kieranperez

Enlightened people still have desires, particularly sex. I know very well known teachers that are enlightened that still have sex, are in sexually fulfilling relationships, and have even had their share of the oh so common sexual misconduct that is prominent with enlightened teachers. This belief that enlightenment diminishes one's sexual desires or something like that or even has "control over it" (whatever that's supposed to mean) does not and has not ever withstood the test of experience over the course of the time. It is true that for some people (I would actually put myself in this category) that practice and further spiritual development and deepening of insight does seem to diminish some people's enjoyment of things like sex and more "worldly enjoyments". That though is a very complex subject matter as it is a medical statement that shows no universality at all among practitioners along the various paths of practice. Plenty of enlightened beings were VERY sexually promiscuous in their lustful desires in yet it didn't retract from the fact of their deep realization and depth of insight. People such as: Adi Da Trungpa Rinpoche 16th Karmapa Swami Muktananda Eido Roshi Sasaki Roshi Sri Amrit Desai Charles Berner/Sri Yogeshwar Muni Osho (not as far as sex as far as I've found but in terms of his clear greed when it came to material possessions and even prescription drugs) Alan Watts (alcoholism) This list as many people that are familiar with this space and have done their homework know this list could be A LOT longer. That's just the clear downright unhealthy versions of desires. Take it from Shinzen Young who almost became the only dharma heir of one of the most enlightened Zen roshis of the 20th century in this 3 way interview on this very topic with him and also a neuroscientist whose a very deep meditator as well addressing this very subject matter on sexuality on the path.

I really appreciate this question here. On the one I want to express the obvious that there is no barrier and that there’s the belief and insistence of illusory barrier that holds up the hindrances and the veil of ignorance (including this here) that I would say “barrierless barrier”. Which is ultimately just more gibberish and an insistence for ignorance. It is the insistence for my own self damnation. That said… Traumas. Very deep traumas. Working on it and it’s taking time. If I’m fair with myself I’m doing a good job with all the work I’ve been doing but yeah, traumas for sure. Not sitting enough and doing enough practice because I honestly don’t to do more for various reasons and motives. Not maintaining practice off the cushion throughout the day. Not enough trust and faith and too much of a closed heart which ties in with number one. Not having the courage to follow my heart and following this path as much as I deeply desire to. Not enough selfless service (karma yoga). I’ve had the inclination to do volunteer work and start following my intuitions to say hand out food or clean up street and so forth but I’ve been resisting and avoiding it. Every time I open up to those similar types of inclinations things really open up for me and I get out of my own way. A lot of this boils down to surrendering to this path of purification. Staying consistent with my practices.

Thank you. I really appreciate this. I will take a look into it.

What I am interested in: I would like to pay for a quality money management course. Nothing crazy. Just something that could teach basic good skills and strategies to saving, spending, and other solid foundational stuff when it comes to establishing a wise relationship with one’s personal personal finances. What I am not interested: I am NOT interested in some kind crypto cheat code when it comes to making money or some stock market investing strategy. Please refrain from such recommendations. Thank you.

My recommendations: Be honest about what it is you want. What exactly are you seeking out of this? No bullshit stuff you’ve heard from other people. You personally. Fundamentally it sounds like you’re trying to be free of suffering. You might be well suited to enter a more Buddhist orientation to practice as it provides a contextual framework that is oriented towards that end and would be aligned with what you really want. I highly recommend you find a great teacher that can really help you. I really can’t state the importance of this enough for a lot of people. Find a strong lineage, container, and teacher that can support your practice and really help you with what you are really dealing and what you really have going on. Give this a try by going to some retreats and perhaps doing some residencies at certain monasteries or ashrams. I highly would recommend starting with retreats and just getting in contact with teachers and talking with them one on one. By and large they’re very easy to get in contact with and they can hold up the mirror to many blind spots and misunderstandings you may have had and perhaps accumulated over the years. Find a solid psychoanalyst. I can’t recommend this enough.

It depends on how you’re using the questions. Ultimately though the question really is irrelevant. I could say if you go about using the Who & What as separate questions as is done in enlightenment intensives like Peter’s then, as far as a technique goes, yes they are different questions. If you’re doing self inquiry then, ultimately, it’s not really about the question.

The CEO took a million dollar pay-cut in order to double the starting salary of his employees from $35,000 - $70,000 per year. Many of the employees were able to start families of their own. Tbink about being in that kind of leadership and actually taking that risk for yourself and your company. He was told he and his company were probably going to go bankrupt. Think about that… @Leo Gura

https://mckenna.academy/ @Leo Gura

It really is nuts. My dads cousin who lives in Florida just died and his now widow of a wife and daughter are still not vaccinated nor convinced while they live in a state that is getting ravaged by COVID. It’s interesting because I come from Cuban descent (at least for half my family tree) so my Cuban side of the family (outside of my immediate family that is - my Cuban father doesn’t buy any of this bullshit) is just going to hang on to their right wing ideology even as it leads them to falling off a cliff. They just can’t stomach what comes from the left because of the fear of the left and all their history with communism and socialism which they escaped from. Which I imagine you might relate to in some way @Leo Gura in terms of potential family members of yours since you came from Russia. You can even see a similar dynamic going on with the Jews in that video.

You made more money in that internet marketing business than you have through Actualized???? Are you still earning money from it today???

Judgements aren’t bad. Bad judgments are bad. “Bad” in the sense of “unskillful judgments”. Trust your capacity to make skillful judgments grounded in good sense-making and honesty. Oprah does in fact greedily sell bullshit spirituality to people, despite the fact that she’s also conquered a rather harrowing upbringing. There is some basic intelligence in the self contraction when faced with bullshit. But yeah, sounds like some basic therapy would help when it comes to your mom and uncovering the complex underbelly of inner conflicts when it comes to the relationship with your mom that you’re not aware of.

I think working with a good psychoanalyst would be really great for him. Kudos to you for sticking with him. Having the patience to really allow him to work through this stuff is a mark of real maturity. As far as I can tell, it’s a quality that’s rather rare these days. So I just want to encourage that. As far as recommendations though, psychoanalysis would by far be my top recommendation. You could go to a good trauma therapist like Somatic Experiencing but this seems to more psychic conflict than some ongoing contraction in the body that is manifesting as neurotic symptoms.

The mind man… the mind… Condolences to those kids. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/california-dad-killed-his-kids-over-qanon-serpent-dna-conspiracy-n1276611?fbclid=IwAR22bO3XN7iLEjmn5H4ju1wZbG4TPy6ydtDNkLXZ1BHsBvouGMfQvBZmPOI

You need high quality therapy. I highly recommend psychoanalysis.

I’ll concede to that point. Fair enouh.

This is a load of just straight up gibberish.

DRUG INDUCED PSYCHOSIS IS NOT SATORI.

Get over it. People’s motivations don’t need to confine to what you think they should be based on your preconceptions of what is a “good reason” and not. Newsflash: “long term studies” for any pharmaceutical is 6 months. There are no 100 year long studies for anything. Yeah? How do you know. People can also have greater physical performance and capabilities than they would otherwise. Yeah? Who is the one that draws the line of what is and is not a good reason?…

I'll give my usual prerequisites... Diagnosed with ADHD at 6 (2001) with a ton of cognitive testing and was on ADHD medication for 17 years (I've been on every single one) up until the age of 22 when I got off. This really is the crux of the issue. We don't really know what ADD/ADHD is. There is something to be said for diet for some people. I've met people with ADHD who that really is there issue. I'm in property management/real estate and gave a guy a showing who has ADHD that's literally allergic to what seems like everything. That said, one of the things that's really starting to be understood is how much of it is also trauma related. The work of those that have pioneered things like attachment theory and so forth are really finding that ADHD is also a developmental trauma and even prenatal trauma. I'm certainly in this camp. ADHD though is certainly a legitimate phenomena. It's not some made up Orwellian Big Brother conspiracy theory just to drug children (though it is certainly over-diagnosed). I really am of the stance that we have to take a look at the family structure within our Western cultures as children who grow up in child centered family structures for example have a lot less cases of things like ADHD. Famously The Dalai Lama was once giving an interview where he was asked about self loathing and he stopped the press conference because he couldn't understand Americans and self loathing because it doesn't exist in Tibet due to the nature of their upbringing. Westerners are growing up with a lot more attachment disturbances and neuroses than a lot of other 3rd world traditional cultures because of this change in upbringing and lifestyle and the burden parents have to endure. Especially the lack of legitimate spiritual infrastructure in our culture. Oh please. Give me a break. From what I've studied

Only thing is that's all hearsay. We have enough historical evidence to back up people like Gautama Buddha or Muhammad and so forth. There's plenty of historical sites we know they went to and so forth.

There is no evidence to suggest there was ever a historical Jesus. Keep that in mind. Not even the gnostics regard him as a historical person but rather as an archetype.

How many of you that are on this forum have actually done a retreat? Please list how many you have done, how many you have coming up that you are genuinely planning on attending, how long each retreat was, and also what kind of retreat/intensive it was. Total Retreats for me: 2 Retreat #1 April 2021: Virtual online 3 day meditation retreat (good way to dip my toe in the water. Retreat #2 April 2021: Peter Ralston's last Insight & Enlightenment Intensive. 7 days total. Upcoming Retreat #1, August 2021 (signed up): 7 day Rinzai Zen sesshin Upcoming Retreat #2, September 2021 (signed up): 7 day Rinzai Zen sesshin

@Consilience apologies for never getting back to this. I'm concerned about the getting caught up in a collective agenda that is besides awakening. I'm very careful to notice what agendas certain organizations have and how they conflate that with realization. Whenever I see teachers that conflate realization with their political agendas as being one thing, that to me is a problem. I've looked into monasteries that are very heavy on BLM and what not though I've heard they may have very awake teachers when it comes to the depth of their insight, that still for me is a no go and a big red flag. Doshin has been incredibly helpful to me with this. I also am concerned about getting paradigm locked within a particular framework such as Buddhism or yoga or whatever. I don't want to pretend that Buddhism or some tradition has it all down or pretend anyone or anything does. Personally I'm a bit allergic to surrendering to any dogma. That said, I can totally work within a particular framework and form of practice without dogmatizing it. I just don't want to be pressured to dogmatize it. This is the same thing with Peter as far as I've heard. He stop transmitting back in the 90s because his students just got hooked on him. Which, to be fair, it's hard not to when you're really around a guy who is very powerful energetically. Yeah I definitely hear you there.

I'm calling bullshit.

It's probably going to happen and as far as I can there's nothing going that's going to stop it. As it must be. If it's going to happen, it's going to happen. As a great Zen master I heard once say when asked about change, "We change when we have to." China isn't some separate isolated cause to any upcoming world war. This has been building for several decades now and, like I already said, as far as I'm concerned, nothing is going to stop it from happening. The mistakes that were made in history usually repeats on higher level when the generation that made them and learned from them has died off. There is no lever to be found as far as controlling things. There is no center of control.