BipolarGrowth

One thing that I think has helped me is becoming more authentic overall. Once you’re not afraid to make a joke immediately as it comes to you regardless of the epic fail which might occur, you have a chance of being perceived as funny if the joke lands. I’d say it’s a lot of repetition of saying jokes and getting feedback until the feel for what works most often becomes second nature. That’s my rough philosophizing about humor. I wouldn’t necessarily call myself funny, but I do try to be funny a lot, in a somewhat effortless way built into my default egoic programming.

I’ve listened to almost all good pop music in English, and after spending a brief time in K-Pop, I also started getting into Russian pop which is now my current favorite. I post my favorite pop songs I find on here if anyone is interested. https://www.instagram.com/anima.unleashed?igsh=a3k4MXp0eDRrMzQ5&utm_source=qr

I’m not sure if this video brought me three minutes closer to Self-Actualization or took three minutes away from my Self-Actualization journey, but it was fairly entertaining.

Spiritual progress comes by encountering suffering intentionally and consistently on your own terms until you’ve devoured the suffering in so many places that you start to run out of places to find suffering. Trying to avoid suffering is the path to holding onto suffering and amplifying it.

This is my current reading list that I’m working to complete. Most of the books are focused on Buddhism or related spiritual traditions. I’ve read several of the books already, and they have all been recommended to me by reliable sources. Also, you can check out Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha by Daniel M. Ingram which is one of my favorites. He has a free version online here: https://www.mctb.org/mctb2/ Seeing that Frees by Rob Burbea is also a top favorite of mine. Crazy Wisdom by Chögyam Trungpa Journey without Goal by Chögyam Trungpa Meditation in Action by Chögyam Trungpa Born in Tibet by Chögyam Trungpa Nagarjuna The Philosophy of the Middle Way translated by David Kalupahana Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha (2nd Edition) by Daniel Ingram Majjhima Nikāya: The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha by Bhikku Bodhi and Bhikku Nyanamoli Book Recommendations Made in MCTB2 B. Alan Wallace’s Dreaming Yourself Awake: Lucid Dreaming and Tibetan Dream Yoga for Insight and Transformation Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche’s The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep (1st book) & Wonders of the Natural Mind (2nd book) Sleeping, Dreaming, and dying: an exploration of consciousness with the Dalai Lama edited and narrated by Francisco Varela TA today a new introduction to transactional analysis by Ian Stewart and Vann Joines Saints & Psychopaths by Bill Hamilton Nisargadatta’s I Am That Pointing Out the Great Way by Daniel P. Brown (it’s a book on mahamudra) Clarifying the Natural State by Dakpo Tashi Namgyal (highly recommended Vajrayana book) The Lotus Sutra The Avatamsaka Sutra Jay Michaelson’s book Evolving Dharma: Meditation, Buddhism, and the Next Generation of Enlightenment A Path with Heart by Jack Kornfield (about integration of awakening) After the Ecstasy, the Laundry by Jack Kornfield (about integration of awakening) The Spectrum of Consciousness by Ken Wilbur Integral Spirituality by Ken Wilbur The Omnivore’s Dilemma The Tipitaka, also known as the Pali Canon, is divided into three main “baskets” or collections: Vinaya Pitaka (Basket of Discipline) Suttavibhanga (Division of Rules) Khandhakas (Sections) Parivara (Accessory) Sutta Pitaka (Basket of Discourses) Digha Nikaya (Long Discourses) Majjhima Nikaya (Middle-Length Discourses) Samyutta Nikaya (Connected Discourses) Anguttara Nikaya (Numerical Discourses) Khuddaka Nikaya (Minor Collection), which includes texts like the Dhammapada, Jataka tales, and others. Abhidhamma Pitaka (Basket of Higher Doctrine) Dhammasangani (Enumeration of Phenomena) Vibhanga (The Book of Analysis) Dhatukatha (Discussion of Elements) Puggalapannatti (Descriptions of Individuals) Kathavatthu (Points of Controversy) Yamaka (The Book of Pairs) Patthana (The Book of Relations) These collections form the core of Theravada Buddhist teachings The Short Length Discourses of the Buddha The Long Length Discourses of the Buddha The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha The Bhagavad Gita The Ashtavakra Gita The Avadhuta Gita The Ribhu Gita Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi The Small Book of Christian Mysticism The Big Book of Christian Mysticism Designing Destiny by Daaji

I had my first kid on August 27th of this year. It has definitely helped me to switch gears and mature. It also has put me under new tiers of life pressure and responsibilities. I’m very glad to have a partner who is so supportive and gives so much energy to help raise him.

It is fair to say I’m captivated by Buddhism. You are right in that there are plenty of western people trying to water down Buddhism. I’m not a fan of this myself. And I wouldn’t necessarily claim that any Buddhist sources I learn from have reached some ultimate level of spirituality in part due to this concept being hard to define, more difficult to verify, and even harder to be sure that it is actually understood by oneself free from lots of self deception. I’ve spent a good amount of time studying and practicing in types of Hinduism. Hinduism is more of a beginning foundation for my spiritual practice and understanding than Buddhism. I find the deeper understandings within Hinduism and Buddhism to be quite hard to distinguish. When I listen to the Ashtavakra Gita or Avadhuta Gita being read and compare it to the Vajrayana Buddhist teachings coming from more original sources such as Padmasambhava, it seems to me that a very similar truth is being pointed to. My introduction to eastern spirituality came initially through Hinduism as the ice cream of my sundae, and Buddhism now serves as the whipped cream and cherries on top of the sundae as I’ve only really begun learning authentic Buddhism in the past 2-3 years. I’ve eaten the ice cream again and again for some years, and I’ve naturally moved on to being interested in the whipped cream and cherries more lately. Of course it’s not a good meal if you don’t return to at least a few bites of the ice cream regularly to create the requisite variety for maximal enjoyment. Lol. I guess that’s a good fat American analogy for describing how I relate to the Hindu and Buddhist traditions.

@Someone here thanks for the warm welcome. Things are going quite well. Life always has its challenges, but nothing worth complaining about really. I hope you’re in an enjoyable season of life too.

Chögyam Trungpa has quickly become one of my favorite, if not my all-time favorite, spiritual authors. He was born in Tibet and brought up within the Vajrayana Buddhist tradition as a teacher since birth. He earned the equivalent of a Doctorate of Divinity at a young age. As he was nearing adulthood, he was forced to move from his home in Tibet due to the Chinese invasion. Eventually, he began to settle in the United States and other western countries as a spiritual teacher. Some have claimed that he has had one of the most potent influences on successfully bringing authentic Buddhist teachings to the West. In this book, Shambhala: The Sacred Path of the Warrior, Chögyam Trungpa introduces us to a new way of interfacing with spiritual practice and living the good, virtuous life. Shambhala is meant to serve as a secular path into the truths usually found in mystical or religious contexts. Although secular, the Shambhala tradition is not without its magic and deep appreciation of the beauty of human potential in this life. A warrior in this tradition is a fully authentic spiritual practitioner who moves toward creating an enlightened society due to compassion flowing toward other sentient beings. It is easy to see a strong influence from the author’s training in Buddhism reflected into the structure of the Shambhala tradition. I personally find great value in viewing the spiritual process of growth and development from various perspectives, and Shambhala introduces us to new terminology which gives insight into a unique process and view which can also be seen as universally applicable. I encourage those of you looking for new spiritual books to read or philosophical models to interface with to check out this book and even more so this author. And in keeping with the style of this forum, Buddhism will not make you Awake and is a complete waste of time 😉 If you might be someone who should restrain themselves from overusing psychedelics due to personal factors, Chögyam Trungpa is a great and accomplished teacher on how to waste your time incredibly effectively.

I just logged onto the forums for the first time in a while to make a post about the Life Purpose course. I bought the course probably 2-3 years ago, but I’ve only been committed to it once I hired a life coach. It’s taken me 1-2 months of 20 minutes each morning to finally complete the entire values pass section. It’s great to see that you’re motivated to come back after several years to work through the course again. Just the values pass portion alone has done wonders to clarify my life.

Now one must ask if the original post in this thread or my new signature is of lower quality.

Here’s one way that can go down.

Thinking isn’t negative. Negative thoughts are negative. And labeling a thought as negative is a negative thought. If you would like to get out of such ruts as you mention, I think it’s going to take a change of perspective. Thought is not bad, and I actually doubt it’s much of your problem at all. You can say obsessive or negative thinking is your problem, but I’d say we need to “go meta” on this situation and see that your lack of trust in life and love of life in whatever moment comes is the real issue. At the end of the day, this is what meditation is meant to cultivate. Your meditation shouldn’t be measured by the lack of thoughts you find. It should be measured by the degree of love for life that you find after doing meditation or a certain spiritual practice. If whatever practice or type of meditation you’re doing isn’t producing this, a mistake is being made somewhere. Examine your life carefully to find moments where whatever you’ve just done has seemed to produce the result of loving and embracing life. You’d particularly be looking for constructive behaviors rather than destructive behaviors obviously. After the first hit of heroin, a lot of people can love life for a bit, but we’re after behaviors that are sustainable. Your walks sound like an activity which has many positive effects on you. You can try using that as a sort of meditative practice. Instead of seeing obsessive thinking during the walk as a type of failure or undesirable element of the moment, you can work on being able to notice that activity in a somewhat detached manner all the while you continue enjoying the good parts of your walk like normal. Maybe all of this “advice” is wrong and doesn’t work for you. If that’s so, throw it out and forget it. This is only one perspective. Anyway, best of luck.

How do you strive without desire?

Sure there are plenty of actions we can take to awaken. The issue is that awakening shows precisely how little reality there is to thinking the ego takes actions. The ego acting and getting what it wants is a gross oversimplification of what is happening. When I wrote this, I just had the momentary inspiration to illuminate the partial perspective that it is God and the conditions of our existence which are given to us that ultimately awaken us rather than our efforts. Of course there is plenty of validity to seeing awakening as a personal journey and endeavor which takes focus, determination, strong desire to break out of the limiting norm of common behaviors and perspectives, and much more. The OP already illuminated the effortful and individual part of the equation, so I illuminated the effortless and God/destiny driven part of the equation. Both are relevant, and neither is correct on their own. Even together, these understandings point to a very limited picture of what goes on when awakening happens. @CoolDreamThanks was essentially saying that someone has to want to bake a cake for a cake to be created. I was saying that without the conditions of a baker’s existence giving him or her the ingredients of flour, sugar, and the other fattening ingredients used to make a cake, you’re not getting far. One important thing to understand is that one of the conditions for a baker’s existence is that they want to bake things. This also is in some ways deterministic. Desire is oftentimes not entirely up for us to choose. The desire to awaken isn’t something most human beings can cultivate deeply given their current life circumstances, and this is a huge reason why awakening isn’t that common of an occurrence. Awakening is actually not that difficult, but finding yourself with enough intrinsic desire that you would succeed on the path toward awakening is quite rare. The conditions that give a person a strong enough desire to awaken are more of a limiting factor than the difficulty of the awakening process.