Introduction
If you are like me, you
probably do not always read introductions. This really is different as it explains some important concepts
necessary to make this book more than just an interesting read. This book will change your life if approached
correctly.
When I arrived at
PurdueUniversityin 1975, I was a devout Catholic and I
attended Mass every Sunday. My feelings about church doctrines and teachings were conflicted. A lot of it did
not seem correct or consistent. I was interested in having a relationship with God and an understanding of my
purpose on earth and beyond. Since I grew up Catholic and attended a Catholic grade school this was the only
view I had ever known. To this date, I am grateful for this upbringing, because it was this path from birth
to present that brought me to where I am today. It was also responsible for developing my moral compass and
the cultural context of who I am.
The first glimmerings of the idea that
there were other paths of understanding came to me in my freshman European History class where I came to
understand that for much of Europe’s early history the Church and government where pretty much one and the
same. Most appalling was that the Church seemed to put its own political interests and survival above all
else. This was a real shock to me, because I thought that the Church’s only purpose was to help the
parishioners develop a personal relationship with God and live a life that would ensure their entrance into
heaven. My church was failing to give me the answers for what I was searching. I knew there had to be more
than just blind and obedient faith.
During that same time, I discovered
that Satsang classes and meditation groups were available around campus that focused on direct personal
self-development. I began attending these on a regular basis. I also began to read and study different
approaches to the Eastern disciplines as well. I signed up for a credited university course called the
Philosophy of Eastern Religions that turned out to be the most interesting and exciting college course I have
ever taken through three college degrees. After that, I was full bore into meditation, self-realization and
on the hunt for spiritual enlightenment for the next thirty-plus years.
During the last several years, I began
meditating one to two times a day with a sense of urgency to attain enlightenment. In the past, I
occasionally had mystical experiences during my meditations, but now they started happening regularly and
with greater intensity. I was so excited about the experiences. I wanted to share how I had attained this
level of awareness, so I began outlining a book. I wanted to teach others what I had learned, so they could
get to this level of awareness quickly.
Although I did not feel that I had
attained enlightenment at this point, I felt that I was rapidly approaching it. I began to review some of the
dozens of books on my bookshelf about enlightenment for background material and I reread some of them with
renewed interest. For the most part I recognized all the concepts and they all made sense in context of my
new understanding of who and what I was. Nothing was new here. The problem was that they were only
registering conceptually as they always had and what I was experiencing was beyond conceptual. I needed to
figure it out how to convey this information in a way that others could cross the chasm from conceptual to
non-conceptual.
I began to meditate with this question
in mind and in a short time, something unexpected happened. I bridged from the conceptual to the
non-conceptual. This was a different and understanding than what I had encountered in my recent mystical
experiences. I fully non-conceptually realized my non-duality, who, and what I truly am. The mystical
experiences were just another distraction. They were not what I was looking for. They were decoys. What I was
really looking was quite different and unexpected, non-conceptual enlightenment. That was my first big
revelation.
How to teach others to bridge this gap
from conceptual to non-conceptual self-realization became my next driving search. I set the thirteen-page
outline aside as it held no real value anymore and began to meditate on the second question. The entire
outline of this book and workshops came into my awareness. The answer to this question was my second
revelation and the genesis of this book.
Here is the thing. Enlightenment is not
hard to attain. It is right in front of you. It has been with you your entire life. It is your birthright.
You do not have to search for thirty years or meditate for twenty. You do not have to pay homage or worship
any guru or master to attain it.
There are a few pre-requisites that you
can choose to fulfill or not. If you do not choose to fulfill them, you will not be able to recognize
enlightenment.
There are many paths to enlightenment
including thirty-plus years of meditating, but most are not necessary. The direct path presented here will
take a few hours for most to get the first glimpses and a few months to maintaining lucid wakefullness as a
normal state of awareness.
Reading this work sequentially and
maintaining an appropriate cadence are important factors to ensure success in reading this book. Reading the
book slowly enough so that you have the time to integrate fully the concepts before attempting to cross the
threshold is very important. That is, when you read the concepts throughout the book give yourself time to
fully absorb and think about the implications of what they mean. One of the many paradoxes of this approach
is that you need to understand the concepts well, before you can get to the non-conceptual. Once you are at
the non-conceptual, the concepts will be of little use to you except to teach others. You will not need the
concepts any longer.
It is more about taking the journey
than reading the book, because if you only read the book you are not going anywhere. You will be stuck in the
conceptual. You need to move to the non-conceptual.
Last and not least, I am not asking you
to believe anything I tell you. This is not about belief. It is beyond belief. Belief is a hope or a desire
that something will turn out to be true. The truth or the knowing is going to happen to you on this journey.
You will no longer need belief, you will non-conceptually know and you will become.
This is an exciting journey and because you are reading these words right now, it is
happening to you right now. As you will see later, right now is the only time anything happens anyway. Enjoy
the ride.
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