Enlighten Up! is a movie about the search for transformation — that eternal inner drive for answers and betterment, the search for permanent change in your understanding. Kate Churchill, the movie’s director, thought that she knew the path. She believed that yoga can transform anyone. She created a project where for 6 months a person was to be immersed into different practices of yoga until he finds the one that has the greatest impact and helps bring enlightenment.
This is where Nick Rosen comes in. Nick was the perfect person for the challenge. He had questions of his own that he was looking to find answers to. He had very inquisitive mind and was not going to accept someone’s perception of things without having facts, without understanding, without experiencing for himself. And that is really the right approach, because change comes only through comprehension, through internalizing and making peace inside with your own questions.
It was really beautiful to watch Nick’s journey. He was capable of looking deep and providing great insight. He met many a great teachers in yoga studios in New York, Los Angeles, on a farm in Hawaii and ashrams in India. And yet he did not find the jolt that will shatter the old understanding of reality and bring enlightenment.
But what is enlightenment? After the movie Kate and Nick were answering questions and they told us a story of how they met someone who described the moment of enlightenment as nothing. Nick asked what does that feel like, what is the nothing? They told us laughingly that the answer he received is that he had asked a stupid question. Nick was looking for a description, an answer. However, that great feeling which accompanies the moment of pure clarity and pure knowing cannot be described. It really needs to be experienced. That moment of being one with the vibration of the universe and feeling the flow of love and energy just is.
Transformation, change in an eternal quest. There is not one answer. In fact, each answer leads to an expansion that has in it more possibilities, and the even greater need for understanding and exploration. Therefore, the quest is a permanent search for the soul.
And yoga was not the answer for Nick. In fact, the greatest lesson in the movie came because Nick did not achieve enlightenment through yoga. And it was a lesson for Kate. She was given the lesson of tolerance, of accepting that there are many paths to transformation.
After the movie I had a chance to speak with Nick. He was really wonderful, very warm and very charismatic. It was great to see that the whole experience of being a star of a movie has not gotten to his head. He was a bit humbled by the attention people were giving him and in every conversation was trying to show the person that he appreciates it and he is just as attentive towards them. I sincerely hope that he takes my offer to write with us and share his reflections on the yoga immersion, his experience with the screening of the movie and how he feels about the reactions of the people he meets and being someone they all want to talk to, or anything else he feels like.
Enlighten Up! is a fantastic movie and I recommend that you see it. It is playing at the IFC Center, a small and cozy movie theater which makes the experience of the movie even more personal and meaningful. You can watch clips from the movie and learn move about Nick and Kate here.