ValiantSalvatore

Hey, first of all, I want to apologize to for doing stupid things Namecalling on his forum !! Since this is a platform where people can exchange information and insights with human beings or people/systems etc. It was not very sharp to do that. This is what I intended to post after, the retreat I scheduled. To give further information about all of these conclusions and experiences that I am listing. I unearthed some weird believes this time. But, I want to make sense automatically, since my personality type is INFJ. So, I am prone to search for meaning or create an ideology, I would be a great demagogue. See Hitler for example. Micro Retreat Shinzen Young What happened during the retreat? During the retreat, I had two experiences that I finally wanted, I can't retrace if I had them before, since memory is not my strength without support. So, I finished reading the Book Integral Psychology and was able to infer some meaning from the psychedelic experience or my weird and I know the stage, psychic breakthrough. I was becoming stage turquoise or I was catching the ox or I was becoming one with all sentient beings. I was reaching an early psychic stage. I now know that for more or less. Sure, so I am trying to be as literally as possible, since it is the best way, literally, to use the English language for me including hidden meaning. With puns, I will or you will potentially see that. The knot in my stomach, the burning knife stabbed into my solar plexus, or how Ken Wilber describes it in Integral Psychology which is a great book (I bought the booklist 3 years ago approx or 2) der Weltenschmerz, or how I would philosophize it with my current understanding of -- the twist and turn of the world, the up and down of shame, anger, frustration and joy and pain turning into flow. Or also the body-brain problem. Or body-mind. But the brain is in the body. Now how did this happen since various people could be interested in it and most apparently, first it happened spontaneously, regardless of what technique is out there I can make a list at the end of what I tried for 3 years now and for how long. You deal with that problem as long as you are doing meditation regularly and most importantly attend retreats. So, why am I saying this? Because a teacher a coach or a guru can be a great facilitator, yet Knowledge at this point matters. For instance about Shaktipa and different traditions and how they use it. So, how that knot in my solar plexus or more precisely sternum untangle itself. It just happened, through training and I was so happy listening to the teacher's voice, that my the knot unsnarled and I just cried because of the thought there is someone who cares, I am afraid this will go deeper in the future, but that is okay. After that unsnarling, I looked at my sternum / solar plexus and it was like a tiny metal ball was pulsating up and down and I saw that, with my own eyes, I felt alive, but inside my body and brain hence the body-mind issue. The knot unraveling itself part 2: Again, I can't tell how advanced people are on this forum which makes me mad all this hideous behavior of people in real life. I am not the best, I tend to be an escapist. Which is not better, but I want to get to the theme Vision Logic later. This time the knot unraveled itself while I was either doing some sort of feel in practice as a basic mindfulness thingy and then focusing on expansion and contraction of that point, basically when does any point in one's body starts to expand and contract and then it gets complicated. So, my mom came home she was visiting some friend and I immediately as she opened the door to the apartment upstairs, I had to cry and the sternum point/void/unfulfillment/knife stab etc. burst open again at the same spot. Because the thought preceded that I am not capable of caring for her currently, because my emotional capacity does not have the necessary breadth of mind inside my heart. Because I keep asking friends and people about observations that I make around meditation and they most often lack the necessary description skills but asking about chakras helps. Since this was once a system in use (See Integral Psychology don't take my word ! ) Now, this is the good stuff, so I know what it means no. I called Shinzen during the retreat but I lacked the precision to accurately tell everything about the practice since I noticed that he noticed that I noticed that he noticed that there are other things one can work on. I just re-did an older retreat in November one of the audio recordings there about the Primordial Unfulfillment which is the same thing I meditated on the Q&A section. Since this was one of the first problems I encountered when I started meditating late 2014 or beginning 2015. The incentive although was depression. I don't see many threads here about retreats or experiences of retreats so one can come to one's own conclusions, through a more or less comprehensive letter of recommendations or not of retreats, especially with psychedelic insights. Since this can go wrong, see YouTubers who do it recreationally, unearned consciousness is valueless. IMO !!! Also, some are bit too comprehensive which is great for greatness, also I do not visit the forum that regularly, even though having a support group would help me tremendously since I am the 7th percentile in conscientiousness according to the understandmyself test which I took two times now. Also, doing other big 5 tests. With different results in conscientiousness solely as a main divergent. Process of mastery with techniques Techniques I used during the retreat from Shinzen Young were, the classic see, hear, feel, in and out. He had an offering? Called introduction to spontaneity, in which I used Auto Speak for the first time. Feel Flow and Rest. These are the things that I am working with also gone. He also offered the pain processing algorithm, yet looking at the pdf documents helps to clarify some ambiguity and obscurity. Auto Speak and 1P-LSD I was not under the influence of any substances during the three days I also did not eat much. I tried Auto Speak basically a mantra for the first time I assume many people on this forum would never try this, but I can help in various ways, through strong labeling during a mindfulness practice, because it does not obfuscated the precision with which one attempts to identify an emotion, since one automatically includes the auditory capacities... literally of the system of practice. So, I chanted as loud as I could because I was quite angry that nobody cared and I dislike holy days. Now, back to my 1P-LSD trip this is where it can get dark for people, with the word intelligence. Because I sat down and meditated on my chair where I usually meditate and wanted to sit for some time it was either a 4 hour sit or a 2 hour. As I was sitting down my awareness was so present that I could not use a meditative technique it would hinder my from subconscious processing the Hintergedanke or thought way way way-way back in the reptilian brain? And I felt like a knight, I felt like my intelligence was a tool that can be used also, how my type of and this is where it goes astray(Literally I saw how the strength of my attention climaxed). Archetype Infj, or w/e Raven, Beaver, Gemini, Aquarius, Leo, Pisces etc. little Bird. Started to become active it felt like I went through a whole bell curve of my cognitive capacity. With a focus on how I think through journaling etc. I felt like a old wise knight with a scare inside his sternum through a battle with others, call it Nadi or whatever names there are. Now, during this trip time just passed and it was similar to Auto-Speak or Chant technique which seemed to help transcend time, not space but time. Also, blurting out numbers seemed to filter my speech or headspace? potentially, since I noticed while speaking how unconscious thoughts went through my mind and influenced chanting. Even when people walked through the house or I heard a tiny noise downstairs I noticed it, even my neighbors could hear me, because of the day after one of their child started copying me saying einszweidreivierfünfsechsiebenachtneunzehn 12345678910, and backtracking that to 0. Using the American sound system. Or what I learned how I think Americans use sound. This was a bit embracing but the child seemed quite happy or teenager and laughed quite jovial. Expansion and contraction I tend to dislike this part since I could not do it, but I am now able to turn pain more into flow and spread that flow through the body and able to distinguish between feel in and feel flow. Which can then again be some feel quality with anger, frustration, equanimity, or something pesky. But, I felt especially since my breath work is shit, how this void of unfulfillment expanded and contracted, but I had to work myself towards that point first to perceive it even as a void, or ball of emptiness or pain since it felt first like a gaping wound. But expansion and contraction allowed me somehow feel around and within this void similar to Leo's new video the contours of that feeling can move up and down and mingle at the core and sometimes manifest as a contraction and an expansion often feels for me like a small perforation at the iron ball of pain to be creative and dismantle this ball, evoking spikes and thunder of different flavors which turn into flow. This can be great for anyone a bit more serious about their practice. Auto Walk This is where it gets interesting for me since Shinzen tried to point out to me in case I am pondering about the advice correctly to use feel out, so I often imagine why for instance and this is my own way of seeing stuff, people attract certain human beings it is like they have an aura or something similar. I attended a Soto Zen Retreat this year and was there for 14 days, I did not wear a Kimono since I was not sure how to manage washing etc. But, after the meditation session or Sesshin we did Kinhin - Auto Walk - for 14 days so to speak and more often. Which, in retrospect, I regarded as building an armor you are constantly assessing where the person in front of you stands and you walk around the zen garden ( we did meditate once there ), I thought how people in medieval times perceived this pratice as if they build some sort of armor with the clothes. So, I did auto walk and imagined dragon ball z trying... to push my energy outside and build some sort of aura, since I have the habit of attracting weird people. As I walked and tried feel out and becoming one with my cloth and even my sweat or smell, since I am tall I automatically attract attention, and since 40000 Americans live nearby (military) often you see Americans. It's quite odd how a European mindset and American mindset in terms of materialism clash and how they deal with "black people" especially, last time the big big's came out and I felt like a serotonin rush, because some random girl and my gut... or intuition is quite right often with this was starting to talk about big, the same when you sit in a bar and a lot of stereotype black people come in and in my mind, and yeah I had a serotonin rush because someone was triggering my American identity. In Germany, they would say you are large or tall aka Groß and people build an identity around that, which my family always did, but I regarded this as stupid since most likely I have scar since birth which makes me mad about meditation. Imagine you apply oil near your hip and it feels like your nervous system receives an orgasm. This is just not very productive. Or it hurts and I have to take a break because blood does not flow through this part of my body, which makes breathing difficult. Now, I saw a young German guy with a couple an American couple. I was just walking past them and was a bit mad for not feeling I have a voice since people are so constricted towards time and European uppishness is quite real. Anyway, I just said something back about white since I rarely ever talk about race since simply there are not many black people so you talk about culture and national identity and not skin color. The German guy just had to laugh and it reminded me how most open-hearted socialist leaning or German people are but can be very big on color blindness. The American couple was just thunderstruck because the German guy laughed and most likely they went like you can't do that bla bla bla etc. Yet, I feel they deny subconscious processing very hard. First year of attending retreats online and offline + 1P-LSD trips insights/observations - still integrating This is only expedient for cross-referencing practice and observation in daily life about one's techniques and practices. Now, I feel like I now know what catching the ox it is reaching stage turquoise and becoming one with all sentient beings. Which occurred to me during my Psychedelic inquiry about nature and intelligence since I wanted to have an experience of self-design? This is what I had in mind but this occurred. A sense of unity between humanity and nature. https://psychonautwiki.org/wiki/Unity_and_interconnectedness and instead I wanted https://psychonautwiki.org/wiki/Existential_self-realization. Which is the brain and intelligence stuff? I am treating this with too much casualty. This trip was nice, but if ones surrounding does not allow it I would refrain from taking action this, is just for people interested who maybe never even looked it up. I attended 4 1/2 retreats this year, 3 micro retreats which are around 60 hours or less and 14 days at a Soto Zen temple. http://www.meditation-zen.org/en Now, what I am trying to make sense now are sounds and animals and the world makes when one has taken psychedelics. I can't find the original example where Sadghuru asked the people to rub their hands and suddenly a wind starts streaming in. But, this is what I mean, especially when meditating to nature sounds or somewhere where there is actually nature. I like to equate this with the Bardo Releam ? Samsara it is called apparently Ken Wilber talks about everything, but I saw this while I lived in China Jin'Ang Temple in Shanghai or Summer Palace in Beijing, Lama temple, Confucius temple etc. that picture in some temple. summer temple in Beijing here the tapestry/painting I saw. U can see each releam hell at the bottom gods at the top. Animal and Hungry people.. excuse my petty sophistication. And demigods and humans to the right. One can even see people or cross-reference this with spiral dynamics and sounds especially to see what is going on with one surroundings that is what I am currently assuming after watching so many enlightened people. I also saw one traveling monk in a train station and after the retreat I did some weird things and abused the search algorithm of youtube and personalized and backtracked every magical thought I had, to break the C.O.D.E, I thought how many coincidences can occur simply by filtering the youtube channel only to enlightened people. But what in retrospect they did, they just skilfull deflected the unconsciousness of people in the crowd. I actually believed I saw this guy Also, from a sensory clarity perspective, my perception of reality becomes more vivid after meditating. It is like I am in a mild psychedelic upcoming phase at the back of my skull. Also, after this retreat, I meditated lying down for a couple of hours, since I just get tired of thinking about my scar and when other people are not there, I can't distract myself or have the necessary impetus to do something. (Agreeableness 76 percentile with 7th conscientouness is odd) as male. With a high testosterone level. Most likely. All of this nondual talks are great, yet I listened to Shinzen Youngs Audiobook again and I have a hintergedanke which tells me the following: that Freud was wrong at one point or carl young I never read it, I watched only a video about Carl Jung, yet know some odd theory how god was created through a book from Leo's booklist. And he ordained in the Shingon school which is a Vajrayana the diamond way or thunderbolt way, which encapsulates if I understand things correctly more techniques and or different techniques, such as chanting, rituals choosing ones deity or rather being chosen, + others, and there are Mahayana and Hinayana which all originated from India primordially and the schools themselves from Theravada. ( I did a lying meditation while listening to the Audiobook after the retreat and listening to tons of videos, for a healthier information consumption). So, the small wheel, the big wheel and the diamond way, back to jung or freud was wrong as a hintergedanke, I remember Ken Wilber saying this in an Audiobook most likely.. and I just looked it up in the book, archetypal communion or Ananda. Would be the actual thing (Path of saints) I am not sure if that is what Leo talked about in the Video today. With the subtle body merging with the surroundings. Without listing more bad stuff, and old thought patterns. I am not sure if there is a stage turquoise female here, but I assume she is one in case this is interesting since it is interesting for me. (Still, I believe it is Zen all the way.) What I want to work on and integrate next year, Sounds especially the ones I heard during psychedelic trips and the ones who are becoming more apparent, I watched so many videos now of enlightened people and tried to decipher their body language like I have an Arhats disease, to gain some knowledge of their behavior because they seem so different like, they can tune in into different frequencies of sound in order to act accordingly to the energy present. For instance bird and dog sounds I often felt at the zen retreat they show up when there is fear or a hungry spirit something below or at ethnocentric thinking same with female stomach sounds of care.., birds I feel start... making sounds at a level of personal power and will when there is a good spirit present, I often feel at the core/sternum that they make fun of myself, but show me beauty too. Otherwise transportations, trucks, maybe ships? airplanes etc. I will use auto speak since it feels I am transmorphing time. And that this is a sign for a cue to space and time at least that is what it reminds me of chanting also helps to feel into my concrete brain. Here is the list of techniques I tried in three years of practice now staying with one practice and I can understand why Leo looks at his hand. ( I started with 5-minute practice !!!!!!! and moved to 1h by the end of the quarter of the first year of pratice.) List: - Basic mindfulness counting breath (5min a day to 20 min a day for a month max) - Body sweeping (5 min to 15 min a day a month max) - A different version of counting breath, for instance, inhaling exhaling count instead of every inhale ( same time period) - Tonglen which is a prayer I read from a book from the Dalai Lama I found the article while browsing for this post (approx 5 - 7 minutes or 10 a day for 4-8 months after my meditation practice) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonglen (in China + Germany) - Do nothing for 2-3 months ( in China + Germany ) - See hear feel from Shinzen Young ( one year and a half now, for 1h - 45min approx insight timer) - See good, feel good, be good or how the technique is called for two months approx. the same time span - Pain processing algorithm for two months to one month - Self-inquiry for approx 1 month in China which was hell with a glass in front of me ( approx 1h - 45min after Leo's video about self-inquiry) ( I used the App Headspace and now use Insight Timer, but I try to not rely on some gadget in order to meditate and I can't yet build a structure as perfectly as I want it to) And that is about it: Tonglen helped the far the most with jealousy so I dropped it quite quickly because it was so effective it fulfilled its end but, now it's creeping back up, so Tonglen can help very well with jealousy in daily life. Otherwise, self-inquiry was a bit too much I would currently try to outwit myself, and working with the mindfulness system after reading the pdf and taking some notes, and listening to various teachings and things making sense now that I am a bit older. Is working great or quite well for me, I know now more or less what to do in order to move to stage turquoise and then integrate some hang-ups that I have, but I need more knowledge in order to do that. Shadow Work is currently not enough. To deal with that, and shamanic breath work is something I did not try, yet because of the potential repercussions. Anyway. This is enough for one post and sorry again for being mad I was and I still think sometimes partially that my intuition was right, but I was identified with thoughts, so there is no excuse for that and my action. My intention was a bit different but this was a very weird retreat. Too much old baggage. (Arrogance is currently big and very new to me I did not see that not at all maybe anger) I can share a couple of the Audio recordings for people who train within that system. P.M me and I can send you some of this stuff. Here is also some information about Vision-logic -> spiral dynamics stage yellow. Or integral thinking. Non-exclusivity - Everyone is right Enfoldment - Some are more right than others Enactment - If you want to know this do that https://integrallife.com/three-principles-integral-thinking/ ( I bought a membership for one dollar to access some content mainly about yoga, I don't know if the video or transcript is available) P.S I hope I did not confuse any knowledge and hope this is helpful for everyone present here. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays !!

Where does it start where does it end? Who cares? At what point? Till what dies? The what of what? Who cares if not? Why not count yourself to death or cough ? bark. The twist and turn of the world? schuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuujhhhhhhhhhhhhchhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Is it really a segmental story? Maybe the universe picks u up. Like the Slingo wished ? P.S A crazy one. Shoot it, cowboy. Where is my horse? Or Bull? bark psstt....the disease is there. Better cough during the holy day? Light and dark, from good, to bad, to better, to great, to bright? Colors. To time ? of speak ? bark ? Ever tried Auto Speak? How nuts can rationality be? Scared of a dog or a bird? I am sane. ? Cowboy. wuff Is it one story? Really?

@Emerald If I understand correctly.., the currently you peg yourself on stage 3 with glimpses in different stages, yet you feel as though the spiritual content that is out there, does not have the impact upon you, that it used to had since there is not any progress anymore on the path or it is potentially not visible or reflected in daily life. Because thought and attachments are obstructing your perception and thinking? Also, that you gain insights more easily since glimpsing the ox, yet at the same time, it hinders any progress because of an attachment to insights? Also, being aware of the pattern alone is not the remedy, since you know that letting go, escaping the thought process is what will ultimately cease the awareness of the pattern which is aware of the pattern? I am not sure on what stage I am if I had to guess it would be 3 nothing more or less. I had some insights into stage four, but I think it is similar to spiral dynamics. The subject of one stage becomes the object of the subject at the next stage. So, I can see hints and glimpses of the ox weekly. In a sense of some awe-inspiring or beautiful, thoughtless moment me catching myself having had a thoughtless moment and not being sure if it was essentially thoughtless or filled with unawareness or subconscious processing. (Gibber feelings at the back of my head, right before the neck starts, or at the occipital which could make a nice pun). So, I can't see stage 4 daily, so I can't really contemplate upon stage 3, only describe my subjective experience. I do get insights which I am want to test about people or reality, testing it helps, me to verify some truth. But, without having some sort of comparison and not being able to talk to people in real life about this makes it difficult. Yet, trusting awarness and testing one insight constantly helps, while being aware of confirmation bias. Well, I am assuming that you are tired of shinzen young talk here on this website still, I can recommend his life practice programme which directly addresses your core issue of mindfulness during the day. It is or can be quiet inspirational since each week it has new guest, talking about their lives and how they can apply mindfulness strategies to conquer day to day life. https://www.lifepracticeprogram.com/ (The program is weekly on Wednesday or Tuesday, it should be in the U.S.) I tried this when I wanted to become more mindful during the day, now I apply the techniques when I do some routine task. (Cleaning my room, walking to classes or to a friends house, going to the toilet, if you are really good talking to people when it is not a very challenging conversation.) I can recommend also the HeadSpace APP, when I first learned to practice some sort of meditation it helped me, they had a couple of cool articles and many options how to use meditation in particular circumstances. Or for particular problems/activities. Like relationships, cycling, jogging, walking, concentration, etc these are the ones I remember. I am by far not very good at it and can do it most effective when I am alone or walking. (Applying the mindfulness during the day / an activity) Signing up for retreats also helped, I did this now again for motivation. Otherwise remembering the awe-inspiring moments and contemplating about them in my journal or writing about the feeling can be a great aid. Also, since I can't do this now but I would do it if I had bla bla, going to a meditation group or dojo nearby. Especially, when it has some Japanese influences or potentially Indic, I am not sure what you like, just seeing a different structure, the architecture and different people can help to inspire oneself again, to walk one's own unique path. This is what shinzen adviced me when I talked to him with the life practice programme. Also, to be pedantic/nitpicky... I read that you stopped listening to spiritual content possibly, reading is better about something that used to inspire you about the whole process of reaching enlightenment. Hopefully, this advice is useful. Also, here is the video about interacting with others. I can also recommend the app insight timer, in case diversity and seeing beautiful people practising meditation all over the planet practicing different traditions. There are also teacher that one could come in contact with. I wrote to one guy recently because I wanted to know about integral yoga, he sent me two books and explained the overall philosophy to me and what kind of yogas it entails. Here the video about interacting with others.

Chillstep zen type: Nujabes great mellow, hip-hop: Lofi, worldcentric stuff, inspiring: (by far my favorite - mandarin ) DnB / Melodic: (this just makes me happy) Hip Hop / Rap that work for me with psychedelics: this is just legend Classic Trippy/Cool videos: Viking/Nordic/ShamanicFeels (this is awesome - both) Rock/Metal/Alternativ/Djent stuff never thought it would be that awesome to trip on this: Music that took me ultra-deep: (This was just nuts all of it) Casual/Pop/Funky: All of that was on some form of LSD. 1P-LSD etc.

Hey! I was curious about how do you visualize things, into your reality? I am doing this process now of visualizing my life purpose for 1-2 months each day for 10 min. 5 min affirmation and 5 min visualization. I am not going to share my LP , but I am quite curious how visualizations are working out for you? I am doing a set of two visualizations one about the bigger picture and one about the details of actualizing a more productive/conscientious day and overall life. (In total 20 min of visulization) What are you doing before or after your visualization in order to manifest that particular vision? How does your life look like after you did your visualization especially if you do them before bed. Does this change anything for you? Is there anything that did not work in terms of the procedure of visualizing things? What worked and how does your procedure look like? Are you only doing affirmations repeatedly spamming a sentence or word? And/or are you creating a visual procedure that runs like a film roll in your skull. Or do you do anything different that does not include any of the processes above? Anything that you personally do what has helped you realize your vision while you are where doing your visualization? For instance, imagining sounds, focusing on the potential fact that it is already real, feeling it, sensing it? How do you take action and how does your behaviour change or what changes your behaviour ultimately? Or anything you tell yourself, for instance trusting the process or setting up notes around the house to remind yourself. What and how did the most effective approach to visualization unfold for you? My procedure looks like the following: I will lie down in bed use my arm as a "biofeedback" device. Sort of like you are taking the subway to work and reach for the handle at the top. So, when I get tired I immediately notice that because my arm will automatically fall down and I can stay awake and I am focused. Then, I will do affirmations for 5 mins for instance for the me becoming more conscientious part of the visualization. I will say and repeat silently to myself. I am diligent and well-ordered and enjoy studying every day for college/uni. After that, I try to visualize exactly how that is supposed to unfold. So, I imagine that with as much granularity as possible and also envision it into the present moment. (Zu vergegenwärtigen ...) so I feel and see the vision like Leo describes it in his visualization video. -> The vision then looks like this: I see myself waking up and immediately taking a shower visualizing the rooms that I walk through, then I go back to my room and visualize me meditating, then how I go through life the next couple of months and weeks/days ahead. All in once. So, that I walk to uni and see the lecture hall or the classroom of the lecture, coming back and seeing the faculty and me walking back towards my apartment. Then how I sit down additionally making a cup of tea and then sitting down at my desk and start writing or imagine my writing/learning for the exams ahead of me. Then how I repeat this at home when I go back to my hometown or at the student's dorm for days and months to come. Also, for 5 minutes. This is how the process currently looks like for me. Currently, I can't seem to find any success with this. I am approximately now 30-40 days into this habit. It worked quite well for me with the becoming more funny exercise/visualization. The difference there was I did it directly after meditating in the morning currently, I intend to do stretching exercises afterwards. In which, I have not been as consistent as with the visualization habit, but first things first. How does all of this look like for you? Feedback is very much appreciated and loved thank you!

@kieranperez Hey Shinzen had a theme which focused on this subject. Last weekend the theme was called "The Black Hole of Primordial Unfulfillment" or smth. similar. Via the home practice programme or online retreat. During the 4 hour segment of this theme, he talked about, how yes all of this is normal and he quoted some Spanish poem .. in Spanish. During the meditation exercise, we sat down and felt into this feeling noting it and feeling it's intensity in pain and it's size and giving it levels of intensity 3 , 2 , 1 - strong, mediocre, mild. I can send you the recordings from that retreat. I also have the same experience at the same spot with anger or an intense burst of emotions. For me, it tends to dissipate/disperse into a flow, so I feel in and then the feel in immediately goes into feel flow which dissipates or disperses through parts of my body/torso mostly. After that, I feel a sense of equanimity for as long as that flow traverses through my body. Also, this pain stems from below my sternum. If I recall correctly, you are also into psychedelics. I had a trip during this years April or May where I felt very warm and happy, extremely strong and somehow felt an unstoppable resolve. After that trip I worked out a couple of days later and it felt like that spot in my body ( I was doing dips) was starting to burst open and I could not handle it very well. But it felt so good, but way to intense. At the same time for me, it currently feels like all of this stems from a deep-seated feeling of shame, hatred, resentment, anger mostly and frustration. Also during a different trip, I imagined I was a yogi testing his inner system ... and at one point I could not handle it anymore ( I was breathing into this spot constantly feeling it's pain) and I felt I am torturing my body because I was feeling into it heavily. Also, during the zen retreat in September there was a guy who was quite odd, I was the only one who talked to him besides the nun there and he was in my room. He had to leave the retreat because he was extremely angry and he could not stop to wheeze, he collapsed during meditation and they called the fire brigade who talk care of him.( I walked passed him as he was talking to the zen master we meditated outside) He was quite introverted like myself to a degree, I asked the others but they did this not very seriously and they were a little bit excited that something happened( He was more or less a regular guy he was a teacher of mathematics and physics for kids but who knows what he says was true ? I don't understand why people lie at retreats) . So, I am going to be careful with this, but I also talked with one guy there at the retreat he lived with a yogi in India, he told me that you can break through with a psychedelic and his heart seemed extremely open, similar to what I see ... with Leo especially if I compare older videos. That is insane, but at the same time quite inspiring. So, potentially yoga can be more effective in dealing with this. Yet, obviously meditation helps IMO.

For those who like spiral dynamics and integral theory / Ken Wilber. Here is a youtube channel with unique footage the videos have 1 view..lol and the channel is very very new. So...enjoy! P.S it's not me. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgIOJD2wuX-4B4EDpy64o1Q/videos

@Leo Gura Lol, it suprises me every time. I will see . Thanks for the reply. Sounds scary...

Hey, so, while searching and browsing a bit through the forum I did not find a post related to a zen retreat. Before writing this post I was not sure if it would be beneficial or interesting for other people to view this. Yet, I tend to write (post) mostly because I enjoy writing and feedback, also it is a healthy way for me to express myself. So, this is going to be story based since I can recollect most of the things what I wanted to express in an arbitiary manner. So , a word of caution for being unsystematic / not orderly. This year I did my first real retreat in flesh and blood for two weeks at a soto zen tempel in France. I did a couple of online retreats now with the home pratice programm from Shinzen Young and was quite excited to see a zen master for the first time in real life. To compare their teachings and see their similarities since I am now following Shinzens "teaching" now actively for 1 year instead of testing technique over technique, which I still do to a degree. When I arrived at the monastery I was like so often to late. Thus, missing the introduction and the welcome dinner (literally it was in the evening..). Consequentially, I did not do much that day and went to bed walking around the tempel a bit and unpacking my luggage, taking care of small necessities, things I forgot and making sure I have them. The following day we had Zazen so I will describe the life at the zen tempel first, for the total of the two weeks to present an overview: First week: 2 times zazen 1,30h each session including walking meditation (kinhin) for 20 min. Second week for approx 3 days. : 3 times zazen same procedure Second week the last approx. 4 days: 4 times zazen same procedure Each day was structured as follows: -> Waking up at 6 am -> Zazen following chanting of some prayers -> breakfast in silence + small break (Genmai japanese rice soup, each morning which was tasty) -> Samu (community work / joint work in case that makes more sense) -> Lunch -> Samu -> Dinner -> Lunch -> bed rest / bed time In total the retreat was not that meditation intensive, yet you are supposed to pratice while doing samu which a few people tried, yet there was still an air of meditativeness around since the monks there worked too and had to check if people do their work correctly. What suprised me the most was that the whole monastary was autonomous, they planted their own food, vegetables and herbs. So, the work around the monastery included mostly working outside in the area of the monastary. Cleaning, gatherhing herbs, or manure taking care of weeds and the service - preparing food, tea, knitting and gathering fruits for deserts. That was kinda cool for me to see what an autonomous structure would look like or self-sustaining. That is it about the structure or how people live in a zen monastery here in Europe day in day out besides events. Now, the people there were mostly beginners at the first week this was an introduction to life in a monastary. At the end of the retreat are moving closer to the end of the retreat, more experienced people came. What was interesting for me was eating in silence, I tend to dislike talking about food analyzing it, to pass a comment about it's taste or how I am feeling. Which is all nice and such, yet I tend to prefer to eat in silence, to enjoy food and use that as an time to be present or pratice a meditation technique at least... breakfast. So, we all had to bring a bowl with us and if not they will give you one, when we sit down to eat, we will unpack the bowl the the cutlery and chant / sing a prayer / song name it as you want it and sit down and eat, sitting on a zafu or some padded thing on the floor and at a thin and long wodden table which streches itself almost through the entire room. Like an H the tables were placed with the - part of the H on top of the H. Dunno, I'll stop. So, we had to unpack everything and sit down and while you eat they come by and serve the food, water, tea and you have to clean your bowl after you eat at the table with a large bucket and throw the water that they have brought to you and you have cleaned your bowl with into this big bucket and pass it on to the next living being next to you. After that is done you are finished. Still eating in silence was so odd with so many people, trying not to make noise with your spoon, seeing how greedy people are with their food or critically pecking around in their bowl not focusing on their pratice while they where eating or simply going on with it as if they were bored and needed to be entertained / wanted to do smth. Still, many people where just focused on not making any nosies and thinking about other people if they want food, since we were not allowed to talk. The unpacking of the bowl annoyed me the most since my tissue was always dirty and I never know if I could have a new one which you could have and I did exchange the dirty tissue near the end of the retreat. Which was another "theme" for me and others.. at the retreat what are the rules ? What are we allowed to do ? And is all of this religious or not ? Well, most people there where beginners like myself which annoys me a lot, but they never meditated and were most likely searching for a way to deal with mundane stress. So, I did not talk to many of the people there because I did not see a good opportunity to exchange experiences and if that is not possible I rather talk to peers or did nothing, which I did most of the time during breaks, sitting on the bench, applying meditation techniques see, hear feel, and enjoying the silence or the presence of people there without being involved or retreating from them and applying the techniques while being vigilant. The participents of the retreat were mostly from Europe, there was one guy from the U.S and most of the people there where either French or German. There was one girl from sweden and one from britian. Which evoked the next question or problem what Leo also talks about and is simply a theme in "consciousness work.." the problem of language. Who speaks which language ? What assumptions do I have about this person ? Why does language create duality ? How can I accurately assess my perception of the enviroment / people / situations using language or being the recipient of some form of communication ? This is also one thing the teacher talked about and which I remembered talking creates duality. And now I really dislike talking because people and myself included tend to want to see the things only in their viewpoint and I tend to seek first to understand then to be understood. You get the point. So, it is frustraiting to see all of this duality / politics going on even at a zen temple which Leo also mentioned and if I remember correctly he also said in one video that people at a zen temple are quiet unconscious and I imagined people to be way way way more conscious there. It was different, yet the people who visited the tempel were mostly beginners so there where not many high consciousness people their. Besides the nuns and monks which some of them even if they were enlightend seemed to be quite unconscious but, I can't assess that since I am not enlightend. The master there was a real tourquise zen master which I loved the way he talked was very zen, also very soto zen, slow and epic even when it was in french it had the quality of a real zen master no doubt. His voice made you feel equanimous and when I once looked at him to check spiral dynamic stages to see if he was doing smth. similar he seemed to maintain contact with his eyes while he was talking and I looked around the room to see if anyone else seems to experience reality in that manner, things I asked myself during lsd trips.. and it seemed like I hit stage turquoise or what ever that may mean I just experienced an non-dual perception for sometime with thoughts going on but reality looked different and I was affirmed more or less by a zen master. What was also quite cool for me all of the more serious participents who came from a dojo studied something tech related. Which was motivating for me to continue both studying and meditating / pursuit of enlightenment. I talked to one from this dojo he was a teacher ( history and french) and he meditated for 25 years, it still amazed me how much he held on to his status on all of this status games, male chimps or w/e play. At one point he wanted to out argue or take on the leadership role when the zen master was talking and he caused chaos because he did not respect him in that moment, but he could have helped. The zen master leaned against the wall and made himself smaller since he was quite tall 1,90m approx. which made the history teacher feel uncomfortable. Still, he was a man with a heart let's say. It amazes me how people think monks are stupid or not smart or if that is a believe people in general have or the monks have about themselves partily. It is very difficult for me to see a monk as a dumb person. During the meditation sessions we did zazen which is just sitting or do nothing or shikantaza the method without a method. It was quite odd to meditate for a minimum of 3 hours a day for two weeks, after I tripped on LSD at least 3-5 times before and to incoperate some "insights", "perceptions", hunches, intuitions or ideas about reality and to check if they are phony or if I can really trust me awarness. This is fundamentally the only thing I currently know and experience I can trust 100%, yet it is so difficult. As an example I had to work with a nun quite often which is similar to my mom from her personality, so I kind of knew what to say and what not to do / to do in order to not cause any trouble and also help her. When we sat a the dojo she was looking for a word and I knew it annoys her so much that she wanted to know, because she was extremely curious for someone her age imo. I wanted to tell her and she looked at me with an expression that everything is fine, I had to almost cry that I can trust something so simply and that I constantly test my own awarness. The zen master also talked about different types of consciousness and that basically that they are 8 types of consciousness and various traditions and such, yet he was talking about 8 and reduced it to 5, because ultimately and that is the sense I have you still did nothing, you just sat and when a zen master can take you into an non-dual state or deepen your pratice, any teaching is unnessecsary to a degree. Still, guidance helps yes imo. Back to the 5 types of consciousness he talked about the senses , sight, sound , touch, smell, emotions. To be aware of them an still you just sat time went by and sometimes at the end of a zazen I had this magical child like feeling again, that everything is mystical and life is fundamentally awe-inspiring and mysterious in a positive, curious sense. The same feelings I had while living in China which makes me love anything related to asia even more ! Espeically, japan and china. I was especially curious to see how a zen master acts in accordance with his surroundings after I tripped on 1P-LSD and everything seemed to react to me I sat down at 4 am and meditated till 6, it was pointless to use any technique (see,hear,feel / mindfulness which I usually do) because awarness overtook my state of perceiving. I was sitting in my chair where I usually meditate and started the app insight timer and listend to some meditative music which altered the experience dramatically, I felt first that I can actually sit, without a technique and be aware of my surroundings, my state of consciousness, my body and at one point I could not tell anymore if I listend to the meditation music or was lost in thought, which still occured. I started hearing the birds chirping and somehow this triggered in me the question, What is nature ? What is intelligence ? Is nature intelligent ? Why can't I let go of intelligence ? What is a system? Is an organism a system ? What would happen if everyone in the world would be a systems thinker / stage yellow (sort of asked that ) and I kept asking these questions till I received feedback. And I don't know why but during this whole tripp I regared myself as an engineer and I kept asking what could be done to make this a system sort of asked that and regarded everything as parts which make up a whole. So, while I sat down I was drawn deeper and deeper into these inquiries wanting to have an answer and I was drawn deeper and deeper and it felt like I received answer I considered myself as a system which lives in congruency with other systems which included nature and nature aka the birds chirping in the backyard gave me feedback since they themselves ( " apparently according to Eckart Tolle and such) are enlightend or closer to enlightenment / true nature. It was insane it felt they gave an answer, that I am a system, they are a system, and I felt bad that most people do not care or have the capacity to care about something so simple like a little bird. After I was taken deeper I thought about race and what could be the insight of every race and then to dive deep into that thought, at the end I felt like I am an indian yogi who was so blissed out that doing nothing and abiding in that feeling of bliss is that best thing to do. Since, humanity is in one way or another doomed. Also, a bunch of other stuff I felt like i was almost transported to a different planet, my sense of self completely vanishing almost. Also, I was so angry at one point that I could not properly meditate because of some personal stuff. That I felt so pathetic in a good sense, that I never respected, nature, meditation or the power of consciousness or awarness but mostly the meditative pratice. That I grew so much and matured in terms of what is respectable during this process. It was and still is nuts, I am still feel like shit because I am not practicing as rigorious as I did. Skipping now almost two months maybe just one this year. While never missing a day besides 3 during two years. The feeling of this whole experince was Yugen if I may be so free as to use this from Leos blog or not.. I am still pissed that I can't sit in a lotus postion and still amazed that I can't admire the posture of zen masters in order to be ONLY inspired. So, after this experience I was quite interested to how a zen master reacts to sounds if people really get direct messages from consciousness and how can you distinguish that from thought, even though I felt like he acted upon the enviroment extremely conscious and also mentioned the sounds in the background which the animals made. I am still wondering how one can be one with nature. And that this is stage turquiose and he seemed like he is . This is the best and shortest video I could find from the master, I talked to shinzen young last year with the life pratice programm and he checked the website and the masters, I also did another retreat talking to him this year and he asked me about the name of the master and the name deshimaru which is the teacher of the guy in the video above. Rang a bell. So, this is shinzen approved for those interested lol. I don't speak french and this is also something which was quite interesting to observe since it is so hard to guess someones stage in spiral dynamics even when you interact with them coming back to the problem of language. I confused someone for stage blue because his english was not good, yet at the end we talked a bit because I talked to a french girl and I could see that they interacted on a green level. Also, many people there where at least green which was awesome. I still don't know what I have learned or what my 1P-LSD experiences amount to besides that it is fun and frightening sometimes. Yet, somehow it comes back when I do retreats that is what I notice with psychedelics. I am still a beginner and confused about the pratice, espcially now since I asked one teacher what technique should I pratice and I receive the answer just one. And the other one says as long as you develop equanimity, concentration power and sensory clarity everything is fine. The latter seems to be true at the moment, yet I question if praticing one technique hardcore will get you faster to enlightenment that is what Ken Wilber did with Soto Zen and after that he did some tibitean meditation. W/e. So, this is it I feel like my pratice or my enlightenment journey is just beginning and quiet a big task, since I finished the LP-Course and working on implementing that, even though both will not be easily done. Also, which annoys me is that this guy talked about genetic memory not conditioning or such but genetic memory. I downloaded the audiobook from rupert sheldrake about morphic resonance or smth.(only listened in) like that and now there is actuallly some shit in my body which teaches me ? TF IS THAT ?! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_memory_(psychology) There is a lot more but, this is enough for one post.

Hello everyone, I was wondering whether or not cannabis or hemp is beneficial to raise consciousness ? Or to be more specific is cannabis lowering consciousness and or is it raising consciousness and yes, I have no idea what consciousness actually is. So, I am going to describe how I felt while smoking cannabis/weed to describe my current notion of consciousness and then would ask you guys and girls what do you think about cannabis and it's effect on consciousness ? Is it lowering consciousness or increasing it ? For instance a lot of people who smoke cannabis are considered hippies or are some sort of activists mostly enviromental and for animals. Otherwise a lot of people just do it for the "buzz" go out party, drink and smoke weed. The latter one of the two is more apparent. So, considering stages of development especially morally, the former one of the two is quite highly developed or rather has enough awarness to care about enviromental problems and the mistreatment of animals, human rights or in general has interested to partake in other activities that help people/society. Most people don't care as you can see in daily life they throw garbadge on the floor and bascially are littering planet earth ( just wanted to use the word ). Back to the original question and my experience with weed/cannabis. I used to go out and party and smoke weed or just relax at home and smoke weed with friends play video games etc. So, basically these are low consciousness activities as long as you are not hyper aware / enlightent or whatever these activities are not really benificial in raising consciousness. Yet, I loved it when I smoked alone and just listened to music it felt like my mind expanded and apparently weed can enhance sensory perception (brighter colors, you enjoy music more and other things I don't know often times I just felt very inside my head) so, it was pleasent to listen to music and see how thoughts expand. Thinking about live, god and often times philosophizing about things that happend in daily life. During that time I was 18 - 20. It kinda helped me wake up in the sense that it also fked me up ( party, wrong people etc.) after I stopped smoking weed I noticed that there have been a lot of signs for "spiritual awakening". A lot of music contained snippets from talks from Allan Watts and I steadly saw really every morning I went to school during this time, a graffiti saying "Wake up this isn't real". So, as hard as it pushed me down in terms of consciousness it also helped me to actually be on that path that spirituality even exists. Or whatever concepit I have woven around that. Still, I think meditating and smoking cannabis not as often as I did would have been more benifical. Especially the amount of partying I did or just playing video games while smoking weed was unnecessary in retrospect and in my opinion. So, does cannabis actually increase awarness / consciousness or is it simply lowering it ? What do you think ? In genreal does it lower or increase awarness / consciousness ? ( Hope, a thread like this has not been opened to often.. )

Hello, I wanted to ask what are some general ways to avoid depression ? I am doing the following currently to not fall into the void of self-torture: -> Journaling -> Taking a cold shower each morning wish helps to reduce depressive symptoms -> Sports 2-3 times a week ( running mostly) -> I went vegeterian and I lived vegan for 6 months I do not know how benefical is that, yet a friend told me to eat bananas and I generally eat a lot of rice and vegetables or noodles and pesto. Fruits and oat meal with dry fruits. Eggs and cheese. I take b12 supplements for fatigue issues which works. -> I am meditating with two different techniques. A loving-kindness version of mindfulness and the another mindfulness pratice which helps a lot, in addition to sports. -> Gratitude exercise 1-2 times a week Still, I find it difficult to reconcile the paradox of meeting people and having friends and to not get depressed often times I feel like shit after I have interacted with people or if I am subject to a smaller group of people. In larger groups it somehow is fine, yet I still long for having social contacts. Yet, at the sametime it depresses me to steadily consume or the need to go out and party in order to have friends. So, I am quite introverted and I can stay alone for a long time, yet my friends just play video games and talk about the same shit do not have goals and somehow drift through life without living the 9 to 5 grind and, basically living like their parents which I hated since I was a teen I hated the way my family lived taking zero risks and always being unneccesarily skeptic, not being curious undermining my curiosity, having zero interest besides sports and always talking about people or do nothing. While at the sam time allowing me to go out and enjoy "western" culture partying and drinking alcohol. Never even contemplating a different life style. We live to work 9 to 5 to take some vacation have some fun with friends than suddenly the relationship falls apart someone dies fights are not reconciled / mediated and failures are accepted as inevitable or risks are not even taken. I can't stand it I'd rather fail and learn or do some calculated risk, but still this mindset is "mediocrely" strong. I love the concepts of personal development and I mostly suck at taking action, since this is something I avoided, since it implied emotional upheaveals and I could not deal with them appropriately before meditating and journaling. I feel like I am a product of nothing since my parents were not really there for me and I spent the most of my time alone or with my grandma and she was just a whole nother category to deal with, she is just an egotistical, complacent, arrogant, nasty, toxic, old women which has 0 capacity to experience empathy or step into other peopls shoes. Conditioned from head to toe. Unnessecary and manipulative. We live in the same house and appropriately we interacted like 10 - 5 min a day always about the same things, so I wanted to get away from her, her arbitrariness or despotism was just to much to handle for me and she did not respect any boundaries. I am often reminded about things in the past which make me feel like I am an unworthy being. My family is only of "material" help so, they can provide me with the neccesary support that way, yet emotionally I feel extremely distant. I want to work on my live purpose, yet I find it difficult to not get sucked back in to depressive episodes and I do not have a support structure that can help me. Even, when I chip away at both of these things day by day. It is almost impossible for me to no be confronted about my past, otherwise it would be easier for me to not fall into depressive states or phases. That's why isolation helps me tremendously and small interactions with people often times are enough or interacting with people on the internet to work through some of these things with shadow work. What are some good ways to work through these things ? I have postponed a lot of "critical" life choices and I already regret a few. I have a purpose even if it is not that strong and I contemplated about having a vision basically since I am 18-17. I am now 24. Especially, during the last three years where I traveled and saw different cultures and people my vision that I always had in mind was extremely vivd and motivating. Now, many things seem meaningless not in the sense that they can fulfill me or provide a healthy outlet/way of doing things / being. Yet, regardless which value, idea or vision I come up with contemplate and insert personal meaning into. At the end it comes back to a neutral sense of "meh" and realizing more that a simple life would provide me with more fulfillment, yet at the sametime I hold on dear to my ambitions, yet struggle to execute them and that makes me feel like a failure. I want to work at my purpose now and study more and stop not going to university since I feel discriminated and like an outcast. Even, if that implies being at home not attending uni and studying for myself. Yet, somehow any content or concept is meaningless since you are inserting value into it and it is a mental construct which can fall apart or you learn to sustain it.. or transcend at best.. The region here is quite ethnocentric/blue and my resentment for people sometimes rasises to a preposterous level.. I can deal with it in a creative way, making fun of the situation or writing, yet I can't deal with the subtleties. I talked to a psychcologist (two differents ones) and I have an appointment scheduled in december this year. Yet, their opinions vary so much that I can't accurately assess their competence. One says oh you need help immediately and take some substances the other one said that I do not need help and we can schedule an appointment but in a different city. So, I am unsure what I can do in the meantime to not fall into this depressive mode again. I sometimes get phases of sucidial thoughts for a couple of weeks and need to escape into some activity to not think about it, I do not know how normal that is one of my friends says oh that is normal, but the rest of them don't. I do not like people or humans since I feel like I am being steadily attacked or not seen and heared. I never felt so much like an outcast and accepted it so much at the sametime. I do not fit into this world, even if I can be a "good" node in a network and provide value to other peoples life in some way. I know my biggest enemy is me and has always been, yet I desperately need a support structure, which my family can't provide to 0,0000000000000000000% I tried billions of times, but it is not possible for these people to relate to me. I like the idea of family, yet resent it's ethnocentric egotistical version of it strongly, I integrated parts of it with shadow work. My friends are mostly rational people they can listen but their heart is in their minds, the people who are very emotionally that I meet can't deal with my struggles and mostly are to distant. So, we could only call etc or they are effected to much, but at one point I can't just keep things to myself. So, I'll talk.. bluntly, people tend to not like that, yet otherwise they act out the same ways in which they act in which ways I feel like shit. What are some activities that I can do that prevent longer times of depression or feeling like shit about myself ? I would like to join a group where I can do sports, yet this small town is shit and the university is on top of a hill and the activities they offer for sport are not good once a week soccer and the gym, some yoga, and that's it ? So, I can not meet people twice a week to build solid friendships, I am considering joining the students " general students commitiee. I do not know if changing the university would be worth it and I do not own a car, so I can't drive to a sports club nearby and to a degree I am tempted to not buy one since it simply pollutes the enviroment and costs a shit ton of money. Buses only come hourly. So, options are limited. What are some good ways to avoid depression ? Vitamins, foods, activities, exercises mentally or emotionally ? I want to work on my purpose now to not be the person that I never wanted to be. I am making progress, depression is something relatively new for me.

Meditation / Mindfulness meditation -> helps to build a daily structure, mental clarity, equanimity, perspective about ones goals and values, introspection, concentration, will power, changing habits or building new ones , helps with sports for instance noticing self-defeating thoughts or counting ones steps while jogging, other small things for instance not forgetting where I placed an object in my room, feeling better about studying and recognizing self-defeating thoughts, also my mental health is better way better Journaling -> goal setting, planning, mental health, happiness, self-expression, writing abillity / skill, increases vocabulary, jotting down what one has learned through out the day or from books improves retention , good for some personal development excercises Shadow work -> incoperating disowned elements of myself, being too needy, too angry, too lethargic, arrogant, manipulative, negative, not arrogant / confident enough, self-doubt, courage etc. expressing them in a healthy way and not feeling guilty about it or unconscious about these aspects of my personality Solo travels -> courage, growing out of my comfort zone, exploring, expanding my horizion, exploring different cultures and perspectives , meeting different people and learning from them / making friends, dealing with uncertainty and chaos, managing my own budget, dealing with people from different cultures and working with them. Looking forward to retreats and yoga and fking reading more books.

He seems to be quite green

@Elisabeth I have a similar feeling at the same spot, I will try to desrcibe and relate. It feels for me like there is a deep void a hole that has never been filled up or nurtured, a hot knife stabbed into the middle of my chest / chest-bone / solar plexus. An emptiness that feels like an endless vortex that fulfills one with the beauty of melancholy or the evanescence of existence, as I see the beauty of this world pass by.. music, nature, cities, landscapes, parks, flowers, trees, beaches , the ocean all of this seems to fill up this void or mitigate it's pain or I am drowning in it's never ending circle of agony and misery. I will not get into the details when I started noticing it, yet I can relate quite well. Since, I am strugeling with a phase wise / wave wise incoming phase of depression from time to time. Also, it feels like nerves in my body are sometimes twitching at this spot like they re-aling themselves. Since, I am meditating this inner dilemma started to ease itself out and I feel more confident in my abilites and skills that I have acquired and I am not that scared of using them or feel the pressure of anxiety, self-doubt and self-hatred or social pressure. I tend be a "dreamer" so, I have high ambitions, but zero support emotionally not materially. So, I started doing everything myself as a kid and feel into the trap of immediate gratification and failed in the terms as what society denotes as failure. I tried nofap for a time and it felt it quite invigorating, more focus, more confidence, less plessure seeking and also being able to maintain / sustain habits and routines. Also, everytime I do shadow work it feels like bits and piece of that spot started to integrate itself into this spot. I asked one of my best friends that knows me since my birth he is extremely open-minded and quite the contrarian. He described it exactly as either of us has described, also that he feels unfulfilled at a different spot in his body in the context of talking about depression and how to deal with it. This seems reasonable for the other questions. https://www.epainassist.com/abdominal-pain/stomach/what-causes-pain-in-solar-plexus-area the picture that they use may not be at the exact spot, for me it is a tiny bit below my chest-bone. This a bit more spirtual / esoteric but with more focus on depression. http://chipur.com/solar-plexus-true-center-emotions-relief/ Same here it feels like I am unstopable in the sense of ultra confidence or self-esteem and not in the sense of being a despot. I feel great have fun see the world more brigthly, I feel energized, hyper productive and laser focused and quick-witted and mentally alert. Like I took to much sugar and can't contain this massive amount of excitement and energy. I don't know if there is a cure , I would love that this void would be filed up and I can be energetic and hyper productive most of the time. Balance is key most likely and mindfulness meditation has helped me a lot. I am doing the unified mindfulness technique or see / hear / feel / in and out and what not technique from Shinzen Young. I am interested in chakras and yoga, yet I want to work on some other things for now. I want to start a yoga practice and deeper shadow work in the future when I feel more stable in terms of my "academic" future and when I am more on track with my life purpose.

@S33K3R I appreciate the advice. I can understand what you mean that I watch my thoughts and the content of my thoughts. For me it is more of an emotional component that I am unable to reconcile. I am also doing a mindfulness pratice it helps a lot both with thoughts and emotions. For me thoughts that put me down are. Why do people treat me this way ? Or why are people so toxic and do not work on themselves, or sublte discrimination, why is the world so fucked , why does nobody care ? Why do I care etc. It helps a lot to dissociate my self from these thoughts with a mindfulness pratice.

@John Lula @Just Do Nothing This is interesting. Thanks! I appreciate it. I am going to my first retreat this year in a zen monastery looking forward !

@Just Do Nothing I know what you mean it is just that the depression or sadness is so strong I can't bear it sometimes and I am praticing mindfulness for about 3 years now. I know cognitively and experientially that accepting what ever arises now is the best process to digest these feelings, regardless if it is happiness or sadness, anger, fear, worry, hatred, joy etc. I've read the book "The Art of Happiness" a couple of years ago when I started self-actualizing since buddhism interested me and was fasciniting for me as a teen. I do not remember the content I bought a couple of books on happiness from Leo's book list and read them all, I have a scientific / socital perspective on how to achieve external happiness, which still contributes to happiness and also the "socital" internal part about happiness which connects with spirituallity. I hate chasing highs and lows or not hate it is something that never fullfilled me and left me empty, so I am not chasing something like that at all. I have subtle addictions like the internet, music and the internet and music... I stopped gaming and watching tv and I stopped using social media since I was 16 because we read an article about how people steadily compare themselves when they use social media and that it is bad for one's health in english class. I use it sparsly FB, WhatsApp and I do not know what else counts as social media. I browse this forum from time to time ( spiral dynamics is very intriguing that is why I am here now often) and I use youtube and browse Quora that is about it. I would really like to change my nutrition, to see if that is the cause for depression or if it is really.. something which I can't do anything about because of chemical imbalances or some other thing. I can't really deal with pressure in uni because I feel like I belong to nowhere and I am steadily project to sterotypes and subtle forms of discrimination which drive me sucidal, people ascribe all kinds of ideas on to me that I began to question my identity since I was little any association with ones skin color or ethnic background is just stupid but hard to get rid off, especially when you do not pratice mindfulness or are NOT ! subject to any kind of discrimination, I do not like any kind of group associatve thinking and when you are mixed people try to claim you for both sides, so you move into a worldcentric perspective quite quickly, since you see the stupidity of associating yourself with your nationality and how much pain and struggle it causes to associate oneself with one nationallity or two it is simply a concept with content... , race is the same. I can't stand being and working in groups over 4 or 5 people they have so many unconscious assumptions and of course I could be the one who has them I am pondering this so often, yet people do not notice it when they go unconscious IT IS THE UNCONSCIOUS ! Mindfulness made me aware of a lot of bullshit that is inside of me and if I compulsively think about these things it is highly likely that other people think similar and I am even praticing mindfulness and 99.9% of the people are not, it is rare to meet someone who treats me with prejudice" and yes obviously there are people who are more aware and did not pratice mindfulness. I am so aware of facial gestures and gestures it drives me nuts how much people display what they are thinking simply by doing small things and that these patterns repeat themselves with people who are holding similar beliefs let's say racist or prejudice about people. It is ridiculous. I talked to a zen master once and he gave me the advice to build a structure that is what I want to do, yet I have difficulties building one, since my enviroment is not in favour of me enabling me to take care of my emotional needs of just being with some people and in general people here are just either way people from rural areas or stereotypical "foreigners". Sure, there are some who are ok, but somehow I feel I belong nowhere I can connect I see the way they think or act, but I never experienced it like them since people treat me differently. I am either treated as an individual which is fine or as someone who belongs to a group / ethnicity and these two notions mix themselves up. The people I can relate the most to are people who traveled or are mixed and saw some other cultures or who are extremely open-minded. They mostly treat my human ( green people ) , yet, potentially yellow people I meet are the most pleasant to deal with the amount of non-judgementalness is still insane. When green feels threatend they tend to attack you personally even if they know the things that they are thinking are subjective and also due to conditioning. There are so many thoughts about my past that I do not know what to do with them besides socializing and forgetting myself and feeling not that good afterwards or praticing mindfulness, journaling or calling a friend, lying in bed listening to eckhart tolle to the 1000end times. I have a good idea what spirituallity is about and listened to a lot of talks and audiobooks from jiddu krishnamurti, allan watts, shinzen young, "ken wilber", and a couple of others that I highly want to focus more on practice, reading won't help as long as I do not pratice, yet I have difficulties putting things into action, since I am plagued by depression and thoughts about the past the habit part is making progress. It is difficult for me to constantly accept thoughts let go or label the typ of sensory experience and let it be. Of course I can do it but not 24/h a day. My whole upbrining is a disaster ( from a mental level and I feel emotionally neglected and disjointed from most people) from my perspective it does not make sense to blame other people but , I can even say it does make sense since it releases some anti-stress hormone. But, that is like smoking a cigarette a short buzz and you feel good. I do drop in mindfulness into the day but it is not that structured at the moment I can do it now with household activities constantly, at least the practice not any state. I just would love to transcend and be that feeling of transcendence even when I imagine it is priceless, yet I also want to live in this world and therefore I am set out to suffer. But, right now I want to build that foundation /structure / system ! I would love to receive some exercise that one can do to relieve / prevent depression or some tips on nutrition, I am also ready to try anti-depressents, yet I can't tell it is so odd, I prefer not to and I am scared that during the time the anti-depresent first starts to work, in these initial phases (4-6 weeks), that I will not be able to handle uni and loose a semester. I am not really willing to do that since I wasted time already I'd rather try something alternative then to rely on some cruch. But, I am willing to do it if that does not work.

This is also good:

Weird german alternative hip-hop the imagery explains everything (Green / Yellow~ish)

@DeannaDevil I can elaborate a bit on that. For instance at orange most people regard themselves as individuals and many people including myself would rather regard themselves as individuals regardless of their background. Instead of being associated to a group and be downtrodden by sterotypes. Etc. a lot of orange/green type humour is about culture, ethnicity and their peculiarities imo. What I perceive you most likely fear is that when you become green that all you do is care for people and entrench yourself in ideologies that activists preach in order to build a better society, more wellbeing or free the animals, protest against oppressive goverments or movements etc and in order to be green you have to be like those people. That sounds like a healthy green, sounds more like you would embody your ideal of how things should be in the world and your life, instead of falling prey to group think, ideological people. I would recommend that if you know people who are ideological , yet good hearted and green. That you spend some time with them and see all of their faulty beliefs and how much pride and ego / narcism they develop through feeling better since their values or worldview is superior to others and that they do not acknowledge that, but let you subtely know that they are better. At the same time you can see how compassionate people are who create these ideologies and that they really care about other people, animals, plants etc and their reasoning behind why their ideologies / ideals are so important to them and you can contemplate that viewpoint and be detachted from the ideals themselves and see what you want to install or not This is basically where I am at to a degree since I resent competition it triggers me sometimes badly that I just get very angry to not live up to my ideals / standards that I just rather work together with people in friendly communality or revert back to a more aggresive form of myself or work alone completely ( that is what I do most of the time) . I still get shit done and I am working on my productivity. Yet, this is mostly "orange" work and needs orange tactics or some larger system which integrates this slowly somehow imo. To give a better example the best guy in our major is quite green and he is by far the most productive and efficient person since he is social and takes care of his needs and also receives a lot of help from green people with whom he built a connection with and people at green love ! to help. Or they are extremely fine with it. Orange tends to weigh pros and cons, green does to , but is more relative about it. As long as there is time for themselves they can sacrifice the time that they have and spend it on a friend who needs his/her help as long as there is a good bond between the two of you. Also, the bond does not need to depend on the person being in the closest of circles like a blue friendship would be like, it is more of a apprecation of the connection of the two of you made and the persona that you wear/have. Another example is one of my best friends he is the "artist" type, went to the U.S (Las Vegas) to pursue his career in stand-up comedy and acting he also plays in a band, yet even if he is smart his best friend has a masters in economics (his best friends gf has a master in electrical engineering and they are both green left people) to give some credit. He never finished his education and had trouble finding a regular job, deadbeat sounds a bit rough lol. But, you could call him that to a degree he is very idealistic some might say megalomaniac, a bit like Russell Brand but not that successful lol. So, even though he is green he is not successful but extremely creative without taking any substances at all, besides alcohol and even that rarely. He has a regular job and always seems to find something which potentially makes him fulfill his dreams/ambitions on a monetary basis. Green feels like the most creative stage for me. You can let loose and show vulnerability in many aspects or facets of your life like speaking or holding a presentation, writing, interaction between people becomes extremely playful and status and recognizing the other persons intelligence or any sort of "political/socital game" like that is secondary. It feels more emotionally expressive and creative you can sing, dance and laugh with people and forget your persona or not feel threatend around green people that they will hurt your ego or that you neccesary have to please them since you are out for fun and you have to provide them with knowledge, interesting facts, news about your accomplishments. You will also feel if you are a more sensitive type depressed by the events that are occuring all over the world, terrorism, donald trump, refugess, enviromental destruciton or catastrophes, politics in general and see it more clearly for what it is and why progress is important, your capabillities in self-expression will rise tremendously in that way creativity increases enormously, also the ability to self-actualize (Abraham Maslows hierachy of needs) becomes stronger many green people I know like to draw, play an instrument or have played or learn languages and travel to expierence different cultures and not to increase their skills or earn some money, gain knowledge, so the drive to do things for itself increases and the satisfaction that comes from doing it. Sometimes green can be extremely nasty and depict you as the shittiest human being you can be since at green I feel like you can truly see a persons personality even if they hide it behind a mask, a lot of it oozes out. It is amazing that you can just be with a person and share your lives and enjoy a good time / plan activities that does not focus soley on the activity or your agenda of having fun. The agenda moves more to convincing the other person to finally (f-ing) realize that both of you have are going to have a great time, since there is an activity which you both enjoy and the bond of your friendship / relationships is in the foreground and not the agenda of pleasuring the other person or to be pleasured be the other person. It does not sound like you are demonizing these stage, but are considering the repercussions of how it will play out for you on a individual level when you move towards this stage. I hope this moves things into perspective. One thing green can do when it is ideological is to team up with red people I do not know why and it can be scary. Stay away from them or learn and observe lol.

@Zweistein I like the picture it would be nice if people could have the same equality of outcome and equality of chance. Yet, this can only be an ideal imo. I would love to see a goverment which builds the neccesary structure to increase peoples overall capabillities and also educating the new generation for instance about parenting, so they can provide the best outcome for children and how to optimally raise their childrens talents and predispostions. Yet, I do not think that it is possible to the degree people would love to want it. I like this from Alan Watts without Chaos their would not be order, without inequality we would not know what equality is, same goes for justice, but we could provide a structure which strives to combine both, so maybe at one point these concept's would stop existing since they have been integrated to such a degree, that there is not a polarizing force anymore. I don't know why there are only boys on the picture, I think marketing or pictures / memes nowadays are quite egalitarian. imo

Thanks you can also thank my friend. She brought that up. I never thought of it that it could be a privileg, it this is something I am contemplating currently the concept of privileg. (since 2 days or so). I know what you mean with woman getting shunned for acting contrary to their socially imprinted role/behaviour. I also tend to sit sometimes like the crossed legged position women tend to do. https://www.quora.com/What-are-your-thoughts-on-men-sitting-with-their-legs-crossed I listened to some JP video where he talked about body language and that he uses it for comfort as far as I remember and that it is better to use this position sometimes since it makes you smaller ? It can be comfortable.. but not always lol. In China people also sat liked that so, that was the first time I noticed it, it did look kind of elegant, sometimes arrogant, but not always. I never saw it in the EU besides when I went to uni and my profs. start sitting like it so for me it is the "liberal intellectual" way of sitting approriately.