r0ckyreed

That’s a good point. With these new Covid variants emerging, we need to stay home and meditate instead of going to bars. The pandemic isn’t over yet. Day game is the best at this time.

I watched Leo’s recent video on how to develop my game. I am wondering how to practically do this during Covid. I got my vaccines, but I am still nervous to go to bars and get Covid and then bring it back to my parents. We need to stop the spread, stay at home, meditate, and invest in self. I find it difficult to relate to others during this pandemic, and it seems more difficult to get close to anyone with this virus still prevalent. Covid has changed how Game works now. Game is not the same as it used to be. How can I attract and get close to women if the new norm is to stay 6ft apart and wear a mask? I think Leo’s Game advice would work if not for Covid pandemic. Any experience and input would be appreciated.

Yup! Even Rocky Balboa needs blissipline.

Update: I found my own answers to the paradox between work ethic/discipline and playfulness/adventure. The key thing is to get in touch with your higher self. Really imagine what your higher self and what kind of energies they have that might be different from yours now. For instance, my higher-self is more playful, adventurous, humorous, and doesn't take things so seriously. My higher-self plays and flows with life. My higher-self could be seen as lazy, but yet my higher-self gets everything done. My higher-self does not "work out," but rather it "plays out" and has fun. My higher-self does not "work or grind" but rather it flows and yet gets everything done. That is the key is that my higher-self still goes through challenges of doing what is most emotionally difficult because my higher-self has integrated all parts of who I am. My higher-self makes the challenges become effortless because that is what the state of flow is about. Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is on my booklist to read. What I mean by parts is that according to Internal Family Systems (IFS) theory, our psyche is made of many parts to ourselves. We all have sub personalities within our minds, and IFS is all about helping us integrate all these parts to ourselves. For instance, part of our minds want to be lazy, playful, and adventurous, and another part wants us to have discipline, work, grind, and accomplish goals. The key is to stop the battle in our minds and turn it into a playground where all parts of yourself feel like they can be authentic and come together. This is a big issue with addictions. Part of our minds want to be sober and another part of ourselves loves the alcohol or drugs. The key is to bring more love to our parts by helping the addicted part of ourselves become more connected with higher energies of love. Alcohol and drugs are a way of numbing, and until that part of your mind burns through that karma, then that behavior will always continue. Burning through karma is when all parts of your mind become integrated on a single issue or fully. The way you integrate all your parts could be done through journaling, self-hypnosis, therapy, act-as-if, imagination, and bringing more love to all of your parts. The issue with the part of yourself that wants drugs or whatnot is that that part of your mind wants to feel good and feel loved and approved and still is convinced that drugs help it grow. The key is to do things that help us grow. Sometimes as Winnie the Pooh stated, "doing nothing very often leads to the very best of something." It is okay to be lazy, have fun, be adventurous, and playful, and it is also okay to have a discipline. The key is to discern what kind of energies you are attracting from your activities. If your discipline is a grind and something you hate doing, then find a way to flow with it or just stop doing it and follow your heart. Follow your heart always. If your spirit wants to play and stop doing work for the time being, then do that. You will be more productive if you allow yourself to play and follow your inspirations and excitements. What is the point of all of your hard work if it isn't helping you become more aligned with the spirit of yourself? Play with your work and your work will never be a grind. It will be effortless and more enjoyable. The first step is not taking life so seriously. Learn to use your imagination and follow your heart. Find your inspiration from "doing nothing" as Pooh reminds us to do. This all ties back into Leo's Satisfaction Meditation video where he states that work ethic is important, but it all needs to revolve around higher energies of love, playfulness, satisfaction, and adventure. We only live NOW. The only thing to be regretted on death bed is that we did not fully live now and our lives were not aligned with our spirit of adventure and inspiration, etc. Have no goals or plans other than to live fully now. Look at a dog or a child. They can teach us a lot what life is like to live fully now. They don't have plans. They have fun. Why grind when we can flow? As David Lion stated, "when it is you, it is forced. When it is God, it flows."

There is no reason to live in the same way there is no reason to be happy or to play music. You do it because you want to and enjoy doing it and you enjoy doing something because you enjoy it. These are the limits of rationality. There is no point in living or dying. You make your own point, but your point isn’t needed to live. Emotions come first, rationality comes second. Find what excites you. There is no reason to feel excited other than that you want to. If you don’t want to, then there isn’t a reason for that either unless you make it up for yourself you see. Either way, you make it up. Might as well enjoy this one shot miracle that you have. If you are thinking of suicide. I recommend you seek professional help and not make any big decisions. Just wait and weather out the storm. The storm is temporary. Just have faith that after the storm will be a beautiful rainbow.

I got the vaccine. I am just more concerned about spreading it and getting my family sick because I still live at parents home to support them and also to save money for college. I would go out more if Covid was not here. I know it is still possible to get Covid even with the vax. EDIT: I guess I will use the wisdom from your video for future reference whenever Covid is less of a problem. For now, I will stick to the books, nature, meditation, and personal/spiritual development. Some ideas that come to my mind is that I can wear my mask and go out to bars or whatnot anyways, do some magic tricks, and work on developing my sense of humor.

@hyruga Thank you so much! Very helpful! Leo’s new video Burning Through Karma helped me answer my questions here. I have a spiritual side and a human side and I gotta burn through my cravings to transcend them.

I appreciate your all’s responses. I agree. I am wondering, how do I integrate the two parts of myself together. I have one part of me that is very ambitious and wants to read, exercise, and push myself to full potential, but then another part of me just wants to relax, play, screw around, and go on adventures and hikes and eat junk food. I think Leo explained this best in his Holism episode, where I feel like a part of me is ambitious, but another part of me wants to relax and play. How do I best integrate these two parts of myself? I need more nuance in my life. For instance, I want to “do what is most emotionally difficult” (in reference to Leo’s video on One Simple Rule To Ace Life) and being totally satisfied with the process, as described in Satisfaction Meditation. Thank you!

Hello. I had a friend recommend Z-Library to me, and I was wondering if anyone has any experience using the site or recommends it. I am not for sure if it is an actual online library or not. Any help and information would be greatly appreciated What are the 5 most important topics to contemplate? Please list the top 5 topics that are most important to you to contemplate: 1. Existence Q: Who the hell am I? What am I? What is Consciousness? What is existence? What is reality? What is what is? A: _____________________ 2. Free Will Q: What is free will really? Is free will something humans have or something that God has or neither? Do free will and creation go together? If free will does not really exist, then what does that say for morality, art, and creation? How can we have discipline without free will? How can we have discipline with free will? A: Free will assumes that there is a free willer. The illusion of separation between a subject and object, where subjects choose how they interact with objects. Notice how in your direct experience, no other minds exist. All you see are objects or "things" in direct experience. Where is free will in direct experience? Free will is an ego game and is biased towards the ego. We wouldn't say that I have free will over Earth rotation or the growing of trees and falling of leaves. Yet, on our own bodies our cells grow and die and sensations and thoughts grow and die. Where is the free will? Oh! It is an idea, a projection onto what actually is! Being creative takes place without free will has well, and so does discipline because free will is everywhere and also nowhere. Free will is what reality has and not what humans have. Reality has "free will" because it is totally infinite and omnipotent. 3. Life Purpose Q: What do I want to do with my life? What am I most passionate about? How can I monetize my deepest passions for life? If I had 1 year to live, how would I use my time? If I had 100 million dollars and had 10 years left to live, what would I create? If my life was a book, what story and legacy would I want to leave behind for others to read? 4. Selfishness/Selflessness Q: Why does selfishness even exist? Does selflessness even exist? Could all motives to be selfless be driven by selfishness? A: Selfishness is survival, and survival is the game and dream of life. There is no transcendence of survival without survival. There is no awakening or selflessness without ego and selfishness. Selflessness exists through awakening, when one realizing they are the One. Psychological egoism states that all motives are ultimately selfish and state that altruism is an illusion. This theory of human nature is unfalsifiable, but it can be resolved in a way. Selfishness has no motive at all. Yes, all motives are selfish, and the answer to become selfishness is to eradicate all motives for being selfish. Let go of all attachments and selflessness is there. However, true selflessness is death. You cannot embody 100% selflessness while playing the game of survival. 5. Morality Q: What is morality? Why does morality exist? What is the nature of morality? A: Morality is the survival game we play. It is a collective way of surviving in a society. Morality exists as a concept in the same way free will does. Morality does not exist in a tree or in the universe. It exists in the mind. But what about evolution and other animals morality? Yes, other animals can appear to have their own moral systems, but this does not mean that morality is a fact of life. There is nothing wrong with not having morality. Morality is relative to society, culture, individuals, etc. My dogs don't kill each other because it is right or wrong, they are friends because of survival, with no selfish motive at the moment to commit such action. What are your thoughts? What is your list? Thank you!

1. Actuality 2. Satisfaction Meditation 3. Power of letting go 4. What is wisdom 5. Guided exercise for Infinite Consciousness

Imagine that you have a baby that you gave birth to. Sometimes, too many principles can be confusing and hard to remember and keep track of on a daily basis. What would be the top 10 most important principles, rules, or lessons that you would want to impart on your child before they grow up and take on the world? Here is my list, feel free to critique and add your own. 1. Ambition, potential, and work ethic- live life to the fullest and develop a work ethic for following through to unlock your dreams and full potential. Take action! 2. Contemplate Daily - live an examined life, where you are contemplating for its own sake for gaining insights into reality that you can actualize. Contemplate each day. Think for yourself. 3. Invest in yourself (life is deeper than money) - spend time each day growing yourself through education, reading, etc. Save money so you can have freedom, not things. 4. Kaizen - find ways to make small improvements and habits each day 5. Courage - face fears. Stand up for yourself no matter how uncomfortable it may feel. Be assertive for what you need. Have the courage to persist even if it seems like nothing is happening. 6. Integrity - your actions represent your principles and values. Do what you say. 7. Passion/Excitement - Always live your life aligned with your top passions and excitements. 8. Gratitude and self-compassion - always have and express gratitude for yourself and give your self the love and kindness you always deserve. 9. Playfulness - while work ethic is important, it is also vital to be playful and enjoy life right now. Have your mind and soul like a child and bring playfulness and joy to whatever you are doing. 10. Question All Social Influences - invest in being all alone by yourself in solitude. Society makes slaves of us all. Be an independent thinker by allowing yourself time to be alone and away from social influences. Don’t do drugs. Don’t fall for peer pressure. Real peace and serenity is always in the present moment. Change your friends if all they want to do is change you. This is my first attempt. I am going to need to make my list more simpler because it is so wordy. I will contemplate this more. What are some of your principles that have been helpful to you, but also that you would impart on your child for being successful in the world?

Philosophy. I see philosophy and personal development as the same. Philosophy is supposed to grow us. Although, in the end, we are all perfect the way we are, personal development and philosophy to me are about actualizing our full potential while also having a deep existential connection to it. I love philosophy because it engages my mind and motivates me to keep growing and helped me develop a love of learning in college, where I never really valued learning, education, and thinking until I took a philosophy class in college. Philosophy is my ultimate passion and love for life. It is amazing that we exist and that we can ponder and introspect about reality and our function within it. With philosophy, a deep passion for me is to grow, but to also help others grow and develop their own philosophies and answers to life’s deepest questions and challenges. How I apply my love for philosophy is through existential therapy. I use existential therapy to help others find their own answers to life and also reframing how they view life to the fullest and existential layer. A lot of times, our problems in life prevent us from looking within to that existential domain. So much of life is missed when we do not spend time contemplating. I love helping others, but I also love just being in solitude out in nature just contemplating and marveling at life. I love to read books out there as well and write about insights or just think them. I have a bias towards contemplation over meditation. I use my contemplations to help me ground myself into being. But I also realize that contemplation is actually a form of meditation called analytical meditation. I believe contemplation is the key that unlocks the answers to life if only we stop wasting time and do it. I truly believe Socrates when he states that “The unexamined life is not worth living,” as well as “the only thing I know is nothing.” I still don’t know where I want to go in life or the specifics of what I want to do, but I do know that philosophy is my passion and the impact I want on the world is through my talks, teachings, counseling, and writings about philosophy and how we need to live more examined lives. Don’t shut off your minds, use them! This is the one thing I don’t like about traditional forms of meditation because clear thinking is important. We examine our lives through both thinking and not thinking I suppose, but I know that we should learn how to contemplate more clearly in life. Contemplating and questioning is lacking in our society. If everyone spent time deeply contemplating, there problems would be few as opposed to many. I witness this with my clients, which many of them I admit are still at the physiological stage of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and need that emotional/social support. Philosophy and examining life, enjoying life, and blossoming to my full potential are some of the things I enjoy. Memento mori has been a practice that has helped me put my life in perspective. I also subtlety help clients do this to by them thinking about life in terms of an hourglass in which it is all about what we do with the sand (time) we have left. Any feedback is warranted and well-appreciated because I am still trying to make my vision of philosophy, personal development, and consciousness raising more clear and specific.

Could running a marathon a day for the next 30 days be considered a running meditation? I think sitting meditation can be okay, but Jedis are trained to be active and passive with the Force. Sitting down all day long does nothing for personal growth. The point of life is to grow into the best versions of ourselves and to maximize our potential in life. On our deathbed, we will be confronted by at least two main things, which are whether (1)we lived up to our potential and used every ounce of ourselves to the Universe, and if we also (2) enjoyed life and actually had fun and were playful with life. So could running a marathon a day be a spiritual meditation practice that could combine both potential and playfulness? I believe what Rocky Balboa was doing was a spiritual practice. He found a reason to keep going and staying in the Ring of Life even though he could have easily laid down, stayed at home watching TV. What do you think?

Tests are bullshit and don’t let them define you. The real tests in life is how you handle suffering and failure. They are inevitable. Intelligence cannot be measured through a test. Failing or passing a human test is meaningless. Focus on acing the test of life. Most people fail that test. Don’t let results dismantle you. Stay in the Now, and focus on using your time to the fullest. If you give it your all, then there is nothing to worry about. Be invested in the process but remain unattached from outcomes.

I am current a therapist-in-training and am studying to be a therapist. I find that a lot of my clients could benefit so much more if they were dedicated to the process and implement what was discussed into their actual lives. I give my clients tasks to do but a lot of them fail to follow through. I tell them that “expecting results from coming to therapy once a week for an hour is the same as Kevin Durant expecting to win NBA championships by just going to the team practices.” It is important that people realize that therapy is much more on you than it is the therapist. It’s about what you do between sessions. But it is important to have a therapist that supports and also challenges you to grow. I am existential therapist, which means I focus on the existential domains of an individual and how they cope with the inevitabilities of life (death, isolation, freedom, meaninglessness, and suffering). A lot of therapists don’t go deep into existential domains cause I feel like they themselves have not went that far in their own growth. If you do not know what you want to “work on,” then it is really hard for any therapist to support you. My way of doing therapy is that I am like a philosophical guide/companion that tries to help you to understand yourself, your strengths, and your areas of further development. Some therapists have other therapists to help them with vicarious trauma. But some therapists have not went far enough into themselves into the existential domains. I believe that we don’t truly know ourselves until we have the balls to dive deep into the ocean. But first, one must go through the kiddy pool, then adult pool, then ponds, lakes, and then oceans if I were to put that analogously. But a lot of people I work with are not ready to go to ocean, so you have to meet them where they are at and assess where they want to go with therapy.

Good point. I was over-generalizing there, and I realize that now. Yeah. I see it now. Both can be powerful. My biases are that running a marathon would be more challenging, but I guess the same could be said about sitting and doing nothing! Lol! I just don’t think sitting for a long time is healthy for body and will not grow the body, but it may grow the mind. With running, I see it as growing both but I may do an update post after trying both. Many people already are sitting on their asses all day doing something, but very few can sit all day doing nothing. The reason I choose running is because our bodies were designed to be active, and I heard that sitting down for long periods of time can lead to blood clots and other joint issues down the road. I guess the same could be said for running in a way, but at least it builds cardiovascular system and immune systems and is overall very healthy for body. But like anything, too much is too bad. That’s a good point. Trust our feelings and all. I need to work on following my intuition more. I typically just follow my highest passions and excitements and look for challenges I can do. Challenge is essence of growth. My highest excitement and goal is to be able to do a month marathon, but I realize that I need to build up to it. My heart tells me that I need to do more with my life besides sitting down all day at work helping clients and then coming home and winding down just to detox, self-care, and prepare for next day. My whole thing is “get busy living or get busy dying.” All we have to do is become an embodied of our loved potential. When I die, I want to realize that I gave it my all. Most of the gravestones I see sadden me because most have not lived their potential. @Gesundheit2 what has helped you follow your intuition? All I do is follow that enjoyment and excitement. I want to make my grinds enjoyable and not grind through grinds.

It’s a paradox. No properties can be aware because anything you name is already couched within awareness. This is the solipsism problem of how can I differentiate between inanimate objects and animate ones or ones with consciousness and awareness or not. It is generally assumed that when you look at human bodies walking around that there is another mind there who is aware. When you look at a plant or rock, it is generally assumed that it isn’t a self. The headless void of the Watcher is your answer, which cannot be named or put into words.

Oh wow! Wonderful post mate! I am no longer sitting on my ass. Get off the ass and hit the dirt. Real spirituality is in the discomfort. Hedonism is in the comfort. Keep going like Forrest Gump and Rocky Balboa!

I will keep looking for it on booklist.

True dat. I would also agree that progress and potential are illusions just like everything else. Life is an illusion, and I want to play this illusion to the fullest before it is over. I only get one shot at life and whether it is real, virtual, fiction or whatever does not matter to me because there is no alternative to beingness here and now that I am exposed to. I am the only judge and the only one that matters on deathbed if I even have one. I think it is important to balance enjoyment and potential. If we are not growing and having fun, then what are we living for? Right on brotha. Keep living now, and it is also important to plan and use concepts as long as we still focus on the present. Make the most of Now. There is no tomorrow. That’s what I am saying. I realize that running and meditation and spirituality are all one.

So could sitting all day as well. I heard of research that suggested that we should only be sitting for less than 3 hours per day as it is bad for joints. Sitting for long periods of time could be unhealthy. I will probably build up to 30 day marathon. None that stood out to me. If there was a book like that, I would be surprised that I did not see it. I will check booklist again to see.

You are the book.

What has helped me is waking up at 5am and writing at least 3 crappy pages. The goal is to write down all my insights and to let the ideas flow through me. It helps with contemplation practice. @JosephKnecht I see that your book Who We Are is on audible. I will definitely check it out! I do not have audible yet. But I plan on getting Audible plus for $8 per month, which seems like a damn good deal for all the books it has on there. How do you get your book onto audible? By the way, do you have any other tips for formatting and how to organize writing. I tend to connect all of ideas together and it is hard for me to separate them at times. Do you plan on getting your other books onto audible? How is that process? Thank you!@JosephKnecht

Get pissed off and disgusted by what you are doing to your body, finances, future, health, etc. If that does not wake you up, I don’t know what will. You can do it. Small steps in the end are big steps.

@JosephKnecht Wow! Thank you for sharing! Your book seems interesting! I will consider buying it and reading it. I am also wanting to write a book too. I think the challenge for me is what main theme I want to write about in my book. I could literally write about many things, but I think its a good idea to have different stages of the book to organize it. How do you publish a book once it is completed? @JosephKnecht I am a noob at writing books, and I would really appreciate any feedback on this. Thank you @LastThursday for starting this thread!