What is Enlightenment?

I must admit that I won’t answer this question. Mostly because no one can, to any satisfaction, and I find it incredibly more fascinating to find out what happens after awakening, or self-realization. 

Self-realization is simply becoming aware of our true, fundamental experience of self. 

People often mistake a self-realization or an awakening experience for enlightenment, and then set out to teach it, fully believing that they understand and know it completely.

It's like taking a cup of water from the river and attempting to sell it, saying it is the river.

A good teaching is one that keeps bringing you back to the river itself. 

Becoming the flow yourself is the enlightenment in this metaphor. 

Surprisingly, it is relatively easy to find the river. The flow is what we already are, although its very simplicity can hide it from us. I don’t know why it took me 22 years to realize that.

The work that takes longer is to find and integrate all the pieces of the self that are not in the flow. Conditioned and contracted states of being control our emotional and energetic reality. These frozen states are split off from the flow. They have their origin in the basic defensive functions of our psyche and seem to be important to our healthy development, but once the true Self is realized their limitations become obvious. 

Having an experience of true Self allows one to let down defensive walls that used to be weight-bearing for the psyche, and could not have been removed prior. Realization of true Self gives us another point of view from which to observe our defensive systems and their limitations, and slowly surrender them to flow. 

Letting go of defensive structures that we used to get a feeling of safety is very interesting work. There is a degree of faith and trust required, that when you let go of a contraction there’ll be something worth while on the other side. A lot of the structures are unconscious, some preverbal, and there are times when one part of our psyche is willing and eager to let go, while a vital, earlier part is not. We need to honor and trust the timing of our soul, and at the same time challenge ourselves to push through old limitations. 

When we stop identifying with the contracted, small self, the examination of the defensive systems becomes a fascinating exploration. As we open and become more aware of our inner defenses we experience a wonderful sense of discovery, accomplishment and lightening up. This keeps occurring, in a way that is similar to the growth of a tree, where the growth itself becomes the delight, and any need to achieve or define enlightenment is passed by as a young fascination.