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The non-duality war I personally think its very healthy if there is a part on the forum where people actually truly can debate discuss it, but not mengled with the articles of certain paths. Because it can get them to think critically. (it requires however another set up in the forum). I do strongly disagree that all paths are as good as others. Of course, someone who is further sees that the 8 folded path, that purifies the desires is best among paths, because someone is thrown in himself. But what makes something like this, or such a claim toxic? Because there is certainly a point being made by Leo. Keep in mind the 8 folded path, we will come back on that in a min. So what is then so toxic? I will show you guys an example of what is toxic, what is a perfect example of trying to "debunk" something in an ill way (not to forget, debunking is healthy, I promote it). Here is an example shown that is actually thrown, and already explained in my comment what is so wrong about it. Dear xxxx, You miss again the point, xxxx. So I will again explain it to you. The dhammapada, is well studied by me, and its examples are good to share. I live up to those examples, secluded from unwholesome deeds, sense indulgence, concentrated on Awareness and I am awakened to my true duty in accordance with my True Self. However, you seem to miss the point again. Your aim should not be me, but the subject that is presented. If you find it misinformation, support this with decent evidence. Refer to what is pseudo-wisdom in what I shared here as teachings. If someone lives up to it, and shares examples that enlighten the way, then surely this is wise to do. For those who follow it up, and look into it, surely, this is wise to do as well. However, if you do not come up with decent arguments, surely any intelligent being reading this, will surely understand that what you say is hollow, your own misunderstanding that is situated in either your own passions or ignorance. And should read the Dhammapada yourself and put it into action. I do not see a single article coming from you, that actually challenges what I shared here as teachings. There for I conclude because of not taking a stand to actually debunk it with decent arguments, your post as being filled with ramblings and pseudo-wisdom, egotism and can be there for classified as foolish, per swaying people to agree on things that lack evidence and has therefor nothing to do with wisdom, being intelligent and being situated in the fruit of wholesomeness. If you disagree, and are not willing to put any evidence in what is wrong with what I am teaching here, and why it should be otherwise, and how it should be otherwise, then surely if you can't keep your mouth shut, sit still, putting your attention on yourself and being concentrated on Awareness, and instead just keep mumbling around here in this forum referring to me how I am situated in spiritual egotism, you clearly miss your aim, and are yourself trying to astray by your pseudo-wisdom. For you can also just not read what I write, put me on ignore, and leave it at rest. But you do not do this, you come to me, again and again. How can that be of a good intent? Surely you didn't miss that. ................................................................................................... (So for all haters of Leo (or anyone else that is hated) that do not have come yet with decent arguments and are not willing to present them, but are just attacking, this message above is for you as well). The same counts for all that have something to say about Leo... If you don't have decent arguments, then leave it be. You must be ready to give arguments when asked for them. However I do point out towards Leo, see, they throw at me as well, and I have seen very very nasty things being said towards Leo, without a decent argument, or not willing to later point things out more, clearly with decent arguments, (e.g youtube) and I have seen nasty things being thrown at me. So whats toxic? That which makes it toxic, is that people do not come with decent arguments, and when asked, still don't. I would definitely would like to see a place where people can criticize peoples work, but with decent arguments (I stand widely open to be debunked very hard, but one must be coming with arguments, that are verifiable, and if I ever write something, people can just say to me: Please let us debate this, I wanna put this to the test with decent arguments, and I shall never say, I am not interested to support my claims with decent arguments with a clear mark of refraining from sophism). Preventing this healthy critical thinking in a forum, surely will lead people to think, oh Leo is going to discern who is non dual and who is not, and this is however imposing a non-dual by not non-dual which is toxic if not supported by good, solid arguments. (I am willing to support this further if Leo wants this, I stand wide open to make myself useful here) I don't believe Leo meant that as his intention however. Remember the claim about the 8 folded path? I dare to speak out that the 8 folded path is the best among paths. And I am willing to put decent arguments on that. Nothing toxic about that. However, I do am afraid that many, just can't put up decent arguments that are refrained from sophism, to actually truly demonstrate why its wrong even if they would wish. Some examples from other works, is just not enough to debunk something, although a valid point can be made. I am not supporting psychedelics, but I am betting that Leo would not say to me: Motus, you are crazy, you didn't gave me solid reasons why not, you are toxic. I always come with arguments, and if not, one can always ask for them, and I give them. And I find this healthy, because in this way I can warn for his reputation, (its what a good wise friend would do)! Create an article about what truly is non-dual according to you, and stand open for an argument back, letting readers decide for themselves. Thats key. And I would suggest that the administrator can use this information for improvement into all directions. (useful information can come out). Saying: Those non-dual, will never debunk something or debate it and correct a wrong view. This is not true. An enlightened being, or someone with a great understanding or someone rooted in Dharma, is only here to debunk with powerful sublime arguments. Debunking is for example what you do as well Leo, its what you should do. Its refraining from such duty that is dual, being attached. I wonder how many people got debunked by Leo in a positive manner, and I well support many of the points he made. (And I maybe should give those more credit here). I would rather say, if someone makes a probable toxic claim, they should be able to start an article on a forum, and challenge this. IF they do not respond to that, not even when asked in private to join it, or do join, but keep being toxic, not using arguments, just sophism to persway people and make war, now that is a reason to ban. I don't see a reason to ban, because he said; take the path I took, your path is wrong Leo. Or, Leo is not the right teacher. Motus is a bad teacher, his teachings are rubbish. (taking this personally is of course based on a wrong view, there for asking for arguments, which if one is not willing to put, and keeps going on with sophism and per swaying, then you can state: Wrong intent, false speech, wrong act, wrong view, wrong place of attention and concentration) (= Reason to ban?) Why no banning straight away, what do I think? Because, such a claim can be supported by arguments and should at some point, and the reader should ask for them to kindly explain why, if the writer did come up with decent arguments that can be checked to be valid, by his own core with a clear mark of refraining from sophism, he should be reasonable. Well now, the one answering should put decent arguments, and refraining from sophism. Otherwise, yes, if one just claims widely, without arguments, just throwing and throwing, is indeed making toxic claims due to not willing to support this claim with decent arguments. Deciding what is a good argument, valid argument etc, yes, one must be more educated, and that is another problem I come across. Therefor if someone is trying to debunk me, I will be more critical at pointing out rather why its sophism, and why it should be avoided. And I will do this as well for Leo, or anyone, if I see sophism, for the sake of education. I would ask nicely, that those who get a decent argument thrown at them, learn from it. Get along, harmonize, learn. I would ask nicely, that those who do not have a decent argument or are not be willing to put one when asked, just shut your mouth, and sit with it. Go watch some video's of Leo, or read some of the teachings I posted here. I really would like to see a reply from Leo, how he looks at the points I make here, as he is the administrator. And really would like to hear your thoughts about this article. (Remember, again, don't attack me, for theres no me, or a Leo, just learn to focus on my points that I make and come with arguments that are in line with the subject presented). (I posted it in the same forum, for practical reasons)

When I first started this sub-forum, my biggest concern was that people would use it as a platform to engage in religious debate. Thankfully that's never happened. However, what I failed to foresee was the same dynamic manifesting in a more subtle form: people engaging in nondual debate. This is even more regrettable, because it goes directly against what nonduality is about and such folks should know better. There has been a recent trend of people stirring up nonduality debate or embarking on "discrediting" campaigns. It's this toxic tendency to criticize and nitpick nondual teachings because they happen to differ from how you think nonduality ought to be done or taught. As if there is one or two paths that everyone should take, and all others are delusional. This is a classic trap. Traditionally, most spiritual paths -- as part of their marketing strategy -- highlight their upsides while conveniently never mentioning their own downsides. Then they criticize all the other paths by only highlighting their downsides while never mentioning their upsides. This creates a false apples-and-oranges comparison. It's functional purpose is to recruit new adherents. It's basically a dishonest advertising campaign. The problem with this approach is that it breeds intolerance and sectarianism. It creates in-fighting and distraction rather than contributing positively to the discussion. It's intellectually uncharitable and ultimately makes the entire field of spirituality/nonduality look hypocritical to outsiders. If you are so nondual, or so self-realized, why are you wasting so much of your time fighting others? This is such a rookie mistake. The reality is that nonduality is a difficult thing to teach, no matter by what method. Traps are numerous NO MATTER WHICH PATH YOU TAKE. There is no such thing as the perfect path. There is no such thing as a path with no downsides or traps or potential for delusion. Any path you take can be misused. Any teaching you hear can be misused. Any teaching can be dangerous in the wrong hands. Any teaching can be nitpicked and criticized into ill-repute if one so desires. You can easily write a massive diatribe about every single spiritual teacher and spiritual path ever devised by man. And you would be half-right. But all of this is just an ideology game. It's a fundamental failure to understand the other person. It's also rather annoying to moderate and creates idle controversy where none really exists. Not only does it turn good people against each other, it's false and ignorant. Just because you've had a rude awakening -- just because you realized that reality is illusory -- doesn't mean you get to come on here and trash the value of conceptual work, or traditional self-help, or other nondual methods. Just because one method didn't resonant with you, doesn't mean you get to crap all over other people's methods. Again, this is such a rookie mistake we shouldn't even be having this discussion. The work that we're doing here is very nuanced. It's very easy to misunderstand. It's very easy to demonize. It's very easy to abuse by its nature. All advanced work is this way. And our work here goes WAY beyond enlightenment. I am counting on you to be a nuanced and understanding student. If you disagree with this philosophy and think that all there is worth doing in life is enlightenment, that's your opinion -- and you're entitled to have it -- but you have no business being here. Go spend your time doing something productive that you believe in, rather than debating, "debunking", and criticizing -- with flagrant disregard for intellectual charity -- the hard work of others. Anyone engaging in nondual debate like: "Method X is all bullshit. It's delusional. Teacher Y doesn't know what the hell enlightenment is. Just follow the method that worked for me." will be banned. There is nothing nondual about such behavior. It's juvenile and driven by a lack of understanding of the deeper aspects of this work. The very act of making such posts is already evidence of one's low level of development. Highly conscious people do NOT behave in this way. Here's a very simple rule of thumb: you will NEVER see highly-conscious and self-realized masters debating, criticizing, nitpicking, or engaging in "debunking" campaigns. Because all of that is egoic, dualistic, ideological nonsense. If they disagree with a teaching, they simply avoid it. They don't start a crusade to fight against it. They understand that different people resonant with different paths and teachings. They understand that everyone needs to find their own path. Remember that guiding people to nonduality is an inherently challenging thing. It's one of the most challenging teaching scenarios. If you ever get the opportunity to teach hundreds or thousands of people about enlightenment, you'll gain a new appreciation for how many of them will deeply misunderstand you and use your well-intentioned teaching for evil. Have respect and compassion for that. When assessing the value of a teaching, observe the principle of intellectual charity, and seek to understand the communication rather than how best to discredit it. Discrediting is easy, understanding is difficult. Division is easy, integration is difficult. Hostility is easy, compassion is difficult. To be a part of this community, you certainly don't need to agree with me on everything. I've always encouraged you to think for yourself and never follow blindly. But you do need to agree with some of my core values like: intellectual honesty, tolerance, compassion, holism, and openmindedness. You must show a basic level of tolerance for diversity and you also need to adhere to the principle of intellectual charity when discussing the pros and cons of various nondual paths. If you don't agree with such principles, that's fine, you just have no business posting on this forum. Please help me keep this community in line with this high standard of discourse, so it doesn't devolve into the kind of low-consciousness finger-pointing that we see all across the web. And none of this should be taken to mean: "So Leo is always right?" No! Leo is just a guy on the web who shares ideas with you. Be very intelligent in how you understand and apply these nuanced and tricky ideas. And none of this should be taken to mean: "Leo is saying that all teachings are identical and equally valid." No! That's obviously not the case. Some teachings are downright absurd. Use of good discernment is ALWAYS necessary. But even if a teaching is absurd, you're still not entitled to troll it or crusade against it. Your actions always speak louder than your words. If you choose to engage in debate or crusading, that shows us exactly what your level of development is, no matter how many enlightenments you may think you've had.

It also includes those who confuse their first enlightenment as the end of the road. And those who behave like cocky fools after enlightenment, thinking they've figured everything out. And those who use enlightenment to bash duality, not realizing that nonduality includes duality. One's behaviors speaks louder than one's enlightenments.

@Extreme Z7 No, more like psycho-spiritual purification or chakra cleansing. As your "energy-body" is purified, energy blockages are unblocked and you become more spiritually attuned. Very much like a Jedi gets attuned to The Force. Your mind and body become clear, untainted by low-consciousness cravings and fears. You're permeated by a thirst for consciousness, love, and the Infinite. Materialistic matters become irrelevant in your calculations in the same way that as an adult you no longer crave kids toys. You acquire a kind of glow or radiance. Most people have no idea how much emotional baggage they have locked up in their entire body. The energy flow is all twisted up from a lifetime of low-consciousness living, repressed emotions, and repressed passions. Ego takes a heavy toll on the body. When you're stuck in your head, you're not aware that you're also very much stuck in your body. There is no hard separation between mind/body/spirit. It's one interrelated system. Fixing this whole mess is another one of the very important aspects of spiritualy/nonduality that Zen Devils neglect. When it comes to your happiness and well-being, clearing this up is probably gonna have a bigger impact than enlightenment.

Justification is an ego game. Nothing is ever wrong. Reality IS Love at the most existential level. Hate is just a low consciousness manifestation of love. This is where the distinction between small nonduality and BIG nonduality is really helpful. Nonduality includes all of duality within it. It's NOT a rejection of duality. It's an embrace of Absolute Infinity, without any cherry-picking. Duality is what happens when you fail to embrace BIG nonduality. You guys would REALLY benefit from reading the entire The Law of One series and paying very close attention what Ra is teaching you about how intelligent infinity works. It's really hard to explain this to someone who hasn't experienced Divine Love. It's indiscriminate. Go have a direct experience of Divine Love. Then all this will make perfect sense. This is where a psychedelic might be helpful. Do some MDMA or mushrooms or 5-meo until you experience more love than your head can handle.

What I've learned: I will be less effected by my circumstances though honesty, letting go of value, detachment from this social person and taking things less personally. I need to be careful to distinguish what my intuition is telling me and what social conditioning wants me to do. Beliefs = consciously adopted beliefs + programming + assumptions Through eliminating beliefs one will become radical open. Life will become magical again. I need to master one domain. Otherwise I will not be able to create something valuable. I am absolutely free. Only my mind/social survival is limiting me. I just need to get free of social survival. Many philosophers have discovered aspects of nonduality. They knew that language is an illusion and cannot display absolute truth. Many people today are not aware of this. Physics is fascinating. When matter and antimatter come together a huge amount of energy gets set free. Or all those thousands tiny particles that make up our matter (quarks, leptons, neutrinos...) I only work out to stay healthy and to feel good in my body. I don't want to reach some ideal. Just working out for one hour, a combination of endurance, strength and mobility is totally enough if I stay relatively active throughout the rest of the day. I am annoyed when the day does not work out how I imagined and others occupy my free time. I am easily influenced by my father and other persons with authority. There is a huge gap between poor and rich. The poor people become more and more. They make the government responsible for their circumstances and therefore search for other types of government (Trump or the AfD in Germany). We need to care about these people, otherwise conflicts will arise like we are seeing at the moment. Be the change that you want to see. Raise the consciousness of humanity. I am still very very closed-minded. While I read a few pages of "The Law Of One" I noticed how much resistance I have. But it clearly could be possible. Contemplation Pre-Contemplation: Presence, Clarity, Possibility Contemplating: Intent, Openness, Focus, Questioning I don't take Enlightenment seriously enough. I need to study other traditions more. Enlightenment is just the beginning. How I am moving towards becoming a sage: Eating less raisins and exchanging it through tea and raw fruits. It starts to work out. Reading a lot in the Book of Not Knowing. I am getting to the really interesting parts now. It is getting easier to take really cold showers. Feeling and observing my emotions. Not repressing them. Dealing with them. Creating an intuition incubator - simply a little journal/note book with things my intuition told me. I review it every day and look what I can do, so that I really act upon it and don't forget it. Surrendering to this confusion whether I should just listen to my intuition or to be more realistically. Visualization and assessing my values. I found a technique to stay awake in the morning. Just sitting upright in bed, and not lying down again. A big difference! Working out intuitively without any plan. Self Love. Feeling strong emotions of love with become almost painful. Having quite a few "successful moments" with neti neti and contemplation. I feel like I am growing a lot at the moment. What my intuition is telling me lately / how I will become a sage: Taking more and longer cold showers My life purpose could be AI and programming. I could develop apps which analyze how people think, their beliefs and how they should move towards Enlightenment. But I also could become a coach because I recognized how much I like analyzing the psyches and shadows of other people. I could combine AI and coaching! Writing a big review about 2016 Meditating and Contemplating throughout the day for short periods of time Doing more mindfulness meditations Creating a strong morning routine Not spending much time on the Internet in the morning

The problem with responding to critique is that it makes one look defensive, and only further feeds accusations of acting from ego. It creates debate, which is always anti-consciousness. There is no consciousness to be had in a debate. All ego needs to do to win, is drag consciousness into a debate. Instant win. Sorta like fake news. In the battle between low consciousness vs high consciousness, low consciousness has more latitude and power. High consciousness has to stay high consciousness, which often just looks like silence. It's sorta like waging war on terrorists. Every time you do it, you're forced to stoop to their level, and by definition you lose and they win, because their goal it to drag you down to their level. Dragging people down is much easier than lifting them up. It's interesting to see how a spiritual master like Jesus allowed himself to get nailed to a cross by refusing to stoop. Now that is true embodiment of nonduality. And a very rare thing.

A) This is trivial because when one speaks of "raising" consciousness, it's a linguistic device. Not a literal existential claim. It's a way of speaking to help people understand certain things about this work. Again, you assume I'm naive about these things because you like to nitpick rather than seeking to be inclusive and hearing the intent of the communication. This is what happens when you let the left side of your brain become a lawyer for the ego. It can nitpick anything anyone says. You could take the words of Buddha himself and make him look like an ignorant devil if you so desire. B) All nonduality teaching and communication is METAPHORICAL. As it must be. You cannot speak of enlightenment non-metaphorically. EVER! So whether you choose to speak of it in religious metaphor or scientific rationalist metaphor, it's all metaphor requiring decoding. C) The self resides in EVERYTHING. Thought is an aspect of self. EVERYTHING is an aspect of self. Atman is Brahman, Brahman is Atman. Your conceptions of nonduality are excluding duality, which is an immature conceptual of nonduality. No masterful nondual teacher rants against duality, mundane life, education, mastery, or other people teaching nonduality using alternative styles. Because he understands the game. I could choose to teach nonduality by only speaking of it in terms of Jesus. Jesus this... Jesus that... Satan this... Satan that... And that would be no less valid than whatever your favorite way would be. I encourage you to seek to be more inclusive and generous, rather than nitpicky and harping. The ultimate goal is full acceptance of reality. So long as you harp, you aren't really understanding of reality, or embodying nonduality.

You haven't researched this topic deeply enough, so you can still handwave it away as "merely placebo" in your mind. With more research, you will no longer be able to do that. Again, I'm not a fool. You think I haven't taken into account placebo in my research? The bigger question is, have you taken into account circularity in your thinking? The problem is that you guys who think you know about nonduality by learning it from Jed McKenna or the like, is that you generally don't do research. Because, hey, your premise is it gets in the way of enlightenment. And then when you hear something "different", you easily handwave it away because, hey, it's not related to enlightenment. (Notice the circularity?) But of course that's only because you haven't done enough research to have of a bigger picture to see that there are many other facts left unexplained. In your mind everything seems explained, but that's only of course because you haven't exposed yourself to the broader set of experiences available. If you did a powerful psychedelic, or seen a person channeling, or spoken with a real healer, or spoken to a shaman, or seen an actual spirit, or encountered a non-human entity, or had an enlightened master read your mind, or had an enlightened master transform your body-energy, or seen an aura, or traveled out of body, or had a near death experience, or did a past-life regression under hypnosis, or re-lived memories of being in your mother's womb, or researched schizophrenia, or researched multiple-personality disorder, or researched many other edge-cases in brain science like split-brain patients and phantom limb phenomena... you'd be MUCH more openminded, and better off for it. But all that stuff is "just a distraction from enlightenment" so I guess you don't care to waste your precious time investigating it. Although I find it odd that you don't mind wasting your precious time arguing about how nothing but enlightenment matters. The problem with modern "skepticism" and "rationalism" is that it isn't real skepticism, but a veil for ignorance. It's become a weapon to shoot down all edge-case phenomena -- the very thing I've been warning you about and trying to inoculate you from by teaching radical openmindedness and concepts from epistemology. But people still think I'm kidding. Don't think that just because you understand enlightenment, or have had an enlightenment experience or two, that all the sudden your web of beliefs doesn't have you by the balls. It still does.

I'm 18 years old and I've been blessed so to say with an incredible philosophycal construct since ever. Two years ago I've got depersonalization/derealization, in which the world around me seemed to be pointless and my sense of self totally gone, not feeling alive/human anymore. I went to two different psychiatrists, but the magical pill cure didn't worked, as I was unaware of nonduality at the time, being an atheist. I've been addicted to video games and pornography and I soon as I managed to erase them from my life, everything seem to be falling apart, due to ego death I assume. I basically found out that I'm going through a Kundalini experience (dark night of the soul) and it's a horrible necessary process, but it seems so hard to cope with it. All the existential crisis, OCD, pannic attacks and exhaustion are totally fucking up my life. I've been meditation and contemplating for some months now and I'll continue onward with the self inquiry work, hoping to see the light again. I wish that Leo could respond and encourage me, as he knows what I'm going through. My Intuition/God wants to change me, but it's hard as hell, man. Thank you for your time.

And that is my personal choice as to how to guide people on this path. Every teacher is forced to make a choice. There is no way to teach nonduality without making a stylistic choice. If you stay openminded, you may discover my choice has hidden merits beyond what you presently can envision.

@jse How easily one could use that very excuse against all nonduality teachings. That's the chief reason why the world is 99% unenlightened.

That's almost certainly false in my view. I've met healers (both enlightened and non-enlightened) personally who've spoken of their successes, I've had healers work on me, and if you spend even a bit of time doing research into various mystical traditions and alternative healing modalities, you'll see they don't make sense unless you allow for healing to be real. Just one of the cool perks of mastering nonduality

Important Note: I'm not claiming any of the following is true. It might all be false. The following material requires extreme openmindedness and nuanced discernment, which many people reading this may not have. So don't blame me for bringing you something "crazy". That said, if you really want to strain your brain, read the following book (available here for free as PDF). This gives you a little taste of the periphery of spiritually and how much stuff you still need to explain in your worldview aside from nonduality. Again, my purpose here is to encourage radical openmindedness, big-picture thinking, and research. Not to convince you of any particular point of view. Nor do I claim that I believe all of it. Think of this more as an exercise in radically new ways of seeing the world. The reason I post this, is because I see people getting cocky about how much they think they understand reality. And I want you to be open to the possibility that there's a lot you don't understand. I of course include myself in this. And I want you to see the lengths I go to to keep my mind open, yet still rational and common-sensical. To me, openmindedness is no mere platitude, but an active, alive, everyday way of life. I recommend you start reading from page 69. And challenge yourself to finish at least all of Book I. Enjoy! And don't get lost down the rabbit hole

This is not true. The ego is not thinking. The "ego" is the sense of self created by conditioned likes and dislikes, desires and fears. Its a very very small part of the chain of causation. Surrender is a process of the intellect using non dual vision to gradually reprogramme the likes and dislikes so that the mind naturally rests in the vision of nonduality (spiritual purification) - the fact that there is nothing to resist in terms of everyday fears and desires. Once nonduality is established in the mind, there is still desire, but the desire is for harmony rather than egoic resistance. The ego is still there, but its seen as a notion in awareness and not mistakenly taken as the person. The enlightened mind is surrender and the way the mind achieved this is through using the intellect to neutralize the egos binding likes and dislikes.

These "paths" prepare the mind for enlightenment - they neutralize the likes and dislikes so that the vision of non duality is revealed in the mind naturally. The point is not to try to manufacture contrived kindness or compassion, but to understand that every time you make a judgement about something you are violating "dharma" because you are attacking the Self, your self, God. God is everything, it is nondual. The ego is the thing that likes to "play God" by deciding what is right and what is wrong. As you drop all notions of right and wrong your natural state will become peace, love, kindness, understanding, compassion naturally arises because your mind is not deluded by its likes and dislikes. I dont know whether you have noticed this, but maintaining a dislike (in the hope that you think it will make you more holy) does not make you any more compassionate. Its normal to dislike gross violations of dharma, like harm, yes harm is "wrong" but compassion should be your main focus if you want enlightenment, again not contrived compassion, but an understanding that people are victims of God's programming, nothing here is personal, although there IS freewill and that is the freewill for you to purify your mind and stop focusing on social or political issues (if thats what you are doing) because developing the ego is nothing to do with enlightenment. But all the other gratuitious likes and dislikes need to go in order to realize nondual vision in your subjective experience. Krishna (the personification of God) in the Bhagavad Gita says that "I am the mind that is not opposed to Dharma". This means the enlightened mind needs nothing yet desires to contribute. Its not really a case of saying there is no right and wrong, its just a case of getting rid of the arrogant ego that tries to impose "right and wrong" on Gods creation. Read between the lines when responding to me please, dont take what i say about "God" at face value Ultimately there is no creation or God, there is just awareness, but if you take yourself to be a spiritual seeker then you need to purify the mind by doing these neutralizing practices. Thats the "work" aspect of enlightenment. Also, just mulling over what you said about the selfless thing, its not really about trying to be a helper of people, its more about just doing ones "duty". In India nobody is thanked for doing what they do, because their society is built upon this notion of dharma, of contributing your part without making a song or dance about it. This is a desireless way to live, and is conducive to creating the kind of mind capable of understanding nonduality. In the West, if we dont say thanks we are discredited, because there seems (to me at least) this idea of entitlement. If we ask a favour of someone and they do it, were expected to roll out the red carper and thank them and owe them and such. Because this is a dog eat dog desire-fuelled society, its self serving rather than duty oriented. I would not confuse altruism with selflessness, the selflesness being spoken of in the traditions and enlightenment cultures is just a lack of the conceit, the lack of "entitlement" that we westerners seem to have bred into us from day one. Were taught that were "losers" if we dont get what we want, so it becomes a dog eat dog society. Being "altruistic" is the same vanity taken to the other extreme. I recommend heartily a visit to India, you can feel the sense of dharma there, but nobody is trying to go beyond that in an attempt to "help" others, its just a very casual I do my thing, you do yours but we both don't screw each other over to gain the upper hand. Yes, there are lost of little tax fiddles and all the usual selfish stuff going on too, its not a perfect place, (because were human, and the Self is the negative stuff too) but the point is that it isn't about being a saint either. Its just about not breaking the number one rule: "no harm".

I'm planning to release a video on this topic in the future. Been gathering my notes for over a year now on this topic. There's a lot to say from all the psychology and nonduality research. In the meantime, to avoid making your kids closedminded ideologues, guide them towards openmindedness and investigation of direct experience. Teach them not to accept ready-made answers, but derive understanding from direct observation. Teach them the difference between beliefs and awareness. Teach them the difference between hearsay and direct experience. Teach them that not-knowing is better than knowing. And demonstrate all this yourself.

Thats fine, thats your reality and it the results of your actions will fructify so you continue to see "sad little pathetic egos" and in the process destroy your own self worth. Because did you notice, youre attacking your own ego when you attack mine? Then ironically you look for "spiritual" or philosophical solutions to get rid of your own self inflicted pain. That is delusion. Im not offended because everything is the same. Thats nonduality. Are you learning something?

Another view on enlightenment....and spirituality....that's different. I copied and pasted my comment I posted on Leo's 5meo video interview with Martin Ball. Reiki is first off non-demonational or religious. Rei means spiritually guided and ki means energy, the vital life force or the universal life energy. Reiki is guided by spiritual consciousness. This is a non physical energy that animates all living things. And to some it would be interpreted as the Holy Spirit or God living within us. Reiki is a form of energy healing. Reiki guides itself with its own wisdom, rather than requiring the direction of the practitioner. Purging energy from your stomach as what Martin describes about 5-meo-HDTV reminds me of clearing the energy from your solar plexus chakra, which is where you hold all of your emotions. Ki, also known as prana, chi, ti, biofield energy, etc. is thought to be the underlying energy of everything that exists. Ki is influenced by the mind. If you have positive healthy thoughts, your Ki becomes stronger. If you have unhealthy, negative thoughts, your Ki is weakened or becomes unhealthy. It’s so interesting because I’m sure you’ve noticed that our physical health does have a connection to our emotions. Like when we are depressed or aka have negative energy we are sluggish and it can weaken our immune systems while being positive we have a tendency to have more physical energy and get things done. Life becomes so wonderful when we no longer allow ourselves to be governed by our emotions. The HOLY SPIRIT = ENLIGHTENMENT, nonduality, etc. like Leo mentions in his video.......

This is delusion. Its just snobbery. Mastery is a relative concept, born of relativistic ideas. Its got nothing to do with nondulaism. You cannot marry nondualism with dualism. In the egoic mind you can, you can have your stupid ideals and messed up distorted misconceptions about nonduality as much as you want. And hold both as paradox. This is still ego tho, and its nothing to do with nonduality. Nonduality is the vision you understand when duality is finished, uprooted from the mind. Its not a both / and, its one or the other. You cant be deluded and be undeluded at the same time.

@LetTheNewDayBegin Awareness is not trapped in the self. The self is an illusion within awareness. Self doesn't remain because it never existed in the first place. The self can NEVER become enlightened because enlightenment is the awareness of no-self. Free will isn't a miracle. It's an illusion (of control) which causes all your suffering and separates you from Truth. Ask yourself this: Why do you want free will? If you have it, you can never be happy, because it means you must always be on-guard. Nonduality is a path of surrendering control. This whole issue is one of power and control. You -- ego -- wants to think it controls stuff. But in fact it doesn't. And to believe that you do control stuff is the chief delusion that causes your suffering. So when you gonna wise up and give up the game? I mean... you can keep seeking power, but at some point you're gonna realize (hopefully) that the greatest power is total surrender. THE WHOLE PURPOSE OF THE SELF IS TO CONTROL STUFF! (But it always fails in the end.) So you're playing a game you cannot ever win.

I've recently realized that the reason that I've felt as though I already have some understanding of what enlightenment is like because I underwent depersonalization/derealization back in high school when I tried weed and began smoking regularly. According to Shinzen Young, DP/DR is like the evil twin of enlightenment. Based on the other perspectives I've seen on DP/DR, the experience is incredibly dark. It's some weird sort of "half-realized" state where the ego doesn't entirely surrender itself and the person begins to see the flimsiness of reality and the movie-like qualities of life. My own experience of it nearly destroyed my life, although I didn't know what was happening to me at the time. This makes me wonder whether guys like Jed Mckenna or Steven Norquist whose interpretation on enlightenment is much darker than guys like Echart Tolle are "wrong" in their interpretation of nonduality or if their's different forms of truth-realization or if all these people just have a mental illness. It's all quite confusing.

I've recently realized that the reason that I've felt as though I already have some understanding of what enlightenment is like because I underwent depersonalization/derealization back in high school when I tried weed and began smoking regularly. According to Shinzen Young, DP/DR is like the evil twin of enlightenment. Based on the other perspectives I've seen on DP/DR, the experience is incredibly dark. It's some weird sort of "half-realized" state where the ego doesn't entirely surrender itself and the person begins to see the flimsiness of reality and the movie-like qualities of life. My own experience of it nearly destroyed my life, although I didn't know what was happening to me at the time. This makes me wonder whether guys like Jed Mckenna or Steven Norquist whose interpretation on enlightenment is much darker than guys like Echart Tolle are "wrong" in their interpretation of nonduality or if their's different forms of truth-realization or if all these people just have a mental illness. It's all quite confusing.

The next level vision is becoming a Sage. You should be always asking how can you get the most out of life! Ask yourself “what is the best life possible for a human being?” This answer is available to everyone of us but no one taught us. The greatest human beings on earth were not entrepreneurs, celebrities, athletes, political leaders, CEOs, engineers, nor academics, nor self-help teachers; THEY WERE SAGES AND MYSTICS. Great for us is who is getting the most juice out of life, not the status and money and stupid stuff. What does it mean to be a sage? They are people like Buddha, Christ, Heraclitus, Socrates, Marcos Aurelius, Confucius, Rumi, Yogananda, Ghandi, Ramana Maharshi, The Dalai Lama, Osho, Sadhguru, Ken Wilber, Peter Ralston and so on. It is not a matter of success or achievement; it is a quality of self-mastery (not a meditation master but a TRUE MASTER OF BEING HUMAN, A MASTER OF UNDERSTADING REALITY AND LIFE). These people can really enjoy life as it is. Key qualities of a sage: - Commitment to Truth - Commitment to Consciousness, Goodness and Love and embodiment of them effortlessly - Turn inwards to transform themselves - This is well beyond enlightenment Vision of The Modern Sage We are taking Eastern Nonduality and we are paring that with the Ancient Greek Philosopher and a bit of artist/scientist. It is the modern Renaissance Man. He had mastered consciousness, but he has also a deep conceptual understanding of life and reality too. It is a union of the left and right brain and you don’t want to do it in a way that you are living in a cave but you use your understanding of the world to solve real world problems. YOU ARE IN THE WORLD. You are highly creative and productive. What a Sage is not He is not a smart and cold intellectual or academic who lives in theory. A sage is not an ideological crusader. How to become a Sage? The vision is more important than the how. You will figure it out in the process. If you have a strong and juicy vision, the how will solve by itself. START WORKING ON DEEPENING THIS VISION! Set your top value as Truth and Understanding (Truth for Truth’s sake). A radical turning inwards is necessary; you will need to free yourself from materialism. Also, there has to be a purification of your body, mind, emotion and habits. As you turn inwards, you will develop a strong energy body. It means that you can take emotions that are coming and you alchemize it, you convert them into love and Truth. Also what is required is massive theoretical learning. Osho read 150,000 books! Sometimes people think that they should only meditate because reading books is bullshit but this is really misguided. There is much more understanding to be had beyond enlightenment. You will need to look for the juicy knowledge. Exploring non-ordinary states of consciousness is crucial for the sage (you can do this with psychedelics, special breathing or meditation techniques and so forth). Being creative is important for a sage; listening to that muse and living that out, benefiting the world (the Life Purpose Course). You will also need to develop unconditional love and compassion for the suffering of others. Also, to become a sage you will probably want to help others raise their awareness and that will definitely merge with your Life Purpose, one way or another. Be careful because there are tons of ways that awareness can be raised. WE NEED PEOPLE TO INFUSE THESE CAREERS, FIELDS AND BUSINESSES WITH CONSCIOUSNESS AND AWARENESS. This vision is not for everybody. Objections What about Life Purpose? Don’t take becoming a sage or enlightenment as stopping you from having a life purpose. That would be failing to embrace paradox. Enlightened people are the most alive human beings on earth and purpose drive people ever! The Life Purpose teaches you how to be creative and create a career; find that! You don’t want to be enlightened and working on 7/11. You want to be enlightened and creating stuff, self-expressing! Becoming a sage is a personal purpose, don’t confuse it with career purpose. All of this is an illusion? Why work on that? Don’t get this wrong. To master yourself you need to take this enterprise really fucking seriously. You have to be after understanding, not success. Since this is a difficult goal, you will need a longer term horizon (10 years +). What is the other alternative rather than becoming sage? You have no better alternative than becoming a sage!

@Beyond Words Nonduality means everything is infinitely interrelated. It's not like consciousness is one thing, reality is another thing, meditation is a third thing, and enlightenment is a fourth thing. IT'S ALL ONE INFINITE THING! The distinctions you make between things constitute reality. And all these distinctions are arbitrary. It's like you're partitioning an infinite-sized hard drive. How many partitions does an infinite-sized hard drive have? And of course scientific method is a part of S. Otherwise it couldn't exist S includes everything possible.