On Jan 31, 2008, at 3:38 AM, TurquoiseB wrote:
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "tomandcindytraynoratfairfieldlis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > Barry writes snipped: > > And again, you are assuming the "unenlightened" > > model, which believes that "progress" *has* to be "made" > > "towards" enlightenment. If you shift to another > > equally accurate model and description of the process -- > > that everyone is always already enlightened and that the > > *only* thing that marks "enlightenment" is a realization > > of what has always already been going on -- then there > > is no "progress" possible. > > TomT: > The reason it is called ignorance is that one actually is able > to ignore that which they always have been and will always be. > It is not called stupid or smart or arrogant or gratuitous or > a lie it is called IGNORANCE. Name and form. For those who have had a realization experience, whether it be temporary or permanent, the "always already enlightened" model is just so much more *accurate*.
Yes, but even in sudden paths to E, relative obscurations will remain. That's not to say that an individual cannot go from total ignorance to complete enlightenment in a flash, but it is extremely rare and has happened to maybe a handful of people in history. And also, the world is filled with people (esp. nowadays it would seem) who claim to be enlightened or had some total awakening but may actually be in something else. Unless you have a person, a standard really, who can verify that experience, it actually has little meaning. More often than not students will mistake any number of well known sidetracks as the Big E.
Even when one does authentically have a non-conventional experience of our Natural State, on still is on a path, just one where it is a pathless path, as obscurations do still remain.
It's *obvious* when it happens that there was never anywhere to "go," nothing to "become," no "stress" to get rid of, no moment at which you were ever "unenlightened." Enlightenment is, has always been, and will always be; the only thing lacking up til now has been the realization of what should have been obvious. As Tom suggests, the being who has considered himself "unenlightened" has just been being IGNORANT of what's been right in his face since the day he was born. So I've always wondered WHY spiritual teachers went for that *other* model, the *inaccurate* one.
Because different people have different propensities and different dispositions. Most people need some sort of support or training wheels to begin to let go of their identifications.
You know the one -- the one that says that there are things you have to "do" to "become" enlight- ened, that there are "obstacles" like stress that can prevent enlightenment, that one can ever be "unenlightened." Why not do what Ramana Maharshi and a few other teachers did and just TELL THE TRUTH from Day One: "You're enlightened. Right here, right now. GET OVER all this 'unenlightened' stuff already." :-)
Ramana actually himself spent years in all sorts of absorptions before he had his "sudden" realization (same with Nisargadatta, a Nath who has mastered kundalini and yoga first). He also taught his students based on where they're at, not a "one size fits' all" approach.
As far as I can tell, the entire TM model for the enlightenment process is a LIE. Worse, it is a *known* lie, because Maharishi has at times written eloquently about the other model, the "always already enlightened" model. So he *chose* to tell people that they were unenlightened, and would remain unenlightened until certain undefined conditions were met. He chose to *reinforce* the ignorance rather than dispel it. WHY, one wonders?
Ignorance sells? :-)
