Viking

being present is shit

65 posts in this topic

Haha! And you say meditation and kriya doesn’t help? And here you came with a beautiful insight that will last forever! 

This thing is: meditation and connecting with the source makes you happy with less things. Haven’t you noticed that some things is not fulfilling anymore like they used to? And you also see mor clearly what actually IS important to you. That’s it! To live truth is not about being a vegetable - it’s about LIVING. 

With more concentration and “being present” the more we can enjoy doing nothing particular :) 

Cosmic love my friend <3

 

Edited by cirkussmile

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
9 hours ago, Viking said:

I get that, but why should I go after meaningless meaninglessness?

@Viking Because your life (as I read from the way you frame your questions) is such that you are convinced that you are actually making choices.
That there are reasons for doing things and that you compare them and pick the best ones depending on the predicted outcome.
That you have control over your life, even if it is only by making informed choices.

From the point of view of meaningless meaninglessness, asking a question: 'why should I pursue it?' is absurd. A 'why ' asks for meaning!
Even if I understand where this question comes from, there is no honest answer to it from the place I am at. I can give you a reason to abolish reasoning, but that would be a form of deception.
It would be a deception because I cannot correlate the state in which I am with any practice that I did. This state however is the best one I have ever been in.

It does not mean that you are a puppet on strings however. This total, complete determinism is parallel (orthogonal) to total, complete freedom.
You are both enslaved and free from the perspective of meaningless meaninglessness.

9 hours ago, Viking said:

why not enjoy this life, even if it just appears like I do? because of this ?

Meaninglessness is not about stopping your enjoyment. It only looks that way from the point of view of meaning-seeking.
You think that you pursue enjoyment because it is meaningful to you. Abolishing meaning is not a rejection. It is exhaustion of it.
It is a place in which a new way of being opens up for exploration in parallel to the meaning-making way. It is an orthogonal way of being.
It is not a either meaning or meaninglessness but not both kind of thing, but meaningless meaninglessness
When you get it, you will see it as a completely disjoint thing. You can still have meaning or meaninglessness AND meaningless meaninglessness.

Sorry if it is confusing. I'm doing my best to explain it.

9 hours ago, Viking said:

is that better than enjoying life? (talking from my perspective now, obviously nothing matters from the empty perspective)

It's a way to enjoy life unlike any other you know. Your question looks like this:

Quote

-Man, I really love water skiing.
-Is that better than enjoying skis?
-It's a different way to enjoy skis.
-How do you use them?
-You have to attach yourself to a speedboat on water and you will ski on a lake.
-Are you nuts? Everybody knows that you cannot stand on water in skis!
-You have to stand on a bridge to start and the speedboat will yank you off.
-You still have to stand on water to ski after you take off! You will fall into the lake!
-Not unless the speedboat is fast enough.
-You're crazy! Why would you do that if you can ski on snow?

The problem with your question is that we're talking about life (instead of skis) and life is the only thing you know.
In this sphere of generality, the only other thing is death. You have experienced death before you were born and the memory of it you have (which is a non-memory) is what you have to do in order to arrive at what we're talking about here.
Meaningless meaninglessness does not subtract from life. Death gives you a new life each second if you give it a chance.
Seeing the world with the eyes if a newborn is the greatest gift you can give yourself.


Bearing with the conditioned in gentleness, fording the river with resolution, not neglecting what is distant, not regarding one's companions; thus one may manage to walk in the middle. H11L2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

@tsuki are you a math student? you use a lot of mathy words xD

What I got from your post is that there is another way to live life, which is beyond meaning, this life simply happens when you exhaust meaning, and realize its limitations (though what limitations meaning might have ive no idea) is that right?

in that state you can also have meaning and meaningless meaninglessness.

What I guess is in order to get to that state I have to inquire myself out of all meaning, including the meaning of wanting to get to that state because that meaning is baseless. though i dont know if its practical because its too much inquiring, the meaning map i have is way too complex and deep i think to get rid of in a lifetime.

I guess I have a "why" for getting rid of meaning but as I would start to, that why would fade because i would realize its fault, right?

@cirkussmile I think I do know better what I want because im trying to break out of the self deceptions ive entrapped myself into. maybe meditations and yoga helps, though apparently I dont know what being present means yet, because I always have the background noise in my mind.

Edited by Viking

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Next to finding Existential Truth and embodying Existential Truth, Mindfulness is the third most important thing to Enlightenment.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
14 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

Next to finding Existential Truth and embodying Existential Truth, Mindfulness is the third most important thing to Enlightenment.

can you elaborate?

i think mindfulness is useful only after a certain stage of development, before that its agitating and boring.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
2 minutes ago, Viking said:

can you elaborate?

i think mindfulness is useful only after a certain stage of development, before that its agitating and boring.

After a while you don't have to try to be mindful, you just do it automatically.  Noobs have to try though.  

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
6 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

After a while you don't have to try to be mindful, you just do it automatically.  Noobs have to try though.  

i dunno, i tried being mindful for a really long time (almost a year) and and im still a noob, no improvement.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
4 hours ago, Viking said:

are you a math student? you use a lot of mathy words

Sorry. I'm an engineer, so it comes naturally to me :).

4 hours ago, Viking said:

What I got from your post is that there is another way to live life, which is beyond meaning, this life simply happens when you exhaust meaning, and realize its limitations (though what limitations meaning might have ive no idea) is that right?

Yes. It is not that meaning has limitations per se, but you have limitations when you are preoccupied with seeking meaning.
These limitations are related to your identity (identification) and your notion of suffering and desire.
Meaningless meaninglessness makes your suffering enjoyable in a sense, but don't take this enjoyment as the same kind of enjoyment when you engage in meaning-seeking.

4 hours ago, Viking said:

in that state you can also have meaning and meaningless meaninglessness.

Yes. Meaning-seeking is superimposed with meaningless meaninglessness. Like two simultaneous layers.

4 hours ago, Viking said:

What I guess is in order to get to that state I have to inquire myself out of all meaning, including the meaning of wanting to get to that state because that meaning is baseless. though i dont know if its practical because its too much inquiring, the meaning map i have is way too complex and deep i think to get rid of in a lifetime.

Deconstructing meaning-map is equal to deconstruction of the self. The point is not to arrive at the empty, deconstructed self, but to observe how one meaning that is being deconstructed is replaced by other without your intervention. This way you become detached from meaning. It becomes something like vision, or hearing. A way to perceive things like colors (vision), or pitch (sound). There is no you in that.

4 hours ago, Viking said:

I guess I have a "why" for getting rid of meaning but as I would start to, that why would fade because i would realize its fault, right?

Right. If meaning-making is your primary direction in life, then you in fact do need a why to go into that.
Most spiritual teachers give you promise of nirvana, but it is nothing like you may imagine from within your current paradigm. 
When you read  descriptions of nirvana, it really is the greatest joke of all time. Joke at our expense.
It is true, though!

Edited by tsuki

Bearing with the conditioned in gentleness, fording the river with resolution, not neglecting what is distant, not regarding one's companions; thus one may manage to walk in the middle. H11L2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
4 minutes ago, tsuki said:

Sorry. I'm an engineer, so it comes naturally to me :).

haha dont be sorry, im a physics student so it's all familiar :D

5 minutes ago, tsuki said:

The point is not to arrive at the empty, deconstructed self, but to observe how one meaning that is being deconstructed is replaced by other without your intervention

what you mean is that the more I observe, while at the same time deconstructing, I see clearer and clearer that I dont control anything and I enter a paradigm in which im not bothered by meaning, though I still feel it, because meaning creation is built into our brain.

so in order to get to that place I need to continue meditating, observing and contemplating?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Just now, Viking said:

what you mean is that the more I observe, while at the same time deconstructing, I see clearer and clearer that I dont control anything and I enter a paradigm in which im not bothered by meaning, though I still feel it, because meaning creation is built into our brain.

so in order to get to that place I need to continue meditating, observing and contemplating?

Yep.
I wouldn't conflate that with brain, though. The objective-materialist paradigm in which brains exist is one of many aspects of your meaning-matrix.
Deconstructing that will show you amazing things.

Generally speaking, the more basic a concept is, the more fireworks you experience when you deconstruct it.
Fireworks being intelligence swirling meaning all over the place, trying to orient itself. It feels like madness.
When it settles though, your intellectual/perceptive capabilities increase. There is nobody to benefit from that, though so you carry on like nothing happened :). The internal difference is vast however.


Bearing with the conditioned in gentleness, fording the river with resolution, not neglecting what is distant, not regarding one's companions; thus one may manage to walk in the middle. H11L2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
28 minutes ago, tsuki said:

Yep.
I wouldn't conflate that with brain, though. The objective-materialist paradigm in which brains exist is one of many aspects of your meaning-matrix.
Deconstructing that will show you amazing things.

Generally speaking, the more basic a concept is, the more fireworks you experience when you deconstruct it.
Fireworks being intelligence swirling meaning all over the place, trying to orient itself. It feels like madness.
When it settles though, your intellectual/perceptive capabilities increase. There is nobody to benefit from that, though so you carry on like nothing happened :). The internal difference is vast however.

did you actually sit and deconstruct stuff? or did you meditate? im often hitting a wall while trying to deconstruct something. for example if i ask "why do I want X", i answer "to feel a certain way, which i interpret as 'good' " then I ask "and why do i want to feel that and no other things?" and there is no answer, but I still want to feel that way.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Viking said:

i dunno, i tried being mindful for a really long time (almost a year) and and im still a noob, no improvement.

Have you done any psychedelics yet?  Psychedelics like LSD can really expand mindfulness.  It did so for me.  

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
34 minutes ago, Viking said:

did you actually sit and deconstruct stuff? or did you meditate? im often hitting a wall while trying to deconstruct something. for example if i ask "why do I want X", i answer "to feel a certain way, which i interpret as 'good' " then I ask "and why do i want to feel that and no other things?" and there is no answer, but I still want to feel that way.

For me it was more of an automatic, intuitive process.
At some points in my life I read things that deconstructed various aspects of reality and by trying to make sense of them, they deconstructed me.

  • Heidegger's Being and Time blew my identity away.
  • Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-philosophicus blew the language away.
  • Self-inquiry into the nature of emotions revealed that what I thought I was, was simply an interplay between thoughts and emotions.

In case of Being and Time, the rip of identity was instantaneous and deep. Integration of it took me a few years.
Tractatus L-P ripped the language in conjunction with Leo's video about deconstruction after a few years of puzzlement.
Observing the interplay of feelings and emotions was a process that took a few years of mindfulness and arrived at meaninglessness.
Only then, after facing deep meaninglessness I arrived at the point I am now. 
Meditation (do-nothing) technique was very helpful after I started to reconnect to the original experience of ego death after a few years of integration.
I did not know any of this at the time, I got into spirituality only recently thanks to Leo.

It all took place over my last 4-6 years, but the root causes run much deeper into my adolescence.
You can read some of my stuff here:

 

Edited by tsuki

Bearing with the conditioned in gentleness, fording the river with resolution, not neglecting what is distant, not regarding one's companions; thus one may manage to walk in the middle. H11L2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

@tsuki I think I read that some time ago, but forgot.

So I guessed... Every person who actually got any big results in life, like enlightened masters, billionaire entrepreneurs, did so from a place of intuition.

Here comes into play my self confidence, I always thought and think that im an ordinary dude that has no "life road". When comparing myself to others who succeeded im far inferior and I dont believe I can achieve anything worthwhile, even though i might say to myself i am, deeply i dont believe this. Barely anything interests me, and absolutely nothing interests me deeply. All I have is some hope that something will. i think that was caused by my lame childhood.

The problem is that I have some image of where I want to be and I feel like I have to force my way there. everything in my life feels not genuine, not automatic, not intuitive, forced. That's one of the reasons I simply dont want to read books and develop myself, im forcing myself to do it though. When I think "develop myself" im feeling like I have to do homework or something, which sucks. I'd much much rather watch movies and tv shows than live "my life".

im already ready to take a shitton of psychedelics so my brain would start to function semi-authentically, though im a little afraid it will cause psychosis or schizophrenia, because after my trips I always believe that it somehow damaged my brain and im stuck in a stupid state of mind. also i started hearing sounds when i meditate and when i fall asleep.

@Joseph Maynor I tried LSD, though only 125ug, I did notice a huge shift a few days after, and I felt really authentic in the week after the trip, but my mind got cluttered and it passed.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Viking said:

So I guessed... Every person who actually got any big results in life, like enlightened masters, billionaire entrepreneurs, did so from a place of intuition.

Here comes into play my self confidence, I always thought and think that im an ordinary dude that has no "life road". When comparing myself to others who succeeded im far inferior and I dont believe I can achieve anything worthwhile, even though i might say to myself i am, deeply i dont believe this.

This is precisely the limitation of the meaning-seeking paradigm that you're missing.
There is no life road. People that claim to have a story, have it only in retrospect and even that story misses half of events to make itself coherent.
This was one of many realizations that came after writing my experiences.

1 hour ago, Viking said:

Barely anything interests me, and absolutely nothing interests me deeply. All I have is some hope that something will. i think that was caused by my lame childhood.

Wrong. Dead wrong.
Imagine the most fulfilled, peaceful person to ever exist. That person could sit and do nothing for hours because he would be perfectly happy with whatever happens. Interests, passions and drives are a form of imbalance. Imbalance that comes out of meaning-making that pulls towards goals and pushes away from suffering. The fact that you are disinterested in most things is an expression of your good mental health. 

What bothers you is the relative lack of greatness because you (mentally) surround yourself with titans of success.
These titans of success only got to the top because of their titanic imbalances. People always compare themselves to others.
As you are more successful, you compare yourself to more successful people.
When you are at the top, you compare yourself to God and curse your mortality.

Don't go there. It will destroy you.
Learn to suffer peacefully. Then, you will be free to go to the top at your own pace.
Your suffering when you're bored is a plea to influence your frame of reference.
You can either change your material wealth (achieve success), or change the people you look up to.
Admire ordinary life. It has more to offer than you can imagine.

1 hour ago, Viking said:

The problem is that I have some image of where I want to be and I feel like I have to force my way there. everything in my life feels not genuine, not automatic, not intuitive, forced. That's one of the reasons I simply dont want to read books and develop myself, im forcing myself to do it though. When I think "develop myself" im feeling like I have to do homework or something, which sucks. I'd much much rather watch movies and tv shows than live "my life".

I bought into that paradigm of planning and achieving when I was ~20 years old. Now I'm past that.
I'd much rather look at what I have right now and combine it somehow to produce unexpected outcomes without pre-planning.
Instead of pulling myself towards a goal set in advance, I play with whatever I have right now and propel myself forward.
There are various ways to achieve success, despite what mainstream self-help may tell you.

I also barely read. I mostly listen to youtube interviews/lectures out of curiosity. Applied philosophy is my passion.

1 hour ago, Viking said:

im already ready to take a shitton of psychedelics so my brain would start to function semi-authentically, though im a little afraid it will cause psychosis or schizophrenia, because after my trips I always believe that it somehow damaged my brain and im stuck in a stupid state of mind. also i started hearing sounds when i meditate and when i fall asleep.

Be careful with that. Jung used to say: beware wisdom you haven't earned.
I have never tried psychedelics, but from what I've gathered - they are a powerful tool. A dentist doesn't use a jackhammer, so be sure what kind of worker are you.

Edited by tsuki

Bearing with the conditioned in gentleness, fording the river with resolution, not neglecting what is distant, not regarding one's companions; thus one may manage to walk in the middle. H11L2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

@tsuki When I do something im not passionate about it (aka not meaningful) becomes painful, i start to suffer. I think that may be because I want to do something else, something i am interested in, but some stuff I have to do to survive, or so it will pay off later.

1 hour ago, tsuki said:

I much rather look at what I have right now and combine it somehow to produce unexpected outcomes without pre-planning.
Instead of pulling myself towards a goal set in advance, I play with whatever I have right now and propel myself forward.
There are other ways for success.

I think that's only possible when you're in the state of meaningless meaninglessness. ordinary people need goals to feel the meaning reward when approaching the goal.

maybe i sounded a bit reckless with the psychedelics, im actually very careful.

Edited by Viking

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

As others have said, you are not being present correctly. What is it that you enjoy doing? When you are doing that which you enjoy, is it sh*tty? In these moments, you are truly present! 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

@BuddhaTree then how do i become present? if being aware of my breath doesnt do it?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!


Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.


Sign In Now