“In this book, Ilona’s honesty and integrity shine through. In a world of gurus vying for your devotion and money, Ilona’s new book is refreshingly different. In ordinary language, completely free of pretense, she invites you to take a look for yourself and discover whether your assumptions are true. She skillfully guides you through an investigation that may reveal a shocking clarity that you are not what you thought. I enjoyed this book.”
—Joey Lott, author of The Best Thing That Never Happened

“As Ilona points out in this wonderful book, there was truly a fire started with the Liberation Unleashed movement that occurred
several years ago. I remember it well, as many people flocked to the movement in order to cut a path straight to liberation. In many ways, the movement has revolutionized the way people consider liberation these days. The pointing is very direct and leaves out a lot of unnecessary spiritual stuff. I’ve known many people who found it to be tremendously helpful. And the fire of the movement
is still burning strong with this powerful book by Ilona. Highly recommended.”
—Scott Kiloby, CEO of The Kiloby Center for Recovery

“Liberation Unleashed further documents an exciting new spiritual activity: online peer-to-peer mentoring, no airline tickets required. This book helps move us from the age of the guru to the age of the friend.”
—Greg Goode, author of The Direct Path and After Awareness, and coauthor of Emptiness and Joyful Freedom

‘Liberation Unleashed’ Excerpt:

Fear Is A Sensation

Fear informs us about itself through an intense sensation. There is a distinct flush that gets triggered by thought, sound, color, smell, taste, or touch. Fear makes itself known as a sudden contraction. It’s not pleasant and may set off a chain of reactions. It’s felt as a strong no to whatever is triggering it.

Imagine for a second that you are in a desert, a wide-open space. You are walking for hours, in circles. You go up yet another hill and see a closed door. It is standing right there, very obvious, and it is locked. There’s no key around. No key in your pockets. The door does not move, does not open; it just stands there. You are stunned and cannot move forward. So you sit by the door and sit some more, thinking, guessing, and dreading what might be behind it. It feels as if the door is guarding something, something that you need but cannot see. At the same time the lock is having a laugh; it has done it’s trick, making it appear that there is something important behind the door that is protected.

There is another way to find out what is behind the door. No need to unlock it, no need to push it open, just take a step to the side and look behind that silly door. There is nothing there! The desert continues in all directions, and the door stands there, but it’s not an obstacle to your journey.

Fear feels and acts like that lock on the door. It stops one from going further. Fear is a signal to step back; it’s a warning of danger, real or imagined. The feeling can be so strong that it may paralyze thinking and acting.

Fear is a sensation. It is not to be avoided but rather noticed and felt. It is not good or bad in and of itself. It is doing its job, keeping the self-image and belief structure safe and intact.

Recognition

Once it’s seen, it cannot be unseen. This statement refers to recognition. In other words, what is recognized will always be recognized, no matter the situation—unless, of course, you have memory problems.

Let’s say you meet someone and ten years later you meet her again—instant recognition happens. It’s underneath the thinking.

Recognition is something that operates outside of thoughts. You meet that old friend and recognize her simply because she has a unique face, body structure, voice, and so forth. It’s like learning the colors in childhood; a child is shown the color and is told that it is called “red.” That child then recognizes red at any time in life as being “red.” You hear a song once, and the second time you recognize it—I’ve heard that song before.

When we look at something familiar, recognition takes place—the “aha!” moment. We don’t need to philosophize or make logical connections to simply recognize what is already the case.

It’s difficult to see the illusion of a separate self only because it has never occurred to us to deeply question the assumptions, I am a separate entity, I have an identity. The “I-thought” is assumed to be “me,” the doer and thinker, a subject with free will and choice.

When we start digging into these assumptions, it becomes obvious that an “I-entity” cannot be found. When you face this head-on, recognition happens. “There is no separate self” can just be words that raise your eyebrows, or they can be a knowing that is beyond thought.

What is, simply is, without any manager, orchestrator, or puppet master pulling strings. Life is just happening, and everything is happening within it, as it. Nothing is separate from anything else.

Everything is dependent upon everything else as one movement, one dance—empty and yet so rich in its fullness.

Recognition is a moment when we know that we know. It’s something familiar showing up; it may have been forgotten, or it may have been denied, but once that recognition happens, it is not possible to unrecognize that pattern. Once the seeing happens, once it becomes clear that the separate self is an illusion, it can never be truly forgotten again. Different situations arise with different levels of intensity, but what has been seen can be seen over and over and over again in every situation. It’s not hidden. When we look at what is obvious, without thinking or referring to a memory, without trying to fit it into models of reality or to match it to the descriptions given by teachers, there is an intimate, instant recognition. This is. This is what is happening now; the rest is a story. No one can convince you that you recognize something. Of course, you can pretend and say that you do and make logical explanations, express opinions, have debates, write books, and teach about it. But deep knowledge comes from within, from looking for yourself, from wanting to know beyond doubt.

An unusual book! This book presents actual on-line dialogue which shows how people are carefully guided to clearer understanding of who or what they are “IN ESSENCE”, the culmination of which is an “awakening” to “reality”.
Those who are seriously “on the path to enlightenment” so-to-speak may probably benefit most from this book.

—Walt Dutchak, author of Watching Thought and Mastery of Self

This is one of the most useful books on self-enquiry that I have come across. Some of the dialogues are extraordinary. A book for the spiritual seeker who has come up against the inevitable paradox that there is no seeker and nothing to seek.

— Richard Redmont

If you are like me, you are constantly searching to break through and see the light of truth. Even though you have a lot knowledge and experience on the subject you don’t seem to be there. There seems to be either something you’re missing, something you don’t understand, something overlooked, or something preventing you from knowing and experiencing the truth. For me, it was the latter. It was the sense of “I,” the sense of self which is so insidious and persistent that it attaches itself to every belief and experience you have so that it is all tainted and you never seem to see the light of truth.
The final step or solution of every path involves eradicating the belief in “I.” In the Bagavad Gita, Krishna says “If you persist in clinging to the I-sense you are lost.” How to do this last step is shown perfectly in this book. Ilona and Elena are lights of wisdom and truth in showing the way to releasing the sense of “I” and self. This book could and should be your last in how to break through this last and most difficult gate of illusion. It is the perfect solution.
— Curt Graf