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God is everything, emptiness/nothingness is the door. You cannot conceive of the whole except by way of emptiness. Donald Trump will born again in a body of bones and flesh, Ramana Maharshi will not. Hindus believe in God and the soul. Jainas don't believe in God at all but only in the soul. And Buddhists don't believe in the soul or God either. But about reincarnation all three agree — even Buddhists agree, who don't believe in the soul. A very strange thing…then who reincarnates? Even they could not deny the phenomenon of reincarnation, although they could deny the existence of the soul; they say the soul does not exist but reincarnation exists. And it was very difficult for them to prove reincarnation without the soul; it seems almost impossible. But they found a way — of course it is very subtle and very difficult to comprehend, but they seem to be closer, the closest to the truth. It is easy to understand that there is a soul and when you die the body is left on the earth and the soul enters into another body, into another womb; it is a simple, logical, mathematical thing. But Buddha says there is no soul but only a continuum. It is like when you kindle a candle in the evening and in the morning when you are blowing it out a question can be asked of you: Are you blowing out the same light that you started in the evening? No, it is not the same light, and yet a continuity is there. Buddha says that just as the candle flame is not the same — it is changing constantly, although in another sense it is the same because it is the same continuum — exactly like that, there is no soul entity in you like a thing but one like a flame. It is continuously changing, it is a river. Nirvana means to extinguish this illusory flame of life.

Hey, I have a few questions and hope you can give me some answers 1. If God is emptiness/nothingness, how can "it" have attributes like Love or Consciousness? aren't these some-things and not no-thing? 2. If reality is infinite, does Hogwarts , Gandalf/middle earth and The Force from Star Wars exist? 3. Does it make a difference if you die as Donald Trump or as Ramana Maharshi? If yes, which difference? 4. What is the Atman? Is it a personal Soul bounded to a specific human? But that wouldn't make any sense since only emptiness/brahman exists?

Good question. Let's first differentiate between mind and consciousness. Mind = talking, emotions, thoughts ... Consciousness = You .. The non-located no-thing experiencing the mind. Your mind/brain/ego is of course separated from mine because your brain is at another location in this world. Now here comes the really strange part. You are the self-aware non-located no-thing (consciousness/nothingness) experiencing one....... mind. I am ,,,,,,the self-aware non-located no-thing (consciousness/nothingness) experiencing another mind. So You are I and I am You. The Law of One. We are all one. Unity. etc etc etc Two ways to attack the problem: - We are One, but yet, this Infinite One has infinite minds attached to it and it can only experience one mind at a time. - We are One, but yet, this Infinite One splits itself up into many finite One's, which each has a mind attached to it. You are one part of the Infinite One, I am another part of the Infinite One. Both ways can't explain reality fully though. They are both lackluster. So the question: "Why do I have this experience and You have another experience" can't be answered. If it could be answered fully, then reality wouldn't be infinite.

"The goal of the game, is to spiral out of the game, and to Attain the True self for higher experiences." What if there are no ultimate goals? Life is a game. You can never stop playing. You can die/kill yourself but this is merely like a piece in Ludo that dies, and then God rolles a dice, wooah it's 6, new piece comes in. "I also wonder rather people do not experience already that they are multi "incarnated" intelligences? That are converting different planes of existence already through their "Dreams" that are to real to state to be a dream, feeling parts of them die as if family died, which is just another part of them on a different plane of existence." What you call The True Self was never born so it could never die. It's not a thing. Yet, Nothingness is what you are, yes you. It's this nothingness that experiences everything. It's also out of nothingness that every experience is created. And thus every experience happens "inside" nothingness. "The true star of the game, your True self, is the Supreme that governs all your worlds. Your true self is your ultimate guide and protector in this game." A true star, an ultimate guide, a protector? Interesting properties to give nothingness. But whatever floats your boat. "So let this article be a call, knowledge for your True self, a signal that this all is grand scale and highly complex." Yes, reality is infinitely complex... not just "highly complex". Knowledge is for mind, not for the True Self. The mind has knowledge which it can store and proces, which the True Self then experiences. "I am saying that there is no vast source, so for example its more likely that those believers in that we come from monkeys, themselves were once monkeys and other animals in form of intelligences (spirit), and find it plausible that all came from apes, it is more likely that that is true, then that we actually truly come from apes. Awareness was already, so one of those people might have had some experience about previous creations of himself, and accidentally believed it was for all. Comes up with a logic and so on. And is at that moment just in yet another game." Just like your ideas here is another game. Those "believers" .. "themselves" were once "monkeys" Which believers? Who is it inside a biologist that may once have been a monkey? ... Actually I think my main problem with with this discussion, is that I simply don't see the point with this thread:D Just like I haven't seen a point with any of your comments posted on this forum so far. I have thought about putting you on ignore, because everytime I read a post from you, I feel like I have wasted time. Just like I have done now. Jeez.

Motus, you sound like you got it all figured out. My advice to you: - Sit down and ask yourself if you really understand who you are, and how the "game" functions. Could it be that it's all just ideas in your head that are actually hindering you on your path? You seem to be pretty attached to these ideas you postulate here on this forum. Try to become deeply aware of the fact that all you post here is just that: ideas created by your mind. And then embrace reality, embrace the not-knowning, and dive into it... It's when one fully incoporates the"I actually don't know -- I have no clue -- but I'm open to whatever it might turn out to be"-mindset into the heart that true greatness can be allowed to arise out of nothingness. Frustration and fear may be the first reactions though, but it'll pass. I can recommend "The Book of Not Knowing" by Peter Ralston. I for one haven't bought Leo's booklist, but everyone knows this book is on the list as Leo has has given credits to Ralston in some of his videos.

This is one of the most comprehensive video on the subject on porn. You will understand how your biology is fucking you up, porn addiction has a tremendous power in our brains. Attraction between males and females are one of the most sacred events on earth, it's an allegory of the dance between opposite forces, nothingness and infinity, above and below, negative and positive, fire and water, consciousness and matter, coming together to realize the Oneness. Kind of new agey though very true. When you don't have confidence, when it's not natural and flowy for you to have sex with girls, fapping to porn robs you of your power to actually go and see them, have pure feelings for them, have confident sex with them. I'm telling this from what I've lived, what I'm living personnaly. Oh and stop telling yourself that it's a sin to have sex before marriage. If you're into spiritual stuff, for sure sex is sacred and should be performed only with someone with which you have a deep connexion, and girls love it only that way really, they can't stand porn-like sex, they'd be glad to be taken roughly but only by someone with which she could share parts of her heart. Then you should have sex with as many girls as possible that you would be glad to have as your wifes and who love you deeply. But you shouldn't lean onto those kinds of beliefs to stay in your comfort zone and fap to hardcore porn whilst saying that sex before marriage is a sin. This is nonsense to my ears. Don't you feel the cognitive dissonance ? What I would personnally advise is to watch videos from Real Social Dynamics, rsdfreetour / rsdtyler /julienhimself/ rsdmax on youtube and mostly practice getting out of your comfort zone. I used not to have a clue about what was going on, now I know the basic structure of human interaction from biological, psychological and energetic points of view, which means I can do something about it since I understand it. Though you still need balls. Also, mostly, in my opinion, David Deida has captured beautifully how the Feminine and Masculine forces interact. Read The Way of the Superior Man and Intimate Communion, it will lay down a conceptual structure in which you know where you're at and where to go. You seem like you have deep hearty feelings that are not balanced by confidence, and this I know well. You need to live my friend, do things that make you step out of your comfort zone bit by bit, so that the next girl you have a crush on, you don't become her non-sexual friend, you act with confidence to sweep her off her feet with your love and confidence. Ain't that a pretty picture ? But this needs to be built brick by brick. I myself have been in your shoes, mostly when I was beginning highschool, though I never held the belief that sex before marriage would be a sin. I just wasn't feeling confident and I believe that the fact that I'm holding in my secret garden two very opposite things, the addiction to hardcore pornography and the desire to find a pure princess that I could love infinitely like in the Disney films. Eventually, this will blow up while growing up. Girls aren't princesses at all, they like rough sex too, maybe more than we do. And really, I don't want a princess, I want a girl that challenges me to better myself in every way, because that's how life is, we evolve, if we don't we die. Commiting to a relationship with a girl is the exact opposite of the comfort zone. Only after having pushed through it will we reap the benefits that were sown, by gladly welcoming into our lives without any needyness and with full confidence someone that matches our own needs to evolve to the next level, and that will also evolve at the same time. One last thing I too unconsciously fantasize about a mentor. But I know very well that I shall be my own mentor and my own student. This is the only way. You couldn't even profit from what a mentor would be able to provide for you if you're not your own mentor and student first. A mentor can't help you with anything that you're not willing to do for yourself. Though I agree that it would be of good help to have someone you can rely to and ask questions and be cheered and challenged whilst making your own progress. Girls are the best mentors for spiritual progress in my opinion. They have the ability to feel the little holes in your structure and point them out, only to feel you become stronger. They can rip your ego of all its fallacies until only the purest diamond is left shining. Though it is very rare to undergo this kind of evolution so deeply, couples usually fall apart because they're not commited to truth, freedom, love and evolution, or they're just not on the same level anymore and need to evolve somewhere else. But through Intimate Communion, we can truly reach the depths of our beings, and surrender to the powerful archetypal forces of the universe, fusing each other into One, enacting the universal dance through the bodies mind and soul in an intense explosion no less powerful than an nuclear one. Those relationships are quite special and unique. And they're to be lived only by the most free and loving human beings. It can't be otherwise.

It's all about perspective. In the "boy draws on a blank paper"-analogy, to me, - the boy/the boy's hand/the pencil = God (y) - blank paper = True Self (z) - whats drawn on paper = experience/happenings/ego/mind/body (x) - The blank paper is eternal (was never born, will never die) & it's conscious of whats drawn upon it. - The blank paper is infinite in size & in its "ground-state" it's just completely blank and empty (nothingness). - The pencil that's drawing can switch randomly between infinite colours and infinite types of pencils and it also has an ereaser on it's back that it often uses. - The pencil can draw an infinite different pictures upon you. - Whats drawn on paper is real enough, but only momentarily real. If you cling to whats drawn, you will constantly switch between happiness (when something good is drawn) and sufferiing (when the drawn disappears again). - If you realize that what's drawn is NOT you, but just experience/happenings, and that you are the no-thing/blankness that experiences all that, then you become enlightened. - Makyo is when there is drawn something you percieve as 'extraordinary'/true and you then cling to it as Truth. - A True Complete Enlightenment Experience is when you become fully aware of what's going on: ... Your perspective/awareness sort of raises above the paper, and you directly see the pencil drawing on the blank, eternal you... You meet God. - A Real (with a capital R) Awakening happens when the pencil -- for whatever reason -- momentarily, completely halts all the drawing while also erasing the earlier drawn (mind/memories) completely. What is then left is just the blank paper: nothingness (True Self). No experience. It's not an experience. That's enlightenment. The mind is COMPLETELY killed. NOTHING is left. There is only YOU (nothingness) left... discovering your self (but ITS NOT AN EXPERIENCE, because you are a no-thing, and a no-thing can't be experienced). This is litteraly equal to physical DEATH. The only difference is that -- for some reason -- it's possibly to keep the body alive while the paper is completely blank... It's sort of a paradox, right, because the body is something that's drawn on the paper... What when you go to deep sleep? Isn't this equal to what I just described? Sounds like it... the difference may lie in that when you go to deep sleep, "the pencil is being handled in such a way" that the mind doesn't remember itself shutting down.. it happens gently and unconsciously... A real awakening, here you see the mind/ego getting annihilated right in front of You , and then momentarily there's nothing left but You, and then some "time afterwards", the ego comes back, and You see it coming back.., like You get pushed back into a skull from the nothingness... When going to deep sleep and waking up, it's all happening in such a way that the mind is programmed to not store (remember) the experience of it being killed. In a same way when "you" wake up from deep sleep, the mind is programmed to not store the experience of being resurrected from nothing. I'm not talking about the deep sleep/nothingness itself, because here there is only You/Silence/Nothingness, i.e. it's a no-experience because the mind produces zero experience -- the paper is blank -- simply because the mind is death. I'm simply talking about the very few seconds BEFORE the death of the mind (the killing), and the very few seconds AFTER the resurrection of the mind. No one remember falling asleep. Yes, we remember when we went to lie down on the bed. But we never remember any experience of actually falling into deep sleep (= the mind being killed). This, I postulate, is "simply" because the brain/mind is wired in such a way to not store such an experience. If the mind, on the other hand, WAS wired/programmed to store such an experience, then everyone would be enlightened, lol, because everyone would see their egoes/minds getting completely killed, and thus everyone would directly be able to see for Themselves that They are not the body nor the mind/ego. Everyone would be scared shitless, lol. Very few would dare to go to sleep -- because it would feel like getting actually killed. And from an evolutionary perspective it's extremely "bad" for an "organism" to realize its True Self is not the body (for very obvious reasons), so OF COURSE the brain/mind is wired to not remember falling asleep. Same goes for waking up from deep sleep. Everyone has tried to be waken by someting/someone while you were in a very, very deep, deep sleep. When that happens, you are always very, very confused in the seconds after waking up. I think this is because the mind/brain is wired in such a way to not remember the experience of being resurrected from nothingness. Also if your body dies/you commit suicide... Then... there is no mind left to integrate/remember "the experience" ("the experience" = the 'right before' and the 'right after' the 'no-experience'/ego-death. And thus, physical death has nothing to do with enlightenment, just like going to deep sleep has nothing to do with enlightenment. Enligthenment is sort of a paradox, because enligtenment, yes, is the DEATH of the MIND. But at the same time, enligtenment requires the mind/brain/person to be FULLY 'alive/awake/aware' to actually remember the experience of both the killing and the resurrection of the mind . It's the memories of such two 'happenings' that produces an enlightened person. The space between the two happenings (i.e the killing and the ressurection) is the no-experience/nothingness which the mind itself can't remember because it wasn't there. But the process of the killing and the process of the resurrection; this the mind 'can' store and remember as a memory. And when the mind remember these two happenings, the mind can now see that it doesn't really exist, and it starts producing thoughts and emotions without the "I" labeled on to them. So an enlightenment experience could basically be described as: - going to deep sleep, while being fully aware of going to the deep sleep (i.e. the mind rembering the experience of going to deep sleep, i.e. the mind remebering the experience of itself being annihilated into nothingness). - then shorty after waking up from deep sleep, while being fully aware of waking up from deep sleep (i.e. the mind remembering the experience of itself waking up from deep sleep, i.e. the mind remembering the experience of itself being reborn from nothingness). In both cases, of course, "You" (z) is always there, You can't be modified. You are just there. You experience the memories the mind produces for You. So after all... Enlightenment is sort of a paradox because it's: - on one hand: all about the mind (it has to be 'alive'/'be there' to store certain experiences needed for enlightenment) - on another hand: not about the mind at all (it has to be killed for reaching enlightenment) It's two opposing statements ... Yet both of them are equally true and false Truth with a capital T comes when the two opposing ideas come together and form a circle: - the mind has to be killed (one half of the circle). <----> So You can become You (Nothingness). - the mind has to be alive (other half of the circle). <----> So You can experience the killing of the not-you. The True Self can only fully discover itself by directly experiencing the killing of The False Self. Without a False Self (ego) in the first place, there could be no True Self (nothingness) in the first place And vice versa. The world we all see ourselves in is dualistic. For there to be darkness, there has to be light. For there to be 'a day', there has to be 'a night'. For there to be 'good', there has to be 'evil'. For there to be a True Self, there has to be False Self. Two opposing things are always two sides of the same coin. So basically enligtenment is a change of what x (ego / mind) produces for You (z) to experience. If "you" are an enlightened person, "you" are still just a person/ego/mind/brain running around -- playing the game of life. The difference "just" lies in what this person says, does, thinks, feels . (What the mind produces for You to experience) So achieving enligtenment is after all just achieving a special type of personality ... But a very special, rare kind of personality, of course. Its traits are, among other things: - Absolute Self-Discovery. - Unconditional Love to all of reality. - Deep intuitive understanding of human life & how the mind/ego functions. - Deep understanding of reality. - No attachment to any experience, yet no detachment from any experience either. - Passion for life -- passion for both self and others. Cheers. EDIT: I edited the shit out of this one. Added a lot of rambling shit.

I'm not claiming that anything I wrote is "Truth"... In fact I THINK I wrote, that Truth can only by experienced, not communicated. So this is just my humble description of Truth... _ a description_ . Descriptions is concepts and logic. Yet, within rationalism and concepts, I would say my above description is accurate. If you have any valid arguments of why I might be wrong, feel free to point it out. The mind cannot "know" stuff. The mind is "simply" a brain that produces and processes internal software (thoughts, emotions, vision, sound, sense of feeling, smell and so on) -- which btw depend on the external "programming" . I include vision and sound because it' light and soundwaves being processed by hardware to produce software.. the software is then video and sound you see and hear. The "you" that experiences all this is not software itself. It's simply NOT A THING. We can call it consciousness or apeshit, both are equally true. Yet consciousness sounds "better" lol. That's why we say you are nothingness. Self-aware nothingness is the basic fundamental nature of reality. ", but one thing i know for sure is i have to detach and let go" ... Yes, just don't become too attached to the idea that you should detach from everything, hehe. There are a infinite number of traps in this journey. Forget all concepts. If you realize you are nothing, then naturally, you cannot attach anything, but you cannot detach from anything either! Attachment and detachment -- bvadr,, FORGET the concepts and go for direct experience. "you just change the thing you hold on to to something different." You hurt me here. lol. You are probably right though ... However, I enjoy contemplating this stuff and discussing it But you are right, I should be careful I don't get too attached to any idea my mind produce. ... I would say, though, that I'm in general conscious of the fact that everything we discuss here is merely concepts and can't lead to Truth in itself. "How can there be x,y,z if there's only y?" x isn't anywhere, and wasn't anywhere to begin with. "x" as ego is just a stream of apparantly random thoughts and emotions that is happening. Yet, the random stream of thoughts and emotions are what makes up your personality. It's your persona. But IT'S NOT YOU. What you are, is just the experiencer of all this stuff. But it's even wrong to call it an experiencer, because you aren't a noun or a thing... You are more like an eternal proces of reality that is all experience, that knows all experience, and that creates all experience. Yet, you are right, there is only y, but because y is infinite beyond time and space, to realize that it is infinite, it has to create the counterpart: finiteness. And you are a finite part of that infiniteness. As an analogy imagine a little boy with very high creativity sits down and wants to draw a picture with his pencil. Before he begins, the white paper is absolutely blank. It's nothing.. It's just paper. Now the paper = infinite consciousness = you When the boy begins to draw he sort of makes a finite picture out of an infinite number of pictures he could have drawed. I think that's the best language-made explanation of true infinity... Right before one begins to draw a picture on a blank paper, there are an INFINITE number of possible pictures that can be drawn. As SOON as you start to draw, you transform the infinite to a finite picture. Anyway, if you see yourself as the paper being drawn on... Can you see what the problem is if you, as the white paper, begins to identify yourself as what's drawn on you? What if the boy draws something ugly and bad? You would cry... However, if you realize you are not whats drawn on the paper, but that you are the paper itself, then you cannot be hurt... Unless the boy tears up the paper lol:D Also, because something is drawn on the paper, you as the paper are able to identify yourself. If boy never drawed anything on you, you would not have anything to contrast yourself with, and thus you would not know your self. "Isnt x's(ego's) biggest dream to be the z(immortal being, spirit ), which is still just illusion on another scale? Ego on a spiritual level, still allowing for Other and war. " x cannot dream anything nor have any dream. x is not a thing. x is an experience... a stream of emotions and thoughts. x may give you these streams of emotions and thoughts in a nice package labeled "DREAM". It may even, if it's REALLY naughty be labeled "I HAVE A DREAM" ... If the package is only labeled "DREAM" we got an enlightened dude right there. Must be extraordinary to have a stream of emotions and thoughts without the "I AM/I HAVE/ I XXX"-part labeled on it but only "dream", "hungry", "thirsty", "funny"-packages. My point is, nothing has any dream. You see what I did here? It's nothing that has any dream. ITS Z THAT HAS THE DREAM CMON MATE!! The difference just lies if the dream has attached an "I"-feeling to it or not. If the dream has attached an "I"-feeling to it, then z cannot see that it's z, but identifies instead as the "I" (the x that doesn't exist). If the dream has no "I"-feeling attached to it, but is just a happening..., then z can see that it's z, because there are no dirty little tricks being played anymore and becaise the dream is still an experience, which has to be experienced, and if there is no "I" from the ego saying it's experiencing anything, but the experience STILL _HAPPENS_ then my gentlemen,, the z is free to see that there are only happenings, and that it is the nothingness-"perciever" percieving all the happenings. You call "z" an "immortal being, spirit"... which is just a bad use of conceptual words imo... Better call "z" NOTHING. EMPTY AWARENESS. That's more accurate, even though no words and do your true self full justice.

I keep on grappling with this unintegrated trauma that causes me to almost start crying when met with disapproval, yelling, or conflict. I keep on scouring the internet trying to fix it and trying to focus my awareness on the feeling everytime it comes to surface. It's incredibly frustrating that I still haven't fixed this especially since I feel like it's the last thing that really needs to be resolved before I can feel real unwavering confidence. It's the only chink in the armor, Once I have this fixed, I'm damn near perfect. Things I've considered: -Julien says that continuing to "bullshit your subconscious" is too much of what self help is nowadays. It sounds like he's focused more on self acceptance and integration of perceived negative aspects of personality -If I want to overcome fear of confrontation, I should trigger more of them to gain exposure -I've been trying to heal the underlying trauma beneath the need to cry in the face of disapproval by focusing on the feeling (based on Teal and Emerald's videos). I should keep looking into more trauma release techniques -I've looked up some clever comebacks to insults so that I'm ready for confrontation. I also want to orient my personality towards being more of a dick. -I've been trying to practice comebacks so I can say things with more conviction. I don't know whether this will come with more confidence, more competence or just staying present and fully believing in what I'm saying as I say it. Like Tyler says, I should keep my foot entirely on the gas and not on the brake (yup, stay present) -In the sort term, I can block out shame by not buying into it and taking it too seriously. I've worked very hard on myself so for the most part, I'm not prone to making social mistakes that are egregious. I'm cool. But how can I now block that shit out if I'm so open-minded now? Stay present? I need to figure out what that feels like within my body. -I'm beginning to see a greater and greater separation between my thoughts and body. Who is really thinking these thoughts? The universe? These thoughts don't come from me. I they made me then what the fuck am I? Is the world really two-dimensional? I've begun to suspect this. Am I really this nothingness with no location?

Actually, im one of those geeks, and sorry, but i already found the deeper meaning: 42 is 420 in disguise, since 0 is replaced with nothingness to confuse the layman. The answer to everything (meaning of life), therefore is "blaze it"

@AxelK It would impact the mind's phenomenal experience. But consciousness is way deeper than you're presently thinking of it as. You don't have direct consciousness of consciousness yet (of course, otherwise you'd be enlightened) so you're confusing consciousness with phenomenal experience. But consciousness is independent of experience. That's the whole point. Consciousness was there before you were born. And it will be there long after you're dead. Also note: "the brain" is an idea. It doesn't exist in direct experience. And when it does, it's a phenomena, not a brain. All of it occurring in consciousness (Nothingness). Discover the eternal, immovable Nothingness that you are.

Note: This document is a work-in-progress and will be improved and supplemented over time. ----------------------- So you wanna become enlightened, eh? Good! That's where this journey starts. A burning desire for TRUTH is essential to success in this. Don't let people confuse you with talk of how "desire is bad", "seeking is delusion". No! Seeking is essential to breakthrough. Don't burn your ship before you've crossed the ocean! That would be foolish. Rather than filling your mind with beliefs and ideas about enlightenment, let me give you a bare-bones structure for how to actually make progress towards enlightenment. There are at least 20 totally different ways that I know for how to get enlightened. What I'm going to share with you here is just ONE way out of dozens. It is however a very direct way. This method is highly effective. It may not work for everyone, but then again, no method works for everyone. I call this method self-observation or Leo's version of self-inquiry. "Self-inquiry" as classically taught by Ramana Maharishi is technically different. Anyways... First, let's be very clear what we're talking about when we speak of enlightenment. So... What this basically means is that YOU are deeply confused about who you think you are. Right now you think that you're a human being, sitting there, reading this text on your screen. This is false. Pure fantasy. You are in fact not that thing at all. What we have here is a case of mistaken identity. You think you're a body, but you're not. You think you're a mind, but you're not. You think you're an entity living inside your head, but you're not. You think you are a physical object but you are not! Take a moment to seriously consider the magnitude of my claim. IF I happen to be right, and you happen to be wrong, then what that means is: you are NOT a human being, or even a physical object! Not metaphorically-speaking; not as some philosophical curiosity; but literally! How could such an outrageous thing be possible?????? How could you be mistaken about what you actually are????? Very easily actually! Recall how you've met people in your life who you knew were indoctrinated from birth with silly religious beliefs about Jesus and all sorts of other nonsense. Recall how little children believe that Santa Claus exists because they don't know any better. Recall how terrorists believe they are killing civilians in the name of Allah and will go to heaven with 72 virgins waiting for them. Recall how racists insist they are right for persecuting minorities. Well... here's something you're not gonna like hearing: that same delusion mechanism which existed in them, is operating FULL-FORCE within you right now! Yup! You too have been indoctrinated by ignorant parents and teachers from birth into believing a fairy-tale. Except in this case, the indoctrinated idea was: you are a human being. What a mind fuck! Now, in this work of "self-observation", you will discover -- for yourself -- what you REALLY are. Important: I am not asking you to believe me. You will have to demonstrate empirically, for yourself, that what I say is accurate. You can be skeptical all you want here. It won't upset me. "Okay" you say. "So what am I then if I'm not a human being or a physical object?" Great question! Sorry to tell you this, but your ENTIRE identity and life story is just a giant optical illusion. Like this non-existent triangle: There's nothing really there! Although it sure seems convincing, doesn't it? The problem is that you cannot know what you are rationally or logically because the mind is the source of the confusion. See.... No matter how cleverly or deeply or long you think, all the mind can ever do is symbolize stuff. It can only create maps and models. But you are not a symbol or a map or a model! You are not an idea or a thought! So you have to directly experience what you are. This MAY take months or years of very careful self-investigation. Note: I am saying that you have NEVER IN YOUR ENTIRE LIFE ever experienced yourself before! You've only experienced phenomena, none of which is essentially YOU! So what is this mysterious "essential you"? Let me spoil the surprise because otherwise you will waste YEARS searching in the wrong places, thinking you've found yourself when you really just found another false belief. So... as directly as possible now: the entity who thinks it's reading this sentence does NOT exist! Again, please try to fathom the magnitude of what is being said. This is extremely radical (but nevertheless true). Since you are pure awareness, all your focus goes toward shining "light" on sensory phenomena so it's really hard to "see" yourself. Pure awareness is very subtle, which means you have to develop extraordinary mindfulness abilities to "see" yourself. "But Leo?! You can't be serious! This sounds like a crazy New Age hippy conspiracy!" Let me assure you it's not. I am no hippy. I'm probably more rational and logical than you are. But I do recognize the limits of logic and rationality. The problem here is that you've been so brainwashed by society that what I'm telling you right now sounds crazy. That's okay. Just keep your mind open to the possibility that what I'm claiming can be directly verified by you. Nothing here has to be believed. But you do have to be willing to take it on as a temporary hypothesis to be verified or falsified. Leo's Patented () Step-By-Step Process To Become Enlightened: Find a quiet, comfortable place to sit alone. (You don't need to sit cross-legged.) Turn off your smart phone and disconnect from all distractions Set a digital timer for 60 minutes Now sit silently and start to genuinely wonder: "What am I if I'm not the body?" Do NOT meditate! Sit and carefully observe your direct experience. Notice that direct experience is THE ONLY THING you have of reality. Nothing else is real. Realizing this should make you very "present". Try to locate yourself within direct experience. Be very specific and clear with yourself: What are you? Are you a foot? A hand? A face? A mind? A brain? The envelop of the skin? The picture of yourself in the mind's eye? A feeling in the chest? What? Seriously! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU????????????? Notice that anything you might point to as being "your true self" cannot be true, because that's just another experience arising. Here's the logic of it: Firstly, it isn't constant. It fades in and out throughout the day, so it cannot be you. Secondly, you are observing it, so it cannot be you because "you" are the one doing the observation. So again, WHAT ARE YOU? Open your mind to the possibility that you are mistaken about being a human body or mind. Just sit there and keep genuinely wondering about what you really could be. Try to locate the one who's perceiving things. Do not philosophize or come up with theories. Focus 100% on what your direct experience is telling you. This is ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL!!!!!!!! The bulk of the work happens right here at this step. You have to slowly become aware that all your thoughts and ideas and feelings about "you" are not really you. They are just symbols and stories. For example: notice that the image of your body that you have in your mind is NOT actually your body! It's just an image! And the same goes for the feelings that make up your body. Those feelings are real, but they are not actually you! As any theories arise of what you think you are, notice that what that is, is a thought! And no thought can be you because you are the one perceiving the thought, and also because your existence does not depend on any particular thought's existence. Notice you don't cease to exist in between thoughts. Just sit and keep doing this for 60 minutes without getting distracted in irrelevant thoughts. As your mind wanders off track (and it will wander a lot) don't beat yourself up. Just bring your focus back on the self-observation. After 60 minutes, stop and notice what happened. Notice if your mind feels "elevated" or more aware. Frustration and confusion are OF COURSE going to arise. Do NOT be discouraged by frustration or confusion. Believe it or not, these are signs of progress. Do not expect instant results. You must be very methodical and patient like a crocodile. Repeat this process every day for at least 60 minutes for the next few months. Be very patient. It will take several months just to start to get your bearings straight. And by that I don't mean you will become enlightened. I mean you merely begin to realize the magnitude of your ignorance. In this time span of 3 months -- let's say -- you will get a strong sense that it really isn't possible to locate yourself. This may seem like you've failed, but actually this is a huge advance. Now you've finally started to realize that you've never really met yourself before. Now the journey towards enlightenment can begin in earnest! Just keep doing the process without discouragement. At some point, your mind will crack and you will surrender to the realization that there's no one home. That life has always run with you. And BAAAAAMMMMM!!!!!!! Enlightenment has occurred! Notice, I did not say YOU got enlightened. Rather, enlightenment has occurred. So who got enlightened? No one. Tips For Self-Observation: Don't just do this process mechanically, you MUST be genuinely curious about the truth of what you are. Try to establish a daily habit of self-observation. You need to build consistency and momentum. Be very careful about coming up with theories about what you are. We don't care about theories here. Every theory is NOT it. We only care about direct experience. REPEAT: ALL THEORIES AND IDEAS ARE DISTRACTIONS! Spend time asking yourself who you really believe that you are under the conventional worldview. Are you a body or are you the owner of the body? Are you inside the skull? If so, where exactly? The point of doing this is so you're clear and honest about your present beliefs, even if you intellectually know they are false. It's very important to get clear what exactly your false beliefs are. Do not be vague in your answers to the query of What are you? It's vital that you be precise and specific. Answers such as, "Well, I dunno, I'm just in the skull somewhere." are NOT GOOD ENOUGH!!! What EXACTLY are you identifying with? Hint: it will either be a thought, a body sensation, an emotion, a visual perception, or a combination of the above. But all of those cannot be the true you because they are not constant. Create an active sense of doubt that you are a human being or a physical object Any belief, thought, or idea about who you really are is automatically FALSE! Drop it. Any sensory experience about who you really are is automatically FALSE! Drop it. All scientific theories or models are automatically FALSE! Drop it. All spiritual, New Age, or religious ideas about who you really are, are FALSE! Drop it. You are NOT a visible object or "thing" so stop looking for yourself like you would look for a missing dog. You are NOT located in any area of space, so stop looking for yourself as a point or hidden object somewhere. You are NOT located inside "your" head You are NOT located inside "your" body There is nothing magical to discover in this process. You are not some kind of unicorn or fairytale creature. There is nothing hidden. Everything you see before you is exactly what there is, nothing more, nothing less. It is not possible to find yourself, so this process is futile. But you need to realize that through doing the process. Not by believing me. You will get VERY frustrated during this process and want to quit. Just accept the frustration and keep going. This process will surface deep emotional issues from our subconscious mind. You will experience emotional turmoil and anguish. Just accept it and keep going. You will feel depressed at times. Just accept it and keep going. Your mind will use every excuse in the book to distract you and get you to stop looking. Stay vigilant to all these tricks and keep looking. DO NOT GET TRICKED INTO STOPPING! The truth of what you are is ever-present. It is always HERE and NOW. You don't need to go anywhere or do anything to see it. You are you right now! Be prepared for this self-observation process to take several years if necessary. Understand that enlightenment happens always only in the NOW. Never in the future. You can be enlightened RIGHT THIS SECOND! You don't need to wait 3 years. Always intend to become enlightened right now! Enlightenment/Truth is NOT an emotional state. Enlightenment is occurring always, even when you're watching TV or sitting on the toilet. Meditation is NOT enlightenment. A psychedelic high is NOT enlightenment. A powerful energetic experience is NOT enlightenment. A vision or hallucination (however real it may feel) is NOT enlightenment. Enlightenment is what's absolutely true without ever changing. Don't forget the possibility that you may not be a thing! Don't forget the possibility that there might be nothing to find There is no you to become enlightened. When this is realized, that's enlightenment! Hint: it's MUCH simpler than you think. A HUGE HINT: The thing you're looking for but aren't finding... THAT'S YOU!!! Don't expect it to have any attributes. Don't expect the mind to have anything whatsoever to latch onto. You cannot grab NOTHINGNESS by the collar. You can only realize you're already it. Think of it this way: you are looking for a needle in a haystack, but this is no ordinary needle. In this case the needle is literally the realization there was no needle to begin with! A cosmic joke! You've been punked by God (yourself). Best Self-Observation Questions: What am I? No, seriously now... WHAT THE FUCK AM I????? No, cut the shit! What am I -- RIGHT NOW -- in my direct experience???? Who is aware of reality? Who is aware of me? Who is perceiving? Who is the owner of the body? Who is the owner of the mind? Who is feeling pain? Who is asking all these questions? What was I before I was born? What am I when I'm in deep sleep? What could I be if I'm not the human body/mind? What connects and unifies all of my different senses? What is true independent of ever-changing sense experience? What is true independent of my life and my death? Why do I believe I'm the body? Why do I believe I'm the mind? Where to do thoughts arise from? If I'm the body, what is everything else that I'm seeing? Why do I trust my feeling that I'm the body? Is a feeling really evidence of TRUTH? Why must I be an object? What if the "perciever" has no attributes or properties? When I close my eyes, where did the world disappear to? Where is sound occurring? Where are thoughts occurring? Where are body sensations occurring? What is the relationship between physical body sensations and my visual field? What if I don't exist? What if I can't locate myself because I am "empty" or without form or attribute? What if I'm addicted to looking only for objects or perceptions, but my true nature is neither of those? What if I'm just an idea? What if my entire paradigm of physical reality is just an idea? Could my body and brain just be ideas? Is any physical object actually permanent according to direct experience? What distinguishes one object from another? Do boundaries between things really exist, or are they ideas? What would happen if I stopped distinguishing existence from non-existence? How To Tell If You're Enlightened: This is very simple. Answer the following questions honesty: Did a major shift in awareness occur? Are you absolutely clear now of what you are? Are you the physical human body you've always thought you were? Do you feel infinite, without boundaries or location? Do you actually understand, or are you in a temporary meditative high? If you answered: "YES! YES! NO! YES! I UNDERSTAND!" then there's a pretty good chance you're enlightened. If your answers were not: "YES! YES! YES! NO! YES! I UNDERSTAND!" then chances are you aren't enlightened. Keep trying. If in doubt, find an enlightened master to help you verify the depth of your realization. Don't get cocky, remember, there is more than one enlightenment breakthrough to be had. You ain't gonna become Buddha with just a few years of self-observation. Is it worth the struggle? Abso-fucking-luty! Awakening is divine. Videos Explaining Enlightenment In More Depth: https://www.actualized.org/articles/spiritual-enlightenment-intro https://www.actualized.org/articles/what-to-do-next-after-learning-about-enlightenment https://www.actualized.org/articles/spiritual-enlightenment-part-2 https://www.actualized.org/articles/spiritual-enlightenment-part-3 https://www.actualized.org/articles/enlightenment-faq-part-1 https://www.actualized.org/articles/enlightenment-faq-part-2 https://www.actualized.org/articles/how-to-become-enlightened https://www.actualized.org/articles/my-enlightenment-experience https://www.actualized.org/articles/being-a-spiritual-seeker-good-or-bad https://www.actualized.org/articles/radical-openmindedness https://www.actualized.org/articles/mindfulness-meditation https://www.actualized.org/articles/understanding-awareness https://www.actualized.org/articles/the-enlightened-self https://www.actualized.org/articles/the-benefits-of-enlightenment https://www.actualized.org/articles/how-your-mind-distorts-reality https://www.actualized.org/articles/enlightenment-guided-inquiry https://www.actualized.org/articles/grasping-the-illusory-nature-of-thought https://www.actualized.org/articles/what-is-god https://www.actualized.org/articles/the-dark-side-of-meditation https://www.actualized.org/articles/mystical-traditions-around-the-world https://www.actualized.org/articles/becoming-a-zen-devil List Of Enlightenment Exercises: https://www.actualized.org/forum/topic/7587-list-of-enlightenment-exercises/

Here's a partial perspective : Pure love is dual ? Where did you get that idea ? Don't confuse the mainstream idea of "love" and actual pure love. "love" in the mainstream sense could be compared to extreme compassion and rapport (at least from my point of view). But pure love (as in, the Love of God) is more like an energy, an energy that allows phenomena to happen, an energy that every human being perceives through their 5 senses and their thoughts. Also, you say that God is everything. Therefore it is pure love. And it is ego. And it is suffering. And it is EVERYTHING !!!!! Again, if you look at pure love as an energy that allows phenomena, then that question is stupid. Suffering is phenomena. By the way, this perspective of seeing pure love as a sort of energy isn't groundless. A lot of people having had enlightenment experiences, and/or breakthrough 5-MeO trips report seeing love that way. Of course, this is metaphorical, and I have not experienced anything of the sort myself, so... But, still. There is nothing. Period. NOTHING AT ALL !!!!! And this nothingness is also absolutely everything. And you ARE that. There might be nothing to improve on the nothingness side of you, but there definitely is a lot to improve on the everythingness side of you. Of course you don't have to improve anything. But just realize that you ARE the ENTIRETY of ALL THE SUFFERING IN THE WORLD !!!!! I don't know about you but I don't think I could bear this much. Because anything that can be is, has always been, and will always be. Otherwise God wouldn't be Absolute Infinity. Essentially, yes. It would be fundamentally the same. However, why settle ? Why do nothing with your life ? See, when you become enlightened, all you do is see through the illusion of the ego. But that doesn't mean you don't spend any time in your ego. In fact you probably spend most of your time in your ego. So if you're gonna play that game, why not play it well ? So yes, it's the same when you're not in ego. But no, it's not the same when you're in ego. Also, it's hard to transcend a weak ego, personal development is a part of becoming enlightened, there's a reason a lot of people don't believe in God. Yes. But it's not "the universe punishes you when you do bad things," nor is it "if you do bad things in this life, you will be reborn as a bad thing." It's more something like : You did something selfish and now you enjoy the suffering. Let me clarify what I mean by "selfish." I mean basically anything that assumes that there is a self doing something. Aka. literally everything you do when you're not enlightened. The Buddha used karma to essentially describe the endless suffering that comes with not being enlightened, because why pursue enlightenment, right ? It's only after you become enlightened that you can act completely selflessly.

Let's be clear on one thing. There are no things in reality. This includes space and time. All 6 channels of experience stem from this nothingness. They're here because they can be, so they are. See, in this nothingness, there is no boundary which means that anything that can be is, has always been, and will always be. No boundary also means Absolute Infinity. Those 6 channels are obviously the 5 senses and thoughts. Now, thoughts are really difficult to understand. They exist as they appear, and they're kind of like ghosts of all other 5 senses. They are symbols, they represent things that they themselves are not. And then we believe that those things are real, and we act as if they were. Could you imagine living life without thingness ? No, you can't, because that's the point of thoughts.

Is there a way of explaining all this with ego, enlightenment, spirituality (not the typical spirit persona that's going to some heaven) in just 5-10 minutes without sounding like you're part of some nonsense religion? I came from a very atheistic, grounded, scientific point of view before I found Actualized.org and Leo's videos and other research it lead to. But I can't exist in this short period of time in eternity and not try to understand it or not search for deep truths if it can be found by humans, and all this with enlightenment and everything around it really got my attention, seems like the most "neutral" study of existence to me. But when trying to explain it in a few minutes (that's all the time most people got) I can't get to get through why this is different from religion. Although Leo has given some good lines about why this isn't made up religion in some of his videos, I think "ego", "enlightenment", "nothingness" just sounds like another idea. Especially this thing with our true nature and enlightenment, although everyone agrees that everything in our body has changed throughout our lives, it's easy to think that we are this deep memory or sum of an equation of all things that has happened. Of course you could say not to care what people think, but eventually someone will ask and for some reason I want the explanation to catch their curiosity. How would you explain all this in 5-10 minutes to someone that know very little to nothing about it? Can it even be done? Is limitations of language the problem?

@Mr Lenny Please listen to me carefully. You are not somethingness, nor are you nothingness. Both views are related to nihilism and eternalism. Concluding that one is nothing because he is not something, is a wrong conclusion. That which you are, is all pervasive Awareness. Which is not nothing, or something, a combination or a subtraction of something and nothing. All pervasive awareness, is not bound to a single body or a single mind, but is all pervasive throughout all bodies and minds. And by this, there is behavior in accordance with all pervasive awareness, and behavior that is not. The behavior of good and bad deeds are not in accordance with Awareness, and are there for suffering due to their conditioned states. The true good deeds, that are in accordance, are the deeds that arose from seclusion from wrong view, intention, act, speech, effort, livelihood, attention and concentration. Its a deed sprouted from the from the right view, that there is only Awareness, and there for there is polarity of good and evil with the root of it as being desire. Wrongful deeds, are deeds where one forgot about oneness due to his desires, and thinks there are others besides awareness and acts accordingly in believing so, which creates huge clouds everywhere, making it hard to realize the truth, to remember again what one is. There for let one seclude from wrong view, intention, act, speech, effort, livelihood, attention and concentration by focusing on how in essence you do not differ, but that due to forgetfulness of ones true nature one behaves badly. Stop the flood of bad information, alcohol, drugs, to much food and focus on the all pervasive you and receive knowledge accordingly. Work hard, surely soon or later your view becomes perfect.

Lyrics: A long day alone The emptiness is so real Never having peace of mind Running from what I can’t see And there is no where left to hide Turn and face these empty eyes All alone, heart unturned Trying to find Break me down Replace this fear inside Take this nothingness from me I want to find I want to shine I want to rise Break me down I try to find myself I find the stranger trapped inside And I’ll take one more step away From a face I used to recognize Familiar shadows closing in Suffocating fear descends It comes alive, uncovered eyes Trying to find Chorus x2 Break me down I want to find I want to shine I want to rise Break me down Repeat Break me!

For whatever it's worth. I was just meditating on infinity with an intention for it to show itself. To maybe get a glimpse of infinity like Leo describes. But something else happened. What I first experienced was a mind that was totally empty of all content. The usual meditation but deeper. I observed the mind in that state for quite a while. And just as a note, that totally empty mind does feel like it is infinite. Infinitely empty. So that is the closest I experience of being infinite. But than the infinitely empty mind vanished too. There was nothing there. Not only was the pitcher empty of all content. But the pitcher itself no longer existed. So did the pitcher return to infinity? Or did it return to nothingness? Or something else? What is that when it happens? It's just a total blank space there. Where would experiencing infinity fit into this? Anybody else experience this happening to them? Maybe all the time? Maybe never? I just don't know where this fits in. Should I try to stop that vanishing from happening for now on and just remain in the experience of mind empty of all content? I really don't know what to do here and it's happened before on occasion. Does somebody have some experience with this happening to them too? Thanks

@Deep That's interesting because one time I purposely surrendered within a state of Samadhi just to see what would happen and I vanished for a while. Of course I didn't realize I had vanished until I returned to the Samadhi state (sorry, I don't know all the exact lingo but you get the message). 2 days ago I left a reply on another topic that stated "At the heart of Samadhi lies nothingness". That experience, or should I say non-experience, is what I was referring to when I said nothingness. There was no awareness of anything because I didn't exist (no mind/thoughts). There was no experience, no bliss, no infinity, no God, no awareness, no emptiness, no nothing. After that happened I wondered if there was a level of awareness that enlightened people have achieved that could experience that state of absolute nothingness. So I'm asking, what do you see here that I may not. What are your thoughts or better yet, direct experiences on this? You seem to have knowledge in this area. Thanks

@Leo Gura Awesome pic Leo. Now, pls don't interpret what I'm about to say the wrong way. I'm only saying it according to my experience, ok? (It's not a debate.) It's riding the ox backwards into one's body from nothingness, maybe not with M.C. Escher's drawing of lizards. Below..just another pic, just another hint. Then, one is left with a huge residue of 'divine love' / 'bliss' when awaken.

It could help for sure, but with all the informations there is on internet nowadays, no you don't need one. It is cool to have people to talk about these kind of stuff in real life though Anyways, you could search for temple or dojo in your region (google map is your friend). Search on facebook too, maybe there is a group about non-duality/consciousness/nothingness (try every key words) near you live.

There CANNOT be a how! That's why this work is so challenging. How can there be a how for nothingness? All hows are somethingnesses! The only way past this brick wall is persistence and finally surrender. You are the only thing standing in your own way, but you aren't ready to give yourself up quite yet.

@cetus56 Union with what? Anatta is a buddhist term. The anatta doctrine states that there is no self. They examined the elements and declared them to be "empty" but failed to recognize that what was witnessing the emptiness was Bhraman, awareness/God. So Anatta is just a philosophical misconception of the nature of reality which means that Buddhist doctrine is still stuck in this material universe, therefore it is a humanistic philosophy. But Bhraman is the only thing that exists, and the world does not exist, it only appears to exist. There is no real "samadhi" because samadhi is a state experience in the apparent non existing universe of which Bhraman is the ever present witness of. Bhraman doles out state experiences which we call samadhi, but these are in the dream. There is no "union" because non existent entities cannot "unite" with "nothingness" because nothingness is a philosophical concept (as I mentioned before). Also, how can all entities awaken and return to the absolute? There is nobody here to awaken, there is only Bhraman looking at its creation. You also mention "God" in the same sentence as anatta, which means you are lumping Bhraman in with the Buddhist concept of anatta, but if you are to refer to the Buddhist concept of anatta then you cannot talk about God in the same context - the two are incompatible because Buddhists assert that there is no God. So this is not right either. "God" is the aspect inherent in Bhraman which is called ignorance, or "Maya" which projects and a world. However there is no real world. You can verify this yourself by contemplating the concept of time. Time is a thought, is it not? If time as a concept, and there is only one "eternal now" then how does this account for the fact that your body changes and deteriorates over time? If there is no time, and only one moment, the "now" that means the body never changes. And its true, because there is no world, no body, its just Bhraman projecting thoughts every nano second that seem to look like a continuity of a life, its not a real creation, its a projection, like a predetermined programme. Your "life" has happened before, many times, and will continue to happen again in the next cycle. Its like a movie playing over and over. I think you are confusing a lot of doctrines and lumping them all in the same category. This is a symptom of the perennial philosophy, a belief system based on the assumptions that all the non dual systems of thought point toward the same truth, which is just a new age belief system. Perhaps you get a lot of your information from this new age video here? I think this sort of thinking just confuses people and leads them on a wild goose chase, chasing ideas that are not even remotely related to each other.

Yes. True. Aren't we "God/Allah/Infinite" too? (Paradox.) Surely Leo, there has to be paradox. We still come back down to earth after our enlightenment experience, even if this is all illusional/fictional. We don't stay "up" there in "heaven" experiencing "divine love" and peace, although that's what we are all the time. We could practice being this non-duel while we're here on earth. (I know that there's nothing/nothingness in front of me.) Just saying non-duel could be misleading. Not everyone's life purpose is no purpose and to work at 7/11. I saw all that debate. (Looks funny. ) I think it doesn't matter which type of thinking you choose, both lead up to the same mountain top, whether it's non-duel or non-duel/paradox. From my experience, the second one helps since we have to deal with everyday living.

Be careful with doing #1 and #3. Monks/gurus/sages do those things for a good reason. They could make sacrifices for someone else or for the world. I understand that we live in a non-duel reality. Our thoughts are coming from nothingness - that we are just a "program." There is no "you." Yes, I get all that. The thing is, the opposite is also true, right? That's why they call it paradox. We don't live in a black and white world; we live in a gray one. It's not so easy to say that it's completely non-duel/no free-will when there is paradox. You (we) could at least plan your (our) next milestone. If it doesn't work out, that's ok too. So, how do you explain paradoxes? Non-duel verses duel? Ego verses fictional ego? Free-will verses no free-will? What is the paradox of no free-will? Surely, we have a drop of free-will, no? It's because of paradoxes. If not, what's the point of us seeing this duel awareness we call earth?