Ah This

lost it in the first place. You are dreaming that you are unenlightened. You can dream you are in heaven. You can dream you are in hell. And you know: you dream sometimes you are in heaven and sometimes in hell. In the morning you can be in heaven and by the evening you can be in hell. One moment you can be in heaven, another moment you can be in hell. It all depends on you. It is something to do with your psyche. It is not something outside you

The ancients said: “(Self-) cultivation takes an unimaginable time (while) enlightenment in an instant is attained.”

So the first path is not really a path but a deception, a very alluring deception. In the first place, it is self-cultivation. It is not against the ego. It is rooted in the refinement of the ego. Refine your ego of all grossness then you become a self. The ego is like a raw diamond. You go on cutting it and polishing it and then it becomes a Kohinoor, very precious. That is your idea of “self,” but it is nothing but the ego with a beautiful name, with a spiritual flavor thrown in. It is the same old illusory ego.