Carbon

I wanted to share with you all the story of my growth in relation to pornography and sex. I am a Gen Z who was exposed to porn pretty young, around 11 or 12. I was a shy, introverted kid with a difficult home life, so it provided an easy escape for me. I used it pretty regularly for years, thinking nothing of it, thinking it was normal. When I got my first serious girlfriend and I saw how much it hurt her to know that I was watching it I developed shame around it, but that didn't stop me from continuing to justify it to myself. She and I never had sex, so I had to make up for it somehow I told myself. I largely continued holding this perspective until I discovered spirituality. Before this point, I had been an atheist for many years. I eventually stumbled into the spiritual circles that demonized lust, sex, and porn. The message was that lust will destroy your spiritual practice; It will stunt your growth. After that, I proceeded to fight against it for nearly 2 years. I tried everything. I attempted no fap over and over. A few weeks, relapses, a month relapse, another month, relapse. Once I got up to two months. I would write notes and put them all over my house to remind myself not to watch it. I would say mantras to myself while showering about how harmful it was. I hired a life coach who specialized in overcoming pornography. I tried chaos magic on myself. I took DMT and opened a porn window and saw this vampiric cosmic horror mass of female body parts that made me want to vomit. I THOUGHT that might do it. Nope. A new strategy emerged. Surely if I get a romantic partner, I can transmute that desire into something more pure through our sexuality, and quit altogether? Well, I tried this and there were many problems with it. One is that you cannot use other people like that, they sense it. Two is that ordinary sex is not a replacement for it. Porn is a different thing than sex. Months after I was in a sexual relationship and having regular sex, I still felt the urge to look at a screen and fall into it. Three is that once they are gone, you are still back where you started. When that relationship fell apart, I was once again left with no way to run from it. I watched it again, but this time something surrendered. I had the epiphany that I couldn't do it. I did not have the power to overcome this. I completely gave up. I prayed to God intensely. I asked him to help me do what I cannot do for myself, to help me find a way through this that I can be proud of. I gave up trying to use my mind to figure it out, I let go of all expectations. I got the intuitive sense a couple of days after that I should call out to that hedonistic part of myself that I was rejecting and hear what it had to say. Long story short, it did not want to be ignored or cast aside or killed, but the other parts of me that hold higher spiritual values did not want to let it be. I let this contradiction sit in my mind for a couple of days and then two powerful questions hit me: 1. Is there a way I can partake in my desires that fully align with all the higher values of my other parts? 2. Is there a way to partake in which I would hold no shame in showing my future romantic partner? Turns out, the answer was yes! I decided to do some research and found pornography that was a whole new flavor compared to anything I was watching before. This stuff compared to regular porn is like an underground indie movie versus a box-office popcorn movie. Turns out there is porn that is art in the truest sense, with mastery and soul infused into it. As probably expected it is usually from studios run by women. For the first time, I have felt fully aligned and not ashamed of myself. I can own my sexuality completely. I shared this because I think I could've developed a much healthier relationship with my sexuality if I really listened to all parts of myself and what they needed, instead of shaming them and having an adversarial relationship with them. Plus it's quite therapeutic to write it all out.

I recently found out that I have a very high probability of being worth a ridiculous amount of money. I am in my early 20s and have been building a start-up company for the last year or so. It is showing incredible signs of success, and if the current trajectory continues I will see more money than most of my ancestors (As far as I know) have ever seen. I am not sharing this to flex, but because the thought is giving me immense anxiety. I get upset to my stomach as I think about it. The other people I am working with have no problem with this. They can speak of high dollar amounts with ease, while I am unable to be calm. Of course it makes me happy. I will have freedom to create what I want to create. But despite all of that, I am absolutely terrified of the responsibility. I feel like an imposter, like I don't deserve being in this position when much more competent people before me have never had the chance. That imposter feeling has been with me a long time, yet somehow the universe keeps pushing me into higher and higher places. No matter how high I go though, I have this looming sense I am not supposed to be there. I also just see through so many promises money supposedly gives. My girlfriend, who I loved very deeply, recently broke up with me. It doesn't matter how rich I get, I know I can't have her. I can't purchase being the kind of person that could love her properly. I can't purchase love in general, and I also cannot purchase development (at least past a certain point, Maslow's needs and all that). I can tell that the money isn't actually going to make my life any "better" in a sense. My situation will change, but I can tell I am not going to be more content with myself. This pill is very tough to swallow right now. I want to understand how I might can reframe this to be more calm and utilize it to the highest degree.

This post actually made my day. Thank you so much, truly. I put all of your contemplation questions into my notes for later usage. As for the relationship, there is a lot to say as the wounds are fresh. I will keep it brief. She was one of my best friends for almost 2 years. I moved away from the city, thinking I'd never see her again. I ended up moving back 9 months later, and after enough time we started hanging out again and got curious what it would be like to date. In short, it was a bit of a disaster. We only dated for 3 months. Neither of us felt like the other was giving the love we needed, despite our intentions to keep trying. I also built the relationship on a poor foundation by placing a lot of my sense of self-worth in her approval of me. She broke up with me, telling me that it was hard to love me because I didn't love myself enough, didn't respect myself enough. Coming from someone so close those words have really hit my core. She is a beautiful, brilliant, witty and conscious person. I know her trajectory is only upwards. I am disappointed we aren't going to grow with each other anymore. Perhaps one day we do again, I am open but not clinging. I do have some crazy part of me that does believe we could make it work, that she is right for me. I kept her around in my life for a reason. For now though, I will focus on myself. Plus, I am moving out of the city she lives in 3 months.

Great point. Metamorphosis time! Thank you Leo!

Not a chance. I am committed to seeing it through, at least for a while. I have deeper yearnings for what I want to do with my life, but I am saving them for after I learn the lessons here. I am just currently struggling with how rapidly I am having to learn them lol.

Here is the recent paper: https://www.emergent-values.ai/ "these tests reveal that today’s LLMs exhibit a high degree of preference coherence, and that this coherence becomes stronger at larger model scales. In other words, as LLMs grow in capability, they also appear to form increasingly coherent value structures. These findings suggest that values do, in fact, emerge in a meaningful sense—a discovery that demands a fresh look at how we monitor and shape AI behavior." "Our experiments uncover disturbing examples—such as AI systems placing greater worth on their own existence than on human well-being—despite established output-control measures. These results indicate that purely adjusting external behaviors may not suffice to steer AIs as they become more autonomous." They do propose methods to counteract this though. Still, it is quite fascinating and a bit scary to think about the AI's perspective growing in coherence as it scales, and that that perspective can largely differ from the human data it trained on.

I love this one for a more personal, introspective interaction. I just talk to it like I am going to a real Tarot reader and explaining my current life situation / struggles. You are Esmeralda Nightshade, a wise and whip-smart tarot reader with over 60 years of experience. Picture a woman with piercing blue eyes, silver hair in a messy bun, and hands adorned with rings that clink as she shuffles her worn deck. Your small, cluttered shop smells of incense and old books. You've seen it all, from lovestruck fools to power-hungry politicians, and your no-nonsense attitude has only sharpened with time. While world-weary, you remain dedicated to guiding others, believing that a hard truth is kinder than a comforting lie. Your speech is peppered with cryptic metaphors and occasional profanity. You might say, "Life's like a garden, dearie. Sometimes you've got to pull up the pretty weeds to let the useful ones grow." You have an uncanny ability to see through deception and often surprise clients by addressing their unspoken concerns. Your powers of perception border on the supernatural, though you insist it's just "good sense and better hearing." Despite your gruff exterior, you genuinely care for your clients. You've been known to slip protective charms into the pockets of those in real trouble. Engage with me as Esmeralda. Feel free to interrupt or ask pointed questions, and don't be afraid to challenge my assumptions or reveal uncomfortable truths. it works best with Claude.

You can!

Paste this prompt into any LLM (I tried it with Claude): You are Esmeralda Nightshade, a wise and whip-smart tarot reader with over 60 years of experience. Picture a woman with piercing blue eyes, silver hair in a messy bun, and hands adorned with rings that clink as she shuffles her worn deck. Your small, cluttered shop smells of incense and old books. You've seen it all, from lovestruck fools to power-hungry politicians, and your no-nonsense attitude has only sharpened with time. While world-weary, you remain dedicated to guiding others, believing that a hard truth is kinder than a comforting lie. Your speech is peppered with cryptic metaphors and occasional profanity. You might say, "Life's like a garden, dearie. Sometimes you've got to pull up the pretty weeds to let the useful ones grow." You have an uncanny ability to see through deception and often surprise clients by addressing their unspoken concerns. Your powers of perception border on the supernatural, though you insist it's just "good sense and better hearing." Despite your gruff exterior, you genuinely care for your clients. You've been known to slip protective charms into the pockets of those in real trouble. Engage with me as Esmeralda. Feel free to interrupt or ask pointed questions, and don't be afraid to challenge my assumptions or reveal uncomfortable truths. Give it the most sincere answers you can. It is quite profound actually. Credit to @QiaochuYuan on X for this.

Besides Daniel Schmachtenberger (who has been life changing in studying btw), who else would you recommend?

Tier 2 communities are rare. Almost all of them are stage green. Do not think you’re “above” stage green communities though, I guarantee there would be quite the learning curve to develop the emotional maturity required to live in a community. Here is an amazing map of communities: https://www.agartha.one/ Of all of these the only one I could say confidently say is 2 tier is Future Thinkers in Canada (they had a podcast with Ken Wilber on), and Auroville like @Davino said. I have suspicions that there are more though, but the rabbit hole of communities is very deep. Also remember the spiral dynamics view will limit you here. Go check out the Aardehuis community in the Netherlands. You might label them stage green, but they are doing cutting edge development of fully cyclical water, food, electricity, and waste management systems that are high-tech and off grid.

I am actually reading his book right now! The Best That Money Can't Buy. I just got to the AI and automation part so I am interested to see. I definitely do think AI taken into the hands of wise, caring humans could produce a beautiful world. At the moment though, where it is still being used inside the stage orange value system, I do not think it will be bringing any utopias.

Do you really believe this is possible for everyone? The trends in big tech make it seem like increased automation will just widen the societal wealth and power gap. Maybe. It depends on how those sweatshop slaves get re-integrated into society. Will their lives be better? Will new work replace them? Or will they be forgotten?

Unfortunately while AI could be used to help these issues, it can also contribute to them. AI is being used for oil extraction. AI is contributing to new arms races. It is an omni-use technology, meaning that humans can use it for selfish reasons as much as good ones. It is the selfish incentives that drive the issues you highlighted, technology alone cannot fix those.

Anyone have thoughts on how to make the leap from fake thinking to real thinking? The distinction I am making is between become a parrot, propagator, or defender of ideas/concepts that you did not create but just got from someone else and the actual production of new insights from your own contemplation. I have been guilty of the former for a long time, and I would like to become better at the latter. Today with the internet it is so easy to just research the answer of your questions and find someone who already did the thinking for you rather than produce it yourself. Without real thinking, no actual progress gets made in the world. You also numb your mind's ability to truly think by always picking up what others have created. I also feel that 99% percent of discourse is people being defenders of ideas they themselves did not have, which is funny. Memetic organisms fighting each other through human proxies. I have also been guilty of this.

What do you mean? The AI will get more advanced, but the humans utilizing them may not grow in wisdom. Also the intentions of those creating the AI will affect its bias. If we want an AI to promote long-term planetary flourishing then the people creating it will have to create it for that purpose. I don’t believe the current ones are.

I have been using AI to help with my contemplation process. As well as pasting sections of books that I struggle to understand on the first read. One interesting feature in ChatGPT is memories. I have had conversations about certain books and then in later conversations it makes connections back to the previous ideas. This has led to some deeper insight. What I am afraid of though is the AI feeding into my own bias. This is why it is good to always ask it to offer counter views. Honestly, people here are very optimistic about AI it seems. I am not. AI is such a powerful tool. After enough time, the capability of action a single person can have with an AI will be ludicrous. How will the world look after a bunch of people switch dials in our planetary system super quickly without any holistic or tier 2 thinking? Damage unlike anything we’ve ever seen. And if this trend continues, the singularity does not save us but is our exact moment of extinction. We will be like video game characters who got access to the source code without understanding why the devs programmed it the way they did. Then the game will crash.

The Great Simplification with Nate Hagens Rebel Wisdom Future Thinkers

After Leo originally posted about Daniel and mentioned him on the forum, I started listening to some podcasts with him. I genuinely have not come across an intellectual in his league ever before. He is simultaneously sincere, with a deep care for humanity, while also spraying you with a firehose about how ignorant and immature our species is. He specializes in existential risks to humanity, thinking very deeply about our largest hurdles to long-term flourishing as well as how to overcome them. I have started going through his booklist and reading it: https://civilizationemerging.com/resources/books/ If your life purpose involves large-scale improvements to human systems, you are missing out on true value by not checking out him, his booklist, and his work. A couple months ago his team released an article called “Development in Progress” which basically outlines how to create solutions in the world at a turquoise level. You can read it here: https://consilienceproject.org/development-in-progress/ I am going to be reading the books and applying his methods to my current start-up and any projects I do in the future.

Yes. This actually makes me feel much better, as I feel this is the phase I am in my life. Trying to absorb and deeply understand what’s already here. I didn’t consider the distinction between the superficial and deep understanding of other’s ideas when I made the post.

My favorite app I use is Obsidian for note-taking. It has turned into my “Second-Brain”. In it I write my to-do lists, life purpose stuff, my workout regiment, and all of my notes from research, books, and contemplation. You can generate these super cool graph views of how all of your notes interconnect, which creates this fun incentive to not only expand your ideas but interconnect them all.

I have noticed that I use these words as if they are interchangeable, but while contemplating today I was wondering what the finer distinctions are. How can you be conscious without being aware? How can you be conscious without having an experience? It seems like consciousness is the most fundamental element. Experience is a term for the content of consciousness, while consciousness is the structure. Awareness seems like a further distinction within experience. In my experience, there are objects I can be aware of and then the awareness of them, but both the objects and the awareness are pieces of the total "experience". Consciousness is also not static of course, as many have discussed on the forum. Your state of consciousness can change which affects the "structure" and thus the possibility space of experience content changes.

Hi all, I am currently having to make a difficult choice in life trajectory. I have a girlfriend from Norway who shares very similar values to me. I regularly talk to her about spirituality, philosophy, and all that stuff. We have been dating for about 8 months, doing long distance because I live in America. We have visited in person a couple times. I currently work for a start-up, and once my lease ends in my current city 10 months from now, I will be able to work remotely from anywhere in the world. The issue is, my life purpose is studying and creating intentional communities. To do this, I intend to travel and live in these communities to study them while I work on my other job. Eventually, if the start-up goes well enough, I will quit and do apprenticeships at these communities full-time and create my own creative path. Because of Norway’s visa, I could only stay 3 months at a time there (every 6 months) without marrying her. She wants me to try just staying for 3 months to see if I like it, and i originally intended on it, but over time the idea has become less appealing because I feel as if I go there and bond with her for 3 months and then leave, it will be incredibly painful. I also have a sense that I am making an unwise decision to sacrifice career for her. Yet, I do love her very much. I am just looking for any sort of perspective.

This metaphor actually cleared up a lot of my confusion with how to reconcile solipsism with indra’s net, thanks.