“Enlightenment”

by Dr. Larry Morris

A Zen Master once said, "Enlightenment is an accident; spiritual practice makes you accident prone." Sometimes we question the wisdom of our daily routine practices: we may do spiritual exercises, we may jog; we may meditate or do Tai chi, yoga or zazen or some other form of prayer or some other inner soul-searching, study, or reflection. What's the point, we sometimes ask ourselves? Where is all this routine leading? Am I getting anywhere with all these daily practices? Sometimes our progress, at best, seems minimal. Sometimes we wonder if we're not going in the wrong direction even with all of our spiritual routines. Someone once said that nothing is so impatient as watching our own lack of progress on the spiritual path. But if we persist in our efforts, daily, weekly, monthly, even for years, one day we wake up and realize that we have experienced a profound inner change. Our life, slowly and gradually, has come into a new sense of order and harmony, and we are at peace with ourselves and our world.