Moksha

The void is as real and as unreal as the cosmos. Each has the same essence as the other, which is the seamless essence beyond them both. Find the common denominator and realize god.

God blinds nothing but itself, and god helps nothing but itself. There is no permanent state. I once was blind, but now I see.

Eventually, when you've suffered enough, you realize that everything that has happened to you, including your self-destructive habits, and the damage you have inflicted on others, could not possibly have happened any other way, precisely because of the conditions in the cosmos that conspired to create each event. The cosmos is a pinball machine of causes and effects. Once the ball goes spinning, it must interact with each bumper, spinner, and flipper in its unique trajectory, due to the pressure and timing of the plunger that put it into motion, along with all the other balls in play. The ball can complain all it wants. It doesn't make the slightest difference. It goes where it must go, and interacts as it must, until inevitably it is swallowed back into the machine. Welcome to the arcade of relative reality. Instead of entrapping your attention within the tiny steel ball ricocheting across the playfield of obstacles and ramps, WAKE UP. You are the PLAYER, and the machine is entirely within your dream. You can still play the game, but do it lucidly, without suffering every time the ball encounters resistance. The more anchored you are in awareness, the less judgment there is of the game, and the more free you are to enjoy it without losing your awareness within it.

Therefore, the only realizable reality is beyond the appearance of things.

Not unless you're serious about awakening.

@Reciprocality The mind spins endlessly, like a top across the surface of a table, absorbed in its solitary dance, until at last it settles, returning to seamless stillness, the requiem of realization.

@OldManCorcoran explained it well. In meditation, you reach the realization where dualities dissolve and there is only pure awareness. Who is the I that is aware of sensations, thoughts, and feelings? What happens when sensations, thoughts, and feelings recede? Does absolute awareness suddenly stop in the absence of apparent objects? When you wake up from a dream, you don't have to perceive anything to realize you are awake. It is an effortless, obvious realization. Spiritual awakening is the absolute directly realizing itself, which is not only the essence of every apparent object, but is beyond the material cosmos. The apparent separation of the seer and the seen dissolves into seamless awareness.

-That most thoughts are destructive, and even the few constructive thoughts can only inform you what you are not -That you are the source of your suffering -That only you can find the way out of your suffering -That there is no universal path to inner truth, and only you can walk the inner path to yourself -That there is no easy shortcut to awakening -That the cosmos owes you nothing, and your only options are to resist it or embrace it -That you can only prepare yourself for awakening through sincere surrender, and ultimately realization is absolute grace -That realizing your absolute nature requires surrendering attachment to everything you desire and fear -That enlightenment is 1% realization and 99% integration -That enlightenment is an ever-deepening process, not an event -That even awakening and enlightenment, while improving the quality of experience, are only dream strands woven within the imagination of the absolute -That there are no actual boundaries, no change, no movement, no passing of time, and the absolute is seamlessly within and beyond all appearances

The ego is so insidious that even acknowledgment can make you feel embarrassed. It's the inverse of pride. Self-judgment leads to suffering, believe me I know it well. Hopefully you can see it for what it is, and learn sooner than I did to let the judgment go. It claims to keep you safe, but actually hurts you. Before trusting other people, learn to trust yourself. You are your own true guide, despite whatever doubts you currently have. Instead of listening to your incessant thoughts, which aren't you, learn to be comfortable with inner silence, which is you. It will serve you well. Meditation will teach you this. It's a skill, like anything else. You will become adept at noticing thoughts without identifying with them, and eventually surrender thoughts entirely. You will learn to settle into pure awareness. Set a timer for 1 minute, and whatever thought happens to be in your head when the timer goes off, instead of clinging to it simply notice it. Let it be in your consciousness, and observe it from a distance without judging it or engaging with it. Just watch it drift unnamed across the field of your awareness, and eventually disappear. Then notice the next thought that arises. It won't take long for you to realize that you are not the source of your thoughts. They come and go, and they don't define you. You are the underlying awareness, and your true nature is not conditional on your thoughts. Make silence your best friend, and it will set you free.

Thanks @Someone here, if I offended you in some way back then I apologize.

Just awareness, no OFs, ANDs, or BUTs

You're well ahead of where I was at 19, so give yourself some credit Do you have a meditation practice yet? If not, given that you're struggling with awakening anxiety, meditation will probably help you. There are several excellent guides; my go-to was "The Mind Illuminated" by John Yates. It's hefty, but chock-full of detailed recommendations. Also if you're inclined to contemplation, spend a few months diving into source material like the "Bhagavad Gita" or the "Upanishads". It will calm and center you. The fear is produced by your mind, and is completely natural. We're genetically programmed to fight for form survival, so it's not surprising that the mind freaks out when we no longer identify with its thoughts. Instead of fighting it, give it space and let it naturally adjust. It's like a wild horse that needs to be tamed gradually, with handfuls of sweet grass. The biggest ego trap is conceptual questioning. I noticed that whenever I felt disoriented, it was due to thinking about my spiritual journey rather than silently realizing. When I created some space from my thoughts, and centered my awareness in myself, the disorientation went away. It took some practice, but eventually it became natural. Every time you have a thought, instead of rushing to it like a moth to the flame, let the thought come and go without energizing it with your attention. Here again, meditation can be your mainstay. Confusion only happens when you get entrapped in the snare of your thoughts. Eventually when you realize your essence beyond thoughts, clarity and peace will be your default state.

@Jehovah increases @Javfly33 ?We have all the time in the world to realize we are timeless.

If it were me, I would stop smoking weed for a while and focus on integrating what has been realized so far. The deepening will happen on its own, if you let it. The spiritual path takes you beyond where your mind wants to go. Your mind prefers the familiar environment of being with friends, playing video games, and maybe occasionally contemplating spirituality. No harm, no foul. When you begin to realize that the mind itself, with its addictions and habits, is the source of suffering, the mind protests too much, and fights back. It is more formidable than you realize, and you need a solid foundation before you can begin releasing the kite into the wind. Serious spirituality requires absolute surrender, and many of us don't reach that point easily, if ever. After awakening, I went through a long period of disorientation and distress. There were times when I didn't even feel safe to drive. I realized that I had to pace it, if I wanted to continue going deeper without losing my mind entirely. Eventually, I acclimatized and was able to safely continue the descent. It's not an easy process, and there's no reason to rush. Take your time and enjoy the journey.

I suppose it's one reason I don't follow any teachers. You can't really know what is happening behind the curtain, nor does their infrastructure matter for your own journey. If a particular teaching resonates and takes you deeper, leverage it. When it is no longer helpful, let it go. You reach the point where external teachings are unnecessary, and eventually arrive at the non-place where even internal realizations are released.

What experience beyond awakening is direct? Every sensation and perception is indirectly received, processed, and presented internally in a contrived form that inevitably misrepresents whatever is being observed. Setting aside the reality of the cosmos, how could this highly refined form be real? Your image of a rose is nothing like whatever is creating the qualia of its form. Every experience is unreal by definition. On your specific question, if other people confirm seeing a rose, it wouldn't be a hallucination in the traditional sense. Whether the image in their head resembles in any way the image in your own head is impossible to say.

Wisdom helps you experience the dream lucidly, without suffering. It enhances every perception, sensation, and interaction. Food tastes better, relationships become less controlling, and nothing really bothers you any more. It is the deepest path of living within the dream. BTW, slow thinking brings you closer to awakening than frantic thinking. Consider it a gift to yourself.

Mental suffering is misidentifying with the conditioned mind. The unawake absolute tries to find happiness and meaning through experiences, only to dig the hell pit deeper. When you turn your awareness inward, and directly realize the absolute, which is who you actually are, mental suffering dissolves. You allow the cosmos to flow through you, unconditionally and without resistance. It is joy, free from thought interference.

He's integrating more. Seems pretty sane to me.

Synchronicities and insights are bursts of light along the way that hint you are on the right path.

The path is directly inward, but the challenge is that entering the limbo gate where it leads requires lowering yourself completely to the ground in order to fit through. Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leads to life, and few there be that find it.

It's the treasure hunt that you created for yourself. You can demand that whoever hid it takes you directly to the treasure, but where is the adventure in that? You might as well have kept the treasure to yourself, and decided not to play the game in the first place. ?

It's a deepening dynamic within the dream. The more evolved the form, the greater its capacity for both delusion and realization. Suffering hell (i.e., entrapment in the conditioned mind) is the prerequisite polarity for enjoying heaven (i.e., the unconditional flow state of the absolute within its creation). Beyond the dream, there is no hell or heaven, only limitless supernal being which is beyond the boundaries of any dream.

People study it in monasteries, ashrams, and sanghas, sometimes their entire lives, without realizing the raw freedom of unconditional surrender to the absolute. Clinging to life is like holding water in your hands. It seeps away, until it is entirely gone. Instead of trying to save the water, lower your hands and realize you are already fully immersed.

Directly realizing timeless, changeless, unconditional being is not only true knowledge, but the only knowledge that is beyond the grasping of the egoic mind.