A reality tunnel is created by the conscious and unconscious selection of perceptions, experiences, concepts and beliefs that create our experience of ourselves, others and reality. Out of billions of possibilities flooding us at every moment, our neurophysiology notices those things that support our beliefs and filters out those that don’t. In psychology, this is known as “confirmation bias.”
A reality tunnel is experienced as true and real by us and therefore is usually mistaken for reality itself. Our life is defined by reality tunnels.
Is there an ultimate truth or reality?
This is a very tricky and dangerous question because as soon as we consider it, we are creating reality tunnels.
And as soon as we ask this question, we begin to discover there many reality tunnels that claim to have the answer. To name a just few, there are science, philosophy, religion, spirituality, linguistics, new age beliefs, etc. There are many teachers available who know these reality tunnels inside and out and are therefore considered enlightened masters within the context of their reality tunnels.
Truth is not a reality tunnel.
What we are is not defined by any reality tunnel, no matter how sophisticated, interesting or profound it may be. And the moment this is pointed out, it immediately creates a new reality tunnel and thus a relative truth.
A truly enlightened teacher knows that the moment they open their mouth they are creating and sustaining reality tunnels and are moving away from truth. In Zen, it is said, "Open mouth, already a mistake."
A truly enlightened teacher does not teach a reality tunnel but wakes us up out of all reality tunnels. This seems impossible, as anything a teacher says or does necessarily creates more reality tunnels. And yet the true teacher awakens great doubt and natural meditation within the student.
If you want to wake up and discover what is actually true, be wary of all teachers teaching systems. It is not that difficult to learn, practice, internalize, actualize and then teach a system and be “enlightened” within the context of that system. But this enlightenment is not true enlightenment. It is reality tunnel enlightenment. You simply meet the reality tunnel’s criteria of enlightenment and bingo! You are the guru.
A true teacher is a completely paradoxical event. They have no agenda. They simply are. They say what they say and do what they do and somehow people awaken around them. They may use reality tunnels as pointers and yet they stand completely free of them. It is this freedom that is so contagious to their students. It is easy to catch. There is no cure for it!
When we discuss enlightenment we are discussing a reality tunnel, not enlightenment. True enlightenment is not knowable and is not an experience. It is prior to all experience, all knowledge, all perception and conception. It is what is before anything is. It is not definable.
If “you” do anything to realize enlightenment, you are just creating another reality tunnel. You create a “you” that wants to be enlightened, and this “you” is just creating more reality tunnels. Trying to get out of reality tunnels is just another reality tunnel. There is nothing “you” can do. And yet…
And yet awareness has a natural capacity to wake up out of reality tunnels simply because it is already awake. This, that is prior to the entire matrix of being, is always awake. This is what you are. Enlightenment only has meaning to the unenlightened because for the enlightened, there are no unenlightened. There is just this.
Silence is the language of truth. Emptiness is the land where it is spoken.
~ Tom Thompson, The Awakened Heart Center for Conscious Living
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