tsuki

@flowboy @flowboy Tests are generally unreliable because enneagram is cognitive, not behavioral. It is much better to understand theory and type yourself by understanding the mechanics of your ego. I'm type six, but depending on my stress level I can become nine or three. I also have something of a minor ego that is centered in five and can go to eight or even seven. It is very tricky for a six to type itself.

@flowboy That's Eli Jaxon Bear, enlightenment teacher focused on the enneagram. You may be a sexual six. The difference is that six is fueled by fear and stuck in the head. The machoism is then a way of fending the threat off by being aggressive. An 8 is always willing to escalate while a 6 is more of a push-surrender dynamic. If you're unsure if your type, you are probably a six. Doubt is the fear of fear.

@NoSelfSelf For me, emotional mastery is about having emotions as a sense (like sight) and incorporating the information they provide into behavior deliberately. The "mastery" part is about being skillful in it to the point where it becomes second (or even first) nature. It is not necessarily about suppression, although knowing how to disregard some feelings can be of great value because it is very counter-intuitive.

Sinking the mind in the breath: day #18, #19 and #20 OM changing continued, but I was not focused enough because my wife was preparing for her medical examination. Thanks to the tuning, I started to enjoy the sound of my voice and became much more conscious of how I use it. I find this mild fascination very healthy and it makes me feel much more confident and grounded. Two days ago we had a small party and I had an opportunity to dance. It was extremely pleasant to release tension this way. My mother in law visited us yesterday. The three of us went for a long walk to the forest and visited my parents. After she left, me and my wife fought over the fact that we fight a lot. lol.

How does this video make you feel?

Why the urge to challenge them? What do you feel before the fights and afterwards after you've been beaten? In my case, the urge to fight feels like a self-winding spiral. The more hurt I am, the more I want to argue. The more I argue, the more I hurt others. On the surface, I am presenting them with razor-sharp arguments that touch the core of the issue. On a deeper level, the core of the issue is usually that people don't want to look past their wounds and insecurities. Have you ever caught yourself fantasizing about physically hurting others?

@flowboy I was similar to you, but the difference is that resistance seems to strengthen your resolve, while it wore me off and made me self-reflect. If everything around you pisses you off and you see the sheepish behavior everywhere, I'd say that you've outgrown your environment. Changing its structure is only an option if you are in a position of power and are actually willing to cooperate with the people you currently argue with. Being a whistle-blower is only beneficial for the group if there are structures that check people's power. You cannot go around humiliating people that have the potential to stomp you. You have to be smarter than that. Perhaps you are enjoying the rush of being a white knight fighting for the right cause? Speaking up for those unwilling to do so? Consider the possibility that those in power are actually weaker than you and the threat of your presence makes them push you. I'd say that it is much wiser to understand the structure you are operating in and develop your personal niche where you rule by yourself. That way you can provide value for the group while enjoying freedom you seem to seek (if that is really the case for you - you may actually be seeking struggle).

@Truth Addict Hmm, I was hoping for a second there that you would actually cooperate instead of backpedaling all the time. Have fun ♥️

First, we're bullied by our emotions and react to them through projection and denial. Then, we learn about that and try to repress them to gain clarity. When it fails, we actually listen to them and learn what we are. What if they teach a lesson and are gone after you've got it?

Let's look into this more closely. The bottom-line of experience is presence, isness without description. You do things non-reflectively or rather things happen. Then, you stop the world and create an image of what happened. That is samadhi, contemplation in silence. In order to bring the non-reflective action into language, you need a context (tradition) and re-contextualization. Re-contextualization is when you have knowledge that is expressed as a relationship between symbols, make the symbols ambiguous and 'feel' what happened in your experience. Whether it fits or not. Its basis is analogy. Only then you can do something consciously - you have made a distinction that can be used deliberately. Last step is the actual description and sharing and that is what you called 'knowledge'/philosophy. Knowledge in itself is an object of experience. You can have knowledge about knowledge and it is grounded in experience. Intelligence however is prior to language. It is the pre-condition of the first point on the list: non-reflective action. That is the creative potential. It does not come from the person - the person is an invention that is only possible because there is intelligence. Notice that you always do something first and only then you can reflect on it and make distinctions. The problem is when the capacity for non-reflective action, presence, has been burred underneath philosophy. That is what the ego-mind is. It is a recycling plant that obstructs the presence/intelligence. But the presence is always there! To say that 'something is just a theory' is to admit that you are incapable of reflecting silently upon your experience. The rest is just re-contextualization.

Is all knowledge just a story to you, or do you acknowledge the possibility that knowledge can reflect reality? Epistemology and metaphysics are unified through non-duality and reveal how accurate knowledge is possible. Many ancient sources (including Buddhism) teach that reality is one self-illuminating mind. Studying the small mind of the personal self is how you learn about reality that is beyond it. That is why all knowledge comes from within.

Is that a dogma of yours or do you actually understand the cases when the mind is deceitful? Your specific experience/POV is conditioned from your birth by your environment. The dormant mind is just a recycling plant that adds cohesion to the impressions it had collected. This agglomerate is what is called the false sense of self and that is the part of the mind that is to be mistrusted. But, you may ask: by whom is it to be mistrusted and on what accord? The agglomerate has to accumulate knowledge and learn to mistrust itself. It needs to dismantle and question its own motifs until the light of the en-lightenment sees itself, its own presence. What, in the end, is enlightened - is the mind. Thoughts are still there after it occurs and these thoughts are not conditioned. They reflect reality accurately. The origin of ideas Leo is presenting is irrelevant. They are upaya, a trick for the ego to dismantle itself. That's always nice to hear, especially from people I consider my equals ❤️|❤️.

What I was asking is: how exactly are you making these new distinctions. Like, you know how to move your hand, but do you know how to make a >>new distinction<<? How about you explain to me what absolute infinity is?

Thanks Mandy. I actually seek the opportunities to cry. That one felt like induced through the body, like something was released.

What if there isn't any? Can that be proven? What kind of proof would satisfy you? If you want to learn something, you have to accept it as a possibility and then seek it in your direct experience. What I wrote of is not 'signs'. I do not have it memorized, I access it as I write it. Find the commonalities between these 'signs'. It's subtle. Have you ever tried to understand what it means to understand? What happens when you have the 'AHA' moment?

Concepts are named distinctions, pointers. All names point towards something, sometimes to an appearance and sometimes to actuality. These names need to be 'fleshed out', like pointing your mind's finger towards a dog and saying 'dog'. Infinity is a pointer towards something that is beneath language, towards something that is more fundamental. The mind is making distinctions, but what does it make distinctions in? In nothingness. When all distinctions collapse, you are absolutely nothing and that nothing is ripe with potential to make distinctions. That is absolute infinity. Have you not experienced this? Absolute infinity is the potential for actualization. Lack of resources to do so does not invalidate it - on the contrary! Without the potential, you would have not have been able to say 'hmmm... I don't have the piece of paper long enough to write the never-ending list'! Bound entities such as 'finite human' are a choice that is actualized in response to potential. It is actualized on the level of the mind that has the creative capacity. What is the source of potential? Absolute infinity. You can always question the established order and find cracks in it. That is what you've been doing on this forum. All beginnings and ends can be questioned by noticing inconsistencies. It does not matter whose inconsistencies they are. Infinity is not 'vastly huge'. It is the inexhaustible potential for creation from which 'things' come. Infinity is boundlessness. If you take a number line, infinity is not on the number line. It is not a number.

If 'infinite' means 'boundless', then 'infinite possibilities and points of view' refers to the "skill" of creating new points of view. You can unwind the present moment into a never-ending stream of causal events. The selection of events is also intentional (arbitrary) and there is a never-ending list of ways to select them. Selection is a choice. Think of it as trying to convert analog signal into a digital representation. Each probing resolution is a possible worldview. Video on point to watch:

Sinking the mind in the breath: day #17 Yesterday evening I felt immense desire to get away from breathing, stop listening to sages and distract myself. I deliberately started watching some starcraft matches on youtube, but the relief they brought were minimal. When I got home from work, I started watching cat meme videos because I understood that I simply wanted to laugh. I came across contagious laugh compilation and I started to laugh, and at some point, that laughter suddenly changed to tears of sadness. Today's morning practice was very scattered. My wife had told me that I sound sleepy and groggy. My voice was very unsteady, my throat was hoarse and my voice transmitted the heartbeat. I noticed that my diaphragm was visibly beating like my heart. I couldn't focus when I was reading yoga sutras.

You wanna contemplate infinity together? We could break each other that way. What seems to be your obstacle?

@Truth Addict @Aakash Infinity is not lots and lots of bounded "things" of various sizes. Infinity is the possibility of boundedness, the precondition of finitude.

@Nahm ??

Suffering lies dormant as a possibility that you will stop being mindful and run off on autopilot.