of unconditional submission and the only other kind of experience I will have less is kind of dramatic impact on our being is suffering and sometimes suffering can become so intense so acute so overwhelming that it can also bring us to our knees and compel us to give up and to stop resisting and to say none of my will but thy will be done and sometimes that's how we achieve that result that's how it's sometimes how transformation happens it's through unreasonable pain and unreasonable suffering just as it can happen to unreasonable joy and unreasonable happiness but ego death is a result of giving up absolute giving up it's when we have no choice but to give up it's not it's not the result of a decision that's something we make up our mind I'm going to give up it's something that we find ourselves compelled compelled to do by the deepest dimensions of our own self choicelessly so either that is a tangible thing and the the beautiful thing about ego death is that it's if we experience it it's a moment Beyond time when we run our strategies become irrelevant and we realize there's nothing more we can do except to let go it was literally nothing else it's going to save us the mind is destroyed in that the Eagles destroyed where we find ourselves utterly helpless utterly vulnerable and hopefully utterly willing so once again ego death is real but it's not at least in the way that I understand it which is the space to my own experience all I can speak about is what I know from my own experience the ego it's not that the ego dies once and for all forever and ever to return again I don't think such things like that ever hardly ever happened maybe once in a very long while but rarely but it's more that the ego and the mind stop completely for a few seconds a few minutes a few hours or longer doesn't have to be that long just has to be enough to become completely crushed Natalie annihilated at the level of the eagle the love of the Mind and if it's complete and utter even for a few seconds it will leave us utterly changed and transformed not perfectly but dramatically and it's these kinds of moments these kinds of Mind moments it's change everything it's good it's good to try and be clear about this this is everything well maybe if I maybe if I meditate a little longer every day it'll help me get a little closer it may help and it might not help because all the strategies in the world in the end after we've given up anyway this is kind of the point I wanted to make and what spirit or God or Consciousness seems to be asking for for from all of us from a relative point of view is unreasonable because God is Spirit of Consciousness seems to be demanding everything from us if we want to be free if we want to wake into enlightened awareness she's asking for nothing but nothing but everything we have to give and we usually don't want to give that much for anything or anyone even for God that's the challenge that's why usually these mind moments where we come to a halt everything stops completely usually catches by surprise so it's usually something we don't expect is going to happen but sometimes the experience though if we're lucky Joy unreasonable happiness lightness of being ecstasy can become so overwhelming that we just stopped and give up and let go and in the same way sometimes they are experience of suffering can become so overwhelming that we can not only find ourselves helpless and on our knees begging for release and that's what that's what it takes so so what I'm describing is not the kind of thing most people really want to experience because it's just too it's too daunting it's too overwhelming it's too frightening really this is why I always this is why I always encourage people to spend a lot of time in their spiritual practice cultivating the conscious desire the conscious intention intention to want to be free to really think about it to confront yourself do I want to be unconditionally free can I have okay should I experience it would I be able to handle that kind of Freedom am I really ready for it is it what I really want because I want to be to that freedom and have to do anything to give up competing and control and a very primary and fundamental level of my being once and for all and forever eternally for eternity giving up and letting go at the deepest level of our being that's something we have to be prepared for so as we can't necessarily catalyze the kind of intense and intensive mind moment that I was just describing as a result of will we can certainly prepare ourselves to be ready for it and the way to prepare ourselves to be ready for artists is to engage in a contemplation that requires a really a contemplation that requires us to confront the actuality of our desire for Freedom our desire for enlightenment do I really want it and am I prepared for it because it's an assault on the way things are like nothing else ever could be most people find that when they within their first glimpses of Enlightenment most people find that it was there was two that it's too much and that they're not really ready for it yet I think the best thing we can do most constructive thing we can do in terms of spiritual practice is to prepare ourselves we get as ready as we possibly can Here and Now for the league because we only can be as ready as we can we can only be as ready as we can be and we're only going to know how ready we are when the moment actually comes are we going to resist or we're going to continue to hold on where we freeze up in fear where we will We submit and let go that's the question so it's the it's contemplating the absolute and non-relative nature of the ordeal that will prepare us to let go when you wake into enlightened awareness you don't get anything you lose everything so it's only letting go it's not a receiving of any particular gift want to strip naked and for this we need to be ready and we can prepare ourselves but it requires a a deadly seriousness about all this because Enlightenment as I understand that it's not about self-improvement has nothing to do with working out on neurosis I'm coming to terms with our pain and fear it's about letting go of our whole story dramatically and in an instant if we can it's at least being ready to do that as all of you have heard so many times it's a lead from the known to the unknown but it's a genuine leap it's not just fancy words the beautiful part of it is life can change so much if we're willing to take this leap they've prepared if we're prepared for when it happens our life can change in the most dramatic ways Beyond where we can imagine that's really true our dreams can come true if we're willing to let go of everything else that's in the way easier said than done after spending three weeks with my own teacher the great hwl plunger I spent three weeks with him day and night and he told me when I was about to leave he said Andrew when you leave me something very big is going to happen to you and I didn't believe him because I was wondering how he could possibly know what's going to happen to me nobody can predict the future so I thought and um I didn't believe him but shortly after I left him something very big started happening it was very dramatic and very overwhelming it was something I could not have prepared myself for beforehand because there's no way you can prepare yourself for it even like you said there is and I realized in those few moments in those few hours a few days did everything that I had ever dreamed of was actually happening but it was much bigger than I could have ever imagined that it actually could be I thought that was being consumed by a mysterious presence that I couldn't see but I could feel and I was both exhilarated and thrilled and I'm profoundly excited and deeply terrified because I realized this was bigger than I could control it was bigger than me that I was I was out of control and I I literally felt like I was being possessed or taken over by this mysterious presence that I couldn't see and I also felt that if this process didn't stop there would be nothing left of me in the end and I didn't know what that meant but it was as it was exhilarating was also completely terrifying because the Letting Go was happening at levels that were beyond my conscious control which is kind of how it happens when it really happens once we go through an ordeal like that all we have to do from then on is not to doubt it and to accept it and to serve continue to surrender if you really let go when this kind of thing happens to you there's no way back which is the whole idea actually if you're serious so when we think about transformation we can think about it as in the context of relative change and relative Improvement self-improvement self-development which is all very positive and wholesome and good all good stuff to be involved with for all of us the relative self-improvement is not the kind of radical shift of radical transformation I'm speaking about radical transformation The Radical transformation that leads to the awakened to align the awareness requires the ego to die not forever but for a few seconds at least mind has come back to completely stop and the ego has to completely disappear for you and for all of us to find out who we really are what's actually really going on here relative transformation doesn't lead to Absolute transformation relative transformation leads to relative transformation and absolute transformation is what it is not the same thing what are you aiming for what are you aiming for what are you hoping for in your own Journey this is what you're aiming for and what you're hoping for is probably gonna have a lot to do with how far you actually end up going so it's good to think in terms of your own self-contemplation an inquiry about your own interested enlightenment are you ready to let go are you prepared to take the leap beyond the Mind from which there's no return or do you really want your life to be a better life a happier life the more peaceful life with his less suffering what do you want emancipation do you want to realize the dimension of reality that's unconditioned and unconditional the freedom unimaginable freedom is the very grounded reality itself always these are things to think about and if you begin to think if you think this way and being very serious with yourself you can prepare yourself to be ready to let go I'm I feel quite convinced this is my belief that uh if we're deadly serious about this and utterly committed that it will happen sooner or later it has to if we have if we are focused on this alone and are not distracted by the things or tempted by other things but are deeply one-pointed and intentive reach the undershore in this life we will there's very few people are that sincere that serious about this serious about other things when you're very serious about this there are other forces at work that seem to come to support us When the evolution of Consciousness and the liberation of Consciousness becomes our primary motivation in a way that is very real and very serious there are forces and inherent momentums and Consciousness itself that seem to reveal themselves and make themselves apparent the forces and momentums that we weren't previously aware of it seems that the universe or the deepest interior of the whole universe which is subjectivity and consciousness it's not static but it seems Seems to in my experience seems to want to become more conscious Consciousness seems to want to become more conscious if that makes any sense to you Consciousness Delights in his own self-recognition and there are forces at work inherited Consciousness itself where there is a mysterious seems to be a mysterious aspiration towards greater depth there's greater reality and greater hypnosis and when you awaken to these internal momentums inherent in the deeper layers of Consciousness itself you'll start to feel yourself entering into a different world because we're not alone in all this if you really want this kind of Liberation this kind of freedom the universe will help you it helped me still helping me irrational excuse me the rational sorry the rational mind finds these things very hard to believe understandably because we're not speaking about rational territory we're speaking about trans-rational reality so you could say part of part of everything I'm describing requires a leap of faith which is true it means you have to realize there's something there's a truth about the nature of reality that transcends the mind's ability to cognize it and this truth is more significant and more relevant more important than anything that the mind could ever come up with you've got to know that deeply in your soul because in the end of course we want to gain confidence spiritual self-confidence that will get us through this in spiritual self-confidence comes from these kinds of the kinds of experiences that I've been speaking about like convince us about this non-relative absolute dimension of reality so it become doubtless and fearless about it I don't know what more to say really about it okay just that it's real in order for this to work you not only do you have to take you have to take it seriously you have to be willing to take yourself seriously the best part of your own self deadly seriously you have to believe in yourself I believe in the believing that you can do this because nobody can believe in you if you you know nobody can believe in you for you you have to do that for yourself we all do but for one hand there's all the help in the world available to us which is what I'm just speaking about and then on the other hand we're completely alone in this taking this kind of leap is something we're either prepared for or not in the privacy of our own soul so eating your death is real ego death is a mind moment it's a moment when the Mind completely comes to a halt until the ego disappears the mind and the personality disappears completely for a few seconds for a few moments or longer doesn't matter how long it happens for us as long as it's my mind is completely arrested and you're willing to go through it what we would help for is that we're so seduced by the joy it's inherent in the nature of Consciousness itself and reasonable happiness that's available to all of us in our own Consciousness that we we've become oddly destroyed by Joy I could be better than that in some experiences I've had when I was younger the experience of Joy was so intense that I thought I was going to die it was so powerful and so overwhelming joy and ecstasy can become painful at a certain point because it's so intense but it can't free us from the ego and in the same way as unfortunately too many of us are well aware more often than not and too often it seems to be the case that um the only thing they will get us to let go is unbearable something unfortunately sometimes there's no other way to find a way to humility than enduring unimaginable pain it's part it's part of the process it's part of the path and we have to be willing to embrace all of it if we want to be free the main thing I wanted to convey uh to convey to all of you simply is that ego death is real and it's got to happen and I wanted to try and describe describe it in a way that to make it tangible and graspable as a truth not some strange metaphysical idea but it's something we can all relate to