Maya_0

Has anyone experienced a sensation of what I can describe as a "electrical energy" during a psychedelic experience? It has felt really intense during some of my trips, specifically on LSD and mushrooms. It isn't always apparent during all trips, however. It feels like a surge of energy, flowing through my body and mind. It is a bit uncomfortable in relation to the other effects. I had an impulse to open my mouth which felt necessary to dissipate some of the energy. Is there anything I can do to mitigate this sensation?

When you say you're looking for ways to improve your life, that is all just your own ideas and beliefs about life. No one else is going to have the exact same ideas about life as you. For myself, an improvement in life consists of reducing the total suffering and increasing qualities like happiness, peace, joy, compassion, love, equanimity. How does one achieve that? By working towards awakening and practicing techniques to hardwire positive emotional states into the brain.

People like to use the word "Self" and "True Self" to conceptualize Ultimate Reality. They like to point out that all this phenomena experienced before you is "who we truly are". But Ultimate Reality is not anything at all. It can't be conceptualized by something. So why are we using the word "Self". There's nothing (no-thing) there to call it anything. It makes more sense semantically to name it in terms of what it's not (e.g not self). But I see many people conceptualizing it as Self.

No. Concentrations is a quality that fades. I came back from a retreat a few days ago and everyday I can feel my concentration lessen a little.

Do you understand that you didn't exist either? With that, you could see there is no need to get upset over the matter.

It's not easy when first starting, especially since we have developed ADHD brains from all the modern technological stimulation and distractions. If you are bored, you are thinking. Think of the meditation as a game to notice whenever you are lost in thought. If you notice you are bored, just be aware of that arising mind content, and then return to the meditation. If you become bored and stop meditating, you've essentially lost the game, as you've become identified with the arising content. Be patient, be persistent. Be diligent and be very vigilant.

Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all mind-wrought. If with an impure mind a person speaks or acts, suffering follows him like the wheel that follows the foot of the ox ~Dhammapada

I would say morality, addictions, and habits are orthogonal to Enlightenment. Enlightenment is just liberation from the suffering caused by a view of self.

Hello. I was wondering if anyone knew of some super cheap accommodation, maybe in South East Asia, or somewhere warm, where I could live in a natural environment in a hut, tent, cave, cabin or some rustic housing ? I'm looking to spend less than $10 a day on accomodation. Primitive plumbing is ok ; as long as it doesn't have rotting structure and bugs coming out of holes in the floor! Prefer it to be somewhere quiet but not too far from where I could go buy food and provisions. I'm also not so much interested in attending a meditation centre because I want to follow my own schedule and practice. Thanks so much. ?

Look into a Zen meditation techniques called Shikantaza, also known as "just sitting"

Maybe depends on what your selling. Can it be sold easily through an authentic, well spoken, honest pitch, the kind that distinguishes Enlightenment? Or will it require an aggresive, misleading pitch, the kind that distinguishes being a devil?

Concept is a mental representation. Sure, you could you could tour the Earth from a space and experience it being a sphere but when your back on earth, it becomes a concept again.

@SvanteTheBeast Enlightenment will allow you to be free from the identity of ego. You will still have an ego, but not be attached to it, and ideally put an end to the suffering in life. This is something attainable while living. Why would you commit suicide? You can live life and have the ability to step out of your ego identity.

Leo is the ego/self. It's not that there is a person who has an ego. The person is the ego. Just the name "Leo" is but one of a multitude of aspects that form the whole ego/self.

Enlightenment is not equivalent to ego death or death or suicide. Enlightened folks still have an ego/self. I believe you misconstrue Enlightenment with enlightenment experiences. Enlightenment experiences, otherwise known as Awakening experiences or mystical experiences, are temporary, temporal experiences one can have that cause ego death. But once the experience ends, the ego is back. Ego death is a temporary death, it is not the same as suicide.

It can be either depending on the person's conditioning, and depending on many other aspects like the person's prior spiritual development and the quality awakening experience itself. I would say the majority of people go through a dark/depressive stage after awakening. But it is only a stage and not permanent. Awakening is a new beginning; akin to being "reborn" as in the Christian tradition. Of course, the ego/self can interpret it as nihilistic and sad, but that is only the ego's/self's reaction to being recently stripped of it's cherished beliefs. It's a stage to feel sad about awakening, but not the final deal. There was never any ultimate reason to do anything. Reasons to do things are things the ego constructs. You can still explore life and consciousness as always! You can still make your own reasons to do things, but know they are only relative and be unattached to them. I really recommend checking out the book "The end of your world" by Adyashanti if you happen to find yourself in a pessimistic/nihilistic place after awakening.

Fasting has a nice enjoyable feeling that I find blissful, clear-minded, light, joyous. I prefer to do it when I don't have to go outside the house, because the outside world can appear to me as more harsh during a fast.

@SQAAD Meaning is only for the self/ego. That's relative meaning. But from the ultimate point of view, there is no true and ultimate meaning.

What sort of meditation are you doing? Different meditation techniques will train different aspects of how your mind works. To train for emotion control, I would recommend doing vipassana meditation with noting. That is also the meditation needed to awaken to the truth of reality, so you can work towards that as well by doing it. For emotional control, the trick is to create a "gap" between what's happening and your reaction to what's happening. That's what vipassana meditation will train. So you witness something that makes you angry, and you can just be aware and feel the anger and rage arise within your body as a flowing flux of empty sensations. You can just be aware of that. And not react to it. That is not supression, that is going right in and feeling your emotions. Awakening will also give you a lot of added capacity to control emotional reactivity if you decide to go for that, but a lot of control can be developed without awakening too.

That's so amazing! I can report the same here but to a lesser degree. Hours after, I still feel some of the jhanic happiness linger. I just went for a walk outside and was feeling like I was walking on a cloud and was laughing and smiling for no reason. There was something nostalgic about it too, like it reminded me of my childhood and being a child in some strange way. I often find concentration practice brings up those forgotten fond memories from the past and jhana really reified those memories. I find it so interesting. I definitely want to make this my new baseline emotional state if I can so I too will be playing with these states for the next while. I agree with you that it's worth it to give up 5 years of your life to live with this sort of happiness & joy. I see it's so beneficial. Everyone should be practicing jhanas! Also, something I found funny: In the in the suttas, jhana is described as "the end of the world", because it's the end of believing happiness comes from sense pleasures. It's so true. Oh what the world would be if people would stop believing happiness is found in the objects of the world!

Woah how did you have an intense jhana for that long? Did you sit down for 6 hours? I'm really happy to say that I just got into jhana! I was just sitting for over an hour playing with it. I never sit for that long. I got my concentration really strong focusing on my breath, piti and sukha appeared after 20 minutes, mostly in my head region. I couldn't find any gross pleasant sensations but dropped the breath and tried scanning my hands for a pleasant sensation. Kept my attention on my palm but nothing. Went back to my breath to pump up my concentration again. I put on a big smile. Found a tingly sensation between my palm and fingers, held my attention on it. Then in seconds the pleasure wrapped up my whole body, it felt like I was in a bubble haha. There was no effort needed to maintain too. It was the strangest thing and felt amazing!?

The word jhana actually comes from the verb jhapeti meaning "to burn up", the reason being: It burns up the defilements, the causes of unhappiness. Jhana is amazing and I don't even know if I've fully entered it yet. I'm definitely getting some sweet piti & sukha from my concentration practice and I still feel it linger hours after I finish my sitting. @ardacigin How has accessing jhana been for you lately? May I ask how long it takes you to get into it?

@ardacigin Hey, I'm thankful for your pointers! I'll give them a try. Specifically, using a pillow to give some back support and dropping my focus from the breath to the pleasant sensation. Another issue I have is tuning into a pleasant physical sensation. Access concentration only usually generates a pleasant feeling in my mind, not any noticable physical body sensations. I only feel a mental pleasure, not somatic pleasant sensations. I take it that the mental pleasure I feel is not a conducive object to switch my focus to when I drop the breath?

Nice! I'm so glad you got to experience a jhana! I've been trying to attain these lately, but I feel certain issues are preventing me. For one, I experience pain from my posture after 30 minutes. The other issue seems that I don't switch to concentrating on a pleasant sensation in the body, but rather just continue concentrating on the breath. I've gotten close, I think. Dozens of times I've gotten to the point where my mind "lights up" as if I'm looking at the sun behind my eyelids, and there is a really sweet cool happiness that infuses my mind. Whatever pain and discomfort I feel in my legs is suppressed. It feels as though I want to stay there forever. I believe this is only access concentration though. Or maybe jhana light? It's hard for me to tell since I haven't explored the territory much. It has left me very curious of what a real jhana feels like. I hope to continue trying to get into the jhanas during next few days. May I ask you what length of sitting time it took you to get into it?

Yes. By loving yourself and accepting and being happy with what's present, you are having a positive influence on the people around you.