Search the Community

The neti neti method

Sure, every school of thought has its issues and/or gaping holes, I reckon. Some of them are based on a general cart-before-the-donkey fallacy, others may have felt they had isolated and found better method(s) or ways of expressing. None of them will 'save' you, but none of them can 'block' you either. Will there be some trial and error? Absofuckinlutely. Some earlier SEERs saw this mind thingy and likely addressed it in a way that made sense to them, so they began to spell it out and hash it out in their minds as best they could. SEERs were 'recognized', some peeps believed them, others saw it the same way, schools were founded, arguments between them hashed out, lineages were kept, etc etc etc. There have always been fakers, thieves, and con artists. The regions between the Pacific Ocean and the Mediterranean (and elsewhere, of course) were teaming with thousands of schools of thought, systems of beliefs, and types of practice. I do not think of the biggies as monolithically as many. The variation, sub-schools, overlaps, and borrowings were immense. Some outlandish schools even gave rise to what would eventually become the field of science, with all its own schools, arguments, lineages, etc. It's a fascinating bit of history to delve into if one wants to take some time out and explore. And now, they all seem to be converging again, and everyone continues to hash it out in their minds, just like humanity has for thousands of years... purddy coolio. Seekers start as swimming in maya, a momentum of ignorance that gives rise to the belief that "I/the me" is separate from the perceivable world. All of the sensory data and mental conditioning are woven seamlessly together, along with this simple (and powerful) thread of ignorance. For example, up to 50% of the 'physical' brain is used in sorting just the visual data coming in, and so when someone says,"You are the tree", the mind does its usual protests, rejections and misunderstandings take place, and it goes on and on, based on how deeply the mind has failed to grasp the pointer, due to its ignorance of what certain teachings point to. Seekers of Truth or Self mostly think they are looking for something else, but it seems what is actually happening is that they are burning through ignorance (not stupidity, but a structure of existential misperception). You present negative criticisms of the via negativa/neti neti aspects of certain schools for your own reasons, assumptions, and perspectives. Based on them, you aim to present potentially better or more optimal ways that your mind prefers to approach it. That's fine. To be critical, though, the way it sounds to me is that you are also putting the cart before the donkey. The infinite openness and limitless aspects of the view your mind is proposing sound nice, rewarding, and advantageous, but it also seems to have forgotten HOW you came to these conclusions (and subsequent criticisms of other schools). Undoubtedly, there has been an ample amount of failure (in my book, futility is necessary), which has required the mind to process and/or release and negate a lot of baggage and ignorance, clearing and emptying the mindset of its previous barriers. You've enjoyed a certain degree of space and clarity in the mind as fruit of your endeavors. Does that sound about right? So, could you have arrived at these conclusions without that general process? It takes a lot of failure to get out of one’s own way, which is what the neti neti/via negativa alludes to. It's how the mind discovers its limitations. Sure, in hindsight, it’s easier to see some of the insanity, silliness and wrong turns, as well as the many shoulda/coulda/wouldas. But, to this mind, it’s also understood that it all unfolded and was done --still -- simply---HAPPENING PERFECTLY SO. Couldn’t have happened any other way in order for it to happen exactly as it did. Hard to explain, but maybe someone else had the same impression. Gratitude for the whole shebang. If the mind hadn't been so delusional or was more conscious of its ignorance, it would have played out differently. In general, what changed over time was noticing and recognizing the space prior to the train(wreck) of thought, becoming more aware.... conscious of my patterns of thought/behavior. Most peeps have repetitive patterns that play out in almost predictable ways, once they become conscious of the general trajectory. Good friends, they say, are best when they point them out. Notice, take note, and become conscious of them more, and they may begin to simply fall away... naturally. Or maybe, in a moment of clarity, one notices the repetitive negative pattern in progress, takes a pause, sees the mind gaining momentum, and seizes the opportunity to consciously turn into it, righting the vessel, opening a whole new set of possibilities that the previous unconscious barrier hid from view. Conscious, spacious presence of mind in context.... right Here, right Now. Gotta go.

When you say that absolute being/consciousness is dreaming reality, you are operating from a limited perspective. You perceive the reality of form as a hologram, a mirage, that "consciousness" dreams. something without substance. For you, enlightenment is the perception that this consciousness is permanent. This undoubtedly implies that you haven't opened yourself to the essence of reality. Form is not a dream; it is the inevitable expression of totality, and any form contains totality in the same way that it is contained within it. Truly, any form is totality. Conciousness is just an expression, a possibility that happens , the reality is beyond conciousness and unconsciousness. Absolute reality is a bottomless, boundaryless abyss that is conscious because consciousness arises within it, since its potential has no limitation. But what is is not consciousness. The reality of form is not a tranquil dream of consciousness at play, but the inevitable expression of total depth, a manifest potential that contains totality in its absolute plenitude. The Buddhist perception of form as illusion is a closed perception. It is purely mental, but without the essential openness, which is that of the "heart" in quotation marks, signifying the real substance of reality, its unlimited vitality, its total power. Look, everything that exists as form unfolds in infinite forms; this is absolute life, total glory. Nothing is illusory; everything is real, because the depth of everything is absolute. The depth of a thought encompasses all of reality. Illusion or mirage implies flatness, and that implies limitation. The unlimited lives, and its life is total, because it has no limits. Well, poor chap Selling Water by the River. Writes a disclaimer... So that means all pointers are.... limited! Because a pointer/word/statement is by definition... dualistic and limited. ... and then gets a Pleads guilty as charged I guess. Maybe you like Halaw, especially the statement marked in red: ... and "even consciousness itself". and https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=Halaw&author=Water%20by%20the%20River and https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=sentience&author=Water%20by%20the%20River and https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=Neti%20Neti&author=Water%20by%20the%20River If you allow, before we turn in circles and many replies are requested, instead of continuing discussing about pointers which are by definition insufficient and limited (see the disclaimer), lets do a shortcut. You can consider the quote below as a general answer in case I can't always give feedback on your points and questions: Besides: It is very good that you don't equate (self)-consciousness (which is an appearance) nor anything else that is merely temporarily arising with Absolute Reality. Neti neti. Chanting who is stating all these points again by the River PS: “That which is not present in deep dreamless sleep is not real.” -Ramana Maharshi PS PS: Complaints and unclarities about this statement please directly to its author. Preferably in the form of a Koan. Because the essence of Ramana is also right here, right now.

https://www.actualized.org/insights/actualized-quotes-238 "Reach a point where you know nothing at all. This is the closest state to God. God is not known like other things. God is experienced as an infinite mystery." Chapeau! Neti Neti https://www.actualized.org/forum/search/?&q=Neti%20Neti&author=Water%20by%20the%20River "The applause of the unprincipled is not only worthless, it is a warning." — John Ruskin

Firstly, don't forget that you must deconstruct even Leo, this is what I'm seeing that is being missed with all the questions about what is better, what is worse, what's it going to take, goalposts moving. We're talking about Infinity, you have to try all kinds of shit. It's tempting to lean on him or on anything, the mind is very sneaky and is hiding from all the work whether it be trips or retreats. Secondly, keep the main thing the main thing. Pick something and use it until it drives you insane. The DMTs are crucial imo. "No self/no doer" alone, will motivate the hell out of you and the DMTs will either produce this outright, or if you're like me it will catch you off guard later on. I did a meditation retreat even after my 5-MeO, NN DMT and Psilocybin work. Frustration, boredom, laziness and procrastination are all TRICKS, of course you feel these. Of course, you're questioning what's effective and what isn't, who do you think supplies you with these questions? The fog of deception is so thick, you damn near have a heart attack when it clears. During the long sessions and retreats, I gain awareness around how my mind uses EVERYTHING to avoid dissolution. I combine mindfulness with labeling with neti neti and let EVERYTHING slip through. For those with ADHD (like me), I had to become a puppet. I danced until the "me" vanished. I surrendered control entirely and just let awareness do the work. And it did. More so than just laziness and avoidance of pain, that can be overcome when you're really after Truth. The mind doesn’t want to die. It will hold on to Leo, to his videos, to this forum, to that one juicy insight, even to the cushion your ass is sitting on. Jed McKenna style, Neti Neti, labeling experiences as they appear and setting every idea of God, Truth, Infinity and Love on fire as the appear is a must. Your mind will become conscious of "something" at some point, that will terrify it. Look back at it, you have triangulated Truth but do not wait for, or expect this moment. (easier said than done) In some sense, just doing psychedelics then running off into survival and hallucination makes no sense if you're serious about the work. Unless you have a closet full of 5-MeO or some other substance, why settle for the continual deception and unconsciousness of daily life? Might as well wear the mind out, the target of inquiry is available 24/7.

The problem is that guys like Maharsi don't have an experience that can be extrapolated to normal people today. That neti neti thing isn't going to work for anyone except him, and current teachers like Ralston simply deny reality to place themselves in a forced flat experience that they call enlightenment. People believe them because they're suffering, and having a flat experience is seen as liberation. Another example is Tolle, who claims that one day he woke up and his mind was free of egoic projection. It's hard to believe because egoic projection is a real structure, which is why it's so solid. It's not a mistake that it will disappear one day, since it would reappear very soon. Tolle's message leads you to deny your reality, and that will never work, otherwise traps you in a state where you are trying to deni a reality affirming that it isn't real

Self Inquiry is a good practice......for the me, for the one needing validation, for the one looking to get something....for the energy that thinks it's separate and needing to do something about it. For the one lost in it's dreamworld. Neti Neti - not this, not that, is also a good practice but for the above-mentioned psychotic. Hehe. Not making fun, just keeping it real and exposing the lies in Spirituality. We cannot say it's nothing, it's all one, there's no time and space, no separation, etcetcetcetc, and then turn around to say and believe all the other stuff to be true. Don't excuse it by saying it's paradoxical. Yes, it's a paradox but don't come to a dead end then say oh well, it's a paradox. Its magic and anything and everything is possible. I will keep doing this shit until i come to a dead-end, till I've exposed my own delusions or until i've confused myself. None of this really matters because it's all Absolutely nothing, but why not? All spiritual practices are doing is strengthening the me, confirming the person behind the mask to be real and showing how processes is the way to go to get to what is already perfect. I'm not saying they aren't good, I'm not saying they don't provide temporary satisfaction or are beneficial in some way, but it's all within the dream of separation and is not doing anything different than when the body digests a piece of bread and the body feels relief and less bloated. Or running to feel fit or walking on a treadmill for exercise. Nothing will get you closer to what already is or make you more divine or closer to your God or further from being a corrupted human. It's all just a bunch of empty nonsense like everything else. This is nothing, right. What makes you think that everything is anything. I'm talking to thought. Thought talking to thought. No one is choosing to or not to do anything and I'm over here jibbering on about nothing. When I'm done, I'll be concerned about my day, maybe worry about something for next week and probably utter some nonsense about what happened yesterday or 10yrs ago. I don't know, I'm not a psychic and don't know what will happen next but all I know is I know I'm full of shit and this world is full of shit and there's nothing really happening, it's all empty and we should all go celebrate this thing called life because it's filled with a bunch of nothing that's causing a bunch of chaos for nothing. Yippee. No I've not gone mad, just free, free to write what the hell it wants. Can't stand this freedom shit, it will get me in trouble and doesn't give a rats ass about the person behind it. Freedom doesn't care. IT could only care if it wasn't free. It's scary....to the me. There is no me. There already is no person/me/I/human/individual, that's why we've named and labeled ourselves, and called it something. You don't get it, do you.

I think with the neti neti technique the Absolute neither discriminates nor non-discriminates, and with iti iti either discriminates or non-discriminates. And so on.

Bashar kinda not really who can trace his teachings back to Law of One and also The Seth Material. Mostly dead people like Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, Plotinus, Adi Shankara who popularized the neti neti technique.

Doing the neti-neti meditation feels like I´m brainwashing myself to not being identified with my body, I feel i´m just practicing it as a belief and not as a realization. How can I realize it as a truth?

Do nothing technique is for beginners and also experts. Neti neti before bedtime.

It's all good I appreciate your response. Yes, I snapped out of the experience because I had a slight panic but I suppose its not risking my mental health to just allow it; going beyond it though is interesting, I've never heard of that approach before unless its like a neti-neti I suppose.

Neti neti is an exercise, not an ontological claim.

All this about identification remains in the conceptual realm of the mind. Reality is simply real, not a matter of identification. The difference between a closed state and an open one is about energy barriers, not identification. The conceptual mind is used to structure perception, but has no relevance, is secondary character. That's why all this neti neti stuff seems a bit superficial. It's easy put the mind at zero, but the barriers still persist. You can perceive yourself as the living unlimited reality without a doubt, and say, "Oh, I'm enlightened." But there are still barriers.

Please, let me being a smartass and criticize Ramana, just as an exercise. According his logic, if they put me inside a 1 cubic meter iron box in the sun at 45 degrees full of mosquitoes and rats for a month, I know it is temporary, so I would not suffer. He always says: ask yourself what you are. You are not the body, because it's temporary. You are not the mind. Neti neti. So what's left? Let's see. Knowing that you are not the body is an idea of the mind. Knowing that you are not the mind is also an idea. The understanding that you are the infinite void is also a deduction created by the mind. You are not the void. This is not true. You are something else very different. Let's imagine the possibility that Ramana was wrong. Don't you feel a feeling of , let's say, incompleteness, when you listen Ramana?

You most definitely can experience it through meditation alone. However, i would recommend neti-neti instead of do-nothing meditation.

Short and to the point. Very hard not to breakthrough if you be committed, persistent, and have a natural inclination for this type of meditation. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/19183043

Is it possible to become conscious of the Earth's rotation around the Sun and also the rotation and motion of the sun and stars that are moving in relation to the Earth and every other planet? To be conscious of the relative nature of time from the limited human expression to the whole of the universe. Like to have the eyes of awareness see the universe from a large grand scale. Imagine sitting down, then suddenly you are one with the universe, all the planets, stars, black holes ect... The Big bang isn't something that happened in the past! We are not separate from the universe, you are the planets motion and rotation, you are the expansion of the universe, you are this mind-blowing thing called reality. The same way we don't beat our hearts and grow our nails, reality is such that it is delicately balanced and mysterious. Leo can you make a guided visualization and meditation for insights that you've became conscious of into those questions you made a video about called " the 64 most fascinating questions a human being can ask". Pick a question in that video that you shared and became conscious of over the years and guide us please. Like your powerful neti neti video. Very powerful. It's interesting those questions I ask but I need a shift in my state of consciousness to gain some serious tractions in my contemplation and consciousness. Your ability to make guided inquiry and visualization videos are amazing.

Imagine a chamber full of lava that you gonna stay in it for eternity to suffer unimaginable levels of pain for an infinite amount of time. That's the classical religious hell as described in the Bible and the Qur’an. I always had fear of going to hell or experiencing hell . But I found a logical way to get myself out of this fear and I want to share it In case someone is having similar existential fears . But Just something that comes to mind.. according to Abrahamic religions (Judaism.. Christianity.. Islam) hell is supposed to be the judgment of an all loving all wise infinitely intelligent infinitely good God for your "wrong" deeds in this irrelevant preordained universe.....!!!!!!! Smells like bullshit right ? Doesn't make sense . I want you to go deeper within yourself . Because god or the source of existence is within. What do you intuite? What does your deepest deepest deepest intuitions tell you? Is the source of all creation truly a God or a devil? What " you" really are is that same source of all creation.. And that is nothing. Literally. Neti Neti .Not this or that. Not anything at all. a quote by robert adams :"All of life.. All of.. existence.. And anything possible.. Are just images on the screen of eternity." Identify with the screen and let all the other shit go. I've found an interesting discovery in neurology that make eternal suffering PHYSICALLY impossible. And also logically impossible. Because If an experience of pain is intensified to infinite degrees it will be no longer "pain". Right ?It will collapse and you won't feel anything. Just like when you get used to something you stop feeling it's presence after a while. That's why the idea of eternal religious hell doesn't make snse.. There is actually a "threshold of pain" in your brain. If the sensation is less or bigger than a certain range of electrical power.. You simply won't feel it. Read about it here : https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threshold_of_pain Also I don't buy the reasoning "because God is infinity he must experience everything".. because god is not a dumb mechanical deterministic mathematical formula. Think about it.. if you are all powerful would you use your power to torture yourself forever? That means you are all-dumb as well 😂 But as far as I know God is all-intelligent!

I've been getting more and more into spirituality to change myself for the better. In the last few weeks I've been ultra focused on being the observer, and distancing myself from the body (e.g. neti, neti method). I figured that the Neti Neti method would distance myself enough that I could act freely in the world and not be inhibited by fear and old habits. However, I've become unbalanced and feel like I'm going crazy now. I've had to take some time off work due to this (and maybe some burn out too). I haven't done a psychedelic in over a year. My mind races and feels unstable and I'm getting small anxiety attacks about "nothing being real". Other than taking a break from spirituality, and doing normal things like excersizing, socializing, and eating healthy, does anyone have any other advice? My doctor recommended chill pills and antianxiety meds and a psychologist. I don't want to go to the psych ward and I want to get back to work. Thank you!

I don't recommend the Neti-Neti method for letting go of fear. States of insanity are generated by high amounts of fear, I recommend laying off the other spiritual practices and only focusing on investigating into your fears. Do the investigations from a neutral observation, you don't need to engage very much in the investigations, just ask the questions and the answers and results come automatically. If the investigations into your negative fear based beliefs make the fear worse, I recommend just taking a break from all spiritual practice altogether until you re-stabilize.

It has been interesting seeing and understanding it from the inside. Going from atheistic to spiritual has revealed the level of self deception that everyone falls into. Being a left progressive hating the right and suddenly aligning with the right ( not identifying as) and hating the idiocy of the left but also transcending both to see and understand both perspectives to synthesise a higher vantage point and understand the dynamic leading to a love and acceptance of it all. Personal development and spirituality with hyper logic and reason alongside allowed me to remain vigilant but the one thing that showed me how delusional the spiritual community were was when my own beloved community started attacking people with gender disorders ( in conversation and debate) while I was sitting right there and known to them. It became clear that there was ‘religious’ infiltration of authentic spirituality which has slowly got worse over the last 5 years. Influence of individuals highly susceptible to belief who could be swayed by panic and fear despite the reality of the situation being a direct experience of me that had never caused a single problem… just thrown out the window with not an ounce of critical contemplation for a ‘let’s wipe them off the face of the earth because of the ‘agenda’ conspiracy. It was so easy for them to just play traitor to their values of live compassion and understanding. I love old Greek philosophy which painstakingly and methodically worked back to the ‘agathon’ ( source/infinity) using hyper logic and reason. Like platonic retroduction or the neti neti method. It was a very fast and intense pathway to having the elusive, sober glimpse of enlightenment. something I’ve been revered for teaching in my community and constantly tackling to bring them back into balance with. my personal battle is not devolving into any negative or judgmental mindset that would be associated with my characters predicament. At the end of the day, no one knows other than if I tell them which means it only exists as an idea. The reality is as I present to the world and even that doesn’t matter. What matters is that I remain balanced and continue to teach and encourage love compassion and understanding. If something is not known it is better to learn about it than become fearful and eventually hateful. It is all allowed and each individual won’t be coerced as it is their inherent right to just be until a time they are ready and enthusiastic to learn and discover, to become endlessly curious about everything. To find out how it works instead of forcing it to bend to their way. we learn and we teach but we never coerce a child to move beyond their educational level( people in general) and I found a lot of peace in that.

Not so easy, if fact quite difficult, placing yourself in the absolute perspective is done by first realizing that reality is unreal, of the total emptiness that underlies the appearance, then you realize the endless emptiness, and for that you have to be totally empty, without any mental grip, then the second step is to realize that in the emptiness is always you, and open that you, your true being, that expands limitlessly. that is the real, the absolute and what you or anything else is. It's not something obvious like oh, it was in front of my face and I didn't realize, then I did that neti neti thing and voila. no, there are energetic blockages, it's a real work.

I can't help but to feel Osho was quite the charlatan. Consider this: You can become so conscious you understand why your bathroom floor has 57 tiles and not 56. Not as a logical explanation like "Is because the building architect designed it like this". But in the way you understand why you live in at an apartment that has bathrooms with 57 tiles and not 56. This won´t come from logical deductions this will come only from inner consciousness and pure direct intelligence. Osho was still is in the beginner levels. A human is enhanced in much bigger possibilities than to arrive at this neti neti stuff of" there is no goal"

@Javfly33 It's simple, because you are the body. Not only the body, but also the body now. Those mystic who said netí netí, you are not the body, they are simply wrong. Sounds good, maybe I try the program. But wait, if you did, why you act like hysterical when someone says anything not wonderful about sadhguru? The program excludes that circumstance?