Leo's Perspective on Elites, Meritocracy, and Success

[Hardkill]

6 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

That's not surprising because MAGA are lunatics. They will be shocked by many things as reality crushes them in the end.

It's not just MAGA republicans. It's also the more Reagan-type Republicans who have no idea how much their policies or ideas are hated by most Americans and who have this fantasy about their party one day going back to being like that of Reagan.

Don't they ever realize why the Republican party has never once won a supermajority of Republicans in either chamber of Congress since around the days of Teddy Roosevelt presidency in the 1900s decade whereas the Democrats have had supermajorities in either or both chambers of Congress a number of times since 1900?

Also, moderate Democrats have to stop playing whiffle ball and play a lot more hardball.

Edited Wednesday at 10:18 PM by Hardkill

[Emerald]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

Well, that is the difference between truth-seeking vs political activism or success. Success in the material world requires some delusion. But my commitment is to truth-seeking.

I don't agree with this.

Most of the change in the world comes from grounded pragmatic solutions, not wild ideals. The wild ideals crash and burn most of the time.

I try to keep people grounded because there is so much fantasy in the Green leftist political domain. We need a real, accurate view of how politics works, not wishful thinking. Especially in the era of Trump.

Why is truth-seeking the most valuable thing to you? I mean, it sounds like "the right thing to do". But is a commitment to truth-seeking to the negation of worldly drives really in alignment with your truest deepest will?

I also value accurate perception and seeking truth... and in the aggregate it has enriched my life and served me well (though it also creates some difficulties).

But meaning is far more important to me than Truth is. And meaning can only come when the awareness of Truth is limited and the mystery is embraced.

And my truth seeking that I do in this life always comes in service to meaning-making and living a beautiful life or helping others do the same. 

Honestly, you have all of eternity to be the Truth. So, why commit yourself to it as the end in itself? I'm asking this genuinely.

But I firmly disagree that ground pragmatic solutions are the things that move things along. Anything that's rooted in the inception from logistical thinking will only maintain the same.

Consider the level of wild dreaminess that it took to invent cars, computers, and airplanes. And think about all the political revolutions of history that have shaped the way that we do things. And this can be applied to all drivers of societal progress from breakthrough technologies to institutional shifts to paradigmatic changes, etc.

While all of these things require pragmatism to bring about, it all begins with a new idea that has never been before.

You won't change anything unless you awaken the dreamer first before any of the logistics are applicable.

[Leo Gura]

36 minutes ago, Emerald said:

Why is truth-seeking the most valuable thing to you?

Because truth is true, and everything else is not.

36 minutes ago, Emerald said:

But meaning is far more important to me than Truth is.

What good is meaning if it isn't true?

[Thought Art]

So does Trump have all the power right now?

I am a bit concerned a wave of confusion is about to rush through the world… 

If the most powerful man in the world is a lying TV show host…. 
 

Most dangerous man in the world. Gliding on the waves of ignorance, anger and emotion without critical basis. 
 

100 years of deterioration of the American public from TV, fast-food… hmm. 
 

This is seriously a post truth era and there is no solution! 
 

No Current Solution to lying and corruption…

Lying and corruption is where the power lay. So cowards just side with it. 

You don’t even know where the lies or truths are when you think you do you don’t. 

Lying and corruption and infinite funds to spread those lies and untruths. Trump ol boy, that red tie. 
 

The ones who fought against fasciam like Jordan Peterson and others who supported trump have shown their hands either as idiots or worse than the uneducated. 

Edited Wednesday at 11:57 PM by Thought Art

[Emerald]

15 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Because truth is true, and everything else is not.

What good is meaning if it isn't true?

It's a great story. Duh!

That's like asking "What's the good of watching a movie if it isn't based on true events?"

To me, making your life about truth seeking is like being in the movie theatre trying to stay connected to the fact that you're in a movie theatre rather than surrendering and losing yourself in the narrative.

I'm not judging if that's the way you want to spend your time in this movie theatre called life... but I'd much rather just watch the movie.

[Leo Gura]

5 minutes ago, Emerald said:

but I'd much rather just watch the movie.

Yeah, that's why I'm me and you're you.

I care about truth when no one else does. That's what makes me one of a kind. That is my superpower.

Edited Wednesday at 11:58 PM by Leo Gura

[Emerald]

33 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Yeah, that's why I'm me and you're you.

I care about truth when no one else does. That's what makes me one of a kind. That is my superpower.

I don't think you're one of a kind in that sense... but uncommon nonetheless. Though I'm learning to find much more value in commonality in recent years. Difference isn't quite as impressive to me as it once was, so I don't find much inherent value in being one of a kind unless it's for an important reason.

But I understand that we're different in that sense. I'm not trying to challenge your orientation to truth or argue you out of it if it's really in alignment with your truest deepest will. It could just be the game that you're here to play.

But I'm genuinely asking you why that's your thing. I want to know why you care about Truth so much and why that's the main commitment of your life.

In one of my medicine journeys, God was showing me how it plays different 'games' with different people as a means of alleviating suffering in its finite forms despite there being infinite suffering. (I'm sure this is just one angle of an infinitely complex dynamic)

And it has all these complex escape hatches for its incarnations so that it can tolerate the sufferings of the infinite whilst still being able to know and love and be with all suffering for all of eternity. 

And it was showing me these monks. And it was showing me how the game they're playing with God is this really labor-intensive game of transcending the physical world.

But it was showing me that there was an opposite dynamic game that it was playing with me... similar to the rich father and spoiled daughter trope. It even showed me images of Paris Hilton.

And the game is that it weaves all these experiences (positive, negative, and neutral) and physical reality itself to give me as a gift from a state of separation and relationship where I play the role of the finite and it plays the role of infinite. 

But it was showing me that it plays lots of different games with lots of different people (and probably other incarnations as well, but that's just an assumption of mine).

So, why is the Truth seeking game your game?

Edited Thursday at 12:30 AM by Emerald

[UnbornTao]

"What else?"

- George Clooney

Edited Thursday at 12:46 AM by UnbornTao

[Leo Gura]

16 minutes ago, Emerald said:

So, why is the Truth seeking game your game?

Because it's TRUTH!

[Emerald]

3 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Because it's TRUTH!

But you could've chosen any game to play while you're here.

The medicine experience that I mentioned indicates to me that God itself doesn't seem to prefer playing the Truth-seeking game over other games. It's not like the Truth-seeking game is superior to other games. It plays lot of games.

It's perfectly fine incarnating as a sea urchin and playing the sea urchin game as it is to incarnate as a human who's in the process of awakening to higher Truths.

It showed me that it values the limitations of incarnation. And it's okay with any limits... including and especially limits on Truth.

So let me ask the question from another angle...

God... why are you choosing to focus on Truth in this lifetime?

[vibv]

3 hours ago, Emerald said:

But you could've chosen any game to play while you're here.

The medicine experience that I mentioned indicates to me that God itself doesn't seem to prefer playing the Truth-seeking game over other games. It's not like the Truth-seeking game is superior to other games. It plays lot of games.

It's perfectly fine incarnating as a sea urchin and playing the sea urchin game as it is to incarnate as a human who's in the process of awakening to higher Truths.

It showed me that it values the limitations of incarnation. And it's okay with any limits... including and especially limits on Truth.

So let me ask the question from another angle...

God... why are you choosing to focus on Truth in this lifetime?

Evolution.

[Davino]

@Emerald @Leo Gura

There's people that love magic tricks. And others who want to know the truth and mechanics behind them.

Ones find more joy in discovering the trick 🃏 and others in enjoying the magic ✨

[Emerald]

10 hours ago, vibv said:

Evolution.

 

6 hours ago, Davino said:

@Emerald @Leo Gura

There's people that love magic tricks. And others who want to know the truth and mechanics behind them.

Ones find more joy in discovering the trick 🃏 and others in enjoying the magic ✨

You guys don't know why Leo prefers what he prefers. 

It's like if I asked Leo "What's your favorite food?"

And then one of you chimes in "Pizza."

And the other of you chimes in "There are people who enjoy Mediterranean food and others who enjoy Indian food. One finds more joy in certain spices while others find joy in other types of spices."

I'm asking Leo in particular because I want to know something about him in particular. It's a personality question.

[Husseinisdoingfine]

Chinese people on RedNote learning about the homelessness issue in the US.

https://www.reddit.com/r/TheDeprogram/comments/1i5s53d/chinese_people_on_rednote_learning_about_the/

[RendHeaven]

On 1/23/2025 at 1:03 PM, Emerald said:

God... why are you choosing to focus on Truth in this lifetime?

 

22 hours ago, Emerald said:

You guys don't know why Leo prefers what he prefers. 

It's like if I asked Leo "What's your favorite food?"

And then one of you chimes in "Pizza."

And the other of you chimes in "There are people who enjoy Mediterranean food and others who enjoy Indian food. One finds more joy in certain spices while others find joy in other types of spices."

I'm asking Leo in particular because I want to know something about him in particular. It's a personality question.

I have a very similar disposition to Leo.

My personal answer is that the freedom of being unbounded brings me more reconciliation and fulfillment than getting sucked into (boxed into) a particular movie.

I have nothing against the movie - I may even love the movie. But I do not want to merely watch the movie in a linear spoonfed manner.

I want to play around with it - pause, rewind, dissect, reassemble. And then I want to watch a different movie and do the same thing. And then I want to explore every nook and cranny of the theater before finally walking outside and seeing the sun. All metaphorically speaking, of course.

This freedom to tinker and go beyond is the birthright of Consciousness. What a shame to drift through your movie as a passive consumer with no care for the active vision behind building the thing, and what a shame to not even realize there are other movies, or that you're in a beautiful theater, or that the sun is waiting for you outside!

You do have a good point that eventually all vessels will physically die. Going beyond the confines of this movie (ultimate Truth) is inevitable anyway.

So I can see how you would wonder "why rush to end the movie when it will naturally end by itself anyway? why not construct illusory castles and play princess? what does it matter whether I'm actually a princess or not?"

I'm in no rush to die or to burn everything to the ground through deconstruction. I love life. This movie is beautiful, with all of my arbitrary biases (such as being born male or being attracted to women - this shit only flies within my current movie!)

I don't see truthseeking as necessarily anti-human. Although the truth will oftentimes directly contradict your human survival agenda and mental constructs, that doesn't stop you from playing the game.

For example I can become highly conscious of the demonic supply chain practices behind the manufacturing of my electronics, but then continue to use those electronics to advance my life.

Yes, this will initially cause cognitive dissonance because I want to see myself as a good person (survival agenda), but the TRUTH is that I am participating in evil.

And I can become conscious that I will overlook my own evil (because I'm allowed to get away with it cuz I'm specially exempt according to my needs). And therefore nothing changes, and life goes on.

Except - armed with truth, I no longer have the fantasy that I am a good person.

I am a complex entity struggling to survive, as is everyone else, and we are in a mutually exploitative web. That's the truth. It is what it is. And I can continue to enjoy the movie.

So truthseeking does not inherently hinder the enjoyment of the movie, unless you go out of your way to get emotionally reactive or defensive to what the truth has to tell you.

The ego may consider this bleak, but, to roll with this example - "I'm not a good person" is in many ways a more accurate/truthful position than to insist "I am a good person."

I personally do not see this as bleak. I get thrilled when I learn of my own shortsighted interpretations. It's liberating to have once believed reality was a certain way, but then to discover you were wrong. The truth is always more intricate and dynamic than you had ever given it credit for. This discovery is its own joy.

To answer the question above in red:

I'd rather be a real princess than a fake princess.

And if it turns out that I'm actually a peasant in a shack instead of a princess in a castle - then that is what I am. I have no interest in larping royalty.

Whatever is ACTUAL wins by virtue of existing as such.

[ryoko]

On 23/1/2025 at 9:33 AM, Emerald said:

God... why are you choosing to focus on Truth in this lifetime?

You're asking someone "Why do you breathe?", what answer can they give.

[ryoko]

On 23/1/2025 at 0:47 PM, vibv said:

Evolution.

I wouldn't be so sure to call it evolution. We are already evolved to unlock it if it's our priority.

[Emerald]

@RendHeaven That makes sense. There's an orientation to expansion as opposed to contraction.

My orientation is towards contraction and limitation... which are the necessary birthplaces of meaning and beauty.

And any experiences that I've had of Truth and the infinite have been to serve the path of the contraction, limitation, meaning, and beauty that I'm on.

To me... infinite expansion and infinite knowing becomes so random. I've had experiences where an infinity of experiences flash before me as I scratched the surface of infinite knowledge.

And the chaos of it has highlighted to me how much I appreciate that which small, limited, imperfect, ordinary, grounded, Earthly, and meaningful.

I'm like a Hobbit more than I am a princess.

[Davino]

On 23/1/2025 at 6:24 PM, Emerald said:

You guys don't know why Leo prefers what he prefers. 

Maybe we do both have the same ultimate value: Truth. Which being the topic of hand I tried to give you insight into the workings of Leo's mind as I've also been contemplating those questions myself and observing Leo's behaviours as well as yours.

On 23/1/2025 at 6:24 PM, Emerald said:

It's like if I asked Leo "What's your favorite food?"

Imagine there's a plate everyone hates

That's how it feels to love Truth 

So as fellow truth-seekers, I understand the intricacies of that path and understand how it differs from yours.

In the end I thought it was a good remark and I'm sorry it didn't provide you value.

As a final remark:

Quote

There's people that love magic tricks. And others who want to know the truth and mechanics behind them.

Ones find more joy in discovering the trick 🃏 and others in enjoying the magic ✨

It is indeed blessed the one that enjoys both.

[RendHeaven]

3 hours ago, Emerald said:

My orientation is towards contraction and limitation... which are the necessary birthplaces of meaning and beauty.

Meaning, yes. Beauty, maybe not.

Beauty is borne of both expansion and contraction as far as I can tell.

Infinity is not dull or neutral. The increasingly revealed intricacy and reconciliation is breathtaking.

Beauty is indiscriminate.

3 hours ago, Emerald said:

And any experiences that I've had of Truth and the infinite have been to serve the path of the contraction, limitation, meaning, and beauty that I'm on.

I think I know what you mean.

When I see how self-serving, limited, arbitrary, and fictional my human life is, I paradoxically get fired up to play it up.

In that sense I don't think we're too different. I still value truth above all else, but in practice my life is severely limited and I'm just doing my best. A flowering relative-reality life is not mutually exclusive with truthseeking.

3 hours ago, Emerald said:

To me... infinite expansion and infinite knowing becomes so random. I've had experiences where an infinity of experiences flash before me as I scratched the surface of infinite knowledge.

I'm familiar with this. It's destabilizing, threatening, and leaves you begging for your human life to come back. Gasping for breath in tears when the floor once again grounds your body and the sky above hugs you warmly.

But if you could surrender to even this, and dare to go even deeper (it will feel like jumping into a pool of lava), the randomness will become intelligible as you access what Leo would call "Omniscience."

But this threshold guardian is brutal, it's basically the final boss of fear. I always turn tail after small glimpses because I have too much to lose. I love my life too much. And God loves me for my weakness.

So maybe truth isn't my top value, based on how quickly I fold when everything I hold dear is dangled above the endless abyss of oblivion. Survival maybe wins in the end (for now).

But the only reason I'm able to make this assessment is because I wanted to know the Truth of my predicament. I value Truth enough to know when I don't value Truth, which is a privilege and reward that only a Truthseeker can enjoy.

4 hours ago, Emerald said:

I'm like a Hobbit more than I am a princess.

Hopefully a real hobbit, and not a fake one