Sensemaking Crisis (actually, everything crisis)

[Ayham]

I am going through a sensemaking crisis, I am trying to stay in it as I believe it is useful to generate true understanding.

This has happened due to reading so much stuff of contradicting nature.

Reading books on idealism, reading books on science, reading books on materialism, reading books on logic, reading books on various spiritual paths, reading books on various philosophies, books on various religions, etc.

I literally don't know what to believe anymore.

I am trying to use it an opportunity to navigate and switch between multiple lenses, but it is actually paralyzing me in real life, for example, I abandoned spiritual practice because I just can't choose one out of so many, I am not able to have meaningful conversations because I don't really know where I stand anymore, spiral dynamics was useful but that too is just another lens, I am too wary of self deception to actually decide on anything.

I want to stay in this state in order to gain true understanding, rather than rush to a comfortable choice and cling to it as dogma.

Yet it is not really practical to live in.

--- (rant below, sorry)

This is also accompanied by the constant ridicule by most of my blue middle eastern culture.

In middle school, I used to have a reputation for being a "disbeliever" lol, very few kids wanted to be friends with me, and those that did still ridiculed me.

In high school, I got better at handling social situations, I was able to form friends even if from dogmatic beliefs, I did my best to understand them, talk to them from their worldview, and integrate stage blue, and I actually ended up studying orthodox Islam so in depth just to integrate it and not make it a shadow.
 

But I hate how most of my social circle takes me as "lost in his mind", "deluded", some even literally think i am almost insane because I am "weird"
I literally laugh at their face at all of this, I learned to not care, but sometimes I do end up caring.

I feel a form of existential loneliness haunting me every day, no human mind can get mine, not in an arrogant sense, it is just that no human mind can get another human mind the same way it gets itself.
And this loneliness just.... haunts me.

I feel like, finding love or a high quality loving girlfriend would help a lot, but I don't want to be dependent, and also finding a girl like that in my culture is like finding a needle in a haystack.

I am about to start college, I feel like a pseudo intellectual, I have a lot of knowledge in so many fields, I am too much of a generalist, I am trying to learn computer science and cybersecurity and marketing and real life skills, I have been volunteering, making connections, and getting certificates to my CV, I am not sure if I can leave my country, I come from a very poor family, my father is rich but he left us many years ago, I am literally responsible to take care of my family and I am unable to do that yet.

Thoughts of solipsism haunt me every day, I am not even sure why I am posting in a forum with "other people".

I am too ambitious and hard on myself, yet I also feel like I might have ADHD, I don't meet my standards at all, I can't even make good sense of the world or be consistent in all the habits I want to do, I know people my age doing better than me.

I have no results in anything
I read a lot but I feel uneducated and like a pseudo intellectual
I train but I am skinny as fuck, though I admit I only train in summer holidays, but after finishing school recently I won't quit now
I eat a very healthy diet and I have terrible cystic acne
I meditate but that goes nowhere, I can't stick to a spiritual path, one day I do kriya, one day Buddhism, one day Sufism, at this point I am too overwhelmed and disappointed to choose anything at this point

How the fuck am I supposed to live life and make sense of it?
I took a 3 days at home retreat a month or so ago to answer this question, I got cool answers but nothing is changing.

I am genuinely sorry if I ranted too much

Edited October 9, 2024 by Ayham

[Rafael Thundercat]

Direct Moment to moment experience or your rigth now is here you stand before any sensemaking. When I read a book with some sort of lens about reality I read it from the position of being in my here now point, even if the book speak about time and space being illusions I still starting the book and ending in a certain time and space. To change lens you need first to have the normal eyes where you add senses to see from another angle. Keep coming back to this ground otherwise nothing make Sense anymore. Senses, see,hear,smell,taste,touch...

[aurum]

@Ayham be careful because being overly-paralyzed is often just more self-deception. You are taking a position by attempting to stay neutral. Neutrality is a position. So you’re not truly “not-deciding”.

Notice that you cannot not take a position.

[Ayham]

I am not sure you guys understand

[Salvijus]

40 minutes ago, Ayham said:

I abandoned spiritual practice because I just can't choose one out of so many

Sufism is the best path for you probably. Because it's in your veins and in your karmic lineage. Nothing wrong with exploring and gaining blessings from other paths/teachers aswell. 

Edited October 9, 2024 by Salvijus

[Ayham]

@Salvijus part of the problem, how do I know if a karmic lineage is real? it sounds cool, but I have been trying to be more attentive to my world view and not adopt any belief without direct experience or good reason.
Old me would have probably accepted it because it is a cool spiritual concept.

how do you know something like a karmic lineage exists?

[Ayham]

Engaging in PROPER sense making is hard as fuck, many people in this forum have probably done that at some point, but it is easy to get to a point where you think you passed that stage and figured out the truth, which.... ta da! is exactly what we parrot here.

I am saying that most of us have accumulated a lot of dogmas here, even though we think we are beyond it.
How do you know enlightenment exists? I would argue most of us here have taken this for granted, without even experiencing it
is reality illusory?
Is solipsism the truth? is reality out there or a construction of your mind?
maybe science or some religion holds the absolute truth?
is what you see on psychedelics bullshit or real? most of us would assume it is real without second guessing (I have no direct experience yet)
how do you know spiral dynamics is valid? did you just accept it because some authority figure like Ken Wilber or Leo or whoever presented it?

 

I am questioning the exact beliefs that are core to this forum, as well as the materialist worldview, which is core to a lot of us subconsciously, even if you believe it is wrong intellectually.
I am not coming at this from a scientific skepticism, science is also being questioned.
I believed most of this for a long time, but currently, reality is falling apart.

 

Edited October 9, 2024 by Ayham

[Ayham]

I quite literally have no idea what is there to believe.

Edited October 9, 2024 by Ayham

[Salvijus]

29 minutes ago, Ayham said:

@Salvijus part of the problem, how do I know if a karmic lineage is real? it sounds cool, but I have been trying to be more attentive to my world view and not adopt any belief without direct experience or good reason.
Old me would have probably accepted it because it is a cool spiritual concept.

how do you know something like a karmic lineage exists?

Hm. Good point. I don't really qualify to make a statement like that.

I think you could drop that concept and simply follow your heart, it will take you where you belong. I wouldn't be surprised if it will be sufism tho lol. 

I could share my own experience. I also had lots of internal conflict and confusion about life and which direction to go, which path to take. Something that I feel in your post aswell and I believe I can relate to it. The internal conflict and doubts stopped when I got sucked into my lineage. I did not chose it even. It just sucked me in when the time was ripe. Life became very obvious and easy. Later I discovered my teachers speak about lineages, the importance of them, and what role it plays your life. It resonated with me deeply as the Truth. Something that I feel is experiencially true for me aswell. But I'm not in a position to prove such things, sorry. 

Edited October 9, 2024 by Salvijus

[Rafael Thundercat]

50 minutes ago, Ayham said:

I am not sure you guys understand

So help us to make sense better Lol

[Ayham]

@Salvijus okay got it, that makes sense.

@Rafael Thundercat I am sorry if that seemed the wrong way, it seems to me that whenever I ask this question, the answers I get are not the type of answers I am looking for, so that's what I meant.

I am looking for a practical, no-bullshit answer, I think that's would work for me, preferably from someone who has went through a similar experience.

Edited October 9, 2024 by Ayham

[Salvijus]

32 minutes ago, Ayham said:

I am looking for a practical, no-bullshit answer, I think that's would work for me.

You think too much. Mind is eternally confused and doesn't know anything. A practical advice would be to see your thoughts as utterly stupid (because in reality you don't know a damn thing). Then silence will come. And it that silence you will simply be carried by the gentle currents of the heart where ever. And you won't mind where it takes you. Because you have no idea what's best for you nor what the hell is happening in life. But it will feel extremely fulfilling to say YES to your heart with every breath and witness miracles unfolding. 🌟 🙏 🪷 🦋 ✌️ 

Edited October 9, 2024 by Salvijus

[Ulax]

@Ayham Do you have any hobbies or ways to enjoyably relax?

[Nilsi]

Bro, every man goes through an identity crisis at your age. You’re just a very intellectual person who overanalyzes the situation, while your peers deal with it by getting into stupid relationships, drugs, or other distractions. No one has their life figured out at 17.

As someone who’s a few years older and just as cerebral, I can tell you there’s no reason to worry. Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’ll be fine. Have fun, work hard, make mistakes, and eventually, you’ll start figuring out how life works and where you fit.

In the end, none of us really have it all figured out. As you get older and „wiser,“ you’ll get more comfortable with your own flaws while also becoming better at life. It’s a momentum that just builds over time.

[Ayham]

@Salvijus yes that works, it is like some sort of self inquiry, detaching from my thoughts, it works for a moment, brings mental silence and happiness.
Yet of course, that can not be maintained, it is just avoiding the problem.
I can't just shut off my mind every time, I need to live with and beyond the world at the same time, balance them out.

@Ulax I mean, my hobbies are this work I suppose, which involves: meditation, reading, exercise, also stuff like chess, talking to people, listening to music, night walks.
I used to also play video games and watch anime, but it doesn't engage me anymore, like I can't get hooked in.

@Nilsi okay, that's good, you mean like, to not pressure myself too early, but you said you were in a similar case, how are you now? did you figure your life out? what worked for you?

[Salvijus]

if a centipede were to think how to move each of its legs, it would become immobilized and stuck. 

There's a lesson here. 

Edited October 9, 2024 by Salvijus

[Leo Gura]

@Ayham It's okay man. You are doing very good for your age. You just need to slow down and enjoy the process more. You have decades ahead of you to sort all that out. Evetything will make sense two decades from now.

Edited October 9, 2024 by Leo Gura

[Carl-Richard]

Welcome to Green. It will get better.

You're also young. As for choosing a path, you just have to try something. Doing something is better than doing nothing. Nothing will be absolutely perfect. As for finding out what to believe, it's the same answer. As you try out things in life, you'll find out more about what you want, which in a big way informs what you believe.

Edited October 9, 2024 by Carl-Richard

[Thought Art]

@Ayham aren’t you very young as well? Could this be normal as you are exploring?

[The Renaissance Man]

@Ayham I don't feel my experience reflects your problem enough to propose any solution, especially in the existential part. But in your rant I'm also seeing aspects of "ineffectiveness". Like feeling like a generalist. I also do feel like that sometimes: after all this learning, and even clear growth, I'm far from a master at anything.

As I said I'm still working on it, but I'm planning to be a lot more professional in my future of personal development and effectiveness. Like, really going after mastery, with daily deliberate practice on one thing at a time. I may study multiple, may engage in philosophy or whatever else, but there should be a staple of 1-2 hours a day, solid, to master one skill about self development, be it understanding an emotion, or working on charisma, or whatever else.

I believe this kind of focus, and a shift from studying to practicing , has the possibility of providing leaps in growth, even if you change what you practice on every 2-3 days. I don't know if I'll have the wisdom and discipline do stick to this, but eventually I feel it will be clear enough to be the only way to make a serious dent pretty fast in the very solid systems of self-deception and emotional mastery.

Also I'm curious, did I at least get partially one of your points, or did I miss entirely?

Edited October 9, 2024 by The Renaissance Man