# Enlightenment > Enlightenment is defined as lightening up and recognizing that you are the dimension of reality rather than an inhabitant within it, which occurs through inclusion rather than escape from physical experience. - Canonical: https://sassani.app/topic/enlightenment # Enlightenment "Enlightenment" in Bashar's teaching is deliberately stripped of its mystique. Across many sessions he returns to the same pun: enlightenment is lightening up — dropping the heaviness with which the personality tends to take itself, its circumstances, and its spiritual progress. The deeper definition he adds is structural rather than ecstatic: enlightenment is the recognition that you are the dimension of reality you previously thought you existed in. The surface teaching (lighten up) and the depth teaching (you are the dimension, not the inhabitant) are the same point seen from two altitudes. ## The shortest definition: lighten up Asked directly "What is enlightenment?", Bashar gives a deliberately plain answer: "Enlightenment, in the most simplest possible way I can state it, is simply the willingness to lighten up." The mechanism is straightforward — lighten up on yourself, your frequency rises, and from that broader perspective you can see that everything is connected and one. To recognize that oneness and apply the recognition in life is the experience most people call enlightenment. He extends the same point to spiritual practice itself. Someone who "overdoes" meditation is like a person so worried about health that they bring on disease: the over-effort encodes the belief that the unwanted state is powerful enough to require that much defense. "Then you will be enlightened. That is all enlightenment really is — lightening up, allowing the balance to exist in a natural way, a natural case, a natural timing." ## The deeper inversion: you are the dimension *A person expands into the room they thought contained them* Behind the lighter formulation sits a structural reversal. The "whole process of enlightenment is discovering that you are actually the dimension of reality itself that you previously thought you existed in." When you stop locating yourself as a thing inside a circumstance and recognize yourself as the dimension in which the circumstance appears, you can regulate your relationship to experience instead of being regulated by it. Asked about the Buddhist and Hindu emphasis on escaping suffering and samsara, Bashar frames this as the central paradox: "The way to rise above the suffering of the physical realm is to totally and holistically embrace it, so that it becomes something within you instead of seeing yourself as something within it." Once the physical is seen as a part of your total being, you stop feeling victimized by it. "The idea of ascension and enlightenment is the recognition that you actually are the dimension of reality that you previously thought you existed in." This is why escape is the wrong direction. You do not transcend the physical by fleeing it; you transcend it by inclusion — by allowing it to be a part of your total being, at which point its apparent power to trap you collapses. ## Expanded awareness, not reduced awareness A useful correction Bashar offers: becoming more enlightened does not mean becoming less aware of the negative. As consciousness expands, it becomes more aware of the negative, not less — because creation contains positive and negative, and a larger awareness includes more of both. The difference is that awareness itself is neutral; a negative possibility only activates when you feed it the energy of fear or worry. You can be aware of a negative without being activated by it. This is consistent with the structural inversion. If you are the dimension, then everything appearing in the dimension is content of you — none of it is intrinsically threatening. You can afford to be aware of it. ## What enlightenment is not Bashar's framing also clarifies what enlightenment is not. It is not the acquisition of a new state you lack; it is the recognition of what is already true. It is not a destination "out there" or beyond the physical; it is a rearrangement of who you take yourself to be in relation to the physical. And it is not a heavy, austere achievement; the heaviness itself is the obstacle. When spiritual seekers take the path with extreme seriousness, that very heaviness signals they have misunderstood — the path is, by Bashar's account, lighter than they are making it. ## Practical implications Lighten up on yourself, literally. The single most consistent instruction is to drop the heaviness — about your progress, your circumstances, your spiritual status. The heaviness is itself the obstacle. Stop trying to escape the physical; include it. The paradox is that transcendence comes from embracing physical reality wholly, so it becomes within you rather than around you. Trying to flee the physical keeps you located inside it as a victim. Don't confuse expanded awareness with negativity activation. As you expand, you will become more aware of both positive and negative; that expanded awareness is neutral. Only feeding negatives fear or worry activates them. Beware of overdone practice. If a spiritual practice carries the undertone of fighting off something powerful, the practice itself is encoding the unwanted belief. Natural timing and balance serve better than overexertion. Prefer the lighter definition when in doubt. When the concept of enlightenment starts feeling heavy or distant, the plain definition — the willingness to lighten up — is the most reliable re-entry point. ## Representative passages Enlightenment, in the most simplest possible way I can state it, is simply the willingness to lighten up. All you have to do is lighten up on yourself, raise your frequency by doing so, and you will have a broader perspective that allows you to see that everything is connected, that everything is one. Fundamentally the ability to recognize everything as one and apply that recognition in your life constitutes the experience most people refer to as enlightenment.— Bashar, Permission Slips (permission-slips#qa-2) The paradox here is that the way to rise above the suffering of the physical realm is to totally and holistically embrace it, so that it becomes something within you instead of seeing yourself as something within it. … The idea of ascension and enlightenment is the recognition that you actually are the dimension of reality that you previously thought you existed in. … the quickest path to enlightenment is to simply lighten up and not be so heavy and take everything quite so serious.— Bashar, All Aboard The Train [2012] (all-aboard-the-train-2012#qa-4) Remember that the whole process of enlightenment is discovering that you are actually the dimension of reality itself that you previously thought you existed in.— Bashar, Lenny Roseprivate (lenny-roseprivate#text) Then you will be enlightened. That is all enlightenment really is — lightening up, allowing the balance to exist in a natural way, a natural case, a natural timing.— Bashar, Orion Lights (orion-lights#text) As you become more expanded, you will become not less aware of the negative, you'll become more aware of the negative, because creation is all positive and negative things. But just becoming aware of them is still a neutral state. They don't get activated until you feed them energy.— Bashar, All Aboard The Train [2012] (all-aboard-the-train-2012#qa-10) ## Related - [Christ Consciousness](https://sassani.app/topic/christ-consciousness) - [Excitement](https://sassani.app/topic/excitement) - [Higher Mind](https://sassani.app/topic/higher-mind) - [Unconditional Love](https://sassani.app/topic/unconditional-love) - [All That Is](https://sassani.app/topic/all-that-is) Markdown twin of https://sassani.app/topic/enlightenment. The HTML page is the source of truth.