Forestluv

Omg no. ?

I didn’t say it was. I said “when a man says”, not “when Mikael89 says”. Even if sex isn’t the primary motivation for you, you are missing several aspects - as many women are trying to explain to you. Notice how women aren’t saying “Yes, yes! Mikael89 you’ve got it. You understand us.” Rather, they are saying “No, no Mikael89, you are not understanding. I’ll try to explain again”. To me, this indicates that you are missing something and misunderstanding something.

Well, a “romantic relationship” certainly sounds softer than “getting a woman”. Yet, what you mean by “romantic relationship” may be different than what most women are attracted to. It seems many men may use the term “romantic relationship” as it may be softer and more appealing - yet deep down it seems sex is primary in “romantic”. What is being expressed in this thread is that there is more breadth and depth that most women desire. There are emotional connections, mutual support and a sense of partnership. Men can say they want these things, yet it’s pretty obvious when a man says “romance”, yet really means “sex” and sees the woman as a sexual object. When a man says “romantic relationship”, it’s usually code for “sexual relationship” and sometimes code for “fuck buddy”. It’s not the terminology you use, it is the underlying orientation. One way to expand from this is to form meaningful platonic relationships with women. Yet most men are not interested in that because the sex is by far the highest priority.

I would look at what it means for you “to get a woman”. That may be unattractive to most women. I find it unattractive.

@SQAAD If fear of suffering is the only thing interfering with your eternal happiness, why not give up that fear and be happy all the time? What is preventing you from giving up that fear? And is absence of the fear of suffering sufficient for happiness?

@mandyjw Beautiful writing and imagery. ?

That sounds like an amazing opportunity. It reminded me of the film Samsara - which captures an essence of awakening through travel, culture and nature.

@Nivsch What if Net. cant’t form a unified government? Will there be a stalemate and nothing gets done? Could he go an authoritarian route and claim executive privilege like Trump? Could he call for another election? He doesn’t seem like someone who will accept loss of power.

You raise a common conundrum: what if awakening to Truth is not beneficial to me? From a personal perspective, I can see value in being unaware of Truth. Similar to learning the Truth of a magic trick. In some ways, it ruins the fun. As you suggest, there is value in living aligned with one’s personal truth. This is the area of personal development. As well, a lot of spirituality involves living a meaningful personal life. Yet there comes a time in spirituality in which continuing means the transcendence of the personality. The realization that “me” doesn’t exist like I thought it did. The downside of that is that the gig is up. The game is kinda over for the ego. And the ego will not like that at all - so it usually involves considerable discomfort at times. On the flip side, there is also liberation and new deeper appreciation for reality. Yet one doesn’t get to “test drive” this before they begin.

Like I said, we are not on the same frequency and I am unable to connect and communicate with you. I wish you well. Maybe we will connect on something else in the future, maybe not.

From my POV, I am trying to explain prinsof to someone unaware of prinsof. Which is fine. It happens.

I liked how Leo addressed the question of whether one should even take a spiriruitual seeking path at the end of his 10 Ox video. Profound stuff.

In terms of communication, it doesn’t work. It’s like speaking two different languages. I’m unable to connect, which is ok. It happens sometimes.

We are not on the same frequency and my input is not helpful here, which is fine. I wish you the best ? ❤️

No, that is not what I’m saying. I’ve tried to explain it many times to you and each time you want to immerse within a world of contextualization/conceptualization. When you do so, you won’t see it. For example, if you spent a week in nature - away from all people and technology - you would expand beyond your conceptual comfort zone. One may spend an hour admiring a flower, becoming the lower and realizing absolute infinity within a single pollen grain. Not creating constructs and models of the essence of a flower and how it represents absolute infinity. I can tell you have not these types of awakenings by the way you communicate. There is no way to fake through it. . . . Imagine someone who has never done scuba diving trying to convince a scuba diving instructor what the experience is like. This person can spend months reading about scuba diving, speaking to scuba divers and imagining what scuba diving is like. They may go snorkeling and think it’s like scuba diving. . . Yet it will be clear to the scuba diving instructor this person has not experienced actual scuba diving.

You are using an idea of “direct experience” to elevate experience/ideas to higher truth. Notice the obsession to go “beyond infinity”, to extraordinary levels on SD - coral, teal, ruby, whatever. To rank the conscious levels of all forum users, moderators, Leo and nonduality speakers. To post insights only you have received and to gain admiration on the forum. Notice how your threads and posts have become more and more dramatic that attracts attention. As soon as you say “my direct experience was. . . “ it is no longer direct experience - it is contextualized experience that is occurring within direct experience. Direct experience is Now - whatever contextualization you give Now is a contextualized experience. Yes, there are no words to describe the ineffable. It’s not about the words. It’s the relationship with what the words are referring to. You don’t seem willing to look at the attachment/identification to experience. Presenting experience, images and ideas as “direct experience” does not grant immunity. I’m sure you have had insights that are difficult to put in words. Yet as of now, it is a tangled mess lacking clarity.

This is the center of the knot. What emanates from this is secondary. You are like a spider that has become caught in its own web.

Here, "I" is deconstructed to Nothing / Everything. Since I is all there is, we don't need the "I" part - it is redundant. We simply have "all there is". From this Nothing/Everything, observe how somethings are constructed. . . Notice how the construction process has begun: - "I" is all there is. . . to. . . - There is no difference between experience and experiencer. . . to. . . - For something to exist, you must be the thing. . . to. . . - your experience of the object is identical to the object itself, therefore, sure, you can say you are the object. It follows that you are everything that enters your perception. If "I" is all there is. . . that's it. I is all there is. I is Everything. There is nothing else other than "I". Nothing to discover, perceive, figure out, attain, arrive it etc. It's all "I". Game Over. . . Yet, humans are not satisfied with "I is all there is". So we start constructing. Since the mind is not aware of the fully deconstructed state of "I", it will not be aware that it is constructing because it lacks the contrast of full deconstruction. So, let's deconstruct. If "I is all there is", why even have the "I" in there? What is "I" relative to? - I is all there is! It's redundant. It's like saying "Everything is all there is". Of course. So we can further deconstruct to "All there is". "All there is" means that there is nothing that isn't IS. So this is redundant as well. We can further deconstruct to "IS". This is as far as we can deconstruct through verbal communication. From "IS", we can start constructing, which is fine. Reality is a process of deconstruction and construction. Yet be aware that any construction we create, we can deconstruct it back down to "IS". You have constructed things called "experiences", "objects", "existence", "you", "things" and "perception". Humans are conditioned to assume these constructs. Yet notice how enormous the jump is from "IS" to "experiences, objects, existence, you, things, perception etc". This enormous jump took millions of years of evolution. Based on these constructs, you have asked questions: Notice how we started off with "I is all there is", created a foundation of constructs and are now asking questions based on those constructs. You can use questions to deconstruct back to "IS" or you can ask questions to create more elaborate constructs. The deconstruction route: Notice how the above has "things" and "my perception". We can deconstruct that so "things" and "my perception" are not separate. Now things, my and perception is One. So "things" don't come from anywhere, because there is no thing to come from one thing to another thing. . . For the question "Do I have any control over that?", there is separation between "I" and "that" and a new thing added called "control". That can all get deconstructed back to "I is all there is". . . Thus, "I" is Everything. Not "everything that enters my perception". Everything. If you deconstruct to the full monty to Everything = Nothing and embody that, you will see how you are constructing all of reality. It's all constructions which are deconstructed to Everything/Nothing.

@Nivsch I love the colorful fruit as SD codes!!

Based on the OP’s definition of enlightenment, Deepak Chopra comes to mind.

Yea, it's a tricky, nuanced topic. In traditional English "Devotion" generally has a very strong "me" implied. Such as "He is a very devoted father" or "I am going to devote 1hr a day to studying Spanish". I like the frame of "to move something closer to that which is sacred". This reduces the attachment to "me". Yet like you said, within the contraction of a personality dynamic and a timeline, there will be some sense personal dedication to a practice and some type of personal desire - even if that intention is liberation from personal desire. I think this is why many people describe awakening as a "cosmic joke". It's like we search for years looking for our glasses, to discover they were on our face the whole time. It's like we first need to check hundreds of places to determine our glasses aren't there - then after exhaustion we give up and surrender, then discover our glasses where on our face the whole time. In a way, it's comical.

Haha, yes. This is the type of statement that used to drive me crazy when I was confined within rationality. Now I drive some people crazy by saying these types of things. lol

I would be cautious with that. If it naturally pops up, I would stick to the science of the trials and potential medical/therapeutic benefits. For example, the studies showed that the compounds had significantly positive effects after only 1-3 treatments and the positive effects persisted over a long period of time. This is encouraging because patients will not have to undergo monthly treatments the rest of their lives for the benefits. In contrast, patients on SSRIs use the medication consistently over a long period of time. As well, scientists have recently discovered that a new class of compounds called "psychoplastogens" (that include psychedelics) can induce neural plasticity, which has potential to rewire the brain. However, there are still safety concerns we should consider while developing this new class of therapeutic molecules. These types of frames sounds mature. An immature frame would be something like "Last month, my friend tripped balls on MDMA at a concert and now his PTSD symptoms are reduced - just like the JH studies. I think psychedelics should be legal so everyone can do it on their own.". Psychedelic therapy is a legit new and exciting area of science. It's fine to discuss it, just like we might discuss new EMDR therapy methods. Yet, I would shy away from personal subjective experiences and recreational use of pyschedelics - or come across as

@Scholar Yea. Meat-eating culture is generally resistant to emotional appeals. Singer gives a strong rational argument for veganism - much stronger than the counter-argument, imo. . . In theory, I think the argument is lopsided toward veganism - both empathically and logically. . . .Similar to homosexuality - there is a very weak argument against homosexuality.

It’s a relative truth. The is no objective universal truth that would apply to everyone. For me, there are pros and cons of mixing spiritual work and sex/relationships. There is a lot to experience and learn within sex/relationships, yet it can also be a distraction.As well, it depends who the person is. Dating a narcissist is a different dynamic than dating a mature woman on a spiritual path. This is my experience and it’s not true for everyone. A buddhist monk may say to go celibate, others may say it’s fine to be promiscuous. You are your own authority. Experiment and see how it goes. While pursuing women, a lot of egoic dynamics may be revealed that you can work through. Or you may pursue women and spiral into a self absorbed mess and need to change things.