Tristan12

It's not really like that, avoiding the entire domain of dating and relationships isn't the same as something like not going on a trip somewhere and not having that experience. Relationships are a central component of human life so its a bigger deal to miss out on something like that, and there could be consequences. This isn't coming from unnecessary doubt or confusion. I am not interested in having a relationship or pursuing that area in my life, but I want to be sure that I am not making a mistake by avoiding that area that will impair me down the road or lead to regret. I want to make sure I am making a good decision and am not just going about it blindly

@Preety_India I'm not shaming myself for not wanting a relationship, nor am I wondering if I should want a relationship just because everyone else does, I am wondering if its a strategic error for me to avoid and neglect this area of my life and if there will be consequences down the road if I do

@bejapuskas My main concern is if being totally unexperienced in an area of life that is generally considered crucial would negatively affect my life just because I lack the understanding and perspective of what its like to be in a relationship. I feel like it might make it harder for me to understand and relate to people if I am missing that experience myself, and if it would affect my development and growth as a person if I am missing such an Important area of life. I don't know if what I am concerned about here doesn't matter and doesn't make much of a difference, which is why I want to hear from people who are older and who have more experience around this to see what they think. In terms of cravings for it, I genuinely don't think I have any. I wouldn't have a problem with it if I did desire it, and I see the importance of letting myself engage in it and get it out of my system for burning through karma, but I just don't have any cravings for it. So I really don't feel like i'm bullshitting myself here. Also if cravings ever did arise in the future, I could just work through them then.

@Roy I get that for other areas of life, such as health or finances, were they are essential no matter who you are and if you neglect them, problems will arise, but for something like romantic relationships it genuinely doesn't feel like something I want, so I don't see how that would negatively affect my life if i didn't have it. This is what I am wondering. If I never develop experience in romantic relationships, even if I genuinely don't want it, will it still have an affect on my life, and if so, what would that be?

I 100% agree.

So if all other people in my experience are a creation of my own mind, does that mean they are not real at all? Does that mean that they don't have their own direct experience? I know you have no proof or experience of their direct experience, but does that mean that they are not actually conscious beings and would feel no pain if I hurt them or something, like a character in a video game? This is the part of solipsism that confuses me

Enduring deep suffering will burn out all shallower desires and drive one towards Love, Truth and awakening. That's why your soul might choose to design your life that way, it's to lead you towards the highest love. As to why people go through deep suffering but don't end up awakening or end up dying soon after, maybe it's just for soul progression to lead you to awakening in another life time, if you believe in that "When God loves people, he afflicts them. If they endure with fortitude, he chooses them." - Rumi

@ZenSwift If you read through the trip report he linked, the person was listening to Alan Watts

@tedens Wow. That's crazy

These videos of Leo's may be helpful to you: https://youtu.be/zGDGobqibDc https://youtu.be/Jar8Pd5oo_s https://youtu.be/9PjZB9CoFfs

A few weeks ago I was contemplating something about the nature of love and I had this huge insight that really changed my perspective on things. It felt like more than just an insight and more like a direct experience because my perspective and direct experience changed so radically. I basically realized why you can love anything when in a high enough state of consciousness. I saw that at a Being level, the reason you would love something is totally different than why a human would love something. Humans love things because they serve them or appeal to their survival in some way, and anything that goes against that, they can't love. In a higher state of consciousness where survival is not a concern and there is only Being, having a preference for one thing over another is ridiculous and completely unnecessary. I realized that when you say that you could love something like being ugly as well as being attractive, its not just the case that you are not against being ugly and you could accept and embrace it if you were ugly, but if you had the choice you would still choose to be attractive, its actually that there is literally no benefit whatsoever to being attractive over being ugly, from a Being perspective, and you can desire to be ugly just as much as you might desire to be attractive. At this level the thing that makes you love is not how the thing can benefit you, you love it for what it is, as a part of yourself, you being the whole and everything. You love and desire negative things just as much as the positives because it is just another way of being yourself and embracing yourself, and just being able to do that is what makes you love. This was a huge shift in perspective for me realizing this, and I find that even weeks later after that realization I have had quite a large shift in my ability to love seemingly negative things that would have been a lot harder to love before. I just wanted to share this with you guys and see if you had any input.

Be careful using spiritual truths to deal with unprocessed emotions and trauma. Some people might disagree with me on this but in my opinion all emotional issues can and should only be dealt with on a human level and spiritual truths should not be brought into it, because they end up just being a cover for the emotions, and you think you have worked through them or resolved them but actually they are still there. I'm speaking from experience. Unprocessed emotions and traumas (especially something like shame which comes from core childhood wounds) need emotional processing and release to be fully healed and integrated. Nothing you tell yourself can substitute for that, it cannot be rationalized away. It might make you feel better on the surface but it won't fully heal you.

@Leo Gura okay I think most of what I have experienced are lighter forms of awakening then. Pretty much everything I have become conscious of has felt like awakening from a dream in one way or another, and a lot of what I have experienced you talked about in your 'many facets of awakening' and 'what awakening feels like' videos. I've also experienced a lot of mindfuck and feeling like ordinary reality as I know it is just gone. I think what made me unsure was just that they weren't overly strong, because I expected awakening to be something completely mind shattering and super intense like what people describe on psychedelics but I guess those are just stronger forms. I wasn't sure if the lighter forms I have experienced were even considered awakenings at all or just mystical experiences. By the way, I wanted to thank you for everything you've done - I'm 21 and I've been watching your videos for a few years now, and they have completely transformed me and the direction I want to take my life. I've become extremely passionate about inner work/spirituality, I've been meditating an hour a day for 2 years now, I took your course and found my life purpose, and overall I have gained so much amazing wisdom from your material which has allowed me to really have my priorities straight and be on track to creating an amazing life, which I probably would have spent chasing money before. Because i'm still young I still have a career to build and other things to do so I can't go all out on spirituality yet, but I definitely plan to in the future. I know one day I will reach that full God realization and experience infinite Love, which I know is the highest love that you want for your followers. I can't wait to see what i'll be able to do with my life and also the kind of impact i'll be able to have on the world myself, all because of you and your videos, so from the bottom of my heart, thank you!

This goes into solipsism which I still have a hard time fully understanding... if my direct experience is all I have and the only reality i've ever experienced, then everyone else is just a creation of my own mind, meaning they were created when I was and so we were all born at the same time

@Leo Gura Is it easy for you to distinguish what experience is an awakening and what is just a mystical experience? I have become directly conscious of a few of the things you talk about in your videos, such as realizing reality is a dream, and I've never experienced any visual content or angels or anything like that, but i'm still not sure if that would be considered an awakening or not, because people said above that awakening is specifically a realization into the nature of what you are.

@Gili Trawangan okay, thanks

@Gili Trawangan I've heard Leo talking about having multiple awakenings or being due for another awakening on a meditation retreat or something like that, and I always assumed that awakening meant any kind of mystical experience, just becoming directly conscious of something, but you're saying that an awakening is specifically a realization about the nature of what you are, is that correct?

I feel like this is an appropriate thread to ask this, can someone please explain what the difference between an awakening and a mystical experience is? I have had direct experiences of multiple things like reality being a dream and solipsism and other things. I just consider them mystical experiences because they don't feel overly deep but I’m not sure at what point I could consider something an awakening.

However long it takes, we're headed in that direction and will probably get there eventually

Relatable lmao

Couldn't this be considered yellow too? He has a very deep and all-encompassing sort of perspective, seeing beneath the surface, focusing on addressing the root issue of trauma that leads to the addiction rather than getting too caught up with the addiction itself at the surface. To me this seems pretty yellow. I get that it is about psychotherapy and talking about the need for compassion and everything which makes it resonate with green, but I’m wondering if there is anything preventing this from being yellow?

@somegirl I guess it just comes from continuous spiritual practice and putting in the work to raise your consciousness. For myself I'm not at a point in my life where I'm ready to go all out on spirituality, I am still young and have a career to build. The only spiritual work I have done is meditating an hour a day for the past two years, and I have watched probably hundreds of hours of Leo's videos and done a good amount of contemplating in my spare time just because I really love it. I find at this point I get these sorts of realizations fairly often just through contemplating things. I think this particular realization I had after watching some edit of Leo's videos that someone posted in the forum. I was contemplating about love after I watched it and all the sudden what I wrote above really clicked for me and I really got it, whereas before when I would hear Leo talk about it, it was just an idea and I didn't have any direct experience of it. Here's the video by the way:

@Yali I'm guessing its much easier to pull a girl if you have a quick and easy place to take her, like your van conversion, rather than taking her all the way back to your house or to a hotel or something

You should have been like "so do you always go for guys who look homeless?"