caspex

It is more accurate to say that you are the suffering instead.

A Quick Update I am writing a short message here to give a quick update on where I am with my bhakti. I have not missed one day of pooja since, however, I have dropped it down quite low to just an hour a day. In fact, most of that hour actually goes to chanting for Goddess Saraswati as I have taken a Sankalpa to do her japa every day. I have had some cool experiences with that and I will share them soon when I find some time. As for my bhakti of Hanumana Ji and Rama ji, it's going well. I will update on that soon. But it's simply not possible for me to do the same level of practice (3.5-5 Hours a day of Japa of a single mantra) due to my overwhelming syllabus. Not for at least two and half more years. I actually plan on going full monk mode with my pooja after I am done with my academics in 2.5 to 3 years. I will be able to take up a hut in some mountain somewhere as my family does own some land for that. Fun fact, it's pretty close to the Himalayas. I'll do that for a year or a little more. I plan on building myself properly until then so in addition, I meditate at least an hour a day. I am also working on integrating all the Yamas and Niyamas within me (from asthanga yoga) by the end of this year and get started on higher levels next year. Just letting you know in case you do care about this journal. Honestly, I don't feel the need to write here anymore, but I think, just in case anyone who is into pooja or thinking of taking it up, should have something relatable to read.

I am pretty sure Leo won't change much. I have seen a thread like this in the past and nothing much came of it. Also that's definitely ChatGPT who wrote that

Turning off your watch history will not get rid of the shorts button at the bottom of your app. Shorts will also keep being recommended in your feed after a few weeks even if you click on the three dots and say 'not interested'. Moreover, your giving up a useful feature like your watch History. Not to mention, there's a ton of other features that are simply too useful to miss out, and which I need. Look man, I am not trying to use my tools for knowledge, such as YouTube, as a training ground for willpower. I want the tool to be efficient and not drain myself. If you want to develop willpower and discipline do it through more efficient methods such as spiritual practices. All in all, revanced is a tool and not a distraction. That's like saying I would rather use windows Vista and deal with all the bugs rather than simply installing Windows 11 because it's a distraction due to all the features. In my view, choosing to not use a very simple tool to enhance your life is being lazy.

The answer I got while contemplating existence was "Truth". The reason it exists is because it's true. It is it's own reason. I can't tell it to you in words but in experience you see that it's reason is itself, or you could say because it's fully and utterly complete it doesn't need a reason. It is because it is. Also, this isn't a cop out, this IS the answer. In direct experience, you feel satisfied with this 'reason'. You feel complete.

Ashtanga Yoga seems to be mostly integration before anything transcendent. So I think it's a good choice as well.

People do anything to avoid trying out new things. I have been using revanced YouTube for over half a year now and I don't have to worry about any of this stuff. Just get the app, turn off shorts and forget about it. It's literally like the YouTube app just without the things you don't like. It's not that hard to setup, takes 30 mins. It has many more features than simply turning off shorts. You can turn off comments if you don't want others opinion to influence yours. Or you can simply change the homepage to your subscription page so you only see the videos from your subscribed creators. Due to these features, I am at a point where I have turned off and on these features countless times and it doesn't matter to me anymore how many shorts you recommend to my face. Ill never feel the pull again. I have grown resilient to these things and it's all thanks to the app.

I have been using it for around 6-7 months. It works great and I have encountered no problems with my Google account. It removes ads and offers a ton of customisable features for your app.

@Leo Gura I have had trouble recently acquiring a job due to them checking up on my social media presence online. My only presence online is that of my YouTube channel and this forum. While I understand that it likely had to do with my YouTube channel, I'd also like to change my username on this forum so this account is not associated with my name to avoid any future troubles related to privacy. Due to my unique name, it's quite easy to simply search up my full name online and find my account on this forum in the search results along with some of my posts. I understand that I should have been more responsible with my online presence but I am young and only am just starting to care about online privacy. I read the rules before joining the forum and understood I couldn't change my username, however I request you to please make an exception, and change my username to "caspex". I am sorry if this is a bother as I have seen many more requests pop-up recently. I do not intend to abuse my name change nor do I have any history of creating trouble on this forum, please accept my request. I have already dmed you a few days ago, one of the mods suggested to post it in the forums so you see my request.

An introvert and an extrovert have different ideas and experiences about concepts such as peoples, socialization etc. They also possess very different kind of views of their futures and rationalize to themselves why there intro/extroversion is beneficial to that future. An introvert and an extrovert quite literally feel differently into their bodies and their surroundings. They possess different types of self-awareness of their minds. They are definitely different states of consciousness but none is higher by itself. If an extrovert is lower than the introvert it's because of other factors that arise from things like socialization. An introvert, because they are by themselves, may be seen as smarter and sometimes more conscious because their stillness allows them more self-introspection. However, the actual introversion or extroversion is not what is higher or lower in state of consciousness. A very highly enlightened person may be live either way. This can be seen beautifully in Hinduism through the example of Shiva and Krishna. One highly introverted and secluded for the most part, and the other highly extroverted and action oriented.

@Bazooka Jesus At this point I wouldn't wanna reveal any information about myself as the job is quite decriptive so all I am gonna see is that it was religious in nature. Only reason I wanted this job was because my friend worked in the same. My friend told me about why I wasn't accepted despite him vouching for me. @Leo Gura Please respond to my request.

Normal people aren't sociopathic because they are held down by there feelings of compassion and a sense of morality. But this is also what keeps them from becoming saints. A saint is not held down by their compulsions and emotions to a large degree. This allows them to be sociopathic if they want, but they won't, because doing so will bring them lower. Actual sociopaths are also held down by compulsions and emotions, if they weren't, they'd easily become saints. They are just held down by different compulsions and emotions than normal people. While a saint is held down by almost none.

I don't feel the new year being anything different than any other day but I understand the meaning it brings to a lot of people, especially when it comes to starting over or starting something new. Therefore I appreciate it and wish success to others in their endeavours. Personally, I would like to master all the Yamas and Niyamas by the end of this year.

The Lurker, after registering, must make an introductory post hailing our lord and savior Leo Gura for the first 3/4th of the post.

When you are ignorant of your nature as God it's not like you seize to be God. However, God is still deluding itself in the form of you as a human ego. Due to this, it would reform itself after physical death. God could reform itself as anything, depends on a lot of factors. Reincarnation is true and so is heaven and hell. Your 'soul' is simply this all pervading conciousness. Your soul is paradoxically entirely impersonal.

They say that when a forum post reaches 84 replies, the digital cosmos align, revealing the hidden truths of cyberspace, and the OP attains a state of metaphysical enlightenment, transcending the ordinary realms of online existence.

This is it

It's really nice. It really feels like this much awakening should be prerequisite before you enter the world lol. Sets a nice foundation, for whatever you want to do from now on. Whether it be further spiritual growth or be it enjoying the material world. I know these two aren't strictly exclusive but they become exclusive at advanced levels especially because we have limited time before we die.

I have had Obsidian since the beginning of this year and I wasted a lot of time taking down notes for my academics for the first few months. It was a waste of effort and time because the purpose of my notes were to be remembered and to be recalled in the exam, not to be used in further thinking. Something like flashcards would have worked much better in this regard, and it definitely did during my exams, while the notes I had so painstakingly prepared proved almost completely useless aside from helping me create my flashcards. I know this was really dumb on my part and I am willing to admit it. In retrospect, I see now that something like Obsidian is supposed to be used for development of projects, articles or books, efficiently. I want something like this to prevent from happening again. So I thought about how I could Obsidian to leverage my growth, and personally I don't find the idea of a Commonplace book to work. I am still very young (19M) and I don't require a Commonplace book to manage my very simple life and my even simpler mind. What I do require Obsidian for is to increase self-awareness and somehow use it to create. Those seem like the most practical applications to me and the notion of a 'second brain' is simply stupid because Obsidian doesn't organize anything, nor does it think for you, you still do that all yourself. It seems like such a powerful tool but I literally can't use it. I kept thinking of the best ways to maximize Obsidian's potential, but that was stupid, I have decided now to focus on maximizing my own potential instead, and it's not that complex to do. However, I do not know all the use cases of such a powerful tool in context of my two mentioned goals above. This is where I need your help. If you use any sort of advanced note taking app, and have similar reasons for using it, I'd like you to share how you use it and why it works for you. I posted here because Actualized.org is really the niche I fit into the most on the internet, advice from here usually works really well for me even on non-spiritual matters.

Thanks a lot! That's an amazing suggestion!

@Thought Art Ill take your suggestion for forming goals. I am thinking of putting in weekly and monthly goals and completing them. I have been searching, and Journaling and Habit Tracking in Obsidian seems like the thing for me. The setup allows for much opportunity for self observation and finding patterns in your day. It seems boring but it's honestly what I need right now. I don't need Obsidian to think, what I need it for is to perform actions and form actionable plans to move forward. I really want to use it to learn but, I am so chaotic in my life and in my mind right now that I'll give up on whatever I decide to learn. I have been trying to integrate Blue casually for a few months now but I am so far gone that I have made negligible progress on my own. This is why I require an external aid such as Obsidian. The reason for my post here is so that if anyone has overcome similar problems with or without note taking I would enjoy guidance. I apologize if it wasn't clear in my OP.

This forum

I read the whole thing. I thank you for this. It directly answered some of my major doubts I had during my contemplation just prior to opening up this post on a whim.

Using the internet since I was 10(now 19), and being young, it has now fried my brain with all the dopamine and stuff. I quit the internet for the most part two days ago, I feel like I can focus now, and it has only been two days. If I open up a YouTube video, I can quite literally feel being sucked into that dopamine trap. It's really fucked me up and I am not planning to go back. I am sure this is a new gen problem. Mind you, I never even watched shorts or tiktoks since they came out. I fear what the internet will do to Gen Alpha, being handed phones at 2 years old.

It's frustrating searching about yogic concepts, a lot of it just regurgitation. I think it's insanely valuable knowledge but also dangerous as it deals so much with the physical body and it's workings. Even if you go at your own pace, there's no telling what might happen, your knowledge will always be incomplete after all. A genuine Guru would be nice if I could ever find one. As much as a lot of people here hate the idea of finding a Guru and adhering to his rules, we are talking about physical and energetic practices here, it's dangerous and warrants proper guidance, like with psychedelics.