Someone here

@Breakingthewall Like I said ..it depends how far in the spiritual path you wanna get . If you want full blown God-Consciousness where you understand everything about yourself and reality (a state of omniscience)..then 5 minutes a day won't do that. I meditated for about a month, every waking moment, and achieved the cessation oh the chattering monkey mind. That is the first stage of enlightenment. A lifetime of spiritual reading guided me past that. Achieve the first goal. Then keep at it and go deeper I think First, you have to define spiritual awakening. For me, it means something specific when I use the term. Spiritual awakening, Enlightenment, Self-Realization, and several other terms are all equal and point to the same happening. They all point to a radical and permanent change of our identification. Basically, we see through the mirage called “ego” and are never fooled by the mirage again. With seeing through the ego, all the suffering, seeking, and fear that results from believing the mirage of ego ceases. What can the ego do to overcome the ego? So, there is nothing you can do that will lead to spiritual awakening. Does meditation help? Yes, it does in my opinion. Especially, if it is the simple meditation of being present…just sitting and doing nothing else. Not to get something…just be be still…just to be quiet. Sometimes that is all one needs for spiritual awakening…some time where nothing is being done, just experiencing all that can be experienced, and so thoughts cease happening in the mind. In that silence, there may be a realization. Kind of like when you want to fall asleep at night. There is nothing you can do to cause yourself to fall asleep. Any attempts to try to fall asleep seem to keep us awake. But there are things we can do to make sleep more likely. We can turn off the lights. We can go to a quiet room. We can relax our bodies. Likewise, meditation is just something that might make falling Awake easier to occur.

I don't understand what you mean by that. Try to ask a "full" question .

Careful what you feed your mind . Your thoughts create reality . If you keep telling yourself negative crap ,you gonna attract negative shit in your life . The good news is that it's totally your choice what you focus on ,and thus how you feel.

You said it yourself. Direct experience is the only medium to know things . Everything else is beliefs and assumptions that are often false . Stick with direct experience and you will be seeing amazing results in distinguishing truth from falsehood. The catch of enlightenment is your false beliefs about reality that will get shattered ?

One of the biggest obstacles in this work is "fear of going insane" or losing your mind. But that's the biggest trap. You never had a Mind to lose. You can't go nuts cuz in a sense all states are equal. Trying to keep yourself "sane" if you are doing this work correctly is doomed to fail because "sanity" is a distinction or a limitation that you are trying to maintain but ofcourse reality is groundless and unlimited. In other words insane. Not sane. Not insane.

YOU have to want it. Not your spouse, your family, government, whatever. Only when you, personally, have decided enough is enough, will you be able to quit successfully. Decide. Tell yourself why you want to quit. See alchohol as your enemy. Hate it. Fight it. Man up, buck up. Who's in control? Are you a bitch? Get mad at it. F THAT.

It is actually possible to awaken completely sober without using any drugs .although it's harder and takes a lot of effort. But it's totally possible to awaken using meditation alone. Just begin to cultivate the habit of being fully present to the here and now at all times. Your mind is not accustomed to this at all and is taking you to the past or the future 99% of the time or more. As you begin to cultivate the habit of presence (or no-mind), you will begin to see the magnitude of the habit of being unconscious. It takes practice ,and the mind does not like becoming superfluous! , but it is a simple and direct path. Think of it as a rest for your mind. Your mind will become your friend if it doesn't have to be in charge of impossible things anymore! At any time that you are present to the here and now, you are awake. It's just that at first it's hard to be awake for more than a few seconds at a time. So start with 15 seconds. Focus on something positive , a happy memory or a desired state , for 15 seconds in a row. Or focus on nothing at all for 15 seconds in a row. If your mind starts thinking of anything other than your happy thought or no-thought, then start again. Once you can consistently do 15 seconds, work toward 30 seconds, then 60 seconds. If you can get to 60 seconds, you will probably have discovered how profoundly different being awake is from most people's normal state. And your life will change.

You can try raw Maca magic roots . It comes in a powered version. It has the same benefits and works exactly as the capsules. The key though is to be persistent and take it every single day for two weeks at least and you indubitably will experience the benefits. For me it has helped me immensely I'm curing my chronic fatigue. Maca does not contain caffeine or any other stimulant, but it can increase your levels of energy. For that reason,I recommend that you take it first thing in the morning. If you work in the night or want an extra boost on a given night you could also try taking Maca in the evening. Good luck and let me know if you have any questions ?

I think meditation is just about realizing you are not your mind. That’s it. If you wish to go further in your awakening work you have to raise your consciousness . Meditation just helps you realize that You are not all those thoughts, commands, judgments and noise running through your mind, not that nagging, narrating, psychologically assessing voice in your head. You are the Awareness of that voice, and all thoughts. And since You are only Awareness, which has no thoughts, just beingness & observation, the true You is always still, silent, and resting in a peace that passeth all understanding, pure bliss. Watching all that noise. While knowing It is not that noise. Imagine the freedom! Even if you never ‘progress’ any further (to samadhi, self-realization, ‘enlightenment,’ whatever)

@Michael569 sorry I didn't clarify ..Because that's not how I feel . That's ONLY half the story . In the back of my mind I'm of course anxious about the damage I'm doing to my body and health . So I'm split off into two different islands. One that doesn't give a shit and just wants to smoke like there is no tomorrow. And one that deep down knows that this is not the right thing for me to do . Which one I gonna win ? I don't know .

I think it does require a doctor's prescription like other anti-psychotic drugs . So I'm gonna ask my therapist to prescribe it to me . Thanks for the suggestion.

OK good news . Can I get it from any pharmacy without a prescription? Or does it require my therapist's prescription?

The willpower works when there is a wish or desire to leave the smoking. here to leave the smoking is not the desire.it is not the wish. every smoker's inner desire is to continue smoking. so the willpower doesn't work

Sounds good . So it is unlike other antidepressants that come with a huge list of bad side effects. And I'm especially worried about the erectile dysfunction thing lol. What family of drugs is it? Because Most prescription antidepressants are part of a drug family called SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors). They work on raising levels of serotonin in the body but unfortunately It prevents the hormones that cause our bodies to respond to sex from transmitting their message to our brains. Also, how exactly does it help with quitting smoking?

OK. Might try to get some and test it out . Any possible effects to be mindful of ?

I'm afraid There ’s no real alternative . I used nicotine chewing gum once before but even the mild types gave me headaches. I tried vaping of course . It doesn't smell as good as a fine ciggy. It is not for me, not for me though as it irritates my throat and I’m actually concerned at how much nicotine it is possible to vape in the course of a day. I heard that the liquid used in vapes is more damaging and dangerous than the toxins in regular cigarettes. Is that correct? The only sure-fire way is to just hard stop. It’s tough. And I don't know how to do that yet . And also I don't want to especially replace it with sugar (you mentioned lollipops) because I'm beginning to gain a weight and grow a belly and I'm trying to clean up my diet (how ironic ?) and lean down.

Yeah I can relate ? I think It has to do with the amount of focus and anticipation you have. If you’re really looking forward to something that is all you want to think about. But if all you do is think about it you get bored. You have to train yourself to think about other things while you wait. You might say, “Heck no! I’m excited about this. Heck with other stuff.” What if you’re waiting days or weeks or even longer? You’re going to get bored to the point that you get frustrated and that can diminish your enjoyment of the thing you’re anticipating. You’re way better off finding other things to enjoy while you wait. Time will still go by whether you’re paying attention to it or not .

Exactly. But only for advanced mediators. The essence of meditation is concentration. When we concentrate intensely, without much interference, time seems to go by very slowly. The opposite of like when we are engrossed in a movie that was very captivating, when the film finally ends we think, where did the time go. It goes on really fast. So it's a matter of concentration and focus . P.S what the heck is "paraphernalia"?ffs where do you get these words from ?

@Osaid you're welcome . And btw ..it's not just gonna increase your sex drive ..its gonna give you extra energy..you will become so energised that you won't know what to make of yourself lol.. I have been using maca for a couple of months now. And I must say it gave me the energy to do my workouts properly. Before using it, I could not keep training for long. Now I have more energy during my workouts and can do more reps. There will be no harm to your body if you don’t exceed the daily dose of 3mg a day. I also use maca because it gives me extra minerals and vitamins I need.

Sunfood Gelatinized Maca Capsules.

The world has been at war since the Middle Ages. Back then it was called the Crusades, these days it is called the war against terror. As we all know this has been a very brutal and expensive war. There has never been a single name for this war, it flares up from time to time with individual names, but since it is because of belief systems, let's call it, "The Belief System War." Most belief systems are religions. Religions provide reasons for our existence and for our morality. They are all based on faith because they can't be proven to be true. We also have atheism (or nihilism) which is considered to be a belief system even though it is not actually a system. Therefore, what we have are belief systems that are not actually provable and a belief non-system. As time goes on the differences between these ideas are what cause "The Belief System War." So I have a question. First ,when does spirituality turn into a religion? And why does religion which is supposed to be aiming for unity and peace and equality turns out to be the biggest cause of war in the world ? Religion was not meant to fight, it is to create way to love, to heal, to help society, to create joy. And if a person calling himself/herself as religious person is not heading into the direction of bliss and is burning with anger or hatred then I am sorry to say to such a person ..Sorry my dear friend, you have created a war in name of someone who only gave love to this world. Period.

Maca roots are amazing for libido, these days when I have an orgasm, it is extremely intense to the point I have almost passed out. At times, I could barely get out of bed without resting for 10 minutes.

Thanks, Mr. links

My motivation is to heal my Lungs which are severely damaged due to years of smoking .I can actually feel the burning sensation in my chest . And I'm afraid to catch a throat cancer or lungs cancer or heart attack etc . So many reasons to quit . But they all boil down to saving my health .

But I can't make that decision. I tried many times in the past .I keep coming back . Sometimes I spend half an hour hesitating ,"should I put this cigarette in my mouth or not ". And I end up smoking it .