Osaid

You don't need ego to give value to things. You don't need to imagine things in order to give value to things. When you remove meaning from existence you don't arrive at a lack of value. You don't need to imagine meaning or value in order for things to have value. That is why vanilla ice cream tastes good despite what you think or imagine about it. What you're talking about is not neutral at all. It is a limitation which says that you shouldn't care about things. It is a limitation which says that you cannot value things. You will drive yourself insane imagining a limitation like that because it goes against the inherent experiential value of existence. So the body is analogous to "poop" or "pain"? I don't think that analogy tracks appropriately. Why would the universe exclude poop or pain from infinity; just because it is less pleasant to look at? Pleasurable feelings do not dictate whether something is infinite or not. A lack of attention is not no self. That is just a lack of pain. No self is not about deciding to focus on pleasurable sensations. There are many who lack pain and experience blissful states who still have a self.

A human is not self. A human is. A plant is. A self also is, but it is only ever imagination. And it can be unimagined. Again, there is a difference between being a human and thinking that you are a human. Thinking that you are a human is self. It is imagination. It is thinking.

The logic tracks until this point. You are conflating the perception of your body with ego. Why would being absorbed in infinity exclude the body? Is the body not infinite? At what point in infinity does the body lose its meaning? Do things only have value and meaning when you imagine a false self alongside it?

That is correct. Again, there is a psychosomatic connection between self and what is not self. The part that creates action is not self, but it is a reaction to the imagined self. The imagined self which cannot do anything is being used as an object of desire, and that object of desire physically drives you to act out a desire in accordance with that self. Physical movement is not self, but it can be used to serve the self, and this relationship is what is called ego or self-image. It is the belief that you can imagine yourself which causes the physical reactions which serve that self, because now you have a desire to serve and protect that self. In the exact same way how a kid who believes in Santa Claus acts differently while imagining Santa Claus. Santa Claus is not controlling anything, it is the reaction to the belief that Santa Claus does control things which causes the kid to physically act it out. And it is the same reason why that kid will feel genuine physical fear when you tell them that they are on the naughty list. I wrote out some of the tangible measurable symptoms that come along with the no self state here:

Biology is not self. Biology is beyond thought. And there is no "self" which could hope to take responsibility for the causal chain of events which lead to the creation of that biology. You don't control your heartbeat. You don't even choose what you think because that itself is just more thinking. In the same way how a plant growing upwards is not self. That is just its nature and intelligence playing itself out. If the plant has a thought which says "I want to grow downwards" it will not grow downwards. If the plant has a thought which says "I want to grow upwards" that thought still does not control its ability to grow upwards, it was in its nature and intelligence to do that anyways. The self does not control anything other aside from what it imagines about itself. If a human has the thought "I want to make coffee" then it reacts accordingly to that thought, but it certainly didn't choose that thought. You react to the thought, you don't choose it. If there is no coffee left, then you don't actually end up making coffee. You then react to the fact that you ran out of coffee, and you have a thought "I need to go to the store." You didn't choose that you want to go to the store, you reacted to the fact that you don't have coffee. And so the chain of intelligent reactions ensue, void of any real self. This is not to be conflated with a lack of free will, it is just that you can only act as intelligent as your nature or existence allows. Free will is a false premise based on the belief that your imagination can bend and control reality. The concept of free will involves a "chooser" which chooses between two choices. But the chooser and choices themselves are imagined, they are both the same singular imagined object. This does not mean you don't have free will, it means there is no "you" which can gain or lose free will in the first place. Free will does not exist at all, therefore you cannot lose or gain it. You can only unimagine it. You don't lose or gain free will in the same way that you don't lose or gain Santa Claus by unimagining it.

Self doesn't control anything. It's imaginary like Santa Claus. You don't need it to think. It is literally made of thinking. It doesn't exist outside of thinking therefore it could not possibly have any control over thinking.

Not anymore. I might have used to think of it that way. It is very clear to me now what a paradox is though. It is just a failure of your logic to capture reality. Reality is not logic and logic was never meant to capture the whole of reality in the first place, that goes beyond its use. Therefore you get a paradox when you try to apply logic to certain aspects of reality. There is actually a subtle difference in definitions which is well known linguistically. A contradiction will point to something entirely different existentially than a paradox. Google defines contradiction as: a combination of statements, ideas, or features of a situation that are opposed to one another. Google defines paradox as: a statement or proposition that, despite sound (or apparently sound) reasoning from acceptable premises, leads to a conclusion that seems senseless, logically unacceptable, or self-contradictory. I think this is a good succinct summary I found on Google: Many people use the words paradox and contradiction in the same way, but there are subtle differences between them. A paradox defies logic and expectations. A contradiction is something that contradicts itself, meaning it says something is true, then says the same thing is false.

I am aware of the mathematical subsets of infinity, and yes that is different from what I mean. Existential/metaphysical infinity = no limits or boundaries or divisions When you say there is a "smaller infinity", it is not really existentially infinity because you are dividing experience into a smaller subset of itself. It is a division, and thus a limitation, and thus a boundary, and thus it is finite in some sense. There is a conflation happening where infinity is being conflated with an "infinite amount of things" when it is actually just "one thing that is infinite." If there are "things", that itself is finitude, because "things" are a division that your mind makes. It is your mind comparing and contrasting.

Reality is always relatively manifesting itself in an infinite amount of ways. That is why science will explore physical reality forever. That is why psychonauts will explore psychedelic states forever. That is why writers will make different stories forever. That is why video game developers will make different video games forever. Exploring a certain aspect of reality does not mean you are exploring absolute truth, even if it is infinite in its variety. Life has always been "strange manifestations", there is nothing else here. If you don't understand everything it entails, that simply means it wasn't actually infinite. You are looking at infinity as if it is some knowledge or skillset you acquire. Like you can infinitely understand mathematics or you can infinitely understand the physical universe. It is not like that. That is relative knowledge. That is not existential or infinite. "Infinite" doesn't mean there is a greater amount of it you can understand forever. That is not true infinity, that is your mind splitting up infinity into an infinite amount of objects you can acquire or learn or experience. Infinite means there are no limitations or boundaries or divisions to the experience. When you say there is more to understand, that is you dividing and splitting infinity into two objects, one which lacks what the other infinity does not lack. Infinite is never two, it is always one seamless thing. When you split something like that you immediately turn it into something finite.

That is just your mind dividing things. You are trying to separate infinity from itself. To be fair, mind can't do much else. No. There is a difference between paradox and contradiction. Contradiction does not exist outside of intellect, and so it is never experienced beyond that. It is impossible to experience contradiction as something which is not intellect, and so it is an impossibility. Contradiction is recognizing a failure in logic. In other words, it is logic that points to nothing outside of itself. It is intellectual stagnation. It is you making a statement which opposes itself. Therefore, the statement doesn't exist outside of itself. Paradox is being aware of that which cannot be captured by logic. It is possible to experience paradox, but only as something outside of the divisions of logic. A paradox is not contradictory because it is reached through sound logic, therefore the logic points to something existential, but that thing it points to seems to escape the logic itself. Reality does not contradict anywhere, your human intellect and imagination is where the contradictions are generated. You view your logic as something which should apply to reality, and when it doesn't, you anthropomorphize the whole of reality by calling it contradictory, when it is actually just your own logic which contradicts. Logic and intellect contradict, not infinity or reality.

How can infinite become "more infinite"? Unless it is lacking, and not truly "infinite"? How can something without boundary or limitations become more of that? Unless it was still limited by something? There is something very obviously missing here. The way you're defining "infinite" contradicts itself, because you are saying that the previous infinite was limited, and thus that would actually make your previous conception finite. Saying that there is "more infinite" is the same as saying that there is something beyond the absolute. There isn't. You think that there is something beyond infinity. And you will chase after that idea forever, not because there is actually something beyond infinity, but because you will never find it. The idea of "more infinite" is a contradiction, and so you are stuck chasing that ghost until you see through it. You perceive this ghost as "deeper awakenings" and "deeper truths", like a carrot on a stick that paradoxically gets farther and farther away with each awakening.

Or maybe, it indicates a fundamental error or corruption in the method for accessing truth. The idea of "deeper truths" and "deeper awakenings" does indeed bring with it a massive contradiction, in the sense that it adds relativity to truth; that there is a state which lacks truth or depth, and then a higher state which does not lack that truth or depth. Overlooking this contradiction without reconciling the discrepancy may lead to false teachings such as the "bubbles inside of a sponge" supposition.

How is it possible that Leo previously became directly conscious of this, but then later became directly conscious of something opposing this? How do you know that he is not just making that same mistake, over and over again? Something to think about.

I remember visiting my childhood neighborhood a while ago and it felt way smaller. Like about 10x smaller. It physically felt smaller and claustrophobic. As a kid it felt like an open world adventure game. It really made me contemplate about that, and I believe it is because of how we tie our identity to imagination over time, aside from just the physical size difference. I wonder how it would feel to visit again.

It's as much of a perception as Santa Claus. Sure. For this specific example, I'm gonna be anal and say that no, you don't need to fear dying in the future in order to take care of your body. There is more to caring about life than fearing death. Many religious zealots would actually have no fear of death purely motivated by ego, because they believe that they have virgins waiting for them in the afterlife. However, the fear of death can be a motivation created by the ego to preserve the body, that much is correct. But that type of motivation is not necessary to value being alive. You don't need to believe that something is "you" to value it. You don't need to think another person is "you" to value them. You don't need to think that the taste of vanilla is "you" to value it. "You" adds absolutely nothing of value to experience. It is redundant.

I believe it is because they experienced "less time" on Earth, thus they have less memory and knowledge to tie their identity to. Tying your identity to your imagination makes the world unnecessarily rigid.

Being a person doesn't involve a sense of self at all. You just need the person. No extra sense needed. There is a difference between being a human and thinking you are a human. The thinking is the redundant sense of self. It's an extra unnecessary input. Your sense of self has nothing to do with what is not imaginary. So you would protect what is not imagined. The sense of self is entirely imaginary and it does not represent anything actually in your experience. It's redundant. You don't lose any functioning by discontinuing your imagination of something which never represented anything. You can't lose your body by stopping imagination. You can't lose your ability to understand language by stopping imagination. You are giving too much importance to your imagination. You only lose the duality that you imagined yourself in. Anything that actually exists outside of imagination cannot be dualistic, because there is no such thing as something which is existentially dualistic. All duality is imagined, no exceptions. You are already functioning without duality, you're just imagining that you aren't. That is the crux of it. If you see duality as if it is something existential then you are mistaking the map for the territory. A lack of interest or value does not equate to a lack of self. It is just a difference in desire and value based on the circumstance. Being able to value something without any ulterior motive is exactly how love is experienced. When you taste vanilla, you love it purely for the sensation of what it is, not because of something you imagine about it. You don't need to imagine things to value things. You just need to experience them.

If the dream contains the dreamer, wouldn't the dreamer be part of the dream itself? Which part of the dream is the dreamer going to be made of? If the dreamer isn't made out of the dream, where is it? Outside of the dream? Here is an angle to look at: There is a rock. The rock is made of stone, which has a certain appearance. If you did not have eyes to see that rock, there would be no such thing as the "appearance of a rock." The rock depends on your eyes to perceive it and your eyes depend on the rock for it to exist as something which can be perceived by your eyes. Thus, the rock and your eyes both mutually depend on each other to be perceived. Where is the space for a "self" to take ownership over the "seeing" or "perceiving" of the rock? Isn't it the case that the perception of the rock and the existence of the rock are the exact same physical occurrence? It is always ultimately the same occurrence, which is just a complete and total loss of self. Their ability to explain and comprehend what happened to them might differ, but they are all explaining and experiencing the same fundamental phenomenon. The route that they take to reach there probably has unlimited variety though. There is certainly no more imagined suffering about physical pain. There is no such thing as longing for a state where the physical pain does not exist, for example. However, the physical pain itself can still be an object of desire. For example, if you cause physical pain to someone, there can be a desire to alleviate that. If you cause physical pain to yourself, there can be a desire to alleviate that. But there is no imagined resistance about how it will affect you in past or future. If someone is saying that they don't care about physical pain at all anymore, I would be suspicious of that, because that is not what practically happens after enlightenment. There are many people who are resistant to pain, or even have genetics which do not allow them to feel physical pain at all, and they are not necessarily closer or further to enlightenment. Many of them are only able to resist pain because of purely egoic reasons. This should clue you in to the fact that the sense of self is not really about physical pain, but perhaps something more than that. That seems accurate. The less you imagine yourself the more quickly redundant emotions will dissolve. There are incremental improvements in regards to thoughts about yourself that can happen prior to enlightenment. Kind of like how therapy can incrementally improve how you think of yourself. Never looked much into Jim Newman. Physical sensations are not ego but they can be the symptom of one, which may or may not be what he is referring to. Any physical sensation is not mediated by how you imagine it and therefore it is unrelated to ego. In the same way that hearing sound is unrelated to ego or seeing color is unrelated to ego. There is nothing existential outside of your imagination which can be ego. It is imagination which has to create the distinction afterwards and say "this is me, and this is not me." No point in your experience can claim that separation aside from your mind or imagination. For example, there can be a genuine physical sensation in the skull, but the belief that "you" are "located" there has to be ego or imagination. Because you are creating a division in your experience by claiming that, and experience has no feature where it can divide itself, it can only imagine that. No I didn't do any type of meditation like that. My mind is way too intellectual for that. It took a lot of self-inquiry and incessant questioning of my experience of what I am.

No. Why would you need something that does not exist to function? It's like saying you need Santa Claus to function.

That is the common conflation of it; that you become dysfunctional and what not. There is a conflation that the body is antithetical to no self, which is just not true. There are common "anti-human" sentiments like this which pop up in spirituality; that no self or absolute truth is located in some ethereal state of consciousness outside of being human. You are talking about a specific state where you cannot function in the body anymore, that is all. If you say that state is coexistent with a loss of the perception of time, that could be the case, but then you are conflating specific ego-defying states with enlightenment itself. Enlightenment exists everywhere, always.

A big point of mine was to highlight that the physical sensation of the body is not ego. It is as much ego as hearing sound or looking at a color. I feel this is a common conflation. Physical sensations are not ego or limitations. It is what you imagine about them that is ego. The body is as valuable as your current experience of it. In order to not notice your body you would have to phase yourself into some state where the perception of body does not exist. Otherwise, the body is not imaginary, and thus it is inherently unrelated to the ego. If you remove your hand from a hot stove because of the pain, that is not ego, that is a biological motivator designed to move you away from physical danger. If you afterwards say "I decided to move my hand from the hot stove" and you genuinely believe that, then that is ego, because it is the imagined sense of control and ownership which you are overlaying on top of the experience.

Yes that's right, desiring something is the same as putting attention on that thing. This is mostly correct except for one thing about the ego. The body is a common identification but it's not actually what ego fundamentally is. Ego is simply the belief that you can imagine what you are. Many imagine themselves as the body, but they can actually imagine themselves as many other things too. They imagine that they experienced the past, that they will experience the future, perhaps they imagine that they are the universe, etc. The variety for identity is really pretty much limitless. This doesn't necessarily increase or decrease the pain perceived in the body, it is desire which does that, and that desire may or may not come from ego. If you desire to avoid pain, it actually creates an emotion to drive you away from that pain in the form of fear/angst, and so yes it brings attention to it which exacerbates it. However, if there is no desire to avoid pain, or if there is even a desire to experience pain for whatever reason, it does "override" the sensation to a degree, because there is no emotional resistance, and furthermore there is going to be some another sensation/emotion which takes its place, like love/excitement/pride/joy. In the case of playing video games, that is a perfect example of how a strong desire can create a feeling of love which can completely override your perception of pain, so yes that is possible. As you said, when you're focused on a game, you don't really notice the pain in the body. That is because you actually have a desire to continue playing the video game despite the pain you are experiencing. This is the exact same thing that happens when you "surrender" to physical pain, but in this case instead of surrendering you are replacing the desire to avoid pain with the desire to continue playing video games. I imagine that the game probably induces a flow state which causes you to ignore the pain too, because the flow state has no "self" in it. In the scenario of sitting for 50 years, the problem with the pain is entirely dependent on your desire, yes. If there is a genuine desire to endure the 50 years, there would be no problem. If there is a desire to preserve the health of the body, there would be a problem. If I am forced to do it with no way out despite having the desire to leave, it is possible to "surrender" to the pain which simply means that I absolve the desire to avoid the pain momentarily because I see no way out of it. It entirely depends on what you want. You could "phase it out" as if you are busy playing a video game, but nonetheless it is biologically programmed that your body will indicate that it is being harmed through pain, and that will create a biological motivation to drive you away from that pain unless for whatever reason you have a desire to stay with that pain. I want to make something very clear about this part though, which is that the sensation of pain itself is infinite. Same goes for the sensation of the body. I imagine you could figure out some technique which "zones you out" of perceiving physical pain in some way, but that is more like a mental "resistance training" because you are training yourself to phase out the literal perception of pain in some way. Samadhi is simply the state of having no ego which "merges you into infinity" because you realize that you exist as something which has no limitations or boundaries. Physical pain does not contradict that state though, because physical pain has no boundaries or limitations to it either, along with the rest of your experience. Physical pain doesn't inherently have anything to do with the ego because you don't imagine it. It is like hearing sound or seeing color.

Welcome. I understand because I've been in it. Happy that you're out.

Why do you need to define something you already are? Can you stop being yourself? If you imagine yourself differently, do you stop being yourself? It's a maladaptive way of seeking out love in other people, caused by trauma.

It's not metaphysical. Do not turn it into something divine or metaphysical. It is your thoughts trying to predict and control reality. Your thoughts are trying to put reality in a box which you can understand. You want to fully understand how the sun rises. You want to completely understand whether you will wake up tomorrow or not. Not knowing the answer to these creates fear, confusion, disruption, because it then causes you to imagine and assume the possibility of those things not happening. It is the incessant desire to control and understand reality through thoughts which leads you to smack your face directly in all the gaps and inconsistencies that your thoughts will never be able to fill. You can never understand or control reality through a thought. Let that realization liberate you. You cannot think reality. It is unbounded by any of your thoughts. It is free.