Enlightenment Is Not The End of the Path

It's the beginning.

So then the important question becomes, how can we cultivate the ability and readiness to express the beauty, perfection, and wholeness discovered in spiritual revelation?

Andrew Cohen shares his insights in a new article entitled The Evolution of Enlightenment. He describes how his personal understanding, and its expression through his teachings, have evolved from the traditional view of enlightenment to what he terms Evolutionary Enlightenment.
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Some highlights:

"In the traditional Eastern metaphysical perspective, the world isn’t real, it’s only an ephemeral appearance, an illusion, a mere insubstantial, transient dream in the mind of God. I felt differently. To me, the world was certainly real and in fact, was an inherent and all-important dimension of what God always is. For millennia, this question has been the spark of an ongoing metaphysical argument among sages, seers, and philosophers. And it is a significant one.

If the world isn’t real, then nothing needs to be done about the way things are. But if the world is real, then it soon becomes apparent to us that there is real work to be done ... to bring the power of enlightened awareness into the world through rational action, through moral being, and through engaging with the process of time in the most deliberate and creative way."
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"To me it always appeared obvious that the power and significance of that which is Absolute was given validation only through our willingness to stand for and embody its glory as ourselves—through action, through choice, through the way we lived in the world of time and form."
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"To put it simply, enlightenment is evolving. It is no longer found only in the bliss of timeless Being; it is found also in the ecstatic urgency of evolutionary Becoming."
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I suspect many will find these ideas challenging, intriguing or disturbing. Some may think they are just wrong.  For me they are a breath of fresh air, a brilliant light in the darkness. I often have difficulty accepting the traditional teachings, feeling that they demand me to deny my own experience, my own intuition, my own heart, but have become reluctant to express these doubts because so often such heartfelt expressions are met with derision or ridicule.

I appreciate that Cohen has the courage (audacity?) to proclaim that the world is real and that there is real work to be done - in the world of time and form.

This is the best article yet from Andrew Cohen - please CLICK HERE to read it in its entirety.
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Some related RoadKill posts:
Redefining Enlightenment For Our Time
Evolutionary Enlightenment 101
The Endless Thrill of the Possible
Awakening to Deep Time
Time Is All We've Got
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