Forestluv

Of course. You speak of the destruction of climate change as if it is some potential danger that may or may not happen. Climate change destruction has already begun. Irreversible destruction has already occurred. This is it, it's happening now. Its appropriate that some fear and anger may be experienced based on what is occurring. . . Greta also has an immense amount of courage to talk truth to power. She is an incredibly courageous and inspiring person. The responsibility for a sustanianable planet should not be thrown onto a16 year old teenager. She should not have to shoulder this burden. This is the responsibility of grown adults. Yet they are irresponsible and are placing personal greed for corporate profits and power over the welfare of younger generations and the planet. For a 16 year old girl to step up and confront irresponsible adults causing harm is amazingly courageous. Most adults don't have the courage to take responsibility. Imo, adults expecting a 16 year old girl to shoulder this immense burden without any fear or anger is way out of line. Greta is approaching the level of Malala in this regard. . . Green is one level higher than Orange. Greta is Green shaming toxic Orange. Orange is self-centered on their personal welfare - in particular with personal power and wealth. An example in this area would be people within the oil and gas industry. Green is a conscious level higher. Green is not primarily self-centered. Green places higher value on inclusion, diversity and community - the environment is included within community. A couple green features of Greta. Notice how she is self-sacrificing. She is not doing this to gain personal wealth and power. She is doing this for a larger community. This will be difficult for Orange to comprehend - since Orange is so self-centered - Orange has a difficult time understanding how someone could authentically be sacrificing their own personal welfare for a greater welfare. Furthermore, empathy is a key feature of Green. Notice how empathetic Greta is. She says she is one of the lucky ones and she goes on to describe the the pain and suffering of climate change victims. Again, she is not using victims as pawns for her personal gain as Orange would. She is empathizing with others. This will be difficult for Orange to see because Orange has much less empathy. Therefore, they will be skeptical of Greta. It's also not healthy to destroy the planet. I would agree at times it is better to withhold the truth from young children to protect them from the trauma of learning the truth. Yet Greta is old and mature enough to handle the truth. What time frame do you speak of? Climate science didn't emerge until the 1980s. Nearly all the predictive models of climate change from the 1980s-90s have been spot on. @Emerald Yep. Greta refers to her autism as a "superpower". I think it helps her see the situation clearly - while most neurotypical people cannot see the situation clearly.

This description is limited to a physical construct. You don't know what it would feel like to be a biological woman that took testosterone. You can try to imagine what it would be like - yet this would be far from the experience of what it's actually like. There is also an immaterial relative aspect. Relative subjective experiences like gender does not simply reduce down to physical molecules. . . Pain would be another example. We cannot predict a person's level of pain based on the composition of neurotransmitters and hormones.

I'm not sure of the context you are using. . . I'm making a distinction to sex and gender. I'm referring to sex as genitalia and gender as sexual identity. In this context, people can "deny" their physical sex to affirm their gender. For example, a person with a penis may surgically remove her penis - which is affirming to her female gender. . . Yet, I'm not sure if this is what you are pointing to.

A "only-physical" paradigm is hard to maintain. Any 100% paradigm is hard to maintain. The tendency is to see in opposites. That is. . . if there is non-physical then I must reject physical. Which isn't the case. A simple example would be "I have a 100% tall people paradigm". The tendency to think in opposites would be "If everyone is tall, then that must mean nobody is tall and everyone is short. And I can't accept that!". . . This is the dilemma of all dualities. All black and white dualities collapse. I'm not saying that physical is wrong and nonphysical is correct. Rather, just poke a whole in the 100% physical bubble and let 1% physical leak out. Going from 100% to 99% is an enormous jump. The jump from 100% to 99% is much larger than from 99% to 1%. Most people in the only-physical paradigm tend to like and respect science - because science tends to describe the physical word. Well. . . science has clearly revealed the nonphysical. Look into quantum mechanics - in particular superposition and entanglement. These are nonphysical realities. And it's not "pseudo science". Quantum mechanics has among the highest predictive power in all of science. QM has won noble prizes. It is rock solid science and it clearly shows nonphysical reality. QM alone should be able to knock you down from 100% physical to 99% physical. That crack can allow greater openmindedness and space for exploration.

@Average Investor Personally, I would consider that a meditative state, rather than meditation practice. Both have value. . . Sounds like you are ready for some psychedelics. They open up a whole new world.

Hmmm, good question. I also like experiencing altered states. The focus of the forum is not specifically on altered states, yet we talk a lot about altered states and a lot of people here are into them. Spiritual work often involves many altered states such as: flow states, shamanic breathing, psychedelics, lucid dreaming, sensory deprivation tanks, temporary insanity, the paranormal etc. that we often discuss. I like your system to enter trance states. I've entered similar states, usually by consistently staring at something. Yet this can take a while. Like I will spend a couple hours lying under a tree staring at the leaves rustling in the breeze. After a while, I may enter a trance state. It's sort of like a mesmerized state or a dream state. . . Other times, I just happens. For example, I may become mesmerized by a painting of a person. Their facial expression, the feeling. It's like I get immersed into it. I may stand there 10 minutes mesmerized. It can even happen in a supermarket with a box of cereal. . .

I like the "to act out of love and follow the heart" part. I've found that when I am genuine and act out of love, things seem to go better. How do we know when we are acting out of love? This can be tricky. For me, I've noticed my mind coming in and rationalizing that I have good intentions, yet below the thinking. . . it just doesn't feel like I'm acting out of love. Then, I make up stories about how I do have good intentions and acting out of love. This disconnect can cause me internal turmoil. . . Yet when there is acting out of love, there is a knowing it is out of love - it's not an intellectual thing. One thing I noticed was that I thought I was acting with good intentions and out of love, yet it wasn't being perceived by the other person like I was acting out of good intentions and love. I would often say "Well, I know I have good intentions and if they can't see that, then it's their problem". Then I started looking at intention and impact. I was so focused on me and my intention that I was unable to see the impact from their perspective. . . . For example, a couple years ago I dated a woman of color. This was a new experience for me. Occasionally she would tell me "What you just said is racially insensitive." My initial instinct was to protect myself with intention such as "Well, I didn't intend to be racially insensitive. If you interpreted it that way, that's your issue". Yet, there was a part of me that knew I was missing something. I then opened myself up and many of my unconscious biases were revealed. To go deeper, I traveled to foreign villages and lived with local families. Over time, I could see more and more perspectives - and learned about intention and impact. I also discovered that sometimes there was personal insecurity underlying "my good intentions". Judgement and separation began to dissolve and I became better at connecting with people - a wide variety of people. @Commodent Good stuff. Thanks for your input.

@flowboy It takes a lot of openness and willingness to look at this stuff. And it's not always black and white. . . There are times when I have direct experience and knowledge - yet I am perceived as being arrogant. Is the issue with me being arrogant? Or is the issue with the other person interpreting me as arrogant? It can get tricky at times. One thing I've learned is that there are various forms of intelligence. I was high up on rational/intellectual intelligence, yet I was really low on social intelligence. My intellectual intelligence could not compensate for my deficiency in social intelligence and it was causing problems in my inter-personal relationships.

I've had some of that. I was conditioned in a hyper-critical environment. My hyper-criticism was mostly directly inward as self-criticism, yet a portion was expressed externally. In terms of the inter-personal relations you speak of. . . control was a major issue for me. I wanted to consider myself as an easy-going guy that goes with the flow, yet I had underlying control issues. In particular, a desire to control the narrative. A couple traps here. I often considered myself well-meaning. This can be a rationalization mechanism of avoidance. It protects and distracts from underlying issues. I inquired: what exactly is "well-meaning"? What I found wasn't something I wanted to find. . . As well, I introspected intent vs. impact. . . And the saying "I was just born this way and I'm just being myself" is another protective mechanism that prevents personal growth. . . Of course not. The ego wants to avoid looking at it's own self-rigthousness Each personality seems to fit in better in certain situations. I thrive more in certain environments than others. Yet I think you are going a step further than that. To me, the underlying desire is: how can I continue to be an asshole without any of the consequences of being an asshole? You can develop into a person that is a highly talented non-asshole that contributes to society without inter-personal conflict and tension.

How can it start with a denial of sex? There would need to be a sexual orientation for a sexual orientation to be denied. . . Does this not start with a sexual orientation, followed by the denial of that sexual orientation? Let's consider the start. Homosexuality is nature and found in every animal species examined. Yet only one species shows homophobia (humans). In every other animal species, homosexuality is a natural phenomena that is accepted within the community. So what what does it take for humans to deny homosexuality? Imagine a teenage girl feels attraction toward other girls. Why would she reject that? It is not natural for her to deny that. It requires a construct that there is something "abnormal" or "wrong" with her attraction. Otherwise, why would it be rejected? If society celebrated homosexuality and saw homosexuals as gifted special people, do you think there would be desire to deny one's homosexuality? Of course not. . . Imagine a society in which intelligence is stigmatized as evil. If a person realizes they are intelligent, they must hide it or they will be stigmatized and ostracized. If they say something intelligent, they might be rejected by their family and friends - and perhaps beaten and imprisoned. Imagine a teenage girl realizing that she is intelligent and must hide it in fear of what may happen. She hides it from her family. She finds a few other intelligent people, yet they must hide together out in the forest to say intelligent things to each other. They wonder why they are intelligent and why they have been cursed by god. They become depressed and suicidal. . . In this situation, why would someone deny their intelligence? Is it internal or external?

As a general guideline, please don't post while tripping. Have a good trip and let us know how it went afterwards.

The killer bee's have already arrived and have been killing us. More bees on the way. . .

This is where the duality between dream/illusion vs. reality starts to break down. Those having experience lucid dreaming know that what is dream/illusion and what is real starts to break down. If you go the full distance dream/illusion = reality. From the perspective of your dream characters, how many "dreamers" are there? Just ONE - Joker_Theory. . . Joker_Theory is the dream. if we take it one level higher, Joker_Theory (and all people, animals, things) is God. Joker_Theory is within Everything, similar to how Everything in the dream is You.

I would be cautious with this path - it can lead to a nasty solipsistic trap. Be careful conflating absolute and relative. The big "You" is creating all of this, not the little "you". When you frame the question as "Am I just dreaming up this life? I am the only one right now that has a subjective experience?". The answer is both "yes" and "no" - and if these two get mixed up and can lead to a nasty solipsistic trap. At the level of the little "i", no you are not dreaming up this life and you are not the only one with a subjective experience. At the god-like omniscient level of One "I", yes YOU are dreaming up this life and are the only ONE. Because there is only ONE. Think of having a dream in which your dream character Paul asks the same question. Paul asks "Am I just dreaming all this? Am I the only person right now having a subjective experience?". From the perspective of Paul, then no. From his perspective he and all the other dream characters are real. It would not be fair to say Paul is dreaming it all up, because Paul is within the dream. We need to transcend Paul and level up to Krockerman. From the perspective of Krockerman, he is dreaming it all up. Paul and all the dream characters are ONE dream. NOT Paul's dream. The higher consciousness of Krockerman's consciousness. Similarly, there is transcendence of the Krockerman character. Krockerman is not the one dreaming it all up. Krockerman is within God and God is dreaming it up. Krockerman and all other characters are ONE dream. If Paul realizes he is Krockerman - that becomes a conscious lucid dream. If Krokcerman realizes he is God - that is awakening, the Ultimate lucid dream.

Well. . . "lack of acceptance" includes A LOT. Within "lack of acceptance" there is stigmatization, marginalization, ostracization, violence, abuse, trauma and on and on. At a physiological epigenetic level, this can lead to alterations in gene expression correlated with neuroses. I'm open to considering other factors. What do you have in mind?

Haha. That's a great question. Welcome to this gate. . . We create the distinction between "ego" and "true self". This can have practical value in terms of personal development. For example, someone may see that they have been self-centered and manipulative to others. They may see this as "ego" and work to reduce their self-centerdness and manipulation. As well, someone may go on a retreat and resonate with dharma talks about compassion and helping others. The person may say "my *true nature* is compassion toward others". This can be great for personal develop and forming healthier relationships. . . Yet in terms of awakening, it sets up a "good self vs. bad self" dynamic. If the person digs deep enough, they will come face to face with this. Then there is transcendence of the entire self.

There is a correlation between homosexuality/bisexuality and depression. There is an even stronger correlation between transgender and depression. At a genetic / neurological level, there is not considerable evidence that gender identity or sexual orientation is physiologically linked to depression via genetics. So people that are homosexual/bisexual/transgender are not at a higher risk of depression due to inheritance of gene variants from their parents. (although a small genetic input is possible). It appears the vast majority of the correlation is due to environmental inputs. For example, homosexuals/bisexuals/transgender people may face stigmatization/marginalization/ostracization of being "abnormal", "immoral", "unacceptable" etc. This can come from within family and socially. . . At a physical level, this negative environmental input would alter a person's physiology increasing the risk of anxiety and depression. . . It's not the sexual/gender orientation itself. It is the environmental response to the sexual/gender orientation.

Hi Cameron, I think you ask some really good questions. Not only can these questions reveal insights into relative personal and social constructs, the questions can also reveal insights into nonduality. I think some of the confusion may be due to mixing absolute and relative perspectives - which I will do my best to explain. . . It's easiest to start from a nondual perspective: that is - Everything is One. So there is no distinctions between "me" and "you". No distinctions between "masculine" and "feminine", no distinctions between "male" and "female". If Everything is One, all of those distinctions dissolve. As a metaphor, imagine Everything is Blue. Then there is no "Blue vs. Not Blue". If Everything is Blue there is no Not Blue for comparison. We would need to create a distinction - that one thing is Blue and another thing is Not Blue. As soon as we enter into this relative arena, things get tricky. . . Who decides what counts as blue or not blue? What if scientists say a specific wavelength of light is blue and philosophers say blue is a personal experience of perception? What if one society defines blue one way and another country defines blue another way? And what about "sort of blue-ish" - at what point does it count as "blue" and how decides? . . . So these things can get messy. We can say "Everything is One, there is no reason for all this blue business". Yet at the same time, blue is part of the human experience. Similarly: sex, gender and sexual orientation can all deconstruct down to One - there is no sex, gender or sexual orientation. From there, we can create personal and social constructs. We can create simple constructs or complex constructs. Yet notice how these are relative constructs that all deconstruct back down to absolute nothing. So why even create such constructs? Because it's part of the relative human experience. It also has practical value in navigating through society, yet at a deeper level it is part of who we are and how we interact with others. We are both One and unique individuals. We can contemplate gender from both personal and societal perspectives. These two are integrated, yet can also be in conflict. How you personally consider "masculine" and "feminine" may differ from some societal constructs on what "masculine" and "feminine" is. Or, personal and societal constructs can be aligned. Likewise, how you identify as "masculine" and "feminine" may differ from how fragments of society judges you as being "masculine" and "feminine". This is all due to relativity. There is no one universal objective definition. . . Understanding this will allow new space to explore. As you mentioned, we can define male and female "sex" based on genitalia and genetics. The male sex has XY chromosomes and a penis, while the female sex has XX chromosomes and a vagina. This would be a scientific definition based on physical features. This would also have practical value in society. If a male sex person is having pain in their testicles, they would look for a doctor that specializes in diagnosing male sex issues. Defining the sexes based on genitalia is generally straightforward, yet there will be some exceptions. For example, there are rare inter-sex individuals with genitalia that is hard to distinguish (for example, a tiny penis/clitoris hybrid). As well, there are some individuals that have had surgery to remove a penis. Yet these are relatively rare cases. Are designation that male sex = penis and female sex = vagina still has practical implications - we can deal with the exceptions on a case by case basis. For example, in medical school we may learn male sex anatomy and female sex anatomy and the professor may mentioned that there are some exceptions - such as intersex and briefly cover that situation. If a student wanted to specialize in intersex medicine, they would take entire courses in that area. Gender designation enters a much more relative word. Here, it's not so easy to say "Male gender is A" and "Female gender is B". Now we are getting into personal identity and this introduces phenomena of self-value, self-expression and self-survival. Once we enter this arena - the fight is On Like Donkey Kong. There will be people that want to define male/female gender based on their own self interest and others that want define it differently because they have different self interests. Therefore, there will not be a universal definition that anyone agrees on. So some people say, gender should be based on how a person identifies. Another person may say "No! That would mean there would be 30+ different genders people are identifying with!!". So society is working things out and evolving. The old, conservative construct is that gender is the same as sex. A person with a penis is the male gender and a person with a vagina is the female gender. Yet this is a very simplistic binary construct. There is also "masculinity and femininity". These are additional features. By the old, conservative view - Male sex = Male gender = Masculine and Female sex = Female gender = Feminine. This is an overly simplistic binary construct that was the mainstream consensus for centuries. . . Over the past 40 years, much of society has questioned this binary construct leading to a a higher evolved construct that is more complex. People have asked "What a minute. . . what does masculine and feminine even mean? Aren't males and females mixtures of masculine and feminine? Can a male sex person with a penis have more feminine features than masculine? If so, should we call them the male gender or female gender". This has led to a spectrum in which some cis-gender males are hyper-masculine and other cis-gender men have more feminine energy (perhaps 60% masculine, 40% feminine). Some of the male sex (with penis) have much more feminine energy (perhaps 70% feminine, 30% masculine). These male sex individuals relate more to the female gender side of the spectrum and are trans-gender female. . . More recently, some individuals do not relate stronger with either male or female designations and are nonbinary. These new, more complex constructs are at a higher evolutionary level, yet there will be backlash. There will be traditional men and women that want to maintain the older binary construct of Male sex = Male gender = Masculine and Female sex = Female gender = Feminine. They will feel very threatened by new gender expressions they see outside of their norm. Many of these conservatives will feel so threatened that they will fight to maintain the old constructs.

What about a black/white out in which there is little or no conscious recall? On one hand such a trip wouldn't have much practical value - since there is little to no recall. Yet on the other hand, there could be a direct experience without an "experiencer". This may lack conscious recall, yet perhaps there is still subconscious awareness. After a deep 5-meo trip there may be little conscious recall, yet insights may appear of the next week. Perhaps an insight about Mu may arise. It might seem like a spontaneous insight, yet perhaps that insight seed was planted into the subconsious and was later revealed to the conscious. I've found that some of my most profound high dosage trips are at the interface of recall and no recall. When my human consciousness is returning, it's like the trip is just outside of my recall and comprehension - yet I can kinda hang on and contextualize some fragments. Later during the week, the picture can become more holistic and clear. Almost like trying to consciously retain a dream while waking up - in which the dream is right at the edge of our grasp if we reach. Yet with 5-meo, there is also the ineffable quality, which makes it harder to grasp. This would be a different dynamic than too disturbing. I'm curious if you think there is value in pushing the trip depth to a threshold of recall.

@Raptorsin7 By “nondual state”, I am referring more to a subjective human experience. A “dual state” is nondual as well, yet people like to create and describe experiences with each other. It’s part of the human experience.

@Nicachi Yep. I wish I could intentionally make it happen. Sometimes it just comes on. Other times, I can relax and allow space. A good place to practice is out in nature, like laying under a tree or by a stream. For me, it seems like adding in a little bit of risk helps somehow. When I’m home alone, the chances are low. Yet if I’m at an event - in a cafe or at a concert - it’s more likely. It’s a form of nondual experience and is related to awakening. Some people are more sensitive to it than others.

I hear ya. It’s an empathetic thing. Sometimes I see someone in turmoil and I feel how introspection and growth could help them. I really want for them to see/experience the benefits and for us to grow together. Especially if they have had some type of abuse or trauma in their past. That is one of my soft spots. . . Sometimes it works out, but if they’re not into it, it usually doesn’t go as far/deep as I had hoped.

@Nicachi Yea, thats a good way to describe it. It can be super cool as well. Two nights ago I was at a retirement party for work. Everyone was sitting around in a circle eating and chatting. I started to feel dissolution come on. This used to scare me because It felt like I was losing control and I didn’t know what would happen - would I scream? Would I do something stupid? Yet now I I’m not scared - I’ve learned to flow with it. Here, I dissolved and it was like I became this collective organism of everyone in the room. As if they were all me, like fingers interacting with each other. Yet I was able to stay at the interface between the two states of consciousness. I was the collective organism, yet also still me at the same time - right at the interface. It was a lot more entertaining than the stories they were telling.

I was kayaking one time and flipped over in intense white water rapids. Upside down, it was like a whole nother world opened up. I melted away and became one with everything. I became the kayak, rocks and water flowing along. It was a beautiful space to be. Totally safe, like being in a womb or floating in outer space. There was no time. . . Then I snapped back, and my body took over. I was able to get out of the kayak and swim to shore. It was a life-threatening ordeal and I was concerned. Yet it wasn’t like I “blanked out”. I was aware and present. And the sense of it’s beauty remained. I would consider that a type of nondual experience. I’m somewhat sensitive to them. At first when one would start to appear, I would get really scared because of the uncertainty. Yet I’ve learned to work with it. I can have a pseudo nondual mindstate and the body can still function normally. Yet occasionally it can still be scary. Last summer, I was at the edge of the grand canyon when one set in, which was scary afterwards.

Chemistry is a weird thing. I’ve been a few relationships with turmoil, yet an unmistakable magic as well. Living together in a parents home would put a huge strain on a young relationship. If you had space and distance there may have been a different dynamic - or a less intense dynamic. On the flip side, a long distance relationship has it strains as well. To me, it doesn’t sound likely that the two of you are compatible as long term partners. Yet may be compatible short term and learn/grow from each other.