Enlightenment is Simply the Return to Normality
Diana: I had a feeling I may have gone overboard, and knowledge boasting is never cool. It’s embarrassing. I admit I got excited after our meeting. After I sent the email, I even thought to myself, “sometimes a cigar is just a cigar” and analysis of everything all the time isn’t necessary or helpful. Unfortunately, it was too late, I couldn’t unsend. I apologize to you and James.
Sundari: No need to apologize, I understand where you come from and appreciate your honest response. You have a good brain, a refined intellect, and the self-confidence to match, which is true of most Vedantins. Self-knowledge confers the ultimate self-confidence, and we are often accused of being elitist and arrogant when the opposite is true. One advanced inquirer we know was recently referred to a specialist because he had no more problems. He was way too happy with his lot, too self-confident, imagine! The ‘specialist’ questioned him at length and came up with a diagnosis: solipsism syndrome! Apparently, it’s actually a thing in psycho-parlance. It would be really funny if it weren’t so bizarre. They are of course referring to the wrong self, being completely unaware of the Self. The power of Maya to reverse the truth is truly compelling!
At the same time, this confidence can lead to intellectual hubris, as I am sure you are aware. There is nothing more powerful than Self-knowledge which gives you 20/20 vision and total clarity about what’s transpiring in the Isvara playing field. Though you may not be omniscient as the jiva when Self-realization obtains, nonetheless, understanding the Isvara mechanism and the gunas as the Self, you know how everything works in every circumstance. There are no more mysteries for you, no more confusion, and no more self-doubt. For most jivas encountering someone with firm Self-knowledge can be somewhat intriguing, not to mention pretty foreign.
But the mind-blowing heady freedom of Self-Realization can result in what we call Enlightenment sickness, or ES. Most inquirers experience it at some point so don’t feel bad. It’s pretty normal, just the residual detritus of the ego identity which tries to co-opt the teachings. For this reason, James added ‘ordinary’ to the definition of the Self: Whole and complete, ever-present, unchanging ordinary Awareness. ES is not a problem necessarily unless you are unaware of it. Fortunately, you seem to have objectivity about your jiva program and you have the honesty that comes with the knowledge of what it is and how it functions. Knowing that there is never any reason to censure the jiva. It is what it is and you did not make it that way. All the same, if we want the jiva to be happy we may need to adjust certain tendencies. Being enlightened as an ego is not freedom.
In listening to you talk during our zoom chat last week, which was basically a monologue, what was immediately apparent was that you were more interested in what you had to say than hearing us. It was hard to get a word in, and I suspect this is a pattern in your contact with people. You are an accomplished communicator, and we could not really fault your knowledge. But even so, I was a bit surprised because in our email exchanges you came across as someone who is open to learning. However, you seemed more intent on letting us know that you know it all.
We don’t have a problem with that, nor do we judge you in any way. We simply observe what goes on in mithya as the unconditioned Self. But as Vedanta teachers, seeing as the ostensible reason you approached us was for clarification on your progress, it would be remiss on our part not to point out how this tendency impacts your freedom from and for the jiva. After all, Self-knowledge is not about gaining anything, there is nothing extraordinary about it, no degrees, honors, or kudus for being so smart. It is simply the return to normality.
As you know, Vedanta requires a good intellect as the teachings are so subtle. But it is not the intellect that removes ignorance. It is just an object known to you, the Self. Self-inquiry requires training the intellect to think differently, to want different things. The problem with very smart people who ‘get’ the teachings of Vedanta very quickly is who is it that gets it? The mind (ego) has a slippery tendency to claim to be enlightened when it is actually only the ego that is ‘enlightened’. Discrimination between Jiva’s experience of Awareness and the Self’s experience of Awareness is essential. How to tell and what is the difference?
As I think I pointed out to you before, the Self’s experience of itself is qualitatively different from the jiva’s experience of the Self as an object or as objects. The realization “I am Awareness” does not give you the experience of Awareness or make you Awareness because you always have been Awareness. It negates the idea “I am the jiva.” When you know you are the Self and the knowledge is firm, first and foremost is the negation of your primary identity as the jiva, discrimination between satya and mithya is automatic. With this comes the recognition (re-knowing) that there is nothing special about being the Self. Self-knowledge is reality, it is what is true. Everyone has only ever been experiencing Awareness consciously or not.
For the jiva, the mind is functioning properly for the first time because the reversal that Maya imposed on it with the hypnosis of duality has been removed by Self-knowledge. The ‘veil’ that covered the mind is gone and you are free of the jiva program. The jiva who is free does not change except in the way it contacts objects, which of course, indirectly greatly improves life for it because it no longer chases objects to complete itself, has no need for validation or to impress, and does not fear loss.
Freedom is huge for the jiva at first, but it does not feel like anything because it is not a feeling. It is hard to describe the Self as the witness who does not condition to what it witnesses. Perhaps what comes closest to describing the indescribable with the inherent limitation of words is this: it is permanently being the observer ‘in’ the ‘place’ between feeling and not feeling. It is neutral, but far from uncaring. It is an ocean of compassion. It is caring and infinitely compassionate but never invested.
Much love
Sundari
