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“Spiritual advancement is not measured by one’s outward powers, but only by the depth of his bliss in meditation.” Spiritual advancement for pursuit of superpowers is not the way to go. That in of itself becomes an egoic desire. It would actually hinder you than help you. To truly understand you might need to inquire more in what is it thats truly causing you to not be in a state of constant bliss. Or psychedelics. Thats the only reason why I understood the point of meditation.

@winterknight Look, your idea that there is no experience doesn't even make sense. ( I am not talking about the brain, the discussion is already over, I know you don't believe in the brain, don't bring that up again) It's not like I am a complete materialist, for a long time I have read and followed and loved ( and still do) Buddha, Osho, Leo Gura, and their teachings make sense, that is why they have huge followers not you. None of them have ever said that 'That is not experience'. Even Leo Gura the founder of this site that you are using to increase your followers, believes that there is nothing but direct experience. https://www.actualized.org/forum/topic/36099-direct-experience-relativity/#comment-446252 "There is nothing but direct experience, so you have no other other but to trust it. Name one thing which isn't in your direct experience? You cannot." - Leo And here you are disagreeing again and again without any reason. When you say, that is not experience, it's like saying a triangle is round, a square has 5 sides,the color red is blue. This only means that you have lost a follower, who is actually a follower and lover of people like Osho, Sadhguru, Leo , Buddha. If you want to gain followers then you can't put out nonsensical (hence false) stuff and expect you will have a mass following. Yes, there will be those who will follow you, doesn't mean everyone will, because people do sense truth, and when they sense truth they flock there. Where there is truth, there is a following. Your philosophy base itself is not properly made, so it's difficult to believe you have moved up spiritually. Even if you get followers , it will be because you focused on other stuffs, but just try putting 'there is no experience' as your central teaching and go on emphasizing it again and again, I bet there won't be many following you. Instead of giving short quip answers like that of Deepak Chopra that sound intelligent , try to properly convince people that 'that is not experience, realization of xyz (meaningless of language, inchorehence of realization as concept, your definition of enlightenment) is not experience, try doing that. And that would be impressive. You constantly play the word game- realization of destruction of incoherence of language. Reminding me of Deepak Chopra. And guess what, he plays that game even better, and he has millions of followers. And the common consensus about him whether you look at his youtube video comments, or google search or his facebook page comments, is that he is a charlatan. While people like Buddha, Osho, Sadhguru, Leo are revered. Because everybody loves those who spread the light of truth. (over time atleast. Like Jesus was crucified, Bruno was burned, but they are saints now). While those who spread of lies, are not. (Joseph Smith, Mormonism, Scientology) You don't have to put in it in highly complex terms like you and Deepak Chopra do. Truth is pure and simple. Just saying " Okay, I can't convince you , you yourself should walk the path" ignoring me would make me feel(though notfull convince) that you are enlightened, but using highly complex words to redefine, correct my statements over and over again, I don't see Buddha or Osho doing that. They would just ignore me and rest in their bliss. Which also shows sign of egolessness, but your posts shows the opposite. I don't see any bodhisattva like compassion radiating from you and I am talking about each of your post, not this one. Just continuosly correcting and redefining terms according to your ideology. This is __. This is not___ but ____.All your post are of that kind. It shouldn't be very difficulto for a lay person to identify when he sees a truly enlightened person, atleast not as difficult as doing a sherlock holmes investigation. Even animals recognize an enlightened being. Even plants do. And here not only do I not immediately feel like you are enlightened (which I should if you truly were) but allyour behavioural evidence,the demonstration of your ego, your obvious desire to get followers your youtube vids, point toward opposite. You are indoctrinated. That's all.

@fryingLotus First usage but not a break through ??? - what was your dosage ? Why you feel its not a breakthrough ? Though your narrative says you experienced No-self,oneness,bliss ? How many milli grams for 30 dollars or how many trips one can go with that ?

Okay update here guys. The first session: Not full release, felt bliss, oneness, very grounding. Wow. I felt the healing potential. The second session: More hits from the pipe. Wow anxiety my old friend what you playing at? Completely inside my own head, can't relax, can't just be, trying to let go and feel all sensations but my mind is racing to get away. After this I started coming down and there was no afterglow like before. Everything looked darker, it looked like anxiety. I then got a huge wave of anxiety that felt like it would last forever but it passed. I think I was on the brink of passing over but the dose was just enough to set me into the uncomfortable stage where my ego had power to fihht back and did not want to give in. This is what I'm hoping anyway but man it's hard and I get the same thing from normal dmt. So essentially I feel that more intake would have broken me through all the anxiety. Also I feel like the anxiety wave was a layer of my ego returning. So as if my ego was coming back gradually in blocks as I returned to normal. I feel like the anxiety needs to be dealt with and I felt so ready to handle it, this was the confusing thing. I meditated for an hour in the morning (as normal), did some self inquiry for 30 minutes, got some revelations, then later before the ceremony I felt bliss after I spent about 45 minutes self affirming I am ready, I give in, I trust myself, I trust the medicine, I embrace fear, fear is just a label we give to a sensation, there is nothing special about it, I approach fear with curiosity etc etc. So this self affirmation session eventually resulted in my brain just giving up and thoughts seemed to vanish. I then felt happiness come over me. So yeah I felt pretty ready and still had a difficult, uncomfortable experience where all meditation seemed to go out the window. I'm currently reassesing and will be doing another tomorrow probably (eeeek!!). My point here is that if you have lots of underlying issues then, you may break through them or it may bring them all to the surface and you'll feel them in full force. It didn't really feel like it was working me through them either. It actually felt bad for my brain, like I could feel wires getting mixed up and now I have a headache. There was stress and an 'oh no' feeling on the sobering up stage. Maybe someone else could share some words of wisdom for me as I'm not sure where my future with psychedelics lies at this time with this same blockage being experienced time and time again. Time to hit the pen and paper again to get all of these thoughts out. Edit: @Leo Gura help!

Hi, I have recently had the experience/feeling (while reading a book by Stanislav Grof) that spirituality might just be some kind of societal brainwashing. While the essence of it is pure and divine, the context in which it is put leads to pure destruction. I feel like there is a form of unconscious manipulation. The media and a broad spectrum of dualities. Okay to get cynical about occasionally. Just watched a documentary about psychiatry. It's scary what happens at those places. Sometimes you are just at a kind of stage when you get cynical and then it goes to that extreme of despair. In some way this is a very pure state. It makes you realize things. It's one state of consciousness as well as there are many other. There is the one of pure bliss, there is the one of dream and the one of half consciousness. Half consciousness being meta activities like anything you are not proud about. The merge of hills of longing and pushing towards edges. Pure trash of mind. Cleansing.

Yup this is a non dual state, this is classical enlightenment. I’m conscious of nothing or mu. Omniscient consciousness was so much different. it was more rich with god than this. But then as I am typing this. I am also this, so I’m not the one typing. Consciousness is nothingness. IM SO CONFUSED LOL this feels total and feels like it is likely to contain omniscient consciousness than omniscient consciousness is likely to be this. It’s like omniscient would happen inside of nothingness. I feel like I understand every non dual being now lol. Infinite peace, infinite bliss, infinite consciousness , freedom from suffering lol. It all makes sense. Still lol the funny thing is we have to take into consideration that my base level of consciousness was reduced by like 1000- 10000 fold from omnipresent enlightenment. So it’s understandable that I’m only seeing non dual enlightenment now. Especially because I was conscious of god at a higher degree of enlightenment before. It’s easier to maintain. OKAY yes I’ve put this into perspective. This is like using no mind but even you can let your thoughts pass, you could let anything pass and you wouldn’t attach to it because you knew you werr consciousness. But this non dual enlightenment has nothing to do with how god works or even using language to work it out. Like the answer would simply be ohh that’s consciousness. But omniscient present is like, you are conscious of gods design. Like the whole of reality. Theyre very two different states. I’m not sure how they correlate.

So according to Bob Lazar, there is ancient Tech which can produce anti gravity fields without wiring, letting vehicles fly and maneuvre like a red light dot in the dark. I think the guy is trustworthy, seems like the Gov. just didnt kill him in time, or was not prepared for such a leak in the past. So this was 1960-80s We have alien tech, gov is communicating with DMT entities (see crazy infowars) ah and btw you are God and reality is your imagination. Man I love this shit. I see why God wants to play, I want to play too. I think dualities are the most fundamental truth You want knowledge? Prepare for fear and loneliness, and ultimately not-knowing You want happiness? Prepare for sadness, discipline and consciousness, and ultimately conscious bliss You want freedom? Prepare for discipline and self government, ultimately self control You want to be financial free? Prepare to unlearn, uncover, run against a whole system, trust yourself, struggle and counter-intuitiveness

There are no words, the understanding seems to lie in just being. Seriously wtf bro haha its crazy that you know this is here all along. Its like your whole life is just your ego expanding like a balloon thats going to pop and then some frog venom gradually deflates you softly and all built up anxieties are just wiped out with your mind being safely tucked up in bliss.

@Natasha yes I agree, maybe I am spreading my own projections of an enlightened lifestyle. There has been a recent development which has caused me to stop the journey. Ofcourse I don’t mind. But I get you 100% , there will always be an incling to go further and isolate yourself at all cost. In one of Leo’s blog videos. It’s said to be existential loneliness, this is exactly the term that applies to any of us, who seek the need to be in non dual form or in a state of constant bliss and love. It is the inability to accept your duality form, reboot into your form as real. And be detached from any of the infinity emotions or cognitive states/ non dual. I can only presume this is what causes us to march forward towards god at all costs. It’s the fact we only have one life and it must be NOW. I have a whole lifetime of existential lonliness to look forward to. Still it is perfect.

@Freakrik Suffering cannot be forever because suffering is a limited thing. Suffering is finite. Only Love and Bliss and Truth are forever. Only they are Infinite. Do not confuse God for a devil. All devils are finite. Only God is infinite. God is wholeness. There can only be one wholeness. The devil cannot be whole because the devil is divided. When a devil becomes whole, it becomes God.

@Aakash I know friend, thank you for reminding me and i guess i have to stop believing i am still healing from it all and embrace the fully healed state instead in which i currently am, like you say, but maybe not as present in awareness to fully realize it. Indeed, although i may have a completely different need or look for relationships of that magnitude nowadays, Inner-peace is all that matters. As of right now, in this moment, i feel, even if i never have another relationship like that(how it bloomed in the beginning) ever again, i will truly be okay. As of right now, i feel generally at peace, maybe not in divine bliss and pure unconditional love at all times, but that is okay, i accept this peace as my natural state. Makes me giggle, If i didn't open up the way i did about this situation and you didn't respond with those words you did in response, this realization possibly would of never occurred as clearly as i see it now. Gratitude ??

The biggest bliss states I have had in the past was always previous by a deep purge of vomiting. Soak in blissfulness, incredibly beautiful.

The blissful stage doesn't always come. The blissful stage is the end result of the ego surrendering. If the ego refuses to surrender don't expect a blissful stage. If there is psychological baggage you must deal with, that won't be blissful, that will be taxing and challenging as you work through it. Then, on future trips you'll be primed for a blissful stage. Taking psychedelics to experience bliss is not the right attitude. Rather, take them with the expectation of doing emotional work, whatever work is necessary for you to get closer to Truth. The more inner work you do, the more baggage you clear out, the more likely bliss will be in the future. Think of psychedelics like a therapy session. Challenging stuff should come up. This is how you grow.

It seems like I'm on the edge of stage 8. My last few sits I've had 30s - 10 minutes moments of effortlessness. One thing I am not sure about is whether stage 8 practice supposed to be absolutely completely effortless or with extremely little effort because what happens to me is that I can get to access concentration, then bliss and joy arise, then I use very very little effort but if I drop it literally completely, I tend to slip into very subtle dullness within a few minutes. What do you think? Have you had any cessations? Have you tried 5-MeO or DPT? BTW thanks for bringing awareness about this practice to this forum.

FMAB discusses topic of ego very deep, what do you think these series conclude, what is the cause of ego and what is the way to defeat it? Pride's death showed that ego started as a helpless newborn baby calling mama father's death showed that ego started as cocky playful thing that wanted to get out from its shell, eventually it wanted to become perfect being (not sure what that means existentially) and to know truth, to explore world, and to be god Greed's death showed that ego started as a lack of close ppl around it Envy - ego wanted to fit, to have good qualities of human beings Personally, i think pride's death is the best shot. This is why - Before birth baby is in bliss, in samadhi lol, without any problems and pain, but once born its in pain, cold, hot, light, loud noises, etc. So person caries this trauma throughout his life and then first years only adds up to that with parental and societal tiranny, plus physical pain that children often got, so this kind of pattern of helpless baby becomes its personality and runs the body, it then transforms into all sort of adult's egoic actions and ideas, pitifully few can overgrow that, but when you try to awaken and see ego's resistance, you can notice - ego shows a mask/persona of infantile, self-pity, confused, pretending 'innocent', wary, waiting for something, indecisive child who is like 'mummy can u give me awakening, i cant do that on my own, i am just innocent baby!'. And this is mask, a self-image that kind of a defensive mechanism, coz who would kill an innocent baby? Of course it stops u from awakening coz u become justifying and indulging and pity for this baby, instead of remorsely killing it. look how tricky it is! Pretending to be innocent, unconscious survival force that perpetuates since birth day! ALso, in NAruto shippuden. In the final battle, when they kill kaguya and zetsu, you can see the same picture - zetsu becomes a little baby crying to his mama kaguya, and saying to naruto - ur ninja world is just part of my imagination (or something like that), then naruto says even if it is so, my friends and ppl of my village fought through pain and died for each other, while all you do is crying to your mama. Then same in Evangelion, crying pitiful infantile, and same in The town without yourself. Then in Ghibli's animes - Grave of fireflies - boy who doesn't fully transform infantilism during war and this leads to death of him and his sister, and all Miyazaki's animes often has that theme but with often successful endings Maybe this means that ego is just a baby that must be killed. While Hollywood factory today often likes to show infantile and naive and child-loving films in which it is good to be smiling innocent baby who likes his mummy and wants to play and have fun and who doesn't do anything bad. Devils deception datebayo!

@Angelo John Gage if you’re only able to understand one side that makes you no better than them. Forget any ideas you might have of oneness and figure out who you are. Forgot operating on shoulds/should nots, let go of your perspective for a while and see if you can look through their eyes, understand their perspective and beliefs. What sort of shame do you have personally and how might this relate to the human condition, dig really deep. Find teachers that will help you figure out your own biases, not ones you simply agree with or meet most of your standards. One of my favorites for teaching our mirroring effect on reality is Teal Swan but if she’s too much keep looking! Finding your bliss or resolution is going to solve all any pain and suffering you may still have

It is you imagining yourself out of existence. The form being extracted from formlessness Pure Bliss.

@Mikael89 it isn't temporary - even one non-dual state will change you. I like you bro and i don't mean this with any disrespect but obviously you haven't had an awakening yet. When you do you will be on the floor crying and shouting "its infinite..its infinite..its Infinite" over and over and over. You will bliss out for days on end and your mind will open. Discovering you are God is really something. You shouldn't underestimate it.

Trivia to ponder from my favorite ebook I have one prebirth memory, but nothing close to this,,,,, Rebirthing is a necessary precondition to complete a non-violent shift to the Body-Mind. Without it you can never fully develop and balance the chakras, or create a unified field of all components in Awareness. Rebirthing goes beyond the normal field of recollection of early childhood memories normally addressed in psychoanalysis. Rebirthing goes further back to the pre-verbal memories, to memories of birth, pre-natal life in the womb. It goes all the way back to the original orgasmic moment of conception. A truly liberating rebirthing experience requires a basic understanding of the biology of the development of the body. We need to understand the discoveries of science in this area to have full recall and visualization. We need to understand the process of Mitosis, from the original union of sperm and egg to early childhood development. We also need to comprehend the significance of the seven stages of Mitosis, and its relation to our perceptive awareness, and the unified energy field. This essential knowledge is summarized in the following chart: Spirit Mind Soul Mind Body Mind: 7 Speak 7 Spirit 1 Fecundation Neocortex 6 Read 6 Soul 2 Polarization Limbic 5 Touch 5 Body 3 Organization Brain Stem 4 Hear 4 Willing 4 Circulation 3 Taste 3 Feeling 5 Metabolism Birth 2 Smell 2 Think 6 Breathing 1 Seeing 1 Sense 7 Moving MITOSIS There are seven stages of development: In the first two to three weeks the three basic layers are formed in the embryonic tissue: Entoderm: Inner Organs, Inner layer Mesoderm: Tendon and Muscles, Middle layer Exoderm or Ectoderm: Sense Organs, Outer layer One of the three embryonic layers tends to dominate in a person from this earliest stage. The dominant layer may later determine the preponderance of a person's temperament. An Entoderm dominant person will invite people for a good dinner, a Mesoderm person to jogging or mountain climbing, and an Exoderm person to listen to a concert. a. Contractions b. Birth c. First breath All three stages are painful and thus their recollection in the rebirthing process is frequently not pleasant. Still, remembering this pain frees you from it, and sets the stage for further development. The ejection from the womb is intense and frightening, particularly the initial stage of contractions, before movement down the birth canal begins. The contractions produce visions of hell. Compression down the birth canal to birth produces visions of the fall from the amniotic paradise. When you recall the first breath, you also recall the tearing open of the bronchial. Also, at the moment of birth the "foramen ovale" closes and the two chambers of the heart separate. The first painful breath and heart break is the threshold of rebirth. The rebirthing experience, like most all tribal initiations, necessarily involves the acceptance of intentional suffering. Fecundation. A single sperm, one of 500 million ejaculated, is accepted by the female egg. Polarization. The 23 male and 23 female chromosomes meet at the equator and blend to form the original cell. An average size human cell has about the same number of molecules as an average size human brain has cells. The fertilized human egg cell shown below has even more molecules. Organization. The cell divides according to the law of the octave, 1 - 2 - 4 - 8 - 16 - 32 - 64 - 128 ....., up to about 54 divisions, then the organism is complete. By about four months all organs have been formed and simple growth begins. Actual photographs are shown below of the human embryo at the 2, 4 and 8 cell stages. In the first two to three weeks the three basic layers are formed in the embryonic tissue: Entoderm: Inner Organs, Inner layer Mesoderm: Tendon and Muscles, Middle layer Exoderm or Ectoderm: Sense Organs, Outer layer One of the three embryonic layers tends to dominate in a person from this earliest stage. The dominant layer may later determine the preponderance of a person's temperament. An Entoderm dominant person will invite people for a good dinner, a Mesoderm person to jogging or mountain climbing, and an Exoderm person to listen to a concert. Circulation. At five to six weeks, when the embryo is no more than three fifths of an inch long, the heart begins to beat. The heart beats continuously, uninterrupted, until we die. Here an embryo is shown at about five and one half weeks. The big protrusion between the flipper and the head is the heart. Metabolism. At about eight weeks, when the embryo is one inch long, weighing two and one half grams, metabolism starts in the embryo through the umbilical cord connection with the mother's metabolism. The embryo floats weightlessly in warm amniotic fluid, nourished from the outside, in a state of bliss. Recollection of this earliest time in your life is quite pleasant, however, for most the recollection of the birth process which follows is not. Here is a picture of a fetus at about eight weeks. Birth. After nine months of blissful growth, the organism is ready for birth which comes in three stages: Movement. Once out the baby starts coordinating the senses by movements. By about the third month after birth the senses are acclimated to the new external environment. For rebirthing to succeed the fear of pain must be overcome. The same is true of life itself. Otherwise fear will prevent you from starting the backward journey within. In this way many people are trapped by fear into living their whole life in one little corner of their brain. from- http://www.chanceandchoice.com/course-overview/brain-and-mind/

@Justincredible76 Half assing is pointless. You'll want to go all the way to infinity. Or else whats the point? In fact, "bordlerline" breakthroughs are incredibly hellish. Infinity (and beyond) on the otherhand... Is complete bliss. Also, this is not a newbie thing. I've been doing phycadelics on and off for almost 17 years. And only this year I did MEO. Read the entire MEGA thread for starters. Also look up Martin Ball. Get way wayyy more trips under your belt. High dose mushrooms, high dose ACID. You need to do a LOT of research before you do this stuff. And I agree with Leo, you should be at least 21.

If you 'could' do anything alternative, you'd already be doing it Michael. haha exactly! A funny impression I get from Advaita Vedanta is how the master talks about the Self and Bang! The deciple gets woke and starts dancing in bliss ? Its like one is in a very flimsy dream wandering about. Someone comes and gives him a little shake and bang one is awake as the Self. No loss. Only joy, as one is always the Self. That dream character identity was like a thin spider web. And ideally thats how it is supposed to happen. But rarely it happens like that ? Its just that this present waking body-personality identity is so strong and glued with so much insane amount of raw emotional energy, that each time this identity is questioned or loosened even 0.001% of it, it feels like being stabbed in the gut. The seeker doesn't feel oh I am Self! No sir, he/she has to voluntarily put up with this dream-self mutilation for several years until all that knots and fleshy emotional meats leave the system for good.

Since having had a bad experience with weed I have a big fear of losing my mind/going insane. During that trip I kind of lost touch with reality, everything seemed unreal to me. I felt that I lost control. That was also in a point at my life where I was really deep into thinking about existential questions and spirituality so I connected that bad experience to both of those (bad feelings from the trip + existential q. and spirituality -> spirituality and existential q. = bad). Spirituality also seems to evoke those feelings from the trip like feeling that you're losing your mind, losing your grip on reality. So spirituality feels like something scary to me when it goes too deep. On top of that, when I read things like the following from @Leo Gura, I get really scared of reality and I fear that something bad can happen to me. Reality just seems sometimes so full of uncertainty, mystery, crazy stuff, danger that I don't really want to know what's really going on. Well, on the one hand I want to know it but on the other hand I don't know if I can handle anything if it is too bad. So what should I do? Is spirituality too much to handle for some people? Or should I just face all of those fears and make them fully conscious, go through it because on the other side is the land of bliss?

??? There is never an eternal hell, since God is all-loving and all-merciful, and since all imagination is illusory. Eventually, everything comes back to source, bliss.

Shared on a Facebook group. Some guy killed himself as he was unable to awaken... STAYING ALIVE I’m going to try and lay this down as simply as I can: That spiritual “enlightenment” you’re searching for? Not gonna happen. No matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, no matter what you are willing to endure, no matter how much you sacrifice yourself in the hopes of one day “waking up” – every ounce of that effort is literally what is preventing you from seeing what is right in front of your eyes. This ideal of the “awakened being”, the enlightened one, is an ideological poison that has infected so many brains and completely hijacked their functioning. Now, I get why it’s so appealing. Society has done us no favors. Its excessive focus on wealth over wisdom, on progress over presence, on consumption over compassion, on “success” over self-knowledge has led to a horrid state of affairs in which we are all alienated from one another and especially from ourselves. We find ourselves in a dull, grey haze of meaninglessness that immediately wilts every form of life it comes upon. Then, in the midst of such desolation, along comes a spiritual teaching that promises the exact opposite. It promises ecstatic bliss, boundless love for one another and ourselves, a feeling of oneness with all that exists, no more fear of the narrow self-interested ego. We begin to greet others with heartfelt hugs and namastes rather than rough handshakes. We begin to lose ourselves in songs of devotion and rhythmic drum circles under starlit skies and to the sounds of the waves lapping on the shore. We feel effusive love for everyone we meet and see the same reflected back in their eyes. And it seems we have finally found our home and our kin. We have left that grey miserable world behind and emerged into a parallel universe bursting with color, love and truth. For a time. Yet, unexpectedly, the old feelings of greyness begin seeping back in. At first we try and rationalize them away as just “having a bad day”. But then it happens more often. Our interactions begin to lack the luster they had before. We continue participating in the devotional songs, the drum circles yet it feels a bit contrived. We continue to greet one another with hugs and namastes but we also see how these shows of affection are somewhat superficial. We begin to see through others and the facades they are projecting because it is similar to the one we are projecting. We begin to see the greyness lurking behind their eyes, the fear behind their smiles, the quiet desperation with which they sing their songs of devotion, the anxiety concealed in every beat of the drum. Spirituality is the art of pretending things are okay when they are not. The more tormented a person is, the more complex the cover up. We will do everything in our power to surround ourselves with the things, the people, the teachings and the rituals that allow us to maintain that active state of denial in the most comprehensive manner possible. And when we ourselves ARE the problem then we will seek to deny our SELVES altogether. THAT’S what the appeal of non-duality is. Escape from the self. TOTAL ESCAPE. Spiritual seekers are some of the most emotionally damaged and psychologically wounded people one will ever meet. And there is a reason why such an incredibly lofty goal such as “enlightenment” appeals to such a person. The solution is in proportion to the problem perceived. And nothing short of a complete overhaul of who we are will suffice to solve it. This was the rationale feeding the mind of one of the readers of this page before he shot himself a couple of days ago. I had never had the opportunity to interact with him directly but I noticed he liked a few of my posts. I was informed of his death by his best friend who is also an active reader and with whom I have had a fair amount of interaction. He messaged me with the news because this is exactly the sort of thinking I have been criticizing through my writings on this page. What I felt last night when I heard what had happened was a mixture of deep sadness and rage. I barely slept because the image of this boy, who felt compelled to throw his life away because he couldn’t “awaken”, kept haunting my thoughts. Believing himself to be a failure in life, that sense of failure was further compounded by his “spiritual failure” to awaken. He had been an avid follower of a certain fraudster in Portugal as well as a few others in the non-duality scene. As a result of all the “enlightenment” propaganda he’d come to believe in, he became convinced that if he could only become awakened, like all his teachers seemed to be, his life would become radically different. That all his problems would go away. He suffered long with depression, headaches, insomnia and ringing in his ears. But when his friend counselled him to seek help he refused. He chose instead to believe what the brainwashed neophytes of the New Age were echoing around him: that all these were signs of “awakening”… What a fucking tragedy. … Spiritual propaganda is just another ideological poison, just another narcotic which may help you wean off the drug of materialism that most other people are hooked on to, but in the end will consume you from the inside and leave you a specter of your former self. “Waking up” has nothing to do with any of this non-dual garbage about transcending the self that people are being fed, these idiotic songs of devotion people are singing to some invisible entity who doesn’t give a fuck about them. It is simply taking a look at what’s around right now and choosing to take responsibility of THAT over anything else the mind can envision as a “better” reality. And “what’s around” INCLUDES the soaring debt, the relationship woes, the conflict with family, the crippling self-doubt, the uncertainty about the future – all those things that we are attempting to escape using our convoluted spiritual practices. It also means that we are not seeking to define ourselves in either material or spiritual terms. There is no “success” and “failure”, no “loser” or “winner” in anything we choose to do in our lives. Some things we choose will hurt more than others. But that is all part of the learning process by which we calibrate our own responses. Nature has programmed us with one job: STAYING ALIVE. Even the lowly amoeba understands this. The only failure is the premature ending of that process. I’m fed up of this fucking bullshittery. This spiritual circus act with these larger-than-life troupes of performers led by greedy, disingenuous ring masters fleecing their audiences for every ounce of material and spiritual wealth they possess. And the gullible sheep who will willingly swallow whatever shit they are being fed because they are so used to being led out to pasture. So, I’m going to lay down some truths right now that I am willing defend until the grave so that anyone who is thinking of walking down that road may have a moment to pause. 1. There is no such thing as an “awakened” or “enlightened” person. No such permanent state of consciousness exists. Everyone who has ever existed including the Buddha, Ramana, Nisargadatta and all the other “enlightened” peeps inhabit the same everyday ordinary kind of consciousness as you and I and all the other “average joes” do. 2. Some people have “awakening” or satori experiences which are TEMPORARY spiritual epiphanies. Sudden moments of clarity in which things appear to come together in a way that they previously hadn’t. NOBODY lives in a state of constant epiphany. Every epiphany, every insight, every heightened state of consciousness must eventually subside and give way to ordinary consciousness. 3. There is absolutely NO WAY to intentionally and accurately orchestrate such an awakening experience. Trying to do so is an effort in futility and a surefire recipe for great suffering. 4. Rarely, an awakening experience MAY follow a catastrophic nervous breakdown or a period of intense depression. But depression is NOT a symptom of awakening. It is a symptom that you need to seek professional help! (Just because some people emerge from car crashes with a new zest for life doesn’t mean car crashes are events one must glorify or aspire to experience). 5. Ordinary consciousness IS where the marrow of life exists. 6. No matter how many epiphanies one has had, one’s problems CANNOT simply vanish. They must be FACED. They must be taken RESPONSIBILITY for. They must be SOLVED by oneself and no one else. Otherwise, they simply remain and magnify over time. 7. Whatever you resist, persists. Whatever you suppress, festers. Whatever you deny, grows in the darkness of your ignorance. 8. If you truly are willing to take full responsibility for life AS IT IS, rather than as you wish it to be, you will find that all the tools you need to fulfill that responsibility are at your disposal. 9. NOTHING is worth ending one’s own life over. No suffering is too great. No hardship too difficult to endure. The human spirit is equipped with a power and an endurance that is truly supernatural. There is only ONE thing that can subvert it: IDEOLOGY. That is our kryptonite. 10. A single ordinary moment of being ALIVE is the highest spiritual achievement anyone can aspire to. Allow all of this to really sink in. Forget what you’ve been taught by society. Forget all the dreams and promises you’ve been fed by your gurus. Watch the twin towers of materialism and spirituality crumble before your eyes. Plant your feet firmly on GROUND ZERO. Take your stand there. And say: NEVER AGAIN. If you find yourself overwhelmed by life, by feelings of depression, by thoughts of suicidal ideation don’t glorify it as a sign of your spiritual transcendence. Speak to someone. A friend, a family member, a therapist, a counsellor, a physician.

here were a lot of beliefs in ancient Egypt and most of them revolved around life, death and the afterlife. The first kinds of obituary writing in Egypt were Pyramid Texts, which were inscribed on the walls of burial chamber in pyramids. Pyramid texts, which included several figures representing humans and animals, were purposed to protect and help dead kings pass on to the afterlife safely. And the first of this kind of writing was used in the pyramid of King Unas, during the 24th century B.C. Then during the reign of the Middle Kingdom, Pyramid texts evolved to what is called Coffin Texts. The contents of the Coffin Text had much similarity to that of the Pyramid Text. But there certainly were obvious discrepancies; one was that this new form of funerary text was inscribed on the interiors of a coffin, sometimes on Papyri or the walls of a tomb, but mostly on the surface of coffins; secondly, unlike the Pyramid Texts, which were used only by the royals and the elite; the Coffin Text was available for the commoners as well. Then with the rise of the New kingdom around 1550 B.C., Egyptian writing and funerary tradition underwent yet another telling evolution, which was marked by the surfacing of the ‘Book of the Dead.’ The Book of the Dead is a funerary scripture aimed at facilitating an easy and safe navigation through the Duat (the Underworld) for the dead. It was also believed that this entity would enable the deceased to get help and protection from the Gods during this challenging journey. It is basically a collection of spells, some were new but most of them were collected from the Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts. It was written on a papyrus commissioned by the individual before death or by a relative. The quality of the papyri and the texts differed tremendously, and it all depended upon the individual’s financial standing. Papyri were very expensive during that period and only the royals or the elite were able to afford it. There was even a point where archeologists discovered a Book of the Dead written on a second-hand papyrus. The Book of the Dead, at certain occasions, would be written on linen shrouds, which would be used to wrap the dead bodies. Often times, the illustrations included the image of the deceased’s wife; but drawing of vicious lions, crocodiles, snakes, beetles and hippopotamus were also quite common. Each Book of the Dead was unique and different. There was no order or pattern in the way the chapters of the Book of the Dead were arranged. The illustrations, the texts, the spells were all developed in a way that’s to satisfy the preference of the deceased or their relatives. So far about 192 spells used in ancient Egypt and in the Book of the Dead are known. But there isn’t a single Book of the Dead that contains all these spells, and if there is, it hasn’t yet been found then. The greatest and most explicit relic of this funerary tradition that has survived for this long and still is in a good condition is The Papyrus of Ani – a legacy of ancient Egypt and one that is currently situated in The British Museum, London. life for ancient Egyptians was just a segment, a very small part of the eternal journey that awaited them after death. Bunsen, the historian, argues that ancient Egyptians believed that human life, its goal and purpose, was to simply serve as a phase of life through which one could acquire eternal happiness offered in life after death. But to accomplish a harmonious eternal journey one must live a good and just life here on earth. Death Death in Egyptian mythology doesn’t quite necessarily mean the end. It is viewed as the moment when the soul parts from the body and is brought before Osiris in the “Hall of Truth” for the final judgment. The god Anubis is said to be the one who escorts the soul to Osiris. However, before the soul stands to face Osiris and the final judgment, he or she must first pass through a series of gates and caverns that are infiltrated and guarded by mystical creatures that are vicious and will do whatever is possible to stop the passer-by. And to pacify these ferocious beings the deceased would use the spells in his or her Book of the Dead. Spell 31 used to stop the attack of crocodiles And if the deceased manages to circumvent all the obstacles and passes through all the challenges, then he/she will be escorted to the Hall of Truth. In the Hall of Truth, the deceased would then be asked to swear that he/she did not commit the forty-two sins, which are also known as the “Negative Confession.” Here are some of the sins on the list: I have not committed sin. I have not committed robbery with violence. I have not stolen. I have not slain men and women. I have not stolen grain. I have not purloined offerings. I have not stolen the property of the gods. I have not uttered lies. I have not carried away food. I have not uttered curses. I have not committed adultery. I have made none to weep. After reciting the Negative Confession before the forty-two judges, the heart, which is seen as the base of intelligence and memory, would then be put on a golden scale against the white feather of Maat or Ma'at and get weighed. The deceased would be considered as someone who has lived a life free of sins and will be granted entrance to the afterlife, if the heart weighs lighter than the feather. But if the heart weighs heavier than the feather, then the soul of the deceased would be thrown to the Underworld where the merciless monster, Ammut, would devour it. To avoid such calamity, ancient Egyptians would always take measures to protect and give the much needed strength to the deceased’s heart. There were two common ways they would execute this ritual and one was done through magical spells like the kind depicted in Spell 125 or Spell 30B which reads, “O my heart of my mother! O my heart of my mother! O my heart of my different forms! Do not stand up as a witness against me, do not be opposed to me in the tribunal, do not be hostile to me in the presence of the Keeper of the Balance, for you are my ka which was in my body, the protector who made my members hale. The other method ancient Egyptians commonly used for the protection of the deceased’s heart was the burying of the body with heart shaped scarabs. In Egyptian mythology the afterlife is a place of eternal bliss; the anxiously awaited paradise where only the gods and the pure would be able to live in. The illustration of the afterlife in Egyptian mythology is quite diverse, but most commonly it is imagined to be a rich and green place, where there were plenty waterways, crops, people, oxen and so forth. The afterlife is often referred to as the ‘Field of Reeds’ in the Book of the Dead; it’s represented as a place that has much similarity to that of life on earth. In the afterlife it is believed that the deceased will be able to join the Great Ennead (a group of gods) and his or her parents. It was also stated in various scriptures that once the deceased passes the judgment and enters the afterlife, he or she will not only join Osiris and all the other supreme Gods, but will also possess some kind of a divine power as well. This belief is illustrated by the way each Book of the Dead starts out as "The Osiris - [Name of the deceased].” The Book of the Dead clearly depicts the marvelous aspects of the afterlife, but it also states that it was mandatory for the deceased to take part in a number of laborious chores. For this reason, the burial mounds would often have several statuettes with spells written on them; these objects were called Shabti or Ushebti