Open Enlightenment

Direct vs. Developmental Awakening

In this video response I explore the extreme examples of both direct and developmental views of enlightenment.

Note: I mention some traditions, but not all sub-sets or lineages within those traditions ascribe to the same direct or developmental view that I discuss.

Direct vs. Developmental Awakening from Alan Chapman on Vimeo.

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States, Stages, Powers

In this weeks video installment, I tackle the question, ‘What is the relationship between spiritual states, stages, powers and enlightenment?’ asked by OE reader/watcher, Pied Piper. Enjoy…

States, Stages, Powers from Alan Chapman on Vimeo.

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How to experience enlightenment

How to experience enlightenment from Alan Chapman on Vimeo.

Better late than never, eh? Videos should be more frequent from now on.

My last video transformed the blog into a forum, and amongst many other terrible accusations thrown my way I was rather confusingly compared to Andrew Cohen. Let’s see where this one takes us…

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Being Ordinary Interview: Life, the Universe and Everything

I recently had the pleasure of chatting with Being Ordinary‘s Tom Buckley-Houston. Tom has done a wonderful job in editing down our very long discussion into a listenable interview. Although I talk about some of things I already touch on in this video, we end up discussing a diverse range of topics including astronauts, direct vs developmental paths and even the future of the human species. Check it out here!

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The #1 Secret to Achieving Enlightenment Here and Now, in This Lifetime

Authoritarian gurus will try and take it from you; enlightenment doubters and cynics will try to undermine it.

When we choose to ignore the advice of a guide or teacher we dishonour it; when we fail to believe in ourselves and each other we lose it.

The number one secret to enlightenment is not a technique, a special mantra or a bizarre diet. It’s much more human than that.

The number one secret to achieving enlightenment here and now in this lifetime – as I have done and many, many others walking this planet right now have done – is integrity.

Is that all?

Perhaps you were hoping for something along the lines of a pseudo-mystical notion of interconnectedness and an instruction in positive thinking, but then there’s no accounting for taste.

We can all exercise integrity; I just think many people don’t know how. So here it is:

Integrity means that we are honest with ourselves and each other, on the basis that we are all capable, trustworthy and good.

No, honestly.

Do you really believe there is such a thing as enlightenment? Integrity means you consider on what basis you do or do not believe such a phenomenon exists. Who or what is your source for what you believe enlightenment is?

If you doubt such a phenomenon exists, be honest with yourself: do you have an accurate and believable description of what enlightenment is, and do you really have sufficient grounds for believing it isn’t real?

If you believe enlightenment exists, be honest with yourself: on what grounds is the description of enlightenment you believe in accurate and believable? What are your grounds for accepting the reality of such a description?

It takes integrity to understand that just because you have read a few New Age paperbacks you are not qualified to identify the ‘Big Special Event’ you have just experienced as enlightenment; or that reading a few philosophy texts qualifies you to dismiss all ‘Big Special Events’ as nothing but overactive imagination, delirium, insanity, or lies.

We show a lack of integrity when we doubt ourselves, others and the countless millennia old spiritual traditions for claiming that not only does enlightenment exist, but that anyone can experience it should they be willing to investigate the field of spirituality, identify the good teachers from the bad, discover and apply the good maps and models of the territory leading up to and beyond enlightenment, practice a time tested daily meditation for life, and find others – especially those with more experience under their belts – with whom to learn with and from.

Integrity means that you would form your expectations of enlightenment on the teachings of people – both alive and dead – who have displayed integrity themselves. A teacher displays integrity when she is honest about what she does and does not understand, what she has and has not experienced, how someone can experience what she has experienced and openly encourages the discussion of doubts, confusion and difficulties that a student might be facing.

A student exercises integrity when he reports experiences that he thinks might be significant to the teacher, but openly accepts what advice or opinion his teacher gives. It takes courage to admit the inescapable truth that we make mistakes about a lot of things a lot of the time. It’s not a sign of weakness to be helped or guided by others.

It shows a spectacular lack of integrity when a teacher refuses to discuss enlightenment or anything else that a student might encounter, refuses to address or is unable to welcome doubts, confusion or difficulties raised by a student, or instructs a student to perform any action that brings harm – whether mental, emotional, physical or financial – to himself or anyone else.

It shows a lack of integrity when a student is unwilling to address or welcome any doubts, fears or concerns over his teacher’s conduct as a result of it harming himself or others.

Ultimately, if we want to experience enlightenment then we must be true to what we think may have happened, both internally as our practice progresses and externally as we observe our behaviour and the actions of our teachers. Internally, this means not being afraid to try and accurately assess our experience in the light of the many models we have for describing what type of ‘Big Special Event’ might have occurred, but also admitting the limit to which our experience and knowledge can help in such an assessment. Externally, this means not being afraid to openly discuss any doubts or difficulties we might be having with our teachers, or to admit where our own behaviour is falling short of our practice.

Entertaining fantasy about enlightenment or absolute doubt in the reality of spiritual experience are both symptoms of a lost belief in the inherent virtue of humanity. Integrity is faith in ourselves and each other, and without it we are lost.

I have every faith that we are capable, despite what authoritarian gurus might preach, or the arguments made by those patronising teachers who refuse to talk about enlightenment on the grounds that we will only harm ourselves with such knowledge.

If you can exercise integrity when it comes to spirituality, then you don’t have very far to go.

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Technical Morality

It’s common amongst Gen-Yers to have an inherent intolerance for authority or moralising of any kind; we want clear, honest information fast, and how we use it is no one’s business but our own. I think this is admirable to a degree, and I sympathise with the anti-guru approach that results from applying this view to spirituality.

This attitude is prevalent in the emerging ‘practical dharma’ movement, exemplified in forums/wikis such as the Dharma Overground, Kenneth Folk Dharma and our very own Baptist’s Head Discussion Forum (for those coming at enlightenment from a magical perspective). Methods and technicalities are distributed, discussed and implemented, and the users enjoy the empowerment that comes with ultimately relying on their own dedication and judgement.

But is it possible we might be making a fundamental error in reducing spirituality and enlightenment to simply a matter of technique and a model of possible territory?

Should ethics have a more central role in ‘practical dharma’ beyond its usual sidelining as something that is solely a matter of personal choice?

For a couple of years I was only concerned with methods and maps because I believed they referred to something discoverable and verifiable; morality could not offer such objectivity, being primarily concerned with value judgements.

Time and again I see this approach demonstrated on the forums mentioned above. Technical discussions are generally fruitful, but if someone’s behaviour is called in to question, the discussion quickly degenerates in to a tedious name-calling impasse. At this point, morality might skulk out of its dark hiding place and suggest we all just try to get along; deep down, no one involved in the discussion really respects such a suggestion.

And time and again I see arrogance, egotism, envy and a lack of respect displayed in these forums. Lord knows, I’ve contributed enough of that myself over the years.

Hang on

But what if morality does have the same gold standard as methods and maps?

What if, rather than being a mechanism as is usually assumed, the method is actually a moral act?

What if meditation isn’t just something that happens once a day on a cushion for half an hour, but is in fact a specific morality – based on an experientially verifiable practice, not supposition – that informs how we treat ourselves and each other?

The overwhelming evidence, both personal and scientific, shows that meditation mitigates anger, hate, greed, and self-interest, and gives rise to a conscious expression of our original nature (whether we call that nirvana, God or the Tao), whose characteristics are acceptance, interest, openness and love.

It might come as a surprise, but THESE CHARACTERISTICS ARE THE METHOD.

When we apply these characteristics to our experience, we engage with authentic spirituality. This is meditation. There is not one single bone fide approach to enlightenment that doesn’t work in this way. Whether actual recognition of our original nature has occurred – known as enlightenment – makes no difference to the validity of the practice, beyond increasing the depth and potential of the expression; furthermore, enlightenment does not guarantee its conscious expression in our behaviour: practice is an end in itself, not just a means, and if practice is abandoned after enlightenment, then of what value is enlightenment to anyone, including ourselves?

With all of the above in mind, how ethical is it to ‘evaluate’ someone’s progress without addressing the potential (and the all too common) conceit and arrogance that arises as a result of having verification from an ‘expert’ – who only deals in the ‘real world’ technicalities of enlightenment – that yes, you really are an accomplished meditator, you’ve mastered the formless realms and you very well maybe enlightened.

Where is the integrity and mindfulness here? Should this advice always be given to anyone who asks, regardless of their mental state or psychological predisposition? And what if the ‘expert’ is wrong?

The student in this example is not even in the position to accurately judge at what stage he or she may be at, let alone have the forethought and insight to be mindful of any possible unique but unhealthy reactions to this information, or the probable egotistical and conceited emotions and beliefs that may result from being informed of such a position.

In an online environment where autonomy is promoted, and when dealing with conceit so close to the heart that we cannot recognise it ourselves, it is virtually impossible to highlight these shortcomings and prescribe a particular approach without causing offense.

But if everything I have written has a solid basis in reality, then the degree to which we indulge anger, hate, egotism, greed and ignorance is the degree to which we are TECHNICALLY failing. Hate isn’t bad simply because we don’t like it; hate is an indication of a lack of awareness, openness, interest, love and acceptance. Hate is an indication of a lack of application of our method, and a lack of how much we understand our original nature.

To dish out judgements on other people’s progress and attainments without also addressing their morality shows a practical shortcoming on the ‘expert’s’ part; to ask for a judgement of our progress without being willing to accept a similar evaluation of our morality is a practical failure on ours.

I’ve recently been asking myself how often do I bring the ‘practical dharma’ to my daily life, and I can tell you, it’s very rarely as much as I would like.

How about you?

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Shinzen Young

Shinzen Young is one of those rare Buddhist teachers who actually teach enlightenment. You can find his website here, and here’s a whole bunch of great videos .

Thanks to OE reader C4Chaos for the link to this wonderfully frank and in-depth discussion of Shinzen’s approach to teaching enlightenment. Shinzen is the real deal: a bone fide spiritual authority (in the sense that he has experienced everything he talks about) who accurately describes the territory and gives a great overview of what to expect, even after enlightenment, which is very rare indeed.

I’m not sure that I would agree with Shinzen that the first experience of enlightenment permanently does away with the notion of the self, because in my experience the final stage of enlightenment – what Shinzen calls the 4^th stage in the interview – involves the dropping of something fundamental that is not touched by the peak and partial awakening stages beforehand, which is why it remains permanent. (It’s the difference between Adyashanti’s ‘awakening’ and ‘liberation’.) But this is splitting hairs really; his model of four stages is useful and accurate, as I’m sure a lot of Ingram fans would agree.

However, Shinzen doesn’t make the mistake of putting all of his eggs in one basket by only recognising a gradual process of stages, and marginalizing anyone else’s experience that doesn’t fit this model (something I’ve only just recently learned this year); progress with enlightenment can be unnoticeable for a long time, and for some people there may not have been a before or after at all. I think a lot of ‘practical Buddhists’ could learn a lot from this man.

Shinzen has certainly helped in disabusing me of the idea that after enlightenment there is nothing left to learn on the subject, and if I could have him as my teacher, I certainly would.

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Doubt and Faith

The last few weeks have been disappointing.

Website

First of all, people just do not want to do things unless money is involved. Three designers have promised to help, one because he owed a favour, and two on a gift economy basis.  Not one has delivered anything.

Someone promised to build a salesforce back end, with an additional site for an online community with all kinds of whizz-bang features. I learned how to write copy, then wrote all the copy for the new site, and fleshed out the IA, all in time for the deadline….which came and went.

As a result, I’ve given up on the idea of a bespoke site with a bespoke design; we’re going to stick with word press and apply a nice skin. Out of sheer desperation, I downloaded GIMP the other day in the hope that I can learn how to use a graphics package, and knock up a logo myself. How sad.

Then, instead of re-inventing the wheel, we can just use facebook, twitter and other social networking services to aid in the cause.

Detractors

Boy, have they been coming out of the wood work this month! I’m not talking about people who question stuff on this site (and elsewhere) as a genuine inquiry into the subject; I’m talking about ignorant, lazy, and patronising people who in some cases haven’t even bothered to read what they are criticising. Having an inbox full of such e-mails and websites full of such comments can really begin to challenge your faith in humanity. I have wondered a few times if I’ve really wasted the last few years of my life in trying to demonstrate that magick is a genuine enlightenment tradition, and if I’m wasting my time now in trying to demonstrate that enlightenment is a very real, accessible experience for everyone; because so many people seem not only ungrateful, but actually resentful! I’m feeling quite tired of defending my position at the moment, when I’m not quite sure why I have to. Explains why a lot of teachers don’t answer comments or e-mails in person.

Anyway, to alleviate the burden I’ve written a little FAQ for detractors so I don’t have to keep repeating myself.

Online communities

The Dharma Overground is a great idea: an online community for discussing the practicalities of enlightenment, such as what to practice and what to expect in terms of states, events and stages, run by people who have actually experienced enlightenment.

Sadly, anyone can go on there and call themselves an arahat (someone who has experienced enlightenment), and although there are some genuine arahats on there, there are a few who I believe are not, based on how their experience sounds like mine prior to enlightenment, and therefore nothing like my actual experience of enlightenment, or the Buddha’s, or Daniel Ingram’s, or Adyashanti’s, or Ramana Maharshi’s, or Lao Tzu’s, or any other respected teacher’s description of it.

These pseudo-arahats are into a movement called Actual Freedom and (I’ve chosen my words very carefully here) it is absolute dog shit. It is vile, anti-enlightenment, counter-initiatory guff. And it really saddens me to see other members of the Dharma Overground check it out and buy into it. I am absolutely baffled how intelligent people actually think psychosis is desirable (and I’m not just calling it psychosis because I don’t like it; the specific types of psychosis – such as ‘permanent’ depersonalisation – are listed on the site).

Now there is an Actual Freedom forum for people interested in the anti-enlightenment movement on the Dharma Overground, a site dedicated to honest and practical discussion of enlightenment. I’m at a loss for words.

Faith and Tradition

All of this leads very nicely to my new found appreciation for faith and tradition. To practice in order to engage with enlightenment requires faith in both the description of enlightenment offered by those who claim to have experienced it, and their ability to describe it accurately enough as to not be misleading.

There are so many individuals throughout history and alive today who have described a phenomenon called enlightenment in similar ways that mustering up the faith in enlightenment is not very difficult to do. If practice begins in earnest, that faith is vindicated to an extent by even a small degree of progress on the path. But no matter how great an experience might be, if it does not match the deep features of what has been described as enlightenment by this body of peers, then it is not what they are describing. Faith is required right up to the end of ignorance.

The value of an accurate description of enlightenment (that we can have faith in) is its ability to take away the focus from the attainments of the teacher. Either your experience matches the description, or it is not recognised as enlightenment by the body of peers that ascribe to that description. No ifs, buts or maybes. No questioning the teacher’s ability to accurately describe enlightenment, or even the teacher’s own attainments. This doesn’t mean we end up with teachers who have no experience of enlightenment; on the contrary, if the teacher’s experience doesn’t match the description, then they cannot be a teacher.

My primary task at the moment is to create a description of enlightenment that we can have faith in. That is not to say that such descriptions haven’t been provided before (I’m very much enjoying Dogen at the moment), but we need a clear, honest 21^st Century description for Westerners, by a Westerner.

I then want to start a tradition, where people can have faith in the teachings and the teachers, which can then eventually give way to direct, personal knowledge of enlightenment. I’ll be starting my first group soon in London, just as soon as I’ve created these damn banners…

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10 ideas I’ve changed my mind about since becoming enlightened

Here are ten ideas I’ve changed my mind about since my enlightenment in March 2009:

1. The arrogance of psychological development

According to the Integral crowd, pluralism allowed us for the first time in history to recognise the existence of many perspectives. This puts the postmodernist at an advantage to any of the lower stages of psychological development, but at the cost of a narcissism based on moral superiority. Postmodernists can be infuriatingly patronising.

Due to the extreme equality of all values and viewpoints held by the postmodernist, any genuinely new perspective to develop after postmodernism must inescapably reintroduce the concepts of hierarchy, progress and values; the very same concepts championed by modernism. And so it is not uncommon for the post-postmodernist (or integralist) to be mistaken for a modernist by the postmodernist, and the sadly predictable patronising ensues (which is doubly frustrating when you’re more than familiar with postmodernism).

I’ve been on the wrong end of a patronising postmodernist a few times, and I’ve been so enranged and sickened by his or her unexamined smugness, that I’ve responded by informing them that, actually, I’m at a level of development above and beyond theirs, and so they’re just incapable of understanding me. Ha!

In other words, I’ve been arrogant and patronising myself. Rather than seeing this behaviour as inherently postmodern, I’m convinced the integral or spiral dynamics model of psychological development actually promotes arrogance. If this is the case, I don”t believe spiral dynamics is the best tool with which to approach the problems of any given perspective, or a profitable lens with which to view each other.

There is an assumption in the Integral view that developmental stages are in themselves arrogant and patronising, when in truth only humans have that honour.

2. Occultists need to be convinced that magick is about enlightenment

I’ve spent the last few years trying to rehabilitate magick as the Western tradition of enlightenment. I used to think magick was important in this respect, but I was missing the point. The Great Work has never been about the tradition of magick itself, and persisting in trying to convince occultists and everyone else of what magick is really about ultimately has nothing to do with enlightenment.

I always assumed magick was important for the Great Work; when in reality, enlightenment is not bound to any tradition whatsoever. Isn’t it time for a Western tradition accessible to a majority – instead of a minority – living in the 21^st Century?

3. Magick is different to other traditions of enlightenment

Reading contemporary Western Buddhist literature can easily lead to a very narrow expectation of the type and variety of meditative results; when compared to the reported interactions with non-human intelligences, dreams, oracles, visions and synchronicities of magick, a dry meditative practice can seem like a very boring path to enlightenment.

In the past I’ve emphasised the difference between magick and other less ‘exciting’ traditions, which carries with it the assumption that a straight up insight practice doesn’t engender the same variety and type of experience as, say, invoking the Holy Guardian Angel.

But this assumption has no basis in reality; after all, it is the process of enlightenment that is the root of the vast diversity of mystical and magical events, not any single technique or tradition. Perhaps it would be to everyones benefit if magicians talked more about the developmental stages of spiritual development, and Buddhists more regularly described their meetings with spirits, the occurrence of life-changing visions and the development of psychic powers.

4. Ritual and meditation are demonstrably synonymous

I’ve tried many times over the course of three years to show how the practice of ritual can lead to the same process of insight as straight-up meditation. The assumption here is that a technical explanation for how the two seemingly separate acts both engender the same result is directly related to helping others reach enlightenment; but it isn’t. (This is also tied up with convincing others that magick is an enlightenment tradition, as discussed above.)

So I’ve ditched the comparative, specific tradition-related practical approach that attempts to prove a technical synonymity, in favour of a simple symbol that helps to explain enlightenment on its own terms. It proves nothing, but I’m pretty sure it’s helpful.

5. Enlightenment is a science

Personal verification of the promise of enlightenment is to be expected of a genuine, spiritual practice. In order to stress my conviction in the reality of enlightenment (and magick), in the past I have jumped on the ‘deep science’ bandwagon and tried to argue that enlightenment is an injunction that brings forth data that can be verified by peers, thus making it a bone fide science.

But exactly how is arguing whether or not enlightenment is a science (in a specialised sense of the word that only a philosopher might be familiar with) in any way related to a). personally getting enlightened or b). helping others get enlightened? Is it not enough to say enlightenment requires no belief or blind faith, just the will to verify its reality for yourself?

God knows, I am not a scientist in the accepted sense of the word, and neither are the majority of people I know who have actively engaged with enlightenment. Of the scientists I do know, it wasn’t any notion of performing ‘deep science’ in order to prove anything that made them decide to take up insight practice or draw a circle on the floor in order to summon a spirit.

Attempting to prove that enlightenment is a science, as if this is necessary before we might delude ourselves, is simply ridiculous and missing the point.

6. The virtue of the language of the Relative and the Absolute

For me, enlightenment has always been about answering questions such as ‘why am I here?’ and ‘what is the true nature of reality?’ I think these are questions worth asking, and I strongly believe enlightenment provides the answers.

With so much extreme postmodernism floating around, especially within contemporary occult culture, any notion of pursuing the Big Questions required a reactionary language with which to discuss them. Absolute relativity is a myth completely divorced from reality, and it leaves the inquisitive lost in a sea of meaningless perspectives in a universe inherently devoid of value. It was necessary to re-introduce the idea of the Absolute itself, something outside of the individual, but that could be discovered by it. The language of the relative and the absolute has proved useful as a means of navigating away from the insanity of radical postmodernism.

However, such language is inescapably dualistic, and by this I mean it fosters a conceptual divide that doesn’t really exist. And if Absolute Relativity is a myth, why should we entertain the Relatively Absolute into the bargain? Furthermore, talk of the absolute only reinforces the human propensity to invest in the One Correct Answer or a Unified Theory of Everything. I fail to see how this is profitable.

I believe there is a much more beneficial way to approaching enlightenment that doesn’t require first challenging postmodernism, and then erecting a conceptual divide between enlightenment and everything else. I hope to post further developments in this direction in the near future, whilst resolutely refusing to try and prove anything, resolve contradictions or create the One Mighty and Complete System that Accounts for Everything.

7. Morality, psychology and insight are three separate lines of development

Daniel Ingram’s masterpiece Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha provided me with a pure insight model, divorced from the fantasies of many of the models of enlightenment taught by so many Buddhist traditions.

Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory showed me how development in insight can help the progression through the psychological stages of Spiral Dynamics, but that it was perfectly possible to be enlightened at the Traditional stage as it was to be at the Integral stage.

As a non-Buddhist, and being particularly inclined to Aleister Crowley’s Thelema, I wrote off the Buddha’s training in morality as just another example of religious dogma.

But my experience of the process of enlightenment has demonstrated that a). a pure insight model is impossible, b). enlightenment has its own unique psychological development and c). its own unique moral development too.

The ‘discarded’ models of enlightenment certainly require revisiting (I will be writing something up soon), and I hope in the future there will be some research into the psychological effects of enlightenment, with the creation of an accurate psychological developmental model specifically related to enlightenment. I’ve begun to address Enlightened Ethics, which I plan to develop into a method of conscious integration.

8. Enlightenment is not a matter for hard science

While I still believe it is absolutely wonderful that enlightenment is a personal, direct experience that must be verified and understood first hand, thereby invalidating any idea of a priesthood or church, I can no longer believe in strictly relegating hard science to the physical world, and enlightenment to the spiritual level of experience alone, based on the assumption that one has no business with the other. After all, in the final analysis enlightenment has nothing to do with the spiritual level of experience either. The freedom of enlightenment has demonstrated to me firsthand that my identity is not bound up in any of the levels of the Great Chain of Being, and so I no longer have an aversion to discussing the physiology of the enlightened brain for fear of becoming a materialist reductionist.

In fact, I wholeheartedly wish to encourage the notion that enlightenment is a question for science. Not because I believe enlightenment is nothing but a product of the brain, but because I believe the brain must necessarily demonstrate a correlate with the enlightened experience. My identity and perspective on the world is so radically different than it was beforehand that I find it hard to believe my brain is still the same as it was pre-enlightenment. The great thing is, there is still no real research in this area (yes, there have been studies of meditators brains and so on, but there is no reason to assume the test subjects were enlightened or even engaged with the process).

I’m really excited by what might be discovered by hard science in the realm of enlightenment. If only I had money to invest!

9. The Goal mentality

For three and a half years I had one goal in mind, and for three and a half years I struggled to practice the methods of enlightenment correctly and at the right volume in order to ensure success. And when I reached the goal, this investment had negative consequences in the form of frustration, helplessness and fear. Yes: immediately after enlightenment, I had a really shitty time. (I’ll go into this at a later date.)

Of course, early on I learned that after the first peak experience of enlightenment it isn’t you that ‘does’ the process of enlightenment, but the process that ‘does’ you. But I never consciously integrated this experience – I wasn’t even aware that I could or should! – and I persisted in re-enforcing a habit based on the belief that I must chase a goal that I would eventually achieve through my own doing (and the sooner, the better!).

So what happens when you suddenly gain the ability to see every deeply held false opinion you have about yourself and reality for what they are? What happens when you can suddenly and clearly perceive that virtually your entire being is habitually dedicated to a behaviour and way of thinking that is based on an incorrect assumption?

Just because you are enlightened, it doesn’t mean the habits and behaviours based on ignorance disappear over night. They must be replaced by new, enlightened behaviours.

In terms of enlightenment, the goal mentality sets you up for a big fall. While it is very important to realise that both a daily practice of active transcendence and a willing participation is required to attain the very real event of enlightenment, this should not translate to a gung-ho balls-to-the-wall chase for awakening. Such an attitude belongs to the beginner who has not yet had the personal insight – granted by the process of enlightenment – of realising there is much more to reality than the whims of the ego. It appears that without a conscious integration of this insight, the participant is left with a lot of pain and a good deal of work to do post-enlightenment.

10. Maps are always useful

I have personally found maps very useful in my development, as have many of my friends. I used to think everyone should be armed with as many maps and models as they could find, until I met a raw beginner who, ascribing to the goal mentality, had tied themselves up in knots trying to figure out where they ‘were’. Exactly how the headache and expended energy used in trying to find a resolution to this problem were helpful in his achieving enlightenment escapes me (as it turns out, he was slowly but surely making good progress, almost in despite of ‘where’ he thought he was at).

I came across maps just near the end of my first cycle through the stages of insight, and so I already had a good deal of the basic spiritual experiences under my belt. It was a simple question of aligning my experiences with a model to see what fit, and it wasn’t long before I could accurately judge my position. But would I have found maps and models as useful as a beginner with absolutely no experience whatsoever? Would I have memorised the language of the maps and frantically applied them to every little intellectually ‘insight’ or physical peculiarity that might arise during meditation, ending up wondering if i had just landed Naïve Enlightenment or if I was close to the end of the process by experiencing enlightenment in real time?

I can’t be sure, but what I am sure of is that models aren’t always good for everyone all of the time.

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