Neo

I'm sorry - this is all I have for you right now at this minute. My golden nuggets.

Could they be a trap?

Thank you but I would really like to focus on, can you use psychedelics to lead the way, and then not use them, or are you more likely to always either "rely on", or associate these states with Psychedelics?

Something like, looking back in hindsight, there is no you to do anything, nothing to do, however looking forward it seems we need to do, change affect something, and in between is the now moment.

Yes, I don't fail to admit, I don't understand anything, and am stuck in the paradigm. All I know is my whole life I've had a lot of traction, I walk into a room, and most people think "what have I come in here for" and instead, I think, "fuck! I exist!" and when I found Leo's videos about no-self the same sort of "traction" feelings occur so it kept me going on this path. Except, I understand eventually, I may have to admit, "fuck! I don't exist!" I have also had a couple of experiences where I gained complete clarity of the room during self enquiry, a fleeting glimpse.

Life is a Dream Video - Questions This is a hypothetical question, is it possible that meditation and psycodelics and Self Enquiry, make it possible / easier for a person to see the mechanism of the construct of reality in the brain and mistake this for the construct of reality? And further, seeing that the construct of reality in our brain is very flimsy and built on belief systems and sometimes just pure imagination, you then confuse the outer world for one which is merely as flimsy (unreal) as a dream? I apologise for these questions, as Jesus once said, I'm eating meat for weeks and I'm suddenly back on milk, but I have to go through these question I'm sorry.

Yes, this is the "going in" question... WTF if all this "phenomena" is the illusion and the mind is real. And is my "doubt" why I'm going to get a slap in the face?

It's still the thing thinking at this stage, and I know you will say I need to get through that. It took me a long time just to disassociate from thought.

Thank you for your comment and also the useful info about trips as I might need that info in a couple of weeks when they are grown. My actual question may be much more foundational. While I've seen the "brain" video and understand what it is saying, my question is a big doubt coming in; what if the processes of psycodelics and mediation are showing you not the truth of reality, but the truth of the brain and it's actually all wrong.

“Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it”

I haven't been on the forum in a long time. I find it really bad lol. I have a very addictive ego, and I can just get stuck in an awful cycle of posting and reading and clicking refresh and it's not conducive either to work or ironically, not conducive to progress! So... I want to post this to get it out there, and then get out of here, and if it helps anyone, so be it. Maybe I will click refresh later just to tickle my ego a bit!!! I have been doing a lot of contemplation several times a week for about two years now. But only ten minutes here and there. Instead I do a lot of analysing of thoughts, listening to thoughts and feelings, all day everyday, looking to see where they are coming from, constantly. I've also recently been trying not to act on egoic impulses, (this is a new thing I'm trying) but not by restraining them, but by embracing the ego, and listening, and understanding. I've also been practicing surrender, which, for me, is what it is all about. ( I think - who knows?) All this sounds like an awful lot of "doing" however, I am the guy with no time for meditation and I had, at least to begin with, a very cluttered mind. I have suffered my whole life with anxiety and addictive traits. Well I had a bit of a break-through yesterday. I was doing my work and the words started to float around on the screen and I realised straight away that this might be a good time for contemplation. (they have never done this before but as a contemplation practice I've been trying to get my whole field of view to become groundless.) So I sit back and look up and, I can't for the life of me, remember what I was thinking, but it's usually an exercise along the lines of, "am I an object, or am I an observer", or "am I awareness", and so on. And then the room, the field of view did become slightly groundless, and a feeling indescribable. My heart started pounding and I realise I am resisting massively from the stomach area. Like pushing out. And I reminded myself to surrender, as some of you have told me on this forum. In front of me is something indescribable, but I would say like an explosion of white, slowed down a billion billion times, coming towards me. Or like a growing Dandelion, picture below. Except is was an explosion, ... of pure joy. And then as my heart beat became the dominant thing, along with my own words, "surrender", "surrender", then it started to fade. I stood up because I am at work and picked up some things to do, still shaking. and started , trying that is, to work. But I stopped, as I looked around the room, everything looks slightly different and I became slightly tearful. And when my wife came in, I was unusually out in the garden doing something, and she said, "what is it? You look different?" Here is a picture for you:

Who is Margot Robbie?

Are you sure it's not to do with the group you hang with? I've never been interested in sports so it simply never comes up in conversation with my mates. If you like squirrels, talk about that with your mates. You may end up with the reputation for being eccentric and random, but you will also clearly be authentic and original which most people value dearly. And if people won't tolerate it, then they are really not worth it.

That's pretty cool man.

So the CBT approach is to label some thoughts as "automatic." Interesting. They're all automatic. I'm guessing the approach is staying on the cautious side of causing depersonalisation syndrome. If anything else has helped me from day 1 on this forum and Leo's site, it's been separation of thought and awareness. Even when understood on a conceptual level and as long as you keep meditating on this, it has caused me a massive shift from being deeply entrenched in thought and many many positive outcomes have followed. (and this is despite people saying that it is enlightenment itself which is the only goal or real benefit.)

This thread kinda exposes the problems with trying to study serious shit on a forum. Take for example this passage: Right so, half the posters on this thread are saying everything the member has gone though is perfectly normal, more a position of understanding one's predicament or perspective. Or further education is needed as per Leo's comment. Contrasted with errr, "you could have brain damage". "Trusted Source"? Nearly 100% of the members including Leo recommend "onions" as the source. I looked in there and can't find anything trusted. The whole point of it is you can't trace anyone. These hidden onion sites are possibly scams and not to be trusted, but now you say we could end up with "brain damage". The testing kits test for the presence of what you're hoping to find, not for deadly toxins or metals or anything else. OK, if all goes wrong, you were probably mental anyway. Well this kinda sucks because everywhere else we're told that most mental illness is actually the symptoms of the mind resolving itself, the dark night of the soul, etc. But now you say this, there is possibly some people who should avoid this shit altogether? It doesn't seem like a very solid kind of approach that doesn't differentiate between the two scenarios.

This confused me a little bit. Did you mean to say "subject", meaning "dependant"? I'm battling with object (in this universe) and observer. From my perspective you PureExp are an object just like an apple is. So where is the "you" that would make you an observer?

This practical information is very useful, however, while I'm not enlightened, you would not believe the amazing progress I made, and I am the world WORST meditator. Tired. Bored. Falls Asleep. Never enough time to do it. But I've felt all the chakras flowing their energy (and I didn't even believe in this or read about it) and I asked who am I for a good 20 minutes until completely nauseated, and then my words started coming out in some alien language. And then some other stuff like in contemplation where every thing in the room comes into focus at once. Stuff like this happens, and I tell you it's true that I must be the worst meditator currently on the planet.

Would you say it's like our thoughts are the musical notes on a sheet of music, and the space between the notes is you, but that space spreads out around the notes and off into infinity? Many people associate themselves with the notes instead of being the awareness of the song.

Is this a paradox or can anyone help explain? Everything I have learnt is pointing me to the fact that taking personal responsibility is everything. You create your own universe right now, you are responsible for it. I have found this to be empowering and moves me on to better things. If I am part of god, then that makes sense too. But then there is "no free will". There is no free will, so how could I have been responsible for anything?

I might just copy and paste that to the other thread where drugs are much better than meditation ... apparently. Quick! Infinity is running low!!!

Unfortunately the reasons you project on others as to why they don't consider drugs is just that, your own conclusions imposed on others.

So I got thinking, what is it that keeps me isolated from the "core" as per your post @Vanish and I could feel loads of traction in my solar plexus like my stomach was going to jump out!!

It's almost like the one's promoting drugs are.... "addicted"? No, kinda taken over by drugs. In a crazed kinda way.