Leo Gura

@Anton Rogachevski I don't understand your question.

@Markus It's rather funny because he takes these very nuanced, rather academic philosophical positions which are very easy to misinterpret and lead to huge amounts of controversy, which then gives him an opportunity to use his hyper-rational mental abilities to navigate around all the controversy and dispel much of the misunderstanding, but this takes hours of back-and-forth, and polarizes many people -- who either love him or hate him. Controversy is certainly an effective marketing strategy. Not sure if it's efficient at raising consciousness in those people who get polarized. For example, I'm not sure he's helping rid the world of Islamic fanaticism by bashing Islam and theism all the time. But that's just my opinion. He's certainly free to philosophize away. Personally, I think the best way to rid the world of fanaticism of all stripes is by discouraging people from debate, instead having them turn inward to deeply examine their desires to debate, rationalize, and take positions. By taking strong polemical positions and engaging in constant criticism, one subconsciously communicates the values which fuel fanaticism and sectarianism all over the world. In other words, in the face of hate, apply love, not more hate. My teaching style used to be more polarizing. I've been learning my lesson though and have had to move away from that style as my own consciousness rises. I don't see polarized teachings as being sustainable at the highest levels of consciousness. Because they are fundamentally dualistc. It's sorta sad for me to give up my old polarizing style. My ego likes it. It's way more fun to bash people. Oh well... another blow to the old ego I guess. The trick with highly conscious people, is that they are SO FUCKING LOVING, you cannot believe it when you see it. From the surface it appears fake or impossible. Because of that, many ordinary folks get turned off by it because it feels too sappy and lovey-dovey. It's like high consciousness has to dumb itself down to resonate with low consciousness. But high consciousness also doesn't care to dumb itself down. Which results in nonduality remaining a niche field. The paradox of consciousness: you have to possess consciousness to want to pursue consciousness.

Watch the video I recently posted in this forum about Psychedelics vs Meditation Research. The guy literally posts a graph comparing happiness levels of people having sex vs experiencing nonduality states. Hint: nonduality is far better than any sex you've ever had. If it wasn't, why would we even be talking about it? This would be a forum about porn instead.

@AxelK Certainly he's not your typical scientist or rationalist. He's sort of an enigma to me. I don't fully understand why he defends rationalism so much if he's experienced nonduality. Of course the depth of the experience is very important. But also, I bet it's possible to be an enlightened rationalist crusader. Just strikes me as an odd situation. Then again, people can be very diverse creatures. And it's risky psycho-analyzing other people so this is all just speculation.

@AxelK The ego is more than just petty name-calling or obvious emotional biases. It's also the entire metaphysical and epistemic foundation of the mind. One's entire understanding of reality is shaped by the mere fact of holding oneself as a self, not to mention all of one's philosophical positions, which require a lot of energy to defend and justify. It's ironic that rationalists tend to be very clingy about their rationalism. Rationalists tend to have more in common with the religious fanatics they loath, than they do with nondualists. Because the core problem is the position-taking and the loathing and fighting, not the content of one's beliefs. The quality of one's consciousness is manifest at the level of being, not believing or talking.

@Hunter Arrington Oh, he's quite a master debater

The Absolute is the superset of everything relative. The Absolute and relative are not separate. They are the same. But that's an extremely advanced insight. Focus on experiencing just the Absolute for now. Later you can realize enlightenment is identical to not-enlightenment and have a Fight Club moment

@SelfPeace Sure, I always recommend being well-read and pulling from diverse sources. I got nothing against reading those guys' books if you do so in an non-ideological manner. I have Haidt's and Harris' books on my book list. And I like what I've heard from Peterson so far. If all your sources were only enlightened masters, you'd be missing out.

Once the distinction of self/other is eliminated, EVERYTHING becomes YOU! Not only are other people Nothing, so are You! If you're looking for a rationalization for why you should be good. It doesn't exist. LOVE = BEING, BEING = LOVE.

@jse Sure, you can model it. But reality is not a model. So the best you'll ever get is anything but reality as a whole. Direct consciousness becomes impossible under the realist paradigm because consciousness is thought to be a subset rather than the superset. But if consciousness is the superset, it can literally BE reality as a whole! Without modeling. Without speculation. Without inaccuracy or fudge factor. Direct consciousness turns out to be the most scientific method. Nothing quite compares to literally becoming all of reality as a whole. Give it a shot! After that, your attitude towards models will be similar to your attitude towards moldy, 30-day old bread. 30-day old bread is delicious, but only when you've got nothing else.

@SelfPeace He's describing a classic mystical experience, or altered state of consciousness. Sure, they can happen at any time. You don't have to be meditating. You could be watching TV or sitting on the toilet or eating a cheeseburger. But since he was contemplating a deep existential question about meaning and life, it's not at all surprising it happened for him then. It is possible to have an enlightenment experience just from reading a book, for example. Although that doesn't mean reading books is an effective method for enlightenment. It probably isn't. It's sorta funny that he describes music as revealing the nature of being, when in fact EVERYTHING reveals the nature of being. Not just music, EVERYTHING! There is nothing but BEING! Being is exactly itself. Of course, if one has a particular fondness for music, that can push the mind to open to higher awareness. And human minds generally love music. It's a lot harder for the human mind to see the being of rape or the being of a dirty toilet. Being also doesn't need meaning. Being's meaning is being! When the human mind loses touch with the mystical nature of being, it seeks meaning. But being is always superior to meaning, provided one is conscious of being. After all, being is all there is. Also note how he refused the call of being. Because it was too radical. What would one's life look like if you FULLY embraced being or Truth? It would be an unrecognizable life. The very core of the self is set up to resist surrender to being. Which is why surrender to being requires utmost emotional labor. Which is why self-inquiry is so god damn painful and rarely done. Which is where debate comes in! Debate is an avoidance mechanism for self-inquiry.

@SelfPeace I gotta admit a dirty secret: I've always simply intuited -- without any justification or reasonable cause -- that reality was fundamentally irrational and paradoxical, and could not be grasped or modeled. This was my only philosophical position. In my mind, it has to be this way, because it's silly to expect a subset to model the superset. A subset cannot reach beyond itself. If a mind could logically understand reality, reality wouldn't be worth very much. Godel's incompleteness theorem sorta puts a nail in the coffin of the rationalist agenda IMO. Philosophers have been vigorously trying to rationalize reality for the last 2000 years, and they've failed pretty miserably. To me, rationality is itself irrational. It can't help but collapse in on itself at its core. Because it was born out of irrationality. Rationality had to be created, along with time, space, matter, energy, and everything else. We cannot take rationality as a given or fundamental.

@SelfPeace I have imagined offering him 30mg of 5-meo. I would even help him take it and film his reaction. But I doubt he'd be open to it. And I certainly don't want to debate over it as a hypothetical. I'm not a fan of the academic style of philosophy. It lacks soul. But good luck convincing it of that on logical grounds.

Not really a fan of Sam's debating approach to life. He seems to like to debate everything and everybody. Which doesn't strike me as very conscious, although he is very articulate and logical. When one's consciousness becomes deep enough, the debating attitude should stop IMO. I challenge him to 30mg of 5-meo. If he wants to come over, we can film him do it and film his reaction. That's as objective a test as it gets, without getting into endless debating. The problem with the left brain is that can argue it's way into or out of anything. Like a lawyer. The right brain is needed to reign it in, otherwise it runs amok. Access to Absolute Truth is not possible via the left brain, but via the right.

SDS and Do-Nothing ARE mindfulness practices.

@Zaid Yes, that's how it tends to unfold. Keep at it. Keep at it. Keep at it, until something pops.

Congratulations on becoming a dick.

@BeginnerActualizer I don't engage in video games almost at all any more. For me video games were my art, like painting. It was about creating beautiful things and being creative. I might even make some video games at some point. But they wouldn't be mainstream commercial products. More artsy. Nothing is inherently evil. Entertainment does have value when not overused. And all artistic pursuits are valid so long as you feel that it's art that you're doing and you're passionate about it. One of the reasons I got out of video games is because I felt most games were too shallow and commercial, and it's not easy making artsy games and surviving in that industry. The work practices of the industry are also extremely unhealthy and consciousness-destroying. If I ever return to making video games, it would be 100% on my terms. The reason I started my first business was because I was so disgusted by not having 100% creative autonomy over my work. When I comes to my work, I'm a total control freak.

@Extreme Z7 Indeed, my bad

4g dried is a pretty strong dose. Although it's possible to go much higher. 4g can easily kick your ass.

Everyone's prime directive is to be raising the quality of their consciousness. That's what human life is about. The life purpose, as talked about in the course, is about how do you want to contribute to humanity? What do you want your life's work to be? Personal development is something you'll be doing anyway. The question you should be asking yourself is what kind of career will be aligned with your deepest values? Otherwise you'll be stuck working at Starbucks your whole life. If you love personal development or consciousness work, then that probably means your career should be somehow related to that. But now you gotta think through the details. Plan it out. What value can you offer the world?

@Arielle Enlightenment puts you MORE in touch with the human condition, not less. You cannot even fathom or appreciate the human condition until you've awoken from it at least once. If anything can super-charge your creativity, it's enlightenment. Every artist should become enlightened, if only to improve their art. The biggest thing that gets in the way of great art is ego. It's interesting that artistic-types are the ones you tend to love psychedelics. Psychedelics are like raw divine inspiration.

Were they dried 12g?

Video games don't really make you violent (same as violent movies don't make you violent), but they DO lower your consciousness, same as TV. I don't think video games make people violent because they aren't murder simulators, they are GAMES. When you kill an elf in World of Warcraft, you don't do it with violent intent, you do it for fun as a role play. If you actually used games with the intent to hone your cruelty and anger, then they probably would help you become violent. But 99% of people don't play games that way. Most people play games just for fun, to escape reality. Video games are also different than visualization because in visualization you're actually flexing the mind, whereas in a video game you're just seeing violent images, which isn't the same as consciously generating them. But the bigger question is: Are video games harming your consciousness? And the answer is definitely YES! Not because of the violence factor, but because you're using it as an escape from reality. Video games are basically anti-mindfulness training. You're getting lost deeper in Maya as you play. And notice that every video game -- no matter how great -- ends with a sense of hollowness and lack of fulfillment. Which is what drives people to seek out the next great game, and the next great game, and the next, creating a cycle of addiction but never fulfillment.

The dream analogy is very good. That's basically how best to hold reality, as a dream. And you can wake from it, just like a dream.