What is enlightenment?

[Nathaniel]

Without thought,

who are you and who am I?

[Goldcup7]

Originally Posted by Nathaniel

Without thought,
who are you and who am I?

Well, who can answer that?

[JustBe]

Originally Posted by Nathaniel

Without thought,
who are you and who am I?

Bones, flesh, skin, the ability to move, walk, talk.. live!

Before enlightenment-Chop wood, carry water ( or if your like gem, build great gardens..😉)
After enlightenment- carry wood, chop water if you want be different. Lol

[Goldcup7]

Who am I? Let's break it down a little. Say I think, "I need to clean the dishes." Then I go and clean the dishes. Who cleans the dishes?

The human body does the cleaning work. Thinking initiates the body into action. I perceive the thinking and the cleaning. If the mind grumbles about having to clean the big pile of dishes, I perceive that.

It could be argued that I am the mind and I am in control of the thinking. But most people have experienced thinking happening by itself without control over it. Sometimes there is a sense of being the one who is constructing thoughts, but that is also perceived. It can be consistently recognised that I am perceiving thoughts, whether there is a sense of constructing the thoughts or not.

It can be concluded then that I do not clean dishes. I don't do any actions. I perceive or experience thoughts and actions. Perceiving requires no effort. It can then be concluded that I am an aware being or I am awareness itself. This is the path to enlightenment imo, in revealing the true nature of what is.

[J_A_S_G]

Originally Posted by Nathaniel

Without thought, who are you and who am I?

I can point toward my sense of it. What is that sense of being that seems to be unchanging? That innate sense of being exactly the same as yesterday, last year, a decade ago, when we were a teen, toddler, infant and whether awake or dreaming? Even though body constantly changes as well as mind, intellect, memory, emotions, beliefs? The unchanging witness of all change.

I mentioned infant above because I had an OBE at four months old. The perspective was from above and behind mom's left shoulder and that of a dispassionate witness devoid of thought and judgement of the unfolding drama of infant me wailing up a storm while mom tried her best to sooth infant me. If I pay attention that very same sense of innate being is right here and right now as it always has been. It's the same 'space' of innate being that can be more easily "touched" in deep meditation.

[HITESH SHAH]

Originally Posted by Nathaniel

Without thought,

who are you and who am I?

Without thought there is consciousness alone (just like in sleep ) . If someone is aware of the consciousness and it identifies it completely with it and is without thought , there is an 'I' only and there is NO 'you' (like in deep meditation ).

[lemex]

Originally Posted by Goldcup7

It can be consistently recognised that I am perceiving thoughts, whether there is a sense of constructing the thoughts or not.

It sounds to me as if you are talking about spirit (consciousness). What exists is from (because) source. The body too is outside just as any thing outside is, dishes or otherwise. If the outside (I) does wrong how is it I don't act. The outside is used and experienced. I experiences awareness through outside? I have often wondered are we to mediate on the outside by true self?

[Goldcup7]

Originally Posted by lemex

The body too is outside just as any thing outside is, dishes or otherwise. If the outside (I) does wrong how is it I don't act. .... I have often wondered are we to mediate on the outside by true self?

I wouldn't rely on 'inside' and 'outside'. I find no limits for what could be inside or outside. Even the body doesn't have a true inside and outside - it is porous, breathes, eats, drinks and is always interacting with the environment. There is only an appearance of a divide between inside and outside.

Imo it isn't that you experience awareness, more that you are awareness and awareness is experiencing what seems like inside and outside. The body might meditate, but true meditation imo is just being. The best meditation is being the peace and stillness that you are whilst the world seems to turn.

[Unseeking Seeker]

Originally Posted by Nathaniel

Without thought,

who are you and who am I?

Thoughts and senses …
In deep meditation, both disappear
What then remains, is awareness, self-aware
Agendaless, vibrant, rippleless and in ineffable peace

The offerings of this immersion are imbibed and slowly assimilated in body-mind, this form, wherein thoughts and senses again prevail, as they should, to enable us function and navigate earth life. Repeating the refrains of silence and stillness, we see the ego (identity) thin out. Why does it thin out? Because it depends on thought, rooted in attachment to body around which fears and desires orbit.

So, ego being unfed, thins out and one day drops off, just as a dead leaf falls off a tree. Then our pristine awareness, formless, shines in its self-existent light of Self in time and space dissolved singularity, in subjective awareness. This is who we are as that light which renews itself within itself, feeling complete, with absolute freedom and in the deepest peace, needing no coming or going or doing to be done.

When we inquire, ‘who am I’ we fail to see it because we, as this form are the blockage or rather, our identification with form is the veil. When the veil drops, we see, otherwise we do not even though either which ways, we always were, are and will be the Self.

[marcin458]

Real enlightment is to achieve higher levels of consciousness also called spiritual level of the person.

Then you see things as they are truthfully are you see REALITY without illusions of duality at lower levels of consciousness which only seems to be real.

There are 144 levels of consciousness allowed to embody of that planet and above 96 level we can call it englightment and also there are higher and lower level of that englightenment between 96-144.

Greetings
Marcin