@Kksd74628 I think Raptorsin7 and I are working this thing out. As I said multiple times now, the discussion is not at all problematic, it's the way this "discussion" has turned into personal attacks against nahm behind his back. And that, and only that, is not allowed.

I create this topic to share the poems / love letters we wrote to ourselves.

I'm not good at all at this so I consider mine like love letters, not poem and I translated it in english the best I could because my native language is french
So, here's one : 
My Love,

You are the most beautiful, tender, precious of my gifts
You are the one with whom I breathe and live each moment 
You are the one who make everything possible for me
You are the one with whom I learn to compliment and encourage the most I can 
You are my perfection, God, "you are" 

Each day I'm more & more grateful to have you
You are the one who deserves more love, not less (thanks to Matt Kahn haha) 

You are my life, my dream, my masterpiece
I Love You with all my soul <3 

can't wait to read yours
 

So as I feel like there is something slowly peeling off since time passed, I also realized that something is just there already. When I see that or am that, I feel home - at the same time thoughts feel so crazy and like "me" or as insane that it feels hard to let them go - better said: I am already in a process of no return, and that has been the case for 4 years now, with sparks of being whole already - but always going "in the story", which makes me feel super crazy. I cant properly explain it to therapists tho. I know pills will help with letting go, I also know this process is just letting go of myself, nothing else, thoughts and believing in old ways cant make sense of me being "here". One key is trust. I have a big sheet right on the wall hanging at the opposite of my bed: "what is this emotion? + trust the process <3".
I also know these thought loops are not healthy. 
I feel like I either suffer or I am absolutely commited "to die" to Truth. A middle way is just not possible. All the way letting go or suffer. Choose.
 

Hello!
How to do conscious therapy?
What type of therapy approach most effectively makes people more conscious?
I would like to become a psychotherapist. In Germany, due to the system of our health insurances, one has to choose for a specialisation in either CBT or psychodynamic therapy. I like both approaches and am unsure about what will help individuals and our collective more out of a highly elevated conscious perspective.

Why I'm conflicted:

My pro for CBT:
there are third-wave therapy forms (e.g. ACT or MBCT) oriented at buddhist wisdom which deliberately try to make people aware of their subjective experience of reality and of the impermanence of their experience and the illusion of self. What is specifically exciting about this new wave that they do not try to  retrain your negative thought and emotion patterns into positive ones, but rather teach you to observe it from the standpoint of all-encompassing awareness, and thus not further contributing to more clinging to experience. Instead, you help the person to become nobody, how ram dass would say.

ACT is also more open to integrating psychedelics into their therapy - it is often used as the therapeutic framework when patients are given psychedelics.

In my eyes, this is not the case with psychodynamic theory, where the therapist interprets current and past events to uncover unconscious motives to create a story why the person is and acts the way it does, thereby helping the patient to self-realization. By that you add more explanation for why the self (or the essence) is the way it is, not nessecarily helping to expand or transcend your sense of identity. I imagine it more like: this is the reason why you are the way you are (thereby releasing old emotional traumas) while some modern CBT-techniques identify certain chains of thoughts and emotion that are not nessecarily part of your identity and are impermanent so why cling to them.

Further CBT, acknowledges multicausality for your behavior and your essence (e.g. taking genetic influence into account) and always adapts it's therapy style to the current state of research. (by contrast, psychodynamic theory, originally by Freud, was built on a lot of fantasy, independent of scientific scrutiny).


My Pros for Psychodynamic therapy:

Why would a therapy need to be concerned about deconstructing the self? Aren't theories like Maslow's pyramid of needs imply that it is first needed to strengthen the sense of self (and maybe heal it), and only later to deconstruct it? Isn't it better to reach "deeper" into the unconscious to make longer-lasting change then just trying to change behavior and thought patterns on the surface, only later to discover that there are very strong unconscious impulses. 

E.g. you train someone to be less affected by their mood swings and destructive thought patterns due to mindfulness training (ACT, MBCT), or to retrain your thoughts to think that you are loved, that you are efficacious, etc. , but avoid a deeper emotional feeling about yourself being unloved that might be resolved by digging into past childhood events.

Although there is not much scientific evidence for the theory of Freud and more modern psychoanalysts, studies show that the therapy itself (which is founded on the theories) is as efficient as CBT in reliving patients of symptoms.

Psychodynamic theory also does not only try to resolve the symptoms (like CBT primarily does), but it tries to make the individual understand itself which in turn might lead to symptom releave as a side effect. Often, CBT is critized as a product of the fast, post-capitalistic world, trying to put a bandage over a wound which reaches much deeper, only to get employees ready for work again ASAP. 



Of course, I will try to integrate the good sides of both in the end, but I have to choose a foundation in one of those to start my program.

What do you think, wise folks?

Are there any therapists here who integrated these two ways of doing therapy or you know of any besides Beck?
And for the CBT-psychotherapists out here - have you found more modern ways, besides psychedelic-assisted therapy, to reach the depths of one's psyche/tackle deeper-lying trauma, within the CBT framework?

I'm also happy to receive corrections of my perceptions of how these two frameworks try to operate.

Kind regards and enjoy your day.

 

Let's say someone's got/knows something personal/intimate about you, and there is no hope for you to do anything significant about it. You can only accept it. How to deal with that powerlessness?
I've messed up royaly yersterday, and I don't wanna talk about that in details. I didn't do anything wrong or against the law, I just shared something I shouldn't have. How to deal with that inner sense of shame/powerlesness I'm feeling?

Why fight it?  Look for reasons where it is an option:
Most people don't need to... rarely is it an option if you need it.  These videos can help.  Looking at it from a distanced perspective, 3rd person perspective.  Be as rational as possible, not emotional when you dissect this.  Create the right mood or wait for the right mood to happen when you can really dissect it from that distanced place.
Also, I have been there and understand how it feels if anyone feels this way please send me a note to talk. <3
 

Ok, so I think I'm going through "dark night" stage of spiritual awakening... Basically, when I started meditating and studying spirituality, shit was awesome. It took me about 2 weeks to get my first hits of higher consciousness, I felt amazing. The world looked at least 5 times better than before. I felt way more connected to what felt like "source energy". 
Well, I'm only like 2 weeks in this and I made so much progress already, how far can I go? At first I was doing about 30 minutes of basic meditation per day, but then I discovered this "strong determination sitting" technique. When I did it for the first time, it was simply amazing. After that, my "spiritual gains" stopped. I did 1 to 3 hours of strong determination sitting a day for a couple of months and couldn't get any further. I got used to this slightly elevated state and it felt regular. Still felt pretty good, but honeymoon was over.
So, after those months of strong determination sitting, reading quite a bit of different spiritual books and watching lots of Leo's and other similair youtubers, one day I got hit by this sense of darkness. It was strange, I was wondering what this is, because I've never felt anything like it. Day after day, this sense of darkness got stronger and stronger, and I felt way worse than ever before for no reason and felt 100% disconnected from "source energy". After some weeks, I started having very intense panic attacks everyday multiple times a day for weeks. I realized that I know absolutely nothing about this reality and existence itself started looking very scary to me.
I got over my panic attacks, but this super deep darkness and depression didn't go away. I don't have an opinion about anything anymore, no energy, physical existence feels extremely dull and dark, even the most "stimulating" stuff. I'm only 17, but it feels like I already lived in this body for hundreds of years, it feels like my brain doesn't want to experience physical reality anymore. I went to one of the best psychologists in my country, he's 70 years old, working since 1985, has buddha's statues all over his desk and shit, and after a couple of visits, he admitted that he has no idea how he can help me. He told me that it would be a good idea to see an exorcist, I did that, but he didn't find anything. 
I'm extremely drained right now, hard headaches, can barely function, sleeping for 15 hours, waking up more tired... Everything takes 10 times more willpower to do. I checked a lot of things that could be wrong with my health, even checked my testosterone levels, everything was perfect... I'm taking 20mg of prozac for some weeks now, but it does absolutely nothing.
I think it is dark night of the soul... Everyone who talks about this says that the only way to deal with this is to surrender and wait it out. Is this all I can do? It seems like this "state" will never end. I'm in it for about 5-6 months now.
 
 
 

What is the thought that doesn't stop, that fills every gap, that does not want to leave even the slightest empty space? This activity that we do, or at least I do, non-stop, it even seems like sleeping.
It is not a depressing or painful thinking, it is something that you can live with, but for some reason, it seems part of me. Project, remember, search, analyze ... or just say random things.
I think I've seen what it is. I was meditating and I saw that buzzing thought and a peace beneath it. Delve into that peace, that joyous peace was just being . And I realized that the thought veiled that peace. Interesting ... why does he do it?. I realized that over time, since childhood, That pure being me had been questioned. It wasn't enough just to be me. Many people and many circumstances told me: it is not appropriate to be you. I believed, because in a way was true, I need to survive, and I confused learning with having to be something else . So I moved from that center, from that peace that is to be me. The greater the displacement, the more the thought spoke, and with more force, since to be displaced you have to do something. The natural thing is to be in your center. Moving from it costs effort. It is like separating two magnets. You have to exert force or they will rejoin. That force is the constant thought. The further away they are, the more force it has to do. The thoughts have to scream, be painful, create addictions. the compulsive thinking is an addiction itself. If you are close it is a talk. It may seem not so bad, but it's made of anxiety. It is it's substance. The fact of not being able to stop indicates this. Fear, avoid the self, the being. and settle in a place that doesn't exist. as it is unreal, to settle there you must create it constantly, without stopping, so you weave the fabric in which you "rest", you weave it with compulsive thought .You can't stop doing it since you are sitting there, and if you stop knitting you would fall into the void . The only way is to unite the two magnets, rest in the real. The first thing, the fundamental thing, is to remember who you are. I had forgotten!. the second is to make the effort to keep remembering it, since the tendency to rest on the fabric made of anxiety is settled. does not disappear for a realization. Is it possible to live without this annoying crutch? Let's see

I have the habit of asking myself questions pertaining to future events. That's where all of my anxiety stems from, ultimately. I'm always concerned with what people might do to me. I'm very good at imagining an infinite number of dangers vividly, in my mind. I'm doing this 24/7, constantly, and there's no end to it. Some might say, it's part of who I am and I'm starting to believe it is. This is what stops me from doing anything in life. 
The problem is that, my thoughts and beliefs about reality seem so real, that I'm unable to distinguish reality from fantasy. I hold a belief that the world is a very dangerous, spooky and harmful place, where everyone is out to get me and it's only a matter of time. I'm always seeing the worst in people.
Standard practices like meditation and journaling are helpful, but not enough to help me overcome the problem. I haven't been able to identify to problem or properly self-diagnosis, myself. My guess is, I have some sort of complexity, but that's about it. I need help!
Any tips and suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks!
 

Hi all,
I’ve been thinking about ways I can show myself some love and wanted to get some ideas from here.
Some of the things I can think of are:
Best nutrition possible - I’ve been thinking how I’ve been fighting with people in my life over the years to change their nutrition, stop drinking, how passionate and angry I can get at them for not following through. Yet, with myself, I am not so diligent. This one is tricky because sometimes I feel sorry for myself for having a hard day and I go and buy something tasty, but not good for me. 8 hours of sleep per day. Time off screen - target max 1-2 hours per day of phone screen time. Target 2 hours per day of wake time completely disconnected and in the nature. No podcasts, no movies, no YouTube. Try to spend that time in the nature. Pleasant and cosy living space. Not cluttered, plants around, nice furniture, things around that make you happy and make you smile. Sea salt baths every other day, hair masks, face masks. Salons, facials, manicures.  Vacations, get out of the city once in a while. Have strong boundaries and spend time only with people who want good things for you.  I’ve tried many of these, but I am not sure they have been working for me. I was hoping to get new ideas, I think I am missing something. 

I want to share an interesting experience of mine because I think it could be helpful to some of you  

Over the last 2 months, a natural desire to use my voice has bubbled up, inspired by two major points: 
a) I made the simple and obvious observation that a lifestyle of online-university and limited social contact, both due to the pandemic, leaves me silent most of the day. As a result, my voice got even more nasal, weak, and insecure, and my ability to express myself declined as well.
b) I LOVE language, especially English (not my mother tongue), and I recently attended to this love by diving into literature. At one point, I felt the desire to read out loud.

At first, that led me to intuitively hum and 'om' randomly throughout the day, and even speak words and phrases - it just felt good. Then, I started reading out loud daily for 30-60 minutes (Blood Meridian by McCarthy, and The Waves by Wolff), and this IMMEDIATELY had an impact. Although I live in Germany, my workplace is composed of such an international team that we only speak English there. Being at work, I instantly felt so much more capable of expressing myself elegantly, precisely and accurately. I didn't even have to think about it anymore, it just happened. And it also spilled over to my expression skill in German.

This felt extremely freeing and exciting. But here comes the most awesome benefit I didn't even expect: My thinking became more transparent and clear - meaning, I started to "hear" my thoughts very clearly in concrete, linguistic forms. To some of you that might sound odd, because that's just how you experience thinking (I have no idea), but for me this was a breakthrough. Why?:
One of the greatest challenges to developing spiritually, psychologically and emotionally is to correctly identify what one actually thinks. Otherwise, how would one even spot a wrong belief? The thing is that, although I'd say I'm quite a 'clever' and precise thinker, many of my thoughts have always been too abstract/unclear for me to really understand - most of my experiences of thoughts during my spiritual journey had a quality of cloudiness, confusion, and lack of concreteness. I felt my mind moving but could not make out what these thoughts actually expressed in my mind, linguistically, logically. This changed immediately. 

Since then, just a few days ago, I switched from written journaling to spoken journaling, and it's a complete game changer for me. I'm sitting here for 30-90 minutes every day and have a deep, honest and sophisticated talk with myself. Every day I'm having breakthroughs. I cried many times because FINALLY, just through taking the time to look at what is going on inside of me, I understood why I was suffering, why I kept backlashing. And more importantly, I understood clearly what I want in life, and how I'm standing in my own way. The increase in love and compassion I built towards myself is immense. Speaking in this manner is also a great platform for direct contemplation of reality. Written contemplation and journaling doesn't come close for me. What I am working through in 60 minutes of speaking would take ages to write down. The voice feels like this perfect, immediate instrument of expression. It's very beautiful. Of course, sincerity, focus and refined distinction making is needed to not just brabble randomly. 

Maybe many of you have known this for a long time. I feel like this is why Leo once said his episodes help himself integrate on a deep level what he is dissecting in front of the camera. The voice is such a beautiful thing, use it 

It's been 4 days now. I barely slept two hours since then. Across that period. I feel like a flimsy piece of shit. Extreme headache and fatigue. Can't do anything during the day. I tried warm baths.. Masturbating.. Hot herbs.. Meditation.. Soothing music.. And nothing seems to work.  I struggled with bad dreams and nightmares earlier this month and ever since then  my sleep quality has been going down hill and now barely can sleep. 
I feel like a zombie. 
What to do now? ?

Hi, 
 
is it possible to cure these things? mushrooms helped me so much but everyone tells me to stay away but I feel like I need to say fuck them and do what works for my OCD. 
I feel I have heavy metals and toxins or plastics etc in my brain and body from all the hospitals and pharmecutials and bad environment products or whatever. I need help badly and I need access to mushrooms more readily as they are legal in AArbor near me, so I am ready to make that leap, but I am on: 
 
prolixin 5mg
lithium 900mg I know no one is a doctor and shouldn't give advice, but I need some hope at least. Like can I have a seizure on mushrooms? cause I didn't my doctor even said I am fine with mushrooms and lithium. 
 
I feel hopeless. 
 
THanks!

Love. Love. Love. 

It's making sense, the obsessive thoughts of violence and brutality repeating over and over daily, the constant checking of the door to make sure its locked, the constant checking of the knobs on the stove to make sure the stove is off, the constant checking of the fridge to make sure its closed all the way. 
It makes sense! I think I have OCD symptoms. 
I also notice another obsessive pattern that's mentioned online its the obsessive thought that I'm always doing something wrong. 
^this has been a huge theme in my life, I've always over complicated things that my teachers would have me do and doubt myself. In my job I'm constantly doubting my skills and ask my coworkers if I'm doing the task correctly over and over again, making them think I'm not paying attention. 
For anyone with OCD what methods help? I'm 90% sure I got OCD, are the above symptoms mentioned relatable? 
I'm sure meditation is a big help so I'm saved already probably. 

This is something that has happened to me that I will never be able to forget! I've been to hell and it's not what you think. I am referring to hell experiences against your own human finite will. Not some some hell created by the ego mind. I'm not saying these ones are easy, these can also be very painful and cause suffering. I'm talking about something beyond your imagination and control, haha. I did not find much good content regarding hell realms here on the forum and that's why I want to share my experience. I've been to places I would not even wish for my worst enemy. I can not explain it better than Leo Gura; "Careful what you wish for. Degrees of suffering are possible the likes of which your mind cannot conceive."
I did mention some of this experience in my previous post about paranormals, but now I will go much deeper. I have witnessed a total destruction of the human mind in every possible way. It all started five years ago when I went to college. I lived a fairly ordinary life, had good grades and hung out with friends in my spare time. I remember that I began to feel shifts in my reality but it was not something I focused on. I began to feel restless and bored. It felt like I wanted to travel the whole world. I had an incredibly hard time sitting still. Many of my friends started commenting on my behavior and appearance almost everyday but like I said, this was not something I focused on. I began to experience difficulty with my concentration due to the restlessness. It continued like this for a few months until the symptoms worsened. In the beginning I could handle this emptiness with food and luxury vacations abroad, but later I started going through really shady experiences. Many of my friends started hating me for no reason at all. It was not just my friends but all the people out there. I remember being beaten and threatened by completely random people on the street. There came a period where I did not even dare to to go out for a walk because I only attracted "bad luck". It was completely insane because I had not done anything wrong. Even my relationship with my own family started to fall and soon I was almost completely alone in this journey. There were some childhood friends who stayed with me but our relationship was never the same. After a while I was involved in an accident where I broke five bones. I was bedridden for months, not to mention the horrible pain from the surgery that I had. just when the foot had healed, I managed to break it again by another accident. I started having problems with the police and my house got robbed. It became so intense that I had to drop out of college. 
 
This is where my whole life took a turn. I started having massive episodes of panic attacks and anxiety. I was cold sweating and my heart was pounding so hard all the time. I started having problems with social interraction which led to social anxiety and extreme self-consciousness. My mental health began to collapse and I began to experience many "mental disorders" like OCD, excessive paranoia, worry, anxiety, depression". After a while, my physical health also began to collapse. I started having arrhythmia attacks and dizziness where I could faint. My heart could then beat 250 beats per minute and it felt like dying. I ended up in the emergency room and the doctors could not explain my illness so I was prescribed blood pressure medicine which helped slowing down my heart beats. I started suffering from other diseases such as POTS and gerd. All I told you was dancing on roses compared to what will happen next. This was just the beginning!
My energy levels totally crashed and that's when I started abusing drugs. I started using ADHD medication like Adderal and Vyvanse to get through the day but it only got worse with time. The comedown I got with these stimulants was very severe so I stopped using them and switched to analgesic/painkillers. Then things started to derail. I was stuck in a substance abuse problem that made my situation worse, but after a while, I chose to quit cold turkey after an LSD trip where I had many realizations, including that I should stop running from my issues with the help of drugs and start dealing with them instead. I am a person with an incredibly strong will so I managed to go through the worst that lasted a few weeks on my own. My mind was a mess and the suffering got so bad that I had to self actualize everything. I started exercising daily to cope with the anxiety. This helped allevate the symptoms that I had for a while until it got worse. I started having frequent nightmares and severe memory loss. My energy levels got so low that I could not even get out of bed and I started hallucinating dark clouds and other scary shit. I lost my ability to speak and  formulate myself. You absolutely do not want to know what my thoughts looked like at this point... INFINITE MADNESS is a good way to describe it. I was scared from things that did not even exist, but it was so real. After all, everyone creates their own reality. Mine was HELL. It is impossible to describe the darkness I felt. Its like describing God, words are not enough. Imagine a bad trip on psychedelic times 10 without the total ego loss. Remember, at that time, I only cared about survival. It was not like I was sitting in my bed thinking about how bad my life is, NO! I just wanted to survive the hallucinations and the low energy levels that led to extremely negative thoughts that could not even be stopped with all kinds of meditations. I was close to dying at the end. I did not even have the energy to scroll on my phone. I sat there desperately hoping this would end. Anyway, I was very lucky to survive through this. One day I wanted to try one of those chakra balancing session online but instead I found out that I had suffered from black magic / voodo. It was done by a women in my college for selfish reasons. The spiritual healer I contacted was also a psychic so he could clearly see what I was going through. I can almost say that what happened next was worse than the experience itself. 
Now it was time for the cleansing process. My spiritual healer explained that I was incredibly lucky to survive through this and that my situation was critical. He explained that many evil spirits were attached to me in addition to the black magic itself. I also had lots of blockages / negative energy that required intensive cleanse. The cleansing was on distance (Time and space is illusion) and the symptoms I had to go through were insane! The healing process was very very tough. It was full of hallucinations, visions from spirits, visions from past lives. It felt like I was on chemotherapy for several months. I had nearly all the symptoms you could think on nausea, loss of appetite, fatigue, fever, muscle twitching, extreme pain, red eyes, severe insomnia, depression, anxiety, intense dark hallucinations and paranoia. This process lasted several months, Yes, I'm not kidding. Anyway, I managed to survive from this hell and today I feel 1000 times better than I did before this experience. This experience has made me so wise since wisdom comes through suffering. Life is so fucking easy now. Its infinite goodness of just sitting and staring at a wall. WOW! Sorry for any grammatical or spelling mistakes, English is not my first language. Much love and light. 
"Maybe you have to know the darkness to appreciate the light"
― Madeleine L'Engle

Hello, my dear night dwellers. As we all know, Insomnia is one tricky thing to befall a living thing. I’m sure most of us have been jealous of our dogs or cats. How easily they sleep, their minds still and tranquil. Us, however, goddamn. Some of us might not have anxiety or depression, yet still, we dwell in the night till the morning all the same. That’s precisely the point I’m about to make. Insomnia is one of the most mysterious and puzzling “illnesses” or conditions there are. There are no clear answers. Some people fix it by fixing their diet; some people have medical conditions, some mental. Some none of those.
I know it’s hard to feel optimistic about this fucking condition. Trust me; it brought me to the brink of suicide. I am much better now. However, my journey is not the same as yours. My body isn’t the same as yours, nor is my mind. We are all unique, yet we insomniacs share a lot of things in common as well. It took many many hours of studying insomnia, biology, diet, neuroscience, nutrition, pharmacology, self-help techniques, psychology, a bit of literature, the human microbiome, and believe it or not, Zen Buddhism & Meditation, to finally have an understanding of how to deal with my insomnia. I’ve gotten it under control. However, I had to accept many changes I needed to make.
Insomnia could be a journey to start discover yourself more deeply. Biologically, mentally, spiritually. I am not religious; I was born Muslim and became an atheist in my teens. I still consider myself an atheist to some extent. But spirituality does have an impact on your mental state. So does your biology, your nutrition, your lifestyle, etc.
Now the danger arises when you dismiss these topics on hand and think you already know them. I can’t stress this enough. Your mind will trick you into thinking you understand when you don’t. It will trick you into dismissing them. It will come up with any reason possible to avoid introspection and come up with excuses to not read more and change yourself. Do not trust your mind. Do not trust your thoughts. Trust your intuition. Trust direct experience. This you can rely on. Learn things and then directly experience them and see what happens. Many of you will intuitively know that this makes sense. Obviously, it would help if you still had your mind to read and think and remember, but you get the idea.
It will take maybe two years for you to filter out the good information from the bad. To see what lifestyle change works and what doesn’t. You need to keep an open mind, and you need to start to learn things proactively. Be consistent in your lifestyle changes. Not just try something for a week and say, “Fuck that it didn’t work, that’s bullshit.” That thinking right there is bullshit. Learning=change. Behavioral or psychological. If you read that stress induces insomnia, but you don’t do anything to change your stress level, then you haven’t actually learned. You just memorized a fact. You will be amazed by how many things you didn’t expect to influence sleep that does.
“The greatest enemy of knowledge isn’t ignorance; It is an illusion of knowledge.” -Stephen Hawking Many people know that gut bacteria influence your mood and sleep. So they google how to increase gut bacteria. They get an article saying that probiotics increase it. They buy probiotics. Try it. Feel nothing. Then say, ok, well, it’s not my gut bacteria. When in reality, probiotics alone don’t help that much at all. This is just one out of a million examples.
Insomnia isn’t your fault. It’s the worst thing to be told that it’s “just in your mind.” In a sense, it is true, but all of us have very little control of our minds and bodies. I know it’s hard to be motivated when you are sleep deprived. Somedays, when I lose sleep (rarely these days, maybe 5-6 days a month), I start to feel the same ways I felt before. Low energy, tired, want to give up on life. Just shitty overall. Suppose you sleep better the day after, or whenever, get back into the journey. We can’t control our sleep, but we do have control over many things that can start to influence both our minds and bodies. Later on, your mind and body will be your friends, not your enemies. But that won’t come quickly. Obviously, you see how big of a subject this is. I can’t explain every trap and obstacle. This is your journey to make.
“Suffering is the greatest teacher.” -Guatama Buddha Don’t just view this as things to do to avoid suffering. It is that but also more. It’s about healing yourself. DO NOT BE NEGATIVELY MOTIVATED. Try to be actually excited about this. You don’t know where it will lead you, what changes might happen. You really don’t, even if you think you do. This is positive and exciting, not negative at all. Insomnia was the best thing to happen to me. I hope you will be able to say that about yours too.
UNCONVENTIONAL TIPS
Before you stack up on melatonin pills, try pistachios. There  is evidence that just two pistachios contain enough melatonin to boost the hormone above physiological levels. Sleep hygiene is more complicated than the simple don't do anything in bed formula we constantly read about, if you do relaxing activities in bed like reading that can actually be helpful to associate bedtime with relax time. Insomnia causes  depression and makes your mood abysmal. Therefore, most insomniacs you engage with in this subreddit are trapped in this mindset, so that's why this isn't a very helpful subreddit to gain optimism from, and that’s totally understandable. But just keep that in mind the next time someone slams exercising for  not working or that diets have nothing to do with insomnia. Diet does absolutely matter, and diet is much more complicated than trying gluten free or keto or vegan. The raw material for neurotransmitter synthesis in your brain is derived from diet, it most certainly can impact your sleep cycles. The microbes in your gut produce 95% of the serotonin in your body (most of it won't pass the blood brain barrier, luckily your brain doesn't need much). & These microbes thrive when you eat healthy food, especially fiber. Getting your diet on check will require many years of careful rigorous experimenting, researching, not falling to delusional diets and most importantly not giving up. It takes a while for you to learn anything important, health should be your top priority no matter if  you think your insomnia is genetic or not, diet will lessen the blows if anything. Getting morning sunlight does actually work for some but not others, give it a try and try to make it consistent. Coffee in the morning can actually up regulate GABA receptors, so it might actually help some sleep in some people (theoretically). Insomnia can be psychosomatic in some people, not necessarily completely but maybe a bit. If you sleep with the expectation that you'll wake up early, that will most likely happen. That's why if you're worried about an exam and sleep you'll wake up an hour before your alarm clock. How do you stop this? It's complicated, but just keep it in mind. Some people sleep way better when the accidentally fall asleep, because there is no expectation. Glycine is a non essential amino acid, some people report to increase sleep quality when supplementing with glycine.

How would you apply your self Actualisation knowledge to study? E.g. Body awareness helps me drop and relax my body when I'm writing, observation of the mind helps me watch for constructed limitations. Just to name two examples.
 
Share yours peas ☺️?

So I picked english, philosophy and music for A levels. How can I study these fields while also studying all the self-actualization concepts and applying that in my life. How can I be strategic about this. I'm almost disinterested in schoolwork because I know I'm resourceful enough to study everything by myself and I dislike the way they teach me in school, assigning me homeworks and boring essays, etc. but I don't wanna fail my classes and I wanna succeed in life. I picked english because I wanna improve my writing ability, I picked philosophy because Leo got me interested in it with the topics he talks about, and I picked music because I play piano and I potentially want to master piano and create and perform music as a carear. 

Do you have recommendations for good tv shows without so much negativity but with deep insights? real or animated both fine. thanks.

Hey,
as I‘m almost at zero medication to treat my anxiety, I‘d like to supplement. I‘m already meditating for a year now, eating healthy (I‘d say it’s 80% healthy), doing yoga and doing intense cycling every other day. Sleep could be a bit more regular, but I‘m workung on it. No alcohol, not smoking.
I already use Omega 3 and Vitamin D regularly (for several months now). I tried curcumin pills for the last month, maybe it helped, but still had anxiety.
My anxiety (if strong, it leads to temporary depression - heart/emotions fully closed) manifests as tingling in my chest and the fear to look at people and have eye contact. I‘ve had eye contact problem for years, now I know that this is an indicator for how anxious/depressed I am. Also relaxing into it and letting my eyes open instead of pinching together won‘t help, as it‘s not the root problem.
If you can, attach studies to the supplements you recommend.
Thanks ya‘ll?
(saved the two previous comments, thank you)

This is just about general friendship, not dating specifically. I always have to deal with this problem that I feel like I want to appeal or impress someone to seek their approval. Although I try hard not to and I do say no when I have to, but there is always this nagging feeling where I feel guilty if I don't get along with someone who I am friendly with. 
I have this intense need to make myself look like the good person and I usually go to extreme lengths to be in their good books. 
I want to feel strong enough that I can let go and not feel dependent on that person's perception of me and not have this need to constantly please them. 

Author: Jiddu Krishnamurti 
 Book: Life Ahead: On Learning and Search for A Meaning
My comment: Very powerful book. It encourages reader to start questioning, and not merely accepting. The most important thing which I got out from this book is that, Jiddu suggests that young people should be in a state of revolt, in a state of inquiry, as opposed to, what everyone around me (Including parents, family, school teachers, literally everyone...) told me, which was: Shut up, you are ‘too young’ to think about this, too young to meditate, just go out and play video games, eat pizza, and go to clubs, with your peers. For me, this was extremely inspiring and eye-opening, therefore I think this book will be worthy of everyone’s time.
 One of my favorite paragraph: ‘ While you are young you should awaken within yourself the flame of discontent; you should be in a state of revolution. This is the time to inquire, to discover, to  grow; therefore insist that  your parents and your teachers educate you properly. Do not be satisfied merely to sit in a classroom and absorb information about this king or that war.  Be discontented, go to  your teachers and inquire, find out. If they are not intelligent,  by inquiring you will help them to be intelligent; and when you leave the school you will be growing into maturity, into real freedom. Then you will continue to learn right through life till you die, and you will be a happy, intelligent human being.’

http://www.chanceandchoice.com/
Chance and Choice - A Compendium of Ancient and Modern Wisdom Revealing the Meaning and Significance of the Myth of Science
It's relatively inseparable from https://schoolofwisdom.com/
 
https://www.diygenius.com/the-classics-library-of-free-ebooks/
 

Every human being needs a copy of this book. It is essential for personal development work. If you are attempting to reach emotional mastery like I am, this book needs to be on your bookshelf. I would buy everyone a copy if I could. It gets to the deepest root issue of most of your neurosis and emotional hiccups, exercises on how to fix them and how we can incorporate healthy shame in our lives to be human beings. Nothing more nothing less. 

A list of some of the top degree programs relating to Consciousness/Spirituality/Transpersonal Psychology for our college/university aged members. Hopefully others can help find more than I currently have researched:
The Alef Trust's Masters in Consciousness, Spirituality & Transpersonal Psychology Sofia University's Masters of Arts in Transpersonal Psychology The California Institute of Integral Studies' Online PHD in Integral and Transpersonal Psychology (Among others they offer) Ubiquity University's Integral Transpersonal Psychology – Foundations Course (Among other high quality courses they offer) Life University's Master of Science in Positive Psychology  
Please, this is not an area to discuss whether someone should/shouldn't go to college/university, these are simply the better courses that exist currently. If you have one to add please comment below or DM me the link