Am I Finally Ready To Let Go of Dating?

[Jirh]

Ego is loud. Truth is quiet.

[Emerald]

54 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

A chimpazee is certainly better at certain things.

I do not hold myself as superior to a chimpanzee. But I am more conscious.

Consider why that might be.

Maybe one needs such an ambition to grow brighter.

Ambition isn't just ego, it's functional for reaching high places.

Ambition is very important for householders who are walking the path of embodiment.

And I already mentioned that it's my desire to master my craft. So, I'm very ambitious. And my ambition is in service of other people.

But the identity of being "the more conscious person" is actually the opposite of ambitious. It's saying, "I'm already far more conscious than others. And the average person has little to teach me."

It's an anti-growth mindset because real growth and maturity comes from allowing yourself to be humbled by life... and to have such identity attachments challenged and occasionally ripped away for new wisdom to grow in their place.

So, clinging onto such identities leads to disconnection and stagnation. And it also creates major blind-spots in your awareness when it comes to seeing the reality beyond the lens of practical human value hierarchies. 

So, you don't need to cook up some "I'm the top turtle on the turtle-pile" identity attachment to channel your ambition, as that kind of attachment creates a major growth ceiling and causes you to get complacent and closed-minded. 

And it honestly only gets in the way and calcifies you and stunts your growth.

So, you don't need to believe that your craft is hierarchically more important than other crafts in order to be ambitious.

And you also don't need to get so attached to the identities that differentiate you from others to be ambitious.

And if your path truly is the path of transcendence... these attachments to your identities of differentiation and hierarchical specialness will be extra important to detach from. 

The reality is that from the ultimate perspective the "Leo Game" is not organized in a hierarchy with the "Chimp Game" or "The Average Person Game". All are iterations of the same consciousness playing horizontally through each iteration. And it doesn't seem to 'prefer' a more conscious avatar to a less conscious avatar.

It probably gets infinite "value" by being a sea barnacle... and is humble enough to be fine with being a sea barnacle.

So, the more you identify with the Leo Avatar's specialness within relative human value hierarchies as it pertains to your own valuation of human social specializations... you will stay stuck in the avatar perspective that you seek to transcend.

You won't view it with the non-hierarchical neutrality that consciousness itself "sees" your avatar through.

So, I'd just be very careful about ego inflation and being too attached to hierarchical thinking... beyond purely practical reasons.

People can convince themselves that they're hierarchically above others in so many ways.

To give a more concrete example, I used to think that artists were doing the most important and most intelligent kind of people because I was an artist. So, I worked to become great at art. And this enabled me to say 1. Art is the most important human specialization and 2. I am the best artist in this room.

And for that time, I could feel okay with myself because I had differentiated myself and proven myself special and adequate.

And I got really ego inflated about this... which eventually led to a great humbling which culminated around the time of my first awakening glimpses.

But then, I was in danger of using my glimpses of awakening to recreate the same identity inflation... like 1. Spirituality is the most important human specialization and 2. I am the most spiritual aware person in this room.

And that's what it seems to me that you're doing when you go into "People are chimps... and I am more conscious than them!" mode. 

There's also a more subtle hierarchical valuation of your specialization over the specializations of others... which is the real issue.

It's fine to acknowledge practically that you're more aware in specific ways compared to other people. Just don't think that that awareness is a more important specialization compared to other human specializations.

[Emerald]

2 hours ago, Alexop said:

Oh come on Emerald...

Yes, Leo is more conscious than the average folk. If you can't see this, that is sad. That is not to say all he says is perfect. But after listening to thousands of people, how they talk and how they formulate their ideas, how they do thier research, I can say without a doubt, Leo is among the best. 

Humbleness can also be toxic if taken to extremes. I am more conscious than average folk and that is okay. I don't care, that is the truth, i run circles around them. That is because certain circumstances determined me to become like this. There is no free will

 

That's not anything close to what my argument is. Re-read what I wrote.

Leo is definitely talented in the department of consciousness and intellect compared to most.

I am also talented in this way. So, are many on this forum. (Though most people on this forum do also have major blindspots that the average person doesn't have, because of the issues that I highlighted)

And it's not inherently an issue to acknowledge people's talents/skills on a practical level, as human specialization works that way.

The issue is believing that this particular human specialization that Leo has (and many in his audience have) is fundamentally different and superior to other human specializations... and looking down on others who don't possess this specialization and calling them chimps.

It would be like a bunch of plumbers getting together and operating under the notion that plumbing is the most important specialization. Then, they call all non-plumbers chimps.

The issue is the ego inflation and placing arbitrary hierarchies regarding human specializations on top of reality to justify and maintain that ego inflation.

So, sure... Leo is relatively talented/skilled with consciousness and intellect. But it's unwise to create an identity out of it and view other people through that lens... as it creates disconnection.

Like, I remember when my son was in 4th grade, he started getting some of the same kinds of ideas.

He'd heard online that other Gen Alphas are uniquely stupid compared to other generations on some random YouTube Short. (Of course, that's always been said about every generation of young people)

So, he started thinking of himself as the exception to the rule, and like a uniquely non-stupid Gen Alpha kid. So, I had to sit him down to talk to him about it and dispossess him of the notion that Gen Alphas are all uniquely stupid... as it was creating difficulties with socializing with peers... and creating shame about being his own age. (Similar to how people who view themselves as better than other humans can develop shame about being a regular human being)

Though he was always trying to hang out with his older sister's teenage friends... who were nice to him. But he couldn't get a true peer relationship with them.

Then, the next year over he was able to let go of that superior identity of being "the only non-stupid kid" (similar to "the rare conscious person among chimps"). And that enabled him to make some friends who were on the same wavelength. 

And I see this same pattern playing out all the time on this forum.

So, I'm content to have the same kind of conversation with Leo and anyone else who's caught up in that kind of pattern... as it's just not good to be caught in that trap.

Edited 5 hours ago by Emerald

[Zigzag Idiot]

Let me know if my putting this here is a violation and I’ll take it down.

It’s from The Oracle of the Cosmic Way and it’s quite relevant.

 

15. Modesty

Kun

Kên

The Judgment: Modesty creates success. The superior man carries things through.

Modesty, the Sage informs us, is one of the three fundamental Cosmic Virtues that all aspects of the Cosmic Whole are endowed with. The other two virtues are equality and uniqueness. Together, they give each aspect of the Cosmos its dignity. It is due to these basic virtues that a single force is able to rule the functioning of the Cosmos as a whole: the force of mutual attraction of complementary aspects.

Another name for this force is love.

When the virtue of modesty is seen in this context, it means that the modest person recognizes the equality and uniqueness of every other aspect of the Cosmic Whole. It is equivalent to seeing his true place in the whole. He has no need to put himself up or down, because any aggrandizement or abnegation of the self fails to take into account the fact that every aspect of the Cosmos is endowed with unique posses-sions. (See the previous hexagram.) Modesty also means that a person recognizes the uniqueness of his own possessions and the responsibilities toward the Cosmic Whole connected with them.

Modesty is the virtue connected with a person's commonsense. Com-monsense is the consensus of all the senses a person is born with. When none of his senses is blocked, his commonsense gives him a sure feeling of what is true and untrue, because it is in harmony with Cosmic Truth.

Commonsense is closely connected with a person's inner truth-his memory of what Cosmic Harmony feels like. Applied to a given situa-tion, we can picture the process as follows: All the senses respond to the situation in accordance with their unique functions. The inner senses respond to the inner components of the situation, which manifest as vibrations, feelings, smells, etc., whereas the senses of outer seeing and hearing respond only to the situation's outer appearances. When all these senses function cooperatively, the commonsense integrates the various perceptions into a discernment that needs no reasons to prove its validity. Validating one's feelings is the meaning of"modesty creates success." To "carry things through" means to then bring into full consciousness whatever feels discordant and say the inner No to it. The saying of the inner No would occur spontaneously, were it not for the conditioning that has disturbed the cooperation of the senses.

Therefore, in bringing the true self to maturity, learning to say the inner No needs to be recognized as a responsibility that is consistent with one's inner dignity and self-respect. Until the conditioning is undone, saying the inner No needs to be consciously remembered and practiced. When a person is tuned into his feelings, the inner No arises spontaneously and is heard as a firm inner voice.

Consciously saying the inner No to another's ego display engages another natural function of a person's commonsense: as the Helper of Transformation. It transforms what is disharmonious in the situation.

The inner No also has the ability to transform harmful thoughts that attack a person's psyche, thereby protecting

Tum from them.

Failure to say the inner No to the ego

other occurs because the ego in oneself has been aroused; then one falls back on the use of power, either through words or actions, to correct the other. Allowing the ego to intervene in this way causes a person to lose his modesty and his Cosmic Protection.

True modesty also means to recognize that the Sage exists in every person's presence. The Sage in another's presence can be called upon to intervene when the ego in that person is active. True modesty is remembering to ask the Sage in others presence to intervene under such circumstances.

The use of the term "the superior man" in The Judgment comes from the Confucian school and its view that modesty— the mark of the cultivated man—is a quality that comes from working on one's self-development. However, the idea of there being such a goal as

"becoming superior" contradicts the very meaning of modesty. The person who seeks to be superior has already lost contact with the natural modesty he was born with. What is also overlooked is that being called "a superior man" is a spell that forces him into upholding all the abstract values the collective ego assigns to that appellation.

By saying that virtues are not part of our nature and need to be cultivated, the collective ego appropriates a person's natural mod-esty. This doubt about the wholeness of his own natare is instilled in a child as the first step in his conditioning. Being a poison arrow, it demonizes his commonsense and his feeling connection with the Cosmos, preventing him from knowing (through his feelings) that he can depend on the Cosmos for everything he needs. Separated from his feelings and therefore from Cosmic help, the child is then taught to depend on the institutions of the collective ego for his needs. Since the collective ego can never replace Cosmic help, it encourages him to

"be modest" in his needs and behavior. By implication it thus defines modesty ("the highest attainable virtue") as "a selfless acceptance of poverty and injustice." To achieve acceptance of such an idea, it encourages the person to think he will be rewarded by being recognized and accepted by others as virtuous. He may even be rewarded with medals, titles, and fame. Thus we see a paradoxical situation created: that the person who works hard to develop the self-image of modesty, must make sure that his modesty gets noticed!

At the core of all virtuous self-images cultivated by the collective ego is actually "self-denial," for the "truly virtuous" person is the one who has not merely repressed, but totally routed out every aspect of his true self. The object of this cultivation of virtue, thus, is to have no self at all! All self-images tend to be expressed in their extreme through the fact that the object of cultivating them is to " perfect"

them. Since the institutions of the collective ego are those which have taught him his virtues (his parents, teachers, and the society as a whole), the person with the self-image of being modest believes he owes "all that he is" to them; he thus carries with him strong feelings of indebtedness. This indebtedness is always connected with guilt, which becomes active whenever he makes any attempt to leave the prison of their total control.

Of all the hexagrams, this one shows that the ancient Chinese were aware of a connection between true modesty and "good fortune." They noticed that the person who was not arrogant was helped along by what they called "heaven.

*What they were observing was the Cosmic

help and protection that are enjoyed by every person who lives by his natural modesty. But it seems to have occurred to only a few, such as Lao Izu, that modesty is a virtue every person possesses as part of his natural makeup. True modesty is the absence of any self-image.

"Carrying things through to completion" also means stepping out of the collective ego's system of opposites, in particular the hero and anti-hero/rebel models. By setting up the ideal of the self-sacrificing hero, a person is led to sacrifice his true self to the collective ego's values; or, if he discovers that he cannot mold himself into the image of the hero, he may turn to admire the anti-hero/rebel who renounces the system. What he does not see is that the anti-hero is as essential to the dichotomous system of the collective ego as the dragon is to the dragon-slayer, for it is in the nature of the collective ego to embrace the opposing elements that are essential to its system. A person can step out of this system only by recognizing that all self-images, regardless of whether they are of the hero/rebel, good citizen/outlaw, self-righ-teous person/the irreverent person, have their origin in the idea that a person must "become" something, because "in and of himself he is notenough," or he was "born with original guilt/sin/fault? What we do not notice is that in all striving to become something we are actually striving to overcome a supposed fault that has been attributed to our nature. The false attributions are the original poison arrows a child has received from the collective ego, which must be removed, if he is to return himself to his original wholeness. 

[Joseph Maynor]

@Emerald  The issue to me is the problem of the duality of the relative vs. The Absolute.  Seems like a lot of people see others operating from the relative and can point that out, but then have a blind spot about their own relative perspective -- i.e., they kinda sidestep that and assume they have access to The Absolute without any bias.  

[Jirh]

@Emerald Very insightful! I enjoyed reading your posts. You certainly have the gift of clarity and precise articulation.

..

To contribute to this thread, I think there are two distinct issues being conflated here:

1. Compatibility.

2. Superiority.

OP wants to find a compatible partner, but he's failing because of his feelings of superiority.

And this is happening because he's basing compatibility on one main denominator, which is level of consciousness.

It's clear to me that he thinks high consciousness is the highest and best virtue that no other virtues exist or have significant value in comparison.

So any girl who doesn't possess an incredible depth is automatically incompatible with him, therefore instantly disqualified.

But this ties back perfectly with what you said about arrogance. Because most arrogance is actually a shadow cast upon our blindspots.

So it's not that he's higher consciousness than most. It's that he labelled himself as such, and became blind to reality as a result.

So he's not actually looking for a partner. He's looking for a mirror. Someone who will confirm his self-image. And when women don't reflect that image back, because they're not playing the same game, he reads it as incompatibility.

I am pretty sure that there are plenty of girls at his same level of consciousness or higher, but since they don't have the same ego attachment to levels of consciousness, he's incapable of picking up on it. Therefore losing the compatibility signal.

But to be fair, environment matters. And he might be looking in low consciousness markets, which would make his observations partially accurate but his conclusions flawed. So the problem might be partially logistic, which if solved won't magically cure incompatibility. There will be struggling until humility settles in.

Edited 4 hours ago by Jirh

[Joseph Maynor]

@AION Man, they are really piling on you.  Hang in there bro.  

[Yimpa]

Good luck getting rid of me. I will haunt you until the very end.

[AION]

8 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

@AION Man, they are really piling on you.  Hang in there bro.  

God sends meat, and the Devil sends cooks.

Spiritual ego is getting insane of this forum. Especially mods are out of control.

Emerald is making good points. But I don't have the energy to engage like her. She is a warrioress.

Edited 4 hours ago by AION

[Alexop]

@Emerald consciousness can be seen as a meta thing that affects those "specializations" in life as you call them. High consciousness will make the individual more prone to faster, deeper excellence in the "specializations" they go for.

Leo can be a better nutritionist, doctor, teacher in a very short time than most dummies who studied and practiced this for decades. Consciousness helps him understand how groupthink, corrupt systems etc. affect our knowledge and the way we fix and deal with stuff. 😊

Edited 4 hours ago by Alexop

[Jirh]

High consciousness cannot replace any craftsmanship.

A hierarchy between specialities is totally useless.

Edited 4 hours ago by Jirh

[Alexop]

10 minutes ago, Jirh said:

High consciousness cannot replace any craftsmanship.

A hierarchy between specialities is totally useless.

Craftsmanship can be seen as a inherited talent. Ambition is also strongly connected to personality. Big Interest into things and craft is another part of your nature.

So if you are born an ambitious person interested in things and craft that also happens to be talented at it will make a big difference in that specialization. Consciousness can maybe help you even more, especially of your craft deals with other people, systems, self-deception, ego 

Edited 4 hours ago by Alexop

[Yimpa]

14 minutes ago, Jirh said:

High consciousness cannot replace any craftsmanship.

A hierarchy between specialities is totally useless.

Keep spitting that wisdom 💦💦

I don’t understand your second point, please clarify

Edited 4 hours ago by Yimpa

[Jirh]

@Yimpa Thanks!

A carpenter is not better than a spiritual teacher, and a spiritual teacher is not better than a carpenter. Each serves a certain function that the other doesn't. And each has their own particular fields of experience where they can be better or worse than others within the same field.

A hierarchy between people within one specialty is valid. A hierarchy between people who have different specialities is not.

In other words, we can compare between spiritual teachers. And we can compare between carpenters. But we cannot compare between carpenters and spiritual teachers. It's like, apples and oranges.

Edited 4 hours ago by Jirh

[Joseph Maynor]

@Jirh  Except for the fact that in spirituality, ultimately, there can only be one spiritual teacher.  

[Jirh]

@Alexop

Of course, it is valid to seek to be more round as a person, and to build a more robust integrated functional system that combines the intellect with the more practical skills. That's why the more you age, the less you generally tend to work. Your experience moves up the system and becomes more supervisionary than technical.

But at the early stages, this can detract from one's ability to excel at one particular field of expertise. It carries the inherent danger of becoming the jack of all trades, but master of none.

[Jirh]

2 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

@Jirh  Except for the fact that in spirituality, ultimately, there can only be one spiritual teacher.  

In your spirituality. I agree 👍🏻

[Yimpa]

6 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

@Jirh  Except for the fact that in spirituality, ultimately, there can only be one spiritual teacher.  

Justin Bieber?

 

Edited 3 hours ago by Yimpa

[Alexop]

17 minutes ago, Jirh said:

@Alexop

Of course, it is valid to seek to be more round as a person, and to build a more robust integrated functional system that combines the intellect with the more practical skills. That's why the more you age, the less you generally tend to work. Your experience moves up the system and becomes more supervisionary than technical.

But at the early stages, this can detract from one's ability to excel at one particular field of expertise. It carries the inherent danger of becoming the jack of all trades, but master of none.

Yea. For sure one should have thier "thing" that they exell at. But rasing consciousness is the best investment of them all. It will considerably change your life. Not necessarily for the better in the beginning. Becoming aware of the smell in the room is painful and it might take some years until you'll be able to escape the room. Ignorance is bliss. Many chimps live a happy life.

[Jirh]

@Alexop

I like @Joseph Maynor's insight about everything having pros and cons.