Search the Community

From what I understand of the video, @Leo Gura is basically saying that idealism (the belief that all of reality is fundamentally a form of experience/consciousness) is true, because reality is groundless. What kind of leap is that to make? So we agree that reality is grounded in nothing, where anything is possible. Then why is it suddenly such an obvious thing that physical reality is an illusion and that brains do not generate consciousness? If literally ANYTHING is possible within this nothingness, why is a physical reality — where dead things eventually merge to become what we call awareness or consciousness — suddenly not possible in this context? Leo uses unfalsifiable inductive reasoning of the kind you see solipsists use ("you can't view the brain outside the brain") to claim that human consciousness is not generated by the brain, and that's just not sufficient to constitute a logical conclusion. You only have to refer to the "Russell's Teapot" thought experiment to prove how unfalsifiable claims are insufficient by themselves. Even if we grant Leo's assertion that what we call "our universe" is physics within consciousness and not the other way around, we now run into some problems: What happens after death? After all, the idea of death as the end of experience only makes sense in a physical context; if consciousness is generated by the brain. If we were to take seriously this extreme skepticism to what our "minds" tell us, we would have to go through life completely agnostic about what happens after death. Suddenly reincarnation seems plausible — if reality is a groundless "dream machine" that just churns out one groundless experience after another, as Leo also claims. A terrifying scenario, indeed. I have always found comfort in the fact that I know my existence is finite. Becoming an idealist completely shatters this notion. Is this what Leo is suggesting, or have I missed something? Believe it or not, there's an even bigger problem with dismissing all of physical reality as an illusion grounded in experience: Suddenly, everything can fall apart any minute. Why doesn't it? What reason do we have to be shocked if a UFO comes landing or the moon suddenly develops a face that talks? I imagine that the response would be: Because it would all be a dream and it wouldn't matter outside that context. But what about those "dreams" in reality that never end? Dreams featuring infinite lives of suffering? Surely the existence of such "dreams" is unacceptable? I know that my moment-to-moment suffering — whether in a dream or in waking life — is undesirable and would be unacceptable if it were to last for an infinity. This is the reality Leo seems to believe in, and I find it to be not only an amazing leap of logic for an otherwise smart individual, but also a deplorable demonstration of apathy that he seems completely fine with this. He's effectively dismissing all forms of suffering, no matter how gruesome or everlasting, when he admits to believe this suffering actually exists.

I may as well ask this question here rather than create my own thread since it is of a similar nature to Joseph Maynor's question: If the dream allegory is to be used, then everything is to be seen as illusion arising within 'nothingness'. That is, things lack substance and innate existence to them. Why then, do people who claim to be in this 'state' speak to other people as if they're independent minds, whilst appearing to ignore their assertion that 'people' are nothing but paper-thin fleeting illusions? Please explain this to me.

It's all "you." Everything (from the nothingness)...Each spark is probably not a star but a universe that appeared. Going into an ego...embodiment with love.

That tells me that you don’t know your true nature. If you explore more one day you will wake up and realise that what you said is not true... see for yourself... the Truth is nothing exists and you are existence of this nothingness... that’s the closest I can get to articulating

@Patang thank you again! but how do I know that? We assume here that there is nothing behind me as in that "I" am an illusion and the next level is nothingness, like in: nothingness > I (i.e. that there is nothing between the illusion of "I" and nothingness) But how do I know that the relation is not: something so much greater than me that I cannot even imagine it > mind/electric current/neurons > nothingness > me (i.e. that nothingness is rendered in the mind, which then is another subset of something so complex that I cannot even imagine it) Imagine you are a cell in some body: You live in your world (=some body part) and do what you want / have to do (implying for this example that cells act consciously) => the cell might not be aware that it is just a tiny part of the superset (=the body in which it lives), which is again a tiny part of the next superset it resides in (=e.g. the ecosystem<planet<galaxy<galaxy cluster<...<nothingness) and so on, yet the cell lives in the body and imagines that there is nothing behind its existence on the micro level, but here that assumption would be false, as there in fact is something behind its existence (=the body in which it resides). In this example, the cell would do what it does without even imagining that it is just a part of a body, which is a part of the ecosystem and so on. => How do I know that the ultimate superset of my life is not electric current (or something else that is not consciousness)? For example when I meditate, I hear a very subtle background noise / rustling like probably everybody does in a quiet place => this sounds similar to a radio that is not tuned in correctly or the white noise that old TVs produce when no channel is tuned in = electric noise or electric current respectively. So when I sit in quiet meditation and do nothing, sometimes this noise comes to my attention and the way that it reminds me of electricity also makes me wonder if I am not just electricity and this might e.g. be the subtle noise of "me" being constantly created and re-created and maintained or in other words of my being.

1. If nothing exists, why should I care? 2. Does everything literally exist within the nothingness — from heaven to hell and everything in between? 3. Is there any escape from consciousness/experience if it becomes too miserable?

the most important thing is to understand what stops me from ending my life right now? when food, reproduction, love, heaven, fear, death, god, growth, nirvana and whatever else will eventually be exhausted what exactly makes me not to escape from this infinite cycle? when there is no more fear, death, me, you, god, no-god, nothingness, everything, love, humans. when nothing matters, and when you have zero fear and zero care for being alive. what that thing that makes me to doubt killing myself? I think to understand that is beyond knowing absolute truth (but maybe not) and beyond anything my best guess is that you have to commit urself towards fully infinite circle to understand how absolute created itself to realize how you created this infinite myth, this story with no beginning, no end to realize how you became god and created yourself it will take you infinite rebirths thats not some nirvana. not some truth. thats all relative comparing to understanding of how absolute, which never happened never begun, came to be. but u got to be Jedi and die infinite amounts of time thats you evolving from homo sapiens to homo conscious to homo immortalis and beyond, beyond over years that Earth still have thats you evolving your dna and your spirit. and whole humanity reincarnating over and over again. thats you surviving death of universe from heat. you saving humanity and moving to new planet, and to new planet and to new universe. its you eventually finding heavens, becoming absolute, achieving happy end and seeing how you eventually created this mythological universe and came back as a person in this very moment again. life and survival are one coin. when there's no more life, death, fear, love, you, body, soul, mind. what makes you to continue survival?

Nothing! I am just confused by how people describe enlightenment and what it entails. Sometimes it feels like enlightenment means giving up the ego completely, but I see the ego an integral part of non-duality to begin with. Otherwise, I completely agree with enjoying with what is doing. Good question! That is what I am trying to figure out. I would love a description of what absolute means. I can tell you what I have experienced via psilocybin mushrooms: My experiences are quite similar to Leo's enlightenment video that was just released. 1. I have experienced oneness 2. the temporary quality of feeling, sensations, and thoughts. 3. There being no other, because everything comes from within. "It's all me" 3. Deep peace and quietness of the mind as well as stillness that permeates my being. 4. Complete presence in every single moment. 5. Deep understanding and love for myself and others. 6. Loss of control, being awareness itself, not the body. However, my last trip (approximately 3 weeks ago) left me quite lost as I was very aware of illusory nature of my mind-body in comparison to absolute truth and I had trouble pinpointing or grasping deep Truth. I felt that I become conscious of nothingness, the invisible-conscious quality that a lot of people talk about. It's everywhere but nowhere and invisible but not because it was presence. but I did not know what to make of it, what to say about it, how to conceptualize it, as I felt anytime I had a thought about it, I had already lost touch with it. My last trip really exposed the illusory nature of my ego and taught me how important it is to have a empty mind to see what I guess people call the Absolute. The great thing about tripping is that I am very aware of how to get back into this state of mind because the psychedelics forces me to go through it, so I am aware of what it is to have a clear mind. If anybody has any guidance/evaluation regarding this experience and the topic of enlightenment, let me know!

1. If nothing exists, why should I care? This is only a definition of society about existence. 2. Does everything literally exist within the nothingness — from heaven to hell and everything in between? Yes 3. Is there any escape from consciousness/experience if it becomes too miserable? Master Air (green) and Earth (red) and everything will make sense.

The problem with referring to enlightenment as binary is reflected in so many “I’m enlightened now” posts. One can mistake the void, the nothingness, the meaninglessness, the visceral oneness, the “seeing” of relativity, the revealing of the illusion, etc, for “it”. The danger with this binary message is they go no further, because these experiences liberate from the material paradigm, and sure seem to be the pinnacle, never having actually experienced the absolute, the only self, the being, the love that all is. Then, sure, it is binary. But that verbiage is not worth the trouble it gives one on the path. And still, there are no ends nor beginnings, so all is an end and a beginning.

Nono, I mixed up my post before editing correctly When I talked about Adyashanti, he talked about different types of awakenings. You could experience infinite (heart) but no nothingness (mind) (or vice versa). The way he phrased it was that you could be enlightened from the mind for a long time (so you only see that reality has no substance and you are it), then you open your heart and experience infinity too (divine love and deep connection with everything you interact). It corroborate with what Rali from Naked Reality said in multiple videos. @Shanmugam Doesn't answer my question though

@MarkusSweden Because 5-MeO is the Grand Pappy of psychedelics. It shows you the most holistic picture, the most complete, the most nondual. The pure Godhead. It is so mindblowing it blows everything else out of the way. Yes, to your ego-mind "Nothingness" doesn't sound cool or flashy. But that's only because you have no idea yet what Nothingness really is. It's the opposite of what you think. If you think seeing aliens is cool, wait till you see Absolute Infinity.

Just my opinion, these are all concepts to me as I'm not enlightened and have no authority to present this as truth. Disclaimer over! According to buddhism, once you attain nirvana there is no more reincarnation or karma. So you are actually correct, that is a contradiction, because reincarnation is the form we take, once you realize you aren't the form, it isn't that there is no reason to incarnate, you just aren't that, you aren't the form, the form appears to you, but is not you. Once you realize who you are, if "you" (ego) goes away, and there the true you stays, you know who you are, eternal, limitless, timeless. The cycle of birth and death is over, karma is over, if you realize you are what everything arises too, it's over. I believe form is the conduit for realizing you aren't that. How could nothingness know itself without form? Formlessness needs the form to realize itself, and form needs formlessness to exist. No thing can exist, can stand on it's own, without the space for it to exist in. Tolle has called it space consciousness, or just being more aware of space (formlessness) instead of just form. This is why buddhism uses the phrase "emptiness" a lot and they say the true nature of reality is indeed emptiness. When I started on a path a while back this was morbidly depressing, but I was totally missing the point. You can t have one without the other.

So one master today told me that sometimes he experiences sudden samadhis which are something like and probably is mahasamadhis, that feels like he is just out of body somewhere, but then he comes backs after several minutes or hours. It’s not final mahasamdhi, but no different from that, only diff is that it continues for several minutes or hours and might come suddenly without signals. so probably that can explain it. I think what Sadhguru meant by difficulty of staying in the body is that enlightened person might sometimes experience sudden hits of mahasamadhi that are not up to him. This is not final leaving but feels just like that. It’s like body is becoming left, but that process stops once you able to come back. That’s actually one reason (that master’s theory) why many of enlightened gurus like Ramana, Osho, and Krishnamurti and many others died from cancer and other long-term deceases. During that samadhis your body starts slowly dying (that’s also what that master’s body seem to feel like after he comes back from samadhi). So initial awakenings and realisations can actually have very healthy effect on body and mind, they can even cure cancer and there are such cases. Coz these are quite natural states for living organism. But that permanently infinite enlightenment which great gurus had might actually kick your health in the butt because your body simply isn’t prepared for that kind of stuff, see even Sadhguru who is trained yogi struggled with that. You probably need to be very prepared physically. Although it might not be the case for everyone, I dunno. Interesting thing is that I don’t think that Osho, Sadhguru and defo that master of mine and many other great teachers had the final enlightenment which Buddha talked about. They all certainly had some big big unbounded oneness and nothingness enlightenment, but it’s probably wasn’t the final one coz Buddha said (or at least Buddhism says) that his teachers had this unbounded infinite space and consciousness and yet it wasn’t the final thing. So what can that imply is that mahasamadhi probably can be possible long prior the final final enlightenment. And maybe not. But that master of mine certainly isn’t in Buddhahood, yet his stage is already quite a burden for his body’s health because of this sudden strikes, although it’s not a problem for him, his energy or his happiness coz he clearly sees that he isn’t the body. However, after the initial awakenings, where he saw that he isn’t his self-image, his lung cancer has been cured without treatment (that’s no joke). When thought and emotion isn’t fixated on the place of decease, organism have capacity to cure itself, you just don’t need to interrupt it with your ego. But again this seems to not be enough when you are unbounded oneness, that’s something brain and body can’t understand, I guess from this misunderstanding sudden unexpected mahasamadhi can happen.

What about the infinite hell you just stated exists within the nothingness? It is an infinite experience of suffering for which there is no room to transcend experience.

@jpablos16 “Nothingness” is the same as “Allness”. Everything or nothing are just subjective names for the “Oneness”. PS: Se nota que eres hispanoparlante .

Life feels like an empty void to me and I’m just counting the days until the enternal sleep in the end. I have nothing that I desire to do, mostly just habits that carry themselves out. There is no deep desire that I long for like being a musician, an artist, or a dancer, nothing that was a dream I had that got sidelined. It seems that no matter what I do or attempt it all just feels empty in the end, the crushing weight of nothingness around me. I don’t have dreams to follow like other people, I feel like a cold machine just moving around. I feel disconnected from the people around me who have things to live for and achieve. Some days I long for a mechanical body to fit what my soul is like.

@Thanatos13 The space of nothingness has no self, no fear, no suffering, no frustration, no despair, no power, no control. From it surfaces alive-ness, which then disappears back into the emptiness. No-thing and every-thing. Fresh snow suddenly appeared here. Off to go cross country skiing with a dear friend. . .

Point is, you realize it is nothing. When turning inward and becoming aware of your unconscious reactions to the different sensations and experience it as itself rather than for you (as the surviving entity you think you are). To become pure awareness without seeing the world from a survival perspective, or through the lens of concepts. Problem is that there is really no word or concept that ultimately describes what consciousness or awareness actually is, just because they are not it. Maybe there is nothingness without awareness or consciousness... but not now. Now is now, even if there was nothing, there would still be now. But now is not you, or me... let me try this: one could say that consciousness is absolutely nothing. Who said that consciousness is something? Only we, humans did. What if it's the basement for everything, being it "nothing" or "something". We tend to assume that consciousness is something that is added on top of nothing, without thinking that maybe it is the basis for everything, including nothing; that consciousness is more fundamental than "nothing at all", itself. Like I said, awareness can't be eliminated, because it is just now. That's what it comes down to; now. Take it away, and it would still be now. Now can't be eliminated.

This tells me that you might not have the precise idea what Enlightenment is. You don’t eliminate any of those you mentioned. On the contrary you become one with everything and realise that all of these you mentioned are made out of you - the pure awareness. Why do you make this assumption? Why can’t there be nothingness without awareness or consciousness? Try not to take anything for granted when exploring for the Truth.

Here you infer that you still exist. What if no you and nothing at all exists? You are trying to explain it with circular reasoning... Again why do you take it as granted that smth should be experienced at all. Why? Why do you infer that there should be time in any form? What if there is nothing at all. No consciousness, no time, no manifestation, no you, no onnes, no god. Absolute zero - absolute nothingness.

It could be debated (and already has been by some) that deep sleep is "nothingness", but states have touched this body that are deeper. 1.) Jhana in full Commentarial Absorbtion. Source: Hard Jhana/full relative time stop/direct consciousness in personal practice. Secondary source: Visuddhimagga/Vimuttimagga, and other individuals alive now (anecdotal) such as Ajahn Brahm for example. This is deeper than "deep sleep" delta waves, since in deep sleep one's body can have contact at the ear sense door, and awaken from slumber. In Absorption one is fully disconnected from "mind" and the 5 sense doors, including hearing. Most markedly, from the standpoint of an outside observer, the body barely takes in breath and is basically comatose. Otherwise it doesn't qualify for commentarial Jhana. This isn't even to mention Nirodha Samapatti, which I won't even unpack here. 2.) Nibbana, defined this time as the cessation of all formations (not just mental, but those found at Contact with the 5 bodily Aggrigates). Personal practice source: Annica 3 doors experience, body skips like a flat rock against VOID. Things really are quite simple, but if we try and simplify them too much in concept, it's just gibberish and folks get confused and waste time in fear and traps, or more tragic forms of ridiculous do-er-ship. Ramana mentioned in his collected works that deep sleep was a time when the world was gone, but he *may* not have realized that the substrate "I-I" was an impermanence wave that comes and goes. In any case, the Buddha gave a much more exhaustive and useful treatment of these issues with his elucidation of the 4 noble truths and particularly the 3 Lakhanas of conditioned existence. I don't mention these states and terms in order to be literal or fundamentalist, but if we do practice/yoga, self-inq. whatever, then we have to come up with a consistant language in which to communicate our efforts. Without that, it's a bunch of idiots pasting ridiculous pictures at each other and spinning in content. Uh oh! Snap.

Unfortunately emptiness and “no self” isn’t truth. It never was. That’s just a trick we tell ourselves. We attempt to strip everything away to get to “truth” because we think that is what truth is. But it’s not. When all is gone and you swim in nothingness without fear you see it isn’t the truth, it’s just another view. The same thing with ego, just another view. We seek “it” but there is no guarantee of finding it or knowing what it looks like. We use our sense but even that is flawed. Mots like looking at a video game and seeing colored lights blinking, or at a movie and just seeing actors, you don’t see the reality. Stripping it all alway doesn’t get you truth or the absolute, just a different lens to look through. But we are so convinced that the lens is correct instead of seeing it for what it is. To say reality is empty is wrong. Whatever “reality” really is, we won’t ever see it, just different views of it.

Stay with that emptiness..that’s a sign that there is discontent with everything that thought has put together. U see the narrow superficial structure of thought and are not compelled to react to it because you see it’s limits and its shallow nature. Most people escape that discontent into some-thing that fills that void. That’s why one never gets that immeasurable state of nothingness. They are afraid to remain empty and therefore fill that space of fear with some form/projection of thought which they think will bring a sense of security psychologically. If you stay with that sorrow, loneliness, and fear and let it play out by not reacting ‘suppression or control’ you will see that it will start to fade. So don’t escape that emptiness. Any movement to escape is a movement of will that seeks psychological security witch only leads to disorder and prepetual conflict. Simply let conciousness empty all its contents being your fears, pleasures, desires, beliefs, and so on. By not fueling those reactions with your desire/will remain with that discontentment and don’t try to escape. Either way you can’t escape anyhow because you are not different from those desires. Once u see that fact you will remain in conflict because the reason for this conflict is the result of the division through thought that there is a difference between “you” the controller and that which you desire to control. There is no division. This seperate you is where the confusion and conflict manifests. Do you see this? I would start off by not asking others for anything, because how do you known they know? Listening to others assumptions, opinions, and ideas about what they think they know and what you don’t is never going to be any help. So don’t listen to anyone and don’t take what they suggest as any form of truth, this includes myself??‍♂️. Because truth can not be maintained by any thought/thinker/self. If you stay with that emptiness and all the conditioning and it’s content dissolves by seeing that reaction, suppression/control solves nothing, there will no longer be a self “who reacts” or that clings to that conditioning/content to sustain a state of security. Therefore no movement of will to resist what is. The resistance of what is is where the conflict arises. Only when the self is not truth is. Only in emptiness is there an essence or quality of truth. Just do your own thing friend

@Thanatos13 It's a farse! It's a lie! It's nothingness! it's pointless, meaningless, and futille! All of this is lie, the love and hate you have for others is a farse, your memories hold no water, your friends aren't real, it is pure emptiness with nothing to truly justify it. Even your despair is a lie, how can you not see that, you are playing a character who thinks he has gotten there and is seeing the horror, the twist is there is no character and there is nothing to see here! If I got a penny for each time Irony was present in this forum I could buy Leo a wig and mildly convince him to wear it Look, i'm not defending psycs, but what makes you think your experience is any more real than the drugs? Sure, it feels like despair, but by your own logic...do I even need to finish?