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Sure? If I were you I would start wondering why you are not in a nondual infinite state of mere appearance in daily life sobre. Hint: Remaining not transcended very fast and sneaky appearing separate-self thoughts/feelings/filters/lenses which are not seen through because Awareness is too slow to cut these off real-time. And these separate-self-remnants hypnotize and give bias to all appearing appearance. Btw., not theory, but personal experience. What stands between you and impersonal nondual infinite mere appearance Awakened Awareness is... too much not fast enough seen through/cut off Leo. And through these lenses you filter all your Alien- and facets of Awakening experiences. Trust me on that: You can not anticipate how it is when these finally drop. And all your alien-preferences are the same illusion-filters of... Leo. Sure there are Aliens against we all look like ants! But they have the same essence as "we" have. And then there are Aliens against which the alien of the former sentence look like ants. Forever, turtles upon turtles upon turtles... And there are Aliens that make that alien-Leo-consciousness (of) appear like ants. Turtles upon Turtles, n+1, forever. But have fun climbing that turtles... You go wave surfing, yours truly dissolved in the Infinite Ocean... its a free country I guess. Ok, lets see if Keanu spirit is still among us: "I'm at that stage in life where I stay out of discussions. Even if you say 1+1=5, you're right - have fun." - Keanu Reeves Selling "Have fun" by the River

I think that You cannot think of infinity like this, since "you" are the result of an apparent duality, perception and perceiver, subject/object, that is occurring in this specific experience, therefore you will only experience this specific experience, and when die, you will disappear. What remains is absolute infinity, which is impersonal and nothing happens to it since it is immutable.

two possibilities: one, reality is flowing and in its flow it creates a subject who is the center of the experience, who listens to the sounds. This subject really is the sounds, he doesn't hear them. Nobody listens, the sounds are. There is no such thing as hearing, but rather it is an appearance that occurs when the sound occurs. another, the infinite being creates the experience to listen to it. a creator god who creates qualia and experience. which one do you choose? imo, reality is completely impersonal, ultimately it is an unlimited vastness of existence, and from it arises the infinite being that those fragments you cited speak of, the infinite self, and that being combines infinitely in infinite universes synchronized with each other to infinity. An atom is one universe, a cell is another, a human, a city, a galaxy, a universe, multiverse, etc. that's what it seems to be. The question would be: what is enlightenment? Be the unlimited self, or maybe it's still a construction? Well, if it's unlimited it's eternal. When I realized I perceived it like what always was. But imo the real enlightenment is go beyond of that self, to total substance of reality, the totality before any self, where the infinite self is contained. The realization of the infinite self, even sounds paradoxical because it's infinite, is limited, because that self is concrete in a way: it's you.

I have had that realization many times with 5meo. I am the timeless being, I have always been here, my freedom is total and my joy is absolute. but there is a small problem with this: it is personal. I am. there is self. an eternal, indescribable self, but a self that perceives itself as self and knows what it is with absolute clarity. It is not empty vastness, it is infinite self. So, I think there is still identification. On the other hand, only with meditation with one or two puffs of weed, I have had an experience of total opening. There is no self, there is infinite emptiness, and this emptiness opens and shows its essence, it is totality. I look at it and in a moment I am it, but not as a self, but as a total indefinite, impersonal reality. It is extremely difficult to maintain this because the natural human self needs to be a self, it cannot be indefinite, so they are brief openings, a minute or two. Then, how to be sure of anything? Right now im not having those perceptions, so are they real?

Infinite Being IS the dream appearing "in" Infinite Vastness/Being, which has no outside. Appearance is the "light" of consciousness. Appearance is not substantial or material, just mere appearance (in Tibetan Buddhism then called Clear Light, which it actually is. Lucid and bright and no more solid and dense. That is the case when the illusion of dense/material/solid/dual/out-there-ness is lifted, because it can also appear in such ways). And not "out there", but nondual. There is neither subject nor object (these are illusion-arisings), but only Infinite Being. Hence nondual. Impersonal Nondual Infinite Being. There is no subject hallucinating anything. There is just Infinite Being. THIS. The illusion-arisings of the hallucinating subject (and its necessary illusion-counterpart, the "object") can drop away anytime, restoring the original state of impersonal nondual Infinite Being. The appearances of the "world", thoughts, feelings, the character, any understanding, any concept, states, Awakening, non-Awakening, dream, sleep, deep sleep, waking, any state and anything perceivable just floats/rolls through "this" Impersonal Reality which is always right here. And "this" impersonal Reality only perceives itself. And at some point, understands "itself" and realizes "its" (nondual) nature, and what it has always been. Yet, "it" only ever has been "itself". Who is reading this again? And then replace "it" with... Selling just IT Water by the River to itself

Great answer, thanks. About that fragment...let's see. The nature of reality is essentially empty, absolute immensity, as you said, but at the same time it is absolutely full. That's what I meant by an openness that can burn not only the false identity but also physically. Let's see, the opening to full totality, or infinite love, or total light, means according to my experience (which as I already said can be identification, although I think not) that the infinite, by the very fact of being infinite, is everything, and that totality is an immutable reality. everything that was and will be, eternally, concentrated in a formless singularity. It is not a realization of freedom, like infinite vastness, but of absolute, unimaginable power. You can't be open to this constantly, it seems toxic, radioactive to say the least. Then, in my experience, that could be distorted, there are two faces of reality: the empty face and the full face. If reality were absolutely empty, nothing would arise, it would simply be nothing, but reality is. As you have said, the infinite being. What is this infinite being? It's you obviously, but what are you really? When infinity opens up and shows what it is, it blinds you. It is the explosion of infinite supernovas from infinite multiverses, something you can only intuit. It is not flat imagination that creates images, it is total power that creates dimensions and life. You can't be open to it, it has to be veiled or it would kill you, not your ego but your body. This means that reality is not imaginary. If it were, a subject that does the act of imagining would be needed. Impossible. Reality is just the absence of limits, and as you said it's impersonal. An infinite being that imagines is personal, that's a mistake of appreciation, a limited perception. The reality is everything due the absence of limitations, and this "everything" is the total realization. There is nobody imagining or creating, it's only the infinite flow that arises like a natural phenomena from the totality, that ultimately is you, but a you absolutely impersonal, pure light, or pure love could be a definition.

@Water by the River and there is something else, correct me if you think I'm wrong, because I could be completely wrong. In addition to being infinite, impersonal and free, there is a living substance of the infinite. By the very fact of being infinite, it is everything, and this totality manifests itself in what they call mystical love or infinite love, the total brilliance of sacred, immutable existence, which is the core, the heart of reality and truly the only one. reality, the immutable because it is everything, the total absolute, which now takes the appearance of this concrete situation. You can't be totally open to that long time because it burns, it has to be partially veiled to maintain this experience.

But there could be degrees of that. You could be with some suffering but perceiving you as infinite impersonal being. You suggest that it's something that happens one day and then you always are without separation/grasping/suffering. It could be like that sometimes, others no. Depending of the circumstances. And even you perceive yourself totally open, infinite, impersonal, the reality, this reality could perceive itself absolutely, all it sacred openess, the absolute freedom and joy of being, the immutable existence, or not so deep, mixed with the experience. Or according to you, when it's totally open once it's always totally open?

Niroda-style cessations going blank from concentrative meditation in the waking state and then "rebooting": No. I didn't push the concentrative path/Jhanas path much, Mahamudra & Dzogchen -practice is different. On that path, these states don't need to happen, nor are they considered that important as in Theravada. I have experienced the causal states from the states & transitions during the sleep cycle. "Seeing" the rotation of waking/sleep/dream, the causal states that can show along that rotation, lucid dreams, and also the "Reality" of deep sleep. Which is exactly what is supposed to happen according to the tradition when Awareness has become strong/trained enough in the waking state that it continues in some forms into the sleep-phase, and stays during the state-changes in sleep/dream/waking which then "roll by" "before" ones True eternal unchanging Infinite Being. As a sidenote: In the Mahamudra-system there is the so called Nondissolution-Experience that opens up the boundless and eternal/timeless/always here/impersonal nature of Infinite Mind/Infinite Being and how everything emerges from "THAT", including all thought/feeling-arisings, which arise in an impersonal clockwork-like process ripening/arising from the groundless ground of Being, emerging fully formed and then being elaborated as a second step so slowly that one wonders at some point how that could have hypnotized earlier. And how time is constructed. Which I experienced as predicted in this system at the point where its supposed to happen. Which is a very valueable experience, since it shows how the separate-self, time, basically everything is constructed and emerging. Not only when "rebooting" from cessation, but in real/daily life. And that then gets stabilized with further practice. Brown, PotgW: "Though comparable in profundity to the Theravada dissolution experience, the Mahayana experience of nondissolution or unelaboration is very different, both experientially and philosophically, which is why the commentators are careful to refute the nihilistic dissolution position" "Once the practitioner gets some sense of emptiness (mere appearance,WbtR) pervading the interconnectedness of all times and realms, it becomes easier to persist with a continuous focus on emptiness when leaving the samadhi state and reentering ordinary daily experience.'" I assume that if I trained for some time in hardcore concentrative meditation that cessation-states become accessible in the waking state. I know the techniques that have to be practiced to achieve that. Yet, there seems to be a genetic/karmic/whatever factor if the long form of cessations is accessible (Niroda) or not. But I don't need these states since I have accessed the experiences/states and insights they give from other ways, as described above. And I don't need concentrative meditation to keep/access Infinite Nondual Being. Jhanas 1-7 are given anyways at that point, since its hard to "get" Infinite Space or Infinite Consciousness or Nothingness when that is already the case before any meditation during daily life. Jhana 8 (neither perception nor non-perception) / 9 (Cessation and/or Niroda) need "induction" via concentrative meditation.

Here you can find my summary of Pointing out the Great Way/Mahamudra, based on how it developed for me, written in my own words based on my experiences/milestones: Which funnily developed pretty much like the book describes. So it was fascinating for me that the experiences developed very much in line how they were described for centuries in the Tibetan Mahamudra-tradition, delivered by a book of several hundred pages of descriptions. Talking about a sophisticated complex meditation system.... One of the main milestones, after which it continued developing, was the blue marked part below. That happened after around 10 years of meditation (which was not as efficient as possible (quite inefficient actually, that is why it took so long), since I didn't get a lot of stuff right straight away, and had no direct teacher). That milestone is where the awakened and nondual states starts to develop after some time. Afterwards I was hooked, and used all the other tools (like the always here timeless nature of the mind, its infinite and boundless and nondual nature, and finally its impersonal nature in stage 4) for developing Nonduality in Yoga of One Taste (stage 3 Mahamudra), and developing these nondual awakened states towards the pure impersonal and totally unseparated nature, conforming to the Reality of the enlightened Mindstream (stage 4, Yoga of Nonmeditation). Then Enlightenment can happen, but can't be forced. Enlightenment is an accident. Yoga of Nonmeditation makes very (!) accident-prone. On the path are I would say between 5-10 major cul-de-sacs or mistakes one can make, which can either be overcome with applying the right technique of Mahamudra/Dzogchen (or non-concentrative meditation), or with hardcore concentrative meditation (which works without all this sophisticated technique, but is as hard to pull off (discipline, hours on the pillow needed) as we probably all know. That is why we see more "Natural/ or enlightened-by-accident ones" and hardcore concentration meditation enlightened ones (Ingram, Yang, Burbea and the Theravada & Zen crew), but very few Mahamudra/Dzogchen enlightened ones, since that sophisticated system has not been planted fully in the West. I see its potential, and consider that (combined with psychedelics) as the future, since few people can actually pull of the natural style (by definition), or the hardcore concentrative meditation style. So lets see... And if that is not enough, here is some more of the Sales-by-the-River: https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=Pointing out the Great Way &author=Water by the River Bon Voyage, good luck, and if you have further questions let me know.

Because the state of cessation (or the dissolution experience) tends to reduce grasping/attachment because it partly frees from the "grabbing/grasping" character of the egoic mindstream after having had that state/cessation for a number of times. In short, it makes life easier and suffering/grasping less. But it doesn't provide full liberation/the potential for Full Enlightenment. The ideal of early Buddhism was the escape to these states of cessation, the more permanent the better. Permanent Niroda = permanent dissolution = Nirvana = No more rebirth. With Mahayana, the Buddhist Traditions broke through to true Nondual Enlightenment. Leos God-Realization, see the God-Realized approved Supreme Source for example, link above. Sounds a bit different than cessation/dissolve/die and get off the wheel of Samsara/Niroda/bye bye forever? Oh yes... Why? Because Absolute Truth is always right here. Never can not be here. Why shut it all down when IT is always right here? When the suffering/grasping clouds of the separate-self/ego are structurally dissolved (Full Enlightenment), and not just temporarily switched off via cessation, Infinite Nondual Impersonal Being replaces the separation/grasping/suffering of the ego in daily life. And the Sat-Chit-Ananda aspect of it (Bliss/Love/Compassion/Nondual Awakened Awareness) is off the charts. Trust the Salesman by the River. Caveat Emptor is good, but sometimes there is enough good Karma to just buy the right "stuff". by the River So no need for dissolution afterwards... Mahayana philosophy is a totally "different beast" than early Buddhism/Hinayana. For example: https://www.psychedelicsangha.org/paisley-gate/2019/5/8/the-supreme-array-scripture-a-psychedelic-stra-for-buddhist-psychonauts-pp3zz#:~:text=Composed sometime around the third,cosmic vision of the universe. In Mahayana, Enlightenment is not the end/extinction/cessation/dissolution, but the beginning of the caterpillar having turned butterfly, expressing its enlightened intention not only in this life/bardo, but also in future ones. The whole Reality then goes like "Oh nice, one more for the team"... A whole chain of being of enlightened beings (human, alien, ET, Buddha-Field Creator/Sustainer/and so on) fits into the manifested Infinity of Infinities of Infinite Being. See the WbtR 2x2 matrix of enlightened & or merely awakened Aliens & Humans. Its a totally different and much more positive worldview than Early Buddhism, which was more like "die, cease and get off the wheel". Would be a lot of effort on creating humans via an evolution of billion of years and then getting rid of the gig asap., don't you think? Chris Bache in "LSD and the Mind of the Universe: Diamonds from Heaven" called the visions he had been shown of the future evolution of humanity a growth towards what he called the Diamond Soul, a magnificent destiny for the species. And since even that isn't the end, its Infinity up the Chain of Being... well, mucho adventure ahead. So it seems that at some point, Leo gets to become his n+1 AWAKE Alien permanently. Hopefully, he doesn't take to many detours on the way there. Being reborn automatically as n+1 "Infinitely consciousness" awakened Alien is not guaranteed, but earned and developed towards. Soul, Karma and such. Not that the suicides influenced by certain inadvertantly & flippantly irresponsible teachings/statements say "hello" in a less than amused way after he has left his current bodily-vehicle. So in summary, early Buddhism doctrine just didn't reach Full Enlightenment. At least in its doctrine/philosophy. It reached causal states, but not truly impersonal nondual/fully enlightened ones. There have been Nondual Realizers for sure between "the Buddha" (aka time the doctrine was formed)" and the Nondual Breakthrough towards Infinite Reality/ Infinite Being that happened first with Nagarjuna and his Middle Way/Madhyamaka doctrine/philosophy, but the doctrinal break occured with Nagarjuna towards Middle Way, and later Yogachara/(Infinite) Consciousness only. Selling non-extinction of the River by the River for the River by The River

Would you equate these three "modes" you just mentioned (eternal and timeless background nature of True Being/Impersonal Field/Mere appearance character) to what Buddhism tags as Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya and Nirmanakaya, that is, the relationship between unmanifest Absolute and progressively denser manifestation? This is just out of cultural curiosity, because these three terms are not always that clear for someone who has not particularly adhered to Buddhism.

Mostly. There are different versions of what Wilber calls Causal States. Cessation/Nirodha: Totally appearanceless "film-break" like cessation. Timeless/always here/Nothingness nature emphasized. Time needs appearance/objects/"movement"/change, no appearance/objects is timeless/always here. These states also clearly show that if nothing arises there is no self-consciousness. ( https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=pistol&author=Water by the River , thx Benthino for the water pistol). Pure Infinite Awareness/Being with the potential of sentience, but not self-consciousness. That comes later. Which is pretty much a shocker, since it shows that any form of self-consciousness ego/separate-self is a) arising/appearing b) temporary c) True YOU is always "there", existence itself. Even if nothing arises/appears. That empties out the remnants of the separate-self/ego as appearing/constructed and removes the remaining separate-self-identity pretty effectively when coming out of cessation. Nirodha is the big/longer brother of cessation. Causal states with awareness (Infinite (timeless) Darkness suffused with light): Then there are causal states that are infinite/timeless, but self-aware. For example what Tibetan called the Clear Light state (Tummo, Bardo, Near Death). For example something a Neurologist (who had an NDE) for example described as "Infinite Darkness suffused with light". These states can also be experienced passing from dreaming to causal states to dreaming to waking up. One can have these states also with psychedelics, see Chris Bache Diamonds from Heaven. Aware Deep Sleep: Then there is Deep Sleep as not loosing awareness (and hence timeless, no duration experienced) as described by Thisdell, above. Causal States eyes open. And then you have totally empty impersonal states with no separate self arising WHILE the visual field appears. These are also linked by some to Nirvikalpa since there is no separate-ego-anything left, its the totally impersonal Totality/Reality arising by Itself. That is why Ken Wilber called the total empty/flat-lining state (EEG) some kind of Nirvikalpa "eyes-open". These are the true nondual IMPERSONAL states of Enlightenment. Only when having passed these causal states is it truly nondual impersonal Enlightenment/Infinite Impersonal Being. Before that, it is a Unity with the Infinite Nondual Field, and the character/ego hijacking that experience and interpreting it. Very common with certain substances, and easily confused with the final outcome of the total transcendence of the ego/separate-self purified by the experience of these totally empty states (hey, "I" wasn't there, what am I really? For sure not that temporarily appearing character-gig, because that wasn't there. And what I really am has to be the case always, even if there is no self-consciousness or consciousness OF anything at all, aka cessation or deep unaware sleep. That paves the way to true impersonal Enlightenment, realizing ones identity truly is this Infinite Nothingness which can never be any arising/appearance at all. The Infinite Absolute Being/Reality beyond any expierence/arising, timeless and eternal). And the Awareness of that Infinite Reality/Being can also be kept alive if the character reappears, the EEG shows something again. But then, this character/personality has a similiar status as for example your car: It appears in your Infinite Being/visual field, you look "out from it" while driving, but most definitely you are not (only) your car, but the whole appearing show/Infinite Being/Infinite Existing, the screen and the appearing show. Wilber Nirvikalpa eyes open/eyes closed: But the term Nirvikalpa has been used for millenia, so you can for sure find cases where its used for cessation/Nirodha and eyes open causal impersonal states, deep sleep, and anything in between. What is more important is what these causal states really can do: Kill the ego/separate-self-arising-illusions for good, because they show that these are temporary arising illusion-clouds, nothing more. Not by having these a few times, aber after experiencing them often and coming out of them and seeing the ego reassemble itself in real-time often enough can even get the hardest ego-illusions to wonder about their "reality". See below. When training via concentration meditation, it is easier to reach Cessation than reaching True Nondual Enlightenment while the visual field still appears. Because the mechanism of the ego-cloud-separation-arisings is not yet fully transcended. The mere appearance character, the Infinite impersonal field, the eternal/timeless background-nature of True Being is not yet reached while the visual field is there/daily life. That comes later. Later developed forms of Buddhism (Zen, Mahayana, Tibetan Buddhism, aka Mahamudra/Dzogchen) directly aim for the Nondual Realization. They know cessation states and achieve them, but don't value these as ultimate goal. Which makes sense, because if one can enter Nirvana/Nirvikalpha on command, its nice then, and later on the still well and alive ego and its cycles of contraction/suffering kill all the oh so nice Nirvana again. But shutting the whole enchilada including the ego down in causal states is a very good tool. Not necessary, but very useful. These statements are in line with the statements and experiences of modern Theravada-teachers and realizers like Ingram, Yang, Burbea, Taft, Thisdell and so on. And that is why I prefer Mahamudra/Dzogchen (for example Pointing out the Great Way, Brown). More on that below in the footnote 1. The relations of these states get clear once the timless Absolute Reality/Being is intuited as always here. Deep Sleep is so to say is always right here. Since what you really are is always right here, as it is in deep sleep. Infinite eternal Consciousness/Being which is totally empty and impersonal if no separate-self illusion arises. The tree watching itself, fully aware of its temporaray/passing/illusory nature. And that which is always the case, eternally so, True Being, fully understands itself then. Because there exists nothing else that could understand itself besides THIS of which nothing can be said, only pointed towards. So what is it that reads these words right here, right now? What is IT/You truly? Starting out to write a short answer answer, ending up with a Filibustero. Oh well, maybe its helpful for some. Selling Causal States as the final coup de grace for the separate self-character-gig/ego by The River Ok, it had to be coming: WtbtR now with footnotes. Guess not for the faint of hearted. Footnote 1: The original "Buddhas" Enlightenment-doctrine was Cessation/Causal-based, not Full Nondual (impersonal) Enlightenment in daily life. The original Buddhas Enlightenment was Cessation/Causal-based (Nirvana-based, "Nirvana separate from Samsara"). Which is still a conditioned state, bringing a lot of liberation from grasping, but not fully and in daily life. Separate-Self/Ego not fully transcended/dead in daily life. The breakthrough to True (impersonal) Nondual Realization in official doctrine came later with Nagarjuna and Madhymaka/Middle Path: True Nondual impersonal Enlightenment which could be sustained in daily life/with visual field. And while Madhyamaka tended to not say anything at all about the Absolute (neti neti, no concepts can be applied for the Absolute, which technically is correct), later forms of Buddhisms like Yogachara said that (in truly enlightened impersonal nondual states) Infinite Consciousness/Infinite Being IS an expression of the true state of things, and everything appearing is mere appearance (or "imagined"). See for example "Consciousness only school", for example Huang Po's Universal Mind, or the (very humble) Supreme Source "I am the teacher, pure and total consciousness, whence everything manifests. Pure and total consciousness is the supreme source, it has created the Buddhas of the three times, from it have arisen the beings of the three worlds and the whole animate and inanimate universe". God-Realization (TM) approved. Forms of Buddhism stemming from the original buddhist teachings (causal teachings, sometimes called Hinayana school, which doesn't exist anymore), like for example Theravada/Thai Buddhism Forest Tradition (and Ingram/Yang/Burbea/Taft) mainly trace themselves from these forms (although all are adding some form of Dzogchen and similiar stuff), don't stem from the the Mahayana Revolution of Middle Way/Madhyamaka/Nagarjuna), and YET end up at Nondual Enlightenment and not only cessation. And for sure in the original Buddhism some realized Nondual Enlightenment and not only cessation, but that didn't find its way into the official doctrine until much later. And that (besides that the original Buddha probably didn't exist because its the same story Jainism tells about its founder) makes me smile when there "Buddhism"-trashing. Its like trashing "religion". Which kind of religion? Polytheism? Ancestor-cult? Monotheism? Polytheism? Who cares, lets trash the rodents... So, now WbtR made it: Neither "Buddhist" like him anymore, nor the no-rodent crowd. Guess its "Viel Feind, viel Ehr!". Something we Germans are quite talented in. Oh well...

https://www.rogerthisdell.com/post/let-s-talk-nirodha-samapatti-insights-into-valance-and-the-supposed-ontic-primacy-of-consciousness https://www.rogerthisdell.com/post/throwing-my-hat-in-the-jhana-ring and some more stuff from Roger Thisdell: https://www.rogerthisdell.com/post/centrelessness-boundarylessness-phenomenology-and-freedom-from-the-cage-of-the-mind https://www.rogerthisdell.com/post/maintaining-awareness-during-deep-sleep-how-to and: Cessation is a large focus of Theravada/Early Buddhism, helping on the path to Enligthenment. But it is not (yet) Full Enlightenment, see for example modern voices of Theravada like Ingram (Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha)/Frank Yang/Thisdell.They state the same. In Mahayana Buddhism and Tibetan Buddhism/Vajrayana, this dissolution/cessation experience is considered valueable, but not more. Not the final goal. Experiencing Absolute Reality/Infinite Impersonal Being WHILE visual appearances and the mindstream arises as Infinite Impersonal Being/Reality is considered the Final Enlightenment. Because Ultimate Reality has to be constant, always right here. If its not accessible, clouds of separation are still arising which are not seen through. Cessation= Absolute Reality with no arising/appearance/anything at all, hence timeless, but also not self-consciousness (since that is an arising too). Helps seeing the illusion/separation-layers arising on the "reboot" while getting out of the cessation/Pure Nothingness, but does not necessarily destroy all the clouds causing duality. Normally it doesn't do that, that is why it takes lots of cessations on the Theravada path. No cessations are necessary for Enlightenment, it can also happen without them. In Mahamudra, instead of the Dissolution experience of cessation, the so-called "Non-dissolution" experience, or the insight the Infinite Mind/Being is timeless/eternal and boundless (but not yet fully impersonal) is considered of equal or even higher importance. Since that paves the way for the constant realization of Infinite Impersonal Being/Reality while the visual field arises, or Full Enlightenment. It is a difficult topic, needing a lot of reference meditation-experiences in order to start to intuit the differences. Maybe this is helpful for some.

@lostingenosmaze Based on developmental factors, facts, statistics and logic are from more stage orange values. The function of logic and facts/statistics is to use numbers and numeric value and disassociate yourself from the situation. Numbers and data can be used to distance ourselves, make it more impersonal and less personal, especially when one event was so traumatic that depression, derealization, and disassociation is one way to cope with it. Having said all that, stats and data have their uses as well. Averaging the information and numbers, finding the aggregate of other variables, it's good to have data and statistics for an objective consensus reality. Statistics and data on suicide for example is good because it tells us, approximately, just how many suffer from suicide attempts, suicidation, and suicide deaths per years. Mr. Girl actually had a great video on this, about BLM, and his take on Neil De Gray Tyson on twitter bringing stats, and Mr. Girl saying that him doing that is him trying to distance himself from those events with a wall of logic and numbers, triggering apathy for yourself to protect yourself from the overload of empathy and emotions that'll wave and crush your mind. Yeah that was his communication style then.

You are still missing what I'm saying. Leo isn't posting anything. Life is. Life is at play posting through Leo's avatar. Life is energy. Energy is in motion. It is typing happening. Posts happening. The Absolute is posting and typing. It is alive and doesn't have a reason to not appear as it does. You just gave a reason why Leo shouldn't be posting and thats because there are no others so what's the point. The Absolute is you saying this, the Absolute is me responding and the Absolute is Leo posting. It makes no sense to the individual's human thinking processes because it doesn't line up with how it thinks things should be. That's also the Absolute thinking that. Thinking is happening but by no one. Just mouths moving, fingers typing, sense making happening. Appearing as humans and typing and posts and trying to make sense of itself. It is so free it can do that because it's unlimited, impersonal, absolute, and everything with no reason or purpose, it just is. Life goes on. It's illogical.

This is one of the clearest, deepest buy playful, serious but joyful posts you´ve ever written in this forum, and you´ve written quite a lot of clear, deep, playful, serious, joyful stuff. Yes, the harder the anchor in/as the Absolute, the freer the individual relative perspective and smaller the sense of urgency for new relative body-mind perspectives. That is the proper Hierarchy of Reality. As John Wren Lewis implied in the most herculean feat in the History of Mysticism, that of resuming that Hierarchy in two words, "Eternity John-ning" (just substitute "John" with any particular avatar the Absolute emanates in a particular incarnation), it only takes turning "John", or any other apparently solid entity, into a gerund (that is, an "action"), substracting with this simple trick ontology and Identity from the particular avatar (human or not) which most take themselves to be, and placing them into the Impersonal Absolute.

There are degrees to the extent to which you understand something, that's for sure. But there are no degrees to being happy. I'm not sure how to explain this, yet. But definitely, either you're happy or you're not. This is definitely my position which you so strongly contradict (I'm okay with that, btw). The reason why I say that either you're happy or you're not is because, in truth, things don't make you happy. Happiness comes from within, just as hatred comes from within. Hatred is the polar opposite of happiness, btw. And it is also a form of resistance. Yes, this is true. What I'm saying does not suggest anything otherwise from what you say here. Is it broad? All that I'm saying is that all of this suffering, whether conscious or unconscious, is caused by one's own resistance of consciousness itself. This resistance can be in the form of a suppressed memory in which it is still you who is suppressing the memory. It could be in the form of a projection, the form of a defence mechanism, the form of a bad habit like smoking or doing drugs. Really there are many forms of resistance. However, one truth remains. It is you, no one else and nothing external to you or out of your control, who are doing the resisting. Even if your trauma is straight up from your birth, which is highly unlike because you're not yet developed cognitively yet at that stage, but even if that happens to be the case. Should there be resistance from such a trauma, that resistance would still come from you. And, it would still (equally) be the resistance of consciousness. Hence, the struggle is with consciousness. Perhaps not bliss, but definitely happiness. Once something is understood, perhaps something like a wild animal or a criminal or some sort of demonic entity (absolutely whatever) even pain, once it is understood due to awareness, it is impossible to hate it. Why? The mere act of understanding something is connecting to that something in a way that is both transpersonal and impersonal. It has nothing to do with you as an individual, but has everything to do with consciousness. You will be happy even with your scar because you understand that the attack, the violation, or mistreatment you encountered was not personal, not at all. It is exactly enough. Exactly. And if your basic needs are being met, such as the nutrition, the shelter, just the basic stuff, then your struggle with consciousness comes from your own inner resistance. There is a matter that you are resisting. By the way, in case I've still not made it clear. In life, as we call it, there is no choice but consciousness. Consciousness is direct experience. Whatever it is that you're trying so hard not to experience, you will experience it – one way or the other.

Very good. Your post is probably so "way out" that it didn't receive much response, although it being the most interesting one since its posting. Actually, "You" didn't loose "it". Just some clouds appeared that made what you called "deep sleep" a bit harder to directly "perceive/realize" beyond the clouds. Its always there. YOU are that Infinite Being containing the show of duality and nonduality, awakening and sleeping. That impersonal Infinite Reality beyond the "event-horizon" which is so infinite that no "movement" of focus/mind/thought/appearance/perception/I,me,mine-arising can ever get "there". And That Infinite Reality beyond this "event horizon" where small you "can't go" is constant and changeless. That contains all the states of illusion and realizing/awakening, which roll "before"/"within" its Infinite Being. THAT "you" can never loose. Or gain. THAT never changes, because change is contained in it, its expression or modulation. And THAT is absolute freedom & love & bliss. Infinite Liberation. Who are you again? Did you EVER loose yourself (really)?

Did I ever write that Awakened impersonal Nondual states are not beneficial (and necessary) for realizing True Infinite Being? I wrote that dozen of times. https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=Awakened&author=Water by the River

I would say it’s infinitely impersonal. It’s so impersonal that it’s literally nothing

yes, I perceive everything as one, and same: I perceive the total depth of existence, the infinity, a perceiver implies a perception. I cannot say: I am enlightened, but I have accessed states of total openness in which there is no perceiver, there is total amplitude. It is very subtle to arrive at this because the slightest movement of the mind bifurcates it. As you say, it is completely impersonal since there is no perceiver, or the perceiver is the perception . My previous definition maybe was not exact. Reality perceiving itself implies subject. There is no subject, there is total existence, it is not thinkable, it is attainable, and quite difficult btw, just some seconds . But in other hand, once it happened, seems that it's always in back ground

These are good pointers which you mention. "I perceive everything as one" is already one I to many. As strange as that sounds. The "I perceiving" is just more clusters of arising sensations taking ownership of another cluster of sensations/understandings of "everything is one". All appearance, all temporary, all illusion, all happening in Infinite Being. Yet, the impersonal Vastness of Infinite Reality/Consciousness can understand itself. But impersonal. And then, "it" just sees it was always what "it" is (Infinite Being), giving rise to illusions within itself, lending "its" Infinite Consciousness to a mirage/illusion, even if already cosplaying an "I perceive everything as one". Enlightenment is knowing what one truly is, and what Infinite Reality/Being is. And that is shockingly impersonal. Yet, it can't be any different. "Anything" else would be mortal, finite and changing. Truly formless Infinite Being, eternal always here, One without a second.

Nonduality doesn't mean Enlightenment. For Enlightenment to happen, Nonduality (or nondual states) have to ripen normally for a looooong time, for most (according to the traditions 100s to 1000s of hours), to get rid off the "Nondual-Realizer"-identity-arisings towards Impersonal Infinite Nondual Being/Infinite Consciousness without any remaining filter/lense/identity. https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=Nonduality&author=Water by the River Leo doesn't differentiate between Nonduality and Enlightenment (although most sophisticated meditation traditions do, pretty much all of the more sophisticated Budhdist traditions like Mahamudra, Dzogchen and also Zen - Kensho vs. Enlightenment. A Kensho IS nondual but a looong way from Enlightenment), nor seem to care about the difference. His God-Realization is in between mere Nonduality with a nondual-Realizer-Identity and True Enlightenment, see link above. Since he can't imagine Enlightenment in any way (if he could he would be enlightened), he happily just throws the baby (Enlightenment) out with the bathwater (Nonduality) and rejoices with "God-Realization". Strange that the God-Realization seems to suck annoyingly often when sobre... but never mind, no problem, no problemo, pas de problème... that Enlightenment is the end of suffering is bullshit anyway, because... hey... it would mean I gotta practice and am not the most you know what. @BlessedLion Seems you have to be happy with the one-liner or two-liner answers. Putting Nonduality and Buddhism and Enlightenment together in one box and dismissing all of it is in my view an unsophisticated and reductionistic perspective. But apparently useful for some... Selling "the flair of spiritual still dark ages by the River"

Leo the Blackpiller. On a project called "Actualized". A drama in in five acts. Oh my. Act 1: Narrator: What in my view is genetics/Karma is being psychic, seeing Auras, subtle beings, OBEs, and all that stuff. That can't be trained by normies. One either has it or not. Buuuuut training to rest in nondual awakened states? No. Many had to train a lot to get there (called meditation). Sure, some woke up spontaneously. It is called True Being. Every being has it, or better IS it. There are proven ways to access and stabilize that. Meditation for example. Not for every Karma-variant "delivered", but for many achieveable if training in earnest. Yours truly for sure was not extraordinarily gifted and needed over 10 years to get anywhere near anything nondual. But was lucky using a meditation system that got pleasurable quite soon and enabled racking up the 1000s of hours of cutting off the "I/me/mine-bla-bla" sufficiently (many of that in daily life) to get anywhere near awakened nondual impersonal states. Act 2: Narrator: What can be heard in the last weeks from our respected host are frequent expression of suffering, and also being annoyed by being human. If that attitude is not a dissociation (sick form of non-growth/aborted transcendence) and not an differentiation & integration (healthy form of growth/transcendence in Wilber speech), I don't know what is. Wilber, The Religion of the Future. All ways how transcendence/growth can go wrong, and how one can get addicted to 7th haven realms, and how to avoid and correct these, laid on a platter. And now limiting believes and justifications why one can not practice letting go of the separate-self and shutting it off (aka meditation), because... rationalizations like genetics, prodigies, creativity and artistic and other stuff instead of boring meditation and annoying and what not. https://www.actualized.org/insights/profound-quotes-032 https://www.actualized.org/insights/werewolf-boy Leo Gura: "Exceptionally spiritually gifted people are born just like this werewolf boy. And no amount of spiritual practice will give you their abilities. But because all that happens on the inside, people do not see it. So they end up spending their lives trying to emulate someone who is a genetic freak, and of course they end up disappoint with their lack of results or unhappiness in life. Because a werewolf boy has to live differently than normies. And if you as a normie try to live like werewolf boy, you will not be happy because it is not the right fit. This is why above all else in this work you must be true to yourself, to your genetics. Your destiny is in your genetics. But you need to discover what that means, which is no trivial matter." Narrator: Got blackpilled? Got blackpilled! Act 3: Al Swearengen: "That's what life is one vile task after another. Don't get aggravated then the enemy has you by the short hairs." . WbtR: Sorry my friend. https://actualized.org/insights/profound-quotes-032 Narrator: Profound indeed. The Buddha not-en-vogue-long-dead-probably-never-historicaly-existing-gentleman called it dukha. Unsatisfying. A closet-Buddhist in the making? And so much happiness & compassion that there are even dreams of nondual crocodiles biting fellow expressions of his True Infinite Being. Ken Wilber: "Ken Wilber: The downside comes with people that only use psychedelics or drugs and I found that over the years they just become mean. It's somehow just kind of closes them down it's like you keep doing it and you keep doing it you keep doing it it doesn't quite cause the transformation. It can cause a peak experience but generally not a transformative experience and some people like David Deida will say that in order for altered changes of state to contribute to transformation a permanent transformation it has to be basically endogenous and not a exogenous it has to be has your own source People who do that (Psychedelics) the people that do use both (Meditation and Psychedelics) and use it as a sacrament i think an enormous bit out of it." Posted over a year ago: Act 4: Narrator: So, my proposal would be either to rebrand the thing as spiritual-blackpilled.org instead of actualized.org. Or, as alternative, at least not giving the poor folks consuming all of that uncritically limiting believes just because one highflyer got hung up in the seventh-heaventh-with-you-know-what-substances without a way of getting to that blissful estate sobre and in daily life. Leo, sorry for the rant. I wish you really the best, but that self-defeating blackpilling trend (probably generated by severly missing seaventh-heaventh-bliss - which I can understand), pushing it mostly on genetics and prodigy and what not (I would call that at least a bit "Karma" and not only genetics )... I have to testify against it, because for many that "could make it" that constitutes black-pilling & installing limitting believes. And even if a being does not reach Enlightenment in this life, the soul (relative manifestation, but still appearing/same "reality" as everthing else, lasting longer than one life) will carry the transcendence-propensity generated by simply witnessing the mindstream (aka meditation). Same with compassion. Act 5: WbtR: Actualized? Actualized! Selling the drama (5 acts) "Actualized! by the River & throwing the backpills back into the River where the came from" Music while lowering the curtain: