Joseph Maynor

Yep. That's why there's a Path to Enlightenment. It's a process. Just keep on walking the Path and doing the work. You gotta do the work. Enlightenment requires a lot of work.

I never understood what “emotional mastery” actually means. It sounds good, but try to find its precise meaning. Enlightenment leads to a certain kind of improvement in how you react to emotions, but is this really mastery? Mastery implies a certain kind of control, like the Egoic self is no longer at the mercy of emotions which is just not true. The Egoic self is always at the mercy of emotions, even post-Enlightenment. It’s the true Self that realizes all Ego (not just the Egoic self) is an illusion and remains unattached to all of it. The true Self watches the Egoic self struggle with emotional mastery like you as an observer at a zoo might watch too monkeys throwing bananas at each other. It’s fascinating, but doesn’t really have anything to do with you.

I don't know. That's one technique that's kinda fallen out of favor for me. I never use it and I've never gotten any sustainable gains from trying to use it. Don't try to bullshit your own mind.

It's funny that the most successful male Enlightenment teachers are kind of the ones that ape femininity the most. Women have an intuition that is simply amazing. I've seen women cut to the heart of the issue on things that most men are utterly lost on. One of the strengths I have is that even though I'm very masculine, I have the keen intuition of a woman too. Women can't bullshit me and when they try, I can visibly tell they are taken aback that I can see right through their shit. But women have the same thing where I can tell they can see through all my shit too. But that's what women have that a lot of men are clueless about -- keen intuition. And I think women like men that have shitty intuition because honestly two people in a relationship that both have keen intuition can cause a lot of squabbles. I notice that women like boneheaded men probably because of the advantage of not being seen through by the man. I'm the last person a woman wants to be with because I will spot all her shit and call her on it too. I'll never forget the time when I was ranting about something and the woman I was taking to looked at me and calmly asked -- "Who hurt you?" I'll never forget that. She saw right away what the issue was. It was like she peered into my soul and easily plucked out the underlying issue. And of course as men, we don't like that kind of question because we want to be focused externally. But I noticed right away that she was right and I complimented her for it. And we then changed the conversation to talk about that. One thing I also notice about having keen intuition is I can read people almost immediately in the sense of their character, level of intelligence, and level of evolution. I can almost feel the energy that someone gives off to discern this, nevermind looking at them and hearing them speak. And again I think this is why a lot of people don't like to be around me because I can see through people and people generally don't want to be seen through. Just like my female friend who interjected "Who hurt you?", when someone talks to me, I often respond with a similar question that just cuts through all their shit. Intuition is a kind of intelligence. And it's rare for masculine men to have high intuition I've found. Similarly, I also have an equal balance between left brain and right brain which has always made me unique among men too. On the one hand, I am very logical and mechanical, but then in equal measure very creative and artistic too. And this stuff is not necessarily good because it makes me odd and different from most other people. In conversations men don't jive with me and neither do women because I'm too different than what they are accustomed to expect.

The only way is to tell them you don't want to do it anymore. Tell them that it's no knock on them and that you're not judging them, but that you will not do it anymore. Dancing around this kind of issue will only cause you and them suffering. You gotta be blunt but also make sure they aren't taking it to be some kind of moral condemnation of them. Just say it's not something you'll be doing anymore and that you'll be happy to do other things instead. If they give you shit for it, suck it up and just expect that you're gonna take some shit for it. This is the same kind of shit that you get when you tell your family you're vegetarian and you show up to Thanksgiving and everybody is giving you shit about it.

I'm sorry you feel bad. But realize that you clinging to feeling bad is perpetuating this for you -- it's like falling down a rabbit hole of a self-fulfilling prophesy. You gotta let those emotions be there but not take them personally or let them drag you down into a vortex of thoughts that all say nasty things to you. Do something nice for yourself so you have have a positive day and let all this disappointment die today. You're going to have to figure out how to allow negative emotions in your life without clinging so hard to them. I have this problem myself too, so don't think I'm telling you something I don't struggle with myself. Yesterday I was ruminating about something and I just caught myself and told myself to f*cking cut it out. And it's like, once you get in that negative emotion/ negative thought spiral, it just grows like a snowball until you notice it and end it. And you don't end it by trying not to have negative thoughts and emotions, you end it by realizing that those negative thoughts and emotions are not yours and that you don't have to take them personally or make them mean anything about you. But you gotta allow those negative thoughts and negative emotions to exist in your Experience. Trying to manipulate reality to get rid of negative thoughts and emotions is pointless and will cause you a lot of suffering and horrible mindfuck scenarios to occur for you. The mindfuck scenarios occur because you're taking thought and emotions personally and you're gonna feel the hit when you get struck by them. But like I said, I totally feel you because I've dealt with this same issue my whole life. Give yourself a reward -- go do something nice for yourself today. And resolve to not let thoughts and emotions drag you down. You've made a lot of progress. I bought a new computer yesterday that really put a smile on my face even though I had a horrible day yesterday. But I went to bed happy and woke up happy! And today all the shit that I was going through yesterday seemed like a distant memory -- although yesterday I was ruminating about everything and really suffering and perpetuating my own suffering. But see, I was wise enough to realize I need to do something to end that spiral down into rumination-ville. I knew how to cut myself off from dwelling on it. But then again, at 40 years old, I've been dealing with this problem acutely for years, and I've gotten a lot better at noticing it when it arises and then cutting it off and making sure I'm not perpetuating it. Actually pat yourself on the back, I want you to feel that. I think it's important to do that sometimes. And when you pat yourself on the back, I want you to say to yourself that you're proud of yourself. You're proud of the fact that you've noticed this problem and that now you're gonna take steps to nip it in the bud. You're proud of yourself for cutting this off while the problem is small rather than letting it grow into a big problem. You're proud of yourself by seeking feedback on here rather than being too chickenshit to even ask. You're proud of yourself for being honest with your suffering and expressing that to people that can help you. That shows a lot of personal development progress in and of itself. You noticed a problem and took action to solve it.

Thanks Leo. I look forward to it.

It's irrelevant. You get the life you were able to create and develop for yourself. The only relevant questions are: Are you finding sustainable solutions to your Actual Problem Situations in life? Are you able to contribute something back to reality that you feel compelled to give? #1 is small picture Life Purpose Work. #2 is big picture Life Purpose work.

Yellow cross-references everything so Yellow consults many sources for information.

There is a Path — but it can be clung to too long like a baby clinging to its favorite blanket.

I think one of the markers of Stage Yellow is Stage Yellow isn't hamstrung by need as much as Stage Orange is. Yellow has experienced a kind of security in their life that allowed them to develop a mind that isn't always neurotically hunting to satisfy survival needs. Orange on the other hand is all about being neurotically tied to hunting for survival needs. And Yellow like Red also is less inclined to be fake like Orange is, because Yellow never really had to give too much of a shit about what people think about them. When you're at Yellow, you're out of the system basically and you've created your own system. Yellow is living their own system, so their loyalty is only to their own system. When Yellow fails, it's because there's a flaw in their own system that only they can remedy, and Yellow knows this. Yellow is not looking for any kind of help from anybody else. Yellow understands that life is a single man race -- it's you doing your thing, and the only standards are your own. Yellow realizes that success outside of your own system is pointless. In other words, Yellow realizes that success just is harmonizing with your own system. For example, Yellow doesn't do things that go against their own system to please other people because Yellow realizes that only causes a backlash mechanism to occur. Yellow's mantra might be -- be true to yourself first and create your own life; and then maybe you can go help others too. Stage Orange's mantra is help others first (by being a good worker bee), and then maybe you can help yourself. Yellow has much more of a big picture Life Purpose than Orange does. Yellow wants to contribute something noble back to society at large. Orange doesn't typically have too much of a big picture Life Purpose. Stage Yellow realizes the power of scheduling and strategy. Yellow is super-organized and super-subtle in how they live their life and how they speak and write. Yellow doesn't talk in broad strokes, but in shades of grey, always sensitive to the particular case or the paradox uprooting the hard and fast rule. Yellow doesn't really think in terms of hard and fast rules. Yellow fully realizes that your rules aren't my rules, and only my rules truly matter. Yellow doesn't have too much of a persona and isn't fake either. Yellow says what they mean and mean what they say. Orange operates on a need to need basis with people and tends to conceal their authentic voice behind a mask or persona. Yellow, similar to Orange yet different, is definitely more conservative than Green is, and Yellow fully believes in and lives under the banner of personal responsibility. Yellow realizes that people get what they had the capacity to do for themselves in life. Yellow sees all the traps that most people don't see about what holds them back. And Yellow applies this apparatus to themselves first and foremost and sees all their own faults and can probably enumerate them for you in several different ways if asked.

Orange doesn’t really care about ideas for the sake of ideas. Yellow on the other hand is a worldly and cosmopolitan philosopher. Yellow loves ideas for the sake of ideas and uses their ideas to put systems into place that improve their life. Orange is primarily chasing material things and even when they have enough chase even more. Yellow is beyond neurotically chasing money and material things. What impresses Yellow are ideas and strategies for improving their own life, not just financially, but across all relevant domains. Yellow is a visionary and lives by their own vision they have constructed for their own life. Orange just chases money without really thinking about it. Yellow can tell you exactly why they’re chasing everything they’re choosing to chase. Yellow unlike Orange is a very nuanced and theoretical thinker. Yellow is worldly whereas Orange is very much stuck in whatever scene they’re involved in.

What makes you think he might be at Yellow?

I’ve known people at all these stages. I totally reflect on all the people I’ve known my whole life.

Orange is much more covert and professional than Red is. Red exudes a certain kind of rebelliousness that Orange hides behind a veil of professionalism. Orange doesn’t need to shit where they eat and doesn’t want to do that. Orange is all about building a solid professional reputation. See, Orange plays by the rules much more so than Red does. Red is always looking for ways to break the rules. Orange is all about flourishing within a system whereas Red is much more dictatorial and mercurial by nature. You can think of Red as an army of one. That’s how they think. It’s them against the world. Orange is much more integrated in a system that they participate in and profit from. That’s why business people are very often at Orange. Orange is much better suited for working with people than Red is. Orange tends to hide their edges behind a veil of professionalism whereas Red gets off on flaunting their edges. Red will let you know that they don’t give a fuck. Orange will come across as very vanilla and appear very innocuous. Orange has a certain kind of plastic front or persona that Red lacks. And that’s because Orange cares a lot about building and maintaining cooperative relations with people.

There is no mind in the way that we think of that term in ordinary life. Mind is an artificial rope that’s used to corral types of experience that really aren’t a monolith. Ditto for the body. Experience that we label body is not a monolith either. Somehow we got tricked with these words, these nouns, into thinking unity exists where there’s only multiplicity.

What is the boundary of me?

What is it for something to change? What amounts to change? What amounts to no change? Is there some part of reality that doesn’t change? What is that? Can you spot that in your own reality? What could that be? You gotta look at your own reality very carefully. I call this self-observation work. For Enlightenment, you wanna love doing self-observation all the time. It’s the single best skill you can have.

Here's is the dirty little secret that almost nobody knows, and even if they did know this at one time they probably don't know it now. And that is a clean life is a much more pleasurable life than a dirty life. And you can only find this out by doing it. But it's a discovery, and then you'll see that the trap of living the dirty life is people don't realize it's a more painful life in every way -- including but not limited to energy levels. Sobriety in the widest sense is much more pleasurable than being doped up on all kinds of stuff, chemical and informational and otherwise.

What does this even mean?

But see that’s a thought-story though. Nothing actually seen in reality suggests that. That’s a thought-story laid on top of what’s actually seen. I don’t think non-duality is hurt by the fact that distinctions are seen. In fact, it’s a paradox; on the one hand there are distinctions and on the other hand everything is being picked up by my Awareness. And the latter can be seen, it’s not a thought-story. This idea that all distinctions need to or should collapse is a thought-story about what is actually seen. But everything is happening within one consciousness, one Awareness, which can be seen. That’s what non-duality is pointing to. Non-duality points to the fact that God Awareness is the only thing that actually exists permanently without changing, and God Awareness is aware of fluxing, changing actual Experience; and God Awareness is also aware of illusion. God Awareness is aware of the distinction between actual Experience and illusion. Be careful about conclusions about what non-duality should be. That's you trying to fit reality into a concept. That leads to clinging to thought-stories. On the one hand there are changing distinctions, but all changing distinctions are happening within one changeless Awareness. That’s what non-duality means from a seeing point of view. God Awareness is the only thing that actually exists. Changing actual Experience exists, but it’s not a thing. There’s only one true thing in reality, and that’s the one God Awareness.

Enlightenment is a removing of all the bullshit from your lens of reality.

Because fully discovering the true Self is what allows true liberation from the suffering caused by being plagued by ignorance. But a door has to close for the door to the true Self to open. God and the Devil can't exist in the same room at the same time. The only way the Devil can exist is when temporarily God forgets who He is. Of course, most people don't even know what God is, so they're trapped in Ego without even seeing the problem fully. God emerges on your Path and when He does, that flips your life around in a way that you wouldn't know until it happens to you. But for that to happen, something else must die -- namely, everything you care about in Experience -- all your Thoughts that Experience could be optimized to serve you. All those biases that come from looking at Experience and saying this is mine! Most people don't realize that Experience actually contains only a tiny fraction of what people think it contains. That's when Maya will emerge for you on the Path and you'll start saying the word "Maya" all the time. Maya is the illusions of Thought and Experience that go beyond what's actually there in Experience. Maya is actual Experience augmented by thought-stories. But you can pull the illusion out of Experience with careful observation and reduction of ignorance that's usually caused by clinging to thought-stories rather than looking and seeing what's actually there. So, Enlightenment Work is really a careful looking at reality to see what it actually is stripped of all thought-stories about it.

I think Leo might be right about distinctions. There are distinctions that are seen that don't require a Thought to exist. You can see all kinds of distinctions in your visual field, even without the word distinction or the Thought distinction. Experience is not of a piece but is broken up into shapes and parts. Experience is also always changing, which is a kind of distinction too. One can see that Experience changes while God Awareness stays the same. That's a distinction. Experience includes Thought as Thought is a type of Experience. Seeing the difference between what's actual vs. what's an illusion is a distinction. The distinction between God Awareness and actual Experience is also a distinction that can be seen. The difference between the changing and the changeless is also a distinction that can be noticed or seen.

That would be trying to control reality to your preference. It sounds good in theory, but it's unsustainable advice. It's one of those things were I'm likely to say, you go do that yourself first and then come tell us about how that worked out for you.