mandyjw

@Serotoninluv Eckhart Tolle says that there are "doers" in the world and that there are "frequency holders", (think enlightened yogi in a cave) and most people have a mix of each. Neither is morally superior to the other. A 100% enlightened frequency holder can't teach, help others, contribute and create in the world. A 100% doer does things with no guidance whatsoever and intentionally or unintentionally harms people and the earth. You find that most spiritual teachings cater to or promote being more one or the other. Abraham Hicks speaks to doers. There is a lot more value to her work once you already know how to be, but her work has so much value because some people have such busy minds that they cannot/do not have any interest in being. She does give you materialistic incentives to be. At one time I thought that was evil but that was mostly because I also thought that being a frequency holder was much more morally superior than being a doer. Trying to force yourself into being when you have a drive and a purpose to fulfill doesn't help anyone.

@Serotoninluv Creativity, emotion, empathy (or compassion is a better word I think), and intuition are great places to start. Maybe also throw in some communion with nature/mother earth and constantly humble yourself? The problem with an emphasis on thinking and analyzing is that it neglects feeling. You have to care about how you feel and when you teach, you have to care about how others feel. Instead the idea here is the very masculine "feelings make me weak, feelings must be destroyed, I'm doing this work so I don't have to feel." This problem is evident by the incessant strings of questions and complaints from people who have fallen into dark depressive states. Here, we just sort of dismiss this as ego backlash and give people a pat on the back for suffering more, because we're taught that the more you suffer the more spiritual you're becoming and the closer to your object of the truth. The problem is that this work is supposed to feel AMAZING. You are essentially cultivating, love, compassion, warmth, creativity, inspiration and opening yourself up to endless possibilities in life. Before you were closed off to them, or you self sabotaged yourself or you were too caught up in negative thoughts to see the light. I've done this work for four years now, Leo's videos helped to inspire me and open my mind enough to do it but I sought out different teachings. No psychedelics. Very little meditation. Very little suffering. No sitting down to do much of anything but instead constantly watching my thoughts and training myself how to see. My life before provided all the suffering I needed. I feel AMAZING. I have mitigated most of the lows that I feel and the only made the highs higher. Events in my life have become so serendipitous that I feel like I'm going f-ing insane every day. But in a good way. The tiniest little things have the power to make me insanely happy. My experiences and desire for truth continue to deepen my understanding and depth of experience. Seemingly organically. There's a lot of focus on the dark aspects of spirituality here. I don't need to take drugs, or think very long on how I'm actually Hitler and every concentration camp victim at the same time. If talking about the dark things has value, then we must equally talk about the love and joy. If we are speaking to someone who is already depressed, he needs teachings that are at the very least balanced to guide him to truth. Otherwise there's a real danger of self destruction. That's a topic that's being discussed here daily. Maybe love and joy just doesn't appeal to 20 and 30 something men? It just doesn't sell so well. I understand why Leo had a target audience in the past, but why is he still pandering to it so much? Is this Enlightenment, Just For Men? Look around at this forum and tell me, if you were a woman who was just getting interested in this work, would you want to stick around here? So much of truth is paradoxical, so if you lean too far to one side of the paradox and say "this is the way" you tip over the canoe before you make it down the river. So let's take the paradox of, "You must be intensely dedicated to seeking the truth to find it." and "You are already enlightened." There's this sort of unspoken narrative here of being the hero who goes out on his own and discovers the truth and makes the truth his bitch. Equally true is the narrative that life and mother earth brought you forth for a reason and she is loving and leading you towards the truth with every conscious step and misstep you make. It's a balancing act to keep the dedication to truth without getting a spiritual ego... then comparing your progress with others and expecting rewards from doing a certain amount of work as if spirituality could work out as nicely for you as a math problem would. Another paradox is that God is a man, and God is a woman. You have to learn and understand the qualities and viewpoints of the opposite gender, the gender that you were not egoically identified with your entire life, in order to evolve. You also have to consider and embrace their approach to spirituality if you want the truth. Which ironically is why I'm probably getting way more out of Leo's teachings and being around here than the rest of you.

@7thLetter I'd really suggest starting a retirement account with Vanguard or another low fee investment management company. You can just set it to withdraw a monthly amount from your account and start with whatever you're comfortable with. That way you get a retirement savings building without having the shock of a market crash when you just invested a huge sum. You can choose just a target retirement account or a lot of people recommend investing in the total US stock market. It totally depends on your comfort level.

You know how the sun feels when you're kind of cold and your just sitting there quiet and feeling grateful for the warmth? Love is when you emanate that feeling outwards.

Do you find yourself absolutely overjoyed with little things?

Use how you feel as a guide. Are you happy, peaceful or still very prone to falling into depressive states, or anxiety, etc?

Of course it's not in time. Now is the only time you can experience timelessness. Then why look for it in the future? I found his "practices" to be life changing.

Dedication and intense focus for the present moment. Did you watch the video? He specifically addresses that toward the end.

You need to find something to pursue that lights you up.

All I'm saying is focus on the change you want to make, do not give the suffering a single thought. You're giving it too much weight. Also yes, accept the ego backlash. It is a really beautiful thing. It's the thing that tells we we made a superficial change because we thought the problem was superficial and didn't really understand what the deep problem was that we needed to address.

Yes, stop the work. Keep the consciousness. Why do you think studying will give you a good life? Do you really truly want the job that you're studying in order to get?

You've created a separation between your normal life and your meditative states. You need to watch your thoughts as you go about everyday life. You cannot expect meditation to fix your thoughts when your mind is active throughout the day, you must bring space and bits of meditation in throughout the day. Eckhart Tolle is an AMAZING teacher for doing just that.

Suffering is secondary. It has value as guidance, but never in itself. Suffering means that you aren't accepting. Seeking out suffering doesn't mean that you'll accept more, sooner. There are no hacks to acceptance. You can't hack your way to surrendering. That's what ego backlash is, it means you went too, far too soon. The value in the suffering from ego backlash is that it shows you what you still must accept.

Do you realize how analytical and masculine your approach is? You've got to balance things out to fully grasp truth on a deep level. You've especially got to balance it out when you're teaching people who are struggling to get a basic understanding of that which cannot be understood.

Living unconsciously means that you'll fall into suffering. It can be tempting to CHOOSE to suffer as part of a spiritual quest because when you choose to suffer you have the power over your suffering, and also the goal of some future state of bliss that may be obtained by your noble choice to suffer. That's another trap. It's the trap that religion has sold for hundreds of years. Religion says, look at all these people going about their lives living unconsciously and seeking silly pleasures, they are miserable. You must CHOOSE to suffer and have FAITH in this future goal you'll get if you can purify yourself through suffering. You can choose to be free of suffering now. You can be at peace now. You absolutely do not have to suffer. The entire point of this work is deciding, ok I'm done suffering. I wanted to suffer in the past but I no longer want or need to suffer. I accept what it, I accept life, I accept this present moment as it is without needing it to be something more. I'm here to meet it with love and peace and acceptance and therefore I no longer suffer.

You have the power to focus on whatever you want and draw into your experience whatever you want. There's absolutely no value in seeking out or giving any of that stuff your attention unless it is unavoidably your experience in the present moment. If your intent is to feel better give attention to that which makes you feel good.

Yes, that's a very important point about the difference between self treating a condition and using them as therapy in a controlled environment. My concern is that when people hear that drugs can save them years of work, the temptation to do them before they are ready is huge because they want to be like other people they see and they want what they want now. If you are already spiritually advanced enough for psychedelics to become part of your path, they will be. I think the discussion and suggestion of using drugs to people as a general audience is a major disservice. It's easy for me to tell other people that they shouldn't use drugs because I'm happy with my progress and haven't touched a single substance. It's also easy for people to tell others that drugs are a powerful tool because that was their experience. The most important thing is to trust in your own experience and not get caught up in the idea of conditions needing to be just so because the problem is not your conditions but the power you give them over you.

This is all distraction and comparison, with some more comparison thrown in. They have nothing you don't.

How can you have any true approach that doesn't undersell God? You can't paint a grand picture of something that someone can only attain in the future if they do the right things. That's religion, not non-duality. That's seeking a conceptual future instead of understanding that you're already divine in this moment.

This is half right. Kids or babies are enlightened until around age 2 when all hell breaks lose and the ego begins to develop. If you've ever lived with a toddler you know first hand the turmoil and suffering that a developing ego causes. They are still enlightened in a lot of ways, but it's a pre-mind pre-conceptual understanding kind of enlightenment. The same kind that animals enjoy in a way. They don't regulate their emotions so they can be very present and fully enjoy experiences in a way that we can't because in learning to regulate your emotions you create resistance and repression. So if you define enlightenment a something that happens spontaneously, yes they are enlightened. if you define it a state you enter of your own conscious choice then no.

@Shin That's a really good one too. My dog seems to have had some sort of a stroke last night, so it was good timing to watch that again.

As he said in the video, it's both! But if I have to pick one, I pick just is.

@thesmileyone Drugs are for people who are completely caught up in reality. They artificially destroy your resistance to things. They can only give you a glimpse at best of what reality could be like without resistance. Dropping your resistance is a practice you can only do when you are lucid. Drugs are also only for people who are really advanced so that you don't take chances of entering states of psychosis or extreme depression and confusion. In my opinion drugs should only be used is cases of those who have severe PSD or similar issues. I get their value in a lot of cases but I think the drawbacks way outweigh the benefits. You put a huge block in your path when you credit a drug for letting you achieve a certain state. The problem with not using drugs is that you think there's a problem with not using drugs.

I had the same exact experience with The Power of Now. I think he is incredibly clear at explaining things. He really does a good job of keeping concepts out and not misleading people into going back into concepts.