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@Shin I think he means that the story about color (coming from light rays into my optic nerve, rods and cones, and being transferred and perceived by my brain to be color). when I am just with the color red fully, all that is there is the Direct Experience of it with no imaginary story behind what is being Directly Experienced. Even the story of me seeing red will vanish, and it will be just Pure Being. And there may not even be a “color red” because that itself is an imaginary distinction within Direct Experience. @kai0 Feel free you correct my interpretation of what you said. It is just my imagination of what I believe you meant.

@Leo GuraThank you so much again for your help with my journey. That Actuality vs concept has to be like the MOST important videos of yours, but that is just a belief, concept and imagination. I am starting to see the Actuality is essential to any meditation because like you said we want to strip away all concepts and baggage to have the NOW raw and fully experienced. Very good. Thank you!

I think I finally realized the Donkey and mirror analogy that you described about trying to get the donkey to see itself. In a way, you are trying to do that with “me.” I am starting to see that whatever it is that I am looking for, it can only be found here in this moment. There is nowhere else I can be but here. I am talking about I as in direct experience not this thing behind the eyes. it’s almost like what Douglas Harding said about headlessness. “Where my head should be, all I see is the world.” @Leo Gura

@Leo Gura thank you! I just read you response about color red. This was the conclusion I came up with after realizing that the whole idea about magic and the magician is just more imagination. The idea that my senses are based in reality or not is imagination. The only thing that exists is NOW.

Damn it’s so easy to get lost in concepts. Thanks for calling out my bullshit. In my inquiry, I find that Direct Experience is all that exists. Even though, this is the case for me, I still question whether what appears to be here is what is actually here because our minds influence and project many ideas into reality. Also, there are illusions in reality, but I guess what is Actual is that the illusions are occuring and anything else is Imagination. I have a direct experience of a magician making a dove appear/disappear out a hat, but the method of the illusion is Imagination from my perspective, which is the only thing that is Actual to me. I see how Direct Experience is what is, but I also see that my direct experiences may not be accurate when I see a magician. A magician’s job is to fuck with my reality. I have a direct experience of the magic, which appears to be real, but I am imagining when I speculate how he does it. If I just went based off of my direct experiences alone and not off of my own past experiences in magic (which are imaginary), I would be convinced that a dove actually appeared and disappeared (or whatever magic trick you think makes sense). Oh! I think I see it now! What I see is what I see. It is what it is. It is actual! But if I start believing it is true or false or yatta yatta and going off in concepts like I’m doing now, then I will and I am lost in concepts. The hypothetical case about the magician and magic is all imagination. Even the idea of whether a magic trick is illusion and reality is an idea itself!

Damn it’s so easy to get lost in concepts.

@Vittorio Remember that Enlightenment is NOT a state. An LSD trip is NOT enlightenment. If you cannot see Truth in every moment of your life, Right NOW, then it is NOT enlightenment, but rather just a MYSTICAL EXPERIENCE. Enlightenment is not an experience or a state of consciousness or being, it is Truth-realization.

Yeah! Both are true lol! That’s why I love actualized.org cause I learn more about myself, but I just need to do the work!

So I have been studying existentialism, and the basic idea is that we cannot control what happens to us. The only thing we can control is how we respond. Even though, the ego is an illusion, which would be considered the chooser of a choice, choice is what a product of God. Since God is experiencing a human, God has free will that is limited to human experience. Sure, there are neurodevelopmental disorders and all kinds of things that can impair our choices, but we still have the ability to respond to life. We can respond rather than react. Determinism is all about cause and effect. It is very materialistic, and claims that there is no choice being made. But, the Universe to me is not like a clock, but rather like an Intelligent Mind. If the Universe is Infinite, that means it can do anything it wants and does not want. There is no cause and effect or rules because all of those happen within the Subjectivity of Mind or God. I think there is an experiential way of verifying Free Will. Alan Watts describes free will and determinism as related to the process of breathing. Breathing is both something that we do and also some that happens to us. There are two perspectives on this. 1. Everything is happening to us and I am like a puppet. Or 2. I am God and I am controlling the entire Universe. Both perspectives are true because Voluntary and Involuntary are one. Free will and determinism collapse at the absolute perspective. There is no boundary that separates what is voluntary action and involuntary. So what is a choice? A choice is our ability to respond rather than react to life. A choice can be thinking about different things, which is produced by involuntary things like neurons in brain. But choice is also not just thinking about different options, but the ability to Act on them too. So I guess, no choice is totally "free" of external influences, but the whole idea is that it is not just Free Will or Determinism, it is rather that both exist and are inseparable since everything is One. We cannot have voluntary action without involuntary, and we cannot have involuntary without voluntary. We can increase our Free Will or our ability to respond, but the level of Consciousness that we are at. For instance, if I am at low consciousness, I may be more reactive. If someone tells me to think of a purple elephant, I will think of it, but if I meditate and gain discipline over the mind, I will be able to control it. Also when people insult me, if I am low consciousness, I will react and not really have free will. It will be almost like a reflex, but if I meditate and evolve myself and realize that I don't have to play their social game (meta skill), then I can choose to be offended or peaceful. There it is! Please let me know what you think. This is a tough question because I did consider the possibility that since ego is illusion, choice may also be illusion because there is nobody choosing, but at the same time, there is no difference between illusion and reality. So to say that everything is an illusion is also to say that everything is real. Right? What does it mean to say that something exists or is an illusion? Is there really any difference? I mean isn't that what an illusion is? That something appears to exist, which everything does appear and disappear through the law of impermanence. So I guess there really are no objects in the entire universe that could exist? Thank you sorry for the rambling, I was contemplating as I was typing. Please let me know your thoughts!

The big problem I see is that Determinism is unfalsifiable. There is no way disprove that Determinism is false. So what would be evidence of free will?

I guess since I was never born, there is nobody that dies. The question that arises for me is that how can there be any knowledge about death if all knowledge dies in death. But I guess maybe knowledge is an illusion because it assumes there is a knower to what is known. I see death like the silence in which sound is born and then dies. The impermanence of things is the death of things you could say I guess.

Good point. I guess the point I was trying to say in "finding" the truth is about unlearning all that I hold that is untrue including the "I" at the center of inquiry. I have been thinking about Memento Mori, but I realize that I am not sure if death can really be known to be a reality. Are we really mortal? What does mortality mean? If there is an afterlife, then wouldn't life be like a dream? If there is afterlife, there is no mortality. Even if death is a reality, what does that mean if there is no experience? I assume that if or when this ego dies, it would be like it never existed, like nothing ever existed. It was all just a dream. I try to do memento mori every waking moment, but all I can be certain of is that NOW is the only reality. Time is illusion. The assumption is that death is the end and that it is a reality, but I realize that death is just my belief. It is the ego's story that it tells itself I guess.

Thanks! I realize it’s hard to type without using first person language. I also realize that I am hiding from awakening every time I post my crap on these forums. I have the tools to do it but I’m avoiding it by seeking refuge and comfort on Actualized.org. I discovered that Actualized.org is serving me ego in a way. What I need to do is go into a dark forest and just find the Truth like Jed McKenna says. everything else is just a distraction from truth.

Good point! I think I am starting to realize from all of your responses, that free will is an illusion, but a necessary illusion for the ego to survive. The ego has to feel like it has control, which I guess is part of what it means to be ego.

Meditation is also about realizing that you are God, and therefore has infinite will! There is no duality between voluntary and involuntary action. They are one. You are controlling everything. Yet, everything is happening to you. Both are true.

Remember, there is no separation between choice and happening, voluntary and involuntary, God and ego, or reality and illusion. They go together. Choice is happening. Voluntary action is involuntary. God is ego. Reality is illusion. Limitations are what define reality and make choice a possibility. Seeing and breathing are both happening to me and I as God am choosing to see and breathe. There is no separation between what you do and what happens to you. They all go together.Right? The essence of who I am seems to be Consciousness. It is the no-mind that can be reached when you silence thoughts. It is interesting how people say that you are not your thoughts, but if you are not your thoughts, you are creating a duality. If you are not your thoughts, then how is it possible that you can silence what is not you? By you, I mean I don’t mean The Wizard of OZ of your mind, I mean The Pure Awareness that has always been there. Since you are The Infinite, you also have free will! If the Infinite didn’t have free will, what would control the Infinite??

Cogito Ergo Sum = Experience therefore Existence Do that practice, and you will realize that consciousness is the only thing that can be known to exist. Start to doubt everything, and realize that you cannot deny that experience is happening. Doubt cannot exist without consciousness because everything that exists is in consciousness. Consciousness is an incorrigible truth, meaning that even if everything you experience is an illusion, the fact that you are experience an illusion is True.

Thank you all for your responses! I am learning a lot!

So I just watched Actualized.org's Introspection video! It was great! I am just going to get right to the point, I think that rationalism is a better guide than feelings (please prove me wrong). As much as I want to agree with Yoda when he says "search your feelings," I just do not see how we can trust our feelings. Our feelings are arbitrary and random. Rationality has been my way to cope with my feelings. My feelings are not always rational, and I think the best way of introspecting is by examining your own mind and contemplating it. You can examine your feelings, but our feelings are impermanent. They are always subject to change, whereas rationality is more constant and in our control. However, I do acknowledge the criticism of how can do we know what is rational? What is the difference between rationality, and how can we know if rationality is the best way? These are good criticisms because we cannot use rationality to verify whether it is the best way because that is biased, but this objection also works with feelings. I think we should feeling into our emotions, harness intuition, but truthful rationality is our instrument to guide our introspection. Rationality is not about following some mathematical or logical formula. Rationality is just using our thoughts to verify our experience on a deeper and impartial level. Rationality is best when it is free and not bound by rules because to think outside the box, we have to be willing to explore the territory that is beyond logic. Logic is a structured way of thinking, whereas rationality is more just about exploration, questioning, wonder, not-knowing to verify what is true. Feelings can be influenced by events that are random and maybe irrational, but true rationality is able to see through the bullshit, and even it's own limitations. Many people say that they "feel the holy spirit." But if you were that person, how would you know that you felt the holy spirit and not just something else? I think rationality helps us observe things impartially. As soon as we bias our rationality to serve our beliefs, it becomes irrationality disguised as rationality to the person who thinks their beliefs are rational and not just beliefs, but the Absolute Truth. So this is my argument, please help me out here because I am more of a thinker than a feeler. I have used Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy (REBT), which is a form of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) on myself my whole life. I used my rationality to influence my emotions rather than my emotions influencing my rationality. I think this is very important because emotions can influence how we rationalize things, but the rationality I am talking about is more like contemplation. I see contemplation as basically rationalizing or questioning things at a deeper level to understand it. Thank you!

@Ibgdrgnxxv I am INTP I took the test a few times and I am the Logician personality. Now that I think about it, I think it is kind of interesting that I am Intuitive and Thinking. I would think that Intuition is more in line with Feeling rather than Thinking. But I think the reason why I am Intuitive rather than Sensing is because I think reality is beyond our senses. Intuition is our unconsciousness picking up things that are conscious mind can barely comprehend I guess.

@Leo Gura Okay! Thank you so much man! I wish you a great day! Thanks for your time and videos! I am going get your Life Purpose course for Christmas!

@Leo Gura Thank you! I will continue to work on my introspection, but I still am skeptical about trusting my feelings because they are full of bias. I think examination or observation like you said is our best guide, and this is what I meant by rationality. I think that what I mean by rationality is just critical and truthful examination and observation

@Leo Gura You are right, but aren't feelings also co-opted by ego and selfishness? All I do to verify things is by examining, feeling, and then rationalize in that order. My intuition is beyond my rationality, at least that is how I see it.

@Leo Gura But we have to look at where these rules and regulations come from. Our government is corrupt and controlled by corporations and what George Carlin calls "The Real Owners." Democracy is a lie. The government has always pulled all the strings, and government cannot be trusted to make the best decisions for everyone. Government is easily influenced by corrupt people, and it is controlled by corrupt people. The ideal is to have a better government, but corruption is inevitable when it is run by Devils. @Leo Gura I don't know whether I am libertarian or not, but I distrust the government. We need to have a balance of freedom and responsibility. People need to be free, but also be free enough to consider the freedoms of others. "With great power comes great responsibility." For me, I believe in collective freedom. When I talk about freedom, I mean freedom as in the freedom of the whole. Freedom is the most important thing to me, but not at the cost of exercises my freedoms to enslave others. You could say that is freedom, but deep down, a libertarian would be dumb if they did not include the freedoms of the collective community. It would be a bloodbath. We need to cut down our horseshit self-bias and include everyone as a member of our family. What a family would be is community, not genetics, and I think this is our problem is that selfish Devils wanna inflict their will onto others and enslave the freedoms of others be that it is (1) passing drug laws, targeting Black communities to restrict their voting rights; (2) vaccination ID requirements; (3) loitering; (4) eminent domain; (5) redlining; (6) gentrification; etc. Government is both part of the problem and part of the solution because government is run by Devils with agendas. The good part of government is the order aspect of legislation, enforcement, and judicial system are essential services even though they are corrupt. People cannot be trusted to use their freedoms responsibly, which is why we "need" a government, but we also have to consider that the government does not use their power responsibly either so I guess government is a necessary evil that should not be trusted. The problem of government is who is it the oversees that the government is operating fairly, and who oversees the overseer, and the overseer of the overseer of the government's checks and balances, etc. etc. to infinity. Government is substrate for oversight which as we can see is a problem because a corrupt government will produce more corruption. It just seems like there is no way out of this problem of how do we build a better government because who is to judge and track this process? How do we know when we have a "just" government and system?

So where do you all think Captain America would align politically?