Media, the new Buddha-teacher

Back in the days of the Buddha, enlightenment was almost impossible to attain. Today enlightenment is much easier to attain. Not because we're nobler beings, not because we've grown. But simply because we have access to a much, much larger  amount of data about living. We see other peoples lives, fictional and otherwise, play out in cinemas, on tv, on facebook, in games. People are everywhere, and their lives are described in minute details in the public.

We now more about the pitfalls of being human than ever before. We know about sins we do not commit ourselves. We learn about the challenges of other people all the time. And the brain dissects all that data and it compares them to you and your life.

And you only need to do one thing to make all that knowledge help you on the way to enlightenment. You just need to be aware of what is going on in your mind.

Today most people experience enlightenment in some form or other. Extreme sports is the pursuit of that golden moment of enlightenment where the acts you do makes you forget yourself and enjoy the pure joy and fright of the moment. That is enlightenment. That is freedom.

Bored people experience enlightenment when they find that special moment where somehow it all makes sense. Busy people feel enlightenment when suddenly there's no more to do on the todo-list.

Buddha didn't have all that data, but he sat him self by the road and watched life roll by, he saw people passing by, and he gathered data about life. Day after day. Until suddenly his brain reached the tipping point and enlightenment was unavoidable.

Today, Buddha, would sit still in front of the tv for a month, and he would be enlightened. He would play games for weeks, driving himself to exhaustion, and he would reach enlightenment. Or he would dive into the worldly pleasures until they were no longer pleasures and he would become enlightened.

Today, Buddha is you. Just watch, be aware and let life go on, and you will get there. Enlightenment is for everyone.

Buddha was right, but now he's wrong.

The middle way that the Buddha found is no longer applicable. Not really. His insight is no less stunning today than it was way back then, but all of those Buddhis practices are relics from a different age.

You don't have to live in seclusion to find enlightenment. You don't have to say no to the world to let go of the world. You don't have to live healthy to find the way. In fact, all you have to do to find the way, is to wake up.

And for most of us, the awakening is not sudden. Enlightenment doesn't hit you like a brick wall and changes everything. For most of us it takes years to wake fully from that worldly dream we call reality. And still, we are more awake today than we were yesterday, and we will be more awake and aware tomorrow than we are today.

And setbacks are ok. It's quite ok to relax if you've worked to hard. It's ok to step back to humanity and enjoy the comforts of good company, Jack Daniels, Viagra, cigarettes or Joints, or what ever kind of stimulant you prefer. You can dive into a hedonistic lifestyle for a while, just to ease the pressure.

AND IT WILL NOT STOP YOUR ENLIGHTENMENT.

As soon as you've taken that first step, there is nothing to stop you from being more aware. Nothing will stop you from waking up. As soon as that first step is taken, enlightenment is coming to you. All the wordly pleasures that you might take refuge in as reality is being taken apart, will serve as pitstops. You can stay there for some time, but sooner or later, you will, by your self, want to move on.

So don't worry about you faults. Don't worry about your addictions. Don't fight them. Notice them. Notice how you enjoy it and why you enjoy it. You don't have to fight it or even do anything about it. Actually, fighting it, is the worst thing you can do. AA is not a cure for alcoholism, it's just a sustained fight against the acts of alcoholism. No wonder AA-people still call them selves alcoholics: The fight against it, maintains the AA inside.

Now, just to be quite clear: You can lose your way. You can become such an addict that you will always fight enlightenment. You can become consumed in the fight for the next fix. But still, notice it. Don't fight it. Just notice what you do, why you do it and how you like doing it.

Just take a few minutes right now. Look out. This is the world. Forget the pressure of work or the IRS. Forget about your lover, your child, your family. For just a second, just be you. If you find yourself thinking about things, just acknowledge the thought, and then try to let it go.

What you will see is a world that just is. The people over there? They have no intentions, they have no hidden agendas. They just ARE. As are you. There is just existence. THere's just this moment. And in that moment the world may exist, but all the mental projections of hope, love, hate, fear, joy, sadness are gone. They do not exist until you let them exist. There is no hate in the world. There is no sadness in the world. There is no Joy, no fear, no hope, pain.. there is only the physical world around you. All else is you. Forget about you, and it will be like letting go of a 100 pound backpack. It will set you free.

Just for a moment.

And next year, that momemt will be twice as long. And the year after, you might be able to remove yourself from the equation at will. And if you get that far, enlightenment is just around the corner.

Forget about the Buddha. Forget about scripture. Forget about gurus or holy men. Only remember that all you see in the world is created by you, and just start to be aware.

Go get it Tiger, enlightenment is so cool !!!

Letting go

It's so very hard for most of us to let go of anything. We like our cars, we like our appliances, our game consoles, our computers, our biceps, triceps and our abs and we love the people who love us or makes us feel good. It's very hard to let go of the things we love.

We even love our enemies, we love to hate the things we hate, we love our life crisis, our problems, our deadlines and most people love their jobs, even when they hate to do the work. It's just as hard to let go of the things that we hate.

We cling to all the things that makes our human existence human. The work and the toil and the feeling of being a difference for someone somewhere at any time.

But what if all this clinging to stuff is holding us back? What if our idea of being human is less than it could be, just because we cling to things?

Usually we're held back by the things we cling to. They fill every waking hour of our lives and we have gotten used to living a todo-list-life. Even our holidays are packed with todo's and agendas. It's so very hard to just stop doing anything and just being in the moment and enjoying it. It seems like none of really think we deserve to be free and happy, unless we put in the work to earn it. And when we finally get to be free and happy, we choose to put our freedom into a well organized schedule.

Some years ago I got the job I always wanted. That happened more than once, actually. My pay was enourmous, but so was the hours and the workload. And suddenly I realized that all the extra money just meant that I lived way more expensive than I used to. When I realized that the job that I wanted, wasn't really something I wanted to do, I quit and my pay was reduced to the bare minimum. And i found myself with enormous amounts of time on my hand. The first months I enjoyed it immensely. I read all the books that I hadn't had time to read before. I even spent an entire month seeing every episode of every season of tv-shows like Dr. House, Angel, Boston Legal and every movie I missed the last 10 years. And then I ran out of anything to do.

My todolist was empty. And I felt like crap. I mean, having lived a life where I defined by self and my worth in terms of accomplished deadlines and todo's, there suddenlys wasn't anything in my life worthwhile. And at first it made me feel like crap.

And then I realized: I was held prisoner by ideas and values that weren't even mine. I couldn't let go of the things that I had clung to so hard. And it pissed me off. Being able to do what I want, when I wanted to and go where I wanted when I wanted, should be a blessing, but it felt like a curse.

I've let go of almost every need. I still need to eat, drink and sleep. But the only reason I need a job is to get paid, so that I can pay rent and buy food. But everything else is now "nice to have" and not "need to have". And I don't have very many things.

And now, I am always doing something that I love, just because I love it. I wake up in the morning and write a post like this, or I wake up and just sit in the morning sun feeling its warmth, or I wake up and do something completely unexpected. Suddenly there's almost no agenda to my life and every days is more exciting because of it.

It's freedom baby, and its hard to get by unless you let go. And let's face it, most people loooove the prison they created for them selves. I know I did. And there's probably still a lot of chains that hold me prisoner, but there are a lot less chains than before. And I'm getting really close to being entirely without chains.
So, because you probably love your prison, I will not even contemplate telling you to get out or let go. Besides, you probably don't have the balls to take what comes with freedom. You see, when you're free there's no one to tell you what to do, and that makes you totally responsible for everything that you do.

So do you? Have the balls to live free?

Wordly enlightenment

Enlightenment is a difficult word, since it has so many different meanings. For some "enlightenment" is about a period of history, for others it's about spirituality.

I don't believe that we can actually say anything meaningful about spiritual enlightenment. But we can speak of a worldly enlightenment. Worldly enlightenment is about being aware of everything that happens in your mind and with your emotions.

Here's an example. You're driving to work, and when you arrive you realize that you can't remember anything from your drive. You know that you drove to work, but can't remember a single thing since you got into you car. When you arrive you 'wake up' and realize that you have been doing something without even being aware of it. That's enlightenment.

When you drove you weren't really aware. Your mind didn't really need the sense of YOU to drive to work, and since you had nothing to think about, your 'you' dissappeared. So, in some sense, you were taken over by processes in your mind and you lost your self to those processes.

The same happens when you get very excited. For instance, angry people are no longer aware of their anger. They ARE the anger and the anger is controlling them. They loose them selves to feelings.

At other times we even think we are aware when we really aren't aware. When you read a book or when you spend hours thinking about some issue, you forget yourself and you're not really present. You mind has gone to another place, and you forgot where you were.

So, being enlightened in the worldly sense is to be aware of all the things that you do, think and feel, while you do, think and feel them.

But, how aware or enlightened can we get? Is there an upper limit? The answer is yes, at least when it comes to worldly enlightenment. That limit is when you realize that the idea of who and what you are is a mental construct. That you actually create yourself in every moment. When you get to that kind of enlightenment, you're done, and you will have to work real hard to become  unenlightened again.


Before that upper-limit the benefits are huge. You will be able to register a lot more of reality in any given moment. You will realize what this particular moment can lead to, and you'll be able to 'spin' every moment towards what ever you want. It's a huge, huge difference. It's like being the best you can be, all the time, and not just in a few glorious moments in life.

Oh, one more thing: spiritual enlightenment is the only way to continue past the upper limits of worldly enlightenment. I will get back to spiritual enlightenment in a later post.

For now, just think about it: Can you be better than you are right now? If you don't think so, you're probably already enlightened or, more likely, in denial about your faults.

And here's a warning: Going for enlightement means that you will face every flaw, every fault and every mistake you ever made. But, in the end, there will be no flaws, faults or mistakes left. You will be in the moment, making informed decisions and you will know where that decision will lead.

It's simply a great way to live.
react to reactions in other people, that you weren't able

Level one in 4 steps

This post is about meditation and is about the first 4 of 12 steps towards enlightenment (whether worldly or spiritual). The first post is here.

Do you have control of your body? No, I'm not talking about moving your arms or legs, I'm talking about the inner body: the pulse, perspiration and not-moving your arms or legs.

Before we go into each step, let's have a look at what this level is about. It's about making the body stay as still as possible. Do it for a few minutes just to ground your self in everyday life and inoculate yourself from stress and panic. Do it for longer periods of time to get a more permanent calmness in your entire being.

Basically this level will make you experiment with the body by making you breathe differently. For me, there are three ways to breathe when I meditate.

• -fast and rythmic, sometimes even forceful breaths. This will make your pulse rise, it may even make you perspire and it's a forceful way to make you body do what you want.
• Slow and calm. Just breathe in slowly, and breathe out slowly. Don't worry about the rhythm, just let your breaths come naturally, but make sure that you complete every breath (all the way in, all the way out, all the way in, all the way out)
• Almost sleeplike breathing. This comes naturally when you fall asleep or if you go into deep meditation. However, its hard to come by this type of breath by will alone, because you need to slow you entire bodily system down. If you can't go in to this form of breathing at the beginning, don't worry - it will probably come by it self at some point, or you can return later after you've worked on different steps and try again - it will get easier, as you improve you meditation skills.

If you have some kind of focus, it will make it a lot easier. A good place to focus is on the tip of your nose. Notice how it gets cooler when you breathe in, and warmer when you breathe out? Good, keep noticing it and keep your focus, while you maintain your current breathing pattern.

If you're new to meditation, you might get impatient, because what you're doing seems like a waste of time. After all, you probably measure meaningfulness in ways of producing stuff or ideas, doing stuff, having obligations, stressing out over deadlines and all things that we value in life.

Meditation IS different. And it might take some time for you to realize the benefits. So, here are few ways to make it a bit easier:

1. When ever you're bored, commuting or something else: Just take a few minutes and breathe easy. I mean, why not - its not like your doing anything else?
2. Before any physical exercise breathe forcefully and deeply for 1-2 minutes. This should improve your performance. This is especially noticeable when swimming or snorkeling.
3. Before a meeting that makes you uncomfortable or gives you an adrenalin rush, go somewhere private, even the restroom or just close the door to your office if you have one, and breathe easy and calmly for 3-5 minutes (if you're already stressed, you probably will have to use some will power).

This works because it takes away the biological control of your existence. You're actually starting to break the bond between emotions and bodily reactions. It will make it easier for you to perform just as you want to perform, and it will make it easier to remain calm and undisturbed, even when that thing that wasn't supposed to happen, happens anyway.

Enlightened, at last

I will not describe what it feels like. I will not tell you if it is something to be 'felt' at all.

It came to me gradually these last months. Actually, it came to me at once, but I didn't notice the difference. Only slowly did my perception of things change. And I know this: Enlightenment comes in many different forms and you will never find it where you expect to find it.

Ask me.

And I know that we must find different words for these things, for enlightenment is not enlightened, the emptiness is not empty, nor is all all there is. There is no truth, and even that is not true. Any search for anything, will lead to this place: ?

Ask me.

Stop asking. Any answer will always be false. A correct answer will always be false and un-real.

Stop believing. Don't believe words, they are poor imitations and illusions. If you must believe in words, make sure those words are your own, and you will be on your way. And one day you will realize that any way will lead to noway.

Ask me.

Don't ask. It will not help. It will not get you closer to the truth. There is no truth. An answer will bring you further from falseness, but any answer is as good as my answer. And still, to get it, you need to stop trying to get it.

Get it?

Here it is: Just stop.

Get it?


No?. Hmm.. Ok: If there's friction in you, let it go. Friction is anything that you feel, perceive or think. Every word you think, is friction. Stop thinking. Every feeling you have is friction. Let the feeling pass. Every perception must be without concepts: you don't see 'trees', 'people', 'streets'. Just absorb it all.

Get it?


Ok, let's try the conspiracy theory-style: Words are the biggest trap ever. Our animal-minds evolved into something with a new sort of plasticity that could store concepts and manipulate them. And we fell so in love with them that we let them take over our lives. Don't believe me? Ok then: Why do you think about love? Love is a feeling. You can't describe it, ever. You can't even describe the color red. Why do you think about love? Why don't you just show your love? Social convention? Yes - the name of our prison: Social convention. Because ultimately, you entire reality is a social convention and the tool of this prison is words.


Get it?


Hmmm...You are a skeptic and a rationalist and don't believe any of this mumbu-jumbo about 'enlightenment'. I get it. As I said: We need other words for this discussion. It's not about some 'spiritual' enlightenment, it's about stepping out of a shadow of concepts that limits our view of reality. Now, I know you are probably not a relativist. To you there probably is nothing to discuss about gravity, cause it just freaking works. And I don't disagree. My claim is that there is something to be learned from trying to NOT believe in gravity. Or to try to be aware of what beliefs you carry around with you all the time. Cause every one of them is giving you a biased perception of reality. Again, I'm not saying that this very visible reality in front of us is not real, I'm just saying that it is wise to know the assumptions we use when we analyze it.
And, if you succeed in letting go of all your assumptions, in the end, what you will find is something else. Not something mystical. But like your mind space now is a mind space that works with concepts, you will experience another kind of mind space that is above concepts. Here's a parallel: Once mankind had an animal mind, now we have a concept-mind. Do you really believe that mankind is now as evolved as existence can get in the universe? And also, would you not agree that an animal mind can not comprehend a concept-mind? Why should we then be able to explain a higher mind space?