SOUL

@Princess Arabia This is the internet, there's no use for sincere apologies, do you think we are emotionally mature and mentally healthy here? Pfft

@Princess Arabia touché and bravo.....but please, paragraphs.

Just straight to the point, if someone uses another person's ideas of success they won't measure up to it, and it's not just because what one seeks for in life is not what someone else does, which can be a powerful insight in itself. Genuine success is not something accomplished, it's a state of being. Of course, I just pointed out the part about using another person's ideas about success...so feel free to disregard mine.

No need to create any self suffering from it, it's really nothing to let it disturb our peace. Words are whatever. Just be.

Over the years, I've come to recognize that a word like enlightenment is rendered almost useless because it means so many different things to so many people that it has lost all meaning as a word. Sure, it has book meaning yet a unique translation for each person, so can barely be used to say anything for us. Then in those years I've come to recognize the word truth is pretty much like enlightenment, it means so many different things to each person the word truth itself has lost all meaning. Yes, truth is the state of being true, but it also means being loyal, fidelity. People just want to believe their truth as if it's fact, this is innate in mind. There is another word that the meaning has so many variations it almost ceases to be useful in communicating anything about one's experience. This word is awake. Those three words have such an ineffable effect on each person that definitions can not represent them accurately. Meaning just about anything and everything to anyone of us, so really, it means nothing to all of us. Does this make them meaningless? In the way that they have no meaningful effect in us so to speak, from those three experiences for the lack of a better word? Or the opposite, they are three very powerful experiences which can mean more than any thing to any one of us. Yet, we can talk for years about them with others and still not really know how another soul perceives them. Although, it appears quite obviously to us if we have the inner life harmony that comes from realizing one's meaning and our being resonates with it, so emanates presence. The behavior it inspires in us is as infinite as the expressions of meaning we have, yet it is crystal clear to those that have this presence the distinctions of what harms and what heals. Again, for lack of betters words.

@Anahata Oh, you are pointing at something, ok, well, then nevermind.

If you divide white light with a crystal or water it creates a rainbow and if you combine the rainbow of material pigments together into one it creates black. Contemplate that...

Ah yes, another person on the forum telling others 'you are doing spirituality wrong' with even calling out Leo to explain your way through how you think he is doing spirituality wrong. To be fair, Leo himself also does this on the forum. I encourage everyone to realize liberation, which is the cessation of self suffering because once one abides in that all 'truth seeking' with the accompanying parsing out of what one believes is the truth is recognized for what it is. Until then, good luck with the mystical mumbo jumbo, I hope it leads you to well being.

I will mostly frame this in the context of romantic relationships but it is generally accurate about almost everyone so we can be aware of it when we interact with others. I have found that people will reveal to us so much about themselves when they are talking about others, especially past relationships. We will learn how they will talk about us to others and about us as a past/present relationship. So when we meet someone and specifically in the case of someone we may view romantically listen closely to what they say about others and their past relationships. It doesn't mean it's always a red flag if they have anything negative to say about others or their past relationships but be aware of how they talk about these others and what they say about themselves in the context of the circumstances and narrative they are portraying. This gives insight into how they think now and how they likely will tell it presently, not what they think and say of it in the past or the future, though. We can even apply this to ourselves, be aware of how we view our own relations and what we say about them. The aspects of the circumstances we highlight or ignore, the narratives we create about them and how we portray them. I've been aware of this for a very long time and even catch my own mind trying to 'tell stories' about past, present and future people and situations that I will not believe because it's just self bias. Also, be aware of how we 'tell stories' about others to others, it will give insight even to oneself about how we think about and view it all. It will help to interrupt the reflexive bias the mind will conjure up and allow us an opportunity to view things in clarity. Finally, don't beat yourself up because of this, even as I have said all this stuff about being aware of how people tell the stories of the things in their life it does seem like you take some responsibility for them though they might not be yours to claim.

Truth is some conscious agent efforting to verify what it perceives as real for justification....wisdom is that conscious agent realizing it doesn't require justifying effort to be at peace with what is so is in liberation.

So raging at others who don't accept your word as gospel truth is now them raging at you? Wow...just wow.

This is often what happens with 'truth seekers', they believe their experience is the absolute truth for everyone, preach it like they are an authority about it then lash out attacking others if their word isn't received as the gospel truth they think it is.

Go back? I'm not sure you thought this through...there's no going and no back... Also, sorry to hear about no healing for you, others can and do heal whether you ever experience it or not.

What if someone is addicted to pickleball? Asking for a friend...