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I just about performed a facedesk when I read this. The reason the sun still rises, and the birds still sing etc when you have erectile dysfunction has nothing to do with us being indifferent to it, and everything to do with the fact that one is not directly related to or relevant to the other. If we were truly indifferent, would we have so many humans working tirelessly to cure erectile dysfunction through new pharmaceutical, neutraceutical and other implements? It's true that we're totally indifferent, and an impersonal force, but we're simultaneously a very personal sentient being, with specific agendas and capabilities. The laws as they are at least in my country(US), in fact define it as rape so this is a contradictory statement. You sure about that?

Cool man, relatable in many aspects. I would say there is both a romantic and cold calculated/impersonal aspect to approaching. It's important to balance those two. for example: don't get stuck on one girl or even a few girls (before a real relationship) but also constant and excessive approaching is no use. When your vibe is off just go home and return another day.

At this point, I have experienced so many identity shifts, I almost don't recognize myself from 10 years ago anymore. I have experienced deep shifts that touched so many parts of my identity, both in depth and breadth, so my ego died and got reborn so many times, I'm almost not that person I was at all. It took a few "complete" -- or more accurately, major ego deaths, and many other minor ones. Just when my ego solidifies enough, somehow the events turn in such a way that causes it to take a hit, or even collapse in some cases. I think this is the reason why I don't have a personality type. Unfortunately, this is not the case for most people. Most people don't really change, like at all, from birth till death. They're just born some way, and they gather some conditioning throughout their childhood and early teens, and then remain the same forever. The saying "Once a cheater, always a cheater" is very true, because it applies to most people. I think besides people who undergo spiritual awakening, almost no one really changes. It's sobering to realize this fact, because I don't want to be thinking that others can share the same understanding as I, and then find out that that's not true. What I've come to realize recently is that nobody, unless they're spiritually awake, will understand what I'm saying. They will only ever interpret it from their distorted lens/worldview. I don't think this has to do with ego development or spiral dynamics as much as actually experiencing spiritual awakening, because awakening opens your eyes to things that normal people aren't even able to see/perceive. The normal person is only ever able to see their selfish interest without any regard for "impersonal truth". For the normal person, it's always personal, no matter what, even when they say or pretend otherwise, or even when they adopt not taking things personally as an ideology. Even seekers cannot understand me, because they will interpret my words from the spiritual ego's perspective. So it's futile, unless the other person is awake to the same depth as I am, which doesn't seem very common. Not that I'm the most awake person on earth, as I have caught some more awakened signals. But that they're really rare, and getting rarer as I'm awakening deeper. As a lesson and a general rule of thumb: People are patterns of behavior. Once you identify a pattern, make your judgement, then put a permanent label on the respective person. This will make your interactions easier, as it will provide you with more clarity on who/what you are dealing with.

This is not silly, how else can you describe it? He is trying to explain something with human language, how can I explain impersonal awareness. People wont get it. Also, your mind and your language, all this philosophy are only on the way.... What if you do not have language? You would not know anything beyond your five senses. Splendid! I agree with you. It took me ten years to experience that. But yeah, I am not in that state permanently.

Do away with the consciousness framework and this isn't an issue. Simplify everything with the aim of having even a child understand what you are saying. Develop metaphors to do this if possible. From trippy times the breakthroughs created a sort of oneness which had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with whether there were other people experiencing. It had actually flat zero relation to the oneness whether they did or not. I can't actually describe that sense. Consciousness and the associated framework of learning is an ego trap, I am sure of it. Someone on here mentioned "impersonal consciousness" (I think they made the term up), which seems better but I doubt it could be understood easily. It's prone to being hijacked by an unruly ego to go off about lucid dreaming real life to give themselves all the power.

@axiom I'm okay, I've been feeling extremely different since this happened. I feel some of my childhood traumas have been lifted. It kinda feels like young me is being resurrected from the dead... I should just accept my entire 20s was a write-off. Yeah "impersonal awareness" might also work. It is literally just this:

@RMQualtrough thanks a lot for sharing. By far the most accurate description I have ever read. Some guys on this forum don’t understand impersonal awareness. how do you think your experience can help “others” to reconcile one vs many, aka my pov is the only real one. can you pls start another thread to help others to avoid any confusion? how to explain that when there is no you, there is no other. I am only struggling with one thing, how does something come out of nothing and there is no one behind the scene.

@RMQualtrough Perfect.That's it! The panic will subside. After all, who is panicking? All emotions are transient, just like the tides. Time isn't the only relativistic phenomenon. Consciousness itself is relativistic. Pratītyasamutpāda. The sense of an experiencer only arises in relationship to other (objects and thoughts). When it is seen that all is one, experience dissolves to nothing and you're just left with what is. Reality is an impersonal viewpoint. It is not, and never was, an internal experience.

For anyone with the time and the energy to read it, here's a very long paper published back in May which makes some very interesting points. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.704270/full If I'm understanding them correctly, they seem to be suggesting that ALL consciousness is objective and physical, and that it isn't actually "consciousness" in the way that we're accustomed to thinking about it. They suggest that subjectivity is an illusion and it is merely an impersonal relativistic viewpoint, NOT an internal experience. Sounds incoherent? Take a read. Would be interested in hearing the thoughts of the smarties here.

@Scholar Of couree, the Buddha said it best, that all suffering comes from attachment to impermanent objects. The names, labels and identity markers, Thought images, thought sounds, memories of pressure, texture, temperature, and outer sensations are no exception to the rule, all that relative stuff is just more impermanence. Once any person self inquires long enough and deep enough, then gets the 'no self', or 'true self'. All that identity of I am this or I am that, or this way or that way, stops being too serious, and you kind of get the impersonal side of detachment, or kind of get the compassionate detachment of those labels. At the spiritual level, at the deep end of the pool, especially at the masculine side of spirituality, these issues like gender dysphoria, are little, to non existent. However, very few at at that level, and fewer still will appreciate the detached, impersonal nature of a masculine sided spirituality like that, as most people at stage green development, in the hippie and new age communities, in left leaning politics and SJWs, in the Millennial and zoomer generation, are mostly exposed to feminine spiritual marketing don't see how serious it gets, sees those very serious issues, as nothing more than trivial games. Sounds harsh, sounds psychotic, but that's spirituality at the deep end. On the brighter side of things besides spirituality, it does depend on stage of development, moral and cognitive development, personality typing, states of consciousness, life experiences, domains of life, other lines of development, and other areas of societal development like technology, history, infrastructures ect... Yes, there may be small cases of body dysphoria that is born, similarly to chronic depression for those born from holocaust survivors, and assuming there's an over lap of negative effect that technological development of social media and phones have, plus narrative, and ideoligical misinformation warfare, we have a list of options to go from trying to manage and lessen the evil effects of social media on self image of children and teenagers, but quickly I'd still go for the option to build the infrastructure necessary for higher quality mental health treatments, and sex change surgery, in a regulated environment, which will lessen stigma and encourage an increase of people and training to do the operations. I think this is necessary, because if you don't allow for an environment that regulates for this, and instead discourage sex change surgery, then it decreases the quality of surgeons available to do the op, leading to higber risks of fuck ups in the process, harder access to thses resources, and furthering and maintain stigma around such topics for generations to come. Especially the body dysphoria and stigma, are very complicated issues to fix, because body dysphoria can manifest slightly differently per person, also plus the over use of social media. We can have schizophrenic body dysphoria teens, or autistic or psychopathic body dysphoria children. We can have peole who are very extroverted, so they don't realise until later in life they were suffering from body dysphoria, or are extremely introverted that they are acutely aware of it, but don't share that suffering to the outside world. We may encounter someone with multiple personality disorder, have body dysphoria, and multiple internalized roles of the self, but it's only one of the personalities that has it and not the main one and the person has their way of dealing with the body dysphoria. All that, plus the latest pop culture trend, rap music, soft rock, Tik Tok post, mean trolling comments or whatever. It gets tricky to find the exact root cause suffering per person as each one really has different cognitive types and developments to negotiate and compromise with. Each person also has different moral developments. Regarding empathy I'd be careful here, as I do have some empathy but I don't have enough to exactly change my state of being, to become that person so on this point I have little for people suffering this particular issue. I notice a trend with MR. Girl, and how he weaponized empathy against some of the people he speaks to, and because of his relationship with Destiny, and he's ban from supposedly a transphobic joke, and Mr. Girl's past conflicts with hos mom and an ex and hoenstly any person resembling a female, we have to be careful to not mistake his empathy as genuine, it could be weaponized and is influenced by those events. And he loves kids too much, so don't be excited to cite him as your main source of evidence too. Be careful.

Great talk for beginners but still quite superficial. Not to diminish or invalidated his experiences at all, but of course there is much further to go. Working through personal ego stuff, trauma release, etc, is an extremely important part of the psychedelic experience. But eventually, the ego completely collapses and dissolves. After that it's completely impersonal and more about reality understanding itself as a whole at a deeper and deeper levels. And I don't hear that Tucker is going that far. I don't hear it from anyone except for the obvious.

God is Both form and formless. Since God is unlimited, He cannot be limited to being either formless or having a form. Since God is everything, He must possess both form and formlessness. God is unlimited, and His form, consisting of eternity, knowledge and bliss, is also unlimited. Usually form is defined by limitations in space, so an unlimited form is inconceivable to us. It would be the same as formless. Still, for the simple reason that one cannot love the impersonal, unlimited feature of God. One can only love a person. Therefore we say that God is both the formed world and impersonal formless at the same time . You can't escape this problem. You can't lean towards one or another (form or formless). It's both .

I don’t know what “flow” you are talking about. The flow I was referring to doesn’t have any cognition of the so-called ego. If there is any ego there, it is not a true state of impersonal awareness. If you truly entered that state even once, you would recognize that there wasn’t anyone there to register this fact. You can only notice postfactum.

Any reasoning reinforces the observer and observation phenomenon. Notice it. “I think therefore I am”, means not your physical existence but rather a mental construct of the ego-mind mechanism. I am talking about impersonal awareness. How do you know is the reinforcement of the idea that there should be “I” and a knowledge on top of it. Anything revolves around “I” including your knowledge and all the philosophy is based on this idea. It is a self-perpetuated machine, never ending mind game. There is an access to the Truth without any egoic assumption of the mind. It is pure impersonal Being.

@melontonin You can see how it works on a small scale: ex. You think of think of drinking water ------> then you actually go do it and have the experience. ------ So we can assume it can work on a bigger scale aswell. Harder to do and to prove but we can get some hints. Ex. Manipulating your feelings, beliefs and mindset is already a form of law of attraction applied. By having the right kind of feeling, right now, throwing in the bin limiting beliefs, replacing them with better beliefs, having a clearer and detailed idea of what you want, you are in a sense, already closer to your goal. If you apply this priciples, tied with visualization for example, you'll start to get syncronicities etc., and those are certainly real, and are not mistakable for "random coincidences". Look at Jung's work for referance. This of course doesn't mean that you should be sitting for the fruit to fall in you hand, work and action is still needed, so as it is said: "God helps those who help themselves". no magic, this is being logical. This is true, but doesn't disprove the law of attraction, because reality is impersonal, but still structured by laws. In the Dream, you know the laws well enough, you can know how to use them, an if you know howw to use them, you can get what you want faster.

Why do you keep framing it like this instead of just saying "they're ultimately you". As long as they have a POV, it'd be better to say "they're real/imaginary in the same way that you are" to avoid misconceptions. Sometimes you get us thinking that our perspective is the Absolute and not just an infinitesimally small part of it. Honestly, I'd like to know why you feel this way despite being aware of how wildly different from you they can be. This is why the whole "others are you" thing hasn't really changed me much, if at all. Since Infinity is unknowable and an infinite mystery, "others" could be represented in a way that your character literally couldn't make sense of, and apart from that, you'll never fully understand yourself as God, which means others could be anything at all. And that doesn't necessarily mean that they are you since we don't even know what you are. You could say though that they're made from the same thing you are made of perhaps? Idk but this God thing seems infinitely impersonal to me. Watch out for it becoming an ego thing is my advice.

Consciousness is all well and good. But it is not God-realization. The point is not to realize everything is consciousness -- of course it is. The point is the realize you are the one and only God. To speak of form and formlessness is really missing the point. That's far too disconnected from your own Godhood. Be careful talking about Truth as something impersonal. It's YOU!

@Galyna when there is an impersonal sense of awareness time seems to pass neither fast or slowly, the moment seems to be totally out of time, it's hard to explain it in words. I mean...when you are having a great conversation which just flows and you get "lost" in the moment and in the reflection of "another", you can only make sense of time when you get back to the concept of time and try to make sense of it.

Time is a mental construct of the ego-mind. Time only arises when there is an identity to whom this time exists. I have noticed that when "I shifts" toward impersonal perception, times slows down vs when "I" focuses on the identity. Similar to undifferentiated attention that flows freely and does not stick on objects and things. Rather it becomes what it "sees" ( do you understand what I am talking about @Someone here? ) I am sorry if it is a bit convoluted. I've described it in my " Collapse of dualities" post. Have you ever become it, when you are looking at something/someone and the feeling of this dense "I" disappears? Inner and outer collapses into One experience which does not have any cognition of self. Einstein proved that time is relative in his Theory of relativity, time depends upon your vantage point, and so there is no single absolute time. Therefore, it is highly relative and hinges upon itself. It is highly subjective and therefore! it is an illusion. Let's even drop science....what is time truly? Memory that is created by the liner perception and sequencies of events. But everything that has ever happened unfolds right now in your field of awareness, do you agree with me? Time is a quality of consciousness so it can self reflect upon itself and create the illusion of physical reality. When people refer to the prove aka from the past like pics and things, they do not understand that illusion of physical reality unfolds as they go creating their past pictures and notions of the past events in their minds. Simple answer hides with the non-dual, non-liner perception. Have you ever noticed that the nature of Consciousness is "to become what it creates" Why do we even say non-dual? Because there is only One thing that can exist at a time, even though there are many appearances that "pretend" to happen simultaneously, but one is always being held within the conscious experience. Very simple to check, try to concentrate on many things at a time and see. There is always one primal perception and "other things" that happen on the background of it. That is the quality of mind to put tag on something it fails to comprehend. We do not have a direct experience of it, it is just a theory that does not hold any ground. Just bunch of symbols, do you agree with me? And yes, so true, because there is nobody there to be aware of it. The biggest joke of Lila. Bury the "character" and they will take "time" with them into the "grave". Sommie, you made a great point. Thanks for putting some time to explain things. But you have not answered my question from the relative standpoint. I was just curious how people perceive the flow of time when experience the impersonal awareness. Does it slow down or get faster for you? I agree with everything you say, but on the personal level, what has changed for "you" with awakening in terms of time flow. Thank you....

Guys, can you pls share what happened with your time perception after awakening? Either I am getting crazy or something has happened with time perception for this “l”. Last week was experienced as one day. But now for some mystical reason time slowes down. I have noticed that it correlates with impersonal perception. Seems like time is so fast when you fully become what you experience. I know there is no time, but if we talk from a relative point of view…is it normalcy?

Cognition is the biggest obstacle to Enlightenment. Atman is not a realization, it cannot be achieved, it’s always present, however, it is hidden! The reason you cannot become IT because your thoughts are superimposed on the Being (Amness/Atman) which in terms creates the illusion of ego, false knowledge of your true nature. “I am…” is the thought, root of all suffering and all the falsehood is dancing around this cognition, and enforced by it, by I AM something. Guys, I want to share with you step by step practice that helped to recognize impersonal awareness. Disclaimer: there is no doer in this process, there is no “I”, “me”, blah blah blah. Using these nouns to help others, no more, no less. Step one: Observer and observation: notice the thoughts and notice something/someone who observes them. This is your mind creating the split between the observation and the observer. Step two: Observer and the Void! State of mind where it masquerades itself under the guise of void. No thoughts state is still your mind’s games. One is creating the state of silence, another is watching that silence (both of them are your mind) . Still two! Notice it. Background. Space. The absence of any thoughts is still…..a subtle game. Still separation because one is noticing and the other is thinking, even this void, no thoughts is still a separation, meditative space in your mind is still a separation, because there is a cognition that meditations occur to someone, void occurs to someone, in this case minds pretends its void, it can even pretend to be quiet and non-talkative, but notice mind is still there, so funny. Still two. You and another you which still thinks there is no mind, aka some progress hahahah. I was stuck in this phase years and years. Step three: total collapse of the cognition, final surrender. In this state of Being, you won’t be able to recognize any void, any space, any observer with the observable. You become literally Reality itself. There won’t be any inner/outer separation. You look at the chair, you become a chair and observation of it, nut now you are aware and one. Observer is not there any longer. If there is still a notion/cognition or any separation, you haven’t got it. If any thoughts that follow/above/beyond this cognition is still a mind. If you are fully present, in the state of Being, if you become what you see, literally, you won’t be able to register “I” on top of the experience. There won’t be any room for the observer and the observation. It is nothingness! Awareness which is not aware of Itself! You won’t be able to register or observe any experience. You won’t have any cognition. But you will exist as an experience. How cool is that? The only way you will be able to register it, understand, cognize is a post factum, in the retrospection. But not when you are it! Because pure consciousness can only become either one, no two! It will be either the non-cognitive experience, or the thought ( I am the observer of the experience). Two different states of Being. You real face is in the absence of any image, experience, cognition. Just a pure non-dual awareness!

Ok. So I clicked this thread because I was baited by the title, right. I read your statement, "Gives me chills that this kind of romantic interaction exists and is actually possible." Did a little internal chuckle, my pride showing there. "They can't be that special." Interesting that I preemptively diminished the greatness of others. Was I feeling threatened somehow? I start watching. I'm impressed by Eben's ability to connect his feelings to his body. I tend to imagine feelings as omnipresent. But he would pinpoint them, so now I'm wondering if there's more for me to learn. Still not amazed tho Annie begins speaking. I'm immediately floored by the ridiculous amount of responsibility she's taking. When Eben spoke, he seemed to just say the event trigger and then the brute facts of what he experienced. With Annie, she spoke more about her self image and all of her reported sensations had a personal twist. Shame, for example, is such a dynamic emotion. She's wrestling with the emotion. Whereas Eben would speak of his feelings as though they were parts in a machine (at one point he said "black and white needles," etc.), it felt more impersonal with him. 8:48 comes along. I have to fucking pause. Jesus. "I need you to tell me that it's ok to be sad" ... "your sadness is beautiful" Bro I'm not crying, you are ????? Ok, you win. It hit me too. One thought I had in hindsight is that, Eben's overexplaining after the emotional release killed the magic a little, but perhaps it was necessary for a room full of clients. It's weird to think that this whole thing was, despite being very real, also in some ways a drama for the audience. That is the nature of public talks. If Eben really sank into the silence (which is what my intuition says would've been best) and allowed Annie to express even more, the love between them would've grown even higher. But unfortunately the audience doesn't have that kind of patience. Perhaps even deeper, and now I'm projecting, but I felt that Eben did an oopsie around 10:55 when he recounted his wife's vulnerability as "not coherent" and "not going anywhere." Look at the stiffness of her face for the next 20 seconds after that lol. It seems to me that in this clip, Eben still put too much of a subtle emphasis on "fixing your wife's sourness." He says "your sadness is beautiful" but then basically lectures to the audience about how he managed to "fix" Annie's "incoherent" narrative. The victory of the mood change was capitalized on, turned into content. Furthermore, Annie JUST said that she felt like her voice was not given a chance to speak as much, and yet he just monologues after her moment of vulnerability. Did he really even register what she said? Hence, at 13:58 when he asks, how are you feeling, she fakes the reply, "Great!" But then admits that she was lying, but then lies again by saying "I feel soft." Because she feels like she can't bring up this same issue again. She has to save face for the seminar to keep running. She has to keep pretending she's not sad. Well, this was 2012 lol. I'm sure a decade has made them significantly wiser to each other's needs

It is common to ask, "How do I know that I am not just making all this stuff up? How can I talk with someone who is only a figment of my imagination?" It is nearly impossible to produce anything in the imagination that is not an authentic representation of something in the unconscious, you are talking with your various selves, that is the whole point, the figures are autonomous, this is something we do not want to hear as it is a frightening reality to know that we are not the master of our house. Active imagination does not only have to do with immediate issues in our personal lives, but can also take the form of a mythical adventure, a journey into the archetypal realm, setting foot into a land of evil, taking on a heroic quest to heal the sick and wounded and helping an innocent queen. Each of us has all the great archetypal themes hidden inside, however few of us can actually partake in this great primordial energy within us unlike our primitive ancestors. This kind of active imagination connects us to the timeless cosmic dance of the archetypes that goes on eternally in the unconscious. It is a way of discovering how those universal energies flow through us as individuals and express themselves in a unique and special way within our individual personalities. Jung's technique of amplification helps to interpret these images by using mythological, historical and cultural parallels in order to turn up the volume on the fantasy material. Four-step approach on how to get started with active imagination: *It is important to find a convenient way to record the imagination as it flows out, many give up before they get started because they can't figure this out - your inner dialogue should be written, types or recorded, this is your protection against passive fantasy - the writing will help you remember and digest experience. You should not try to dress up your imagination and make it sound impressive incase someone happens to read or listen and it is something you do for yourself. The goal is to experience and record whatever flows out of your unconscious, honestly, in it's role, spontaneous - there must be a room that is quiet and private enough to shut out the world, a half an hour, and you must be alone without disturbance. You are entitled to that freedom, privacy and security, you need it in order to make your journey into the inner world. You should feel free to let out your raw feelings or emotions without worry. The first step in active imagination: Invite the creatures of the unconscious to come up to the surface and make contact with us. Every interaction helps up to develop the organs of perception of the imaginal world. We often have something vague and invisible in the unconscious that bothers us, we can feel the conflict below the surface, but we can't see what it going on - we can't associate it with anything specific. Some times it is an inexplicable free floating anger, we can't say why we are angry or at what, we just feel it, moods, worries, depressions, inflations and obsessions all come. When this happens you can go to the unconscious in your imagination and ask the unseen content to personify self, you can start your active imagination by asking: Where is the obsession? Who is obsessed? Where does this feeling come from? Who is the one inside me who feels this way? What is it's image? What does he or she look like? If you do this, an image eventually comes into your mind - we invite the inner persons to start the dialogue. By taking our minds off of the external world and focusing on the imagination, we can direct our inner eye to a place inside us, then we wait to see who will show up. To invite the inner figures we need to empty the ego mind, we clear the mind of all thoughts of the external world and simply wait with an allured and attentive attitude to see who or what will appear. If you see someone, you can begin by asking: Who are you? What do you want? What do you have to say? You dialogue begins - surrender yourself to the experience and don't try to control or push the imagination in any direction. If you have fantasy material that has been in your mind all day, you can assume that it is expressing one of the main conflicts where psychic energy is concentrated in you. You can begin by going to that specific place as a starting point for active imagination instead of passively watching the same fantasy repeating over and over, you carry the material forward. You can also start this by embodying one of you inner figures and assume their consciousness, or make you invitation by going to a symbolic place in your imagination. There have been a few days when I walked and walked and almost nothing happened, sometimes you grow weary walking but generally if you go to the inner place and search you'll find someone waiting for you. Jun also found that active imagination could be used for understanding dreams - if you have a recent dream that you recall or a reoccurring dream, you can extend the dream by imagining where it left off and in this manner you can continue and interact with the dream bye extending it out. This is a legitimate process as the dream and imagination come from the same source in the unconscious. It allows you to continue the story and go to the next step the dream is leaning towards and bring the whole issue to a resolution. Dreaming increases when one does active imagination, the issues that would be presented in dreams are confronted and worked out - as such dreams become more focused and concentrated and less repetitious. For dreams to not waste your time, Jung used to describe this method for people who were too overwhelmed by intense and frequent dreams. You have invited the unconscious, the images have risen up into your imagination, now you're ready to begin the second step. Below the willow tree Is where I hide the darkest parts of me They're hiding underneath The broken lies that I just still believe Below the willow tree Is where I sit and hate on my enemies I drown 'em in my dreams I think it's me who needs some humility The dialogue: This is to give yourself over to the imagination and letting it flow, to let the inner figures have a life of their own in your imagination, you begin to talk and interact with beings who answer back. They express different viewpoints from those of your conscious mind. They tell you things you never consciously knew and express thoughts that you never consciously thought. To begin the writing process, the alterations must be noted for they reflect the psychic processes in the unconscious background which appear in the form of images consisting of conscious memory material. In this way conscious and unconscious are united. By focusing on your writing, you concentrate and experience the active imagination more deeply, protection you from wandering off into passive fantasies that creep in from the edges of the mind. Often the inner person will lead you off on a path, if you feel that it is wrong to follow the person you have the right to say so, that in turn will often lead to a heated discussion of the conflict between this inner person and yourself. The dialogue has begun and the different parts of the self are learning from each other. Most people do a fair amount of talking in active imagination, exchanging views and trying to work out opposing views, even asking for advice from some very wise ones who live in the unconscious, however not all dialogue is verbal, it can also take the form of images that speak to you without words. It is important to stick with the image that we start with and not allow one's self to be distracted by other fantasy material. It may take days, weeks or even years for certain fantasy to be resolved, you must be present with your feelings and sense that it is actually happening. You're not merely an observer, but an active participant. Do not try to dominate or manipulate a conversation either, active imagination is a process of listening either to the words or the images. After so many years of ignoring these parts of ourselves, we find they have some unpleasant things to tell us when we finally listen. They may also appear as frightening and threatening; this is your golden shadow which you must wrestle with to find you undiscovered potential. We must turn a friendly face to the unconscious and it is when we listen and give them time to express themselves that we can gain new insights that can be integrated into our conscious life. We know that the mask of the unconscious is not rigid, it reflects the face we turn towards it - hostility lends it a threatening aspect, friendliness softens it's features. The ego is a small island surrounded by deep unseen ocean of energy where huge forces are at work. Active imagination is underwater diving. Though our ego is small, we shouldn't take everything the inner figures say as authority, that will be just as one-sided as our ego centered approach. Active imagination starts out from affirming that the unconscious has it's own wisdom, it should not be confused with guided meditation practice which seeks to program the unconscious so that it will do what the ego wants it to do - there is no script, you will have to go your own way, which is both terrifying and exhilarating. You must ultimately walk the path alone. The values: Ethics means proper conduct, it in tern derives from the Greek word ethos, meaning the essential spirit of a person or people. I It sets limits to protect the imaginative process from being inhuman or destructive. The Universe is awesome and beautiful, but it's forces behave in a way that is amoral. They are not concerned as we are with this specifically human value of justice, fairness, service to our fellow humans. These primitive archetypes serve a realm close to the instincts. The do not have a superego, socially appropriate behaviour. And since the creature who arise in our active imagination and personifications of the impersonal forces of nature, it is we who must bring the ethical into active imagination, but not all archetypes are like this. Some may be concerned with human values, some may be concerned with human values like love and moral responsibility. There is truth and wisdom in every figure that comes to us and they help us compensate the one-sidedness of our ego. It is as much the ego's duty to bring reasonability as it is to tend to the welfare of our fellow humans in the outside world. The images of the unconscious plays a great responsibility upon a man, failure to understand them, shirking our responsibility deprives him of his wholeness and fractions his life. The rituals: To bring the active imagination of the abstract level, we must give it the concreteness of immediate physical experience, the most important step of all is for the images of the unconscious to find their place and purpose in one's outer life. Don't take our conflicts and urges and try to live them out externally or literally by projecting onto external people. For this reason it is important that one should not call to mind the image of those close to us and start talking with that person in one's imagination. It is confusing the inner with the outer reality. If asked the inner figure will almost always cooperate and alter his or her appearance, you can then enter into your dialogue with a clear sense that you are talking with a part of yourself and not an external human being. To incarnate the experience we must do a physical ritual or integrate what we have learned in our daily life. This can be taking time alone to be aware of one's feelings, lighting a candle or incense, walking, reconnecting to the physical world, making it tangible with art, etc. Jun's ritual was the calligraphy and art in the Red Book, which occupied him for many years. He took his communication with the unconscious seriously and valued it greatly. Each ritual must be custom made out of the raw material of your own inner self. Keep your ritual small and subtle and they will be more powerful, the best rituals are physical, solitary and silent, these are the one's that register most deeply with the unconscious. Ritual in it's true form is one of the most meaningful channels for our awe and sense of worship, this is why ritual came spontaneously into being among humans in all parts of the earth - this is why modern people were deprived of meaningful ritual feel a sense of emptiness, they are denied contact with the great archetypes that nourish our soul life.

ESTJ ESTJ: The Director (Extraverted, Sensing, Thinking, Judging) ESTJs are often described as logical, take-charge kind of people. They are assertive and are very concerned with making sure that things run smoothly and according to the rules. They are committed to tradition, standards, and laws. They have strong beliefs and possess sensible judgment, and expect that other people uphold these same principles as well. David Keirsey, the creator of the Keirsey Temperament Sorter, suggests that the ESTJ personality type is the "Guardian Supervisor," one of four "Guardian" archetypes (Supervisor, Inspector, Provider, Protector) Key ESTJ Characteristics Individuals with this personality type tend to place a high value on tradition, rules, and security. Maintaining the status quo is important to ESTJs, and they often become involved in civic duties, government branches, and community organizations. Because of their orthodox approach to life, they can sometimes be seen as rigid, stubborn, and unyielding. Their take-charge attitude makes it easy for ESTJs to assume leadership positions. Their self-confidence and strong convictions help them excel at putting plans into action, but they can at times appear critical and overly aggressive, particularly when other people fail to live up to their high standards. People often describe ESTJs as predictable, stable, committed, and practical. They tend to be very frank and honest when it comes to sharing their opinions, which can sometimes be seen as harsh or overly critical. Strengths Practical and realistic Dependable Self-confident Hard-working Traditional Strong leadership skills Weaknesses Insensitive Inflexible Not good at expressing feelings Argumentative Bossy Dominant: Extraverted Thinking ESTJs rely on objective information and logic to make decisions rather than personal feelings.4 They are skilled at making objective, impersonal, and impartial decisions. Rather than focusing on their own subjective feelings when they are making judgments, they consider facts and logic in order to make rational choices. People with ESTJ personality types tend to be very practical. They enjoy learning about things that they can see an immediate, real-world use for, but tend to lose interest in things that are abstract or theoretical. ESTJs enjoy concrete facts as opposed to abstract information. They are good at making fast and decisive choices, but they may often rush to judgment before considering all the information about a situation. One positive side, this trait makes them good leaders, but it can sometimes lead them to being viewed as harsh or abrasive. Auxiliary: Introverted Sensing They are good at remembering things with a great deal of detail. Their memories of past events can be quite vivid, and they often utilize their recollections of past experiences to make connections with present events. Because their sensing function is focused inwardly, they tend to be less concerned with novelty and more focused on familiarity. They enjoy having habits and routines that they can depend upon. While this gives them stability and predictability, it can also make them stubborn and unyielding at times. Tertiary: Extraverted Intuition This aspect of personality seeks out novel ideas and possibilities. It compels people with this personality type to explore their creativity. As they process new ideas and information, they may explore the possible meanings in order to spot new connections or patterns. This allows them to look at incoming information and recognize that there may be more than one interpretation or possible outcome. Inferior: Introverted Feeling When this function is used, it may lead ESTJs to make decisions based more on feelings than on logic. These are often internal valuations that lead to "gut feelings" about some situations. While this function is not used as often, in some cases a person might allow their subjective feelings to override their objective interpretation of a situation. ESTJs tend to give much thought to their own emotions, so this function often operates on a largely unconscious basis.. Personal Relationships As extroverts, ESTJs are very outgoing and enjoy spending time in the company of others. They can be very boisterous and funny in social situations and often enjoy being at the center of attention. Family is also of the utmost importance to ESTJs. They put a great deal of effort into fulfilling their family obligations. Social events are also important and they are good at remembering important events such as birthdays and anniversaries. They look forward to attending weddings, family reunions, holiday parties, class reunions, and other occasions. One potential area of weakness for ESTJs is their tendency to be rigid when it comes to rules and routines. They take their own opinion quite seriously, and are often less inclined to listen to what others have to say on a subject. Career Paths Because they appreciate order and organization, they frequently do well in supervisory roles.4 When in such positions, they are committed to making sure that members of the group follow rules and traditions and law established by higher authorities In school and work situations, ESTJs are very hard-working and dependable.4 They strive to follow directions to the letter and show a great deal of respect and deference for authority figures. They are thorough and punctual about completing their work, and rarely question or complain about the work they have to do. ESTJs have a wide range of personality characteristics that help them excel at a number of different careers. Their emphasis on rules and procedures make them well-suited to supervisory and management positions, while their respect for laws, authority, and order help them excel in law enforcement roles.. Popular ESTJ Careers Police officer Military Judge Politician Teacher School administrator Business manager Accountant Banker Friendships People with this personality type are sociable and enjoy getting their friends involved in activities that they enjoy. ESTJs often value dependability over almost everything else. If you are a stable friend who sticks to your commitments, you will likely be able to forge a strong friendships with an ESTJ. Parenting ESTJs children tend to be very responsible and goal-directed, but be cautious to avoid placing too many expectations on your child's shoulders. They enjoy structure and routine. While they are good at being self-directed, they still need guidance and rules to give them the security they crave. Relationships ESTJs are dependable and take their commitments seriously. Once they have dedicated themselves to a relationship, they will stay true to it for life. They tend to avoid emotions and feelings, which can be difficult for their partners as times. While they may not express how they feel through words, remember that they will often convey their emotions through actions.

I'm taking Adya's "Fierce Love" course, and he's also saying that ultimate reality is beyond love, but that love is one of the first manifestations of ultimate reality. That's represented by the map of consciousness too. At the top of the map, you have pure consciousness, which is an infinite field of potentiality that manifests as peace, joy, and love. Ultimate reality is not indifferent; it's impersonal. The view of God as indifferent is at the level of pride. However, at the top of the map, God simply is. The point of life is to become more like God and manifest peace, joy, and love. To do that, you need courage. Courage alone is powerful; it's the foundation and it's connected to all of the other noble values of humanity: integrity, honesty, unity, truth, peace, joy, and love. When you listen to interviews with Rowling, she talks about her value of courage. And we all know the impact she had. Ramana's definition of enlightenment was "absolute courage in all situations."