A practice can be helpful, but didn't the Buddha compare it to a raft, suggesting it be abandoned when you reach the other shore?

The word enlightenment conjures up the idea of some superhuman accomplishment, and the ego likes to keep it that way, but it is simply your natural state of felt oneness with Being.

I call animals "guardians of Being," especially animals that live with humans. Because, for many humans, it's through their contact with animals they get in touch with that level of being.

So the single most vital step on your journey towards enlightenment is this: learn to disidentify from your mind.

When you are not honoring the present moment by allowing it to be, you are creating drama.

If a fish is born in your aquarium and you call him John, write out a birth certificate, tell him about his family history, and in two minutes he gets eaten by another fish - that's tragic. But it's only tragic because you projected a separate self where there was none. You got hold of a fraction of dynamic process, a molecular dance, and a separate entity out of it.

A true spiritual teacher does not have anything to teach in the conventional sense of the word, does not have anything to give or add to you, such as new information, beliefs, or rules of conduct. The only function of such a teacher is to help you remove that which separates you from the truth of who you already are and what you already know in the depth of your being