aurum

Dreams! Your dreams are gateways to your unconscious. By studying your dreams, you can find out really just what is going on in there. For instance, I've had a reoccurring theme in my dreams where I get so close to success, but then somehow, someway, I just can't cross the finish line. It's like it's right there. But then I get in a loop where everything and anything suddenly seems to stop me. So what does that mean? Well, it means that unconsciously I may still have some blocks to success. Some buried part of feels like I'm just not good enough to make it. So I bring awareness to it and start to look out for thoughts and actions that may be manifestations of this unconscious belief. The great news is you get more data almost every night you dream. So it's like a free coach every night. Also, you can sent your intention before you sleep for answers you may be looking for. Sometimes the answer will play out in your dreams.

You're talking about Tantra. I have a small passion in this area since I really love sex. Tantra is the art of using sex for awakening. You DO orgasm in Tantra, and actually it's way more powerful the orgasms people typically have. The difference is that you learn to direct the energy of your orgasm. So instead of exploding it out and it depleating you, you circulate through your system and have it energize you. It's not necessary to do that every time. In fact it's not a good idea to do it every time. But it can be powerful The benefits to awakening occur because the ego usually dissolves briefly in orgasm. There is no you, no thoughts of any kind. And so you can use this to taste your true nature. You either use it as a coping mechanism to escape from yourself. Or you get so lost in Maya that you can't even view sexual partners as individuals. It really just depends. There are people who get in monogamy because they think it's what they're "supposed to do", which is low consciousness. And then there's people who really just connect with someone and both people benefit.

@Prabhakerbasically nailed it but I'll throw in my thoughts as well. Enlightened people still experience the ups and downs to life. That's what it means to live in duality. However, they don't view it like we do. During a 10-day meditation retreat, I had what some people would consider an "enlightenment" experience. I temporarily dropped identification with myself. One thing of many that sticks out for me about this experience was my relationship to suffering. Sure, there was suffering. But it wasn't happening to me! It was so obvious at that moment that everyone was simply operating under a misunderstanding. The only reason people had any problems was because they thought their problems were happening to them! I laughed and laughed and laughed. I had to control myself in order not to disturb the other mediators. The rest of the day I spent in a deep sense of peace. Eventually I "lost" the insight as is very common with this work. But I still have the memory which serves as a useful guiding point. So yes, Enlightenment is the end of psychological suffering. But the dream goes on, which is why for practical purposes we do what we can to create an extraordinary life. Of course nothing I'm saying will compare to you proving this for yourself. But hopefully this will serve as some motivation.

I urge you to reconsider or at least test the waters first. I did a 10 day retreat and that was hard enough. I probably wouldn't have stuck it out if I didn't have a formal structure and other people.

Denying anything, including pleasure, is just more ego. Ask yourself: what beliefs do you hold that tell you pleasure is bad? Do you think it makes you more "spiritual"?

From the vibe I get from your post, I'd say college wouldn't be nessesary for you. That being said, continue being strategic. Imagine RIGHT NOW that you made the decision to not go to college. Do you have a place to live when you finish high school? How about a source of income to support yourself? A tangibal business opportunity? People to invest in you? A marketing plan for selling your music? A backup plan in case music doesn't work? Start looking at these questions now. This is a serious thing you're considering and is going to alter the course of your life drastically. It's okay if you don't have it all figured out either. The most successful people committment first and act second. But since you have the luxury of time to plan, don't waste it. Play some chess with your life. About your parents: they sound like caring people so realize they want you to take the "safe" route. They will likely not support your decision if you choose to drop college. So don't expect their help. The disapproval of parents is one of those things almost everyone has to go through. But everyone has to leave the nest. Work double as hard to become a success and they will likely start changing their tune. Or not, but either way it doesn't matter. Not if it's something you know you need to do.

To live an authentic life purpose is not an easy thing. Social conditioning runs so deep in everyone that many people don't even remember what authentic desires feel like. So I'm a bit of a pessimist on this issue. As long as we have a society, there will be conditioning.

You won't be thanking me when you're doing diapers at 3 AM but I appreciate the kind words

Caveat that I've never had a kid. So my advice is entirely second-hand on this. From what I've heard, the solution is to flip your perspective. Instead of thinking "how can I keep my dream AND still be a father?", shift to "this baby is going to FUEL ME to my ambitions". Think about it. Do you want your son to view you as: 1) Self-actualizing your potential 2) Hard working 3) Setting and out achieving your goals 4) Role-model and an inspiration 5) Wise 6) Able to help not only himself, but for others Or, do you want your son to view you as: 1) Never lived up to your potential 2) Largely ignorant 3) Lazy 4) Not someone to look up to 5) Barely able to keep it together, just treading water I'm obviously going to assume it's more like the first list. So now use that as MOTIVATION to actualize your life. You haven't been given an anchor to hold you down. You've been given PRESSURE that is going to force you to figure things out and to grow. It won't necessarily be easy. I can only imagine how difficult it would be to balance a family with self-actualization work / life purpose. But in the self-actualization journey, we tend to get the challenges we NEED rather than the ones the ego wants. Congratulations on your rocket fuel

Growth

Thanks!

I don't look at time management / productivity tricks because you're not getting to the root cause of the problem. Generally speaking, what I often see is that people claim they need productivity hacks, but really they lack self-awareness, suffer from limiting beliefs or fail to think strategically. I'm sure there are some useful productivity tricks. But it's just not what I'm interested in because you're not going to solve very much. If you haven't read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, start there. That's a classic for a reason. After that, I'd look into The Big Leap and The Success Principles. If social media seems to be a problem, definitely check out Deep Work. Bonus: Read The Obstacle is the Way. Amazing book for flipping your paradigm on obstacles. Good luck! Those are all links to my blog. Let me know how those books worked for you.

Careful here. It's very easy to rationalize that you're showing unconditional love when you're really just trying to ignore / forget about a problem. These are not at all the same thing. You can love someone unconditional at a deep level just for what they are (infinity / God / You) and simultaneously realize that they are not someone you should have in your life. The harsh questions I would have you ask yourself: is this someone who will benefit your growth long term? What needs does this person fulfill for you, and how might these needs be skewing your judgement?

Terrible. I was a freshmen in college and had just broken up with my highschool girlfriend (we never had sex). I was an absolute wreck. One of my friends (girl) invited me to go out and party with one of her girl friends and one of her guy friends. I just wanted to forget about the breakup so I agreed. After partying, the four of us went back to my friend's dorm room. We're all drunk as fuck and pretty soon my friend is hooking up with her guy friend while I hook up with her girl friend. Clothes come off. My friend throws me a condom and now we've got this mini orgy going on. But I'm still such a wreck from the breakup that all I can still think about is my ex. Totally kills any enjoyment and I couldn't even keep it up for very long. After some brief shitty sex, we all drunkenly pass out. Story gets even worse because I eventually found out the one girl had a fiance. Something tells me she wasn't ready to get married.

I can't say weed gave me any real growth. And most people I see using weed are certainly not self-actualizing. Stick to the tried and true classic psychedelics. If you can't find a way to obtain them, that's probably a sign you shouldn't be taking them.

Besides that I don't want to end up like @Life Coach , I'd say there's plenty of reasons I'm in a relationship. One is that relationships are amazing personal development coaches. Wherever your bullshit is, a relationship is going to rip it out and shove it in your face. Another is better sex. There are certain things you just can't do with a ONS or fuck buddy. Another is that I'm lazer focused on career right now. It's just way more practical to be with one woman who supports me 100% than trying to deal with all the bullshit of being single. How about deep connection with one person? Getting to grow and support each other together? So those are some general reasons. Obviously they all hinge on the idea that you have an amazing partner in your relationship. A relationship with someone who isn't that caliber is probably going to be worse than being single.

Thanks!

In the beginning, yes. I was in a new city where I didn't know anyone so I just went out by myself and cold approached. 4-7 nights a week. It was brutal. But eventually I made friends, got a social circle and got 100x better with women. Those RSD infield clips starting becoming my real life. It was crazy. What's funny is that I'm not even a dating coach. So I really have no reason to sell you on doing cold approach. I just like to share this story because it's my truth and because I don't want some guy to throw away an amazing part of life because he's afraid to talk to a chick. Dude, get it all. These things can be synergistic IF you're strategic enough. Look, I haven't taken 5-Me0. So maybe one day I'll snort a line, see God and come back and tell you it was all bullshit. Fuck having sex, just become a celibate monk who meditates all day. But I have had an Enlightenment experience sober. And while it supercharged my desire for spiritual growth, it paradoxically ALSO supercharged my desire to accomplish goals in real life. You think that motivation for sex is coming from the ego, but it's not. Not in your case at least. The ego is largely fear based. Low vibration. It would rather you sit in your home and whack off than have sex because THAT'S SAFE. No change necessary. No pushing your comfort zone. Stay the same. Not everyone is ready to just launch into non-duality at any point in your life. Everyone comes to it at their own time in their own way. The most important thing is you honor that intuitive voice. If that's pulling you towards cold approach, and I think it is, then fuck what Leo says. Fuck everything I said. You follow your path. No one else's. I hate to keep being so blunt but you have to figure it out. No excuses. Like Leo said, balance doesn't mean 50/50 split. Balance could mean you go out for 3 years like a maniac every night and then decide to dial it back. Don't use this balance shit as a rationalization to not take the action you know you should be taking. Alright I lectured you more than enough good luck man.

Your desire to "skip" the stage where you have sex and relationships is really your way of dealing with this. yes, women are angels that only go home with 6'2, rich men with six packs. Come on man. Would you be happy? Like really happy? Or would you just be escaping? "Approaching girls is scary, maybe if I do drugs I can get away from all that" Admit it man, you want a girl. You want it bad. There's nothing wrong with that, but if you want a woman you're gonna have to work at it,

Test, test, test. If he makes a claim, try it out. Until you do that, it's just theory. There's a lot of spiritual phenomena like what Copper talks about that I'm going to be experimenting with in the future. My guess is there's something there, but I'm doing my best to reserve judgment until I verify things for myself.

The fact that you went on a forum to ask a bunch of strangers whether you should approach ONE GIRL shows me you are already coming at this completely wrong. Your thinking is WAY too small. I'm going to answer the question you really should be asking, which is "how do I have a mind blowing sex life / relationship while in college?" First off, learn theory on attraction / gender dynamics. Use Leo's book list, use my blog, use YouTube, it doesn't matter. Just find quality content of people who know what they're talking about. Next, start hacking your university social scene. I don't know how it was for you guys but at my college Greek life was King. Find whatever your niche is and start connecting people / adding people to your social circle via cold approach. Then you're the shit. Whatever sex life or girlfriend you want, you'll be able to have it at that point. And yes I'm greatly oversimplifying the process in this comment. The real purpose of me writing this is just to get you to switch your thinking about WHAT'S POSSIBLE.

Blah blah blah. Limiting beliefs, block it out. However I'm sure it is a challenging niche to get into that will require a ton of action. That's where the strategy and full commitment will have to come in on you part.

"When the student is ready, the master will appear" - Some Zen guy I always tell people it's really up to the person which book will be best. I could hand 1,000 random people a copy of The Power of Now and if they're not ready for it, they're not ready for it. My strategy for choosing books is simply to keep my eyes and intuition open. I've found that every time I act on a strong urge to read a book, I always get tremendous benefit. It's actually tough for me because with the blog, reading is partially what I do for a living. So I often get bogged down in trying to get through books just to get through them and end up resisting that intuitive urge that says "read this one". So ask yourself: what are you drawn towards? It doesn't have to be an obsession, just follow what interests you. I've found curiosity to be a far better driver than almost anything else.

@eskwireNot saying you shouldn't do it, but It sounds like an extreme decision. Plenty of people are able to have fulfilling relationships, so is the problem really with relationships? Consider that.

I really feel like many people are not grasping the effect of Virtual Reality in the future. VR is the one thing that I see that has the potential to effect the world as heavily as the internet did. Only because of the direct grab on people's attention and time/energy it will save people. Will people still travel when you can just put on a headset and be anywhere you want? What about the entertainment industry? You still going to pay for a on stage show or movie when you can transport yourself into a movie? How will relationships between men and women be effected when there's VR porn? Kidding, but also not kidding at all. So my point is people are massively underestimating this. And don't think it's a pipedream for 50 years in the future. If the internet taught us anything, it should be that things are moving fast. Zuckerberg knows. It's not a mistake they bought Oculus.