Welcome to the end of your spiritual search …
If you’re familiar with our website at all, you’ll know that it’s all about the spiritual journey.
Using the archetype of the lone wolf choosing to walk her own path and seeking a true home (hence why our website is called ‘lonerwolf’), we’ve offered innumerable spiritual resources for lost souls and spiritual seekers.
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But there comes a point when the spiritual search ends.
Yes, we continue evolving and changing – that’s the nature of life. But eventually, something within us shifts at the deepest level, and our desire to seek for Oneness, Wholeness, and Enlightenment ceases. Poof! It vanishes. It’s gone. Hey presto!
“Why?” you may ask.
The answer is that, suddenly, we come to realize that all we’ve been seeking is already here.
Our True Nature is always and forever within reach.
It’s as if the veil has been torn from our eyes, the mirror of our minds has become wiped clean, and the doors of perception have been finally opened.
And this, my friend, is the end of the spiritual search. It’s the end of the exhausting seeking, searching, longing, pining, prostrating, and praying for something that is already always here.
It’s the end of identification with the ego or “me,” and the beginning of understanding at the deepest level that we are Life itself playing out in innumerable ways and forms.
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Table of contents
What is My True Nature?
Perhaps a better question is “what isn’t my True Nature?”
There are innumerable names from endless traditions that point to what our True Nature is. It has been called Brahman, Tao, Buddha-nature, Christ Consciousness, Self, Allah, the Absolute, Non-Dual Awareness, the Holy Spirit, Spirit, God, Goddess, Satchitananda, Oneness – just to name a few.
Our True Nature is often described as infinite, boundless, pure, all-pervading, serene, silent, and unconditionally loving. It is the space from which everything arises and returns, and has no beginning or end. We call it the Sacred Wild as it manifests as both form and formlessness, and is ultimately indefinable and unknowable to the mind which tries to limit it through mental constructs. It is the very essence of inner peace and freedom.
Why Enlightenment is a Joke (That isn’t Funny!)
For many people, what drives them to continue their spiritual search is the promise of enlightenment. After we undergo a spiritual awakening, and perhaps a kundalini awakening, and have done a lot of inner work, we’ll eventually be able to earn enlightenment, right?
Well that’s the (unfunny) joke.
Enlightenment is a big juicy carrot dangled in front of the ravenous mind that believes itself to be broken and missing something. In other words, enlightenment is a story created by the ego that feels separate from the Divine. It doesn’t exist.
The frustrating reality is that when we strive to become enlightened, we are perpetuating our suffering and exhausting spiritual search. We believe that the deficient “me” here is going to eventually get to a perfect and ideal “enlightened” future state. It’s a spiritual treadmill.
The more we seek, the more we reinforce the separate self, the ego. The more the ego is reinforced, the more we seek. And so continues the cycle of unhappiness and desperation.
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Can you see how this can be exhausting?
Enlightenment doesn’t exist because there is no “me” to become enlightened.
How can “I” become enlightened when the “I” is just a mental story to begin with – the very story the entire spiritual journey is set out to dismantle!?
The whole point of the spiritual journey isn’t to reinforce this small and separate ego, but to untangle this contracted “me” energy, make space in the mind, and allow us to taste the Truth of Who We Really Are: Our True Nature.
Author and teacher Scott Kiloby puts this another way:
There are many spiritual methods and belief systems that promise future fulfillment, happiness, money or other success. If you look closely, the whole idea that you can gain something from spirituality is based on a false premise, which is that there is a separate “you” that lacks something … As long as you seek enlightenment, enlightenment is unavailable. In seeking, you act from the false concept that you are a separate self that lacks something. It is that very concept that creates the need for a search. Enlightenment is the realization that there is no separate “you” to gain anything personally from life. There is only life and you are THAT. No separation. In that realization, your entire resistance to what is vanishes and the deepest truth of spirituality is revealed.
7 Ways to Awaken to Your True Nature
Firstly, it’s crucial to understand one thing. Awakening to your True Nature, reconnecting with your Soul, however you want to put it, doesn’t happen by ‘your’ doing. It happens by grace. It arrives when it arrives.
This reminds me of the old biblical verse (Eph 2:8) – “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God.”
With that being said, although you can’t control when the shell cracks, when the seed falls, and when the bud blooms, you can create a good atmosphere that encourages this blossoming.
Here are seven ways to awaken to your True Nature:
1. Understand that everything you need is already here
It is here. It is in you, it is in me, it is in all life, both sentient and insentient. It is everywhere. As long as you are searching for it, it cannot be found because you assume that it is someplace else.
– Gangaji
“All the answers are within.” I know this sounds cliche, but there’s a reason why it’s a common saying. Pair this with a gratitude practice, and you’ll be stepping outside of the endless game of seeking, striving, and consuming that is a cornerstone of spiritual materialism. Instead, you will gradually deepen into an appreciation of the beauty of what Is and the wisdom that is always accessible within you.
2. Simplify, purge, and make space
We carry so much clutter in our lives. Any type of mess is a weight on the mind (which causes the mind to become hyperactive). Clutter can be what we externally possess or agree to or, alternatively, what we internally carry. Examples of external clutter may include excessive belongings, too many unnecessary commitments, and disorderly social engagements. Internal clutter can include, for example, unexamined beliefs, ideals, desires, and traumas. I’m not saying that you should sell everything, cut ties with everyone, and go live in a nunnery or monastery. Instead, just try to make as much space as you can in all areas of life. Practice non-attachment. Do this at your own pace with self-love. Making space allows what’s important to grow and flourish.
Psychotherapist Robert Johnson echoes this sentiment, writing,
To ‘create space’ is both to allow realisation of our inherent higher Self to occur, and to allow existence to ‘send’ desired things our way. In this sense ‘creating space’ is a metaphor for Self-realization … When we do not create space, when we are too present in our ego-self and its chronic tensions and mistrust of existence, there is no room inside for creation to occur.
3. Be sincere and committed to a mature spiritual practice
Your spiritual practice won’t “earn” you awakening or self-realization of your True Nature, but it will help to make the garden of your being fertile (if that makes sense). As Bonnie Glass-Coffin Ph.D. and don OscarMiro-Quesada write:
For it is difficult to remain awake to our true nature, even after we have glimpsed it. The ego fights mightily against our enlightenment. That is why spiritual practice is so important.
This is why practices such as meditation, inner work, and soul work are so vital. They help to make internal (and external) space, undo inner knots and contractions, and relax our inner selves. They help us to experience spiritual maturity.
4. Learn to trust your own inner authority
There’s another main reason why we chose the wolf as the symbol of this website (and the spiritual journey). The wolf symbolizes self-sovereignty and trust in one’s own inner authority. Without this trust, it’s too easy to give away our power to limiting belief systems, gurus, teachers, and others who would have us buy into their worldview. Indeed, it’s too easy to go astray when we have no inner fire, no inner sense of our own divine sovereignty.
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Spiritual teacher, Jeff Foster, echoes this, pointing out that eventually, we have no choice but to trust our own inner authority (so better now than later!):
All your preconceived notions of “enlightenment” will shatter into a million pieces; your happy ideas of “spiritual awakening” will not survive this, oh no! You will be forced into a face-to-face encounter with life, without the comfort of Mummy and Daddy, without the shield of belief, without the protection of ego, without the seeming security of fixed reference points. Even your most beloved spiritual gurus and philosophers will no longer be of any use. The raw pleasure and the pain of it, unfiltered, at last! No longer numb, you will be as softly vulnerable as you were in the beginning, before you knew right and wrong, good and bad, God and the devil. At first, this will be terrifying, this total reliance on inner authority, on your gut, on your belly, on your intestines, this absolute openness to experience, this honoring of yourself; but you will learn to trust the path of no path at all, and you will make your nest in the warm bosom of insecurity. And everything will be held in the most profound silence. Oh yes, for sure, there will be heartbreak! Yet there will be joy, too, the likes of which you’ve only ever dreamed about!”
Trusting your inner authority doesn’t mean becoming an egomaniac or denying all help/guidance from outside sources. No. Instead, it means honoring your innate, bone-deep wisdom that is outside of the realm of mind altogether.
5. Be aware of the ego’s tricks, ploys, and scams
There’s no need to demonize the ego, but it is a tricksy fella. It will do all it can to convince us that if only we align our chakras a little bit more, awaken our kundalini, or clear all past karma will we then become enlightened. If that doesn’t make it hard enough, we’ll also have other ego’s confirming these delusions around us – and that’s why practicing spiritual discernment is so crucial. Without being mindful and being able to see clearly through our own delusion (learn more about ‘makyo‘), it’s easy to get trapped in the sticky spider web of cosmic la-la land.
Remember that awakening to our True Nature (what is known as Moksha, Illumination, Enlightenment) is not something “achieved” by the individual self, the me.
6. Explore the nature of the “I”
To awaken to our True Nature we need to be able to distinguish what is actually true to begin with. In other words, we need to actually have direct experience of the transparent/transient nature of the ego and the unchanging presence beneath that.
Perhaps the simplest way to do this is via self-inquiry, or asking the question “Who am I?” This can be done either in meditation or in contemplation. Indian sage Sri Ramana Maharshi popularized this technique which has been adopted and taught in many meditation circles and spiritual fields.
So, who are you? What within you isn’t subject to birth, change, and decay? I’ll leave that to you to discover. :) Feel free to check out the book ‘Who Am I?’ for more guidance.
7. It’s simple
After reading all of this you might be thinking, “geez, this is all so complex.”
Don’t worry. It’s not. But it seems that way!
Our minds have a way of complicating things; creating stories and obstacles that don’t really exist – making a mountain out of a molehill. Believing that we must “earn” our way to freedom.
As spiritual teacher Unmani writes,
After searching for fulfilment or enlightenment for years, to be told that I am already fulfilled and enlightened seems to be too easy. ‘Surely it must be something more, something very spiritual.’ Enlightened people should act a certain way and look a certain way. They should be vegetarian and not smoke or drink. Enlightened people are people who have attained a special spiritual state after years or lifetimes of meditation and self-enquiry. They have dissolved all their karmic knots and opened all their chakras. This shows in their compassion and their aura of unconditional love for mankind … Why would Life be anything but easy? There is just the assumption that it has to be difficult because in the play, when I want to achieve something, it seems that I need to work hard at it. The nature of Life is not difficult. Look at a flower; does it work really hard to be a flower? Does it need to hold the image of ‘flower’ in order to be a flower? What is being pointed to here is simply Life recognising itself. Life being Life. Flower being flower. It’s so easy that it’s already all just happening by itself!
In other words, this is it. You are it. You are already that which you seek. You don’t need to pretend to be something or someone special. What you’re looking for isn’t in a future ideal state. Everything is here already. Why wouldn’t it be?
When we orient ourselves toward this simplicity, we find the truth. We discover a doorway of awakening. We learn that simplicity is truth. We understand that simplicity is clear, pure, and untainted while complexity is of the mind which is convoluted, dramatic, and stressful. The mind believes everything must be a super tricky game. This gives the mind the illusion that it’s “achieving” something special while preoccupying itself. But what you are seeking for is that which you already are, and what you already are can’t be achieved!
So move toward simplicity. And figure out what that means to you.
***
Awakening to your True Nature is both an end and beginning. It’s the end of the spiritual search but the beginning of freedom. And ultimately, that’s all we’re searching for at the end of the day. At the heart of every lone wolf walking the inner quest is the longing to reunite with that which we truly are.
Has this article sparked any new insights or discoveries within you? If so, you’re welcome to share below in the comments. And if you have any other insights or discoveries that you want to share, I’d love to hear them too!
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Definitely not an easy topic… In my opinion, “enlightenment” is the very moment you realize you have to change and start trying to come into contact with your inner self. From then on it’s all on you and within you…
Thank you Matho, it definitely is quite a slippery topic due to its very nebulous nature. An interesting ‘koan’ to your definition of enlightenment would be to ask; if enlightenment is the freedom from the self/ego, who is connecting with who ‘within’? who is there that has to change? If there’s a desire for change, then it can’t be enlightenment, as we’re still enslaved and bounded by desires for the present moment to be different than what it is.
omg… thank you for.. you know?
being so beautiful
so pretty and notty all the time
i think you been following me
lost and found
eeeeeeee
*mwuh*
Thank you lovely :)
Divine timing is in the house <3. Super article! :D Thanks a lot for putting so much effort in this website. I'm so so sooooo grateful <3
Thank you Gaëlle, I love hearing the synchronicities :). We’re grateful to have this website as our very own spiritual path <3
This is on my mind for a while thank you I worked so hard on my path I am tired of it.Finely some rest. Love Maria
It’s often the tension of the search that allows us to experience the nuance and truth that exists at the moment of surrendering into it.
Warm hugs :)
I remember when i realized this, mind blowing! Well said.
Mind-blowing quite literally :), thank you Matt
This is a great article! I forget these things from time to time (anxiety sucks).
Love you guys.
Thank you Peffs. Don’t worry, it’s the nature of the journey to always come back to this central insight. The ego is one big anxiety constraction hahah :)
EXCELLENT ARTICLE. Exactly how I feel. ;)
Thank you Robin, I’m glad you liked it :)
Hello!
I have a kind of a philosophical/intellectual question – I often come across terms like oneness and wholeness, but I am not sure if I am getting any of it right.
So do we, by “oneness”, mean existence itself? Like we are a part of existence itself, we are not some “being” thrown in an empty cold space? As I talked about it with my friends, this state of being, existence, “conscience” is like wi-fi – it is everywhere. We are like some devices using it – it doesn’t come from us, it simply is. And our egos are the things that make us think that we are the sources of our own, special kind of wi-fi?
Or a different analogy, we are like candle flames – but we are all one and the same – we are air. Every flame is just very hot, glowing air. And we think we are some separate “things” (different flames), but all the time, and when we die, we continue being what we were – air.
Like, we are at the same time everything (all of the air/wi-fi), but nothing in particular (eg. the air I just breathed in is still just air / the wi-fi powering the computer you’re reading this on is a radio wave).
So, am I getting this right? Or am I completely off the mark?
I would really appreciate some feedback.
Thank you!
Dear Corvus,
Thank you for your interesting question.
I agree with your description of consciousness being like a tv channel’s signal, and I’d say our brains are like the tv set. It’s not like your brain is creating consciousness, it’s more that it’s receiving the channel. It can tune into all kinds of channels as many of the psychedelic stories people share will illustrate as well as some of the ‘mentally ill.’
This is where it can be tricky to explain these kinds of topics intellectually though as this is something that can only be understood experientially. The mind can brake this all down into neat analogies and concepts, but it’s not quite the experience itself. For example, when the ‘ego’ dissolves or rather, we stop internally identifying with it and our consciousness shifts to Being in the inner stillness, there’s no ‘being’ that can be thrown into ‘a cold empty space’ as you put it. Who will be there to experience that empty space if there’s no ‘being’ (born from the ego)? More so, there’s not really an empty space, there’s just life unfolding as it does now but nobody there to attach itself to some passing thought/concept/feeling/sensation. It’s just all arising and falling in constant flux unbounded by a sense of time or localized sense of self.
I hope that provides some clarity.
As I understand, this is about the “go with the flow”. Accept yourself, recognize your flaws and try to be a better person, while you live a moral life.
However, as I see, the question here is that you always become with the One after you die, no matter what kind of life you lived before (morally right or wrong), or there are consequences? What are these consequences? Are you being judged in/after your earthly life?
I’m asking these questions, because as many as we are, there are as many choices (easy or hard, less- or more meaningful ones) in our lives, and in the end, these choices determine what kind of persons we are.
I think, death is not singular. We may not exist as breathing beings, but this software, the mental…energy remains…for the mind to really die…is enlightenment….and we practice this is life, so that when physical death comes, the mind dies with it…instead of carrying on….
Thanks John for your comment.
Your question seems primarily focused on the morality aspect of the spiritual path. From my own experience on this path, I can tell you that I don’t agree with an externally imposed morality, and neither do many of these traditions. In Buddhism for example, its focus is on ‘right action’, not so much ‘moral action.
The reason being that when you live a life where your more and more aware and more and more present, the right (morally good) decision is evident. The risks of having an externally imposed morality like some religions are that people don’t act in a good way just for the sake of being good, they act in a good way with hopes and promises of rewards in an afterlife. So is the person truly moral or are they just self-interested? That said, having externally imposed rules is the second-best option if we can’t aspire for everyone to be ‘awake’.
But the biggest consequences I’ve found are experienced in this lifetime, there’s no need to worry about afterlife consequences or punishments. If you behave in toxic unvirtuous ways, you attract a lot of suffering into your life through the people who relate to that way of seeing the world and feel you’re a kindred spirit until they decide to act in toxic ways against you. Hence the emphasis of ‘purification’ in so many religions. While behaving honestly and being of a good character makes you more trustworthy, attracts people who feel like they can be open and vulnerable around you, leading to all kinds of joyous connections and opportunities.
Ok, if I understand you correctly, you are saying that, if I do good deeds in my life, I’m going to get good things back, vice versa.
This sounds a bit simple, because in my experience, life is much more complex than that.
I’m giving an example from my current life situation here.
I’m living in a small village, in a family house. I have an old, grumpy, evil and even paranoid neighbour. I got a dog in this May and since then this neighbour of mine is shouting, threatening and cursing me in any vulgar ways possible, because of the dog barking. He wants me to lock the dog up or even get rid of it. He is known to be a dog hater (although he also has a dog, but his dog is kept locked up and it’s intimidated by him), so he is an evil person.
There is no way on earth, that I could make peace with him ever. I never shout back at him, I’m not living loudly (like listening to loud music all day), it’s just this dog of mine he hates from his heart. So this man won’t give me back any good, no matter how hard I try, how good I’m towards him.
This is my experience with my neighbour and there are many similar (but not this dramatic though) people in my life (because of my job, I meet many people, mostly the same ones), and there are good ones too of course, so it’s not just plain black out there.
So there are people who won’t change and won’t give you any good for whatever reason. I have to be happy with the fact that I’m not doing anything bad for him and I don’t have bad intentions towards him, because somewhere I can undertand him, but it’s too much what he is doing.
Thanks John for sharing your example.
I know that behaving with good character in life will attract more sincerely good people and situations, but I don’t claim that it’ll only attract such an outcome. There are genuinely grumpy, bad, mean and even psychopathic people in this world who aren’t open or receptive at all to how you are and are too consumed from within with their own suffering to have enough bandwidth for anyone else. My answer was in relation to your question of morality and afterlife consequences.
If you’re asking about how to handle difficult situations it’s different, for if you can’t change it (unless you decide to leave your home) then what can you do other than accept it? The whole path of being more awake and present forces us to be more responsive in life, that is, be free from that which creates suffering in us. If we can’t change the circumstance, the only thing within our control is full acceptance of it, letting go of our desires for the situation to be otherwise. That’s in essence what is spoken about in the whole ‘non-resistance’ approach to life, to flow with it.
Thank you for your answer. I try to handle such situations in my life as lessons to learn from.
You can also perfectly see (without even knowing my neighbour personally), that he is indeed suffering and this manifests in this form of behaviour.
Anyway, I’m willing to try to make best of this situation, and I’ll also do more frequent introspections, now with more attention, thanks to your guides. :)
Hello Luna and Sol <3!
A really tought-provoking article… thank you so much! It takes me think of two questions I asked on your article "what is Soul (and can it it die, escape or break)?" Just two questions I've been asking to myself for a rather long time…
1) When the soul becomes One with the spirit Now I know it is part of it anyway ;) ),then it doesn’t “die” completly for sure, but somehow it has to disappear to dissolve itself in the All, doesn’t it?
2)Then the soul (or what used to be the soul) experiences a feeling of endless peace, bliss and love… but how can it be, if feelings are actually from the ego?
I hope you can answer me… Thank you so much for thi website I love!
Thank you Lapwing for sharing your thoughts on the article.
Ultimately your questions seem concerned with the mortality aspect of the journey, as in when we die, does our experience continue in some way?
The way I see it, the soul is the unique essence of who you are. Our minds through our egos create stories around this experience. If your soul is the pure state of BEINGNESS, your mind latches on to that experience and turns it into the story “I am being” as a thought, a peripheral interpretation of what is happening.
Seeking our true nature involves turning away from that peripheral ego story, and directly facing our true nature, that is, the BEINGNESS. But this leads to the second question, who is the one who will experience that BEINGNESS if the ego isn’t there when we die?
Nobody. This is where the idea of Zen Buddhism for example of ’emptiness’ comes in. It’s not the same as ‘Nothing’. It just means there’s nobody there to experience the beingness, the beingness arises for its own sake alone and not for the sake of our egos.
Because if you pay close attention, you’ll realize the force that is asking the questions your asking is the ego that is afraid of realizing it’ll disappear, that it won’t existence when it merges back with Spirit. And it wants to find something to cling to, some explanation or story that will allow the idea of the self/ego can continue an experience the Beingness when it merges back/when it dies.
I hope that provides some clarity; it may fulfill your answer, or maybe the ego will seek a new explanation somewhere else. :)
I like the article and your responses Matteo, though ploughing a lone furrow takes it’s toll, All the hedonistic escape routes, such as sex, alcohol, drugs, fanatacism for a cause, etc, act as distractions, and without validation from others, it becomes hard to find connection, meaning and purpose. However, overall, I feel the article is a tad nihilistic, which may be the best way to be, I don’t know. We’re living through confusing external times, so things seem so much more magnified.
I hear your concern. I see it as, a need for rest and refuge, and yet not knowing how and where to find it. I think they are saying that minds go on striving because that is their feature in living bodies, and to be able to open it to impermanence allows it the only rest which can nurture it to go on…
Thank you Charlie for sharing your thoughts. I agree, it’s definitely quite difficult to trod this path alone without the structures/reminders that come from being in a supportive environment. I believe that’s why there’s such an emphasis on ‘Sangha’ and ‘Ashrams’ in the Eastern traditions.
I’m not sure about the nihilism though. Nihilism is defined by extreme pessimism and a radical skepticism that condemns existence. True nihilism would believe in nothing, have no loyalties, and no purpose other than, perhaps, an impulse to destroy. This path focuses on quite the opposite, becoming so open and vulnerable to life, to your true nature, that you allow yourself to feel everything, to feel connection and compassion for everything. To the ego, the idea of shifting your sense of self away from it can be perceived as a ‘death’ though, and often is misunderstood as nihilism as we can’t even imagine what a different center within feels like.