JC Bailey

I'm looking for the ultimate book that I could hand to someone, which will clearly reveal their self-deception and (more specifically) how they are trapped in a web of beliefs. Ideally, I want this book to: - Be easy to read (a child or elder should be able to understand it). - Be as short & concise as possible. - Be approachable for someone who's new to philosophy and epistemology. - Focus on the deceptive nature of language/beliefs/concepts, and point the reader in the direction of actuality/consciousness. - Not include too much religious or cultural baggage/dogma. - An explanation of how to deconstruct your mind would be a nice bonus. Thanks

Looks like exactly what I was looking for, thanks.

I recently had my first glimpse of awakening/non-duality and thought I'd share how it happened, as it took me by complete surprise and was actually a culmination of three events involving shrooms, THC, and some random contemplation. The first event was my first high dose of shrooms. The effects weren't anything like what I was expecting. I essentially got a direct experience of what I can best describe as a state of mental "groundlessness" where clinging to any idea became impossible, it also somehow made it very easy for me to trace the origins of a lot of my beliefs/ideas. There was also this vague hint of seeing everything as an infinite fractal. My second breakthrough happened when I ate a potent THC edible. This time, I experienced a sort of "ego death"/OBE. It was a bit terrifying, as it actually felt like I was dead. I no longer had complete control over my body, I did not recognize myself in the mirror, and at one point I did not even remember where or who I was. It was way more intense than the shroom trip, but I also had a much harder time understanding what in the hell happened. Finally, today I was doing some random contemplation during a car ride and came to what I would call an "experiential insight", which materialized as a connecting of the dots, mostly involving the two trips described above. The first part of this insight is the realization that it is impossible to know anything for certain. This triggered another realization, which is that ALL humans are completely full of shit and will never not be completely full of shit. It was during that last realization that I had a moment of clarity and the dots began to connect. While this was happening, the following came to mind: * Human bullshit is not a bad thing, because bad things are bullshit. * Human bullshit is not a good thing, because good things are bullshit. * Human bullshit is not bullshit, because bullshit is bullshit. It was like someone pulled a rug out from under me and there was no floor to land on, but I didn't fall because there was nowhere to fall to. This is also when a terrifying realization hit me, which is that if I ever stopped bullshitting, I would be dead. I was also able to connect my previous experiences of "groundlessness", "fractals", and "ego death" all at once, and these ideas sort of merged into one thing. I see why it's called "non-duality".

It really does, but I'm looking for something like this in book form, not a video.

Pretty good taste in music here, here's a couple of my favorites.

Remember to build an audience & work out loud. Youtube and Twitter are great tools for this, use them. This keeps your motivation up and is also good marketing for life purpose.

I consider myself an independent game developer and am always studying video games more and more deeply as a medium, so I thought I'd share what I think highly conscious game design looks like. I think what a lot of people fail to realize is that video games are fully capable of everything that books, movies, music, ect. are and more. Even without VR, video games are more capable than any other medium of expanding peoples' perspectives and making them more conscious, especially since they are interactive. Sadly, the medium is still very young and mainstream gaming has a looooong ways to go. That said, there are still plenty of developers who are dedicated to making more conscious games and helping to advance the industry towards that end. Some of the common themes I've noticed with conscious games is that they tend to focus on using the medium of video games as a form of communication rather than simply trying to be fun, they also tend to go meta and are often indifferent to the player. The primary design goal of a conscious game is to create situations conducive to triggering insights in players about the nature of truth & reality, thereby expanding their capacity to be conscious. Below are a few especially interesting games I've come across that might add more to your life than just simple entertainment. Also, please share your own finds if you happen to know of any notable conscious games! The Witness (& Jonathan Blow) This game is all about perspective & going meta, and is essentially a metaphor for enlightenment. It's FAR from a traditionally "fun" game, yet has more depth than most other game's usually do. The video below will explain what I mean if you don't mind spoilers, I do recommend playing the game yourself first though. I also recommend watching some of Jonathan Blow's talks on Youtube if you want to have your mind blown at how deep game design can be taken, though some of his ideas may fly over your head if you aren't intimately familiar with game design. (Great hands-on talk by Jonathan Blow) Maquette Another game about perspective, as well as a 3D fractal simulation. Not released yet, but looks very interesting. Starseed Pilgrim This is a very unique game about figuring out the rules of its universe by playing intuitively and getting a feel for how things work. Practically nothing is explained, there are no tutorials, and the game is seemingly completely indifferent to the player. YOU are solely responsible for figuring out the rules of the game world, and I find that amazing. You don't just make progress, you also have to figure out how and what you are progressing towards. Because of this, you will likely either really hate it or really like it depending on your mindset as a player. Baba Is You This game is VERY meta, it's so meta that at one point you end up literally playing as an entire level.

Here are some deaths that Trump and Biden are responsible for (this is not a complete list). Trump's COVID-19 inaction and ignorance directly led to the needless deaths of many Americans. Estimated U.S. COVID-19 Deaths Due To POTUS Inaction: https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/05/06/trump-covid-death-counter/ In 2003, Biden voted for the Iraq war, a needless war that is STILL going on today. Iraq war estimated body count: https://www.iraqbodycount.org/ What amazes me is the unreal amounts of denial & cognitive dissonance that happens whenever these statistics are brought up to Trump and Biden supporters. Trump supporters deny/downplay these statistics despite these being AMERICAN deaths. Biden supporters deny/downplay these statistics despite how many of these deaths came from America indiscriminately dropping bombs on NON-COMBAT CIVILIANS in a foreign country. NOTE: This is not meant to endorse Trump. The point of this post is to point out how backwards American politics is, as I feel like many people are so desperate to see Biden win that they fail to acknowledge their double standards.

Had Trump voted for the Iraq war and Biden not, it would surely be held against him by the left. I recognize that the centrist left can't be too outspokenly unbiased on their politics because it would increase the likelihood of Trump winning again, but I have a feeling that inner awareness of political bias doesn't exist for a lot of the left, considering how dogmatic many of them still are.

Of course, I am actually more or less a Bernie supporter. This was not meant to endorse Trump. The point of this post is to point out how backwards American politics is, as I feel like many people are so desperate to see Biden win that they fail to acknowledge their double standards. I will be reluctantly voting for Biden, most likely.

Oops, meant to post this to the career & life purpose section, please move it. Thanks.

As a solo game developer, I always used to struggle with getting large scale projects done, but eventually came up with a highly effective solution to resolve that - make task lists, also buy a whiteboard. Essentially, the single best way to organize projects is to create lists of whatever tasks you need to complete, and then take those tasks and break them down into smaller tasks. The reason this works is because the human mind is lazy and cannot handle doing lots of work at once very well, but if you only have a tiny 15-30 minute or so task in front of you, it becomes significantly easier to get it done with minimal resistance. Completing just one small task will help you gain momentum as well, and for creative tasks such as writing it's a good idea to start by editing something in your project to get you into a creative flow state. Completing these small tasks will of course compound over time, and this is what allows you to complete large-scale projects. I also suggest buying a whiteboard and mounting it directly in front of wherever you do your work so that you will see it every time you look up. At the top-left, write today's date and "Tasks", and in the bottom-right write a 1-2 month goal and the date you want to complete that goal by. In-between the two, list off at least three 15-30 minute tasks you want to complete for that day that will move your project forward. Remember to check and update this every day. I also suggest keeping a master list of tasks somewhere on your computer to keep track of the big picture of whatever project you're working on. Always remember that if you are having a lot of resistance to working on your project, it means that you aren't breaking your tasks down small enough for you to handle. Hopefully this helps some of you lazy bastards out.

A couple of those games are available online, I just don't want to plug.

I used to have a similar problem, and what solved it for me was to stop eating the traditional breakfast/lunch/dinner at set times, and to instead eat whenever I am actually hungry. Just be sure not to go too far with this the point of starving yourself, and be careful to not mistake emotionally-charged cravings for hunger. What I've personally found is that 3 meals a day is not at all a natural way for me to eat, and that about 1-2 meals a day is more my speed, and that's with being fairly active at my full time job. That's only my experience though, it may be different for others.

I always thought "even if a conspiracy theory is true, who the hell cares?", and I'm glad it got brought up in that video. At one point, I watched a lot of Alex Jones thinking he was playing a character and eventually realized that he and most of his audience were for real, and thought to myself "oh, I guess people really don't know how to spend their free time".

Are video games art? I recently experienced an "awakening" of my intuition and have been going ham into game development. I mainly do pixel art, coding, and sound design/music as a solo developer, and am obsessed with making top-down Metroidvanias.

Forget enlightenment for a second, acceptance = happiness. You live in a world that is completely magical, you are completely surrounded by an enchanted fairy tale land, yet your memory and identity of the past blocks you from seeing the magic of the present. Hopefully you can recall how when you were a child and less identified with yourself, reality was much more magical and full of wonder & life. My advice is to start practicing more total acceptance. Sadhguru's talk of being at ease does a good job of explaining this.

I've been looking for good movies (or games/anime) about awakening, ideally ones that aren't just metaphor but are literally about enlightenment, and I don't mean documentaries. Any suggestions? Some of my own suggestions: Silence (2016) is a pretty good one. I'm not sure if it's intentionally trying to communicate awakening, but I certainly got the sense it was by the end. I'll add more if I think of any...

Metaphors for enlightenment are everywhere, and they tend to fly over the head of people who don't know anything about it beforehand. literal enlightenment by comparison is rather rare to find in media, and I'd say is better to share with newbies. People need to have a basis of explicit understanding before they can effectively take in the implicit.

Reminds me of this scene from They Live. Anyway, I recommend reading your news online, not watching it. Read news from a variety of different outlets - read news from conservatives, libertarians, democrats, progressives, ect. Doing this will help you keep informed with less bias & distortion of facts. I also wouldn't suggest spending more than 2 hours per week taking in news.

Inspired by Sadhguru's talks of being "at ease" and Leo's body awareness video, I've been wanting to do an experiment where I attempt to enter a state of extreme relaxation & higher consciousness. The goal here is to reduce bodily & mental energy consumption to the point that my sleep quota drops to 1-2 hours/day (if that's even possible), and hopefully I receive some insights from it. I've had tastes of deep relaxation before from doing daily tension-dropping practices, which have felt amazing, but I'd like to take it to the extreme for a day just to see how deep I can go. The Plan: The practice I came up with is fairly simple - the day before and of, I'll be drinking nothing but water just to flush my body of food and chemicals - and on the day of the experiment, I'll be laying down on my back and continuously scanning my body from head to toe while releasing any and all tension. Of course, I will be getting up every hour to stretch & sip some water, but otherwise the entire day will consist of just releasing tension. I'll be reporting my finds here once I'm done, but if you'd like to try this yourself please tell me how it goes - just be sure to do it safely.

Jonathan Blow = Stage yellow video game designer. His entire design philosophy is all about delivering "epiphany" moments that make you notice something new that you likely didn't notice at first. His last game, The Witness, is literally a game about perspective. He's also very Yellow in the way that he analyzes other people's games.