Is enlightenment for monks who have the luxury of spending all day meditating on the nature of self and reality?

No.

Is it for single, upper-class yuppies who made their fortune, traveled the world and did everything, and, now bored, are looking for the next big ‘experience’ in life?

No

Is it for middle class people who heard about ‘enlightenment,’ ‘self-realization’ and ‘liberation’ somewhere, or wandered into a ‘spiritual’ bookstore or a satsang/darshan being given by a well-known sage, and decided it was time to switch priorities from the ‘normal’ pursuit of building family & wealth to dropping out and becoming a ‘seeker?’

No

Is it for lay people already ensconced in responsibilities and the full-time occupation of earning a living and providing for their growing family?

No.

Asking “Who is enlightenment for,” immediately makes ‘enlightenment’ into an experience, an event that takes place in ‘time’ for an ‘individual person,’ for “them,” for making some dramatic change (hopefully for the ‘better’) in their ‘personal’ lives. But enlightenment is not some permanent ‘bliss’ experienced by an ‘individual person’ when What Isn’t finally changes to What Is for “you” in “your “ future. It’s What Is, already, right now, with you Being exactly as You Are.

Before asking “Who is enlightenment for?” we should ask the far-more important question, “Why do you want enlightenment? Why do you ask who it’s for? Is it because you heard it would permanently relieve all your problems and ‘suffering,’ leave you permanently happy and blissful?”

99.9% of the time, that’s why anyone asks “What is enlightenment., who is it for, and how can I get it.”

So what you’re really asking is, “Who is attaining permanent peace & happiness, and the end of all ‘suffering,’ for…’cause I really, really want that?”

Ahhh, now doesn’t that feel better? Coming clean and being brutally honest about this whole conceptual ‘search for self-realization and enlightenment’ crap, and what you really want?

And guess what. There’s nothing wrong in that. It’s OK to desire permanent peace & happiness, and the end of all ‘suffering.’ Every human does. It’s just that that’s not enlightenment. Enlightenment is everything being exactly As It Is, without retaining the false illusion and encumbrance that there is a separate, self-enclosed “me” around to judge anything or want anything to be other than exactly As It Is.

Permanent Peace & Happiness can only exist when the false identity of a ‘separate person or entity’ is totally annihilated. 100%. Not intellectually. Not 99.9%. Directly, 100% ‘apperceived’ and embodied. Which of course, was already present (in infancy,) but you forgot…and then went looking for What’s Looking :-)

Do monks, ashram-dwellers, Bo-tree sitting Buddhas and 6 to 10 hours-a-day meditators/contemplators have the advantage in realizing the individual ego does not exist, thereby re-discovering their True Nature as Sat-chit-ananda, the Primordial Peace & Bliss. Over the bored yuppies, the dilettantes and vast majority of ‘normal’ lay folks, those extremely busy with school/family/work? You would think so, right? Yet, throughout countless centuries, hundreds of monasteries and millions of committed monks, almost none of them have 100% annihilated the non-self and directly apperceived themselves as The Self. While simultaneously, some of the most dearly-revered sages who abide full time in The Self - Ramana Maharshi, Sri Nisargadatta, Adi Shankara, Anandamayi Ma, Krishnamurti and many other male/female sages, never became formal monastics or practiced (or recommended) long hours of meditation. Nisargadatta and so many other householders to numerous to mention, have had the full apperception of ‘enlightenment’ dawn through them and be re-realized as What Always Was even while running a business and raising their family.

‘Enlightenment” - for escaping karma, reincarnation, suffering, life, death, and Reality/What Is, is not for anybody.

Enlightenment - all exactly As It Is, Enlightenment as your True Name & Nature, is for everybody & everything…and it’s already Here & Now.