7thLetter

@Viking I mean I speak from experience and that has been how I got rid of ‘most’ of my bad behaviors. Of course it can be different for other people when you take in consideration their past, their genetics, etc. Personally I try to include every way possible I can to improve myself with fitness being one of them so that could be one of the things definitely contributes to it. So I’m not really saying enlightenment or meditation itself will cure all your problems. Also I wouldn’t know that because I’m not enlightened. But even Leo says that enlightenment won’t cure all your problems. You still need to work on your psychology. I would say enlightenment and mastering your psychology are two completely different things. Leo even says that even enlightened people can still do unconscious behaviors like go to strip clubs. Why not? Enlightenment doesn’t mean you can’t have fun but its more of a change in your thinking and your relationship towards fun. I think that’s another important thing to understand, which is that consciousness seems to just change your motivations towards certain things. And from the outside perspective you don’t really know what anyone’s motivation or intention is towards something until you ask them. The lower-consciousness person thinks the higher-consciousness person goes to the gym so he can get big and help him get laid. But what the lower-consciousness person doesn’t understand is his motivation for going to the gym. Maybe from the higher-consciousness perspective his motivation is because he enjoys it, he wants to become healthy, and all the additional results like getting bigger come as a byproduct. So let me ask you, what would you do differently as Shinzen Young to get rid of the addiction? I know nothing about him but I think I saw a post that he did eventually get over the marijuana addiction. But are you saying you would resist the temptation to smoke more marijuana? Like, “Today I’m going to throw all my marijuana and quit for good!” Sure it might work in the short-term but down the road the cravings for marijuana might come back. I think balance is the answer we are looking for. Again, I know nothing about Shinzen Young but maybe he only worked on enlightenment and not his psychology? Maybe fitness could have helped? Yoga? Nutrition? More theory? More action? One more thing to think about is that there really seems to be no end goal to enlightenment. Growth is infinite. I don’t care how many years he’s been working on his enlightenment, there’s always more room for improvement. As human beings we’re all dysfunctional in a way. We all have so much to work on. Maybe Shinzen Young had some past emotional trauma? Addictions are there to fill up an emotional void inside of you and maybe he just hasn’t gotten to working on that? There’s a lot to think about here.

@B_Naz I agree, and at the same time you don’t want to resist the desire to do those unconscious behaviors and ‘get rid of’ those behaviors in a neurotic way. That has been one of my biggest insights or realizations in my journey. Which is not to align your life with the theory in a neurotic way, but to instead use it as a guideline as you continue to grow yourself internally. Those unconscious behaviors will then exit out of your life naturally depending on your level of consciousness. The theory is not there to tell you what to do in life. So for example, a psychologically dysfunctional newbie who is listening to advanced personal development theory for the first time won’t be able to apply any of it and take action right away. If the theory says that video games, drugs, sex, partying are unconscious behaviors, and that society is here to fuck us all so distance yourself from society, instead sit in a cave, do psychedelics, enlightenment work and meditate. He/she wouldn’t be able to to do it. The newbie would be so closed-minded, so he/she would have to work on open-mindedness and several other things and work their way up little by little. But as the newbie becomes a bit more comfortable with listening to the material, there’s the trap of resisting bad behaviors, “I should NOT eat this icecream” or “I need to STOP watching TV because the theory said I shouldn’t do this!” But sometimes you just gotta let these unconscious behaviors happen and be aware of it. There will be ups and downs, and its never perfect. In the end, the growth will come naturally as you begin to move up to higher levels.

- Stop wasting your time on video games - Understand how money works, get your money psychology together, so as an end result you can buy yourself some time to do the things you want to do and not have to work countless jobs - Buy stocks/cryptocurrency - Read more books - Meditate - Don't get a tattoo - Stop spending money and hoarding a bunch of things that you don't need - Go through a TON of experiences because that's the best way to learn

Honestly I don’t think counselling would help you with that or any external source. It may work to some degree but you are on your own for any inner world struggles that you are trying to overcome. No one could talk you into becoming emotionally detached from a job. However, you can find the answer through an external source, and work from there. And the answer is through deep contemplation, meditation, etc.

I know meditation is one solution, but that has already been one of my habits that I'm trying to be consistent on. What more could I work on? It seems like I tend to make these wrong decisions quite a bit in my life. I'm a male and it reminds me of what you would read in books of how females tend to be highly emotional creatures. Some examples are getting a terrible tattoo, spending over $5K getting the tattoo, deciding I don't like it so I get it covered, then deciding to get laser tattoo removal. Another example is joining an MLM a couple years back and 'investing' over $5K into knowledge and into the business. Spending hundreds of dollars on pointless 'deals' at shoppers. That's when I had a bit of a problem with hoarding items. Getting a job as a Security Guard, signing a contract, then deciding last minute I don't want to do it so I had to pay $600. Some of these were before I started to self-actualize but I somewhat still have a bit of this problem. Currently working on my money psychology I know that will help. Advice?

@Leo Gura Hmm, good point lol

@aurum Secrets of the Millionaire Mind is actually the last book that I just finished reading. Really good book for anyone looking to improve their money habits. Although it could use a little less advertising of the millionaire mind seminar. And will definitely look into your second recommendation, thanks!

@aurum Definitely have a lot of psychological issues around money. Coming from a lower-class background, a lot of my beliefs must of came from my parents. They tend to spend quite a bit and that must have rubbed onto me. I also used to have a friend with some DEEP psychological issues. He would often talk to me in a condescending manner, and manipulated me in a way that made me spend my money. Of course everything I do is done on my own, but his thoughts seemed to influence mine. For example, as a teen I worked a whole lot, saved a couple grand, and I would always brag about it to my friends. With him knowing how much is in my bank account, he would always call me a cheap ass when I didn't want to buy this or that. Every single time. At first it seemed like he was joking, but the more and more he said that its like fuck off. And I think that might have contributed to my spending habits. Glad I cut him out of my life though. Nowadays I tend to be a bit more smart with my money, maybe a little too stingy, but I'm working on it.

Happy Birthday Leo! Btw how do people know its his birthday? How do I not know this after following him for 2-3 years

@Girzo If you lived my life for a day you might understand. And again you can’t be too sure where I’m at based on what I’m saying here. I’ve posted a thread a couple days ago explaining my thoughts on something similiar to what you just mentioned there in the case with your friend. People often times fall into this trap where they tend to ‘copy’ or emulate what they hear in theory and create an identity around it when they actually have not done the work to grow themselves to that level yet. A popular one with men and picking up girls is becoming an alpha male because they believe that being dominant, non-reactive, etc. is attractive to girls. So often times you would get a beta male trying to be dominant and you can tell that he’s faking it, and it just comes off as insecurity. So in the case with your friend, you pretty much mentioned he fell into this same trap, and ‘copied’ the different spiral dynamic levels when he is not actually there yet. In my case yes that is a dangerous trap to fall into, and I need to be aware of that, but that is my own inner demons that I myself need to work on and no point in saying if I am in fact dealing with that trap or not at the moment. I already gave you a good explanation of my thoughts and a bit of my life story in the last post but now it seems like I’m trying to justify to you that I’m stage yellow, which is pointless. You can think what you want about me I don’t care, because I know myself more than anyone else. Although what you mentioned about partially being at certain stages like 10% here, 20% there, is definitely something to think about. One thing I want to add though is that Leo mentions in his video that there is a transitioning phase in between stages, or paradigm shift, and its not always easy to get from one to the next. For me, I don’t remember exactly the last few transitioning phases but from what I experienced last, it has been a really bad depression phase that I had to go through. Everything in my life went wrong but recently broke out of that phase and it created a ton of momentum in my inner and outer world. And there you go, you mentioned entrepreneurship which is a suitable career choice for stage yellow, and trading is linked to entrepreneurship. Of course I’d probably look into something else more like starting a business once I’ve made enough money trading. And its not just finances, but being ‘woke’ and doing something that is not authentic to you, would make you feel guilty. It’s a matter of authenticity. The reason why the self-actualized human being wouldn’t do finances is because it doesn’t really align with self-actualization. But people could honestly build a life purpose around finances, same thing with building legos for a living (a story mentioned in Leo’s life purpose course.) I’m already feeling guilty for working a job that doesn’t align with my values, and its always been that I want to get out of this situation. Plus living with family is something I want to change. Cool the self-actualization helps you deal with it in the moment and I don’t ‘have to’ change it, but that’s not what I want. Besides I really don’t give a rat’s turd what the theory says, its not that “oh finances are not what you should be doing because you are woke now.” It’s, you’re free to do whatever you want. Aligning your life with what the theory says is again falling into the neurotic “copy trap” that I mentioned. It’s all about experiencing the theory for yourself.

@Spiral @Girzo Thanks for the comments, it has lead me to do a bit of self-reflection and looking back into the different stages out there. What I’m saying here will be based on my own knowledge of the Spiral Dynamics model, Leo’s video, and the website http://spiraldynamicsintegral.nl/en/ So let me explain. @Spiral Replying to your first comment, the reason why I mention it could be a behavior of the stage yellow paradigm is because it is mentioned on that site that, “stage yellow may seem cold and distant as they may forget to connect with people at times (because of their enthusiasm).” I would describe that as their enthusiasm with their inner world since they are often times creating models in their head and analyzing almost everything that is on their mind. So yes I agree with you that the different stages don’t have a lot to do with building relationships because I do socialize with anyone out there for fun but mainly I am often times in my head analyzing things. And that is a huge part of it as well that I mostly prefer people of the same stage, hence the reason I don’t hang out with anyone because most people I meet don’t understand the way I think. @Girzo@Spiral Now replying to both of your comments, I’m kind of getting the feeling that you two are judging me by a single post I made and trying to make the assumption and say that I am in fact stage orange. But I can also make the assumption and say that you two are not seeing the bigger picture here and taking into consideration what I have been through in my 22 years of existence, the fact that I might have wrote this post after work while my emotions are all bottled up, the fact that you two have never met me in person, a possible misunderstanding of how the spiral dynamics model works, and a possibility that I might be stage turquoise and that this could be a social experiment to see if people will judge me by a single post online. (Not saying it is an experiment but that’s a possibility.) I’d say its pretty difficult to determine what stage you truly are, but I agree with what Spiral last said. Which is the fact that you have to go through stage green in order to get to stage yellow. But let me give you guys a little bit of my life story so maybe now it will all come together. I have been through stage blue, which is when I was highly religious. I was a Christian. Then when I was in the stage Orange paradigm, that is when I did the Pyramid scheme stuff or Multi-level marketing, whatever you want to call it. I was highly materialistic, I loved cars, all I wanted was a Lamborghini Aventador. I would manipulate people, and only cared about success. People in the same MLM business were Christian too and so was I so we always went to church on sundays and valued God. So you can tell they’re stage Blue/Orange. Did MLM for a year. Then I transitioned into doing cold-approach pickup while I was still in the stage orange paradigm. I was also self-actualizing on the side meditating, etc. did this for a year and halfway through the year I could tell that I’m slowly transitioning into stage green. Caring about the girl’s feelings, only caring about getting a girlfriend, while my wings only wanted to get laid. Highly empathetic and sensitive. I even went to a rave one time and literally saw some 16-18 year old kid OD on the floor, saw some chick having a seizure, and I remember talking to my wing saying “all they wanted to do is have fun..” Cause I cared about them. My wings didn’t understand the way I thought, I was always different from the other PUAs and everyone else was about selfishness and getting results. In the stage green paradigm I felt like I was hurting other people and myself so I quit pickup. So now we can say here that I have a really good understanding of the stage orange paradigm cause I’ve been surrounded by A LOT of it in my past life from meeting network-marketers, to PUAs, and even listening to all the self-help, and pickup material out there. So that also tells you that, with a great understanding of stage orange, if I don’t currently see that frame of mind in myself, then I couldn’t possibly be stage orange. Now why would I have trading the markets as my dream job? That doesn’t mean I’m materialistic and only care about success. Sure I want some nice things but it would be mainly so I could move out of my parents place, and get out of a job, so I could have the time to self-actualize and travel. I also actually love understanding how the market moves and understanding the psychology of why people sell/buy here. Trading is highly analytical as well, which is another trait of the stage yellow paradigm, someone who is analytical. Stage yellow is also authentic to themselves and I would say that trading is the closest thing to authentic to me. You don’t deal with people, and its a lot of analytical work. Girzo you may be possibly idealizing what the different stages are like. We don’t have a lot of examples of people in stage yellow like Leo, and there isn’t much said about what kind of career path these different stages go for, but I don’t think you would start questioning the certain stage’s career path up until stage Turquoise. Turquoise seems to have a global way of thinking and helping others, which seems to be what Leo is doing, although he seemed to start Actualized.org from the stage orange paradigm. And that is not what stage yellow is about. Yes it is at a higher level of consciousness and trading the market is considered lower-consciousness, but what career path do you expect stage yellow to have? Doing youtube and helping the global economy? They are more focused on themselves, and their own values. Very similiar to the stage orange paradigm but they have their differences. You also need to take into consideration that being conscious doesn’t mean that you have the action taking factor all figured out. Someone could be stage orange, they have a success, results-oriented mindset, they have big dreams, they want a mansion and a lambo, but hell they could be stuck at Mcdonalds because they don’t understand the entire domain of business or their money psychology is out of place. Being at the higher levels on the graves model doesn’t mean you have it all figured out. Couple more reasons I would say I’m yellow is because I have talked to my old PUA wingman a while ago, criticizing his behaviors, trying to ‘help’ him solve his problem, but he’s too stubborn and doesn’t get the bigger picture. He then later makes a facebook post indirectly attacking me saying something along the lines like, “Oh its funny how people read all these books and never take action.” Stage orange is highly pragmatic and sees yellow as someone who makes things too complex and never pragmatic. Yellow sees orange as someone who doesn’t understand the bigger picture. But really these days I’m more accepting of the way people think because they are the way they are for a reason. To end it off here, another reason I say I’m stage yellow is because I can sort of tell that the next stage for me is stage Turquoise. Which seems to be a more spiritual and accepting and global way of thinking about the world. I don’t know how to get there, but it will just happen naturally. Thanks for reading.

This isn't a new insight or anything, but think of it as an addition to Leo's "Learning = Behavior Change" video, and a reminder to you of that theory. Lately I've been letting things happen as it is, letting my growth occur naturally, and letting things flow. Much rather than trying to create change in my life in a neurotic manner by telling myself that "I HAVE TO do this and that." And I believe that's honestly the way to go rather than listening to some theory or looking at the ideal psychologically grown person to be and emulating that without doing the inner and outer work. Because that just seems to be the case with some people, and don't get me wrong I've often seen this in myself as well. In the self-help community, I often see people trying to 'copy' whoever it is they follow and they end up creating this identity for themselves acting like they've got it all figured out just for the sake of impressing other people. For example, Network marketers or people who run MLMs do a lot of traditional self-help, post success quotes on facebook/instagram, and tend to criticize people who work 9-5 jobs. They come from a frame of mind of, "Ha! You said no to my MLM opportunity? Have fun working at McDonalds for the rest of your life! Fucking 95%'ers." I've been involved in MLM myself and this is literally what I've seen in others, even when they themselves still work jobs and don't even have the success yet. Because that's what the leaders in the MLM industry who actually do have it, teach that to their followers verbally, and non-verbally. This is especially seen in the Pick-up community as well (which I've also been apart of myself) where PUAs would 'copy' the experienced pickup artist's theories and they try to become that person in a conversation with a girl. For example, the experienced pickup artist is someone who is nonreactive to the girl's "shit-tests" and doesn't show as much emotion, is often a theory that is taught in the PUA community. And I would see PUAs COPYING that theory and ACTING as that nonreactive guy without letting it come naturally to them by doing the work that is required. I have tons of examples, but lastly I just wanted to mention that it happens in the self-actualization or spirituality community as well. I think there's a problem with spirituality going mainstream. That's great that more and more people are aware of the teachings, but sometimes you would get people who read the popular book on spirituality and they act like they're all spiritual all of a sudden and start preaching what they've read. In conclusion, listening to the theory is great, but do the training that is required as well and just let your growth come naturally, don't force it. You don't need to ACT in accordance with what you heard in Leo's video. If Leo talks about his ideas at the stage Turquoise paradigm and you're stage Orange, you don't need to act like you're stage Turquoise. If you hear about eating healthy, and doing hardcore meditation retreats, while you come from a victim mindset and is overweight and just getting into personal development for the first time, you don't need to neurotically drop all your old habits and force yourself to eat healthy and do hour long meditations. Start small, build your way up. With self-actualization, I think we already know that the training means doing the meditation practices, contemplation, etc. Build your way up from there and the growth will come naturally. Anyways, I think that turned into a long rant, I'll end it here. Thoughts?

Detachment from outcome is a state of being and a level that you get to as you start to develop yourself. These personal development ideas are not something that you need to copy. It's not "Oh I read in a book that I need to detach from outcome, so I will TRY to detach from outcome." No its, "I will continue to grow myself, and I will reach a state of detachment from outcome as a byproduct."

Just some advice from my personal experience, but growth or change in your daily habits from personal development is something that should come naturally. So as you begin to develop yourself, the things that you don't need in your life will exit out of your life. For example, once you constantly do the practice of meditation, you start to let go of negative thinking habits naturally, and you would also let go of any bad habits that you have naturally like alcohol, drugs, etc. So its really not that you listen to some theory on the internet that you SHOULD quit alcohol and porn and drugs ENTIRELY without doing the personal development work. Its that you constantly grow yourself while surrendering to any habits that your body and mind desire to do, and be aware of the fact that you are doing those things. Watch Leo's video on awareness. I mean I don't know your situation personally because the only judgement I can make is based on this forum post, but that may possibly be it. It could be the fact that you are forcing the personal development, rather than letting things happen. Let go of the idea that things SHOULD be this way or, I SHOULD eat healthy, or that you SHOULD stop drinking alcohol. But do not force it, let things happen and be aware. Btw, check out this video, literally was uploaded today which is pretty crazy since I'm here writing a post about something similiar. Edit: Just another thing I wanted to add, watch Leo's video "Learning = Behavior change." Lately I've been playing a lot of brain games, and one of my favorites is Chess online. I'm a beginner and even at level 1 the computer is still tough to beat. But as I play more and more, its getting easier and effortless. And that's how you should think of your personal development. As you do more and more practice, things start to become more effortless and you barely even have to think of it because it all just happens. The ideal level you want to get to, isn't something that you want to try to 'copy', if that makes any sense. You can't get there by 'copying' the ideal and then you're suddenly that person. You just have to grow yourself and then you will eventually get there. I often see that in Christianity, they give you the ideal person, who is Jesus, and the sins that you SHOULD NOT DO. But they don't really talk about the growth process. So followers are left with, "DON'T HAVE SEX" and they force themselves not to do it and they're unhappy, etc. etc. Anyways, that's all I have to say

I'd want one because I've never experienced it before. I'm 22, not ugly, but ugly personality. Back then I was super needy, so now its like ok girls don't like needy guys, and now I'm cold as hell. SUPER picky as well when it comes to girls I'm into. These days I don't really feel like investing the energy into flirting, unless I'm GENUINELY interested in a girl. Kind of not that into one night stands so I don't see a whole lot of value in flirting if I'm not going to be in a relationship with that person because socializing takes up so much energy. I do little by little though. I'm an INTP, maybe its just me. Used to to pickup for a year, and now kind of trying to get back into it. Anyways, I'd want one cause I just want the experience and the dating experience. I have a feeling I'd learn a whole lot from having one. Will it make me happy? I'm not sure I'd have to find out. I've grown myself so much over the years, I've come to be really independent. I don't NEED a relationship but I do want one. The desire for a relationship has really pushed me though in my personal development journey. The reason why I got into personal development in the first place was because I've always wanted a relationship. And it still pushes me to this day. Of course the sex would be nice, love/compassion, all that. But really if you're consistent with your inner growth, you really don't need one because its another form of external happiness like food, entertainment, alcohol, etc. etc.

The short answer to this question is probably "yes" but I'm sort of looking to understand it more at a deeper level, or at least get my thoughts validated. So I'm 22, never had a girlfriend in my life, so I have no idea what its like to be in a romantic relationship. Lately I've been having the desire to be in one. I imagine it to be a great learning experience for me in a way that we would be sub-consciously helping each other psychologically through everything that we go through in life. For guys I think the desire for women act as a very strong source of motivation for men, which is where I'm coming from. The reason why I got into personal development in the first place is to get rid of my shyness and insecurities in order to go talk to girls that I like. I also remember reading from either "Think and grow rich" or "The Superior Man" that without women, men would be nothing or do nothing, something along those lines. Currently I'm doing fine with all my habits, meditation, reading, gym, etc. And of course I'm doing all of it because I'm starting to see how much internal happiness I've built up for myself, but there's also a side of me that does it in order to hopefully find attract a girl that I really like. Would I do these things if women didn't exist in the world? Good question I don't even know how to answer that. After doing a lot of inner work though, I've come to be very independent. These days I don't have the need for a lot of friends, I spend most of my days by myself. So I do understand the fact that if you grow yourself enough you don't need anyone but yourself to some degree, but is it really the same for wanting to be in a romantic relationship? So let's look at some of the things that a relationship would offer, and maybe I might even be answering my own question at this point by typing so much. A relationship would offer you sex, ok that's a source of external happiness right. It offers you love/belonging from another human being, which is listed on maslow's hierarchy of needs above safety and physiological needs. But is that a source of external happiness? I remember going through a depression phase, I'd say human interaction was one of the reasons why I got out of it. ALSO, a big reason why I fell into that 3 month depression phase was because I was really into this girl who had a boyfriend. I was flirting with her and she was leading me on the whole time so it was tough. A romantic relationship also offers you growth in a way, depending on how psychologically developed your significant other is. That could possibly be a source of internal happiness if its helping you grow, right? But if we were in a relationship and didn't have all these things, that would lead to unhappiness. You would miss having all these things if your partner went away for vacation or passed away out of nowhere. Also if you were in a toxic relationship with your partner manipulating and cheating on you, that would lead to unhappiness and a lot of psychological stress as well. Anyways, really just me trying to justify why or why I shouldn't look for a relationship at the moment. But I really do see it as a strong source of motivation for me. The desire for a girl pushes me to grow myself so that I could be in a good mood, which means I'd be in a talkative mood, and a talkative mood means I could go talk to girls. But in the end maybe I'm just creating an idealization of what its like to be in a relationship. Thoughts?

@Kisame Your reply was golden. Thank you for that

@Dan Arnautu Hey thanks for the reply in your video. I was thinking maybe read the person’s entire situation first before answering. But maybe I could have been a bit more specific on my part. I definitely don’t have a misunderstanding of what an introvert is, but it can be a bit limiting with the fact that I get my energy so drained that I can’t even say a word. I’ve worked in the hospitality industry for over 5 years now, working with customer service to improve my confidence and how I carry myself. I have a lot of social days, and a lot of anti-social days depending on my mood. So yes I do understand introverts can be social in several cases. I did mention that I got into pickup later on in the paragraph and I did it for a year. I did take a lot of action. Went out to clubs, bars, malls, schools, streets, you name it. I’d say I’ve done over 400 cold approaches in that entire year. Have over 60 numbers in the notes in my phone. Wrote my reference experiences for almost each girl. I guess I’d say I took the wrong approach to it a lot of the time. I looked into too much theory, I also took an ‘asshole’ approach to game. But overall your advice was not bad, it has definitely got me thinking about getting into pickup again. Just not going to do daygame anymore but just going out to clubs on the weekends for now probably. I quit because I felt that it was destroying who I am in a way. With all the manipulation and the other PUAs you surround yourself with. I was also getting heavily invested into self-actualization so that got in the way. Still am though, so I would change my approach if I got back into pickup. Anyways, thanks again

You listed a lot of the most important ones, I can't really think of any more but maybe you can add deep-breathing exercises or self-awareness exercises. But instead of looking for hundreds of ways to improve your mental toughness, start small. Start with all of the ones that you've listed here and focus on those. Once you've felt that you have built a habit of doing each one of those daily, then start adding other habits. Maybe listening to motivational audios/videos is another good one. Or re-framing any negativity in your life. For example if you started to complain about something that you don't have and re-frame it into appreciating what you do have. And practice that with every other negative thought that might come up. But like I said, just focus on a few and build onto those that you've already listed. Build onto them in a way that you're laser focused on becoming better at each habit like if you only do 10 minutes of meditation for example, and work your way up to 15 mins then to 20 minutes. Cold showers? Build your way up from 30 secs to a minute. Working out? If you bench 40lb dumbbells work your way up to 50lb with more reps, etc. You get the point. And as you keep building yourself up in every single area of your life, you'll be a fucking boss man good luck

One of my biggest struggles is finding a girlfriend, but most importantly, the right girl. I'm 22, never had a girlfriend in my life. The reason why? Its not that I'm ugly or anything, I'd say I'm above average. I'd say it has to do a lot with my personality. My whole life I've been a huge introvert. Elementary to high school I'd always hang out alone during lunch break. So obviously I had no dating life in school. After high school it got a bit better because I had little hookups at parties but that was it. I was always quiet and shy, and that's how I turned to personal development. The goal was always to improve myself in order to talk to girls. I'd find every way to improve who I am, and I still find every way I can to this day. I also got into pick up, did that for a year, few dates but no success. But I honestly can say now that I've reached the confidence goal that I was looking for. But the problem now is how picky I've become. I've set my standards so high these days that the girls I end up being interested in are already in a relationship, or they're attention-seekers, whatever it is who knows. It's actually very rare for me to be interested in a girl. I've had several girls that were interested in me, but they just never met my standards. Based on the myers-briggs test I might be either INTP or INFP. Plus things have changed so much with me getting super involved in the deep inner work that I've grown a lot on the independent side. I often don't feel like I NEED a relationship but I'm 22 and I really want to experience what its like to be in one. It also seems tough to find someone with the same interests and someone who at least understands personal development at a certain level.

Just do what you want

So I've only gotten halfway through Leo's recent upload, "Life Is A Dream" video and I've came up with several questions. If anyone is kind enough to answer them and help me along with other readers understand this topic, would be very much appreciated. How did Leo come up with this insight? I mean I'm sure it must've been through psychedelics or an enlightenment experience. Why does he seem so confident in his belief that life is a dream? He talks about the materialist paradigm, but wouldn't he be speaking from another paradigm himself which possibly may or may not be the absolute truth? Isn't it just another 'belief'? If God is dreaming an infinite number of 'dreams' like my life and Leo's life and a dog's life and the tree's life, why could God 'wake up' from the dream in one human's life, but God doesn't wake up from the dream in every other dream? If let's say only 1-2% of people have waken up from the dream, does that mean God has only partially woken up from the infinite dream? If we could come to the conclusion that life is just a dream, wouldn't the fact that we can come up with that idea also be apart of the dream? Everything in the dream must be apart of the dream and not separate from it right? So that includes all ideas and thoughts meaning enlightenment, spirituality, non-duality, God, etc. is all apart of the dream. Any absolute truth that a human can come up with is just apart of the dream and not truth?

@Leo Gura So are we all experiencing the same "dream" and interacting within' the same dream? What if the fact that we call this a dream is part of the dream too? Since thoughts and ideas are a part of the dream itself?

Definitely could relate to this post. I'm 22, started doing all this personal development stuff and started dropping most of my friends around 19-21. It didn't happen all at once but it all happened sub-consciously. Started seeing the negativity in them, and I felt that they were bringing me down in a way. But I definitely built some kind of ego around all that. I started to think that I was 'conscious' and that everyone else was ignorant. I think that it also created this standoffish behavior in me and I would just sabotage all the relationships that I had. Even with my mom. I went into full hermit mode had basically no one anymore in my life and I fell into depression. I even stopped doing my personal development. All I did was play video games and it kind of felt like it was all supposed to be this way as a result of hardcore personal development, falling into hermit mode. But now its all getting better again for me. I was out of a job for 3 months during my depression phase, had no human interaction other than my family. Started to interact more with my family again, and depression got a bit better. Then finally got a job and now I'm starting to socialize a lot more at work and my happiness levels are better than ever. Starting to realize that relationships are important in someone's life and its not just all about hardcore personal development. I mean, I do believe that there is a point that we can get to in our personal development journey where you are 100% independent but in the early stages I would say no. It's all about being able to balance the two and its not about one side of the spectrum.

So I always was a quiet loner kid throughout elementary and highschool, and that has always been something that I've wanted to change about myself. I thought it was because of social anxiety, so I discovered psychology, and personal development. After looking more and more into this stuff, I found out that it was just an introverted personality of mine. But still, I wanted to become more social so that I could get the confidence to be able to talk to girls. I then got into customer service jobs dealing with customers, MLM, and I also did pickup for about a year. When I was doing pickup, it felt like my overall confidence was at an all time high, but there were sacrifices that I had to make when it came to pickup. Sure I had the confidence but it felt like I was dying on the inside psychologically because of the narcissistic behavior that I had little to no control of. I then cut back on the pickup, and started working at a huge restaurant which was a very social environment. At first, I was very very social working there, made a ton of friends during the first few months. My level of happiness was pretty high I would say, and I was able to socialize with the girls that I was interested in with no problem whatsoever. Later on down the road, after a year of working there, it started to feel like I was getting depressed. I stopped talking to the friends that I made there, especially the girls that I was into. And my life just felt like a huge mess. I was being scheduled 6-7 times a week, working 8+ hours a day, and the girl that I really liked had a boyfriend. Constantly every single day people would give me a bad reaction because of the way that I was acting. I was being all quiet and grumpy, and they seemed to take that personally. The more it happened with all these people, it kind of felt like it just adds onto the depression. Another thing I want to add was that I had a habit of taking cold showers. I thought it was helping with my self-improvement, but for me personally I'll say that it constantly put me into a bad mood. Because I hated taking cold showers. It was kind of like I knew it was a good habit to put into place, but I would always tell myself that I hate it. Anyways, I quit the job, then I fought this depression for 3 months. It felt like I was going through some life-crisis. All I would do is stay at home for the entire day and play video games. I had no motivation at all for self-improvement no matter how hard I tried. I still went to the gym daily but I didn't try as hard as I usually do. So now that I'm out of the depression phase, I got another restaurant job with the same company but the restaurant is a lot slower and a lot smaller. I made a good first impression during the interview, but working there, people know my personality sucks. I have a desire to be social and make friends but I'm not as social as I should be. I feel more shy and often hesitant about striking up a conversation with most people. People want to talk to me, but I really feel like I lost my social skills. The social skills I have now are pretty basic compared to what I used to have when I was doing pickup. I get a couple people reacting in a bad way towards me because of the way I act. If I were to make an assumption, I would say they think I'm stuck up. At this point, I'd say that I'm probably not going to be able to keep this job after 3 weeks now. Probably going to have a chat with my managers to see where I'm at and talk about my struggles so far. This makes me not want to work a job because you always have to deal with people and their emotions, and insecurities, and assumptions. And also its often this game of trying to impress the higher-ups. ANYWAYS, I apologize for the life story but would you agree that the video games and staying indoors everyday ruined my personality? Is there any advice that anyone can give me? I could go back to pickup to get back my social skills but that's just not something that I want to get back into.