- Understanding Awakening: Awakening refers to a spiritual and mystical state of consciousness that many interpret and experience based on their personal perceptions, genetics, and neurological make-ups. It can occur in various types, depths, and facets resulting in multiple occurrences of awakenings, each with a different flavor or perspective. These awakenings weave together to form a clear understanding of 'Absolute Truth' from various angles.
- Experience of Awakening: The experience of awakening does not involve physical changes. It equates to a significant increase in consciousness or "sobriety." Ordinary individuals operate at a level between zero to three on this "consciousness dial." But this dial can go up to significantly higher levels. Crossing a certain threshold on this dial leads to an intense realization of being "awake." This realization can be chilling due to its outrageous enhancement of consciousness, surpassing human levels of sobriety.
- Misconceptions about Awakening: Awakening does not alter the visual content in one's experiences, and the room and objects remain the same. Misconceptions may arise when its description is vague, leading to misunderstandings filled by various fantasies.
- The Consciousness Dial: Imagine consciousness as a dial that can be adjusted. At a state of deep sleep, the dial is at a very low point. However, it can be adjusted beyond usual human experiences, up to infinite levels. Upon reaching certain extraordinary levels on this dial, you may experience the phenomenon of awakening, which might initially feel surreal and terrifying due to unparalleled consciousness.
- Experience of Awakening: When consciousness is heightened, it's almost like turning a knob that increases one's experience of reality. Even though the physical appearance of everything remains the same, the understanding of everything completely changes, making objects appear new or alien. This awakening isn't a cognitive process but a direct consciousness of things, not necessitating a thinking process.
- Realization of Reality's Luminosity: At a higher level of consciousness, reality becomes crystal clear and highly lucid, like looking at something in a vacuum. Colors are sharper and brighter. What we perceive as matter is recontextualized as luminous consciousness. Physical existences appear more like projections of our mind, taking on the characteristics of a mirage or an illusion, whilst still maintaining their solid nature.
- The Perception of Divinity: With a highly sharpened presence or lucidity comes the realization of divinity or spirituality. The recontextualization of reality reveals that everything is part of a divine spirit, which exists eternally within the mind of God. What was once thought of as experience or a manifestation of biological processes is now seen as the illumination of God's mind.
- Realizing Ourselves as God: With further increase in consciousness and introspection, one realizes they are not only part of God but are God themselves. This involves the comprehension that God is real and is present in the current moment. However, accepting ourselves as God requires breaking through a wall of denial, moving beyond the idea of being a part of God to realizing we are the entirety of God. This realization marks true awakening.
- Awakening to the Entire Universe: The experience of awakening leads to the profound realization that one is the universe realizing itself. This shift in perspective recontextualizes the concept of self, leading to the feeling of being universal or cosmic in scale, beyond the physical and metaphysical.
- Realizing the Cosmic Self: The experience of awakening results in a dissolution of personal scale, fostering the understanding that one's existence is infinite and cosmic. The viewer's perspective shifts from seeing oneself as a small human in a vast universe to becoming the universe itself, relating at a cosmic level.
- Understanding Existence and Transcending Death: With awakening comes a profoundly existential understanding of "I am-ness," realizing one's identity as existence itself, absolute and without an opposite. This understanding leads to a transcendence of the concept of death, either framing it as an imaginary construct or experiencing it as the ego's death or dissolution.
- Comparing Awakening to Dreaming and Dream Breaking: The awakening experience is likened to realizing that life has been a dream and 'breaking' this dream results in grasping that the mind was never contained within the brain, challenging and shattering previous physical perceptions of reality.
- Experiencing Certainty and Obviousness during Awakening: Awakening brings a clarity and certainty so profound that it is deemed obvious, with no doubts remaining. This understanding that one is the entire universe dreaming up their life becomes so crystal clear that it might lead to laughter at the previous doubts.
- Acknowledging a Radical Realization: The realization stemming from awakening is perceived as so radical and divergent from pre-conceived ideas and stories that it shocks the individual. It results in a profound understanding of the divide between the map (pre-conceived notions) and the territory (the real experience).
- Dismissing the Notion of Self: Awakening leads to a startling realization of the non-existence of a finite or a human-self, causing a dismissal of the belief in a human self inside a human body.
- Understanding Nothing and Everything: Upon awakening, one understands 'nothing' not as a lack, but as the entirety of life experience - 'everything'. Subsequently, one realizes that they are 'nothing' and 'everything', culminating in the realization of pure oneness as all boundaries dissolve.
- Critiquing Previous Misunderstanding of Reality: The realization post-awakening allows individuals to identify their previous misconceptions about reality, existence, and the concept of self, inducing astonishment at how wrong they were before this profound understanding. It's the realization of the true divine and astounding nature of existence that was previously unimaginable.
- Sense of Oneness: Viewer may realize that they are one with everything and everyone around them, such as their physical surroundings or people they interact with. They might also become conscious that the past is only imaginary and a construct of the present moment.
- Realization of Infinity: If the viewer delves deeper into their psyche, they might realize that they, as well as the reality of their existence, are infinity. This overwhelming realization brings a deep sense of completeness, satisfaction and a profound sense of peace.
- Struggling to Define Self: The ego mind might try to define or understand what the viewer or God truly is, but will fail as infinity is undefinable and ungraspable. This leaves the viewer with a profound existential mystery and a deep sense of awe and wonder, yet, they are absolutely conscious of this mystery.
- Understanding Perfection and Infinite Beauty: The viewer realizes that they are infinitely beautiful and perfect, which leads to complete self-acceptance and love, melting away all self-judgment and criticism.
- Non-linear Awakening Process: The journey to a "pure awakening" is not a single event but rather a series of smaller awakenings that might take years or even decades of work, integration, and discovery. This process involves understanding and integrating various aspects or "facets" of awakening into one's understanding of reality.
- Highest Levels of Awakening: At the highest levels of consciousness, physical distinctions start to break down and the viewer becomes a perfectly conscious and symmetrical point, containing everything that possibly could be. This state of consciousness goes beyond mere physical experience and is not a product of any natural or mechanical processes.
- Limitations of Understanding Awakening: Awakening cannot be comprehended from a lower level of consciousness, and no amount of thinking, logic, or science can surpass it. Even the understanding we think we have of awakening is far from the truth due to the limitations of language, mind, and our current level of consciousness.
- Importance of Experiencing Awakening: Despite the existential bind of understanding awakening, it is still necessary to strive towards it, even though our current understanding of it may be flawed or incomplete. However, only through experiencing awakening can one truly understand it.
- Understanding awakening: Understanding the concept of awakening requires one to elevate their consciousness beyond their current level. This cannot be achieved through logical thinking, scientific reasoning, or imagining. Instead, one should push beyond these and 'turn the dial' to reach higher, more profound levels of consciousness.
- Awakening goes beyond the ordinary: The video challenges the widespread misconception that awakening is a mundane or ordinary experience. Genuine awakening, in contrast, involves understanding the fundamental nature of oneself, God, and the universe, leaving oneself in awe.
- Misleading teachings about awakening: Leo criticizes teachings that present awakening as simple and ordinary, arguing that this deeply misrepresents the profundity of the experience. Beware of spiritual teachers who downplay the significance of awakening and present it as something easy or straightforward.
- The facets of awakening: Leo makes it clear that there are numerous 'facets' to awakening, some of which are neglected or overlooked in his video. These include elements like 'self-design' - the realization that, as God, you are designing your own universe. A true, full awakening is a deep and comprehensive understanding of everything.
- Recommendations for exploring awakening: To validate and deepen understanding of awakening, Leo recommends reading from his listed books, written by expert teachers and researchers. In addition, he advises against being misled by teachings that oversimplify awakening, cautioning of the traps within the spiritual journey.
- A profound experience: Leo emphasizes the extraordinary nature of awakening. He explains that truly awakened beings can instantly recognize those who are not by their understanding and responses to questions about reality and God. Full awakening, according to Leo, should result in a fundamental shift in one's reality, leaving one amazed and humbled.
- Differentiating pure awakening from mystical visions: Leo distinguishes the profoundness of genuine awakening from experiences of mystical visions such as seeing angels or religious figures. He stresses that seeing these entities does not equate to awakening, which is instead characterized by self-realization and a fundamental shift in consciousness.
- Continuous discoveries: Leo concludes that he is continuously discovering new aspects of awakening and invites viewers to stay tuned for future revelations. He underscores that although he has discussed a significant number of facets, this does not constitute a comprehensive picture of the awakening experience.