The0Self

^^ @Chives99 Pretty much, yeah.

Here you go: Plain description of the general fundamentals of what happens, from pre-awakening, to total liberation; the beginning of what can happen after total liberation. It says "(Intro)" -- it's an introductory description of the actual whole path though. And if some degree of awakening is already a lived-reality for you, this will resonate. But, as he actually says in the comments, "move beyond the map and (re) inherit the territory."

What the separate self is at the most fundamental level, in the realm of consciousness and discernibility, is pure consciousness. But of course, there is no separate self. When consciousness becomes absolute (or rather all delusion is dispelled), something else is revealed that is certainly not consciousness (there's no way to imagine it, and certainly not while having preconceptions that it is consciousness) -- it's the absolutely-most fundamental, and it's un-expectable. It's not even in time -- the time/consciousness(subject)/perception(object) tripod is only a reflection of it. Again, consciousness is what the separate self is at the most fundamental level... But there is no separate self. You could say there's only the sole beholder, but there's nothing to see, since there are no parts to view. "Non-relative awareness" one could say, but it's too close for "consciousness-of" to be possible. It's pure intimacy and timeless, and not in consciousness. It's not that consciousness is false -- it's what is -- truly, it's more like it's just another sense like any of the others; seeing, hearing, feeling.

After a shift when I was 23 years old, psychedelics went from hallucinations of angels and aliens and whatnot (and some genuine reality-breaking insight as well), to just increasing conscious power by such an enormous amount that the egoic process disappears, and opening up illusion-breaking beyond-time God-realization -- which is basically an un-hallucination. No more hallucinations -- I suspect because nothing discernible is any more hallucinatory than any other. Damndest thing really. And come to think of it, it definitely is at least associated with a falling away of existential fears, and existential needs.

The following is intense and dubstep-ey -- the sound isn't for everyone, it seems: I would definitely recommend silence, but if you want music, those are examples that will do just fine. Preferably play them loudly with nice signal processor, mids, subwoofer, etc -- but that of course doesn't really matter.

A relative danger in not taking them is not having the knowledge that your authority as God can be revisited. That is a concession though. The danger in taking them, on the other hand, is simply suffering -- exacerbated if the character (reflection of the underlying true nature) is either 1. not ready, or 2. their ego structure is in just the right setup to clash with psychedelics, or 3. they get the insight but don't take the hint that you can do this work without psychedelics, as that's where 99% of the truth is. Psychedelics are both the cherry on top and also a potential cheat or sneak peak of what's possible. I can neither recommend them nor not recommend them. For me, they were essential, but paradoxically I never actually needed them -- after you already use them to find that God realization or even higher (the highest, if you don't prefer to describe the absolute/fundamental as God) is possible (because you went there), they just provide keys at key points. An ongoing, burning-away-falsehood, natural self inquiry driven by unshakable curiosity and passion for alignment, groove, and expansion... this is where the money's at. Earlier attitude of this may be "What is everything?" You know you're on the right track when the internal egoic attitude is something like "Come on man... you don't need to look there! Stop that! This is not where we wanna go!!" Though until you get to the point where that happens automatically, you can perhaps strong-arm your way into initial genuine direct insights in something beyond finitude and separate identity. Don't take this too seriously -- at the highest levels it's recognized that reality truly isn't in a certain way, as the actual fundamentals of reality are constantly shuffling and therefore there is no real universality, which can't really be seen until after total enlightenment (which has finality yet is paradoxically ongoing).

When consciousness becomes absolute (or rather all delusion is dispelled), something else is revealed that is certainly not consciousness (there's no way to imagine it, and certainly not while having preconceptions that it is consciousness) -- it's absolutely-most fundamental, and un-expectable. It's not even in time -- the time/consciousness/perception tripod is a reflection of it. Consciousness is what the separate self is at the most fundamental level... But there is no separate self. You could say there's only the sole beholder, but there's nothing to see, since there are no parts to view. "Non-relative awareness" one could say, but it's too close for "consciousness-of" to be possible. It's not that consciousness is false -- it's what is -- it's more like it's just another sense like any of the others; seeing, hearing, feeling.

No it means there is the imagination that there is connection to another dream also being imagined. Nothing contradicts truth, because it’s not anything describable or fixed. The only true bedrock is no bedrock at all. The only true self is no self at all.

Even the imagination that God is sovereign, while it is true... any conceptual grasp of it will be a layer of illusion. To understand any deep insights like this, you need deep insight. You can facilitate this by doing one pointed inquiry into the self, or something like this or exactly this: allow and lean toward thought activity/movement and resistance, and collapse the distance and be so closely oriented toward it, that what is being resisted disappears and reveals another layer, and so on. A sign that you’re on the right track is this sort of attitude from the mind: “Come on, man... Stop that! You just don’t look at that, man! ?”

@Vincent S There is never a point where exploration can’t go further — not that I see. With that said though, there is definitely a finality to the sense of separation being gone, because when it’s not there, it’s the loudest thing in the room at all times. It’s like a slap in the face that never ends, but the slap is only beauty without comparison.

Only when things are seen as radically distinct, are they truly not separate.

The key that you are just necessarily missing until you've awakened beyond nonduality: reality isn't in a certain way. As in the actual structure of reality is constantly shuffling; there is no solid background reality. Impermanent; transient, but absolutely so... and that's the stillness. The singular frame of reality (all of them, though there really is no continuity) is gone as it appears, since the stillness of a phenomenon is simultaneous with its dissolution -- in a way this is how the illusion of time is so robust. At the highest levels of insight, it's beyond-beyond (infinitely fundamental/subtle) the usual insights that are bound by consciousness itself. You don't understand this insight in the usual sense, because the reality more fundamental than context and even consciousness is revealed. You don't know it, it's beyond knowing, because there is only that. It might seem like consciousness can't not be fundamental, or that when I say beyond (more fundamental than) consciousness, what I really mean is some kind of ultimate consciousness... No... I really do mean literally more fundamental than consciousness. Absolute being unbound by the trio/tripod of time-subject-object.

Anyone can do it if they authentically want to -- which in a sense everyone does, yet no one wants to pay the price. Not calling Leo out here, because it simply comes with the territory -- being in liberation territory and sharing your insights as you have them... But someone putting themselves above others and considering themselves special is a red flag. Some teachers have a need for validation and being seen as special, and thus are not (yet, at least) qualified to teach. Again in Leo's case it just comes with the territory. I am in liberation territory myself, but I'm not above others -- if I believed that, then I'd be deluded.

It's a good thing Leo made that video otherwise some here really would be going down an egoic seeking road with solipsism as a concept. The video is completely consistent with solipsism -- if it sounds otherwise, open your mind up to the possibility that you might need to go back to the drawing board... not for your conceptual understanding of realty (unimportant in comparison) but for where you're headed.

Basically when your ego is still overly running the show to a degree, what truth manifesting as your insight can sometimes say is that “you can have Heaven all the way over there if you want” — your job is to follow that and say “but I want to be less far from you.” (so to speak anyway) The ego wants to feel good, but not as much as it wants to survive — it’s just how seeking presents. And it’s just the nature of loops.

In case I forgot... meant to post this: Simple yet rather complete, accurate, and useful and relatable overview of the path.

Imagine being in love with Brad Pitt, even when he's playing the role of Hitler (or "bad person" / whomever).

Definitely Moreover... It's not even like it's just a good thing to have, it's that literally: if it's not there, then you're simply not travelling in the direction pointed toward what you're authentically aiming for, and so the view involved with that is a trap and a distortion. That's a very foundational thing that I seemed to understand conceptually for a while, but couldn't understand what it actually meant and couldn't trust it fully (with impossibility of doubt) until authentically deep awakenings. Just a suggestion for some general content and frameworks pertaining to this sort of beyond-awakening territory (if one chooses to continue practice even after awakenings with finality/totality to them, which I do recommend ); maybe for potential ideas/openings: Rob Burbea's work on "Soulmaking Dharma" (or Soul Making Dharma). If you haven't heard of it, you might be surprised how advanced it is. You can easily skip that particular manifestation (of this avenue you're exploring/expanding the subtlety of), but it's definitely congruent with beyond-awakening practice. I believe dharmaseed.org has all his talks on the subject. My intuition is it's not particularly the best thing for pre-awakening practice, but it's just a framework anyway, and obviously nothing that needs to be taken too seriously.

Yep Watching your video really resonated. I've had a similar experience. Wouldn't say it was as deep (or less deep or more deep) than yours. At the higher levels of this stuff we're doing, even the distinction between universal and particular can dissolve beyond imagination. That's how you know when solipsism isn't taking you in the wrong direction (as it probably very often can) -- when higher awakening coincides with deeper intimacy.

Thinking about them can only get you so far in answering existential questions. You have to actually wake up for it to be anything other than mere concept or (if you're lucky) intuition subject to doubt. Practices and passionate inquiry. What is mme who?u? Just for example: 1. See what the present perception says. 2. Then see it as inner phenomena rather than a solid external reality or story, and dis-identify from it by seeing it as an object, putting distance between you and it. 3. Then close the distance by, rather than going back to number 1 (seeing what it says), see what it's made of. And see/feel/intuit that you, aware only of your self, are a singularity that includes the very movement that seemed to form that perception. Or any similar serious (and eventually, necessarily fearless) inquiry. The point is just to stay in unbound non-conceptual consciousness, and not lose contact with it, even in the midst of perceptions appearing and disappearing, not allowing them to say anything to you. With a very one-pointed active flow of refusal to activate/move/contract/flex the "identity-formation muscle." Genuine insights and awakening arise out of this sort of space. Just one way to go about it, but the actual process of insight has a distinct quality that can only be learned by curiously going about inquiring with deep yearning for truth, or freedom from the false (perceptual filters).

Looking at the title had me a little worried , because I had a similar profound experience (and associated abiding insight) before a fuller, more complete awakening later down the road. But I was pleasantly reassured, especially after having seen most of it (haven't finished). This seems to be, even if nothing else, a skillful way to decrease the number of folks without a proper awakening (or even just enough genuine insight) taking solipsism and awakening down the wrong path.

Infinity holds infinite infinities.

Just checked out the vid. The way I see it he's not talking on that level. What you describe is reifying "other Gods" and expecting it to somehow be an existential error that isn't common to doing the same for reifying "typing on a screen on an internet forum with people other than this one" as we are doing now. It's obvious there aren't really other Gods in the ultimate sense, but obviously the opposite isn't true either -- in order for any distinct God to appear as distinct, it has to imagine itself to be separate from the whole. Whether it believes it and gets engrossed in it (by its own doing, so to speak) is what awakening is all about. It's not complicated at all, it's just extremely subtle. Though it's NOT subtle when separation is seen through -- it's no longer a conceptual understanding at all. Until dualistic consciousness is seen through this just isn't obvious. The appearances are totality; they're also a reflection of truth. Hallucinations nonetheless, in a sense. The consciousness of the appearances though... is not even a hallucination, it's an illusion.

You're correct, nonduality is not the end of the awakening process -- though it does have finality since separate identity is seen-through irreversibly. When enlightenment happens there's no one else who is unawake, so it's hard to talk about this, but anyway... Examples of not just fully enlightened, but also those who have abided here in this way long enough to be effective as a teacher: Bernadette Roberts, Rob Burbea, Jed McKenna (pseudonym; likely born Peder Sweeney) Currently accessible: Angelo Dilullo MD (Simply Always Awake), Adyashanti And plenty of Zen teachers. And I don't know if Leo has been awake long enough and in such a way for him to effectively do one-on-one guidance for liberation -- I certainly can't yet. I think it probably takes like 10 years but that's basically just a slightly educated guess. That's just off the top of my head, not wanting to make a mistake somehow by listing more. There are certainly many more -- especially for nonduality, but enlightenment on the other hand is really uncommon in relation... So to speak... But again when enlightenment happens it's obvious that truly, no one is really unenlightened anyway. And your intuition is correct, that there are no enlightened "people." Any one who relates to another one is not the enlightened one, but an after-image of the underlying enlightened truth -- the clothes (ego-suit) that the unbound-by-ego enlightened one wears. Something that I imagine very easily gets mistaken for enlightenment, but is actually not even nondual recognition, is a sort of state that can be brought about with self inquiry, concentration + insight practice, even psychedelics sometimes... Many, including Adyashanti, call it Witnessing. Or "The Witness." Akilesh (Sifting to the Truth; perhaps enlightened but has definitely at the very least reached nonduality) calls it the spacious mind. Rob Burbea called it the vastness of awareness. It's kind of like you're God looking in at experience rather than out (though it's not really describable so definitely don't take that literally; it's kind of a figure-ground-reversal), and seeking and self and objects are replaced with pure consciousness without conceptual activity; pure subjectivity. This is an incredibly blissful state, but it's not nondualty, and certainly isn't enlightenment... though it's very easily going to be virtually synonymous with what's called initial kensho... and as long as you don't think you've personally attained enlightenment, you'll definitely at least realize that enlightenment is real (truth exists). When the consciousness and the world disappears (often, but not necessarily, after spending a lot of time in this Witnessing state), that's nonduality -- identity is seen through; self falls away in a sense. When the perceptual filters responsible for constructing a self, themselves (the filters/layers of contracted energetic illusion) fall away though, via an ongoing automatic curiosity-desire-inquiry... that is associated with enlightenment.

For real like what the fuck... Interestingly I never really followed Peter Ralston's stuff anyway. Bernadette Roberts and Rob Burbea were far more clear imo, and now there's a new guy Angelo Dilullo MD who guides even more clearly and effectively than probably anyone I've heard of. Maybe Ralston meant abiding higher consciousness -- but even the idea of psychedelics not facilitating that...is dubious in my experience... it really is . I don't know how it is for others, but for me? Holy crap psychedelics were like one of (if not the most) important things. Same seemed to be the case for Michael Taft -- but interestingly he doesn't give any guidance whatsoever on psychedelics, so he also seems to think meditation is where it's at... even though his awakening literally happened on a huge dose of LSD (pretty common theme, huh? )... though he (Taft) did attribute the awakening to situations being perfect that day -- he had just moved to Japan, he was with a like-minded friend, he'd had a perfect day or something, and he ended up deciding he could die right there, and so he did, and never came back... But of course, it is still the case that it happened on LSD... for fuck's sake... (On the other hand, while Michael Taft speaks very highly of what >>700 psychedelic trips did for him, he also says that he noticed negative effects in many others who used it, so he probably sees it as very clearly not a one size fits all approach -- but then again, probably just about nothing is foolproof.) Although I will relent that there is a different axis of development -- doubtless abidance in truth, or whatever you want to call abiding absence of separation and subject-object filters -- which depends far more on immediate desire for alignment with absolute truth here and now, than one's ability to let go into psychedelic ego death. While essentially nothing is more powerful than psychedelics... also there is nothing is more powerful than self inquiry done right, with steady unshakable passion to wake up to absolute truth come heaven or hell, life or death, right then and there. But even so, Ralston just completely does not resonate here on this one.