awakening,enlightenment??

[atman]

I want to know is kundalini the only way to enlightenment if not is what other paths are out there

[Stookie]

There isn't a single way to enlightenment. Each person has their own unique individual awakening. While one person may have to meditate for hours on end, another climb a mountain, another may just have to sit under a certain tree at a certain time. It's not a goal or a set of procedures, it's a shift in perception. It already exists for everyone, they just don't percieve it.

[CFTraveler]

Plus Kundalini is a side effect, not a path.  Many paths to Kundalini, many paths to enlightenment.  Many paths to enlightnment that do not necessarily activate Kundalini.

[astraluminated]

I think awakening is a bread term but enlightenment is not so much. enlightenment is that the light of you atma comes within you brain and activates the thousend petaled lotus or sahasrara. Sahasrara is also where the Goddes resides according to hindu tradition. Enlightenment of the brain feels like if someone has activated two lights in the two hemispheres of your brain, it is like you brain litterally lits up and you can see this when you have you eyes closed even. and also all the nerves on the top of your head gets activated, almost impossible not to scratch. and then the fountain of pure Kundalini shakti comes down your head. its really cool. I got this when i only practiced Sahaja Yoga for three months.

[MindFreak]

Enlightenment and awakening are two words that describe the same thing. They both refer to "waking up" from the dream world that we all live in created by our minds. And it is a permanent experience, in that once you experience total awakening, you can never go back to your old way of percieving things. One monk described it as a rope breaking that can never be re attached.

[jilola]

I think awakening is a bread term but enlightenment is not so much.

I sort of agree with this. One is instantaneous and often fleeting, the other is permanent.

Broadly speaking enlightenment and awakening are the same but in fact they are two signs of a deeper initiatory experience, namely self realisation.
The difference is in the permanence of the experience and the subsequent understanding.
Both stem from a direct experience of one's true nature, that of the infinite and integral One.
However, the enlightenment tends to be more abrupt and overwhelming while the awakening, in my opinion, is more gradual and persistent.
The bottom line with both is that a level of realising one's true nature has taken place and it's been experienced in one way or another -  neither of the two being an end in and of itself.

Certainly both experiences change a person forever but the expression of that change in the everyday life in the illusion is different.

2cents & L&L
Jouni

[star]

Enlightment is not a very happy thing.  When it finds you, it takes time to live with the change.