Enlightenment sickness is claiming you are free when you don’t know what freedom is. It is due to inadequate listening (sravana)and reflecting on what you have heard. It is typical of modern spiritual teachers. Reflecting (manana) is systematic resolution of doubts created by the teaching, “You are unborn existence shining as ever-present whole and complete non-dual consciousness.”
Why is Reflection so difficult? Because the ever-free Self is the mirror opposite of the self we have been told we are. Consequently, an inquirer must change the dualistic orientation of his mind. Beginning seekers are always fixated on changing their experience of reality rather than understanding reality as it is. So, it is necessary to convert the desire to experience into a desire to know. If you know What you are, your daily experience will automatically align with it. If you change your experience of life without knowing who or What you are, the changes will not last and seeking won’t stop. Trying to gain what you already have is called samsara.
The Dualistic Orientation is shifting your identity as the Self from the unknown to the known category. If you knew What you are, you wouldn’t try to change your experience of reality. Once you find out What the ever-present Self is, the desire to shift it to the known category arises. But it doesn’t fit into that category because it is the knower of both the known and the unknown.
The Self is not a new, extraordinary entity or a state of consciousness. It is the most ordinary entity, always available as the content of the word ‘I’ , ever-present existence shining as unborn whole and complete consciousness.
What is the nature of the world/body? (1) It is an object of experience. (2) It is matter. (3) It is endowed with attributes/qualities. (4) It is subject to change. (5) It is temporary (manifest and unmanifest). It is only available in the waking state; it appears when you wake up.
1 . The teacher said: If you think you know Awareness well, then you only know a small portion of It. Therefore, limitless Awareness, is worthy of inquiry.
A zero-Sum Conundrum.
“A small portion of it”…our primary means of knowledge, direct perception, has very a limited range. Our secondary means, inference, expands the range of perception but is still a limited means. It is a sad fact that at the same time, you think you are only a body/mind entity, you are everything that exists.
If I say I don’t know what I am, it means I was asleep during the teaching or the teacher was incompetent. If I say I do know it, I run the risk of exposing my ignorance because I have just been told that the Self is not an object of knowledge. We are always ignorant of something but nobody wants to feel stupid.
The Solution: I know what I know and I know what I don’t know, which means that the reflected self has been objectified. So, inference establishes the fact that I must be something other than what I know and what I don’t know. I must be something other than what I experience and don’t experience.
Almost all curious people want to experience the Self once they have heard about it because knowing it as it is, is perfect satisfaction. Nididyasana is for claiming my identity as Awareness, not experiencing Awareness.
Definition of Freedom
2. The Student said: “I don’t say I know it, nor do I say that I don’t know it because ordinary ever-present consciousness is The Knower and I am That. Whoever understands in this manner understands correctly.
He knows it isn’t an object and he knows that it is his ordinary “I,” the ever-present knower of the known and the unknown. His inert equipment, the body-mind-sense complex, has been objectified by the teaching and he is now free of it.
The Upanishad actually ends here with the listening phase. Reflecting is questioning what you think in light of what you’ve heard from the teacher and discarding the beliefs, opinions and ideas that don’t jibe with what you have heard. If you don’t listen and reflect adequately, you will just memorize the answer and call yourself enlightened, to your detriment. This inquirer passes the enlightenment quiz.
The following 3 verses summarise this teaching.
3. The one who knows it knows it not, but the one who knows it not, knows it.
If you think it is an experience or knowledge, you don’t know it. If you know it isn’t an object of knowledge/experience, you know it as your existence shining as unborn whole and complete consciousness.
The next verse is one of the most profound in all Vedantic literature
Self Knowledge (atma jnanam)
4. To say you know it you must know it in every state of mind. To know it is to understand that you are immortal. By virtue of Awareness one gains life, but one “gains” immortality by knowing It.
Summary: The Self is the invariable existence shining as unborn consciousness in the mind because of which life’s discrete experiences are possible. I am that Consciousness.
Freedom is not an event. It is not an experience. It is a “non-experiencing” witness. It is not a part, product or property of the body. It is not an altered experience; the wise and the ignorant have the same experiences. It is not a finite entity limited by the boundaries of the body. It does not borrow light like the mind. It is eternal consciousness. Once the jiva understands, its idea of itself and its attitude toward itself changes. I don’t “become” immortal. I stop worrying because I am immortal. I am perfectly indifferent toward what happens and doesn’t happen. I am perfectly satisfied no matter what happens in the transactional reality.
