Endangered-EGO

@Javfly33 This is exactly my case 2 weeks ago. I made a post about that, and @Nahm made me realise I identify with the "seeker" the spiritual ego. Maybe reading my post might help you realise the same thing. I am not sure if you actually need to awaken to be "liberated". I had a lot of awakenings, but they were never permanent and I thought I had to get there. Pursuing awakenings is not necessarily pursuing liberation. I'm avoiding the term enlightenment, because I consider "liberation" being a part of enlightenment but not the whole thing. Here is exactly what I did, I contemplated free will, thoughts, effort etc. I noticed I differentiated between the random thoughts and the controlling thoughts. Differentiated between the "spiritual ego" and the "ego". I had to contemplate all those things to realise that a thought is a thought. Write down every different type of thought, everything that leads to a thought, every thought that is reactive, and every thought that come out of free will. What is the difference between a thought that leads to action, or a thought that isn't followed. Who decides what to do? What is the decider? Make up thoughts, make free will experiments (like write down what you think you are going to do next, and see if you can do something else). You need to differentiate every thought, every combination of thought-emotion-action-time. The chain of thought. thoughts reacting to thoughts etc. This doesn't even take long, just contemplate it, write it down, as much as possible with the intention to find out what types of thoughts there are. Again, I am not sure if you need to have had awakenings or be very mindful to be able to do that. I just see similarities between your situation and my previous situation. And read my post: @Leo Gura I'm not sure forcing yourself to meditate more than you can handle is better or even faster. Adyashanti said that, going at it with determination like an athlete just worked for him because he struggled so hard he finally gave up everything and had an awakening. Most people aren't ready to experience hell in order to "know the truth about hell". Forcing yourself to do self inquiry and meditation is just not a long term solution for most people who desire changes in perception (awakenings) or "liberation from suffering". If you truly want to experience "GOD's mercy", just give him no choice but to have mercy, go get tortured closing the door behind you. You'll give up any sanity you had left for truth. If you enjoy meditation, and it feels good, your mind will simply end up desiring to meditate more, and fall into mindfulness meditation during the day. Mixing effort- with effortless-meditation raises concentration too. You cannot start to sprint in the middle of a marathon. Keep the pace. The mind needs to build up momentum, by desiring to meditate. If it feels good to be focussed, the mind will naturally enter that state. If it feels bad the mind will try everything to get away from "IT". Same with psychedelics. If you expect a bad trip every time you take a psychedelic there is no way you are going to take them any longer. Every Master worked hard and smart. Smart being more important than hard imo.

@Swarnim Yes, it is not my intention with this practice to be awake 24/7. I have seen the nothingness, and I do self inquiry and use the deconstruction of reality with neti-neti in combination. I have a lot of "associations" of objects that I consider a thing. On that I am working too, I am also doing that with every suffering that occures, using shinzen youngs mindfullness methods. Unfortunately I am not aware of all the associations I have. An awakening into the nothingness can help I believe, but I'll exercise mindfullness with what I have now. Unfortunately It is hard to deconstruct every association of "bad pain" that occures, because it doesn't happen really often, and I don't want to deliberately hurt myself. I'll just wait for the suffering to happen, and not cause myself for harm than necessary, because I am more interested in relieving suffering than in truth atm. I have seen the nothingness and had countless awakenings. I want to "stabilise" and fall deeper into enlightenment in the now.

@Swarnim There is possibly a lot of "Me"-ness in physical discomfort. I just don't see it yet.

@Seraphim Thanks, one more teacher I probably need to listen to

I don't agree. The do nothing is the contrast to meditation with effort. It is so the mind learns to meditate on auto pilot. Of course it needs to be alternated with meditation with effort/concentration. The do nothing meditation is for people who already meditate. People who don't meditate cannot not-meditate, because their doing-nothing is always the same. It is also a good to notice how the attention has changed from regular meditation. Advanced meditators just sit down, close their eyes and meditations just happens.

@r0ckyreed Shinzen young has a guide (5 ways to know yourself) you should read that. I recommend reading Shinzen Youngs guide I just mentioned and Adyashantis "True Meditation" Book. I'll give you a hint, there is no difference between meditating or not meditating. There is no doing or not-doing. Shinzen Young uses the "Do Nothing Meditation" in contrast to the "labelling meditation". Meditation vs anti meditation he sais. The do nothing meditation is pretty easy. "Whenever you realise(!) you have the intention to control the attention, let that intention go" It's not trying not to meditate, it is meditation without effort. If you meditate and you do that sometimes, you'll notice you will simply fall into a concentrated effortless state sometimes. "If labeling makes you too racey do nothing, if do nothing makes you to spacey, label" - shinzen young Adyashantis Meditation is maybe perfect for you. It is meditation with as little effort as possible. About 99percent "allowing everything to happen" like the do nothing meditation, and only IF YOU NOTICE you are to deep into thinking, (so you don't have to put effort into it) you bring the attention as gently and calm as possible back to the object of concentration. You let go of the thoughts instead of switching with effort. You might not be there yet, but a lot of people "fall into meditation" instead of being bored while having to wait for something. You have to find just the right amount of effort to meditate.

I am just contemplating a little bit, feel free to tell me your POVs. The paradox of free Will. I got that there is no "decider" in the mind. The mind is not the primary thing that makes things happen. The mind can only fight itself, and it does so not because of free will, but because of circumstances outside of it's capacity to manipulate. So then, who/what decides? Religious people would say "the soul". With the realisation that the mind cannot do anything on it's own, not create anything but just react, it needs to be pointed in some general direction. But who/what points it? You guys point my mind into the direction of pointing the mind toward itself, because you realised that paradox, but if reality is not (pre)determined, and there is nothing "I" can do but to react in a way that my entire being didn't decide. I kind of (want to) believe, that the soul, the source, "god" or whatever, that formless thing decides the reality it wants to experience. So the mind has no other choice but to follow/react to "IT". The mind also somehow also seems not to be able to manipulate IT. The ego wants to manipulate the reality while realising the nothingness, but it just doesn't seem to work like that. So basically the mind either feels like a trapped slave, which desperately wants to have things go it's way, or realise the futility of trying to manipulate reality in a metaphysical way and just adapts as good as it can, because anything else would lead to suffering and nothing else. Now how does that change anything? It doesn't that's the best part of the paradox, there is nothing the mind can do to get out of it. Consciously doing the opposite to experience free will, is also an illusion, because without the previous experience of the paradox of free will, it wouldn't have tried to do the opposite, which is a purely reactionary action it takes because of the circumstances. The weird part is, while the mind ceases to try, there is a freedom that arises.

My results: 2 seconds of "nothingness" in total (not God) and merging with the perception of the hand a few times. Been really really grounded. However no eternity, no love, no reality is a dream, no illusion, no me creating reality, no concept shattered etc. I usually dismiss the nothingness really fast, because I had none of the above but I believe this was the nothingness very shortly. (defined by the thinning out of reality and no-self.)

@lmfao Hey, that is the first instinct of someone who starts to realise that there is no free will. Being trapped by circumstances. Do what I did, contemplate thoughts and decision. Just test out thoughts/action/effort/emotions with free will. Somehow this gave me a HUUGE sense of freedom, because I realised I have no choice but to follow my Intuition/heart. This also took away the "effort" part of deciding. @Someone here Yes that is exactly what I did-observing and questioning thoughts-, ever thought is reactive and not creative. Thoughts reacting to each other in a self nourishing loop, without any foundation. I am just using the ego as "the sense of identification with thoughts", I m using ego because it s easier to write. Not in my experience, the realisation of No free will came with a big sense of freedom, freedom to not have to fight thoughts with thoughts, the mind realises the futility of fighting itself, it is like a knot that just gets bigger the more it tries to resolve itself. There is no problem for the mind to solve. Having no free will is one of the biggest freedom of the mind. But the mind in fact never decides, it can only learn outside of it's control. That is exactly the point. The free will illusion is from the mind, but the mind needs it to make decisions based on everything else but the free-will paradox. The paradox needs to be taken out of the equation, for the mind to function: The mind cannot say "Well it doesn't matter what I do, because there is no free will". This is just not working, because that's also just a reaction, and a harmful one. Tricky mind haha. @Javfly33 About pain: It is possible to enjoy physical discomfort, like cold water and heat. If you voluntarily go to the sauna, you can enjoy it for a very long time, but if you were trapped into one, you would suffer right away. But that's just survival, the alarm about being close to death is ringing, if you know you can get out any second, the pain is not making you suffer.

That's what I just implicitly "understood": And it is the first time I am going to say the same "semantic confusing shit" all the other people that understand it said. I always saw what they told as a paradox, because it doesn't help to hear that "there is nothing you can do to awaken" A big thank you to @Nahm that led me to recognise that I identified as the seeker. And I finally went meta. So there it is: The Seeker never awakens, the ego can only realise the paradox of the "path to enlightenment", by seeing that the more you try to solve that riddle the bigger it gets. The harder you try, the harder it gets. The paradox of the paradox is that there is nothing the "I" can do or not do. There is not even a possibility to allow everything that happens to happen, because that is something the ego does to try to not fight with itself. But trying not to fight with itself is trying to do or undo something(which is also do-ing). So there is "not anything" you can do (or not-do) to either get to enlightenment. "Do nothing" is also not something you can NOT do, because it is just the opposite of the same coin. Meditation vs anti-meditation. I had a lot of "awakenings", but those were not the enlightenment insight. Realising the paradox of enlightenment right now, has not in any way shape or form changed my perception on the world, or how I feel (except freedom). "Now what can I do" is the thought that came up most often during the last few hours. Should I meditate now to get an awakening? Should I stop meditating? There is NO ANSWER. Not even do-nothing is the answer. There's not anything anyone can do in either way. The ego/the thoughts are not creative in a free will kind of sense. They are reactive, reactive to everything else that occurs including itself. There is no doing anything. It does so by itself. The seeker will continue to go the path, no matter how much it tries to do the opposite, it just fights with itself gets a few nice things a few bad things, but it can not get anywhere. "I am going to stop meditating, because there is nothing I can do" - But stopping is doing something. The mind can never ever get you anywhere. If this is the first time you hear something like that, and you want realise the futility of the ego trying to resolve itself, try to contemplate thoughts, thinker, decider, do-er etc. My mind now knows that there is nothing it can do or not do, or try to do or try not to do to get anywhere anytime. That's the paradox realisation I just had. Now I heard that this is enlightenment? Apparently it is enlightenment as long as I don't forget it, (and there is also nothing I can do to remember or to forget it). But I expected the nothingness to come up the second I realised that fully. Or heaven. Or at least ego death? I had those awakenings multiple times, without consciously realising, that the ego and seeker, were a strange loop of illusory self feeding identifications. So, now what for me? I know I cannot stop, I cannot decide, it's kind of deterministic in nature because the mind is reactive. And the seeker wants awakenings, but also knows now that there is nothing it can do. Is this enlightenment? Is this the realisation, that the thing inside of me always was enlightened? Can I now start a cult and confuse people with this? (jk but it would be hilarious though)

@VeganAwake That's what I thought, I'm observing it beginning right now. Checkmate atheists!

@EmptyVase I contemplated a lot of thoughts, I am right now contemplating effort too. Because I honestly don't know what effort is, and curiosly I am not being productive, because of the effort. But maybe there is no effort. I realised the effort needed to "do something" is in the thinking before you even start doing it. The second you decide to take action there is no real mental effort. I believe that effort are contradicting thought loops or resistance. Only time will tell. Yeah well, the problem is, there is not anything the ego can do to remember it's futility. I remember it now, but I will continue to look for "an answer" an probably sometimes struggle very hard, until I realise the futility again. I don't even want to contemplate it right now, because I still know it is futile. You can send me the thread if you want, I also had a "heaven" realisation a few weeks ago, when everything was love and perfect, and there is nothing that is not perfect, however that was more like "There is nothing I have to do, everything is perfection"-insight instead of "There is nothing I can do or need to cease to do" right now. @Breakingthewall Do you know the illustration of the guy running on a path, slowing down, sitting and finally laying down? You are the path, not the runner, the path doesn't change, the runner looks for truth, but you are the path. The runner (ego) can do whatever it wants, the path is still the same. The awakenings don't change the path, it's the runner that changes. There is also nothing to learn from what I said, because it doesn't change anything. It's like realising, the ego is in an infinitely big prison. How could it be different? The structure and it's contents are one thing.

@iameternallife By that I mean, there is no controlling the awareness with ego. We talk about the same thing. @Nahm Yes, thoughts are probably the thing I am the least mindful with. When I do that with the thought it kind of feels like I am forcefully stopping the thought, and not allowing it to vanish. I probably need to notice the beginning of the arising and not the thought mid-thought, correct?

@iameternallife Yes I believe meditation will be more "letting awareness do it's thing" for now @Nahm I am sure it is not the absolute, it is not even the nothingness. By 'catch it', do you mean "be mindful and equanimous with it"? I don't know what's going to happen, the only thing I can do is observe, before letting new thought patterns create themselves.

@IAmReallyImportant If you want to know for sure, do exactly that: Ask her on what topic she can find out something you ALREADY know, and only you can know. So nothing on the internet, no previous conversations, no help from outside possible. If you can, you should chose different environment than usual. As soon as she sees something and is sure: She can tell you the subject, or the question she asked to your soul/aura whatever. She can choose the specific subject, anything she is sure about of course. now you write everything down that is true to you from that question. If she says something, about: "Oh I feel resistance", or if she is wrong, she just might tell you, that she read things about you that you didn't know about yourself. Do this experiment, if she passes, she either is a real psychic or an incredible mentalist/magician.

@IAmReallyImportant What i meant was way more radical. Your mind makes EVERYTHING UP. There are just more dense things like in the material world, and less dense things like dreams. What people mean with real or not, is substance in the material world. But how the mind sees the world is a made up story, that the mind created to learn, adapt etc. You imagine the Body while feeling it most of the time, which is of no substance. The imagination of body part pictures is of no substance, the feeling is a outside perception. Distance and depht are of no substance, it is ENTIRELY created by the mind in order to function. Those constructs of the mind are most of the time useful for survival in the broadest term possible. When you see things, those could be either "hidden" and you have a 6ths paranormal sense, OR constructs of the mind that could be a bug or a feature. If you find someone who perceives the same things without communication, it has substance, is provable, and proves a hidden dimension of objective reality. However you know there could be an infinite amount of realms and every one has an access to a different realm, that would make it difficult. Is psychotherapy true? How is this any different than tarot card readings. In my opinion they are the same, just different methods that can help. How can you know something is true? rationality alone doesn't make it. But you can make some guesses to stay sceptic. Does you girlfriend get money from you, or any comfort-stuff that isn't emotional, she could stay for? Does a psychic makes money from people? Does a psychic strongly believe she/he helps people with some superstitious believes? Does a psychic maybe keep people who suffer from schizophrenia from going to see a psychiatrist? Is this not dangerous? Would you rather have the real be true, or willing to accept that those hallucinations are neither from a realm nor useful, an being seen as a crazy person who needs to go to a psychiatry? I just described the current society, I have no intention to insult you, but if you suffer from those hallucinations (or whatever you call the access to the paranormal realm), in a non-metaphysical sense, it is psychosis/schizophrenia. It might be more comfortable to believe a psychic than a psychologist, psychiatrist, but I wouldn't replace the psychologist with a psychic .

@Harikrishnan There is a difference between knowing the unlimited possibilities of the universe it's infinite dimensions, mystery of consciousness, and not allowing frauds an con artists to scam naive people. Again, not saying there is no-paranormal, but what A LOT of psychics do is at best misleading or at worst exploitation.

That's the power of your mind, that actually works. If you believe in it it works best, but even if you don't believe in it, the suggestion still has an effect on you. Have you ever had sleeping pills? Just buy sleeping pills and if you know you can take them, you worry less about sleep and don't even need to take them to fall asleep. That's not even placebo, that's psychology. I have done soul travel countless times, you can view it as "materially true" or as a "mind-true". The mind is it's own thing. It tells stories about everything, how the mind perceives the physical world is a story. the story is true for the mind. However the story created by the mind of it's soul, is like a translation of it's fears, ambitions, desires etc. In that sense it is true for the mind. But there is an objective difference between the objective reality. If you see a demon in front of you, it is true for your mind, if you cannot touch it it is only true for what you see and the story behind it. If other people don't sense it it isn't true for their mind. The mind tells stories, some stories are more adapted for the objective world, and others are not so adapted. The same is with dreams, they are true for the mind in that sense. But not true in the objective material medium of perception.

It is funny, I was just about to make a post about psychics, that I don't believe anything enlightened people say about the "objective" world. And That I needed proof for the paranormal, especially things about psychics. Things I don't consider paranormal anymore is synchronicity, even though I have absolutely no idea how that works or how this can be possible, aliens, and the healing power of the self. I'm gonna play the sceptic to show you the possible scam: Do you know that your crown chakra is wide open? Or do you believe it after she told you? That's not something provable. You know that everyone who even thinks about going to a psychic doesn't do it out of rationality, but out of curiosity and intuition. Everyone who goes to the psychic will say that what she mentioned about intuition/insight/downloading information/reading people's emotions. Would say that it is 100percent accurate to them. People who don't believe in the paranormal don't go to psychics, and even those who don't believe in the paranormal them have some kind of "paranormal" experience, they just forget it or think they were tricked by their own mind. Having visions is synchronicity, again I don't know what that is, but a lot of people experience it, it is weird, but it saying that there is synchronicity in your life, doesn't make me a psychic, and it doesn't make her a psychic either. If she had specifically mentioned that you had seen UFO's I would not have made that point. But I guess she didn't, or didn't directly read it out of you. Psychics also use a sequence of things, how you react to previous answers, to guess the next thing they can read out of you. For example (I of course don't know if that is the case) you told her that you have seen UFOS, and she tells you that your soul came from some kind of alien race, that was saved. If you agreed that you had visions of the past, she would have told you that you were a magician in Atlantis or some small deviation of that. Reading someone's personality, is a skill, but not a paranormal one. Some people are really good at it, she read you, not your soul. Or did she tell you something so specific like : your attachement anxiety comes from the fact that your grandmother left you 10 years ago after being diagnosed with lung cancer, and she chose to stay in hospice. I have made countless "soul travel" in a mild hypnotic state. It's just the mind creating them. However an enlightened woman I know claimed you can travel through dimensions when you let go of the nothingness, which is real. I doubt that, honestly. She once spoke russian while being asleep without having learned it. Not sure about if that's the case or just an illusion. Siddhis are also not proven to work by outside observers. I don't say real psychics are not a thing, I have just not seen anything that I would consider proof. Things that I would consider proof are specific things, you write down before on a sheet that are most important to you, and then you see if the psychic tells you those things specifically. If not then it's too general. Self proclaimed psychics all do their research before, those that do that, are scam artists and deserve to be fined for misleading people and scamming them. If someone here claims to be a psychic, then tell me what topic you would like to read from me, I'll write down a lot about the topic, and then compare it after the reading. And I am not paying any money for this experiment, if it works, we might find a way to make it provable and measurable in a quantified way.

Hello, I have a questions about some self inquiry methods that work for you. I have had a lot of awakenings and semi-awakenings (how I call them) I define the semi-awakenings by the thinning out of reality. The sense of detachements and unsubstantiateness of the objects of perception. I find myself most of the time IN the illusion of the ego, and still trapped by it. I have had a lot of sober awakenings, some of them were so beautiful, others were maybe even more incredible but not necessarily beautiful. Unfortunately the awakening always comes down, and I am trapped into the ego elusion again. So I am asking what methods do you guys find very useful to make the ego/reality "thinner". Its kind of frustrating to remembering that the suffering that comes with the ego is illusion, but it feels real. In some sense I am an awakening-junkie, because awakening is the only thing that is really satisfying me deeply. I'm sure I am not the only one who struggles with this, and struggling with not-being free of the ego makes it even worse. How do I deal with the ego desperately trying to awakening, while simoultaneaously trying not to try to awaken? What methods/habits do you guys use to make reality thinner that can work 24/7. It doesn't even need to be very noticeable. For now I don't really want to use psychedelics, because I don't want to break through with violence to avoid the dark night of the soul. I'm sure there will be a time for that though.

@Moksha I just tried to focus on the gaps, however they happen mostly when I attain effortless concentration in meditation. It's also kind of tricky, because I tend to want to have a goal in meditation but during meditation I always have to give that up to have a good meditation. I'm curious, have you ever tried shinzen youngs meditation on expansion and contraction? It's like meditation on the entire "flow of perception" the gap-the appearing of the object-the expansion of the object-the contraction of the object- the disappearing of the object. Its just makes you observe the relationship between the awareness and the object within. Apparently after a lot of practice you can realise the expansion and contraction of an object simoultaneously. I'm not there yet, but I believe this is the most awareness-stimulating (for the lack of a better word) meditation I have tried. Do you perceive objects like that too? or just the discontinuity?

@Moksha I get what you are saying with spaceousness, Adyashanti talk about that, and shinzen young teaches to notice the "gone" and the objects expanding and contracting within the space of awareness. The problem, I believe, is identification with the "spiritual thoughts". Realising that those were just thoughts made meditation effortless yesterday. The gaps between thoughts were way longer than usual even though there was no effort in meditation yesterday. About continuity, I noticed that when I focus on the discontunuity of thoughts I tend sometimes to realise that the awareness of the external word is waaayy less continuous I once found myself cooking asking myself "How the fuck did my hands take the pan out of the shelf put olive oil and meat into it without anyone controling it." That was probably the longest discontinuity I noticed, I also feared I had lost memory, but I was just very much in the now, and could remember when trying. I do that practice noticing the gaps sometimes, but it is often fuelen by the desire to get somewhere I am not, by thoughts I identify with, so I am a bit lost with the though things, I just started contemplating and experimenting with thoughts. If I happen to notice the gaps during meditation that's okay. I'll contemplate the thought-gaps though. I might be at a turning point now, and I don't know where it will lead me. So I don't know, I don't know who decides what to do. haha. @Nahm Thank you for your help, I'll let you know what your help did to me, once I know it myself.

This is absurd, there is always one more layer looking for identification. And sometimes it switches language, depending on what story the thoughts are telling. Or what language the people I intend to talk about it talk. I have thoughts in 4 languages, and it switches the more I go up into the layers of thoughts, trying to trick itself. This makes me laugh, "I wonder where this is leading me", which is also a thought that seeks identification. I'm really curious about that stuff.

@Nahm "The identification is a self nourishing thought-loop" is what an insight I got from reading faceless posts. I think I am going to raise thought awareness without interfering. As I mentioned, the identification will probably switch from the second thoughts to the next, or to the changing awareness thoughts. Yesterday I just laid in bed with a very calm mind doing nothing, not even meditating and it was calm. There is definitely something to it. "Now what should I do, how can I do contemplative work and neti neti and self inquiry if I just obsverve the seeker" is a thought and a mystery to me. It is a strange loop of deciding to do stuff, but who decides? hahaha. I'm just going with the flow now I guess. "Oh, I want to be in the mystery, how do I get there? What can I do?" hahahahahaha. "I wonder if the spiritual part of me will work without identification"... man that's also just a thought. I risk to identify as the referee of thoughts to decide what to do or what not to do hahahaha. Oh damn that is tricky. Just more thoughts always want to become identified with, in a very sneaky way, it's like the alan watts story of the police chasing thieves up a building. Everytime the police goes up one floor, the thieves go up one, and so they never catch up (until they arrive at the roof). That is happening with my thoughts right now. Maybe I'll inquiry every "level of thought", I don't know what the roof will look like or if it's an infinite loop. Really weird.

@Blackhawk Spirituality is a very tricky business. You cannot prove enlightenment. And if someone makes money with it, it's easy to be a sceptic and say: "oh he just wants to make money with naive people". What they don't know is Leo is bad at marketing and he is doing it intentionally as he mentioned. I work in eCommerce, and I can tell you Leo would sell at least 2-3x as many courses if he just used retargeting ads for people who perform certain actions on his website ( I won't go into details, but it is pretty simple to make retargeting funnels), he could sell more products and have a lot of costumers for life, by making events, selling new stuff etc. I don't see any downsides doing this in the short term, but he could use that for exponential growth, which is sometimes chaotic and stressfull. However I think the devil in me would want to just pump as much money out of it as possible, because growth is really satisfying.