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@Azote Good luck on the math exam!

Oh, sorry to hear that, but if you don't get it (and are not passionate about getting it right yet) then of course, what else to do but engage in life more. I didn't set plank anywhere. I didn't tell you that you should go some way. I just try to point that your rationalization of quitting spiritual practices might be because in stillness of meditation all the crap in unconscious is welling up to the surface, and it might be very hard to face it. In one of your posts you told that you can only handle 10 minutes and then you break crying. That might be the sign that you encountered what I am talking about. It goes like this: you meditate -> in the stillness of meditation you turn inwards and become aware of the negative emotions -> it hurts you, you turn away and your mind throws all possible irrational and irrelevant ideas why you should go some other way -> you think that the problem is somewhere else, meaning you distract yourself from discovering your pain, because it's painful. Ouch. And it's scary. The danger of quitting here is that if you don't let the shit that you encountered to become conscious it will remain unconscious and it will drive your behaviour in such a way that you will become miserable to such a degree that you won't be able to ignore it anymore. And it's not the best way to go. It's a way to become successful miserable person neurotic to the bones. Your rationalization is irrational. Consider questioning this decision. You close your eyes on all pragmatic benefits of meditation. It's like stopping going to the gym because "well, I'm not ready to be healthy, I don't get it, I should earn some money first", see how irrelevant it sounds?

1) Why dismiss rationality? I didn't say that. Discovering it's limits is the simplest thing possible, it consist of one question: who is aware of the reasoning? 2) What pre-rational bullshit do you mean? Pre-rational bullshit is called religion. I didn't say anything about religion. Practicing spiritual techniques with a good part of skepticism doesn't make anyone religious. 3) What are the necessary stages of evolution? Why are they necessary? Evolution of what? 4) Who looks up to a post-rational guys?

How can it even be a mommy issue? It's a matter of awareness, not your belief system or habits. If there's reasoning, then who is the reason of the reasoning? Who is reasoning? Where does reasoning take place? Who is asking questions? Who are you fundamentally? What is everything? Who is listening the voice that is reading this text as you look at these letters? Mysticism equals rationality taken to it's absolute. There is fundamentally no difference. The whole point of science is asking questions and looking for answers. Rationality? Bullshit! You are not nearly rational enough! Now here's the fun thing: avoiding investigating these fundamental questions by the excuse of rationality is completely irrational! And if a behaviour is not aligned with the reason by which it was justified than there's some other hidden reason for that behaviour. Maybe it's just scary? Since all your old worldview may just fall apart into little pieces to leave some place for something new. And the idea that all your life is a lie is incredibly terrifying.

Nofap: yes, 3 days in, goal - 30 days. Diet: yes, 11 days in, goal - 30 days. No smoking: no, 0 days in, goal - 30 days. Coping skills: I slept just couple of hours, there was no question should I smoke or not. I tried to smoke consciously though. Meditation. yes, 11 days in, goal - 30 days. Jogging: no opportunity today. Set of reminders: I am about to do self-compassion, other are irrelevant because I am away from home all day.

Nofap: yes, 2 days in, goal - 30 days. Diet: yes, 10 days in, goal - 30 days. No smoking: no, 0 days in, goal - 30 days. Coping skills: I guess I invented a new one: I tried to sit the second hour of meditation and had an incredible craving to give up and masturbate, I got to the bed, took the phone, put my hand in the pants and procrastinated until cravings were gone. But that doesn't work with smoking yet, I guess I relied on "awareness alone is curative" because I completely drained the willpower with nofap today and smoking cravings were too stubborn. Meditation. yes, 10 days in, goal - 30 days. I had some incredible tension release because of do-nothing technique today. It felt like I'm about to have an orgasm, I even had erection and energy moving all across my body and then just, you know, it's gone, that was so relieving, Also here's an insight: meditating without self-compassion creates the biggest energy block, you judge yourself because you can't concentrate, which is totally out of your control since there's no free will, then it produces uncinscious muscle tension and it carries with you. Jogging: yes. Set of reminders: self-compassion - yes, still don't pay enough attention to planning my day according to vision and noticing procrastination.

@Everyday Thanks!

Nofap: yes, 1 day in, goal - 30 days. Diet: yes, 9 days in, goal - 30 days. No smoking: no, 0 days in, goal - 30 days. I was negotiating about an hour with myself when I was with a friend and then smoked. I smoked more than 5 cigarettes and I felt this disgusting taste again. Coping skills: I forgot to use it. Meditation. yes, 9 days in, goal - 30 days. Jogging: yes. Set of reminders: yes, except for labeling procrastination.

One more insight for today. People often say about some band that it's no good anymore. Something like "they sold themselves to a label and write music for money". This is very common phenomenon and I think I have an idea why that happens. Probably that happens because initially the drive for these musicians was somewhat neurotic/egoic and when they get successful they just don't want to work as hard anymore because they got what they wanted, it doesn't come from their heart anymore. Even things like "I want to help people" can be neurotic, for example when you want to build a good self image around this because you think you are not good enough unconditionally. Another good example is "contribution to society/evolution", couldn't that be just a desire to be significant because you are not significant enough for yourself independently of circumstances? Deep authentic desire to help people and change the world and the same but neurotic one are very subtle to distinguish. I think the difference is detachment, you understand on a deep level that everything is a meaningless piece of shit, all your work will be gone forever because the sun will burn the planet in the end and who gives a fuck how significant you are, but you still can enjoy achieving your goals, I mean "can/choose", not "need to".

@moon777light Not only think, hopefully.

Imagine life of a bum, what is it like? Every morning you get up dirty in some shithole. You have to beg for money and often you barely manage to get enough for even shitty food. Sometimes you starve. Everyone treats you like shit. You wash rarely in places like river or lake or if you are lucky probably under the cold water somewhere where people let you. You can't get to a warm place with a clean and soft bed and just lay down and relax. Just imagine yourself in this position, really imagine how you smell like shit and beg people for money every day because you have nothing in your life and this is the only way you can eat, at least for some time. Imagined? Do you think it's disgusting? Yes, because you are used to comfort. If you would be forced to live like that for a year and all your concerns are only about survival that will probably not shock you that much. Your smell wouldn't be such a problem when you managed to get some food after a day of starvation. You would probably get used to beg for money because you have to and won't be so ashamed anymore, this emotion will just forcefully atrophy, same shit with your smell and look. Now imagine Chester Bennington, a singer of the band called Linkin Park. What would it be like for you in his place? You probably have a great house, a great car, a dream career that you are passionate about, millions of people around the world would fucking shine if they get to meet you, your wife is a former Playboy model and you have three kids. I mean really, just imagine that many people around the world are obsessed with your character, cool, huh? Probably not that cool since he committed suicide about a year ago. What about Kurt Cobain? Merilin Monroe? Robin Williams? Now imagine one more time that a crowd of people are obsessed with you. You meet them, they want to take a picture with you, they are shining and utterly happy to talk to you. What if you have a 100 concerts a year and you meet these people every time it ends? Do you think it would be as pleasing to you as it first seemed in your imagination? Probably not. Same shit with house, car, dream creer, Playboy model. And usually if people commit suicide and don't even leave a note it means they suffer because of the devastating depression for several years. What is it like? Probably you cry almost every day, you are hopeless, you feel like shit all the time, your suicidal self-talk accompanied by total, utter emotional devastation can barely stop for a brief periods of time, you are totally used to and even sick of all the wealth that you have, it has zero positive effect on you. Is that too different from life of a bum? If you think yes than you have never been depressed as much as all those people that I listed, they fucking killed themselves, see? Do you remember this feeling of anticipation when you wait to get something like a computer, a car, a girlfriend, money or something else? Then what happens next, say, in a month? You get used to it and it's like you have always had it. Yes, it's plausible. But not so speacial anymore. I don't know why did I write this. I just had an impulse. I guess the point that I want to make is that you have to be happy with your life purpose independently of success. You don't have to wait for fascination, curiosity, desire to create like for a shipment from an internet shop. Life purpose is not something you get, it's something you give and can't keep for yourself because it burns your pocket. And also that physiological and psychological health and enlightenment are way more important than everything else. Are you ready to live a life of happy bum?

No posts for 12 days, here's what happened during this time: 1) I started an accountability partnership with a girl that I met online, then I got addicted to her and it ended with a bit of drama from my side. I was having a heavy ego backlash after 6 day nofap streak and honestly told her that I lack communication, but that shit was completely dictated by my texting addiction and a very unreasonable expectations about the amount of messages that I would receive from her. 2) This accountability partnership broke the streak of heavy misery and relapses that I experienced before. I didn't relapse diet for over a week and it's so damn delicious, reality feels brighter and I don't feel groggy except when nofap shit fuckes me up. I had a 6 day nofap streak, I relapsed it first consciously then unconsciously in the next day and maturbated several times, but still I feel way way better than before this streak. I still smoke, 1-3 day streaks max, then relapse, the bad thing about it that it doesn't make me feel worse if I smoke 1-3 cigarettes a day, actually better, when I quit it 1.5 years ago I was motivated by disgust of excessive smoking, now it will be harder to convince my subconscious mind that I need to quit. What have I learned recently: 1) I shouldn't make important decisions until I get calm. This is how I wrote her about the lack of communication, I was in the emotional hell and still believed my mind. I did that many times before. The problem is that I rarely get calm, when I do I love everyone and have no problem with the world. But most of the time my thought process is moved by shame and depression and half of the time I don't realize that. 2) I still get addicted to women that I get to make friends with incredibly fast. I get very needy and annoying and they just get sick of me. 3) I overthink what people think of me. Shame and guilt shapes my thoughts and I tend to percieve people's opinion about me worse than it actually is. 4) I project too fucking much. I am addicted to figure out people's personality traits and I make many mistakes when I do that. 5) I preach too much and often stick my opinion where it doesn't belong and wasn't asked of. 6) CONSISTENCY IN DIET FUCKING MATTERS!!! 7) Nofap streaks longer than even 4 days don't work for me. I think that I experience kundalini awakening and related side effects like depression and ADD for several years and nofap makes it unbearable. 8) I have to slow down the amount of meditation practice to only 2-3 hours occasionally + 1 hour a day. Also I should not skip the self compassion practice that I did before. It's just useless to try to deal with the amount of the emotional challenge that is way beyond my level of equanimity. Goals for now: 1) Nofap 4 day streaks. No porn, no edging, as fast as possible. 30 days in that mode. 0 days in. 2) Diet. Take current streak to 30 days. 8 days in. 3) No smoking. 0 days in. 4) Not forget to use coping skills. 5) Meditation. 8 days in. 6) Jogging 3 km a day except when not able at all. 7) Stick to the set of reminders in my habit tracker app that I made before. (There are also stuff like Vision work, Self-compassion/affirmations, Labeling procrastination). 8) Track habits both here and in habit tracker. My mind is stupid and still doesn't want to keep track of the goals seriously and precisely. Why do I want to do all that? My life is fucking painful. Why the fuck am I wasting my time in misery if I can get happier/healthier/wealthier? I definately don't enjoy all the time that I waste. Do I want to regret another wasted day? Month? Year? Or do I wan't to become a better person? Or keep suffering and failing? Do I wan't to spend a day feeling unhappy and running away from that? Do I wan't to feel like shit only because my petty ego tells me how miserable it is because of a little discipline? Ok, I accept myself being a loser, it doesn't define who I am and it's absolutely fine, but why the fuck would I keep being a loser if I have so much potential? If I get to achieve smaller goals, then it will motivate me more, then it will snowball. My life can become way way better than it is now. It will be so fulfilling to get up and realize that I wan't to do things, that I am engaged and energized, that I don't merely cope with suffering with a bunch of hedonic gratifications. As I write this my mind tries to sabotage me, shame and doubt, and it will happen again as I keep trying to proceed my goals. That's just temporary patterns that are left in my psyche because of the parenting by people who spent their life in suffering and will never even know that they live life like a burden. I promise myself to believe in myself and treat me with compassion and encouragement. Svāhā.

I have zero caffeine intake, I never drank coffee often but also I reduced tea couple month ago which definitely had a good effect on my sleep. This time it's due to energy spikes because of Nofap and SDS. When I quit drinking tea I noticed that even one cup gives me insomnia, I did the experiment several times to make sure it's because of tea.

Focusing attention on the phenomenon of tiredness. It might be broken into its components as well: physical sensations of weakness/heaviness in your body plus emotional resistance/sadness.

Still smoke. Nofap and diet - ok. I didn't meditate but I'm too fucking exhausted, I couldn't fall asleep at night and then worked on the job. I'm fucked, I need to get some rest.

Nofap, diet, meditation - ok. Smoking - not ok. I meditated 1 + 1.5 hours. 1.5h SDS caused a little backlash, it's weird, it's not that difficult to no get up from cushion but the aftereffect is very unpleasant, I feel tired afterwards and more spaced out but at the same time have less trouble to stay still, I guess meditation works, but the emotional baggage that it uncovers is beyond my level of equanimity, all negative emotions that make me unconsciously impatient when I don't meditate become conscious when I meditate and they are very difficult because I become highly aware of them. I got another temporary job proposal and unfortunately most likely I won't be able to meditate 2 hours a day. Anyways, the main goal is to not relapse nofap and diet during this week and meditate 1 hour a day. Also it's very important to get to the bed early to not get too depressed on the work. I commit to that during this week. To use the work to stay on track with addictions and to journal every day, even if I relapse, to get back on track as soon as possible and not beat myself.

How about meditation on fatigue? On relaxation? Holding positive states?

@Azote How would you make them more precise? Except for the 1 and 4 ones it comes down to a long streak with no relapse, like 1 year or so. Reducing strong addictions takes several years, but 1 year is a reliable sign that you have reached more or less stable state.

Depression is back. I was hungry and tired and away from home, holding till the last drop of equanimity but I smoked again. I guess the addiction is back, it makes me sad after 1.5 years of not smoking, I have to quit again. I suppose it's some seasonal pattern, last summer I had problems with equanimity either. At winter there's more fatigue and depression feels kinda like passive sadness, in the summer there's a strong desire to cover the depression by some pleasure, depression gets kind of bound with cravings and they multiply each other. Except that other addictions are fine, I was deciding to buy some crappy food again but managed to convince myself that it's only gonna make me feel shittier. Meditation - 2 hours. Vision work: I made an excuse to not do that again. First I postponed it than I just completely went off the day plan that I had. I thought that I have no precise goals, but actually I do have them, I just don't track the progress and didn't formalize them. Here is my goal list: To generate an enlightenment experience To break the addiction to porn/lust/masturbation To stop eating unhealthy To lose 30 pounds To develop a good sleeping pattern I shall not skip the vision work tomorrow.

'BAD-BAD ME!' - I wrote that jokingly, but unfortunately it's impossible to transmit that playful tone through letters. Primarily because I became aware in practice how it makes me feel better, secondarily to lose some pounds.

Meditation 2 hours, nofap - ok. Parents asked me to help them with some stuff so I had to skip this day with everything else. I didn't have an opportunity to eat good food because I was away from home since I finished meditation. But I used that as an excuse to overeate and I actually could choose a little healthier stuff than I have chosen. BAD-BAD ME! I postpone the goal list for tomorrow. Rules are still the same.

I broke the misery, but I still overate. Nofap - good, meditation - practiced right in the morning. I guess this is quite a vague goal, but I think by the same vague judgment I accomplished it 50%. I really regret eating sweet crap again, it sucked all my juices right away and I'm still groggy. Although I feel a little more energy because I didn't masturbate. I was analyzing, why when I worked on my life purpose I had so much energy and now I am so lazy. It seems that at some point I understood that LP won't make me fundamentally happy, then I unconsciously started using this as an excuse to not do almost anything except meditation. I understood that the desire is an ego trap and it's completely impossible to resolve this craving. But instead of completely surrendering my cravings I started using this unconsciously as an excuse for instant gratifications. This is very tricky place because surrendering cravings (enlightenment work) takes vision and vision is craving in it's nature, that's kind of a paradox, you have to crave to do things (meditation) that will stop cravings. You have to have a deep desire to surrender all desires. I don't know why did I stop working on my vision again, I just get stuck over and over again. This seems to be the very important stuff, to fuel my motivation every day, it's so damn easy to forget what the hell are you doing, especially when you get depressed. From this day on I will take my vision work as important as meditation and do it every time after meditation and not do anything if I did't finish it, I'm sick of lack of progress. I will journal about it. I think my problems with diet and masturbation are related to lack of vision either. Because I don't imagine benefits of abstaining vivid enough and the possibility of instant gratification overweights that vague image of why should I abstain. When I started this journal I was in touch with my vision, I imagined my success, that's why I managed to stay clean for 22 days. Then when I had that nervous breakdown I fooled myself that it won't work/it's too hard and blah-blah-blah. When I managed to stay clean with diet for a month I had a good vision of how I will feel. Judging by how I was working when I thought that LP will make me happy I really can mobilize myself a lot. But all these events with nofap withdrawals made me believe that I'm weak/depressed/too unhealthy/need lotta rest. I really could already abstain from fap fully and retrain my endocrine system but I bullshit myself that I need more time than I actually need, that I need more comfort than I actually need. It's also easy to think that I have to love myself, to give myself more compassion, but love and indulging your ego is not the same, making yourself going through hell in order to feel better afterwards is a form of love either. Right now it seems to me as a good idea to have a reasonable and precise short term goal before the job thing is gonna be known: Two 7 day nofap streaks, reset with no porn and just 1 quick orgasm Daily meditation at least 2 hours a day, at least focusing on relaxation, right after sleep Daily vision work after morning meditation To not spend money for useless shit To plan daily what I am gonna do To eat healthy food that I bought Tomorrow I will post my long term goals. I will copy this message to my phone and read tomorrow to not forget.

Let parents do their neurotic patterns. Don't catch those patterns. Let them be the way they are, it's not your business to change them, but it's your business to not be affected by this. Don't resist, just let them judge and nevermind. Why would you resist what is? Does this ever work? They gonna act the way they gonna act.

It's been 10 days since the last post, jeez. What happened during these days: I got very depressed when I worked, I was working and crying for half a day on the second day of one time job. I relapsed smoking at that day and some other days. I didn't smoke for over 1.5 years, but I was a hardcore smoker before. I completely ignored the diet. Total nofap relapse, I only abstained from masturbation for 1 day. That's what I have mostly been doing during these days, like a heroin addict - all life consumed in addiction. Had no internet for several days. Skipped two days of meditation because I had literally no opportunity to meditate on the job. What are my latest thoughts: I was seriously considering getting help in form of therapist and medication, Shinzen Young seems to be a reliable guy and in a couple of vids I heard him saying that meds might be necessary for some people. But the problem is that I have no money for therapist, at least in coming month. There is a possibility that an opportunity for a summer job will arise in this month. It is located in a tourist area hundreds of miles away from my home, so it requires moving there for the whole summer. I guess that if it will happen I will accept it and try to use this opportunity as an accountability structure to stay clean with my fap addiction because it won't be possible to jerk off for days there. But I have a fear that it won't be possible to meditate regularly. I don't know, I guess I will go there and see if it works and then get back home if it doesn't. I spent almost a year mostly coping with my shitty state, I need some change and I pin my hopes on this job. In some late video Leo said that sometimes self development is like 2 steps forward and then 3 steps backward. It really characterizes what happens to me during last weeks. I almost didn't use porn for several months and masturbated mostly when really needed, and now again I am a full time addict. I had some success with the diet and now again I eat a ton of shit every day. Smoking - I thought I will never smoke again. I guess I start to appreciate that fail is an inevitable component of success. And the only thing you can do is to get back on track with your efforts. Like with concentration practice, if you spaced out for several minutes and realized that, just get back to the breath, there's nothing else to do. Every unsuccessful attempt has value and contributes to the last which will be the successful one. I still always fall into the destination trap. It's quite annoying and creates an internal conflict. I always crave for some ultimate solution for all problems, that I will get to the place where everything is solved. It will never happen until I die. There will always be some challenge in life, there will always be some thing that needs to be solved and then the other thing will come. It's a never ending process. Why would I turn impermanence into an enemy and hold onto something? Dunno. It just happens. I have a goal for tomorrow: to spend the day the way that I won't regret it. I will keep daily journaling.

Is it possible to have a normal level of the cholesterol and at the same time hypo/hyperthyroid problem? @Leo Gura as far as I know you have encountered the thyroid problem. There is some shit going on with my health, if you are curious details are here in the latest post. Symptoms look like B12 defficiency or thyroid problem, but my B12 blood test result is above 300 pg/ml and 200-900 is considered to be the normal range, or 500-1300 in some sources, which doesn't look like very strong deficiency, plus I have high levels of hemoglobin. My cholesterol is in the middle of the normal range. Can that vary a lot from test to test, depending on what you eat, how you sleep, what you do etc? I'm doing the research and trying to exclude the things that doctors may not suspect due to their orthodox knowledge. In the state hospital they suspected bipolar and trying to exclude heart desease, kidney disease, neurological stuff and I'm appointed to all of that + ultrasound of the abdomine. I have read in several sources that you have to exclude thyroid stuff before you get diagnosed with bipolar. I said that to my doctor and he was skeptical because my blood doesn't show anything significant in regards of the common analysis (slightly heightened lymphocytes) + creatinine (close to the upper limit) + cholesterol (in the middle) + sugar (close to the upper limit). I'm trying to convince my parents to give me money to order the thyroid test, TSH, T3, T4, + antibodies, very occasionally I have slightly heightened body t for over 1 month that doesn't respond to antibiotics prescribed by my doctor, maybe there is an autoimmune attack on my thyroid.