Have you ever felt Enlightenment?

I'm talking about reality shattering enlightenment here, normally when people talk about it they sound like what I imagine to be grey haired hippies in army green trench coats.

What im saying is they don't make much sense and arent clear in what they say has had a "profound" effect on them. Of course to "See" this extremely intriguing dimension you'd have to do some pretty back-alley stuff.

So I'm asking you level headed bombers, have you ever been there? And can you describe what the hell everyone else just talks in roundabouts about?

No.

What are talking about? Is that a picture for a game? What dimension?

@ImmortalSaiyan said:

Is that a picture for a game?

It is. I know because I took it.

I felt lighter after I got my hair cut a couple weeks ago. Does that count as being enlightened?

Breaking the stifling chains of religion and realizing I was an Atheist.

Yeah.

Though, I'm sorry to say, but... it's a lot like how grey-haired hippies talk about it. Seriously. It's like talking about a color no one has ever seen before.

To me it is realizing something that just shatters my perspective, and makes it much broader.

Well I'm happy I'm getting my life together so I feel enlightened.

This one time, salvia...

Yeah, I did drugs a few times.

The pic is of a rare Playstation game called LSD it's all about dreams ,is totally random and scary as hell.

Well enlightenment is really just a change in beliefs, where your Idea of the world , self image and all that stuff is changed like born again christians .I think the main reason they sound like "grey haired hippies in army green trench coats" is that they maybe are a little more open minded than you and see the world in a different way than you do ,so what they say sound crazy or weird like what a fundamentalist religion sounds like to an atheist . My experience of enlightenment when I was seriously depressed for many years and then one day realizing all of the negative things I believed about my self were wrong .I was thinking about stuff in my life , then the Idea popped in my head , it made sense to me and my life was changed forever so enlightenment is cool .

@SirPsychoSexy said:

Breaking the stifling chains of Atheism and realizing that God is very real and personal.

And I'm not trying to be funny or rude by altering the quote; that really was the moment of complete clarity.

Yes i have. The problem is the nature of enlightenment as a subjective experience prevents it from being easily passed around by word of mouth.

I think Enlightenment is working Fridays at the gentlemen's club downtown.

You will not find your answers here, I doubt buddhist monks spend their spare time on a video game forum. Im pretty sure anyone else who claims enlightenment doesn´t know what he/she is talking about.

Clarity. You see what things and people really are, as they present themselves to you.

Often, the loss of doubt is misconstrued as enlightenment. Evident in all the religious nutjobs, with wide-open glassy eyes, shut close and unable of true sight.

I would not wish it on my worst enemy.

Enlightenment does not necessarily entail the use of hallucinogens. That said, I have foolishly thought that I realized some profound truths about the world while under the use of certain illegal substances, only to wake up the next day and laugh at how ridiculous and naive I was only a few short hours ago.

I thought this guy had an interesting take on enlightenment:

"Stan Tenen has studied the mathematical structure underlying the sequence of letters in the Hebrew text of Genesis. His research has shown that the geometric patterns fundamental to modern physics were available to us long before physics per se was considered an independent science."

There's always good ol' Terence Mckenna:

The Role Of Psychedelic Plants In Human Evolution

Enjoy.

My guide to enlightenment:

Finding God... again...

This reminds me of the God gene, also, no.

@ImmortalSaiyan said:

Is that a picture for a game?

It is. I know because I took it.

Are we talking some erogenous-cloud shit?

Yes, I was sitting on the ground playing with some sand that was left over after some construction work and I felt enlightened for about 10 seconds.

@mlarrabee said:

@SirPsychoSexy said:

Breaking the stifling chains of religion and realizing I was an Atheist.

And I'm not trying to be funny or rude by altering the quote; that really was the moment of complete clarity.

Yeah, I don't think that's gonna convince him. There's a Devil in his dick for crying out loud!

Anyway, for me I think it was the day I realised that everyone is entitled to their own beliefs and opinions no matter how weird they seem or how strongly I disagree with them. It's always better to nod and say 'yes' repeatedly while looking vaguely disinterested than to argue with someone you barely know about something that you don't really care about one way or the other.

That or the day I discovered the Uni-Vibe.

Yes, I was on the toilet this morning.

I often 'know' the proper equation to solve a problem before I can explain it - not trying to put myself forward like a theoretical mathematician or something. Just, writing excel macros and such. Sometimes I can never explain it. What I did works and I try to alter it and I can't understand what the hell I did. So I think that brief stage of understanding when I come up with the equation is sort of pure enlightenment.

@Elazul said:

@mlarrabee said:

@SirPsychoSexy said:

Breaking the stifling chains of religion and realizing I was an Atheist.

And I'm not trying to be funny or rude by altering the quote; that really was the moment of complete clarity.

Yeah, I don't think that's gonna convince him. There's a Devil in his dick for crying out loud!

Anyway, for me I think it was the day I realised that everyone is entitled to their own beliefs and opinions no matter how weird they seem or how strongly I disagree with them. It's always better to nod and say 'yes' repeatedly while looking vaguely disinterested than to argue with someone you barely know about something that you don't really care about one way or the other.

That or the day I discovered the Uni-Vibe.

I'm not trying to convince him. After years of Agnosticism and Atheism, the day I realized that the God I no longer believed in was still there and hadn't changed a bit was my own moment of "enlightenment." His quote fit my experience exactly in reverse.

The day I realized how small and insignificant my (and the rest of humanity) existence in the universe really is (and what that ultimately means), and not from some depressed loathing of humanity either.

@SirPsychoSexy said:

Breaking the stifling chains of religion and realizing I was an Atheist.

@mlarrabee: Cool, fair enough. It wasn't super clear from your original post that you were referring to your own experience, just that you weren't trying to be rude to the guy who's quote you'd changed.

I was enlightened to the fact that I was wasting my money on pieces of cardboard, so I stopped plaing Magic. Does that count?

I had a really good math teacher in grade 12. Was amazing, the way he stated everything just made total sense, I always struggled with math, barely passing with a 50, even failing one year with a 43. But I came out of his class with a 97. I now know my maths because of him.

I've felt spiritual before, but the time I'd really say I was enlightened was after my second viewing of Up in the Air.

The ending of that movie is just so calming, I couldn't help but feel good inside. It was a really, really, really odd feeling, but it's also the best I've ever felt. I haven't felt this with any movie since, or even after seeing Up in the Air another time.