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@Nahm Thank you <3 I am speechless at the love and support you are throwing at me <3

@Peo Firstly be the one who pays for it. Get a part-time job and make some money. That way you are not beholden to their financial favors. Second, you don't have to tell them it's for a retreat. Alan Watts (that joker!) once said that a clever Bodhisatva only tells others of his enlightenment when its too late for them to do anything about it. So some tact is perhaps helpful here. I understand how it feels when others want to tyrannize you.

What if you directly experience advaita metaphysics? What if at the core of my being there really is a "blue being" that I can go and see? How then should you interpret it? Literally, as entities inhabiting the spirit world as their scripture suggests, or as mental constructs from the depths of the psyche? As alien worlds? As dimensions of God overlapping each other? My point is what if there is an actual difference between metaphysics and philosophy? In other words, what if the metaphysical explanations which one might take for allegorical end up as literal representations in the physical world? What is then the higher truth? The stillness of the Zen/Ramana lineages, or the alien worlds of the Shivaists?

@Nahm Haha @ivankiss The issue i have with Buddhism (particularly of the Zen variety) is that it is so concerned with developing a certain character in people. Other than that, i find Zen to be unnecessarily obtuse. I get the impression that what Zen teachings and Koans want to portray can be shown much more directly and effectively. I also don't like the excessive importance it puts on sitting mediations.

@Nahm Sure. Well I realized that my mind was holding on the initial experience of fear and trying to avoid another one at all costs. It was just doing what it is designed to do. Even though at the time i was saying that "I'm not afraid of being afraid", i realized that's not really what i'm doing. So at night when i was meditating I surrenders as much as i could. I let the truth of my being reveal itself. You know, the screen, the Self, what have you and stayed there. Then i realized that whatever might happen to me cannot touch my real self. So i just let anything happen. Actually i focused on raising my energy and clearing my energy centers rather than getting caught up in whatever phenomena i was seeing. At the end of the day, i simply didn't experience any more fear. I expect situations like that to rise again but i think i should be better prepared to deal with them if they do.

@Shaun Because everything is not an illusion. There is so many different dimensions to this life that calling it illusion is unnecessarily dismissive. You can self-realize and experience your true nature as peace. All you have to do for that is to stop using the mind to confine experience into logical equations. You can detach fully from life and experience it as a meaningless void. You can blow out your sensory limits and experience metaphysical phenomena. You can cling to your body and your ego and experience the dimension time. All of this is possible. Let's call any of these modes of existence a dimension. The issue is that people who operate at different dimensions tend to label the experience of others who live in other dimensions as illusion. But it isn't so. No matter what your reality is, it is still reality. It is God. Hence one definition of enlightenment: the realization that there has never been ignorance in the first place.

I really like where Sadhgurur says "there are questions in the universe without the intellect." Honestly (and IMO) most gurus and people who are enlightened are very quick to dismiss stuff as ideas and concepts and not giving them the light of the day. Of course having experienced the transcendental consciousness when its peaceful, i can attest to the reality of their claims at that intensity of vibration. But most people don't talk about the experience of the transcendental being itself. Considering how diverse and mindblowing it is, i'm surprised. Maybe most people don't experience the Self like I do, but it's as if enlightened beings are sometimes afraid of letting go of their enlightenment. I could be a deluded fool though. It's just my understanding.

@Schahin Yes. The process of natural evolution is still occurring. Evolution and constant change is a very palpable aspect of consciousness itself. People say that Consciousness, bindingness and bliss are the absolute experience of God. But I'd say that at many levels, change and evolution are in effect.

Actually I have some update. I don't think there's much point into going detail anymore. But I managed to get over the fear. Thank you all for your support.

@winterknight Well "I" (wink wink) went ahead and followed that advice and got over the fear. Thanks for the help.

@mandyjw Sorry, but no. That explanation is only useful when you objectify fear, not when you are afraid yourself.

@Nahm Let's think about it like this: Imagine an object floating in space. At first it looks like a pyramid, but the lines making it are not straight. They are curved. Then it changes form and looks like a ball, then it changes again and looks nothing like a conventional geometric shape. The point is that what I saw was not non-physical. It had a shape. Just not an ordinary shape.

@Nahm "I" cannot know the absolute truth. The absolute, is. Actually, i should make a correction (sorry!) nonphysical is not correct. Non-euclidean is more accurate. @Highest Seems to be the case. @ivankiss I know you are saying that "one should abide as God" at all times in face of fear. It wasn't possible to do so. The strength of the fear was so strong that it revived a very weak sense of individuality within me. And it was afraid. To clarify that this is isn't an unknown, per se. It's a non-euclidean "being". @JohnnyBravo Yes i understand the concept. I will try to practice it more and more.

@winterknight Well. This issue won't come to a proper conclusion considering I'm trying to convey post-rational experiences in words. I'll share a few lines regardless just for the sake of it. All of this are broken representations of experiencing the Self, from the 4th dimensional perspective adopted for the reason. 1. There seems to be intention and purpose behind God's activities. 2. The mechanics of these activities are illogical. 3. There seems to be several different dimensions of existence overlapping on one another. One could choose to experience life at these levels which are drastically different (everything about them is different. Qualities of perception and their objects are different). 4. There seems to exist, and innate ability, to change the outcome of life in the 4th dimension through intention. By simply intending something to happen, the universe will bend to God's will. 5. The different dimensions of consciousness are apparently inhabited by "beings". These beings are all manifestations of God in the same sens that human beings are. But are drastically different in every other aspect.

@Nahm Accepted.

@winterknight Isn't the truth of enlightenment that "there has never been any ignorance in the first place"? Is God incapable of intention?

@Nahm An example of what I'm afraid of: A non-euclidean, meta-morphing "being". They don't really do anything. They don't appear to want to harm me in any way. They are just terrifying. You can have your outlook: they are either inhabitants of the spirit world, or are representations of my buried fears. Either way, how to deal with them?

@winterknight Ah i see. I understand why inquiry failed "me" and why surrender is... well surrender. Btw I want to mention that my issue is not fear or aversion of experiencing fear. It's how to allow fear to express itself at the moment of its manifestation without the body being overwhelmed by it.

@winterknight I see what you mean. Something like how a method actor operates. Well i dunno. I've never tried to actively do that so i'm clueless. Like i said, these judgments are being made after fact as someone who has purposefully decided to take a 4th-dimensional outlook and explain them after the fact. Somewhat like how you can say "I'm enlightened, ask me anything". It's playful at best. Just mean to say that as far as methods meant to clear away resistance for "enlightenment", one has subjectively been more effective.

@ivankiss I don't fear fear. At the moment i realize that i display aversion to fear, but that is not the crux of the problem. The question is how to properly merge with fear, or how to allow fear to manifest itself properly and get done with itself. Ideally, without hurting my body or people around me. Recently i've had a heart awakening and its (potentially) giving me extrasensory perceptions. I don't care if you call them visions into new dimensions or hallucinations, but the fact is that at the time they occur they are very scary, considering that there is also some kriya involved. So that's what i'm really after: How to allow fear to unfold itself, or more accurately how to surrender to fear.

@winterknight I understand. I will dedicate some proper inquiry to it. Not exactly sure if this is what suggestibility means but I don't think I'm easily manipulatable. I have a very heightened sense of appraising people's character. I can almost immediately notice when someone has the intention to manipulate me or whatever. One thing about my experience with inquiry and enlightenment: It seems to me that self-inquiry results in complete detachment from phenomena and the world, while surrender results in merging. These are very distinct modes of being. In both, the world disappears. With self inquiry though, attachment instead is completely to a confusing, shapeless "self". Literally the void. With surrender though, there is no attachment, but that doesn't mean fear magically goes away (i mean what i call the manifestation of fear in the body, and in retrospect).

@Dumb Enlightened Well just try to raise the energy. It all depends on your intentions. If you just intend for it to raise, then it will, and new ways of experiencing life will open to you. There a numerous practices to help raise you energy. All sorts of yoga, meditation techniques, breathing exercises, even drugs.

@Highest No need to apologize. I also don't think i'm explaining the issue properly. The answer is more and more surrender, probably. Thanks for the info. @ivankiss This is very good advice. Hard to integrate in my situation.

@winterknight I think at the time i failed to surrender to the fear. Mind you the "soul" wasn't what caused the fear. It was all the other stuff. But I think i'll manage with continued exposure. There is no history of psychosis in my family whatsoever. I've only taken psychedelics twice and that was a long time ago. I have experienced some weird phenomena though: 1. I vividly remember first entering this body when it was an infant. 2. I've had memories that are definitely not from this life 3. Very frequent dejavu to the point it sometime happened daily and for prolonged times. Things like that.

@Dumb Enlightened Ah yes. Welcome to the path my friend. It'll get really wild if you keep surrendering. I suggest the path of surrender, listening to music that comes from a loving artist, eating good, healthy food, and above all else, yearning for enlightenment. And I would highly suggest to not take pharmaceuticals if you are not sick, and specially to avoid painkillers if you do not have an actual wound or infection that needs treatment. You don't want to alter your body chemistry too much. Basically, surrender is about doing away with your resistances. You can feel resistances in your body very vividly. In fact you've been feeling them your entire life - just been ignoring them. Upset stomach? Clenching sensation in your groin? Feeling of anxiety above your diaphragm? Frequent throat aches? These are all symptoms of resistance in my experience (baring actual physical ailments). So keep surrendering to life. Intend to have them cleared. Give them attention. Breathe into them. That sort of thing. There are various yoga and upaya for this stuff. Just desire enlightenment and a higher level of consciousness.