Forestluv

@Angelo John Gage You’ve got a sincerity I appreciate. Awakened beings often have a similar feel to me. It can feel polished, shiny and spiritually. There’s a genuine rawness I like about your video. Perhaps due to your life history. Plus I’ve never seen a guy that feels like NJ to me awakening and speak like you. I sensed it immediately. I think it’s really cool and that you can connect within certain crowds that many nonduality teachers can’t. And not just the nonduality, also personal growth and living a good life.

@vpandey You won’t figure it out, because figuring is within it. You can get direct experience of absolute in the room you are sitting in right now. Yet it can be difficult because the mind is conditioned to perceive relative and direct experience with absolute involves a “death” of a separate self. So the mind will spend years conceptualizing about reality, enlightenment, absolute etc. The power of psychedelics is that they dissolve both dualistic conditioning and the self. It can be done without, yet takes a lot of willingness to let go and “see” it and usually involves a lot of practice.

@Angelo John Gage I think this is an awesome video. I think you can resonate with a specific audience better than any nonduality teacher I've seen. I grew up in N.J. and I now live in the Midwest. There is a big population of guys I think you could connect with really well. I'm not making any value judgement here, yet this is the general description: guys that have strong masculine traits and intellect. . . guys that tend to enjoy stuff like trucks, beer, barbques, fishing, hunting, camping, grew up Christian, home-improvement, football, shooting pool etc. It's hard to describe, yet you have the "IT" factor in this "genre". I cannot connect with guys in this genre. I come across as too emotional, yoga-loving, academically arrogant, soft, woo woo etc. I can connect with people in other areas, yet not here. It's like seeing one of the guys I went to high school with in N.J. awaken and come back to help the other guys awaken. I think it is totally awesome. A few comments on the content: -- I love how you framed it as "the real red pill". That is totally what it is. I have tried to use this frame and guys dismiss me because I have zero cred. in this area. But I think you totally pull it off because you've got that cred. with this group. -- I like how you discussed opposites of good and evil as being two sides of the same coin. Going from nonduality back to duality is very difficult to transmit. I particularly like your analogy that life is one giant movie and everyone is playing their role - yet since One Everything is Everything, both good and evil is within Everything. --I think the part about how "you can experience God" could be a bit confusing because it includes both the little dualistic "you" and the One nondual "You". I would have stressed this a bit by saying something like "you can experience God, which is the Ulitmate You - the ultimate You is within Everything. -- I think a lot of terms used to help people learn nonduality can be used essentially as synonyms. Words like Everything, Nothing, Reality, ISness, Oneness, God etc. I would have grouped them all together and maybe say that they are essentially the same. When I was learning nonduality I didn't know that the words are essentially the same and got confused. I noticed at times you would say something like "The One Everything is God". I would have added a bit more to highlight all the words that collapse into one when we enter nonduality. -- I like how you spoke that Christianity teaches the God within. Again, you have the "IT" cred. with guys in this genre. There is no way I could pull that off. I went through a long hardcore atheist scientist stretch and guys in this genre smell it out - they just know that I was not a real Christian that awakened. -- I didn't sense any intellectual arrogance in you. Yet you were confident and intellectual. Again, I think that is hard to do for a lot of intellectuals - I have this academic intellectualism vibe that masculine guys interpret as being arrogant. They can sense I was never part of their group. As hard as I try not to do it, I often come across as talking down to them. -- I like how you used a lot of masculine traits at the end when describing the biggest Red Pill - stoic, leadership, confidence, power - Marcus Aurelius and how he could have had all the power and sex he wanted, but he went for the biggest red pill. The underlying sense for me was "this is a man". I would have lost this audience as I talked about "surrender", getting in touch with one's emotions, like their inner vulnerability etc. Yet you described it as "gaining control of your emotions" - strength. I think there are a lot of people that can benefit from your style and vibe. In particular, I think you can reach a large segment of guys like few other nonduality teachers can. It is awesome to see and I totally wish you the best.

@Giulio Bevilacqua I think this is a very good question for self-inquiry and contemplation that can yield deep insights. Yet I also think it can be over-intellectualized and conceptualized - which can be a distraction. There are many different nuances and ways it could be answered. Many different ways we could use the terms "witness" and "disidentification". Personally, I've found it helpful to engage in practice that observes the "ISness" of the underlying dynamic. There is an essence of direct experience in this area that is inexplicable. During meditation, I've asked "what is identification?" and I watch. If I get into thinking, I'm off track. I just watch and observe for "it" to appear. A thought like "I procrastinate too much" may arise. Just observe that. Observe the "ISness" of that identification as if it was under a microscope. Is there a feeling present associated with the thought? Is there an energy present? Is there a sense about it? Do more thoughts arise that are linked to the first thought? It involves observing, not analyzing it or trying to figure it out. If that arises, then I stop. I've found this type of nonverbal direct experience to be much deeper than merely thinking. I may try to put the direct experience into words, yet at that point the words aren't so important. The underlying sentiment is much more important.

I would make a distinction here between "development" and "awareness". I would say the Tier1 stages involve much more development. Awareness really expands during the Tier1 to Tier2 transition. I would also make a distinction between the underlying developmental skills/values and the personality. For example, consider the development of learning algebra in middle school, pre-calculus in high school and calculus in a University. Clearly, a University student who has studied calculus is at a higher developmental level than a middle school student studying algebra. Of course the University student could be a jackass and taunt middle school students as being dumb. Yet that doesn't change the underlying principle that calculus is more advanced than algebra and the University student is more advanced in this regard.

@kieranperez Personally, it's much easier for me to express love to someone I love than to myself. I really had to re-think this. I think I was conditioned to believe that doing things for myself was selfish (bad) and doing things for others was selfless (good). I suppose there is some truth to that, yet I became way off-balance. I was trying to take care of others and neglected myself. So I ask myself "How can I be good to myself in a loving way?". I came up with some ideas and asked if that action would be loving to someone else. For example, I have a lot of body tension and the idea of "self massage" came up. I asked myself "If someone I loved had a lot of body tension, would giving them a massage be a loving act?". My answer was "yes", so I figured it was a form of self love. Another example: I noticed I was stressed out and eating poorly and I wasn't preparing healthy meals for myself. The idea of "cook myself a healthy meal" popped up. I asked myself "If someone I loved was stressed out and unable to prepare healthy meals, would cooking them a healthy meal be a loving act?". Again, the answer was "yes", so I started preparing myself healthy meals. I actually got into it. Looking into recipes, food shopping and learning to cook. I prepared myself a yummy meal. One night, I took it to the next level. . . I created a nice peaceful environment with music and candles. I added in a bath and self massage. I don't know if this officially qualifies as "self love", yet it really felt like I was being loved by myself.

I consider rational thought to be within the intellect. It is one just one mode of being for me. To me, the term "post-rational" is not quite right because it suggests other modes of being (emotional, empathic, intuitive, creative etc) come after rational thinking or that other modes are "better" than rational thinking. I prefer to think of it as a jazz band - rational thinking is just one instrument in the band. All the instruments get integrated together to produce the beautiful music. Sometimes there is a trumpet solo, sometimes a drum solo, sometimes all the instruments are playing together at the same time. For me, my sense of being feels healthiest when emotional, intellectual, empathic, intuitive and creative modes are all integrated and communicating with each other. What tends to happen in some people (myself included) is that the rational/intellectual mode dominates. At times, I realize I'm spending 90% of my life rationalizing/intellectualizing/analyzing. It's like 90% of the song is a drum solo. Then, I need to rebalance all the instruments.

@Chumbimba The three most important variables with psychedelics are dosage, mindset and setting. It sounds like you've had several positive experiences with psychedelics and they may be a helpful tool for you. As well, it sounds like psychedelics are "calling" you to explore more. I would also consider your concerns. In particular, your one bad trip was off on two of the three variables. You say that the dose was too high and it was a poor setting. Being around people is hard enough, being around people with negative energy is even harder. If you correct for those two variables (reduce the dose and trip is a comfortable, supportive setting) the likelyhood of having an insightful trip increases greatly. As well, I would try to reduce the anxiety associated with the bad trip. I would go into it as relaxed as possible, knowing that a low dose trip in a comfortable environment is very likely to go well - similar to your other trips. Regarding a family member with schizophrenia and psychedelics. There may be a risk factor for individuals with a family member that has of schizophrenia - yet we just don't understand it well. Having a grandfather with schizophrenia raises the risk by about 5% over the general population - that is a relatively low risk factor - because there are many genes involved and environmental inputs. As well, the brain changes start to occur in early adolescence around 15 and behavioral changes generally occur late teens/early 20s. If you had a somewhat normal upbringing (without significant abuse, trauma, chronic drug use) and haven't experience significant perception and behavioral changes (hallucinations, difficulty speaking, thought disorders, bizarre behavior) you are likely at a low risk - about the same as the general population. I also have a family member with schizophrenia (my uncle) and I was mildly concerned with the risk of psychedelics. For me, I would just be more cautious about dose / setting to avoid a traumatic trip. I would do it alone or with a trusted friend in a very familiar, safe, peaceful environment - like my house or out in nature. I would just be extra cautious to avoid a lot of people stimulation (crowds, concerts, noisy cafes etc) and negativity (negative friends, harsh music/movies with violence etc.)

I think Lisa Cairns is good at discussing emotions and spirituality. She has a heart-centered approach and is grounded.

Super. Nice work ??

@David Hammond That sounds great to me, thank you ? Earlier you had used the terms “good” and “bad” in a way that shifted my impression of the meaning. Language can be tricky sometimes.

We are not connecting due to being on different wavelengths of thought and prior experience. It happens sometimes.

Yea, we are not on the same frequency ??

@davidomni Welcome to the forum. I’m looking foreard to updates on results ??

Yea, that’s what the experience is like. For me there is a temporary dissolution of personal awareness and an appearance of a “collective” awareness that is aware of itself. At first it was really uncomfortable and even scary Thanks for the moth name ?

Along the collective fish theme. . .

If that thing winks at me, I think I’ll lose my mind. . .

I like allowing some flow for wander. Insights often arise for me in that space.

I wonder if it says “Whooo Whoooo”

You totally tripped me out ?. I was like “is that an owl?” ? It looks like two moths. Their bodies are on the branches. They are two seperate organisms, yet come together to make a higher level organism. I’m so amazed by it,

@herghly I usually take 5-meo in bed. Quite often, I continue laying there gazing out the window at a latge tree. Also taking leisurely strolls, especially in nature. I often feel very loving afterwards and want to connect with someone I care about. I don’t necessarily want to discuss the experience, more to connect at a meaningful human level. We often have open and deep talks about life.

Do you happen to know the name of these moths? I’d love to read up on them.

I appreciate your input. I thought this playful context was different and I learned a lesson here. I can see my error in judgement that you pointed out. Things can get hyper-serious on the board and I like some humor sometimes. The forum can get waaay serious at times.