love already understands

it's common knowledge that spiritual aspirants often confuse the quest for enlightenment as a drive to obtain and assimilate new information. spiritual awakening is actually a process of simplification. it involves the removal of obstacles, which take the form of beliefs about reality. information and beliefs are not inherently the enemy, but in the context of awakening they keep us separated from truth because they distract us from direct experience.

once the process of simplification reaches a point where there are no longer enough obstacles to eclipse the light of truth, realization occurs and understanding dawns in a natural way. information that was previously studied and incomprehensible is seen in a new light. from the previous standpoint, it was simply beyond reach, just as one can't see the contours of a forest when immersed within it no matter how hard one tries. the attempt to comprehend enlightenment intellectually is merely a diversionary tactic of the ego.

if one wants to emerge from the forest, one has to start walking up the mountain. it doesn't help to sit there under the trees and wonder about what the view's like from the mountaintop, or to merely read about and discuss others' accounts of that perspective. one simply starts taking steps, and while the view at the top is breathtaking, the steps themselves are just steps; nothing spectacular.