Not necessarily, no. It’s very individual. There’s a general tendency, for example, I don’t think it is possible to realize the true emptiness of death before realizing the ultimate beauty of life. Some insights are just deeper than others by their very nature. But even in this case, ultimately they are connected, life and death are two sides of the same coin, they are intimately related to each other. So it often times takes form of waves, ebbs and flows, so to speak. A period of egoic suffering, followed by a period of flowering of love and expanding sense of beauty and appreciation, followed by a period of deeper peace and serenity, as well as a quieter mind. These periods can last years, months, or even days, and they can repeat themselves many times, too. Some people describe them as mini-awakenings of sorts, of which one can have very many. So, there are certain tendencies in progression, this is true, but generally speaking, it’s not always linear at all, and the cycle can repeat itself many times, usually with diminishing intensity after self-realization, or with ever-increasing intensity before self-realization, if we’re talking about milder awakening experiences. Self-realization is simply the most intense part of the journey, it is the peak of it. Intensity here refers to emotional/energetic intensity, that’s what people tend to find most challenging.