krazzer

I'm stuck in a cycle. I seem to have two modes. The fantasy mode and the reality mode. In reality mode, I work on my own business with pleasure. I have fun with my kids and wife in the evening and weekends. I dedicate my free time to meditation, self development, reading, carpentry or having fun with my wife or friends. When I'm in reality mode, I generally feel great. But after some time, I always start to long for fantasy mode again. At some point the urge to go to fantasy mode again is too great to overcome, and my brain comes up with reasons why it's ok to do this again. So, eventually, I start entering fantasy mode again. I start to play WoW again (or anything else that takes me in to a fantasy world, but for simplicity sake, let's stick to WoW here). At first, this is great. I still operate in reality mode, but in my free time, in the evenings, I'm in fantasy mode. Gradually over the days, I start to chip off time from reality mode to be more in fantasy mode. I skip hanging out with friends, I skip watching Netflix with my wife. I skip meditating. I skip working out. The damn game is just to much fun. Screw reality. I start to login the game for a short while to check something during work hours. I put the kids to bed as early as possible, so I can play again. Eventually, I look at my work todo list, and I make it as short as possible, just to do the absolute necessary work, and skip the work that would grow the business, or prepares for future changes. That's when I play WoW for 8 hours a day, with a short intermission to have dinner with the kids and wife and a little mandatory play time until they go to bed. And that's also when I start to think about it might be a better idea to leave fantasy mode, and go back to reality again. And then, I'm back in reality mode living life in a more adult way, being more social person. And this cycle keeps repeating itself. For years, maybe even a decade. I'm not sure what to do with it. Clearly I cannot operate forever in fantasy mode, that would make my life quite miserable. I also don't have the strength to be in reality mode all the time, I keep falling back. What do I do? Do I keep fighting to stay in reality mode? That is what I've done in the past decade. Or do I accept the cycle? In reality mode I can mostly undo the damage I do in fantasy mode, so it is possible to keep living this way and have peace with it, even though it is somewhat mediocre. But in the back of my mind I know how awesome my life would be if I keep staying in reality mode.

@Mz Hyde I don't want to run from it. I just want to go to the fantasy land again, because it's very pleasurable.

It sounds to me you are close to a breakthrough but are resistant. Keep going.

Everything already exists. Every possible future, every possible past. Every possible reality. And it exists right now. You are just experiencing this limited version of reality that seems to have a timeline.

Are you sure that you havent covered the "basic survival stuff"? If you have a job (even though you hate it), and you can pay your bills, have shelter and food and water, don't you have covered survival? Why are you stressed about your job? Is that something you could work on? By all means, if you hate it, try to find a new job. But also try to accept your current situation.

If you see the body as a burden then it's more the mind that is the problem labeling it as a burden

‘Is there something that you “should” be doing but are not doing it? Get up and do it now. Alternatively, completely accept your inactivity, laziness, or passivity at this moment, if that is your choice. Go into it fully. Enjoy it. Be as lazy or inactive as you can. If you go into it fully and consciously, you will soon come out of it. Or maybe you won’t. Either way, there is no inner conflict, no resistance, no negativity.' - Eckhart Tolle

There is not much to say. If you meditate enough and eventually reach a very high state of consciousness, you will probably transcend the need to be productive. Productivity or "Wasting time" become laughable. No way other people will understand.

I've been meditating almost every day for the last 3 to 4 years of my life now, and I've had multiple enlightenment experiences. I'm not sure if I can say i'm truly 'enlightened' but I know for sure that my current mind state is in a completely different plain of existence than most people around me, and completely different than my own mind a few years ago. While still being very grounded and a rational person, I really buy into the idea that the I is an illusion and that awareness is greater than our body. However, a few days back i started reading this book: https://www.amazon.com/My-Stroke-Insight-Scientists-Personal/dp/0452295548 Which basically says that the left side of our brain is the rational part, which creates thoughts, and that the right side brain is awareness and does not create thoughts but is aware of what happens in the rest of the brain and is aware that we are all one big energy field. Also if parts of the left side brain are disabled, the right side brain's awareness brings one onto a permanent blissful state, or Nirvana as Buddhist monks call it. So is meditating nothing more than training your right side brain to be more dominant? Is everything we are trying to achieve here basically this, and could you even call it spirituality? Isn't it all just neuroscience? Not that it really matters, the result is the same, I'm just curious how you guys look at this?

You created weekday habits. Habits are done automatically without to much effort. You don't have any weekend habits. If you wake up and think to yourself, what should I do? Then your mind will only come up with things that satisfy you in the short term. So plan ahead, and try to structure it in a way so you can do it every weekend. For example: 9:00 get out of bed, and do exercise 9:30 meditate 9:45 shower 10:00 breakfast 10:30 study 12:30 lunch 13:30 clean the house 14:00 free time

Same here. What I noticed: The bigger it gets, the harder to remove, but stronger the motivation to stop when done so.

I just deleted my porn collection yesterday. I was building it up since august or so. I have been trying to quit porn for years. This year, I had some realizations about death, the point of life (that there is none) the universe and being god. My ego used this: "Whatever you do in this life doesn't matter, nothing is real, so you might as well enjoy some porn". I stuck with this for a while. But recently, I had a different thought process. This life, it doesn't matter what you do. The whole universe ends when this story of my life ends. But does that mean you should perform destructive behavior? I'm stuck living this life (unless I kill myself o.c.) so I might as well try to enjoy it as much as possible. And that doesn't mean drowning myself in pleasurable activities. I know how that works. The pleasure diminishes and all-round happiness diminishes as well. Everything else in life becomes a chore. And knowing that I am god (as are you), I simply make a choice. And I have chosen. No more porn, no more games. Those are my 2 biggest addictions. I can't do them in moderation. Drinking alcohol or eating junk food, I don't have any problem with those. They never leave me wanting more. But games and porn do. Let's just stop that shit. I know what will happen. I've walked this path before. It's a path of peace and happiness. I failed in the past because I felt so good my ego said "You might as well play some games" which slowly but surely escalated to porn. This might happen again, and I'm in peace with that thought, but I know it's always a choice. So I would encourage you to delete it all. But you really need to feel strongly motivated to quit forever.

I would say, if you are doing things, don't bother with nootropics. Because when done right, you'll be in that state anyway. I was shocked when Leo described the effects of Modafinil, because he described a state I'm always trying to be in. It's like my second life purpose to find out what gets me in that state. The 5 point @alankrillin mentioned are most important I believe. I have been in this state many times, one time it even lasted 6 weeks. It makes me feel very happy all the time, still mind, hyper focused, extremely productive, super creative, I make way less errors, and unlike some reports with Modafinil, I'm super social as well and I'm not bothered by any interruption. I might try it out some time to see if it's really the same state as I'm describing. Luckily I live in the Netherlands and one google search got me on a shop where I can order them for €2,00 a pill ?

This has been going on for years now. I'm going from a really blissful state, back to a miserable state. I'll call them heaven and hell. When I'm in heaven I'm: Feeling at peace all the time Having no problem eating healthy Highly productive No problem with talking to anyone No fears whatsoever Very positive about anything Energetic Helping others When I'm in hell I'm: Feeling miserable all the time Can't resist eating junkfood to feel better Can't get much work done Socially awkward Seeing problems everywhere Lethargic Watching porn Gaming too much The funny thing is I'm 100% and totally aware in which state I'm in, but I can't escape hell if I want to. Most of the time it just happens in an instant. BOOM, and I'm back in heaven, and all my 'problems' vanish like snow in the sun. I can't put my finger on what the circumstances are. It has nothing to do with external events. When I'm in heaven even the hardest situations are no trouble at all. In hell the simplest thing can disturb me. It seems like when I'm heaven, I fall back to hell when I do something stupid like drinking too much, skipping too much sleep, etc. But not always. It feels like at some point I fall back into hell no matter what. I have been in heaven once for 7 weeks straight. I want to there all the time. Is this even realistic? I feel like I'm gradually more in heaven than in hell, but it's a slow process.

Masturbation is keeping the need alive. Just like when taking sleep pills for a long time, you can't go without anymore. You need to stop masturbating cold turkey. You will probably have a lot of bad nights before things settle. I would recommend reading before sleep. Drinking tea, take a bath, meditate. And no computer/tv/tablet/phone 1 hour before bed.

It has an ego, but not consciousness. Humans don't have consciousness either.

You are consciousness. The whole world, your body, your brain, your experiences, they all appear inside consciousness. When the body dies, it's just the body that dies, but not you! When you awaken this becomes so obvious.

Keep doing it anyway. This is also a process. Learn to love the beauty in everything, even low conscious people

And yet you know when all of this happens in a dream, it's just a dream. Except that you don't know when you're in the dream. Just like you don't know that you are dreaming right now.

Because of years and years of conditioning. You need time to integrate.

It's not a matter of opinion. It's a matter of how to formulate the unformulatable. The true self and no-self are the same thing. If you experience it you can see how you are nothing and everything at the same time.

I doubt that he will completely stop spiritually progressing. With the urge gone, I think his chances of waking up are even higher.

Yes, everyone is I, all is one. Where do we begin? Good question. Everyone is already there.

I am that which cannot be conceptualized

You are everything. You are every possible version of yourself, of everyone else, and of all creatures that you don't know that exist, and even the ones that you cannot even imagine. All at the same time. You are beyond death. Death, and your whole life, has as much significance as a single breadcrumb.