I’m not a big fan of the idea that the awakening has to happen at one moment. Because it may looks like it happens to somebody at one moment but before this moment there was a lot of work. Hours, days, years of work. And then something special happens.
Something special can happen to you if you just change you life. If you change your way of living. Of course if you, for example, move to the other city or even country. Or if you just divorced. Or if you give birth. Of course at this moment all your life changes. But we talking about external changes. Something outside of your body changes and it influences on you or it doesn’t. And it cannot be spiritual awakening because spiritual awakening goes from inside of you. From Inside of your body. From inside of your soul. Let’s take a look closer how it happens. Bright example is Buddha. His birth name was Siddhārtha. Siddhārtha Gautama.
In overview his life looks like he did nothing. He was very rich. And he enjoyed his life for first 35 years. And after that he suddenly became an awakened person. And his name Buddha means “awakened”. And here is his real story. When Siddhartha was born a man named Asita predicted he would either become the greatest king of the world or become a supreme religious leader.
And then one time when Siddhārtha was 35. He used to feel some discomfort and he didn’t really love his lifestyle. Once he asked his closest servant Channa to ride across the city. And during the ride Siddhārtha all of a sudden noticed some old man by the side of the road. Siddhārtha said to Channa to stop and asked him what is it? What’s wrong with that man?
And Channa said – It’s just an old man. He lost his hair and his teeth. His skin has wrinkles. And his body is bent because of age. So what’s wrong with him?
Siddhārtha said – will I be an old man?
Channa said – unfortunately everybody’s getting old. And it doesn’t matter you are rich, or poor. It happens to everybody.
Siddhārtha kept silence. He was deeply shocked. It was his first time he saw anility.
Couple of days later Siddhārtha and Channa rode again and Siddhārtha saw a guy lying in the street. He was writhing with pain.
Siddhārtha said to Channa – what is going on to that boy?
Channa said – this guy is ill. He is in pain. Such is life!
And at that moment Siddhārtha realized that illnesses happen to people. And people’s life is very fragile thing.
Later Siddhārtha and Channa were riding somewhere and Siddhārtha saw the last offices of somebody. He saw how the corpse was delivered to some special place where relatives were going to burn the body according to tradition. And Siddhārtha was faced to death. It was his first time he understood the death is unavoidable.
And Siddhārtha asked himself – how a human being can understand the meaning of life? Life that makes people older, has a lot of illnesses and must finish by death. How human beings can be happy and take pleasure living the life?
He lost his peace and began to think about it. And some time later Siddhārtha and Channa were riding when Siddhārtha saw a strolling holy man who was walking in the street. He was dressed in tatters and he had a cup for alms. And Siddhārtha perceived what he had to do. He had to leave his family, richness and power. He had to became the same homeless holy man. He has to commit himself the search for truth. The truth that can bring the disengagement from anility, illness and death.
Siddhārtha said to his father what he was going to do and his father said no and he set more guards on his son castle. So Siddhārtha woke up in the middle of the night. Left his family. He met a hunter who was dressed like a vagabond and offered him to change their clothes. He cut his hair by an axe. Said bye to Channa, gave him a letter to his father. And left the house in the darkness of night. So this is the beginning of the awakening of Buddha. But it didn’t happen to him incidentally. He was getting ready for it.
So what is spiritual awakening? In opposite of “spiritual growth” “spiritual awakening” is the productive term and “spiritual growth” is the process term. Spiritual awakening is the change of quality of mentality. And The spiritual growth is the progressive improvement of quality of mentality. So Spiritual awakening term sounds like result, like something already done. It’s the change of quality of mentality.
And in the meantime. I think everybody had or will have their own Spiritual awakening. Everybody who sets up themselves as spiritual people. And I had my awakening when I was 21. Before that I had special insight about my future. And asked myself – who are you going to be? who you want to be in your life? Because I am a human being. Not a human doing. So who do I want to be? And I told the truth myself. Maybe it was my first time I was telling the truth myself. It sounded like music to me. And it was awakening which means I looked at my life and looked at me from the other side. And what I saw, what I found out was fantastic. It was my awakening. It hadn’t too big scope of awakening as Buddha had but It definitely was the change of my quality of mentality.
And we have to say that Spiritual Awakening is the Iceberg phenomenon. Because it looks like isolated case what we have before and after. But it’s not because there is the big part of it under the water. The hidden part of it. In my context of it may looks like it just new insight and nothing else. But only I know how that could happen and what I had and what I did while I was making it to happen. In the context of Buddha we know he was very cogitative and reasoning all his life. From the story I told we see how reflective he was and it made him who he is till present days. It was 2,500 years ago.
So now we know that Spiritual awakening is the change in quality of mentality. Then Signs of Spiritual Awakening are Signs of the change in quality of mentality. I would say the biggest sign is the continuous work on quality. It maybe anything. From car-drive-thinking to active form of learning. From meditation to reading books. Everything that helps you to improve your quality of mentality. Because Spiritual awakening is the work product, it is output of spiritual growth. In other words you keep growing for some time and then you get you awakening. It sounds very easily and it is. It’s long but it’s breath-taking performance. It’s like scramble up a mountain. You work hard, you may tired but all of it doesn’t matter when you see the extremely beautiful views. It’s the same.
It’s iceberg phenomenon. Because your spiritual growth is the hidden part. And Spiritual Awakening is the visible part. This is the rule of life. Look at any successful sportsman. She or he was works on it for a long time only a coach knows how long. We don’t see it. Because it’s not interesting. Its work. There’s no performance. And the result – the visible part – the winnings – the top of the iceberg what is it? It is success. And Spiritual Awakening is the Spiritual success.
Once again. It may be achieved by a lot of tools. And your spiritual growth. Your progressive improvement of quality is the main sign of your awakening. So what is it in reality? What is Spiritual Awakening? I hope you know that we are, our planet, and our universe all of it consists of vibrations. And simply put Spiritual Awakening is the change of your vibrational frequency. So it’s practically the same. Quality of mentality or vibrational frequency. No matter how you call it. The change of it. Positive change of it is the Spiritual Awakening.
And your progressive improvement of quality of mentality in other words your progressive improvement of your vibrational frequency is the Spiritual Growth. It is steps. And Awakening is result. Awakening actually is upward transition. High quality transition.
And maybe if you have ever speak to somebody who is on the high level of his quality of mentality or who has high vibrations you just can be beside of him and feel it. You can feel something good. Happiness, gladness or something else. And It is also true of places. On the Earth are places where the vibrational frequency is higher then in the other places. Why? Because earlier in this place used to live somebody who had high vibrations. And this place just remember it and since sometime it gives it back. If you feel how strong this place is – it helps you to grow. Honestly speaking I know one of these place. And I go there every summer. This place is in one hour drive from the city where I live. So I just arrive there and just stay for a few hours. Because now in that place is nothing but couple of thousand of years ago there was the city. So it was capital of that area. And a holy man, or a man of God or whatever you call it used to live there. And he had the power. And the land remembers his power. His spirituality. And you can feel it through the time.
3:58
Damie John 