CreamCat

@pluto Oh, you're talking about spiritual realm. Can you get the address of one of them for us? I want to meet them.

@Serotoninluv What about achieving success in one's niches? Do you have recommendations for that? You plowed through decades of hard work to obtain tenure which gives you wiggle room. You know what it takes to achieve something big.

NoFap increases the level of testosterone which is necessary for accomplishments. However, if you don't masturbate, you have two options. Wet your underwear someday Or, have sex with someone before you do

@Serotoninluv I am feeling that I may be putting the cart before the horse by focusing too much on enlightenment before building up fundamentals. Building up fundamentals means eating right, sleeping right, breathing right, and so on. I want to become a functional human being before seriously pursuing enlightenment. I think TJ Reeves' take on spiral dynamics is useful. He sees lower stages of spiral dynamics as foundations for the higher stages. For example, you master Beige by eating right, sleeping right, and so on. You master Purple by making at least 5 good friends, improving your relationships with your family, and nurturing your tribe. You master Red by developing motivation and drive. If you get C- on Beige, you need to work on Beige again until you get A+ on Beige. This means you need to work on your sleeping pattern before working on higher stuff.

I'm think I'm kind of aware of enlightenment at the moment. I feel that consciousness is not rational. I feel that it's thoughts that are rational. Consciousness is aware of supposedly rational thoughts. Something like trans-rational knowledge would make more sense than trans-rational consciousness. If what I'm experiencing is enlightenment, enlightenment doesn't really change much in the short term.

I tried this, and visualization became very fun. It became far easier to feel emotions during visualization after watching images. I watched images, closed my eyes, and visualized. If the image faded, I would open my eyes again, watch the images again, and close my eyes again to resume visualization. I'm going to prepare more images for future visualization sessions. Right. Thanks for reminding me of visualizing in the positive side.

I try to visualize for 10 minutes every day. It hasn't been a month since I started it. There are a few problems with it. Since I visualize with my eyes closed, it is difficult to conjure up images and feel emotions. It is easy to be distracted while I visualize. It is easier to visualize vividly while I read or watch something inspirational. But, such vivid visualization opportunities are rare because most things I read or watch aren't inspirational with regard to my life purpose. It's difficult to decide what to visualize. Is there a more cutting-edge technique that is easier and more effective? Or, do I just need to do it better? Isn't self-image susceptible to destruction by others' negative opinions? EDIT 1 : I just visualized for 10 minutes. I visualized being successful for a while. My visualization naturally moved to how to prevent myself from being distracted. I visualized writing down distractions in my smartphone's inbox and my computer's inbox. I also visualized making it a habit by rehearsing. Every day, I look at my inboxes and move items in inboxes to my task management system so that I will either drop the items or schedule them to be done in the near future. It seems that visualization is better for problem solving than for improving self image.

Bolsonaro is worse than Trump. At least, trump didn't go as far as saying he'd rather have a dead son than a gay son.

@Serotoninluv You might want to read my summary of TJ Reeves' take on spiral dynamics on this forum. Did you read it already?

@Serotoninluv I don't see Orange as a substitute for Red in terms of motivation. Rational thinking is not very motivating.

@Serotoninluv TJ Reeves advocates embodying every lower stage properly before moving up. In a way, purple is not dead. Blue and Orange are very much alive in myself. Red weakened, but I need to strengthen it again to refuel motivation. I'm going to work on Beige, Purple, Red, Blue, Orange, and then Green. I'll start with Beige. Working on Beige means sleeping right, eating right, meditating right, breathing right, and a few other things. He views spiral dynamics as something like maslow's hierarchy of needs. He says ignoring lower stages leads to unhealthy aspects of higher stages.

@How to be wise Perhaps, a separate section of the forum? Philosophies don't fit well in self actualization.

You can learn self actualization by teaching. Learning and teaching are not totally separate. I summarized TJ Reeves' latest video on that thread. I learned a lot in the process of summarizing his video. Other people will also learn a lot from my summary.

@Joseph Maynor I don't know. Ask TJ Reeves. I just added more details to clarify Coral.

I think this is one of Leo's blindspots. He told us to just do it. It's going to require willpower to do that if you are not careful. But, willpower burns out quickly. The following video tells us to make the process as enjoyable as the end results. One Line Summary To live a happy life, find a way to make the means as enjoyable as or more enjoyable than the ends. Short Summary The vast majority of people spend the vast majority of their time on doing what they don't want to do in order to get what they want. It is impossible to live happily if you spend most of your time on doing what you don't want to do in order to get what you want. To live a happy life, find a way to make the means as enjoyable as the ends. Most successful people on this planet find a way to make the means more enjoyable than the ends. Long Summary When we do a lot of unwanted things to get what we want, we are playing a game called `a means to an end` where the ends justify the means. When we approach getting what we want by making ends justify the means, we bulldoze parts of ourselves that don't enjoy doing something. We play a zero sum game with those parts within ourselves. We do things we don't like to do and don't want to do in order to get what we want. What if your whole life is just doing something you didn't want to do so that you could get something you wanted? The vast majority of people on planet earth spend the vast majority of their time on doing something they don't want to do in order to get something they want. This is a recipe for absolute disaster. Your life will be unbearable. People choose to settle in this way because they have a belief that it is impossible to live in any other way. We were trained to do something we don't want in order to get what we want. We think this is the way to live life. It is absolutely impossible to live happily if your strategy toward getting things we want in our life is to do something you don't want to do. If you want a happy life, you can't live a life where the ends justify the means. Let's say you want to get to the ocean. You are convinced the only way to get to the ocean is to walk through industrial waste dump for hours. For the first time you do this, you feel it's worth. On the second time, it's going to feel less worth it. The third time feels even less worth it. Eventually, it's going to feel not worth it at all. You spent the majority of your time unhappily. You spend more time on going through industrial waste dump than on enjoying the actual ocean. The ends are not going to justify the means. Once you get want you want, you feel that the means are less and less justified by the ends. To live a happy life, you have to find a way to enjoy the means as much as the ends. You want to get to the ocean without going through industrial waste dumps. You have to find a desert road to the ocean so that you enjoy getting to the ocean as well as being at the ocean. Most successful people on this earth in terms of living life itself find the means they enjoy more than the ends. For example, they want money, but they find a way to make money that they love more than getting the money. The best questions to ask yourself What would I do if I never got a single dime to do it? If someone gave me 5 million dollars, what would I do with my time now that I no longer have to do anything to make money? Get creative about how to use the answer as a means to making money. It is simply your mind that tells you it is impossible to make money by doing these things. People are so limited by what is and isn't possible. They are even more limited by the idea that they couldn't possibly create some possibility that didn't exist. The questions to ask yourself What do I really want? What am I currently doing in order to get what I want? What are the ways that I am doing what I don't want to do in order to get what I want?

@Callum Milner Who are integral teachers? Do you think teal swan doesn't have integrity because she divorced a few times?

Like who? The most successful entrepreneur in your field? I don't care much about enlightenment, yet. I still care more about practical tips I can get from others.

@Callum Milner Why? She gives me quick useful tips that are easy to digest.

I'd like to see his training program of the future.

Damn, it seems TJ Reeves is creating new stages. Is he the pioneer of Spiral Dynamics? Whether or not he is really Teal, I admire the level of discipline behind his beautiful muscles. Everyone can understand disciplined muscles. I also like his masculine energy.

What is Teal?

@Serotoninluv I'm worried about Leo Gura. I'm not sure whether Leo is open-minded enough about his own beliefs although he advocates open-mindedness in his videos. He couldn't even entertain the idea that a man could be sent to prison for months for accidentally bumping his hand into a woman's ass although there are news reports of such a man. In my country, that man has been famous for a while. He probably thought I was lying. It seems Leo Gura has at least two personalities. Nondual Leo Gura who features himself on videos. Dual Leo Gura who has strong convictions about things that others are not sure of. He appears on forum.

I wouldn't go that far down the rabbit hole of relativism. Read my comment above again. I wanted to use relativism to soften dogmas, but not to justify unhealthy behaviors. Beyond a certain point, relativism becomes ridiculous. I advocate obtaining direct data through your own little experiments. Become a mad scientist for your own life. For any belief that people have, there are better beliefs. Do you believe in black holes? Or, do you want to test validity of black hole theory? Most beliefs are like black hole theory which is convincing but might crumble under examination. My current beliefs about pedophilia are a sand castle and can crumble in the future. At least, I recognize my beliefs as a sand castle. Some people consider their beliefs as facts. I'm not sure whether Leo recognizes his beliefs as a sand castle because he seems to have strong convictions.