The Surprise of Awakening

It's so very easy to think that we know what awakening is or might be as so many of us have chased it for years. In that chasing we spend time imagining it would be here or there, this or that. But those are ideas, projections. Waking up will reveal itself very clearly when it happens and it won't be at all like what you think it is, even if some of what you thought about it actually shows up.

First and foremost awakening is about loss, huge loss. It's about the disappearing of all we think about we and the world genuinely are, and the new view of something much different. We completely drop the ideas previously held so dear and come face-to-face with truth: nothing, absolutely nothing, is as we thought it to be. This is at once shocking and delightful. Not unusual to laugh and laugh when this shows up. Also not unusual to at some point fall into a sense of meaninglessness from the indisputable recognition that what we took to be the concreteness of life is empty not only of meaning but of genuine reality. It's an appearance, nothing more and nothing less.

In other words, awakening is never what we imagined it might be- bliss, love/dove, constant joy and smiles, omniscience or superpowers- as much as it is the gut-level nonintellectual realization that life is simply life, a thing-unto-itself, both causeless and in turn not a cause of anything , and that it has nothing at all to do with our thoughts and judgments of what it is. Melded to this is the utter recognition that the "me" we thought so real and precious was never anything but a wisp of smoke, a believed idea.

Awakening is not for wimps. It is total destruction and then a slow-growth rebuilding after the foundation is in place. If your lust for it is not fierce and final it may not even be worth it. If it's all you care about it very much could be.

Making it Happen

Well... that's an oxymoron if there ever was one! Never possible to make awakening (or anything, actually) show up unless it is meant to show up. This can be very hard to accept when we want it so badly and have not yet realized how things manifest. What to do?

Nothing can be as good as something since this cannot be forced. Many wake up without ever having given it any prolonged thought or effort (some without even knowing what it is until it happens), many wake up after relentless seeking and many after giving up on the entire pursuit. No way to know in advance what will trigger it, if anything. 

But what I've seen is a significant number of seekers making one huge final push of self-inquiry, of following pointers and looking deeply at thoughts and suddenly wham! there it is. And I've seen a lot of seekers do exactly the same and nothing shows. Some of that non-success is probably attributable to a big push that still has intellectual seeking tied to it and some to the simple fact that it is just not yet to be. This is all mystery... no way to figure out why some awaken and others do not, be it via determined effort or spontaneously and without that particular focus. It can only be said that it will happen when it happens.

I absolutely recommend the whole-hearted embracing of a method that points towards letting go of attachment to the faux truth of thinking and looks instead at what might be present in actual reality; looking right into this very moment and finding your clearest most honest experience. It is only in the deep recognition of what is actually present that awakening flowers. This, combined with the possibility of it being time for it to appear, could very easily do the trick. Or not. But if you are a dedicated seeker (as I was) who seriously suffers (as I did) then obviously there might be more reason to do this this than in idle wishing or staring at your belly button. It doesn't matter what method; what matters is that it is non-intellectual inquiry and that you are on fire with it. After that it's anybody's guess. Awakening is never forced, created or appears via desire or wishing. Yet those who are on fire, horribly deeply honest and willing to die in order to live just might find themselves burnt to a crisp and laughing in absurd joy. The old cliche- if it can happen to me it can happen to you- is cheesy and so very true.

Go for it.