Leo Gura

Animals aren't lost in thoughts.

I personally never found it very practical. It's all nice ideas but no method for getting enlightened is given. You're just taking the author at his word and filling your mind with spiritual fantasies.

Basically: pictures of you doing cool, fun SOCIAL stuff. Relaxed and easy-going. No nerd activities. No solo pictures. No mirror selfies. << All this tells the girl you're a loner loser nerd who can't get a date in the real world so he's desperately trying online.

To me Nirvana = Heaven, which, if you've ever had an enlightenment experience, is exactly what it feels like. The whole world becomes heavenly and divine. Even all the "bad" stuff appears good. Nirvana is what occurs when the illusion of ego get's shattered (enlightenment).

Jed's claim that only a handful of people in the world are enlightened is ridiculous. It's a lot more than a handful. There are tens of thousands at least. Which is one clear sign to me that he hasn't done a truly broad survey of the various enlightened traditions. Or he simply has a penchant for drama. His attack on spiritual people and meditation is simply false, and again seems to be part of his dramatic style. The problem with Jed is that he doesn't really acknowledge any paths other than his own. Although he seems to be sort of fond of Zen. Which is ironic because Shinzen Young is from the Zen tradition. The Zen tradition alone has thousands of enlightened people in it.

I dunno about Socrates, but Tony Robbins is definitely NOT enlightened. He seems quite addicted to ego. I doubt Socrates was enlightened, despite him saying, "The only thing I know for sure is that I know nothing." The only enlightened ancient Greek I know is Heraclitus. If you read his writing, you clearly see that he was in a class all by himself. His statements are refreshingly Zen-like and powerful. While you can't know for sure who is or isn't enlightened, in practice it's pretty easy to tell once you've studied enlightenment long enough. I can usually tell from hearing just one or two sentences if the teacher has a grasp of enlightenment. It just becomes very obvious. It's a handy skill to have actually, because it lets you sort the wheat from the chaff very quickly. I can know in just a few minutes that Tony Robbins will not teach me the deepest truths of life. His teachings are useful, but they are not existentially deep.

I have very limited control over the software's features. This forum software is incredibly complex and is developed by a staff of programmers at IP Board. It has bugs and other limitations which we are at the mercy of until future releases or certain plugins get released. There's a lot of stuff I'd like to improve but can't because the core code cannot be modified.

You should make a careful intuitive, gut-level evaluation of whether your passion is truly gone for this field, or it's merely clouded temporarily by drudgery. If your passion is truly gone for something, it no longer feels meaningful. The activity feels pointless, even if the hard work became easy. In which case, grinding it out is a terrible move. However, if you feel this field is still very meaningful at its core, but you're glum about your prospects in the field (for whatever reason), that means you should stick with it and perhaps change up your approach, or just stay the course and wait it out. The question you should be concerned with is: Does mathematics still hold deep meaning for me, despite any temporary annoyances? And never forget, there are MANY different ways to pursue mathematics. You might hate teaching mathematics, but love some other aspect of it. You might hate calculus but love geometry, etc. In that case, you need to niche yourself better within the broader field. Don't be afraid to carve out a totally unique way contributing to the field of mathematics that suits your style and passions.

When in doubt, just name your biz or product after a fruit: Peach, plum, watermelon, orange, banana, kiwi, etc

@Pinocchio Okay, but I'm still not clear why you say Shinzen is not enlightened. I don't think you ever said why. Let's also not forget that there are many stages of enlightenment. So you should clearly define your terms. When I speak of enlightenment, I mean classic enlightenment: Kensho: dis-identification with the self as a body/mind, answering the What am I? question. There are many stages beyond that and there is a transformation of the mind that occurs over the years as one learns to embody the enlightenment insights.

Branding is not really about the name itself. There are many successful products and companies that have stupid names, including Amazon, Apple, Google, the Nintendo Wii, and many others. The key is the quality of the product, knowing WHO your target audience is, and testing the marketplace very strategically to make sure that your product/service is economically viable. As long as you got these 3 elements down, you could name your product an iTurd and people would buy it.

There are a lot of opportunities. Coaching is a big market and its going to only grow bigger in the future. Of course it's STILL difficult to break in, just like ANY other business. All business is challenging and competitive. It has to be because the rewards of success are highly desirable. My focus was life purpose coaching, although I was broader than that in practice and never really defined a niche because I got into Actualized.org. You could say my niche became self-actualization, which is not a good idea for most people because it's way too broad and no one knows what self-actualization is. My first clients were distant friends or acquaintances. Coaching is a people-business. You gotta rely on people in your social circle when you start. It's a sign, yes, although it could mean various things. You need to sit down and do some deep soul-searching. The life purpose course will help you a lot to figure all that out. There are many angles to consider. I'm not sure what you learned in the "performance coach" program so it's hard to say. Many different kind of people can be life coaches. There's no one type of person. This is giant field with room for a variety of personalities, styles, and approaches. That said, here's what I see as common between great coaches: They really care about helping people They are interested in consciousness/awarenesss They enjoy coaching They enjoy connecting and relating with people They are empathetic and compassionate They are committed to this as a life purpose, not just a job or a side-gig They are hard-working They are savvy about marketing and business, and willing to learn & master it They love to read and learn about personal development They do lots of inner work on themselves That's a fantastic niche! There are many coaches who specialize just in that. Many artists and creative professionals need help via coaching, and man of them have the $$$$ to pay you (which is nice). I don't know that I've made too many mistakes. My career as a coach worked out very well. My biggest mistake as a coach is that I have a tendency to give too much direct advice instead of guiding clients to their own answers. This is my personal bias because I enjoy giving advice more than coaching. Which is why I ultimately exited coaching and now do video advice full-time. It's just more suited to my personality. Coaching is NOT teaching. Coaching is guiding. There is a big difference. A good coach can coach a client on a problem in an area where he has zero personal experience. But for that you need to learn how to be a strong coach, which requires training and practice. Developing yourself is important, but it shouldn't stop you from becoming a coach if you really want to be a coach. Every business market is competitive, so that statement is kinda moot. Any business you enter will be very challenging, period. There are no easy marketplaces where you can just stroll in and be financially independent. That would be way too easy. I say this to put things into proper perspective. I didn't write up a formal business plan, but I did spend a lot of time thinking about my niche and how to brand myself. Yes, niching yourself is important. Generic "personal development" coaching is gonna be hard to sell. I can sell it because don't even coach people really, I give advice. And I was lucky to a large degree. Keep in mind that when you niche yourself, you're not really limiting who you coach. You are ONLY specifying your marketing and sales pitch. You can still coach people on issues outside your niche as long as they are willing to pay you. The purpose of niching is so that prospective clients are clear about the benefits your coaching will give them. Very few people will shell out hard-earned money for "self-improvement". People will only pay for tangible results like, "We can save your marriage" or "we can find you a new job that pays 50% more".

The direction of your life and how to realize it.

@Emerald Wilkins You'll grow bored and tired of that fear with a few years of diligent practice. It starts to get old and tedious. Letting go of control is actually what you secretly desire most. You just fear the unknown territory that will put you in. It's impossible to will surrender. It will come about after enough of hitting your head against the brick wall.

It's actually every simple: Step #1: Any time you experience a negative feeling of any time in relation to any circumstance << That's your demon arising right there. Step #2: Become aware or mindful of this arising in present time. Step #3: Watch it closely while at the same time loving it to death. Don't fight it. Accept it and love it to death. You can also use a journal to write out your inner demons and work with them that way. Or you can do therapy or life coaching.

When you meditate, stop manipulating your experiences in any way. Just sit and accept everything as it is. Do you see that on a meta-level, what's happening right now with you, is that the ego believes it can control this process. It's trying really hard to be a good meditator. It thinks it can stop mental images from arising. It thinks that mental images are somehow undesirable. All of this is of course ludicrous because the ego doesn't exist and has no control. The manipulations are just additional layers of delusion of which you have no control. Whenever you notice the urge to control something in your meditation, just drop the need. Soon you will enter a kind of very deep, calm flow state and you'll actually start smiling because you're finally accepting reality exactly as it is = happiness.

If you what you seek is classic enlightenment -- dissolution of the self -- then the two most important questions are: Who am I? What am I? And others that go to the root of your existential nature. Examples might include: Who is perceiving? Who is aware? What is aware? Where am I?

Basically the same.

Don't forget to blink! Try this: the next time you meditate, stop manipulating anything about your experience whatsoever. Stop all trying. Zero manipulation. And just accept everything that occurs. Everything! Don't even try to relax or not relax. Don't even try not to try.

@aurum Be careful with drinking the Jed Kool-aid. Oldest spiritual trap in the book: make your spirituality superior and exclusive of all others.

I may post some content once in a while, but my time is limited and mostly committed to improving the weekly videos and creating new courses. My job on this forum is mostly to make sure it's running smoothly. This is primarily a sandbox for you guys to share your own ideas and contribute valuable content.

My focus has always been self-actualization, never relationships or sex. But that's just me. Even when I did pickup, I did it first and foremost to improve myself. Not for the girls. Actualized.org Maybe. Not sure about that yet. I think relationships are great, if you can find the right match and if you know what you're doing. Are they are distraction from finding your authentic self? Absolutely. I'm not really passionate about either. (Which should not be interpreted as meaning they are bad or wrong or useless concepts.) I talk a lot about it in the life purpose course. I like teaching people. Will I always be this active? Probably not, so enjoy it while it lasts It's not the activity, it's the chimp behind the activity that's the problem. All the things mentioned on the sales page of the course. Most importantly: your life purpose! Perhaps in the future. It's nothing fancy though. So you wanna know what's in the secret sauce, eh? Perhaps in the future.

Sorry, don't let me intrude on the chimpry.

This! Best way is to demonstrate a strong value for meditation yourself. She'll naturally get curious why you sit every day for 1 hour. Then you can tell her that this the most single most important secret to all of life (which is true!) and that only ignorant people don't meditate

Do nothing meditation is usually done while seated. So I'm not sure what you're asking. You can also meditate while walking or doing mindless chores. But this takes more practice.