AndreiC

Honestly, I think you can get a pretty good idea on how to contemplate by just working on one of Leo's worksheets. In my opinion at least that's exactly what they're helping you do. If you want a sort of mega deep example of this, look at what the values assessment part of the course is, it looks like a huge contemplation exercise to me.

So I took Leo's course, And man, it hit me right in the feels from the intro. I was already in a sort of weird state from the experience I mentioned in the previous post, and I really knew that my current way of life was no way to continue. So I really did my best to soak everything in. To be honest it's kind of scary just how strongly the course fit the bill for me. I did the values assessment, and that was quite amazing, some of the things happening towards the end of that section really blew me away. I really contemplated all those exercises with all my might, I would meditate just before doing any sort of work just so I could really focus all the way. I ended up with my short list of values, I somehow felt that all of those were actually the same thing, but the limitations given by vocabulary ended up needing more words it, anyway the closest ones of all were freedom and adventure. I kind of saw the values as something I want to follow, at the same time though, I really felt like I should never disrespect those, they were kind of bitter sweet that way. I could see that the suffering I experienced the years before was just because I tried to live by values I sort of took from others instead of cared for myself. Another great takeaway from that section for me, was the actual way in which the exercises worked, blowing everything up and then condensing it in the purest form you can, there's wisdom in that, and it can be applied to many things, including very practical stuff. I realized that every time I had really pulled a great result at work was with similar means, I had been using this kind of strategy on occasion, but not consciously, it's insane how much confidence I took from that. With this new knowledge, I was already feeling extremely powerful, so i figured it would be smart for me to ride the wave and begin living up to my values that day. I didn't even wait to finish the course before I got to work. For me freedom is huge, so I had to leave my old job while I still had the strength. I mean small bets are great, but some things won't bend, so I had to take a big bet, this was clear to me for a while but i never really had the courage to get it done until this point. I literally realized I was on the beginning of the hero's journey and this was in fact my third call to action...even the number made sense. Even then, I couldn't simply go ahead and do it. I had to be smart about it. So I... practiced. First I told my wife about my plan, after that my friends, my parents and a few of my more trusted colleagues. You know how there's this vibe people give you that in this sort of thing you always have worse expectations that what can actually happen ? That was totally true, everyone was totally OK with it, even when at this point I had no idea exactly how to continue. TLDR: Began the course, gained a huge morale boost, figured out my values, gained the power of contemplation, began to prepare "the field" for the changes I was about to make.

I have trouble with this one also. In my humble opinion it's just fear/resistance taking the guise of whatever works best. Perhaps contemplating on the situation enough will help you clear things up. In my case at least it always helps. If you did the course, perhaps you can retry the fear visualization it worked wonders for me.

This. Basically it's a phenomenon of corruption. You have to keep in mind that any organization is a system and it sort of gets a mind of itself. Sooner or later some less competent people are going to get in there. Once in, they are difficult to remove, in part because they may be bad at their job, but they're likely to be extremely good at, office politics, avoiding blame, responsibility and so on. Pretty much every empire in history and every company nowadays has a period of rise, stagnation and decline. This is just the way groups of people wind up working. The only places where you can expect competence to really be the prime factor is in young, usually small organizations, and not even all of those.

Hey guys, I've been thinking of posting this for some time now, but never really got around to doing it. So after about half a year of taking Leo's course I'm here to share some of my experiences, I imagine some people may find it interesting, if nothing else for the sake of a case study. In this post I'd like to give you some background info and the story of how I wound up here. Background: The engineer I never really found a place where I really felt comfortable until I got my first job. I was lucky enough to work for a small company that supplied industrial equipment all over the world. My expectations were totally destroyed almost immediately. I always pictured a job as a place where you go, get taught a bunch of stuff and finally end up doing whatever it is you're taught. What really happened, is that they just threw some half-ass documentation in my lap and sent me somewhere in the mountains to fix a broken machine I didn't know anything about... and that more or less continued for 5 years. It sounds nuts, but I managed to get it done every time, and because of that became one of the stars of the company. Somehow the experience of taking a bunch of unknowns and solving a problem really clicked with me, I loved it. The thing I loved the most was the interdisciplinary nature of the work, machines are beautiful things. Chemistry, Physics, sheets and sheets of paper full of calculations, mechanical, electrical and software, all of these things working together like a symphony, with me in the center of the action. I loved it. Soon enough I was in charge of the coolest projects, and soon enough after that I was the leader of the R&D department, I had some ridiculous success towards the end. The reality Something had always felt somewhat fishy in the company though. I never had the feeling it was going to last, the quality of the organisation was very very poor in many aspects, and there was not even an intent to correct it. Soon enough things went sour, they had to fire a bunch of people and I was still there, earning just as much as before, working 4 times the load. I had to start cutting corners, which made me very dissatisfied with my job, but who gives up on a great position and a great salary. At least in my culture it's very uncommon, so I wound up taking the conventional approach and feeling like a prisoner for one year. I didn't really have the guts to get out of the situation. The bottom of the pit The worst part of it all was that I could feel my passion and love for my work slowly but surely wane, not being allowed to offer my projects the appropriate amount of attention was really a pain. These things take their tolls, and before long I was so exhausted that I made a mistake, which was literately a few centimeters away from costing 3 people their lives. The sound of 100 tons of steels scraping against the building we were in, is now just a distant memory, but at that time I could hear it ringing in my ears for several days. The experience Within a few minutes of the accident, everyone but me was off the site. I remained in solitude thinking of how the hell that could happen, so I pulled the log files from the computer and started investigating. Turns out I myself must have pressed the button to move the equipment. And yet I could simply not remember doing it. I searched my memory with all the willpower I could muster, and nothing was there. Kinda freaked me out. But since I was introspecting anyway, I also noticed I couldn't feel any particular emotion. There was a mild dose of anxiety, but overall it was just another Monday. So I had to wonder, how's that possible, am I so caught in this autopilot that I'm unable to even realize how close that bullet was ? That's when things got crazy, first thing, another voice appeared in my little monologue, it seemed significantly more upset. Wondering what the hell is happening another voice appeared, and then another. I had this rather clear sense that they were all mine, but if they are all mine, what am I. While trying to identify myself as one of these, the numbers just increased and increased, my head felt like it was about pop and soon enough I had this feeling like a lens sort of zoomed out and I was above it all somehow. Being all the way up there felt completely awesome even, I sort of had a sense like I was the space in which all of these things are happening. The experience ended and other than, I must be loosing it I had no idea what had just happened, actually I'm still far from sure and I can only manage to explain it up to this point thanks to the vocabulary I got out of watching Leo's videos. By this point it's just a memory of a description rather than of the actual experience. One good thing came out of it though, and that's that when things came back down, they rearranged a little differently somehow. The resolve After that, I started researching, to see what the hell just happened. I had no particular interest in psychology, personal development, meditation or any of these things. The only thing I lived for back then was...the machine, the thrill of victory and not much else. But now something new had been revealed to me and it was fascinating. So i began to scour the internet for papers, courses youtube channels, anything that seemed to fit my experience, curiously enough it felt like just about everything did and my appetite was ridiculous, I could never have managed to eat up so much real information in a few months before.. While trying to absorb as much information of possible, I stumbled upon the "How to be a strategic motherfucker" video and found Leo. What can I say, things clicked, for the first time I could hear someone say out loud that they believe some of the things I've been trying to articulate to my boss, underlings, parents and so on for years, but none of them listened. They all knew better, which left me in the awkward position of thinking I'm just the stupid young guy. For the first time, now I thought, maybe I'm the one that's right. Clearly at this point a major life change is in order, there's no way I'm putting myself in the situation I was in again, but it's also foolish to rush it. So after eating up all of Leo's videos, cleaning up my diet, taking some time off, starting to do yoga, and meditating every day, I finally decide to start the Life Course. From that point on, things only became more and more interesting. TLDR: Had a "great" career. Didn't have the spine to quit while ahead. Ended up having some sort of experience (any tips, advice or interpretation on this is appreciated), found Leo & self help, took the Life Purpose Course.

@JustinS Thanks for that, I'll get reading!

I used to do this a lot back in colledge. In my opinion you should avoid it as much as possible. At least in my case multitasking tends to lead to everything being less effective. Especially things like Leo's videos demand a certain amount of attention. If you use them as ambiance you may miss out on some of their meaning and that's a shame. My suggestion is to find some soothing music for your work if you need it and save the heavy stuff for a moment when you can give them proper attention.