How difficult is it to attain enlightenment?

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What makes enlightenment difficult to attain in America is the fact that there’s very little infrastructure out there other than dharma books of various quality. A few mystics have crossed over to the US, one of the most notable being Osho, but Americans are distrustful of Eastern spiritual gurus and for good reason, this keeps the teachings from spreading.

There is one book that I recommend to anyone looking to become enlightened, Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha. It articulates, in native, untranslated English, to the Western mindset, exactly what mystics in the East have been studying and writing about for centuries.

With this book, you will be prepared to go to meditation retreats and actually be able to accomplish things there. When you get back from the retreats, you’ll be able to keep making progress because you’ll have a greater understanding of the path.

I have been meditating and thinking and experiencing for well over a decade and I’ve never come across anything that lucid.

Meditation should not be hard. The reason people think it’s hard is because descriptions are mired in difficult and often misleading language. It is quite common to mistake a step on the path for the end of the path. Many many teachers even get it very wrong.

If you were to be born in India, and you wanted to be enlightened, you could avail yourself of an entire industry aimed at directing you towards good teachings. But in the US, you are out there all by yourself. That’s what makes it hard. Not because earning the jhanas is hard, it’s not. If you had the right teachings and don’t get lost, you can do it in a couple of months.