Everyday Enlightenment
Welcome!
If you're visiting this page, it's likely you are interested in topics like Meditation, Suffering, Mindfulness, and Enlightenment. Great! This website is all about reducing suffering and increasing mental clarity through meditative practices, but with an emphasis on small micro-meditative tools that can be used throughout the day as part of building up a new way to live life.
Everyday Enlightenment is intended to provide an extremely simple yet comprehensive framework for learning about Enlightenment, coupled with an extensive online toolkit that can be used by anyone, anytime, and eventually every day, all day as an approach to experiencing life.
There are thousands of schools of thought, and so many ways to approach Enlightenment. Everyday Enlightenment is just one resource and isn't intended to be all-inclusive, but it offers an approach that is rare to find. The key concepts that differentiate the approach of Everyday Enlightenment are
- No emphasis on formal meditation.
- Learn to harness pieces of your daily routine as the tools of Enlightenment.
- Use these tools all day, every day.
- As you Awaken, the practices become part of you.
At its root, enlightenment itself is about achieving a dramatic reduction in suffering, and a dramatic increase in mental clarity. Enlightenment can be found every day, all day, in everything around you, and through meditative practices, you can harness the many moments of your day in a way that becomes a path to enlightenment. If this is something you are interested in pursuing, read through this page and see where you can get started.
Getting Started
Depending on your level of experience with topics such as mindfulness, nonduality, impermanence and meditative practices in general, you could approach this site very differently. Look over each of these types of Learners, and see which one matches where you are. Make sure you understand the purpose of this site, including how The Framework works, and then dive in and start browsing through some Exercises to see where you might be able to find some traction in the journey to enlightenment.
For First Timers or Beginners - Learning
There are two types of Beginning Learners, those who have never really heard much about meditation and don't really know what it's about, and those who know something about mediative practices, but haven't really started incorporating those practices into their life. If either of these match where you are, make sure you have a decent foundation in the following topics before diving into the exercises. The internet is full of many amazing resources, and below are a few topics to get started, and once you feel that you understand the basics, take a look at the rest of this page.
- Nonduality - What is the nature of Self and Other? How are they different? Or are they?
- Mindfulness - What are thoughts, emotions, sensations? All are part of experiencing The Now.
- Impermanence - If everything changes and eventually goes away, why are we so attached?
For Intermediate Learners - Training
Training
For Advanced Learners - Masterful
Masterful
The Framework
Everyday Enlightenment is essentially a set of tools (exercises) for developing the Qualities of Enlightenment. In order to conceptualize this development, a very simple framework is available to describe the why and how of these practices. Understanding this framework is useful for exploring and understanding the Exercises, because they are organized and categorized within that framework. However, if you are experienced enough with these types of meditative practices, you can likely dive right into The Exercises.
In order to easily contextualize the concepts of Everyday Enlightenment, and to aide in categorizing the Exercises, a conceptual framework has been made available. This framework is fairly arbitrary, and although it uses a lot of terms, these are just made-up terms to demonstrate the why and how of progressing to enlightenment.
Template:Everyday Enlightenment Framework Chart
The Themes of Enlightenment
Experience The Now
Template:Experience The Now Overview
Embrace The Change
dddd
Unlearn The Self
dddd
The Qualities of Enlightenment
In support of The Themes of Enlightenment, there are four Qualities that we can directly work on. There is not a one-to-one mapping between Qualities and the Themes, but as you can see in the framework chart, there is a strong correlation, as explained more below.
Focus
Pursuit
ddd
Adaptability
ddd
Relation
ddd
The Stages
- each explained
Deluded
d
Learning
d
Training
d
Masterful
d
Enlightened
f
The Exercises
When it all comes down to it, The Exercises are how we progress. They are organized in a number of ways which are designed to help you choose what interests you most and is helping you personally.
Below Here OLD STUFF to reorg
Okur?
The Mission
Why, Where, and When
Why would I want Enlightenment?
Our lives are clouded by delusions that bring unnecessary suffering and confusion. As we learn to rise above those clouds, we find a dramatic reduction in suffering, and a dramatic increase in mental clarity.
Where and when should I look for Enlightenment?
Enlightenment can be found every day, all day, in everything around you. It can be an integral part of your life, and the first step is to start noticing it and embracing it.
What
Template:Enlightenment Overview
How
How do I become Enlightened?
There are thousands of schools of thought, and so many ways to approach Enlightenment. Visit the Resources page if you need help getting started. Everyday Enlightenment is just one resource and isn't intended to be all-inclusive, but it offers an approach that is rare to find.
The key concepts that differentiate the approach of Everyday Enlightenment are
- No emphasis on formal meditation.
- Learn to harness pieces of your daily routine as the tools of Enlightenment.
- Use these tools all day, every day.
- As you Awaken, the practices become part of you.
How: The Tools of Everyday Enlightenment
The entire intention of this site is to encourage you to incorporate these tools into your life, not once or twice, but all day, every day, for the rest of your life.
Visit each of these pages for these exercises, and figure out ways to incorporate them into your daily life. (The full list will also always be found under Exercises){{#categorytree:Exercises|mode=pages|hideroot}}