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This is kind of a naive way to put it but imagine consciousness being this invisible barrier of "nothingness" spread infinitely wide across all directions and dimensions, where ever there is interaction that "nothingness" is the witness. The brain/mind is where separation happens because the mind is the thing that keeps account of memory and uses logic such as "past, present and future". So in theory you can say that the human body is a biological robot and consciousness is stealing all the witnessed perceptions, IT is the interaction of the two objects. Awareness is aware in of itself, just like how the sun emits light by itself. The body will die but consciousness won't, it's there forever stealing interactions from all forms. But you need to be careful with interpreting Leo's words because him saying "no brain, nothing exists" can come across as extremely nihilistic. Nothing is real, but everything is real at the same time, define real? what is real? Sciences already says that the foundation of everything is nothingness, the more you zoom into a particle or atom the more its "nothingness" there isn't anything there! And Yet here we are.... experiencing a human experience, so again, define what is real? We are in a dream, as a dream character we pointing at the sun and saying the sun is real because its there, forgetting it’s all a dream, and yet there is such a thing as the dream taking place in the first place. So when this body dies and consciousness re-joins itself there is no "this world", "this time", "this history" or "these people". To consider this reality as "real" is to consider all other possible realities as "real", it's only real because you're experiencing it right now... for now... As for saying there is no brain it doesn't make much sense to me, the brain is the receptor to consciousness, once the brain shuts down during sleep you lose all conscious experience of this body even tho the body is doing it's own thing, such as breathing, healing, disgesting etc. If you cut a receptor in the brain such as a pain nervous system then neither the body or consciousness can experience pain and therefore you can cut your limbs off and dissect your own body without a care in the world, and as Sadhguru if people didn't have pain in the body they would start to pull out their intestines and swing it around for fun

Yeah, nothingness and emptiness are words that can easily confuse, or even scare people. There isn't nothing. There is simply no thing. You only use the word nothing because you though there were things in the first place. I do kind of like the word no-thing-ness though. But these words kind of fall flat eventually because they first have to point to an illusion in order to describe truth.

No, it does not. You are misunderstanding what consciousness is. You haven't actually had a direct experience of what nonduality means. You're intellectualizing it. I know an enlightened master who took 1000ug of LSD after his enlightenment to test himself. He was unable to tell the difference between night and day. But his grounding in Nothingness was unshaken. Consciousness isn't a product of the brain. The brain is a form within consciousness, and as consciousness is the only thing there is, it is self-interactive. A rock hitting you in the head and causing a bruise is consciousness (a rock) interacting with consciousness (your head) causing a change in consciousness (a bruise).

Hey folks, I thought I was "enlightened before" but I wasn't... The final step took months but it finally came in the form of a very simple realization - there is no I to be enlightened. I had heard people talk about it this concept and thought I "understood" it, but experiencing it as a reality is a whole other thing. This video helped me a lot: ^ Adyashanti talks about this and nothingness (which is related to no self in my experience) in other videos

Sadly that is also incorrect. The truth is that ego is an arbitrary line we assign to things and cannot be fully sure if it’s gone. It’s not the light humans fear or that dark, but the void. To say that you are hanging on to joy shows you aren’t ready for nullity. It’s not thinking one knows, but knowing. Its a mistake to think that life is about being happy and productive, that’s the modern society’s view on things. To gaze out at all of it and fathom true nothingness is nothing short of crippling. It’s laughing in a sense at the absurdity of our existence and attempts to cope with the void. It’s not something you can prove but rather something you can sense and comprehend, it’s thinking but not with words or pictures but more of a sense. But isn’t that spirituality in a nutshell? No real evidence and just taking people at their word? A negative value to the void is an accurate stance to take when you strip any attempt at joy or happiness. It’s a weird phenomenon of sensing it’s not a desirable outcome, but knowing it’s the truth, and having all of it not matter one way or the other. Seeing that most of spirtuality is selling something they don’t have.

Beauty does in fact require meaning. Saying that everything matters though is a false statement because nothing matters. That’s the point. Enlightenment doesn’t exist and even if it did there is no point to it. There is no point to anything that we do. Meaning is simply humans pretending at something. Unfortunately you are incorrect. That fact that you are suggesting deeper shows an ego defense against true nothingness. All the teachers I spoke to say they would not recommend it unless death is your other option. It’s not the emotional high that you mistake for it. You don’t seem to grasp true meaninglessness if you seek to assign a positive value to it. It’s a state that once you reach it you don’t want it, yet in your bones you know that doesn’t matter. It’s not something I would expect you or anyone here to understand. This whole forum and website is stuck in the dream and doesn’t want to rip away what feels good. Nothingness isn’t about feeling good or peace, it’s about seeing reality for what it is and such a state tends to be hostile to the human mind.

So, LSD whooped my ass to say the least. I decided to take a breakthrough dose because I had taken 100-150ug doses before and handed them without a problem, even tho 150ug was starting to get difficult. So, I took the 200ug and instantly I felt as if I was dying literally. I began panicking and trying to hold on to myself but I was dying out really fast. As time went on reality started breaking down and eventually that is when death came. Reality turned into nothingness and I went back to nothingness. It was shocking, I died and left my body and went to the place where I was before I took this human body. There was just complete nothingness, and it was terrifying until the death swallowed me whole. This death period lasted probably around 10-20 minutes and then I slowly started regathering myself as an ego and it was the scariest thing that had ever happened to me but it was the best thing that ever happened to me. Ironic isn't it? My death was the best thing that has ever happened to me in my life. It felt like God grabbed me and tore me to shreds! Here is some of the insights that came up shortly after I came back from death. As an Ego, I try to put an anchor in reality to create a meaning in life and a purpose. There is no place to put the anchor How could you place an anchor where there is nothing there On the anchor I put my deepest sense of self on for me its: My ex GF, other unconscious beliefs/values adopted, my brother But there is no where to put the anchor because reality does not exist and the anchor doesn't even exist! Because nothing exists, I try to make something exist so I adopt beliefs and reinforcements to make myself feel that I exist I was struggling and desperately trying to find an anchor before i even met my ex gf Then later on used her as the anchor Now shes gone and there is no anchor Even though the anchor is illusory and was never there to begin with I used my ex gf to deepen my illusion Unconsciously But my brother as well I used many others as an anchor Anchor that is illusory and non existent My brother and mom made the basis of the anchor then everything else added onto it Of course each thing added on which proportioned differently My ex gf became a huge proportion of the anchor And i used her to make the anchor feel more real than ever but then she was stripped away and now my anchor feels hollow and empty again But she is an illusion she doesn't even exist i just tried using another ego to fulfill me as an ego Sports teams, video games, and many other hobbies Were also thrown onto the anchor the ANCHOR IS ILLUSORY AND DOES NOT EXIST! used my ex girlfriend's appearance as an appeal to my ego's anchor I also noticed that there is no difference between atheist and religious person. atheist : no god is my god religious: god is my god Unless I full go into the empty void and die, I will continue to use people on my anchor the brain itself is a hallucination 'Other' people are hallucinations 'Life' is a giant hallucination Overall, I understand that even though it was the most terrifying experience I've ever had, I must die again. My goal is to surrender myself fully to death without any resistance. Of course, this will take years and years of consciousness work but I know I can do it.

You are going into nothingness(in the end)before that you need to learn everything about yourself because all knowladge is self knowladge #Brucelee

Sorry but that simply isn’t true. If you experience anything besides utter nullify then you are stuck in the ego defense of projecting some kind of meaning. That is not what happened, it’s a gripping sensation and utter nothingness. It’s not a desirable state yet I knew in my bones it is truth. Anything else is just a mental defense to find meaning. It’s like what Albert Camus said. If you aren’t living with meaninglessness then you aren’t awakened. If you still see beauty and meaning then you see nothing.

Whole action born of no-thing or nothingness. Then your head will go missing hehehe?

Dear @InfinitePotential, Thank you for your pointers, they are very helpful. I purchased the book list and I have the first book in the Enlightenment section. I'll go back and revisit that chapter if you remember which chapter is that. I got some other 5 stars book too from that section, and some of them seem more intellectual to me and just keep repeating the same premises that the author claims. 1) So, people on this forum, with their medium of body and mind, typing their opinions and thoughts, are also like the apple example? 2) Is "Nothing is Everything" as a concept also something too, and liken to the apple example? Isn't all the understanding about Nothingness also another perspective, but not the Absolute Truth? Mostly importantly, the apple example is a very effective pointer, how is it reconcile with everyday living? Even in @Leo Gura's video, with all these deep ultimate understanding, it's made clear that he'll still live this life and fine-tune different facets of everyday life, how is this story different any other people who haven't reached that level of deep realization? Seems like there is still always business as usual regardless there's the deep realization of "we're not the body and mind" and "this IS Nothingness." Would love to attend some sort of real life interaction where people are fearless and authentic about exploring these questions together, without ego, without spiritual bypass, and without the simple brush off reply of either you get it or you don't...

all this nothingness talk, the truth is in front of your eyes, you perceive what is it ain't that complicated after all but the mind wants to and will do a million mental gymnastics before it will recognize what is so in a sense all this mental craziness is good, let the mind run a mental marathon eventually it will relax

If I can think about nothingness a bit more and reason my way into it... First book (I think) on the enlightenment section goes on to talk about how everything is Nothingness. For example, an apple is Nothingness. If Nothingness were somehow different from an apple then it would have that quality and be that which is different from an apple. Clearly, True Nothingness is not a blank state, empty space, non-existence, or anything that can be captured by a word, including Nothingness. I.e. there is a truth which is incommunicable and Nothingness is merely a pointer, albeit a favorite of mine. Additionally, clearly there is "something"... I mean here we are. I have difficulty reconciling this with my thoughts that there should be nothing (blank state, non existence, conventional nothing). This makes me think (sorry for thinking) that true Nothingness must be identical to Absolute Infinity. All that can be "imagined", any possible object of awareness, exists in potential. Okay I'm gonna go forget all this and let go of and transcend all concepts for a while.

Can you re-formulate this question? I'm having a hard time understanding it. Ideas are not masked by language. If you think that you need to 'plan' your use of language and its results are ideas to transmit - notice this: When you talk to somebody, you are not aware of the mechanism you use to talk. Your mouth and vocal chords move by themselves. You do not blow your lungs. You do not move your hands to tap your keyboard. They move by themselves. Try to align your mouth and blow your lungs to mimic a sound you make when you say 'vase'. Try to manually tense your muscles to produce a movement that taps letters 'v' 'a' 's' 'e'. It's impossible! You are (the) talking. You are (the) language. Language is hollistic. There is no you that is not language when you express ideas. The same goes the other way around. When you read these sentences, you are not piecing the letters together manually. You are not moving your eyes. You are the text. Everything you make of it is you. It appears out of thin air, just like that. That is the God's creation at work. You literally, physically, create me (@tsuki) out of nothingness. This is why there is no you. Everything you see is you. You are 'out there' not 'trapped inside with your ideas' behind the curtain of language. There is no language!

Hehe superhuman beings. It has nothing to do with being enlightened. To me it’s so natural and obvious. It’s strange how we make enlightenment some end goal or something. Like the ultimate achievement. When you are not it is. That simple. Nothingness is only difficult to the knower/known.

mood is a terrible measure, I noticed. my mood fluctuates a lot. and while I became more aware of good mood, the same could be said about bad mood. I'm much more conscious of those mood swings nowadays. it's a bit frustrating, because I'm now much more aware of my little moments of annoyance, frustration, boredom, nervousness, irresolution or disappointment. (one year ago I would have buried myself in distraction without even noticing) but how do I measure how deeply I'm grounded in Nothingness? I can see how that's the highest indicator. but how exactly can I 'measure' that?

@Sukhpaal @Leo Gura Is it fair to say that nothingness is like a camera that does not understand the image it captures? Like a video with nobody to watch it? This is what I imagine a trip-induced death to be. An experience so overwhelming that it cannot be named. Returning from that would be a life-changing event.

More like, your emotional reactivity. Mood is a terrible measure of growth. Mood changes wildly. You gotta ground yourself in something more long-term and stable. Like Nothingness. The truest measure of growth is how deeply you're grounded in Nothingness/Truth/You. Because Nothingness is the only thing which cannot be destroyed. Everything else is fleeting, including success, joy, health, wealth, relationships, career, friends, reputation, thought, or anything else. Even experience itself will end. But Nothingness will remain forever.

There is no way to get it short of enlightenment. This is the heart of enlightenment. Your mind cannot create a "sneak peak" of enlightenment. A genuine nondual experience is necessary. Also, thinking about nothingness will not get you to Nothingness. "Figuring it out" will not work. I tried that for several years and I wasn't even close. You are not going to think your way into enlightenment.

No problem! I haven't yet realized it in the depths that Leo seems to (have just watched about first 20 minutes of Hawaii mindfuck video so far... Lmao damn this 5 meo sounds nuts) as well as sages enlightened masters etc, but I've definitely had some brief glimpses of nothingness / void, maybe. And my intuition is telling me there is definitely something there. Or rather, nothing. Problem is, it's scary. But I believe if you can get past that it is infinitely peaceful and fulfilling, and is home.

I love freedom more then anything else. Is it ok to break social contacts with family and frends to cultivate This longing for freedom. When I'm in contact with pure sourse, I feel too happy to defind myself as a son, Brother etcetera. I like to be present in the now, without obligations to others. I Love people though, always friendly and loving. But I hate to be defind or defind myself or others. Osho Said at one point that he had been nothing for 23 years, I Love that qoute. I touch This feeling and insight of being nothingness every now and Then. I would Love to be total free, and rest in intuition and nothingness, transcendending oneself that is. Many of you can probably combine This with close connection to friends/family. But I Love integrity, I Love to live "secretly" where no one knows what I'm up to, not even me "myself" Can anyone relate, and is it ok to break contact because you Love solitude and Love to go with intuition at all moments in life with a minimum of aspects that can interfere with that. Or is it ego? Despite I want to arrange my life to be in a state of no ego. It's tricky, But I like to really minimize mundane stuff in life and purify and rest in love/happiness every single moment.

The best part about nothingness is that it shines.

Nothingness is not what you imagine it to be. It's the opposite. This word "nothingness" confuses most people.

@thehero It's probably wise to build a stable foundation before working on this stuff. My understanding is that enlightenment is only direct, first-person realization of Truth, God, Nothingness, etc. By becoming enlightened, it does not mean that you have mastered every aspect of life. While it does seem that having enlightenment experiences would alleviate some emotional trauma, you can't force an enlightenment experience to happen. It could be some time before you have an enlightenment experience, even if you dedicate yourself to the work. What would you do in the meantime? That's a lot of time spent waiting. Though I don't know your experiences or circumstances, I'd suggest that you think of learning and growth as not being all or nothing—rather a little bit of this and a little bit of that. Put most of your effort towards your biggest problems but don't neglect the little things. Practically, this could look like working predominately on your mental health, finances, and relationships, while at the same time beginning to learn a little about enlightenment. I trust you to know what's best for you.

Thanks guys! @OBEler It is quite complicating haha, the death brought me peace. My death was liberation, it was truth. It was terrifying at the start to know that there was nothing and all of this is a hallucination. But eventually I surrendered and went into the void. It sounds depressing that all there is, is nothingness but that is just ego talk. Being conscious of reality and the illusion of reality is the most glorious thing ever. When you’re conscious of reality you realize there are no problems with life and whatever problem there is out there, you just made it up. Everything is perfect right now, it doesn’t get any better than the present moment.