Spiritual awakening is self realization

Maple trees symbolize balance, offering, practical magic, promise, longevity, generosity, and intelligence. One reason behind these meanings is that maple trees have the ability to adapt to many different soil types and climates. The maple syrup produced from these trees was an important food source for Native Americans and has come to represent success and abundance. A specific type of maple tree, the striking Japanese maple, symbolizes grace, great blessing, serenity of the elements, and peaceful retreat. It’s especially beloved because of its beauty and star-shaped leaves. In Japan, this maple tree is sometimes referred to as momiji, which means either “baby’s hands” or “becomes crimson leaves.”

Spiritual awakening is the realization of the non-existence of what you consider to be your “self”. To the self it feels like death, or, one could say, the dissolution of it into something “greater”, which is very difficult to describe. It feels like this something greater has no attributes whatsoever, that’s why you find such amorphous, intangible answers in spirituality. Sometimes this amorphous, unfocalized, intangible “something greater” is called “consciousness”, “awareness”, Spirit, Being and the like.

What is seen much later on the spiritual path is that this “thing” also doesn’t really exist, so one finally and unequivocally realizes himself as himself, just the real one, authentic one, not the fake one, constructed one, which used to be the source of all confusion and suffering. There’s usually a very long period of time during which the person is convinced that the self doesn’t exist at all, and since most people never go past this stage, they can only speak in metaphors and innuendo about what is happening to them. They might even fail to speak in non-spiritual language at all, they may become very preachy in their daily life.

This is entirely normal and it actually does help a lot of people which haven’t made the first realization yet, it pulls them in and helps their self “fall”, so to speak. So even though it may not look like it from the outside of the spiritual communities, such vague and intangible answers can be of great help to the seekers, and so such vague teachers can amass a non-trivial following. There’s nothing wrong with that, they’re just doing their job, or at least what they consider to be their job. Most of them are having lots of fun doing it, also, even though it can be maddening for the seeker to read vague answers to all their questions.

If it’s not your cup of tea, don’t read them! Read something else that makes more sense to you or do some other practices, there are a lot of them: meditation, self-inquiry, radical honesty, non-violent communication, many, many modes and ways of spiritual development, which is also personal development. You can also read it like poetry while focusing on the internal experience it brings. Reading it intellectually while you don’t understand it makes very little sense. Just keep in mind that for one who has completed the journey (one who is enlightened), all those intangible and metaphorical (or even metaphysical!) answers make complete sense.

Because if it doesn’t make sense, then you don’t understand what the other person is telling you about themselves and the awakening experience they are going through and what they are trying to do (help others awaken). And this, in turn, means that you don’t know yourself very well, since all people are fundamentally the same, and the experience of awakening and the spiritual journey which follows it is as accessible to you as it is to any other human. So, if you pursue the spiritual path diligently, sooner or later these answers will begin to make at least some sense, otherwise you aren’t making any progress. And paradoxically, being frustrated about all this is also a part of the path, and a part of the progress.

So what exactly happens when someone is alive? Please no metaphors or intangible answers, what, literally does it feel like to be alive? The “self,’ as you call it, it just an illusion. There is no separate entity you or I can locate, called the “self,” or the “ego,” or the “I/Me.” So nothing happens to it. The false perception/belief that there is a separate “self/me” entity suddenly drops away, or ‘opens up,’ or ‘spreads out of the way,’ revealing true objective Reality, like the clouds spreading apart, revealing the Sun that was always there. Too metaphorical?

Now, you come in from a sunny walk where you saw your shadow everywhere, and look in the mirror or feel your body. The shadow has disappeared, and you realize it was just an illusion. And as you look into the mirror or caress your body, you know what you really are. Too intangible? Or. You have an all-encompassing, permanent perceptual shift where you apperceive directly (not know intellectually) that although there appears to be a real Reality of phenomena rising & falling, there is no entity ‘creating it,’ no ‘time’ in which it’s happening, and no self-contained “you” standing separate from the phenomena as subject-object…and never was. The separate “self” was always an imagined location, the phenomena were just happening without an observer or awareness, and it’s all just spontaneous function with no ‘reason’ or ‘purpose.’

That would probably be considered a pretty precise answer, with no metaphors and minimized intangibilities. And reading it, you now have no more idea or experience of spiritual awakening or enlightenment than you had before reading it. Simply put, the created self dissolves and the true self emerges. An awakening is when spirit awakens in matter. Enlightenment is the revelation of Truth and the remembrance of who you are, beyond who you thought you were. It’s a bit like waking up from a dream. On awakening, you realise the dream was illusory and the character you played was nothing more than a figment of your own imagination. That is exactly what happens!

How that happens, however, is as unique as a piece of popped corn. In the beginning, all kernels look the same but once popped, everything changes. During the intense heat of awakening, your protective skin bursts open and your insides come spilling out - you are quite literally birthed from the inside out. You’re still corn of course, but now you’ve taken on a new unrecognisable shape. Entirely unique. More beautiful. Flower-like. No longer hard, but malleable, soft, light. You are a piece of art. Cheers!