In traditional Eastern premodern enlightenment, the ego was an obstacle because as long as one was hypnotized by its endless fears and desires, it was impossible to let go of compulsive identification with the mind and time and experience the bliss of Being. These days, the modern Western counterparts of those traditions, if they see the ego as a problem at all, do so only because it is the source of psychological pain and fear. But what I'm teaching is, dare I say it, a new kind of enlightenment in which the goal is not only an individual attainment but, more importantly, a collective emergence that has tremendous evolutionary significance for us all. And therefore, I say the ego is a problem for a much bigger reason: because the degree to which we are identified with it is the degree to which we inhibit our own potential to consciously participate in the evolutionary process. When the goal is to create a new stage of development in time and through the mind, ego is no longer just a personal psychological problem. It's the one and only obstacle to the emergence of a new and glorious future. The creation of that future is what this teaching is dedicated to.

By: Andrew Cohen 

Inherent in human nature is the quest for certainty and the sense of security that is its reward. So there is always going to be a clash between the evolving self's aspiration for certainty and the necessity to relinquish that need in order to be able to keep moving up to higher stages without ever halting one's vertical development. The authentic self is the expression of the evolutionary imperative itself, within the human heart and mind. It is a perpetual, unending, and always ecstatic impulse in consciousness that strives only to create the future. But in order for the authentic self to function uninhibitedly, the individual has to be willing to continually let go and embrace ever more of the world of form in every moment. It's only a rare individual who actually is going to have the courage, the authenticity of interest, the fearlessness, and the liberated awareness to be able and willing to continually let go in that way and at the same time have his or her own deepest sense of confidence in the nature of being and in life remain absolutely unthreatened. What I am saying is that it's possible to be deeply certain, to have the absolute conviction that is the hallmark of enlightened awareness, together with a profoundly open and vertically aspiring self-sense or evolutionary impulse. At an existential level one can be absolutely convinced and still be vertically reaching, groping, learning, inquiring, and growing eternally.

By: Andrew Cohen 

Spiritually, the enormous challenge for each and every one of us is to look directly into what it actually means to be the one who is going to consciously evolve for the sake of our collective salvation and transformation. From the absolute or nondual perspective that emerges in spiritual revelation, there is only ONE. There literally is no other; there is only one without a second. To truly understand conscious evolution, we have to grapple with the profound implications of that absolute fact. I believe we can only consciously evolve to the degree that we have actually realized at the deepest level of our being that we are that one without a second. Facing into the truth of nonduality—that the many is the one and that the one is ultimately who we always are—in an evolutionary context forces a confrontation with any relationship to the life process that is less than whole, complete, and fully committed. To consciously evolve is to surrender unconditionally to the truth that there is no other and at the same time to accept responsibility for what that means in an evolving universe—a cosmos that is slowly but surely becoming aware of itself through you and me. That one without a second is simultaneously awakening to itself as it develops, as it evolves, and it is that one, as you and me, alone, that can now begin to take responsibility for endeavoring to consciously create its own future.

By: Andrew Cohen 

The intersubjective structures that will hold our future potential don't preexist out there in the ether; they are created by real people. And I feel like a big part of my work has to do with finding out what it actually means to create those structures, consciously, together. I don't know where this is all ultimately leading, but I do know for sure that the stability of the new structures is completely dependent upon the actual level of integrity and authenticity of the individuals who are creating them.

By: Andrew Cohen 

If you’re having trouble with meditation, that means you’re not really doing it. The powerful thing about meditation is its radical simplicity—be still, be at ease, pay attention. That’s the beauty of it—meditation means doing absolutely nothing. And there are only two positions in relationship to that: you either do it or you don’t. But often human beings find this simplicity unbearable. It confronts us with ourselves at the deepest level, and most of us just can’t bear that degree of transparency. But that’s why it’s important to learn how to meditate. It is only in the exquisite simplicity of doing absolutely nothing that you begin to be able to see yourself in ways you ordinarily would never be able to do. If you really engage with this unbearable simplicity, it’s impossible to hide from yourself.

By: Andrew Cohen 

I am endlessly compelled by the notion that higher stages or levels of development do not preexist, that is, they are not “given” but are literally created by brave individuals who actually venture into new, uncharted territory, laying down “grooves” that others follow, which eventually become actual new structures or stages. The fact that the future, even at the most subtle metaphysical levels, literally does not yet exist challenges our most fundamental spiritual/religious notions in every possible way, but if we're ready for it, it can be the source of enormous inspiration and promise. I think potentially what's the most thrilling for the postmodern self is the discovery that we are literally creating the future, which means we are not separate from the creative principle or God-impulse itself—God is evolving as we evolve. And this moment itself, assuming that one is leaning into it with all of one's being, reaching for the future, is potentially the very edge of the possible.

By: Andrew Cohen 

The future is not a given. What's going to happen is not already known and is not predetermined. So often, we tend to hold onto metaphysical worldviews that tell us that the higher levels and stages of development are already laid out. But they're not. This is a new way of thinking: the recognition that the structures of the future are yet to be determined, yet to be created. And they don't create themselves; they are created to the degree to which human beings at the leading edge consciously engage in the evolutionary process. Only those individuals who are way ahead of their time begin to create these new structures or grooves in consciousness, and in time, when others progress through the lower stages, they're going to follow those grooves that have been laid by the evolutionary pioneers who went before them. When enough people take that path, those grooves get deeper and eventually become stages that everybody is going to develop through automatically. So the awakening human at the leading edge today bears a profound responsibility to be an evolutionary pioneer—to be the one who is literally living in that place between the present and the future. There is no one else who can do this for us.

By: Andrew Cohen 

A healthy self-love means we have no compulsion to justify to ourselves or others why we take vacations, why we sleep late, why we buy new shoes, why we spoil ourselves from time to time. We feel comfortable doing things which add quality and beauty to life.

By: Andrew Cohen 

Enlightenment means consciousness beyond ego and evolution means development in time. So Evolutionary Enlightenment means the development in time of consciousness beyond ego.

By: Andrew Cohen 

Real communication is a creative process at the highest level of human potential. When human beings come together for this purpose, something new is literally created in consciousness. Miraculously, the mind of enlightenment itself begins to emerge through the collective and an extraordinary evolutionary potential is revealed.

By: Andrew Cohen 

The expression of enlightenment—whether it is premodern enlightenment or postmodern enlightenment, traditional enlightenment or evolutionary enlightenment—is the expression of that consciousness that is always inherently free from time. In order for your own self, at the level of consciousness, to demonstrate freedom from time and history in a dynamic and significant way, you need to do whatever it takes to accept responsibility for anything and everything that has happened to you as an evolving self in time that could prevent that which transcends time from awakening within you.

By: Andrew Cohen 

The power of absolute love is a raging fire of uncontainable majesty that consumes any and all who come too close to its flames. That fire burns wildly, aware only of itself. That is why the wholehearted and very conscious participation in the entire process of self purification is always such an integral part of spiritual evolution and transformation. Indeed, in most cases, the extraordinary leap that profound surrender always is will not occur free from the corrupting influence of ego unless our conscious participation in our own purification is intense and deeply committed. What is so miraculous, though, is the powerful recognition that that participation in the process of our own transformation is that raging fire of absolute love in action, moving in our own hearts and minds as the desire for Liberation itself.

By: Andrew Cohen