Search the Community

Slightly dramatic style: Going through the "The Crisis" was a torment. Most mornings I would awake from bliss into dread. Some mornings I wouldn't wake at all, I just couldn't face it. Through it I knew one thing, that if I was going to survive it I would have to carry on as I always had - plan B was just too hard to contemplate. Unfortunately, plan A was unbearable. "The Crisis" was certainly existential. I hadn't had a word for it until a Life Coach I was consulting with half jokingly pointed out that my crisis was in fact an existential one. I believed at the time it was a hand waving gesture on his part. I honestly believed my problem was a materialistic one. I hadn't ever married, I hadn't brought up children, I seemed incapable of leading anything other than a mediocre life. The icing on the shitcake was that I was in fact now old and there was no going back. It seemed that all my friends and people I cared about all had exactly what they wanted: to be normal. Why was that so damned hard for me? I had tried so hard to be part of a tribe. I had long term supposedly deep friendships. I'd had the long term girlfriends, I was the first to buy a house amongst my friends, I had a high salary and a university education - the first in my family. I had tried to do everything that society had asked of me. But none of it really stuck. I knew deep down it was all bullshit and nothing could undo the sensation. That sensation undid me in the end. The time had come when carrying that sort of cognitive dissonance around couldn't be tolerated any more. Either I would be normal and fit in or I would go all out and be different and unfettered. I fell for the first person that gave a damn and I desperately wanted normality with her. I chased her like a hungry wolf and she nearly succumbed. But after a very long period she rebuffed me with conviction - she had finally made a decision, and I wasn't it. During the early stages of both being in love/lust, strongly wanting normality and strongly wanting out - I lived a zombie existence. During waking hours I couldn't bear to be indoors. I in fact wanted to run far far away. I spent many many hours just walking aimlessly. I would take trains to nowhere in particular just to be somewhere away from my home town and myself (Eckhart Tolle's story strongly resonates with me here). Slowly over time the realisation took hold that my crisis was very much not a materialistic one. What I realised was that I hated myself, not in a cut myself kind of way, but in the same way that a lazy or fat person is vilified. I hated that I was a coward around people, that I needed people's love so badly, that my own indifference and indecision caused so much resistance and inaction, that I gave away my responsibility to others, and that no matter what I tried I would fail, and even worse I wasn't particularly interesting as a person. I ran to New Zealand completely unplanned for an unspecified amount of time. I ended up being amongst 20 somethings. This helped. I had an excuse to behave like a young person again, and I could reinvent myself. I ended up being called Tom for two months (despite having Guillermo for a name). I came back somewhat rejuvenated and full of a sense of my own ability to change my circumstances. Coming back was painful. The mental torture was still there, just to a lessened degree. But I made strides to do more things by myself. I would sit in pubs and restaurants and cinemas by myself. It was unbearably uncomfortable at first. In the end I realised that my "normal" friends didn't do this sort of thing: they were the cowards. Over time this gave me great personal strength. During that time I would find myself crying at music in the car or being uncontrollably emotional at work. I needed to learn to love myself, I even saw a hypnotherapist. She cleared some of my "blockages" and I began to feel lighter. That incessant feeling of needing to run slowly went away over years and I began to settle into my current self asymptotically. How am I now? A lot more mentally stable. I've learned to accept my mediocrity - just like everyone else does - it no longer presses on me so hard. I've also learned that I'm very much responsible for myself and the direction my life takes. And I still live in hope that life will end up being wonderful and maybe one day extraordinary. Fuck normality, I was never cut out for it.

Greetings lovelies, Over 25 years ago, in my early 20s, I had a bad LSD trip. I have developmental trauma (from age 6 weeks), which is tricky to reach and heal. Somatic approaches can help, and plant medicine but I've been too scared to do a healing dose of psilocybin, ayahuasca, etc. since that bad trip. For years I've had a strong meditation practice and had glimpses of dissolving, oneness, egolessness, and sustained periods of deep acceptance. However, I still struggle with amygdala hijacking, which is distressing and destructive (like being possessed...). The psychoactive part of 5-MeO-DMT lasts 20 minutes on average so I decided to feel the fear and do it anyway (it took a year and a half to build up the courage). During the ceremony I was extremely scared before smoking the pipe. I had two very safe people with me -- the facilitator who is a wise friend and my partner. Holding the pipe, my friend, the shaman (I truly believe he is now given the phenomenal space he held for my banshee part...), counted as I slowly inhaled. Up to the count of 8. Hold. I must have exhaled. In the first few seconds I thought (I was still thinking then), oh, this is just like being very stoned [on marijuana]. The next second I was in another dimension. I could see my partner's face but through a worm hole or something like that (hard to describe...). I was somewhere else. I did not surrender to it. Instead I was absolutely (expletive coming up - am I allowed to curse here? - ok will bleep it a bit) f*cking terrified. I recall wailing quietly - "I don't want to be here", "I am so scared", "I knew I should not have done it." I experienced a "white out" (apparently) for the next 20 minutes with a few brief snapshots of awareness/sensory information: seeing the alarmed faces of the shaman and my partner; clinging onto both of them like a bush baby; hearing my partner cry; the strong command of "Surrender!" and me softening; and a brief experience of bliss/oneness/wonder when I saw the beautiful mandala on the wall, which now had glowing white light around it. That's all I recall for those 20 minutes until I was lying at my partner's feet. I briefly sat up to make one definitive statement about my trauma. Then led back down with intermittent shakes throughout my body -- the somatic release of my terror. The two people present later shared their witnessing. For the first 10 minutes or so I was fighting with something/someone and was kicking so much they couldn't get near me. It was so intense my partner felt traumatized by the suffering he saw in me. My friend was commanding "Surrender!" a lot and chanting and telling me to release but I didn't hear him until about 15 minutes into my journey. He suggested that fear is fear in my body regardless of trauma, bad trip concerns, etc. Since Mr Toad (4 days ago now) I've had flashbacks. All of which have been wonderful. Bright, oneness, peaceful experiences. I have been changed. I was triggered this morning and rather than react I was able to sit on my cushion and fully feel my emotions instead. That's huge for me. My partner reflected to me that I've faced something inside that was so hard for me to see before but that seeing has also made me more vulnerable and sensitive. That I've wrestled something out of my unconscious that's been silently ruling over me with fear, and I have stepped more into my power and fearlessness. I need to integrate a lot more though (TRE, yin yoga, yoga nidra, sound healing, etc.) which I've been a bit undisciplined about... I'm sharing to add to the catalog of 5-MeO-DMT trip reports in case it serves others. I'm also interested in any responses. And to be honest, I'm proud of myself for facing a big chunk of fear and I feel pretty kick ass . It was the most terror I've ever felt or rather ever recall feeling (my baby self may have felt it). I am planning to do it again to face more, release more, and heal more. I am hopeful for greater integration of my being for the lofty goal (always) of being love and loving others. Love

1) I'd intellectually realize that all of those things are impermanent. Life will take them away from you sooner or later, well before you die. 2) Start getting comfortable with just being. Start practicing some sort of do nothing practice where you are just silently being. The more at peace you can be with being alone, the easier detachment will become. Find the happiness, joy, beauty, and fulfillment with doing nothing at all, and you've hacked life. 3) Just be patient. I've had days where I feel totally in bliss and completely willing to accept anything life has to give, and then I've had days where I'm totally caught in my ego stories, craving and desiring things that are completely out of my control. Attachment takes time to let go of, this is because of the self survival mechanism that keeps you alive. Don't underestimate its power. I'm sure other people on this forum can give helpful advice. This was just sort of off the top of my head, I hope it helps

Self-Actualization Its such a gargantuan thing . One glimpse is not enough You gotta experience absolute infinity and passed broke through all the traditional boundaries that keep us in ordinary consciousness boundary of insanity the boundary of death the boundary of existence and non-existence all these boundaries )(quickly broke through within 10 minutes entered the Godhead Godhead is like the heart of God it's the heart of absolute infinity it feels like this infinite cosmic chain reaction which has been going on forever it's eternal and its scope is unimaginable in size it's beyond all measures of size it feels like you're entering into the middle of the Sun and going inwards and going deeper and deeper and it almost feels going inside this infinite headed Hydra where every human being, just like a ball of human beings and corpses and animals and all the sentient you're just kind of like going through it and through it they pile on human corpses and then they have a like one soldier buried underneath and he's trying to struggle his way out of all these no beginning or end there's no center because it's of infinite diameter if you imagine it like a big sphere it's the Sun of infinite diameter now a window opens up where it's time to heal myself and it spontaneously happened about a window of ten seconds opened up where you scan through the body up and healing took place my entire body sort of healed itself the first time experience such a thing for similar to advanced mystics commonly report healing the substance of everything which is the ultimate nature of reality is not physical, it's not made out of matter it's not energy even and it's not even consciousness or awareness this is not awareness really what it is it just is being and even to call it being isn't quite right because really it has no name that's the key inside that you realize that you can't name the substance of which reality is made it's just it irreducibly it and it's all one all of it is one this is the key understanding is that you cannot define the substance of reality in terms of anything because the thing you're defining it with is itself the substance so when you call it matter or energy or awareness or consciousness or you put any kind of label on it or you think of it in any terms of a kind of physical way or spiritual way material way all of that is not it and the closest thing to what the actual substance of it is is nothing so the substance of everything is nothing and all of it is non-dual.reality is a strange loop what is a strange loop this is a concept from Douglas Hofstadter basically what it means is that to say that reality itself is a strange loop is that it's a vicious circularity you see reality has nothing to define itself against it has no ultimate standard or arbiter to ground it in anything and so therefore even ideas like existence and non-existence are circular and they don't really exist it's impossible because the itself you're trying to use itself to understand itself and it just can't do that it can't grasp itself it's like Alan Watts talks about how a knife can cut everything but itself or or a hand can grasp everything but it can't grasp itself it can't turn in on itself because it is itself well this is happening at the highest level of what all of reality is and the problem is when we do science or when we do philosophy or when we do any kind of religious cosmological thinking about All what is the nature of God know that none of that can work because you're using it to try to grasp it which isn't it and so there's this vicious circularity which is inherent to all of reality and when you see this circularity all distinctions collapse and breakdown and at that point you go into a sort of free fall and you fall into this Godhead where there are no distinctions at all really it's all one substance even the distinction between existence and non-existence no longer applies because that's also seen to be groundless and viciously circular and that is the ultimate nature of reality what it is is it's like a cat unraveling a yarn that unravels the cat that's that's the essence of reality that's the essence of consciousness work is that you are this cat and as you are doing the work and you think that you're going to unravel the work really the work ends up unraveling you and you realize that all of it has just been this one yarn the whole time this is what non-duality really means and he got a really a clear and full hit of this non duality and as he opened his eyes sitting there on his couch he was his couch …he was completely aware that he was nothing and that all sentient beings all animals all humans and any other creatures or aliens that exist anywhere out there that they are all him and he was sitting there in his room and he was looking around and he saw and he clearly connected for the first time he clearly connected how what's happening right now in this finite room that he was seeing is actually none other than absolute infinity itself so this is the insight that the Buddhists and the Hindus talked about where they talked about how form is formlessness and formlessness is none other than form the two are one . when he opened his eyes that all of that was present right there and it was present here in the now as he was standing there that all of this is not happening to a human being it's sort of like what a human being is is a little bubble within this absolute infinite singularity in the same way that like if you imagine a bubble within the Sun like imagine an Air bubble or a little vacuum bubble within the sun which kind of bubbles up to the surface and and then goes poof that's really what it's like to be a human it's to be this little bubble and that's what you're experiencing right now as you're sort of in this bubble and then this bubble really is not happening to anybody it's happening within nothingness its nature is nothingness and then that's what you ultimately are and that thing there doesn't exist nor not exist it has no properties no features it's just nothingness and what he realized also is that since he is all sentient beings and all sentient beings are one they're identical that he is also literally Buddha and Christ simultaneously and all the other mystics that have ever existed and so he stood there in his room he remembers very vividly and he realized like yeah okay --- I am the Buddha this is what the Buddha this is exactly what the Buddha is was and currently is so it's not like the Buddha was some guy who lived 2,000 years ago or something like that it's like no the Buddha is exactly what's being conscious of what you're experiencing right now not in a metaphorical way literally because the Buddha was nothing Christ was nothing you're nothing every single living creature is nothing your dog is nothing your cat is nothing that is what's conscious of everything and that thing is one and that's what unites us all and really what it all is is it's just one being this infinite singularity it's not just one being it's like an infinite head Hydra and it can be anything that it wants to be and you're just one of the heads of this Hydra and this Hydra is fully alive and conscious and it wants to be and you're just one of the heads of this Hydra and this Hydra is fully alive and conscious and infinitely creative so life is not something that is happening within your body life is happening across the board everywhere every single square centimeter of the universe is alive but of course we don't really see it that way because we're very human oriented and we're also very mammalian oriented and were biology oriented and we don't See the life throughout the the fabric Of space itself but when you go into the Singularity you you see that since everything is united in one that it all of it is alive there aren't parts of it that are and parts of it that aren't that's distinctions that we make in a relative fashion for scientific purposes and for just for human being purposes he also became acutely aware that non-existenc is impossible and that there there's no thing there's nothing to fear about death because death is just death is here right now if you want to think of it that way you think that when you die you go somewhere you disappear to some void or some nothingness no that void is here right now that void is what's conscious of everything right now there is no other place to go you can't escape the all you can't escape infinity because infinity is everywhere there's no way you can escape it anywhere you are it already is anywhere you can be it's already been so existence is literally impossible and that's a pretty cool thing to realize about life change your attitude towards life and towards death and towards people and everything else also the insight that reality as a whole is is just this causal chain of creativity that the causal chain of creativity goes down infinitely forever to the bottom like some scientists will say oh well our brain is is doing all the work all the neurons they're making us creative know every single one of those neurons do you not understand it's infinite it's got an infinite causal chain that goes down forever you are never going to get to the bottom of what makes that that neuron act like that neuron you could break it down to subatomic particles strings and below that and other dimensions and you will see you will never get to the bottom of it it'll keep going and going and going and going and going forever there's an infinite causal chain to everything to every thought that you have to all creative insights to enlightenment itself to your being to your sitting here and breathing and being alive it's an infinite causal chain of creativity that's the essence of this thing it's gargantuan it's beyond anything that that can that could sit within the little confines of science for example and that's it you became aware of everything innocence everything has been understood and that was a very clear point where it felt like okay that's it this is it this is everything there is to understand about life and then this acute sense of life is complete this is what he had wanted to know since he was basically a kid since he started doing philosophy when he was a teenager in college and then for the last five years or so since hes been doing consciousness work in pursuing life this is what he wanted to know he wanted to know what is the substance of all of reality and here he finally got it not just as a little glimpse but as a full-blown understanding where everything was clear where there were really no more questions left and that's it so let him talk about the after-effects so a couple of days past and various after-effects were happening of course he came back to ordinary consciousness after some number of hours the next day he was back into ordinary consciousness but there were lingering after-effects most importantly was that he retained understanding of the truth and he retained it to this day because it's not a experiential thing which is happening right now it's not like experiencing it it's more of sort of like you understand why two plus two equals four you don't necessarily need to run through the proof every time you just once you get it you get it even though you might not be experience it right now , also now whenever he is kind of going through his day even though he is back to ordinary consciousness just when he is interacting with stuff when he is Looking at his hands when he is going to The bathroom when he is cooking when he is writing whatever he is seeing that everything that he is seeing around him is is not physical the substance here is not physical it's not colors it's not sounds it's non-dual it's a non dual substance and that's pretty cool my meditation has gone through the roof his ability just to sit and and then his mind starts to sort of focus on the non-duality of what's in front of him is it's quite remarkable although what's interesting is that he experiences some kind of ups and downs and there's sort of oscillation and even a little bit of depression after he came back because what he has discovered is that having these sorts of peak experiences or even any kind of breakthroughs in your personal development it works like an oscillation like a spring so the way that a spring works that it oscillates up that's when you have your peak or you have your insight or you have some breakthrough in whatever you're doing and doesn't necessarily have to be just enlightenment it could be in your business or in your art you have this breakthrough then as well as a spring would honestly then it has to come back down it doesn't come back down to baseline it comes back down lower right because it oscillates and then it sort of goes through this kind of sneaking motion until it evens out so it's just like a wave like this but then it it comes back to baseline although the new baseline is a little bit higher than the old baseline so what you're doing is you're having these the experiences and then you're gradually raising your baseline but you can never expect that your baseline is going to become your peak that's the mistake that people make and so it's all so natural with this model to understand that when you have your peak you're also going tohave a little bit of a crash could be a epic crash or it could be a little crash you know it just depends on your situation and then it sort of reverberates like that over a couple of days maybe even a couple of weeks and then it smoothens out so that's a good lesson to keep in mind because that's such your expectations for what these things are going to do to you so you're not blindsided caught off guard by them so in a sense his meditation has skyrocketed but also in a sense he still notices just these minor agitations and frustrations and annoyances like sometimes they don't even just want to be sitting like one of the things he'll be talking about here in a second is he became extremely creative after this and So he has so much creativity that his mind is racing with with insights that he needs to write down and so it's hard for him to just sit and just to observe reality and to meditate because he is being so creative and so that creates some kind of annoyance and also just the idea that he has to sit there also there's this kind of like underlying layer of annoyance about it he doesn’t know more so than it was in the past he’s sure that's a phase that he can just kind of push through but uh it has been bothering him a little bit so by no means am is he in some sort of ecstasy or bliss as he is walking around that has not happened he does have a sense of peace and especially he notices a sense of peace resulting from not seeking answers anymore he don't feel like there's any answer that he particularly needs to get through any kind of inquiry and so in fact usually when he does inquiry usually when he sits to meditate he actually does a form of inquiry but now he doesn’t have anything to inquire about so for him now it's more about just meditation which is just being with the present moment it becomes very simple there's like no asking himself questions of “who am I,” “ what am I” “ what is the world” “what is reality, what are sentient beings” it's like no just sit there and notice that everything is already infinite it's more like that so that's guess sort of the way that inquiry might progress if you're doing it right and you're having the actual answers he still notices very acutely my addictions and bad habits because they have not gone away don't expect your bad habits and addictions to be cured by these sort of existential insights he means it could happen but not necessarily and most likely you'll need to work on those separately so he still has plenty of work to do as far as that goes creativity for him has gone through the roof because one of the things that sort of happened to him in this journey of going into this Godhead is that he realized the creativity of everything and he realized just how powerful the force creativity is and he sort of opened a channel it felt it felt like to divine creativity and that now is sort of flowing through him it was before but now he is more aware of it and he is more aware of just how how massive a force this is and so over the last week he had been very creative working on his book got a lot of stuff done had a lot of amazing insights that he'll be sharing with you in the future that he has been taking notes on and conceptualizing and making sense of so the creativity has been quite remarkable and his passion has also been as high as ever in fact after all this happened after these insights he felt like even though his life was complete now and there was nothing particular that he needed to do he was just passionate about sharing these insights with the world and he was just passionate about the creative process , getting more in touch with his his creative process in in ways that he sort of got out of touch with in the past and that has been a great experience although it is challenging to balance creativity with no mind or meditation for him that's been a big challenge for a while now and it still is even now because as he finds his creativity Rises since his work is very conceptual and theoretical he is thinking a lot about that a lot and a lot of interconnections are being made a lot of stuff has to be written down and organized so he is organizing ideas and concepts in his mind but as he is doing that he is sort of in monkey mind mode in a sense and he is not in that kind of still peace meditative zone and then when he is being very creative all day and then he goes to sit down and meditate for an hour that's challenging because that kind of transition is difficult to make us once his mind gets creative is just off on its own being creative and it's hard to put a stop to it and just be silent so he is still struggling with how to reconcile those two.. one of the things that he noticed with zen people and Yogi's and such is that it's a lot easier just to focus on meditation alone like if you're living in a monastery or in a cave and you have no creative pursuits whatsoever you don't do any any kind of art or any kind of business you're not working with concepts you're trying to organize your knowledge to share with other people that's a lot easier because you can just sit there with a blank line all fucking day and if you're an artistic type of person then then good luck with that is all he is saying now he is not saying that the Zen masters and such and Yogi's can't be creative they can be creative but his guess is that they compartmentalize those things well this is hard to do them both simultaneously to get into others way and then the last after effect that he really noticed is that he has realized that he has entered into spiral dynamics stage turquoise it just occurred to him just dawned on you think oh yeah okay this is turquoise he is in turquoise now and what turquoise is it's the recognition of non-duality the interconnectedness of all of life and yeah it's just it's like it's beyond systems thinking so systems thinking is still happening stage yellow is that a-- is at this level of where you're thinking about the world in a sort of analytical fashion or as stage turquoise is it's more at the level of being your being it you're feeling it you're more connected to it on an energetic level it's beyond just breaking things down into analytical systems the way that a academic or a scientist might do and it's it's seeing them the irreducibly mystical nature of all of reality so that's stage turquoise and he thinks stage turquoise is also tapping into the creativity that creative power of reality you know in a more direct sense in a much more conscious sense knowing where that power comes from opening those sort of channels and so yeah he was quite thrilled to enter that stage he hadn't really thought about stages in the past usually he would think of himself as a stage yellow kind of guy because he is always thinking about systems and analyzing stuff for multiple perspectives but here it's kind of like feels like going to the next level now that doesn't mean that he is in stage turquoise fully he still has remnants he thinks of the old stages within him that he needs to work through there's still some orange in there there's still some green stuff to work through he is still very much passionate about stage yellow but then say turquoise is really where it's at that's where you ultimately want to get to and the only way you're going to get there is through direct mystical experiences and having insights about the absolute nature of existence that's how you do it that's why stage turquoise people are so rare is because he thinks as far as you can go just using your logical conceptual mind is stage yellow and then to go beyond yellow you need to have these experiences for yourself so the question arises “am i enlightened,” and the answer is no he doesn’t want to say that he is enlightened he doesn’t feel like he qualifies for for that classification because he thinks that what's missing is that even though he has the insight and the knowledge and the understanding he thinks that there's a further step that needs to happen which is that he is missing the abiding non-dual awareness that he knows is possible so he thinks that the the ultimate step would be to to be able to actually stand here before you and - guess it's almost like to be permanently high to be permanently tripping so that you're actually seeing the non duality you're not just knowing it but you're actually it's like right here it's very powerful you're almost in a sort of ecstatic state he is definitely not there he thinks that for that to happen he would need to do a lot more meditating and just being present with the moment not that he particularly any kind of insights but just to be present he already feels like he is not like the human body he is a little bit detached from it but he thinks like not totally so more work needs to be done there which leads us to the question of what's next well he thinks what's next for him is exploring stage turquoise more exploring creativity figuring out how to reconcile creativity and meditation he thinks what's next is a lot more meditating mm just sitting and doing nothing and just being with the present moment he really needs thousands of hours of that is what he feels like but that's challenging because he is working he got business responsibilities he is writing a book he has a product that he wants to release so there's like a lot of stuff that he wants to accomplish so it's all about choosing priorities and and it's hard for him to justify sitting for ten hours a day just in pure meditation although he is sure that would get very pleasant very quickly if he did that what's also next for him is organizing a lot of insights and knowledge that he has a backlog of for the world and then sharing that that's also what stage turquoise is all about is it's really about connecting with your life purpose and and making your life purpose sort of divine your divinizing your life purpose whereas before it was sort of just like “okay yeah I'm helping the world,” maybe or “ I'm doing some good for my career,” and here it's like no it's like he is a force of God doing God's work with his life purpose it's sort of like that and by the way if you're wondering like oh how does he reconcile a life purpose with enlightenment work there's nothing to reconcile the two are two sides of the same coin your life purpose and your enlightenment will fit together perfectly if you get them right and the one will fuel the other and it doesn't matter if your life purpose is teaching people or making art or making music or running a business or whatever it is it doesn't have to be teaching people your enlightenment will still dovetail with your life purpose what else is next for him is more research and more learning he still feels like there's a lot of stuff that he wants to learn and to research for the purposes of teaching it and also these are more minor relative insights so these are not absolute things that he is researching these are just relative insights there's a lot of stuff within the mystical and spiritual domain and within science and philosophy and history in other places that when a research and kind of cobble together as he is doing his work for the purpose of his life purpose but also just because he is naturally curious about them what's more is more tripping is more tripping he found that al lad is the most effective tool for contemplation even more so than five Meo DMT because five meö is just it's extremely powerful it's all it's overkill really and it's it's too short to contemplate anything serious you're just getting a little taste of the honey you're not able to eat the whole jar he means unless you do it constantly, for him but the AL ad is more gentle and he loves it because he gets to sit there for four hours and just contemplate the hell out of everything that he wants to and it's very very very productive for him so that's his go-to tool these days not to say that he’ll never do five Meo you know but he likes the sort of gentleness of al-lad and he can still go just as deep what else is next for him is more personal development there's still a ton of stuff that he wants to work on in himself that is sub-optimal like he said bad habits addictions annoyances emotional disturbances of all that stuff is still there and you better believe that it will be there for you even after enlightenment all that shit will still be there you're going to have to work on it so don't be thinking that enlightenment somehow makes personal development obsolete or that you if you're pursuing enlightenment then you shouldn't be doing personal development no.. you need to be doing both because they're both going to be necessary you can't avoid doing just regular old fashioned personal development so what are the lessons quickly for you firstly it's that the most important question you really want to be asking if you're an existential thinker like he is.. is what is the substance of reality that's even more important than who are you what are you what is the substance of everything this stuff here what's it all made out of you should be wondering about that every spare minute of your day another lesson for you is that conceptual understanding is very helpful when you're trippin so sometimes we talk about concepts in this work as a bad thing like all concepts concepts are terrible they keep us from the truth yes and also no because people who don't have the right conceptual foundations are not able to make sense of it of the truth and they're not able to make sense of their trips and so for him the more he understands conceptually the better he organizes his own knowledge through note-taking and thinking about it in a sort of ordinary fashion then when he does experience these deep things then he can make sense of them and then also he can talk about them so he thinks one of the most important things you can do if you're having enlightenment experiences mystical experiences in your meditation practice whatever is right about it journal about it talk about to somebody because as you're trying to articulate it to yourself or to somebody else you're also clarifying it in your own mind what it is and that helps it to stick and then that helps to lay the foundation for the next experience you're going to have and the next one in the next one so you're sort of gradually layering this stuff like almost like layers of cement right you need to gradually layer the cement it has hardened then you put another layer on another layer and that way you can develop yourself very high another lesson for you is think through what the grounding for anything is this is related to this issue of the substance of reality so how any substance ground any substance because what you need to ultimately realize that it's all circulars the vicious circle is a strange loop it's a cat unraveling a yarn that unravels the cat there is no substance there can be no grounding that is the essence of reality is that is a thing which can have no ground because it is itself and there's nothing outside of itself to ground it that's the key insight but you've got to grasp it very deeply with your whole being not just with your intellect so spend some time thinking through that on paper like ask yourself the question what grounds the difference between existence and non-existence because if you're like an ordinary person you think that there's existence and there's non-existence but why do you think that does the difference between existence and non-existence actually exists or does it not exist or neither think through that just using your ordinary logic to see that your logic starts to break down and then that will set you up for having the right kind of insight future another lesson for you is make sure that you hone your desire to know the truth this is one of your key weapons in this work is to have a genuine a very genuine authentic desire for the ultimate truth you have to want to know not to improve your life but for it sounds like you want to know because you want to know because you want to know because consciousness wants to know itself and your consciousness and you just want to know don't underestimate how powerful just that desire is purify it let it guide your life let it set your priorities let it tell you what to do let it tell you when to trip let it tell you when to meditate to contemplate that can do a lot for you cut through a lot of bullshit another lesson for you is that creativity and enlightenment fit together perfectly now he just said that meditation creativity can be at odds with each other that's true but creativity and enlightenment can fit together perfectly in the sense that once you have these deep mystical experiences then it really frees you up to be creative in a non detached way and it opens up these channels for you so if you're an artistic type of person if you enjoy being creative if you want to have a big impact on people with your creativity and you want your creativity to be more effortless and not so neurotic and strained and filled with ego and all that then enlightenment is like the perfect thing for you watch what happens with your creativity when you start having these experiences it's going to be amazing it's going to be levels of creativity it's going to be so much creativity you're going to be at a loss of words and you're not going to know how to get it all down on paper so much creativity infinite divine creativity it's remarkable you're going to feel like a vehicle of God doing God's work with your art or with whatever and the final lesson for you is that if you still have any doubts there's nothing more worthwhile than this work there's nothing more worthwhile than the truth it is by far hands down the most powerful and the most significant thing that can happen to your life it'll transform your entire life and it will take you to levels of development that you never imagined possible that you don't see other people around you generally having in society it'll put you sort of into a category of your own and while that might feel a little lonely sometimes or whatever in the end it's totally worth it so if you're sitting there and you're struggling to self inquire to contemplate and you don't know why you're not getting the results well just keep in mind that you're after a very big thing here this is a very big thing very big prize so you're not going to get it cheaply or easily might take you some years of struggle to get there in the meantime just keep telling yourself that it's going to be worth it have that sort of faith and doesn't have to be blind faith but it just has to be a lil you guy mean you can use a little logic here as well he means he is not just standing there bullshitting you this stuff is life transforming and he wishes that he could communicate the full emotional power of this stuff better but it's just not possible because this is something you have to experience for yourself that's it.

Thank you. To me, that is not really to stress on yourself to have great things or ways to do/make/create. It’s in the future. What you really need that is what you do every day to be better. « A day is long and a year is short » That means you even don’t know what you can do in the next 5 years. Maybe you will not have that or you will be extraordinary. You don’t know! What you do today? What do you do today? Don’t tell me you don’t know too! Of course, everyone needs a sense of purpose but is it too pragmatic or too strategic? It is needed but are you sure that you have done the checklist for today? Is it following your bliss or a boring thing? There is tons of way to make your day better. And do it and sometimes you can post that showing how you dealed with abc and xyz in that self-investment process.

At times I feel like I'm a genius. At other times I feel like I'm an idiot. At times I feel ambitious. At other times I feel lazy. At times I feel bliss. At other times I feel depressed and lonely. When I talk to people I feel like I just become a reflection of them. I feel like there is very little of "me" aka the ego. Every interaction I take part in I become a different person. I feel like my whole psyche changes depending on who I'm talking to or what I'm watching. Watching Youtube videos I feel like they are all just me talking. (e.g. watching a Leo video, watching Joe Rogan, Jordan Peterson, stand-up comedians, politicians) I feel these dialogues fill my head, I understand them, I become them. But when it's just me alone I feel like I am nothing. I wouldn't be able to recreate those ideas on my own but when I watch them I feel like I have a full understanding of it. I often feel like there is nothing to say, just bathe in my own existence and the beauty of whatever this is. I do enjoy creativity though, This is something I have enjoyed since I was a child. I often produce absurdism or surrealist works of art because nothing in this world makes sense to me anyway. The best I can do is just let it flow out of me, which normally results in utter absurdity. I guess this is my calling? I've matured a great deal and experience a lot in my life so far despite still being in my 20s yet when I do what comes most naturally to me it's often just making silly little absurd artwork like when I was a child. Anyway sorry for the little ramble. I'm not even really sure what I'm trying to ask here. Maybe someone can try to give a shot at trying to analyze me. Or tell me if this makes any sense. Anyway, just love to you all. Everything is too beautiful

@Galyna yeahh at home, having cool breeze on the rooftop of my house. Feels so better being in a bigger space ?, pure bliss... Now my only concern is to not be lazy giving time to my work, I'm slacking off quite a lot. @Natasha I like the music, it's a bit melancholic, and Transitions into ups and downs kinda unique way.. You can listen this https://youtu.be/ycYewhiaVBk

Yeah that was really unexpected! The thing is that she understood my personality very well and my struggles with inferiority complex, believing I am flawed in some way and when I experience things it's never enough. My insights are not enough, my knowledge is not enough. "Everyone else" knows more, is more enlightened etc. I got LOC confused with states. I've read David R Hawkins and he also has a LOC model based on states, like if you are enlightened everything is just pure bliss no matter what happens. Ananda said that it's totally possible to enlightened and be jealous, angry and reactive so it has nothing to do with states. She judged me based on my sense of self and perceptions of my reality. Based on that, I think she is accurate and I trust her.

Feels pointless writing a post about all this I am going through. I am still writing this nonetheless, which means that I do see some point in it, doesn't it? I do not know what I mean by saying "I". Can give it a name, one description or another but names and descriptions are in a different realm than what I experience myself to be. Almost as if this "I" is an activity rather than an entity. This produced numbness IME. Feels like all these happenings just happen. No effort is made for them to happen. Meanings dismantle. All the ideas are seen as ideas. Limited and unnecessary therefore no action is taken to embrace and make them happen. This state brought a feeling of what they call "non-doership". This sounds nice, right? Doesn't feel nice, though. Actually, it feels worse. And whats the worst about it is that I'm okay with it! Even feel happy about it. I feel like there is nothing to talk about, nothing to think about, nothing to do in life. This made me isolated AF. Friends are slipping away, family is slipping away, all meanings are slipping away. I am becoming lonelier and lonelier day by day. And you know what, I see no point in doing anything about it. It's like I really do not give a shit. On the contrary, I do care all about it. But this caring-not-caring warfare inside is what catches all of the attention therefore little to no attention is left for anything else. This isolated state is not satisfactory. No joy, no bliss. Only this "no-me" which is actually just a new "me". Sensations of frustration and wanting to get out comes up more frequently. I've caught myself wanting to brute-force abandon my mind while on DMT trip. I also feel like physical death wouldn't be something bad. That's one way of getting rid of this "I-thought". Easy way. Although even suicide feels ridiculously pointless. It's like I've reached a point where I no longer have a choice. All that is wanted is getting rid of the "I-thought". It feels like life is not worth living with this illusory assumption of a separate self. I am considering leaving everything behind and going completely quiet, although this idea feels even more vague and lonely. Paradoxical, but at this point I feel like making it further by myself is very unlikely, if possible at all. On the contrary, am considering to start attending vipassana retreats, meditation retreats, psychedelic ceremonies ect. At the same time, putting trust in teachers sounds like a joke. However, as I have stated before, all these ideas are just mere ideas. It's like being stuck in observing without the ability to act on anything. I want this to end. Feel like wasting my life being in this "non-doer" state of shit.

Instead of giving up ... you just return attention to breathing from the stomach, and relax the body. Gravity basically does that for you. You’re just not-tensing really, not resisting gravity. That’s it. When you quit, it’s to avoid feeling. I believe you that you aren’t recognizing that. Doesn’t matter really, just don’t quit & be willing to feel however you feel. Meditation isn’t even an effort, or a doing, really...so there isn’t really a ‘quitting’. It’s just sitting there relaxing and lightly focusing on breathing. Quitting is avoidance. What’s being avoided is feeling. The bliss and relaxation came from you, is you. The lsd quited the mind. It ‘works’, is helpful, but is not needed. You could google how to relax. There are virtually countless ways to go about it. You can make a fist right now and feel the tension of the contraction of the muscles...and then un-fist and feel the muscles relax. Do that with your whole body. Stand up and tense every muscles at the same time as much as possible...then let go and feel the relaxation. Then you would know relaxation via direct experience. It’s simple like that. Don’t think about it. It requires no thinking. No. You quit. Not trying to poke you in the eye...but this kinda must be said, must be realized. Notice the temptation to blame, when truly - you quit. That feeling is emotion to be released. It’s up to you to let the blame meditation isn’t working thinking perspective go. When you do, emotion releases. When that occurs, thought stories arise, opportunities to blame, resent, be mad at someone, regret something, worry about something, etc, etc. Return attention to breathing from the stomach instead of pursuing those thoughts / perspectives. Learn to let them (thought) go. Learn to let emotion out. You can do this. Technically, it is non-doing. The body releases automatically. The natural nature of thought is appearing & disappearing. Technically, you’re struggling with not doing. You answer is typically more doing, and clearly you have tried that and it doesn’t work. Suffering has a way of opening minds to practices of non-doing, relaxation and feeling. You refuse to let thoughts go, because you’re avoiding feeling. If you simple sat with it, you’d experience the emotions, and some outpouring. But that’s it. It’s not like monsters come out of the closet and eat you. If you video taped the whole thing, it’d be so boring you wouldn’t even watch it. But do whatever feels best to you, the path of least resistance. You can approach this solo, and you can talk with anyone you want about it. All in the name of liberation & well being really, all Good. Broken record here I know, but the body so to speak naturally empties if you just sit down long enough. Don’t fear it man, it worth it. It feels great to let it all go, cry some shit out. No big deal. It’s far better to get stung by a bee, than to live in fear of bees. Very tempting to call you a loser here so you can feel the relativity and realize that statement is just nonsense, but you really are a good person, and I love ya and I digress. Yes it does. Let go of the “fixing” mindset, and welcome the letting go mindset. If a marble was stuck in a garden hose, it wouldn’t be “broke” and need “fixing” to get the flow going...just the releasing of the marble would be ample. There is a source, and you want that flow. To “get it”, accept counter intuitive suggestions, like meditating every morning and letting go. No quitting. Just returning to breathing from the stomach. There’s no report card, no getting it right or wrong. For sure, that can only help. In a nutshell, it’s expression. If another person helps that, great. You can utilize the best of both worlds so to speak. You can do this solo too, by writing about how you feel. However that is, and what you write doesn’t actually matter...learning to express it, let it out, is the point. You are the “base” and you are Good. When thoughts arise about yourself that don’t feel good, let them go. Express them if it’s helpful, but don’t believe them. Really try your absolute best to catch yourself doing this - and flip the script. Give yourself some love. If you think “my base is fucked”, reach for a better feeling thought. Even if it feels a tiny bit better...you’re going in that better feeling direction, toward the love & clarity you really are. Momentum of feeling better builds. Eventually is is the default, and there is emptying of emotions along the way. Godspeed. You can do this letting go. Just a misc thought...airbnb’s secluded in the woods, I’ve found to be ideal. Alone in nature is best, imo. I think they have some kind of COVID cleaned guarantee or something or other close to that, idk. There’s still risk of course, and up to you, just thought I’d mention it cause that’s what I’d do. Being around anyone, especially at home / with same people or family can trigger same stuff, same reactions, same patterns. I always preferred pure alone, not uttering a word for days or weeks. Whatever works for you though. I agree. Just want ya feelin good, happy, having fun, thriving. ??

I understand this is the issue, but i've been on this single point for months now and it's not clicking. I try to meditate and then i just give up, keep attention on thinking, or finish a session but i never get any emotional release through sitting and breathing. The closest thing that's worked is breathing with LSD, but i don't know what that was now. The bliss and full relaxation of the head only came from being high as a kite plus trying to relax. I have no idea how to actually relax, and neither does anyone in my immediate family. I'm going to see a psychiatrist in the coming weeks, and i'll likely get either lithium or prozac, i've heard prozac is good for relaxing so i bet all this stuff will work better with the added effect of an antidepressant. I have the belief though. I am in that condition as we speak, and trying to sit down and meditate to let it go has done virtually nothing for me over the past 6 months in providing lasting relief. I really don't think i can work out that belief and feeling just by myself. I've tried and i end up on a roller coaster of improvement, only to end up back where i started or worse off. I internalize and personalize a lot, everything in my life has always come down to who I am, judging aspects as either positive or negative. But i don't know how to find all the beliefs, and then just stop believing them. Saying to myself I am a good person, vs saying i am a loser, doesn't produce that much of a difference in feeling. I think it comes back to the avoidance and suppression of feeling. I know i do this, i have all sorts of behavioral ticks like scratching, leg shaking etc that are all about avoiding feelings, but being aware doesn't get me any closer to fixing it. I've spoken to a psychoanalyst, and she told me a key to success in therapy is forming an emotional relationship, where the person is comfortable expressing and feeling emotions, and success is influenced by how much a person has the capacity to and is willing to feel into their emotions. I really think this is something I need to do and will benefit be more than anything else. My relationship with my parents is emotionless. Both my parents are emotionally immature, and i've never had a relationship with another human being that was emotionally sensitive and completely open. I've got the point before here from people on the forum, i think what i need is therapy, not enlightenment and advanced self help. My base is fucked, and it's like everything else i do is adding stuff on quicksand. Until the base is affirmed nothing will stick. I can't really travel anywhere right now because of Covid, but i'm going to start doing intensive psychotherapy for 3-4 times a week for the foreseeable future. The foreseeable future is just that for me. I'm going to try and get a job with my family, and just spend virtually all time outside of work to address these issues. Who knows how long it will take, but i got nothing else to do in this life time, and whenever i solve it, i'll have the second half of my life to finally be a whole and functioning human being. I've seen/heard the script of therapy and meds working well for lots of people. A balanced mind, with energy and some will power, if i can get that from therapy and meds and live my life then it's a win in my book.

Heaven and hell are normally seen as two different physical places (with unknown locations) where you/your soul goes after you physically die. You go to heaven, if you are "good" --> You do the "right" things that the sacred books tell you to do. You go to hell, if you are "bad" --> You don't follow what's written in the sacred books. The problem is that religious books were written by men mainly with a poethic and figurative language (with allegories and such) and that many people interpret (by cherry picking the passages) sacred books "licterally" and/or in a materialistic way, so that they see heaven and hell as physical places and they decide to believe to this "good" and "bad" foreplay narrated in the sacred books. And that judgments are a mainly human invention. There is no "good" or "bad", but only facts that happen and that our mind define "good" or "bad" through some kind of cultural/personal imprinting. In reality it's all just a story. Heaven and hell as figurative places where you stay there and live in bliss or burn forever don't exist. There is indeed some kind of karma system (eg inherited karma from the family/genetic) existing in our world, but not in a way that lead you to go to a place or to another, but rather that create a heavier pain body in you or a lighter one. So what's heaven? Eckart Tolle describes heaven as the state of peace in which you are where you are really conscious of the present moment. If your mind is not drifting away in the future or in the past or rather by attaching itself to some emotion or some kind of idea/concept etc. you'll experience peace and that peace is heaven. Leo likes to describe heaven as becoming conscious of your Godly nature (that you are God/infinite).

DISCLAIMER: I had no intention initially of writing this trip report, but I just had to because of how interesting it was, and for personal documentation reasons too. This post is admittedly crazy, outlandish, bizarre and just plain weird. And I don't want this to start a non duality war. I also don't want this post to invoke judgement on the 'electrobeam' physical avatar (it will happen anyway by God's design (how else is duality possible ) , but I'm just pointing out my intention is not to troll or invoke such a response). I fully appreciate and embrace anyone who believes I'm deluded, crazy, zen devil, etc. I love you all and embrace all opinions that may come of this. I almost know nearly no one will resonate with what I'm about to write here. Maybe one or 2 yogis out in the jungle somewhere. But this post might strike a chord in 1 or 2 of you. Who knows and lets see. Why I wrote this Trip Report During the trip, I wasn't that surprised or valued this trip with any importance. In a weird way, everything that was happening was just normal. After coming down though and reflecting on it again, I just went "hold on, that was actually insanely crazy" I started to feel the significance of what just happened. I felt absolutely no significance, no surprise, at all during the trip. Absolutely no reason to feel alarmed. I even talked to people around me completely normally, and talked to them genuinely with what I was becoming conscious of as if its a normal talking point with people. But afterwards I went "what in the hell was that???". And I regretted sounding like an unusual guy to my flatmate. I was extremely shocked. This humbled me on the come down. And here I am, recording it. Also I dont claim to be enlightened(far far far from it), but I will use enlightenment terms to help with explanation. Intention for the trip So I awoke to infinite love some time ago, and after that I saw the universe completely differently. I basically realized that all suffering, evilness, etc was actually designed to give me a massive loving awakening. It was all done out of love. Just imagine your mum said "sorry I can only give you 20 bucks for your 21st birthday" and then you chastise her, attack her, then on your birthday she said "just joking! I actually gave you a million dollars!" And you find out later that she gave you that million through working 90 hours a week. Can you see how lowering your expectations by saying she can only give you a little, is actually better than if she said "i will give you a million dollars on your 21st birthday"? By lowering your expectations, when you actually get the gift, its a massive gift. Well thats why god invented world war 2, trump, etc. Because he's lowering your expectations so that when you do realize infinite love, you get extremely excited. That's why there's so much self deception, it all increases your surprise. And people on here asking "why is there torture, rape, etc" is like the child chastising her mum saying "why do you only give me 50 bucks for my 21st? You horrible mum!". And how would you feel once you realised that all those judgements of trump was like you chastising that mother? Once you realised trump was you? How sorry would you feel? Knowing all those judgements you did was pure stupidity and ignorance? So for the san pedro trip, I wanted to repent all my sins (all my judgements and hatred) because I felt so fucken ignorant, sad, arrogant and stupid for judging God, myself. And also my intention for this san pedro trip was to simply ask God for how to embody and live a life fully immersed in infinite love. BUT I'm not your typical seeker, I'm extremely/radically open minded, and I'm an extremely curious seeker that loves to 'understand'. I love omnipresence. Absolutely love it. A scientist's/INTPs dream is 100% omnipresence. Its philosophical nirvana. That's what us scientists get wet dreams over. We aren't like other seekers that just want to feel happy, or get over suffering, or just care about feeling good all day. We want to 'KNOW', 'UNDERSTAND' we aren't just satisfied with feeling good, we want to consciously know what's going on here. We want to go meta, again and again and again and again for absolutely no reason at all except because we are curious. And so, I had my intentions for the san pedro trip, but honestly, God decided to reveal some juicy secrets instead, so I just went for that. Drinking San Pedro I drank 30cm of san pedro juice I made up (getting pretty good at this brewing shit now, also my body must be getting use to san pedro because it didnt vomit this time, woohoo!) Trip Report - All the normal stuff that most teachers on here would agree with I think So I came up extremely slowly. Again just like the other san pedro trip report I did a while ago, I did not realise how high I was getting. I was getting waaay higher than I noticed. For me I thought what was happening was just a slight buzz. Nothing serious. Infact I was convinced I did the brew wrong, and I microdosed on this stuff (until later ). So I started questioning, how do I completely eliminate all hatred and judgement so that I can be infinite love all the time. Because I'm 2000% aware that I'm jumping from 1 to 2 and back to 1 again, and I'm doing that due to hatred and judgement. Once judgement and hatred is gone, and I embrace everything, that's it! Game over boiiis! I won! But then of course, being the highly meta, and scientific/INTP mind that I am, I jumped to questioning "wait, why am I even trying to eliminate judgment and hatred all together?". Like a curious question I've had for a while is, why did I, God, jump to duality in the first place. And then I became aware of the play. How we are all actors just pretending. The level of pretending that I became conscious of was insane. We pretend so much that its incredible. Matt Khan is pretending to be a spiritual teacher, that's the level. He's so conscious yet he's still pretending. And of course he isn't actually there and there are no 'others' but what I'm saying is God is capable of pretending to such an extent, that you could be as deeply enlightened as Ramana or Matt Khan and you'd still be pretending. Those teachers aint free of pretending, trust me. They get sucked into the thought story of being a teacher, and don't even realise they are getting sucked into that thought story. You can be deeply enlightened and yet still dogmatic and still believe in stuff and confuse truth for falsehood. This is how insanely large self deception is. Its unbelievable. I became aware of all of my lies (and this was necessary for repenting my sins of judgement and hatred). I had to let go of all lives to fully surrender to god. Then I became conscious for the first time of True omnipresence. I felt exactly, ex-act-fucken-leeee why everything was the way it is (and there is a ridiculously mind twisted answer below in the "off the deep end" section) but for now lets just say that I became aware that God knows everything about me, and before reincarnating as me, he knew exactly what was going to happen to me. Every single bit. He knows why I suck at meditation, COVID-19, my reincarnations of past lives, every-fucken-thing. Because the Godhead is a land where you know fucken everything. Its insane. And so when you think you're struggling with meditation and it sucks, and how everyone is better than you, or some other hardship, God KNEW all of that precisely! (to the nearest millimetre, nanosecond, micro moment, including the devilry) before deciding to reincarnate as you. Like in ego consciousness, it really feels like you're here for the first time, and God's doing something new and your the first. That's true. BUT! At the exact same time, God also knew everything that was about to happen. Its sort of like, imagine genes are the Godhead and the phenotypes are your life. Yes the phenotype is happening for the first time, But you knew everything that was gonna happen from the genes, just the knowledge from the genes is different to the experience of the actual phenotype though. So that's sort of what omnipresence is like, you dont experience everything but you fucken KNOW! The image I had of omnipresence was heaps of clouds out in the sky, and a dragon flying through it just looking down. Don't know why but there ya go. I decided to go for a walk because I was convinced I took a microdose and whats the worst that could happen (should have learnt my lesson from the last san pedro trip I did, but I'm God's son, so not learning my lesson is in my genes ) And again, just like the last san pedro trip, I didn't wake up, here I am 100% conscious as God. Just happened without realising it. No ego death, just here it is. And see at this point this is where doing trips to better or improve your life or spirituality goals starts to break down, because once you're fully conscious that everything is God's plan, you realise all your deficiencies are God's plan too. Even what I'm writing now, God knew all of this before reincarnating as me. And so improving spirituality from that state of consciousness doesn't make sense, because its already perfect. Your failure is perfect. At that point its just like, everything is already done. There's nothing to do, or improve on. And you realise, you entering this trip with an intention is itself a persona. Like you've got an intention because you're an actor pretending you're going through a spiritual journey that isn't actually there. But once you take the acting clothes off, there goes your intention. There goes everything. The intention's meaning requires acting as a basis for it to make sense. And so at this point its like, ok well, I'm at the beginning, where I'm trying to arrive at. Now there's no need for an intention...... now what? (meanwhile nearly got hit by a car because I stopped in the middle of the road just to recognise what's going on... oh the irony of being highly micro and macro at the same time) But then consciousness changed its tune. No, I'm gonna pretend again. And when I pretend, we need to change. I need more love. This story has gone through too much suffering, and not enough love, and the story's course needs to balance back to love again. And then I remembered total 100% omnipresence and perfectness. But then I went I know! But I need more love! That's gotta happen! Then God reminded me of 'the beginning'. Where I was before this entire, multi incarnation, multi universe world began. And reminded me that, you've known infinite love all your life. For eternity. This dualistic world you're in now, its new. Its never happened before. And that's amazing. Instead of rushing to where you were when you began, enjoy what this world has to offer. Trip Report: Off the Deep End: This is where I'd imagine the teachers on here reading this like wtf?? Insanity started here (if it didnt already hahahaha) Like stop rushing, and appreciate duality and form. Duality and form is a gift. Its not horrible. Its a gift. And I resonated with that godly message to a certain level, because this world is beautiful, and I am rushing too much to the enlightenment finish line, without enjoying the process. But honestly, from God consciousness, from a non dualistic standpoint, I rejected it. For the first time I witnessed God rejecting his own advice. Saying no to it. I said (extremely sincerely and genuinely and deeply) (as God) I know but, its not fun anymore. What's the point if its not fun? Its getting boring. Its getting too suffering intensive. I want a change to this world. Then an extremely subtle "snap!!!" happened in my brain. So subtle that the devil tried to cover it up. But it felt like I had just communicated my sincere plea for help, for love, to an extremely alien form of my higher self/God. Ridiculously alien. Expressing a need for change to the story I'm pretending to be in. And this is where things start getting trippy. Mind you, during the trip I thought all of this was completely normal. Only after the comedown when I remembered all this did I go, what is the actual fuck was all that about? So God said to himself in a monologue (as I AM God) "you really reject this dualistic life? You're seriously fed up with it? Its seriously not quenching your thirst?" And I thought about that, and honestly the answer was "yes". If I'm extremely honest with myself. I don't give a fuck about being a spiritual teacher, helping others, engaging with anyone in this world, all I want to do is know thyself. I'm super curious, and just want to know what the truly fuck is truly going on. I dont want bliss, or even love suprisingly, I just want to KNOW. To be as One as possible. Fuck the world. (this is in god consciousness, depression and human disorders are so long gone by this point I can't explain. So this is God saying it, not depressed electrobeam). Then God said "if you truly want to know all this stuff, then there's only 1 way". "what is that?" Then I got shown shit that I remembered. It didnt suprise me at all(until I came down). I remember this very very well. I knew this before the big journey. God showed me what true awakening is and said "all of your questions wont be answered, and what you truly want wont be discovered, until you truly awaken. There's absolutely no way to know the answers to your questions without 100% awakening" And what's the cost of 100% awakening? Completely and utterly forgetting everything that happened. Like completely forgetting when you were born, where you were born, your reincarnation's births, dmt machine elf incarnation births, your parents, the entire massive journey. Full on Universal Mind dementia. You'll know exactly what you want to know, but you'll need to completely forget your life to truly get the answer. Complete dissociation and never ever remembering it again, you wont even know this life happened. You (god mind you hahahaha, like the highest of the highest) wont even have a slight clue whether this journey happened or not. (like thats insane). And I went "hmmm that's right, I totally forgot about that" (now that seems insane but yes that happened hahahah; because im a good pretender. lets be real). So there I was walking around the park, contemplating (as God) whether I should completely and utterly wipe out this entire universe and multiverses to merge with True infinite love. Completely forget. And I walked back inside to take a sit on my sofa, because, you know, this is a pretty big decision, I need to think this through. and my flatmate asked if I was feeling ok, and I said "yeah I think I screwed up the brew because I don't feel anything". And I said that genuinely, I literally didn't feel like this san pedro did anything except for a slight buzz. But then I remembered I'm contemplating whether I'm gonna wipe out the entire universe. So I said "actually, I'm contemplating wiping out the entire universe, so maybe it did have an effect". But then from this level of consciousness, psychedelics are completely and utterly imaginary and everything is happening because of God, got absolutely nothing to do with psychedelics. So I'm like, wtf this is weird, I dont usually act like this off psychedelics, but at the same time psychedelics are completely imaginary, wtf... I'll come to that another day if I dont choose to wipe it out. The Absolute/Final/Total: Not Infinite Love, but infinity itself!!!! Mindfuck, radical open mindedness alert woo woo. I don't mean to offend anyone, but through the process of contemplating True awakening. I became conscious that all of my awakenings (no self, infinite love, everything/nothing, intelligence) were all just 1 dimensional, or all just apart of the matrix! Like I became conscious that the next big journey CAN and possibly WILL journey towards God completely differently to all of my awakening experiences. Like there are infinite different types of awakenings. And all of my awakenings were just 1 fucken type. Like I mean, non duality, and wave in the ocean, its all just 1 type of being. Non duality is just 1 type of being out of an infinite number of beings(at the same level of consciousness. Of course there's lots of types of beings, but I'm saying there's an infinite number of beings with the same level of consciousness as non duality), used to journey towards God. non duality is just a tiny sand spec in the beach. I've experienced infinite love, non duality many many many times before. I know those states very very well. I'm not confusing non duality for something else. I mean it when I say non duality is just 1 type of being, and there are completely different "big journeys" that probably happened in the past that uses completely different types of being equivalent to non duality but completely different. And of course, I had to ask the question. What's infinite love? Is it final? Is it absolute? And God made it clear, to truly know, I need to merge into infinite love and completely forget everything about this big journey. Even forget that non duality is a fucken thing! Because when I truly forget, even non duality wont exist. True awakening is beyond non duality, and the next being might be equivalent to non duality in terms of states of consciousness, but it will be completely different. And this sort of realisation of forgetting, made me realise, that Love also, is just 1 type of being. Its just 1 type of the highest state of consciousness. There are infinite states of Being equivalent to Love, but different! In other words, each big journey uses an equivalent state of consciousness, but one that is completely different to Love. But for you to realise those different states, you need to completely wipe out this big journey and completely forget and dissociate from it. What is God really? But see this is the thing, what is god really? God is pure unlimited-ness. Its not divisions, or energy or even fucken Love. Its pure, utter pure, unlimitedness. Like Ramana Maharshi is 0% aware of how blank the canvas really fucken is. Its extremely blank. The canvas isn't fundamentally made of love, no, no, no. You haven't reached the highest awakening if you're not aware of that. That canvas is made of pure unlimitedness. You can dream up any fucken thing, so much that its terrifying. That's what God is. Its not Infinite Love, that's not final. I know that sounds off, but I know 10000%, Infinite Love is not final. Final/Absolute is pure unlimitedness. Pure dream up whatever the fuck you want. Yes God ultimately wants to merge with itself, to unite with itself, and it does a dance between duality and non duality, but keep in mind, that's not what God ultimately is, beyond that is pure unlimitedness. That's what God actually is behind the scenes. And at this point of the trip, God started sweating a little. Because he just remembered what he actually is, and its terrifying. Electrobeam was fine. He was high, happy, low heart beat. But God was having a bit of an existential crisis. And God wasn't surprised, or shocked, God was like "oh thats right". And a bit of terror. At the fact that he's pure unlimitedness. Because the scary part is not that God is pure unlimitedness. God can do everything. Can dream up anything, but the terrorising part, is the fact that the one thing he can't do, is kill himself. Eradicate himself. Stop himself. You have no choice but to dream everything that you're capable of dreaming because you can't kill yourself. Holy fuck if that doesn't scare you, then I didn't imagine you and duality was real all along. Are you aware that your ability to create horror is unlimited? Youre a fucking supernova on repeat! And your job as God is to control yourself! Woah and I thought I had it tough doing my day job. What is Omnipresence really? Yeah we like to think that omnipresence is knowing stuff. unravelling stuff that's hidden. Omnipresence at the lower levels (in this dimension) is western science. Discovering microbes and stuff. The next level higher is awakenings, like everything and nothing. knowing what God actually is. The next level is revealing devilry and self deception, the next level is total omnipresence, knowing everything about why everything is the way it is... but that's not the highest... the highest level of omnipresence is, accepting, or being fully conscious that you created everything. Literally everything. I used the gene phenotype above in the normal section of my post about what 100% omnipresence feels like. The highest level of omnipresence is realising you made that entire thing up on the spot. You're so unlimited, your canvas is so empty, that everything you could be 100% omnipresent of, is there, not because God planned it, but because God created it on the fucken spot. god doesn't need to bend to any rules to make things appear. He doesn't have to plan. God doesn't have to plan the laws of physics. God is so unlimited, and his canvas is so empty, that he just makes it up on the spot. Your entire life, infinite love, waking up process, etc. Wasn't planned. God made it NOW, by saying "this is what I want NOW". Nothing else needed. Just now. Just this is it now. He doesn't even need intelligence, its beyond intelligence. Its pure unlimitedness. Everything that is to be omnipresent of, is literally just accepting that what you create is what is. In its purest form. And at this stage of the trip, I started questioning "wait, did I just create duality because I was worried about how unlimited I was and I needed to rein myself in?" I felt like God was a wild gorilla, and duality was the cage. Then further I questioned "did I just create infinite love just to rein myself in"? Because its 10000% clear to me that infinite love isnt final. Then I came down from the trip. And reflected on what happened and went wait, what the fuck? I failed to get takeaways for that one, I need to do more trips.

Saturday July 25th, 23:04 I think I'm past the worst of this dark night of the soul, although I can't say that with full confidence yet. It's been extremely rough. There have been some times in the last two months where it's just been terror. I really don't want to talk about it too much right now, but just some really dark feelings and thoughts. Although I can't say this with full confidence either yet, my way out of this seems to be that it's important that I start working towards a life purpose. Hence I have bought the life purpose course in a sort of moment of panic. When I bought the life purpose course I was repeating to myself "I MUST, I MUST", but very quickly I found that this attitude of trying to force myself to do something like this wasn't going to work. Since then, I don't have the same kind of obsessive attitude about it, but in its place has come an attitude where I'm just like... what gives... I can do it anyway because the alternative of not trying anything and not doing anything isn't going to serve me any better. I have been having that attitude with a lot of things lately. With many things, I am not sure if it's going to work or if it's going to help me, but do I rather just stay in bed depressed? Today I had a moment of clarity in which I realised or felt that I had the power within me to actually create a lasting change within myself and really create a good life for myself and consistently spend a lot energy developing structures, routines, disciplines and so forth, whereas before I never felt like I could because 'I don't work that way' or 'everything goes in cycles so it's only inevitable for me to quit it' or whatever clever reasoning I had. I started to notice that whenever I felt like I couldn't continue with something but then still did it, thinking it was the last time I would still have the energy for it, that then the next day I found I could do it again, and then the next day I could do it again, making me now think that this whole notion of me 'having to eventually quit or take a break from everything I try to do structurally' was perhaps maybe just all in my head, a strong self-fulfilling prophecy. There's still things I tend to be reluctant towards to accept or at least to let go of. Why do I have to suffer? Why is there suffering in this universe? Is there really more peace and bliss than there is suffering in existence? Bla Bla Bla... Useless questions. Getting me nowhere. In a way I'm sort of lucky to be such a deep spiritual non-dualistic thinker because it just makes me feel like the notion of suicide doesn't make any improvement in the best case scenario, and will give you only more trouble in the worst case scenario. I've had suicidal thoughts, but thoughts of what would happen if I did commit suicide made me too afraid to seriously consider doing something like that, although I have fantasized... I really don't like being here on this earth in this position. I don't like what I'm feeling and thinking, and I don't like what I'm seeing around me on this earth. But it's useless to complain, be negative and be miserable. The only thing I can do, the only thing I am really forced to do, is to start focussing on what my possibilities are, on what can be done and what life can be created for myself, alternated with just being very present in the moment and being in the here in now. A little bit of hope, a little bit of presence. That's all I can rely on right now. That's all I'm really forced to be concerned with. I can have hope for the future, but I got to realize that the steps taken towards a more fulfilling future are being taken right now, and that really the only power I have to create a situation in which both my inner and outer reality are more... prosperous are being dependent upon the steps I am taking right now. But at least I'm starting to feel like there is some power within me to create a life that is really fulfulling, that there is some possibility that can create a life for myself that can be really peaceful and joyful and not be forced to 'suffer my karma' as some kind of victim as I previously believed. I dreaded that idea and it gave me a feeling of deep despair.

Another enlightenment exercise: Noting aloud Kenneth Folk quote: http://awakenetwork.org/forum/kfd-archive-wetpaint/12498-tips-for-stream-entry “ Forget about the tips and tricks. Forget about the centerpoint. Forget about the 3 characteristics. Forget about whether you think you are concentrated or not. Forget about what you think you know about meditation. Every time you discover the "problem" with your meditation, note your reaction to that thought. Note the thought itself. Note once per second, aloud, for the duration of your sitting. Note catastrophizing, dramatizing, histrionics, self-pity, evaluation thoughts, impatience, despair, self-loathing, joy, triumph, scenario spinning, longing, desire for deliverance, irritation, doubt, bliss, absorption, distraction, fear, anger, rage, disgust, euphoria, hope, contentment, anticipation, softness, hardness, coolness, warmth, pulsing, burning, itching, throbbing, stinging, tingling, hearing, seeing, tasting, smelling, pleasant, unpleasant, neutral, petulance, futility, dullness, fatigue; what have I left out? Of course you would like some kind of a shortcut or a tip. There is no such thing. There is only the mastery of this simple technique. By the time you master this technique, you will be an arahat. If you distract yourself from this technique by trying to tweak the recipe, the warrantee is void. “

I never knew about happiness I didn’t think dreams came true I couldn’t really believe in love Until I finally met you If I could have all the time in the world I know what I would do, yes I’d spend the time In pleasure sublime just by being with you Of everything I know and love and treasure It’s you my love, who gives me perfect pleasure I love your way with me, your touch, your kiss, your smile To be with you is happiness and bliss

Leo's already tried this or thought about this (based on his video). And so the following wont help him. But for others, I want to share an experience about my severe stomach pains and how I cope with it. So since I was a kid, I've had extremely bad irritable bowel syndrome. And it affected my energy levels. It affected concentration for meditation, sex, studying ability, a whole lot. And feeling sick all the time sucks. Like literally since I was a kid, after every fucken meal, I would feel sick to the stomach. I, like Leo, tried all traditional methods. Doctors did scans of my chest, endoscopy, gave me heaps of anti biotics, blood tests, vitamin B12 injections etc to no avail. They ended up telling me it was from 'anxiety' and sent me to a psychiatrist, which ended up fucking me up more. Doctors don't really value irritable bowel syndrome, because its not inflammatory. But for all I know I've got crohn's disease and their diagnostic methods are just so cheap that they will only pick it up once it gets severely worse. I've also tried a few non traditional methods to no avail. (funny that the oldest methods are called 'non traditional') So a month or 2 ago, I had a skype session with a spiritual teacher (who is actually active on this forum). And I told him, I've got severe stomach pains and it affects my ability to do pickup and meditate. What I've noticed is that certain feelings affect behaviour. For example, if you feel blissful from a psychedelic, your behaviour changes and you start skipping, taking more risks, etc. If you are sick, its like the opposite, your behaviour starts to become reclusive and fearful and lack of consciousness. I was about to ask him if he could explain the metaphysical/non dual mechanics of what's going on, but before I could he stopped me right there: "welllllllll... I would be careful about your interpretation of what's going on, because if you want to do pickup and you feel sick from having a hangover, you can still have the best time of your life and be the most blissful you've ever been. There is nothing inherently absolute about the feeling of sickness which says you must act a certain way." Then I told him "but like, if you feel sick, your behaviour does change, like when you take mescaline for example, you start talking to the neighbours, or when you take alcohol you start doing other stuff" Then he said "yeah but that's all just because you're interpreting those experiences to mean something, and your behaving in according to those meanings, not to the experiences themselves" And then I said "so sickness and psychedelics are just a placebo effect?" Then he said "everything is a placebo effect" So this conversation opened me up to the possibility that everything you feel is an interpretation and a placebo effect. And actually I believed it, because I felt extremely sick taking the cactus, but when the cactus kicked in, even though I felt extremely sick, I felt amazing. And I was picking up chicks outside just because the mescaline was so strong. So that was evidence that this teacher was onto something. So now, whenever I feel sick, or tired, I question whether the feeling is associated with the semantic meaning of "tired" or whether I'm making that up, and then I try to invoke Love and Bliss to dissolve the sensation of tiredness and sickness. You would be suprised, in the same way you can dissolve negative emotions through emotional mastery exercises, you can dissolve the feeling of sickess and tiredness through invoking love and bliss onto the feeling and by questioning whether the feeling is associated with the meaning that is causing the behaviour (inspecting feeling from thought, and separating them).

@Space that...is fuckin class (<In northern Ireland thats a saying that's very common, it's like saying thats awesome). Man, the vibrations are brilliant...it makes you feel like your gonna vomit tho to haha haha? But the bliss is *sooooooooo* heavy, weighing down on me, my face, my arms...I can't move, or don't want to move. Bliss is the reality in that place. ? Pure. Amazing Man, I am so humbled by this whole experience, it's fucken awesome. I just can't wait to get more 5meo and progress towards enlightenment wayyyyyyyy faster ♥️

Haha ... Actually literally nothing, fuck. Yoooo I need to order myself more 5meo haha. Jesus. I had a really challenging DMT trip 2 days ago, had sort of divine heavenly music playing in my ears and I smoked a big bit of DMT and WOOSH everything magnified and turned into ULTRA HD blue digital pixils/tiles and massive chunks of reality where just getting ripped out with this amazing spectacle to behold. I remember shouting after it was over "wow"..."WOW......"*.W.O.W.**** really loud. Unfortunately the majority of my trip I was locked in a room with my *being* being ripped and destroyed and obliterated for 10 minutes haha. I knew it would purify me lots. After, I thought "fuck it" and smoked up 15mg of 5meo hcl (the batch that was good) unfortunately that was all I had left so I'm gonna have to order more. At that point I was translated into realms of bliss where overwhelleming euphoria permeates perpetually through your entire body and reality. Heaven. Lol. I can't WAIT to get moreeeee ?

yeah, angel always leave me with tears of love and bliss, soul travel really interesting, I heard of it before however never had experience with it are you aware of the travel ? do you have any memory of the experience or just see the outcome from it? I see you are reading An Introduction to Chaos Magic Chaos Magic one the best kind of magic for us we human are better in Chaos Magic than other spirit-entity best of luck

Some people have found great value in working with 5-MeO-DMT at lower dosages. Other people say 5 Meo dmt low dose is complete waste of time. Of course having a breakthrough experience on 5 meo dmt is much more valuable than low dose. But what about people who are not ready yet for a full dose and still want to get some value from this divine medicine. I want to share my results and want to know what values you get from low dose 5 meo dmt trips. Do you use it for therapeutic work? Do you do yoga exercises? Breath work? What do you do in the come up phase which is mostly very unpleasant? Here are my personal results from these trips,: Setting: I plugged low dose (3 mg - 10 mg) 5 Meo dmt hcl 15 times (with a different boofing technique postet here) and just sit in silence in my room with eyes opened or closed. during the trip: there is almost no fear, even when heart beat is racing and heavy breathing occur which last for 1-3 minutes no visuals at all negative thoughts in come up phase like "why are you doing this? maybe this time I will experience something really shocking, I should not do this again in the near future, please let the trip end in some Minutes) a little nausea sometimes sometimes I feel a little dizzy and cannot locate myself which is weird and unconfontable after comeup I can meditate well, there are less thoughts very rare: (just one time 4 mg low dose) I feel bliss and tears from my eyes flow. I wish I could experience this every time low dose.. after the trip: Biggest value: very strong music enhancement even days after. it feels like my head is slightly burning when I hear music. my dreams sometimes are a little psychedelic

I seriously cannot believe that nobody would actually even try or attempt this considering how you guys consider yourself psychonauts. Let me explain why that small amount of DMT is necessary, it is like a jumpstart for the piezoelectric motor of the pineal gland. That jumpstart lasts for only 10 minutes so if you cannot get that motor running within 10 minutes, then wait a few minutes and try again. Taking a blastoff dose can be compared to overrevving a motor, the brain has built in functions which reduce the RPMs. Activating the pineal gland is COMPLETELY different. The goal is to start the piezoelectric motor at an RPM that can sustain itself indefinitely. When you manage to achieve that, this is when you will feel INFINITE bliss and happiness. I suggest you stay in this meditative state for as long as you can. Me being the idiot that I am, the first time I stayed in it for 30 minutes and still felt infinite bliss for two hours after leaving the meditative state. The second time I attempted it, it had the same success rate, so me being the idiot I am, stayed in that meditative state for only about 45 minutes. Thinking it was so easy, the third time I tried it, instead my consciousness arrived at something written in Sanskrit, then I felt something push me down. I opened my eyes and my entire room was in quantum darkness. I could move but knew I couldn't occupy any space. Then something grabbed me and I was taken into some pocket dimension with two beings that looked very pissed off. Then I was taken into a pocket of dimensions where I was shown the only thing truly real was consciousness. I was FULLY conscious so this was completely different from a trip. I'm not sure if it's because I shared the method before attempting a third time but I haven't been able to activate it ever since. So don't take it for granted.

Meditation is supposed to make you feel. That's it. If it is terrible stuff that is surfacing up, it will make you feel that. If it's time for bliss and love, it will make you feel that. Go with it. Good luck

@Dylan Page hey man, just know this...that existential pain (greatest suffering in the world when I had it) makes for INCREDIBLE fuel for awakening... You should do what I did, dedicate yourself to the discovery/path. Do it legit. Even on this website, actual awakening is very very rare. Become one of the few to actually become immortal God♥️ do not believe you are God. Do not disbelieve you are God either. Practices practices practices. Kriya yoga, self enquiry, concentration, contemplation, investigation. You've clearly got something up with your mind...you could be psychotic. Truth is, I don't know why you have existential anxiety. But one thing I know...healing is available if your willing to do the practices. Most people here don't focus on the practices and don't take it seriously... And the only thing I have to say is, if your condition is making your life Impossible to live happily, then the only logical choice is to dedicate yourself to the path of healing. The actual version. Sacrafice your entire life and you will save your life ??? Matthew 16:25 (NLT, Bible) "If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it." Nobody will understand when you try to explain this to them by the way. They wont. Get yourself some psychedelics my friend, and use them with care and power. They are the real workers of magic. ♥️ Anxiety was massive for me, I know very much what it's like. Also, doctors won't help you. Practices (and psycs) will help u. Test your psycs before consumption. You do not know what awaits you post awakening. I'm not awake yet, but I know what is awaiting my intuitively. I feel it's bliss stalking me. Heaven. Nirvana. BLISS ????? everlasting life. Unending love. Entering the divine dimensions

Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing? Leo Gura Jul 19, 2020 _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ However in the video Leo says: " Everything is Nothing" and " there is no distinction between something and nothing " But the title does not say this. The title says that nothing exist only something exists. So where is the evidence that nothing exists other than "nothing" being an abstract dualistic concept but not a real thing? The title of the video is not " There is no Distinction Between Something and Nothing " Similarly Leo has said there is only Love and that hate doesn't exist and he justifies that because assuming nonduality is true then if we add hate to Love it's two things not one. ____________________________________________ So we return to the original title Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing? Prove that that is not true. That "nothing" doesn't exist. It's a mental construct. What about the idea Nothing is all there is , everything is an illusion? It doesn't matter, an illusion is not nothing. What about the statement alone Nothing is all there is ? That doesn't work because we experience different things. We only experience things, thoughts etc You go into a pitch black dark room insulated from sound yet you can sense your feet standing there, or your own breathing , thoughts memory etc. Just being alive you are experiencing and that is not nothing. Ok what about statements like Infinity is Zero Up is Down Hate is Love Everything is Nothing I am you You are Me If you take two words like this that are considers opposites and you put the word "is" or "am" in between. The are interesting because they doesn't make sense. They seem clever , paradoxical and your brain tries to make sense of them but it keeps looping an it can't In the video the idea is raise why does the universe have various things in it ? Wouldn't it be simpler and more elegant to have nothing? Hypothetically yes but that would be extremely boring. So we return to the original title Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing? Why wouldn't only something exist? Where is the proof that nothing exists? See, the intuition gets it right the first time. There is only something Then the mind comes in, intellectualizes and imagines that nothing also exists That's the minds illusion, nothingness. It's elegant in it's simplicity. However reality is not elegant in that way. Sometimes we find peace in simplicity. But that is because our minds can be overwhelmed if attempting to be aware of a multitude of things at once. To focus on on one sometimes is a needed relief from the whole universe Meditation is an artificial thing, But it is useful to use to step out of distracting, repetitive chatter We need to get away from "it all" sometimes ______________________________________________________________________ https://www.huffpost.com/entry/emptiness-most-misunderstood-word-in-buddhism_b_2769189 Emptiness: The Most Misunderstood Word in Buddhism “Emptiness” is a central teaching of all Buddhism, but its true meaning is often misunderstood. If we are ever to embrace Buddhism properly into the West, we need to be clear about emptiness, since a wrong understanding of its meaning can be confusing, even harmful. The third century Indian Buddhist master Nagarjuna taught, “Emptiness wrongly grasped is like picking up a poisonous snake by the wrong end.” In other words, we will be bitten! Emptiness is not complete nothingness; it doesn’t mean that nothing exists at all. This would be a nihilistic view contrary to common sense. What it does mean is that things do not exist the way our grasping self supposes they do. In his book on the Heart Sutra the Dalai Lama calls emptiness “the true nature of things and events,” but in the same passage he warns us “to avoid the misapprehension that emptiness is an absolute reality or an independent truth.” In other words, emptiness is not some kind of heaven or separate realm apart from this world and its woes. The Heart Sutra says, “all phenomena in their own-being are empty.” It doesn’t say “all phenomena are empty.” This distinction is vital. “Own-being” means separate independent existence. The passage means that nothing we see or hear (or are) stands alone; everything is a tentative expression of one seamless, ever-changing landscape. So though no individual person or thing has any permanent, fixed identity, everything taken together is what Thich Nhat Hanh calls “interbeing.” This term embraces the positive aspect of emptiness as it is lived and acted by a person of wisdom — with its sense of connection, compassion and love. Think of the Dalai Lama himself and the kind of person he is — generous, humble, smiling and laughing — and we can see that a mere intellectual reading of emptiness fails to get at its practical joyous quality in spiritual life. So emptiness has two aspects, one negative and the other quite positive. Ari Goldfield, a Buddhist teacher at Wisdom Sun and translator of Stars of Wisdom , summarizes these two aspects as follows: The first meaning of emptiness is called “emptiness of essence,” which means that phenomena [that we experience] have no inherent nature by themselves.” The second is called “emptiness in the context of Buddha Nature,” which sees emptiness as endowed with qualities of awakened mind like wisdom, bliss, compassion, clarity, and courage. Ultimate reality is the union of both emptinesses. Some Buddhist students think that a meditative state without thought or activity is the realization of emptiness. While such a state is well described in Buddhist meditation texts, it is treated like all mental states — temporary and not ultimately conducive to liberation. ___________________________________________________________ Reality is impermanent. Things come and go. When they go do they go into "nothingness? " No they disappear. They don't go into a place called "nothingness" Nothingness is the mental construct. That is the idealistic illusion things don't have "no" or "non" in front of them. Those are abstractions There is. There is no such thing as nonduality. Absence of duality is not a thing And because it's not at thing that doesn't mean duality is real. that is another construct There only are things And if you says there are only illusions of things illusions are not nothing They are something Welcome to somethingness