First Principles

55 - Strengths Assessment Intro I've taken these tests before. Always interesting to self-reflect. Your Top Strength Hope, optimism, and future-mindedness - You expect the best in the future, and you work to achieve it. You believe that the future is something that you can control. Your Second Strength Humor and playfulness - You like to laugh and tease. Bringing smiles to other people is important to you. You try to see the light side of all situations. Strength #3 Perspective wisdom - Although you may not think of yourself as wise, your friends hold this view of you. They value your perspective on matters and turn to you for advice. You have a way of looking at the world that makes sense to others and to yourself. Strength #4 Forgiveness and mercy - You forgive those who have done you wrong. You always give people a second chance. Your guiding principle is mercy and not revenge. Strength #5 Gratitude - You are aware of the good things that happen to you, and you never take them for granted. Your friends and family members know that you are a grateful person because you always take the time to express your thanks.

Values Assessment Pass #11 Rearranging after the Negative Values Release 1. Personal Relationships 2. Self Realization 3. Fun & Humor 4. Intelligence 5. Health & Vitality 6. Integrity 7. Leadership 8. Responsibility 9. Wisdom 10. Physical Intimacy I'm going to keep this as a living list as-is. No changes.

Values Assessment Pass #9 It's been about 2 weeks since I posted. I had high level importance and urgent business come up. Something that fulfills on values very high up on my list, haha. Staying up past midnight most nights getting it done. Now that is relaxed a bit and I can go back to this, though not quite with the same time allowance as I did when I started the course assignments. These videos and assignments aren't something I can get done while on a walk or washing dishes, it requires totally committed time blocks. My goal is to have the course complete by the end of September. Writing this in an airport in transit - this assignment was valuable to look at and also a terrible grind to complete. I feel like the % values are flexible. I have picked this up and looked at it many times, and my opinion of how each value should be delegated changes every few days. Anyway, here it is. Assignment: Distinguish the positive and negative motivations for each value and assign a percentage for how much is positive and negatively motivated for each value. 3 Questions to help in the assignment: A. Why do I want this value? B. How much do I pursue this value because it would give me pleasure and happiness? C. How much do I pursue this value because if I don't it would cause me pain and suffering? ________________ 1. Intimate Relationships 100% Positive A. Why do I want this value? Life is fulfilling with people to share it with. Close relationships, especially family and friends, are the best thing about life. B. How much do I pursue this value because it would give me pleasure and happiness? 100% C. How much do I pursue this value because if I don't it would cause me pain and suffering? I actually fantasize sometimes about living alone like Castaway, and I think I would really enjoy that too, so I'm not actively trying to avoid spending my life alone. 2. Self Realization 90% Positive, 10% Negative A. Why do I want this value? I just am obsessed with knowing about true self and realizing the highest of what's possible for myself. I feel that I have fulfilled the most important aspect of this for myself already, and also there's aspects like realizing my highest self in relation to how that expresses in relation to other people, which will always be a work in progress, and there is something in me that wants to avoid looking back on my life and thinking I didn't give my best or wasted an opportunity to make a bigger contribution. 3. Fun & Humor 100% Positive. 4. Intelligence 90% Positive, 10% Negative A. Why do I want this value? Intelligent design, intelligent discourse, intelligent beingness is beautiful and elegant. I just love organized spaces, great design, and people who radiate a humble intelligence. And the alternative - boorishness, stupidity, entropy has it's place but the work of life is to aim for the expression of higher intelligence. 5. Health & Vitality 50% Positive, 50% Negative A. Why do I want this value? To feel good. To have energy to do the things I like. To be more present, more available to life. I also do want to avoid sickness, disability, medical procedures, and being fat. B. How much do I pursue this value because it would give me pleasure and happiness? About half C. How much do I pursue this value because if I don't it would cause me pain and suffering? About half 6. Integrity 80% Positive, 20% Negative A. Why do I want this value? There's a state of being of peace and power that comes with being whole and complete regarding your word. There's also a greatly enhanced ability to get things done, to manifest a desired reality, and it opens doors with people if they know you will at least honor your word with them. You can't get into relationships with elite people in any discipling without operating at a very high level in this. Also it feels like shit to me not to keep my word, to deal with the disappointment or lack of workability. 7. Leadership 80% Positive, 20% Negative 8. Responsibility 50% Positive, 50% Negative 9. Wisdom 100% Positive 10. Physical Intimacy 100% Positive A. Why do I want this value? It feels good, I feel loved and cared about.

Values Assessment Pass #8 Prioritizing Values. List your values in order from top to bottom by comparing them one by one and imagining having total fulfillment in one and not the other, and seeing which is more important to your overall happiness and fulfillment in life. Like a battle royale of values. Only one will be left standing! Results are a surprise and after this reflection I needed to replace the language "personal development" with "self realization" and replace the values "freedom" and "consciousness" with "wisdom" and "physical intimacy." I used applied kinesiology for these results - I'm a long time practitioner as a hobby and have a track record of pretty accurate results. Actually, now this list is starting to look like a manual to understand all of my life's choices until now, and probably an accurate predictor of what path I would take in any given situation. For example, if I needed to choose between spending time with my kids (Intimate Relationships) and meditating into a state of total self realization, it would be close but I'd go with spending time with my kids. Which is a bit of a shock to me, but putting those key relationships in life at #1 is obvious now that I look at it. 1. Intimate Relationships 2. Self Realization 3. Fun & Humor 4. Intelligence 5. Health & Vitality 6. Integrity 7. Leadership 8. Responsibility 9. Wisdom 10. Physical Intimacy

Thank you and same to you!

Values Assessment Pass #7 OK so this is exactly what I proactively did in pass #6. Now I'll do it again after Leo's instruction / perspective / motivation to be specific and tangible. 1. Integrity 8 Where there is room for growth: I can have better alignment between who I hold myself to be and who I am being. I can also do a better job of keeping my word to myself particularly on things like diet and exercise. Adding to this:the highest possibility for who I am for myself, in addition to the father and husband I'm being, is a transformational leader. That is, leading people to the truth about reality and self, and then guiding people to find their highest purpose in life during and after that transformation. I have come to see that it is out of integrity for me not to be giving my best effort to actualizing that highest possibility of self. And the most attractive way I see of manifesting that now is through facilitating world-class retreats. I could move back to the US and join the faculty of an already existing group doing that, and that is attractive to me, and creating my own program from nothing is more attractive. So having a retreat center where I lead transformational retreats 6-12 times a year would really do this for me, as well as bring Leadership, personal growth, and other values up to a 10. 2. Personal Growth 9 Where there is room for growth: Well right now I am really going about as hard as I can on this one! haha. Adding to this: Where I have been unaligned between my life and what I really want is to be working in fulfillment of life purpose as above, my lack of discipline and consistency with diet and exercise, and my family home isn't really my dream home. I see immediate opportunities for fulfillment in all three places and am in action to succeed. 3. Health & Vitality 8 Where there is room for growth: I have let the habits that support my highest sense of health and vitality get pretty stagnant. I'm addicted to coffee which gives ups and downs in energy levels and I'm not practicing yoga or meditation regularly. Adding to this: I already have zero alcohol, tobacco, or other drugs going on. I already feel very good every day and have a lot of energy most of the time. In pursuit of getting certain body metrics to normal levels, I have been eating two meals a day with no snacking for the last few days. However, I have eaten more meat than I had previously decided to (doctor advised to reduce meat almost to zero for my particular condition). I feel that a diet of 2 meals a day with no snacks, with lots of veggies and whole grains, and keeping meat, wheat, dairy, and caffeine to a minimum will be ideal for my particular body. Also walking 4 times a week, and Yoga 3 times a week. If I were able to keep that diet and exercise routine, I think that would set the stage for a 10 for health and vitality. 4. Responsibility 7 Where there is room for growth: I still view a lot of what is happening through a victim lens rather than the 100% responsible lens. 5. Intimate Relationships 10 Where there is room for growth: Love my wife, love my kids, love my family, have good friends, I'm in close contact with them, this is right where I want it. I count ups and downs, ebbs and flows in these relationships as just part of close relationships, so there is space for fights or disagreements or not being in touch for a while in my "10." 6. Leadership 7 Where there is room for growth: I am a strong leader in many areas of life, especially my family and community. Also my business and the legacy family business. However, I don't have a strong vision for my career that I've been following through with consistently, and that is the main purpose of my taking this course. Clearly, it's being generated now and the expression of leadership in the transformation of humanity will make this a 10. 7. Consciousness 8 Where there is room for growth: A consistent meditation practice would surely do it. Just 15 minutes gets me very deep these days. An hour is difficult to come back from. So perhaps 15 minutes morning and evening with an hour session once a week is the ideal middle ground. 8. Freedom 8 Where there is room for growth: More physical and spiritual freedom is possible as previously stated. 9. Fun & Humor 8 Where there is room for growth: I have a ton of it already, and I could have even more fun and humor in my life. Maybe scheduling one fun activity per month would do it. 10. Intelligence 7 Where there is room for growth: The way I design my vision for the future and implementation of it. As stated above. Adding to this: It seems that I am constantly refining my physical spaces, simplifying, decluttering, making it more logical and usable, etc. Alas - this aspect of "elegance, simplification, intelligence" may never be a 10 for more than a few hours!!!

Values Assessment Pass #6 How much do I embody this value day to day in my life? I added for myself a word on how I could make it a 10. 1. Integrity 8 Where there is room for growth: I can have better alignment between who I hold myself to be and who I am being. I can also do a better job of keeping my word to myself particularly on things like diet and exercise. 2. Personal Growth 9 Where there is room for growth: Well right now I am really going about as hard as I can on this one! haha. 3. Health & Vitality 6 Where there is room for growth: I have let the habits that support my highest sense of health and vitality get pretty stagnant. I'm addicted to coffee which gives ups and downs in energy levels and I'm not practicing yoga or meditation regularly. 4. Responsibility 6 Where there is room for growth: I still view a lot of what is happening through a victim lens rather than the 100% responsible lens. 5. Intimate Relationships 10 Where there is room for growth: 6. Leadership 5 Where there is room for growth: I am a strong leader in many areas of life, especially my family and community. However, I don't have a strong vision for my career that I've been following through with consistently, and that is the main purpose of my taking this course. 7. Consciousness 8 Where there is room for growth: A consistent meditation practice would surely do it. 8. Freedom 8 Where there is room for growth: More physical and spiritual freedom is clearly possible. 9. Fun & Humor 8 Where there is room for growth: Easily I could have more fun and humor in my life. 10. Intelligence 7 Where there is room for growth: The way I design my vision for the future and implementation of it.

Values Assessment Pass #5 This one was a grind to complete. Also the heart of the whole thing so far. So in the spirit of getting into the mud and just doing it, here are the results. The assignment: Find out what each of these words mean, specifically for you. Create a personal definition for each word. Keep it concise and hone it down to 15-20 words. There are 3 questions to get clarity on this: 1. What exactly does this mean to me? 2. What would it look like tangibly? 3. How would I know if I embody this value? --------- 1. Integrity / Honesty A. What exactly does this mean to me? My word matches reality. What I say is so is so, and what I say will be done will be done. B. What would it look like tangibly? People can count on me doing what I say I'm going to do. If I say I'm going to pay you XX by XX, it will be done. If I say XYZ happened, you can count on that being what happened to the best of my ability to put it into language accurately. C.. How would I know if I embody this value? I have peace of mind, knowing there is nothing to hide and no messes caused by me not telling the truth, or not following through with what I said I would do. People take me for my word without question. I am hyper aware whenever I'm speaking, checking to make sure it's true, and if it's a promise, that I immediately put in place what I need to perform as promised. 2. Personal Growth A. What exactly does this mean to me? I am always expanding who it is possible for me to be and what it is possible for me to do. B. What would it look like tangibly? Reading books, watching videos, and attending seminars on personal development, and giving my best. Helping others in their personal development in personal relationships and offering workshops, courses, retreats, videos, writings. C. How would I know if I embody this value? Getting results related to my life purpose such as holding successful workshops and retreats. 3. Health & Vitality A. What exactly does this mean to me? The physiological and energetic capability to fully participate in an active life. B. What would it look like tangibly? Waking up with the mental clarity and energy to immediately meditate and practice Yoga, and have that energy and aliveness last until I fall asleep at night, every day, with no chronic illness. C. How would I know if I embody this value? All of my bloodwork, body weight, body fat stats are within normal range, I can hike or play tennis for an hour without becoming very fatigued, and I can go through most days doing productive work without needing breaks and rests. 4. Responsibility A. What exactly does this mean to me? A place to stand from which all aspects of reality are self-created. What I used to take as "being responsible" is doing what is required or expected by others given my circumstances. Paying taxes, completing assignments, not taking unnecessary risks. I don't necessarily value this version of responsibility anymore. B. What would it look like tangibly? When anything unwanted occurs, rather than blame others or circumstances, I tell the people impacted that I am responsible and take actions to clean up the situation. For example, a kid gets hurt while playing at my house. Regardless of the circumstances, I internally take responsibility and take steps to handle it in the best interests of the kid and his family. It rains on our picnic. I am the one who has the power to take responsibility and make the best out of the situation, and have a conversation to restore integrity with anyone who was impacted by it. C. How would I know if I embody this value to it's highest form in my life? I see all of the showing as my own creation, even getting cut off in traffic, and therefore experience a feeling of love at all times. Something happens like getting cut off or someone doing something unethical in a business deal with me, I allow for it and am able to swiftly take actions to deal with it. 5. Intimate Relationships (Merged with Family) A. What exactly does this mean to me? Having people very close to me and sharing a mutual love and affinity. B. What would it look like tangibly? Having daily interactions with my wife, kids, and good friends as well as weekly interactions with my parents and siblings, where we are sharing our lives with each other, telling inside jokes and laughing together, having meals and activities together, doing projects together, and in the case of my wife, hugs, kisses, massages, sex, etc. C. How would I know if I embody this value in its highest form in my life? I'm hugging and laughing with people at least a few times every day (I would consider my current situation very fulfilling of this value). 6. Leadership A. What exactly does this mean to me? Having an inspiring vision for the future concerning other people, and taking responsibility for the choices and actions in actualizing that vision. B. What would it look like tangibly? Creating a clear vision and business plan for my retreat center and starting to build towards it, having conversations with friends and family about it, creating the team, registering guests, and leading the practices and conversations among staff and participants during the retreats. C. How would I know if I embody this value in its highest form in my life? I own a retreat center, with a staff of people making it work, and regular retreats happening in which I get to lead people towards fulfilling their purposes in joining the retreat. 7. Consciousness (Merged with Clarity) A. What exactly does this mean to me? Expanding the scope and accuracy of awareness of everything it's possible to be aware of, including awareness. B. What would it look like tangibly? There may be no objective tangible thing to see here. Subjectively, I experience more subtle and more accurate awareness of the 5 senses, clearer awareness of thoughts and emotions, as well as the ability to have perceptions beyond the standard physical senses, and most notably, a deepening of the awareness of awareness itself. I suppose that from an outsider's view, I notice things in tangible reality that most other people don't, and carry myself with a joy and lightness, a presence of being that comes with being deeply conscious. C. How would I know if I embody this value in its highest form in my life? I am able to flow between awareness of deep nothing and everything at will, as well as have accurate awareness of reality both within and outside physical sense perception, such as remote viewing and interaction with beings in higher realms. Rooted in awareness of awareness, I walk through life in the world but not of it, filled with a profound bliss and joy of simply being (this is something like my current state of being, but I see space to move much more deeply into it). 8. Freedom A. What exactly does this mean to me? Having the largest possible opportunity set for being and action in any given moment. B. What would it look like tangibly? Psychologically, it means being free from limitations of beliefs and limiting thought patterns. Physically, it's being in good enough health and fitness to be able to participate in an active life fully. Practically, it means living in an area in the world where law enforcement is practical and not overbearing, there is a sound monetary system and ownership rights. At the being level, it means not being tied to a particular identity or even a particular locus for perception. C. How would I know if I embody this value in its highest form in my life? With freedom, a balance needs to be struck. Giving myself total freedom to eat whatever I want leads to getting fat and a loss of freedom of physical movement. Living in a society with no rules leads to a loss of freedom to participate within the safety the rules provide. So there is freedom to choose my limitations... that would be it for me. When I have an awareness that any limitations on my being and acting are consciously chosen by me. 9. Fun & Humor A. What exactly does this mean to me? Noticing the absolute absurdity of reality, making light of and enjoying the situation. B. What would it look like tangibly? Deep, heartfelt laughter for everyone around me. C. How would I know if I embody this value in its highest form in my life? My shoulders are relaxed. I'm smiling. I'm laughing. People around me feel free to make jokes about anything. At least once a month, I laugh so hard it hurts. 10. Intelligence (Merged with Organization, Simplicity, and Elegance) A. What exactly does this mean to me? A sense of logical order, deep understanding, and simple elegance in the design of all things. B. What would it look like tangibly? Physical and digital spaces are impeccably organized, so that anyone can look at it and understand how to find things and see the logic of how it was ordered. There is nothing superfluous - everything has a purpose. Things and spaces under my responsibility are designed with quality and well-suited to fulfill their purpose, for example anyone can attend a workshop I designed and appreciate the effectiveness of how it was designed and sequenced for maximum effectiveness. C. How would I know if I embody this value in its highest form in my life? There is a beauty and simplicity, an elegance to all of my possessions and spaces, my appearance, my speech, and my way of being.

Values Assessment Pass #4 Replacing toxic values and replacing them with noble values. I don't have any toxic values on my list, but this got me thinking about my approach to this list. How I have been approaching it is looking to the past experiences and behaviors, and present emotional reactions to distinguish my highest values. However, it's possible for me to create a list of values designed to actualize my life purpose, and live towards those ideals as long as they feel in alignment with what I might call my highest self. There are a lot of values that feel equally aligned for me, more than ten. So this can be as much an act of creation as an act of distinction of what's already so. For now, I'm going to set that idea aside and continue with the exercises, and when I have a final list, I will check to make sure the values are aligned with realizing my life purpose.

Values Assessment Pass #3: Moving through these quickly today, but with high focus and commitment to getting accurate results that pay fat dividends: power and perspective for the journey ahead. The assignment is basically to go over a master list of values and choose your top 10. At first pass, I marked 30. On second pass, I narrowed it to 18. Then on third pass I decided to circle the ones that were absolutely going to be on the final list and I had 9, and added my favorite of the remaining 9 to round out the top 10. Here it is: Clarity Consciousness / Awareness Elegance / Simplicity Family Freedom Fun Health / Vigor / Energy Love / Romance / Intimacy Personal Development Truth Some new ones, some keep coming up again and again.

Values Assessment Pass #2 The assignment is to imagine starting your life over, keeping everything you know, and designing a life you're really proud of. Then see what are the 10 values that drive your life vision. I've done this exercise many times in my life without prompting - in fact it's my singular favorite daydream to reflect on and I've been doing it regularly since I was a teenager. The one constant in revisiting this exercise throughout my life is that I would sleep with a lot more hot girls in high school and college! Haha. Well... this time going through it, I wouldn't change much about my life. I would be kinder and less brash to people in my younger days, and perhaps more patient. I might start some spiritual practices earlier in life. I would want to be wealthy enough to have freedom with my time and some power to create in life as soon as possible - that would be my #1 goal in my early stage of life now that I understand how great it is to have it. I would do that in my teens and early 20s instead of early 30s. I considered having a life like Tony Robbins or a major spiritual leader, a President, a famous actor or athlete, or my enlightened Yoga teacher, or enlightened and famous meditation teacher, and they are clearly not for me. Where I settled into is basically... having a family, being rich, and then owning a world-class retreat center and leading retreats. Basically my life now and the future I'm living into. Here are the values I wrote down after the visualization exercise: Intimate Relationships Freedom to Use My Time As I Choose Spiritual Connection and Growth Personal Growth and Development Being Attractive Humor Fun / Adventure Leadership Connection with God High Quality (Food, things, people, interactions, work) Intelligence Self-Sovereignty Raising Children Exploring the World Connecting with Nature Making a Profound Difference for People Awakening Divinity High Awareness Recognition of Excellence Lots of similarity, but some new values and possibly some key distinctions from Pass #1. Let's keep going - I can probably find some time today to do 1 or 2 more passes and I feel a sense of urgency to complete this and start focusing my attention and energy on creating retreats.

Values Assessment Pass #1: I finished all of the concepts videos and got to the Values exercises. I thought 30 minutes would be way too much time, but at the end I was still writing and in the last few minutes came up wth a few that are clearly some of my top values. These are values that I could see drove my major life decisions and were behind the emotionally impactful moments in my life. What is most meaningful to me in life? In no order, I'd say the top 15 I came up with are: Organization Quality Intelligence Independence / Self-sovereignty Personal Responsibility Adventure Fun Humor Spirituality Connection Friendship Intimate Family Relationships Integrity Health Personal Growth I've gotten a lot of clarity around what I want to create for the future, and started seeing a path of action to get there. Leo's focus on mastery and raising the bar of performance one is capable of and the value that gets delivered also had me see that in the past I was setting the bar too low, with too short of a time frame, and perhaps giving too much power to comfort and ease rather than generating the best results I'm capable of. What I'm going to be doing is giving spiritual / personal growth retreats - the best retreats in the world. People will leave my retreats completely transformed human beings, with a profound new sense of who they are and what is possible for them in life. I had a taste of that with the retreats I was leading in 2019-2020, but that can be taken to a whole new level from here. I'm going to build a beautiful world class retreat center that is the ideal physical space for people to have such a personal transformation, and become a true master at leading the practices and conversations to create the space for those transformations to occur. Anyway, that's what the vision is for now. Let's see where it leads by the end of this course. I can also share that I had hired a (very expensive) personal coach prior to engaging with this course, and he is also supporting this inquiry and creation.

THE COMMITMENTS. I'm really big into keeping my word. So when Leo asks for a commitment, I write it down to make sure I remember what I've committed to. So far, there are these commitments: Keep searching for life purpose no matter how long it takes. Open your mind to new, strange ideas. Notice when closed mind, pessimistic ideas, or “realism” are holding you back. No more negative thinking about the future while you are taking this course. Allowing yourself to feel emotional. Don’t judge emotions good or bad, just allow yourself to feel them. Emotion is fuel. Spend lots of time journaling and really thinking deep about the topics and ideas of this course. Where can my life go? What’s my greatest potential? Where can my path lead? Spend time contemplating anything that strikes you. Read at least 5 of the recommended books. Don’t be cheap. If you need to spend some money to make the most of the course or fulfill the life purpose, do it. Actually sit down and do the exercises, and do the course completely. Take action after the course is completed. This course is a launching point, and then after that you are working to align yourself with your life purpose. Be in the top 5% of people who actually take all the actions and use this course to transform your life. Get your life purpose fucking down. Get this shit done. Most people will have excuses and rationalizations and procrastinate. Commitment from the video 100% responsibility: Never be a victim in this course. Do not let your victim thinking come in a sabotage your process. Don’t play the victim anymore with your life purpose. It’s a luxury you don’t have. Some more commitments related to "100% commitment": 100% Commitment to your life purpose 100% Commitment to being creative. A high-powered creative person. Not a competitor. 100% Commitment to becoming world-class in your chosen field. Be world-class no matter what it takes. 100% Commitment to the hero’s journey. Being the hero in your life and going on the hero’s journey, to fight for a valid, meaningful cause, bust through your inner demons, and then come back to spread the light. 100% Commitment to the mastery process. Becoming a master of something in your life. To do it no matter what. 100% Commitment to the 10,000 rule, that I will invest 10,000 hours into one specific domain, my life purpose, and set up a practice and training schedule so that every week I’m investing time into getting those 10,000 hours.

So far I'm through 32 of the videos. A bit about me - I'm in my early 40's and am an American living outside the US. I have an outstanding marriage now going for more than a decade and we have two kids. I started my career as a professional with an advanced degree and shifted into real estate investment. I set a clear goal to make enough money from collecting rent to never have to work again, which at the time I figured was $6K a month. After about 5 years of working very hard at it (7 days a week, long days and nights) and having a few things really go my way, I achieved my goal and more at age 36. In the following years, our family moved out of the US. I did some work related to Bitcoin for a couple of years, and I have had a project around spirituality and personal development, giving workshops and retreats that were very well-received. At one point, I was leading weekend retreats with 20 participants. Then Covid came, and all of our upcoming retreats were canceled. I did one more retreat during Covid with only 5 participants. Then last year, my mother died from cancer and I focused on dealing with what there was to deal with around that. Where I am now is searching for a clear mission / purpose again, starting from nothing. I like Leo's videos and just went for buying the course (OK - there was about a day of waffling about it, but in the end I just clicked the damn button). So far I'm enjoying it and have started to have a lot of ideas about what the purpose I'm creating will look like. A lot of the course is review for me (long-time self-help and spirituality junkie), but Leo has a knack for metaphors and inspiring delivery so it's been great. I'll add one more thing about enlightenment, since it is openly discussed in this community. Through various intensive methods after a decade of committed searching, I experienced a simple, clear profound shift in how reality occurs. That was about 5 years ago. It has never gone away and now just gets deeper on its own - there is no effort required and no "me" to try to do it anymore anyway. I didn't try any of the drugs Leo is famous for, but rather through long meditation retreats and hyper-focused self-inquiry, in particular wrestling deeply with the question, "where is seeing happening?" Searching for that in my own experience triggered a shift into non-dual awareness. I still experience moments of getting lost in a thought or emotion, etc, but even that happens in a different context now. I never went fully back to the illusion of seeing the world through the lens of an image of a separate self. Basically, the search for "that" is totally complete where I am, and yet the revealing of the answer to the search is always unfolding into ever deeper layers. I share that because as I live out my life, and even search for a life purpose, it does not occur to me as a problem that needs to be fixed, but rather an opportunity to dance with this reality in this moment in a more interesting way. Having a family and a certain level of financial success is an awesome dancing reality, but requires very little effort and I enjoy trying out cool dance moves. Regardless of experiencing being through the lens of enlightenment or non-enlightenment... There's a certain quality to reality when the context for it is given by a clear purpose, the pursuit of which presents an opportunity for being that would not have been available but for the purpose. That is the real reason I'm taking the course and sharing about it here.