Vercingetorix

It's Inspiring and motivational to read your Journey! For me, it seems you are progressing. You can try to do "unlimited sits": if you want to get rid of a crippling problem/emotion fast, first actively make yourself feel it by engaging in a situation that brings it up or by imagining such a situation\ thinking of a past situation. when the emotion is strong, start meditating. Identify the sensations you are resisting and focus on them, accept them, see their true nature, see they are temporary. and sit with them until they pass. If you have to go to do other stuff, resume where you left in the next time you have free time. You have to break the conditioning of the mind, the magic circle that make emotions feed thoughts and thoughts feed emotions. Sit until thinking about or engaging the situation doesn't bring any more emotions or very weak ones. Congrats, you are free from them If you do it seriously and correctly most emotions will fall in a few hours, max a few days (for each one) warnings: 1)your ability to handle strong emotions is proportioned to your concentration ability, don't create emotions so strong you can't handle. develop your concentration first! 2) if you are thinking "well how long before they disappear, I've done it for hours already", it means you are not really accepting them, you want them to go away. so watch and accept them (easy to say ). Alternatively, you can do a vipassana retreat which is quite similar. so great for purging emotions!!

we use words, trying to explain stuff, all just for not fully feeling our emotions. Ultimately words are just dust in the wind. to move towards freedom you have to understand the true nature of thoughts, to stop giving them power and start feeling everything you tried to avoid so far. What I try to do nowadays is whenever I'm lost in a story/emotion is to sit and meditate and focus on feeling the emotion (developing concentration really helps in not engaging in thoughts), and I do it until the emotion is released, theoretically even if it lasts the whole day or a week. Whenever I have free time I sit and continue the process until the story is dismantled (now that I think about it it's basically vipassana ;D ).

maybe I misunderstand you and you already know this, but Law of attraction cannot bring you directly to enlightenment like they say in zen, desiring to get enlightenment is one thing that hinders you from getting it.

If you want him to open up emotionally, to cry, what can help is you opening up to him in the same way - tell him about your worries for him and how much you love him and about your fear of losing him, break down with him and cry, put yourself in a vulnerable place before him. then two things can happen - he may also break up and open his heart to you, or he might feel his fatherly instincts taking over and grow a will to continue living for you. Being vulnerable before others usually trigger compassion, for oneself or for the others. I would also recommend you read the book "Nonviolent communication: a language of life", for me it helps very much improve my communication and understand other people. Specifically, if your father thinks that you can't understand him, it has a method to make others feel understood!

@Outer Thanks, I checked it a bit. I think I'm quite familiar with this knowledge :) I'm pretty sure Leo is talking about a literal cave. Self is also an object...

Hey Leo, about wanting to live in a cave: I do not fully understand this, why is it more fulfilling than being around people? If your ego is polished enough, shouldn't being around people be as fulfilling? And if being around people triggers stuff in you, isn't it the best way to work on your ego? I'm puzzled about this issue, because like you I believed that spiritual development is a solo work, done alone in the room. But I have this friend, that I see as a very hardcore spiritual person, and the freest man I know, after doing lots of meditation, spending 3 months in a Zen monastery, doing tonnes of psychedelic drugs (He told me about a similar experience to yours about experiencing physical death on DMT), but now his focus is towards mastering communication and exposing himself to unfamiliar situations, being honest and authentic, opening himself to people to see how they mirror the ego. Whats your opinion about it, isn't it a very good training ground for seeing and exposing the ego? Why does it seem that you are not into it so much? And also, have you read the book "Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life"? It's about how to deeply enjoy being with people, and to transform all kinds of "negative" emotions to empathy and love. such a beautiful book.

Leo is saying in his latest video and in general that there is point in experiencing enjoyable stuff like higher states of consciousness, experiencing beauty,love and all that. So he advocate using affirmations, visualizations, setting goals and stuff that help us achieve those things. But is this the thing that will make you blissful in your life? Won't it just create more misery and cravings? Isn't it preferred to just practice being in the moment, learning to be content with what is, even if it's just thoughts or unpleasant sensations?

@Simon Zackrisson The way I try to reconcile it is by understanding that in reality there in no suffering, no terror, nothing bad can really happen, the worse a man or an animal can really experience is just very strong sensations (can you even say they are unpleasant?). When you take away the story and the resistance behind it's not so bad. The problem is that every human being lives in the stories in his mind and there tonnes of suffering can happen. But every moment you have the chance to see through the illusion and go to reality where there is no good or bad. But we can only control ourselves, so our duty is to see through the illusion, whenever you see yourself creating a story like "existence is ugly" see itself for what it is, just another story and go back to reality, to your breathing, your senses and know there is no ugliness there.

So I meditated a SDS tonight and after an hour and 20 minutes I started getting a bit nauseous, it got stronger and after a minute or so I felt like I'm just about to faint (I know the feeling well) so I ended my session and lay down until it passed. It never happened to me before, before that I felt like my whole lower body felt asleep, especially the base of the spine was hurting a lot, could it be that my blood supply to the brain was somehow weakened because of pressure from the posture? Would you think it's dangerous to faint during meditation? Did anyone experienced or heard of something similar? I was a somewhat tired and weak, usually I meditate fresh in the mornings, maybe it's just that? Btw, I have a history of fainting when I'm very weak and dehydrated or when I lose a lot of Blood.

@Bebop I'm used to doing 1 hour SDS ,in he last month I've done some 70-90 mins, but this time I was much more still (usually I adjust my back a few time). I also had a period of time when it felt that my whole body fell asleep but it passed. It's likely that i ran out of energy, I was working at a pretty hard and was quite tired. Some part of me want to give on faint and see what happens but I am also afraid, it feels a bit like dying to me ?

@abgespaced I wouldn't say so, it's working against their conditioned mind. I don't say to suppress anything. A woman can change the way she reacts to emotions and impulses, if she sees that acting upon them autumatically doesn't get her fulfilment. don't see the difference with men, maybe they are less emotional but it's essentially the same processes.

@abgespaced or an enlightened being? Your not eating and drinking analogy is not relevant imo because it's just the opposite, emotions, bodily sensations pass if you are just watching them, you will never die if you won't act on them (even if it sometimes feel so). It's beautiful to watch. meditation teaches you to stop being the slave of your emotions. Normally people do what is pleasant for them and avoid unpleasant. With meditation you understand those are just imaginary walls that exist in your mind, and you are able to become free of them and do what you "truly"/"spontaneously/Intuitively want regardless of how pleasant or unpleasant it. So when woman meditate of course they can develop this ability.

@The Monk When you are thinking you are not conscious. Thoughts=ego=resistantce to what is. when you resist you suffer. shift your focus to your breathing, to your bodily sensations that are causing you to feel "bad" and you'll notice that when you are just watching them, there is no resistance, there is no suffering, only sensations. It might be that as you develop awareness the ego/thoughts have more food for suffering but be aware that's it's again the ego doing his "job".

@abgespaced Until you die. Have you never meditated? Don't you see how conditioned the mind is to what it perceive as please tell or unpleasant, and how meditation helps you uncondition your mind?

realise that everything outside in not really outside, it's inside you as well Understand that all the "ugliness" is not in what is happening but rather your resistance to the sensations you are feeling.

@Martin123 What does it matters if you asked for it? If I see that you are caught up in a story it means you will bring yourself sufferings so I want to help you, as I would I liked anyone to help me when I'm dreaming. I just showed you the time we are living now might be the most harmonious in the history of Humans, so we are in the right direction. Also, you didn't respond to my second and third points, what's useless about them?

@Martin123 I did, If there is anything relevant that you think I've missed you are welcomed to point it out. what's preachy about my comment? it's my opinion, If you don't see any value in it ignore it, though if you see it as preachy it might trigger something in you so it's a good oppertunity to investigate what and why, maybe you know that I am right?

1) watch this from 13:20. understand that relatively speaking now is maybe the best the world has ever seen. 2) make sure the ego is not bullshitting you again. I don't think intuition can predict the future, it's just a hunch you have based and all the stuff you are exposed to, something that rationally escapes you. If what you are exposed to is false or very partially true, your intuition will be "false" as well. 3) Even if such event happens so fucking what, why would it change anything in your life? today you may die by the infinite amount of ways, does it change the way you live? Still, the best thing you can do is live moment to moment, mindful, present, happy, not caught up in the stories of your mind like this one. Like you can be caught up in it all you want just see that it brings you suffering in the end, then you will have the motivation to give up on stories.

@Principium Nexus the battle is not outside, it's inside you. hate happens when you resist the sensations in your body. more resistance = more ego. I am not sure you can really help people from a place of ego. Buy you can accept what is, stop resisting, then compassion will flow in you and you will naturally do what you can to decrease the suffering of people. And you will also not suffer anymore because suffering is resisting.

@Principium Nexus Keep in mind that hating seeing other people suffer will only generate more hate. If instead you accept and stop resisting will will develop compassion instead of hate and from it you can help others.

Don't you see that the only way to get out of the illusion is to suffer? Why will you otherwise want to get out? Embrace your suffering because it is your motivation to get out. Every suffering begin with a story Of course there are many exceptions, but In general, Christians are stuck In a lower development stage. They suffer less because they are gullible and believe in all the lies they are told, and it protect them, their monkey mind doesn't have to struggle with uncertainties, they have answers so the mind is quieter. But one day they will realise it doesn't make any sense, their paradigm doesn't fit reality, and they will get out of their sheltered prison... Then they will be free and their mind will go crazy like ours, and they will create stories, and they will believe those stories and those stories will crumble and they will suffer like us. And when they will suffer enough they may decide that it is enough, time to get out of it. Time to wake up. Time to enjoy reality, the present moment, the only thing we truly have. So I say, bless the suffering in your life, this is your way out. back home.

@schmitzy you should strive for authenticity and openness. That is don't tell him he is a coward but you can imply/ask him about this, why does he behaves in such a way? Maybe he is not aware of it and would like to improve? Maybe he has a past trauma regarding this? If you manage to talk about this with him it can help the relationship - you will understand better if you want it or not.

@abgespaced @abgespaced I think that as one develop his/her consciousness he/she becomes much less effected by biological mechanisms, you gain so much more control of your life and what you want consciously is reflected more and more in your actual behaviour.

@Whywolf oh may I can attempt a very bad explanation: It's traditional Indian medicine. its beauty is understanding that everyone one is different and needs a different diet/way of life that fits his body-mind characteristics. So meat, for example, may be very bad for your health but very healthy for someone else. They view the world through the elements and their qualities, and by identifying what are the dominant elements in you and the imbalances you are prone to go through you can engineer a diet and a way of life that will keep you balanced. It's quite complicated and often counter-intuitive system. They also use herbs and massages and tonnes of other stuff. What I cook/eat depends on the weather, if it's a cold damp day, or a warm dry one, certain food will be better than others. I have dominance of the Pita Dosha (Fire and water elements) so for me in general food that warms or blocks is not recommended. So I eat less such foods like brown rice, white flour, Nightshade veggies. And it helps my emotional balance and heat waves I tend to suffer from in the summer, as well as clears my skin etc.

@Prabhaker Truth is not always wise, and untruth is not always foolish