Self Seeking

By DEnnis Waite

SELF SEEKING
By Dennis Waite
Out November 1^st from Mantra books
Separate the true teachers from the self-seeking gurus.

Extract: What is Enlightenment?

Enlightenment, the realization that I am eternally free, is the culmination of human evolution. Everything is working against it. The one who pursues it with single-pointed devotion is a salmon swimming upstream in the powerful river of life. (Ref. 416)

The aim of my new book Self Seeking is to explain how to go about finding a teacher who can teach Advaita. But the first question you need to answer is ‘Why do you want a teacher?’ Presumably you will say that you want to be ‘enlightened’ or to gain ‘Self-realization’ (don’t forget the capital ‘S’!). That being the case, you also need to be sure that you know what enlightenment is (and that the would-be teacher also knows this!) and how one should go about ‘getting’ it.

‘What is Enlightenment?’ was the title of a journal published by an organization that was called, at the time, ‘Moksha Foundation’, and was initiated by the teacher Andrew Cohen. At the beginning of the first issue, he said:

I have found and continue to find that there is so much confusion, misunderstanding and misinformation as to what Enlightenment actually is and what it really means. That is why I have encouraged my students to start this publication as a vehicle to present our ongoing investigation into this question, and to share our discoveries with those who are also interested in this vast and most subtle subject. (Ref. 539)

This must be one of the peaks of irony, since he was embarking upon a massive exercise of disinformation to propagate considerable confusion about the topic! In an interview on the first page, entitled ‘A Passion for Death’, he says:

Enlightenment is a condition in which there is a conscious knowing that one has come to the end of becoming. To be fully Enlightened means to come to the end of evolution, the end of any possibility of evolution. Even people who only glimpse what Enlightenment is for a brief period have intimations of the kind of finality that I'm speaking about. It is the element of finality that makes that kind of knowing that I'm speaking about so extraordinary and so difficult to describe to people who haven't tasted it. (Ref. 539)

This bears little resemblance to the mokṣa described by Advaita. But it was clearly going to be a significant influence in the West to seekers wanting to find out about Nonduality. The journal was published quarterly until Aug. 2008 – 41 issues – and then changed its name to ‘EnlightenNext (The Magazine for Evolutionaries)’ for a further 6 issues.

The change in title is because his teaching has now evolved even further into what he calls ‘Evolutionary Enlightenment’, described as:
Evolutionary enlightenment is about the ecstasy that compels us to create the future. And it's not a future that's going to unfold by itself while we go back to sleep. It's a future that we forge the hard way through direct, conscious, intentional engagement with the life-process itself. (Ref. 540)

It is a tragedy that the truth of our already existing freedom from limitations of any kind should be turned into a striving for some imaginary achievement in the future! As I try to emphasize again and again, enlightenment is only (!) about realizing what is already the case; it is nothing to do with ‘evolving’ into some superior being with higher consciousness.

When we recognize our true nature, a process of deep inner healing begins to take place. We are able to see unconscious patterns playing out, and limiting beliefs and destructive behaviors naturally begin to fall away as we align with a higher consciousness. (Ref. 591)

Here is Stephen Wingate, from the introduction to his book ‘The Outrageous Myths of Enlightenment’:
What are Self-realization, Awakening, Liberation, and Enlightenment?

You are the One Self, Awareness Itself. Stop for a moment right now, and notice this presence of awareness that you are—here and now. Notice that you are spacious, open, awake and free. Notice that these words are arising in this spacious openness that you are. Notice that the activities of the mind—thoughts, emotions, sensations and experiences—all arise naturally and spontaneously in you, this spacious, open presence of awareness.

This peaceful, loving, spacious openness is what you are. This spacious openness is the Self, the Liberation, the Awakening, the Enlightenment, the Peace and the Love for which you’ve been seeking.

You have always been, and always will be simply THIS. (Ref. 502)

This description does not tell us what enlightenment is. ‘Simply this’ is the modern satsang attempt to tell us what we are – although it has to be said that it does not do this very well! But it tells us nothing about how we come to realize what we are. ‘Enlightenment’ is the realization of the truth, not the ‘substance’ of that truth. And, more to the point, being in the present, ‘open’ to whatever is presented by the senses, totally alert and mentally calm, is NOT who we really are. It is simply an indication that the mental equipment is ready to attend to someone explaining who-we-are. ‘Peaceful, loving, and any other good words that you might think of along these lines, relate to the mental attitude. They are descriptions of the mind, not the Self.

Francis Lucille made the following statement on the status of the ego (in a discussion on ajāti vāda):

When we say that the ego doesn’t exist, we mean that it doesn’t exist by itself as an autonomous entity, that it exists only as an object appearing in consciousness, in atman. This object can never see the consciousness that sees it. The only possible logical inference is that this consciousness sees itself. When this inference becomes actual experience, we call it enlightenment. (Ref. 707)

It is more useful to think of the ego as a ‘process’ rather than an object. The processes of mind are only possible because of consciousness. The idea of Consciousness ‘seeing’, ‘knowing’ or ‘experiencing’ itself are common ones but not really meaningful. This is still a ‘mixing up’ of absolute reality with the world appearance.

Neo-Advaitins simply tell you that enlightenment is a myth – it is not possible for someone to be enlightened because there is no person in reality. For example, Halina Pytlasinska tells us that:

Enlightenment is really a myth. The problem with non-duality, or the perspective that there is Oneness, is that it is beyond words. So we’re doing our best with words to get close to it, but we will never fully describe it with words. It is a myth about enlightenment that there can be a special enlightened person, or guru. There is no person to be enlightened! But there is the realization that there is no separation. There cannot ever be an enlightened person; there is just the realization that there is no separation. (Ref. 573)

Neo-Advaitins frequently use expressions such as ‘there is the realization that’; ‘it is seen that’ and so on. It is never explained where the realization ‘occurs’, where the ‘seeing’ occurs etc. Dispensing with the person also dispenses with seeker and guru and absolves the supposed teacher from doing any teaching. Quite neat, really…

SELF SEEKING By Dennis Waite is out November 1st from Mantra books or from wherever books are sold.

BOOK LINK: https://www.collectiveinkbooks.com/mantra-books/our-books/self-seeking-advaita

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