Sunday is Message Day on the blog. Monday through Friday we look at contemporary events and day-to-day occurrences at the intersection of Life and the New Spirituality…but on Sunday, we reserve this space for a specific teaching derived from the material in Conversations with God
Through the years I have given hundreds of talks and written scores of articles revolving around this material. Every seven days we will present in this space a transcript or reprint of one of those presentations. We invite you to Copy and Save each one of them, creating a personal a collection of contemporary and uplifting spiritual thought which you may reference at any time. We hope you will find this a constant source of insight and inspiration.

This week’s offering: The second in a series of Sunday pieces taken from the transcript of a talk on the nature of Enlightenment and how to achieve it, before a live audience in Ashland, Oregon in July, 2004.
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So the Master has great compassion. Compassion for the individual and compassion for the world that all of us individuals are creating. The Master knows that such a world, a world of such suffering and pain and lack of happiness and joy, is not necessary. But first, you have to know Who You Are.
Paramahansa Yogananda described himself as being enlightened. That is how he described himself. And, by the way, he was enlightened. He was enlightened because he said he was.
Yes. I hate to break the spell that anyone may be under, but to be enlightened is to say that you are. It is quite as simple as that, and we will talk more about that in just a minute.
People heard Paramahansa Yogananda give his talks and explain his technique for Enlightenment, which involved a process that included, among other things, deep meditation every day. And the process was one that Paramahansa Yogananda taught to his students and his students taught to their students, and their students taught to their students, on and on, until a very large number of people all over the United States, and indeed, around the world, were involved in this Self-Realization Fellowship, which, by the way, continues to function to this day and now has many followers.
If you talk to some of those members of the Self-Realization Fellowship, they will tell you, “This is the way. This is the path. Master has shown us the path. There are many other paths, this is not the only path, and this may not be the best path, but it is the surest path that we know of, and so come and join the Self-Realization Fellowship.” And that is wonderful, because that is their experience, and they are sincerely sharing that.
In even more contemporary times, a fascinating man named Maharishi surfaced a few of decades ago and he announced yet another path to Enlightenment. His path was called Transcendental Meditation or, for short, TM. Maharishi made friends with the Beatles when they were at the height of their popularity, and within a very short period of time became very popular around the world and began teaching far more widely and creating temples and meditation centers all around the globe.
He established huge universities. There is a very large one in Fairfield, Iowa, right now. And there are other learning centers that he has established around the world. And many so-called TM Centers.
Now, I learned Transcendental Meditation and I learned it from other students who learned it from other students who learned it from other students who learned it from other students, who learned it from the Master. And there is some sense of quiet urgency on the part of some of those people in the transcendental meditation movement, because they will tell you that transcendental meditation is a tool that can bring you to Enlightenment in a very short period of time, and they want that for you.
When you have a life-changing technology you naturally want to share it with as many people as you can. And there is nothing wrong with that. That is very exciting and it is very wonderful. But as with sex and as with sugar and as with any good thing, it can throw you out of balance if you are not careful, if you just go overboard with it.
Now there are many other programs as well. Like Maharishi and transcendental meditation, like Paramahansa Yogananda and the Self-Realization Fellowship, like Werner Erhard and the est program. There are many programs. Many approaches, many paths developed by many Masters. There was a book written called Many Lives, Many Masters, by a wonderful man named Brian Weiss, and he talks about the fact that there are many ways to reach the mountaintop. Which way, then, should we recommend? Which way, then, should we encourage others to take?
Or should we simply encourage others to investigate for themselves the many paths that there are, and empower them to know that inside their heart and soul they will pick the path that is just right for them if their intention is pure and if their desire is true?
(Next Sunday – Part III in this series.)