Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Enlightenment is Our Natural State

Enlightenment is the natural state of our being. It sounds too simple. You may think of asking, why then only a fraction of the human population is enlightened. It is because, we give more importance to the mind and we always work on improving that. The pure awareness could be equated to a plain white paper. The mind is something like a painting on that white paper. When we work on the mind, we give a different coating over the existing coating, trying to create a better mind. The awareness is always pure and no external thing can pollute it. It is the emptiness itself. How could something stick to that emptiness.

The only way to get back to our real nature or being established in our pure awareness, is to make the mind pure. When the mind is perfectly pure, it becomes non-existent. For example, the pure water is perfectly transparent, tasteless and odourless. When there are some minerals or solute particles, it may become a solution and take a different name, by losing its purity. In the same way, the ultra pure mind is a non-existent mind.

One can never see the plain white sheet which is behind the painting. To get to that, you have to remove the painting. Creating another painting over that or trying to manipulate the painting will not help much. In the same way, you have to transcend the mind to get established in the pure state of pure awareness.

One may ask, how come this strange mind with all its ignorance started working, completely masking the pure awareness. The Buddhists call this ignorance a 'beginningless ignorance' and we do not know exactly how it all started. The good news is that, we have a way to put a full stop for this and return to our original nature.

One may ask, if there is no mind, how will I function and carry out my day to day responsibilities. The answer is that, when the screen is clear, the projection is perfectly visible. Imagine, you go to a movie theater, and the movie is projected on some screen which has different colours. It would not make much sense for you. In the same way, if a thought comes in the state of pure awareness, it is more innovative and powerful. At the same time, you shall remain not affected by the thought and would be able to function better.

Now, you may think. It all sounds good! But, is it really possible to achieve a state where there are no thoughts and stay in the state of pure awareness? Or is it really possible to become a silent witness of the thoughts, not being carried over by it? The answer is, you might have already experienced such a state. I need not give you a proof. That state being too brief in duration, you might have missed to observe it. Let me try to help you recollect. Have you ever come across any frightening situation? You might have seen a snake in your living room or your friend might have given you a shock by shouting when you did not expect at all or you might have escaped a near accident. In such shocking events, you shall be pushed to a state where there will be just pure awareness and no thoughts. Could you recollect anything of that sort? At some stage of your life, you might have come across such situation.

It does not mean that such a pure awareness is always related with a shocking incident.. ha ha. You might have experienced such a similar situation in immense joy too. But, such awareness, is actually beyond pain and pleasure. It is a pure witness, a state of high alertness, a plain emptiness which is the pure consciousness. This state of awareness is our innate nature. Nothing has to be added to realize that. Just the not-necessary things are to be removed to realize and experience that, which is our pure state of being.

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