The White Belt

@Rilles Even when the headphones weren't on?

How did you manage to not throw the baby out with the bathwater? You say you've realised that everything is pointless, meaningless. Yet you've still managed to run your website, keep up your weekly videos, manage your business, answer your emails etc. I just read your comments about how doing things is pointless, and my mind tries to tell me to throw away my passions and big goals. I'm struggling to not give into my mind. How did you manage it? How did you reconcile the paradox in your mind? Please tell me! x

@Leo Gura Thanks Leo. I watched your paradox of personal development video after asking the question. It helped. You said you would probably do about 30 videos each one on a paradox. Not a bad idea. Perhaps you can make one called 'The paradox of doing meaningful things in a meaningless existence'. Just a suggestion.

@Leo Gura I'd really appreciate it if you took the time to answer, please.

@Leo Gura - You said after 5-MeO your girlfriend started looking into enlightenment. Is she still into it? How far has she gotten?

I've just begun a relationship. It's only 5 days old but we'd been seeing each other a couple of months. I've known her for two years but we weren't close during most of that time. Since the start of the relationship i've been freaking out a lot. I'm almost ashamed to say that I'm already afraid of her cheating on me, I don't feel like i'm good enough for her, I feel like it will end in disaster, I feel hopelessly insecure. She's told me the last two people she has been seeing and I know one of them and it hurts to imagine them together even though it was a year ago. I've told her exactly how I feel which is good. She's sympathetic and says to me that she wants to put me under no pressure. She tells me that she feels for me like she's never felt for anybody else before, and still my mind isn't satisfied. I'm doing well not to put any of my insecurity or doubt onto her. I'm keeping her away from it. The weirdest part of this all is, is that when i'm with her, it all melts away. I feel mostly comfortable and fine. My plan/philosophy is this: You're just experiencing resistance because you haven't been in a relationship for several years and you don't wanna fuck it up because you like her an awful lot; wait it off. I feel like these feelings will subside soon, but i'd like to move them along quicker. Entering a relationship with somebody should be a joy! Not an anxiety trip. Any advice on how to get these feelings to melt away? Thanks.

In a word: Underrated. I'm having a little ego backlash today. Nothing too major just a little irritation. Last night I smoked weed, blunt, through a pipe. Everything in my field of awareness was vibrating. Little particles. It was almost see through. I could sense the disappearance of parts of my body. My present moment awareness was so fine tuned that time seemed to slow down entirely. I was listening to music and each note seemed to go on and on, like in normal experience my mind would hurry it along. It was super great! Give weed a try more. It's brilliant. After a couple of years of meditation it becomes more like LSD than anything (I haven't tried LSD but I imagine it so).

The most powerful trip i've had was on edibles. It was 10x more powerful than any mushroom trip I had. I was seeing sacred geometric patterns floating above me, and I thought I (as the body) was going to die. Scary as hell. You can't underestimate edibles.

@okulele Amen.

Background: Dating for 3-ish months. Romantic (confession of feelings, kissing, hugging, dry-humping) for 5-ish weeks. Tonight I am staying over for the first time. She's super nervous about me staying over. I really like her, I want to be respectful. I read an article from a Taoist website saying that in Taoism, for best results, you should sleep in bed together for at least three months before having sex. What do you guys think? My intention is for our first time to be the best sex she's ever had. I want to give her the mind-blowing night she deserves. Thank you.

Out of respect I won't give a 'report' per se. But we did do it, and it was hot, sweaty, passionate, loud, animalistic fucking and it was great. Thanks guys

I'm on her bed. She's in the shower. Who needs Taoism anyway?!

@Phrae I'm a westerner who holds no organised religion.

You're over-sensitive because you're defending yourself. People are saying things about you that you already suspect about yourself but keep lying to yourself about, then when people threaten to uncover your lies, you go on the full attack. Be brutally self-honest and stop defending your neuroses and lies.

AKA Shivambu. Does anybody do it? Has anybody benefited from it? Thanks

Like @aurum says. Extra meditation is good but it takes years to see good gains in slowing the monkey mind, so don't rely on that. I recommend before you move onto other work, take a few conscious breaths to bring your focus to your new task. Relax your muscles a little and do some -NEGOTIATION- seems ridiculous but I've found it very necessary. Set a timer and commit to that task for that time. 25 blocks with 5 min breaks works very well for me. If you need to work for a long time, do 3, 25 minute timed blocks of focused work and then take a longer break to do whatever the monkey mind wants to do

Would it be more effective to put mindful awareness on the movement of thought and keep coming back to that, or to put mindful awareness on bodily sensations and keep coming back to that? Or is it all one system in the sense that technically I could be mindful of my ass all day long and it would still increase my ability to catch negative thoughts as they arise? Thoughts on this? Thanks!

@Leo Gura Have you ever used weed for self-actualization purposes? If so, what are the results?

@Shanmugam Thank you very much! Do you think that mindfulness of thought is more effective than mindfulness of bodily sensation?

My only source of self worth has been taken from me. Goodbye cruel world.

Some people have super high thumbs ups when all they do is crack jokes without adding anything of value. Can it.

@TJ Reeves God damn it man. You are a bad ass. Excited to see where you go from here.

Opinion on Owen/Tyler RsD?

@Jhonny Certainly it does... Because it makes you question things more deeply, and helps you to sort out the hearsay from the true, and if you carry the principles of meditation with you, then you live a life of application and testing over mental-masturbation (a word I have come to love) which is how you improve intelligence ultimately.