We Can Change The World
by Jim Dreaver

"If a ruler cannot implement a politics of enlightenment, then that ruler
must abandon the throne to pursue enlightenment first."
– Nagarjuna –

There is enormous pain and suffering happening in the world right now. Children being killed and maimed by land mines in Angola and elsewhere; revolutionary wars that slaughter innocents in regions throughout Africa; ongoing turmoil in the Middle East; hatred, fear, and suicide bombings in Sri Lanka; the brutal oppression of women in Afghanistan; human rights abuse in Tibet and China; the violence, poverty, hunger, crime, and injustice in the streets and cities of most countries in the world, including our own United States.

It has always been like this, and it will continue to be like this, until there is a fundamental transformation in the consciousness of humanity, beginning with those who are in positions of leadership and power. There have been, throughout history, enlightened leaders, people who have set the example of what a liberated consciousness can accomplish in the world: Marcus Aurelius, Ashoka, Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr. We need more such leaders. The good news is that the seeds of enlightenment – if not greatness itself – exist within every one of us.

To make a difference in the world then, we – you and I – are charged with the responsibility to wake up fully, to become enlightened, to realize our true spiritual nature, to find, within our own hearts and minds, the peace that passes all understanding. Without such an inner transformation, we ourselves are still driven by the personal conflict – self-doubt, insecurity, greed, and fear – that marks the unawakened, ego-centered mind, and that is the primary cause of all the outer conflict and suffering we human beings experience.

The purpose of this article is to describe exactly what enlightenment is, and what it takes to find it so that we, as concerned human beings, as leaders, can come to true inner fearlessness. Only then can we bring all our gifts and talents to bear in the most focused, creative, and unconditional way possible. This is what is needed if we are to change our world.

What Enlightenment Is And How It Looks In Daily Life

Enlightenment goes by several names: awakening, self-realization, liberation, or, simply, true self-knowing. Whatever we call it, it involves a fundamental shift in the way we see and experience reality. In my book The Way of Harmony , I call this shift the core insight, an idea which has its roots in many wisdom traditions. It is seeing that we are not our story, our personal history. The world we’ve created between our ears that we "think" is who we are, and that gets expressed in the body as tension, stress, and dis-ease, is not who we really are.

The more clearly we see the inner drama for the illusion it is, the more it drops away. Our body relaxes, our mind clears, our heart opens, and we experience the deep inner well-being – mental, emotional, spiritual – that is our true nature. With this profound inner relaxation the edge is taken off any personal suffering or challenge we may be experiencing, and this maximizes the opportunities for healing and change. With this inner serenity, we are no longer attached to results and circumstances, which means we can now throw our creative energy into our work and projects without fear of loss or failure. Imagine how liberating that is!

At the same time, because of our inner clarity, our coming into resonance with the natural rhythm and harmony of creation, we are guided every step of the way on our practical journey through life. We are shown, in other words, from one moment to the next, the action steps we need to take in order to support the healing and transformation of our body, our relationships, our work and life circumstances, and – ultimately – our communities and our world.

How Enlightenment Happens

Enlightenment, as I said, is the result of a shift in perception. It doesn’t come about because of anything we "do," in other words. It is totally the result of transforming the way we see.

This is critical point to understand, because what stops most people from awakening to the truth and beauty of their natural state of being is that they are convinced they have to "do" something. They think they have to change their diets, give up certain habits, alter their circumstances, meditate more, pray differently, join a particular religion, or adopt some new belief or spiritual practice. These things all have value, but none of them is actually needed.

The problem, the barrier to enlightenment, is not what we need to stop doing, or need to do differently, but it is "we" ourselves. It is persisting in believing that we, as psychological and emotional entities, actually exist, that the world inside our heads is actually somehow real, when in fact we have made it all up. The more we look within and contemplate this notion – that the reality between our ears is completely a fiction, a fabrication – the more we see the truth of this. It is an astonishing realization, when we finally come to it, because it is so liberating.

This, then, is the understanding that all awakened people come to. Kalu Rinpoche, a Tibetan master, and a teacher to the Dalai Lama, put it this way: "You live in illusion and the appearance of things… When you understand this, you will see that you are nothing. And being nothing, you are everything." Nisargadatta Maharaj, a sage who lived in Bombay and who attracted many Western seekers, shared the secret of enlightenment with these words: "Wisdom is knowing I am nothing, love is knowing I am everything, and between the two my life moves."

Enlightenment is real. We can have it if we want it, precisely because it is who and what we really are, beneath all our beliefs and ideas about who we are. We just have to want it, that’s the key. Waking up, becoming inwardly free, has to be the central focus our lives, more important than finding the right relationship, making a lot of money, or achieving some other material or worldly goal. We can definitely want and have all these other things, but enlightenment has to be first. It has to be the foundation. It has to be our guiding principle.

This is what it is going to take if we are to change our world. The change must happen within each of us, individually, first. Enlightenment is the only thing that can bring us to true inner freedom, and that is why it matters. Otherwise, we live out of ego and separateness, out of our individual beliefs and stories. We live out of the past, out of fear, and then history just repeats itself over and over again, and the cycle of sorrow and suffering remains unbroken.

© Jim Dreaver, 2000

The material in this article is based on Jim Dreaver’s book, THE WAY OF HARMONY (Avon). Rumi said, "Whoever enters the Way without a guide will take a hundred years to travel a two-day journey." Jim’s own enlightenment journey accelerated after he met Jean Klein, a former physician from Europe and a master of the inner path, in 1984. However, his passion for awakening had its beginnings much earlier, including when he was a young artillery officer serving with New Zealand forces in Vietnam, and personally witnessed the senseless suffering and waste of life there. He now writes, speaks and facilitates workshops and training in the art of enlightened leadership.

Back to Madam X conversation...