Oakville Zen Meditation
“I am awake” said the Buddha What did he mean?
From over-thinking to awakening: a path towards serenity & compassion
“ I am awake” declared suddenly and loudly Prince Siddhartha Gautama 2500 years ago
after 9 years of ongoing meditation.
This is why he received his nickname “the Buddha” meaning “the awakened one.”
What did he mean? “I am aware / conscious” of the current genuine reality of what life is all about and not from the fictional world of our mind. In other words: “ I am not daydreaming”
Being aware is to focus or to pay attention consciously on something or someone in a mindful way
that is to simply observe and reflect like a mirror.
No thinking, no analysis, no judgment, no decision, no ego-driven mind.
It is like being in a state of pure and thoughtless consciousness.
Going further, being awakened or enlightened means:
1) That our awareness takes over our cognitive self. Instead of being in charge of our life, thinking becomes the servant of our awareness rather than us being its slave.
The way towards awakening is based on mindfulness meditation practice and not from blind faith or reading books. If you are trying to achieve enlightenment or awakening using your thinking, then
it is your ego trying to add it to itself making itself even bigger and more important.
2) That our powerful ego- centered thinking ceases to be a self-serving mentor that is taking possession of us 24/7 by trapping us in its mind-made fictional world and could ruin our life.
So, what is the process and what are the glimpses of awakening?
Realizing and accepting that life carries its loads of “suffering” in the forms of negative feelings from “I want this”, “I don’t want that”, from external causes and from our mind-made illusions/delusions.
Such illusions are:
Now that is the present moment is the only reality of space-time since past and future
exist only in our mind, pictures and cell phone calendar.
Nothing lasts: everything is transient in order for the evolution to move on.
Nothing can be controlled 100%.
Nothing has a permanent, unique, independent, separate and self-sustained self-entity.
Life, people, events and surrounding are what they are and not what we want them to be.
Our mind is a wonderful instrument but also our worst deceptive friend.
Not understanding these illusions causes suffering.
Ounce we are able to be mindful of these illusions, we become able to dissociate them
from the genuine concrete reality of our surroundings in the present moment.
And what about after awakening?
Once you have a glimpse of awareness you know it firsthand. It is no longer just a concept in you mind or from teaching or in the books but a way of life in which the ego- centered mind is under controlled rather than the opposite. Serenity and compassion for self and others are around the corner.
Thank you.
