I might have had a mini-enlightenment last night

Even though I no longer believe in God, I'm attracted to non-religious Buddhism. So even though I don't engage in any sort of formal Buddhist practice, I like the idea of being enlightened. 

Just seems better than being endarkened. 

Though I can't say with any certainty that the intuitive flash that coursed through my consciousness as I was heading to bed last night was a sign of a mini-enlightenment (I'm way too humble to claim a maxi-enlightenment), I like the idea that it was.

So I'll go with that.

I was heading down the stairs that lead to the bedroom where I sleep when an unbidden realization hit me. This wasn't a thought, or an emotion. It was an instant knowing. 

What I knew at that moment surprised me, given my usual tendency to see myself more positively than I'm sure I deserve. 

It was: You're just an ordinary person. Nothing special. Nothing really to be proud of.

While this didn't feel like an emotion, the after-effect of the knowing was pleasant. I felt like a weight had been lifted from me, the burden of trying to appear more competent and accomplished than I actually was.

It was sort of akin to the sensation I had decades ago when, after believing that I could figure out a way to actively manage the investments my wife and I have and beat the market, I concluded after considerable reading and research that investing in index funds was the way to go.

Meaning, I'd just try to be average, as I wrote about in a 2008 post, "Profitable spiritual investing."

As the world financial crisis deepens, conversations tend to turn toward money rather than other subjects. Last night I was with a group of people who discussed the ins and outs (not to mention the ups and downs) of investing in tough times like these.

I didn't have a whole lot to say.

Briefly I held forth on the Buddha-like nature of index fund investing, where you don't try to beat the market through some clever scheme but rather rest content with rising and falling in concert with the overall financial tide.

I told my friends, "If the world and national economy go to hell, so will our investments. If things improve, so will our portfolio. It's a humble way to invest, since you're happy to be average."

This is pretty much the same way I feel about my spiritual investing strategy now.

For many years I thought I could beat the system. That is, find a way to salvation, God-realization, enlightenment, or whatever, that would lead to a better result than others would enjoy who weren't privy to the inside knowledge I possessed.

I've written about my shift from "active" to "passive" spiritual investing in previous posts:
"Running so fast to become motionless"
"Spiritual diversification, a sound investment strategy"
"Spiritual investing takes nothing"

Here's  an excerpt from "Why atheists are more "spiritual" than religious believers," a 2014 post that echoes some of what I experienced in last night's mini-enlightenment. 

Maybe this statement seems paradoxical to you: I feel more genuinely spiritual now that I've stopped believing in God. But it makes good sense to me. Here's the main reason why.

I no longer feel special.

Virtually every religion and spiritual path considers that its adherents have a special relationship with God or whatever other supernatural entity they believe in. 

There are so many chosen people on Earth, they vastly outnumber the unchosen, the non-special group I'm pleased to be a part of.

I understand that feeling special has its own delights.

In my case, I was a member of an India-based spiritual organization which taught that those approved for initiation by the guru had been "marked" to return to God/heaven after a karma-cleansing meditation process.

Cool!

For about 35 years I embraced the enjoyable belief that, out of all the billions of people on this planet, I was one of a relative few who were the special beloveds of the supreme being. 

Of course, devout Christians, Jews, and Muslims feel the same way, along with countless believers in other theological belief systems. 

Eventually I started to realize that all the talk I was hearing about being "humble servants of the Lord and the guru" was, to put it bluntly, a crock of shit. Genuine humility wasn't much to be seen among devotees of my spiritual organization.

Not surprising.

Since members of this group were told over and over that they've been singled out by a higher power to learn cosmic truths and experience realms of reality not available to other human beings, naturally a pervading sense of "tribal" pride was evident throughout the organization.

We were the cool kids in the spiritual lunch room. Other faiths were inferior, since they didn't have the direct connection to God we did. 

I'm happy that this form of egotism has been discarded.

Sure, I've still got lots of other self-centered tendencies rattling around in my psyche, as we all do. But to get rid of The Big One, a belief that God had chosen me to be his best buddy for eternity, whereas my infidel wife wasn't going to get the same afterlife prize -- this increased my humility quotient by a lot.

Now I don't expect that I'm going to have any different sort of afterlife anyone else does. Namely, I strongly suspect, none at all. 

I also don't expect that there is any power guiding my life which isn't also directing the lives of every other entity on Earth. 

Thus I've embraced a sort of "index fund" approach to spirituality.

Meaning, I don't try to beat the market. I don't assume that I have any special knowledge, any special talent, any special relationship with reality. Whatever laws of nature apply to everybody else, I'm content with.

Comments

[Ron E.]

Brian. I wonder if your instant knowing experience is what I know as a moment of clarity. Whether or not it can be called enlightenment, I don’t know. I always thought such moments were common place, as they pervade my head often. I don’t see them as anything special – although they are pleasant in that when they occur everything feels just as it should be. It doesn’t feel to be thought, in fact just the opposite.

I wonder if they can become so commonplace that a feeling of living every day in a kind of acceptance gradually becomes the norm. Even when life become a bit fraught that too falls into accepted. It could also be described as feeling embraced, of being part of life, being connected.

Perhaps as they say in Zen – we are already enlightened; we just don’t realise it.

[808]

I can see how that would be a mystical experience. The specialness of religion is what divorces it from spirituality.

Releasing the mind from the specialness obsession of the ego is indeed enlightening.

We’re all One… ❤️

[SantMat64]

I too had an enlightenment experience recently. I was hit by a bright light and a voice from heaven that told me "every iota of creation is proof there is a creator."

I spoke to the voice, and said, "you can't fool me. The entire universe came from absolutely nothing. The nothingness created everything. It didn't need a creator. It just happened on its own, just like that."

The voice just laughed.

[um]

@ Sant Mat

BEFORE a thing
there was NO-thing

That states only that things were once not ... that is all ... nothing more nothing less.

And that is what we witness ... things appear, exist for a while and finally disappear

There is nothing to be said about the orgin of things, twhat keeps them allive and what makes them vanish again.

NOTHING

To be alive there is no need to know these things .. being alife is an fact. and that fact is enough to make coffe.

[um]

>> It was: You're just an ordinary person.
Nothing special. Nothing really to be proud of.<<

My nephew, most of his career having spend in the [high grade] restaurant business comes now and then to see his uncle, have a walk in the forest and have some food and or a drink.

Being a kind of idealist, he easily is painfully aware of the shortcomings of the staaf in the establishments where we have a drink or some food.

He knows or could have known that overtime the old-style french service has gone with the mind and that staff members are often recruited from the university..

One day, when his frustration and irritation was at peak .. I smiles and laughed at him saying .. look nephew, just look for once ...these are not waiters these are "plate carriers"

That very moment his attention was drawn away from his thoughts and feelings and he started laughing and laughing for minutes at a stretch and i even had to calm him down

There and then he turned the key in the lock of the door. ... he will have many from these experiences in the future if he is courageous enough

What matters is the shift in focus .. this time it were the waiters, that were used as a stick to hit him on his head ... hahaha

Nobody changes .. you have always been a normal human being.

[Satwant]

I had an intuition while I was in question and answers of gurinder singh dhillon rssb. It was that he does not answer the questions, they leave me in more confusion rather than crystal clear clarity. I then realised I can answer my own questions with more clarity than this Charleton baba of beas. If this is the case , then why do I need a guru. I then asked why am I bowing down to this man, what makes him more special than anyone else; why does he need Z level security; and indeed why am I here. The long and short of it was that I was mislead, I followed the crowd, and my parents. It was a wasted 20 years of life I would never get back.

[808]

mys·ti·cism
/ˈmistəˌsiz(ə)m/

1. belief that union with or absorption into the Deity or the absolute, or the spiritual apprehension of knowledge inaccessible to the intellect, may be attained through contemplation and self-surrender.

"St. Theresa's writings were part of the tradition of Christian mysticism"

⬆️ that was the first definition entry and I like it. Time spent with a specific teacher is never wasted. You learned something. You’ll continue to learn and grow. You were seeking and seekers tend to make seeking a lifelong journey. In fact, the mystic path is a lifelong journey whether you have one teacher, two teachers, multiple or none. You’re getting closer to knowing your true self.

[808]

I hesitate to write certain things because everything I write comes true. (I should probably write that I won the lottery or something.) I won’t say I’m old, but I will say that the past 4 years have been more like 14 years. So many changes.

And yet, from a mystical perspective I am closer to the beginning of time. In some ways I feel younger. In some ways I feel much older. Time and the experience of time has shifted dramatically.

I don’t have any anxiety anymore. It’s like there is a master plan and all I have to do is go along with it—really feels lighter. Not much to worry about.

[808]

In Christian Mysticism, “sin” is seen as a mistake to be corrected rather than an evil to be punished. This helps to save time or “abolish time”. There is a pretty big difference there.