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Week 4 *** Hours Sat: 105 Hours sat this week: 29 Current daily average: 3.75 Experiences: The opening sit of the week was one of the worst experience I've had in my entire life. My alarm went off at 4:00am but I only started at 4:30 because it was freezing and I was feeling lazy. The first few minutes were pretty normal but I lost track of time completely after that point. Gradually the resistance welled up inside of me like battery acid was leaking over my organs. My heart started pounding, I started shaking. It felt like my head was going to explode, both from the physical feeling of pressure and the barrage of thoughts that started hitting me from all sides. As the resistance deepened I started to feel physically ill all over my body, like my veins were filled with hot tar. I remember once I drank an entire bottle of vodka on a night out and ended up begging for death on the floor of a nightclub toilet. This was exactly like that, combined with strong negative emotions and negative thought. I started retching; physically trying to vomit, my stomach was empty though so nothing came up. My room couldn't have been more than 5 degrees but I was drenched in sweat. I just sat there and remembered Mooji talking about Sri Ramana Maharishi: I said to myself “there's nothing back there for you” The pain in my ass, knees, back and ankles intensified as time progressed. I literally felt like a resistor in a circuit would feel if it had a nervous system and gradually had more and more electric current pushed through it with increasing voltage. I have no idea how long this lasted but it felt like a thousand years. Then in the space of about 5 seconds I dropped into a new dimension. It felt like bomb diving into a swimming pool where the implosion of cool water hits your entire body at once. Every single muscle in my body relaxed and I went into deep REM. All of the activity of my mind ripped apart like an engine that had run past its max rpm and had run out of oil. All words lost their meaning and I separated out from the mind completely, I could "see" it just as a movement of energy in front of "me". The pain in my body/emotional centres felt like it was being sucked out of me. A bit like if you open all the windows of a house on a hot summers day and a cool breeze rushes in. The really painful parts of my body still felt the same but the relationship to the pain changed 100%. If you are holding your hands in a fire it's excruciating but if your hands are near a fire on a cold day its beautiful. In both cases the fire is the same. The pain was the same before and after “the drop” but now the pain was kind of beautiful. This is the best analogy I could come up with. I finished the sit, everything was completely the same as before; I felt “normal-ish" is what I mean, but I was still completely blown away by what had happened. I didn't know suffering could just stop so rapidly like that and I didn't know it was possible to go so far out of the mind. I've observed thoughts before but this was like a whole new layer of depth that was added, beyond description. I did 3 more 3 hour sits on Monday and then 4 3 hour sits on Tuesday. *** Every day when my alarm goes off my inner voice goes “I'm up, I'm up, I'm up” and then I reach over and turn it off. On Wednesday for some reason my alarm went off and I said to myself “I'm awake, I'm awake, I'm awake” and I turned it off. I sat for a few moments and then just burst out laughing. I'm awake. Of course! I'm awake! That's all I've ever been! I've experienced this fundamental shift many times but it's still just as surprising and relieving to realise it again. I instantly shifted from bear down to ease up meditation. I was beginning to get abiding paraesthesia down the front of my legs so I switched to sitting in a chair. It was just sitting, no effort or determination or willpower, I wasn't trying to sit still. I also wasn't just sitting physically, internally I was just sitting in “awake-ness” I prefer to say this instead of awareness because it's easier for me to understand and feel, but its consciousness/god/the witness/awareness that I'm talking about. I took my seat fundamentally as the awakened mind. This is where “choosing” enlightenment becomes possible. This guy articulates what I was trying to describe a few weeks ago with the term "willing": … And so I sat, like a king I consulting with his people I practised recognising my “awake-ness” in everything that happened to me. [sound] bird chirps (ok next) [feeling] peaceful sensations in thorax (ok next) [thought] You're not awake (ok next) [thought] (in response to previous thought) LOL! what the fuck are you talking about, of course he's awake it wouldn't be possible for you to exist if he wasn't awake. (ok next) [sound] dog barks (ok next) [physical sensation] PAIN (ok next) [thought] mental image of me writing about this (ok next) [thought] you should stop updating your journal, enlightened people are quiet (ok next) [feeling] feeling of shame (ok next) … and so on. There's no attempt at manipulation, just allowing everything to be as it is when it arrives, when its present and when it leaves. It's tricky to talk about because I've heard the same things over and over again, but now I actually get it. Its so obvious and at the same time paradoxically impossible, there isn't anyone to do non-manipulation, awake-ness is already the substrate in which everything happens, like fish swimming in the water. Everything that happens is only possible because I'm awake, of course I'm not awake, I'm in that which is awake. I just continued sitting in a chair. A chair is much easier because there's not as much pain and you don't have to concentrate so much on your body sensations/posture. I didn't record these hours, so all of my recorded hours are those that I spent meditating on my knees in front of a wall. *** On Friday it happened, what I've been trying to get to. I sat down and just kept watching and allowing, letting my resistance gradually erode away and at one point I was just awake. I heard the sound of the birds chirping but it was just the bird chirping. Not like bird over there, I'm here, oh there's the beginning of the bird chirping and now its done, no: JUST THE BIRD CHIRPING. I looked at the wall and all there was just the wall, tears were streaming down, laughter happening, dog barking, pain happening. This is literally impossible to describe because its so present there isn't even anyone there to collect details to write about, storing memories, thinking up analogies, shit just happens. I've only experienced this for a few brief moments in my life but only under extraordinary circumstances, never as result of meditation. I suspect that as I continue practising and eroding away my ego structures through the process of purification these states will become more frequent/permanent. I now really, really get what Adyashanti was talking about in the first video I linked to in my first post, its a state of willingly allowing yourself to fall away by taking your seat as consciousness - a ritual suicide ha ha. I thought I got it before, and I kinda did but now its become a fully realised teaching in me, purification has become conscious; I've developed the taste for it. I don't have to motivate myself into sitting anymore. I want to sit for 6 hours a day now. The process is quite terrifying, even outside of meditation. As I'm typing this I'm feeling the joints of my fingers scattering randomly around some keys, stringing together words out of nowhere to create something that has meaning. It's all happening on it's own and I have no control over any of it. I don't even have control over the fear that comes up as a result of realising that I have no control. All I can do is watch. All I shall do is watch with equanimity, and allow that aspect of me to gradually subside, and I know it's going to take as long as it takes. *** I'm going to add notes to my journal because there are so many things I want to document. I don't intend to try and teach or explain anything for its own sake. I just want to document how I'm thinking/feeling/rationalising through this process so that I can see any traps that I fall into and in the event of something bad happening, my notes will serve as an example of what not to do. I've found journaling to be a really useful tool to gaining insight into myself. DO NOT take anything I add here as gospel, or right, or wrong for that matter. Its just a journal and I'm still very immature spiritually so I don't really know what I'm talking about. These are some videos/speeches/songs that I used to watch to help G-up emotionally and psychologically in addition to my vision video. i don't need them anymore, but they were useful for me so I'll share them: Videos: An Invocation for Beginnings Meet the Hero Go all the way Lil dicky album trailer Olan rogers apparel adverts; good balance of hilariousness : seriousness because that's what the spiritual journey is. Spring Fall Songs: Extrodanary machine Yellow Flicker Beat

@Mal @Kenya My concern is that: I, (future-higher-forum-status-me, and potentially current high-status others) may be taken more seriously than I/we should be..... Actually Mal, you got me thinking about this, in relation to these titles...when you said how "you" (myself and some others) don't know what we are talking about....I thought how true that is.... there are people bringing up serious topics in their lives (even suicide etc)... the story you provided was actually a perfect example of what I am saying.... so, Are venerable members potentially imbuing more trust/ value/ truth into the suggestions they receive from others?... and.... Is this potentially, dangerous, or unhealthy for lost souls at times? I don't feel that I have personally constructed any sort of hierarchy... but who knows?... I feel that the actual names of these titles, inherently denote a hierarchy in themselves...given the dictionary definition of each status.... that said, you are probably right, that I have over-constructed this mentally...made things seem more significant than in the universal reality...I had only guessed that the intended purpose for increasing levels of status may have been to help newbies find mentors...I have no idea if that is actually why the status titles are there...I still don't really get it... are they just to encourage posting? Mal, I am so sorry that you have felt pressured to coach, that shifty/unfair....(they could at least pay you, kidding). Personally, I believe that there are lessons we can all learn from each other... and status is irrelevant in this regard... an individual just beginning to explore consciousness, may surpass most others in a specific realm of thought, where their unique mental skills are truly able to excel.... and the opposite is also possible, even for experienced personal development mentors...

How many of you are doing fasting? I've been doing 14-16 hours of intermittent fasting every day for 5 years now. I also do at least one 24-hour fast a week and occasional 48-hour ones. The benefits of fasting are quite amazing. Autophagy - self-digestion that cleans accumulated waste and repairs cells on the mitochondrial level. Also, it's needed for healthy brain cells. Longevity - in mice, fasting increases life span. There have been also experimental studies about rejuvenescence, which is basically reversing an organism from adulthood into its embryotic state. Possible effects on humans as well. Growth Hormone - the Holy Grail of longevity and leanness. It increases by an astonishing 1300-2000%. It helps to build muscle, lose fat and also makes your skin clean, smooth and less wrinkled. Ketosis - while fasting you increase the production of ketone bodies by 5-fold. You become a fat burning machine, which has more to do with mitochondrial density and energy levels, instead of losing weight. Because of that you won't be burning muscle while fasting either. In fact, you reduce muscle catabolism to a bare minimum. Increased metabolism - fasting doesn't lead to a metabolic crash. It actually speeds it up by 3-14%. Protection against tumors and cancer - in mice, intermittent fasting leads to cellular suicide of cancer cells, while protecting normal cells. This happens because of when in ketosis, there's no sugar for disease to feed upon and they starve. Not definite evidence that fasting could potentially cure cancer, but it definitely will increase your resistance to it. The benefits of fasting will be even more profound after the initial 36 hours. Autophagy revs up exponentially especially after this mark. I would recommend people do a 48 hour fast at least a few times a year. I just recently finished one of mine. I didn't even get hungry or lose muscle. In fact, I feel like I set the perfect environment for enhanced recovery, because of triggering these anabolic hormones. If you want to know how to survive a 48 hour fast, then you can read my blog post with my 2 day fast formula. Anyway, what's your relationship with fasting? Intermittent fasting is very popular, but what about several day fasts?

I had a dream recently where I was walking down the street with Eckhart Tolle and I asked him, "Eckhart, why is it that your suffering led to your enlightenment? When so many people around the world suffer so much, and it only leads to more suffering, even suicide. Suffering hides from awareness and is only ever the punisher and not the teacher. But for you, it seemed to have some sort of scientific effect on your ego, breaking it down until you could see it for what it is" I can't remember what he answered in the dream, could anyone help me with this? Cheers guys.

Thanks Ayla!!! I love you, really. hehehe.... very nice of you sharing that. I had a similar experience but not with suicide, my thoughts almost drove me crazy, so the "I" didn't have a choice.

I know this place is not where we should discuss politics and it is not what I want. However, I find it quite hard to stay hopeful and sane during the times that my country face. Like terrorist attacks and suicide bombings aren't enough, these days there has been a "military coup attempt" in my country. People are crazy, killing each other, you hear jet planes above your house and sonic blasts that break glasses. And the crowds on the streets, religious authorities calling people to the streets to stand in front of the tanks for God's sake. Even right now when I'm writing this there is a call from the "minaret" calling people to the streets. Here I am, at home for two days, just thinking, remembering Leo and trying to stay cheerful but something happening on the street, a message from friends or comments from family members bring me back to the reality and what a sh****y world we live in. It's like a glimpse of war, and very hard to stay hopeful. What are your insights on this? How can one find a state of mind that is not affected by the social crisis that is going on?

hi my lovely family hope you are all doing fine ? can we discuss this topic, I don't mean suicide, can we do visualizations and affirmations , to leave physical body ?

@zasa joey I have been in situation like you. It is rather deep shit and it will not bee easy to get out of it. It will be hard and scary, but I doubt that there is easy way. I remember sitting, trembling with fear and wishing I was dead. But there were two fears for me: 1) fear of what I think I should do, 2) fear of my torturer (friends in your your case) . These two fears squeezed me from opposite sides and I have no escape. Then (when these two fears seemed to crash me like vice) I confronted smallest of them (fear to do what I thought I should do). And I went through this fear and saw that it was empty air. Nothing. My imagination. Bullshit. But this was my other fear that forced me to go through that thin air. I wouldn't be able to do this without help of fear from my torturer. People like me (and probably you) are not able to do the necessary job without inducement. Imagine that your friends would treat you with love, sympathy, acceptance. You would happily live further in your shit and blame everything and everyone for your situation. Your friends are such assholes with a reason. I don't recommend to kill them Look at what you know you should do but are afraid to do. Go through that fear. Or wait until your friends will push you through this (as I've done). And then you will say "thank you" to them. I don't know if meditation will help you. For me meditation showed what an asshole I am (I thought I am nice guy) and in what deep shit I am sitting. One of my best friends tried meditation and committed suicide after seeing what horror is inside him. Take care !

As always. In our interplay she dominates me & controls my emotions. I lose my complete autonomy. She gives me a panic attack. I feel near deathly. I went a good 8 months of no contact. We had a civil relationship for last few months that just climaxed last night in an ugly phone confrontation. it was awful. I feel as if someone just took my life force out me. & sucked my prana from me. She always controls my emotions --- I thought I'd passed this moment in my life. But I haven't. She's still able to completely make me feel the lowest I could possibly feel on earth. It's power in giving to her consciously. But not by my own permission. I don't want to feel the panic & the pain. But it's surging through me uncontrollably in this morning. Bc last nite. I think I just committed spiritual suicide out of self hatred.

I feel like the squirrel who didn't gather nuts for the winter right now. I also reverted to bad habits like in giant collapse backwards. Id lost 30lbs. Now getting heavier. Quit smoking. Began up again. Made new friends & was social & self loving. Now I'm isolating Im in a hole my finances are in hole My reputation feels like a sack of bricks it's not just the politics like I said That's just another outlet like smoking that averts my attention to my emotions I meditated today all day. But I continuously cried. It uplifted so much trauma. So much trauma. I meditated all day. I I still feel like my root chakra is unaligned. In fact. My only open chakras are the heart & third eye & crown. Everything else is is closed off. I I spoke to my ex today. We mended some things. I cried a little bit more realizing how much I really missed being in love & in a relationship. & knowing we'll never be the same. I don't want her back. But ut the pain is so deep. Its ran a core trauma wound from childhood. A family suicide. An abusive parent. On/off troubles with recreational drug use. In my end. Which I stopped. I wouldn't say I'm addict but a habitual avoider of my own pain & emotions

Life is a journey, from the second we are born. When I was 3 years old I started having panic attacks, Maybe even earlier but I don't remember anything before that. When I was 12 I started treatment for anxciety and depression. I am one of the rare people born with depression and anxciety issues and for years I didn't understand it or know how to handle it. Going through a very traumatic move from one country to another when I was 15 sure didn't help either and by the time I was 19 I had a burn out. I was done. I was finished I didn't try suicide or anything like that but a part of me did die then. I was done living with disfunction and I got serious help. I had to train my body and brain to become "normal". So in my early 20s I got really into self help and spiritualism (removed from all religions and dogma) I felt like a 80 year old, an old soul compared to my peers, but now I am 36 and I realise that there is SOO much that I do not know about being enlightend. You can never know, you can not even begin to imagine how cast the world of thinking really is. Two years ago I made a huge change by ACCEPTING who I am completely and totally. Faults and all. I dont care what people think of me, I am FREE. I still take meds for depression bbecause of the chemicals going on or lack of going on, in my brain but I feel amazing. I discoverd Leos video 6 months ago and I agree with so much of what he has to say. In the last year and a half I have started my own bussiness, gotten my health checked out, started being more aware.... My goals for the coming three months are to focus more on my physical body, and losing some weight, about 10 kilos. I sometimes feel as if my body isn't connected to ME if that makes sense. I want to LOVE my body. I want to deepend my relationship with other people. I want to inspire and motivate others who go through depression and anxciety, I want to empower young kids to be themselves!! I want to start living more outside of my head, be intouch with what is around me, and travel a bit and just generally get my daily life routine sorted out. My goals for the coming week are *Start doing pilates every day!!! *Tell people I love them more often. Really listen and to not judge. *I work with young kids and if I can just make a difference in one little girls life, and to make her feel STRONG I will be happy. *Make some to do lists (laundry, admin, house chorse ect) and GET THEM DONE instead of sitting in dirty washing for 2 months because I am too self absorbed in my own little world. Be more AWARE of what is around me. In the Now. EVeryone has different goals and mine might seem small but if you have been depressed, like me, you know that sometimes getting into the shower is an achievment. START SMALL and build it up. Baby steps, create new habits every day by making small changes!!

Masochism can have a wide variety of allures and it may be difficult to pinpoint the precise mechanism which leads you toward it but I can rattle off a few. Subconsciously you think you're shit/scum/unworthy and therefore when cuckholded that part of your self-image is confirmed and therefore you experience a more integrated self. There's no expectations of society or peers on you while being degraded so you can drop your mental guard and 'submit' fully. These things are actually pretty good( the results at least) however the results to achieve them seem to be out of alignment with your sexual polarity (or what you believe to be your sexual polarity) and therefore this causes you dismay and also some of the social stigma puts you off of it. This may also cause issues with not being congruent to your self-image. Not understanding or properly pursuing your sexual polarity can cause intense anxiety ie. trans people with high rates of suicide. Therefore, in alignment with the goal of self-actualization, you must seek to understand yourself. My advice: Get sex. Hot, nasty sex with plenty of girls. Be dominant with some and let others be dominant with you. This will ground your understanding of your sexual polarity in reality and not in whatever the internet pick-up videos tell you. You should still move away from intense femdom as it often relies on overstimulation and unproductive image programming but be aware and accepting of this general tendency you have. It's cool bro. I think some dommes are kinda hot in porn and I'm fine with that. At the end of the day, you've gotta do what feels right, the things in alignment with your highest self- don't be swayed by stimulation, rationalization or social conditioning.

Hi, I'm new here. I found out about this after coming across some videos on Youtube. This has really hit home with me. I feel like I'm at rock bottom. I spend my days breaking promises to myself that I'm going to turn my life around. I have struggled with journaling, typing, writing etc my entire life. I'm more than 100 pounds overweight and off work because of it. I was in a 12 step program for 11 years and relapsed about a year ago. now I spend my days smoking pot and worrying about world events. I'm extremely irresponsible with especially with money and paying bills. I recently sold the house I inherited from my father that I let get run down because I couldn't take care of it and moved to a brand new place that is farther away from family and I'm blowing the money I have left foolishly. I have a great idea for my career but I have stopped working on it completely even though my family completely depends upon me because I am the sole-provider. There has been a several deaths in my family, including my youngest sister's suicide a couple months ago. My childhood included physical, sexual, mental, and emotional abuse. Now, I find myself often in rages and yelling and lecturing my wife, my son and step son with long-winded guilt trips and anger outbursts. My poor habits have affected my wife. She has bipolar and has gained weight too.. It isn't always like this. We do have some good times together and are very much in love. But I have cheated and she knows. I also struggle with pornography but for the most part have lost interest in sex because I feel unattractive. I also have ADD and have just started back up on my prescription although I have never had a period in my life in which I have been able to get myself to take medications properly. I don't really have any friends and I don't really seem to want any. On the outside it seems I have my life together and I am a good father and provide everything he needs and spend good quality time with him, but inside I feel like a bad person, and worse, I feel like a terrible father and husband. I just don't know where to start.

Fck it I got nothing left lol.. I remember seeing writing in a washroom on the highway "Life's not worth living until you find something worth dying for" Les do, If we fail we have no safety net. This is very dangerous , fuck it I don't care anymore Nvm, I want life purpose for sole purpose of crushing others in body spirit and soul, in a heartless sense. Connection to oneness is when one gives the need for desire, wanting power means you feel powerless, love when you feel unloved. Charlie is right, enlightenment, a feeling of everlasting love. Should put the suicide thoughts away and simply be so free oh soo beautifully free. Peaceee infinite waters diving deep once again haha Infinite oneness, something nobody in life experiences, ego is so overwhelmingly greedy, hungry and bloodthirsty a terrible beast wanting to kill. Enlightenment, freedom

7578 sample of questions my mind randomly spits out Why would I motivate myself with the idea of presenting all I got done each day in a journal? That is inauthentic motivation. Do I have to rate information now and sort out whatever is not in alignment with my values? Is life really that short? Is time that limited? What will I regret on my deathbed? Which way to choose, since taking a bit of everything is about to make me fail again? Is my ego taking over (again)? Were all the feelgood states of mind I had during the end of my stay in the Netherlands just a by product of passive smoking in my student dorm? Or was I just too undercarbed? Or was it my brain changing through the new environment? Or just my euphoria after the dip, my recovery with actualized.org binge watch? Will I ever feel this way again? How much does ground cost? Where exactly am I going to live when my studies will be finally over? Not believe in anything that is not true? How can we even know? Does my ego only like knowledge because it wants to be labeled smart? Does my ego only like art because I had positive experiences with it from early on? Suffer just a bit by meditation to then shine around even though my life is still a mess? What is my tricky mind doing again? How do the others perceive me? How am I really acting? When was the last time I looked at my actualized notes? Or the last time I watched more than just the weekly episode? Why am I so unconcious again? uh-oh... Just like the metereologists do observations and predict the weather I could take a closer look at my life and do some predictions... But what I might find might mean that I need to change a bunch of things again. A bunch. Of things... I just want to be ok. This sentence sounds rather harmless. But it is actually terrible I just found. It is a mindset I fall into again and again. Not only does it usually not help much since it indicates nothing but the fact one is not in a good state but it is rather a complaint about reality on the one hand and the ego´s victim mentality saying: Oh look at poor me that has had it so hard all this time but I am so humble-all I want is to be ok (I am as well angry at life and very jealous of the ones around me that "are ok") on the other... So I guess I better say: Don´t feel guilt for wanting more than just being ok. Don´t find excuses for not working upon it. Don´t loose gratitude only because you want to feel better. Don´t say you don´t deserve or it is not possible to be more than ok-don´t limit yourself. Don´t just want to be ok. I admit-there is a problem. I accept reality. But I don´t just want to be ok. There is no motivation in "I just want to be ok". I just want to be ok came out of surviving and not growing. It is unstrategized, unconscious and non purposefull. This phrase is self actualization suicide actually... Yes, I wrote this entry without knowing what I would write about... Just pulled this out of my ass. How did you know?- You are very smart. Last Monday I accidentaly left my things in the males changing rooms at the sports center. But it was really early so nobody was there and nobody noticed... Except for me who came back to the female ones wondering who ubducted my shoes and why my keys were saying 633 when all there was is 700-1200 or something like that. Just hilarious-made my day. (^ ^)

@ArabiaNytes Hi, "ArabiaNytes"? One of the beautiful aspects of reaching 2nd tier cognition is the newly found ability to see who's real and who perhaps is going to be a possible drain our already limited and precious individual and collective resources. This important piece of wisdom goes hand in hand with an ability to discern and then embrace (or disregard) some ideas in favour of more fruitful, self-sustaining and wholistically nourishing attitudes and relationships. Skepticism is indeed a much needed skill to navigate the dream state of 1st tier deficiency modes of experience. However, while at the stage Maslow coined as "The Momentous Leap", according to the research one no longer need employ an attitude of skepticism, but instead lean toward a tendency of increasing "Witnessing presence". This witnessing is a much more advanced mode of processing reality, and therefore is a lot more accurate than mere "throwing bait" and waiting for a bite. A good rule of thumb that has served me well during my years of self-development is to pick as accurate a framework (or "Map") as possible, lest I become led on a wild-goosechase with some random and empirically questionable New Age pre-rational mindset, and inadvertently make my life more of a mess that it previously was! I'm extremely glad however that this very common catastrophe has not been the case for me So, as this map seems to be working for me, (and many other thousands of Intergal people) along with the help of a large community of mature self-actualizers and developmental psychologists (professional post masters degree psychologists, in fact) I have absolutely no problem recommending it to other aspiring self-actualizers who are serious about their own self development - and I mean serious in the capacity that their lives depend on it! Those of us who don't feel our lives depend on it are welcome to chose from a varied catalogue of other self-development maps that currently accessible to us in this day and age. Fortunately for those of us who DO follow this map and reach high levels of awareness, it becomes apparent to us that we can never define "people" by any random colour - but merely point out that certain cognitive patterns belong to certain levels of cognitive development. If you are unfamiliar with this phenomena I'd like to direct you to Alfred Korsybski's work "The Map Is Not The Territory" here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Map%E2%80%93territory_relation This will explain things in better terms than I have time to to at this point. Despite the obviousness at 2nd tier that the map is indeed not the actual territory,I hope you would agree that it is wise and sensible for relative convenience-sake to categorize, say for example, the great Manchester United F.C. as a soccer club of "Premier Division" quality. Mostly because of the obvious work, investment and skillset the club has developed over the years. If we can certainly define a premier league soccer club, we can certainly define a person's level of ego development. There is one developmental stage we currently know of however who flinches at the mere whiff of drawing any such hierarchical value judgements. This is the "green" or pluralistic stage of cognitive development. Unfortunately for us at this time this is the current centre of gravity in the academia world. While we continue to indoctrinate and churn out "en masse" this particular flavour of deficiency mindset based on the works of philosophers who collectively (but not surprisingly) had a high rate of suicide, while it is an indeed crucial aspect of the evolution of consciousness, it is thankfully not the complete picture. I hope that more and more of us are turned on by the cutting edge model of Spiral Dynamics and other such "colour coded" models of development, and wholly embrace their already tried and tested capacity to individually and eventually collectively pull us all out of the deficiency mindset and catapult us into a new transformative and radically inclusive way of being. I hope that you too will be able to join us also! Warmly Mal

Check out these two: Woods of Ypres - Death Is Not An Exit The bleak life and modern times Of grey skies and electric light Life... life... So life is precious, after all Respect the body, for it is all you really are Life... life... So life is precious after all Protect the body, for it is all that keeps you on We are confined, to the nature of reality Where the failure of our system, will be the end of our dream Between the fields of darkness, before and after we exist Earth is a spiritual place, but there is nothing after this. We were nothing... for a billion years before our time And we will be... nothing more again, for an eternity yet to come Whoa! Death is not an exit (death is the flick of the switch) Whoa! Death is not an exit (death is a flick of off the switch) The bleak life and modern times...Of grey skies and electric light In the bleak life and modern times...Of grey skies and electric light Woods of Ypres - Career Suicide We were born to live, in a desperate time Where it seems the death of dreams, is the end of life But we have only one life to live, just one opportunity And failure is not the end of the world, that's just society! Career suicide is not real suicide, Career suicide is alright Career suicide is not real suicide, Career suicide is fine We are all expendable, and we can be replaced. They have supplies of infinite lives, and no time to waste. But we have only one life to live, one time to exist And though there is no afterlife (after all), there is still more to life than this! Career suicide is not real suicide, Career suicide is alright Career suicide is not real suicide, Career suicide is fine Career suicide is not real suicide its not real suicide at all... Career suicide is not real suicide, its not the end of the world... Death is the failure of our parts, Failure is just the death of dreams There's more to life than suc-cess but only death is real... ONLY DEATH IS REAL! Death is the failure of our parts, Failure is just the death of dreams There's more to life than suc-cess but only death is real... Career suicide is not real suicide, Career suicide is alright Career suicide is not real suicide, Career suicide is fine Career suicide is not real suicide its not real suicide at all... Career suicide is not real suicide, its not the end of the world...its not the end of the world.

Of you course you are right I might have been too unspecific, I want to give a better definition of what i imagine to be the NEW version of a Universal Genius, a "Wholistic Human" Lets propose one Person is investing 50h per week into "A" ("A" is his main thing/interesst can be a business or science research or the likes ...) Now he could invest 30h more per week into "A" and make it 80h work in that area, become an expert, do that for 5+ years and expect to be "on top" of this field "A" (maybe getting several promotions / beeing head of department etc...) but i say what will happen is... (and i KNOW very successful people who exactly experienced this)...he will be burnt out/ joyless / depressive not only if he failed to reach all of his (neurotic?) goals but EVEN IF!! he reaches his goals, because the goals are 99% just sublimations for something else that person realy wants! he is neuroticly onesided! (in lack of a better word) The Alternative would be, to instead invest the 30+ extra hours into totaly unrelated areas, that seem to not benefit his "career" on the first look form our western goal-oriented point of view and short-term thinking what success is: -learning an instrument!! (Crazy! what? ..no! better communication between left& right brain hemisphere) -meditation!! (again better l&r communication, also more creativity, more "grounded" personality) -going for walks (reducing stress hormones, beeing alone) -investing in doing maybe 2 kinds of different sports, boxing and yoga or gym and swimming (awakening the body-intelligence) -having a fullfilling love-life & gratuitously help people ("total waste of time right"?? no! beeing emotionaly secure/connect ) In 5 years the same person, would instead of hoping for a promotion, have an amazingly expanded horizon and easily just start his own business/ create real value/ beeing confident of making his "own game" instead of trying to 80h/per week "suicide-working" himself to the top of a sick industry that means nothing to him really... So what i mean by "universal genius" is NOT learning about everything the mind can learn, but seeing that the mind is only ONE part of a human, and now learn about everything that is HUMAN! Investing in equal parts into intellectual work (which i still hold realy important im not saying to become a neanderthal ) , in emotional understanding, in creative expression, in love and comapssion, and in body & health ... a Person who can do THAT! is my defintion of the NEW TRUE UNIVERSAL GENIUS in the HUMAN sense! Because that´s what we are after all! PEACE! I know this might sound crazy but i think it is quite beatiful

I cant take this anymore, lately i,ve been having thoughts on suicide, i even cut myself, im so pathetic but pain is just too much for me to cope, i just want to live freely, efortlessly, all these chains, constraints, mental prison. I even dont know if it is fault of my genetics, or my past experiences, i dont know if im clinically depressed or not. I just cant accept myself, i want to but i just cant. i have too much limiting beliefs, insecurities, and my friends and everyday situations affirm it more and more. i feel like no one loves me, no one understands and accepts me, i feel like they are looking at me like pathetic human being, coward, worthless, and i feel like they always judge me. I can't just tell myself to change my attitude, to change my thoughts, i cant do that! jeez i wish someone could help me, all these people who dislike me, hold me in disregard, disrespect me, are looking down at me, i wish they could see the world from my eyes for a day maybe. Im already so fucked up with my self-esteem and all that shit and plus everyday they are adding up and up. I just really want to know how the fuck am i being perceived, how do i seem from distance, that i cause so much hatred and laughter. I just wanted to write here and release all this crap that i have bottled up inside, i cant even speak to anyone openly about this. now i sometimes consider what leo says in his videos, staying the fuck at my home, alone, doing nothing, not socializing, cutting ties, but then what? when im left alone, firstly my friends just wont get it. secondly, i will always feel like i ran away, that i couldnt achieve shit, that i coulndt make real friends and bonds, i couldnt gain respect and love from my friends and peers, i never had a girlfriend or fucked a girl beside a prostitute, i have never fought and got my ass kicked or i have never kicked someones ass, always running away and afraid of conflicts and confrontations, not standing up for myself. so thats why i just ran away, but how can i live on after that, how can i forget my past, how can i forget such a failure and worthless piece of shit i am. real coward! I should be living according to my own balls! but i guess i dont have them. thanks for your attention.

this is only another concept, but it might shed some insight into the nature of reincarnation. I think we as humans really underestimate our power. With the help of religion we are taught that we are simple beings under the control of a higher power which we have no chance of replicating. This entire existence is because of the contrast of nothing and something. The nothingness that makes up consciousness creates everything that we know. We are a creator. There was a study done in which people were told to think about a certain phenomenon (aliens, angels, god) before entering sleep paralysis. Of course the people that believed in UFOs and alien encounters were abducted and probed in a hyperrealistic experience. The people who strongly believed in God had a spiritual experience involving angels and heaven, or an image of Jesus. They all felt this was real, and that it really took place in real space. This is why there are so many different truths that are fought over, because something is real to everyone but not everyone can believe that everything is real. People become addicted to this world and their ego so much that if they leave too soon that attachment/manifestation has so much momentum that it doesn't end with the physical body. This is why suicide doesn't help people, the pain theyre experiencing doesn't end with the body. I think one of the benefits of enlightement allows you to break free of the physical and to experience it finally without attachment, which allows you to leave this existence when your body dies. In conclusion, we experience what we believe and create. These concepts might make sense and make me feel like I know these answers, but they are only that: concepts. I think reincarnation is just as real/not real as anything else you've created. All I know is it's fascinating to think about.

Is Suicide The Fastest Way To Enlightenment? This question demands that you know what enlightenment is. And do you really? I think Suicice would be the ultimate egoic act in many ways.

My Worst Fears 1. I’m afraid that I’ll never express my deepest potential and to realize how amazing my life could be. The scenario of my fear plays out like this! As a child, I was a highly creative and imaginative child who conveyed his imagination through acting, roleplaying, creative writing, and storytelling. I would tell everyone from my therapists, my friends, and even my camp counselors and my siblings my imagination and I loved immersing them entirely in my own imagination. I strongly identified with Buster from “Arthur,” Calvin from “Calvin and Hobbes” Alice from “Alice in Wonderland” and Belle from “Beauty and the Beast.” Yet as I grew older, I stopped expressing my imagination and I abandoned it in the graveyard of broken dreams, dead memories, and untapped potential where unexpressed potential dies and rots away. As an adult, I completely abandoned my imagination and childhood to become “normal” and I would mindlessly go through the day feeling deeply unhappy but not knowing why. I would be unconsciously trapped in a midlife crisis where I forgot how it felt to be happy and all those dreams and aspirations from childhood were never realized and died. As I grew older, I became more regretful and I started to realize how miserable and unfulfilled I was all along because I didn’t express my potential and I never truly lived. I wallowed in the mire of regret and missed opportunity and sunk slowly in that swamp. I wasted my life! 2. I fear being trapped in a dysfunctional situation permanently like a bad financial situation where I’m constantly trapped in the cycle of poverty and debt where my opportunities are completely limited. The worst dysfunctional situation for me would be the situation Jesse Ridgway is in where he is trapped in a dysfunctional family with a tyrannical father who forces his power on Jesse, who mentally abuses him, and who destroys his possessions and who victim blames his son and denies his anger, tyranny and being a psychopath. I feel like in that situation, I would stoop to such a low level that the cycle will continue and only worsen. I feel like the situation would end in me committing suicide or feeling deeply bitter and hating humanity and completely losing my optimism and exuberance. I feel like Jesse will have a damaged self-esteem that is beyond fixing, a deeply pessimistic outlook on life, a bitterness and hatred towards his father, rejecting advice and help, and a deep anger that will destroy him from the inside out. I can identify with Jesse’s passion for gaming and I want to be his best friend to help him lift his spirits, regain trust, and realize his own potential. I feel like my worst fears are becoming deeply bitter, angry and neurotic and being trapped in a dysfunctional situation like a damaged family, poverty, depression, self-loathing and inner pain. 3. I’m afraid of losing my freedom and individuality and being made a slave by my parents, society, or a master or by an oppressive government. A fictional scenario would be that I was kidnapped and made a slave and my masters killed my individuality by ripping away my culture from me and by ordering me to obey with the threat of punishment. My humanity would be denied and I would so silenced and censored that my freedom would be seen as damaging. My masters would tighten their control and their power over me and would reject the concept of freedom as a dream or fantasy! Even worse, my masters would delude me with the idea of freedom to keep me in slavery! I would be so controlled by rules, masters, and toxic beliefs that I’m permanently stuck. 4. I’m afraid of being trapped in a bad family situation or relationship situation. The scenario would look like this. For a bad family situation, I would have a cruel and sociopathic child who never expressed any love or gratitude for me, would scream at me all the time and order me around, would threaten and attack me, and who would say “I hate you and I want you to die.” The child would create so much emotional pain for my life that everything goes to Hell. I would end the day feeling drained and just wanting to burst into tears and to explode in rage and vent. For a bad relationship situation, I would meet a woman who had charmed me with her charisma but I discovered how toxic of an influence she was on me and how she tightened so much control on me. The woman would dominate and abuse me and shatter my individuality and force me to “love” her without truly understanding genuine love. I would become my wife’s slave and she would completely shatter my will and will resist my freedom. Someone like Amie Carter was in both situations of having a cruel and psychopathic child who abused and manipulated her and she was in a toxic relationship with her ex-husband who cut her and his child out of her life, spread lies about her, and blamed her for being a “bad mother.” My Four Worst Fears Simplified 1. Never expressing my creativity and rotting away my potential until it’s too late. 2. Being trapped permanently in a dysfunctional situation like a broken family or poverty 3. Losing my individuality and freedom 4. Having a bad family or relationship situation where I feel powerless. What all these fears are themed around is never expressing my own creativity or discovering my potential, feeling completely helpless when faced with a toxic situation, having no freedom to express myself authentically and not to fight back, and to be a prisoner who is completely robbed of my freedom. I’m also terrified of becoming a bitter and toxic pessimist who is angry, bitter, nihilistic and who feels like there’s no point in living. These fears also have the themes of self-expression, identity, and dysfunctional situations.

Suicide Is The Most Foolish Thing Q: Dear Gurudev, I have had thoughts of suicide many times in my life. What happens if one commits suicide? Suicide Is the most foolish thing a person can ever do. It is like, someone is shivering in the cold and he goes out and removes all his clothes. What will you call him? Foolish! You are already feeling cold in a heated auditorium, and you go out into the open and say, ’I am so cold’, and remove your jacket, your t-shirt, your inner garments and throw them all out. Will the cold become any less? No! People who commit suicide find themselves there because they are so attached to life. They are so attached to some pleasure, so attached to some joy, that they want to kill themselves. And when they kill themselves they find themselves in a bigger soup. They feel, ‘Oh my God, this restlessness, these desires which had created such intense agony inside me has not gone. My body has gone but the agony has remained. It is only through the body that you can dispel the agony and get rid of misery. Instead you destroy the very instrument by which you can get rid of agony. That is why this knowledge is so important. If you do pranayama, Sudarshan Kriya and meditation, you will realize that you are not the body. Dedicate Your Life For Some Higher Cause What is it that you are hankering for in life? Are you hankering for love? Attention? Money? Pleasure? What is it that you are hankering? These hankerings are boiling desires and they are creating this foolish idea inside you to commit suicide. If you feel you want to commit suicide, I tell you, I need you. I need you to do my work, so you better stay back. Dedicate your life for a social cause; for some higher cause. When you think only about yourself, ‘What about me, what about me’, then this is what happens. Depression comes in. Forget about yourself. Die for a cause but don't kill yourself. It is worth dedicating your life for something higher. I need you. Come here (to the Ashram) and do work. There is so much work to be done, help me out. Know that you are useful to me. If everyone else says you are useless, remember, 'No, I am here, born at this time because Gurudev needs me. I have some work to do for Gurudev. I am not going to commit suicide', got it?! So, do my work. If you cannot do yoga and meditation, then sweat it out and do my work. I have lots of work I can give you. I can give some work to the entire nation, and the entire population. I have plenty of work to be done. And whatever you need, I will provide you. You need a roof above you, I will provide you, I guarantee you this, but don’t kill yourself. The Human Body Is So Precious After so many different lives and different bodies you get a human body; a human birth. After being a worm, a frog, a scorpion, a chicken, a mouse somewhere in some hole, a cat jumping around here and there, a dog, a bird, etc., then you get a human life, after going through all those births. So it is very precious! Your Hankering For Pleasure Is The Cause Of Depression In You Wake up and see, all pleasures are momentary; how long will they stay? See that they are so momentary. Five to ten minutes of joy and then it is gone. What is it that you are hankering about? Some people appreciating you? My dear, it has no meaning. People appreciate you in front of you, behind you they feel jealous about you. That is what happens. They praise you today, tomorrow they criticize you. So what? Do you see what I am saying? What is appreciation? It is just a few thoughts that are passing through the mind of someone.Do you think they are going to do it forever? Some people have good comments and some people have bad comments, so what. If someone criticizes you, so what? Those who criticize you are also going to die, and you, the one being criticized are also going to die. One day all will be finished! So why are you so much bothered about somebody’s appreciation, or criticism? Why can’t you just be yourself? You know, it takes such a big load off your head not being bothered by anybody’s criticism or adulations. You can just be yourself; natural. And if you live like this, so lightly, then where is the question of depression? Do you see what I am saying? If You Get Thoughts Of Committing Suicide 1. Know that it is just your prana which is low, so do more pranayama 2. There are millions of people who are suffering more than you, look at them. When your suffering becomes smaller you will never think of committing suicide. 3. Know that you are needed, you are useful. You have to do something in the world. 4. Forget about what people think of you. People commit suicide because they think they have lost their prestige, their status. What status? What prestige? Who has time to think about your prestige? Everybody is entangled with their own problems, with their own mind. They can’t step out of their own mind, where do they have the time to think about you? These types of tendencies come because you think others are going to disrespect you. I tell you, it is worthless to worry about what the society thinks of you. Mainly, we must realize that suicide is the worst thing. This is one of the major reasons that we should conduct as many Happiness Programs as possible. Do you see what I’m saying? When you start the breathing exercises, it all goes away!

It depends on the mind and why you are killing yourself. For instance Jains kill themselves by starving themselves to death (Sallekhana), but they do it, usually, at the end of life. "When death is imminent, the vow of sallekhanā is observed by progressively slenderizing the body and the passions. Since the person observing sallekhanā is devoid of all passions like attachment, it is not suicide." In most of cases killing yourself will not bring you to enlightenment. Because the reason you are doing it is most likely tinged with hatred(of self), greed and delusion. If you have attachment to not being, or being, etc... that will obscure enlightenment. Now, have there been beings that have gotten enlightened that way? Maybe(depending on their minds/reasons)... but it is really, really rare, and not something anyone should consider if trying to reach enlightenment.

Is this the laziest solution to enlightenment?