Seeking Enlightenment is Pointless (You Are Already Enlightened)

What Are You Really Looking For?

Have you ever had a thought, a feeling, or even a realization that lasted forever?

Probably not, since everything that has a beginning also has an end.

In meditation, we often seek something more, hoping for a permanent shift. But what if the very act of seeking is keeping us from what’s already here?When we practice any form of spirituality, there is this hope that one day we will have an experience that changes everything forever. Maybe we are even serious meditators, earnest practitioners, and we hope that, because of our good deeds, we will be rewarded with enlightenment someday.

Sure, we read that all these spiritual masters say there is nothing to attain, nothing to gain, but we may secretly think that this is just a strategy to get us to let go.

Or maybe we can feel within ourselves, how awareness contracts whenever we focus on a particular thing.

“Will this give me enlightenment?”

If you’ve meditated enough, you probably know what I’m talking about—the constant grasping, seeking, that seems to interrupt the experience of just pure awareness.

What is it that we are seeking?

If we were to "get something" from our seeking, it would mean that what we got would be relative anyway. It would mean that whatever we get, would have started at a particular point in time. And this would mean that it’s not infinite, but limited. Everything that starts will also come to an end. Anything that appears and wasn’t there before is impermanent. Mentally, we may understand this. And yet, we may still seek. When we meditate, we do it because we want to have a nice feeling, or a realization or whatever. Or maybe we start trying not to seek. Then we seek not to seek, thinking we might get a realization if we do it well enough.

If I were to propose a solution to this now, I would basically say, “Do what I say, and you will get such and such result.”

Just more of the same, right?

Observing the Search Itself

One thing that may help with this dilemma is to be really honest with ourselves.

When we sit in meditation, instead of trying to be perfect meditators, not having thoughts and embodying the Buddha, we may just observe ourselves as we are. 

We may observe how our awareness contracts into seeking something. 

We may observe how we judge ourselves after realizing we are seeking something. 

We may observe how we hear many different voices fighting in our mind, not coming to rest, and becoming more and more hopeless about it all.

Whatever it is that you are observing, recognize it as an impulse that won’t get you what you want.

Everything it could get you would be a relative, impermanent thing; not direct realization of Truth.

Trying to Suppress Delusion Is Delusion Too

Nobody and nothing can give you a direct realization of Truth because you already have it. It’s not something you get, because you already have it and you’ve always had it. This changes our whole approach to meditation.

Instead of looking for something that’s not here right now, we see how pointless this constant seeking and grasping is, and we will let go of it. Maybe only for a tiny second before the seeking comes to life again. Then we may try to grasp this tiny second again, thinking maybe we'll be better at this "letting go," …and we're pulled back into seeking mode again.

But you will observe this, recognize the pattern, become conscious of it, and let it go again.

Another direct method would be to ask yourself, "What is this that's seeking? Who is trying to grasp enlightenment?" It’s not so much about pushing seeking and grasping away, but about observing it with equanimity, not being attached to it.

Zen Master Bankei once said that “trying to suppress delusion is delusion too.”

Since we are already the Buddha, pure Awareness, how can we even be bothered by seeking? It’s only our attachment to it that makes it so difficult. If we were to look at our seeking impulse like a rotten piece of wood on the ground—being okay with it but paying no attention to it—we’d surely not be misled by it.

But if you are attached to it, just be honest to yourself. 

“Ok, I’m attached right now. I want to seek enlightenment or whatever.”

Ok.

That’s how it is just now.

In the next moment, something else will appear, and you'll have already forgotten about it anyway.

Reality just being what it is.

In meditation, we just try to relax into Being. To relax into what’s already here, what was here before seeking, or even after seeking. And not trying to make it into something. Not trying to find an explanation for it all, not trying to gain an understanding or anything of that sort. 

Just becoming aware of all of that, and letting it go.

Wishing you all the best on your path.
Your friend of the way, bye.