lmfao

Fair. I need to see that at the end of the day this is a story and I've bought into someone else's ideas. @Dlavjr Indeed, it is a very confusing thing. @Bulgarianspirit How did being good ruin your life? Both of us have created this generalisation of "people are like X" as a primitive reaction to hurt.

Very good question. I don't know the difference to be honest. You're right in thinking they're sometimes one and the same and are connected. The conceptual nature of a "need" is indeed a construct. But on a down to earth level and relative level, it's obvious that there are gradations of how "actual" a need is. The most clear cut case being the need for food and drink for material survival. Sometimes we talk about needs for our own survival, and survival is a deep topic. You can think about it on many levels. Physical survival (good medical health), emotional survival (which will involve feelings of belonging, loneliness and intimacy) , conceptual survival of the ego's sense of self (metaphysical) . ** This pattern of conflict between needs and attachments mirrors itself in the tug of war between meeting your needs for "self actualisation" versus transcending your needs for enlightenment. If one doesn't get enough of their "attachments"/"needs" met, they often end up lost in neuroticism and cannot develop the mental clarity to even try to transcend their needs. Hence working on both ends is often important. I use the word 'often' to emphasise that you are your own person, and whatever tends to be the case with others doesn't determine your own path. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ** I have not the direct experience to talk as an authority, but my heresay is that physical health is in very large part determined by your beliefs, mind and consciousness. With this being the point of view of David Hawkins, who thinks that to cure medical ailments you need to pay attention to your experience without giving it medical labels. As well as saying things which cancel your belief that you are suffering from X disease e.g. "I am not subject to X. I am an infinite being who is only subject to what I hold in mind".

@Galyna Love. That reminds me of something

Tuesday 15/09/2020 I can't figure out the meaning of illusion. Suffering, one confronts and somewhat lets go of suffering, and it somewhat subsides and alleviates. I'm trying to look at what the suffering is made out of. I can confront it, somewhat alleviate it, but nothing deeper is being seen.

Like @SirVladimir said, it's a direct response to stage blue. And stage blue can be retarded Take a look at fundamentalist islam in the middle east, or medieval Christianity, if you want to understand what stage orange is reacting against.

@andyjohnsonman If I insert myself into your situation, I would say that what is you're calling silence isn't true silence. There are many things unnoticed and not investigated still. For the life of me I still haven't figured out what the fuck a physical body or bodily awareness means.

What was the most intimate desire?

SSRI's for me blunted emotion. Common description for this is that you "feel like a zombie". So that got me to want to stop. I've been tapering off very slowly, but even then it's been a bumpy ride. The withdrawal of these drugs can be rough, in addition to the side effects whilst taking them. I'm almost paranoid that I've "damaged my brain" but I don't allow myself to be that pessimistic about it in the long term. Withdrawal for me involves muscle weakness, severe dizziness ( https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20144124/#:~:text=Dizziness is the most commonly,to be vestibular in) and agitation.

"A Course in Miracles" is where I go for non-dual Christianity. I only have the workbook. If anyone here thinks it's worth buying the theory, let me know or explain why it's good.

David would be writhing in his grave if he saw the state of conservatives today. His politics just shows ignorance or lack of knowledge. His lack of understanding causes him to project partial perspectives as a full picture. He sees postmodernists and leftists, sees their ego as narcissistic. But all egos are narcissistic and self important. Then he selectively uses the domain of the absolute to invalidate one side but not the other. His muscle testing is what puts me off the most about him as well. I'm just amazed that someone like him is convinced of such a thing. But I shouldn't be too shocked, not all people and teachers are the same. He shows you a path of illumination regardless. I didn't buy his maps of consciousness book because I was apprehensive about this numerical model of his, but it is nonetheless referenced every few paragraphs in any book of his. I don't hate the model though, it's cool. I can't figure out how on earth I could validate such a thing. The exact sequences of things, the labels he gives. The only way the model could make sense is if your consciousness is distributed across multiple levels/numbers at once. But if ones psyche is that complex, then it will present itself in a confusing way, such that discerning whether the model holds or not practically unviable. ^The same criticism can be levied against spiral dynamics, and the resolution to that applies here I guess. But to me personally this particular model is harder to see or grasp.

@Leo Gura I swear, no matter the teacher you always know some dirt on them . So what silly ideas does Leo Gura have?

@zeroISinfinity what's a Jed?

@Galyna blessed. I'm in a so called dark night so this is good wisdom.

@Gesundheit You're not wrong to feel there's "something strange" with how disagreements or discussion works. You're right that Mods usually agree with Leo. For me, whatever angle you go about this stuff it will come back to topics like love, god and psychedelics (with ralston being a symbolic figure and good example in discussion). Here's the discussion I see being replayed. A: "You can become conscious of God" B: "God is a word and concept, don't get attached". I get a bit annoyed when one of those perspectives are called right and the other wrong. Nobody making the points they should make. Some of the people who say B aren't and haven't been "conscious of God". And think its just a meaningless story. They just haven't seen that facet of things. However. Some of the people saying B are "conscious of God" but they know that this work is a continous process of discarding labels and entering not knowing. And they way you do that is to stop with the labels. But I see people advocating A failing or not mentioning the distinction between those two sorts of people in B. If that distinction was made there would be a lot less nonsense. Some of the people in A know what is required for not knowing (even if they don't state this distinction) , but some people in A who don't understand this distinction will be stuck and stagnated. And they need to B to stop being stagnated. But instead of B being seen as an antidote that some people need, it's ignored and seen as delusional. And when that happens, you're in a belief system and couldn't be further from truth.

David Hawkins is a GOAT. I recently bought 2 of his books at once, he's very easy to read and it all just flows.

Monday 14/09/2020 00:20 Wonder if I'm going crazy or the point of any of it. Wondering whether I'm imagining and creating spiritual meanings and experiences where there are none. And whether there's just this nothingness. I've encountered this feeling before and each time it feels alien and dangerous. Whether I was muslim, atheist, or now "spiritual", the experience and feeling encountered is the exact same. Feeling lost, confused, sad and scared of meaninglessness and nothing.

When I read this thread, I see someone condoning an attitude of not stopping or thinking you've reached an end with words like emptiness or love. I talk from my POV. I'm not the one with a vision for what this place is. Or the one thinking about how these things steadily rise and effect the whole atmosphere. The way that everyone who isn't me engages with certain things isn't something I factor in either.

There is the "three-fold training" in Buddhism. Morality, concentration and insight. As Daniel Ingram describes it, "insight meditation" involves paying attention to how sensations arise and vanish. You are instructed to notice sensations in your experience at a high rate, 1-10 sensations per second. This high rate is very important. Through insight meditation, you're building an awareness of impermanence through seeing your sensation to not be solid. You look at sensations as they expand and contract, rise and fall, and their general flux. This is distinct from concentration meditation. Concentration meditation on the other hand almost looks like it's trying to build a solidity/continuity to experience. You pick a singular object to be aware of continuously.

@Someone here It can feel like you perceive yourself to absolute nothingness, so you're then immortal. There is nothingness and there will never not be nothingness. I remember being convinced of the immortality of my true nature with the depth of the experience. But that state of consciousness has faded from me in the present. I shouldn't go extrapolating meaning from that so readily, it's better for progress if I don't conceptualise with it and dig deeper since I'm not in that state right now.

@Thewritersunion well its on audible if that works for you. It's a very thick book and read, you'll probably want to skim through certain parts or speed read it, so I don't know what audio books are like for that. The audio book is 30 hours 17 mins long. Maybe you can convince your parents or whatever to subscribe to audible or use birthday money to buy the book.

Brief description of my material conditions is in order, so as to describe the familial dynamics. I'm about to finish my second year at university. I'm roughly 20 right now. I'm the youngest of a few children. My parents are pakistani, muslim immigrants. Since term time at university ended for the year, earlier than usual due to corona, I'm living back at home with my family for the summer holidays. Whilst I could write a long list of different things and annoyances, one has to consider the magnitude of things in the bigger picture and think about priorities, whether those priorities be spiritual, emotional and physical. Cost-Payoff analysis type shit, albeit I'm sure if I finished reading radical honesty I would have a lot to radically change and reconsider about my entire approach to life So I'm just focusing on my relation with my father right now. I'm raised in the west, he's raised in pakistan. A lot of polarity in regards to our upbringing, worldview. I'm 20, he's in his mid 60's. Large age gap. He's religious, conservative, a traditionalist. He's the tribal chief of the family, the alpha. Now whilst he is the leader of the family and all that, you hearing that alone might paint an unfair distorted image. Relative to other pakistani men I've seen, he's quite open minded, understanding. He has exceptionally good emotional/social intelligence. He's suffered emotional abuse at the hands of my mom for many years now for half his life. Relative to other Pakistanis he's liberal, even if at the very core of him he's religious and traditional in his own affairs. I am one of those affairs however. One point. I feel like I can notice things about him that the rest of the family are in denial about or because they are sheep-like, and more brainwashed in general by the matrix of culture. I feel like I'm watching a slippery, cunning snake in action with him. Not because he's "malicious", but precisely because he can't see or appreciate his own cunning, which makes it all the more annoying. Whilst making this post, I've deliberated on how to best communicate and summarise the multitude of experiences, subtlety of annoyance, the history, but it's difficult. But fuck it, we don't have time for an autobiography here ----- Okay. So. One thing about the household, we do favours for our dad. We sometimes do favours for each other. We all do this thing where we call for each other across the house. Just calling for each other loudly with our voices. We all do it for different reasons, some cool, some toxic, some urgent, etc. Here's what annoys me about my dad. I can be in the opposite side of the house, he'll yell your name and expect you to just go to him, and to do what favour he asks you. He masquerades as being diplomatic, but it isn't. You have to go to him, you have to do the favour. Of course you might say no but he'll display silent disappointment and silent frustration any trained eye can smell from a mile away, almost like a spoilt child. But he's subtle about it. Or apparently it has to be subtle because everyone in this god damn house is so fucking crazy they can't detect it. I'm fucking on the autistic spectrum and even I can see it. His tone is never really chilled, he never really sees you as an equal. And that's what pisses me off. He can never just ask you something from an equal power dynamic. He's the patriarch. Parents have control over their children. The way he calls you to do favours. I'm not some fucking servant for some Mafia boss. I wouldn't mind helping, doing chores and shit if he just didn't always permeate this dynamic he cant fucking see he's creating. I have contextualised my services to him as permission to cohabitate for rent (a view which he would find depressing because, he wants to be a loving family) , but I can't even make it that because at least your boss treats you like an adult and not as some person they can treat as a mule and make their life decisions for. He'll call my other sibling from across the house, say "Hey X, why dont you take @lmfao for a such and such today" when he never fucking even asked me if I wanted to do that in the first place. So many times he's forced me and coerced me into doing shit in my entire life. Coerced me into cutting my hair when I never wanted to. My family gaslighting me as a dirty and unkempt slob. So why I made this topic. I want to raise these issues with him, but I don't know how to do so. I see so much about how he is subtly idk how I can bring it up without it appearing like I'm some rebellious hippie. He's an old man, how the fuck am I supposed to talk sense into him. Yet as a career, he's always talking to mentally disturbed psychiatric patients, always manages to navigate and understand other people, has a large social circle, yet can't fucking see what he's doing. Ugh, I need to finish reading radical honesty and get my shit together.

@Thewritersunion Have you looked into or heard of Ken Wilber's book "The Religion of Tomorrow"? I've only started it, but in it he gives his theory of a tier 3. He's upgraded or modified spiral dynamics.

Just gonna write an update post my situation here. I almost got into another mini situation and conflict in regards to family issues, but then for some reason I just paused and got bored of following the same patterns over and over again in my mind. I think my outlook on things has changed a bit. One problem I have present in this relationship that came to light in my problem with people in other relationships is having too high expectations. Being idealistic. I've usually defaulted to assuming all sorts of negative things when my idealistic expectations aren't met. I have often thought about, why can't X change their ways, why can't Y just ..... and etc. After throwing myself at this sort of conflict so many times, attempt after attempt to open myself however I could in the pain, I'm only just started to see a little beyond that way ---- So whilst I did have an argument today, and did fall into the same pattern for at least a few minutes, I changed a bit. Rather than just being upset and and distraught and whatever for the rest of the day, I'm just left with a positive/nice feeling of not-knowing. It's the kind of awe/intrigue where your eyes are just wide open and watching the world. After so many attempts and falling in the same pattern of negativity, I just felt bored of engaging things the same way. It's just a good feeling of satisfaction. Don't get me wrong, I'm still stuck in hell and am in the pattern in a sense, with this accumulated karma still hanging over my head. But just a little bit of progress is good. Because for so, so long I tried the approach of "radical honesty" from Brad Blanton, also contemplating what emotional honesty with self and others means, felt so shit from it, but kept going on. And finally there's been some change. Honesty and vulnerability is shit and sucks. Don't let anyone sell you otherwise. It's just the least shit.

A lot of the time when I do kriya yoga and meditate, my change in perception is too drastically different from my default consciousness that I get scared and run away. And so I never maintain a consistent or daily meditation practice. My mind just panics because the contrast is way too huge. Like going from normal, completely egoic consciousness to more "empty" consciousness which sees self and all of reality as unreal. Like the jump is just too huge! Any advice or thoughts? What I find so weird is that, I've realised in the past before that the reason I don't meditate as much is because I get scared from seeing this. But then I will shortly forget this insight I had about why I don't commit to meditation as much, and get absorbed in distraction of my life and addictions. So to cope with this distress, my mind erases from my memory states of consciousness like this and thoughts I had whilst having them. And Maya and my default consciousness mask this whole realisation or awakening experience as if it never happened. The jump is just so huge that I worry about going mad despite not actually going mad, but the worry about going mad will make you mad. I don't know lol. The mind going a bit wild here feels like an involuntary reflex/reaction (but isn't this true about emotions and the mind in general), but it is nonetheless something I have to just not turn away from and watch. I shall remember this is a narrative. Maybe I'm simply neurotic or aren't cut out for this, I don't know. Or maybe that's an excuse to run away from truth. ------------------------ I think Leo shooting a video on insanity and dissociation is a good idea, especially in relation to enlightenment or the search for it. It would be a further elaboration on the dark side of spiritual work. I'm certain that modern medicine's conceptualisation of certain cases of insanity and dissociation is off the mark.

The plant would have to want to enlighten in the first place and I don't see that happening.