Feeling torn between ego development and the pursuit of deepest truth

[manuel bon]

Hi everyone! For those who don’t know me, I’m 24, Italian, currently living in the Netherlands. About four years ago my father and brother had a serious motorcycle accident, an event that deeply impacted me and marked the beginning of a serious inner spiritual journey. Since then I’ve studied various teachers (including Leo), meditated consistently, and explored non-duality, ego, consciousness, and metaphysics. I feel genuinely drawn towards deepest truth of reality... I feel like I need to understand what reality really is in order to understand myself and how to live. At the same time, I’m still very much a human being with ambitions, desires, fears, and responsibilities. I’m trying to build a career (I’m a classical guitarist and certified meditation teacher and thought i wanted to share mindful practices with musicians, but thinking about that I don’t think that I can live out of that since musicians don’t have money - I’m considering working with non musicians). I want financial stability, and honestly part of me wants to be rich and successful. I also care about making an impact and really help people with mindfulness, because it has really changed my life for the better, and it helped me grow.

On one side I feel drawn toward ego dissolution, selflessness, and truth beyond identity, there’s a part of me that wants to let go completely (every year I am more and more connected to thse things, thanks to meditation and sometimes doing psychedelics). But on the other side I still want to build something in the world, I want money, autonomy, and recognition, and I feel afraid of “losing myself.” I don’t fully know how to integrate spirituality with ordinary life, even if I want to work with meditation. I sometimes wonder if my desire for the “deepest truth” is healthy growth, or if it’s partially an escape from unresolved emotional material, trauma, or uncertainty. I also want to do psychedelics as a way to deepen insight, but I’m unsure whether that would be growth or destabilization, even though all the experiences I had were helpful for my growth. I don’t fully trust my motivation yet. I don’t know if I’m seeking awakening or relief. Maybe both. Every time though that I start having deeper experiences while meditating or in trips I start being scared of loosing myself, even if one part of me wants it.
I intellectually understand that money and ego are relative constructs. But in practical life they matter. So I feel stuck between these two paradigms.

Thanks for reading❤️

[Breakingthewall]

Spirituality doesn't imply detachment from material success. It implies reconfiguring the idea of material success towards your true inner calling, detaching yourself from the social paradigm of success.

The material and the spiritual are one; aligning yourself with the flow doesn't mean rejecting the mundane, but rather seeing it as an expression of the flow of reality.

Periods of crisis or disorientation may occur, but the more you break the energetic structure that confines you, the more fluid your life will be. It's not a mistake to delve deeper into the path you've begun, but rather the only possible success.

I would say it's essential not to believe, or to believe with many reservations, in teachers; great part of their message is geared towards their own success as teachers.

The only authority on this matter is yourself. The path to the complete opening of your energetic structure is unique; it must be discovered by you. No one can guide you. Anyone who tells you they can is trying to steal your sovereignty over yourself. This is very common in spirituality, which is plagued by vampiric narcissists.

You are a pioneer in this. What you are going to do has never been done before, since there has never been another structure like yours.

[gettoefl]

I would propose, do both. There is nothing better than spirituality. It simply means to see what is there - to train the mind how to do that. It's the highest meaning in life and what everyone will choose if they knew what it meant and what it grants. But yes, the world has charms too. We all wish for the creature comforts and the mod cons. It is not unspiritual to live life to the full. In fact it helps the spiritual path since we expose ourselves to all aspects of the world, the good the bad the ugly. The world is a laboratory to put our spirituality into action, namely to see things in the light of truth. So I say go hell for leather with both. You are young and you are smart and you already tasted the truth. So become say a self-help influencer and a mystic in the same lifetime. Why not!

[Ziran]

3 hours ago, manuel bon said:

I don’t fully know how to integrate spirituality with ordinary life

Almost everything that exists, here and now, in the material world, can be condidered as body-and-spirit, as vessels-of-light.  "Mundane" objects and experiences are flickering with opportunities.   Cultivating optimism helps with this.

Best wishes,

[VeganAwake]

Psychedelics can help create different paths or ways of thinking, so can alcohol, marijuana, art....etc..etc..

No need to keep using substances over and over again in my experience! You sound like an out of the box thinker already! You're good!

The only way you can find out what you really want to do is through experience. 

Or you can just dive into something and stick with it.

Nobody can tell you the answer because there isn't a 1 answer fits.

The things you described are not separate categories.... They might seem that way, but they are not...... It's all life!

Like the old saying  "where there's a will, there's a way"

Ego always wants to know everything and have the advantage.

There's no secret truth or better way of living life........free yourself from that belief and do what makes you happy and fulfilled......or don't!

It ultimately doesn't matter

❤️ 

[Oppositionless]

I'm becoming a bit of yoga evangelist lately but that's because it's changed my life very quickly for the better. Put simply, it can help you with both your egoic and spiritual goals without pushing you too far into dissolution territory if you're not ready for that (unless you do more advanced kriya techniques)!

[Yimpa]

 

[manuel bon]

@Breakingthewall thank you for your message 🙏

I think because of all the meditations things that I felt in my life combined with psychedelics understood that to some extent I am more than my body, I am more than my ego; and following Leo for some time now I really resonate with what he teaches, also along to other spiritual teachers. Maybe I am getting a little bit lost in the fact that I will die one day, that my ego will die one day…to some extent that comes as a relief because I see all the manipulation and the pain I create in myself and others in very subtle ways, and what I do in my life right now is really trying to grow as much as I can and become as more aware as possible to be as good as possible, but often I hurt myself and others. In this process of trying to become “perfect”, there is a part that knows I will die and at the end nothing matters. 
Honestly, I am very confused. I don’t want to sound arrogant, but I can see that my level of development in many ways is deeper than all the people around me and that makes me scared. Sometimes I think I might be delusional or crazy, but then other times is clear to me that they are who are more deluded. Not having someone close to me on my same path is destabilising. I feel when I am alone I am able to really work on myself and my consciousness, and then when the real test comes when I am with my family or with my girlfriend I almost quickly fall into unconscious behaviours.
Sorry for this long message, I know I’m literally writing down everything that is happening in my mind and it can be chaotic, but I am grateful to have the possibility to share these things here. Thank you.

 

[manuel bon]

@gettoefl thank you for this nice message! You always have very big ambitions and big dreams, any in general I would like to make a living make lots of money through our conscious spiritual work/business, and although from one side I really believe in myself and I know that I can do it I feel very limited both because my family needs help with my father situation but also because nobody around me fully supports me or helps me to become self-employed. As a said in the previous message speaking of spirituality, also when speaking of business and self-employment I am alone and I have nobody close to me in this journey. I am finishing my masters in the Netherlands and around June I will go back to Italy where’s my family. There I don’t know anyone anymore, uncertain I don’t know people who are into spirituality or into business. If my father wouldn’t have had the accident, I would have probably travelled moved to other big cities and explore opportunities but I don’t want to abandon my family. I don’t want to abandon my mom.

[Ziran]

1 hour ago, manuel bon said:

I can see that my level of development in many ways is deeper than all the people around me and that makes me scared. Sometimes I think I might be delusional or crazy, but then other times is clear to me that they are who are more deluded

It's not delusional.  It's like dancing with two different partners.  You'll get it sorted.

[manuel bon]

@VeganAwake such a nice message, thank you! I feel a bit stuck because of my family situation, I would love to have so much money to support my parents, and bring my dad back from his brain injury… I feel stuck because there’s no one close to me who can actually help or even support me in becoming self employed, and ever time I talk about being financially free they laugh

[manuel bon]

@Oppositionless which yoga do you do most?