Attuning to an Enlightened Consciousness

In many spiritual traditions there is an emphasis on attuning to enlightened beings. These can be teachers that you have learned from, or legendary figures from centuries past. Some may even think that attuning to angels or divine entities assist one on the awakening path. If you can benefit from an attunement with an enlightened being, how is it done?  Before we explore this answer, let’s consider the meaning of the words enlightened, attuned and divine. Let us explore what we mean by an ‘awakening path’.

• The word enlightened means, ‘to know or to understand’.  To be enlightened about something means that you know or understand the topic intimately.
• The word attuned means, ‘to be in harmony with, accustomed to, and receptive to’.  When you are attuned to something, you are in harmony with it, accustomed to its ways, and receptive to whatever powers it holds.
• Divine means, ‘from or like God, sacred, excellent, or delightful’. Of all the words we need to understand this is the hardest, as it carries so many other connotations from our past upbringing.  To even understand the word, it is implied that we are able to have some concept of what is ‘like God’, and that is surely beyond our mind’s capability.
• What is an ‘awakening path’? This often depends on who you ask and one’s motivations for following such a path.  For our purposes, let’s consider an ‘awakening path’ to be one which brings us into harmony with all that is.

Before you can even consider attuning to an enlightened or divine being, you have to find one. How can you even recognize one?  If you knew what it meant to be enlightened or divine, you could simply do your best to live from that understanding. Then you would essentially be attuning to your own enlightenment or divinity. Often the first step to benefiting from a relationship with an enlightened being requires that you have already developed some of the qualities in yourself. What are some of these qualities?

Every authentic spiritual tradition usually has a text or body of knowledge that shares the qualities and characteristics of a divine person. This is how we know when someone is a saint, sage or seer. This is how we recognize in others that with which we seek attunement. Some of these qualities are:

1. Sincerity
2. Honesty
3. Love above all else
4. Resolving hate
5. Reconciliation
6. Releasing attachment
7. Possessing nothing
8. Being harmless
9. Surrender

This is just a short list. For an exhaustive list one can study the Bhagavad Gita, The New Testament, or the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali for a few more points of consideration.

By developing the qualities you attribute to a holy or enlightened person, you begin to resonate with their state of consciousness. You begin to tune, or attune, your consciousness to the same frequency. They can then more easily recognize you and you can more readily recognize them, authentically.

You know how this works. Are you not more like your friends than you are like the people you feel you have nothing in common? Are you not more at ease with those with which you feel similar? To say you want to be attuned to a spiritual or enlightened person indicates that you want to be at ease with that with which they represent. By altering your behavior or view of life to match, you are in a better place to understand what an enlightened person has to share.

There is an innate problem most people experience with this phenomena. When they consider attuning to a spiritual person, what they really want is the person to uplift them, to do something for them. Attunement requires moving into a similar harmony, vibration and way of being. For you to truly attune to a living or legendary person, you have to do your part to move, even if just a little, towards embodying what they represent in your own consciousness. In reality, this takes work. It is not a passive experience.

If you feel a strong connection to the idea of the Christ Consciousness, you aim to embody the qualities the Christ lived. If you want to benefit from the blessings of the life of a saint or sage, you try to understand how they lived, and then do your utmost best resonate with that same quality of life. Then you will be in harmony with them. Then you will be attuned, and in time will understand and be enlightened about that which they were enlightened.

Any other approach, born out of neediness or selfish desire to ‘get’ something from them is a waste of time. Life in this body, in this world, is precious. Wasting time on the trivial is not usually a quality of spiritually awake person.

Ask yourself, “who represents a spiritual state I’d love to understand, know or be able to relate to?” Take 10-15 minutes to contemplate the life of the one you want to be attuned to. Really think about the qualities of this person. How did or do they live? How did or do they see this world? Then ask yourself, “what one quality can I sincerely commit to embodying today?” Do this every day.

In time,  you will find that you have, ever so slowly, begun living like the one you admire.  Eventually you will then realize that you are naturally attuned to a clearer state of consciousness. You are more peaceful, clear, and understanding. You may even find that the other qualities this person embodies, which you didn’t even try to cultivate, begin to express naturally in your life. Then you will know true attunement to your teacher, guide or mentor.