Look for Nirvana in the Present Moment

Many people think of enlightenment as something they might attain in the future.

But it is a mistake to look for it in the future.

One should look for nirvana in the present moment, not in the future.

Consider all the things you want or fear in the future, or regret about the past, or things that you want, or like, or don't like now - let go of all that, let go of whatever is separating you from nirvana now, and look for nirvana right now in the present moment. (Letting go doesn't necessarily mean you don't have emotions, it can mean you let go of your attachments or aversions to emotions.)

Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, whatever is happening, that's where you should look for nirvana. Look for it with a calm mind.

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Copyright © 2024 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Gradual Awakening Part III

This is my third article on gradual awakening. The first is here, the second here. In this article I am going to propose a theory to explain why some people have gradual awakenings.

Different people, for whatever reason, brain wiring, brain chemistry, etc, experience certain mental phenomena at different levels of intensity.

For example, some people have the empty house experience (see below) and think, "This is enlightenment, now I know what it is". And other people have the same experience but it is not very intense and they don't think it is really important, it is kind of fun, but they might never think it was awakening unless they read that web article.

And the same thing is true of cessation/fruition. Some people like Ron Crouch (see below) have an intense experience and recognize it as awakening. Other people have fruition and enjoy the afterglow but don't see anything about anatta in it. Other people don't even notice fruition, they just notice an afterglow sometimes after a particularly good meditation session. When it is not intense, people wonder why anyone would think that was awakening.

The people who don't experience these things intensely,  keep meditating and over time they as Shinzen says (below) work through the mula kleshas and lose their attachment to their self-image gradually. This process also can happen for people who had an intense awakening experience as they deepen their enlightenment. 

Here is the empty house experience:
https://theconversation.org/what-is-enlightenment-no-i-mean-really-like-what-is-it/

Imagine as clearly as you can that you enter a large house that you have never been in before. You feel strange and kind of scared, there is furniture and drapes but no people. You wander around feeling the creepiness of being alone in this big house. You go from room to room not knowing what you will find. You start to get nervous and a little fearful being alone in this big house. You wonder how long it has been empty like this. In time the sense of the bigness and emptiness of the house starts to weigh heavily o­n your nerves. Finally, when you can not stand it any longer a shocking realization occurs to you: you're not there either! o­nly the experience exists.

Here is Ron Crouch's experience of fruition:
https://web.archive.org/web/20150315043206/http://alohadharma.com/2011/06/29/cessation/

Practitioners who have experienced the moment of Nirvana struggle to put it into words, because describing it can make it seem anticlimactic even though it is truly extraordinary. What it feels like is that there is “click”, “blip”, or “pop” that occurs for an instant. When it first happens it is so quick that the meditator could even miss it. However most people do stop and ask themselves “what was that?” It can be a bit baffling because it seems like nothing happened, and that is exactly right. For an instant absolutely nothing happened. There were no shining lights or angels, no pearly gates or choruses of joy, no transcendent experiences of unity with the cosmos or the divine. It is nothing like that at all. It may not be until you really think about it that you realize what an extraordinary thing that instant of absolute nothing really is.

As you reflect on it you see that there was something truly amazing about that moment. In that instant everything disappeared, including you. It was a moment of complete non-occurrence, the absolute opposite of everything that has ever happened in your life up to this moment, because it could not really be said to have happened to you. No doubt, it is a weird realization, but there it is. Following the experience of this absolute nothing is what my teacher aptly calls a “bliss wave.” For some time following this moment of alighting upon Nirvana you feel really relaxed and fresh. These two experiences, seeing that you disappeared and that you also feel great because of it, lead to a very important discovery that will shape how you view yourself from this point forward. You begin to understand in a very deep way that there really is something to this whole idea that the cravings of a “self” are the root of suffering. When it was gone, even for an instant, life suddenly got much better.

Here is how Shinzen Young describes gradual awakening:
https://www.lionsroar.com/on-enlightenment-an-interview-with-shinzen-young/

The sudden epiphany that’s described in many books about enlightenment, that has definitely happened to some of my students. And when it happens, it’s similar to what is described in those books. I don’t keep statistics, but maybe it happens a couple times a year. When someone comes to me after that’s happened I can smell it. They walk into the room and before they’ve even finished their first sentence I know what they’re going to say. You remember, right…? Your own case.

When it happens suddenly and dramatically you’re in seventh heaven. It’s like after the first experience of love, you’ll never be the same. However, for most people who’ve studied with me it doesn’t happen that way. What does happen is that the person gradually works through the things that get in the way of enlightenment, but so gradually that they might not notice. What typically happens is that over a period of years, and indeed decades, within that person the craving, aversion, and unconsciousness—the mula kleshas (the fundamental “impurities”), get worked through. But because all this is happening gradually they’re acclimatizing as it’s occurring and they may not realize how far they’ve come. That’s why I like telling the story about the samurai.

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The Five Aggregates of Clinging

Someone on a discussion forum asked about the five aggregates of clinging. The person asked about their meanings and how to practice with them. I also have a lot of trouble understanding the meanings of the Pali words. There is a good reason for this. The Buddha used the term "aggregates" (piles or heaps) instead of "categories" because they are collections of dissimilar things. That is why they are hard to understand and also hard to remember. We want nice simple easily defined categories that we can understand and remember in one word - but the complexity of reality does not conform to our desires.

Shinzen Young gives a good analogy to explain the aggregates. He says if a TV screen is displaying something white and you look closely at it with a magnifying glass you will not see anything white, you will only see red green and blue pixels.

If you look at self closely you will only see aggregates.

Look closely at self (everything you consider "me" and "mine"). What do you see?

Work out your own aggregates. They don't have to match the orthodox definitions of aggregates because they are aggregates (collections of dissimilar things) not categories. This is good to do because it will make it personal and more meaningful and easier for you to remember. 

This is in part what I see when I look at everything that is "me" or "mine". You might come up with different elements:

• Body
  • Brain
• Possessions, other people my friends family etc, my groups I like (sports teams etc), groups I am a member of (ie Americans)
• Mind:
  • Mental activity: thoughts, emotions, impulses etc
  • Sensory input: sight, sound, smell, taste, touch, vibration, rough/smooth, hard/soft, temperature, body sensations including body sensations that accompany emotions.
  • Concepts: I am an entity, a person, an owner (my car), a haver (my friends), a doer, a controller, a thinker, feeler, (just examples: a student a teacher, and employee a boss, a spouse, parent etc etc)

(You can study the orthodox definitions if you want to make sure you have everything covered.)

Look closely at your self and understand everything you consider "me" and "mine".

The next time you experience a egoistic reaction, ask yourself where in those aggregates is the entity that is offended, insulted, threatened, losing, wrong, inferior, rejected, etc?

Is a thought an entity? Is an emotion an entity? Is a brain cell an entity? Is a concept an entity?

Everything that can be considered self, if looked at closely, is made up of things that are clearly not any type of being or entity.

The full term is not "the five aggregates" the full term is "the five aggregates of clinging".

All those things that make up self (things that are "me" or "mine") are the things that we cling to that cause us suffering.

But what is the use in clinging to the aggregates if there is no entity or being in them?

Can you let go of all those things?

Ouch!

The pain of letting go is really the pain of not wanting to let go, and it is similar to the pain of actual loss.

Just contemplating letting go is hard. It produces a distinct feeling.

When you examine this feeling, you see it is the same as the common factor found all forms of dukkha. "I don't like this.", "I don't want this.", and more or less fear.

By recognizing this feeling in unpleasant emotions that arise during the day you recognize it as the feeling of letting go, or a reminder that you should let go.

Letting go.

My advice on how to learn to let go has multiple features.

• Observe the emotional pain and be conscious of the cause.

• Try to see how emotional pain is caused by attachment to "self", and how unnecessary that is because there is no "entity" in any of the components that combine to form your sense of self.

• At the same time use some type of relaxation, meditation, or mindfulness technique to ease the emotional pain and reduce the stress response, but not to suppress thoughts or emotions.

• Shinzen Young describes a similar process he calls purification. He says it is an acquired taste like the taste for spicy food. Spiciness is caused because the spice molecules bind directly to pain receptors. Spiciness is pure pain. But just like you can learn to like spicy food, you can learn to like letting go. It is a change in attitude. Instead of looking at emotional pain as something to avoid, if you look at it as the path to freedom, everything changes and you start to appreciate it rather than run away from it. Shinzen advises that equanimity can be maintained by not pushing away thoughts and emotions while at the same time not getting carried away by them, and not judging people, yourself, or your thoughts and emotions.

I will discuss the process of letting go in greater detail below, but it is helpful to have an understanding of how the process works before getting into the details. The following overview should provide that understanding.

Overview of letting go:

• Let yourself feel unpleasant emotions, don't push them away.

• But don't let them go uncontrolled or let your stress reaction go uncontrolled.

• Be a detached observer not a participant.

• Don't judge.

• Soothe unpleasant emotions with meditation and other techniques.

• Mentally review the situation and any sensations that caused the emotion.

• Dig deeper for layers of emotions covering other emotions.

• Understand that feeling emotional pain is needed to let go of it and that letting go leads to freedom.

• Try to see how emotional pain is caused by attachment to "self", and how unnecessary that is because there is no "entity" in any of the components that combine to form your sense of self (bodily tissues, individual thoughts, individual emotions, etc.).

• Accepting the pain is preferable to resisting it.

• There is a great reward for putting aside your ego. Surrender is smart.

The goal of letting go is to be able to think of or experience a situation with much less emotional pain.

It can be difficult to recognize when you are paying too much attention to unpleasant emotions or not paying enough attention to them. Too much of either is not good. Each person has to work this out for themself. Here are some things to consider when letting go of attachments that cause unpleasant emotions.

• Try to be relaxed.

• Notice the emotion. "Notice the emotion" means you let yourself feel the emotion, but it doesn't mean you let it get out of control or that you let your stress levels get out of control. At the same time you are feeling the emotion, try to soothe it, or calm it by breathing in a relaxed way or using some similar technique. But don't push it away or suppress it.

• Notice the sensations in your body that accompany the emotion. If you notice any tension in your body try to relax it.

• Try keep an attitude of being a detached observer rather than getting caught up in the emotion as if you were watching a move and forgot where you were and were so caught up in the movie you thought it was real. Remember you are observing your emotions. They arise from the unconscious unasked for uninvited. You don't have to believe they are reality.

• Don't judge other people, yourself, sensations, thoughts or emotions.

• Notice that common factor in all dukkha - it makes unpleasant emotions easier to bear because it is familiar.

• Remind yourself, "This emotion is showing me an attachment, I should let go. Letting go leads to freedom."

• Try to see how emotional pain is caused by attachment to "self", and how unnecessary that is because there is no "entity" in any of the components that combine to form your sense of self (bodily tissues, individual thoughts, individual emotions, etc., which are all governed by unconscious processes). Notice that emotional pain is caused when something that produces the sense of self is threatened. Why do you have these painful attachments when there is no actual entity in any of those things that are threatened? Ask yourself, what you are protecting, the atoms that make up your body? A thought or emotion that arises by unconscious processes unasked for and uninvited?

• While trying to stay relaxed, review in your mind the situation that the emotion is about, any physical sensations that are involved such as unpleasant sounds, smells, physical pain, emotional sensations, the feeling of "I don't like this" etc. Relax any tensions that arise. Doing this reduces the force of the emotion. It conditions you to think about it without reacting with an unpleasant emotions. This is what "letting go" means. Letting go is not forgetting. It is not suppressing. Letting go is being able to think about something without emotional pain.

• Ask yourself why you feel the emotion and repeat the question to dig through layers of answers. Repeat the above review process for the answers you find.

• Surrender - Acknowledge the truth of the situation, admit those things about the situation or yourself that you don't really want to admit, and accept them.

• There are various techniques that will elevate your mood, lessen the intensity of emotions, and/or reduce the stress response. They can be used in two ways: easing the pain of emotions can reduce them to the point where they don't bother you at all, or reducing them to the point where it is easier to review them and let go. Each person has to figure out for themself which use is appropriate at a given time. These techniques involve:

  • Relaxation exercises

  • Samatha meditation produces mental tranquility.

  • Metta meditation

  • Jhana meditation - Use unpleasant sensations (ie sounds, pain, emotional sensations) to trigger bliss.

  • Observing sensations that come into awareness - Deactivating the default mode network in the brain (see below) reduces the intensity of emotions.

This is how you let go of emotions, noticing them calmly while you are relaxing and easing their effect, allowing yourself to feel them, and understanding their source.

Letting go will set you free.

Awakening is the process of letting go of attachments to self.

Practicing this way in daily life with dukkha as it arises is more important than understanding the orthodox definitions of the aggregates. If you want to find everything that belongs in the aggregates, you can work backward from your emotions to see what you are clinging to.

The Buddha understood the pain of letting go. That is why he taught meditation and mindfulness techniques that help to us to bear the pain of unpleasant emotions.

Samatha meditation produces tranquility and gladdens the mind. Jhanas produce bliss. Metta is really a lot like jhana. Mindfulness greatly reduces the intensity of emotions.

• Samatha meditation activates the parasympathetic nervous system which turns off stress.

• Mindfulness deactivates the default mode network in the brain which has the effect of greatly reducing unpleasant emotions.

• Jhana and Metta meditation cause the brain to produce neurotransmitters and endorphins, and lower levels of stress hormones.

Practicing this way can produce a gradual awakening without the need for mystical "enlightenment experiences" or "realizations".

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Copyright © 2020 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

My Views on Gradual Awakening

I.

Traditionally, awakening is defined in four stages of increasing freedom from the ten fetters. I have posted before on gradual awakening and the fact that people can become awakened so gradually they don't notice it. This fact has some very important implications about what awakening is. It implies that the stages of awakening are not like a series of steps where you only get benefit when you have stepped up on the first step. Awakening is like a ramp where any level is possible. Most people already have some level of awakening (some level of freedom from the ten fetters) and you can increase your level gradually and continuously by meditating regularly.

The dictionary definition of gradual is: "moving, changing, or developing by fine or often imperceptible degrees"

Shinzen Young, and others, say people can awaken so gradually they don't notice it happening.

If that is right, then the moment of awakening can be imperceptible.

If the moment of awakening can be so subtle that it may not be noticed by the experiencer, then the change from not awakened to awakened can also be so small that it is imperceptible. If the change can be so small, someone who has just passed stream-entry (the first stage of awakening) might not be significantly different from someone who is just a little bit less awakened and has not passed stream-entry.

The development of awakening is not like a stairway with discrete steps. It is like a ramp where any level is possible. There aren't natural divisions or steps to awakening.

Awakening is a lot like equanimity. Everyone has some level of equanimity. Some people have little equanimity, some people have more equanimity and others have a lot of equanimity. Awakening is like that. Everyone has some level of awakening. Some people are little bit awakened, some people are more awakened, and others are very awakened. If you look at the definitions of the ten fetters, it should be obvious that different people will have different levels of attachment to them.

As I have shown above, someone who has passed stream-entry may not be significantly different from someone with a little bit less awakening who has not passed stream-entry. This indicates hat stream entry is an arbitrary level.

The stages of awakening divide the path into artificial and unnatural steps which causes people to become distracted into focusing on how to get to the first step. Instead followers of the path should be observing the activity of their mind and trying to see the origination of dukkha and the cessation of dukkha.

Everyone already has some level of awakening - some level of freedom from the ten fetters. People don't need to obsess about how to get awakened. If they will just practice meditation and mindfulness and observe the origination and cessation of dukkha in their own mind, they will get more and more awakened (more and more freedom from the fetters) gradually and easily, they will develop more and more compassion, good-will, equanimity and their ego will become less troublesome. When people understand this, they will see that arbitrary steps are irrelevant and a hindrance and they will let go of any attachments to those steps, and they will benefit more from their correctly focused practice.

II.

I posted a reply on a discussion forum to someone who complained that he had lost faith in awakening.

Did you ever hear that some people get enlightenment gradually instead of suddenly, and sometimes it is so gradual that they don't even know they have become enlightened?

Shenzen Young and others have said that it happens.

This means that enlightenment is not like a series of steps - it is like a ramp where any level is possible.

It is like equanimity - some people have little equanimity, some people have more, some people have a lot. And you can increase your level of equanimity gradually by meditating regularly. If people can become enlightened so gradually they don't notice it, then enlightenment must be like that too. Everybody has some level of enlightenment. Some people have little enlightenment, some people have more, and some people have a lot. And you can increase your level of enlightenment by meditating regularly .

So my advice is to try a kind of meditation that will reduce your suffering today (not sometime in the future maybe) and over the long term can increase your level of enlightenment (compassion, good will, equanimity, and unselfishness).

Stop worrying about that first step to get enlightenment. You are right it is a load of crap. It was invented to keep the monks organized. It is of no use the the average person.

Everybody including you already has some level of enlightenment. If you want, you can increase your level of enlightenment as much as you want by practicing meditation and mindfulness. Watch the activity in your mind and study the origination and cessation of dukkha.

Don't waste time expecting the earth to shake and the heavens to open and Buddha to jump down and shake your hand and congratulate you for becoming awakened. It doesn't necessarily happen like that. It sells books and retreats and makes money and gains followers for them, but it is not much help to anyone else.

III.

I also posted something approximately like this:

If your goal is enlightenment and you are expecting the BIG CHANGE to herald your awakening, then you wonder, "What do I have to do to get it? Go on a retreat? Read a book?

If you learn that people can get enlightened gradually without even knowing it, that you can be enlightened without experiencing the BIG CHANGE, then it makes sense that everyone already has some level of enlightenment and the purpose of practice is to gradually increase your level of enlightenment. You are not waiting for the BIG CHANGE, when you experience unpleasant emotions (dukkha) you do not think you need to go on a retreat or buy a book. Instead you watch your own mind during sitting meditation and during daily life. When you experience unpleasant emotions you wonder, Why am I not more compassionate? Why do I not have more good will? Why do I not have more equanimity? Why is my ego so troublesome? You examine the origination of dukkha. You observe the emotions in your mind and body and observe when they go away. You observe the cessation of dukkha.

When you are waiting for the BIG CHANGE, that is the focus of your obsession. It is distracting you from practicing correctly. And the BIG CHANGE itself is not what most people think. After the BIG CHANGE you still have emotions, what is different is that "they don't stick in your mind" or "you don't overreact" or "it is the aggregates that have the emotions". This is just what it is like for people who have a regular meditation practice for many years without a BIG CHANGE. You still have unpleasant emotions after the BIG CHANGE and you still have to practice if you want to experience the end of suffering. If you have the BIG CHANGE or not, you still have to keep practicing and observe the origination and cessation of dukkha.

When you understand the BIG CHANGE is not the only way to enlightenment, that it is not necessary, but is promulgated because it sells books and retreats and gains followers, then you can practice correctly: Just watch your mind and observe the origination and cessation of dukkha and you will gradually increase your level of enlightenment, your compassion, equanimity, and good will will increase and your ego will become less troublesome.

IV.

Then I posted this:

Some people have an insight all at once and are astonished.

Others have the same insight but realize it little by little over time so when they get the full idea it doesn't astonish them.

Some people see a sunset and are overwhelmed, all they want to do is to write poetry and sing songs about sunsets and tell everyone they can how beautiful sunsets are.

Other people see a sunset and think, "That's nice" and they are not overwhelmed.

But they are seeing the same thing.

Whether it's worth it or not is an individual choice.

Personally, I would not practice a form of meditation that might give me enlightenment some day in the future unless it also provided some benefit for me today in the meantime.

I started meditating to help me feel better after a meditation session, less stressed, more serene, long before I ever heard about enlightenment.

My attitude toward enlightenment now is that it's something that is incidental to meditation. If I advised someone to meditate, it would be to help them feel better after a meditation session. I believe everyone already has some level of enlightenment and that level will increase gradually if they meditate regularly - but passing some arbitrary threshold is not really something anyone needs to be worried about.

Passing an arbitrary threshold (stream-entry) only has utility if the stages of enlightenment are like a series of steps - you don't have any benefit until you step up on the first step. But if enlightenment is not like steps but is like a ramp where any level is possible, then you can get a lot of benefit even if you have not passed that arbitrary threshold because as you approach it your level of enlightenment increases gradually and continuously.

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Copyright © 2020 by ncu9nc All rights reserved. Texts quoted from other sources are Copyright © by their owners.

Gradual Enlightenment

Shinzen Young and Jack Kornfield have both said that enlightenment can be a gradual process rather than a sudden experience.

In The Science of Enlightenment, a book written by Shinzen Young, Shinzen says that people can become enlightened gradually without knowing it.

He writes:

... in my experience as a teacher, enlightenment usually sneaks up on people. Sometimes they don't quite realize how enlightened they've become over time because they have gradually acclimatized to it.

This intrigued me so I searched for more information on it. I found a file on the Shinzen Young Mindfulness Community on Facebook, (Shinzen Enlightenment Interview.pdf) that discussed this in greater detail and I have quoted the relevant excerpt below.

What Shinzen describes seems to be that the effects of meditating regularly over a long period of time produce the changes in a person that constitute enlightenment, whether you know it or not, whether or not you have the insight reported by people who experience sudden enlightenment.

Shinzen says that gradual enlightenment occurs when someone "gradually works through the things that get in the way of enlightenment" and "over a period of years, and indeed decades, within that person the craving, aversion and unconsciousness - the mula kleshas (the fundamental “impurities”), get worked through. This means that if you learn to let go attachments and aversions, then over time you will awaken gradually.

If this is the case, then one can simply meditate and not worry about having any particular insight or crossing any particular milestone.

You can judge your progress and the effectiveness of your meditation practice by your own observation as to how it helps you to live with increasing equanimity and compassion. If you find your equanimity and compassion are increasing over time, then you are probably doing it right.

Here is the excerpt from Shinzen Enlightenment Interview.pdf

However, for most people who’ve studied with me it doesn’t happen that way. Not suddenly. What does happen is that the person gradually works through the things that get in the way of enlightenment, but so gradually that they might not notice.

You remember that I said in traditional Buddhism it’s very significant that it’s formulated that something passes away and it’s not something that you get? So what typically happens is that over a period of years, and indeed decades, within that person the craving, aversion and unconsciousness -­-the mula kleshas (the fundamental “impurities”), get worked through. Because it’s gradual, they may not realize how much they’ve changed. As the mula kleshas get worked through they suffer less and the fundamental alienation between inside and outside diminishes. But because all this is happening gradually they’re acclimatizing as it’s occurring.

In acclimatizing they may not realize how far they’ve come. However, they often do notice it when “the doo doo hits the fan”. Like a major bereavement, a major illness like cancer, a serious injury, or their life is somehow threatened. Then they notice how everyone around them is freaking out and how much less they’re freaking out. Then the contrast becomes suddenly very evident. That’s when they would tend to notice it. That’s why I like telling the story about the samurai.

“This samurai went to the Zen temple on the mountain and lived there for many years. He didn’t seem to be getting anything out of the practice. So he said to the Master, ‘I think I need to leave. Nothing’s happening as a result of this practice’. So the master said ‘Okay. Go.’

As he was coming down the hill one of his former comrades, a fellow samurai, saw him in the tattered robes of a Buddhist monk –which is equivalent to a glorified beggar from a samurai’s point of view –and he said ‘how could you be so undignified to join the counter-­-culture of Buddhist beggars?’ and he spit on him. Now in the old days the samurais were extremely proud. Any insult to their personal dignity meant a fight to the death. So the monk who had formerly been a samurai just walked on and after he’d walked a certain distance, it occurred to him that not only did he not need to kill this guy, he wasn’t even angry.

As the story goes he turned around and bowed towards the mountain three times where he had practiced. He bowed in his recognition of all that he had worked through. He recognized he no longer needed to kill someone that had offended his dignity. He noticed how fundamentally he had changed as a human being.”

Of course, it’s not just samurai in 16th century Japan. The same things apply to 21st century North Americans. Maybe they’ve been practicing for 10, 20, or 30 years and it doesn’t seem that much has changed. And then something big happens and then they realize how different they’ve become compared to ordinary people. I’ll give you an example that happened just a few weeks ago. Someone who has been coming to retreats for quite a while went to have a biopsy to determine whether they had a serious cancer or not. While waiting for the results this person noticed they weren’t worried. Anyway, it turned out that the biopsy was negative. So all the unnecessary suffering that would’ve happened but didn’t, that was the effect of that person’s years and years of practice. It’s my impression that many more people have that gradual unfolding than have the sudden...

Jack Kornfield, in an interview on inquiringmind.com, describes gradual enlightenment as the gateless gate:

There is also what is called the “gateless gate.” One teacher describes it this way: “I would go for months of retreat training, and nothing spectacular would happen, no great experiences. Yet somehow everything changed. What most transformed me were the endless hours of mindfulness and compassion, giving a caring attention to what I was doing. I discovered how I automatically tighten and grasp, and with that realization I started to let go, to open to an appreciation of whatever was present. I found an ease. I gave up striving. I became less serious, less concerned with myself. My kindness deepened. I experienced a profound freedom, simply the fruit of being present over and over.” This was her gateless gate.

The Buddha himself said that awakening is a gradual process in the Uposatha Sutta:

Even so, bhikshus, just as the great ocean slopes gradually, slides gradually, inclines gradually, not abruptly like a precipice — so, too, in this Dharma-Vinaya, penetration into final knowledge occurs by gradual training, not abruptly.

Here are some excerpts from an article on gradual enlightenment written by Sensei Herb Deer who teaches at the Sweetwater Zen Center.

July 20, 2013

Gradual Enlightenment is Better. ~ Herb Deer

First of all, let’s define enlightenment as being selfless, compassionate, wise and present and throw in for good measure the realization that everyone and everything is connected in oneness. This should mean, for example, that an enlightened person puts the care of others before satisfying selfish desires and is able to communicate with honesty and integrity about any struggles with this.

...

Sudden enlightenment is a spontaneous awakening to our oneness with all things and the perfection of our life, such as the Buddha had when he saw the morning star under the Bodhi tree.

...

This sudden awakening experience is described in every spiritual tradition in one way or another. In Zen, it is emphasized especially in the Rinzai lineage as crucial for spiritual enlightenment.

...

Gradual enlightenment, on the other hand, is the slow and patient process of growing and maturing in our practice through consistent discipline and progress. The consistent and persistent practice of being mindful of our activities leads us to progressively refine our experience of emptiness and oneness in our daily life.

The Soto Zen School tends to embrace this more.

Maybe we can all agree that manifesting enlightenment in daily activities is the most profound expression?

But I say that the gradual process of awakening is more important to embrace in a spiritual path for several reasons.

First of all, the sudden kensho experience is like grace in that it cannot be guaranteed as a result of practice. Some people have a better chance at it if they practice with more effort and determination. But ultimately we could never judge the merit of anyone’s practice by using kensho as a measuring stick.

Second, kensho isn’t meant to take care of long-term emotional and behavioral patterns, and it doesn’t. This has been proven over again by ‘enlightened’ charismatic Zen teachers exposed to be abusive to their students in many ways.

Having a kensho experience may help us to see our karma more clearly, but it will not change our long-term patterns of emotions, behaviors and addictions.

Related Articles

My Views on Gradual Awakening

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