Markus

Here is something interesting than has occasionally crossed my mind. The self, a subject/object distinction, develops somewhere in early childhood. My earliest memory seems to be something that doesn't contain a "me" (and the only one that doesn't, in fact), it is just a memory of two pigs eating. It's allegedly been researched that people generally don't remember events without the event involving "them" doing something, which could be one of the reasons there are basically no memories from early childhood - in the period where the child could already use language but didn't perhaps have such a strong sense of self. Wouldn't it perhaps be true that the sense of self, as it gets constant reinforcement, continues strengthening itself all throughout life? It certainly seems to me that middle-aged and elderly people are considerably more stubborn than people of my own age (late adolescence). From this I would hypothesize that older people will have more layers of bullshit to work through, if they try to pursue enlightenment, and will thus have a path of more suffering, on average. The reason this even caught my interest is because there is all this talk about the emotional labor of doing self-inquiry. I just finished a 2.5-day home retreat of doing it and wouldn't say it were so bad. Yes, I did have occasional bouts of hatred and resentment towards other people and at one point seemingly every object come up but nothing worse than I've experienced in 45-minute sessions of simple meditation. The other thing that I already have once made a thread about, but what certainly confirmed itself, is that I rarely experience the self coming up with answers to "What am I?" I get into a deep state of meditation where I can inquire "What am I?" and silently wonder (Which is great, I guess, but certainly doesn't trigger an enlightenment experience). I was walking on a footpath while doing that. Yet as soon as a person would approach me, I could feel the self-activity re-emerge. It's almost as if I'm paranoid about self-inquiry not working because it seems too easy.

I'm interested in hearing what you guys'n'gals think or know about TM (any personal experiences etc.) So this morning I happen to be on a little research tour about exploring some different forms of meditation than I've already tried or heard about. I did 5 minutes of research about TM and my first impression is - isn't it just a bs marketing scheme? The technique is described as simple and effortless. You close your eyes, get comfortable and focus on a mantra for 20 minutes. But wait a minute, you need a qualified instructor to give you your personal mantra, as well as give you a 3-hour course, to make sure you're doing it right and using the right mantra. And to hear about all the supposed benefits. A simple mantra meditation that anyone could learn on their own + marketing hype and complication making things sound complicated = TM?

The problem is not thinking per se, but thinking without knowing that you're thinking. So when you think "Oh, there I went again! Jeez!" you know that you're thinking.

What's the big difference, even? Meditation + "What am I?" = self-inquiry. I would in any case consider self-inquiry a meditation technique. If you seem to lack focus in self-inquiry, practicing a mindfulness technique on the side might be useful. Self-inquiry is meant to bring about an enlightenment experience by exhausting the preconceptions of the mind and giving an insight into your true nature being awareness. I imagine it would take quite a while to start grasping the fundamental nature of experience through mindfulness. At the same time, once you do, the experience will probably be deeper, easier to re-access. But the last part is just speculation using my logic - I have no idea whether that would actually be the case. I just presume that enlightenment from self-inquiry is faster and more about spontaneous luck whereas enlightenment from mindfulness alone is slower and is about being able to dissect your experience to the point where you see through the illusion of the separate self moment-by-moment.

Well, when you rub the tip of the penis with your palm you can perhaps experience so much pleasure you'll find it very hard to keep going. There's a technique for you. We can call it "strong determination rubbing" - masturbation on steroids.

Alright so I'm awfully inflexible, have knee pain (medial) and neck pain, and have been procrastinating for two years doing anything serious about it. It's time to change that. I want to have a better meditation posture plus get back to the gym to lift weights. Any advice/resources to increase flexibility in general, or more specifically for a total beginner, would be welcomed. Especially some routines or something like that. Mobility WOD (https://www.youtube.com/user/sanfranciscocrossfit/videos) is a great resource, as well as the book "Becoming a Supple Leopard". However that'd be better suited probably for someone who is already athletic and tackling specific mobility issues. If one were to ask me which of my muscles are tight...umm...all of them, I'd say. So something general to help that would be good.

The Topic How a high level of moral development functions without clear rules and judgements ("Thou shalt/shalt not"). What I want to know Why and how having moral values and making moral judgements limits one's Self-Actualizing. What is the alternative to making moral judgements? How can one live without them? Why this tideo? You have previously mentioned how having rules actually belongs to a low level of moral development, and that with enough awareness morality becomes effortless, or something along the lines of that. I think it's important to share this view with the world as pretty much nobody could comprehend such possibility and is therefore stuck in moralizing and judging. Moral judgements are some of the most prevalent and toxic ones people make. An insight into how there's a radically different approach one could take would be a tremendously important one, up there with the insight of no free will or how much one lies.

@John Thank you for the encouragement. I really appreciate it.

@ULFBERHT That's probably good advice. I guess I'll have to identify what my worst areas are and start to work on them. As far as pain goes, my two key problems are medial knee pain and pain around the tibia. I figured the medial knee pain is probably from a lack of external hip rotation, which when meditating cross-legged can make the shin move sideways to compensate, squeezing the medial meniscus between the thighbone and shinbone. Any stretch I tried to do for external rotation caused pain in that area though. I remembered a banded distraction where I rotate my hip outwards with the leg straight, I'll try that out. As for the tibia, it seems like my ankle range is terribly restricted. Yet the issue is, I can't really mobilize it without the pain acting up. Perhaps that is from a weak foot, or tight calves. I'll try to tack some of those tissues with a lacrosse ball for a few weeks, see if it gets any better. I've also found I have really tight hamstrings, which is probably what ended up causing me pain when squatting, deadlifting or doing bent over rows, dealing with that should be pretty straightforward.

From what I know, for the general well-being of the planet, veganism is better than vegetarianism, since you don't consume anything from factory-farmed cows or chickens. If you care about the ethics of animal consumption, same answer. Health wise, strict vegetarianism or veganism is not necessary, though one should consume less animal products and considerably more fruit and vegetables than most people do.

@Arik Yes, the thing about the chair is that sitting properly in it requires conscious effort, whereas the cross-legged postures naturally keep the spine straight. I sometimes feel hatred for Western culture for coming up with the damned chair, responsible for significant loss of hip range of motion, as well as a lot of back and neck pain.

Inspiring. I wish I could practice sds. Too bad I have some medial knee pain right now and can't really take any cross-legged posture without sharp knee pain, even with tons of padding. I must be twisting the medial meniscus by compensating for lack of hip rotation with the knee moving sideways (which it never should), don't really know what to do other than to do stretches for external hip rotation and give the knees some rest. The "seiza bench" I made by putting two thick pillows on each side and a plank to sit on across them must've fucked up my knees worse than they were before.

The idea of stopping suffering in the world is juvenile and idealistic. There's a new strain of virus or bacteria - people suffer. There's a natural disaster - people suffer. There is lack of food - people suffer. Okay then you say, let's say a certain course of action could raise the world's living standards to the point where people wouldn't have to worry about these things. Well, such places more or less exist. A first world country where there's plenty of food and water, horrifying diseases don't run rampant and natural disasters either don't occur due to climate or the damage of them to people can be largely prevented. Are people happy? Just walk on the street and look at people's faces. Talk to them, or hear them talk. Bullshit. Their minds have created a living hell, invariably to at least some extent. That person thought badly of me, someone wronged me, he doesn't like me, she's such a slut, our government is a bunch of morons, I hate my job, I don't have enough time for myself, the world is meaningless, we're all gonna die, I have allergies and they're so annoying, girls don't think I'm attractive, I just can't find a partner, I'm so offended. I wonder what extrinsic solution is gonna stop this. Better living standards? Hardly. Anti-bullying campaigns? Nope. Promoting conservative values in society? Nope. Having social media like Tumblr where people can "fight for justice"? Oh come on. Because the problem is - our minds are rotten. That worked to keep us alive and help us reproduce, but with the relative safety we have, it fails even at that. People's problems are psychological. Not only in the 1st world but also the 3rd. Not only of neurotic and depressed lawyers and doctors, but also of children with TB and polio. Who is gonna fix people's psychological problems? Psychologists? No, the truth is, only they themselves. Can you in any way be of use to people? Perhaps you can. It would first help to be self-honest about why you want to do that. A lot of the wishing to better the lives of people you never see or meet is probably trying to live up to a self-image of being a good person. If you want to help others, help yourself first. Become enlightened. Do it. Clean up your unconscious garbage. Get to stage yellow and beyond on the spiral dynamics model. There is no other way to be truly loving and compassionate, plus effective. Have you ever seen how grumpy doctors and nurses often come off? Even hostile. To do what they do with all of your heart, you've got to get past your own petty bullshit. As long as you believe you're more important than anyone else and your ideas are better than anyone else's, you're not bettering the world. And as long as you believe you're a separate self, you will be like that. Quit lying to yourself. Admit how judgmental and narcissistic you are - it's helped me so far. The most effective person at changing the world is the person who understands that nothing needs to be changed. Otherwise you'll burn out. Your love will turn into bitterness, and then to hate. I closely know a person who went to become a doctor to "help others". That person is miserable. A miserable person can't love unconditionally, because misery comes from not loving unconditionally. You can't love unconditionally if you don't realize the world is perfect as it is. Yet you can't help others the best you can if you don't love unconditionally. You don't get to unconditional love by suppressing or denying the self, you get there by transcending it - with unapologetic selfishness. You don't transcend the self selflessly, now do you? Paradoxical, very much so. I'm writing this because I wanna show how great my ideas are. Because I want to be a savior, like Jesus. I should be cutting through this crap, rather than encouraging it. My posts perhaps help others, at least a bit. But the thought alone of that possibility fuels my ego. I just had an epiphany of sorts - if you believe you're an ego, any good that you may do or think you do is just fueling that ego, which will inevitably lead to that ego hurting someone due to its delusions of grandeur.

Good and evil don't exist outside of people's heads. It seems like an infantile concept suitable for a certain level of development, one that is later better left behind, later being as soon as possible I may claim.

@The Alchemist Certainly starving oneself, or depriving oneself of sleep would be very difficult for the ego, but not healthy for the body at all. If you find it difficult to get up it's probable you're either adjusting to a new rhythm or are sleep-deprived. If you choose to start getting up earlier, it'll be hard at first but eventually as easy as getting up whenever you're getting up now, which means the only "benefit" is temporary.

Fitness, at least physique wise (which can be a fairly shitty indicator of fitness), doesn't take much time at all. Staying lean doesn't require any time, technically. To talk about muscle mass, one could work out for 45 minutes 3x/week and be really bulky. So why aren't the intellectuals fit? Because most people in general aren't. They're no exception. Being an intellectual hardly means one is doing personal development.

It is indeed not possible to focus on two things at once, but rather shift focus quickly from one thing to the other, which results in considerably less concentration. As for listening to videos while doing mindless tasks, why not? You'll still pick something up. Something is an understatement. Unless you want to contemplate existence while eating, listening to something seems like the second best thing.

@The Alchemist I used to wake up at 5 am for I don't know, 5 months or sth I think. Therefore I'd have time to eat, shave, practice speed reading, do affirmations and visualizations, and meditate before going to school for 8. It felt pretty good to get those things over with. But I think it's being disciplined in general that feels good, time might be pretty irrelevant. Why don't I do it any more? I tend to be more alert late at night than early morning, plus time always seemed to pass too damn fast when I got up early (no idea what that's about). I still get up at 6 so I guess it is not THAT different but I don't do anything besides stretching, showering, eating and watching videos in the early hours. I don't do anything that really requires much concentration. If you're a social person, you'll probably also find it inconvenient since you have to go to bed early. If you're a cave-dweller like me, and don't have responsibilities related to specific times, I don't think it really matters that much whether you get up at 4 am or 1 pm.

Is honesty really usually viewed as a good habit? A woman's at a job interview. The employer asks what she thinks her worst quality is. "Honesty", she says. "I don't think honesty's such a bad quality", the employer replies. "Well, I don't give a fuck what you think", says the woman. I think honesty is something not everyone knows to appreciate. But it's worth it, first and foremost for your own integrity, as well as those who care about truth.

@The Alchemist 3 days? Of course you will feel like shit. You will feel like shit for the same reason jet lag happens: your circadian rhythm has been disrupted and it takes a while to adjust. If you want to experiment with waking up early, either shift your waking time earlier gradually or put up with the consequences of a sudden change. In any case, try it out over a longer period of time.

Thanks for the replies. @Leo Gura Yes, perhaps I'm self-deceiving, don't want to rule that out. It does seem though that putting my attention on the back of the head at least temporarily silences the mind. It seems that my attention always goes to some body sensations in the chest or head but there usually isn't a verbal answer.

Ken Wilber is enlightened. He has R.E.D.D. and he's still very sick. Enlightenment might make a chronic condition less irritating to deal with but it doesn't cure it.

Is there any set-in-stone rule that will prevent you from self-actualizing if you smoke weed? Nope. Weed may cause problems with short term memory, paranoia, laziness, and brain damage (the science spread in the weed community is cherry-picked, regular use of weed absolutely may cause brain damage, especially in adolescents). Is it guaranteed that you will have these problems with weed to a significant extent? No. But if you do, it certainly doesn't help. Addiction as itself is something that goes against the definition of a self-actualized person. A self-actualized person definitely wouldn't need weed and probably wouldn't desire it either, since they're happy on their own and weed is not fulfilling.

If you can only do one, do meditation. I may be biased here but let's lay out what these two things are. Visualization: playing a movie in your mind to change your subconscious beliefs and habits. It has the potential to change your old beliefs and habits for "better" ones. Meditation: developing concentration, clarity, and equanimity about experience. It has the potential to show you what beliefs really are, who you really are, what the world really is. Deep enlightenment is as close to fulfillment as you can possibly get. If you're fulfilled, you won't need to be successful. My two cents.

All that you could ever call you is your subjective experience, or a part of it. All that ever i s you is awareness (technically it's unspeakable, but if one were to put it into words, that's what it's best described as). Speculation over whether awareness is a property of the brain, or exists on its own, or is something that finds a new body once the current body dies - it's all just beliefs. It's just seeing and hearing arising and subsiding in awareness. Being someone who has had, and still largely does, a rationalist worldview and self-image, I could say that awareness arises from the brain and stops after death. But there is no possibility of contact with such truth. Awareness can know itself, but not the lack of itself. There is no experience of unawareness, hence awareness never began and never ends - not because it goes on forever in time but because it is atemporal. You are not a human being. You were never born and you will never die. Welcome to the trans-rational.