What the hell is Enlightenment!?

[Steve]

One comment regarding relativity. I will agree that everything is measured relative to something else, but the criteria by which something is measured can remain subjective, even if the scale is not. The measurement is, by definition, establishing a scale that is concrete.

Thanks for the honesty.
I have had this problem with my IRL friends. While speaking to them in person, they feel I am talking down to them. It couldn't be further from the truth. I just want a straight forward answer about these ideas. Giving me wishy-washy descriptions of how the concept is ineffable or too difficult to express just makes me push harder because there is an answer in your head when I ask, "What is Enlightenment?"
Indefinite answers are useless when describing Gravity. They are useless when describing Money. They are useless when describing Love. Poetry can beautiful and truthful, but if I don't get a true answer, I have to push harder or walk away.

I am sorry if I offended anyone. I am not coming at this with a definite answer. I am simply laying out my current answer, allowing others to comment on it while inviting their alternative answers.

You haven't offended me. And I don't feel like you're talking down to me. I honestly feel like you're kind of bluffing a little.

Good poetry doesn't describe love; it demonstrates love. And by understanding the demonstration, we better understand the abstract. As a practical matter, I am still married after 23 years because I demonstrate my love to my wife through acts of love.

 

[Flying Crane]

Nothing wrong with that, but we must end the conversation if we are at impasse and can't find where we agree.
We can't start the conversation until we understand our mutual starting position. We must start from agreement or we talk past each other.

That's fine, if you feel you aren't getting the answers you are seeking. I just wanted to point out the difference in the perception in the answers: wushu-washy vs. no clear answers exist. Some people might take exception to their answers being called wishy-washy

 

[Tgace]

I don't think it can be described.

It would be like me trying to describe a color to you with words...and science has shown we all see/colors in different ways as it is.

Any communication is me trying to use symbols to pass a message/concept along to you. The actual "thing" has to be experienced...not explained. I'm not a good enough "explainer" and you may not be a good enough "understander".

 

[TieXiongJi]

I don't think it can be described.

It would be like me trying to describe a color to you with words...and science has shown we all see/colors in different ways as it is.

Any communication is me trying to use symbols to pass a message/concept along to you. The actual "thing" has to be experienced...not explained. I'm not a good enough "explainer" and you may not be a good enough "understander".

That is the eternal problem of all discovery. We make a discovery through 1000s of hours of struggle and when we finally have it, now we want to share how we got there.

 

[Steve]

Out of curiosity, does anyone here believe himself or herself to be "enlightened?"

 

[hoshin1600]

It is considered an offense to say something bad about someone who has taken vows. Just like the saying "if you see the Buddha kill him" is considered one of the five cardinal sins in Buddhism to commit if you shed blood from a Buddha.

hi Oaktree, since you seem knowledgeable in this i wanted to address my usage of the " kill the Buddha" comment.
i use it as a phrase to engage the thought of letting go of convention. there is sometimes a tendency to adhere to a strict concept of what is and what is not. my usage is aimed at pointing out that once you "get it" you dont need to continue on the same quest and path. you can let go. there is another saying that Bruce Lee used to point to the same concept " once you get across the river you dont need to carry the boat around on your back"

 

[oaktree]

hi Oaktree, since you seem knowledgeable in this i wanted to address my usage of the " kill the Buddha" comment.
i use it as a phrase to engage the thought of letting go of convention. there is sometimes a tendency to adhere to a strict concept of what is and what is not. my usage is aimed at pointing out that once you "get it" you dont need to continue on the same quest and path. you can let go. there is another saying that Bruce Lee used to point to the same concept " once you get across the river you dont need to carry the boat around on your back"

I think the use of the term could have a misunderstanding that killing a Buddha is alright which is a clear violation.

 

[hoshin1600]

@hoshin1600 , you seem to have a pretty concrete idea of what you mean when you use the term. Can you share that? I'm very interested in getting this conversation grounded, and from my lay perspective, you seem to have some direct experience. It seems to be a little out there so far... a little too many phrases likely to be used on greeting cards.

i dont think there is a way to rein this conversation in. it would be like herding cats.
Tie Xiong Ji seems to be on his own path and in his own universe, Im not really interested in feeding that.

but i will answer you even tho i thought i already answered. i guess i wasnt very clear in my answer. i wont use the word enlightenment because that seems to mean all kinds of things to people here and at that point the conversation is pointless.

satori or kensho is the Japanese word used to label the experience that the man Siddhartha Gautama attained while sitting in meditation. after some time he created Buddhism as a path for others to attain the same experience. so logically the next question that needs to be answered is, what defining qualities describe that experience. i will refer you to Buka's post.
there is a difference between the outward description and the inward qualities of the experience. so i use the familiar concept of romantic love. the outward description is that love is an emotion. the experience itself while it can be described cannot replace or even come close to the actual experience. try explaining romantic love to an 8 year old who thinks , boys are icky and girls have cooties. any verbal analogy will always fall short. "you get sweaty palms, you get butterflies in your stomach, its like a warm cozy blanket"
Satori however is not an emotion. which leads me to explain it with western science (which a traditional Zen practitioner will never do) In Zen there is a practice or a process of training. everything is controlled and regulated from how you eat, to how you poop. Steve Jobs had a habit of wearing the same style shirt every day, a black turtle neck. he said it allowed his brain the freedom to think about other things. so this is the purpose of why Zen training controlls everything. so there is a process to the training. this process has the effect of re wiring the brain. it really does change the neural pathways of the brain. Siddhartha through his training changed the way his brain wiring worked. this changes how stimuli is percieved in the brain and how that stimuli is processed. this changes the way the world and his existance is perceived. how he sees the world. today using brain scans we can see that the brain of psychopaths is very different than that of a normal person.
Psychopaths' Brains Show Differences in Structure and Function
people while on the drug LSD have been able to taste colors. it changes the way the brain works. the difference here is that satori is not as dramatic and not caused by inducing chemicals into the system but rather through will and action. (you also dont have to worry about giant spiders with dead babies hanging from their mouths)
In Rinzai Zen training there is a tool called a Koan. it is a riddle in the form of a poem. these koans are carefully constructed linquistic structures that are designed to short circuit rational thought. the Zen master uses these riddles to gage your answers. he can tell by your answer if you are using the same common thought neural paths or are thinking using satori. the way the brain processes the riddle will have an effect on how you answer. once you get your first one correct the following riddles get progressively easier because you are strengthening the neural pathways.

i should note some of the comments in this thread are confusing the religious aspects and the pure experience of satori. reincarnation has nothing to do with satori in the physical sense but Hinduism and Buddhism as a religion has a doctrine that satori is a path or a pre-requisite of escaping reincarnation.
i hope this helps.

 

[hoshin1600]

to

I think the use of the term could have a misunderstanding that killing a Buddha is alright which is a clear violation.

Buddhist law says to kill anything is a violation, so here we have a redundancy. if it offends you, my apologies. but we are discussing concepts and in a philosopical discussion. killing is a moral dilemma but i dont think anyone reading this is going to go out looking for Buddha with a knife.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

As has been said many times, the map is not the territory.

You may measure, but you may not be measuring what you seem to think you are measuring.

In any case, I'll bow out now. I know what game you play at. It isn't nice, and I'm not interested. Goodbye.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

No problem. Just one last comment. I did focus on one relationship. My rationale is that if you can't manage it with one, you can't with many. If tha makes sense.


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It completely makes sense. My only point about that was that one relationship - or even several - may be competency. Someone with an enlightened approach to relationships would be good at handling all of them - even the bad ones - without regret or stress.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Never forget the brilliant revelation by Einstein, "Everything is Relative."
All measurements are relative to something.
Love is measurable when you yourself compare the severity relative to all of the people in your life. There is 1 person that you love the least and 1 person you love the most. Set Least to 0, Most to 1, then everything in between is now measurable.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Take it internally and you will recognize how a single art piece is the least beautiful and another is the most beautiful, then measure everything else in between by those two references.
Objectively measurable only comes after gathering enough samples to a single template which references everything relative to those measurements. Then we can create the Beauty equation just like Netwton solved the Gravity equation by making it relative to objects and the Earth. 9.81...m/s^2 is an average, not a real number as gravity is completely relative to the objects being modeled.

That's not really measurement. That's putting things in ranks. If I have more of X than you do, that still doesn't tell us how much X I have.

The point about beauty is that there is no universal template. Things I find beautiful someone else will not. This is even applicable to individuals (someone I find beautiful, you may not). So, we could estimate someone's average apparent beauty to others, but we can't measure their absolute beauty - that is something that changes depending upon who the viewer is.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

My goal is understand this concept of 'enlightenment'. I can easily claim that I already understand it with my initial definition. Instead of simply agreeing with myself and telling everyone, "I get it and can explain it", I prefer to provide my answer and let others tell me their answer so I could possibly understand why they define it in their way.
But as soon as one says, "It is ineffable and talking about it is pointless", I am forced to end the conversation.
It could be measurable or not, but if no one knows what it is or can't provide at least a measurable path (similar to debating the efficacy of Alcoholics Anonymous vs other anti-addiction programs), then what is there to talk about?

I am glad that Hoshin1600 told us his path; Zen Buddhism. Now I have one answer about a measurable path.

If you feel you achieved enlightenment now or in the past, I want to hear your story and how you got from Not Enlightened to Enlightened.

All the different answers are indicative of the problem in seeking a measurable path. There's not a single target, so you can't measure the way to get there. Enlightenment is at least partly defined by the person who experiences it - perhaps entirely. At the very least, the path and experience is somewhat different for every single person, which makes measurement irrelevant, at best.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I am glad they are not so fervently sure about their own position to confidently talk down to others. It is possible they have a better understanding of Enlightenment than the Westboro Baptists...

Almost certainly.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Thanks for the honesty.
I have had this problem with my IRL friends. While speaking to them in person, they feel I am talking down to them. It couldn't be further from the truth. I just want a straight forward answer about these ideas. Giving me wishy-washy descriptions of how the concept is ineffable or too difficult to express just makes me push harder because there is an answer in your head when I ask, "What is Enlightenment?"
Indefinite answers are useless when describing Gravity. They are useless when describing Money. They are useless when describing Love. Poetry can beautiful and truthful, but if I don't get a true answer, I have to push harder or walk away.

I am sorry if I offended anyone. I am not coming at this with a definite answer. I am simply laying out my current answer, allowing others to comment on it while inviting their alternative answers.

Part of your issue may be in asking everyone that question. If I go around and ask a bunch of people (even here on MT) what Nihon Goshin Aikido is, I'm unlikely to get any accurate answers. If I ask people who have studied NGA to a certain point, I'll get some disparate answers, but all will contain a kernel of truth.

So, asking "What is enlightenment?" of people who haven't really given time to trying to understand the concept would be like me asking you to define NGA.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I would say the westboro baptists have a lot in common with the Catholics.

Not with the Catholics I know.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

wushu-washy

Wushu-washy... Which form is that in?

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Out of curiosity, does anyone here believe himself or herself to be "enlightened?"

I've had moments where I experienced what I define as "enlightenment". Very few of them. Outside of those transient moments, I find myself always far from enlightenment.

 

[Tgace]

I've had moments where I experienced what I define as "enlightenment". Very few of them. Outside of those transient moments, I find myself always far from enlightenment.

Ditto.

I've had flashes...typically in situations when I was outdoors for long periods (hunting, camping, climbing)...that I believe were brief moments of it. Never been able to access that moment at will, or for long (if enlightenment it actually was).

 

[Balrog]

I have been hunting for this elusive ENLIGHTENMENT since I heard the word when I was ~10 years old.

Lose 20 pounds. You will have been enlightened.

No need to thank me, glad to be of service.