Flyboy

I'm not sure how familiar you are with the Path or maps of it, so forgive me if you already know this... but there is MUCH more beyond Stream Entry, so don't rest on it, even if it feels amazing (and it is an awesome accomplishment). But many have said it is less than 1% of the full thing, with huge shifts in your everyday experience ahead of you. Also, after your first cessation you should be capable of "cycling", or going through a full spiritual high/low cycle (including dark night) in a much shorter period of time (like sometimes less than an hour), ending in repeat cessations. This "review" phase can continue for some time, but will eventually begin another macro cycle which will put you through the full process again. Completing that will land you the next "Path", and another major shift. Really recommend reading MCTB if you haven't already.

I've watched it 3 times and cried every time. Watching it with your own mother is a particularly moving experience. Pure, genuine, human truth and love <3

Sounds like you had one, congrats. Stream Entry How did you get there, if I may ask?

You should definitely read the book Radical Honesty

I can only speak for myself, but I started my journey weirdly by awakening my third eye almost right away. It literally went through a very painful 6 month process of decalcifying (during which I had crazy storms of electricity and vibration in my head, tons of insomnia). As it eventually matured though, my sleep started to get really wild, with mystical visions and entrance into other realms becoming a common experience. Some of these felt like breakthroughs and had lasting effects in waking life--for example, my vision got super clear and kind of holographic in early January and has remained so permanently (like halfway between normal and Mushroom vision). I have awoken at night several times to Kundalini surges happening through my spine. It's hard to make sense of these, but based on the follow-on events, I think the January shift was crossing the A&P stage, as it was followed by a pretty solid dark night. I have continued to vipassana since then and am still working my way through cycles of Re-Obs / Equanimity, still feel like I have a ways to go to cessation though.

Sam Harris has glimpses but is probably not even past stream entry. I read Waking Up and wasn't impressed. He falls into many of the traps of materialism (implicit beliefs in science / materialism). But he has his purpose, just like Jordan Peterson. Sam Harris is PERFECT for hardcore stage Orange people who are looking for something "more". He is relatable enough to them to have credibility, yet encourages subjective exploration of consciousness. With some luck, they will open their minds a little after hearing him speak, and as they explore they will eventually start growing out of Orange.

Awesome thanks for sharing!

Glad to help! Not Knowing and MCTB are totally different approaches, but ultimately complementary. I struggled to integrate what I read in MCTB for several months, especially if you're a Leo fan. Shinzen's "Science of Enlightenment" and Frank Yang helped me eventually reconcile it, mostly. Let me know if you get stuck on this like I did. After MCTB you will finally understand what meditation really is, but even then, there is a long way to go. But that will keep you busy for quite some time

To learn concentration, read: The Mind Illuminated To learn insight practice, read: MCTB and Seeing that Frees For peak experiences: do many different psychedelics and different dosages, combine with integration and contemplation and intention. To unravel the self, I'd combine Ralston's Book of Not Knowing with contemplation, journaling, shadow work, and self-inquiry. Keep mixing the self-inquiry with meditation as well, as it will get more effective when you can enter higher jhanic states. Finally, accept NO GROUND. Whatever you realize, let it go, and keep going. Do this forever, even if you think you realize God. This is the key to not getting stuck somewhere.

@Being Frank YangFrank, at some point would you mind doing a detailed video / blog on how you actually did the meditative practices that were so effective for you? I'd love know what you mean when you say things like "Vipassanize the air, go from solid to liquid to gas, expand to infinity and collapse to nothing, drop the center", or more detail on what your day-day practice was like, obstacles you encountered, traps you fell into, etc. Some of your language is difficult to interpret when it comes to the actual practice Especially in the 3 years you spent prior to Stream Entry, what was that progress like? I'm working very hard on the path of insight but it's challenging to know if I'm really doing it correctly or making real progress to my first cessation. Thanks again for posting here and adding to the discussion, it's extremely valuable.

@Leo Gura How do you get around the fact of the NOW being the only thing that exists? Your own teachings have given me incredible illumination into how the mind works, especially when it comes to recognizing concepts vs present reality. This is inescapable when you talk about psychedelics--all psychedelic experiences are immediately relegated to past experience, which is merely a concept occurring in the NOW. Thus, they become maps of the territory as soon as they end. Wouldn't it be more accurate to say you have experienced God than to say you have realized God, because in the moment you are reading this, that is not your momentary experience? (I would only define realization as something I experience right now, always) I have heard you say that time doesn't matter when it comes to enlightenment, but I simply disagree. The now is all there is, and if it isn't NOW, then it is just thoughts, concepts, and feelings occurring in your mental stream.

Yup, this is one of the great combos. LSD is like the golden road to a great DMT trip, possibly because of the synergy in 5-HT2P receptor action. I don't generally advocate mixing drugs, but this one might be a worthwhile exception.

Frank, I love this and it has cleared up a lot for me, but something is still confusing me. Leo talks about "everything is God", yet you speak of "No Self" (which to me means, basically, not even God exists? that everything just is?) I have a hard time with this because in a way it's coming back to reality being completely mysterious. Is this what you truly mean? Or is "God" still the point, just one that is truly All of the Above, as in Everything AND Nothing, Unity AND separation, Infinity AND dog poop. This makes sense to me, but I'm still trying to understand what you really mean by No Self.

@Leo Gura I really appreciate your reply. Isn't imagining still a concept inside the dream? Couldn't you disregard anything and promote anything by using this language? Isn't presuming you are God when we are talking about realizing God begging the question? What if the Truth about God was beyond even Absolute Infinity, as infinity is still a concept that exists within our limited reality (like rationality itself)? To be clear, I agree with you, I just want the argument to be as strong and clean as possible, for my own understanding and that of others. My objective in challenging you is NOT to argue but to clarify my own understanding. I care about this deeply and see the truth in it, and am committed to this path with all my energy. For me, psychedelics are not an option (brain receptor injury), so I must figure out how to get there the "hard" way. Meditation seems to be the only road open to me, so I'm trying to understand it deeply.

It seems to me that the biggest difference between Leo's teachings and Frank's is the "Knot of Perception." By taking meditation to its ultimate conclusion, the illusion of reality being "dead" is finally broken (this is an actual change in mental processing, where the mind no longer makes models of reality which are updated, but instead perceives it directly, 1 to 1 with sensate information). When reality is seen as it IS, there is NO ROOM left for any "self", and the dependently originating and infinitely intelligent / interconnected nature of every particle of existence is perceived in real-time to be alive, aware of itself, and part of the infinite loop of existence. This infinite loop starts with you, and in the NOW continuously expands to infinite mind (through a God-mind version of the conceptual chain (ala Derrida), where every concept leads to other concepts until all of infinity is invoked, which then collapses back into infinite causality which manifests you (and every other particle) in every instant. All of this happens Everywhere, in the Now, with Everything. It is the great cosmic snake, with no center, no self, springing from Nothing but encompassing Everything: Leo's teachings focus on the God-mind part - the part of this loop where all of infinity is known and comprehended. Frank focuses on the whole loop. You guys are talking about the same reality though. When Frank says you are projecting a separate self onto reality, it's like when Leo talks about projecting math onto reality -- the concepts within "understanding" are like math - very close, but not quite IT. And of course, they never can be. Reality can only ever BE Reality. @Being Frank Yang I would love to know if you agree with this.

Edit: Love the discussion in the other thread. Really appreciate this kind of discussion between two people I really enjoy learning from.

How seriously do you consider the possibility that they have created a blind spot for you, though? I have heard you say "I was put on this earth to do psychedelics", and other such things. Your latest video actually demonstrated that you do not really understand what a cessation is (per Ingram and others, there is NO conscious experience during a cessation. Consciousness stops completely, like a frame taken out of a movie reel. As you come back you witness reality restarting before your eyes. If there was ANY conscious experience during the cessation it was not a cessation). That is widely considered to be only the first step towards enlightenment (stream entry), followed by wildly more powerful experiences and insights farther down the path. While I don't discredit the depth you are achieving in "understanding" reality with psychedelics, have you considered that maybe you are going very far on an axis of awakening that isn't IT, per se? For example, multiple respected teachers describe direct experience with the Source (ie. Nothingness) as a stage beyond God-realization, and that even this is not "it", as it is still an extremely subtle identifying. You talk about it not being "ego", but do you consider that EGO could ultimately refer to ANY kind of identification, even with being God, or with understanding itself? Ultimately "understanding" is the final thing to let go of, resulting in a complete return to THIS, NOW. Are you able to let go of understanding? Are you able to let go of God? Could the paradox be that until you do let these things go, you can go no farther?

I eat, therefore I am. Meta-bolism. Try it. Great discussion though

I second this request. I have seen the value in your work, and have thus invested a huge amount of my time learning from you. To my dismay, though, almost no one I recommend you to will listen to you long enough to realize "where you are actually coming from", as these traits tend to put them off very easily and they make hasty judgments. I admit that even with pretty significant personal tolerance for this, I had to listen to quite a few of your videos before I was really "sure" that you weren't coming from a place of narcissism. It's an unfortunate barrier for many, as the holism in your work is unparalleled. A specific request would be for you to soften the tone of authority; if you look at your own progression you went from the "eager explorer" to talking as a "master"; in other words, you basically always speak as if from above. Even if true, people pick up on this. It's super hard to convince people who don't have a clue why you are "above" to accept your authority as fact. It appears like spiritual narcissism. I think the best and most truly developed Master would be humble and soft, knowing that their grace and wisdom would shine through. Masculine-style love only works when there is established trust, and you don't automatically have that with strangers.

I'm a cancer. I am one of the most anti-manipulation people in the universe. Fiercely independent. I don't rely on friends to give me a sense of worth at all. I don't work particularly well in teams, and harmony is almost never my goal. I'm rarely suspicious about people. I don't care much at all about my reputation or what people think of me. I can be very competitive (I was a fighter pilot). I am almost never offended and if I am, I deal with it extremely directly. I absolutely never shy away from an open confrontation. I am more logical than intuitive, yet I am very open. I am bold and forceful, and rarely would be described by the word subtle. The calendar does not define you or who you become. Sorry astrology.

Somehow I think this conversation just went way over my head........

I feel like there's some phrase out there for this argument... something about epidermal follicles, being divided......

The Book of Not Knowing - the single best deconstruction of "self" I have ever found, though more of a guide to your first "glimpse" than to a permanent understanding; however, the deconstruction can benefit anyone and will break you out of ideology in a profoundly personal way MCTB - How to actually get enlightened, the hard and permanent way: unraveling the knot of perception; also a fantastic source for understanding what is NOT enlightenment (such as formless Jhanas) The Science of Enlightenment - Shinzen Young's explanation clears up some of the technicality in MCTB with an approachable framework The Mind Illuminated - How to master the concentration side of meditation (which will support the insight side of it) Seeing that Frees - A truly advanced guide to some of the highest insights on your path

I think it's worth remembering that all of these energy models are MODELS, based at best on subjective experience. They are likely to vary significantly from person to person and based on your own interpretation of their meanings (and unfortunately, by your expectations to a large degree as well). They are also heavily influenced by the dogma and culture of their originating source, so really watch out for that. Investigate your experiences openly, but never "believe" what they say will or should happen. One thing is for sure... the body-mind is a highly complex and interdependent system. As such, balance, observation, awareness, and gentle experimentation are always going to be keys to success. Expect unexpected consequences and instabilities. Which I personally think is a good reason to be really clear about why you want to do energy work... Do you want to be enlightened? Do you want powers? Is it for emotional health? It may or may not actually support those goals, so I'd consider that carefully. I personally decided to leave Kundalini alone until I am much farther on the path, as I started realizing how difficult/destructive it can be when unbalanced.

Guru Viking would be an awesome experience, he's very experienced, down to earth, and highly multi-perspectival. I'd also personally really love to see you talk to Frank Yang. I know you guys disagree on some things, but that disagreement would be incredibly interesting and illuminating to hear discussed in a mature way (and I think Frank would be willing to). This would be my #1 most desired video that you could make at this point, as it would help us all understand the nuances between a steady-state "traditional" enlightenment and psychedelic enlightenment--from two people that I deeply respect.