UnbornTao

In what ways is it real? You yourself admitted in your first post that this belongs to the realm of belief - and that's accurate. It's only "real" insofar as it is imagined to be. It may seem real as a result of how your mind interprets and makes sense of circumstances. The sensory input gets filtered through all kinds of thought-forms, like preference and presumption. This same principle may apply to many areas of life, but it stands out especially with consciously adopted beliefs. Obviously you didn't die, since you're writing here. You're alive. So - without taking that for granted - what is life? There's a lot to uncover there. But your thinking here is sloppy. It lacks rigor, objectivity, and groundedness. Actually contemplate your experience, setting aside stories, preferences, and unnecessary concepts. It's a subjective state. Were substances involved? Can you see how the mind can fabricate entire worlds that aren't objectively occurring? With effort, I could believe almost anything I wanted, but that would go against the spirit of honest inquiry. Fundamentally, what happens after death is unknown to everyone, since everyone alive is alive now. And notice: being alive, we also don't truly know what life is - nor the self, the mind, or experience, for that matter. Your stance is founded on a complex matrix of unconscious assumptions. What did you experience? What is it that you hope to accomplish by engaging in this pursuit?

That's fair, but I don't see where I insulted him or was offensive. My post might have come off as blunt or rude, though. It's true that I wanted to destroy his commitment to fantastical thinking, so I figured I'd give it a shot.

What are you up to? Promoting dogma isn't aligned with the spirit of the work we do here. Also, this shit (the video) looks AI-generated. A completely different approach is to destroy every fantasy and belief you hold, rather than piling up more. This greatly increases your openness and your ability to examine matters in a more grounded and powerful way. Why not give it a serious try? In the end, it's more real.

If my data isn't stolen, count me out.

Love it. Is that a yogurt factory?

I'm leaving it up for grabs. Did you read Ramana's story on the other thread? Insects bit at his legs, he lived in a cave, and all he did was sit. On what condition did his alleged happiness depend? The main disconnect here is that what you're calling happiness is simply getting what you want. When you don't get what you want, or fail to avoid something unwanted, you call that unhappiness - and this whole dynamic boils down to survival. Cnsider this: why aren't you happy all the time? By fantasy, I was referring to mahasamadhi. It's entirely hearsay. And yes, there are such things as wishful-thinking, beliefs and wholly biased, subjective fabrications.

Gorgeous landscape.

It may well already be the case - happiness being independent of all that. We simply tend to attribute our happiness to the circumstances that seem to elicit it. But again: are agreeable feelings that arise the same as happiness? And if not, what exactly are we talking about? Most likely anything consistent with one's self-agenda. Perhaps happiness is even independent of the self, in a strange way. Fantasy is overrated; changing one's mindset and disposition is underrated.

Where did that come from?

Isn't that the whole point - that happiness is independent of circumstances?

I know, I just made a distinction. Improving the way one breathes can be done regardless of diet. I simply suggested focusing on the former in this context, since breath plays a central role in breath-arianism. But isn't eating the antithesis of the practice? What do you mean by being more spiritual? Anyhow, I find the feasibility of such a lifestyle highly dubious. To me, it is nonsensical and fantasy-based. Occasional and controlled water fasting seems like a better option, in my view. Still, thanks for sharing it.

She totally went Ramana on you! --- Sorry, lame joke. Is that even how the expression is used?

We don't know, and any attempt by the mind to comprehend this matter will inevitably lead to misunderstanding. In your example, it would be an encounter with what is there for itself that's being perceived or distinguished as the wall. Perhaps there is no wall at all… Something is, though, or so it seems. At this point, you'd start contemplating: What is an object? You are, so attempt to grasp the very one that you currently are - get enlightened! Did it work? Being open and genuinely wanting to know are the main ingredients. We like to "wait around," thinking it requires a long time but it doesn't have to. Intend to get it now, and intend again, until you do. In any case, being happy is accesible now, even if one's true nature is unknown.

Shave your head? I don't know. Ohh that's awesome. That's more than a little change, though

Happy with our work, not if we work. It wasn't a conditional statement. As for making a dent in happiness, we'd really have to understand what it is. It might not be what we think. It seems that when you stop doing dysfunctional things with your mind, happiness comes more easily as a natural result or condition. I think that's the point being made in the video. Then again, happiness isn't our goal and never was; the promotion and survival of our selves is. We often unconsciously resist certain aspects of our experience. Embracing one's current experience, whatever it is, goes a long way toward being happy in life. It changes our relationship to it. Even when it is painful and unwanted, it is allowed to be what it is, which facilitates understanding. This can dissipate much of our resistance and suffering.

Love it.

Fasting is a good one, as is removing an addiction - even if only for a short time. Use your phone less. Cut down on sugar. Meditate longer than you'd like or are used to. Cook a dish you've never tried. Any small step we take to stop running from pain or fear can serve as good practice.

@MellowEd When you get rigorous with yourself, what exactly did you go through? It sounds to me like you're more confused than usual. Did you take any substances? The mind has a powerful ability to interpret events and circumstances in ways that generate entirely fabricated worlds, that we then proceed to live in. You need to be a bit more grounded and less airy-fairy. Make a clear distinction between a fabricated, subjective state and what we might call a factual or objective experience - an actual sensory encounter, like seeing an apple, not an "encounter" with extraterrestrial beings or the like. If you don't mind answering, what are you actually up to? What do you hope to gain or accomplish with these practices? And what do they have to do with what's true? You might want to start by dissecting what it is you mean by you and yourself - what is that experience about? Who are you for real, not according to hearsay, preference, belief, or BS?

Sounds like wishful thinking and fantasy-based. What's its purpose? And why do the followers take it up? Learning to breathe properly is invigorating, and it doesn't require any extreme lifestyle changes. I bet all of us can improve the way we breathe. Usually, we resist it, even if only subtly, or we do it too quickly and superficially. It would be better to contemplate, maintain a healthy diet, and drink plenty of water. So, I'm making a distinction between lifestyle and the truth.

You can also just go for an experience of real being now. Why wait until one's self has been stripped? I suspect in practice those aren't mutually exclusive: to perceive Being, the self must be seen for what it is. Bless them. Sure. We can pursue it, and at the same time, direct consciousness is always sudden. There really isn't a path, but often, prior to this kind of realization, there's a process of dwelling on a question, investigating, discussing, and perhaps studying pertinent material - which might help put you in a good state, even though awakening isn't a result or effect. Like waking up from a dream.

That is a sloppy statement.

Perhaps. But consider that the now is an absolute and might even be the source of time, prior to "before and next", or the context for them. That is, we have yet to become conscious of the Now - it's likely being heard as the way we experience "the present moment", which is fine. At the same time, they aren't quite the same thing. I can't really tell because I'm not conscious of that now.

Do we actually grasp the significance of that, though? That's the key question. Intellectually, we can understand it. It's relatively straightforward if one understands English. But what does our experience say in the matter? It's a fascinating contemplation. For example, we likely keep holding the present as a moment in time, and don't quite perceive the Now. Anything we point to - whether it happened years ago or a millisecond ago - seems to be process-based, which isn't the same as an experience of now. Now it's an absolute, and naming things is one of the functions of language, so things can be named; another thing is whether that is an accurate representation of what's so. It's still a representation and not the thing itself. Some food for thought, sorry if I sidetracked the thread.