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The 2 biggest challenges I faced during meditation is physical pain and sleepiness - until recently. I meditate in the cover of night, when everyone sleeps in the other rooms. Leaning my back on the chair's backrest will make sleepiness kick in, if I don't lean my back, physical pain will start to distract me. How I solved this? By slowly drinking 750 ml of very strong Black Tea 15 min before the practice, my meditation session effortlessly skyrocketed from 20 min to 120 min in one night! Here's how it went: 0-31 min - Concentration Meditation: (on breath): I noticed how the ego will use different kinds of distractions (positive, negative and neutral thoughts) to keep me in the Great Illusion, this made me slightly angry at the my ego's nature. I also felt waves of gratitude and slight euphoria wash over me at the end. short break- to pee and just stand up (it's extremely bad to sit for more then 30 min without standing up, read google) 35-67 min - Do Nothing: I managed to enter some deep "nothingness states" in short bursts, I wasn't sleeping nor "present". short break 70 min-102 min - Neti-Neti Self Inquiry: During this practice I noticed anger build up, as though the ego didn't want to acknowledge it doesn't exist. At the end of this practice I opened my eyes and looked at my hands: 1 sec they felt mine, the other sec they didn't feel mine, then again mine, not mine, mine, not mine. During this I "felt" my consciousness "quickly shift" from duality to non-duality. This lasted for about 30 sec. Mind Blowing! short break (just laid on the floor contemplated on the experience) 110-135 min - Concentration Meditation: Now I started to feel the effects of tea wear off (fuck), so sleepiness started to kick in. Still meditated though. I slept extremely deep. My dreams were unusually vivid and long. May Infinity Bless You!

Neti Neti

About a month ago on the 3rd day of a meditation retreat I became aware of that my present sensations are more fundamental to reality than the language that is layered on top of it. So all meaning, values and morals are completely groundless. I red the book 'Neti Neti Meditation' by Andre Doshim Halaw later that day and it talked about non-duality or suchness which seems to be what I became aware of. He also said that there is this nothingness that is deeper then suchness. In one of Leos videos he said that non-duality is couched in nothingness. Yet sometimes when people talk about enlightenment they sometimes seem to talk about non-duality and nothingness at the same time without making a clear distinction between the two, which is very confusing to me. Isn't enlightenment the realization of nothingness? What does non-duality have to do with that? I got the insight while doing the do nothing/letting go technique. If i want to pursue enlightenment should i try to get back to that state, doing the do nothing technique or is that only going to take me to non-duality and not nothingness? Or is starting a self inquiry practice a better alternative? Even tho I've gotten really good at doing nothing and I've only done self inquiry a handful of times. Any information, book tips or resources related to the topic would be greatly appreciated.

@Delmo Sel-Inquiry (Neti-Neti) will make you realize for yourself that death is an illusion of the survivalist mind. In order to survive, the survivalist mind created the illusion of death.

Three years ago man, i was a mess. I grew up with assholes, drug addicted alcoholic friends and that's exactly what i have ended up. Anyway, not to bore you with all the details, Fast forward a year, move away from that cancer city and i say no more. Stop smoking stop drinkin( hardest thing i ever done cuz i'll be drinking since 14) start working out, listening to Leo, with my then orange kinda way of looking at life and doing all good. Started seriously working on my music career. Loving everything Leo is teaching me until we get to enlightenment. What the fuck is that ? spiri shit, new age shit, i hate that shit, i'm atheist what the fuck leo and all that jazz. Lucky or unlucky for me, listening to the neti neti episode, i'm walking with my dog, earbuds going, fine, i won't change this stupid episode about "enlightenment" dunno what the fuck is this, and i don't care. hippie religious shit. Fast forward, who I am what i am ? and than puff. I died. I'm dead. In fact. I never lived. I'm nowhere to be found and in the same time i am everything. I'm nothing and everything. My internal voice just goes somehow to the periphery of my mind in that second like billions of insights explode in my mind. The line from the bible comes in mind. I'm the alpha and the omega and things like oooh this is what they are talking about, this is there big God who they don't even know it is. OMG god exists ? and its me ? its this ? its all of this. and all thata jazz bla bla bla, ya'll know how it goes on with this stuff. I just have a mystical expirience that i shit my pants i fall on my knees start to yelling " Vai de pula mea !" Which means in romanian something like " Oh my fucking dick" Anyway. Fast forward 2 years later: I wake up in the morning and 1)I go for a run, come back take a cold shower 2)Do the wim hoff method, streching yoga, meditate for 25,drink that leo's smoothie take leo's suppliments and run to work. 3) i have a cool ass job so i listen for like 5-6 hours a day to audiobooks. Everything about enlightenment, philosophy and leo's books 4)Come home, take a 20 minute nap, 2-3 times a week take an ice bath, focus meditation for 25 than vocalise for 1 hour. 5)Once a week do the shamanic breath, if not go do some breath work and mindfulness meditation for 45 minutes. Eat leo's soup and commute, fuck my girlfriend, eat with her ( while maybe watch Jordan Peterson cuz she digs him and i also learn something cuz i'm obssesed) 6)Than read maybe a half hour, or do some new technique, exercise that i just learn today from some book or somthing that i already knew 7) Go for a night time vipassana meditation for 30 min , hit the bed an repeat. That's what i do 5 times a week, maybe saturday i go a little harder, do on hour of wim hof, or shamanic breathing, do like 4 hours of meditation or somthing, than at night i go out and get fucked up like crazy. And that what i did last saturday and Jesus, Something happened on sunday. I was so hung over that i think i had like a nervous breakdown or somthing. Like nothing bad happened, but i don't know, all my conceptions and like my mind, started like a train that hits a wall or going of the rails like crashing in somthing and just ..just crash. My mind broke down, but i was fine, like the watcher, pure awareness but it was super disorientating and the ground , or at least my minds ground has fallen away and its just, wierd. SO I didn't really wrote in this forum cause it seemed like a waste of time, i could have worked and meditated while typing away my precious minutes but i think i'm gonna have a break this week. I will be meditating for an hour a day and doing my vocalisation and nothing else ! No more reading no more learning no more grasping understanding and bla bla. Do nothing. And yeah this will be my journal. Or not, maybe i will get my energy back and with that my obsession too and i will have no time for this.

Yea exactly! You're already aware because you are already it! To put something on awareness isn't like our thoughts are focused on the awareness, it's more like you just are that, and you can become aware of that awareness. Sounding crazy huh... I'll have a read at Neti-Neti @WindInTheLeaf you have no choice but to be aware of it? Wouldn't you say? You are already it, and you can be aware of the it!

"If you put awareness on something, it exists" How can you put "awareness" on "something" if they are the same thing? Try doing Neti-Neti self inquiry.

I've done LSD but I expect a completely different experience. im going to do 1.5g but with chocolate so it would effectively be like 2g. gonna lay in my bed at home the whole time. I already laid in nature for 10 hours on lsd, so I think I should be fine. will I be able to follow youtube lectures or do the neti neti method on them? or will they just take me for a ride?

I tried to do a Self-Inquiry the way described in the Neti-Neti book recommended by Leo on his book-list! After about 10 min into inquiring myself, I noticed that "Me" exists only when "vibrations" (everything from the "knowing" faced of reality, senses, thoughts, inner voice...) are present, as soon as these "vibrations" get weaker or almost disappear so does this "me". The "me" watching life unfold is actually life unfolding, or more accurately, the being "observing" these vibrations is the "vibrations" themselves! I also noticed that "me/the observer" pops in and out of existence is a very fast and almost unnoticeable manner. So was this a proper insight derived from the "not-knowing"? Or still a form of a belief from the "knowing"?

Yes that's neti neti. It's part of self inquiry. This neti neti is done to relax your focus from objects. stop asking who am I if that doesn't work for you. There are bunch of other more practical, contemplative questions. But from reading your posts, I'm assuming that you have a limited understanding on Self-inquiry. Search Self-inquiry and listen to at least 3-4 teachers breaking this down. Seach for the commonalties in their interpretations. That's the bulk of the work. Anyway I'm listing some of the questions that work for me. 1) '' What is it, that knows this experience?'' 2) ''That which knows this experience, is it attached to this experience?'' 3) ''That which knows this experience, does it have a boundary?'' 4) ''That which knows this experience, does it have a color, shape, size, location etc?'' 5) ''That which knows this experience, does it change with the changing experience?'' 6) ''That which knows this experience, how does it knows it's presence?'' 7) ''This knowingness, is it ever present or it comes and goes?'' 8) ''That which knows this experience, is that an experience itself?'' The answer to these questions is never verbal or something like, ''I don't know/I don't care''. These questions are here to facilitate the observation. Always stay with your present experience. Never go to thoughts about what should or should not happen right now

cant do that. isnt that neti neti what youre describing? and what questions am i supposed to be asking? if i ask who am i, i get an answer -"no idea"

I've also used weed to make my meditation sessions more present to the moment and differienciate what I am and what not, try to focus on that. Its called neti-neti meditation.

Hey pluto, I did some self-inquiry from the neti neti method and I just ended up depressed. I looked for everything I could be, but just ended up finding nothing and then Leo said that nothingness is enlightenment and that I am nothingness. That just got me bummed out because isn't enlightenment life-changing? Maybe I didn't do the technique right but this was the video:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie For the last couple of meditation sessions I tried taking the concept of a philosophical zombie and then substract it from myself. Such a human could have thoughts and emotions or he couldnt function in the world, the only thing lacking is the awareness experiencing all of it. I try to get a real sense of it. I guess this is simmilar to Neti-Neti, maybe its helpful for someone.

An analogy. So you have undertaken the initial stages of the self investigation process. And the initial stages of self investigation involve what's called a 'neti neti' process: - I'm not this. - I'm not my thoughts. - I'm not my sensations. - I'm not my feelings. - I'm not my body. - I'm not my mind. The 'neti neti' process is only the first stage of the path of self inquiry. It only tells us what we are not. It is necessary to see what we are. It is not enough to simply see that the rope is not a snake. We have to see the rope. If our investigation only takes us as far as 'it is not a snake' then there is still the possibility that later on we may mistake it for a stick or a shadow. So we have to go further than just seeing 'it is not a snake'. We have to see it is a rope. We have to go further than seeing simply what I am not. We have to see what we are. In other words: 'what we are has to see what it is'. That I that I am has to know itself clearly. You are not a body or a mind. You have to see that you are pure awareness. You are inherently peaceful. In other words: 'you cannot be disturbed'. How do see clearly what we essentially are? In the exactly the same way that we see clearly what anything essentially is. If you want to know what something is, you give it your attention. If you want to know about Mathematics, you give your attention to Mathematics. If you want to know about music you direct your attention towards music. Whatever you want to deeply investigate, you simply give that thing your attention. And as a result of shining the light of your attention on that object, what it is gradually or suddenly becomes clear. If you want to know what you essentially are you have to give yourself your attention. That is the essence of self-inquiry or prayer.

So i been reading Erich Neumann Origins and history of consciousness cause I heard it's a good way to enter Jungs work. I red a few of his works here and there in the past but now i wanna get seriously in it and i want to ask, especially Leo Gura, Do you think he was enlightened ? Seems to me that his work is about how to get enlightened but in the most geeky, scientifically way, but in the end, he comes across like a mystic. What do you guys think about it. And Leo, if you agree do you think there is some value in his work and maybe make a video about him/his works. ? By the way, Leo, change my life. That fucking neti neti, man. I died two years ago. I saw the tail of the ox. Now i have no way of going back into ignorance, i have to see it all, have to know what is on the end of this rabbit hole.

It's not an either/or understanding, but a both/and. Meaning there is only me, awareness, so no delineated line really exists between, me and the objects that appear within me. However, there is a gap or space that can figuratively be created to "see" (neti-neti) thought and other objects as not Self, until Self-knowledge is firm. In this regard there is a feeling that "I", pure awareness, just AM and Im aware OF all objects and they are false/illusions. This is helpful for discriminating the real from unreal. There is a shift in perspective from being identified with/as the I-thought/ego (thinking it is me), to be-ing awareness, that's just "associated" with the apparent person. This seemed a bit long winded, sorry.

The two I like the best are Ramana Maharshi's "who am I" self inquiry and neti-neti (not this, not that). Hopefully you know what I referring to? If not, I will explain. If they are effective is up to fate I guess.

Some things have to be clear to you - you are not your thoughts, you can never be the monkey mind. This is classic identification with thinking!! I prescribe you the Eckhart Tolle pill. If you can be aware of it, it's not you. Neti neti. That simple.

I'm quoting my own post to clarify what I mean, hopefully, lol Everything is illusion/dreaming, except what you really are, awareness/presence. To recognize what you are, you need to negate (neti-neti) or see through, what you've thought was real (phenomena), then you realize you've always been it, awareness. But, the dreaming/illusion/phenomena, although seen through, "persists", meaning, thoughts/feelings/sensations/sucky situations/illness, etc ....continue to be experienced (by no-one...lol). In that sense, there is no getting out of the dream/illusion, although you know it's not real. Peace.

Hey everyone, I just wanted to share some images I have created after I had quite an intense experience last night after doing Leos Neti Neti Enlightenment Guided Inquiry. After I watched Leos video on The Truth about Spiritual Enlightenment multiple times, I thought I had gained a logical grasp of it. Neti Neti has been the only way I have been able to accept what I actually am in reality as truth and experience a glimpse of it myself. My favourite thing about it is that your mind begins to open up while doing the inquiry until it is open enough to question the very nature of all your beliefs systems. It honestly feels like your mind is being warped and every belief system you once held is just recognised as a story and thought. The kind of thoughts that ran through "my" mind when doing this inquiry were - "Could you have actually been born if there wasn't a thought confirming this belief?" & "How could I possibly die if my physical body never existed in the first place?". I'd be happy for you to let me know if you think I'm on the right track after reading the text on the images I posted. I decided to create them because unfortunately even though I am aware of this truth, it is very easy to get sucked back into the mundane world. Thanks

Godammit... I was literally mulling over making a post with this exact title, not even an hour or two ago (although you have put it better than I would have) ... Was just now googling this phrase to get my thoughts together and first thing on google is this post, made 54 minutes ago. Seriously, what the hell? Oh well, either way it got me interested in finally starting neti neti so mission accomplished, I guess. Geez, and I thought I was going to be so original and ask "what" am i, instead of "who" am i? I'm telling you this is crazy.... I'm in a freaking dream....

I have almost been there, countless people have experienced it, it's more probable that it is real. But of course how it is experienced is far different from the concept of it. It can only be truly understood after experiencing it. But the ''i'' is not needed, existence can exist without the notion of an ''i'', it's just superficial language game. From my experiences, what absolute nothingness means is that the true nature of yourself is impersonal nothingness or emptiness, so much that you actually do not exist, you drown in the emptiness until you disappear then you become everything that is, at the end you stop identifying yourself as everything. Now only what IS is, alone. You can trigger this by being the observer yes, you can also trigger it with other methods, like introspection, self-inquiry, neti-neti method, etc.

You've totally missed the point of self inquiry. The whole point of self inquiry is to keep you looking/observing until you break free from delusion. What you call 'me', 'reality' are layers of stories glued together. They can only sustain if they are unexamined/unobserved. The moment you look, shit start disappearing like empty air. Doesn't that ring some bell? maybe you and your whole life stories and constructs are just a house of cards. What is the purpose of Self-inquiry? Its to deconstruct yourself, your beliefs about being a human/alien/nothingness and your world. Observation is the only direct spiritual practice and self inquiry is just a technique to keep you oriented and focused. There are other techniques like spiritual autolysis, mindfulness with labeling, Guided Neti Neti, staying with the I AM etc which basically facilitates the same observation with slightly different spin. Until?? Until all that can be deconstructed is deconstructed. And what is left? That which is Real. The unreal never existed and the real can't be destroyed.

@Applejuice You seem overexcited. First of all, stop chasing states. Awakening is not a state or any kind of form including the feeling of bliss (however, it could be accompanied by it). Based on what you are saying I would say you are on the first stage. Neti Neti process is essential starting point and maybe you already learned what you are not from it. However, this is not even a halfway. Now you need to become conscious who you are! And noone can tell you how long may it take. You will need lots of self inquiry and presence as awareness. You need to become conscious of your unlimited nature. You will need to empty your mind. You are trying to achieve smth while meditating instead of being still. Work on that...