What in the schwarzkopf hair models is this??

"The one" will come into your life if you are socializing regularly and you are a great guy yourself. You attract what you are, not what you want. You can sleep with women, just don't manipulate them or lead them on. @28 cm unbuffed

@Average Investor Break ups are tough and trust me I have hit rock bottom when a relationship ended and I felt like it was the end of my life. But I have to praise you on the progress you are already making. You are cutting people out of your life that no longer serve a purpose, your thinking of travel and new skill sets to learn. These are all excellent things to be focusing on at this point in your life. 
You will attract what you focus on, so if you focus on the positive and being the best version of yourself, you will find that you attract more and more of these amazing things. Where as, if you focus on the break up and the hurt and pain, that is what you are calling into your space and you don't want that to consume you or take another minute of your life. 
Your life is so precious and it is short, so make the most of the time you have, go explore the world, get into being in your best health, start a new sport or go to the gym, focus on things you can learn, see, and do, go out with a few more girls till you find 'the one' and have fun, enjoy the process and explore the person you are becoming. Make a decision to be awesome and to accept nothing but the very best for yourself and your life. 

Spirals 4 step guide to making a great first impression. You focus on these in this order.
Be fun, she doesn’t need to laugh but a smile goes a long way. Something I like to do is to hit the girl with my hip assuming we are standing side to side. Catching her of guard although it’s great if she sees you coming.
Get her trust, a hand shake while you introduce yourself works fine.
Get her respect, by expressing what’s important to you, can do this using the regular small talk questions. I would think about how you best reply to “where are you from”.  Your values are more important than the city etc.
Lastly show interest yourself.
Bonus point don’t stay longer than you need to if the convo is dead, leave. Ask her for her number or talk to her later. It’s ok to leave the conversation yourself.

I think responsible casual sex (with someone who won't get hooked on you) is fine if you don't have to move your ass for that too much or sacrifice more important things.
Although the quality of that sex is questionable, cause if there's no chemistry it's like meh. But at least it's worth trying to realize that it's not worth it and stop daydreaming about it.
Believing that you have to become a macho is a trap of low self-esteem. You just need to be able to attract someone for relationships.

Not in the slightest.
But I did have a powerful vision for my life, I was very ambitious, and I was following my heart. Which is really all that matters.
You are young. You've got many years to put all of those things in place. Obviously don't waste time sitting around on your ass, but don't panic either.
Right now what you're missing is hope and faith in your vision.
Vision is useless if you don't have rock-solid faith in it. You need to train yourself to believe in it. Visualize it every day with a hopeful vibe. Do not visualize it pessimistically, negatively, full of fear. That is terrible. That is counter-productive.
Holding a big vision is not easy. It is scary. Your mind will not believe it is possible. I used all sorts of mind programming techniques to reinforce my vision and overcome various doubts. But the most important thing is HEART! You must have HEART! That is what carries you through everything. Your life purpose must be non-negotiable. You are doing it no matter what. There should be no option for failure because you already know there is nothing else you'd rather do.
There will hundreds of doubts in this journey. You have to really cultivate hope. Not in luck, but in your hard work. Your vision will get actualized through honest labor.
And remember, a big vision requires lots of patience. You don't need to be Buddha by next month. Recalibrate your exceptions and split your vision up into smaller chunks, so you are not evaluating your progress based on whether you are like Ralston or Buddha. That may not happen for 40 years. And that's okay, you don't need that to enjoy your life.

A) Nothing is necessary. Having an impact is of course meaningless in the absolute sense.
B) Don't confuse different levels of advice. When I say "Make an impact" this not a nondual truth. This is pragmatic advice for ordinary people.
C) If you take a look, the most enlightened people, even though they realize that all action is meaningless, NEVERTHELESS devote their lives to making an impact. Because that's what a high quality human being is wired to do. Think of making an impact as eating or crapping. It's something the human being does, which if you ignore, you'll be sorry.
D) Making an impact is not some mandatory thing. I'm just pointing out to you what kind of life you will enjoy living most. People simply don't think through these things. Your psychological needs do matter when it comes to your happiness.
E) If you really don't want to make an impact, don't. But even that is an impact. You cannot not have an impact. The question is, what kind of impact will you want to have? A conscious one, or an unconscious one?
F) If a guy makes 1500 videos about something, that's quite an impact he's making.
G) Life purpose is a conscious CONSTRUCTION. Life purpose is not something you "find in the world". It's something you decide to create in the world. Not for any reason. Simply because you want to create something.

do stuff. the more you do it, the more you'll know whether you like it or not.
but do stuff. do something. start something new and try to get good at it.

@Torkys I see several problems here over and over meditation is treated like a chore. They only practice one kind of meditation . They take on 5-20 practices at a time then when they feel overwhelmed , bored and frustrated. Then they  slide ,slide and slide-down. I rather help you succeed than watch you fail.
I can understand going back to sleep or taking break it happens especially when crazy traumatic shit happens that overwhelms  your entire being. this happened to me  so i can relate.
That is not what I see here for the most part though.
 
 Creativity is the joy of life variety is the spice.
In meditation do 30 minuets minimum a day.  Change it up do different kinds.  one hour is all you need minimum 30 minuets
If you want to do more than one practice that is fine but you should start with no more than 3.   Stabilize those become proficient and explore them from different standpoints find ways to make them interesting.  No one wants to be bored to death.
Stop looking at actualize.org like a all you can eat buffet. Stop binge watching 5-20 videos. 
Ask yourself what are the 3 things that I Most want help with or that I want to change?  Then make those your 3 Practices that  answer to that question. I strongly encourage your first one to be meditation because if you can not calm you mind on some level and acquire some awareness everything will be harder.
Take notes : How will I incorporate this into MY life successfully ?
Take subconscious resistance into account, Your mind has been programed Aka "brainwashed" from birth"  to be lazy  to have others think for you and force you into the idea that you are separate limited being.  These programs  to do everything to stop you from being or ever gaining awareness to see this very fact.   That is just the truth . News ,advertising ,tv shows ,video games , the education system , culture in general enforce and reinforce this over and over until the patterns and habits you hold to are not even your own.  Realize that it takes 40 days to establish a habit by repeatedly doing  over and over until that habit is pushed into your subconscious as a rule to supersede previous shitty behavior. You better believe there will be resistance from your mind.  Know it, expect it ,and plan for it.
Stop caring what others think or if they are on the same level as you. or who is more enlightened. There is always someone doing better than you and worse. I person in the process of life long enlightenment helps those that are doing worse and asks for help from those that they know have surpassed them. 
Understand that you could be wrong and if you see shitty behavior realize after the fact accept and make amends for it. Then do better. All things in life can be a mirror If you can get out of your own way. 
This is just a rule am implementing  When a person poses a comment that has nothing to do with a topic and you want to respond to them don't do it on the thread copy there statement and post it to them in mail. That will stop topics from being derailed and it addresses the comment directly to them. 
 
Sorry if this post went a bit off topic but sometimes that is how my chaotic mind  "thought process works"
At any rate I hope you find it helpful

@Jayden Birch Being a sage IS a specialization. Sages sacrfice a lot to be sages. Don't confuse being a sage with being a dabbler who just reads whatever books strike his fancy.

The reality is you need it.
Enlightenment without personal development work produces enlightened assholes and rubes.
Personal development without enlightenment produces polished egos who can never find fulfillment no matter what they achieve. This would be like the Tony Robbins effect (sorry, Tony, my projection )
After enlightenment you still need to master the following things:
Relationships Socializing Science Business/career Family Health Bad habits & addictions Bad cultural conditioning like sexism or racism Embodiment of unconditional love Old childhood traumas Ethical behavior

I was recently dealing with this as well, there were a bunch of things I had to do and I had to force myself to do them otherwise I would slip into procrastination and time-wasting addictions. Here is what helped me:
1. Be very clear with your top 3 goals. Not so much about how you will accomplish something but what it is you want to accomplish and why. I found that a lot of the time I was simply dabbling in a bunch of random activities without focus which led to me to moving nowhere. 
2. Minimise your lifestyle drastically (see Leo's video Lifestyle Minimalism). This helps remove distractions, if your mind is all over the place it will be difficult to focus on the same thought/goal for any longer than a minute. This again led me to think about a bunch of different things and procrastinate, not achieving any of them (this is why it's important to focus on a small number of goals such as 3). 
3. Try and practice awareness throughout the day. What I do is a set an alarm on my phone every 2 hours that's quite faint but still audible. When I hear it, it reminds me to stop what I'm doing and become present to the moment - very helpful for beating procrastination e.g. mindlessly scrolling through social media feeds.
The above things will help to move past your first 3 sticking points, you are partly addicted and have little self control because you are not clear about you goals (this is important). This overwhelms your mind with other less important distractions and you end up addicted to being distracted. Bringing in the awareness aspect will help you catch yourself when you unconsciously begin doing your habits. The problem is not that your addictions are bigger than the goals, it's that you are exposed to them more frequently throughout the day by things such as phone notifications and distractions lying around the house.
About your 4th point, you will not know if what you want to do is really what you want to do by thinking about it. The best thing I found for myself is to actually do it and then see if it was something I liked doing or not. Often times, even if I didn't particularly enjoy doing it the act of doing it to see if I did actually want to do it was far more satisfying than sitting and thinking about it.
Once you focus on what you want (and keep it firmly in your mind, by reminding yourself of it often), and take steps to start doing it (even by doing it for 1 minute as an exercise for starting an activity) the discipline will come naturally. Forcing discipline is very unlikely to work!
My 2 cents, hope they help. I have some of Leo's video's that this is combined from but I don't think sharing them will help you much, it may cause you to stay where you are, in a state of non-focus. If you really want I can say them, just reply in the below post but ask yourself if you really need them.

Maybe it’d be easier to type down your ideas rather than a physical notebook. When ideas are attached to a computer — you can’t really move it around to lose it that easily. And with mobile tablets or phones — the part that it’s pricey makes it more likely that you’ll focus on not losing them.
I’ve found probably hundreds of blogs through my personal development, but James Clear always seem to have had the best advice on discipline.
https://jamesclear.com/behavioral-psychology
https://jamesclear.com/habits
https://jamesclear.com/motivation
https://jamesclear.com/procrastination

i am not sure if this is what you are looking for but it might be relevent
“Life is difficult. This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it. Once we truly know that life is difficult-once we truly understand and accept it-then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters.” quote by scott peck from the road less traveled 
and this
http://www.nscblog.com/miscellaneous/four-tools-of-discipline-from-the-road-less-traveled/

@egoless You set an intention for what you want to know, and you apply your keen observation skills to the issue. As you observe a thing with an open mind and genuine intent, the answer will be revealed with time spontaneously.
See video: Learning = Observation
Boredom is usually just an illusion you have to bust through by becoming more curious about the thing at hand.
It sounds like you lack discipline, focus, and follow-through. Without those, you will never succeed at anything. You must learn to discipline yourself to have a work ethic. Or accept that your life will forever be mediocre.

Just do it. There is no how.
You need to learn how to just start taking action. And the only way to do that is by doing it.

Another fake action is feeding the ego's desire to project it's issues elsewhere to avoid looking inward such as what you are doing now,
It's also what I am doing as I type - I'm just aware of it.
 
It's so elusive that it's scary - the post was unnecessary and is a very watered down version of what almost all self-help gurus talk about.
 
Back to the drawing board for both of us, huh?

Absolute skepticism can be good. But you have to be careful not to misuse it.
For example, why are you so certain that all knowledge is neither correct or incorrect?
Is it speculation when you get hungry and drive to the store to buy dinner? Are you just speculating that you could buy some dinner with cash? Or is that something you know works to keep you alive?
See, the thing is, no matter how much you speculate or doubt, then there is reality which gets your ass moving and doing. So don't sit around speculating about fantastical things, instead, observe reality in motion. Observe the real patterns. That is proper contemplation.
For example, when you ask a question like, "What is happiness?" that is NOT a speculation. Happiness is a word which refers to something concrete in your direct experience. So find that thing and look at what is really is. What is happiness? Like REALLY! You've felt it before. So what is it? Don't theorize. Don't go reading the answer in some book. Look at it! Or maybe it's all just an illusion? In which case, look at that! Is that actually true? Are you conscious of the illusion? Or are you just saying it's an illusion because some guy in a video said so and you are aping him?
Your contemplation has to be grounded in reality.
What we are interested in exploring the most is all the stuff you do after you've doubted everything as much as you can. Why do you still go to pee? Why do you still get angry? Why do you still get sad? Why do you still go to work? Etc. After all, if you really doubted all that away, you shouldn't be doing any of it. So if you're doing it, clearly you believe in it. Clearly you are a slave to that reality.
So far your doubt has only gone skin deep, even though it appears absolute.
If your doubt were truly absolute, the universe would disappear out of existence, and you along with it. And that would be the happiest day of your life. And it would be no mere speculation.

This post
I'm calling " open contemplation " 
It's a chance to make this forum less about telling each other about how things are, and more about some deep collective introspection right now. So anyone is welcome to comment. 
The aim of this is something similar to a consciousness workshop. Where a group of people get together and start questioning there own experience. 
This is for people who have the intelligence to realise that they are deeply ignorant and do not know! And from there we have the space to actually look. 
If there is a specific experience or distinction you want to look into here I am happy to contamplate with you here and see if we can both come to some sort of genuine insight or realisation together.
If you want to get involved but don't have anything in particular that you want to contemplate here, then have a look at the suggestions for topics of contemplation below. 
This post may be your chance to actually contemplate for yourself, in your own experience, without any authority from anyone. Your shooting for direct evidence. Buddha can't help you here, Jesus can't save you now. YOU contemplate, YOU desern YOU find for yourself what's true. 
To help people to be more effective in there contemplations I have outlined some guiding principles. 
Pre contemplation components 
1. Presence: Put your attention on the present moment.
2. Clarity: clarify what you are going to contemplate. 
3. Possibility: hold that it is possible to become conscious of whatever it is you are contemplating.
contemplation components: 
Intention: intend, right now, to become conscious of the truth.
openess: Allow yourself to deeply not know, and be open to whatever may be true. 
Focus: keep all your attention on your subject; when you wander off, immediately bring your attention back. 
Question: Truly wonder; keep a steady questioning that's related to your intent.
 
So let's get started 
suggested topics of contemplation- 
what is a distinction? 
What is self?
what are emotions, why do they exist? For what purpose? 
what is self image?
what is thinking? 
What is separation? 
How does space exist in your self experience?
how are you stuck in time? What does it mean to be timeless?
fear & desire?
what is authority?
what is a person?
what is culture? What assumptions, beliefs and ideas has culture got?
and so on.
 
 
 
 
 
 

@haai14 contemplate, research, contemplate, research - raising your consciousness. 

No, you aren't jerking your brain off when you contemplate things like time and reality. In contemplation - and thinking - you use past experiences which may not be present but they will create a good map in your mind (which of course isn't the territory). If you don't want to contemplate existential things, contemplation is still useful. You can contemplate things like virtue, good and bad, how a good life is created, happiness (which is crucial if you want to create it)... and even personal questions. It is useful for understanding (thus maybe gaining the ability to manipulate) almost ANYTHING. You need to have this in your toolkit.