Andrew Cohen has a magazine with this title. He claimed that he was enlightened but said that he had doubts about it all the time. So his definition of it included having doubts about himself. I am certain that I am not enlightened and have no doubts about it. But I am also certain about what enlightenment is. It is available to practically every person, but it is optional. This article could also be called East Meets West.

In psychology, they have the flow experience. There are a few books on it like, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience (© 1990) by Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (last name pronounced "cheeks sent me high"). Dr. Seligman (former president of American Psychological Association) calls him "one towering figure in the social sciences."

In his book, Authentic Happiness (2003), Dr. Seligman (author of a dozen books on psychology) describes the flow experience like this: "When does time stop for you? When do you find yourself doing exactly what you want to be doing, and never wanting it to end? Is it painting, or making love, or playing volleyball, or talking before a group, or rock climbing, or listening sympathetically to someone else's troubles?"

The back of the book, Flow, says "These investigations have revealed that what makes experience genuinely satisfying is a state of consciousness called flow-- a state of concentration so focused that it amounts to absolute absorption in an activity." Absolute is a powerful word. It is used to describe God. People can experience the flow at different degrees. I would play volleyball for hours and feel it during the whole time but at different degrees. Sometimes for a few minutes I would experience the flow experience to the infinite degree. This is the greatest thing that a human being can feel.

A woman had a near death experience and wrote a book about it. She said that while she was dead she felt something nicer than she ever felt when she was alive. This was her encounter with the flow experience. To feel it to the infinite degree, feels totally perfect. It is common for people to never experience it while alive. Although, the most ancient scriptures known to man say that people feel it while in deep sleep. This flow experience to the infinite degree is at the core of a human being.

During it, time stops. I would have a feeling of eternal peace while feeling it. Eternal is a powerful word, but it was a renowned psychologist whose book describes the flow as absolute. When you feel it, you know that it is the secret of life or the meaning of life. It is supreme. It is being one with the universe. So I would think about how if I could play volleyball all the time, without stopping, for the rest of eternity, then I would be really happy. Of course that is impossible. But it can be felt while doing nothing at all. Millions of people around the world do meditation where they are doing nothing at all, physically.

A Harvard Medical School professor (Herbert Benson, M.D.) has written a classic book on meditation called The Relaxation Response (1975) which is now being taught in many medical schools. This book teaches that the very purpose of technology is to make life easier so that people will experience less stress. But it explains that it is not working since people are now feeling more stress than ever before. So enlightenment is the ultimate state that a human can achieve. An enlightened person is someone who is in the flow experience to the infinite degree all the time. This is enlightenment

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