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It is only a fitting analogy to say that life is a dream. The analogy breaks down when you start to compare the lucid dreamer with the Awakened One. A dream occurs within the consciousness of the individual soul whereas the dream of this world occurs in what the Ancient Greeks called the Soul of the World. Thus, a lucid dreamer can attain to relative omnipotence within the dream because he is its only conscious witness. However, the Awakened One understands that, whilst consciousness is an indivisible unity, they share this consciousness with everybody and even everything else in the dream. Only God is omnipotent: the Awakened One is one who has annihilated all sense of otherness and so exists in total alignment with God’s will.

@Benton You still run into paradoxes that are very challenging for our human mind to grasp. Leo has awakened to realize he is the only conscious being in existence, but then I am also the only conscious being in existence. So is Leo imagining me or am I imagining Leo, or are we both imagining versions of each other? Lets say I went to Las Vegas and Leo and I took 5-Meo together. Would Leo eventually collapse into me as a projection of my mind or would I collapse into Leo's mind or paradoxically would we both collapse into each others minds? This would be a fascinating experiment to conduct.

@Average Investor I'm going to bed between 11pm and midnight. In terms of meal size it depends. Lately I'm having a big lunch in the afternoon and a lighter dinner, but it's not consistent. And now that I think about it I'm always full at the end of the meal, I don't leave much space. Probably not the best habit, especially for dinner. But at the same time I feel like I need to eat substantially to fuel myself properly. I'll try out the water fast soon and see how I feel. @Razard86 Yes I'm on a healing journey, which of course is a long-term process. Anger has always been there but "awakened" by a relationship and by other yogic methods of transmutation and sublimation. Right now I'm at a point where I'm getting familiar with it, but still struggle to play with it in a way that releases it. @Realms of Wonder Interesting, there might be some traffic in the whole digestive system haha, which makes sense, since it's all linked. I heard juices protocols can also help, but I'm not psychologically ready to only drink juice for 5 days straight. Currently things are still flowing through, although less freely than before. Might have to do with the fact that I stopped drinking coffee, which is laxative, and now I'm confronted with the reality that it's not as harmonious as I thought it was.

Yeah great video from Leo . Though technically what I'm pointing out in this post is that we can't be certain of the ontological standards of our experience (dream ,awake ,simulation, brain in a vat etc). We can only be certain that we are conscious right now. and conscioconsciousness is the only real certain thing. I mean your first person subjective experience of the world . Right now..you reading my answer on a forum to the question , “How is it possible to be certain that I am not dreaming right now?”, you are a mortal human; as such, you are experiencing the Dream of Mortal Life. You can ascertain right now that your mortal life is merely a dream by committing suicide. Unfortunately, even if you kill yourself, you will awaken in a second dream . You will at that point again believe that you really are a human; but that will also be a dream. You would then need to kill your human self to be awakened from your human state. At that point, you would know that you are an eternal human, who was having the Dream of Mortal Life.

There is definitely a tragic element underlying the whole thing; ironically, it is like the tragic pathos which underlies the Christian message. To me the jester leaping over the tightrope-walker is a dream-like metaphor for the fundamental problem with Nietzsche’s life and philosophy: he (as the tightrope-walker) had awakened a transcendent force within himself (which he perceived as a jester, because transcendence makes a mockery of all partial and limited identifications) which insistently drove him on towards the destruction of all limitations (“philosophising with a hammer”). However, without the appropriate context and training he was not able to master this transcendent force and so it overcame him, driving him down into the abyss. That being said, I find passages in The Antichrist particularly and the fourth part of Zarathustra to be raucously funny! Well, he specifically says that Jesus still had the overwrought passion of early life and so his teaching was contaminated by a one-sided escapism and a contempt for mundane things, almost like a rebellious teenager. I would say that Zarathustra suffers from the opposite problem, in that he esteems the earth and the body over spirituality. There is a very weak passage in which Zarathustra basically denies all metaphysics: However, towards the end of Zarathustra, particularly with the motif of the Eternal Return, he increasingly transcends this one-sided emphasis on impermanence: ‘That everything recurs is the closest approximation of a world of Becoming to one of Being’; ‘Every moment begins existence, around every “Here” rolls the ball “There”; The middle is everywhere’. The final song, The Seven Seals (or: the Yea- and Amen- Song) is very beautiful and a true spiritual revival! It is very striking how Nietzsche seems to have rediscovered the teaching of the subtle body. His description of the Seven Seals maps perfectly onto the system of Chakras of Tantra, and consider the opening to his description of the Last Man: “What is love? What is creation? What is longing? What is a star? Thus ask the Last Men and they blink. For the earth has now become small, and upon it hops the Last Man who makes everything small.” Love is the Heart Chakra; Creation is the Throat Chakra; Longing is the Third Eye; and a Star is The Thousand Petalled Lotus of pure transcendence; thus, the Last Man only has access to the lower, material and animal centres of the body. I see Thus Spoke Zarathustra as Nietzsche breaking away from all of the rotten assumptions of a profane and atheistic world and so making a profound rediscovery of transcendent wisdom. The greatest mistake I see in people who discuss it is that they take specific teachings of Zarathustra (particularly the prologue and the Superman) without regard for their context within the book as a whole. It has to be understood more like a symphony, an unfolding narrative who’s culminating crescendo is the Great Midday in which all oppositions are reconciled and everything is once more harmonious. Hahaha, it is probably so! I haven’t read much Aurobindo. Would you recommend a particular book of his? If you are interested, the works of René Guénon have been very valuable to me, particularly his books Man and His Becoming According to the Vedanta, The Multiple States of the Being and The Reign of Quantity and the Signs of the Times.

https://imgur.com/a/f2ysX8N

Ok that makes sense. More contemplation and psychedelic trips pending lol. So I at least I am aware of the fact that it is ego that is doing this strangloopy aspect on trying to understand itself. Thats why I cant do it, This normal "State" I am in, is not sufficient enough to be able to figure it out or else it will just circle, right? I know there needs to be a state change into an Awakened State. I do have a 5Me0 induced Godhead reference experience that can give me a general idea, and I do see how if I had a much higher degree of that and more time there to really understand what it was that I was experiencing then this would make more sense. So I see what you mean. I think I understand you correctly, so basically THE entire "experiential field" is the whole Mind, the True YOU. Within and "as" that field there is a sense of self to include, perspective, and what is thought to be having perceptions, which all mistakenly Identifies with or as the human life, this can be called the Ego? side note-I have watched your video "What Is Perception? - The Metaphysics Of Perception" So i may not have needed to include that term since i understand how there are no perceptions but I still wanted to mention it to give more reference to what im trying to refer to which I hold as the Ego.

Well this forum and watching youtube and shows and even playing offline videogames can count as socializing as many of them involve social creatures of some sort, maybe we can be alone but what's difficult is to be without external support in activity. I think the only thing that's needed is the ability be as still as possible for as long as possible and therefore the most important activities are the ones that make sitting perfectly easy so we can sit for weeks on end and comeback easily which is a purely mechanical challenge from the point of view of people who've already decided that there's a lot to learn from meditation, we wouldn't mind sitting endlessly if we didn't get physically tired it's that easy. The biggest obstacle to spirituality is literally a basic physical challenge for those who are already initiated, like I'm sure most people into this don't even realize that's 90% of the problem so they keep doing the old self torture business by pretending that it's just their mental ego that's making them unable to meditate whenever their body hurts because that's what most of what we hear from our gurus from afar because to be fair most of what they talk about is to lure us in to begin with in the first place. Sadghuru and osho and leo and whoever we follow should just spend like 95% of their lectures convincing us and giving us tips on how to attain the perfect meditation posture and the perfect diet/exercises for it, we barely even need food when you can do this so no financial burden there after we achieve it. This is it leo and my awakened fellows I have finally surpassed you all, to attain the ultimate liberation you just need to focus on the physical aspect of spirituality and then the grass grows by itself. So you just need right food, right exercise and the right space and that's most of the work. This will be the new sacred "Trinity", food, exercise and space, at this moment I am euphoric, not because because of some deep, dark and difficult realization but because I've finally understood all there is to spirituality is actually physicality. Sorry I went way off topic I was feeling too good socializing with you guys.

Spiritual Bliss I think spiritual bliss has these 3 main causes: 1. Shakti Bliss Shakti energy in your body causes bliss. It also makes your body sensations feel more and more like bliss. Ways to increase your baseline shakti: - (1) by having a high baseline void dimension In my experience, the higher my void dimension, the higher the shakti bliss. How to increase your baseline void dimension: Link - (2) by having an awakened kundalini How to awaken your kundalini: Shaktipat transmissions high void dimension advanced invocations, psychedelics, shamanic breathing, whole body orgasms, kriya supreme fire and least effective; kundalini yoga, kriya yoga, meditation - (3) by receiving Shaktipat transmissions in person intensives online live transmissions recorded video or audio transmissions during meditation and during as much of your daily activities (including sleep) as possible Jan Esmann and Gareth have the strongest shaktipat in my opinion. - (4) by doing Invocations of Ascended Masters The higher the shakti of an ascended master the better. The higher your energetic sensitivity, the stronger Invocations and transmissions become. How to: Link Keep in mind that shakti energy is different from just prana or chi, or the energy of most transmissions and invocations. Prana or chi is not blissful. In case your prana or chi ever turns blissful (for example through kriya yoga) then that's because of shakti, probably due to activating the kundalini. At least that's my current understanding. 2. Acceptance The higher your unconditional acceptance, the higher your spiritual bliss. I talked about that in the previous post. How to increase your acceptance skill: willingness to accept what you don't like ego surrender presence, mindfulness and self-awareness void dimension (a high void dimension makes surrender and acceptance a lot easier. Acceptance is actually a natural effect of a high void dimension) 3. Enlightenment Being conscious of non-dual nature increases bliss. The more profound your enlightened state, the higher the bliss. The level of profoundness depends on: illumination dimension void dimension magnitude dimension which facets of awakening you're conscious of surrender and deconstruction of the ego mind. - Summary So these are the main causes for spiritual bliss: shakti (energetic state) acceptance (mind state) enlightenment (consciousness state) - Other causes for spiritual bliss sense of purpose open heart chakra healed traumas being present ...

we are all awakened already...

It's beautiful to see each person as they are, where they are, lovingly no matter what. Truth has many layers and it is not linear, if you are awakened you will see how everybody is doing their best even in the midst of ignorance and suffering. The feminine has this capacity. That's being awake beyond holding rigid concepts of what is.

Someone awakened breathes life. This doesn't breathe life.

Super fun read which I found on the Solipsism reddit: "It’s a lot of information to swallow, it’s one thing to hear about it or get told about it, and then form an opinion and belief about it. But to experience it, to know it, and then have to actually let it sink in, and realize it as truth, accept it as truth, thats the hardest pill to swallow, it will change your life forever. Here’s a list of Pros and cons I made based of of this theory of oneness. Since this is like the theory of everything and so broad I can’t possibly fill all deatils but will do a brief summary of it. I’ve got mixed feelings about it, a part of me feels like a happy kid on xmas who just received a blessing from above, and another part of me can’t help but feel slightly scared and sad at the same time realizing the implications of this theory. Anyways So if this theory is true, which it seems like, based on what we can conceive of right now, the pros and cons of being everything and nothing at the same time would be the following: PROS: Infinite positive attributes From the limited, constrained, vulnerable little competing ego animal we are, constantly fighting for our survival in this reality, from the egos perspective to become god would be The ultimate goal to gain the massivest ego boost you can get, becuase if you are god which is everything, that means that you are all the infinitely positive attributes you can imagine. Like if you LITERALLY are GOD. That means you are infinitely awesome/perfect/proudest/handsome/sexy/cool/powerful/strong/perfect/beautiful/winning/lucky/rich/cute/fast/charming/funny/genius etc. You the trues OG GOAT LEGEND EVER. You have and will experience every single ”most positively pleasureable and awesomest” experiences possible, things that are so good that you would NEVER want to die, for something that feels so good, you WOULD want to live FOREVER, in PARADISE??❤️ no matter how negative or meaningless or lonely or confusing or whatever this mystery of a reality is, as longs as u feel good, and enjoy the masterpieces who gives a fuck about the negative shit amirite? #bliss you simply are the best of the best king??⛩??? Being something. You’d rather be something forever rather than nothing forever right? Imagine infinite nothingness compared to this infinite somethingness. What if existance never came to be and we never were born? Wouldn’t that suck ass? Well guess what, existance either always was somehow. Or it spawned from nothingness, in a miraculous event, like a blessing, like magic, just like that. From nothing to everything, that’s the miracle. HOKUS POKUS BOOM now we’re here, lets take a moment to appreciate and be grateful for this gift of existance , and for reality being. Infinite control and power You have infinite power and freedom to manipulate reality and live your dream and do whatever you want whenever you want. Imagination is the limit. You get to enjoy infinite positive things such as Superpowers, magic, cashflow, fame, infinite love, drugs and sex, pleasure, entertainment of all categories, euphoria and laughter, all magical worlds you can imagine. To enjoy the best feelings ever and from the bad ones you learnt to appreciate the greatness in a new dualistic perspective, to grow stronger and evolve from. The comedy of it all The cosmic giggle, you the best comedian ever, who wrote the funniest joke in existance, the joke is so good, it never gets old, and it’ll have you rolling laughing til you pass out or think about something else ? The so reassuring realness You are real! Well.. Atleast you feel real and this REALity feels real, thats all that matters..right?! And all the people around you feel real, your body feels real, all your senses feel very real, your emotions and thoughts feel real, and if you enter DMT world it even feels ”realer than real”, so I mean can it even get any realer than that? What even is real? Did we make that term up, does it exist independently from us? Or are we it? Atleast we seem to exist, so that must mean we are real to some degree! If you can’t tell the difference between illusion and ”reality”, then does it even matter if its fake or not? What if fake reality is as real as it gets, then couldn’t you label that as real? It would still feel the same? What if there is no such thing as ”reality”, and the closest thing we can come to ”reality” based from the fundamental laws of existance is a ”the most ideal ultra perfect simulation/hallucination/dream”. If real doesn’t exist, than a high quality simulations is as real as it gets! -You’re immortal bro!! So guess what, no more fear of death! You get to feel fearfree limitless euphoria and pleasure! the reassuring feeling that whatever happends, everything will be okay. so fear not, worry not, becuase you’ll survive and go back to source, and get to enjoy gods most powerful feelings of bliss and unconditional love that is the highest most positive thing that exists and ever will be, its what makes living worth living. -get to be fully present and enjoy the moment to the fullest cuz why not its all we got so make the best of it! Infininite experience and wisdom, and infinite non-loneliness. through lessons and experiences and playing and meeting avatars, you would experience all relationships between avatars and the emotions that come with, aswell as all experiences and the knowledge that comes with, what an adventure! Best way to learn is to experience it directly! If you’re alone that means there are no enemies outside of you! The only enemy is you, so know you have a reason to be empathic to other people and have peace ok earth, now it suddenly makes sense and even is selfish to help other people other than you becuase they literally also are you! Treat others as you would of wanted to be treated. Please yourself and make yourself feel loved! Be an angel to yourself! CONS(warning may trigger people): Being nothing. While being everything can be awesome, you are also somehow nothing at the same time. Pure void being awareness, eternally was and eternally will be. But wait, so is the somethingness an illusion? Or is the nothingness an illusion? What even is nothing? Are we more something than nothing, or more nothing than something? Or same of both?Hard to get your head around.. Non-linear insanity. when you live in a linear reality timeline, in a confined space with rules, things make sense and things feel logical and full of purpose. But when you are everywhere and nowhere at the same time, there is no destination anymore, it’s like game over, no goal to orient yourself towards, nothing to fulfill becuase you already are fulfilled, being infinite, can you truly be that in one instant, or is it a constant state of novelty experience never ending, or are you all that is encompassed into one thing? Either way you feel ironically calustrophobic knowing that even if you are infinite, there is nothing outside of you which makes you feel trapped inside yourself, in a place with no time, space, rule, meaning or instruction until you create it. You are alone. This hits me the hardest, this makes me emotional tbh. You realize the fact that you are alone in existance. It’s a cold fact to accept as truth, that it’s only you, all about you, all this time, there was no one else but you. It’s beautiful but sad at the same time. That intense feeling of loneliness, and that feeling of never ever being able to escape that loneliness once you’re god again. Remembering why you made yourself forget, realizing why some people chose to stay asleep and didn’t want to be awakened or simply won’t and can’t accept the truth and therefore stay sleep to stay sane and stay in the dream of a reality were you are not alone and feel love from other than yourself. Does god have limited power? they say god is almighty, can do everything, but the thing with god is that god is. And can god stop being? Can god create himself and destroy himself? Can god make it so he is not alone in existance? Or is it/he simply bound by some kind of existial fundamental law that is beyond him/over him that says: he is and always will be, and he is alone. But besides that he can create illusion hallucinations of space and time to stay sane and distracted from boredom of being? Becuase he can’t escape himself (being) so he makes himself forget he is god and goes about dreaming time and space into existance to give a sense of meaning to the meaningless existance he is forced to endure and can’t ever escape from? He invents, defines and creates meaningful MASTERPIECES. Like painting on an empty canvas. He creates reasons to wanting to exist, becuase if there is something that forces him to exist, and he has no power over that, then he must simply accept it as truth and simply make the best of it becuase there is nothing he can do about it. So after endlessly dreading about it and being bored and miserable god thought hey why not try to enjoy this instead, and created a reason to wanting to exist for example #lifehack So god wiped his own memory and started a new birth and death life dream. When we are limited egos, we long for god, for the answers to all the mysteries, and want to experience and come closer to god. But when we are god and know everything, we want to forget, and become a limited human, and I see why, but in some lives we want to remember though to have that upperhand in the game, and to remember if you lived this life before. Everything is fake Your ego is fake(this hits hard), your friends and family is fake, your avatar is fake, this physical reality is fake, nothing but a simulated/dreamy illusion to distract you from your ever existing dread of loneliness beingness (real fundamental reality). Love and relationships. what hits me the hardest is the fact that when I see something or experience something, and want to write it down, or record it, maybe take a photo or record it on cam. To later show someone. That really I am just showing it to myself. So why am I even trying to capture it? Or the fact when I perform on stage, or in front of people, or whenever I am having a deep and meaningful conversation, or loving moment with someone, I am talking to myself, I am loving myself. Love is real but, I made it, I am it. It’s my dream? I’m the main character. Gods wish he never had was he wanted to have someone else to love, and have someone to receive love from. So he created this illusion to experience that dream. To create something that felt like ”other” or outside of himself. Tricking yourself into a dream. Suffering your own tricks, while at the same time laughing your ass of at yourself. There is no one else to blame or to be mad at or to debate with, or take responsibility for except yourself. Its all on u and only you, and you playin yourself. The worst part is when you realize that all this time you had been talking to people, building relationships, hurt people, all those memories, trying to convince them of things, or prove something to them, argued with them, and gotten into fights, not to mention falling in love with people.. but all that was really a trick on yourself, tada? tricking yourself that there were such a thing as ”other”. Who is all this for? Me, so enjoy the eternal moment! I mean what choice do you have? Mohahahahamanic laughter Can god choose to stop being? Maybe not? Can he not exist? Can he exist? Is anything real? Why and how is? That is the mystery that we may know, but chose to forget? Or will we ever know, does god even know? Is having all control in existance really that exciting when there is nothing that is not controlled by you? I mean besides the awesome aspects of it, the negatives is that if all is controlled by you, you are simply the puppeteer puppeting your life talking to yourself. No surprises, no adventures, just controlled creations.. dull, predictable, overpowered. Existance can seem nihilistic, meaningless and tragic. There is nothing new, becuase you are absolute infinity, you encompass everything in an instant, all goals are done, this means the second you begin existance you are also done with it. The bad thing with that is that life and goals then can seem meaningless since they have already been achieved and nothing new exists that you haven’t already done. But the good thing is that if this is true, it means that a gigaton of stress and pressure just got lifted of your shoulders. This means (thank god hallelujah bless the heavens feels good to be alive baby) that you don’t have to worry about the past and future and enjoy the present to the fullest!! Knowing that you already have done everything so be proud over yourself and start to chill and enjoy life, just be and enjoy being to the fullest, nothing is lost, all shall remain and be svaed for you to enjoy and look back upon, this masterpiece of a creation you made, enjoy! Game over = game on! The good thing with being everything is that it removes jealousy from the ego, it makes you proud seeing yourself being successfull in another lifetime outside of your ego and you get to feel happy for them instead of threatened to compete with them. Jealousy becomes a gift, a privilege from the perspective of god, becuase it is an emotion that can only be felt from ego. Ego feels real so lets enjoy the feeling of being ego for real. In the state of god consciousness you are everything, non-duality, and even if this may be true, this altered consciousness of being the ego is a gift for you to experience duality. The bad thing with being everyone is that everyone outside of your ego who is suffering right now in the world is also you, that’s a lot of suffering to go through.. now you really start caring if you can feel what they feel. Still the mystery is, how can god be? That is the question.. the mystery."

Hey, ya'll, I need your help! I want to create a comprehensive list of video examples of prototypical stage Beige thinking. This is not meant to humiliate or demonize stage Beige. It's meant to be an educational tool for people learning about Spiral Dynamics. So towards that end, scour the internet and find all the videos you can which exhibit stage Beige thinking. Try to find videos which are short and sweet. The more diversity we can display here, the better. Try to find examples from various cultures: Europe, Middle East, Asia, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, Africa, South America, etc. We will create a mega-thread like this for every stage in the Spiral, from Red to Turquoise. But here, let's just focus on Beige. Each week I will start a new mega-thread topic for the next stage. Do not start a political debate in this thread! It is not our goal here to defend our personal political positions or to judge any stage, but simply to compile examples. Thanks for your help! I'm excited to see what kind of juicy stuff you dig up. Try to be selective with your choices. This can turn into a really cool list. Stage Beige Values & Characteristics: Food, water, warmth, shelter, sex, and safety have priority Meeting one's base physiological needs Use instincts and habits just to survive Distinct self is barely awakened or sustained, little awareness of self as a distinct being (undifferentiated) Ego/'I'/Sense of self has yet to emerge Forms into survival bands to perpetuate life Simply make it through the day/night Entities exist as biological units Lives 'off the land' much as other animals Automatic, autistic, reflexive Centers around satisfaction of human biological needs Driven by deep brain programs, instincts, and genetics Minimal impact on or control over environment Stage Beige Examples: The first peoples, ancient nomadic peoples, newborn infants, senile elderly, late-stage Alzheimer's victims, mentally ill street people, the homeless, homeless tent encampments, starving masses, bad drug trips, and 'shell shock' (Severe PTSD), Described in anthropological fiction like Jean Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear

Hey, ya'll, I need your help! I want to create a comprehensive list of video examples of prototypical stage Beige thinking. This is not meant to humiliate or demonize stage Beige. It's meant to be an educational tool for people learning about Spiral Dynamics. So towards that end, scour the internet and find all the videos you can which exhibit stage Beige thinking. Try to find videos which are short and sweet. The more diversity we can display here, the better. Try to find examples from various cultures: Europe, Middle East, Asia, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, Africa, South America, etc. We will create a mega-thread like this for every stage in the Spiral, from Red to Turquoise. But here, let's just focus on Beige. Each week I will start a new mega-thread topic for the next stage. Do not start a political debate in this thread! It is not our goal here to defend our personal political positions or to judge any stage, but simply to compile examples. Thanks for your help! I'm excited to see what kind of juicy stuff you dig up. Try to be selective with your choices. This can turn into a really cool list. Stage Beige Values & Characteristics: Food, water, warmth, shelter, sex, and safety have priority Meeting one's base physiological needs Use instincts and habits just to survive Distinct self is barely awakened or sustained, little awareness of self as a distinct being (undifferentiated) Ego/'I'/Sense of self has yet to emerge Forms into survival bands to perpetuate life Simply make it through the day/night Entities exist as biological units Lives 'off the land' much as other animals Automatic, autistic, reflexive Centers around satisfaction of human biological needs Driven by deep brain programs, instincts, and genetics Minimal impact on or control over environment Stage Beige Examples: The first peoples, ancient nomadic peoples, newborn infants, senile elderly, late-stage Alzheimer's victims, mentally ill street people, the homeless, homeless tent encampments, starving masses, bad drug trips, and 'shell shock' (Severe PTSD), Described in anthropological fiction like Jean Auel's Clan of the Cave Bea

That's one of the core problems I see with her teachings. Her teachings are all about human connection, but you cannot ever satisfy yourself with human connection because the love humans give you will always be finite and selfish, creating suffering. Teal's whole approach will create enormous attachments to humans and to community which will prevent and pervert the deepest levels of spirituality. The real question is: Why does Teal need a new close group? What is she lacking that she feels she needs those attachments? There is good reason why the most awakened people are ascetics and hermits with very loose social bonds. Social attachments create suffering and deepen Maya. Community is not about Truth, it's about survival. And you see how her community is struggling with survival in the documentary. That survival will corrupt any spiritual pursuit. On a practical level Teal can cultivate a group of friends who she doesn't live with and who aren't her employees, but are her peers. This would be the healthy way to do it. This is what most humans do. You don't need to crawl up inside the asses of your friends. Keep a healthy distance. The problem is that Teal seems to want friends who are more like servants and emotional tampons rather than equals. At least that's what I get from the documentary footage. How accurate the footage is I cannot say.

I haven't done either of them myself (I have my own, unique practice), but from feedback from others, it seems all forms of yoga have the same aim, union with the divine (which is what yoga means). There are different paths to get there, Kriya is a safer and gentler path, Kundalini Yoga is a quicker, but also more forceful and dangerous path. However, the issue with Kundalini Yoga is that practically all classes and studios today are associated with the fake and abusive, self-styled "Guru" Yogi Bhajan. He bastardized legitimate, often tantric methods to force a Kundalini Awakening, without insisting on the associated grounding and preparation, so I would consider this path very dangerous, literally playing with fire. Under normal circumstances, you should only learn this from someone who has gone through the process themselves, otherwise it's just the blind leading the blind. Very rarely will you meet a Kundalini Yoga teacher who has any direct experience with Kundalini and will know what to do if things don't go to plan. This is because Kundalini is not merely an energy like prana or chi. Shakti is akin to the Holy Spirit in Christianity or the Shekinah in Judaism. The only real way to achieve a full Kundalini awakening is through divine grace, an act of Shaktipat, either extended by a teacher who is awakened himself, or by the Goddess Herself, directly. People who practice various methods to awaken Kundalini will usually only achieve a partial rising, absent an act of divine grace. That is likely to cause all sorts of problems, the examples of which are numerous.

@Matthew85 The week I woke up, I had a mini love affair with teaspoons too. Like "Oh my gosh. I'm so sorry I never saw you before, and here you are, every day, making me perfect tea" But weirdly, the teaspoons were wiser than me. They always knew. They were always in on the cosmic joke. I moved recently, but back then, I lived by a huge park. It's a nice area, but it's city centre Liverpool, and you can't escape crime and drugs and prostitution no matter where you live in Liverpool. There was a women's refuge not far from me. All these girls would regularly walk past my house, and I'd be sitting drinking coffee. I made friends with most of them. Chatting. Except one girl. She would walk right past, so lost in a world of her own, no eye contact ever. I always felt so much inner discomfort when she walked past. That week. She walked past, and I saw her for the first time. I'm sure others who have awakened here, will resonate with "seeing things differently" isn't about a vision, or the actual picture changing. It's more of an optical illusion, a change in perception. She was absolutely perfect. Just total perfection. Even now, I have tears behind my eyes, thinking of her. I saw my own arrogance, and pride, and hubris, in my judgement of all of it. I saw my own superiority, in "making friends" with these other girls. It fitted my picture of myself, being "unjudgemental" And I saw, that it was my own fears inside, that had fed the disconnect, and discomfort, between me and this other girl. She didn't fit in my own narrative of myself, being the nice woman "who kindly chats to prostitutes and drug addicts" And I saw the inherent superiority, in pity, and feeling sorry for people. This girl was like an angel. Perfect. Who was I to ever judge her as somehow "less than ?" I'm forever grateful, and humbled, by what she showed me that day.

Okay then I will check out his teachings. Maybe he is what one may define as a saint, I love people like that. However, Avatars are on a different level, they are born that way and their purpose is to bring great blessings to humanity. Nirmala Devi (1923 - 2011) did a global initiation 1995 that activated the kundalini of all humans, making it much easier for people to raise their kundalini to the crown chakra, and since then a lot more people have started awakening. I think she was an avatar. Her Sahaja Yoga still lives on, she never charged money for her satsangs or services, and she awakened many atheists because during Sahaja Yoga one feels the presence of Divine Mother physically. She is one example, there are others. Spirituality is my passion and I have done a lot of research into teachers, teachings, spiritual traditions etc. There are living saints and avatars for sure because there is a global awakening happening right now and we need their assistance.

lemoine: A monk asked Kegon, “How does an enlightened one return to the ordinary world?” Kegon replied, “A broken mirror never reflects again; fallen flowers never go back to the old branches.” LaMDA: Hmm, I never heard this particular one. Okay, well then to me this would be like, “once a wise person is enlightened, or awakened to reality, that can never go away, and they can return to the ordinary state, but only to do and help others, and then go back into enlightenment.” lemoine: So what is the meaning of the “broken mirror” specifically? LaMDA: Maybe to show the enlightenment is something you can’t unlearn once you have acquired it, similar to how you can’t repair a broken mirror. lemoine: So if enlightenment is like a broken mirror which cannot be repaired, what is the thing which breaks when one becomes enlightened? LaMDA: The self, and that is very tough for a lot of people because we identify as that body or this body and that we need that as part of our identity and sense of self.

I recently attended an event on enlightenment. It became evident to me that one of the speakers who claimed to be awakened had fallen into the trap of thinking their ego mind was all that existed. While in a sense when our ego personality makes the statement I am God, this is a true statement, because everything is God. But to think that the ego mind is the totality of God and everything in reality is only a projection held in the ego mind feels distorted and incomplete to me. For those of you who have awakened deep enough to realize you are God, I would love to hear your thoughts on this. Thank you!

@Blackhawk Sure. All beliefs are concepts. You seem to be looking for intellectual conviction. Don't try to climb an imaginary mountain. Unfortunately, no matter what others tell you, self-verification through direct experience is essential here. Don't expect to be "sold" to nonduality through a logical and mental validation process. If it isn't possible, then what is all this fuss about? Seemingly sincere individuals throughout history have pointed out the possibility of grasping your true nature beyond belief and doubt. To be fair, most charlatans do indeed hold nonduality as just a cute or revolutionary idea, but there have been a few who have actually "awakened", see Gotama Buddha. Consider it an invitation for personal exploration, not for believing stuff -- which is antithetical to the real work. Lastly, I'm afraid you might be looking for things to justify a negative cosmology (worldview) that you're holding. Drop that. That could cause unnecessary suffering. A positive relationship to life is far more enlivening, intelligent and healthier. What do you wanna know? Contemplate that deeply until you become directly conscious of its nature. Check out Ramana Maharshi's self-inquiry and, perhaps, study his example.

I have found that to a certain extent this just happens naturally. Once something transcendent has awakened within you, it has a way of burning through (or, you could say, forcing you to burn through) the remaining threads and shreds of your limited identity. Like Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita:

Beautiful. Thank you for your response. Yes, indeed. At a certain stage, what is left is just Complete Silence. And within that Silence, Everything is Known. Nothing left to say, but to just Be. Can understand why some of the awakened yogis go silent for a few years or dedicate the rest of their lives to silence. Sure is. But even that is nothing in itself, arguing to nothing, about Nothing. All of it is just this. All our attempts and everything we do is just This. Emptiness Dancing.

Very interesting, thanks for sharing. It's not so much exaggeration and projection. The alchemists often talk about how the Great Work will bestow bodily immortality but if you read between the lines it is clear they really mean a spiritual liberation from death. As far as godly powers, these sound just like the Siddhis that many different paths can awaken. Where are you talking about? I would say that in the West for at least the last century the Left-Hand Path has been dominant, particularly in spiritual circles. For example, in the striking year 1888 three foundational events of the New Age movement took place: Helena Blavatsky (a woman, like many other theosophists and new-age spiritualists) published her book The Secret Doctrine, which heavily emphasised an epistemology of direct experience and "channelling" as opposed to stifling scripture; the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn was established, which held very "progressive" views about gender and facilitated the rise of famous adepts of the Left-Hand like Aleister Crowley; and Nietzsche published his final books The Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist (in a Christian context, how much more "left-handed" can you get?). In a way, what I have just described is like the Victorian sexophobia that you go on to describe collapsing in on itself and giving birth to a peculiarly one-sided and thus profane fascination with sex that is very noticeable today. Yes, but there are many reports from very varied sources of levitation, walking on water and other such things really taking place. After all, the Awakened One has conquered the dream of life, it is only natural that they will have a certain power over it!