5.1 What is the process of attaining the final and absolute stage of enlightenment?

The transcendentally awakened mind witnesses this with a serene, tranquil clarity. The analysis of the nature of reality is completed by practice of the transcendental yoga taught in this chapter. Step by step you will learn, from direct intuitive experience, that this and that are now, have always been and will always be, inseparable.

In reaching this stage in your meditations, you have been supported by the profound intuitive conviction that reality is an inherent unity. Step by step, in chapter 4, you came to understand the underlying unity of all things. Now, in chapter 5, you will learn to experience this unity directly.

With the intuitive certainty of the transcendentally awakened mind, you now have the unshakeable conviction that there is a final stage of enlightenment. Know as a certainty that, with a last sustained effort, you will experience directly, in and for yourself, the final and absolute nature of reality. The process of enlightenment is now so advanced that it has become virtually inexorable; it is now only a matter of time and practice, provided you maintain unwavering determination to reach the end of your journey.

Firstly, you will recognise through direct intuitive experience that this is entirely a mental product of that. You will recognise that the world is the materialised and illusorily externalised thought process of the one mind, which alone is. You will learn simultaneously to participate in and transcend this thought process – that is to say, you will learn to participate in, and simultaneously transcend, conditioned existence.

Secondly, you will recognise that there is no difference at all between this and that, except ignorance of the nature of reality. You will understand through experience that this and that are different states of the one, inherent unity. Witnessing this from the real and absolute viewpoint of that, or experiencing this from the relative and illusory individual viewpoint, are simply two sides of the same coin.

Thirdly, you will experience all things as one. This and that are inseparable. ‘You’ and ‘I’ and everything else will be known and experienced in their real and absolute nature as an inseparable, all-embracing and infinitely harmonious unity.

Finally, according to your nature, you will come to the end of your journey. If you are of a religious and devotional inclination, you will become at one with God. If you are of a secular and analytical inclination, you will realise the unconditioned state.

Regardless of whether you are secular or religious by nature, the potential for good, afforded by your journey and your effort, will have been significantly wasted if you regard enlightenment as a prize you have attained for your own benefit. The fully conscious component of reality, the fully enlightened person, is an empty vehicle driven by an unseen hand, a selfless tool devoid of individual volition and dedicated to the enlightenment of all others. At one with reality, motivated by infinite compassion for the suffering of others, act according to your intuition to heal, to help and to enlighten.