Consilience

But in a sense yes enlightenment does. Because the truth of the matter is the mechanism that is creating suffering and depriving happiness is a mechanism built entirely out of delusion. When the truth is fully seen, suffering becomes an impossibility and the source of authentic happiness is found. How can one know authentic happiness without knowing what's really true?

This is precisely incorrect. Desire is the underlying energy for survival activity. Even if you identify as awareness, desire will remain regardless, as will survival activity. I guess in a sense "you" no longer desire, but it's not because desire no longer arises; desire to live is going to remain until death. Also, identifying as awareness is another attachment that needs to be let go of to know thyself. Can be a very sneaky last ditch effort of the ego to survive.

Taking psychedelics will put all your fantasies of loving Now to the test. When your reality is crumbling before your eyes, how grounded and enduring is your love for Now? I don't view them as a means to enlightenment, but I respect their capacity to keep me honest about how far Ive come. How can I claim to have reached enlightenment if I become terrified on acid or am suffering through insanity on mushrooms? A real master wouldn’t be phased at all. I agree though that you cannot escape the sober work though. Id recommend being more holistic with your thinking OP.

This statement is false.

Or maybe you can't do anything? How can anything be done if there is no one to do anything? Hmmm...

Awesome! Really happy the post was helpful Feel free to DM if you have any questions on the book, meditation, etc.

Start with Shamatha meditation. Specifically, the Anapanasati technique which literally translates to mindfulness of breathing. This will cultivate not only concentration, but long term very pleasurable, tranquil states of mind that are ideal for insight and contemplation, whether for existential truths or more relative “down to earth” self help insights. A great book that explores this technique in depth is The Mind Illuminated. 10 minutes per day of Anapanasati with a focus of the breath sensations at the nostrils, slowly working up the time at your own pace, is a great place to start.

Agree with @Barbara building consistency is key. My personal minimum when starting and even to this day is 10 but 5 mins is better than 0. Fatigue can definitely be a defense mechanism. It can also just be you’re not accustomed to being that relaxed unless you’re going to bed. The mind will adapt over time. In terms of techniques, you can keep your eyes open, do standing mediation, or strong determination sitting for longer durations. You may also look into using a body scan technique. This will help sensitize you to the energy of the body and then from there you can return to the breath. For example if you’re doing a 20 minute sit, the first 10 minutes are a body scan, last are a focusing on the breath. Just an example. Note that overtime, your mind will work through this fatigue. Turning into the fatigue and using it as your meditation object is also another powerful technique. You may find that with enough penetrating mindfulness, the dullness/lethargy transforms into a fluid, even vitalizing source of energy. This, however, takes a lot of consistency and training.

I disagree. So would Peter Ralston who was the one that opened me up to the possibility a little over a year ago. Not that I should blindly take his word for it or you should blindly take mine. But we also disagree about Absolute Beauty so Im not surprised there’s a clash here haha

@Gesundheit You completely misunderstood the happiness I was referring to. Imagine a happiness that is entirely independent of whether or not one is in a happy state.

Hmm... I think I get what you're saying. Do you think it's really necessary to go about hating the dualistic Universe into annihilation? It seems like that's just more projection, emotion and self generated interpretation of experience, not Consciousness.

@Spiral Wizard that was a really interesting video.. ?

I used to have this perspective. Now I disagree. The search for truth is derived from a desire for self knowledge, or knowledge of reality. What is the context for this desired knowledge? A belief of its intrinsic importance to the pursuit of happiness/the good life. We ‘believe’ we’ll somehow be better off with this knowledge, aka be happier, which is ultimately the context for such a pursuit. The happiness I speak of is a meta perspective to what Jed is talking about though. It is a happiness that transcends both heaven, hell, and any and all states of consciousness which is why the cost and answer to such a question “what is really true” does not matter. Just because this thread has already entered this territory with the quotes, yes “Im” writing in subject object duality. Gft over it please and thank you.

+1

All I can say is regardless of whether you deny perception/consciousness, it’s here, it’s primary, it’s completely undeniable. Any extra metaphysical claims about the substance of reality are subject to unfalsifiable skepticism. Rather than chasing a phantom substance which may or may not exist, enlightenment is about discovering the nature of what is Absolutely True. This requires careful concentration into the heart of what underlies perception, all experiences, and all thoughts. When you’ve studied epistemology and direct experience long enough, you’ll understand why Leo as well as a great number of people on this forum have let go of the need for thoughts to explain Absolute Truth. More specifically, why we make the claim that thoughts cannot explain Absolute Truth. The truth of the matter is that any thought cannot be Absolutely True due to the nature of thoughts existing as functions of time which is of course an illusion constructed by the mind, the fact that thoughts are symbolic representations of reality (the map is not the territory, never has been, never can be), and finally, the fact that all reason and rationality will always dissolve into an infinite regress of reason where one must eventually concede that they’re taking on a belief. Thoughts can be used to talk about the nature of thoughts, exactly what Im doing now, but this still isn’t the nature of thoughts Im speaking of. Less mental masturbation and more direct observation dude. And again, whether you want to chase phantom metaphysical substances which cant ever be proven due to the nature of conscious experience only having the ability to exist as experience, by all means go for it. But it’s not really the type of work you’ll get very far with.

Well that and it’s literally not consistent. Just because the mind constructs the consistency, it’s actually a different moon. The light, rotation and position have all changed. Moment by moment, some facet of direct experience has changed. Even the fridge is not the same fridge while staring at it moment by moment. Whether one’s level of consciousness is capable of observing the fluctuations in perception and see through the illusion of consistency is a different matter.

Try as hard as you want to deny that your direct experience is reality. The fact of its “isness” or “being” is the fact of its reality. It’s not a myth that reality is consciousness, it’s quite literally what you’re directly experiencing right now. To deny this is asinine. If you want to believe there’s a 2nd layer underneath your direct experience, aka the consciousness you THINK is a myth (your mind projecting on top of your direct conscious experience), s’all good. However at least recognize it’s a more convoluted belief system that requires extra mind baggage that careful, objective, direct study of experience and reality does not need. In fact, if you studied your direct experience long enough you’d notice all sensory perception has no solidity to it at all, it’s just a fluid, spacious, fluctuating field of is-ness popping into and out of a void; the “objective” reality science thinks is out there is quite literally impossible if they knew what they were actually studying, which is perception. The thoughts that think there’s a 2nd layer are also popping into and out of this void. But Im guessing you haven't meditated long enough to perceive this resolution of direct experience/reality/consciousness/perception. It required an extremely stable, mindful concentration of what is really happening vs what your mind thinks is happening.

Im well aware. Nothing you said here has anything to do with my post.

What he's teaching here is a very spiritually immature pov. A true master knows that a thorn can be used to pick a thorn out. Spiritual practice, self inquiry, meditation are tools, strategies to recognize what was always the truth. Sitting here saying there's nothing to do is incredible unhelpful 99% of the time. Even in zen they recognize ACTUALLY doing nothing is better than the doing nothing 99.9% of humanity is running around with. Additionally, I would bet money most of the people spitting this neo-advaita perspective couldn't sit in a room for 4 hours straight without distraction or stimulation without suffering. Meditation, "the path," isn't just about falling into some illusory trap of needing to do something. It's about becoming conscious of the ways your ego is still manipulating you and in control. Meditation is a litmus test for how full of shit you are, how strong your spiritual ego is.

This is what you gain with insight and wisdom from spiritual practice.

Success and money =\= level of consciousness. It would be even weirder if it did..

LSD for suuure. I met my soul on Acid. Can't introspect much harder than that honestly.

+2

By realizing your ordinary life, the mundane boring act of the daily grind is none other than God. Any resistance to living your life is still ego, attachment. What comes after realization is the embodiment and purification of Self Realization. This is why daily practice like meditation is still so important. Giving yourself the space, time, and practice to let the insight penetrate the deepest levels of mind and continue to unfold. This is why we meditate, not necessary to get some bigger insight, but to let the awakening start to shape and mold the mind, to let the awakening slowly burn away selfishness and egotism. While the whole idea of "there's nothing to do, no path to walk" is technically correct, it's a rather shallow, immature understanding of spirituality. Let the awakening transform you. Let the awakening deepen. Let the awakening you feel during peak psychedelic trips and deep meditative states merge into the mundane. Let the awakening shine light into every corner of the mind until even the daily grind of wage slavery is seen as none other than the perfect expression of God. Let the awakening light a fire for your most authentic individuality to fully and completely express itself, and then transcend wage slavery altogether as you walk the relative path of Self Actualization. Or something like that haha. Anyways, as the zen saying goes "Before enlightenment, chop wood carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood carry water." Just don't be afraid to upgrade the axe.

I spent a solid 8 months diving into the Mind Illuminating, reaching stages 6-8 consistently and do not regret it at all. May have occasionally peaked into 9 and 10. Then spent some time doing zazen because I had this massive intuition that I needed to let the Fuck go and stop worry about states. Do not regret it at all. Finally, just recently completed a 9 day Vipassana retreat with Shinzen Young using his version of Vipassana, See Hear Feel with labeling, and had a MASSIVE breakthrough experience, like full blown satori state feeling like I'm tripping on psychedelics non stop for a solid 4 days. Yet I believe what led to the breakthrough was the foundation I'd set with TMI, and then the release and surrendering I'd done with zazen. My foundation was primed for a pure dry insight practice like See Hear Feel to really open me up. Plus having Shinzen's guidance on the retreat really helped me understand how to take the technique to an entirely new level I was unable to do on my own. My recommendation would be to start digging into TMI and learn how to stablize your attention though. This is a critical skill many meditators don't ever really devote serious time to. You can reach wonderful samadhi states using the techniques outlined and it's quite a powerful system overall. I've had much better immediate and therefore longer term success with TMI than the work I've done with Kriya Yoga. Because my short term success with Kriya was unimpressive compared to the work with TMI, I ended up devoting my efforts towards TMI. Eventually though, I had to give up the state chasing that's more or less built into the TMI model. I think in a sense, it's really helpful to know where you're gauged, how you're progressing, etc., but I just had to take a break and switch to a do nothing practice like zazen. I may or may not return one day I'm not sure. With See Hear Feel it's Vipassana except focusing on every bit of perception, not just body scanning which I believe is the traditional technique taught at 10 day Vipassana retreats. You start dissecting every bit of perception which essentially removes the grounding for the self to exist. For me, observing how my sense of self was primarily an amalgamation of see-in, hear-in, feel-in, see-out, feel-out perception really cracked it open because rather than experiencing the self as a single feeling, I started breaking it apart and untangling it all together. This then allowed me to start observing much more clearly the impermanent and illusory nature of not only the ego overall, but it's specific see-in, hear-in, feel-in, see-out, and feel-out components. Anyways, without going too much on a tangent, my vote is to focus on attention stability and accessing Jhana states with TMI. You won't get this with Kriya, at least not that I'm aware. And in all fairness, TMI is actually a Shamatha-Vipassana hybrid system, so you will most certainly be gaining insight into the nature of self, experience, and reality as you work through it. Once you've reached a certain level of mastery with TMI, I think you'll be in a much stronger position on where to take your practice. You'll also probably return to pure Vipassana with a new, more holistic, skillful foundation.