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lol ok that was funny BUT!! Just imagine: I force the dalai lama to work 16h shifts in an indonese i-phone manufacture, scourging him to put together 2 random pieces faster and faster (those workers also don´t get weekends free so neither gets he) ...and 1 year later or 5 years later ...let´s see if he is still in bliss after a double-shift of that work knowing he will have to do it for the rest of his life ...he will be soooo happy definatly! Fuck the real-life circumstances ...you ONLY!!! need enlightenment...

I don´t need to become enlightened! It is just a word, some person came up with at some point ..which is fine. If i reach a state on that someone would call me "enlightened" he can do it ...i don´t care. But i don´t want it. I don´t desire it. Seriously i dont!! The more i learn and understand about myself the more i realize i dont have to become ..."enlightened" ..i dont have to "become" ..anything. I am more intressted to learn about what i AM right now. The idea of "becoming" anything is actually at the core of everyone´s misery, the paragon of disdain of "now", What you become is a result of what you are ....if what you are right now is just someone who wants to become something ...this is a feedbackloop ...you wont never arrive anywhere!! If someone sermons: "you people have to get enlightened ...then you will be happy (nowadays if you are not happy you are sick and need to change!!!) 24h a day" and some people believe it and try to become enlightened(happy) so hard and they fail and are even more depressed instead ... I ask: isn´t it better to just accept life as it is: and if you have to work a normal job instead of working in your "dream-carrier" ...(which per definition you can´t realy evaluate in terms of personal "satisfation", since it is just a dream, an at best semi-conscious desire-construct) thats fine! And yes, life is! hard sometimes, yes! why is that bad? it is not bad! you have to do stuff you don´t want ...so what? find a way to still enjoy it, grow a thicker skin and make a joke about it , don´t deny it ...just have humor and feel good about the now anyways even it is not exactly like "you" wanted it ... isn´t that enlightened too? also most of us HAVE to deal with different people, some are funny some are agressive, some are stupid and some a smart, some we like some we don´t but mabye we find that we don´t have a reason to not like them and start to like them instead, and that is some kind of enlightenment too? And Isn´t it ok to sometimes not be blissful? if you see inequity? or if you see a person with 50pounds too much, smoking a cigarette and eating his soon last burger ... do you must be blissful at this sight? if you see some parents treat their little daughter like shit and you can almost see how she will be exactly like her ignorant mother in 20years ...do you must be blissful? If you see your boss is doing no work and getting 5x your salary ...do you must be blissful? Is every feeling of "i don´t like this" just an illusion you have to vanquish, or is enlightment when you stand up and ACT! instead of just thinking ..."oh it is unjust...but only in my head..and since the new tacit agreement is that noone exists anyways it is ok to not help that person over there..." THIS is not my definition of enlightement! Isnt life a rollercoaster sometimes? Some tasks are hard and unpleasant ..you dont feel eternal bliss while doing them, but if you made it you feel realy good... I think the notion and the expecation to be "happy" all the time is absolutley ridiculous and hurtfull!! i think that has to be said! Life is NOT like that! we can try to improove our life and it is realy important to remoove all layers of bs-beliefs we hold , but even in a yogis life there are some shitty days and that is fine!! just remoove the megalomanic inclinations of what "enlightenment" is supposed to mean ...in the end we are not seperated as enlightened and not enlightened but united as living beeings experiencing ourselves, some with more insight some with less but noone with total understanding and noone with no understanding at all.

That`s hard... Just some words of my Guru; Once a gentleman came to a doctor complaining that there was something severely wrong with him. He was hurting all over and was very sad but all the tests came out normal. The doctor said, “There is nothing wrong with you. Go to the circus and watch the clown there. He will make you laugh.” The gentleman said, “Doctor, I am that clown.” It is one thing to entertain others and be humorous, but quite another to be happy yourself. Happiness does not come by a talent or skills that you develop. Unless you realize who you are, what the nature of consciousness is through your own introspection, happiness remains a far-fetched reality. The spirit of self enquiry in the true sense which leads to meditation is absolutely essential in this quest for happiness. The 6th century Indian philosopher and thinker Adi Shankaracharya has said that it is dispassion towards the ephemeral and connection with the eternal that brings true joy. In fact, he goes further and asks, ”What joy does detachment not bring?” The word for solitude in Sanskrit is ‘ekant’, meaning ‘the end of loneliness’. Loneliness cannot end by changing company, even if it is more sympathetic and understanding. It can only end when you discover your real nature for yourself. Robin Williams, though he made millions of people laugh, could not end the deep seated loneliness inside him. This shows clearly that only spiritual solace can take you out of despair and misery. External pomp and show, wealth, admiration and adulation are not helpful in dealing with inner discontent. While alive, he made people laugh and in his death, he gave people a message to lift their eyes above the mundane towards something higher. You can bid goodbye to misery by connecting with an altogether different dimension, that I would say is solidified silence, a bolt of bliss and a glimpse of eternity, which is in you as you. You simply have to tap into it. There is little use in having a machine which you cannot operate without a manual. Spiritual knowledge is like the manual for life. Just like to drive a car, we have to learn how to operate the steering wheel, the clutch, the brake and so on, to move towards stability of the mind, we must know the basic principles about our life force energy. This is the whole science of pranayama. When our prana or life force keeps fluctuating, our mind also goes up and down through the roller coaster of emotions. One cannot handle the mind from the level of the mind. It is for this reason that although counseling or psychiatry seems to help in the beginning, it is not able to provide a complete cure in the longer term. Just forcing positive thoughts on oneself is not enough and more often than not leads to a relapse. Medication like anti-depressants also seem to help only in the beginning and eventually make the person dependent on them rather than free him/her from the tendency. This is where knowing the secret of breath can really transform lives. Breathing techniques like Sudarshan Kriya stabilize our life force and consequently the mind. The inner dimension unveiled by the practice of meditation deeply enriches us and its impact slowly spills over to all aspects of life. As prana rises in the body, one starts to feel a transformation as direct experience and not as a forced mental exercise. One starts becoming happier, creative and more in command of their mind and emotions. Another thing that can be really helpful in coming out of depression is developing an attitude of service. Thinking ‘what can I do for society’, getting involved in a bigger cause shifts the whole focus of life and can take one out of the rut of ‘what about me’. Societies where values of service, sacrifice and community participation are ingrained do not have these issues of depression and suicides. The Sikh community is a great example of this. Life is a combination of happiness and pain. Pain is inevitable but suffering is optional.Having a broad perspective on life gives you the strength to move forward through painful times. Know that you are very much needed in this world. With all its infinite possibilities, this life is a gift for it can become a fountain of joy and happiness not just for oneself but for many others as well.

@SkyPanther Yes, NDE is very similar an awakening experience of bliss or pure self or soul. I became interested in nde's after my first experience and many reports are identical. Many also interpret that experience it in their own personal way to too. Religious or whatever. In that type of sudden near death experience, ( when you let go of the body/ self) I would think that the mind would cling to whatever is available to believe in. Fall back on the faith, so to speak. Sharon Stone had a NDE. She said one thing that I can really relate to, "where we go when we pass, is right here!" And she puts out her hand showing Opra Winfree the empty space next to her. I had that same exact impression after my first experience. I don't know if that's just how the mind interprets itself when no thoughts arise?

I do not know; Sam Harris would be a good person to ask though, heh... I can say that from my reading and experience (during meditation) the default state of the mind is "equanimity", or "sublime bliss". And it is because your mind, for those moments that you are being mindful, is free of "conceptual proliferation". If you have the interest there is a booklet that is very interesting in that it points to exactly this when talking about "nibbana" or enlightenment(It is also what is mentioned in the the Wikilink above): Concept and Reality http://www.dhammasukha.org/uploads/1/2/8/6/12865490/concept_and_reality.pdf It is also interesting to note, that a lot of people that have near death experience, also state that they experience bliss. And this could also be because their consciousness is being freed from the "mind", because they are slowly dying, and parts of the brain are shutting down.

@SkyPanther This makes me wonder if what we interpret as experiencing a state of bliss, pure self, true self, soul, pure being, what ever you choose to call it, could that be the shutting down of the part of the brain that is responsible for the self conscious (the monkey mind). I experienced a silent ocean of pure being twice and both times there was a distinct shift in Conscionsceness. It felt like awareness came to a point of focus right before it happened. Than the mind became void of all thoughts. All that remained was consciousness and a total stillness and a feeling of bliss. Could that experience be caused by the shutting down of a certain part of the brain? I guess that gets into bio-feedback. Who knows, maybe someday we will have the technology to be able to induce a state of bliss through electrodes that swich off the "monkey mind". Bliss on demand. There could be franchises. "The Bliss bar" "The Bliss-tro". Imagine that, everybody hanging out with electrodes on their heads half blissed. Very cool!

@Fishy It is needed, I know this very much. As sadhguru had once said: "Ignorance is only bliss for a short while"

I did the 3h sitting on the edge of a chair with a pillow, closed eyes. I got a steeple in the vincinity which rings the bell in the distant every 15minutes (i can hear that from away), so i knew i will have 12parts à 15minutes. I concentrated mostly just on not mooving (obvi) but sometimes after the bell rang i went: ok the next 15minutes i will focus on breathing (while also not mooving of course) or i will focus on just what i hear or what i see internaly, to make it more varied and "do-able", perhaps i will try a whole 3h sit on next sunday again, this time only focusing on not mooving and nothing else. While i did the sit i had some smaller rewarding experciences like feelings of bliss and realizing: "ohh! I ...AM!!! THIS!! is me... of course ..how could i have forgotten"... but also some siginificant changes came afterwards and the next days. Also near the end the pain grew quite strong at some point but somehow i realized i couldn´t fight the pain ..i mean i could fight but i couldnt win so in this situation the brain becomes realy creative since it is forced to handle the hard situation and i though im just like water now ...flowing around the rock (the rock beeing the pain) and it worked ...quite nice...then the last bell rang .. calmness and also relief Afterwards, that same day i went to go bouldering and on the way i had some funny ideas, or it where the same ideas as i usualy have but they seemed incredible funny and ridiculous to me and i had to laugh, i felt really silly in a good way, i joked around with myself a bit ( i wasnt searching for that but it just happend and i noticed that it was a long time since i was so foolish usually beeing quite rational and bla ... ) also the next day i noticed that i came up with some questions about society, some analytical models that i just created on my way home from work ( again i wasnt searching for that, neither am i saying that my ideas were "good" or usefull but i usualy don´t just come up with rather philosophical theories , so this was somewhat interessting. And the next days to follow i felt like i was way more secure in my conversations, like i could go into speaking quite different instead of trying to be very nice and goal-oriented or to please people and make a nice impression in a way i could just... go ... see what happens , i had trust in me since i knew at least a bit more about me now... was cool. You can start with 60min or 90min of you´re adventerous Now you decide if it might be for you. I already planed: 7-10 o´clock this sunday...

Hi all, one is completely new to all this so please go easy on one. Where to start???? So 6 earthly months ago (now to one), one somehow became completely balanced within the mind and everything unravelled like the mechanisms on pandoras box just before it opens. it was like the jigsaw was finally complete not that one had even known one was completing a jigsaw. Obviously one was like WTF is this and in the early stages one rationally and logically diagnosed oneself with Metaphysical Solipsism as ones ever overthinking mind there has to be causality for everything. So how could one be imagining everything and why isn't ones life perfect if it is all ones imagination??? One was in turmoil trying to get to the bottom of it and one came to the conclusion that one is either already dead, in a coma, or dreaming. so one hit google, obviously. but when one realises that one is google where then???? One stumbled across Advaita Vedanta relatively early on, One Gave Tony Parsons a call as he was the only person on the Planet that seemed to be talking ones language. After attending one of his gigs, It still wasn't going away it was being reaffirmed with every step. Its no so much Bliss that one requires but having heard about nirvana, moshka n all that jazz one would have expected something a bit jazzier!!!!!! If it helps anyone, not that there is anyone, believe nothing literally , don't even believe that you have just read the above. The conditioning you have received all your life, one would imagine, is impossible to break free from. one now finds "one self" living in the eternal now with a working mind only. one still doesn't know what meditating is and to be honest it never interested one. one previously only really ever believed in science "FACT" and lived in the future how ironic!!!!!!!!!

@jjer94 Many years ago I had the fortuned bliss to experience samadhi. That indescribable experience gave me profound knowledge about so many issues. One of them being; `yes indeed, the scriptures and sages are right, we are really all one`. Being said you now know it`s not about belief, though I see your own point above is all about belief (!). You can sit a fucking twenty years in your room waiting to get enlightened meanwhile the world around you is fallen apart without you even noticing it? Yeah mate, that`s the way. You are missing the point. I`m telling you that most people will be further on the path to enlightenment by doing karma-yoga or Seva than meditating in twenty years time. By doing karma-yoga your developing your heart chakra, your life will be full with love and joy. By fucking meditating in your room you`ll be lots of time miserable, selfish and pitying yourself. And even when you`ll become enlightened, you`ll be an enlightened jerk. The wise thing off course, is to do both. That`s a true integral approach which will give you and the world the most benefit. And, by the way, gives you the most merit and destroys the past karma. Leo`s way is just half the way, that`s why I asked him to shoot some video on Seva. -

I was doing self inquiry meditation today. And after 60 minutes or so, my focus increased a lot, a strong resistance I felt, I still continued. And after that, suddenly a dark dark, extreme dark black color appeared (my eyes were closed) and for some moments I felt a perfect bliss, a complete happiness. During that time, actually, thoughts were coming and going, I was able to observe them but I was clearly not attached to it. That experience was something like perfect, complete peace and beyond understanding. I tried exploring that state and then the bliss went away. I just wanted to know, if anyone has felt this way and what's the meaning of this.

In Hinduism they call it all `The Divine Play`, Consciousness playing with itself, being Sat, Chit, and Ananda (existence, consciousness and bliss).

In the core of every human desire is magnification of happiness. May it be through emotional stability, soothing words, excitement, the euphoria rush from hardcore drugs, the beauty of music etc... The key to understand happiness is that every being has a different way of achieving happiness and all ways are okay. For example I am the most happy when I take acid, the pure bliss and peace it gives me is indiscribable. But is this the only and one way? Absolutely not. I have had friends that freaked out on acid because they couldnt distinguish what is reality and what is not. Happiness has many facets and can't be really defined in words. It is every beings own responsibilty to take care of their own happiness.

@Adam D Holy shit, you've just described my life at the moment in that post! Although I'm half way, at the intersection of follow the money, or following my excitement, joy, bliss, integrity. More and more I'm finding out what's real and what's not. Health, relationships, fun, feeling alive, happiness, being the best version of myself, improving, self-awareness and so on. Thanks for your comment Adam!

@Arik @werlight @Nic @Emerald Wilkins My experienced happened when I dropped all sense of self. I could feel that consciousness was no longer localized at my body location but surrounding me and extending outward. I remember a distinct shift in awareness as if awareness had come to a point of perfect focus. I never experienced that happening before. It was scary to let go like that for the first time, but still something about it felt right. So I let totally go and instantly I became pure being. It was as if my soul or pure being was floating in a ocean of pure bliss and silence. It felt like "home". I don't remember closing my eyes, but I was no longer seeing my physical surroundings. That happened twice. The first time was in Sept. and again in January. The first time my eyes were wide open. The 2nd time I was meditating. I felt that sudden shift in awareness that I never knew existed before. I don't know what happened. It felt like I went into another dimension it was so distinct. Very different! After it happened I thought "What the heck was that?" I never expected that to happen at all. I still don't really know how to explain it. Maybe that's just the way it is. I remember that all questions ceased to exist and everything was well taken care of. So no need to even ask. It was beyond everything within existence, but yet it was the source of all existence. It truly felt like home. Just to add a note: After the first experience happened, I sat here and knew "That infinite stillness and silence surrounds us at all times". Where we come from and where we return to is always present. We never left it " Everything that happens within existence is happening within that source of infinite silence at all times.

To find absolute truth, you need radical open-mindedness. You need to test these things for yourself, construct some sort of experiment, because If you blindly blow-off mystisism as "pseudo science" with pure ignorance with little to no knowledge or eexperimentation whatsoever, then you are not a good enough scientist. This is why in anything spiritual radical open-mindedness is needed. You might as well forget about life purpose, because it involves masculine and feminine "energies". You have research, but no experimentation, which means the case is closed. How can you even negate spirituality without even testing it? Not that I am strongly inclined to spirituality, but meditation itself is the search of one's true self, and is spiritual in sense. Again, ignorance is not bliss, it is ignorance. I believe in this spirituality thing because of the experimentation with NoFap, I got some of "magnetisism" with woman, they were really attracted to me for some reason, you have to firsthand experience these things to believe them. little did I know it was abundance of sexual energy, I abused it incorrectly and got hospitalized for psychosis, and had a psychotic break with reality. I wondered why all that happened until I researched that you're not allowed to play with these kinds of things. Mystics aren't going to go prove they have superpowers, the idea that yogis have some kind of superpowers is silly. Everything in the million dollar challenge is astrologers, their purpose is to bullsht you and steal your money. Do you even have any scientific background? You also spelled investigator wrong. You also biased your own definition of absolute "Truth", ironic isn't it? You're also chasing low conscious bullsh*t like money and woman. This whole idea of arguing is monkey business, we should argue to learn, not to prove.

You are not looking for an answer! That's not what self inquery is about! You ask "who am I" and just look, only look if you can find yourself. It's not about an answer, it's about a direct experience of the Self. Also who is aware of your bliss and awesomeness?

How do you KNOW that your purpose has been revealed? I just had an incredible emotional reaction of joy and bliss and wonder after receiving a thought of what I could do with my life and it's so obvious and something that will bring me so much fulfillment and answers so many questions about the suffering I've faced in my life and it's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, and I'm sure it's my calling. But yesterday I was sure I was being called to be a ascetic. How do I know this is real? I can see a clear path of actions to take to make this real, and it would be so simple and easy and fulfilling and helpful to hurting beings and challenging, but something I know I could find a way to do, and the lives I could touch and the impact I could make would be a psychic force in the darkness of the rational world. But how do I know for sure, that this time, this is the time that I'm RIGHT about this being my purpose? Maybe I shouldn't be? Oh, but this feeling, this lovejoyhappinessecstasy and the perfectness of the solution--which briefly and without specific details involves me going back to help people who are trapped in a situation I was trapped in, because they are me, and I have insights to share with them, and they have things to share with me. I just posted this on my Facebook page regarding this because as I sit with it, I am more and more certain that this is my purpose in life, not that it should happen in any particular way, but that I should find a way to do this even if I work 40 hours a week doing something stupid and meaningless (and everything can be made to have meaning when you live in the moment) and work on this as I can, or find an opportunity to do this within the mechanisms of existing reality and get paid for it, it doesn't matter how it happens, I can't expect specifics. I just have to take each moment of experience and try to be in the moment while moving forward. That is hard. How do you do that? Facebook post *Enlightenment Update* I believe i have just discovered my true life purpose after 45 years. It's not anything I expected and yet it's more than I ever dreamed. It is completely attainable. It will bring me more joy and fulfillment than anything else I could ever do in life, no matter what form it takes--if I do it like a starving artist or like a big celebrity. And the truth is, I'm not ready to tell many of you what this new purpose is because it is actually kind of personal, I will just say that after 45 years, I found a way OUT of MY pain and worry and fear and anxiety and misery, and I think I'm uniquely qualified to help people who are like me figure out these truths sooner. So, that's what I'm going to do. One way or another, however the universe or God or what have you is leading me. And I'm going to continue to grow myself. And isn't this kind of the way life should be? Have we lost this from our earlier traditions of apprentices and mentors? Isn't that what all the fantasy novels are all about? Luke Skywalker had to have Obi Wan. I'm encouraging all of my older friends, no matter where you are in life, to find a way to reach out and mentor someone. Not just anyone. That won't work. You have to find someone to mentor who is like yourself, maybe a slightly less insightful self who you recognize as similar to you before you grew, and to do that, you have to get to know someone on their terms which will build your empathy and you will grow. Mentoring, like child-rearing is a two-way street of sharing wisdom. If you don't believe me, ask a kid what they want to do and then pay very close attention and listen and try to take "no" out of your vocabulary. Do what they want to do and listen to what they are saying and talk to them like they are as smart as you are, because they are. They may not have as many experiences as you have, but they are learning from every experience they have, and if you let them, they will teach you new things you never knew, because they are in the moment. They are absorbing what life has to offer and not just waiting in line or driving to work or relaxing before bed. To them, every moment is a discovery and something new, and just when you are convinced that they can't possibly teach you anything new, they do, because they have real insights sometimes too. This is the same for kids and adults as it is for democrats and republicans, conservatives and liberals, blacks and whites, and any kind of divisive label you can come up with. We just have to stop shouting and open our ears to each other and maybe we are all at different stages of enlightenment in our lives and I think enlightenment is maybe an over-important term, but maybe we all have different perspectives, but it doesn't hurt to listen, and many times you learn something.

Hey all So for the last week I have been meditating 20 minutes twice a day. In the morning I did "mindfullness" and in the evening "letting thoughts go". On monday I bumped that up to 30 minutes and I started self-inquiry. I asked myself the following questions: "Who is aware?" "Who is perceiving?" "Who am I?" just like Leo suggested. What I found as I started this inquiry was that I really could not get a sense of what the answer was. I asked myself these questions over and over but there was no answer at all. My mind was shut or quiet. Sometimes the voice would come up with a timid "I" or with my name but I really could not pinpoint it and when I asked "who is aware of I?"-complete silence. Suddenly after about 10-15 minutes as I was already frustrated there was this awesome sensation. I just felt it coming on. It was like a shower of bliss and awesomeness. Unfortunately it only lasted about 20 seconds hence it was one of the most awesome sensations I have ever felt. Nonetheless I really struggled with getting my mind to come up with answers at all. In addition to that I did a "strong determination sit" of 1 hour this morning. I tried to do self-inquiry whilst at it but there were no real answers to my questions, yet again. What was really interesting was that after about 45 minutes as I sat through pure pain and discomfort I just let go. Up to that I point I was just frustrated, in pain, bored out of my mind,... but then it almost became pleasurable. I just existed and there was no more resistance. Really interesting experience. I would really appreciate some feedback from you guys. Especially regarding my self inquiry. How would you rate my progress? Any feedback, tips or suggestions are much appreciated! Thanks!

I just thought I would share my experiences here. Hopefully they might be helpful to somebody on here who’s trying to understand what they are going through. So enlightenment? I watched Leo’s video about spiritual enlightenment. He talked about how it is such a rare thing, maybe only one in a million could achieve it. So, yes, that sounds daunting. It seems like some people have a tendency to lose their minds on their way to enlightenment. So I thought a somewhat different perspective on the subject might be helpful. I think my own experience perhaps isn’t enlightenment but just a stopping point along the journey. I don’t know. Everyone has their own way of labeling their experiences and this is how I see mine. This may be something that is easier for you to wrap your head around than enlightenment. Maybe it is just a story that I tell myself to create drama in my life. You be the judge. Life has no meaning until you give it meaning and all of that. I think my experience is somewhat rare but perhaps not as rare as what Mr. Gura describes as enlightenment. If I’m going to put a label on what happened to me I would say it was me developing my own morality and sense of ethics and where that ultimately led me. I think it is something that a lot of your teachers have experienced, especially the ones that you liked really well. It is perhaps not such an unattainable feat of the mind. So I was a quiet introverted kid. I lived in my own head a lot. I liked to read books. I would find myself lying awake at night thinking about things like – What happens when we die? Do we just disintegrate into nothingness? Can I be okay with the belief that I will one day just disintegrate into nothingness? That’s sort of sad and disturbing to me. What does it all mean? - My mom took us to church I think more to socialize and have a community to fit into rather than through any real need to instill faith in God. My dad had a somewhat strained relationship with his mother, who was very religious, and I think that made him jaded about God and religion. He used to read passages of the Bible and make fun of them. He did not go to church with us. Eventually I started to hate church and began to refuse to go. It was just boring. All through junior high and high school I thought about these types of topics a lot. A lot of the time I would be going about my daily business on autopilot with thoughts like this in the background. Hey, I likely could have spent thousands of hours on this. I don’t know. It was automatic to me. It was just something that I did. I didn’t feel the need to share these ideas. I just thought them. I read a fair amount of the classic books because I had to for classes and some on my own. I liked authors like Mark Twain, Jack London, John Steinbeck, Sinclair Lewis, Charles Dickens, George Orwell, etc. Lord of the Flies comes to mind as an important book in my thoughts. At any rate, what I now realize is that I was drawn toward books in which the characters faced moral dilemmas. If you look at any famous classic book, it probably revolves around some big moral dilemma that the characters are experiencing. One of my teachers would talk about God a lot and I thought he was kind of kookie, but I liked him. There was another teacher who I now realize seemed to be sizing me up on the moral development scale. I remember him asking me “What would happen if you turned in your assignment late?” As I was always waiting until the last second to turn things in. So the year was 1995, I was in college and taking a couple of history classes and a class about the philosophy of morality. I was an introvert and never fit in to the college scene very well. I was more immersed in my studies than the average college student I would guess. But I was studying all of this stuff, Greek and Roman history, Socrates, Charlemagne, World War I and II and it just seemed to me that everything was starting to make sense and come together cohesively in a meaningful pattern. History wasn’t just a series of random events but almost seemed orchestrated and moving in a direction of greater freedom and social justice. Political systems were becoming less and less authoritarian as people gained more and more power. I felt so inspired and uplifted by these ideas and couldn’t sleep at night. I was just thinking and thinking about all of these ideas and trying to put all of the pieces together. The philosophy of morality seemed to fit perfectly into the paradigm that I was forming. I remember reading Kant and his ideas about why human beings should have value. Why should we have human rights and a respect for life? Because human beings were endowed by their creator with these rights. If there is no God than human life has no value and we’re just a bunch of sacks of meat. I’m sure you could argue against this all day, but this was my uplifting realization. During this time I was thinking a lot and just didn’t feel like eating so I think I lost 20 pounds, and I wasn’t heavy to begin with. At any rate, I was thinking all of these thoughts one night and it just hit me that there must be a God and I felt this shift in me like my ego and the part of me that wanted to be selfless came together and something entered my heart. I don’t want it to sound like another BS religious experience. It was a profound shift in me. Unfortunately, I was still very much me, an awkward introverted girl trying to navigate my college experience and not really doing a very good job of it. I felt like wow, I need to do something and take action on this. I tried to talk to people about it and of course they just thought I was nuts. I dropped out of school and pissed off my parents royally and made a whole slew of strategic blunders. I tried to find someone to give me guidance, but I realized I was on my own. I had to figure out my own path and I did a piss poor job of it. I didn’t really heed to call to go on my own hero’s journey, as they say, and wound up going back to school. I didn’t have the skillset to deal with my experience and didn’t find anyone to guide me to a better path. So this became a big source of shame for me. This experience I had and couldn’t really relate to anyone I knew about. I felt like I was failing the world in a sense. I wasn’t ready to be Gandhi or Martin Luther King or anyone awesome like that. I’m not going to relate my whole lame life story after that point. It is not impressive. At some point I started to learn about the dark side, conspiracy, 911 etc. and then my life took on a whole new level of effed upness. I’m not going to relate that story here. But this phenomenon is something that is understood and studied in the psychology field. I’m no expert on the topic. I do recall one of my high school teachers handing out a worksheet about the levels of moral development and moral reasoning. Lawrence Kohlberg is a psychologist who spent a fair amount of time studying the subject and breaking down the various levels and what type of moral reasoning is behind them. You can size yourself up on the scale. So thanks Mr. Leo for your videos. I am started to see the light I think at the age of 40, yikes. Yes, we all need to grow the fuck up and meditate and figure our shit out. So enlightenment sounds like an attempt to bliss out of reality. What I experienced is not that. It is something that ultimately created more suffering in my life. I still had a lot of layers of crud over my shiny authentic self as Leo would say. I’m finally finding ways to lift those layers of crud. It’s a slow process and the hero’s journey still seems like something I still don’t really want to take on. I have to or I will remain miserable and un-actualized. That’s all that I’m going to write for now. Hopefully this will give you something to ponder on your journey to enlightenment. Anyway, here is some info about moral development Levels and Stages of Moral Development Level 1: Preconventional Morality The first level of morality, preconventional morality, can be further divided into two stages: obedience and punishment, and individualism and exchange. Stage 1: Punishment- Obedience Orientation Related to Skinner’s Operational Conditioning, this stage includes the use of punishment so that the person refrains from doing the action and continues to obey the rules. For example, we follow the law because we do not want to go to jail. Stage 2: Instrumental Relativist Orientation In this stage, the person is said to judge the morality of an action based on how it satisfies the individual needs of the doer. For instance, a person steals money from another person because he needs that money to buy food for his hungry children. In Kohlberg’s theory, the children tend to say that this action is morally right because of the serious need of the doer. Level 2: Conventional Morality The second level of morality involves the stages 3 and 4 of moral development. Conventional morality includes the society and societal roles in judging the morality of an action. Stage 3: Good Boy-Nice Girl Orientation In this stage, a person judges an action based on the societal roles and social expectations before him. This is also known as the “interpersonal relationships” phase. For example, a child gives away her lunch to a street peasant because she thinks doing so means being nice. Stage 4: Law and Order Orientation This stage includes respecting the authorities and following the rules, as well as doing a person’s duty. The society is the main consideration of a person at this stage. For instance, a policeman refuses the money offered to him under the table and arrests the offender because he believes this is his duty as an officer of peace and order. Level 3: Postconventional Morality The post-conventional morality includes stage 5 and stage 6. This is mainly concerned with the universal principles that relation to the action done. Stage 5 : Social Contract Orientation In this stage, the person is look at various opinions and values of different people before coming up with the decision on the morality of the action. Stage 6 : Universal Ethical Principles Orientation The final stage of moral reasoning, this orientation is when a person considers universally accepted ethical principles. The judgment may become innate and may even violate the laws and rules as the person becomes attached to his own principles of justice.

I am meditating and want to grow spiritually, but I think relationships are important as well. You never ever hear of monks or spiritual teachers caring about sex. Sex is a human pleasure that you are supposedly supposed to get over once you realise that you can reach higher states of bliss and connect with the divine nature of consciousness. But in my experience, you can grow a lot from relationships and it is one of the beautiful things about being human. I don't want to give it up. Is the fact that im finding it hard to detach from relationships signalling that I have a long way to go before being enlightened?

@jjer94"In fact, meditation can become a trap for some people when they imagine that they are getting somewhere, as if there's some destination they need to arrive to in order to be who they are. They believe that a silent mind (or feeling 'bliss' or whatever other bogus fleeting experience) means enlightenment, so they work so hard to try to silent the mind, as if you need immense effort to reach a state of effortlessness. Sure, earnestness is required to reach enlightenment, but in my opinion, trying to brute force your way to a silent mind is a fool's game. It's like cutting off the heads of a hydra when they're just going to grow back. " Your first sentence makes sense, but I'm sorry, the rest makes no sense. There are many who study non-duality. Why aren't they all enlightened? If you don't know HOW to let go, or release control, you aren't gonna get there. Releasing control itself is meditation! And what's the best way to LEARN how to release control? Sitting down and learning how to release control.... Yes, you can be mindful in your day-to-day activities, but if the practice of realeasing control is not at the forefront, then it is extremely easy to get caught up in these day-to-day tasks. Meditating in your day-to-day activities WITHOUT proper practice of sitting down at the cushion is like learning how to run before you walk.. Yes, spiritual autopsy and acquiring knowledge about the truth is very useful, but doing that just means that the monkey mind can see through it's fake nature. It doesn't mean that the monkey mind is going to quiten down. You are coming at this from an angle of spiritual autopsy VERSUS meditation. I would argue that it is NOT one or the other, but both. Also, what is your definition of enlightenment? The monkey mind seeing it's fake nature is not the same as actually having an enlightenment "experience". There is only this moment. THe right NOW. Everything is just passing away around you. If one doesn't meditate and doesn't develop the practice of meditation, this cannot be truly seen.

You don't have to meditate to reach enlightenment. Technically, you don't need to do anything to realize what you already are, because you're already it! All methods to reach enlightenment are just a matter of removing obstructions (desires, fears, beliefs) in order to see that you've been there the whole time. That's why they call it the "gateless gate." In fact, meditation can become a trap for some people when they imagine that they are getting somewhere, as if there's some destination they need to arrive to in order to be who they are. They believe that a silent mind (or feeling 'bliss' or whatever other bogus fleeting experience) means enlightenment, so they work so hard to try to silent the mind, as if you need immense effort to reach a state of effortlessness. Sure, earnestness is required to reach enlightenment, but in my opinion, trying to brute force your way to a silent mind is a fool's game. It's like cutting off the heads of a hydra when they're just going to grow back. I'm not saying that meditation is useless. When used as a way to release control, meditation can be a very powerful tool. And it doesn't necessarily have to just take place on the cushion. Life itself is your meditation. Every situation can be an opportunity to release control. Monkey mind is not the issue; it's the importance you give to your monkey mind that's the issue. Monkey mind will start to settle down a bit once you start seeing through your desires and fears (i.e. releasing control), and you don't need to be on the cushion to do that. Cheers!

@dominic1 This is the kind of question that if you ask 100 ppl, you'll probably get 100 different answers. No two will be exactly alike because it is all illusion of mind and the way mind will interpret that experience will be different for each. That being said, the first time I let go of my ego self and had an awakening "experience" it was quite dramatic. Conscionsceness was no longer localized at my body location. It was filling the room and became externalized. That was VERY different to experience for the first time. There was a distinct and sudden "shift" in consciousness. Just as if you changed the channel on a radio and tuned to another station than the one you normally listen to in daily life. For me it was like discovering there was more than just one station to tune to. It was like tuning to a "universal" frequency of pure consciousness. I became just a very silent observer in the background to what was happening. I flowed into the consciousness that was outside of my body location and was suddenly floating in an ocean of pure silent bliss and stillness. My interpretation of that was that I entered another dimension, it was so distinct from my usual awareness. Again that's just the best way I can describe it using words and mind. I refer to all this using the word "I" just for the sake of conversation. I'm not "enlightened" but I do understand that all this is "Maya" that is happening within my mind. My interpretation of nothingness is there is no experience of that. No "heavenly" feelings. You don't exist when nothingness happens so it can't be described at all. It is a total blank space within awareness. It's a total non-experience. Not even a silent observer is present experiencing a state of bliss so there is no memory of that at all..... So I guess to sum it all up, we all have "awakening experiences" until we get to the point where the "I" vanishes and than there is not even an experience to be had of any kind because there is no experiencer remaining. That's my illusion!

If you don't meditate at all don't start with a hour. Start with something like 20 minutes, I even recommend 10 minutes to starters. Do the "Do Nothing" technique for three months, than raise your sitting time to maybe 30-40 minutes. Than do that for a while and than you can start to sit for 60 minutes. If you have sat some time (I'd say 1-2 months) with 60 minutes and "Do Nothing" try doing it with strong determination sits. If it's too hard go back to 30 minutes with it. It's key to start slow here and make it a habit. Every raise of time is challenging in the beginning and you can't hold up with it if you challenge yourself too much in the beginning. It needs a few months for most people to really see where this is leading you (or get a sense of it). Also, get a vision for why you actually want to do this. I have very strong motives so it's never the question for me whether I meditate or not. Now, after a year of it I have seen so much (and it's just the early beginning) that I can't picture going back. That's my thing now and I love it. Cheers to you, PS: Also picture the big picture. Visualize where this would lead you in one year. In the first year you can master the 1 hour sits (w/ or w/o strong determination). The second year you can do the 90 minutes or 120 minutes and so on. I see myself sitting for 4 hours with strong determination sits in I'd say 5 years. That will be insane. I probably wake up on the way with this stuff. Now, if I look at 10 years from now I'd like to have mastered 6-8 hours. Then I'll nuance that for the rest of my life, maybe join a Zen monastery some day, I don't know. Visualize how your life would change if you can sit for 8 hours and also how it would feel to sit for 8 hours w/o pains and complete bliss. How would you feel in your normal life?