### I. Core Purpose and Theme "The Leap: The Psychology of Spiritual Awakening" aims to clarify the concept of "wakefulness" or "spiritual awakening," dispelling much of the confusion surrounding it due to varied interpretations across different teachers and traditions. Taylor's goal is to clearly identify the characteristics of wakefulness and establish what it means to live in this state, presenting it as a psychological and ontological state that can exist outside traditional spiritual or religious contexts. The book approaches wakefulness not as an extraordinary or otherworldly phenomenon, but as a natural and normal state. It is also framed as an "evolutionary leap," representing the next phase of human development, with a direction and purpose behind it: the growth of consciousness. ### II. Key Terminology - **Wakefulness / Awakening:** These terms are preferred over "enlightenment" by Taylor, as "bodhi" (the original Buddhist term) literally means "to awaken". Wakefulness is described as a "higher-functioning state," "state of expanded being," or "state of optimum being". It is primarily a state of being, often occurring outside spiritual or religious traditions. - **Self-System:** This term is largely equivalent to "mind" and encompasses everything that creates and constitutes an individual's perceived identity, including memories, beliefs, concepts, attitudes, and psychological attachments, as well as functions like concentration, information processing, and cognition. Awakening involves a shift from the normal self-system to a "wakeful self-system" that is more subtle and labile. ### III. Forms and Paths of Awakening Taylor suggests there are three main ways wakefulness can occur, though he notes no hard and fast divisions: 1. **Natural Wakefulness:** A small number of people are seemingly born awake, where this state is their normal condition and unfolds naturally without special effort or specific transformative events. Taylor himself describes his own experience as an innate spiritual sensibility present "for as long as I can remember," with his spiritual development focused on understanding and expressing this part of himself. 2. **Gradual Awakening:** This occurs incrementally over a long period, usually through conscious spiritual practices, adherence to a spiritual path, or living a spiritual lifestyle. It can also happen involuntarily through a long process of loss or failure. - **Spiritual Practices:** Meditation is considered the "sine qua non" (essential aspect) of every path of awakening, from Buddhism and Yoga to Daoism, Sufism, and Kabbalah. Its main long-term effect is to gradually shift the psyche from a state of sleep to wakefulness. Other practices include self-discipline, renunciation, prayer, solitude, and quiet. - **Involuntary Gradual Awakening:** This is exemplified by individuals forced to let go of attachments due to professional failure or the end of a marriage, which can initiate a process of detachment leading to awakening. - **Role of Books:** Books can provide guidance, orientation, confirmation, and help individuals build an intellectual framework to understand their new state. 3. **Sudden/Dramatic Awakening:** This is the most common form and often occurs in response to intense psychological turmoil, crisis, or trauma. - **Ego-Dissolution:** This mode involves the dissolution of psychological attachments, and in the process, the ego and the entire self-system. Intense stress can cause the old self-system to suddenly break down, creating a "great open space of being" that a new, higher-functioning self-system emerges to fill. - **Energetic Awakening (e.g., Kundalini):** These are more explosive and dramatic, leading to a violent breakdown of the normal self-system. They can be triggered by intense turmoil, intensive meditation/yoga, or even psychedelic drugs. - **Psychedelics:** While not generating full-fledged wakefulness, psychedelics (like ecstasy or ayahuasca) can create a "psychic opening" that unlocks the transformational potential of turmoil or trauma, or provide "peek experiences"—glimpses of a transcendental dimension that can shift one's conception of reality and values. This might then encourage a person to pursue spiritual practices to recapture the experience, as seen with Ram Dass. - **Spontaneous Awakening:** Some traditions, like Zen and Ch'an Buddhism, suggest awakening can happen spontaneously without specific preparation or practices, implying that striving strengthens the ego and hinders the realization that wakefulness is one's natural state. However, Taylor suggests this view can lead to rigid egoic processes if seeking becomes goal-oriented or a diversionary tactic. ### IV. Characteristics of Wakefulness The characteristics of wakefulness identified by Taylor through his research align with themes found in various spiritual traditions. They are uniform across awakened individuals, varying mainly in intensity [Draper 1]: 1. **Perceptual Characteristics: A New World** - **Intensified Perception:** The world is experienced with vividness, directness, and wonder, similar to a child's perception. Nature is particularly captivating in its "is-ness" and beauty [Draper 1]. This is attributed to the ego consuming less energy, allowing perception to remain fresh and intense [Draper 1]. - **Aliveness, Harmony, and Connectedness:** Everything, even inanimate objects, shines with "radiant aliveness of spirit," leading to a strong sense of connection and harmony with the world. This reflects a "direct apprehension of the essential sameness of our being with the being of everything else" [Draper 1]. - **Transcendence of Duality:** The illusion of _maya_ (deception) is uncovered, revealing unity behind apparent diversity, where subject-object duality fades away [Draper 1]. William Blake's "To see a world in a grain of sand and a heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour" is cited to illustrate this expansive perception. 2. **Affective/Emotional Characteristics: Inner Well-Being** - **Inner Quietness/Stillness:** A significant reduction of constant "thought-chatter" results in a peaceful and calm mind [Draper 1]. - **Profound Well-Being and Bliss:** Awakened individuals experience intense well-being, serenity, contentment, and often bliss, liberated from habitual worry, negative emotions, boredom, loneliness, and dissatisfaction [Draper 1]. - **Appreciation and Gratitude:** There is a heightened sense of gratitude for all aspects of life, counteracting the "taking for granted syndrome" [Draper 1, 262]. - **Absence of Fear of Death:** Fear, especially of death, significantly decreases due to a reduced sense of separateness [Draper 1]. 3. **Conceptual/Cognitive Characteristics: A New Mind** - **Increased Presentness/Timelessness:** Awakened individuals are intensely present, with the past and future losing importance, focusing on immediate experience [Draper 1]. This "eternal moment" is especially associated with spiritual experience and the arts. - **Broadened Perspective/Universal Outlook:** The egocentric view shifts to a wider, global, and universal perspective, recognizing superficial distinctions and fostering a sense of oneness and empathy with all human beings [Draper 1]. - **Autonomy and Authenticity:** Awakened individuals become more inner-directed and authentic, less swayed by external opinions or cultural values [Draper 1, 226]. - **Transcendence of Ego:** The ego "self-system" softens or dissolves, not as an disappearance of the self, but an "expansion of self," extending identity beyond the personal body and mind to wider realities, ultimately the cosmos [Draper 1, 249]. - **Beyond Intellectual Grasp:** The true meaning of awakening cannot be fully understood conceptually but requires direct experience, with concepts serving only as pointers [Draper 1, 105, 126, 165, 317, 347, 367]. 4. **Behavioral Characteristics: A New Life** - **Altruism and Service:** A strong impulse to contribute positively to the world, manifesting as compassion, altruism, and self-sacrifice, where others' well-being is as or more important than one's own [Draper 1, 162, 199, 200, 244]. - **Reduced Materialism/Status-Seeking:** Less concern for worldly success, possessions, or personal ambition, and unaffected by external praise or blame, due to a sense of wholeness that eliminates the need for accumulation [Draper 1]. ### V. Evolutionary Perspective Taylor views wakefulness as an evolutionary progression, the "next phase of human development," and believes it will one day become humanity's normal state. He suggests that the "wakeful self-system" is latent within the human race, manifesting through: - Increasing frequency of temporary awakening experiences. - A growing "impulse to awaken" that draws people to spiritual practices. - Increased latency of wakefulness in individuals, ready to emerge when psychological attachments dissolve and the normal self-system breaks down. - The "Leap" also refers to a collective spiritual awakening occurring worldwide. ### VI. Challenges and Misconceptions The process of awakening can be confusing and disorienting, particularly in its initial stages. - **Confusion and Misdiagnosis:** A lack of conceptual framework can lead to difficulties, or even the suppression of the state. Suddenly awakened individuals, especially without prior spiritual knowledge, may feel confused, thinking they've "gone mad," and risk being pathologized as mentally ill and medicated, suppressing the awakening process. Some characteristics, like an altered sense of time, can superficially resemble psychosis, though core features like empathy and mental quietness do not [Draper 1]. - **Carryover of Negative Traits:** Until wakefulness is properly integrated, pre-existing negative personality traits may be amplified, posing a particular danger if an awakened person becomes a spiritual teacher. There is a tendency to idealize spiritual teachers as perfect, incapable of selfishness or mistreatment, which is a misconception. - **Misconceptions about Practice:** The idea that one "can't do anything to awaken" (i.e., that spiritual practices are counterproductive) is a misconception. While rigid, goal-oriented striving can obstruct the evolutionary impulse, the purpose of practices is to generate the necessary inner structural change. ### VII. Support and Integration - **Understanding and Support:** Organizations like the Spiritual Crisis Network and Spiritual Emergence Network provide crucial support by promoting understanding of profound personal transformation. The simple realization that one is undergoing a positive transformation can transform confusion into clarity. - **Integration:** Integration of "achieving awareness" (reliance on external plans, outcomes, and existing goals) and "awakened awareness" (openness to synchronicity, inner knowing, and a loving, guiding universe) is key for effective living. Living solely in awakened awareness can lead to being untethered, while solely in achieving awareness leads to stress and a narrow life. - **Continuous Journey:** Wakefulness is not an endpoint or a static state, but an ongoing process or a "different journey" that can become more integrated and refined, or potentially corrupted and faded. ### VIII. Author's Background and Research Steve Taylor's study began with his master's and PhD dissertations, focusing initially on people who awakened after intense trauma. He then broadened his research to include gradual awakenings through spiritual practices and those who seemed naturally awake. His previous book, _Waking from Sleep_, studied temporary awakening experiences, while _The Leap_ focuses on permanent wakefulness. He also co-created the "Inventory of Spiritual/Secular Wakefulness". Taylor notes that his research validates insights from spiritual traditions, suggesting that wakefulness exists as a fundamental psychological or ontological state independent of specific interpretations.