Enlightenment and Awareness - what are they?
Our Driving To The Rez second hour panelist, Fred, asked about the relationship between Enlightenment and Awareness.
During our free, monthly enlightenment class at the Shamanshack in WA, we decided to explore this question.
As a wisdom seeker, the main tool I use to advance my studies is to explore questions asked by other wisdom seekers. Without interesting questions, I would not have any idea of where to look.
The questions cannot be random. For them to be useful, they need to be well thought out and accurately worded.
For example, the question posed by Fred was “Enlightenment vs Awareness”. The first answer, as is typical if you know me, was short.
There is no “versus” between Enlightenment and Awareness. They are not contradictory to each other, or in any way opposed to each other.”
Having had some years learning the larger meaning behind peoples questions, it appeared to me that his question was more in the nature of:
How do Enlightenment and Awareness compare to each other? Are they related in any way? Are they the same thing? Does one lead to the other?
I checked my understanding of the question with Fred, who then confirmed that, indeed, this is what he meant.
In this article, I am going to summarize the discussion that followed.
First, let’s define the meaning of each word.
Enlightenment: I have a very specific definition of this word when it comes to present teachings. The definition is “our own true nature correctly perceived.”
Awareness: For this definition, I will simply copy a simple one from Webster’s online dictionary - “having or showing realization, perception, or knowledge”.
As we can see although one can be used with the other, the two items are not directly related. In order to understand further, we can say that both of these definitions contain the word “perception”. But, one of them has it as a verb, the other uses the word as a noun.
And that is as far as the relationship between the two extends. If you perceive your true nature correctly, you’ve expanded your awareness to include your new found perception.
There is an exercise that I like to use when talking about the difference between perception and awareness. The exercise is a simple question: “Are you aware of the Antarctic? Are you able to perceive the Antarctic?” Now you should be able to know the difference between awareness and perception. As Enlightenment is “our true nature correctly perceived,” we can now see the noun difference between Enlightenment and Awareness.
If you enjoyed this simple example of wisdom seekers working together, and I know I did, I would like to extend an invitation to join a further in depth look at this topic on our Second Hour of DrivingToTheRez.com. You will have access to the full library of past and future episodes with it, and also a ticket to the Friday morning After Party, which is where you can join the panel in further exploring this topic as it relates to your personal wisdom seeking.
Inelia
