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@Hello from Russia Great report! What was the price in roubles?

Oops. I overlooked that, I'm sorry. That'd be very weird, lol.

@tsuki Those questions were kind of a joke. It's impossible to answer them conceptually. So are zen koans. In Rinzai zen if you try to conceptually answer a koan or ridicule the question the teacher sends you to meditate further and you are considered to not solve the koan. Koan is kind of meaningless question, something like "what is the sound of one hand clapping?", "show me your original face before you were born". If you try to answer the question the normal way it means that you still cling to ideas instead of direct experience. You try to understand and answer what you actually have to experience and become. When I asked the questions I intended to make you investigate them in your direct experience. So.. The question "what is problem made out of?" entails following: What you call a problem is an experience, more precisely an image of the future that "you" want to get to This experience represents a thought (image of enlightenment) and a feeling (craving for it) If there's an experience there's awareness. But is that really the case? Is experience different from awareness? Or is that the same thing? Non-duality means non-duality, not two. The whole point is that the desire to "get somewhere" is not a problem at all, because what is that desire made of? Non-duality. You are the desire and everything else simultaneously. Everything is one. By "can we go deeper" I meant that what if we not just try to let go of the desire, what if we try to investigate/observe it in the direct experience and try to understand what it is? P.S. All that relates to that "problem" that people keep mentioning in this topic. The real problem is that most of the people are lost in conceptual understanding and don't practice nearly enough to even understand and distinguish common meditation techniques, but they rigorously keep projecting, arguing and thinking they "get it". P.S. 2. No, you don't try to observe the desire in do-nothing, otherwise it becomes noting technique.

@Jack River It's obvious that trying to reach enlightenment is like trying to poop when you clench your anus. Does that understanding make you enlightened? You still gotta meditate even if you understand that. "You're not enlightened till you're fucking enlightened." - Leo Gura

@tsuki

I mean more literally. Thought about the problem is an object "in" awareness. But what is it made of? What are thoughts made of? Are they made of the same thing any other senses' experiences are made of? What is that substance everything is made of? And finally, since the self is just a thought: what the hell are you?

Can we go deeper and ask: what is the problem made of? What is the substance of thought about the problem?

I think that sounds appropriate.

@robdl It is already quite a debate. The problem is that you guys put the cart before the horse. You try to describe enlightenment which is an absence of I and absence of any technique or method. But before you get there you have to follow a technique, you have to meditate before the habit of meditation starts to meditate by itself. And you seem to not get what is the point of do nothing technique described by Shinzen. I would consider it a technique since a technique is a way of doing something. Do-nothing is a way of doing meditation, meditation not in a sense of enlightenment (it's actually the original meaning of the word meditation = zen (Japanese) = chan/chan-na (Chinese) = dhyana (Sanskrit)), but in a sense of exercise. The point of that way of meditating is that when you let go of control/attempts to observe it just spontaneously happens with time. Mind naturally calms down. And monkey mind is not a problem. Getting lost in thoughts is not a problem. Since the expectation is that you will spontaneously/naturally awaken from it more and more, just because you give up your free will. So please watch the video once again and stop trying to describe the result of meditation instead of how to meditate. Many subjects of our disagreement are addressed there in very precise terms.

A technique is a way of doing something. Doing nothing is a way of meditation. Is doing nothing a technique? Is that a free will? Do you choose to get lost in monkey chatter or does that happen to you? If that happens to you then is that a doing?

If you call it "passive" then there should be the opposite - "active". But awareness can't be passive or active in its nature. Awareness just is. Everything there is is awareness. We were talking about the technique and you tried to refer to enlightenment/your true nature - awareness. The video that I sent previously describes what is this technique about.

If you call it the "passive awareness" then how can it be active?

Perpetuation of doing is doing, effort. Again, that's doing. You are describing the technique called 'noting': monitoring your state of mind. Noting requires control and effort, even though the form that you described requires minimal effort and control, yet it's not do-nothing. Watch this video. Be really clear about what he says about the technique. The instruction for this type of meditation is two very precise sentences. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ6cdIaUZCA

You shouldn't. Practice whatever you like. Whooops! Mud contest gone bad! I didn't say Kriya works or not, or that I prefer it. So what? --------------------------------------------- I'm getting outta here! Sorry for not blindly following your opinion.

The question is: what is the subjective effect of that objective difference? All heroin addicts report they're fucked. What do yoga practitioners report? You try to proof you're right instead of getting to the truth. No one makes you practice anything. No one makes you blindly believe in the power of Kriya. What is the point of your blind assumptions and guestimations about Kriya? Go diligently try Kriya and then tell that it works or not, otherwise you're just bullshitting and this thread is nonsence.

Try 3 hour long session. That's not do-nothing. No control means no control. If long thought sequence happens and you are unaware of it - let it happen. Otherwise you're trying to notice it, which is control, because you direct your attention on thoughts.

Try rigorously concentrating your attention on the automatic process of separation "I" versus "there". How does that happen? Is it really the case that there is some "there" and some "I"? Or is it just an arbitrary metric for convenience that became so automatic that you can barely notice you do that illusory separation all the time? Like meters and kilograms - there's no such things. There is no liters in the ocean.

Welcome to the pre-non-dual epileptic club. Cheers!

Anything else but enlightenment turns out to be meaningless dissatisfactory shit in the end. Technically enlightenment should be an even more frustrating shit. But I'm not there yet. Oops! I meant "here" of course. I'm not here yet.

Quick outline of the quality do-nothing session: let your inner voice talk random shit till it gets bored of itself and shuts the fuck up.

I suppose that the problem is that you judge yourself for the lack of focus. Try this algorithm: 1) Focus on your task 2) Notice how you get distracted and feel annoyed/ashamed/guilty because you can't focus, DO NOT try to not feel this, let yourself butthurt but still go to 3 3) Give compassion to yourself and praise yourself that you noticed that "oh, I have just distracted and got annoyed, good, I can relax and try again, cool" 4) Go to the 1 Do that in a loop. Eventually you will catch fire and realize "wow, I was studying 10 minutes without distractions!". ADD won't pass easily and quickly. Baby steps, gradual progress, positive reinforcement and an enormous amount of love and patience directed to yourself is the key. There are many other factors involved: food, stress, exercises, health etc. So there's no quick solution.

I'm at home. My two female bosses started systematically violating my personal boundaries (actually from the beginning, but that wasn't serious, yet..), meaning they were shouting at me. At some point I got mad and started arguing because of the another conflict. Then I said "maybe we stop snipping at each other like kids till the end of the season and solve the problem the mature way?". The one that I told this (that hottie that was teaching me in the beginning) "handled" this problem to another (the older boss) and then the interesting stuff happened. We talked with the older boss: first I apologized for the content of our argument (I was kinda in a hurry and fucked up a little bit with the work), when I started talking about my boundaries she tried to convince me that I am trolling that hottie and I should get off, also that "we're women, we're emotional, you're man, you gotta be patient". She tried to convince me that the younger boss is such a sensitive bunny and that the fact that she's telling me this is such a private thing which is obviously just an attempt to cover the ass of the younger boss and abuse my empathy. Then she jokingly threatened me because I ridiculed this cheap trick. The next day I demanded my money and even more interesting shit happened. They got together and started some weird "official theater" (while the work was unofficial) because they understood they did something wrong and thought that the fact that I'm such a kind and soft-skinned nerd will make this shit work. They tried many obvious manipulations at least half from this list, when that was happening I didn't sleep all night and just said "I'm probably not in the best condition, I will sleep, then we talk". The next day I came into senses and demanded apologies and my salary or I'm getting outta here. The older boss apologized. Then I worked one day and when it came to the salary time they payed and fired me, I guess because the younger boss found out about apologies of the older. We had some time together with the younger boss, talked all night once, had very intimate conversations. She probably contextualized the situation in general like I felt in love with her and just try to annoy her because of the resentment. While actually I lost all my attraction a week before when I spot that she lacks integrity and tries to manipulate me (without any conflict), and it probably annoyed her, because she seems to be that kind of a women that sucks value from guys. She started allowing her shitty little abuses from around that time. P.S. I wish you could see the older boss' face all day afterwards when I made her apologize by threatening her profit (it takes some pain in the ass to find such a worker during this time of the season). Ego hates to take responsibility and reflected manipulations. I think I wouldn't do manipulation unless I had to get my money, because the work is unofficial and it's quite common in those places to not get your money in such a situation. There are some lessons from this mud contest: People suck more than I think. Boundaries... Reactivity... When someone violates your boundaries you should immediately protects it in the polite way, for example "could you please not rise your voice on me?" or "help me understand why are you letting yourself to rise your voice right now?". Aggression or silence against aggression doesn't work. Only conscious polite response. Demanding for apologies is ridiculous. Unless you have to work with those people. In relationships it seems to be logical to just leave the person that doesn't show any sign of regret for their wrong moves.

@Soulbass Thanks! Bwehehe. When I use a lot of english I start to phrase in Russian in an English manner, just like Leo did here. Although it sound awkward for those Russians who don't know English it's incredibly convenient.

Please give the video.

I am completely back to society. Nothing new, people still suck and I'm bored as hell of them. There's so little people that I'm interested to talk to. Everyone thinks they know shit and then you find out that it's just a bunch of bullshit. Nobody knows that they suffer. They consider deep conversations lame and boring. They are confident and ignorant and I'm truthful and incofident. I was very careful about judgements and thought that I should be less judgemental and make sure it's not just my narcissism and projections. But judgement is empty. Truth is truth. If something sucks it sucks. And it doesn't. Ha. I had a date with a girl and she really liked me but she lives in the another city. Fuck. Still wanna warm hugs so much. I guess I have a goal - to cry in public and feel like myself, let them judge and not justify. I tried today because I felt like it but it's so fucking hard! Another insight is that I'm too afraid to hurt women's feeling. I'm afraid that if I seduce a girl that is less conscious than me and our relationships won't last I will hurt her. And I don't know. From one side I will have sex and hugs sooner, but from another, am I gonna use her? Am I gonna regret? Is that her problem or my either? Is there safe conscious short term love with someone who is not very conscious? I suppose I need to do some trial and error and see what's true and what's not, it's tricky to say with so little experience. Huuuuuugs.