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Perhaps as accurate as it can get. I still have some blue in me, when things go terribly wrong (like twice a year or so) I start praying to God in the old fashioned way. Even though aware this is not the most high realization of God I had, I allow myself to do so as it gives me some kind comfort. This prevents me from falling deeper and blaming others. When things don't go that well but not very bad like they are going now, I have the tendency to rationalize or to fall into the trap of nihilism (orange?). Yesterday I cried after hearing about a murder of a 32 year old man by a 19 year old, not that I judged the murderer. I felt sorry for him too. He had attempted suicide before and was addicted to games. His motive was: I wanted to feel like what it is to do in real life what I do in video games. I felt his pain and how he lost touch with reality. When I saw a picture of the victim my intuition told me it's at least a stage green person and it made me cry harder, like he had such a good vibe on the picture... Gosh I'm almost crying right now while typing this. However I'd feel like I'd give even the murderer a big hug. I guess these are 'green' feelings? Nonetheless I've experienced moments of what one could call unimaginable bliss, love, fearlessness and peace though. Not caring about talking, needing to answer any existential questions or doing anything, feeling 'God' energy, having only intuition and barely any thought. Ultimately it's beyond words. Those are second tier experiences I guess? But I assume many people in 'green' have them now and then, for example during a walk in nature during the summer when it's raining just not caring about getting wet? Just feeling the rain rinsing away ones ego.

Hi! Its been almost a year since my last trip on LSD where I attempted suicide. I was not suicidal before, it was just on this trip. It was the worst day of my life. Since then I’ve mostly stayed away from psychedelics. I’ve only ever done LSD and magic truffles and I always valued the insights they gave me. It makes me quite sad that I can’t use psychedelics as a tool anymore because of my fear. Is there a way to take psychedelics and at the same time make it absolutely safe? By safe, I mean physically safe, as in, the body as an organism is unharmed. By this I mean safe in the sense that you won’t hurt yourself physically. I’ve researched a little bit but I wanted to also get the opinion and experience of people on this forum. Maybe someone else had a similarly scary experience but has found a way to use psychedelics anyway? Lsd is too scary for me but I was thinking maybe a drug with a shorter duration like DMT for example is less risky when it comes to freaking out and starting to hurt yourself? Also, would taking Xanax, for psychedelics in general, before a trip minimize the risk? I’ve even played with the thought of constraining myself physically before administering the drug. But then I saw the possibility that I still hurt myself by biting off my tongue for example. The irrational mind states I’ve experienced on lsd would definitely make that possible. I know it sounds kind of ridiculous to think about such drastic measures. Maybe I should just leave it alone. But it’s also just that I don’t want to have this fear of psychedelics anymore and I don’t know how to do that without facing it. It’s very strange to have had both the most beautiful experiences and most horrible experiences of my life on LSD lol. Cheers!

So why are we meditating so much to experience God and don´t just suicide to merge with the Godhead?

Thanks for sharing with us your way of living. I've read several of your posts, about suicide too, but i am not sure what are you trying to say. Do you need any help?

Then why suicide? You can pretend suicide feel good by saying it's comfortable, but those are not the same. If your heart felt like suicide was right there would be no doubt. Yet there is, just as there is this forum post. There's no reason to resort to suicide though. If you want to contribute to society you can, it really is up to you. You don't have to but you certainly can. Putting all of that aside, what would be the next amazing to do in life? It doesn't matter what happened, right now what do you want? When you say suicide, I doubt what you want is the pain of hurting the body. What do you think you can only have in the "afterlife" you can't have right now?

Look if you are truly happy and not hurting anyone, power to you. But your family and friends deserve love too. It's not their fault if they don't understand, try and put yourself in their shoes. Consider the fact they raised you, sheltered you, fed you, and loved you for 18 years. Reconnect even if it's painful and don't be avoidant. Be humble enough and realize maybe your "level" isn't as high as you think it is if resentment and anger are the emotions you have towards those who aren't as conscious. Suicide is not the answer to anything. It's just another form of selfishness.

When I was 18 I had already dropped out of school and planned to live alone in nature for for the rest of my life. I had friends and family members I discontinued talking to abruptly and left to Australia, half a world away. Everyone said either they were jelous or that I needed help but I didn't have any room to consider any other option or feeling. I was going to die in nature one way or another, I had many girlfriends by then and I had been high from everything a teenager could have wanted, I was the king before I lost my mind researching all things mysticism and supernatural enlightenment. One day out of the blue I was chosen to live a great life full of wisdom. I denounced everything I ever experienced and began my life as a safe at age 17. It killed me to live in some small town where everything was the same for everyone. Nobody was on my level. I became vegan and flew off to the jungle without notifying anyone. Fuck my parents and fuck everyone, you are all pieces of shit and guilty for the grunt survival of millions, I was going to learn how to become God himself and show everyone what nature in the mind can really achieve. I would have astral projections, I began seeing demons and angels, In my mind I have killed both and became incredibly sensitive to compassion and what freedom entails. As of right now I have lived alone for 8 years wandering the globe exposed to the suffering of the homeless as well as the severe elements so I am strong physically and mentally. I have drank from a finest cup and smoked the best narcotics at this point. I am detached from any notion of place or time. Once I gave all of my thoughts to a lady and she believed were were eternally inseperable. 5 years of denial. I now have SSI from suicidal hospitalizations where I absolutely played the system. The only thing I do now besides meditate is listen to mystical melodic instrumentals and create rock paintings, where I can talk to my higher self in terms of gratitude for the smallest incling of non dual experience. Due to drugs I my dopeamine levels are nearly non existent. I don't need food anymore, I survive on connection to the world. I am. I may die but it is not by my allowance and that's okay. I am content being a homeless non contributing piece of shit. And I may learn how to thank myself through you one day. That's all.

I have been homeless for a number of years, I have seen what time can do to the scared and desperate. I have seen pure hatred for life where a person will beligerantly cuss at everything in their way constantly with a completely dirty outfit, discusting teeth and hair, with nothing to do but be hateful towards everyone while having nothing in life at all not even a place to sit and relax from being scorched by the sun, trust me that's how it was for him. I wondered if I could ever get like that how could I possibly not kill myself. The more I went through life having that come up in thought, which is more often then it probably should've, the less I blamed him. I have attempted suicide a couple times because I had no hope or forsight to be content. That's what drove that man into a hateful existence I believe, he had no room for contentment as his life slid into a bottomless pit of shit. I am currently homeless but I am lucky enough to survive away from civilization and having to live in the hell of believing in God, karma, comparison, and judgement. That shit is a never ending cycle. I am homeless by choice, I am 25 and meditate and wander around my desert oasis in Arizona 24/7, dream loving dreams, eat whatever I choose to carry, read cool books but mostly contemplate how eternal my peace will be. I wish more people could relate and so you have my best wishes! All I ever did was be an introvert as hard as it is. Astrology opened my eyes after I believed aliens were looking out for me, they weren't.

There are books written about this subject.. which I have read. Nato reminds me of the holism thing which Leo has talked about. Because all member countries goes together for the greater good. It acts as one. It prevents wars because attacking a Nato member would be suicide. Together is strong. The former Sovjetunion states Georgia and Ukraine aren't Nato members, and they have been attacked by Russia. While the Baltic states (former Sovjetunion states Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) are Nato members, and they haven't been attacked by Russia. It's their Nato membership which has saved them. Ukraine is now begging for a Nato membership, but unfortunately they can't join Nato right now because that would instantly trigger a war with Russia. A country should join Nato before war starts, to prevent a war from starting, that's why I want Sweden and Finland to join Nato now while we still have peace. NATO is a international intergovernmental political organization in which the decisions are made by consensus between all 30 sovereign member states, and every member has veto right, so everyone benefit. But hostile aggressive countries do not benefit because they can't attack members. "These organizations bring member states together to cooperate on a particular theme or issues that have global impacts and implications such as human rights, trade, development, poverty, gender or migration." https://libguides.lub.lu.se/c.php?g=489859&p=3938549 "Article 5 provides that if a NATO Ally is the victim of an armed attack, each and every other member of the Alliance will consider this act of violence as an armed attack against all members and will take the actions it deems necessary to assist the Ally attacked." https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_110496.htm Basically every swede who is against a Nato membership is against it because they believe in some myth about Nato, or have misconceptions about it. Every argument against a membership can be killed by pure facts. Most swedes don't really know what Nato even is, they just have prejudices and wrong notions. And they also don't know that Sweden isn't neutral anymore, because we are EU members, and we have a thing called "solidaritetsförklaringen" in which we promise to help other Nordic and EU countries if they are attacked. If a war happens in our proximity then Sweden will be dragged into the war even if we aren't members in Nato. And if Russia attacks Sweden it will be because it needs Gotland (a swedish island) and maybe southern Sweden because of strategic reasons if Russia attacks the Baltic states. Because Russia can then cut off Nato from helping the Baltic states, by putting air and sea missile systems on Gotland and southern Sweden, so Nato can't come from west to assist the Baltics. In case of a war Sweden will assist Nato anyway (despite our lack of membership). And Russia knows it. And Russia will act accordingly. So there is no reason for Sweden to not join Nato. Sweden is a close partner with Nato. A Nato membership would definitely increase the safety not only for Sweden, but also for the Baltics. The Baltics have repeatedly said that a swedish membership would increase their safety. It's also morally important to be on the good side and defend the free world, our shared western values, human rights and democracy, by being a member of Nato. For example Belgium don't have any foes, they are surrounded by friendly democratic countries, they are cocooned in safety, but they are still members of Nato because of moral reasons. They want to contribute to a good cause. Almost all the good guys are members of Nato. This should be enough to understand that Nato is good and that Sweden and Finland should join it: Trump didn't like Nato and other international cooperations, while Biden loves them.

I am seeking uncommon knowledge. There are some issues which people either underestimate or don't know about at all. I am looking for issues which politicians never talk about. This is how politics could be used to educate ourselves. I learned about several unknown issues already. Developmental psychology is not mainstream. Suicide rates in autism are gradually becoming more known. Psychedelics are expected to become more mainstream soon according to rebel wisdom. Food is a frequently ignored issue even though baby food is known to be toxic. Food is an extremely threatening issue for food producers, medical scientists, and the FDA. Issues which are extremely threatening to the status quo must be ignored or unknown. Modern slavery for example is threatening to all countries which benefit from the corrupt global supply chain. Feminists often under estimate the importance of men's rights. If the unique ways in which men and women are oppressed are not addressed, then equality can't be achieved. Feminists are starting to realize this. What obscure political issues do you know about?

All these objections are your ego talking. Notice you didn't deliberately "think" all these thoughts. They just came out of seemingly nowhere, right? That is the ego's job. To be negatively oriented, keeping you close-minded. The ego's job is to keep your body alive. Not only that, but to also keep "itself" alive -- the illusion of being a separate self inside a body -- socially & hieracally, climbing the ranks among "the human status space" (we are fucking apes in uniform, man) or at least trying to make sure you don't fall down. If you were open to, or even accepted that you were God (which actually is your true nature lol, but we could also call it Love or Pure Awareness), your ego is afraid you would stop pursuing sex, money, fame, achievements, success, all that jazz. The ego's job is to tell you that you're miserable and not good enough. You mostly believe it. So it gets you up in the morning and makes you pursue things. Illusory betterment for a mental, social construct. But by believing in it you will never become happy or at peace. Cos the ego naturally cannot be satisfied. It is always ready to tell you that you're a piece of shit and that danger is luring all around,... and thus you become afraid and at constant inner conflict on the inside - always looking for something external to make you feel fulfilled, if just for a brief moment: Sugar, sex, drugs, video games, junkfood, junk TV, small talking with other apparent egos, climbing the social ladder, getting higher salary, a new car, prettier muscles, new fancy fashion clothes, more power, more success, more achievements. This is the Matrix. This is enslavement. The movie, The Matrix, is an almost one-to-one analogy of the ego's power over us; its bars around our freedom. Heck, we are all mostly unconscious addicts, enslaved by the ego. How do one get free? Consciousness. Awareness. Love. Conscious suffering & a deep authentic desire to be fucking free again. Don't hate or love your ego. "Just" transcend it. Become conscious of its purpose, nature and mechanics. The shadow & darkness of the ego cannot survive the illuminating burning light of your consciousness. Stay mindful. It is valuable to know that there are two primary ways in which you can see that a person is deeply enslaved by his or her ego. It can indeed, namely, express itself two ways externally: - the inflated selfish external persona that is constantly participating in one-upmanship, constantly reminding himself/herself that he/she is superior to all others (as a way to suppress the ego's negative thoughts). You see that in people who are opportunistic, have zero integrity, and will do everything to achieve their ambitions, including hurting other human beings. - the victim persona. Here the person has not "managed" to suppress the ego (by lashing outwards as in the inflated case). Instead the person has bought into the ego's negative thoughts, believing them. Thus the person think he or she is a terrible human being, not worthy of love, or even worse: not worthy of living (suicide can happen). This person is constantly afraid, and feels like the world is cruel. Indeed, to become a mature adult, you shouldn't suppress nor accept the ego's thoughts. Don't try to "stop" the thoughts either; cos you can't! You didn't start the thoughts, thus you cannot force them to stop either (only suppression/denying will happen, which makes you an inflated, selfish person). As said, you should "just" become conscious of the ego's ways of behaving. Awareness alone is curative. By maintaining mindfulness, you can manage to see the ego unfolding its negative thoughts during the day & constrain yourself to not make the two possible mistakes of either *accepting* or *denying/suppressing* the ego's thoughts. Don't accept ego (you will fill miserable if you do). And don't suppress ego (it will come back a thousands time stronger, if you do). Just be conscious of it! And let it all go. ??? Your true self is NOT the ego. Your true self is Consciousness/God/Love/The Selfless Self/The Universe/ -- whatever you wanna call that ineffeable, mysterious formless "no-thing-being" that you truly are -- that innermost essential experience of 'being you', and which you deep, deep down know you are --- and will see yourself to be, if you can let go of the filters of ego. Ego is not equal to personality either. In fact, a human being's true personality/soul will shine through much clearer if the ego is transcended. Now, it is no easy task to transcend ego. It can take a lifetime. This is what life is all about: becoming your true self (you already are 'it', but realizing it!), becoming free. Also just to note: the ego isn't "an entity". In fact it doesn't really exist at all. "Ego" as a concept is best described as an inner 'tension', a special form of inner "negative energy" that is constantly 24/7 trying to convince you - the real you - that you're 'a separate self' located inside a skull placed on top of a human body. The ego's job is to make you feel guilty (or perhaps indirectly superior if you suppress that guilt). To make you feel anxious, afraid, angry, scared, like you lack something, like you desperately need x or y to become happy. The ego works through comparing you with others. Through dividing, fragmenting and splitting up the outside world in "bad" & "good" objects. The ego creates dualities: good, bad, worthy, unworthy, pride, shame, etc. The ego attaches itself --- often totally unconsciously to you, cos you have bought into the belief that you ARE a separate self (ego) --- to all kinds of things: this person is bad, this person is good, this is MY girlfriend/boyfriend, this is MY enemy, this is MY country, this is the right religion/ideology/belief/, that country is evil, and so on and so on. You thus become deeply attached to all kinds of objects, ideas, beliefs and persons. If your car or smartphone is damaged, it feels like YOU have been hurt, right? Your sense of identity is TOTALLY in the hands of the ego. The ego unconsciously created a worldview for you. A lens through which you perceive and interpret the world. The real you is experience itself! Consciousness. The perceiver is the perceived! The real you is equal to Love, Happiness, Peace. The real you is Whole. Oneness. It doesn't need or lack anything. It's completely at peace, cos it is in a sense nothing & everything simultaneously (non-duality). The ego and the logical mind cannot comprehend this, though. Don't even try to understand it, cos you will fail. The one who "wants" to understand it, in order to become 'superior', more powerful or 'better', is the ego. Likewise, the one who dismisses everything I wrote here is also the ego; protecting its own worldview, denying it could be otherwise. Close-mindedness is the job of the ego. Spirituality isn't about "adding stuff' to oneself (that is the job of the ego). Instead, it is about becoming free (again) through constantly practicing greater and greater self-awareness. Thus, it is actually about "dropping stuff", letting go of unexamined beliefs and attachments. Thus, slowly, your inner true being is allowed to shine through your human incarnation more clearly. We have to acknowledge that there are (sort of) positive things to say about ego as well (don't accept or love it though & don't hate it either): It keeps your alive. Its physical purpose is to keep you alive and make sure your genes pass on to the next generation. Unconscious ego is the main issue. When you have become fully conscious of the ego, it is naturally transcended and it's not really an issue anymore. Its energetic patterns/structures will still lay latent in the brain/mind and activate from time to time, but you are so conscious (of it) now, that you know when to listen to it, and - most importantly - when not to! Thoughts/thinking in and by themselves is an amazing creative technology created by the brain (God) and is not an issue in and by themselves. The ego, however, tries to make sure that you are constantly spending MUCH of your energy on: - polising your self-image, the mask you pretend to the world/social groups/workplace/community - thinking about how others perceive you, cos your ego REALLY wants to accepted by others, cos it believes this will allow higher chances for survival and gene-passing. - worrying, regretting, perfectionism. In fact, when you have transcended your ego fully, you will be AMAZED how much more energy you have available to divert into other activites such as: creation, art, love, creativity, humour, laughter, crying, dancing, playing around, having fun, being empathic with others, building crazy projects, helping others, doing actual GOOD things for yourself and others (healthy eating, meditation, exercise, reading, spending authentic time with other souls). But thoughts created *by the ego*, which you unconsciously attach yourself to (in lack of maturity/ wakefulness/love/consciousness/wisdom), is a BIG time problem and takes SO MUCH of your inner energy resources. As long as you can stay mindful and not attach yourself to your thoughts, it's good. This is much, much easier said than done, though! On a more metaphysical level, the ego is sort of "the shadow of God". God is Infinite & Eternal. The Infinite doesn't "know" it is Infinite cos it lacks the contrast of "finiteness" to be able to see/perceive/know its own nature: Unconditional Love, Selflessness, Absolute Infinity, Infinite Imagination, ... God. Thus, God created the ego as a tool of (ultimately) being able to know Itself. But first: Leela. Play. Survival. Drama. Suffering. Fragmentation. Hide'n'seek. Contrast. And then: self-realization..... Now that you know all this, go ahead and start slowly transcending your apparant (illusory) separate self (ego), so you for yourself can see your true immortality, divinity & Godhood. Practive Self-Love. Practice staying mindful. Meditation is inherently good. ❤️❤️❤️ Oneness is what is. It's all One & Whole. No real separation. I am you. You are me. Just Love. Just God. Just magic. Just mystery. Lila (Divine Play). ❤️❤️❤️ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lila_(Hinduism)

After boosting the ego, if the things doesn’t go the way that ego wants, almost impossible to stop it. As you said, the situation leaded to suicide. Lol. ?

Digital Self Harm and Masochistic Epistemology The section between 22:40 and 30:36 talks about digital self harm and masochistic epistemology. I hate to admit it but find myself relating to these terms Contrapoints talks about digital self harm and how people seek out information that hurts them and that might not be rational to reaffirm their limiting beliefs and their world view. It's about having a masochistic epistemology which means what ever hurts must be true. The reason why I relate to this is because sometimes I catch myself going to the dating section of this forum or I check up on someone going on a racist rant and I'm always tempted to respond or to follow along and watch the drama unfold. But this literally does nothing but reaffirm my limiting beliefs around dating which consists of men being trash, I'm never going to find a decent man, and that men are manipulative misogynistic creeps who only value women for their youth and beauty and once women turn 25, they start losing their value. I know the average man isn't some red pilled scumbag but if you have been locked in the house in the pandemic for a year and the only man you associate with on a regular basis and who is not related to you is the guy at the Cinnabon drive through, you can't help but fill in the gaps of your experience based on the few things scumbags say online and have your views on what men are really like get distorted. As a result, I've been trying to cut back on what I see on this forum and mind my own damn business in my journal. I'm getting better at it but there is room for a lot of improvement. Another instance of this is how fatalistic I got with my world view when it came to capitalism. The pandemic uncovered a lot of messed up systems in society and I'm pretty sure a large portion of the youth has some form of critique against capitalism whether they realize that or not. And plus, I'm locked in the house all day with nothing to do except watch left tube so I started getting really pessimistic of what the future held. It's to the point where in my mind I was like this weed smoking hippie that didn't want to get a job because that seemed like emotional suicide. My rational mind knows that's not the case but the irrational part of me just associates work with abusive bosses and being paid slave wages or if I am making money, working crazy hours and having my labor be exploited until I can't mentally or physically continue. Yikes. Yeah I cut down on leftist media, forced myself to get an internship, and I'm working through my limiting beliefs around money. Don't get me wrong, I still believe that there are systemic issues with the way capitalism is structured but the difference is that now I try to be aware of it instead of constantly focusing on it and causing myself to spiral. And finally, I remember when I got rejected by all the schools I wanted to go to in my senior year of high school, I came across this channel that would basically say things like if you don't go to Harvard and kiss the ass of the people above you that you are going to be poor and miserable for the rest of your life. It reaffirmed the negative thoughts I was having about myself at my time of vulnerability. But then I found that this guy was a part of the alt right and I kept getting recommended red pill stuff so then he lost all credibility in my eyes and I never returned to his channel or similar channels ever again. I noticed that with red pill in general, I can't stomach that type of thing. I try to be open minded and take things with a grain of salt and a lot of times I can do that but when it comes to red pill people, I can't deal with them without feeling like trash about myself. Just goes to show that I still have a lot of healing to do. In the mean time, I mean I already stay away from red pill sites in general, but I should mute people like that on this site because I'm not mentally in the place to read what they have to say. Like it's to the point where I started questioning my own sexual boundaries (YIKES) and I catch myself feeling more and more pessimistic about my dating prospects. I think the whole thing with masochistic epistemology is present with guys who have issues with dating on this site. They believe that you have to have all of this money and status to even get a girl and that everything is hopeless but even when people try to explain that this is not the case, they get all defensive and then it devolves into a gender war. These guys aren't wealthy or powerful, they are using this rhetoric to hurt themselves and get into a fatalistic spiral about how men like them can't get laid and how women have it better and that they are gold digging whores by nature, annnnnnd next thing you know you get a bunch of red pill ideology. It isn't reassuring for them to be proved wrong, they find comfort in their pain even if it is delusional. And I play a part in that and in a way I'm no better because I'm still engaging in digital self harm by tuning into bad faith threads and comments that do nothing but make me feel like trash. But yeah, something like pessimism can be very addictive. I think people sometimes tend to want to be right than to be happy. It's the path of least resistance and a survival mechanism. In ancient times, it's better to assume you're right about there being a tiger behind the bush than to incorporate ~positive thinking~ and figure that it's just the wind. The former negative thinking keeps you safe while the later can get you killed if you are wrong. There is a sense of safety that is associated with being right. I think it can also be seen with people preferring familiarity over what will make them happy even when that familiarity is something like a bad habit. Reaffirming a negative world view can be reassuring. It can make you feel like you are right and that you aren't alone.

Insecurity about not being able to match up to someone's credentials or achievements is one thing (we all suffer self doubt often but it's not really harmful to the other person) Yet insecurity about feeling threatened by someone's success such that you see it as a threat to your ego where it fuels jealousy, envy and hate towards the other person is a dangerous form of insecurity that hinders another person's success and devalues their achievements. Such people resort to sabotaging another person's success. For example, when I was getting my Master's degree and my uncle told my mother - don't let her pursue further education, if she gets a PhD then she will find it tough to get a husband. I still think about that. It always hurts knowing this culture where men have an endemic jealousy and insecurity towards a woman's success.. I remember how in my mother's time, they used to deliberately not educate women in our culture because according to the general male mentality in the culture, there was no point in educating girls because their only job was to get ready to marry a man and learn kitchen stuff and serve him well in the marriage as a good wife and bear him children or else she won't have any identity or value as a woman and she had no value outside of men and marriage. She had nothing to aspire to and this was all she was made for.. Today the government ensures that women get education and men still whine about it saying that successful women won't get husbands. It's the same archaic patriarchal trope that keeps running and deeply hurts women. But women in my culture have decided to consciously break that barrier and not be a slave to the patriarchy anymore. Women get better education and score better academically than men in my culture. There was also this thinking that athletic women won't get husbands in Indian culture. Somehow everything that an Indian woman was or could be, only depended on if she could get a husband. She was considered a failure otherwise. Now women like Sania Mirza broke those social barriers by being successful in sports and also got married. These are evil taboos that keep women behind and do not let them achieve their potential.. I don't care if I get a husband or not. This is an empowered statement. because I'm tired and fed up with this whole patriarchal nonsense where my life, value, existence and identity is decided by men?? No that's not happening. My life belongs to me. Enough of men controlling the narrative. My existence belongs to me and not to a patriarchal society that decides my worth and identity. No. A society that doesn't value my accomplishments does not have any room in my life. Sorry my life is more precious than some fucked up patriarchal mindset that doesn't allow me to realize my full potential and doesn't respect my humanity. This thread was deeply emotional for me because I was reminded of all the struggles women in my country went through to fight against that barrier set by men. India has a deep dark secret and that secret is female infanticide where females fetuses are aborted(although the government is trying to control it, it still happens ) because the male child is more valuable than the female child, so millions of baby girls used to get killed after birth because they were considered a waste of space and resources. Women used to be constantly reminded that they had no other role but to be a servant to a man in marriage, this mentality gave birth to many social evils against women in my culture where it was a routine tradition that a widow would be sacrificed by being burned alive on her husband's funeral pyre to show how much of a devoted wife she can be... This is the mentality that Indian women had to fight against generations after generations because millions of Indian women have paid a heavy price with their deaths because of an evil patriarchal mindset targeting women ruthlessly in the most sociopathic ways imaginable. Today Indian women have come so far in destroying evil social taboos against Indian women so it is very upsetting to find another post trying to devalue those struggles by stressing how women should be relative to how men want them to be. It looks light hearted and chill in the beginning and nothing harmful. But when you extrapolate this same mentality to the extreme you get a country and culture like India where women were routinely subjected to heinous crimes and atrocities as a part of tradition and social practice. Now that we have come so far as Indian women in finally liberating from these heinous evils, we still have many miles to go because there are still parts in India where girls are denied education because the fathers in that community think that girls don't deserve anything else outside of being shipped to a husband as a slave. A lot of Indian women of my age don't even think of marriage and are rather happy not being married because they see marriage as a dangerous trap considering all the past horror stories of Indian women of my mother's and grandmother's time who would be subjected to ruthless atrocities in a marriage by the husband and in laws, bride burning etc. My own mother was forced to either get married or commit suicide, something she never wanted for her own daughter. So she let me date whoever I wanted. All of the generations of women before me in my family were forced to be married, some of them married when they were only 8 years old.. Yes child marriages was a regular practice in India and my grandmother was married when she was only 8. And groomed from that age to be a good wife. And this is not too long ago because my mother was born in late 1960s. So you can imagine that. And my mother was forced to get married in the 90s. So this is not long ago. I'm the first generation in my family to get the chance to decide my love life on my own. And I'm not going to be another statistic in the long list of Indian women who were murdered to keep the patriarchy alive. I live my life on my own terms even though I have my struggles. This thread was started by an Indian guy and against the backdrop of a massively misogynistic patriarchal Indian culture, it really cuts deep. Felt like the same echoes from my ancestral past were being ricocheted. Here is how the first female teacher of India, and the mother of Indian feminism was regularly harassed and abused by men on the streets while trying to open the first girls school in India. Yea this thread triggered a lot of thoughts.

I have mixed experience with stage blue. First, I recognize a unique advantage that the pre-rational has over the rational. Stage blue is more open minded to God as a direct experience. When I tell deeply religious people that it may be possible to create an experience of God, they light up and listen intently. I don't go around trying to convert everybody because I realize that not everybody is open minded. I only tell them If they are ready. If stage blue is hateful toward other religions, I don't bother trying to convince them. They are too strict in their worldview and they do not see any validity in other religions. Sometimes stage blue recognizes the deep similarities they have with other religions. They even admit that all religions are fallible and written by people. When they do this, they are more open minded in a way that makes them more loving. These are the kind of people who can change and might be open to change. This is why I only told one of my grandmothers about experiencing God. She was very grateful to learn about this possibility. One of my grandmothers is subscribed to the theory that Obama was a Muslim and she seems hateful toward Islam. I did not tell my siblings or mother because they are not interested in this topic at all. I could tell my aunt, but someone in the family committed suicide. I will have to wait until after the funeral to tell her. My aunt is open to other religions though. Some deeply religious people will be open to meditation, journaling, shadow work, and more. I don't tell them about the psychedelics though because in my experience nobody is open minded to that possibility. I don't really try to convert people. Instead I work with their worldview. If I work against them, they will be too stubborn and I may cause more harm than help. If I run around telling everybody about this, I might further entrench them in their worldview, making them even more toxic and hateful. As for the specific video you sent, I never ran into stage blue people who are closed to video games. I think the culture will evolve on its own and I don't need to change anybody on that front. I can just do my own thing and let progress win out in the end. If you are interested in working with stage blue, you need to wait for them to be open. I hope you found this useful.

Monday 19/04/2021 11:11 I think I often forget the very obvious fact that whatever I'm thinking, I'm indeed thinking and is in my mind. I can get so lost in my thoughts that I imagine the thoughts to be something external to me, but it is in fact here with me. I think this partially adds something to not procrastinating. It's then somewhat impossible to procrastinate facing my fears and negative emotion, because whatever I'm thinking about and am lost in thought about is already here. The alarm clock is ringing, it's already time. Whatever I'm thinking about is indeed already here, in my mind. This is a very important point to realise. The mental lag between not even realising that your fantasy and bendy maze of mirrors is indeed actually occurring. -- The pain in my stomach yesterday was unbelievable. Eating any food sends me into an intense nausea and pain right now. I had this for 1 week several weeks ago, and now I'm having it again. After I only had 1 meal yesterday, I was so nauseous I was making gagging sounds but no vomit came out. And so I instead forced myself to vomit hoping I would feel better. It hardly helped. I tried eating yoghurt later yesterday, my stomach made lots of sounds and I had the same problem. I've been losing weight quickly due to this. This has all been very unpleasant, but at least I'm getting one benefit perhaps. I'm gonna be ringing and going to the doctor ASAP, this is all so unbelievably painful and debilitating. I have too many stresses in life as well regarding uni, but I'm now taking steps to face them, god willing. My imagery is one of my intestines being all tangled up and tightened. Plus a deep pit of negative emotion and misery. This is all going together with all the pressing deadlines I have. I'm gonna have to change my course, I can't just "push through" some of this. Need medical advice and support from uni. -- Yesterday was an intense day. When I was feeling extremely low, someone reminded me by mentioning one of my best friends who commit suicide. All that repressed grief came out again. I just erupted crying. I had forgotten about him and had repressed it. Typing this now, I'm tearing up slightly. I woke up this morning feeling a lot better. Just briefly, I was feeling great. But then I remembered the events that happened yesterday I felt and the guilt I felt, and this guilt was a very old thing I recognised suddenly coming to the surface. It's as though the universe will present me with the same situation again untill I choose differently. And so I've chosen slightly differently. But I felt like shit. Saw some other thing which made me feel like shit as well. And so it is I wonder. What was that sweetness in the morning? Why does any of this have to happen? What is my choice now, and is existence + reality a prison on what I can do, where I am predestined to go through all sorts of garbage? But why ask such questions? What are such questions? The taoists like to say war is the opposite of reality so as to prescribe how I should align, but if I'm not in a war then what am I in? I've had a hope or fantasy that I could terraform and recreate myself. Platitudes about Plato's cave are another plateau.? Lmao. I'm pruning the ___? Hedges. Ledges like the Freemasons are ___. Praising.

Here are some thoughts on thought itself. I've talked elsewhere in my journal about what is and isn't thought. Suffice to say that thought can be visual, auditory, verbal and so on. One of the principle characteristics of thought is that it is spontaneous. Until a thought arises: "damn I've left the cooker on", there is nothing there. Thoughts don't creep up on us slowly, they come into our awareness fully formed and ready to go. Maybe in the cooker example, you just have a visual flash of your cooker being on fire. In that sense, thought has breadth, it isn't as if a thought slowly emerges and builds itself up. If any "building up" is to be done, then this is done serially, with one thought giving way to the next thought. This is especially the case with language based thought. Thoughts are clearly not completely random. Yes, the way in which they arise may be at random times and places, but there is mostly a useful relevance to them. This implies that thoughts are contigent on your circumstances. They are in the main not haphazard and useless. Although, thoughts that aren't relevant or useful or those that cause unwanted distress, do occur and these are labelled as intrusive. That label is interesting, it's as if those type of thoughts come from a source external to oneself. There is a sense here of not having free will to control those thoughts. This is absolutely the nub of the free will argument: do you, or do you not control thought? I would completely expand out that intrusive label and say that all thought is intrusive, with respect to it not being in your control. You do not control thought, it controls you: that is a radical shift in perspective for some. So the immediate question is, where do thoughts come from, and what does control thought? That would take several posts to elaborate on, so I'll just point back to the observation that thoughts are relevant to circumstances. Largely it's the environment you find yourself in that provokes thoughts. A lot of mental health problems stem from this. The sufferer is medicated and told to somehow break free of their intrusive thoughts, when all along it's their environment and circumstances causing the thoughts. I repeat, we don't control thought. So why does it seem that we have at least a modicum of control over what we think? One observation is that thought comes in ones. That is, we don't hold several thoughts simultaneously. There seems to be limited space for individual thoughts, and instead we are forced to have a stream of thoughts (or more popularly, stream of consciousness). Here is where it gets more interesting. Not only are thoughts provoked by environment, but they are also provoked by other thoughts. So, you may have a visual flash of your cooker, then followed by some internal monologue, then followed by a sensation of panic. This is in very rapid succession, thought trains can be rapid. It gives the illusion of having a unified thought, but it's not true. The thought train can be interrupted at any point by another thought (that is a crucial insight for therapy). It is a feature of thought that it is repetitive. Some thoughts arise throughout the day for example. For example if you are very depressed, you may have recurring thoughts of suicide. Or, if the self help book you read triggers thoughts that you should affirm positivity at 10am each morning. That is how we regain control of thought, we simply instill repetitive thoughts that interrupt (maybe negative) thought trains. The actual source of those repetitive thoughts is still largely the same as for other thoughts: the environment. You still need to read a self-help book for example, in order to start thinking differently. Yes, although, some thoughts install themselves without any prompting and that is the nature of insight. Insight is interesting because it seems different from other types of thought. It is not. An insight is just another type of "intrusive" thought. But if we have a positive reaction to it, then that sets up an environment in which that insightful thought will be repeated in future. In other words, the insight becomes relevant to us in some way, and that relevance is pegged to our bodily reaction to it (i.e. emotion). It's like thoughts have a rating system based on relevance and importance, in turned hooked into emotion: the stronger the emotion, the higher the rating; the higher the rating the more likely the thought will be repeated again in future. It's not relevant whether the emotion is negative or positive, just its strength. Both negative and positive feedback can result: depression or elation. Free will is gained only by modulating thought, but thought is modulated haphazardly and out of our control. If you have a thought that you will finally work your way out of depression, that thought wasn't in your control. In a very strong sense, we are all out at sea at the mercy of the waves and weather. This shouldn't be scary or unfamiliar to us, our bodies work and function completely out of "our" control too. Our thoughts and our bodies work in very similar ways.

I want to share four experiences from my life which when I think about the word 'madness' comes to mind. I want to share them because I find the concept of madness deeply troubling. Madness is one of my greatest fears and I want to understand it and transcend it in order to become a fully integrated human being. I don't want to be afraid of it or resist it or to anticipate it or to live in fear of it for the rest of my life. Without further ado... I had this schoolmate who always scared me a little bit. He wasn't evil or anything like that but he had this intense look in his eyes like he was ready to start a riot or something. Like he had no inhibitions and he could turn into pure chaos. Like he was gasoline waiting for a spark to happen. This was both curious and quite disconcerting. He was always looking for trouble. For whatever reason this unstable personality that he had scared me, felt like he could lose his mind any moment and just descend into madness, take his dick out and start pissing on people on the streets or something like that. A couple years ago my uncle started hearing voices possibly out of the blue, I am not sure. He was always a reclusive and troubled person but this was a new low even for him. He couldn't handle the suffering and tried to commit suicide. He didn't succeed. He's currently on psychiatric meds and seems to be doing somewhat better, but at the expense of being a zombie. Now I wonder, what if I start hearing voices one day, what if I can't handle the suffering and want to kill myself too? The thought that there exists some punishment like that out there which can visit anyone out of the blue and can cause such suffering is almost unbearable. I tried psychedelics a few times and on some of the trips I had the sensation that the intensity of the trip is is so overwhelming that if it increased even a little bit I wouldn't be able to handle it and would get fucked up beyond repair or something like that. It never happened but it always felt like I was about to lose everything to chaos - a disintegration more complete than even death. I've heard of people who took psychedelics and got broken and could never recover afterwards. What is that? In the movie Zorba the Greek there was a scene in the beginning where Zorba was really wild and just started dancing chaotically to exhaustion like some wild animal out of control. Apparently he needed to do it because that was a form of emotional or energetic release for him. For whatever reason that triggered fear in me. I started wondering what is this state, what if he succumbs to madness and can never return to order again? What if his mind gets trapped in some chaotic dimension and he becomes lost forever? Where does madness come from? What are we to do about it as individuals and as a society? Is it self-inflicted or simply bad luck? Can we heal it or recover from it once it happens? What can I personally do to let go of my fear of madness and become more integrated? Let me know your thoughts. Thanks.

intuition an ability to understand or know something without needing to think about it or use reason to discover it, or a feeling that shows this ability Do you claim that if you wouldn't have thoughts as mental talk, you wouldn't have any negative emotions/feelings? Yes, the same mechanism which allows me to write this sentence or work or survive at all is also creating an aversion to sensations in my head commonly known as 'headache'. It's possible to meditate up to a perfect equanimity where all aversion disappears but there is no way to do anything in cessation. Also, the fact that even very advanced meditators are only able to get cessation for maybe 30 minutes. There is still suffering in Jhana yet even Jhanas seem to have a natural limit to how long they last Bro, you have no idea what you're talking about. Again, states you're referring to where there is no aversion doesn't last long, it's extremely hard to become so good at meditation to have them on demand at least for a moment. No, you don't have to think "me that is depressed" to be very depressed. Animals can get severely depressed, do you think they think to themselves "oh no I'm so depressed" and that's why they are depressed? If you have a genetic vulnerability and get triggered by stress - you may get depressed and dysfunctional for a few years, and no amount of philosophizing will change that, you may be able to reduce some suffering through spiritual practice but not gain cognition and functionally back. Depression is a deeply embedded adaptive mechanism you ain't curing it through meditation. Maybe it is possible to do make some profound fix if one would be getting a constant high dose stream of 5-MeO to the brain, like Leo talks about updating your neurotransmitters but IDK if it's even possible. Also, tell it to enlightened teachers who have been depressed and on meds (Jan Essman, Kenneth Folk, Martin Ball insomnia issues) and even committed suicide (Nathan Gill)

@Preety_India Would you have acted differently if you would have been born in Hitlers shoes? What about children who get born into Taliban-Environment and then become suicide-bombers? Are they sick and evil?

@GreenLight Your profile picture explains it everything 4 me. It symbolizes the utmost knowledge that can be acquired without spiritual wisdom. THat is why it is said that those who read the book of Thot they commit suicide. Because without higher understanding it just destroys u. 4 me it is a clear sign of where u want to arrive, but no further more. However, what u are explaining makes me think that u have a tendency to this higher spiritual wisdom. Maybe for past lives, if u don't believe that, probably about some chemistry in your brain. The fact is, u will have it much easier than lots of people if u wanna evolve.

My LSRP test results LSRP Psychopathy measurement test results. Report Primary Factor A selfish, uncaring, manipulative posture towards others. The subtype known as «primary» psychopathy refers to individuals who are completely rational, lack anxiety and have high levels of interpersonal charm. Whilst these behaviours appear incredibly adaptive, primary psychopaths are also prone to dysfunctional and pathological traits such as an inability to learn from past mistakes and a lack of responsibility. Secondary Factor Impulsivity and a self-defeating lifestyle. «Secondary» psychopaths are individuals not dissimilar to primary psychopaths in the sense that they still share many of the same characteristics and traits. However, unlike the primary psychopath, the secondary psychopath is more likely to suffer from intense emotional arousal and psychological issues. As well as this, research conducted on adult psychopaths has suggested that secondary psychopaths are more prone to participate in drug abuse, suicide and interpersonal aggression. Overall, what differentiates secondary psychopaths from primary psychopaths is their destructive behaviour as well an increased reactivity and impulsivity and an inability to control their emotions effectively.

@Denial I'm glad it helped. One of the problems with our social conditioning is that men are split from their emotions. There is no scientific or psychological basis for this image of a cold macho man. This is a complete utter fantasy because in reality men are still very emotional creatures. Our society fails to recognize the significance of emotional mastery and it can worsen people's depression, anxiety, and even the likelihood of suicide. The stereo type that only women are allowed to be emotional is insane and it worsens EQ in men. A real man can recognize the strength and courage in vulnerability and self honesty. Good luck.

I recognized that I felt in control of my life because I have the possibility to commit suicide. This meant that no matter how bad things got, I would have an out. This is how apathy makes us feel in control of bad situations. It got to the point that I threw my belt away at one point. I don't have a clear solution to this issue. My best try is to try to escape to something more productive instead. You could feel in control with a good hobby instead of being depressed. I end up laying in bed defeated for hours and I could lose the whole day because of this. I think you gave me some helpful insight. This attitude could be responsible for any I feel like so many things I do see meaningless and empty. This defense mechanism is supposed to make things feel empty so that we are not hurt by them. In this way our suicidal thoughts are a consequence of us being in denial that we have been hurt. This is a dangerous self deception that founds our self hatred and depression. This denial comes from the fact that we are afraid of being hurt through being emotionally vulnerable. This leads to me isolating myself from other people and being non confrontational. By isolating myself it leads to a lack of socializing which leads to anxiety which leads to suicidal thoughts. The way out is to allow ourselves to be emotionally vulnerable. At least recognize that the current way of being is much more difficult in the long run. It is not easier at all. I don't know who told you to face the emotions you get from not doing something to stop OCD. How many people did this work for? I guess we could try this in the topic of dealing with strong negative emotions in another actualized video on emotional mastery. There are two things you need to recognize. First, your brain cares about your safety. It is using defense mechanisms like apathy to deny that you have been hurt. Meanwhile if you did not act on your suicidal thoughts, then it demonstrates that you still do care about life. There is not a lost hope for you. Secondly, you do not have to accept that everything is out of control. You are allowed to deny whatever you want until the end of time. By acknowledging this, you can become less neurotic in your approach o truth or personal development. As for convincing people that I am better than I actually am, I did have some thoughts like those. I tried to compensate for it with a fighter attitude, but it only worked in the short term. At the very least we can start with self honesty. There are still a couple of problems I have not fully resolved, but I hope we can still help each other. Good luck.

Hey my friend, this is me from the future (relative to when I started typing). It seems like I felt like really going onto a lengthy monologue here, so if you don't want to read all of this but you do want to catch the essence of what I was saying, look for the TL;DR summary at the bottom of this post. I've heard spiritual teachers talk about how everything in life is perfection and all happens exactly as it should be, however this to you (and frankly, still to me as well) is simply some beatific sounding theories that really don't mean anything until you realize something like that for yourself. Last summer, I went through an extraordinarily difficult phase in my life of which this sense of meaninglessness of it all was one of its most prominent features. In particular, I couldn't make sense as to what good this suffering ultimately served, and that question really tormented me. Some nice theory I had read in a book somewhere or something wasn't going to suffice for that. When I was slowly getting out of this very dark phase in my life primarily during the fall of last year, I really sought help from people and organisations to get me back on track and get my mental health and really just my life in general in check again. I had never done that in my life before to the extent that I was doing that now; Not even close. I also tried very hard to find some kind of handhold to work on myself in my personal time by for instance trying out the Life Purpose course that Leo offers on this website, and journaling every day using the GLA(N)D- journaling method and trying to stick to that every single day (basically it's a sort of 'positive thinking' method, but one that's actually helpful and grounded in reality, instead of it being 'wishful thinking' of sorts. It really helps to redirect your focus from the negative and the problems in your life to a more empowering and positive focus and mindset. I personally added the N for 'Noticed' because I also found it helpful to write down some quality in myself or a situation that I noticed had changed in a positive way. Use this link for more information about the technique). What I started to notice especially when I started really talking to a couple of people (primarily; A therapist, a spiritual counselor, and first and foremost a person from an organisation of which every volunteer has a personal background of having dealt with mental health issues themselves), I started to notice that in these conversation, pouring myself out and opening myself up in ways that I had never done before and just telling them exactly what was on my mind and the struggles I was dealing with and had been dealing with, I felt from them a compassion, an understanding, an empowerment, and first and foremost this sense of connection I had so desperately missed. And somehow, coupled with still using that GLAND-method and paying extra attention to the sparse moments in which I did feel a little better, these better moments and particularly these conversations meant so much to me, and these things —at least in the very beginning of my recovery— is what gave my life a sense of meaning again. These few lights in the dark meant so much to me if this almost all-pervading darkness is all I had known for the past couple of months. When I was in my deepest moments of desperation, it didn't really seem like things would ever be totally okay again. I thought that this dark phase would have messed me up so much that I would never really fully recover from it again, or at least not for a long, long time. Surprised was I to find how quickly I could go from feeling absolutely alienated from life and hopelessly confused and divided to a place where I started to feel peaceful and connected again, both to myself and others. And I learned a couple of things about meaning. Logically, nothing really ever changed so much as far as meaning is concerned. I never had some grandiose insight into the absolute nature of reality understanding everything and why it was happening and understanding the perfection of it all... none of that. I neither found a good reason by doing deep metaphysical contemplation and philosophy that did it all for me. It is the sense, the feeling that changed. And paradoxically, at the same time a much greater detachment from the need to seek some kind of meaning or purpose. There are two ways to ask: "What is the point of life?". The first way is out of a genuine curiosity, not based out of fear or dissatisfaction, but just because you're genuinely curious and interested and like to contemplate about it. The second way to ask this question stems out of the feeling of, as I said, fear and dissatisfaction with life. You don't feel whole, you don't feel connected, and the mind is conditioned to want to find some resolution to that feeling of lack. So it starts to think. Depending on where you're at, you might either frantically try to grab hold of some theory you hope will be satisfactory enough to keep holding onto, or you might have already concluded for yourself that really there is no purpose to life, and you're asking the question not to get an answer, but more as an expression of frustration and hopelessness. I can very much understand from personal experience that it can be extremely tempting to try to 'figure it out' out from this place of lack, needing to find some resolution or justification for you being alive at all, for you to be here to begin with. I also very much understand from personal experience that no matter what logic or theory you come up with, it ultimately just doesn't remove this feeling of lack, inner conflict and separation. For me what ultimately did it was that I was too afraid to commit suicide, especially given the fact that I wasn't an atheist (and thus was unable to believe that suicide 'would end it all'), and that I just needed to go on with my life and try to make something out of it, even though at that point it didn't really feel as if things would ever be okay again or that it would be worth it in the first place. I had to go on, despite all the fears and hopelessness. Throughout the weeks and months as I kept going with that attitude, I started having conversations, I joined a 'depression group' where I could talk about my experiences, I found myself a care farm where I would be at 3 days in the week, I had multiple personal goals I tried to stick to (talked about this earlier, also tried meditating every day after some time), I listened to guided meditations and (at first) daily hypnosis sessions, I also started listening again to spiritual teachers, primarily Adyashanti, and his talks also really helped me to come to this to place of Trust, Surrender and Faith again. And ultimately this capacity for 'just doing the damn things that work and leaving out all the rest' was something that I never lost, whilst at the same time also starting to feel better and more connected to myself and others. The paradox is that this refusal or even moreso fatigue of wanting to figure it all out in your head much more easily and effectively will get you to that point where you will be able to abide non-reactively in the exact experience you're having at that moment. Then, there is no more subject or ego that wishes the present moment or the experience to be any different than it is. There will be no division anymore. Without this division, if the letting go is complete, you will find yourself being at peace with whatever is. This is complicated territory to explain in accurate terms, and honestly I question if I'm even capable of making sense of it logically even to myself, but I'm trying it anyways. To me, it is more about your relationship to your experience than even the peace or serenity that comes when you have surrendered to the present moment. In other words: even if no background sense of serenity or connectedness would come, it wouldn't be about that still, but it would be about just witnessing it and not reacting to it and not needing anything to be different. That to me, is primary. So as I said, the more you are capable of allowing all of your thoughts and feelings and experiences to be by not reacting to it by thinking about it or judging it, the more everything will naturally fall together, and any question of meaning at that point will just be meaningless (interesting play of words), as the need for meaning will only arise whenever you are not whole and connected to yourself. At the same time though, the more pressure from your mind, your emotions and your environment you come to encounter, the harder it will be to stay in that detached yet unified state (yes, they paradoxically come together). Interestingly enough, I in my personal experience encounter cycles between being able to stay very or relatively detached from my mind and my emotions even when my emotional-energetical system is really acting up, but also vica versa: when there is relatively little pressure from my emotional system but then I can already be quite discontent and reactive with fairly little negative emotions and thus creating a division in that way. Because it's not always as easy to stay detached from your mind and your emotions, this is why it is (amongst other things) important to explore spirituality both as a teaching and as an embodied practice (or exploration). Here we come back to meaning again. What spirituality is in essence is that it is the pursuit or endeavour in finding a connection with something greater than yourself, greater or more encompassing than your ego. In essence, this is really what all of humanity either consciously or unconsciously is doing. Most of humanity, however, seeks this 'greater something' outside of themselves in the relative world as a substitute for a lack of unity within themselves. The unfortunate thing here in the west is that many people now have identified themselves as 'atheistic' or otherwise see spiritual teachings and practices as something not worth pursuing either because it's invalid according to them, or just not important enough for serious consideration, usually just out of a unfortunate misunderstanding of what spirituality actually is, instead of what they are projecting that it is. Taking spiritual teachings seriously implies that you are open-minded enough to be willing to take seriously the notion that there is a source that is greater, deeper and wider than yourself that you can come to unify yourself with. The more you deepen your inquiry into spiritual teachings and your spiritual practices, the more your focus and aim in life will start to shift from trying to find that sense of peace and connection through external and indirect means, to seeking for that source of peace, love and tranquillity directly, instead of making countless alterations and adjustments in your day-to-day worldly life trying to find that feeling or sense. That's what spirituality effectively is good for: it shifts your focus from trying to find the meaning and satisfaction in the temporary and impermanent dimension of life towards the dimension of which this (sense of) meaning and satisfaction is always and already the case. You just have to learn how to connect and stay connected with it. So where was I getting at with this? I do have a tendency to stray off-course from the previous theme or subject I hadn't finished talking about. Ah, I remember. Spirituality makes you more cognisant that there is a deeper realm to life of satisfaction, love and peace which is not impermanent. It does not only have the capacity to provide greater peaceful or even mystical experiences whilst for instance reading or listening to spiritual texts or talks, or perhaps whilst doing practices or inner explorations (which you may not have come to do had you not given spirituality a serious chance), but it also gives you a more satisfactory and meaningful logical system to go by as opposed to the materialistic and atheistic paradigm in which everything that is not an organism is essentially dead and meaningless matter, which is here by chance, and so is the fact that we happen to be alive at this moment, but before we were here, we were nothing, and after we're dead, we're also nothing; gone. Therefore, atheists and materialists and such seek to derive their meaning from the external world in things such as: relationships, careers, social communities, material possessions, physical health, and at best: improving character attributes, improving mental health and fortitude, and doing (usually relatively shallow) philosophical inquiry. The thing is however, what have people who derive all their meaning in life out of these impermanent focus points have left when it all falls away? We see it happen all the time in the world: relationships fall apart, careers end abruptly, physical disease happens. Even if you've worked on yourself psychologically very hard you will still suffer from a lack of meaning that you will come upon when you or your wife slowly withers away from a terminal cancer; Unless you can make a spiritual connection to the situation you find yourself in —whether you're cognisant that it's a spiritual connection or not. If you have been consciously focusing on spirituality for some time at that point, however, this spiritual connection will be much more easily made to that situation, without your otherwise atheistically conditioned mind throwing objections in the way as to how it is all meaningless and this distracting you from that connection at every moment you do try to surrender and let it all go. I could type more, I wanted to type more, but I notice I'm losing my focus after hours of writing, and knowing myself I will not come back to this text later again to continue writing it, so I'm gonna put out my TL;DR summary quickly, and then I'll leave it be for now Yes, I know all of this writing was probably ultimately a lot more about me wanting to express a whole lot of ideas I had saved up instead of it being about really responding to the need of the questioner, but so be it. This is the way I wanted it for now. TL;DR summary As far as I've known so far in my life, I have not found any absolute meaning or 'point' to life as far as I can intellectually relate to it. However, it is important to realize that this whole search for 'meaning' in itself often (if it's done from a place of lack) is merely a distraction from the ego-mind to prevent you from directly coming into contact and unifying yourself with whatever experience you're having at the moment. Your inquiring about the point of life or generally just your resistance towards your experience of the present moment is merely a distraction for non-judgmental present-moment awareness to come forward. Paradoxically, once you let go of your need to find any point or meaning and come directly into contact with your direct experience of Being, you will find yourself connected with something greater than yourself, and that very connection is what will give you this sense of meaning and connection you had been searching for. You will not find this meaning or 'point of life' as a thought; At least not ultimately. But I do admit that (knowing that) you have certain structures and activities and coaches, therapists and friends to talk to and generally just things in your life to look forward to can be used as a temporary means to get yourself to a place where surrendering will become much easier for you. Things like these can help you connect and therefore reconnect with this sense of meaning, and from there on out with a more stable basis it will generally become easier to reconnect on your own. Meaning can be found through different means in the external world, with things like relationships and deep conversations, and things like contribution and having an ambition or a life purpose. Also seek out activities and communities that help you to connect more to life, and all of this will help you to feel better. Feeling better equals a greater sense of meaning in your life, as feeling and meaning are more or less synonymous. Be mindful of your mind objecting with thoughts like "But what's the point of all of this?" when engaging in activities that are supposed to make you feel better, as exactly that kind of thought is the thought that will trap you in preventing things from improving for yourself, and in thereby finding actual meaning So do things in the external world and also on a psychological or character level that make you feel better and more connected, and you will find a greater sense of meaning simultaneously with that. Along with that, see if you can also connect with this 'source greater than yourself' directly at times in between your activities. A guided meditation or hypnosis session from youtube or such may help with that, or perhaps a satsang or a spiritual teaching from a teacher you feel a lot for. Remember, meaning is feeling. But also, know that there is a capacity of just being the witness where you just are with whatever is, and where then the question of meaning is not relevant. And this is the ultimate; choiceless awareness. See if you can connect with that too, at times.