There are so many views on what enlightenment is, and what the difference is between enlightenment and awakening.
Some say that you awaken, and over time you reach enlightenment, as though enlightenment is a place or goal to reach. Others say that they have become enlightened in the flash of a moment, as though hit by the staff of the zen master.
A similar discussion is thrown around about God. Who and what god is. How to reach God or if God reaches you.
Both are the same desiring, for the same thing. something that is outside of the minds capacity, and both are impossible.
The Buddha stated that when he became enlightened, the whole existence became enlightened. This is a most beautifully enlightening statement, for it inadvertently implies that no ONE can become enlightened, but that enlightenment is all one.
Enlightenment is.
The person that claims to be enlightened using the word ‘I’, is not enlightened, for ‘I’ is the idea of separation. Just the same, the one who claims to be God, is not God, for how can the limitless make itself limited, or the omnipresent be present in only one place. This is why Jesus never stated that he was God. He did however state that He and the Father are one, which interestingly would be the kind of statement that an enlightened being would say.
The belief in knowing God or that you can reach enlightenment is the very substance of the illusion. For the mind cannot comprehend that which created it, nor can the mind drop itself. Both ideas are like trying to find your glasses when you are actually already wearing them.
To reach God, one must drop all ideas of what God is, and drop all ideas of who they are, and discover that you are not, but only God is.
To reach enlightenment, one must drop all ideas of becoming enlightened, and drop all ideas of ‘I’, too realise that all the existence is enlightenment.
Enlightenment is impossible, and only the impossible exists, and that which is impossible is God.
Let there be light
Saddhanta Ananda
LIVING ESSENCE 