What is Enlightenment?
During my Reiki Level 2 class, when explaining that Mikao Usui intended to help his students reach enlightenment, one of my students asked, ‘What is enlightenment?’.
It’s a profound question that can have several, mostly subjective answers depending on which spiritual teacher you listen to. However, they all share a common thread; enlightenment is an illumination of a Universal truth about our true nature.
WE WERE ALWAYS LIGHT
Enlightenment is a realisation that we already are and have always been the ultimate version of ourselves - worthy, compassionate, whole and loving. Once we become aware of our innate qualities, judgement of self disappears, along with the illusion of our limiting beliefs, self-doubt and the perception of our separateness.
So enlightenment, as Sadhguru puts it, is ‘being loyal to our wonderfulness. ‘
THE UNCONFLICTED MIND
Philosopher J. Krishnamurti described ultimate enlightenment as a mind without conflict. Being able to observe ourselves, our thinking, our world, without judging any of it as good or bad, observing them without duality.
Spiritual teacher Mooji also speaks of non-duality as a unity of the Universal self, within which the mind becomes calm, peaceful, loving and without fear.
Author Eckhart Tolle eloquently describes enlightenment as…
“Consciousness finally detaching from the limitations of form (ie our body) and, in doing so, it knows itself for the first time.”
When we have thoughts or emotions but we don’t attach our identity to them, we’re no longer caged or controlled by our mind or body. Instead, we can comfortably inhabit both with a sense of liberation and spaciousness.
Some may experience this realisation in one powerful, awakened moment but most arrive through a slower path of consistent spiritual practice.
MIKAO USUI’S INTENTION
Mikao Usui, the Founder of Reiki, spent many years seeking to deepen his understanding of spirituality and humanity. Although he practised Tendai Buddhism, he sought to experience different cultures and travelled extensively, including to Europe, America and China.
Like many of us, he nurtured an unwavering curiosity to better understand himself and the human experience through studying other religions, philosophies and psychologies, as well as esoteric practices.
Mikao Usui had searched for enlightenment, which the Japanese call Satori, for most of his life. He eventually had an awakening when a bright light struck his forehead whilst visiting Mount Kurama in Kyoto. This was at the end of 21 days of fasting, prayer and meditation in 1921. He was 57 years old.
Mikao Usui went on to develop the system of Reiki that has since spread globally. He believed that Satori could be attained by anyone through daily practice of the Reiki Healing System.
PRACTICES THAT LEAD TO ENLIGHTENMENT
This includes daily meditation, hands-on self-Reiki healing, compassionately reflecting on our anger and worry so we no longer find ourselves lost in past or future thinking. Mikao Usui encourages gratitude as a way of making peace with the present moment and emphasises the need to be kind to all aspects of ourselves, as well as to others.
Within the Reiki Principles (Precepts), we are gifted with an opportunity to have more of our true nature revealed to us through detachment from assigned roles, labels and false identifications. This brings a shedding and a transparency that frees us.
This doesn’t mean we will never again encounter struggle or feel unwanted emotions. The precepts encourage us to greet uncomfortable emotions with compassion, to observe them without becoming the emotion. This way, we can quickly move out of a refracted state and return to a state of peace.
The gift of enlightenment is less about grand awakenings and more about our small, daily choices to live with presence, gratitude, love and compassion. For me, each step becomes its own illumination of our wholeness.
With love and light
Gwen x
