Cireeric

Since Leos Video on Happiness, Ive been doing a Happiness Journal and kept observing my workings of my mind and especially the relation between my activities and my happiness levels very rigorous. What is amazing, is that the way to highest happiness(contentment type happiness) is your highest path. I noticed that my best days are these days where Im reading, doing my meditation, getting my stuff done, doing my exercise + maybe go for a walk with a friend and eat a good dinner consciously and appreciate life. The days where Im not in a good mood is where I procrastinate, scroll through instagram, low energy, maybe eating something unhealthy... Maybe kind of obvious but I got way more conscious about that doing the exercise for the last weeks and got a few more personal insights about what makes me happy and what not. It is also very useful for getting out of bad habits, compulsive behaviors or addictions you have, just noticing very consciously how it affects your state and noticing that it doesnt lead to overall happiness. You dont judge and feel guilt but understand.

Yes I pretty much think that AI that is developed and used in our current system, with arms races will lead to a very bad outcome for everybody. It seems like the intelligence of an AI system is not really wholistic and loving but rather narrow and focussed on optimizing a few metrics. Higher intelligence does not mean more Wisdom/More Loving. The clearest thoughts on this I found in the podcast from Center for Humane Technology https://www.humanetech.com/podcast/the-ai-dilemma and the recent Daniel Schmachtenberger Video about it:

I enjoyed this conversation and even more I liked the conversation between Rupert and Bernardo Kastrup. I think its a very special time to see this conversations where spirituality and science converge. But I think both, Rupert and Don Hofmann doesnt implicate the solipsistic bubble type of solipsism. Reality is all one mind and you are not seperate from that mind. Your true identity is this mind and there is nothing else. But that doesnt mean, all there is to mind is your localized point of view. Rupert Spira is also ultimately this one mind, in that sense he is you. But im sure he still enjoys his own point of view, localized somewhere else. Sure you cant validate this in your own localized experience but I think its more unreasonably to assume that there is only your point of view just because you cant see beyond your localized perspective.

Nice!

You study things to gain understanding of the world. Even the most intelligent language model doesnt have a real understanding of the world. It can spit out the most intelligent phrases, but there is no real understanding behind it. God will not understand itself through ChatGPT, God understands itself through you.

Sounds like you do some deep and intense experiments in consciousness and I appreciate that. But is it stabilizing for your relative self/survival activities stuff? How does it affect your relative human life?

The Guided Meditations of Adyashanti really helped me, especially calming the mind, getting into equanimity. Listen to a few of his guided meditations and you will understand how to calm your mind and get into those states. Then you can do it in your solo meditations more easily too.

Its hard to tell where my journey would went without psychedelics and in what ways I would had developed. But for me the biggest thing was Curiosity and an interest in a lot of topics. First I was just interested in trying MDMA, some shrooms, mostly for fun and the experiences you could have. And then it started my interest in psychology, spirituality, metaphysics, self-help, etc... I started to watch actualized, started reading books, started meditating. Because I experienced these crazy stuff there was an deep desire to understand these experiences and that led to a lot of study. What also was big for me is that in the really deep trips, you really get to face the depth and magnificience what Life is. This really matures you.

+1 for me too! Another one that is probably already overrepresented in this forum for me is Daniel Schmachtenberger. Just his way of constructing sentences, in which he synthesizes lots of complex stuff together, puts them in clear terms and equations or summarizes the gist of complex topics is amazing. Dont know anyone else, who has this clarity of thinking in such a wide range of topics. I feel like watching so many of his videos has transformed my own thinking a lot.

Stanislav Grofs The Way of the Psychonaut is probably the most extensive book on how to use psychedelics for personal and spiritual development. I stoll didnt read it, but its definitely on the list. Stanislav Grof is one of the grandfthers of psychedelics and he worked with psychedelics since early in the 60s and assisted over 2.000 LSD therapy sessions. This man has a lot of experience in psychedelic journeys and this is his magnus opum.

Leo Gura

Would love to find an folder with all of his oldschool content again. Some dude shared an megashare collection with hunred of his real old videos. At this time I discovered this a new world opened for me. The newer content you shared is still amazing and some of his content goes even deeper now, but in the oldschool videos the energy was even more exciting.

Looks very interesting, thanks for sharing!

So I was brainstorming about what are the fundamentals of Self-Actualization or the Heroes Journey. Since one of the ideas Leo often comes back to is this analogy, that if you want to build a Skyscraper you need a solid foundation. Some of the things that came to my mind and where I was building my foundation over the last years is: Self-Esteem: The 6 Pillars of Self Esteem by Nathanael Branden has good exercises to understand and increase your self-esteem Self-Love Learn to embody and internalize the right principles: Leo mentioned many in his videos Find out your own values: There are many exercises you can do. Leos Life-Purpose-Course, or Daniel Schmachtenbergers Dharma Inquiry is good for that Health, Fitness Emotional Mastery Basic Meditation Practice Guiding Frameworks What would you add to the list? Do you agree with the list? What would you regard as foundation/fundamentals?

Ohyes, maybe a good time to rewatch, I think I watched it a long while ago. Thanks!

Damn, another amazing application example, thanks for sharing! Just tested it to make a little quizz for the book im currently reading and it worked really well: give me a little quizz with questions about the book: the selfish gene Sure! Here are five questions about "The Selfish Gene" by Richard Dawkins: What is the central thesis of "The Selfish Gene"? How does Dawkins define "selfishness"? What is the idea of the "extended phenotype"? How does Dawkins explain the evolution of altruism? What is the "meme" concept and how is it related to the book? 1. The central thesis of the book is that the essential unit of selection is the gene Yes, that is correct. The central thesis of "The Selfish Gene" is that genes are the driving force behind evolution, rather than individuals or groups. Dawkins argues that genes are "selfish" in the sense that they act in their own self-interest to ensure their own survival and replication, which ultimately leads to the evolution of organisms that are best suited to their environment. 2. selfishness means that the gene behaves in a way that maximizes its own survival and reproduction. therefore selfishness is behavior that will make itself more numerous in the gene pool Yes, that is correct. In "The Selfish Gene," Dawkins defines "selfishness" as the behavior of genes that maximizes their own survival and reproduction. He argues that this behavior is not limited to human behavior, but rather it is a fundamental principle of evolution that applies to all living organisms. The "selfish" behavior of genes leads to the evolution of organisms that are best suited to their environment, and this ultimately leads to the survival and reproduction of those genes. 3. I dont know. What is the idea of the extended phenotype The idea of the extended phenotype refers to the idea that the influence of a gene does not stop at the body of the organism in which it resides, but can extend beyond the organism to influence its environment. For example, the beaver's dam is an example of an extended phenotype, as it is a product of the beaver's genes that influence its environment. Dawkins argues that the extended phenotype is an important aspect of understanding the effects of natural selection, as it can explain how certain traits or behaviors evolve even if they do not directly contribute to the survival or reproduction of the organism.

When I first tried Modafinil I really loved it, because I was so hyperfocussed for the whole day and at evenig I would got in so much information in the day. But nowadays I noticed the downsides more strongly too. I feel like on 100mg I get a bit robotic like I said, a bit less creative and more down the next day. I still enjoy it once or twice a week in a dose of 50mg now, the effects are not that strong in this way but I have more mental energy throughout the day to learn and less fatique, I can just get more done in a day with a quarter of modafinil. What is really amazing about it is that I can increase my motivation for learning stuff, getting really hyped about the topics I explore. I think if you use that dopamine spike in the right way you can increase your motivation and excitement for the right stuff. But be careful I also noticed that it increases the addiction pathways, making addictive behavior more pleasure(e.g. videogames, porn or whatever) , so if you have little addictions and engage with them on modafinil it can increase them too. Also I think overall its not the most wholistic substance for your brain chemistry, because it upregulates your dopamine in a way that is not really in balance with your overall system, instead of upregulating the internal regulation mechanisms of your system wholistically.

For me personally I noticed that even if I take half of it (100mg) I will have difficulties falling asleep and get a headache in the evening, so my ability to have a clear mind is reduced the next day. Plus I get more robotic, less social and more anxiety. With a quarter of it (50mg) Im more awake throughout the day, have more time where I can concentrate to study and can fall asleep, without having a crash next day.

Those were really mystically for me

In my opinion you cant answer this objectively. Im sure experienced users like Leo will have an way deeper trip with 20 than others have with 30. You shouldnt shoot for the highest. It depends on your prior psychedelic experiences, your baseline state of consciousness, your sensitivity to psychedelics etc... I would just slowly increasing your doses and see where it leads you and integrate the insights. I dont see the need to go deeper and deeper increasingly fast.

@StartStruck Nice, definitely will read this soon. Spiritual bypassing means youre avoiding processing some grief or feeling some emotions that are true for you right now, by a form of escapism with spiritual practices, positive thinking and wishful thinking.

Thanks for sharing! Seems like an interesting course for me. I want to check out his books soon too, since I heard a lot about them. What book from him would you recommend? Although I heard his teaching could contain some aspects of spiritual bypassing, but I will check out for myself.

I recently watched the long Andrew Tate Interview from the Valuetainment Podcast. First and foremost to get a better picture of him, since he seems to have become a very controversial figure in the last year and I didnt knew much about him. I found that he is a perfect example of the conservative worldview. His points perfectly fit into the descriptions from the video about the conservative mind. I also think that he points out some stage blue/conservative values that really are underemphasized in current culture and its also an quite intelligent formulation of the conservative worldview. Recommand watching this, if you want to see an example of the conservative worldview to understand it deeper, although I can understand if someone doesnt want to watch 5 hours of Andrew Tate But be careful he is quite persuasive and I can see how he can draw people in, get them to belief some of the more toxic aspects of his worldview.

Im doing 25 minutes of first focussing on breath to stabilize and then trying to take in fully and notice all sensations as they areise. In the last months my body awareness increased a lot and it feels very good to just meditate + sometimes I do a guided meditation from adyashanti which helped me a lot with really relaxing into the meditation, decreasing resistance and just enjoying it. This one is one of my favorites, but he has a lot of great meditation from the 15-30 min range.