vpandey

And how are you supposed to know this pure love? Boof some psychedelics?

Here we go again at the classical debate of determinism and free will. This is all very confusing. Leo's views these days seem to be that 'We are God and we create ourselves'. That sounds like free will to me if we are one a high enough level of consciousness and not dictated by negative emotions and instinct. On the other hand, the arguments for hard/radical determinism are very strong. And a lot of schools I've found (Stoicism, REBT, Sikhism) say that accepting reality is the way of peace. Or in other words, accepting the world exactly the way it is, even if it is against our egoic agenda. What do the people here think? Tagging Leo Gura as I'm especially curious on his opinion. Other people who understand what I'm saying also feel free to comment.

Not sure if it is possible to be truly selfless like you suggest there. We wanna survive and spread them seed, you know what I am sayin? Now I differentiate between healthy selfishness and unhealthy selfishness. Healthy selfishness is when you strive for your goals while also keeping in mind of other's desires. Unhealthy selfishness is more like 'fuck the world, I'm doing what I want regardless of who I hurt'. I'm not saying compromise truth for rewards in scientific field or relationship. It doesn't have to exclusive. Paradoxically, honesty and truth will lead to better relationships and better scientific progress. Man this gets confusing sometimes. I'll probably log out and go outside now.

If I don't know the rewards of truth, how can I want it? Or anyone else for that matter. You must surely be talking about manifestations of truth that is appealing to the mind like eternal bliss, love, removal of suffering etc. From my experience of people online and real life, majority of us came to these esoteric teachings from a deep state of unhappiness (anxiety, depression, loneliness etc.) and we want to be more happy/peaceful. There is nothing wrong with that and is all and very expected. Naturally as humans we want more pleasure and less pain. So you are partially right, I need a deep desire for truth because of its potential rewards, not for truth's sake. But it's pretty damn impossible to invest decades doing yoga or meditation just for truth's sake. Takes some really stubborn to persist without rewards. How does radical openmindedness and brutal honesty be applied to ourselves? We see ourselves with biases and filters and it's really doubtful we can be totally and utterly honest with ourselves. We can try our best though. Agreed on that. You have talked extensively on this topic of pre-rational and post-rational and it seems very sensible.

What I mean by 'faith' is doing years and years of yoga, taking an strange chemical substance etc to 'reach' Absolute infinity. One would need a certain kind of faith to perform those actions, as like you said it cannot be arrived through reason. Faith as in how Abraham had faith in God's message to sacrifice his son which appears psychopathic to the reasoning mind. Scientist does has faith to start of with. He already has assumptions about reality if we are being hardcore sceptics. for.e.g the causality of things, the permanency of things, reliance on senses etc. On the other hand, he doesnot need faith to conduct actual experiments. To conduct the gold standard of double blind controlled study, one arrives it through systematic reasoning and reducing of biases. I guess scientists needs both faith (as in assumption) and reasoning to conduct lab experiment. I shall be trying some psychedelics in the future but I'll have to make sure I'm not deluding myself too.

Apparently a kind of experience unable to be explained logically (sorta like absolute infinity maybe?). These days though, I hear, it can be created through stimulating certain parts of your brain. Need more research on this topic but it's not really my research interest

I'm not gonna reverse my understanding of reality just because you tell me (sorry!). Need some experience or evidence. And if understanding of Absolute depends on experience e.g. DMT then it makes even less sense to resort to changing my viewpoint. I guess I will experientially understand your point rather than cognitively. Also, 'seeking is not a desire of ego' seems baseless. How about plenty of well respected sexually and physically abusive gurus? If they were enlightened and dissolved their ego they would know that it's not only about their sexual gratification but also desires of women that have to be considered. If God(love,truth) is everywhere, God(love,truth) is the women too. But alas that's not how it is. But thank you for your comment, through rational discourse can we be more understanding State of heroin intake is pretty satisfying but that doesn't mean it's truth. Please clarify what you are saying You have changed my assumption that Absolute is not a state. That clarified my confusion a bit. Now I understand that there has to be 'faith' like religious people say and I have to experientially or emotionally (if that's close to correct wording!) get it. Thank you everyone for your comments. Peace out.

Hi everybody, Sorry if this has been posted before or is being posted in wrong section. Feel free to move it around. I've been listening to Leo's lectures and various other sources. One topic that often comes up is the one of Absolute Truth, Love, Bliss etc. It is established that to reach that state often requires psychedelics, hardcore yoga, meditation etc. My question is: Why does Leo assume that the Absolute Reality of love is the true one? Why does he assume this material paradigm we live in to be 'maya' or 'not real'? Isn't it more likely that the Absolute reality is not the 'real' but an anomaly state you reach through various methods? Also, how do you know this craving for this 'absolute' state of 'perfection' is not just another devilry of ego? Perfectionist tendency of ego to be eternally happy?

He can if he smokes some bud with them

Yo man are you serious? Does every attraction follow with talking dirty? Made me laugh a bit.

'Individual ego thriving in anonymity' can be seen in Pickup culture where you are forced to do it in big cities...It would be pretty darn hard to be neurotic then sociopathic (your evolution of a typical PUA) in a small town.

Dude...I feel concerned about you.. But you gotta stop with self-actualisation, consciousness or any of that work for now. Work on returning to a healthier level of baseline. Seek professional help for whatever is bothering you. But it sounds like you are suffering from depression. Here are some steps you can take yourself besides professional help. These are all 'scientifically proven' ways: Daily aerobic exercise 1 Gram EPA Fish OIL Good Sleep routine Vitamin D/Sun exposure Self Acceptance/Self Love Socialising Do these things everyday for a month and see the changes for yourself if your depression is not too severe. Good luck dude.

In my opinion, it is human nature to crave people's approval. It feels good and probably helped humans perform well, survive and be happy in tribes from an evolutionary perspective. But the problem starts when we start getting attached to this approval and base our entire self worth based on other people's approval. If they like us, we feel euphoric. If they hate us, we feel depressed. Then we are always uncertain whether they like us or not. Hence we are in constant anxiety state. I believe learning to value/love yourself no matter what is the antidote to this suffering. Like Rumi said, "we don't need to go looking for love, we just need to remove the barriers to it"

Yes, in my opinion being conscious about your vanity/envy would be the first step towards alleviating it. Self-observation and self-awareness is a great first step in order to unidentify with the attachment that is responsible for vanity/envy.

It's crucial that you realize that you have some devillish qualities like everyone else but you are not a devil. Don't blame yourself and call yourself devil. If you do, that will take you a step further from actualizing not towards it.