Dear Friend,
In Taoism, Enlightenment is the intended natural state of the human, and the processes to become Enlightened are not so bizarre or esoteric that they can not be done by humans.
These two facts lead out of the mysterious black box of religion, to a land where spiritual goals can be understood by and achieved by you.
As you advance spiritually, you will find that one of the great limits to your progress is that you simply run out of juice after making a spiritual gain. In more technical terms, you deplete your available qi.
Despite enlightenment being realistically attainable, it is energetically expensive. That expense is one of the reasons that when you experience an insight, you experience the tremendous clarity of that insight for only a short period before it is lost.
You simply don’t have the energy to maintain the cluster of thoughts.
Let’s look at some of the major questions surrounding this issue.
How can it be that Enlightenment is a natural state, if the cost is too great for you to keep it going?
There are two simple answers to this question.
First, nature has many energetically expensive activities present within it, and present within a single organism. It is not unusual for an activity to be energetically expensive.
The real question is, “If you are intended to be enlightened all the time as part of our natural state, why can’t the state be maintained and not collapse?”
The answer (also the second answer) is simple, “you are not in your natural state.”
Let’s take a look at the child you, which is closer to the natural state:
- You have a large surplus of qi.
- You do things like sleep designed to reduce your energy costs and restore your energy.
- You eat foods that are high energy.
- Your day has large amounts of exercise.
- You are physically rubbed and cared for in a way that tends to circulate qi.
- You are insulated from outside stressors.
How many of these 6 conditions do you meet now as an adult? Are you anywhere near this natural position?
As you can see, if you do not meet these 6 conditions, the rest of your energetic system is nowhere near the state of childhood (which is close enough to hold hands with the human true state). Should it then be a surprise that the Enlightened self, which was built to use the qi that comes from a fully intact and operational qi system, be unable to sustain itself using a poorly functioning qi system?
You can also see one of the reasons why the third sphere, of the 4 Ascendant Sphere Tradition is the Sphere of Qi. Skill in building qi is part of developing the Enlightened, Complete Self.
Warm Regards,
Master Mikel Steenrod
Keeper of the Gate of Man and Heaven
(Lineage Holder of the 4 Ascendant Spheres Purity Adept School of the Tao)