Carl-Richard

Sure, maybe asking the question from many different angles could help. Still, I just can't shake the feeling that they might be wrong, and you'll have very few ways to tell. It will be just as structurally coherent as all the other answers. When you run across something dodgy on the internet, you can use cues like poorly formulated sentences or domain names to determine trustworthyness. In real life, you have social cues. With ChatGPT, you only have your intuition, and that's an infinite source of paranoia (at least for me, I do score very high on neuroticism ). This must be how autists feel about people lying to them.

Maybe in the majority of cases. The first clinical psychologist I ever met to knew about spiritual enlightenment. My university has a class called "spirituality, religion and existential questions", and we had a lecture that touched on the differences between extraordinary experiences, mystical experiences and psychosis. The most important distinction is that psychosis is generally dysfunctional, while extraordinary/mystical experiences generally aren't (in fact, they're often associated with higher functioning).

I don't feel like asking ChatGPT for anything anymore. There is something eerie about trusting something that didn't come from another human being who has a 1st person experience of believing what they're saying. I get same feeling as when I thought the teacher was bullshitting an answer in front of the class to not come off as unknowledgeable, and I just wanted to go home and never listen to her again.

That's true. It's just an anthropomorphism. There is no reason for God. God just exists. God experiences itself through multiple separate perspectives, not because it has to do that, but because it is doing that.

Lying and manipulating has always come easy to him. Watch his appearance on Ultimate Traveller.

@Danioover9000 I think he was very specifically talking about simple political interventions like taxes, which is kinda dumb to be absolutistic about. You probably wouldn't feel fundamentally violated if we replaced taxes with some other alternative. It would be a different story e.g. when it comes to something like democracy, which is more complex. It doesn't quite work as well then to say "wouldn't you be fine with a totalitatian state if everybody was happy, healthy and fed?" And sure, properly balancing things like process and results is what wisdom is about. This is a bit of a jump, but life itself is a process to be enjoyed. If you're always looking for some result, you'll never be happy.

Neurosis central.

Destiny's insights on psychedelics are so lame ? "I learned that truth is not always good, and that I don't like being alone" ? Or it's at least the way he words it and fails to follow it up with other insights. He seems to be so survival-oriented and identified with his ego that when he experiences transpersonal truth, he rejects it outright, rather than seeing it as a possible next level, e.g. "I might not be ready for the ultimate truth right now, as I'm too identified with my human self, but I'll be working towards that". That is the difference between a spiritual person and a non-spiritual person. As Charlie points out, that reaction might be due to his trauma and lack of love in his childhood. He is so driven by lack that he can't see past that mode of being. Maybe if he didn't take 10.5g his first time and had progressively eased himself into it, maybe it would've been different, but I'm not so sure about that.

Hedonism short-term happiness dysfunction lethargy fragility rigidity decadence vice instability imbalance disorder meaninglessness degeneration dependency self-destructive Eudaimonia long-term happiness functionality vitality resilience adaptivity integrity virtue stability balance structure meaning regeneration self-sufficiency self-improving

It's joy. It's just more subtle than clinging onto every impermanent sensory experience and trying to extract joy from them (hedonism). You have to be a bit smarter than that. I'm using the words in the context of a cross-over between a common English understanding of them and what certain philsophers have said about them, not the context of the Greek language.

Sure, everything is "alive".

Need more context.

No.

Everything is consciousness, but not all of consciousness is equal. Circuits don't correlate with thoughts, emotions, perceptions. Meat does.

Not expressing your full capacities, that is fear. Living life gracefully in line with your rationality, your conscience, your emotional sensitivities and physical capabilities, that is the opposite of fear. Meaning is the structure of reality. Living in line with meaning is to be in line with reality. If you want to skip all that and mahasamadhi right now, go for it (don't harm your physical body), but there is a certain way life is, and there is a certain way to live a good life. The Bodhisattva knows this. No need to deny life.

I'm biased towards perennial truths validated by personal experience. Gaining social approval by being virtuous is not the point. It's just a signal that you're doing something right and a carrot to keep you going (that evolution set up for you by the way). The internal signalling of your body being functional and your mind being clear is what really matters. That is the proof of the metaphysical significance. However, as a general rule, if something is admired, it's usually to be emulated. The devil is in the details.

Survival is ego based. It's just survival done right. What you really don't like, the ugly parts of survival, is survival done half-assedly or unwisely.

Pro-anything turns off the DMN. That is what flow is.

Do we have any lawyers on the forum? ? We only have STEM or drop-outs.

If you want a more mind-oriented example, you also can see the utility of courage in concepts like disruptive practices (breaking with habitual cognitive functioning to gain new perspective), which can lead to deep insights into the workings of the mind: I did LSD 3 times and weed ~1000 times, and then at one point after I discovered the concept of mindfulness, I spent a week in the mountains with my family doing active mindfulness 24/7 sober (with heavy weed withdrawals, which also meant no desire to masturbate), and at the tail end of that week, I did my 3 first seated meditations ever, and on the 3rd meditation, I awoke. The thing about psychedelics, meditation, or any temporary change in state, is that it's a so-called "disruptive practice". It disrupts habitual functioning and allows for a contrast to arise, which allows you to become more aware of deeply ingrained mechanisms. Imagine being a fish that has only been in water all of his life. The fish doesn't feel the water at all. It doesn't know what it is, because it has always been in water and is fully habituated to the constant stimuli. If the fish is then suddenly lifted out of the water, it'll experience the contrast between water and non-water for the first time, and then as it re-immerses itself, it'll become more aware of the true nature of water. That is the essence of a disruptive practice. The explanation for why I awoke when I did is not mainly the fact that I had smoked weed so many times or done LSD a couple of times, but that I had spent a week where I didn't smoke weed and also where I did something completely new (active mindfulness practice). This was in fact a massive confounding of several disruptive practices. And then on top of that, at the end of the week, I didn't go back to weed, but instead I did something I've also never done before: seated meditation. Essentially, that week was like a huge active meditation retreat with a chronic pharmacological disruption (weed withdrawal) as well as nofap (another disruption), as well as being in a different environment than my usual daily habits (skiing in the mountains), which then finally culminated in another completely new practice (seated meditation). This is what it takes to truly get underneath your own skin. You have to see how it's like without it, and sometimes you have to go to the extremes. This was a more spiritual example, but you can also apply it to exposing yourself to other points of view, new perspectives, new mental challenges, new skills, etc. Courage would be to take those opportunities when they arise, despite how hard they might be (within reason; again, balance ).

I'm not. That was just an example.

Sometimes, directly exposing yourself to something challenging can be inherently revitalizing and facilitate growth. The only time where stress becomes unhealthy is when it's unbearable and leads to a breakdown of the system. This is why things like ice baths, saunas and physical exercise, when done in the right way, leads to a higher baseline state, because it makes you more capable to handle life. This is the deeper metaphysical reason for virtues like courage. It's in a fundamental sense the driving force of your life.

I tend say this to everyone, but for you it sounds particularly important: consistency is the key. If the problem is that when you stop meditating, everything goes bad, then you just need to not stop meditating. It doesn't have to be for long every day either. You just need one moment every day where you focus all your attention on meditation. That said, if we're being realistic, there is nothing in the course of a normal day that will make you unable to spend 1 hour for yourself where you have nothing else to do. So it's just about finding that time, fully dedicating it to meditation, and making it a part of yourself. Also, to me, unless you're completely obsessed with meditation, 2-4 hours is a bit much, and you don't want to burn yourself out either. You can do that, but just don't make it an all-or-nothing deal where it's like you've "failed" if you don't get 4 hours in. And of course, if you're talking about spreading it out (e.g. 1hr in the morning, 1hr in the evening), that is more overcomeable. Just make sure it's quality time.

Speaking from experience, having a decent mystical experience induced by meditation can definitely heal anxiety. The issue though is, especially when it comes to social anxiety, that there will be residual behavioral patterns that need to be rewired to fit the new baseline state, which might be experienced as a bit challenging and might take several years to work out, even if you don't feel particularly anxious in those situations anymore (the feeling is rather of being a bit weird or inexperienced). But definitely, it can make a huge difference. Start meditating every day and you'll at least see a gradual improvement. Try to build up to at least 45 minutes in one sitting, preferably an hour. That is where most of the work is done in my experience.

Could add that word to the list It's quite logical as well. Fundamentally, it solves "the paradox of hedonism" (chasing pleasures makes the pleasures less pleasurable). Why does the paradox of hedonism exist? Because what gives you pleasure is not a static thing. It's constantly changing depending on what is salient to your survival right now. If you eat food when you're hungry, that is pleasurable. If you keep eating food when you're stuffed, that starts become not so pleasurable. It's like this with everything in excess, whether it's masturbation, entertainment, or even exercise, and it's the foundation of virtues like "nothing in excess", "discipline", "courage". You need to be constantly moving, adapting to what your body tells you and what the environment craves of you. Basically, you can boil it down to concepts like balance, holism and meaning: do just enough of the right things, don't neglect any aspect of yourself, and do what is meaningful, either with respect to the particular situation or just as a guiding principle. These principles extend far into abstract realms like healthy daily routines, having a disciplined work schedule, creating your life purpose, etc. It all adds up to maximizing net enjoyment in the end. Enjoyment is not just pleasure as a physical sensation. It's the experience of meaning, purpose, understanding, love, truth; connectedness, beingness, aliveness. There is a richness to life that is only experienced by participating deeply in it in all of its manifestations, and that requires something from you. You don't just receive life. You uncover it as a growing organism in the game called life, and you need to play it well in order to truly enjoy it.