I believe I have achieved enlightenment. Where do I go from here?

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Ah what a fun question. Cuts right to the heart of the idea.

You see we have three directions to go here. Hopefully by the time you finish reading, you’ll see they’re all actually the same direction.

I can answer assuming you have reached enlightenment. I could be flip and say that since you’re enlightened, it shouldn’t matter to you where you go. Feel free to clog up message boards with all the other enlightened dudes for lack of a better purpose, that seems to be the thing to do these days if you’re enlightened.

I can answer assuming you haven’t reached enlightenment. Essentially this revolves around regurgitating dharma information from other sources and interweaving it with my own experience, to hopefully give you a better goal to chase and maybe even accomplish. And perhaps even instill a proper sense of God-fearing respect for what proper enlightenment actually is, if I’m feeling particularly inspired.

I can poke holes in the concept of enlightenment. I stopped framing my own life and experience with the concept a few years ago. The more you really get into it, the less it feels like modern spirituality and the more it feels like the Iron-age mystic superman myth that it really is. The one concept that makes real sense, nonduality, doesn’t actually do anything you’d want it to do, like fix psychological trauma, or actually make you more social. People that are spiritually advanced tend to hold on for dear life to both the ideas that they are spiritually advanced, and that spiritual advancement actually means something.

So I have all the options in the world when it comes to advising you, fresh-faced newly-enlightened padawan, about where to go next. Just as you have your entire newly-enlightened life ahead of you to thrive in and enjoy!