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**DISCLAIMER** Everything I write here is ultimately bullshit. The devil dressed himself up as god and declared: “I shall complete 1000 hours of strong determination sitting and cast out the devil once and for all!” God watched the proceedings silently ... How to perform an exorcism: Step 1: Be awake Step 2: Don't touch any “I” thoughts Step 3: Sit motionless for 1000 hours *** I've had more enlightenment experiences than I can count. I've also had a few near death experiences that have really catalysed my urge to wake up fully. I'm currently going through what Adyashanti calls the “got it, lost it phase” of awakening. He details this in his book The End Of Your World, its written for people who have experienced the awakened state and have fallen out of it somehow. Mooji, and Sadhguru also refer to this stage, where the battle against the mind (ego) begins in earnest. I haven't seen it been discussed much on this forum with the exception of this thread: I'm having authentic enlightenment experiences when my false “I” melts away, but I am unable to remain in that space throughout my daily life. My ego invariable creeps back in, like a zombie that keeps coming back from the dead and pulling me back into person hood. This process of popping in and out of truth is very painful and I've finally come to the realisation that if I am going to be enlightened I have to make a stand for my freedom. Yeah sure, there's no free will. Yeah sure, you can't plan enlightenment. Yeah sure, the “me” that wants to be free doesn't exist and the “me” that wants to be free can't wake up. All of that is correct. I know it's correct because “I've” seen it. The “I” that wants to awaken is a false “I”. It's time to become pragmatic about my journey, as Leo says “you're not enlightened until you're fucking enlightened”. Experiences are necessary steps on the path, but they don't count as enlightenment. Enlightenment has to be a living experience, flowing from one moment to the next, not a philosophy that “you” keep spinning. Adyashanti talks about this transition from experience to permanent realisation here Mooji talks about this same thing here As does Sadhguru here and here Osho Talks about the difference between learning knowledge and earning knowledge. Experiences are not earned knowledge. They all talk about putting in a special kind of effort to dissolve the ego. Who puts in this effort? A paradox, but one that must be overcome. I define my ego simply as “that which is resisting the reality of the present moment by means of distracting projections” If I follow Mooji's self-enquiry pointing or I listen to Osho and Adyashanti, through their words I gradually fall into a state of presence and then into "The Truth", the True empty self. This is not sustained, though. Shinzen young calls this getting a Guru Zap, and he explains the benefits of practising strong determination sitting here. This belief that I can't sustain enlightenment is itself a distracting projection i.e. a function of ego (as I define it). The resistance that is coming up now is immense, for good reason. As Mooji says in the video above: “You can't just have a cappuccino awakening, it has to be swallowed and digested and assimilated, then what you know, becomes what you are” The dialogue he has with this woman is really hitting home for me too. I'm now ready to walk through the fires of my own mind and free myself totally. I want enlightenment will every fibre of my being, because I am suffering the one who wants. This is the paradox of my predicament. I've chosen strong determination sitting and self-inquiry as my main techniques to assist in completing my surrender – all the way. Leo recommends self actualizing your way up to enlightenment by systematically working your way through Maslow's hierarchy of needs to get to transcendence. My game plan will be to short circuit. I can respect that most people would want to do this and that this will lead to a very fulfilling life. Personally though, I've been too far down the enlightenment rabbit hole to care about self-actualising, I'm not interested in "creating maximum happiness" so this is not the game plan for me, right now I'm just trying to relieve the pain of being asleep. However, I have found a use for some self actualising theory... To assist in getting the ball rolling I will be using some personal development principals to engineer the initial motivation to do about 6 hours of strong determination sitting per day. This will be like the energy that is needed to fire up a fusion reactor before it is able to sustain itself. As Shinzen Young explains in this video, initial (egoistic) effort is required to get started but eventually the habit of meditation will meditate itself. I watched this video by Sadhguru where he explains the value of desire over discipline. If the desire is strong enough, everything falls into place on its own. *** I will be using many of the techniques outlined in the actualized.org blueprint to help me artificially ramp up my desire to extraordinary heights, and help with self discipline. I'm not going to cover all of them, but the most important ones I've identified are: Vision: I have made a vision video (in place of a vision board) that is comprised of highly emotive, action oriented clips from various TV shows and movie's that I think are relevant to what I am undertaking. I can't upload the actual video because I don't want to infringe copyright laws but it's set out as follows: Part 1 – Breaking away from consensus reality; accepting the challenge and pain that is about to come Zaheer escaping from prison from the TV show Legend of Korra Jonas being selected at the ceremony of advancement scene from the movie The Giver Tris entering fear simulation from the movie Divergent Conversation on fear and laziness from the movie Waking Life Avatar Aang receiving turtle wisdom from the TV show Avatar The Last Airbender Neo speaking with the oracle from the movie The Matrix Karl Popper messaging Trinity from the movie The Animatrix (Kids story) Chemical burn Scene and realization of ego from the movie Fight Club Wood carving scene from the beginning of the movie Into the Wild Part 2 – Battling the Ego Avatar Aang vs Firelord Ozai Neo vs Agent Smith Karl Popper being chased by Agents Edward Norton vs Tyler Durden - final fight scene Part 3 – Transcending/neutralising ego Zaheer guiding korra into the spirit world Aang energy bending the Firelord Neo's crucifixion Karl popper letting go of the handrail Edward Norton shooting himself Final scene of Into the Wild Just do it. Title speaks for itself. Take Responsibility and Victim energy My idea of responsibility has changed recently. Again, thanks to Sadhguru. I have been blessed with an uncomfortable life, taking responsibility will make me wiser sooner than others. Willpower I like this idea of limited willpower. I will be removing all my current restrictions on diet, exercise, work, entertainment, sleep patterns and all other habits. I will be directing 100% of my willpower towards my meditation. If it is true that awareness alone is curative, the awareness developed in meditation will automatically rectify my bad habits in time. This video also has some great tips for managing willpower: Other important concepts: Identity level change Nominalized identity Outcome independence Contemplate Death Embrace paradox and Epistemology Emotional Labor Momentum States vs. Stages Limiting beliefs Force your mood *** Meditation setting, tracking and reporting I will be using the insight meditation app to track my meditation hours. I will not be tracking incomplete sessions. Only sessions over 1 hour will be counted. I have not set any daily minimums. I intend to change between periods of high and low volumes of meditation but I will need to average around 6 hours a day. I will carry out my meditation on my knees directly in front of a wall. Here is a picture of me pretending to exist: I will spend 5 minutes before each session reading the journal entry of the previous 2 sessions. I will spend 5-10 minutes at the end of each session writing down the thoughts and sensations that pulled me out of awareness and into identity. I've found this helps to keep track of macro thought processes. I have already completed 21 hours as I am writing this; I spent the first session fantasising about how I would write this forum post . I wrote that down and on the second session I was no longer distracted by this thought process because I became aware of it immediately. I was then able to inquire into it and resolve it. This is the function of the meditation journal. It's not possible to do self-inquiry without awareness. I will be uploading a screen shot of my timer stats every Sunday with any notes or experiences that I wish to report. I will also calculate and upload my current daily average, to tell if I'm behind or ahead of schedule. If I am unable to upload on a Sunday then I will be uploading as soon as possible thereafter. (I have already booked 2 Vipassana retreats which will run over a week.)

So, I believe in Actualized.org and the ethos here, but ... After scrolling through the forum for hours on end, reading basically the same shit, I wanted to stop wasting my time and delete my account. I could just stop coming back to the site, sure, but platforms like this are addictive and the easiest way to quit is to delete your account and be done with it, that's how I got off Facebook. Cold turkey is by far the easiest and most efficient way to get over something. I started to think of this place purely as a business, outside of higher consciousness values. I've got to say, having a binding (non-es capable) forum on your website is genius mass psychology manipulation. Think about what we're doing here: Talking about self actualisation Breathing self actualisation Discussing self actualisation products Following a bevevolent, omnipotent self actualising leader, who facilitates very specific discussions about self actualisation and when we're all excited about self actualisation, guess what? There are great self actualisation products only one tab away! Also think about what the forum gives Leo: 1. Massive traffic to his website, how many times do we come here each day? 2. New ideas to farm 3. Insight into problems we're having so he can specifically target them, either with free videos that drive traffic here to repeat steps 1-3, or with a new paid product that will probably be released soon. Here's my question, I think it will make for a good discussion: Do you think it's necessary to use business to spread higher consciousness values?

Hey guys, I’ve been trying to pull myself out of a serious slump in motivation over the last few weeks and I stumbled across this method of self-hypnosis that looks like it could be quite powerful. I thought I would share it because it is quite interesting. It integrates multiple hypnotic and subconscious programming techniques into one 3-5-minute procedure that you carry out every night before bed and that you can modify to perform in the morning when you wake up. Doing this will slowly drip your goals and aspirations onto your mind every day and allow you to slowly reinvent yourself over a few months. Here is the instructional video. If you look past the cheesy 90’s transitions and the constant references to shallow materialistic goals, you’ll see that you could quite easily re-purpose this for anything you want to achieve. I’m going to try it out and see what happens, but the results may take a while so I thought I’d share it now in case anyone else wants to begin doing it. The ledger was sold separately and I don’t think it’s available anymore so I made my own ledger pages that you can print off and use instead. See attachments. Mental Bank Ledger.docx Mental Bank Script.docx

Post all your wierd and wacky stuff here. Recently found this video: ... its only a matter of time before I find someone who can energy bend and turn me into an airbender. If you want a crazy read I reccommend the book Seth Speaks by Jane Roberts It's a brain bender for sure.

Hey guys, I thought it would be interesting to see what the personality profile of this forum was like. I made a graph above of the average type distribution for the general population using data I got from the Myers & Briggs Foundation I've never made a poll so I don't know how this post is going to format. Hopefully we will be able to compare the answers with the graph to see if there are any stand out types. The poll will only start to be accurate after about 100 votes and I'm not sure if there are that many people here In case you don't know, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a common personality test. Obviously we're all beautiful and unique snowflakes, but finding out your type can be useful to get to know some of your strengths and weaknesses. You can take a free test here (takes about 10 minutes) A second test is available here (ter be sure ter be sure)

lyrics

Crazy, I'm like a whole new person. Sit tight and prepare to have your fucking minds blown.

It's like lennon said... You know what I'm trying to say? *click*

God says there are no accidents, but I have a MASSIVE FUCKING headache. LET IT BE KNOWN THAT LEO GURA IS THE GREATEST GAMER IN THE UNIVERSE! (and I am a manipulative piece of shit) *kisses feet* *kisses feet* *kisses feet* *kisses feet*

@Leo Gura In Australia, we give the fish a chance to catch us too. It's only fair.

I can try I guess. Suppose you went to bed tonight and you decided that this was the last day you ever told a lie. Tomorrow when you wake up you are going to tell nothing but the truth and that’s how you’re going to live from now on. The next morning you get up and you are now living with the pretence of honesty; you’re living in the present with an identity you constructed in the past. You spend your days walking around telling the truth, and it’s great! You purge huge chunks of identity that can’t survive in the light of your new-found honesty. You piss off most of the people around you, because most of their identities can’t survive in the light of your honesty. Eventually you find yourself alone and your honesty becomes self-reflective. Who is so honest? The identity you made in the past. And that identity is a lie, it doesn’t exist. This is not too dissimilar to true vs false skepticism. When you become skeptical of your own skepticism you reach a stalemate. When you become honest about your own honesty you also reach a stalemate. If you were truly honest you’d die … … literally. So, there’s no such thing as an honest person. It’s a lie. Here are some paradoxical questions: If I told you I was a liar wouldn’t that make me honest? What if I revealed truth using lies?

Well, you can't really tell the truth all the time, even if we take your definition of honesty (quoted below) because you eventually run into a conundrum. You could begin walking around calling out bullshit 24/7 like Dr House: … but after doing that for a while you’d have to admit to yourself that “being honest” is just another pretence that you’ve adopted and that it’s also a lie on a subtle level. The more truthful you become the less you’ll have to say, generally. Eventually you get to the point where you can just go along with the charades, but you won’t suffer any of it. That then leaves you with A TON of free energy to be creative, fulfilled etc.. I think that's what the author is trying to explain.

1000 hours SDS in 6 months 1 year + 2 Vipassana Retreats + 1 Solo 10 day retreat Well, I’ve come to the end of what has been one of the most challenging and rewarding years of my life. My meditation practice has pushed me into a new world, one I could never have imagined when I began. My sanity has crossed a Rubicon of sorts. There is no way I can go back to seeing reality the same way as before. You could say I’ve gone completely insane. I now live in a world of my own; a true wonderland. I am fully aware of what the consensus reality is however, and I can act accordingly. After having thought more about what I want to do with my life I have decided I want to spend some time skydiving and base jumping. I know this is a terrible strategic move to make in the big scheme of things. It costs A LOT of money, it’s very dangerous and it doesn’t contribute much to humanity. Even so, I find it quite romantic. This video captures the essence of how I feel about these sports. I know most people think this is stupid but it’s something that is VERY authentic to me. N.B. I found Donnie The thought of traveling the world, getting up to mischief, living on the edge, laughing, loving and living with people who share your insanity excites me a lot. There is also something very transformative about recognizing your own mortality on a deep level that enriches all aspects of life. I have here a clip of the first solo skydive I did about 6 years ago. I was so keen to get in the air and feel the freedom of flying that I began training as soon as I reached legal jumping age and had saved enough to complete the course. I love watching this from time to time, to me it’s a great life metaphor. The most rewarding things in life are usually on the other side of a big leap of faith. It’s always scary to make that leap but by the time you are falling you have already won, even if you don’t succeed you still enjoy treasures far beyond the dreams of men. Au Revoir...

This is definitely going on my bucket list. I think I would like to build my life purpose around flying/freedom. The two are synonymous in my mind.

Turn off your mind relax and float down stream It is not dying, it is not dying Lay down all thoughts, surrender to the void, It is shining, it is shining. Yet you may see the meaning of within It is being, it is being Love is all and love is everyone It is knowing, it is knowing And ignorance and hate mourn the dead It is believing, it is believing But listen to the colour of your dreams It is not leaving, it is not leaving So play the game "Existence" to the end Of the beginning, of the beginning Us and them And after all we're only ordinary men Me and you God only knows It's not what we would choose to do Forward he cried from the rear And the front rank died And the general sat And the lines on the map Moved from side to side Black and blue And who knows which is which and who is who Up and down And in the end it's only round 'n round Haven't you heard it's a battle of words The poster bearer cried Listen son, said the man with the gun There's room for you inside "I mean, they're not gonna kill ya, so if you give 'em a quick short, sharp, shock, they won't do it again. Dig it? I mean he get off lightly, 'cause I would've given him a thrashing - I only hit him once! It was only a difference of opinion, but really...I mean good manners don't cost nothing do they, eh?" Down and out It can't be helped that there's a lot of it about With, without And who'll deny it's what the fighting's all about? Out of the way It's a busy day I've got things on my mind For the want of the price Of tea and a slice The old man died

@Shin Oh man, I know what you mean. It's confusing when those rich tears come out of nowhere, especially if you're someone who never cries. Especially if you're a GUY who never cries. It can be quite daunting to those ego structures. It's scary to let go. That's OK, don't beat yourself up for that. Embrace the fear.

Yes, I was talking about depression/suicide in the context of enlightenment and existential inquiry. The ego can successfully threaten suicide when it recognizes it's own need to die, THAT'S how crafty it is. It's like, I have to die before I die, I can't let that happen so I'll just kill myself. LOL! ... the emotional mastery is a kind of pseudo-mastery that you can only get by letting go, by jumping in to the ocean - so to speak, instead of listening to people on board for tips and techniques to try to gain control over yourself. ... but you have to take that with a little nuance, as I said, I don't know you and where you're at.

This is the best thread! I drew this a few days ago when the power went out. I was thinking about childhood v adulthood and fantasy v reality

I don’t know what the full nature of “your depression” is but I thought I’d share mine. I realized that [for me] the root of all my depression was fear. I think depression can be quite a healthy sign on the path because [for me] it means that the ego is seeing through it’s own fiction and beginning to dread the inevitable. When it got bad I felt like I was trapped between two huge fears, the fear of dying and the fear of living (being). It kind of resulted in an egoic stalemate where I didn’t want to live and I didn’t want to die. It was so horrible. Then anger pushed me to the opposite extreme where I became a “daredevil” type. That only lasted until I tried everything "daring" and realized that no amount of adrenaline or thrill seeking will ever fill the void. I think that people like Sadhguru point you straight through to the root of psychological issues and remove confusion. When they do, fear vanishes because fear and confusion go hand in hand. When the fear vanishes the depression vanishes like smoke in a breeze. When someone just blows away the smoke, you feel relief and you gasp at the freshness of what you have been missing. Benjamin Smythe gives a great reframe in the video below with “the deal” that he made with himself. I made the same deal with myself and I like to remind myself of it whenever things aren’t going so great. Check out number 652 - Facing the Illusion of Fear-1 ~ FREE Download! It's just clean and simple wisdom. It will take some effort to download but once you have it playing you won’t have to click on anything for an hour or so.

This is a very brave … or an outstanding troll. In either case I recommend checking these links out if you want to take your sexuality deeper. You definitely want to check out Dr Saida Desilat http://saidadesilets.com/ and orgasmic meditation (OMing) by Nicole Daedone http://onetaste.us/ You might like Jaeleen Bennis - Bondassage http://bondassage.com/art-bondassage-week-1/ And here are some others: Mama Gena - School of Womanly Arts http://www.mamagenas.com/ The Red Tent Revival http://theredtentrevival.com/2015/optin/ Have fun!

You can always feel the desperation and mortal terror woven into a true artists work. Yeah, first thing I'm spending my money on is marketing training. Harsh truth is, you need it. Thanks for the book recommendation. I haven't read it yet because I don't have time, because I work, because I need money,,, to buy time. I'll read it anyway. @Loreena Thanks! Your comment made me feel warm inside

Money is easy to hate when you don’t have it. It's also easy to hate when you do. I’ve been very angry about how money work for most of my life. Once I started having my first spiritual experiences I realized that money and employment are some of the biggest obstacles to self-mastery and discovery in the modern age. Employment sucks away all the hours of the day and leaves you too drained and too time poor to really contemplate anything deeply. I have (had) a mountain of student loans looming over my head and the prospect of never having job security or steady income has been eating away at my psychology for most of my adolescence. About 5 months ago, I accidentally stumbled into the most lucrative opportunity I’ve ever had in my entire life. As much as I’d like to pat myself on the back for my strategic thinking and the balls I have when it comes to trying new things and taking risks, I must admit that my discovery was a complete fluke. I don’t want to get into specifics and amounts but if my trial experiments are accurate I should be able to make more money over the coming months than I’ve ever had in my entire life. The opportunity won’t be open indefinitely, meaning I only have a short time to grab as much cash as I can before I start getting competitors and it all goes to shit. Even if it doesn’t work out as I expect it has been interesting to watch myself as this has all started to unfold. I have experienced a true paradigm shift in how I view the world. The other day I went to a restaurant and I noticed myself reading the prices on the side of the meals before looking at anything else on the menu, as I have done my whole life. For the first time, I stopped myself and chose what I wanted by reading the letters and not the numbers. I was also plagued with bouts of greed that I couldn’t have ever anticipated. I was lying awake most nights just thinking about all the things I would be able to do when I have X dollars, and once I have ABC I will then be able to do XYZ to get X more dollars. I reduced my mediation hours to one hour a day in for a large part of January to focus on working things out, I’m glad I didn’t stop because I think this frame of mind would have destroyed me if I had let it run rampant. All the justifications and rationalizations for why it was now good that i start making money astonished me. Not because it's inherently bad to make money but because the possibility of actually getting it changed my thinking so rapidly. I know full well that money isn’t necessary to get enlightened and discover some of the deepest truths a human can come to know, in fact I can see now how easily it can turn into a MASSIVE obstacle to those discoveries, simply because it’s soooooo easy to become attached to it. On the flip side I have been asking myself, realistically, how much self-discovery is possible without money? When I think about what Leo is doing here, none of it would be possible if he hadn’t managed to make enough money from his early business(es) to then have the opportunity to step back and begin contemplating seriously or to get his hands on resources like books and to travel to seminars and visit various spiritual masters. His work would have drawn out all his attention and energy. To some degree, a wise man’s life is based around the position of "fuck you", there is an element of truth to that … but a fool’s life is based around his pursuit of the “fuck you” position. This is a problem. I have started to think long and hard about how much I need. When will I have enough? Will I ever feel like I have enough? Will I need to make the conscious choice to walk away? This specific venture might not work out but the way I think about money has changed permanently. I will never again feel trapped by it the way I used to because my eyes are now open to how easy it could be to get rich if I dedicated myself to pursuing it. Something has also changed about the way I perceive people around me, so much of our daily concern is centered around money, it trickles its way into just about everything. I feel as though I am surrounded by insane people, not just because they believe they exist but because the reality we choose to live in together is just mad. I mean, if we're going to delude ourselves, why don't we at least make a good delusion? It’s like everyone in the world running around to get their hands on as much monopoly money as they can. I mean that in a very literal sense. Imagine if someone you knew came up to you and told you, in all seriousness, they were really excited to start work at their new job because their employer is dispensing freshly minted monopoly money… That’s what I feel like now. These are the things that have been affecting me recently. None of this would have come about if I hadn’t decided to start this SDS challenge. Right now I must leave because those stacks are calling me. Bitch.