Emerald

I agree so much. If a guy comes right out with sexual/dating intentions toward me, it's such a turn-off. I much prefer a guy that I know who I have a platonic relationship with, who's maybe slightly flirtatious with me in an ambiguous way. And the more ambiguous the flirtation, the better. I don't want to know that he likes me. That's what builds up the tension is not knowing if he likes me like I like him. And I have to feel like he is selective with his sexual desires, and not just trying to find any woman, and wants me in particular. Self-control with sexuality is very important to me. Then, I can wonder how he feels about me, and get excited at things unspoken. Then I can fantasize about the moment when things finally go in a romantic direction, which builds up more tension. A man who wears his sexuality on his sleeve, takes all the tension out of the situation. So, most of the time, it's too boring to feel anything other than platonic toward them. So, I agree. The person who posted would probably do well to get to know more women in a purely platonic way without needing it to move toward anything sexual. And eventually, someone will be interested in them if they aren't trying too hard.

Oh, I should have mentioned that I'm not sure if I actually ended up in Paris. That's just where I intended to go. I ended up on a pedestrian walkway, which emerged from the gray of the inside of the door that I jumped into. And on that walkway I materialized right up in the girls' faces who were conversing on a bench. They didn't see me, and it was too close for comfort. So, I walked down this road which lead to a bridge that sat near a river, where there was a mountain-like structure that reminded me of something that you'd see in a place like Arizona or New Mexico. It was made out of redish-orangish rock. But I didn't pay any attention to what I was wearing. I was more focused on seeing if the scene had consistency. So, I walked down that road a bit. And I came back, and the scene stayed consistent. It was still the same place I had just come from. But I met up with these three people, one of which is a well-known spiritual teacher. We were on that road and conversing together about some kind of plan. But the funny thing is, I can't really remember what we were talking about; just the general vibe of it. But I've never had any issue with getting back to my body. I've had the opposite issue, where I can't sustain the experience. So, staying out for any extended period of time is highly unlikely. Probably the longest experiences I've had with Astral Projection have lasted less that 30 minutes. But mostly I can only sustain it for a minute or two. So, I wouldn't worry too much about that. But entities can be an issue because they're scary. So, I don't experience them very much anymore because I've done a lot of inner work. At least I believe that's why I don't experience them as much as I used to.

It could be that you feel limited to the current persona that you have. Maybe you feel like you'd be being inauthentic to come across any other way. So, I would focus toward creating an understanding of yourself as being competent and and normal, and building up a new persona that reflects that. And be willing to bluff a bit. The thing that separates the average person from a person who is needy, is just the way they come across. Most people have crippling insecurities. But on some, it's more obvious. So, to get past it, you might even try creating an alter-ego of sorts. This is essentially what teenagers do when they create their identity. And if they do so in a healthy way, they will be able to fit in. But if they don't create a persona that has the ability to blend and look normal, they will run into problems So, that's probably what's brought you to where you are now. You've not created a persona that's well-adjusted to the social landscape and its unique challenges. And your self-defeating thought processes keep you trapped in that ill-fitting persona. So, all you have to do is create one that is well-adapted. Then, once you can bring yourself above water with your persona, you can build it up even further in whichever way you want. But the one thing to realize is that ALL personas are created. And you can create your persona any way you want. The sky is the limit. The canvas is yours to paint on. So, paint something new.

Thank you.

At the ultimate level, all is one thing. But there is a duality that can be noted within that one thing. So, there are two polar subtle energies of Yin and Yang that ebb and flow in all living and non-living systems. They are like the code that programs reality. But at the end of the day, they are one and the same, as they are the fodder of Maya. This is why Shiva and Shakti are depicted in the Yab Yum position in eternal intercourse with one another. They are never separate.

My thought is that there must be an issue with how you're approaching. It might be the vibe you're giving off. Often times, men with low self-esteem who lack self-confidence, unconsciously put a lot of pressure onto women. This makes them very uncomfortable. For example, when I was 20, I went out to a jazz/cigar bar and I met this guy who was kind of nerdy looking and overweight. But he seemed cool at first. We were playing chess upstairs. I knew he was interested in me, and I wasn't completely not interested in him. Either way, I was enjoying his company. But then he got really insecure about messing up the interaction with me. And I realized that he was putting too much emphasis on the interaction. Like I knew that he felt like I held his worth as a human being in my hands. So, this immediately scrubbed all potential for romance or even friendship from my mind, because I felt that pressure that he'd unintentionally put onto me by giving me that much power and significance over him even in just having met him. But he asked for my number, and I gave it to him. I didn't want to hurt his feelings. And I gave him my real number too. Unfortunately, I was very poverty-stricken at the time. And I couldn't even afford to keep the lights on in my apartment. And so, I wasn't able to pay my phone bill, and I never used it anyway. But one night, a few months later, I was out playing my guitar on the street. That was how I made my money at the time. And he walks by and confronts me about giving him a fake number. And he was pretty confrontational and aggressive about it. So, I told him that it wasn't a fake number. And that I was struggling financially. And I showed him my phone, which I still had (even though I couldn't use it). So, that he could see that I hadn't given him a fake one. So, the situation de-escalated. Then, I get a text from him a few minutes later, and I ignored it. Too much baggage, too quick. If you've ever had a person try to be friends with you too quick, it's the same thing. You know that person desperately need a friend, because they don't have any. But you also know that if you agree to be their friend, they will put too much emphasis on the friendship too quick. Edit: I guess I did have my phone back on at the time. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to text. Either way, my phone was unpaid very often. So, when I gave him the number, he got the message that the number had been disconnected.

I think that just taking action is going to be your best bet. You can waste a lot of time in your head mulling over it. But it's basically a comfort zone where you can continue to solidify your pessimistic outlook on your dating prospects. So, I recommend going out and meeting some people. Go to a club where you can find women who are looking for something fun or romantic. And then just get some experience, even if it's just a one-night stand. I feel like once you get past that initial hurdle, you'll be able to realize that the thoughts you're thinking are just limiting beliefs with no basis in reality. I'm sure that there's nothing about you inherently that is keeping you held back in this avenue other than your mentality surrounding this issue.

Yin and Yang are two polar subtle energies that make up every living and non-living system. So, as human beings, we have a unique ratio of Yin and Yang that constitutes our pre-conditioned personality. So, we are whole as we are, because we are a complete system. We need no one else to be a complete system. But during intercourse, a brand new system is born between two whole people which necessitates its own Yin and Yang interplay. So, during intercourse there are two whole systems functioning within one whole system that encompasses them both. This is similar to how our heart is its own system, but it also works as a part within a greater system which is the body. Or how atoms are a system in and of themselves, but they bond together to create different types of molecules which are also systems. And (speaking heteronormatively) in the system of intercourse, the Yang aspects of the man will connect with the Yin aspects of the woman. AND the Yin aspects of the man will connect with the Yang aspects of the woman. This will make the system whole and unique to them. And it may produce yet another new system in the form of a new child who is also a mixture of Yin and Yang as well. Now, it is more likely that the man will have more Yang than Yin and that the woman will have more Yin than Yang. This is what's most common. But there are plenty of exceptions. And (speaking heteronomatively again) there is basically a circle that's created between the man and the woman. A man penetrates the woman's body (and heart if the chemistry is right) and the woman penetrates the man's mind (and heart if the chemistry is right). And there is basically a flow of erotic and life-giving energy that moves in that circular path created between the two.

You're welcome!

This article gives basic run-down of what the risks are for women with regard to intermittent fasting. It also gives some alternatives to intermittent fasting, so that you can pick a fasting schedule that doesn't mess with your hormones. https://blog.kettleandfire.com/intermittent-fasting-for-women/ But basically, the idea is that if a woman's body registers that food is scarce, the reproductive functions will start to shut down. Basically, it registers that you're starving and wouldn't be able to have enough nourishment to feed both yourself and a baby. So, the body makes it to where you can't get pregnant by stopping menstrual cycles, releasing less Estrogen, shrinking ovaries, etc. I also read in another article that it can increase Testosterone production, because your body wants to gear you up for hunting in a food scarce wilderness. Basically, allowing you to fulfill the male role of provider in the earliest days of humanity.

@crushangel Yes. Those are astral projection experiences. It can be difficult to leave your house. But definitely try to. I once jumped into my front door. And everything went gray, and I decided that doing so would bring me wherever I wanted. So, I tried to go to Paris (for no other reason than it was the first thing I thought of). I ended up in the middle of a pedestrian walkway. Then I went walking around in that location, and saw a lot of cool things. I even met up with a few different people and had a conversation. That's the furthest I've ever consciously projected to. Most of the time I have trouble leaving my house. But occasionally I can make it out to the neighborhood and walk around. Once I make it that far away from my bed, it becomes a lot easier to sustain the experience.

My experience is that the external judgment usually comes first, in the form of 'othering'. But external and internal judgments have a way of snowballing, because they both feed into one another. But I suppose that internal judgment could spring up first too. Sometimes, it is the way we're taught to view ourselves and the world that begets internal judgment which translates into external judgment onto those who deviate from our worldviews. But regardless of the origin of a judgment, you should be able to become aware of it as its happening and watch it with detachment. This is the most important thing.

Another one of my fave sagely quotes.

What I'm saying is that my attractions come about spontaneously and without seduction. They happen when he's not even there. And part of the thing that makes me attracted is not knowing whether or not he's interested. So, the attraction happening (for me) is not active on the man's part. He's just being himself, and I start to get attracted without him doing anything other than being himself.

@billiesimon I think beginning with seeing the label of "good" as fairly arbitrary can be a good start. Ultimately, it is one word and can't really describe a person who is multi-faceted and flawed. But if you have any of those violent images come up, it can important to understand that they aren't coming from you. Nothing in the internal experience comes from you. There is no actual "you" inside the mind that's producing images and thoughts. They are just spontaneously springing into the internal landscape. They mean as much about you as the tree in your back yard. They are just there. They are happenings. But they aren't happenings that "you" caused. So, imagine that there is a thunderstorm that's happening, and it's destroying some things and making some trees fall down. Then, there's some crazy guy who's freaking out because he believes that he's somehow causing the thunderstorm to happen. So, he's panicking because he can't figure out how to stop the thunderstorm. He finds himself completely unable to control it. Now, we see that this man is crazy to identify himself as the cause of the thunderstorm. We know that he has NOTHING to do with the thunderstorm at all. The thunderstorm is just happening, and he's perceiving it. But he makes the mistake to believe that because he's perceiving it, he's the one that's also causing it. As crazy as it seems, this is the same mistake that people make about their internal landscape. And they make that mistake because they identify with the happenings in their internal landscape and they make it mean something about themselves. So, if they perceive a thunderstorm in their external landscape, they don't make it mean anything about themselves. They just try to stay safe from it. But they don't think, "This thunderstorm means that I'm a bad person." They would recognize that as crazy. But with the internal landscape, when they perceive of destructive drives, thoughts, and urges, they fall into that trap. They think, "These internal phenomena mean that I'm a bad person." And if they can't stop it, they do their best to ignore it and create all kinds of protection mechanisms to divert their attention from what is a threat to their ego. But I would imagine that you can't necessarily see the depth of the resistance to the feminine. Most of it is probably unconscious because it would threaten your positive perception of yourself. So, look first to the most overt judgments you come across that relate back to women. Your judgments will show you what you're also judging in yourself. Then you can begin to deconstruct these beliefs by questioning their truth and validity. A lot of it will come from emptying your cup of falsehoods that you've learned from your family, your culture, and yourself.

You can increase your chances and general desirability by doing so. And you can give her a better time if you know what she's interested in romantically and sexually. But that's not really the force that's at work. It's a very particularized projection that she super-imposes onto that man based on his general vibe and way of being. So, if the attraction is organic, she will become attracted before seduction even becomes a factor. And it's based upon his particularity as a person. At least this is always how I've gotten attractions to men. At first, he's just a guy and he's neutral. Then, I think about him and I feel good while I'm thinking about him. Then, I think about him more, and it feels even better. And this eventually builds to a full-blown infatuation. And it never consciously has anything to do with one particular trait that he has or some zone of excellence that he has. It's always just the impact of his essence on me. The way he looks, the way he walks, the way he talks, all of his flaws become magnetic to me. And not because they match some high standard of attractiveness. They are magnetic to me because he is the person who he is.

The thing is that (generally speaking) women are attracted to men based on their unique essence and how they make them feel. So, they aren't really attracted to particular qualities like men are with women. At the end of the day, they aren't attracted to looks, money, confidence, skills, etc. They are attracted to a man as more than the sum of his parts, the essence of which creates a unique vibe that pushes her buttons inexplicably. And no one else can have that effect because they just aren't that person. So, at the end of the day, there's not really anything you could have done. Certainly, you can increase your chances and overall desirability in general. But with any given woman and her affections, it might amount to nothing at all. A man can be good looking, confident, have social status, wealth, and be on a path toward self-actualization; and there's still no guarantee that he will push those buttons with a particular woman. Meanwhile a guy who's less good looking, less confident, lower in social status, has less wealth, and who isn't really interested in self-actualization could press those buttons with that same woman, even if she recognizes that his objective qualities aren't "top-notch." She's not objective with her attraction. She just feels good when she thinks about him and feels good when she's around him. The chemistry is just there. So, it isn't that you didn't do something right or that you didn't act fast enough. It's just that the chemistry wasn't there for her. But when the chemistry is genuinely there for another woman, you can bet that she likes you just because you're you.

It's been a mixed bag of things. Overall, I am glad that I can do it. There's just so much potential for exploration and travel, that I don't mind that scary things happen from time to time. I have encountered negative entities before, including dopplegangers. Once, when I was living with my boyfriend in high school, I decided to take a nap while he was at work. And I woke up with sleep paralysis. So, I sat up after I snapped out of (or thought I had snapped out of) sleep paralysis. But I was actually unconsciously in an astral projection experience, which all seem very real. Then, my boyfriend came in the room to let me know that they had let him off of work early. And he sat next to me on the bed, and we were having a conversation. But as we were talking, I noticed he was acting strangely. His personality and mannerisms were different. But I brushed it off, and I decided to go back to sleep. So, laid back down and as soon as my head him the pillow, he jumped on my back and started biting my shoulder as hard as he could. And it hurt.Then, I snapped out of it and I was in the same spot, only no one was around and light was off. Then, once a few years back, I fell asleep on the couch and woke up to someone unlocking the door. It was my mother. She said that she had just gotten off of work, in a very casual way. But I realized immediately this was off. My mom doesn't live with me, and she doesn't work in the middle of the night. So, as soon as I realized this, "my mother" floated sidelong into the room adjacent to where I'd fallen asleep, all the while keeping eye contact. So, I got up and walked over to the opening of the door she floated in to. At the door, was a doppleganger of my daughter who was about 3 at the time. This doppleganger wasn't scary. I almost feel like she may have been a protective force. So, I stood next to "my daughter" and looked into the room which had a couch in it. And on the couch sat a doppleganger of my mother, my father, my sister, and my husband. And they were all looking at me with deadness in their eyes and were lethargically beckoning me toward them. So, I turned around and went back to the couch, and lay back down where I had fallen asleep in the first place. I've also had invisible forces pull me out of bed. And I encountered a man made entirely out of long black braided screws. But I've also levitated and explored the inside of my house and the area around my house. I've traveled to other locations and met interesting people. So, even thought occasionally I've encountered negative entities, it's been worth it for me.

I've been having astral projection experiences since I was 13. I had a few when I was very small too, but I didn't identify them as such until much later. I just thought paranormal things were happening to me.

The first thing to do is to let go of your identification as a good person. This identification will hide many things away from yourself that you don't want to see. The internal landscape is vast and complex. It isn't all just sunshine and rainbows in there. If you look with brutal honesty, you will find a wide range of things that you'd never associate with yourself. You can even find sadistic and violent parts of yourself that you didn't know were there. The internal landscape is "well-peopled", so to speak. When I had my second experience of ego transcendence, I zoomed out from my ego identifications and noticed that I had two warring drives. I had my compassionate drive and I had my "evil" drive. And they were clashing against one another. And that evil drive was sadistic and violent and produced images in my mind of me delightedly shoving my thumbs into someone's eyes. Not because I didn't like that person. In fact, it was pretty much my favorite person in the world. It was just because my evil drive enjoyed the suffering that it brought to them in the fantasy. Now, I was even further identified with goodness at the time than you probably are now. I would get absolutely neurotic about being perceived as good and honest, to the point of obsession. So, had I been identified with my "good" ego, I would have never seen that drive in me. But in seeing it, I was able to transcend both the "good" and the "evil" drive and simply see them as the impersonal fodder of my internal landscape. Neither of them had anything to do with me. I was just the awareness taking them in. And in my distance from those two drives, I could hear a quieter more subtle voice of Divine Wisdom. And I knew that I already knew everything that I needed to know to live this life. I always had and I always would. And I simply wasn't able to perceive of the evil drive or the voice of Divine Wisdom because I was stuck in the pile of "good" thoughts, that really cared about people and assured me of my own goodness. And this is a problem because when a person is unconscious to the evil drive, it doesn't go away. It sneaks its way in, in subtle ways by disguising itself as goodness. So, in order to see your issues with your Anima clearly, you will have to see beyond your identification with goodness first. And what you find might not be pleasant or paint you in a good light. It may be like turning over a rotting log and seeing lost of nastiness that you never knew was there. But I would start by looking at your fears of how women will objectify you and what it will mean about your worth. Then (without trying to look away or see yourself as good) consider maybe you are unconsciously objectifying and viewing women's worth the same way. This can cause the Anima to project the same onto women as a whole group, so that you get a taste of what you may be doing to it. Remember, the Anima is literal a part of you, and it is literally female. So, if you judge women's worth based on objectified standards, the Anima (as a woman) will feel rejected and objectified and will exact revenge on you. And she will do this by projecting the same objectification/rejection/devaluation pattern onto women, which will make them appear to hold your worth in their hands. And she will make you feel powerless and worthless, because you've made her feel powerless and worthless. So, that's what I'd look for first. But you won't be able to see it if you can't question your own goodness. You have to be able to see yourself in unflattering lights. The identification with goodness will cause you to have a blindspot and to protect that blindspot so that you won't be able to see what's behind it. Basically you need to turn over the rotting log.

There are likely subtle and overt beliefs, thoughts, and mindsets that are designed to keep you in homeostasis. Ultimately, it comes down to identifying strongly with thoughts and believing the thoughts that come up because they are seemingly coming from you. Then, once those thoughts sweep you away, all kinds of emotions get triggered from past traumas. So, it really becomes a snowball effect, where your thought patterns keep you stuck in homeostasis, which causes negative emotions, which cause more negative thoughts, which cause more negative emotions, which cause more negative thoughts... And this continues ad infinitum, unless you can become aware both intellectually and emotionally that those thoughts are not from you and are not to be regarded as true. They are just holding patterns of the mind. So, my advice is to practice Vipassana meditation where you can gain skill with recognizing when you've become swept away by a thought and gain skill with detaching your awareness from the thought stream by resting it on a sensory experience. Eventually it will become second-nature and you won't get lost in the thought stream or tricked into believing that voice. But while you develop that skill, it is very important to get in touch with your needs, feelings, and desires. It is really common for people to repress these things when they're seeking enlightenment. So, it's good that you've noticed that. But it's important to have faith that the process is working, even if it's working slowly.

Maureen Murdoch wrote a book titled "The Heroine's Journey". I found it a lot more relevant to my life than Joseph Campbell's "Hero with a Thousand Faces." At the end of the Hero's Journey, there is the return to the motherland symbolizing the return to the feminine. So, a lot of the hero's journey is about going out into the world and overcoming obstacles and returning to the motherland (the feminine) in a more exalted state. And yes, the dragon is a symbol of the Shadow Feminine, just like Medusa, Sirens, and other feminine monsters. So, Maureen Murdoch had asked Joseph Campbell, if there was a journey that women had to take; a heroine's journey. And he basically told her that women are already in the place that the male hero is trying to get to. So, he said there is essentially no journey for women, because they're already there. But because that wasn't satisfying (and also wasn't true), she decided to write the book, "The Heroine's Journey." And reading it cleared up so many things for me. The heroine first departs from the motherland, just as the hero does. They either have to reject the good mother or the tyrannical mother. Both must be rejected. They experience the severance of that which is most similar to them (the feminine), divorcing themselves from the mother and suffering the mother wound. They then embark upon a similar journey to the male hero following the boon of success. But the difference is that there is an inversion about mid-way through the journey. When following the boon of success and facing the obstacles and gaining success, they recognize the mother wound and their dis-satisfaction, which causes them to turn inward. Then comes the descent into the Underworld. A common heroine's myth is the myth of the Goddess Inanna who must descend into the Underworld to meet her sister Ereshkigal who is the queen of the Underworld. But in order to be allowed to enter the Underworld, she must shed all of her status symbols. Then, as she descends even deeper, she must shed all of her garments. And as she descends even deeper, she must allow herself to be dismembered completely. So, esoterically speaking, this is all about the journey into the subconscious and the connection between the psyche and the Self (with a capital S). But in order to make that journey, all attachments need to be relinquished to be allowed to descend. Then, after the descent to the depths of the Underworld, there is ascension where a more exalted version of the heroine emerges. Much like a Pheonix who was weak and disintegrated into ashes, then rose even stronger from the ashes. Then, there is a return to the motherland and the feminine, which heals the mother wound. Now, heroine's journeys are not as commonly written about or depicted as hero's journeys. Like, the majority of all stories ever written are hero's journeys, because we live in a masculine-oriented society. But if I had to name a couple heroine's journeys, I think "The Wizard of Oz" is a great example of a heroine's journey, as well as "Alice in Wonderland." But the main difference between the hero's journey and the heroine's journey, is that the hero's journey is mostly about the external landscape and the heroine's journey mostly about the internal landscape. That said, every single person who wants to exalt themselves to their highest and reach their fullest potentials will have to go through both the hero's journey and the heroine's journey, many times over the course of a lifetime. But I definitely resonated more with the heroine's journey at the time that I read it. It really fit me so much better than the hero's journey, even though I had already been on a handful of different hero's journeys.

I have to say, I mostly disagree. Now, I do think that the school system should run differently, and be more focused toward well-roundedness as opposed to proficiency in the four core subjects. But having an educated populace is VERY important for a society, even if it may not seem so to those immersed in a culture with mandatory education for children. In places where children are not educated, there tends to be lots of ignorance and magical thinking. This causes many issues. For example, in a certain African country (I forget which one), there is a myth about HIV called the "Virgin Cleansing Myth." The idea is that if a man gets HIV, he can cure himself of it if he has sex with a virgin girl. So, because this is widely believed, child and teenage girls are often the targets of rape by men infected with HIV. I think the main thing is that people in educated societies get used to their privileges, get jaded, and start playing Devil's Advocate. They start to think the world would be better without the privilege that they've taken for granted. But my bet is that "Big Vocab" Johnny in the video, wouldn't like it one bit if he suddenly lost all the knowledge that he had gained from his formal education.

This isn't advisable for women. Intermittent fasting has shown positive results for men. But for women, it can actually cause Amenorrhea, hormonal imbalance, and infertility. The sources that I've read recommend that if a woman wants to do intermittent fasting that they skip a day or two in between each intermittent fasting day.

It's difficult to have a fully integrated masculine and feminine side because of society's level of awareness relative to these topics. I've been working at it for a decade, and I still have a ways to go. So, it can be easy to deceive one's self into thinking that there is no issue of Anima dis-integration, in general. It takes a considerable amount of time to be able to recognize and remove barriers to integration that most people see as neutral. It takes a while to develop discernment with regard to the internal landscape. Also, I've noticed that you're quite attached to the idea of being a good person. Every conversation that we've had has included a lot of worries about being seen in a negative light. So, it can be especially difficult for someone who identifies so strongly with goodness to actually see things about themselves that might contradict that image. And this causes blindspots in awareness, when there are things that you just don't want to see about yourself. Perhaps, underneath the desire to see yourself as a good person and be seen by others as a good person, is a subtle belief. Something like, bad people are worthless or bad people don't deserve love. Some idea that makes you react against it and cling to a "good person" self image. So, I would actually work on detaching your self image from identification with "goodness" first. This will enable you to see more of your internal world. Right now, there is probably a smaller space that your consciousness is occupying within the internal world. The problem with ego and identification is that we learn to keep our consciousness concentrated in one specific area of the internal world. So, we don't see what's going on in the other parts. But the internal world is just as big and diverse as the external world. It's infinite. I hate to bombard you with videos, but I have a few more that are very relevant to this conversation. And again, I've posted them in order of relevance.