Leo's Blog Discussion Mega-Thread

[Joshe]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

I didn't achieve non-conformiry until a few years ago. I noticed a shift in myself once I saw how conformist the mind is.

So it's not something I was born with.

Autonmous is a stage of cognitive development.

Same here. But that's just a self-awareness milestone. 

You may have freed yourself of conformity just a few years ago, but I'm betting you've been noticing it within yourself for most of your life. And each time you noticed it, you felt compelled to address it. Right? That's what I mean by "structural non-conformist".

Someone who is structurally conformist wouldn't even want to know they were operating on conformity. Much less address it should they be made aware of it. They'd sweep it under the rug because it doesn't register to them as a violation.

But for the structural non-conformist, it makes perfect sense why you'd feel compelled to address it: Because your system is built to generate its own models and evaluate by its own standards, so when it discovers it's running on something it can't trust because it didn't verify, that's a violation of one of its top values: self-verified coherence. 

The main point is that these types naturally reject conformity. Not out of some rebellion or epistemic standard, but as a structural cognitive bias toward self-verified coherence. Conformists don't feel the need to reject it because their cognitive bias is toward social coherence.

Neither chooses their bias and neither can escape it.

Regarding the autonomous stage, people such as yourself are operating on hardware that makes reaching it almost inevitable. It emerges from self-awareness after decades of running a specific architecture. 

[Leo Gura]

15 minutes ago, Joshe said:

people such as yourself are operating on hardware that makes reaching it almost inevitable.

It took a lot of work and it wouldn't be active without the work.

I have a disagreeable and skeptical personality, but that's not so rare. What I'm talking about is much rarer and requires serious work.

Frankly, I don't know anyone who has achieved what I'm talking about except Ralston. And none of his students have it.

What I'm talking about is not an innate personality type. But some personality types may find it easier to do the work.

If it was just a personality type, it would be quite common.

Edited 14 hours ago by Leo Gura

[gettoefl]

5 hours ago, LoneWonderer said:

In regards to the post on the Roma community in France, there is the one scene where you see father and son back home in Romania and He's building now his second home there for his son. The project will cost the father about 100,000€ he has saved up with his minimum wage job back in France. When asked about it he says something along the lines of "This is who we Roma people are, this is our culture to build homes for our children". The documentary narrator points out he has 3 kids and will have to build two more houses after this one.

It is a this point I realize the intersection of survival, conformity and complete lack of self awareness. I realize this poor bloke is nothing more than an unconscious survival zombie carrying out an unconscious survival agenda passed down to him through his social circle community. He will spend his entire life paying off these houses for his kids. He's a slave but a happy one at that. He defends his chains (culture and indoctrination from his community) like the men in Plato's cave allegory.

And then I begin to wonder...how am I like this poor bloke? In what ways am I like a fish swimming in water, unaware and ignorant, going about unconscious survival agendas...

I am going to give every cent to my kids. Maybe one day they do same for me. Of course with me gone they will do same for their kids. It's perfect life.

[Terell Kirby]

6 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Frankly, I don't know anyone who has achieved what I'm talking about except Ralston. And none of his students have it.

I mean, surely some of them have. Ralston is a master at teaching contemplation to get to direct insights. Serious practitioners can’t help but come to profound realizations if they are disciplined enough in how they go about it.

[CARDOZZO]

6 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Frankly, I don't know anyone who has achieved what I'm talking about except Ralston

What do you think about Wilber? 

I tend to suspect that Ralston/Wilber are on the same level of wisdom. (this is just an assessment)

Edited 7 hours ago by CARDOZZO

[Terell Kirby]

36 minutes ago, CARDOZZO said:

I tend to suspect that Ralston/Wilber are on the same level of wisdom. (this is just an assessment)

It’s not a question of wisdom, it’s a question of Consciousness. Two different things.

Ralston’s Consciousness of the fundamental nature of reality is separate from elements of his personality.

[ZenSwift]

15 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

After a decade of this work, I am showered with spontaneous insights 24/7. Anything could trigger it, from a random thought to a video or a forum comment someone made. Then I write down the insight in my phone. As I think about it, I usually get additional insights. I have lists of hundreds of these insights, which I later select and write out for publishing.

Sometimes I contemplate ideas for longer, but often I don't even need to.

If I am in a flow state I could have a dozen unrelated insights within 20 minutes.

This is my dream

[yetineti]

5 hours ago, gettoefl said:

I am going to give every cent to my kids. Maybe one day they do same for me. Of course with me gone they will do same for their kids. It's perfect life.

Leaving all your money to your kids is like leaving all your investments to your company. 

[Eskilon]

1 hour ago, Terell Kirby said:

It’s not a question of wisdom, it’s a question of Consciousness. Two different things.

Wrong.

You cannot have a lot of consciousness without wisdom, they are inseparable. One who has a lot of conciousness is bound to be wise, but not necessarlly knowledgeable. You can have a lot of knowledge without much consciousness.

An example is Ramana Maharshi, he was wise but he was not knowledgeable in the tradional sense, he didnt go to university and had very little formal education.

Chatgpt has a lot of knowledge, it has a lot of information stuffed in there and it can vomit it to you, but it has no intelligence or wisdom. 

You can know a lot of things about the dream, but that will not make you lucid, and being lucid is wisdom -- you can't reach it through knowledge of the dream.

Edited 5 hours ago by Eskilon

[Oppositionless]

Leo I saw the Neville Goddard quote. Are you now a law of attraction / manifestation believer?

I want to share something that happened lately. For two years I wanted to move to a bigger city. I wanted it so bad, I hated my hometown. But post awakening I stopped caring and realized I could be happy anywhere. Within 3 months of stopping caring if I move I got the perfect oppurtunity, rent way below average, to move.

Edited 5 hours ago by Oppositionless

[Optimized Life]

On 24/03/2026 at 11:03 AM, NewKidOnTheBlock said:

They're maximizing their muscles i.e. testosterone. Which is fairly strange to me. But simps gonna simp regardless

True bodybuilding and upper body focus yes - it's unattractive. 

But many gym women who work mostly the lower body, are as attractive as it gets imo, hot as hell

Many gym girls know exactly what they're doing, their training is targeted to the male gaze, all the muscle and fat in the right places (eg glutes), it doesnt make them suddenly masculine or turn into serena williams, they still have a womanly shape and upper body is either slim or mildly toned at best, which again is fine, no issue with a bit of incidental athletic tone, can even look good as long as the overall shape, look and vibe is feminine. 

There is a minority of women in the gym who seem to either not understand this, dont care or are lesbians or something and i see them hammering the upper body with wide shoulders and yeah, makes no sense tbh .. must be lesbian or wants to be a man. 

Edited 5 hours ago by Optimized Life

[integral]

10 minutes ago, Oppositionless said:

Leo I saw the Neville Goddard quote. Are you now a law of attraction / manifestation believer?

I want to share something that happened lately. For two years I wanted to move to a bigger city. I wanted it so bad, I hated my hometown. But post awakening I stopped caring and realized I could be happy anywhere. Within 3 months of stopping caring if I move I got the perfect oppurtunity, rent way below average, to move.

If you actually found a good opportunity, that's great, most of the time people don't realize that living in impoverished low quality, low income housing will negatively impact your health long-term, and the quality of the building is super important. I could also live in a garbage can if I wanted to my needs are so low that it really doesn't matter, but in practicality your health will suffer. You're gonna have low energy. You might have health problems, long-term, and these kinds of things happen a lot. It's one of the main hippie traps. 

[Terell Kirby]

47 minutes ago, Eskilon said:

You cannot have a lot of consciousness without wisdom, they are inseparable.

Not as straightforward as you think.

Self deception remains even after profound Awakenings

[CARDOZZO]

4 hours ago, Terell Kirby said:

It’s not a question of wisdom, it’s a question of Consciousness. Two different things.

Ralston’s Consciousness of the fundamental nature of reality is separate from elements of his personality.

It is a discussion between access x embodiment. 

You can access profund states of Consciousness.... Can you embody it in your day to day routine? 

The most Awakened masters were humans at the end. 

This is why is extremely important to "raise" your baseline level of Consciousness because you live there 99% of the time. 

 

[Joshe]

9 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

It took a lot of work and it wouldn't be active without the work.

I have a disagreeable and skeptical personality, but that's not so rare. What I'm talking about is much rarer and requires serious work.

Frankly, I don't know anyone who has achieved what I'm talking about except Ralston. And none of his students have it.

What I'm talking about is not an innate personality type. But some personality types may find it easier to do the work.

If it was just a personality type, it would be quite common.

You're ignoring the fact that your system has been flagging conformity as a violation since childhood, before you ever did any serious epistemic work. I was sifting through your blog and found the perfect example: 

Why did this experience register as "wrong"?

I myself have been experiencing this same internal friction for most of my life. In high-school, I noticed how conformist everyone was and it came to disgust me. By the time I hit 20, I realized it wasn't just the kids, it was the whole of society. And I realized all of this without any intentional epistemic work.

How did I notice it without even trying, and why was my response to it disgust and disdain?

The answer is, a very specific cognitive architecture produces exactly this. And that architecture can be understood. 

The best model I've found so far to explain it is called OPS (Objective Personality), which is built on top of Jung's cognitive functions.

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, Joshe said:

Why did this experience register as "wrong"?

Any thinking person can register that as wrong. You get peer pressured and later regret going along.

That isn't rocket science.

Edited 2 hours ago by Leo Gura

[Miguel1]

On 23/03/2026 at 1:06 AM, Natasha Tori Maru said:

Do you feel disgust behind the judgement? It is a common one for me. And often I find the feeling of disgust arises prior to the thought judgement appearing - or me being aware of it. An extreme turn off is felt.

On the flipside of the above - my feelings of disgust are simultaneous with deep compassion. I have a contradictory set of emotions/feelings that arise together; I understand what drives people to extremes of degeneracy. I also project my own capabilities heavily onto others; when they fall short I can be harsh. I remind myself often there are others out there who are simple. Double digit IQs. Developmentally behind. Brain damaged.

I am in a position of privilege. It is very easy for me to project my aptitude onto others and judge when they fall short. There is a limit to responsibility in the absence of rational intellect, education and competency.

Catching up with ya’ll.

I relate to this one a lot. Sometimes when people behave very poorly / unconsciously, I find myself lashing out onto them in a tough love kind of way, then after calming down I feel wronged by my own behaviour.

[Nemra]

@Leo Gura, nice share!

I haven't finished "Awakening from the Meaning Crisis" yet, but I can't wait to watch "After Socrates".

[Natasha Tori Maru]

@Joshe perhaps conforming registers as wrong when we recognise we did not do what was soverign to us. We were performative and acted in the absence of thought assessment & our own values. This happens in youth a lot prior to us knowing ourselves well enough.

This is one of the most common human experiences. I think almost everyone recognises some conformity from their childhood and laughs about it 

Edited 55 minutes ago by Natasha Tori Maru

[Leo Gura]

@Joshe For you:

https://www.actualized.org/insights/profound-quotes-059

Edited 55 minutes ago by Leo Gura