No Free Will / Determinism

[Revolutionary Think]

@Leo Gura Is this what you mean by no free will?

 

 

[Leo Gura]

@Revolutionary Think Yes! Reality is a spontaneous happening. It's doing you, you're not doing it.

But you shouldn't take this on as a belief. Rather, you should become conscious of it happening RIGHT NOW in your very experience.

[Forestluv]

@Revolutionary Think @Leo Gura

I just want to add that I've experienced anxiety and fear during moments of realization that free will doesn't exist. Overall, it hasn't been a pleasant process.

[Leo Gura]

@Serotoninluv If it was pleasant, you wouldn't need me telling you about it, it would be advertized on TV 

 

[Revolutionary Think]

Ironically though doesn't that mean that enlightenment might be impossible because we don't have the free will to become enlightened due to determinism??? Since nothing is in our control... 

[eskwire]

@Revolutionary Think Why does something become impossible simply because an individual actor isn't "doing" it?

Actually, now that this is brought up, enlightenment is the perfect example of reality happening to you.

Look at how people work on enlightenment but they don't even know exactly what it is. They aren't putting a jigsaw puzzle together following the picture on the box. Nobody gives you a picture. Nobody can help you really do it, they just give exercises that correlate with it occurring in some people. 

Cool huh?

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, Revolutionary Think said:

Ironically though doesn't that mean that enlightenment might be impossible because we don't have the free will to become enlightened due to determinism??? Since nothing is in our control... 

Precisely! Which is why 99.999% ain't enlightened and won't be for a long time to come.

The trick to understanding reality is that whatever happens is precisely what was supposed to happen.

• If you work your ass off and get enlightened, that was supposed to happen
• If you work your ass off and don't get enlightened, that was supposed to happen
• If you sit on the couch your whole life eating Cheetos, that was supposed to happen
• If you read this and decide that all is hopeless and you are victim, that was supposed to happen
• If you read this and decide that you will double your efforts and that leads your enlightenment, that was supposed to happen

How do we know it was supposed to happen? Because it happened!

[electroBeam]

@Leo Gura that sounds like fate.

[Revolutionary Think]

2 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

The trick to understanding reality is that whatever happens is precisely what was supposed to happen.

This is precisely why I want to find a way to turn off my mind but, it's almost impossible. Since you're here I want to tell you about the frustrating process I go through when I lie in bed and I have one of these frustrating mind loops. I lay there in bed thinking of all the bullshit I was told when I was young. Study hard, get good grades, follow all the rules, get a degree and viola that high paying job and that reasonable life await you... Then when you grow up and you find out that these people are full of shit you want to beat the crap out of them. I think about all the jobs I applied to that were minimum wage and at my young age I could've easily done them and never got a chance to do them. I think about even now with a degree and a good amount of vocational education I still couldn't get that 3D printing job that would've made me so happy and even the crappier digital printing job that I was willing to settle for but, I didn't really want. Then I end up going in a mind loop I want to kick the world in its ass for all the BS it filled my mind with when I was young. I keep thinking to myself "you lied to me you no good son of a bitches" over and over again.

Then even when I tell my mind to shut up be quiet and let me sleep I still can't stop thinking about those thoughts. I keep painting myself as this decent good guy who has been betrayed by greedy evil scumbags (even though you mentioned we're all the devil). Then I start thinking to myself did those kids at Sandy Hook deserve what they got when they were shot up with an assault rifle because a mentally deranged individual had access to those weapons then how could I be complaining about my life... but, I still complain about my life. Then it makes it worse and I think how can I live in such a sick, disgusting evil world where that is allowed to happen. As you said though it was supposed to happen because it happened.

Even these mind loops I'm discussing right now might not be under my control and that's the mind fuck about these mind loops lol. If only I can end these mind loops somehow reprogram and rewire myself not to think about these things but, they are a part of my DNA that I can't seem to shed. I keep thinking of a way to get some sort of pay back for how shitty I was treated when I was younger and all the opportunities I didn't get to have because of the stupid job market. Things are improving in my life though but, somehow in my psyche I feel betrayed and feel as though I deserve some sort of compensation even though that's really a figment of my imagination and the Universe doesn't work like that. I guess the best I can do is not get frustrated at myself for having these mind loops because even my thoughts aren't mine. Maybe meditate more and understand that I'm not in charge let things happen with out an opinion. 

 

Bottom line easier said than done but, I'm so happy I have this community to share this stuff with instead of keeping it bottled up. 

[Leo Gura]

@Revolutionary Think The mind cannot stop the mind.

Stopping the mind requires some serious meditation/self-inquiry. Years of it.

Or some deep tripping.

Keep at it. Don't try to stop it in the ordinary sense of telling yourself not to think while laying in bed. That doesn't work.

[Socrates]

@Leo Gura I get the no-free-will but still, something makes decisions, be it the body or the mind.

If not, this says that our lives are preset and either you are born capable-of-enlightenment and achieve it or better luck next life.

In that case, no matter what I do I will win if my destiny is to win and no matter what I will lose if my destiny is to lose.

Sounds weird but I guess we can assume we are winners and act accordingly to increase our chances  

[SOUL]

Why do people who believe they don't have free will choose to tell others they don't have it either? I guess they have no choice and are subject to the unconscious mind's impulses.

Attempting to stop the mind from thinking is like attempting to stop the heart from beating. Why? It's what it naturally does. Although, I would liken the exercise of awakened contemplation to conscious breathing, we can intentionally cease for a short time but eventually we pass out from the lack of oxygen to our brain and the body resumes breathing when we aren't actively preventing it from doing so.

In a similar way we can try to not think but when we aren't looking the unconscious mind springs forth with impulses in many forms. Since we cannot see the unconscious mind doing it's thing it is only once it rises to the conscious mind that we notice it. So our work is to be aware of the machinations of the mind and observe them, not try to stop it from doing what it naturally does.

By being aware of what stirs in the mind we can cease to be influenced by the mind's unconscious impulses which are past experience and choose to be present in the experience of what is happening now. By being attentive to the present moment we are creating the pattern of being present in our unconscious mind to recall at another time.

So at that other time will we reminisce about being present in a past time? Will we just remember us being present in a past moment or will we be present in the moment we have to be in now?

It's our choice....or is it?

Edited November 9, 2017 by SOUL

[Leo Gura]

12 hours ago, Socrates said:

@Leo Gura I get the no-free-will but still, something makes decisions, be it the body or the mind.

If not, this says that our lives are preset and either you are born capable-of-enlightenment and achieve it or better luck next life.

In that case, no matter what I do I will win if my destiny is to win and no matter what I will lose if my destiny is to lose.

Sounds weird but I guess we can assume we are winners and act accordingly to increase our chances  

Yes, the infinite intelligence of the All, inherent in everything.

It's hard to believe until you experience it first-hand.

[Nahm]

Just think of the odds for a minute. “Billions of years in the making” and you just happen to be alive right now, when evolution produces a thinking organism which, if well practiced, can realize it is actually The One. Here you are, right at the unbelievably tiny little slice where this experience of the veil and unveiling to know thy self is. Not lacking any energy or intelligence needed to discover this, and not existing in a time when it is common knowledge you grew up with the knowing. What are the odds of that? At the very least, I’d be suspicious of the entire interaction. The luck is just far to good to be true. 

[Spiral]

Why does "something" need to make decisions? Why can't everything just be the way they are. 

Edited November 10, 2017 by Spiral

[Forestluv]

On 11/8/2017 at 9:37 PM, Leo Gura said:

Precisely! Which is why 99.999% ain't enlightened and won't be for a long time to come.

The trick to understanding reality is that whatever happens is precisely what was supposed to happen.

• If you work your ass off and get enlightened, that was supposed to happen
• If you work your ass off and don't get enlightened, that was supposed to happen
• If you sit on the couch your whole life eating Cheetos, that was supposed to happen
• If you read this and decide that all is hopeless and you are victim, that was supposed to happen
• If you read this and decide that you will double your efforts and that leads your enlightenment, that was supposed to happen

How do we know it was supposed to happen? Because it happened!

I'm curious if there is intention within your use of "supposed".

[Leo Gura]

@Serotoninluv Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Humans have intentions sometimes. A rock falling on your head doesn't. But both are acts of the universe all the same.

[beastmode]

@Leo Gura

On 11/9/2017 at 3:33 PM, Leo Gura said:

Yes, the infinite intelligence of the All, inherent in everything.

It's hard to believe until you experience it first-hand.

Leo - how do we experience it first hand? I assume this is the process of working towards enlightenment and taming my ego, right? I am in the middle of the life course as well as canvassing all of your videos, but I feel a gravitation towards this material. I plan on attacking your spiritual videos soon...

[Leo Gura]

Deep enlightenments.

Or... psychedelics.

You must answer the question: What is reality and why does it exist?

[beastmode]

@Leo Gura Ive taken mushrooms 3 times and they were the most spiritual and memorable experiences of my life. Should I just keep doing those and expose myself more and more to this other world?