Terell Kirby

Ralston differs from a traditional Buddhist in that instead of silencing your mind, he wants you to become conscious of what it’s doing and why it’s doing what it’s doing. He’s like a mad scientist of Consciousness in this way. The idea that emotions happen to us and that we have no involvement of how interpret, process and act on emotion is deemed as a conceptual activity of the mind that reinforces your conceptual sense of self. When he says stop thinking, he really means stop interpreting your thoughts and emotions in ways that give them power over what’s actually the case, which is that they are fabrications of the Mind and ego meant to distract you from the Truth

This forum is one of the few places where we engage in controversial topics like truth and survival. Most online and public forums would shut this stuff down a long time ago-way too threatening. I’m seeing a trend of discussions getting more and more serious in the subject of Truth, which is good.

+1 what “rational” human would? These teachings are liable to get the teacher killed in certain places. Did Jesus make a career off of spreading Truth? Not even close, they crucified him instead. This is the reality of human survival.

Lol

Money exists as a tool for survival. Humans are survival zombies so money (or any other form of currency) holds tremendous value for humans across multiple cultures. Why do you even want to be happy in the first place? Our notions of happiness are culturally programmed for the most part (ie. avoidance of pain, pursuit of pleasure). Society is already starting to see the limits of culturally programmed definitions of happiness.

@Leo Gura thanks for not charging money for your content - YouTube / blog. It’s already hard enough for common folk to see the value in the teachings, just imagine if they had to pay for it It would be like paying money to get slapped across the face with a plank of wood- extremely inconvenient. Money can’t buy a human’s desire for Truth

In 2025, i'm less dependent on validation from socializing- much of that is a result of this work. But I do need to be careful not isolate, deep understanding of the structure of reality can make you retreat into your own Mind-there are profound tradeoffs as it relates to human relationships. I am also an extrovert (ENFP on Myers Briggs to be exact), so I admit I get energy from socializing and relating to humans. Bringing that in balance with time with God is challenging, but a worthy endeavor. I'm also auditing my career path, getting it more aligned with my value system in 2026

love me some hot yoga Consumerism culture in America

I clearly explained it in my post. Read past the first sentence

Bit of a strawman of the post. The ontology of an intellectual matters. Not only that, but a philosopher who hasn't had insight into the nature and structure of reality through meditative practice has a flawed metaphysics. It's critical one has a proper metaphysics to do serious intellectual work. I also wouldn't categorize Tim Snyder as a philosopher- he is a political historian, similar to Stephen Kotkin, they are doing good work, but not focused on philosophical questions of metaphysics at all. John Vervaeke would be a good model of a serious intellectual that Leo is talking about.

Early 2000s- hip hop cultures obsession with oversized white T shirts in rap videos:

@Nemra Leo says we are monkeys unless we watch all 50 hours Something about monkey life seems refreshing

IFS is used by many therapist and support groups worldwide. There's also a 12 step support group call ACA (Adult Children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Families) which is an interesting lens on IFS related concepts. It brings God and spirituality into things, which is somewhat problematic, but community meetings / group support are helpful

This is what integrity looks like--an example of placing one's values at the front and center of politics, this is protesting MAGA the right way. Trump and his goons are pathetic in using lawsuits to extract revenge on people who dissent from their bullshit https://www.npr.org/2025/12/27/g-s1-103808/kennedy-center-lawsuit-chuck-redd-cancellation-trump

hope its far away- still catching up on the homework from part 2 ..

Tried to reduce red to atoms but all i got was red

S. Kotkin has a great lecture on authoritarianism. Leo is right, his political perspective is very mature, knowledgable & credible:

Hair weave, hair extensions. Sewing horse hair on your scalp in general.

Most people have conformed to having kids without putting much thought into it. Seems you are making the process a conscious one by thinking it thru- good stuff. I love children- but legacy is not a top value of mine. If you genuinely value legacy, I could see kids being a good thing

Depends on the nature of the breakup I would say. If they dumped you it will be hard to maintain a friendship vs. if it was a mutual decision out of love and respect. Many ex’s will try to keep you around after dumping you as it makes it emotionally easier for them- but they have no intention of getting back with you and will move on faster while you are holding out hope

This one hits home for me. Its especially evident if you grew up in a poor family with not a lot of money

This one is a big for me. Even in my 30s it hasn’t completely sunk in. The quality of our life is mostly contingent on the effort we give in making it beautiful Good luck in 2026

Sending / received text messages and phone calls while assuming someone is on the other end of the message / phone (this was actually a scary one for me)

it's a heavy series, im on episode 15 -- pairs well with many of the Actualized teachings: Vervaeke himself is not conscious of Absolute Truth from what I can tell, but he lectures in such a captivating and wise manner-- there stands something quite profound to learn from him.

Quite the opposite. There’s nothing natural about harmony at all- social environments have to be configured in such a way where harmonious relations between humans can be facilitated. Also- harmony itself not an absolute good. Harmonious groups delude themselves about all sorts of things. At least a forum space like this allows us to challenge perspectives and prevent echo chambers and paradigm lock. It would be wise to drop the fantasy of harmony being an absolute good altogether. ps. It’s funny how ppl complain about the forum but don’t take any action to leave or engage with it in a way that they feel will elevate it. It’s like the psychology grad who sits on ass all day complaining about to corporations and the economy yet refuses to apply for a job or start a business of his own