Enlightenment is not a point but a process

Enlightenment is often imagined as a destination, the highest peak of human consciousness, reached after years of meditation, yoga, or spiritual inquiry. Once there, we assume the journey is over. But what if enlightenment is not a point at all, but an unfolding process without a final boundary?

Enlightenment may be described through three profound shifts: silence in the mind, compassion in the heart, and blissful aliveness in the body.  A major neuroimaging meta-analysis found that different forms of meditation engage distinct but overlapping brain systems, including the insula and anterior cingulate cortex, regions involved in bodily awareness, attention, and self-regulation (Fox et al., 2016).

From the perspective of the Soma system, enlightenment does not begin by destroying the self. It begins by building it. The first task of life is to develop a healthy somatic identity: to inhabit the body, develop a coherent sense of self, find our place in the world, and celebrate ordinary life. Some arrive with much of this foundation already established.

Then the direction changes from building ourselves outwardly to discovering ourselves inwardly. Through somatic awareness, interoception, and somatic practices, we encounter the deeper patterns that have shaped identity. This may lead to what Soma describes as a Somatic Crisis: a period in which familiar psychological and bodily structures of identity begin to loosen and dismantle. Neuroscience offers intriguing parallels, although it does not establish the Soma developmental sequence. Meditation research has repeatedly implicated the default mode network (DMN), a system involved in self-referential and internally directed processing.

Research on flow adds another fascinating dimension. Flow is the state in which we become deeply absorbed in an activity: action and awareness merge, self-consciousness diminishes, and the usual sense of time may change. An fMRI study by Ulrich and colleagues found that experimentally induced flow was associated with reduced activity in the medial prefrontal cortex, a region associated with self-referential processing, alongside changes in reward- and attention-related regions (Ulrich et al., 2014). Flow therefore offers an important parallel: as self-referential activity quietens, action can become more immediate, effortless, and alive.

As identification with thoughts and personal narratives loosens, another possibility emerges: what Soma calls the Somatic Self, witnessing awareness accompanied by a body experienced as deeply alive, present and connected with life. Research on awareness provides another intriguing parallel. Josipovic's work suggests altered relationships between neural systems ordinarily associated with internally and externally directed awareness.

Within the Soma framework, the journey continues: individual consciousness opens towards universal life and ultimately the unconditional. But even here there is no full stop. This matters because silence, bliss, witnessing, flow, or unity can easily be mistaken for the destination. We may become attached to an extraordinary state and construct a new identity around being “enlightened.” The paradox is profound: the moment enlightenment becomes an achievement we possess, it becomes another identity. Enlightenment is therefore not something we finally acquire. It is an endless process of becoming free, even from the identity of being enlightened.

Brewer, J. A., Worhunsky, P. D., Gray, J. R., Tang, Y-Y., Weber, J., & Kober, H. (2011). “Meditation experience is associated with differences in default mode network activity and connectivity.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 108(50), 20254–20259. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1112029108.

Fox, K. C. R., Dixon, M. L., Nijeboer, S., et al. (2016). “Functional neuroanatomy of meditation: A review and meta-analysis of 78 functional neuroimaging investigations.” Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 65, 208–228. DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2016.03.021.