EternalForest

@blankisomeone Well there's a difference between feeling empathy for someone and being them. I've also felt empathy for people so strongly I might as well have been them in that situation. Perhaps that's part of the key to understanding this, but I think I'm missing the point.

@blankisomeone Non-dual teachers claim I am them, and they are me. This is like the non-duality mantra, yet I honestly have no idea what they're on about. For a while I've lied to myself and told myself I did, but I've recently realized...I really don't. Like, not at all.

@TylerJ I define being "me" as the unique collection of my own knowledge and experiences, which no one else shares exactly. @zeroISinfinity I'm sorry, you're proud of me for what?

@Applegarden I don't particularly desire it; I'm speaking in hypotheticals. But let's assume I really want it. How would I go about acquiring it?

@LordFall @Leo Gura I never said reality didn't have great aspects. But we could easily keep all the great elements and do away with all the elements that cause suffering and ignorance. Is that so much to ask?

@Osaid In that case I'd say God's pretty unsympathetic to not just tell us there is no purpose rather than have us finite beings run around in circles trying to figure out what God's "purpose" is. And I recognize that God speaks to us in more ways than words, but considering that's the most direct way for most of us, I just wish God would be more direct.

@MsNobody To be hopeful, the autopsy results weren't conclusively linked to the virus being the cause of death. Here's what NY Times stated: "Los Angeles County Department of Public Health on Tuesday said the death, of a 17-year-old boy from Lancaster, Calif., was from the coronavirus. Hours later, it walked back that statement, saying the death would be further evaluated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “The case is complex and there may be an alternate explanation for this fatality,” the health department said in a statement." Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/24/us/california-coronavirus-death-child.html

@Leo Gura I understand all that, but my biggest question is why? Why would God do this?

@Inliytened1 Even if I accept this infinite power I still can't, say, flap my arms and fly. If everything's imaginary why can't I just imagine anything I want to?

@TylerJ I'm not saying I can't receive messages from your mind, its that I can only get those messages if you want to give them. I can't make you do anything you don't want to do. So then how am I...you?

@XYZ I'm curious, how exactly did you choose it?

Lately I've been getting nostalgic about 2017. This is the year that I discovered actualized.org. I remember during my days off I would put on his videos and listen while calmly looking out the window on bright sunny days and just be amazed at the amount of wisdom and deep insights I was hearing. Over the years, the videos have gotten better and better, and I've grown to love the metaphysical and spiritual content. But at the same time I think there was a certain magic in Leo's more motivational content from 2014 to 2017. It was such an inspiring feeling listening to him back then, it felt as if he was speaking directly to me when he explained how to escape depression, how to use meditation to improve your life, how build a foundation for success, how to conquer your emotions, and how to see the big picture of life and take action to accomplish your goals and life purpose. I remember those days so fondly, listening to his guided meditations while staring at the beautiful summer sky, taking long meditative drives while being motivated, dreaming and having a sense of wonder, being positive about the future ahead. The newer videos are valuable too, perhaps in a different way I can't fully recognize yet (above my current level), but I was just wondering, does anyone else get nostalgic about Leo's early content?

Rewatching Understanding Impermanence right now after doing some deep contemplation on the state of physical media and data all being impermanent. No matter what the disc, the record, the hard drive, the book, no matter what, all human knowledge will eventually be destroyed, as well as all physical records of our existence. For some reason, this is a harder truth for me to accept than death itself. Because the human body itself is a naturally impermanent thing, but its hard to accept that even everything human body does, writes, records, creates or impacts will also die...

@OctagonOctopus But you can't really lose resources when it comes to consciousness. The law of conversation of matter states that things are not created or destroyed, only morphed.

@OctagonOctopus Why must the fractal eliminate what's behind it? Why can't it expand with addition, instead of with destruction?

There's a time to be serious, but there's even more time to be laughing! To live a life of seriousness all the time makes the soul weary. The line between comedy and tragedy is extremely thin. The same thing that would make you cry your heart out could also make you laugh your head off. It's all about perspective. There's nothing you can't joke about, because when you do, you let go. Laughter is an amazing way to maintain happiness. Leo once made a video about listing out your Top 10 Things You Love About Life. Laughter would definitely be near the top of my list.

The more deeply I study Spiral Dynamics, the more I realize that the true juice of life is lived at Tier 1, and not Tier 2. I mean yes, at Stage Yellow or Turquiose you've accessed levels of consciousness that most people couldn't even imagine, you've gained a total understanding of the entire system, and you've obtained all the wisdom you'll ever need. But...then what? What's left for you to do? The answer is nothing. There's nothing to do, there's nowhere to go from there except to start anew. From my view, the people at Stages Blue, Orange and Green, although they might be going through their own dysfunctions and they have their own levels of ignorance about things, there's a certain bliss in that. There's a certain bliss in living your life simply to make your family happy, to make your friends happy, to go see a football game or an epic concert, to building a business that matters a lot to you, to going to church, to having your own passions, goals and dreams. There's a certain joyful simplicity in life at Tier 1, a genuine purpose and a certain wonder at how the whole system is constructed. Sure, you can still have the knowledge of how the entire thing works metaphysically at Stage Yellow and still get that juice out of life, but its more subdued. There's more joy in experiencing than simply being. Tier 1 gets to actually get dirty and appreciate the highs and lows and intensities of life first hand. Turquoise may be conscious, but at the level they're at, they can't unknow the fact that they are an observer. It's like asking someone: Would you rather watch a movie or be inside the movie? There's a certain pleasure to both, but if you ask me, I'd rather be in the middle of the action, I'd rather be inside the movie!

I never said there was a best stage, I just said Tier 1 is underrated. What stage do you think I'm in? @Eph75 If you think I'm in fear, you're mistaken. I'm just becoming aware that moving up to further stages is inevitable and so it's best to see the best in the lower stages, and recognize that your perspective in them is temporary. Like Leo's video about impermanence, all of this will be gone someday. The more you internalize that truth, the more you appreciate Tier 1, I believe. I'm allured by Tier 2 yes, but I'm not afraid of it. Very important distinction. A defense mechanism would be to straight up attack it and call it inferior, which I'm not. In concept, it's the logical end point to the entire system, and as you said, a building process.

@Serotoninluv Sure, but I think if God wishes to experience itself through the self, then the self is something to be cherished. I guess over time I've stopped becoming so attached to this constant need to transcend-transcend-transcend all the time, and instead, fully relish in the state I'm in now. Because once you've transcended, you've transcended. You'll never really be who you are at this moment again. And I think that's what the beauty of Tier 1 is. Your identity is created out of what you do not know. But once you do know your true identity, you'll realize that all past identities were nothing but an illusion. Enjoy the illusion, while it lasts...

Now before you comment, just to throw it out there, I'm not suggesting that you should treat every date like an interview or an interrogation, these are just questions to throw in from time to time to learn more about your partner and see how compatible your values and your outlooks on life are. Secondly, I acknowledge that sometimes being with someone who is different than you can inspire a more interesting relationship, and you don't have to agree 100% on every single question. Obviously overall chemistry is the most important.

If its going to happen, it'll happen naturally.

@Martin123 Interesting, never thought about it that way! You have a unique perspective on things.

@Martin123 Let me clarify... I'm not treating a relationship like a checklist, like if they don't check off all the boxes on the list, then I can't be with them. On the contrary, I'm asking for questions to discover more about your partner and accept them for who they are + grow with them. Questions are not the only way to do this, as you said just by spending time with one another many questions will be answered naturally. What I don't like though, is when you said that the questions you ask reveal your own insecurities, demands and past scars. That's simply untrue. If the dynamic of a relationship is truly free and open, you won't jump to the conclusion that the motives of the question are toxic. It's like when you ask someone for information and they say "Why do you want to know?" "If you don't tell me why you want to know, I won't tell you.". It makes you feel like that person must suspect the worst of you, and it makes you less willing to be intimate with that person. Granted, anyone can refuse to give information for any reason, but it's best if they're honest and just say it rather than tell you "I don't want to talk about it." when they really mean "I don't want to talk about it with you." So overall, openness and honesty is the best policy.