Modern Koans – Does Enlightenment Make Us Dysfunctional?

Modern Koans is an ongoing series that recognizes that good questions are often more important then their answers.

The riddles of God are more satisfying than the solutions of man. ― G.K. Chesterton

 

Does Enlightenment Make Us Dysfunctional?

Here’s one of those impossible questions I got the other day.

Question: Does a person who, through a focused meditation practice, attains enlightenment, become a dysfunctional member of society?

My Response: Meditation practice is not the acquisition of some new quality. Enlightenment is our birthright.  It is our nature.  As individuals, if there is any work, it is in undoing our determination to go out and get enlightenment.

So what do you think?  It’s a bit of a chicken and egg problem.  We are told we each have Buddha nature.  Yet we suffer.  If we are born enlightened, what happens?  For those of us who exalt the Buddha’s message of suffering and the cessation of suffering,  how do we explain the fact that, without exception, we all fall into dissatisfaction?  We seem to be both perfect and damaged goods all at the same time?

Perhaps, enlightenment isn’t the goal of our practice. As individuals maybe we can only seek to find the balance between the suffering that comes with surviving and our inherent capacity for liberation.  In that sense, maybe we’re always balancing between being functional and dysfunctional members of society.

What do you think? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below.

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