Bill W

From 2.20 to 11.00 was full of shit.

The one where he goes on and on saying everything is shit. I've searched high and low.

Thanks guys

I don't spend much time at all with Leo's videos but right now I was trying to think of something worthy to post on this journal and I was stuck. I've had a very flat day mood wise. Everything feels a bit shit. Then I remembered that video of Leo's where he just goes through a list of things that are shit. This is shit and that is shit etc. It made me smile and laugh inside thinking of that, as that's how I feel today. Will try and find that video now actually

Powerful stuff. That guy is one advanced human being.

How much am I willing to sacrifice? I try to remind myself that every person I meet is a potential teacher. Man, this is hard to do when you've unintentionally programmed yourself with a shit load of character defects so lengthy it might take 2 life times to overcome them. Selfishness, greed, pride, and the list goes on and on. Today's lesson was a light bulb moment just about 30 minutes ago. Someone who I am heavily involved with right now that I have blamed a lot recently for my angst said something about "sacrifice". She was turned down for a job today she had waited 2 weeks on an answer for, and she's gutted. Devastated. She said to me "I'm going to have to make a big sacrifice to get the kind of job I want to get". She was talking about her level of preparation for the next interview. It made me realise something - I'm not making any real sacrifices in my personal development mission, for my growth, for my bad habits and addictions, to sort out my character defects. No significant sacrifices are being made. Yes, I'm a year clean of alcohol and pills but it's not a sacrifice anymore. I have no obsession or desire for those substances. Nothing is being sacrificed to maintain my sobriety. I don't care for drink or drugs and I don't miss them anymore. I'm sacrificing fuck all basically. I'm trying to have my cake and eat it. Eating what I like. Treating people how I like. Not taking my exercise as serious as I used to. Withdrawing from things I need to face up to. Treating my finances and debt situation like money will never run out and why should I make cut backs. For me anyway, growth and sacrifice need to go hand in hand. It's just hit me today, I'm not willing to give up anything right now. All my bad habits and dysfunction. I'm holding onto them for dear fucking life! This is not be being too hard on myself. I don't hate myself or have self-loathing. I just need to face the facts. I think this post is a good unintentional follow up to my post above about Faith

Hang in there man. You've been real supportive of me so would like to be here for you. You are winning on authenticity right now for sure! This thread has turned into a confessional. I've had plenty of "oh wait, maybe I'm just the worlds biggest asshole" moments lately.

I just believe it's easier on the stomach this way. Especially with red meat which I would not have more than once per week. It also encourages you (or me for sure) to be more creative with my meals if I am going meat free 4 days of the week.

Faith In the post above I made some reference to Faith. Over the past year, with the help of Alcoholics Anonymous I've learned that my fear is behind virtually all of my problems, possibly even every single problem that has ever existed for me. So I'd begun to think that fear is the default setting for me and everything else flows from that. However, what if my fear is born out of a lack of Faith? Not necessarily Faith from a wholly religious perspective. Some of the common definitions of Faith seem to include Confidence or trust in a person, thing, or concept Complete trust or confidence in someone or something Firm belief even in the absence of proof Faith is choosing to believe The Bible says Hebrews 11:1 New Living Translation (NLT) - Faith shows the reality of what we hope for; it is the evidence of things we cannot see. Hebrews 11:6 New Living Translation (NLT) - And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him. The relationship between Faith & Fear (And therefore the relationship between Faith & Emotional Sobriety......) I'm going to lean on what the Susan Jeffers book "Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway" talks about. That our main fear is not the individual scenario's we dream up in our head, but, that if such things happen, we would not be able to cope after. Basically, that we cannot handle it Examples of where a lack of Faith is hindering me I do not have sufficient Faith that I will be any better off If I truly forgive certain people whom I hold deep resentments against. I do not have sufficient Faith in the idea that punishment of others is useless to me and that it in fact worsens my emotional sobriety. I used to think I did have Faith in the power of forgiveness, but if I had Faith in it, why have I not acted on it? It's like I have been telling myself I have Faith in forgiveness but I've just been a bit too nervous and/or stubborn to carry out the act of forgiveness. Why nervous and/or stubborn? Surely it is a lack of Faith in the outcome? But Alcoholics Anonymous tells you there can only be one outcome, and that outcome is a strengthening of your spirit and all round sobriety. That it is inevitable and a forgone conclusion that you will personally benefit from forgiving others, and that the benefit can be huge, substantial, and significant. It can even be life changing. The Bible says the same. My first reaction to my own sentence I've just typed is "Yes, I believe that to be so", but do I believe? If we believe something is the best course of action and we can easily take that action, why don't we? Where does the resistance get it's power from? The resistance must be drawing on some power as it can stop you acting in a way that serves both your interests and the interests of others. Everybody wins right? No, because resistance creeps in and stops anyone from winning. Everyone loses. Is long as the other person loses, we still feel like we've won, even though we have lost as well. Not forgiving someone is like keeping them on 0/10 and you on 1/10, rather than forgiving them and both of you being on 10/10 - We would rather be on 1/10 than allow them any points at all????? Crazy. More examples to follow, and some brainstorming on potential solutions to a lack of Faith to follow......

I don't believe any affects are negative overall, but meditation appears to raise uncomfortable thoughts and/or feelings for some. However, these difficulties need to be addressed anyway in my opinion. I don't believe in blaming meditation for this. It's just bringing up what is there, like an invitation to work on your self. Often you need to go back 1 step to move 2 steps forward.

It's definitely good. Have you not heard that there are too many people on Earth?

So basically it would make sense that the gay population increased as it would help the overpopulation of the Earth.

3 Times

I don't think your meditation is working Don.

I wish there were two Leo's. His recent video's do nothing for me, so every now and then I go for a rummage around in his older self-help video's. In my fantasy land, all of Leo's video's would be 5-30 minutes long as well, but I accept I'm in the minority on that one. And I have watched entire 90 minute and 120+ minute video's of Leo's and other teachers. I've yet to encounter a 60 minute plus video that offers any additional benefit once it passes the 30 minute mark. I'm staying off topic a bit with the above.

I think the vast, vast, vast, vast amount of us are on the scale somewhere. I think the key is to keep it as low as possible. I'm on the scale. It's a bitter pill to swallow. You don't come across high on the narcissist scale to me. That you are referring to yourself as one helps reduce your narcissist score and hopefully stop it climbing. The below helps me come back to the reality of some of my problems and why I am the way I am sometimes (i.e. the narcissist in me). This video helps ground me, at least for a while!

I don't think science fiction had been invented yet, at least not for Buddha and Jesus.

That's nice and also true. Like it.

I always thought fear was at the route of most, if not all emotional difficulties. But perhaps underneath fear is a default lack of Faith setting. I'm not lumping Faith and Religion together necessarily. One thing I've learned about fear or I think I've learned, is that it can be helpful looking at specific fears to a degree, but there is a danger of just wasting so much time because fear will just repackage itself again and again. I wonder what percentage of emotionally sick people are walking around believing that their problems are external and caused by something other than their own internal settings and dare i say it infection/illness. The external world is probably more likely to help solve our problems than cause them. Life throws lessons and teachers our way all the time. The most dumb people can still teach you something tomorrow. If anything they always teach you tolerance. The external environment can be a playground for developing mastery just like the internal world of the mind and body can. Proper work on internal dysfunctional programming PLUS pragmatic use of interacting with the external environment equals best chance of serenity for me. We need to road test all our techniques and practices. It's fine being all Zen and Christ like in our bedroom or down at the gym but most of us have to also expose ourself to the insanity of the outside world. Outside world triggers internal dysfunction. Outside world including other people are seemingly not interested in changing to suit our internal rancid state and faulty processing. Result??? Mass delusion as a way of suppressing and coping. So the ones who are not 100% deluded search for the cure. A treatment for the infection that has diseased the ego in the same way 1 litre of vodka a day diseases the liver and 20 cigarettes a day diseases the lungs.

It's probably the first thing you get rid of when you wake up. I bet he gave up snap chat as well.

I believe concentration and focus are skills. They require practice. Some people need it more than others. I am the same like you. What has helped me is mindfulness meditation. I pick a sound to focus on. What helped me was the amount of times I did this and not the amount of minutes per day total. For me, doing this 5 times a day for 5 minutes was better than one sitting of 20 minutes in the morning and one sitting of 20 minutes at night. I found that practising outside of work gave me the best benefits as the benefits then transferred to my work where I was having problems like you. You can practice concentration even in 30 second intervals if you want. In my experience it all adds up. Monkey mind needs daily training. Think of it like going to the gym for the first time in your life. Slow and steady. Build it up. Don't search for a profound breakthrough. As for pills, I wouldn't go there personally. There is way too much content, teachers, practices to access for free and with less risk and less fucking around with your brain chemistry artificially. Unless a doctor thinks there is a medical reason.

If locking down threads cripples people from growing then not much can be done for them to be frank. They can easily get advice from a moderator or Leo. Actually most of Leo's stuff I don't resonate with, but he does do a good job of helping stop people from festering in their own mess, as do the other moderators. Look man, lets see what others say. I know this won't happen anyway as Leo states he already tolerates a lot of low quality stuff on here, he will not be inclined to trigger more of it. If anyone feels crippled in their growth, then use the resources around in this place and the main site and work on that issue and fear directly. Work out what's really going on. I doubt the real problem is not having a place for low quality or low consciousness content. I'll leave this now and see what others reckon. I might be in the minority. And then there is the whole debate of course on what is low quality and low consciousness etc.

That will mean the mods and Leo have to spend time monitoring it. It would still need moderation. So I don't think so. I say carry on locking threads. If your thread gets locked or your post/content is critiqued for being poor quality then people can just learn from that and try to improve. Leo could rightly say that if you want low quality content go somewhere else.

Is that to do with David Hawkins? I recognise some of it