Sugarcoat

It could also be the opposite. You pay attention to something scary because it aids your survival. You want to get rid of that scary thing. You could flip it upside down and say that means we have desire to survive. Then we could ask the question you said

That’s such a broad question. For example big difference between attention moving towards pain in the body and attention moving towards someone with a strange outfit walking past you

Cool you remember so much about your dream lol! Yea dream states are totally different states of mind so it’s definitely something to explore . I even believe it’s can be spiritual work, the subconscious, energies etc

Thank you too for the link!

I don’t even know if it’s possible to know

That might apply to the average person

I was being funny. Yea I don’t know but it’s what I believe

To deal with stress requires us to go inward. ‘

You have all of eternity to do that 😂😂 Enjoy your life now

It can be hard to distinguish meaning from labelling and identifying or even judging. For example if you say Oreo is a kind of cookie. You’re labelling/identifying Oreo as a cookie. You’re not saying that Oreo MEANS cookie. If you say war is bad, you’re not saying war MEANS bad, you’re labelling/identifying/judging war as bad. Meaning seems to be when something has to do with something that it is NOT. For example the sound of the alarm means I have to wake up. Meanwhile in these above examples they have to do with identifying things as they are There might be flaws in this point I’m open to that

Thanks! Id say yours is decent too because it sure guides a lot of our behaviors. I guess that’s kinda where the potential value lies in this contemplation, seeing how it connects to our lives

Meaning is something that is imposed on something for it to represent something else

Why sit for hours when you can just inhale some vapor and get BLASTED into infinity

I’m just being realistic

Awakening through pain:

Part of what spirituality is , is a mental construct that becomes part of your psyche and identity that you hold as a mental overlay on reality, contributing to the sense of distance between you and the external, and gives depth to the self.

Lowkey spot on

Well I speak from my own experience. I couldn’t overcome the cringe feeling (which is fear in social situations) if I didn’t actively put myself in different social situations. Both to directly face the fear, it’s when you face it you can overcome it. And also to give myself the possibility of not being cringe so my self image can change into a better one. So basically if you put yourself in social situations sometimes you might feel confident and not cringe spontaneously, it can happen, so that can change your self image into a more positive one

I guess you also have high self awareness. But maybe that’s implicitly being said here. Because anyone can’t really see their own structures that obviously and identity it’s traps Me personally I suffered a lot mentally in the past. And I saw how it all was my psyche. With time I managed to break it down significantly. So nowadays I’m calm unless something actually scary happens. But then I haven’t except maybe once without drug and a few times on drug, experienced the FULL openness that you speak of. So that’s a bit tricky for me It’s like you can break up the self/psyche significantly, but to go all the way with it is another thing. I might have gone to 90% , but almost never 100% (maybe it has happened without me noticing, like when you’re absorbed into something)

You just described my childhood. I was extrovert and attention seeking as a little child. Then I became shy as I gained more self awareness. And I would daydream so much about this ideal self that would impress people Part of what those daydreams mean is that you feel inhibited in your expression in real life, you don’t feel secure in yourself in real life. So you dream about this better version of yourself. What you wanna do is deal with your insecurities. So challenge yourself to socialize to challenge your fear of being cringe and with time you’ll feel more relaxed. Goal is to feel more confident and authentic Mindfulness and meditation etc can be good to learn to sit with your emotions, to learn to not escape into fantasy. To learn to sit with boredom. To learn to resist your urges. To calm down the mind and anxiety. So it’s a tool for those things. Understand that fantasizing is not the root problem but rather it’s an expression of something inside you that is not fulfilled in real life. So until you solve those things, it could be trauma too, you might use fantasy to soothe. Also there can be a kind of neurological basis, some people have more introvert brain, I do, and are more likely to be absorbed into thought

Is that like a practice you do? Focusing attention on something external? How do you stare without any idea, filter, distraction? Whats so special about you that you’re able to open yourself so seemingly easily, maybe you talked about it before but did you do hardcore spiritual practice that rewired you so now it’s easier to open, or do you think you just have a softer ego than others, why can’t others open? Or do they open but they don’t notice it, like everyone has moments of absorption, or no self but it’s not recognized? Or are people closed 24/7

The thing is, from my experience, I don’t know if it’s written about anywhere at all, is that the outside world gets its richness precisely from the sense of self. The self is deep and solid and creates the perception of a deep 3D external world, full of substance, like there’s thickness to the world, something behind it and not just the empty appearance. It might sound weird, but I noticed how all of this changed when my self thinned out. You really spoke to my soul when you described how some perceive external as dull and dead. Maybe I sound mentally ill but I’m so disengaged from the world it doesn’t absorb me at all. Only my mind has that ability I don’t think it’s necessary to go through this to see the truth though. I haven’t broken through myself fully but I’ve came a looong way

You dont need drugs to realize this lol

That’s great you’ve done that! The psyche has a lot of depth to understand and explore for sure I will def explore this when I get the chance. I have transcended 90% of my mental emotional suffering but not physical pain so that is def an area with development potential. I found this video on YouTube about it, this man had trigeminal neuralgia also called the suicide disease. He transcended the pain with mindfulness. Only sharing in case you would be interested:

That’s so cool. Funny that you mentioned me too I have always been fascinated by these different states of sleep For example I have had at least 50 episodes of sleep paralysis in my life and I’m still young I reached a point where I was no longer scared of them at all, so instead I explore them, and they sometimes turn into astral projection I have been visited by a presence during sleep paralysis who told me a deep spiritual truth, I’m convinced it wasn’t a hallucination I have felt massive vibrations and energies during it i don’t have a lot of experience of hypnagogic states but I’ve had some cool stuff happen like a clairvoyance event It all just fascinates me. I think there’s potential for exploration