“Waking Up” – What Does It Mean?
By Asha Ishaya
The words "waking up", "enlightenment", and "consciousness" are used so often in meditation or spiritual conversations, yet, they can seem so unreachable to us. For most of our lives, we believe they are experiences just for special people - those chosen by God, not for us.
And when we start to meditate or to follow a spiritual path, it can become such a goal, almost like a competition, that if you are really good at it, you will receive an Award…you will receive a title like you are "Awake". Your Teacher, or the world, will decide that you are "Enlightened", and then you can feel really good about yourself as if you have accomplished your mission in life.
It can become a desire of the ego (or the mind) that is no different from someone's desire to win the Olympics, to be successful in their career, to be the most beautiful person in their community, or to have more likes in social media and tons of followers. If Awakening becomes this kind of goal for you, it will probably be impossible to experience it because your mind will be engaged in the experience, and waking up is pretty much the opposite of the ego’s will.
In my experience, waking up is one of the simplest things in life, and has nothing to do with what I said above. It is also available to everyone, because it is always right here, in front of us, all the time, waiting for our attention, and nothing else.
Anyone on this planet can experience it; they can experience what it means to be alive or awake.
The Simplicity Of Waking Up
I never wanted to wake up. I never wanted to follow a spiritual path. I never wanted to meditate. I never wanted to teach meditation. It just happened in my life by chance, organically…one thing connecting to the other by Life, and I just followed the flow.
In a way, the fact that I never had the goal of waking up helped me a lot actually to understand what it means via my own experience. Because when you treat it as a mission to accomplish, you engage your mind, the part of you that will never experience Enlightenment. The part of you that never understands how to be here and now. The only place you can actually be awake is here and now, and it is never in our minds.
It is hilarious because the part of you that is Awake does not want to be awake. After all, it is already awake.
To wake up is so simple because we already are what we are looking for. It is not about becoming something or someone different. It is dropping who we believe we are, but we are not. We are not our thoughts or concepts, we are not our feelings or emotions, we are not the sensations of the body, we are not our bodies. We are not our minds. We are that which is conscious of it all.
So, What Does It Mean To Wake Up?
It means to be awake from the dream. At this moment, almost all humans are living a dream. They are not present to life. They are following their thoughts.
Life is happening right here and now. But we are not here; we are following an illusion; we are completely identified with our thoughts that exist only in our minds and not in Reality. Life is just in front of us, but we are not seeing it.
"We are present to life, we are present to this moment"
When we are awake, we are present to this moment. We are not following our thoughts. We are present to life, we are present to this moment, the only moment that exists.
When it happens, when we are present, the experience of life is totally different. There is no suffering in the Present Moment. There is fulfilment in the Present Moment. There is contentment in the Present Moment. There is no thought in the present Moment. There is the Presence of God in the Present Moment. There is Unity in the Present moment.
What Is The Relationship Between Meditation And Being Awake?
We close our eyes in meditation every day to be awake to Life. I would never be able to understand – not in my mind, but in my own experience – what it means to be awake if I had not included meditation (in my case, the Bright Path Ishayas' Ascension) in my daily routine, every day…
I discovered life beyond thoughts without any effort, without doing anything, just by closing my eyes (and with the guidance of the Ishaya teachers who were doing it before me) and watching my mind. I actually discovered what it means to be alive.
I actually discovered the meaning of the word “Life”. Only in this precise moment. Only here and now, and nowhere else. And most definitely not in my mind or my thoughts