The idea of Enlightenment – An obstacle for the seeker.

As a seeker on the path, for all of us at some point or the other we end up wondering when will be experience complete freedom or enlightenment. The idea of enlightenment always seems like a goal to reach. A place to get to. A finer version of ourselves to achieve in the future. And that idea by itself becomes the obstacle. Because this idea is nothing but a construct of the ego.

Yet, if you read all the great mystics and the sages they talk about enlightenment/ or the shift in consciousness existing in the present in the now. Yet the biggest mistake a seeker makes is believing it is something to achieve. Something to strive towards. Something that is so elusive. It hangs as a prize to get, to receive in a future event. It’s quite the contrary. 

Till that striving is dropped enlightenment is a far cry. Because if you observe carefully even that idea of a moment when you will reach enlightenment  is a story the ego is creating. A better version of itself. As much as a story the mind creates when it says it’s all futile, you will never get there, enlightenment is not for you etc. The mind/ego can never understand the absolute self. The mind has to be dropped. That’s when the paradigm shift starts happening. You need to stop doing. Simply be aware of  your ‘beingness‘. It’s subtle yet there. Immediately the question then arises, if I don’t put in an effort then how can anything happen.

Turn the idea of striving into simply being aware of the present. Be aware of the presence. In being present in the now, doing stops. And gradually the awareness of the present moment starts deepening. As this engagement slowly gets deeper and deeper you also realize everything is just happening effortlessly. There is nothing to do. 

You start realizing you are not the mind, not the idea or the persona that the world sees you as or that you believe you are. You are the stillness, you are the ‘isnness’ behind all that. And this is the shift, this is the beginning of awakening. Enlightenment is nothing but that ever present stillness deepening within you, where you begin to understand you are that which cannot be described or felt. You can only BE THAT.

It’s all here, now, still, constant , ever present. It is you.