What is Enlightenment and how do you get it?

Enlightenment, from what I have understood from reading and experience, is what lies at the end of this journey. It is the far off light that beckons through the dark forest of our past. It is the thing we want to reach more than anything, but which lies just beyond the things we fear the most. The forest we must cross is the forest of lies, deception, death, illusion, fear, judgement, curses, envy, attachment, debt and delusion. We will all turn back in fear and horror many times from the straight path because it is so hard to face the things we fear. We all get lost that way by giving more meaning to what happens to our bodies than we are meant to.

Recently, I remembered being murdered as a two and a half year old child. It is hard to recall being killed. It is even worse when the one who murdered you was your mother. I wept. I gasped, I felt pain in my throat until I forced myself to realize that I have another body now whose throat has not been cut. I am living another life. I was not murdered. I am still alive. Society demands vengeance for such an act. It demands retribution. The bible says, "A life for a life."

 People think that karma is what others owe us, but even if you believe another owes you something, you will remain trapped on the endless wheel and cycle of owing and debt.  Being attached to that idea only brings you back to those same negative people, that same negative situation. Trying to get revenge or compensation binds you to that person. . An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. A life for a life kills us all. If I kill the woman who was my mother then she may want revenge for her life. She then kills me and owes me a life and so on, forever. We will be stuck trying to get what we believe is owed us by the other life after life again and again, and I can only consider that hell.

So, I have let go of my attachment to my death, to my idea of reparation. I have walked away. I am owned nothing. I owe nothing. In that way, I  begin to detach myself from the illusion of life and death of debt to others and their debt to me. We are all immortal. We are souls on a an endless journey. Our only suffering is when we become too attached to our bodies or our lives and believe we are flesh not soul. That would mean I would still be a helpless two-and -half year old child and one who wants to be that forever. I want to more. I want freedom and choice.

That brings me to the idea of how people raise their children as if they are keeping slaves. They believe these people belong to them instead of the idea that these are beings who have chosen and given their parents the honor of helping them when they are helpless. The Native American culture I was taught allowed children to make mistakes, to be free to decide what they must do with their lives. They taught independence and strength. I am glad that I was introduced to that idea so early by my father. It has allowed me to release my feelings of responsibility and the idea that I can save anyone.

I can only save myself and in that way show others that they can be saved. One must let go of the attachment to the egoistic idea that we are the only ones who can save someone or that others are powerless to save themselves. Others must grow in strength too. They have their own paths to follow and mistakes to make. Each of us is responsible to ourselves only. Each of us must find the strength to go through the forest and find the light. We each must desire to be enlightened. That is the first step  while letting go is one of the last. When we emerge from the forest of our fears and hubris and find that there was someone beside us the whole time striving like us, then we are doubly blessed by the sacred knowledge that none of us is alone.

May your suffering soon bring you Enlightenment,




Candice Raquel Lee
Author of  The Innocent: A Love Story  

and Effed Up: An Abnormal Romance

A tongue-in-cheek look at today's selfish and sex-obsessed  world.

Fairy Tales and Fantasies for Hopeless Romantics 

New sweet and gentle Classic Fairy Tales

Do you Believe in Love? You should because it saved your life.

Do you believe in love? I've discovered a lot of people don’t. They think love either does not really exist or it’s just a synonym for sex. I’m here to tell you it does exist, but it’s hard as hell to get. It’s not easy to love someone. In fact, it is very hard and that is why a lot of people just don’t. People hurt us, and people we love hurt us more.

So, why bother? Because love is the thing that keeps old people holding hands when they walk down the street even though their sexy parts have dried up. Love is what keep babies alive. If babies don’t get love and touches, they die. It's called "failure to thrive." Love is what makes life bearable and livable. 

Love  can hit like lightening. It can strike out of the blue when you are walking down the street. People call that meeting your soul mate. I think it is just one soul recognizing another soul it knows, but that does not mean things will be easy from then on. In fact, that will pretty much guarantee that the shit is going to hit the fan because for some reason the universe test lovers. It tests the hell out of them.

In twenty years of marriage, I have discovered that in order to truly love, you have to forgive. You have to forgive yourself, others, God, your parents. You have to forgive that they do not live up to your high moral standards or any standard of perfection as made up by all of us imperfect people who want everyone else to be perfect.

To fall in love is easy. Most everybody is lovable. Don’t believe me? Look at a baby. Or even think about the novel, movie, and newer mini-series Rosemary’s Baby. Everybody loves babies even if they are Satan’s kid. We all start out lovable. I don’t know what happens later but that cute little baby is still inside all of us.

We all want and need love. We may say we don’t, be we do. How do I know? Because babies will die without touch and holding and affection. It is a basic need whether you grow up into a curmudgeon, scrooge or pessimist. You are alive today because somebody must have loved you.

So, how do you get love? Love. The word is a verb. Love others and they will reflect back love to you. If they don’t, it’s their loss. Some people aren't ready, are too scared, too hurt. But the soul is immortal, so we all have all the time in the world to learn to love and be lovable.

So, how do you keep love? Hold on. Hold on no matter what. And if you can’t, if you have reached your limit with someone you love then let go. As the old saying says, “if you love something let it go. If it returns to you then it is truly yours.” I will warn you they may not come back in this life. They may come back in another or another until the end of time. That is the wonderful and terrible thing about being a soul. You live forever so people can take their time coming back. Good people and bad.

How do you tell the difference between your soul mate and another schmuck? Your soul will tell you. It knows the real from the false. When it is time, you will know. Then hold on like hell because that’s when the universe will try and tear you apart.

“Why?” you ask. Because forever is a long time, and if you can’t hold on for even one life on this earth what chance do you have for an eternity? So, love, open your heart and love and get hurt and grow stronger and forgive. What do you have to lose except all your fears?   

Candice Raquel Lee

Author of "The Innocent" a story about the power of  love.

Author of "Effed Up: Abnormal Romance" about how stupid and funny romance can be.

Spirituality and Shameless Self-Promotion

Bagged, unbagged, or both

Now comes the part where I try to spread the word about my debut novel, The Innocent. Am I the only shy writer? I used to read about famous reclusive authors (Thomas Pynchon or J.D. Salinger anyone?) who hunched over their writing tablet, sweated and tortured themselves over producing the prefect prose, then staggered to a publisher, plunked down the manuscript with a grumble and lurched away back to the darkness of their word-a-torium or labor-wordium, or some such cave-like place where they wrote. Many years later, a small obituary would be written about how, sadly, they were found dead in the gutter like Poe. That was my dream of being a writer as a child.

Now I have to promote myself. Unfortunately, this is completely against my modest, ego-destroying lifestyle. How can you destroy the ego while promoting how great you are? There is the rub! I find myself torn between the greedy little kid in me that wants to be queen of the writing world and the sublime being in me who doesn't give a shit.  All day long I go back and forth: "All bow down to my lyrical sentences and profound sayings, and make me queen of the written word!"; "Oh, please! One day I am going to die. Nobody who ever died wished they had another dollar or sold another book. Fame is nothing. You can't take it with you"; "But money is good to have now"; "Money can't buy you what is important in life!"; and on and on.

So, I have some things to work out karmically. I know I shouldn't care, but I want to give writing a try. I know the world is an illusion and a game, but I want to win this game. Why? Maybe because my mother never loved me or my dad died of AIDS. Or maybe because deep down inside I know I am a good writer.  Perhaps, that is the middle path.