As far as I can make things out, there are two levels of enlightenment directly facing us – there are many more after, I’m sure, dimension by dimension.
Those two are (1) Self-Realization and (2) the Realization of Oneness with another.
Everything else seems to build on those two. They are the two organizing principles of all life, probably: The realization that we are God and the realization that another is God as well. I assert that the two together fulfill the purpose of life – to know who we are (answer: God).
Beyond these is the realization that everything and everyone is God, in the same way we are. I’d hazard a guess that that level of realization would be Sahaja Samadhi, the culmination of Ascension.
I’m not sure if one of the two enlightenments facing us has absolute precedence. I can imagine realizing myself simultaneously with realizing the divinity of another. I cannot think of anything more fulfilling than mutual, simultaneous Self-Realization.
That having been said, mutual, simultaneous Self-Realization is simply daily life in the Fifth Dimension. Only where we are, wherever that is, is it missing, lacking.
This is so important a matter, at the risk of sounding pedantic, let me repeat myself. (And repeat myself. And repeat myself.)
Fifth-Dimensional beings are always, already Self-Realized. It is we who exist outside the domain of the Self-Realized, not them. The difference between us and them is that they are Self-Realized and we are not. That’s the only difference. Period. Full stop.
What is realization? There are three levels of knowledge: intellectual knowledge; experiential knowledge; and realized knowledge. For something to have a transformational impact on us, our knowledge must exceed the intellectual and experiential and be realized.
Realization resembles the moment when the match that we’re dragging over the sandpaper suddenly catches fire. What once was inert is now very active. Where no fire existed before, all is now fire.
We have realizations large and small. We have everyday realizations, which we barely notice, and life-altering realizations, such as who we are, which transform everything. (1)
I regard all of these as the sparks of friction caused when one rubs two sticks together to cause a flame. Finally, after much rubbing, the flame of enlightenment comes.
Footnotes
(1) A heart opening, the sight (or darshan) of the Self, or a vision of the overall journey of life are examples of life-altering realizations.