Mother of four experiences the same enlightenment as Buddha

So, let’s tread carefully here and try navigating by the maps drawn by those who have already made this journey—people who described this exact same experience.

One term that's become pretty popular among us is...

The Kingdom of Heaven (out West)

Over on the East Coast, they call that Adventist.

Nonduality (Nondual Consciousness)

But at the end of the day, by definition—and I mean by default—he simply can't be captured using our dualistic human language.

It’s just something you can do on your own. It’s going to happen.

***
Chögyam Trungpa refers to this state as nondual consciousness.

"Tantra" or "Luminosity"? Which one captures it better?

While other Buddhists might reach for that familiar, well-known term—Nirvana—to describe it...

***

Paramahansa Yogananda refers to it as the Cosmic Soul.

The old master Plotinus simply referred to it as "the ONE."

I’d probably translate that as "ONENESS," though I suppose you could also go with "UNITY" or even just "SINGULARITY."

***
Our "patron saint."

Raman Maharshi wrote:

The world is nothing more than an illusion.
Brahman is the only true reality.
The entire world is simply Brahman.

We could honestly sit here and debate this topic until we both hit retirement age.

I have a feeling that once you get to that third sentence, both the philosophers and my brother are going to start lecturing me about how it completely contradicts the first two.

The third sentence describes the ultimate state of nondual realization—that profound moment where the formless merges completely with the manifested world around us.
The Tao, the One, the Absolute—it completely transcends all realms of existence, yet somehow, it simultaneously encompasses every single one of them. 🙂

**

If that Zen master had actually been around to hear Brother Vas or our local philosophers preach, he probably would have just walked off the stage mid-sentence. Honestly, listening to those "nothingness and nobody" types is enough to make anyone want to head for the exit! 🙂)

And he delivered all that wisdom with such elegance, just like...

I'm just checking in.
Don't jump the gun.
Buck!

Karen Sanchez19 — Zen Master CORAVA KOKA, late 20th century era.

He wrote that exactly the same way as...

Absolutely.
I'm bored out of my mind.
Click through to the forum! 🙂

A golden dawn.

God.
Light, darkness, angels... and now we’re all just grinding our teeth.
And then he just went ahead and dropped a million blue-colored quotes all at once. 😁

***
Meister Eckhart—honestly, he might just be the greatest Christian practitioner to ever walk the earth.
It’s what people call the nondual level.

The Deitas—or the Godhead, if you want to be precise—is that level of existence that sits even higher than what we typically mean when we just say "God."

Eckhart famously offered up his most profound prayer:

God, please, just set me free! ''

Zarko recommended this prayer to our climate activist and basically "cursed" him by saying it had to be his very last one.

When Eckhart talks about prayer, he’s really calling for us to break free from this concept of God that belongs to Thomas Aquinas—that version of God built entirely on logic, intellect, and theological reasoning. It’s that "God of the theologians," if you will, the one we try to trap within our own mental frameworks and rationalizations.

Enchi used to absolutely love a good serving of Plotinus’s soup. She’d often ask me to write it out for her again, so I figured I’d offer a warm bowl to all of you too:''

***

I really want to introduce you to a dear friend of mine. I think our conversation could be much richer if we brought some clarity through the lens of..

In my humble opinion

the only truly enlightened philosopher in the West

So...

Plotinus says

(And please, for the thousandth and first time, don't confuse him with Plato—though I know 999 out of 1000 people will!)

(Just a quick note—Plotinus actually refers to ultimate truth, that supreme reality, as THE ONE)

(To draw a parallel with Eastern thought, we have the concept of the Tao from ancient sages who left us the treasure known as the Tao Te Ching)

Anyway,

Plotinus 🙂

1) THE ONE is not a personal God (whom Plotinus respectfully refers to as the Cosmic Soul)

2)THE ONE is that first, most primal thing—existing even before Being itself

3) THE ONE isn't even "one," nor is it even "singular"

4) THE ONE is impossible to describe because it is radically simple—simpler than unity itself...

Attempting to describe THE ONE is practically "profanity," according to a cautious Plotinus

5) In our very essence, we are THE ONE overflowing into this experience.

We humans are simply the Love of THE ONE for the clear Light of what IT is.

6) The soul isn't "in" the universe; rather, the universe is "in" the soul.

7) Similarly, THE ONE isn't found within any being or phenomenon; instead, all phenomena exist WITHIN THE ONE.

8) THE ONE is an activity, yet in itself, it serves no function.

9) THE ONE is perfect because it seeks nothing and needs nothing... and yet, Plotinus suggests that THE ONE is alluring, which we might imagine as a constant state of SUPER-SATURATION.
And yet, this "super-saturated overflowing" of THE ONE is still—simply—THE ONE.

10) Plotinus calls awakening "the flight of the Alone to the Alone"

(Much like how a Zen master speaks of red flowers blooming RED)

11) Plotinus drives home the point about THE ONE with this paradox:

THE ONE IS IMMANENT THROUGH ITS VERY TRANSCENDENCE

12) But...

THE ONE TRANSCENDS TRANSCENDENCE ITSELF 😲

....

****

Man, this guy Plotinus is just way too brilliant for his own good—a total genius and a bit of a wild card myself!

So, I'll leave you to it. Take a little breather from the subtle depth of his words and the implications they stir up...

So, here’s my proposal for an appetizer: let’s serve up some "fried Termites." Let's dive headfirst into the field of termitology and dissect—with surgical precision—every single one of those tedious, mind-numbing terms we keep tossing around.

hiddenpuma75🙂

Bernadette Roberts refers to the nondual state as "no-self" simply because she couldn't locate a "self" when looking inward, and frankly, she didn't have any other way to label it.

Her terminology, however, is a total misfire. Using the phrase

NO-SELF implies that self-awareness has been completely annihilated—which is absolutely not what she means.

Hmm... well, self-awareness *is* the thought "I"...

Who knows? Maybe for "her" (putting that in quotes), that specific thought just wasn't there.🙄

Only this claim holds water:

A=A

Heh. Two As? There's only one A.🙂

''NONDUALITY'' (NONDUAL CONSCIOUSNESS)

But regardless of how you slice it, by its very definition—by default—it simply cannot be captured using our dualistic human vocabulary.

IT CAN ONLY BE EXPERIENCED.

Hmm, I wouldn't go so far as to say it can be "experienced":

Because there is no subject (no individual) doing the experiencing, and no object being experienced...

In reality, nondual consciousness (the essence of ABSOLUTE consciousness) is the very thing that "makes" everything that exists. It is both the perceiver and the perception itself.
: As our friend hiddenpuma75 would put it: You cannot find (EXPERIENCE) the very thing you are using to search (EXPERIENCE).
🙂

The ONE is that first, most primal thing—it exists even before the very concept of battle itself.

It’s not Plotinus’s enlightenment I question. It’s his wording, specifically:

I mean... his expression is also, in my view, FLAWLESS...

But this particular claim always stings:

Doesn't this whole statement inherently assume the existence of TIME??

🙄

THE ONE IS IMANENT THROUGH ITS VERY TRANSCENDENCE

12) however...

THE ONE TRANSCENDS TRANSCENDENCE ITSELF

As our friend John would put it:

You can't transcend yourself from within yourself.

If that Zen master hadn't passed away, he’d probably just interrupt Brother Vance or those other philosophers of ours mid-sentence (you know, that whole "nothingness and everything" crew 🙂)

And he would have delivered all this wisdom with such effortless grace, almost like...

A splash.
A sudden leap.
Buck!

As for Karen Sanchez19—our resident Zen master, though perhaps a bit lost in the late 20th century

She laid out that sense of UNRAVELING like this...

ABSOLUTE.
Pure boredom.
Click the forum! 🙂

And then there's aurora aurea

God.
Light, darkness, angels, and now even the teeth...
And then he’d just flood us with a million blue-colored quotes 😁

ABSOLUTE.
Pure boredom.
Just clicking through this forum!

Boredom?😕

But you won't bother commenting on what was said above regarding the experience. I'm actually quite curious about your take.😁

Karen Sanchez19 said:Bored yet?😕

You seem to have forgotten that even the goddess Eris found herself feeling a bit lonely tonight—so she decided on some ABSOLUTE chaos and went hiding within ten thousand different things just to keep us on our toes.🙂

hiddenpuma75 said:You seem to have overlooked one thing: Eris was simply bored tonight. Since she didn't have the ABSOLUTE presence of a goddess to keep her occupied, she decided to kick off this little game of hers, hiding herself within ten thousand different things.🙂

😁

Good grief, does hiddenpuma75 seriously think they know everything about the universe!?

🙂

Karen Sanchez19 said:Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say you can actually "experience" it:

Because there isn't even a subject (an individual) doing the experiencing and an object being experienced...

In reality, nondual consciousness—the essence of ABSOLUTE consciousness—is what "makes" everything that exists, meaning it’s both the one experiencing and the thing that needs to be experienced...

🙂

So this guy thinks: NONDUAL CONSCIOUSNESS = THE BEING = ABSOLUTE CONSCIOUSNESS...

Man, do you honestly expect me to hand back that diploma you probably got through pure myth and corruption?!

When are you finally going to graduate from high school and move past these basic lessons they feed to the bottom-of-the-class students, just so you can claim that;
CONSCIOUSNESS is not ABSOLUTE, it isn't ABSOLUTE...

I mean, if you view manifested form as the beginning and the end of everything, then maybe that claim holds some weight, but since that's clearly not how it works, that little slogan is nothing more than a total, flying piece of nonsense!...

Honestly, I think you spend way too much time hanging out with that loser hiddenpuma75...

🙂 😁 🙂

ambereagle642 said:Honestly, how does hiddenpuma75 seem to know everything there is to know!?

🙂

Being able to feel genuine wonder is actually one of the first signs of waking up!
And the second sign? It’s being able to write clearly and concisely.

Luke, please accept my sincere praise and I'll give you extra credit just for your dedication. 😁

Consider this your diploma in smiling. 😁

👋

Until a person truly reaches that moment of realization, neither the Bible nor the Quran can offer them any real help.

But once that breakthrough happens? Honestly, they won't even need the Bible or the Quran anymore.

...how on earth can you judge someone's words to determine if they have actually experienced 'THAT WHICH BUDDHA EXPERIENCED'? I have already posted my thoughts on this very subject several times here on this forum: two different people can speak or write using the EXACT SAME words, yet one could be a 'TRUE BUDDHA' while the other is nothing more than a complete fraud just blowing smoke about it.

Elizabeth Miller8 said:...I mean, how are we supposed to judge if someone actually experienced 'THAT WHICH BUDDHA EXPERIENCED' just based on what they say? I've lost count of how many times I've posted this on this forum: you can have two different people saying or writing the EXACT SAME THING, yet one of them is a 'TRUE BUDDHA' while the other is just some loudmouth blowing smoke up everyone's ass...

The thing that Buddha experienced is his own damn problem, honestly.
Whatever you "experience," it isn't YOU! It’s the same deal with being YOURSELF—you don't need to go through some grand epiphany to achieve that. You are who you are at every single moment, even when you're doing something totally idiotic, and even when you're doing absolutely nothing at all. The quality of your actions is the only value that actually matters!

Go ask hiddenpuma75, he's a freaking GREAT-SAGE!

I feel compelled to offer one more observation on this matter. I have noticed that certain self-proclaimed 'Masters' in this forum seem to operate under the delusion that enlightenment occurs the very moment you realize that 'you aren't actually responsible for your experiences.'
In my view, that realization is nothing more than a mere illumination of the mind's own limitations.

ambereagle642 said:What Buddha experienced was essentially his own personal struggle.
Whatever you experience—that isn't YOU! Likewise, to simply be YOURSELF doesn't require some grand epiphany. You exist in every single moment, whether you’re making a massive blunder or just sitting there doing absolutely nothing. The quality of an action is a moral value!

Go ask hiddenpuma75; he's the GREAT-SAGE here!

ambereagle642... when I say Buddha, I am not referring to Siddhartha Gautama.
How can you possibly claim to know what you "need" or "don't need" to experience? If you actually think you have it all figured out, then you’ve clearly reached the level of a master master ever... 😉...(and yet you have the audacity to brag about it 😂)

Elizabeth Miller8 said:Look, ambereagle642... when I say Buddha, I’m not talking about Siddhartha Gautama here.
How can you possibly claim to know what you need to experience or what you don't? You simply can't. And if by some miracle you actually *do* think you know, then you're basically claiming to be a master master ever of the highest order 😉...(and honestly, the fact that you're even bragging about that is just ridiculous 😂)

Okay, fine, Buddha means "awakened."
But if that’s what "true" reality is, then you’ve got an awakened state without an "awakener," which means the person who was sleeping through life disappears during the awakening—even though the whole act of waking up is just another part of the dream itself... I mean, I'm not even sure what you were trying to get at with that one. But yeah, whatever. It's fine to just stay chill, I guess, since non-existent time does its own thing anyway...
😉

So, you’re actually suggesting I should go out and snatch back that degree you obtained through nothing but pure myth and systemic corruption? Is that the plan?

You deserve a diploma in pure, unadulterated selfishness.🙂 🙂

When are you finally going to graduate from high school level thinking? You're just clinging to some half-baked lesson meant for the bottom-tier students. Let me be clear:
CONSCIOUSNESS is not ABSOLUTE. It is not absolute.

My terminology: Absolute Consciousness = "The Absolute"

But your little special terminology—individual consciousness, awareness, "consciousness" by your own definition—that's something else entirely.

True consciousness exists without an object or a subject; there is no thought, no observer, and nothing being observed. What you call "awareness" is just when there's a subject (a person) who happens to be aware of something. That kind of awareness stems from the "ego-thought" blah blah blah.
.. and so on...