Please Share your spiritual awakening progress

[Jannes]

I recently started self inquiry for spiritual awakening. Leo said that awakening can take roughly 1000 hours maybe even more. I recently started to increase my self inquiry session from 1 to 3 hours daily and I feel strange headaches and confusion. I can kind of guess what I have to go through and I already feel how my ego is really good at talking me out of this path especially because I still have doubts that this path will really get me enlightened etc. I already talked to some of the people on the forum who say they got enlightened or had enlightened experiences and that really motivated me.
If you are also on the journey of spiritual awakening I would love to hear your experience because I really want to get my ego excited: Have you ever had an enlightenment experience ? If so how long did it take you ? How does your self inquiry routine looks like ? Are you enlightened ? If so how long did it take you ?

Edited September 12, 2021 by Jannes

[tlowedajuicemayne]

Seeking out a teacher is a good first step. Trying to navigate this alone with the teachings of online gurus and teachers will only lead you to confusion and waste alot of your time. Go seek out a zen master or a teacher who you can go and see in person and have guide you on a weekly or daily basis. 

[SamC]

2 hours ago, Jannes said:

I recently started self inquiry for spiritual awakening. Leo said that awakening can take roughly 1000 hours maybe even more. I recently started to increase my self inquiry session from 1 to 3 hours daily and I feel strange headaches and confusion. I can kind of guess what I have to go through and I already feel how my ego is really good at talking me out of this path especially because I still have doubts that this path will really get me enlightened etc. I already talked to some of the people on the forum who say they got enlightened or had enlightened experiences and that really motivated me.
If you are also on the journey of spiritual awakening I would love to hear your experience because I really want to get my ego excited: Have you ever had an enlightenment experience ? If so how long did it take you ? How does your self inquiry routine looks like ? Are you enlightened ? If so how long did it take you ?

Just out of curiosity. How old are you?

[Jannes]

56 minutes ago, tlowedajuicemayne said:

Seeking out a teacher is a good first step. Trying to navigate this alone with the teachings of online gurus and teachers will only lead you to confusion and waste alot of your time. Go seek out a zen master or a teacher who you can go and see in person and have guide you on a weekly or daily basis. 

Yeah you are right. There actually is a zen dojo close to me that I just found. Hopefully they have an enlightened master.

[Jannes]

@SamC 22

[Moksha]

Awakening happens when you are ripe for it to happen. You can't put a timeframe on it. For some, it happens at a young age, and for others it may not happen at all.

It is a direct realization, not an accomplishment. It is profound, beyond conceptualization. No amount of study will wake you up, until Consciousness is ready for you to wake. That said, there are important steps you can take, meditation and renunciation being key among them, to prepare yourself for awakening.

The Self cannot be known through study
Of the scriptures, nor through the intellect,
Nor through hearing discourses about it.
The Self can be attained only by those
Whom the Self chooses. Verily unto them
Does the Self reveal himself.

The Self cannot be known by anyone 
Who desists not from unrighteous ways,
Controls not the senses, stills not the mind,
And practices not meditation.

None else can know the omnipresent Self,
Whose glory sweeps away the rituals
Of the priest and the prowess of the warrior
And puts death itself to death.

- Katha 1.2:23-25

[Jannes]

20 minutes ago, Moksha said:

Awakening happens when you are ripe for it to happen. You can't put a timeframe on it. For some, it happens at a young age, and for others it may not happen at all.

It is a direct realization, not an accomplishment. It is profound, beyond conceptualization. No amount of study will wake you up, until Consciousness is ready for you to wake. That said, there are important steps you can take, meditation and renunciation being key among them, to prepare yourself for awakening.

The Self cannot be known through study
Of the scriptures, nor through the intellect,
Nor through hearing discourses about it.
The Self can be attained only by those
Whom the Self chooses. Verily unto them
Does the Self reveal himself.

The Self cannot be known by anyone 
Who desists not from unrighteous ways,
Controls not the senses, stills not the mind,
And practices not meditation.

None else can know the omnipresent Self,
Whose glory sweeps away the rituals
Of the priest and the prowess of the warrior
And puts death itself to death.

- Katha 1.2:23-25

I am not doing enlightenment work to win a trophy. I honestly just want to be happy, love authentically, help others and want to free myself from worry and suffering. But still there are of course parts of me that chase enlightenment for social status or something else. But I think there is nothing wrong with that if that’s second priority. Why not pump a lot of incentives into ones ego of how great enlightenment is while one hasn’t dissolved it yet ? I mean if you think about it before enlightenment you can only be selfish, even trying to be unselfish is selfish. Also why is renunciation important or what do you mean with renunciation exactly ? 

[Moksha]

17 minutes ago, Jannes said:

I am not doing enlightenment work to win a trophy. I honestly just want to be happy, love authentically, help others and want to free myself from worry and suffering. But still there are of course parts of me that chase enlightenment for social status or something else. But I think there is nothing wrong with that if that’s second priority. Why not pump a lot of incentives into ones ego of how great enlightenment is while one hasn’t dissolved it yet ? I mean if you think about it before enlightenment you can only be selfish, even trying to be unselfish is selfish. Also why is renunciation important or what do you mean with renunciation exactly ? 

The Buddha sought enlightenment for the same reasons you mention. He saw the transience of existence, and that true happiness cannot come from the world of change. He sought to understand the reasons for suffering, and how to overcome suffering and attain peace.

The ego doesn't want to be enlightened. It may pretend to seek enlightenment, or even claim to already be enlightened, but the truth is that enlightenment is the death of the ego.

Renunciation refers to letting go of your attachments to the world, because you realize they cannot make you happy. The path to enlightenment is the willingness to develop equanimity, or in other words discovering happiness through the Self within, rather than seeking it through the senses.

In the secret cave of the heart, two are
Seated by life's fountain. The separate ego
Drinks of the sweet and bitter stuff,
Liking the sweet, disliking the bitter,
While the supreme Self drinks sweet and bitter
Neither liking this nor disliking that.
The ego gropes in darkness, while the Self
Lives in light.

- Katha 1.3.1