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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.

The first and most important thing to realize is, that nonduality is NOT a concept. All concepts are dualistic by nature because lamnguage and symbols are dualistic by nature. Nonduality is not. This is why you have to have a direct experience in order to truly understand it. You have to become it. It's very helpful to have some understanding about the nature of insight. There is a great video interview series, that Leo did with Peter Ralston, that I highly recommend: https://vimeo.com/181710583 As far as books, also Ralstons material is great, and I also recommend the books of Andre Doshim Halaw. I love them, because they are very short and conscise and crystal clear. I also like Daniel Ingram and Shinzen Young very much. Especially Shinzen has some great descriptions of infinity. There is a great audio progam by him, called The Science of enlightenment. Also Leo's videos about the topic.

@Saumaya Hey I got a question for ya, first of all have you read Neti-Neti Meditation by Andre Doshim Halaw? would you describe your practice as described in that book? And have you read the book of not knowing by peter ralston, did you find it helpfull on your own journey? Thanks for being an inspiration for me brother!

I'm currently reading Neti-Neti Meditation by Andre Doshim Halaw and he already confused me haha, which is good. I am clinging too much to concept of me being awareness. Somewhere in the beginning stated "We are not our senses, perceptions, awareness, consciousness, emotions, bodies, thoughts." Which really made me wonder. What can I be if I am not even awareness? Of course, this is something I have to find out for myself but I was wondering how you guys comprehend this. Is awareness a quality of the Absolute?

@Fredrik Andersson Do you have any sort of spiritual practice and life purpose in mind? I'm not sure where you are on your journey, but I'd look over this regularly until you've got It memorized: actualized.org/start Once you have that down, you'll have a pretty good rough sketch of the important theory for this work. Make sure to watch all the videos and know the stuff really well. You should also buy the book list and life purpose course and work through those. If money is an issue, I recommend at least going to the book review section of the forum and picking ones from there as well as looking through the forum for book recommendations. You should be able to either get books relatively cheap on amazon or ask your local library. Once you expose yourself to enough theory and start doing the work, you'll be on the track to new possibilities. It's important to just drop the belief that sex will make you happy. Most people have sex, and a good chunk of people have great sex lives, but people who live truly ordinary, fulfilling lives are much more rare. Culture just perpetuates the notion that sex is somehow the ultimate thing to strive for, and since most people will never know how deeply fulfilling this work is, they will believe that, and to them, they think they've found ultimate happiness. It's like a poor child playing with a broken happy meal toy, thinking that's the greatest wonder in all the universe. If only he wasn't so ignorant, he might see how overwhelming and grand life could be. Start working on freeing yourself from the misguided belief that sex is going to fix everything and lead to the best life. Here are some recommendations on authors to start off with: Spirituality: Peter Ralston, Jed McKenna, Daniel Ingram; Andre Dolshim Halaw Life Purpose: Gay Hendricks and Cal Newport Newport has a blog: http://calnewport.com/ There are is also ton a free content on YouTube on all of these topics. If you've got money to travel, try doing a vispassana retreat or two with instructors. It could give you the kick in the ass you need. Clean up your diet, get the sleep and exercise you need, and most importantly, have a daily spiritual practice. Try meditating 1 hour per day. To start off with. For getting started, I see two good approaches: 1) Focus on just one habit at a time. Installing one new habit every one or two months can make big difference over time. 2) Do as much as you want, but be okay with doing it badly. I personally more often go with approach two. When I started meditating, I started with two hours per day, but it just mostly consisted of me sitting there with monkey mind. It was still really good for me, as I was building the habit and spending less time in my over-stimulated, unconscious pattern. Sticking around on the forum when you need help should also help keep you on track. Maybe post regularly in the self-actualization journal forum if that's your thing.

I was going to put this in the book review section, but I wanted to put it in the main consciousness forum since the insights from this work have been so quickly actionable in daily practice. God is Nothingness by Andre Dolshim Halaw shattered a lot of my conceptions about the path. I was shocked when I came to the quick realization that I had still been grasping for something, as if the Nothing I had been looking for was a some sort of a physical substrate, despite the fact that I had been told hundreds of times over that this was not the case by a variety of spiritual teachers. Whenever you think you've found yourself, you are not that. I can't really explain why, but when I really internalized this, I felt a reflexive amalgamation of existential terror and pure frustration. It was awesome. I'm going to be referring back to this quick read MANY times throughout my journey. I've noticed that putting the wisdom here into action has also brought about immediate tangible (no-pun intended) results in my practice. A lot of my stumbling blocks in self-inquiry have been resolved. I'm still yet to have my first awakening experience, but a lot of my confusion has been alleviated.

Well, I sit down on my couch and close my eyes I firstly think of what my life will look like if I had a really good eating habit and would use the internet almost never. I try to imagine how good this will feel. Then I visualize what I want my life in general to be like (location, people, environment, activities, life purpose). Mostly then I am in nature meditating with people around me doing the same. I do the Neti-Neti meditation as described in the book "Neti Neti Meditation" by Andre Doshim Halaw.

"Whatever you think cannot be anything more than a thought." "Anything that we can conceive of or perceive is a concept." - Andre Doshim Halaw

Habit-Transformation - Day 16: visualization internet usage - Streak 3 Mindfulness: I had only 6 hours of sleep. I tried to meditate in the morning but quited after half an hour because I was so tired. I almost fell back to sleep. My maths teacher borrowed me an old book of her for first semester maths. I could try to understand the book sometimes in the normal classes because its too easy for me. I just tried to understand the first pages. I did it for about 1 hour and got to the third page... I am doing this to look if I really want to study maths. My tics are coming back again... One of my book orders will arrive tomorrow (Neti Neti Meditation by Andre Doshim Halaw).