I was chatting with a friend of mine whose life goal is to achieve enlightenment, we were talking about some interesting ideas on the subject and some of the more interesting ideas we discussed were destruction of the ego and viewing reality through multiple perspectives at once.

I think its long overdue that we had a discussion about this subject, so what are your thoughts on enlightenment, what it is and how it can be achieved?

I think the closest I ever came was a point when I experienced this strange, otherworld like sensation where I was experiencing the same subject through multiple perspectives at the same time. It was a truly fascinating experience but also very foreign and strange to me, what do you think about this?

Overall I find this subject immensely fascinating, especially the concept of ascending from our own limitations within reality and reaching a higher level of awareness of oneself and the world around us.

The foundation of enlightenment is in establishing ones point of reference in the absolute. Then any experience is just experience.
Those looking for a particular point of reference in an experience to establish themselves in enlightenment will invariably choose to ignore the potential that exists in most experiences of life for a projected type of experience, which is why so many are fascinated and thrilled with the extraordinary altered experiences that are achieved by taking chemicals to alter the mind and senses.

There is a saying: "Before enlightenment, Chop wood carry water, after enlightenment, chop wood carry water."
This saying depicts the reality that the outer experience is not the goal but rather the inner established relationship with the absolute that unites all beliefs and experiences to the knower and the known in the process of knowing.
Enlightenment is not necessarily a goal but a way of living. Often the idea of achieving a goal implies an end, but in reality once one realizes their inherent birthright of freedom of attachments it begins a whole new way of living that expands as you continue to live life from the inner point of reference that is unbounded rather than from the boundaries of beliefs, identifications and attachments to experience and emotions.

In the West the established awareness of the absolute is called praying without ceasing, and in the East it is called Samadhi ,or Satori in Japan which references a 4th sate of consciousness beyond the known three measurable states of consciousness that are sleeping dreaming and waking.

Patanjali (Govinda Yogindra) wrote in his Yoga Sutras about the 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th states of consciousness. Experience and knowledge of the absolute, stabilized permanent awareness of the absolute, Exalted conscious awareness of the absolute in ones experiences of life or the experience of God, and Unity of the absolute in ones self and in every thought, feeling and action.

Very interesting, so enlightenment is then a way of life rather than an achievement - ones reality does not change, but you change?

How does this change occur and what are the things that occur before this change.

Also, what is the absolute?

If you change everything about your inner awareness of yourself, the experience of life changes. It is the same for a child when he or she grows up, he/she is no longer a child and so the world is seen through a different perspective of a changed intellect and appreciation for the world.
Just as the world around ones self is the same from the standpoint of relativity being a child or an adult the experience of a child and an adult is different but the world looks relatively the same from surface appearances.
The difference is more akin to watching a video of someone you know enter a room and actually being in the room as the familiar person enters the room.
We have subtle senses that link us to familiar acquaintance's. In person we experience a cellular communication rather than the limited visual experience when watching a video of something.
As an adult we have developed some differences in relative values and grown in some ways and devolved in innocence or the ability to live in the present moment without preconceived ideas and expectations. Our experience of life is affected by subtle programs of belief and habit.

When one becomes aware of the absolute and begins to give it attention everything about ones experience of life begins to change because one actually gets to experience something more real than temporary realities established in circumstance and belief relative to changing beliefs and hormonal changes that occur within the body.

The absolute is what underlies all of reality. It is the Force in Star Wars, The foundation of God and all action in Religion, and the power that supports all thought feeling and action, the seat of consciousness itself.
It is more than a thing and no thing at all. It cannot be contained nor measured, it is not a thought nor is it an experience tho one can have an experience of it in a reflection of it. It is stillness and silence and it is neither dead nor alive. It is pure potential and no thing can exist without it for it saturates everything that is, was and will be. It is deathless and it is not alive, but it lives and breathes in everything that is and isn't.

The changes that occur in the evolution of inward movement or awareness of the absolute is the cutting of ties to anchors established in relative boundaries that are beliefs and identities of the ego.

The ego is a mechanism that allows consciousness to experience itself. The death of the ego is the death of relative identities and the re-establishing of ones awareness in the immortal Self rather than in the transitory self that is worn like a set of clothes over the soul that is the human experience.
In one sense the ego doesn't really die but rather the awareness steps back from its absorption into the mortal role of birth and death and regains the awareness of multiple lives and multiple realities. Instead of being hypnotized into believing you exist only in one role you awaken to the consciousness that built and designed the stage and its actors. Role playing is traced back to desires long ago and recent which act like wishes that are dropped in a pond of pure potential and have rippled outward into form and experience, and rather than seeing yourself as the object looking into a mirror you experience yourself as the object of reflection that is the mirror of desire and thought.

Free will is the designer of roles and images, it is our own beliefs that create the images but it is the consciousness within all roles that supports the freedom to imagine ones self as whatever one wants to believe in. It is the consciousness that gives life to the roles within time and space and they all exist at the same time in the infinite now. It is only the ego that we identify with that shrouds perception into individual belief and identity within narrow frameworks of time and space.

It sounds like it's everything. You mention 'pure potential' a lot, I like it as a descriptor. Can you elaborate a little more on it?

Are you suggesting reincarnation or are you talking about multiple lives in a metaphorical sense?

What would enlightenment 'look' like in an existence with free will and in an existence where there was the illusion of free will?

Potential exists as everything that is, was and could be in the mind of definition, but if you go beyond definition you can also see everything that is, was and ever will be as the imaginings of thought and desire, and potential as being pure consciousness with the power to create illusions of reality.

If someone invents something we may think that the universe has never seen the new invention before, yet someone had to realize within potential, something that could exist and as a matter of action take potential and bring it into action or being.
Think about it, anything that will ever be invented or conceived has to already exist in potential, as they say if you can imagine it, it already exists. Time and space is a construct to facilitate progression of thought and experience. If the mind is chattering away with incessant or redundant stress related programs it is not a clear mind able to tap into the subtle imaginative potential because it is distracted. And we distract ourselves as a matter of choice. We have free will to self realize, to ask questions and become self aware. We are not ruled by circumstance, we know the mind has influence over our bodies rather than the body having rule over the mind. We sometimes fail to see and experience that mind is not contained within the flesh of the body and that the body does not end at our finger tips or toes.

The enlightened masters have always maintained that one does not have to reinvent the path to enlightenment because it has already been traversed. The only reason people refuse to accept the unknown realities of expanded consciousness is because they are too self absorbed in their own beliefs and ideas about their current conditions and state of mind. Time and space is the medium of transition that is the perception of experience in making choice or no choice at all. We are just as capable of stagnating as we are in creating change and growth. Humans are the only species that can choose to devolve.

If enlightenment could be likened to an invention that exists in potential eventually we as a species will discover what already exists when we find a moment of stillness so that the mind and the awareness can expand beyond the limitations of belief and internal programs related to stress. What it would take then is to shift the awareness to what is more expanded in potential and to leave what isn't serving or expanding behind. This is called in some circles sacrifice, where one sacrifices habit and self serving ideals that don't create universal understanding and unity of mind for something that does. Sacrifice also implies difficulty in change and that relates to the addictive behavior that exists in the attachment to fear and belief that when attempting to abandon addiction heightens fear and doubt, creating suffering or conflict of thoughts, and culminates in stress.
If you absolutely know what is the result of change, and desire it without any distractions then you let what you no longer want go, but if you aren't ready to let it go struggling takes place.

How many smokers want to quit because it makes them sick but won't because they like it?
The current state of mind that creates suffering through the addictions to sensory distractions are similar and so the idea of enlightenment seems like sacrifice. What is being given up isn't seen as worth giving up because people don't experience any benefit from the subject of enlightenment when they don't know what it is or haven't experienced anything greater than their current experience and what they like even if they know its a distraction or it doesn't make them happy.
Drugs are seen as a window to expanded consciousness and I've gotten into some rather heated discussions over the subject of entheogens being the doorway into expanded states of consciousness but they are only altered states of mind created by chemically inducing a physical and mental distraction from the stresses that create the illusions of reality that are labeled the real world, the world of the body and the mind of belief.

Many believe they are born into this world and that will be the only trip they will have. They begin at birth and end in death. Yet some of these same people can believe in an afterlife or a God that lives forever. Tho they don't believe they have within them the potential to exist on their own before and after the physical life, they do believe some supreme master is in charge of their well being after they have performed to a state of satisfaction, to be allowed entrance into an afterlife. Most devout Christians don't believe in reincarnation but the bible speaks of Jesus and John the baptist having known each other in a previous life. In fact it speaks of them switching roles, where Jesus was in a previous incarnation Elisha the student of Elijah, who was in the time of Jesus, John the Baptist the precursor to Jesus' coming. It was in this lifetime that John the Baptist was to prepare the way for Jesus by foretelling of his message of power and purpose and to play the lesser role.
One could look at the time space continuum as the playground for the evolving soul in a function not unlike a school where one progresses through stages of learning to achieve a level of being to become useful to a society of ascended beings. We accept it here in physical life with our children and the identification of being masters of our universe but the ego in its pride often can't imagine anything beyond this life with all of its shortcomings and its limited potentials.

It would seem rather unfortunate for some to be born in poverty and sickness never to realize health and happiness and some to be born into wealth and power and knowing nothing of the other extreme.
It's hard to become truly compassionate without knowing the suffering of another.
In a spiritual world I find it hard to imagine a loving God that would create deliberately a life for one to live that exists in starvation, sickness and death then offer nothing more than the promise of a greater afterlife.
It makes more sense that cause and effect would play a role in the arrangement of living conditions and experiences that are the human role on the planet called earth in the game called evolution.

I find it easy to accept that the consciousness of humanity can wear a lifetime or ego of personality and experience, like we wear a set of clothes. In fact I find it easy to imagine the ability to tap into memories of different lifetimes. Consciousness is not limited by our imagination, we only think we are limited by our imaging of consciousness.

So then enlightenment is a change in perception which causes one to increase their awareness of an indescribable force known as the absolute? This absolute sounds to me like it might be akin to energy.

I agree with you on the roles and images one plays, we all have masks we wear, roles we play in different environmental situations. Perhaps by this, we are not one 'thing', but many?

Also, what do you think about the ideal that everything is connected to each other in one way or another?

About the ego 'death' I wonder if through this you mean that one pushes back conscious awareness of the roles we play in life and instead reaches a higher level of awareness of ones self which is not predicated by the roles that are played within society? I suppose some people might call this the soul?

What do you think the soul 'is'?

And I was also wondering, have you become enlightened Joesus? if so, could you describe the process you went through?

No, Awareness of the absolute begins with inner knowing. By giving the knowing the correct attention one becomes aware of the presence of the absolute and as one gives it attention through the process of focus and dedication such as in meditation, the mind leaves the chatter of habit and belief behind and begins to become aware of things it has not noticed before or ignored. The absolute is all energy and it is energy that has not been measured in terms of energy that fits within scientific boundaries. It is conscious, intelligent and all pervasive.
Increasing awareness of the absolute is not in effect the cause of enlightenment. It is the effect of choice and commitment, enlightenment is the result of intelligent choices, commitment and dedication to a truth that is truth in all things regardless of individual beliefs and ideas of truth that are relative truths.

By wearing masks we pretend, and it is by identification with what we pretend that we often limit ourselves to understanding. The ego very rarely abandons identity and what we pretend to be we often believe at deeper levels of the subconscious.
By removing ones awareness from the identification of the world one begins to merge with it in a more expanded way. One moves with the manifest as it has emerged from ideas and concepts rather than seeing them as absolutes. By standing in the absolute one begins to see the manifest as a projection of ideas or thought maintained by the focus of energy.
Consciousness itself is in all roles. We think of ourselves as being and existing only within the boundaries of the role, and ending when the role has finished, but when standing in the absolute there is no beginning nor an end.

To me it is more than an idea, I experience it as the one true reality.

There is no forcing involved or pushing. Stilling the mind allows a natural process to take place where the mind does not force itself to maintain identification with beliefs and internal programs. It actually takes less energy to move the awareness into the absolute than it does to maintain the thoughts and internal programs of the ego. One begins this process with a tool to take the mind inward to break the habit of forcing the mind into limitations and ideas. There are many experiences that take place during this process of meditation. Experience of stress releasing from the mind and body, exalted experiences of consciousness in both the absolute and the manifest and experiences of awareness witnessing itself in perfect silence or stillness. This consciousness that is witnessed could be called the soul. The Soul is the experience of consciousness as a single point of reference. Rather than thought emanating outward or into more than one reference point at a time consciousness within the soul is experienced as an individual reflection even tho in the experience of union the individual is connected to a whole. It would be like a finger having an experience of being connected to a larger body with a consciousness that has an awareness of itself as a finger rather than being the whole body, yet being attached to the body it shares the thoughts of the body as well.



Patanjali describes in the Yoga Sutras the first stage of enlightenment as being the awareness of the absolute. I recognized that I had known it all my life 13 years ago, but because of it being such a mundane experience due to having trained myself to focus on the outer senses I had ignored it, until coming to recognize its True potential and reality. By beginning to use the tools I was given to take the mind inward I expanded the presence beyond the superficial experiences of it being as if it was nothing at all.
In the past 13 years I have come to gain the living experience of being connected to everything and to witness the manifest emerge from the absolute as well as experiencing it within all things and to experience all things as the absolute.
Experiences vary and there is no one experience that defines enlightenment, It is an ongoing process of expanding the awareness of the absolute into clear perception of it in ones self and all things until the union of matter and energy of the absolute is experienced in everything that is experienced.
In this process intuition is heightened, judgment as was described by the Buddha as the middle way or as Jesus described it "Judgment is not mine but of my Father," This judgment or Intuitive knowing called also the voice of God or the "holy spirit,"divides thought and action into that which expands and contracts the awareness of unity and the absolute, so one becomes more efficient in thought feeling and action or focus.
Because one is connected to everything, what one does with their energy is directed toward expanding not just ones own self but everything and everyone around them.

There is a saying. Consciousness recognizes consciousness. Enlightenment does not have a face and as such is not recognized through relative constructs based on limited reference points created outside of the awareness of the absolute.
There are things that can be measured such as Maslow measured when measuring the coherence between the left and right hemispheres of the brain, but what is happening during the process within the experience of the person being measured is personal, or isolated within consciousness and the soul experience.
Those that share the experience and have gone beyond the need to be recognized as enlightened know what expansion is and also know it is often pointless to try and explain the experiences of expanded states of consciousness because they cannot be validated within the relative measurements of the ego.
One resonates with Truth like a tuning fork that vibrates with the wave of energy that it is tuned to. When one tunes their nervous system to the subtleties of consciousness there are no boundaries and no end to ones abilities or no point of reference greater than the absolute.

I say this knowing full well that the ego often wishes to ask the declared limitless God to prove itself to the relative mind so that it may believe. But it is the very will of the limited mind that holds itself from seeing and experiencing what the free and expanded mind experiences. No power of God can invade the forces that block the infinite from the mind that has determined the universe exists within the boundaries of conditions and ideals that are relative to the ego and free will.
The ego only challenges the absolute to maintain its security in belief and limitation knowing that nothing can be taken from it, if it has no desire to give anything it sees and believes it knows is real.
It is never the ego that asks for help or surrenders itself to more than what it experiences in identity. It is not the ego that guides one to the experience of enlightenment.

So in a round about way I can't give you a definitive answer to that last question, because any answer I would give to identify enlightenment would be without relative measure. And for each the experience of the path is unique. There may be similarities in the struggle between the ego and the expanded voice that is constantly speaking to the limitless properties of being, but if I was to say what I experienced is a definition to the reality of experiencing enlightenment I would be doing you and everyone else a disservice.

Many like to describe their experience and demand recognition for their enlightened status but I wouldn't pay too much attention to those types of personalities if I was you.

So then, in order for a person to become enlightened, they experience this progression into knowing the absolute in a unique way - special to them, right?

In some ways then, I assume it is something that a person cannot teach - but must learn through looking inwardly?

What does inner knowing mean exactly? Is this about looking inward into one's self and temporarily cutting off outside distractions?

What you said about the masks is very interesting. I take it that you mean by pretending to be the roles we play, we limit ourselves in what we can understand - because of the roles themselves.

Like if we played the role of someone who was not good in biology, we would be limited in the understanding of biology because the role we play refuses to allow us to develop a deep understanding of it. Then it is by casting off the masks we wear that enables oneself to achieve, learn and understand more than could be ever be achieved through a mask.

That to me, is a very profound and fascinating idea.

So to me it sounds like you use meditation in order to remove the masks that we wear and then from the removal of those masks one is now able to reach a higher level of understanding - because the old, limiting beliefs have now been removed?

If I understand this correctly, enlightenment is not an event - one does not wake up and become enlightened but rather enlightenment is a way of living, a way of seeing, a way of being.

I think I get why you cannot answer the question about if you are enlightened. Since measuring things limits them and defines them, measuring enlightenment causes you to limit the potential of enlightenment and of yourself. Just like how by wearing masks we limit ourselves in what we can achieve - so too is it that by labeling enlightenment and giving it definition, we remove the very existence of enlightenment which is to remove all limits and become aware of the unlimited absolute.

Also I have for a long time thought about that everything is connected and how they are all in a rhythmic harmony with each other, does the ideal of the absolute mean that everything is connected to it and through the awareness of the absolute do we heighten our awareness of everything in the universe?

Certain choices allow one to expand their knowledge and awareness of reality and the experience of reality as it is influenced by knowledge. Some knowledge is relative to belief which can also be attached to emotions which can influence experiences to be more subjective than objective.
In the case of the Milgram experiment or other documented issues where people compromise what they know to be morally right,unconscious choice will allow fear to take them further down into thoughts and actions that will add to the emotional stress in their lives.
This would be an example of unconscious choices that do not expand ones sense of appreciation and sense of self. Unless you allow contrast to be the relative factor to realizing the value of choice and understanding in how to make value judgments, such choices and their experiences have less value than those which automatically expand the intellect and awareness permanently.
This is in fact an example of growth in experience and enlightenment. Enlightenment by definition is to know and experience, what was not known before. In spirituality it is to know the foundation of reality and to understand how reality unfolds according to definitions and beliefs created through intention, as well as how we are interconnected above and beyond the physical differences seen and experienced through the layers of belief (more or less).

Cause and effect in experience is influenced by desire which comes from the heart but is often clouded by the layers of ego identification and beliefs in what brings relief from suffering or happiness in the face of sadness. The heart leads to union and unconditional Joy and freedom while the ego divides, isolates, categorizes and projects fear of reoccurring past emotional trauma.
For the individual (the isolated experience of personality) the unique way we choose to recognize ourselves in/on the universal stage is all about free will and choice. Our internal programs are unique to the choices we make in what we make real, or accept in relationship to our nervous system which is a mechanism that is similar to each others but different in the way we load it with thoughts and ideas.
You can put several people in a movie theater and show the same picture and not everyone will sit with the same container of popcorn, taste their popcorn the same or even pay attention to the movie and absorb or appreciate the movie the same way. This is a result of free will and the choices we have to think as we will about ourselves and our environment.
Similarly because the absolute underlying all relative experiences is in itself more than can be contained in an experience any individual experience of it is going to be subjective as well as objective.


If one understands the complexity of the ego and its habit of returning experience to the boxes that are created in individual experience and identification one could fully appreciate the term enlightened ego.
The ego can and will make its own determination of its experience and status of enlightenment in its relationship to itself. However the ego also continues to relate to the absolute as being separate from it, in the way it experiences it and describes it. It also has the experience of being separate from others, seeing itself as a victim to circumstance and accepts its suffering in relationship to the cause and effect of others rather than itself as being the cause of suffering.
As such it is not the ego that leads the awareness to the absolute and expansion of consciousness. The ego is a construct isolated to limited identification and boundaries, it cannot project a big enough infinity to lead one to infinity.
It is the heart that knows what is above and beyond conditioning and is always speaking to the reality of Truth above and beyond all relative truths. Not the physical heart but the Soul/Self heart.

Sometimes we say the heart knows no boundaries and we can experience a pull that draws us to do something that makes no logical sense, yet we do it knowing we must regardless of ego and its boundaries of sensibility. This pull is directed to greater sensibility that is willing to surrender the past to the present and a presence that is seen as more powerful than any belief or condition. That would be the absolute Self. We sometimes move toward it without conscious awareness of it.
This can take a very long time if the process is through random happenings and mixed intervention of the ego and its relative boundaries. Most won't deny the ego and its beliefs because it sees limitation and belief as a very real condition that exists in the world and everything associated with it.
If one could surrender themselves to the wisdom of another who has themselves stabilized the awareness of the absolute and recognizes the tricks of the ego the process can take a dramatic turn and be shortened considerably.
This kind of Teacher does not teach enlightenment but can lead another by helping them recognize the difference between ego self and the absolute self. It is then that choices are refined to draw the attention to something greater than boundaries and beliefs and the ability to witness expansion and contraction that results from choice.
Traditionally, religion teaches relative values based on understanding of the principles of that particular religion. The Tradition of enlightenment is that the Teacher leads one to their own experience but does not exclude certain realities that exist at different levels of conscious experience. Natural laws such as cause and effect of choice and the energetics that support choice that is an intelligent supportive force within the universe.

There is a lot of information regarding the expansion of consciousness. Thousands of books have been written and the ones that stand out in the process of ones growth vary from individual to individual.
Modern day gurus such as Ekhart Tolle or Gangaji, or the late Maharishi Mahesh Yogi lead from their own experience of expanded consciousness and appeal to the different flavors of individual experience.
Over 90% of the population of the world believes in a God of some sort, and it is not necessarily the same God they believe in, in fact some don't have any idea what God is but they believe there is some sort of force in the universe that is directly related to life in the universe as we experience it. This belief comes through the filters of the ego but is not necessarily because of the ego, it is inspired by a deeper connection that exists in the foundation of life on all levels.

The reality is that if we knew what it was like to be without the ego we would be able to make simple choices to abandon it. The ego however, as long as it is intact with its ideals and beliefs, interprets scripture and enlightenment as idealistic to ones own identification with relative happiness and its limitations and boundaries, even its concepts of being unbounded or ego-less.

Meditation is removing ones self from outside distractions, taking the mind and body without any influences such as mind altering drugs into self reflection.
Inner knowing is refined intuition, expanded sense of hearing that goes beyond the noises that are mechanical and physical.


When we become absorbed in any role we lose objectivity.


Value systems initiated from lack of self worth is probably the greatest evil that exists within the human psyche. But fortunately beliefs change and choices can initiate changes that expand rather than contract our sense of self and the ability to overcome limitations.


By removing stress from the nervous system it is enhanced, or returned to its fresh and original state of innocence and with the expansion of intellect what has been learned in the past can be used to enhance life rather than to weigh it down. The mind and body become more efficient.
However this doesn't happen overnight, it takes diligence and commitment.

The Upanishads state a formula for expanding consciousness, and the mind and body:
1. Read scripture, or words transcribed from those who have traversed the pathway from limitation and belief to expanded conscious awareness.
2. Prayer, or meditation, as an effective way to still the mind and body so that one can let the boundaries of the outer senses fade and expand the inner senses above and beyond the limitations of mortal moral conditioning.
3. Surround yourself with enlightened company, or make yourself available to reflection. The things you cannot see in yourself out of your own habit to come from subjective conditioning others can see because they are not attached to your beliefs and ideas. Through the interaction of communication and reflection what is hidden is exposed and understood so that choices can be made to rise above them and let them go.

This last one takes a great deal of humility and it is something the pride of ego can never surrender to. In fact the ego will fight to claim its own ability to self realize in its independence of being without any help whatsoever.


Correct. All too often because of the addiction to experience we worship some event and then base the following experiences and values around the event. Life is meant to continue beyond such events and expand continuously. It would be ridiculous to think that nothing can be expanded upon, especially our own experience of an unlimited or unbounded self. How ludicrous would it be to believe you have contained the infinite in an experience or a belief?


This is good, you are understanding the meaning of God saying to moses "I am becoming." God is transition from thought to manifestation and it is intelligent and free from absolute definition and mortal boundaries.
This is just as much a scientific reality as it is often thought to be a religious belief.


Experiencing the absolute is the first step in experiencing it or recognizing it in everything and having the experience of how connected everything is, rather than just thinking about it.
Having a feeling that it is real is often subject to doubts and beliefs but after having the experience of it and knowing it there is no doubt.

We can look into a mirror and see our face change and even change how we feel about ourselves when we look at ourselves but we always know we are looking at ourselves regardless of the change in appearances.
We even experience that what is inside of us does not change as the appearance and feeling changes
Similarly when we come to know ourselves through the absolute we experience life as we know it as the reflection of ourselves regardless of the emotional and physical changes we experience. Looking into it reveals the True reflection of ourselves.

Enlightened = seeing things as they are, spontaneously perceive true nature of phenomena without obstacle.

Enlightenment has 2 connotations:
1. total removal of negative aspects of the mind
2. total development of positive aspects of the mind

The first point is necessary condition for being englightened. When the second point achieved, it is also called great enlightenment.

The first connotation is an illusion. Everything that is of mind is part and parcel to potential.
The second part is an illusion. Everything that is of mind is of God/absolute potential and only the ego seeks to qualify God as good or bad.

In the pursuit of happiness or the pursuit of enlightenment an enlightened person gives advice according to his or her level of experience in achieving liberation from the cycles of self persecution and suffering. The student not knowing what it is like listens to the teacher and through the filters of habit and misunderstanding moves toward ideas based on limited knowledge.
Unless one makes themselves available to a Teacher to surrender their own ideas about what is being said so the Teacher can guide the student toward reality the student makes his or her own decisions about what enlightenment is.

In the case of the first and second connotation these statements are limited statements of truth. They are true to a degree but not true in totality. If the student takes these ideas and makes them a goal without greater awareness and understanding, enlightenment will be like a brass ring on a merry go round. Often the idea is I have achieved something or gained something and initiated a trap or an idea of success.

In truth there is nothing to get rid of in the pursuit of enlightenment but everything to gain in realizing what everything is beyond the duality of good and bad, the need to get rid of, and to get.
One neither leaves anything that is an illusion behind nor gains something that they already have.