SOUL

That's all brown. Although, what is something to be aware of is the effect of having a 'moral law' duality mindset on our well being. Does it cease self suffering and lead to well being or not? Everything else is just brown.

You are stuck in stage brown Oh yea, stage brown for sure. Baha

What? That makes no sense, where did I say it's only due to corruption? That's rubbish man, I said no such thing, haha. No, it just means ratios are all over the place and there are many variables that contribute to them. Pareto aint no Fibonacci or fractals but people wave it around like a magic wand on anything they want. See? Haha. Hey, whatever man, 70-30 or 80-20 that's close enough, right? Any numbers work for Pareto if there's a point to be made, huh. Those dam lazy leftist ants!

I prefer not to view it as two 'sides' because that is a dualistic mindset but many people do including JP and they frame their morality in a theological duality of good and evil. The one side wants to be intolerant of others diversity of just being who they are and call those others evil as they call their own belief good based on just belief and maybe some book. That strange part is this side for many centuries have perpetrated intolerance by demonizing, ostracizing and terrorizing any others motivated by just their belief against those who didn't believe as they do. They still want to so this and do whenever they can. That's kind of what bigotry is defined as, is it not? All the other 'side' wants, the ones they think are evil and want to discriminate against is to not be called evil and be discriminated against. They just want to be who they are without discriminating against others because of anyone's belief. Is that bigotry? Are those 'two sides' even equivalents? JP is trying to wrap that ancient theological duality in the political clothing of ideological opinion to obscure that it is belief based bigotry. Mixing in scientific sounding anecdotes to lend an air of objectivity to the metaphorical stories sort of like creationism for pop psychology. He keeps on perpetuating the faux theological duality that creates bitter vitriolic divisiveness.

It isn't 20% of the ants do 80% of all the work, it's that 20% of the ants are working at a time... but they mostly all do work, not just at the same time. It's not that 80% of the ants do nothing at all and live off the other 20% so he's distorting the fact to fit his belief paradigm and his propaganda. As far as property ownership and income distribution that isn't only 20% working or willing to own land while 80% are not, it's an example of a small percentage of people manipulating the system to their own advantage and to disadvantage others. It doesn't imply that the 80% aren't working hard, just that they aren't getting paid as much for their labor and is a result of the previously mentioned economic and societal manipulation. Similarly that crime breakdown isn't an accurate reflection of how it plays out in reality. Out in the real world it's 20% of the people who get prosecuted and convicted or crime because of social influences, not that only 20% commit crime. There's plenty of people who don't get convicted of crime but surely commit it. Steal food to feed your family and go to jail, steal the wealth and homes of millions get a bonus and a bailout. The Pareto principle is most relevant in randomized circumstances not ones that are purposefully influenced even if those similar ratios are found. It may be that this principle is the reason ants randomly express their work patterns that way, but JP's conclusion about the fact is flawed and application of it equally erroneous. There definitely is something to it in some distributions but there are countless other examples of distributions that don't fit those ratios but since they don't fit aren't included because they don't confirm the idea of the principle, not that they don't exist. This is one of the reasons I view with skepticism whenever it is invoked without other variables considered like JP and others do. It's just confirmation bias. But yes, of course, completely ignore his repressive ideology propaganda in favor of focusing on a small 'fact' one thinks proves him 'right' so then implies everything he bases it on is 'right', that's the JP defense mechanism of his minions. So, 20% of the people spread 80% of the bullshit and 20% of his words are fact, 80% fiction.....lol. Only 20% of the time it fits the Pareto principle but 80% it doesn't. Heh

This is a belief. Diversity is universality. How would you enforce this policy of non-initiation of force on a society? What if someone doesn't want to comply with volunteerism and wants to compel or coerce others, how would you stop them? This is debatable. There is no authority to judge 'non-dualism' and 'spirituality'. Seems more like you just adopted other people's ideas from videos, books and debates and didn't form your own. Keep delving because this 'libertarian utopia' ideology you've adopted from others is problematic and unrealistic.

Then why does he worship at the psychological alter of and preach a regressive ideology as a universal 'truth' for everyone?

You are being too generous to him when he wouldn't be as generous with you and isn't as generous with those he views as ideologically different from himself. He's more like 5% fact, 5% generic self help trope and 90% ideologically driven propaganda. He takes a little fact, a little common sense and then distorts the fact and advice to fit his belief paradigm preaching that it is the 'truth'. As an example he cites a study about a variety of ants that showed that only 20% of them are working at a time. He then distorts this fact to suggest that this is like how in humans only 20% produce everything and the 80% who don't do anything are evil cultural marxist commies who want to take the hard work of others and redistribute it. Yes, only 20% of ants are working at a time because of efficiency is actually fact but how he uses it is a distortion of what really is taking place that he weaves into a narrative to support his ideological propaganda. He's mastered the 'contemplative academic' posturing which he uses to disseminate his regressive belief system as you have correctly identified about him. He constantly does this with animal studies and behaviors by distorting and transferring them to his ideology about how he believes that humans should be living. He popularity stems largely from him tapping into the emotional and mental vulnerability and anxiety of people who want a societal paradigm that had previously entitled them in it that now is changing.

I like both of those guys but how they discuss topics is so different. In Rogan's environment they don't unpack ideas and explore them because as soon as something is touched upon it's only superficially addressed. Then he bounces from point to point superficially and it winds up on Kardashian's ass talking more about that than the meaningful topic. Brand does explore topics a bit more but he's so magically minded and metaphorically inclined that the topic always gets turned into a psychedelic referendum on the universe. So these two in a conversation seems like it's follow the bouncing ball all over the place but then trying to suggest it's some 'universal truth'. Entertaining sure but goes nowhere.

That's the nature of expanding consciousness, so that awareness is present in the moment even while the monkey mind is occupied with daily work. Yes, it's easier to do it with simpler tasks and as the tasks grow more complex it can happen that awareness gets distracted from presence and collapses into getting consumed by the mind's tasks. Exercising consciousness in a way that allows awareness to stay present in the moment and the monkey mind's tasking gets consumed by presence so it is lifted into an awakened expression. Instead of the monkey mind distracting away awareness from presence so it gets consumed by the veiled expression of the unawakened.

Do you realize you and enlightenment are full of shit? It's all bullshit.... just ask Leo, he'll tell you.

So what makes the moral objectivist's morality objective? Just saying it is doesn't make it so. Science doesn't provide an objective morality so using it's objectivity as a guide is still subjectively applied. Any number of discussions found on youtube will clearly show there is no universal interpretation of the facts provided by science that offers an objective criteria to derive morals from so is relativist. Few moral objectivists will rely on science and instead say their 'God' or religious book provides the standard for it. So, then, which 'God'? Whose book? Which parts of who's book since some do claim it's only part of the book that's the right standard. Some even say it only applies to just some people in certain circumstances and differs depending on those circumstances. So both science and religious beliefs give relative standards for morality, then how can we even begin to apply it? From this it is that all morality is relativist and it is simply someone trying to impose their own morality beliefs on others. There are no objective morals so JP or anyone else is just ignorant or hypocritical in their assertion they are morality objective.

Oh look, another JP thread where his haters and cucks come out in droves which is like every time he's mentioned ever. I avoid his stuff not because of the content or ideology but because as I listen to him I can feel the conditioning oozing out of him filled with intolerance and misery. So even if he has valuable insights in his words, it's bathed in monkey mind suffering that makes it an obstacle to bringing well being.

According to what the topic starter says about enlightenment, they themselves aren't enlightened. Circle complete.

"I am enlightened.......ask me anything" Haha!

That's me when I come to this forum...haha

Liberation is freeing awareness from the attachment to self identity... although it is as simple as it sounds but it's not as easy as it is simple. Hehe

In my experience liberation didn't come from insight. The body creates a sense of self and that is expressed in our psychology as self identity. Don't think it does? Smash your toe really hard and find out if you feel it, I bet it does. That shows the body is creating a sense of self without you having to do it, it's spontaneous. Does your mind recognize it as your toe and not the toe of someone else? This is through the mind's psychology attributing it to you and not someone else, it's creating self identity without you having to do it, it's spontaneous. The body spontaneously creates a sense of self identity... it's a naturally occurring phenomena. How can one trust the 'insight' that is filtered through self identity as genuine if one has no experience of liberation and is still attached to the self identity? This forum and spiritual communities are filled with people going in circles of insight and understanding without even freeing themselves in liberation.

There is no inattention, that's part of the false perception of duality. Awareness is aware, it's just a matter of what is the awareness/attention on? Is it on being present or is it on all the self identity/movement stuff?

Yes, attention on the self identity distracts from awareness simply being present. The path is the product of the body just as is the sense of self identity a product of the body. Even if we don't focus on the self identity the body will still produce the sense of self and is part of the part. Simplifying the path to just being present and only addressing what the body needs to survive as the body creates the sensation to motivate us it ceases to feed the self identity as a distraction on the path. The body creates the sensations to keep it alive but we don't have to create and believe the story about the body to be alive.

Self identity creates separation, not words, even in the absence of words there can be a perceived separation in awareness from the self identity.... words are the result of this separation, not the impetus to it. The body spontaneously creates self identity which results eventually in words. Even if we clarify awareness of the perception of separation as long as we have the body, it generates the self identity in our consciousness so we can be aware of it but not necessarily distracted by it. Well, there isn't duality, that is just the mistaken impression of our mind from separation coming from our self identity but it doesn't really exist as duality even if the sense of self creates a perception of separation, The body spontaneously creates the sense of self which causes this perceived separation in our consciousness. There really is no such thing as inattention either, it is distraction so we still have attention but it directed to the body and it's sense of self with the perceived separation. See how that's a false duality? It's not like we either are attentive or have no attention as opposites but our attention is distracted from being on the unity and instead it's on the separation, At no point are we without attention/awareness, it's just focused elsewhere, it's distracted from the holistic presence of being. All that movement stuff you talk about are examples of what distracts of the separation from self identity. I try not to get too complicated in my own experience of the path because I have found that attempting to understand it can be a distraction as well and understanding it isn't a requirement for liberation, Well, multiple words at least, that is what I was suggesting. As long as we have a body and we are alive in that body we are on the path and yes it can be a distraction....it evolved to capture our attention so we behave in a way to keep it alive. Regardless of whether it's simple or complex we walk it and it can be a distraction from being present which is why I simplify mine own path, less to be distracted with. The body spontaneously creates the existential yearning that manifests as psychological craving, emotional desire, physical hunger and everything like that to keep the organism alive. As long as we have the body we will have the yearning in all it's forms. Yes, they can all serve as a distraction from simply being present, that's what the body does. The food doesn't come to our mouth, we have to go get it, hunger is a physical discontentment to motivate us to eat or we die. That last little bit is you getting distracted by the path, more specifically by the words again. I did say "realization" and you substituted 'seeking of finding' then tried to make a point about the words. Should I now tell you running around telling others 'not it, not it', neti neti is 'not it' and a distraction as well? Nah... that's 'not it' either, I don't want to be distracted by the path. Haha.

Well, from a dualist perspective there is the opposition positions of attached-unattached and attention-inattention. This would also apply to awakened-asleep, reality-illusion, truth-false and all of the other spiritual ideology rooted in the dualist mindset. Although, to transcend the dualist mindset there is another perspective to gain insight with and allow me a moment to illustrate it. Let's take light....a single particle of light, a photon and it's traveling through space on it's way to earth. While it is still in space there is no atmosphere for it to interact with so it is invisible, it is unseen even though it exists. This is like our awareness as it manifests in the observerless observation expression and it is our awareness in it's purest form but it isn't what would be called enlightened which I will get to next. When the photon reaches our planet it first encounters the atmosphere so now it has something to interact with so becomes visible as light. It still isn't blocked until it encounters something more dense but this is the first time it can be compared to enlightenment. This is like awareness as it is in our consciousness without the self identity to interfere with, obscure or block it. Then this photon encounters the solid mass of earth and that is when the light is blocked and a shadow is created. The earth is like our self identity that blocks the light creates the shadow and is when we search out the enlightened state of consciousness. The dualist mind sees this only as the opposition position to the shadow but being a separated mind perspective it will always contend with the shadow. Some may recognize this fruitless mindset and seek out the illuminated state of the photon in atmosphere as awareness in consciousness. They remove self identity, the shadow disappears and they glow in this blissful state of enlightenment... but wait. There is still another state that can be realized, the observerless observation of the photon without the atmosphere. That is the unseen, the unity of infinite, absolute wholeness, the holistic expression of awareness in it's purest form. So much so that even to call it enlightenment is to fall short of capturing the nature of it's essence. Yes, my illustration also falls short of communicating the nature of it's essence but it is the best I can do with the language I have and a conceptual mind.

@Mu_ If you actually did read the discussion that you call good you would have noticed we did discuss the different words that could be used so why make that a point of contention. Whether one prefers to use craving or suffering or desire it doesn't matter really since they all stem from an existential yearning that appears to be what disturbs our peace and contentment. Much of the rest you talk about to me is the ceremony and adornment of the path but for my own experience I am a minimalist with regard to the path. Too much complication and complexity in the path appears to distract a very many from the genuine purpose of it, the cessation of this existential yearning that manifests as the craving, suffering and desire in us. I have found from decades of being in spiritual circles of seekers that the monkey mind wants to mentally masturbate over the complicated complexity of the ceremony and adornment along the path as a distraction so that the cessation of yearning gets lost or ignored in favor of the path to it. They become attached to the complex ritual of the path. This attachment quite often is cultivated by seeking 'understanding' expressed as the direct insight of the complicated path instead of that direct experience of being present in peace and equanimity. Once I did have direct experience of being present in peace a sense of bliss and fulfillment quenched the existential yearning and I realized the attachment to the complicated ritualized path is what was keeping me from it. @Emanyalpsid Contemplate your own experience, couldn't it be said that the deepest and clearest insights come from those moments when the clarity of the unattached awareness is perceiving reality without the veil of self identity obscuring it? How can we have genuine and clear insight with the conditioned self identity filtering our perception? So it seems that attachment doesn't lead to insight but it is liberation, unattached perception, that leads to insight.

Liberation is not an understanding or insight into suffering or the 'nature of reality' even if it's transcendental or direct. It is freedom from suffering so even without any understanding or insight one can be liberated. The lure of understanding becomes a 'truth' seeking distraction. There are plenty of examples of people on this forum and within the 'spiritual community' having transcendental understanding and direct insight of the 'nature of reality' without them being free from suffering. Liberation isn't dependent on understanding or insight, it's freedom. Too much focusing on understanding the path distracts from the realization there isn't the need to walk it.

You only once mention that you don't 'suffer' from some things you list, this hardly speaks to what I am referring by the casual use of it. In liberation also called enlightenment the freeing from suffering is what it is, it does not exists apart from it. Of course the way you talk about the meaning of words it seems they have more value then liberation does otherwise you would have mentioned the freedom from suffering more often and not casually just once. That being said let's move on past that and on to the point of this. Truth, yes, it's meaning can be confusing and quite often people focus on finding truth instead of liberation. Even if you interpret it as realization in that context what is 'made real' is liberation and our freedom from suffering. It's not just being made aware of it or awakened to it, it is liberation made real in our exprience. Now if you also want to interpret suffering differently it influences the core of this because freedom from it is central to liberation, it is all that it really is and without it liberation is not what it is. Even seen as unsatisfactoriness, which can also be said as unsatisfactory, unfulfilled or emptiness and it is what gives rise to the craving and to desire of existential life. Whether we view this cessation as desire-less emptiness or crave-less fulfillment isn't the point but ceasing the cycle of that duality of empty and full is the liberation. The path is not the path unless it leads to liberation regardless of how we express that path in idea, belief, word and deed. So my question isn't seeking an answer and the answer shouldn't be inviting a question because that is an expression of duality but all discussion about this is pointing to liberation and if it is not it is just distraction from the realization of it.