To start, I want to show the connection between every day one-on-one communication and the eastern concept of Enlightenment. This is a key new concept - and it allows us to reach the classical enlightenment - in less time - without being a devout Buddhist Monk or going to the Monastery for the rest of our lives. Think of it as the Western way to Enlightenment.

Before we enter into a technical discussion of communication cycles - let us first approach some general concepts that provide a reality for the upcoming information.

• First: Right now, before we start to talk about the 12 parts of communication cycles, you are already a communications authority. You are an authority on the subject of your own communications. Further you are the only authority. There isn't even any competition. There is no real way for you to delegate that responsibility - and still get the job done. You are stuck with that job. Accept that truth - and now start to pay more attention. This is your life. (Practice: be aware of your own authority in communication.)

• Second: You will want to become a more empowered authority. You can do that by building your own internal language. You don’t have to use new words - but you must have your own meanings for these words. You will need to know exactly what you mean. You accomplish this over many years, through the mechanism of being skeptical, doing your own original thinking, and making real choices. (Practice: exactness.)

• Third: Open yourself up to new experiences. Become attentive with your options not already fixed. Open up thinking to allow new possibilities. Open wide enough to take in Reality as it is. Even if you don't understand it. Open up. Allow the world be more complex. Recognize that it is not easy as most of us want to love it or leave it. We are likely to hold our nose and swallow in belief, or we spit it out with skepticism. We want all good, or forget it. Becoming open to new experience is a life-long task. You do not start out knowing how to do it, but as you get older you can get better at it. (Practice open-ness.)

• Fourth: There are no real rules – except those you yourself and others make. There are no handrails to heaven. No fixed way to inch yourself up to higher awareness. You must pay attention. When you are unconscious and reactive – there are many rules to follow. This is because your understanding is low. As you learn and grow each rule loses its outside thing-ness and becomes meaning, which is then experienced. Each rule dissolves into greater understanding and a bigger experience of Living. (Surrender your fix-ness.)

• Fifth: Belief is optional. With your authority of course you can "believe" me, this webpage, or handout, or anything else you wish. When someone asks you to "believe", they are asking you to accept without proof some outside idea as your own. The idea is pushed because the person thinks that once you "believe" something it will really stick, and the new idea will remain with you. I often find the power behind a belief is a strong denial of an unbearable situation or concept. It is not so much as going towards something, but more like being driven away from something else. In my opinion, if you develop your warm sensitive nature - you will be able to know with some authority. You will not have to "believe" you can know for yourself. (Practice as first hand Experience rather than indirect knowledge.)

• Sixth: There are skills you try to master, like the ability to communicate clearly, and the ability to compete communication cycles. You can also try to close communication cycles before you open up new ones. That will ground you in a shared reality and give you strength to carry on. These skills that you master – do not change your nature – they just make your nature available to others around you. (Practice clear communications.)

After one starts improving their reality - by cleaning up their communication cycles - whole new ways of seeing the world naturally start to bubble up. These "new" ways are actually old ways that have been forgotten - more child like - yet still full of adult wisdom. These "new" old ways are based on rich experience and allow us to move away from a flat world of "because" and the terror and doom of reactivity. If you take this path - of improving communications - to the extreme - you reach the classical Buddhism concept of Enlightenment - as a personal experience. You get it all - just like they wrote it down 2,500 years ago - you become Enlightened.