Actualized.org Video Summaries!

[FlyingLotus]

• The most recent list of Summaries & Episodes is here
• ? Leo's Blog: Table of Contents ?
• ▶️ Blog Videos, Summaries & Interviews ▶️
• ? Actualized.org on Psychedelics ? (has all resources on psychedelics)

 

• Leo’s "20 Dream Killers" article.
• There’s an Actualized.org Textbook.  It was assembled by @Cepzeu and others.  Summaries in the Textbook (v2) will say: (book pg XXX).
• You can also check out Leo’s Personal Development Blueprint.  It covers over 100 concepts in personal development.

 

     Actualized.org Youtube Episodes:

• The first 200 episodes have transcripts in the video section of Actualized.org
• If you want to contribute to this thread, select one of the episodes that still needs a summary and post it here

     Episodes:      1 - 249

 

1. [x] How to Invest In Yourself (pg 11)

2. [x] Why Life Coaching Works (pg 11)

3. [] Be Different to Be Successful

4. [x] Get Coached (pg 12)

5. [] Inner Game of Career Development

6. [] The Most Interesting Problem in Philosophy and Science

7. [x] How I Lost 65 Pounds in 5 Months (pg 12)

8. [x] Understanding Resistance (pg 8)

9. [x] Mastery (pg 11) (book pg 140)

10. [] Work Less to Accomplish More

11. [x] What's the Worst That Can Happen? (pg 16)

12. [] What a Roman Emperor Can Teach You About Happiness

13. [] The Number One Reason Why You're Not Succeeding

14. [] The Problem of Self-Control

15. [] The Art of Solving Problems Permanently

16. [] How You Must Think About Failure

17. [] Life Purpose - Critical Points For Finding Your Life Purpose ?

18. [] As Good As Your Life Will Ever Get ?️

19. [] How to Delegate to Your Subconscious Mind

20. [] Garbage In, Garbage Out - Watch Your Information Intake

21. [] The $100 Million Dollar Question

22. [] Positive vs Negative Motivation

23. [] How To Transform Your Entire Life

24. [] Personal Development Blueprint - Intro - Actualized.org

25. [] Personal Development - The Ultimate Vision of What You Can Be

26. [] Life Purpose - The Thrill of Creative Contribution

27. [] Success & Creativity - Why You Should Be More Schizophrenic

28. [] Personal Development - How Your Mind is Like a Rider Atop an Elephant

29. [] Personal Development - Tips About How to Give Advice

30. [] Create an Exciting Life - Your 5 Proudest Moments Exercise

31. [] Happiness & Success - Should You Work on Strengths or Weaknesses?

32. [] Personal Development - Professional vs Hobbiest

33. [] Personal Development Blueprint - Mission Statement

34. [] Personal Development Blueprint - Charged Life

35. [] Personal Development Blueprint - Top 5 Feelings

36. [] Personal Development Blueprint - Eliminate Addictions

37. [] How to Make Your Life Extraordinary

38. [] How to Do Real Personal Development

39. [] Personal Development Blueprint - Meditation

40. [] How To Become Successful - The Secrets That Everyone Overlooks

41. [] How To Get More Energy - An Approach Nobody Ever Talks About

42. [] How To Make A Guy Fall In Love With You - What Guys Really Want

43. [] How To Make A Girl Fall In Love With You - What Girls Really Want

44. [] How To Make More Money - Increase Your Income In Career or Business

45. [] How To Become A Life Coach - Every Part of the Process Revealed inDetail

46. [] Benefits of Meditation - Top Reasons To Start Meditating Right Now

47. [] How To Overcome Shyness - Transform Yourself Into An Extrovert

48. [] What Is The Purpose Of Life? - Use Purpose to Achieve Massive Success

49. [] How To Motivate Employees - Creating Ultra-Productive Workers

50. [] How To Feel Happy - Scientifically Proven Ways of Creating Lasting Happiness

51. [] Productivity Strategies - Are You Prolific?

52. [x] How To Increase Your Results From Self-Help Products by 10x (book pg 206)

53. [] Personal Development Blueprint - Information Intake

54. [] New Years Resolutions - How Getting Back On Track Is A Huge Opportunity

55. [] Self Expression - How To Express Yourself & Find Your Authentic Creative Voice

56. [x] How to Be Happy in Life - Happiness Bottlenecks (pg 13)

57. [] Overcoming Fear - How To Slay Your Greatest Demon

58. [x] Sensitivity - Why Personal Development Is Impossible For You Right Now (pg 15)

59. [x] How To Never Quit - The Key To Reframing The Toughest Obstacles (pg 15)

60. [] The Subconscious Mind - Using Your Subconscious Mind to Create Massive Success

61. [] Negative Thoughts - The Origin Of Negative Thinking & How To Eliminate It Forever

62. [] How To Succeed In Life - The 6 Key Elements of Phenomenal Success

63. [] Fear Of Public Speaking - The One Key To Overcoming It Forever

64. [] How To Change Your Life - Making BIG Life Changes Actually Stick

65. [] Fear Of Failure - Why We Have It & How To Deal With It

66. [] How To Change Careers - Dealing With The Fear & Transitioning Smart

67. [] How To Stay Focused - The Key To Being Extremely Productive & ClearMinded

68. [] Resume Writing Tips - The Secret Mindset For Writing a Perfect Resume

69. [] How To Stay Motivated To Lose Weight - The Psychology of Weight Loss Success

70. [] How To Stop Worrying - The Fundamentals of Eliminating Worry

71. [] How To Change The World - What It Takes To Have Massive Social Impact

72. [] Personal Power - How Personal Power Creates Success

73. [] SMART Goal Setting - How to Set Extremely Effective Goals

74. [] The Subconscious Mind - Using Your Subconscious Mind to Create Massive Success

75. [] What Is Ego - How Your Ego Dictates Your Entire Life

76. [] How To Get Motivated - Creating a Consistent Drive for High Performance

77. [x] The Law Of Attraction - How It Really Works & How To Use It (pg 11)

78. [] How To Stop Procrastinating - A Step-by-Step Process For Busting The Worst of Procrastination

79. [] How To Be More Confident - A Step-by-Step Process for Becoming Truly Confident

80. [x] Self Actualization - The Most Inspiring Self-Help Concept Of All Time (book pg 37)

81. [] Positive Affirmations - The Tricks of Using Affirmations to Transform Your Life

82. [] What Should I Do With My Life - How To Find Your Passion For Life

83. [] Peak Performance - How To Hit and Maintain Consistent Peak Performance In Life

84. [x] How To Stay Healthy - The Psychology of Maintaining Consistent, Effortless Health (pg 13)

85. [x] Overcoming Adversity - How To Handle The Most Horrific Life Challenges Ever (pg 15)

86. [] How To Become A Vegetarian - Practical Steps You Must Take To Succeed

87. [] How To Control Anger - The Shocking Truth Behind Your Anger Problems

88. [] Positive Psychology - What Is It & How It Can Transform Your Life

89. [x] Self Control - How To Develop Self-Control To Create An Amazing Life (pg 9)

90. [] How To Relieve Stress - Scientifically Proven Stress Relief Techniques

91. [x] How To Be Attractive - The Ultimate Attraction Strategy (pg 2)

92. [x] Why Am I Depressed? - The Shocking Truth Behind Your Depression (pg 12)

93. [x] Profound Quotes #001 - "All Of Humanity's Problems Stem From Man’s..." (pg 12)

94. [] True Vision - I Reveal My Life Purpose Until You Can Feel It ?

95. [] Willpower - Scientifically Proven Techniques to Increase Willpower

96. [] Redefining Philosophy - How To Become A Jedi Master

97. [] How To Become Rich - The Number One Reason You're Not Already Rich

98. [] Mindfulness - How To Actually Practice Mindfulness & Conquer Your Emotions

99. [] Profound Quotes #002 - "Specialization Is For Insects"

100. [x] What Is Happiness? - An Extremely Advanced Definition Of Happiness (book pg 60)

101. [x] Self Image - The Amazing, Absolute Key To All Personal Growth (pg 16)

102. [] How To Stay Committed To A Cause

103. [] Introvert vs Extrovert - A Deep Understanding Of Introverts And Extroverts

104. [] How To Eat Healthy - Create A Super Healthy Meal In 15 Minutes ?

105. [x] How To Be A Man - The Deep Core Of Being Masculine (pg 10)

106. [] Positive Thinking - The Key To Thinking Positive

107. [] Healthy Relationships - What You MUST Know To Sustain A Great Relationship

108. [x] Dream Life - What It Takes To Create An Extraordinary Life (pg 15)

109. [] Best Supplements - What You Must Know About Supplementation ?

110. [x] Optimism - How To Become Optimisitic Right Now (pg 10)

111. [] Letting Go Of The Past - How To Get Over The Past In Minutes

112. [] How To Find Your Passion - Why You Have No Passion & How To Fix It

113. [] Critical Thinking - Use Independent Thinking To Build A Powerful Life

114. [] How To Motivate Yourself - The Trick Behind Lasting Self-Motivation

115. [x] Emotional Intelligence - Why Your EQ Is More Important Than Your IQ (pg 9)

116. [x] Cause & Purpose - What Are You Willing To Bleed For? (pg 10)

117. [] Id, Ego, Superego - Understanding An Old School Psychology Concept

118. [] Self Help - How Self-Help Can Revolutionize Your Entire Life

119. [] Life Coaching - The Powerful Benefits Of Working With A Life Coach

120. [] How To Start A Business - Bootstrapping A Successful Business

121. [] How To Use Technology To Super-Charge Your Personal Growth

122. [] Time Management - How To Get More Time In Your Day

123. [] State Of The Union - My Camera Dies In Death Valley

124. [x] The Secret - The Truth They Didn't Tell You (pg 13)

125. [] Personal Development Plan - The Essentials Of Getting Results

126. [] How To Love Yourself - How To Like Who You Are Right Now

127. [] How To Feel Good - Re-Designing Your Life To Feel Amazing

128. [] How To Be Yourself - Become Your Authentic Self Right Now

129. [] True Value - How To Create Success Out Of Nowhere

130. [] The Power Of Routines - How Your Daily Routine Holds You Back From Your Dreams

131. [] Staying Hungry - How To Use Pain For Growth ⚖️

132. [x] Relationship Advice - The Master Plan For Creating An Amazing Relationship (pg 10)

133. [] How To Become A Millionaire - The Truth No One Tells You

134. [] Self Esteem - Understanding & Fixing Low Self-Esteem

135. [] Judgment - How You Ruin Your Own Happiness

136. [x] Profound Quotes #003 - "Children Want Candy; The Intelligent Want Self-Control” - Rumi (pg 9)

137. [] Whatever Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger - True or False? ?

138. [] What Women Want In A Man - 5 Factors That Hook Women Like Crack

139. [] How To Make A Girl Squirt - Give Your Girl An Explosive Orgasm

140. [] Positive Attitude - The 3 Pillars To Cultivating Positivity

141. [x] How To Exploit People To Grow Yourself - An Advanced Technique (pg 1) (book pg 269)

142. [] Stress Management - Permanent Solutions For Stress Reduction

143. [] Why I'm A Dick - And Why I Won't Change

144. [] Goal Setting - How To Set Goals Effectively

145. [x] Bad Relationships - How To Break Your Cycle Of Painful Relationships (pg 9)

146. [] Bad Habits - A Live Exercise For Dropping Any Bad Habit For Good

147. [] How To Get A Girlfriend - The Ultimate Guide For Landing A Hot Girlfriend

148. [] How To Forgive Someone - The One Trick That Makes Forgiveness Easy

149. [] Openmindedness - A Huge Overlooked Obstacle To Self Improvement

150. [] How To Make Friends - 4 Sticking-Points That Limit Your Ability To Make Friends

151. [] Good Vs Evil - Why Evil Doesn't Actually Exist

152. [] Communication Skills - The 6 Keys Of Powerful Communication

153. [] Low Self Esteem In Women - Why Women Have Lower Self-Esteem Than Men

154. [x] Visualization - A Powerful Technique For Reprogramming Your Subconscious Mind (book pg 203)

155. [] Self Confidence - The Two Essential Avenues For Building Confidence

156. [] Why Women Use You For Money - And How To Never Get Used Again

157. [] Why Men Cheat - And 8 Ways To Keep Your Man Loyal

158. [] How To Follow Advice Without Betraying Yourself

159. [x] How To Master & Control Your Emotions (book pg 201)

160. [] Negative Visualization - An Ancient Stoic Technique For Creating Happiness

161. [x] How To Stop Being A Victim - The #1 Reason You Are Stuck In Life  (pg 15) (book pg 84)

162. [] Spirituality vs Religion - The No-Bullshit Guide To Spirituality

163. [x] Self Discipline vs Freedom - How To Create More Freedom In Your Life (pg 11)

164. [x] How To Deal With Depression - The Key To Breaking Out Of Depression (pg 3)

165. [x] How To Stop Caring What People Think Of You (pg 13) (book pg 199)

166. [] How Science Keeps You Stuck In Life - Exposing Problems With "Scientific" Thinking

167. [] Why Women Fall For Assholes

168. [x] Understanding The Authentic Self - Discovering Who You Really Are (book pg 197)

169. [] How To Deal With Difficult & Toxic People

170. [] Leo's List of Top 140 Self-Help Books ?

171. [] How To Stop Watching TV - Why You Must Eliminate TV Right Now!

172. [] Luck & Success - Is Luck Important For Being Successful?

173. [] How To Meditate - The No Bullshit Guide to Meditation

174. [] How To Manage Your Money Easily Using This Budget Template

175. [] The Biggest Thing You Should Fear - Halloween Special ?

176. [] How To Be An Attractive Man - Interview With Dating Coach, TrippAdvice

177. [x] How To Stop Being Lazy - Solutions For Short-term & Long-term Laziness (book pg 196)

178. [] How To Deepen Your Love For Life - A Powerful Exercise

179. [] How To Deal With A Breakup

180. [] Why The Most Successful People Don't Do Personal Development

181. [] How To Have Amazing Sex - Part 1

182. [] The Truth About Passive Income

183. [] How To Practice Gratitude - Xmas 2014 Special ?

184. [x] How To Stop Being Jealous - Techniques To End Jealousy Forever (pg 2)

185. [x] Responsibility vs Blame - Why You Are 100% Responsible For Everything (book pg 89)

186. [x] How To Study - The Keys To Acing School & College (pg 2) (book pg 214)

187. [x] Beware Of False Prophets - Stop Worshipping Human Personality (pg 11)

188. [x] What Is Karma? - The No-Bullshit Explanation Of How Karma Works (book pg 140)

189. [] Stop Demonizing People! - Why You Are Wrong For Calling Terrorists Evil

190. [x] Spiritual Enlightenment - The Most SHOCKING Truth You'll Ever Hear (book pg 98)

191. [] What To Do Next After Learning About Enlightenment

192. [x] The Happiness Spectrum - The Best & Worst Kinds Of Happiness (book pg 58)

193. [x] Paradoxes Of Personal Development (book pg 61)

194. [x] Spiritual Enlightenment - Part 2 - Understanding The Conceptualized Self (book pg 100)

195. [] The Secret Curse Of Being Human + Bonus: A True Spiritual Exercise!

196. [] How To Have Amazing Sex (For Women) - Drive Your Man Wild In Bed

197. [x] Enlightenment - Part 3 - Creating An Experience Of No-Self (book pg 101)

198. [x] Enlightenment FAQ - Part 1 - All Your Questions Answered (pg 2) (book pg 246)

199. [x] Enlightenment FAQ - Part 2 (pg 14)

200. [x] All Of Religion Explained In One Video (pg 2) (pg 12) (book pg 112)

201. [] How To Have Amazing Sex - Part 2 - Increasing Intimacy & Dominance

202. [x] Understanding Emotions - Part 1 (book pg 190)

203. [] Feminine vs Masculine Compassion

204. [x] How To Stop Backsliding - How To Stop Procrastinating (pg 10) (book pg 195)

205. [x] How To Become Enlightened - The Exact Step By Step Process Revealed! (book pg 102)

206. [x] How To Be A Leader - Leadership Secrets Revealed! (book pg 188)

207. [] How To Stop Being A Workaholic

208. [x] How To Meditate Deeper (pg 8)

209. [x] Science vs Religion - The Absurdity Revealed! (book pg 186)

210. [x] How To Create Your Dream Career - The Ultimate Life Purpose Course (pg 15)

211. [x] How To Unleash Your Ambition - Must-Watch For Ambitious People (pg 1) (book pg 82)

212. [x] How To Get Shit Done - The Inner Game Of Being A Results-Maker (pg 1) (book pg 80)

213. [] My Enlightenment Experience - Exactly How It Happened

214. [x] Lower vs Higher Self - Understanding Your Two-Faced Nature (book pg 184)

215. [x] Using Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs To Self-Actualize (book pg 35)

216. [x] Masculinity vs Femininity - Psychology Of The Male & Female Mind (book pg 182)

217. [x] Meditation Techniques: Do Nothing - The Simplest Meditation Possible (pg 1) (book pg 124)

218. [x] Meditation On Steroids - How To Get The FASTEST Meditation Gains (book pg 127)

219. [x] The Grand Model Of Psychological Evolution - Clare Graves & Spiral Dynamics (book pg 52)

220. [] Being A Spiritual Seeker, Good or Bad?

221. [x] One Simple Rule For Acing Life (book pg 49)

222. [] How To Be Funny - Comprehensive Guide To Developing A Sense of Humor

223. [x] Contemplating Your Own Death - To Stay Motivated For Life (book pg 181)

224. [] How To Deal With Criticism, Trolls, and Haters

225. [x] Avoiding Dysfunctional & Abusive Relationships - 30+ Red Flags (pg 15)

226. [x] Advice For High School & College Students - The Keys To Mastering Life (book pg 204)

227. [] Curing Perfectionism - How To Stop Being A Perfectionist

228. [x] Mindfulness Meditation - A Complete Guide With Techniques & Examples (pg 15) (pg 16)

229. [x] A Vision For The Self Actualized Life - Get Yo Ass Inspired! (book pg 21)

230. [] How To Overcome Creative Blocks & Writer's Block

231. [x] How To Deal With Strong Negative Emotions (pg 14) (book pg 43)

232. [x] Radical Openmindedness - How To Break Free Of Dogma & Beliefs (book pg 94)

233. [x] 30 Ways Society Fucks You In The Ass (pg 1) (book pg 54)

234. [x] How You Lie - All Your Dirty, Sneaky Lies & Manipulations Exposed! (book pg 135)

235. [x] 40 Signs That You Are Neurotic - Understanding Neurosis  (pg 1) (book pg 178)

236. [] How To Stop Judging Yourself

237. [] The Challenges Of Making Bold Life Changes

238. [x] Understanding Awareness - The Staggering Depth Of Your Unawareness Revealed (pg 1) (book pg 39)

239. [x] Free Will vs Determinism - Does Free Will Exist? (book pg 176)

240. [] A Rant Against The Pickup Community - Must Watch For All PUAs

241. [x] The Ultimate Model Of Human Knowledge - All Knowledge Explained! (pg 12) (book pg 66)

242. [x] The Most Important Commitment You Can Make + Huge Announcement (pg 1) (book pg 230)

243. [x] 27 Qualities Of All Successful People (pg 2) (book pg 209)

244. [x] The Enlightened Self - A Description Of Your Existential Nature (pg 1) (book pg 105)

245. [x] Fake Growth vs Real Growth - What If You're Just Tricking Yourself? (pg 1) (book pg 26)

246. [x] How To Stop Comparing Yourself To Others (pg 1) (book pg 227)

247. [x] How To Be A Strategic Motherfucker - The 7 Pillars Of Strategic Thinking (pg 1)  (pg 7) (book pg 76)

248. [x] Why Rationality Is WRONG! - A Critique Of Rationalism (pg 1) (book pg 174)

249. [x] The Power Of Self Acceptance - How To Stop Beating Yourself Up (pg 1) (book pg 173) ?

 

     Episodes:  250 - 506

 

250. [x] The Benefits Of Enlightenment  (pg 14) (book pg 259)

251. [x] 3 Step Formula To Be Ruthlessly Effective At Anything (pg 15) (book pg 219)

252. [x] Overcoming Addiction - The Root Cause Of Every Addiction (pg 1) (pg 4) (book pg 44)

253. [x] How Your Mind Distorts Reality - Needy vs Non-Needy Perception (pg 4) (book pg 90)

254. [x] Enlightenment Guided Inquiry - The Neti Neti Method (book pg 106)

255. [x] Grasping The Illusory Nature Of Thought (pg 4) (book pg 93)

256. [x] Lifestyle Minimalism - Renouncing Your Busy Stupid Life (pg 4) (book pg 47)

257. [x] How To Stop Being A Victim - Part 2 - What All Victims Fail To Understand (pg 14) (book pg 87)

258. [x] A Rant Against Morality - Very Foundational (pg 4) (book pg 167)

259. [x] How To Stop Moralizing - Removing The SHOULDs From Your Life (pg 4) (book pg 170)

260. [x] Meditation For Beginners (pg 4) (book pg 264)

261. [x] Awareness Alone Is Curative - How To Auto-Correct Unwanted Behaviors (pg 4) (book pg 42)

262. [x] Be Fucking Patient! - How To Deal With Lack Of Results (pg 4) (book pg 50)

263. [x] The Psychology Of Small Business Success - Top 5 Errors Of Aspiring Entrepreneurs (pg 4) (book pg 220)

264. [x] 10 Important Things You Don't Know You Want (pg 4) (book pg 138)

265. [x] You're Not Happy Because You Don't Really Want To Be (pg 4) (book pg 165)

266. [x] The 3 Levels Of Personal Development Work (pg 4) (book pg 31)

267. [] The Amazing Power Of Psychedelics - Leo Does Magic Psilocybin Mushrooms!

268. [x] How To Use Psychedelics For Personal Development (pg 11) (book pg 207)

269. [] Guided Meditation - The Next Level Of Meditation

270. [x] The Paradox Of Developing Self-Trust (pg 4) (book pg 244)

271. [x] How To Be A Man - Part 2 (Advanced Version) (pg 10)

272. [x] The 64 Most Fascinating Questions A Human Can Ask (pg 4) (book pg 160)

273. [x] What's Wrong With Ego? (book pg 162)

274. [] What Is God? - Leo Becomes Absolute Infinity (Aka God) - All Of Reality Explained

275. [x] 5-MeO-DMT - The Magic Pill To Enlightenment & God (pg 16)

276. [x] Low Quality vs High Quality Consciousness (pg 4) (book pg 24)

277. [x] The Dark Side Of Meditation (pg 4) (book pg 157)

278. [x] The Mechanics Of Belief (pg 4) (book pg 154)

279. [x] How To Harness Your Intuition (pg 4) (book pg 262)

280. [x] The Trap Of Projection, Especially Onto Teachers & Mentors (pg 10)

281. [x] A Rant Against Culture (pg 4)

282. [x] Money Psychology - The Inner Game of Mastering Money (pg 4) (book pg 222)

283. [] Using 5-MeO-DMT To Become Enlightened - Interview With Martin Ball

284. [x] How To Deal With Confusion (pg 4) (book pg 33)

285. [x] Becoming A Sage - A New Vision For Actualized.org & You! (pg 4) (book pg 23)

286. [x] Mystical Traditions Around The World - Nonduality Goes Cosmopolitan! (book pg 110)

287. [x] Becoming A Zen Devil - The Dangers Of Half-Assing Enlightenment (pg 4) (book pg 107)

288. [x] Uncovering Your Childhood Vows - Unwire Your Neurotic Personality (book pg 122)

289. [x] The Pre-mortem Technique - The Trick To Avoiding Project Failure (pg 4)

290. [x] How To Control Anger - Part 2 - Understanding Evil To Death (pg 4) (book pg 153)

291. [x] A Rant Against Naive Realism - Reality Is NOT Physical! (pg 4) (book pg 151)

292. [x] How I Do Research & Develop Big Picture Understanding  (pg 2) (pg 4) (book pg 132)

293. [] The Launch Of Infinite Insights - Leo's Blog!

294. [x] The Role Of Balance In Personal Development (pg 4) (book pg 63)

295. [x] Dropping The Roles You Play (pg 4)

296. [] The Gallery Of Absolute Infinity ?

297. [x] Build Your Infrastructure For Success (pg 4) (book pg 149)

298. [x] AL-LAD Trip Report - A Powerful Tool For Consciousness Work (pg 10)

299. [x] Understanding How Paradigms Work (pg 4) (book pg 68)

300. [x] Contemplation - The Most Important Tool For Sages (pg 4) (book pg 128)

301. [x] Concentration vs Meditation - How To Develop Concentration (pg 4) (book pg 126)

302. [x] The Big Picture Of Self-Actualization (pg 4) (book pg 18)

303. [x] True vs False Skepticism (pg 4) (book pg 72)

304. [x] Leo's Super Healthy Blueberry Smoothie ? (pg 16)

305. [x] The Highest Hero's Journey - What It Means To Be Real Hero (pg 4) (book pg 130)

306. [x] Leo's Super Healthy Vegetable Soup ? (pg 9)

307. [x] Understanding Default Positions (pg 4) (book pg 147)

308. [] Leo's Solo Meditation Retreat - 90 Hours Of Nonstop Meditation In The Forest ?

309. [x] Balancing Theory vs Practice (pg 4) (book pg 29)

310. [x] How To Deal With Loneliness - Especially While Self-Actualizing (book pg 145)

311. [x] How To Get Started With Self Actualization - Over 40 Techniques (pg 16) (book pg 19)

312. [] 2C-B Trip Report - Experiencing Physical Death

313. [x] Intro To Systems Thinking (pg 4) (book pg 142)

314. [x] Why People Seem Crazy (pg 4) (book pg 119)

315. [] Subtle Addictions

316. [] Successful People Are Not Happy

317. [] Making Sense Of Paranormal Phenomena & Psychic Powers ???‍♀️

318. [x] Understanding Absolute Infinity - Part 1 (pg 3)

319. [] Understanding Absolute Infinity - Part 2

320. [x] What Is Art? - Understanding The Essence Of Art (pg 8)

321. [] Setting Proper Expectations

322. [] Leo Hits Rock Bottom - EVERYTHING Understood

323. [x] Learning = Behavior Change (pg 4) (book pg 274)

324. [x] No Growth Possible Without Training (pg 4) (book pg 217)

325. [x] Understanding Meaning, Purpose, & Value ? (pg 4)

326. [x] Distraction - The Ego's Favorite Defense Mechanism (pg 9)

327. [x] What Is The Devil? - The Mechanics Of Evil (pg 3)

328. [x] How To Raise Rockstar Kids (pg 8)

329. [] Correcting The Stigma Of Psychedelics - Part 1

330. [] Learning = Observation

331. [] Correcting The Stigma Of Psychedelics - Part 2

332. [] The Topic Of Mindfuckery

333. [x] Advanced Tips For Self-Inquiry (pg 3)

334. [x] Building Your Existential Vocabulary (pg 4)

335. [] How To Keep The Ultimate Journal (Commonplace Book) + LIVE DEMO ?

336. [x] Comprehension Has Many Degrees (pg 13)

337. [x] Why Brains Do Not Exist (pg 7)

338. [] Reality Is A Strange Loop - The Beauty Of Paradox + GRAPHICS ? 

339. [] The Theme Of Things Going Full-Circle

340. [x] Motivational Speech For Building A Passionate Life (pg 4) (book pg 15)

341. [x] The Deep Problem Of Marketing (pg 3) (pg 4) (book pg 270) ?

342. [x] Jacques Derrida, Deconstruction, Post-Modernism & Nonduality (pg 4)

343. [x] All Criticism Is Untenable (pg 4) (pg 10)

344. [x] Self-Deception - Part 1 (pg 2) (book pg 231)

345. [x] Self Deception - Part 2 - 60+ Self-Deception Mechanisms (pg 2) (book pg 234)

346. [] Enlightenment Experience Happening In Real Time - LIVE! ?️

347. [x] Enlightenment Experience Explanation & Key Lessons (pg 3) (book pg 266)

348. [x] Self-Deception - Part 3  (pg 2) (book pg 237)

349. [] Hitler Reacts To Nonduality / Enlightenment - FUNNY!

350. [] Life Is A Dream

351. [x] How To Shop For Healthy Food (pg 3)

352. [] My Deepest Awakening Yet - Becoming Infinite

353. [] The Importance Of Real Yoga

354. [] Quantum Mechanics Debunks Materialism - Part 1

355. [] Quantum Mechanics Debunks Materialism - Part 2

356. [] Comprehending The Magnitude Of Reality

357. [] Metaphysical Implications Of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem - Part 1

358. [x] Understanding Islam - What Most People Misunderstand (pg 12)

359. [x] Shamanic Breathing Technique + LIVE DEMO ??‍♀️ (pg 8)

360. [x] Collective Ego - Understanding The Egoic Dynamics Of Social Systems (pg 12)

361. [] Going Buddha - 30 Day Meditation Challenge

362. [x] What Is Consciousness? - All Questions Answered (pg 2)

363. [] What Is Intelligence? - Infinite Intelligence Explained

364. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Stage Blue (pg 5) (book pg 275)

365. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Stage Orange (pg 5) (book pg 275)

366. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Stage Green (pg 5) (book pg 275)

367. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Stage Yellow (pg 5) (book pg 275)

368. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Stage Turquoise (pg 5) (book pg 275)

369. [x] Understanding Recontextualization (pg 3)

370. [x] How To Contemplate Using A Journal (pg 10)

371. [x] Sameness vs Difference - The Metaphysical Foundation Of Reality (pg 13)

372. [x] How Ideology Works (pg 12)

373. [] Life Is A Maze

374. [x] What Is Spirituality? - A No-Bullshit Intro To Spirituality (pg 3)

375. [x] How To Escape Wage Slavery (book pg 224)

376. [] Body Awareness - How To Relax Your Body

377. [x] What Is Love? - Advanced Spiritual Explanation (pg 2)

378. [x] 35+ Subfields Of Self-Help (pg 3)

379. [] What Is Actuality? - Distinguish Direct Experience vs Concept

380. [x] Mankind Is The Bullshitting Animal (pg 3)

381. [x] Nootropics - Top Supplements For Increasing Mental Performance (pg 12)

382. [] The Radical Implications Of Oneness (Halloween Edition) ?

383. [x] 65 Core Principles Of Living The Good Life (pg 3)

384. [x] What Is Perception? - The Metaphysics Of Perception (pg 4) (book pg 254)

385. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Important Insights & Nuances (pg 17)

386. [x] The Ten Ox-Herding Pictures - Zen’s Stages of Enlightenment Explained (pg 4)

387. [] The Counter-Intuitive Nature Of Life

388. [x] Understanding Ego Backlash (pg 14)

389. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Areas Of Application (pg 5) (book pg 276)

390. [x] How To Do Self-Inquiry (pg 10)

391. [x] Cult Psychology - Part 1 - How Cults Work (pg 7)

392. [x] Cult Psychology - Part 2 - The Big Picture (pg 8)

393. [x] What Is God? - Part 1 - A No Bullshit Explanation For Smart People (pg 4)

394. [x] What Is God? - Part 2 - Clear Answers To 70+ Commonly Asked Questions (pg 4)

395. [] Aztec Nonduality - Profound Life Lessons From Aztec Philosophy

396. [] Leaving On 30-Day Solo Retreat

397. [] Becoming God - Insights From 13 Back-to-Back Awakenings

398. [x] Understanding Duality - Part 1 - Master List of 250+ Dualities (pg 5)

399. [] Understanding Duality - Part 2 - Scientific Dualities

400. [] Understanding Duality - Part 3 - Existential Dualities

401. [x] Life Unfolds In Chapters & Phases (pg 6)

402. [x] The Power Of Asking Questions (pg 7)

403. [x] What Is The Point Of Life? - An Advanced, Life-Changing Explanation (pg 9)

404. [x] Understanding Survival - Part 1 - The Metaphysics Of Being Human (pg 7)

405. [x] Understanding Survival - Part 2 - Advanced Insights About Survival (pg 7)

406. [x] Understanding Relativism - Part 1 (pg 7)

407. [] What Is Reality? - A Radical Explanation

408. [x] How Authority Works - Where Does Truth Come From? (pg 5)

409. [x] Conscious Politics - Part 1 - The Deepest Political Analysis You'll Ever Hear (pg 5)

410. [x] Conscious Politics - Part 2 - Foundational Insights About Political Ideology (pg 6)

411. [x] Conscious Politics - Part 3 - The Core Principles Of Conscious Politics (pg 6)

412. [x] Conscious Politics - Part 4 - 100+ Specific Policy Proposals (pg 11)

413. [x] Self-Bias - Why All Worldviews Are So Skewed (pg 7)

414. [x] What Is Truth? - The Definitive Answer (pg 7)

415. [] The Power Of Letting Go - How To Overcome Clinginess, Attachment, OCD

416. [x] What Is Love? - Part 2 - The Brutal Nature Of Love (pg 6)

417. [x] How Fear Works - Part 1 - The Ultimate Guide To Dealing With Fear (pg 6) (pg 10)

418. [x] How Fear Works - Part 2 - The Ultimate Guide To Dealing With Fear (pg 6) (pg 10)

419. [x] Understanding Impermanence - Why Reality Is Always Changing (pg 6)

420. [] Announcement - Actualized.org Launching On Patreon + Vision For The Future

421. [x] The Many Facets Of Awakening - List of Top 30 Enlightenment Insights (pg 7)

422. [x] How Corruption Works (pg 6)

423. [] The Dangers Of Spiritual Work

424. [x] How To Discover What's True - A Deep Inquiry (pg 13)

425. [x] Content vs Structure - Going Meta Is A Super-power (pg 15)

426. [x] What Is Death? - How Immortality Works (pg 8)

427. [] Self-Love - The Highest Teaching In The Universe

428. [x] Division vs Unity - The Engine That Runs Reality (pg 8)

429. [] Why Reality CANNOT Be A Simulation - A Clear Answer ?

430. [] Reproduction Is An Illusion - Why It Doesn't Matter If You Have Kids ?

431. [] Total Awakening Live In Real Time - Part 1 ?

432. [] Total Awakening Live In Real Time - Part 2 ?️

433. [x] Explicit vs Implicit Understanding (pg 7)

434. [] How Psychedelics Work - Making Sense Of Psychedelics

435. [x] How Society Evolves - Introducing The World Values Survey (pg 9)

436. [] I'm Leaving To Pursue Awakening & Healing - March 2020

437. [x] Outrageous Experiments In Consciousness - 30 Awakenings In 30 Days (pg 8)

438. [] How Openmindedness Works - Exercises To Open Your Mind

439. [x] Life Advice For Young People - Part 1 (pg 8)

440. [x] How To Forgive Anyone Who Hurt You - A Powerful Trauma Release Exercise (pg 15)

441. [] Learning = Making Distinctions - The Secret To Rapid & Deep Learning

442. [x] Life Advice For Young People - Part 2 (pg 8)

443. [] The Ultimate Structure Of Reality Explained

444. [] Understanding Democracy & Authoritarianism

445. [] Why Libertarianism Is Nonsense - Deconstructing Freedom

446. [] What If Reality Is Nothing But Perspective?

447. [] Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing?

448. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Stage Red (pg 9)

449. [x] Spiral Dynamics - Stage Purple (pg 14)

450. [x] The 9 Stages Of Ego Development - Part 1 (pg 9)

451. [x] The 9 Stages Of Ego Development - Part 2 (pg 9)

452. [x] The 9 Stages Of Ego Development - Part 3 (pg 9)

453. [x] The Trap Of The Toxic Life Purpose (pg 9)

454. [x] Developing Introspection - The Solution To The Problem Of Self-Deception (pg 9)

455. [x] The Sneaky Psychology Behind Conspiracy Theories (pg 9)

456. [] What Is Actualized.org? - The Big Picture of Personal Development

457. [] Guided Exercises For Understanding Infinite Consciousness

458. [x] Deconstructing The Myth Of Science - Part 1 (pg 12)

459. [x] Deconstructing The Myth Of Science - Part 2 (pg 12)

460. [x] Deconstructing The Myth Of Science - Part 3 (pg 12)

461. [x] Should You Go To College? - Common Traps & Mistakes (pg 10)

462. [] What Is Goodness? - Good & Morality Fully Explained

463. [] Guided Exercise For Realizing You Are God

464. [x] What Is Wisdom? - The Ultimate Guide To Wisdom (pg 10)

465. [x] What Are Holons? - Understanding Holism - Part 1 (pg 10)

466. [x] Holism & Holistic Thinking - Part 1 (pg 11)

467. [x] Holism & Holistic Thinking - Part 2 (pg 11)

468. [x] What It Means To "Go Meta” (pg 12)

469. [] Is Actualized.org a Cult?

470. [x] What Is Integrity? - The Role Of Integrity In Life (pg 10)

471. [x] How Survival Shapes Who You Are (pg 14)

472. [] Is Gender A Social Construct? - A Profound Explanation

473. [] Making Sense of Jordan Peterson

474. [] An Advanced Explanation of God Realization

475. [] The Dangers of Misapplying Spiritual Teachings ?️?

476. [x] Understanding and Coping with Nihilism (pg 15)

477. [] How Modern Branding Exploits and Abuses You

478. [] Expose Yourself to More Experience

479. [] Not Everything Can Be Explained Simply

480. [] Why God Forgives Devilry

481. [x] How Your Mind Interprets Reality (pg 13)

482. [] Relative vs Absolute Truth

483. [] The Social Matrix - How Society Is A Mass Hallucination

484. [x] The Top Dangers Of Using Psychedelics (pg 14)

485. [x] The Root Solution To People Pleasing & Loneliness (pg 14)

486. [x] Satisfaction Meditation - How To Make Meditation Enjoyable! (pg 16)

487. [] What Does Awakening Feel Like?

488. [] Everyone Acts From Good Intentions

489. [x] Why Valuable Things Require Development Over Time (pg 16)

490. [] Understanding Bias - Bias, Love, & Mind Explained ?

491. [] Life, It's All A Mind Game!

492. [] Introducing 5-MeO-MALT - The Other God Molecule

493. [] Does Free Will Exist? - What Is Will?

494. [] What Is Paradox? - Why Does Paradox Exist?

495. [] Leo's Worst Bad Trips - Psychedelics Gone Wrong

496. [] Motivational Speech - Oct 2021

497. [] Assumption Is The Mother Of All F**k-Ups

498. [] Burning Through Karma - How To Exhaust Material Desires ?

499. [x] How To Get Laid - Part 1 - The Foundations Of Success With Women (pg 16) (pg 16)

500. [x] How To Get Laid - Part 2 - Outer Game Techniques (pg 16) (pg 16)

501. [x] How To Get Laid - Part 3 - The Top Principles Of Game (pg 16) (pg 16)

502. [] How To Detox Heavy Metals (Lead & Mercury)

503. [] Creation vs Destruction ??

504. [] The Avoidance Of Truth - Why You Fear Truth ?

505. [] Understanding War & Conflict - Part 1

506. [] How To Avoid Getting Scammed, Cheated, Exploited, Conned, and Screwed In Life

 

Edited June 30, 2022 by FlyingLotus

[FlyingLotus]

(Surprised this one hasn’t been done yet.  Great episode for countering self sabotage and building a strong life foundation.  Links and details on examples come from me, unless they offend you then they came from google )

 

388. Summary: Understanding Ego Backlash

“Leaps forward are often preceded by desperate regressive steps backward”

— Don Beck & Chris Cowan

-Along the self-actualization journey you will experience many ego backlashes.  Be prepared for them!  The human mind is like a harmonic oscillator in physics.  A harmonic oscillator is a simple spring where you pull the spring, let it go and it swings back and forth along an equilibrium, seeking homeostasis.

             Homeostasis is the tendency to resist change in order to maintain a stable, relatively constant internal environment.

-The ego-mind is like a harmonic oscillator because restoring forces work on you to get you back to equilibrium, to keep you how you’ve always been.  Ego backlash is a big part of that restoring force, that homeostatic drive in you.

-So what is ego backlash?  Anytime you make a significant change to the complex system that is you, expect a counter force that will pull you back towards homeostasis (aka: equilibrium.)

• eg: If you’ve been fat your whole life, but you’re trying to get skinny, expect a counter force to come in and pull you back towards being fat.  Same goes for any positive change you’re trying to make.

 

 

Where the Ego Comes From

-The mind or ego-mind contains all the behaviors, patterns and survival strategies that you've accumulated since birth.  It’s filled with all sorts of meanings and symbols that you’ve created about life.  All of that gets hardwired into a giant, complex, non-linear network.  That network is responsible for maintaining its own survival. (clip: Struggle to Survive Limits Growth [4 mins])

             If your ego-mind, this network, didn't have a survival drive it would dissolve and you would die.  So you’ve picked up and built a lot of survival scripts from childhood (clip: What Shapes You Most—Suffering and Love [5 min]).

-The behaviors and strategies you learned in childhood were necessary, because whatever situation you were born into created survival challenges.  You had to learn coping strategies to be loved by your family and get them to meet your biological needs (food, shelter, safety).

• eg: Maybe your mom was hyper critical, so you became a perfectionist.  Maybe your brother was a bully, so you became quiet to avoid his wrath.  Maybe your sister was the golden child, so you became the rebel to get some semblance of attention. (clip: Survival Scripts [6 min])

-You developed more survival strategies once you started socializing in school and earning a living in adulthood.  So, even if you have physical survival handled you still care about survival in the social domain.  Being liked, approved of, admired, getting a great partner, having successful kids and an admirable circle of friends.  This is all deeply wired into your ego-mind.

-The ego does two things: avoids suffering and pursues pleasure. That's your whole life in a nutshell.  (What is Ego [13 min]).  Spirituality tries to transcend survival drives.  It asks, what does reality look like when you’re not preoccupied with survival?  Ego is very safety and survival oriented.

-You’ve confused your survival patterns and coping strategies with who you really are.  You’ve become attached and formed an identity out of them.  Now you think that's all life has to offer.

            Your worldview is actually quite arbitrary.  You could have ended up with a very different worldview if your survival conditions were different.  Recognizing that helps you detach from your worldview and stop treating it as this special, one true thing.

            Notice how you spend your life defending your worldview and your ego when it’s really just rationalizations.  It’s illusions and fantasies held together by string.  It’s not how reality actually is. (ep: Survival Shapes)   That’s how the ego is born.  You think that’s who you really are, this thing that needs to survive.

-All complex systems have inertia to them, a homeostatic drive.  It tries to maintain its current state, its equilibrium.  If a system changes too much it will cease to exist.  So, any outside force that can rearrange the system is always perceived as a mortal threat.  Whether that change is harmful or helpful.

• eg: If you have a lego raft and you disassemble it to make a yacht, the raft no longer exists.  Even if you use all the same pieces, the lego raft is significantly different than the lego yacht.

-That’s why self actualization is so difficult.  Your ego is the lego raft that wants to stay a raft.  It doesn’t want to transform into a beautiful yacht because that requires getting disassembled.  Most people don't appreciate that significant change equals death—the death of the old you.

 

What is Ego Backlash?

-Ego backlash is a primal, emotional force that drives you back to your old, unhealthy, dysfunctional ways, back to homeostasis.  It’s demoralizing.  It’s a giant step backward after a giant step forward.

            Because ego is fixated on survival, ego backlash is like an overprotective mother or father.  It’s intention is to protect, even though the impact on the child can be damaging.  It’s a very subconscious force.  Ego backlash doesn't announce itself.  You just experience the blunt impact of it.

• eg: You might get a craving for some some cheesecake, cheeseburgers, or cheese in a can, or porn, or a sadness that makes you want to go back to your ex even though she was a total jerk.  You wonder, “Does self-help even work?  Is this as good as it gets  ?Can I really make significant changes in my life...?”

-The answer is: of course you can, but it's going to take a lot more work than you probably realized.

 

“Man cannot remake himself without suffering,

for he is both the marble and the sculptor.”

—Alexis Carrel

-The ego creates all sorts of clever structures to avoid suffering and to maximize pleasure.  Your whole life has been built upon that.  It’s structures are built upon older structures, like how modern Rome is built on many layers of ancient Roman ruins.  That’s how your ego-mind and psyche are constructed.

            To get the most meaningful change you need to do some psychic archaeology on yourself.  You need to excavate those skeletons that are responsible for why you feel so incomplete, so broken, so dissatisfied with life and so fundamentally inauthentic.  (That’s why you’re so anxious about getting love and approval.)

-Notice that most self help doesn’t go far enough.  It just slaps some superficial change onto an unstable foundation.  Unfortunately, you can’t fix deep foundational problems with a surface-level approach.  That’s like trying to fix a tree by spray painting the leaves instead of nourishing the roots.

            That’s why people become self-help junkies.  If the ego can distract you with a bunch of fancy theory, you’ll never get to the real work of applying the lessons and dismantling your ego.

• eg: What if you took a hard, honest look at your career and found out it violates your highest values? To grow spiritually you’d have to get a new job, but that will affect every area of your life. You need that job to pay the bills, to support your wife and kids.  Losing that job might cost you your family.  You have to stare all these consequences in the face.              

-Your ability to get significant, impactful change is proportional to how much you can tolerate deconstructing your foundation.

            Transforming your foundation comes with pain, the type of pain your ego’s been avoiding your whole life.  That's why few people undertake a conscious, deliberate effort to transform their life.  It’s way too threatening and painful to the ego.  Any attempt sets off a scramble back to homeostasis, to that unsatisfying status quo.

 

What Triggers an Ego Backlash? (26:20)

-An ego backlash can get triggered in many ways.  This list is not exhaustive at all.

-A deep breakthrough, because the ego mind knows that if it keeps going in that direction it’ll die.  So you’ll start wanting to avoid any spiritual work (meditation, self-inquiry, psychedelics, etc), maybe even for a long time. 

• eg: Leo will spend ten days meditating non-stop.  Then his ego will compel him to watch tv, play video games, or eat unhealthy food, which he usually doesn’t do.

-After installing new healthy habits.  Changing your work habits, developing a strong work ethic, waking up early, changing your diet, a no-fap challenge and so forth.

-Trying to install too many habits at once.

-Changing too quickly.  If you do it too fast the ego backlash can be so strong it’s counterproductive.  You could freak yourself out.  You may even get disillusioned with personal development and avoid it for years.  Select a pace of growth or deconstruction that will stretch but not scare you off the path.

-Small changes can also provoke smaller sized ego backlash.  Pursuing enlightenment will provoke much bigger ego backlash because it offers the most transformative power.

-After enlightenment experiences, glimpses of non-duality, psychedelic trips, solo retreats, Vipassana retreats, after lots of self-inquiry.

-Listening to binaural beats. They’re meditative and play different sound frequencies in each ear.  Listening to them a lot can cause emotional upheaval from old memories resurfacing.  After processing that, an ego backlash can happen.

 

How to Prepare for an Ego Backlash?

Prepare for them now so when you’re in the thick of it you can weather it wisely.

1) Don’t Make Any Drastic Life Decisions During an Ego Backlash!

            This is very important.  It can be very dangerous.  You could easily make some kind of foolish, rash decision (leaving your family, divorcing your spouse, quitting your job, suicidal ideation, etc.)

            Don't make any major life decisions when you're feeling very negative, crippled by fear, anger, sadness, or feeling very disempowered or mired in victim mentality.

2) Develop Mindfulness Skills

            Have those mindfulness muscles ready when you need them.  You’ll especially need them in the heat of the moment when you want to throw all this theory out the window.  Develop a daily meditation habit, do consciousness raising retreats, research and consider using psychedelics in a responsible, grounded way.

3) Expect That Ego Backlash Happens

            It will accompany any significant change in your life.  It's going to bring fear, suffering, and a slew of emotion. It’s totally normal to experience this, so you’re not weak or abnormal.

4) Reframe Ego Backlash in a Positive Way

            It’s a sign of growth, so don’t get discouraged!  It's precisely when you're backsliding that you have the most opportunity to learn and grow, but it’s also the toughest, most painful time to stay mindful.

            Whenever you feel like you’re regressing, remember, you’re actually being purified.  You’re growing right now as you are suffering through this mindfully.  That’s a really important reframe.

            When you’re feeling down, remember that your best states usually come after your worst states.  You can rise to a new level, a new breakthrough if you just suffer through this mindfully, with compassion.  By the next week or next day you can end up feeling pretty good!

            Remember, you can still try again next week, next month, next year, and this time you'll be wiser.   

5) Be Compassionate and Self-loving Instead of Perfectionistic

            It's very powerful to apply self-love.  Console yourself.  Take good care of yourself.  How would you treat a loved one who was going through an ego backlash?

            “But Leo, why am I so pathetic?  Why can't I get my shit together?  I deserve to feel guilty for splurging on food, porn, television!!” 

            Don’t fall into the temptation of guilting, judging and condemning yourself.   That just doubles your misery.  When you're doing that, that's precisely when you're not learning.  That’s the opposite of suffering mindfully.

            Nobody can suffer through a full ego backlash with perfect mindfulness, so don't be a perfectionist.  If you expect perfection you'll fall short of that standard.  That will just make you more depressed.  Love Yourself.

6) Understand and Appreciate the Power of Homeostasis

            It’s keeping you alive, so don’t judge it.  Understand your mind as a harmonic oscillator.  It’s not evil or bad for pulling you back.  Your ego is just very safety and survival oriented.

• eg: When you have a terrible psychedelic trip, one that scares the hell out of you, your mind will bring you back to normal within a week. That’s the helpful side of homeostasis.  If it was that easy to shift your mind you could easily slip into total madness and stay stuck.

7) Setup Your Expectations for Growth Properly

            Growth is not a win-only journey, or a straight line that's constantly moving upwards (ep: Setting Proper Expectations.)  Self-actualization is a series of ups and downs with occasional big spikes.  After a big spike downward that’s usually when you get your biggest spike upward.

             Stop expecting quick fixes and one-time solutions. There’s almost never one thing that resolves all your issues.  The ego likes to trick you into overestimating your own development, especially when you start seeing a little progress.  You expect peak experiences to lock in and become your new permanent state when that’s not how it works.

8) Compassionately & Honestly Assess How Much Change You Can Handle

            Figuring out that balance is tricky, because the mind will use that as an excuse to not change.  “I can't handle another meditation retreat.  I can't handle more psychedelics.”  It becomes a psychological cat and mouse game with your own mind about how much change you can truly tolerate without a complete regression. Self-inquiry is important for knowing where you’re at (ep: How To Do Self-Inquiry.)

             Figure out the right pace of growth through trial and error.  Sometimes you just need to go through these “big change, then backslide” episodes three or four times to learn where your tipping points are.

9) Notice How Sneaky Your Ego Is

            This helps you head it off at the pass.  You’re lost in the maze of your own mind.  Life is so challenging because of all the tricks you play on yourself.  You’re not sure how to distinguish your genuine motivations from the devilry of your ego. (ep: Life is a Maze.  ep: Higher & Lower Quality Consciousness.)  Notice your self-deception, your unhealthy survival strategies, your selfishness, how you evade responsibility, how you project onto others and the world (ep: What is the Devil.)

              Fortunately you have around 80 years to live, so you’ll have many opportunities to sort through all this stuff.  You don’t have to fix everything right away.

10) Understand the Difference Between States and Stages of Growth

            It's much easier to attain a high state than it is to attain a high stage of development.  A state is a peak experience.  A stage takes years of work to build, just like learning an instrument or public speaking.

            As a newb you could get lucky and have a peak meditative state that even reaches zen master levels, but you're not going to be at the zen master’s stage of development.  For that you’d need a decade of practice.

            It’s important to make that distinction so you don’t get seduced by those high peak states.  People will do a retreat or some psychedelics and feel on top of the world.  They assume that peak state will be their default state forevermore. It's never like that.  Usually after a high state you drop back down into ego backlash.

 

What To Do During an Ego Backlash

1) Label it explicitly.  That helps you get some distance and objectivity.

            Call it out as an ego backlash.  “That's the ego backlash Leo was talking about!  There it is!”  This helps you not get totally sucked in and absorbed.

2) Observe it as mindfully as possible.

            Apply your mindfulness muscles to those moments of sadness, depression and fear.  Hopefully you’ve already built up those skills by then.  As the ego contracts, the more mindfulness you have the more easily you can observe the ego without getting sucked in and lashing out from it.

3) Suffer though it mindfully, with compassion and self love.

            Mindful, compassionate suffering will purify you and that’s when you’ll make your greatest progress.  It’s very counterintuitive.  This is the pain of growth, so don’t feel discouraged.  This too shall pass.

             Don’t guilt, judge or condemn yourself.  That’s an ego trick to stop you from learning.  Remember, you can get back on the horse again, but this time smarter and with more experience.  (clip: Failure Generates Success [9 mins])

4.  Maintain your positive habits even if you don't feel like it.

            You probably won't want to meditate or observe your diet.  You’ll probably want to push people away.  Try not to do that.

• eg: Leo didn’t want to shoot this episode about ego backlash.  He was procrastinating, resisting, then he went through the usual motions and by the time the camera was on it felt like any other day.

5.  Try rewatching Leo’s episode on Ego Backlash.  You can reflect on the lessons, which may help centre you through these challenging moments.

 

The Collective Ego Backlash (42:50)

-Individually we have egos and collectively complex systems also behave as though they have egos and survival drives.  (ep: Collective Ego)

-Ego backlash occurs within corporations, governments, political parties, social movements of various kinds, and so forth.  There’s a parallel between the collective level and the individual level.

• World War II was an ego backlash of the German people against the harsh Treaty of Versailles at the end of World War I.  It created a festering wound which ultimately allowed Hitler to come to power.
• The American South during the Reconstruction Era (1865-1877) experienced a collective ego backlash against the abolition of slavery.  The KuKluxKlan murdered black people in the 1000s during this time.  Also, President Andrew Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Act of 1866 (this action later cost him enough votes to lose the presidency.)
• Jim Crow laws were also a collective ego backlash against the Civil Rights Act of 1875 and other strides made by African Americans after the Civil War.

-Oftentimes one stage will react strongly against another stage above it.  They’ll try to dominate and demonize it.

• The crackdown on psychedelics after the hippie revolution in America (late 60s to early 70s.)  Psychedelics were outlawed, all scientific research on them was basically banned for decades.  These laws were passed by the Nixon administration.  The war on drugs was declared and it’s still going on.
• Gamergate was a collective ego backlash against feminism, multiculturalism and various stage green spiral dynamics forces.  (That backlash has filtered to other areas of geek culture, especially with youtube clickbait being so lucrative, although it’s arguably not as bad as Gamergate was.)
• If feminists from stage green try to demonize stage orange masculinity too much stage orange masculinity will come back and try to defend itself through an ego backlash.  (Two balanced takes on representation in Star Wars and The Last Jedi.  Vausch calls out leftist circles.)
• The Alt-Right movement and the Tea Party was born after the election of Barack Obama.  It’s a stage blue/orange collective ego backlash against green.   
• The election of Trump was a collective ego backlash against Obama (demo of Obama’s 2012 win.)  That's not the only factor, but it’s a very interesting factor.
• Trump's rise to popularity within politics started with the birtherism thing which was really a direct attack on Obama.

-All complex systems have these harmonic oscillators.  For a corporation or political party to sustain itself as it is, it has to resist death.  It does that by defending itself at all costs, even when it’s dysfunctional or pathological.

-Right now the Republican party in America is self-destructing.  Since 2016 we've been witnessing this.  Some of them see it, but many of them don't because they are part of the system.  So of course the system doesn't see that it is sabotaging itself.

 

You Are the Republican Party! (48:06)

-That's exactly what's happening in your life, with you.  You have the intention to clean up your diet, to meditate, to self-inquire, to follow through on your dreams, but then you sabotage yourself.

-You’re not conscious enough to really see how you're damaging yourself. You have different parts in your mind that are fragmented and fighting each other. You have the higher self, the lower self, survival scripts, competing coping mechanisms and more.

-This is similar to how Europe needed to experience the horror of war in order to ultimately pacify and unify.  Europe is quite unified right now, but that's only because there have been hundreds of wars throughout European history over the last couple thousands of years.  A war is raging in your mind.  All this needs to get reconciled for you create foundational, significant change in your life.

Edited November 8, 2021 by FlyingLotus
my moon is also in Virgo

[FlyingLotus]

(@TimStr and @JuanCruzGiusto wrote summaries for this video.  It’s an important one, so I combined both of them here.  Enjoy!!)

250.  Summary: The Benefits Of Enlightenment

What is Enlightenment?

• The realization of one’s actual physical and metaphysical nature.
• Most people confuse physical experiences with Who You Really Are.
• If you unwire the belief of who you are, you are Enlightened.
• Enlightenment fixes this mistake in one’s map of reality.
• It’s a state of union with all of reality.
• Enlightenment can take years to attain.
• Who You Really Are is an omnipresent empty field of pure awareness that exists outside of the dimensions of space and time and has no physical or metaphysical qualities.
• One of Leo’s blog videos demonstrates this really well.  It’s only 10 mins long.  Absolute Infinity Demo

Benefits of Enlightenment

   Massive reductions of your levels of suffering on the macro and micro scale:

• Large scale: suffering because of catastrophes like the death of family members, illness, existential fear.
• Small scale: the small discomforts, like itching, disagreements with other people, "stuff that just comes with life.”
• Suffering is not part of life, but only part of the delusion of associating with your body and mind.

   Freedom from worry, fear and anxiety:

• Think about how much energy you spend in these states.

   Freedom from the fear of death:

• EVERYONE FEARS DEATH.
• Everything in life is motivated by a fear of death.
• If one realizes that one is neither the body nor the mind, death as a concept no longer makes a sense.  It's just another belief.

   Permanent end to overthinking:

• Think about how much time you waste thinking about stupid stuff.
• After Enlightenment, you only think when it is necessary.
• You will be able to enjoy the present moment fully.

   Immunity to heavy emotions:

• You will still feel emotions but not in a deep and incredibly painful way.
• You are simply ok with them.

   End of addicted and compulsive behaviors:

• No more hard or emotional behaviors (self-sabotage, relationship issues).

   End of worrying about what other people think of you, or how you look or act.

   Permanent end to (neurotic) striving in life:

• Most of your drives are neurotic. Worrying about having more love, more money, power, status, etc.
• No more spending time neurotically on how to acquire external stuff to fulfill the inner void.

   Eliminate loneliness and neediness:

• These are complete illusions of your mind.
• Loneliness is caused by the illusion of ever being separate.
• These things only have power over the ego.

   Eliminate all neuroses (emotional psychic patterns):

• Neuroses are a state of "not being ok with the reality as it is.”
• Enlightenment just makes one become reality.

   Eliminate a lot of stress:

• How much time you are stressed by your family, health, wealth, etc? That will be significantly reduced.
• Imagine doing all the things you do but without stress and without any concern.

   Less need for sleep & more physical energy:

• Thought processes consume tons of energy → they rob us of energy.
• Your body is actually burning calories to feed these processes.
• All your energy after Enlightenment will be directed to enjoying life or pursuing your actual passions.
• Removes mental stress and releases energy.

   Foundational to real self actualization work:

• You haven’t even started self-actualization until you start asking yourself Who You Really Are.
• Until you discover who you really are your ability to do personal development is very very limited.
• Most of your progress is really shallow and superfluous.
• You cannot comprehend advanced self-development until you have some enlightenment experiences.
• Enlightenment is actually the beginning of a whole journey that you stay on for the rest of your life.
• IT FREES YOU UP IN ALL THE AREAS OF YOUR LIFE SINCE THE ONLY THING THAT WAS IN YOUR WAY WAS YOUR LIMITING IDENTITY.

   It opens you up to change your life in whatever way you want and imagine: 

• You can change your personality in whatever way you want.
• You can do whatever you want with your career, your relationships. 
• Your biggest obstacle is your identity and what you accomplish will be determined by who you think you are.

   Helps you deal with disasters:

• With enlightenment you know how to deal with them and stay unaffected.
• Suffering by chronic pain.  Loved ones dying.  A big problem to your health or business.

   Enlightenment puts you in touch with your body.  You will revel in your physical vitality.

• Longer life and better health.
• Your mental environment will be much healthier, which affects the mind-body connection.

   Deep unconditional self-acceptance and self-love:

• That not possible unless you unwire your ego.
• Imagine how powerful your life can be if you live from a position of deep, unconditional self-love and self-acceptance.

   Enables true unconditional love of reality: 

• What you think is love is not love at all.
• You are not capable of true love as long as you believe you are a separate individual living in a body.
• If you become enlightened you can love all reality unconditionally, not just the parts that please your ego.
• Once restrictions by the ego are released, love just pours out of you.

   Powerful and authentic relationships:

• You now think you have authentic relationships with people and the answer is no (friendships, love relationships, family, children, customers, bosses, etc.)
• If you want to take your relationships to a whole new level of depth and beauty and health, become enlightened.
• You need to realize Who You Really Are and then realize who the other person really is, existentially.
• That lets you have an authentic relationship that is not based on neediness, manipulation or self-agenda.
• Your ego is preventing that from being possible.

   Immunity to midlife crises:

• Existential crisis: wondering about what the point is of all of life, of being, of all this.
• The only reason this is happening is because the ego senses it’s own falsehood and fakeness.
• All this need for "making sense” of life is just caused by the ego not wanting to become obsolete.

   Deepest possible understanding of reality, truth and existence:

• Truth is not accessible through knowledge, science or philosophy.
• Truth and the meaning of life is only accessible through direct experience.

   Death without regrets:

• On their deathbed, most people wish they had spent more time connected to reality itself.
• They realize that "doing" was a huge mistake, they should have been "being" more.
• Being in nature more, enjoying more, living authentically to one's own values.

   Healthier attitude to the world, society and humanity:

• No more dysfunctional relationships between the world and people.
• 21st century: crisis, because the ego has done a lot of damage.
• You can turn that around by changing yourself.
• This makes it much easier to be honest and ethical with others, which improves the world.

   What’s the best way of changing the world for the better: getting Enlightened!!

• It’s the best gift to the world.
• If everybody did that, the world would be fine.

   Life can become satisfying like when you were a child:

• A feeling of being in the zone all the time.
• Being free of concerns and flowing with life effortlessly.
• Unconditional happiness.
• THE ABILITY TO BE SO PRESENT THAT YOU ARE IN THE ZONE 24/7 IS THE ONLY WAY TO BE HAPPY AND HAVE PEACE OF MIND. 

What's the catch? There's gotta be a cost...

• The cost is you and your entire way of life!  You need to give up your identity, your ego, yourself.
• You also have to give up the parts of yourself you love, especially these parts.
• You have to give up the idea that you are a physical human body and a localized consciousness.

What Enlightenment will reveal is:

• You have no identity.
• Life is meaningless.
• Everything you believe and know about the world is wrong.
• There is no good and bad, all judgements are fictions.
• There is no value in anything.
• There is no self and no ego being improved by all this work.
• You have zero control over life, because there is no “you” to have control.  This is an absolute surrender.
• There really are no benefits to Enlightenment.  To ask what the benefits are is the problem

Catch 22 problem:

• Thinking about the benefits of Enlightenment only feeds the ego.
• “You” will not be benefitted by Enlightenment, but Who You Really Are will be benefitted by Enlightenment.
• To trick the ego into killing itself, you have to tell it what’s in it for him/her.
• The ego is not literally killed.  It never existed in the first place.  Like how finding out Santa isn’t real doesn’t kill Christmas or make your presents disappear.
• Benefits are pseudo-benefits to convince the ego.
• My life will be extraordinary, but it won't be my life any more, but that won't be a problem any more.

What is Enlightenment like:

• The paradox of enlightenment is that even though it has some negative aspects (life is meaningless, there is no one to be benefited, etc), it’s the most meaningful pursuit ever.
• YOUR LIFE ONLY REALLY BEGINS AFTER YOU GIVE YOURSELF UP.  LIFE BEGINS AFTER ENLIGHTENMENT.
• Your life now is a hollow dream, a portion of life.  You don’t even comprehend what true life entails.
• Not a single enlightened person regretted becoming enlightened.
• Imagine that you are actually living in hell and that by waking up you will wakeup in heaven.
• With enlightenment you will be in heaven and you will never want to come back.
• The gates of hell are protected by the ego and all this "me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, whats in it for me” talk.
• The ego is at home in hell.  It thinks there’s nothing beyond hell.  This is a tragedy.  You can't even comprehend the true power, joy, majesty and beauty of life!

Master life strategy:

• My entire life should be about Enlightenment! 
• It’s the ultimate strategic intent.
• Materialism is a lie.  The quality of your life does not improve with success!
• Stupidity is the default mode!  I have to be wise enough!
• If there is wisdom in you you will realize that you should be pursuing enlightenment.

Edited July 20, 2021 by FlyingLotus
If at first you don't succeed call it version 1.0.

[FlyingLotus]

(Something to keep in mind, this video came out in April 2015.  In Leo's blog on Dec 2017 he wrote:  “I was wrong about some of my earliest characterizations of enlightenment as the ultimate fix for unhappiness and all your psychological neuroses. That is a half-truth. In reality, enlightenment, strictly-speaking, will not fix all your neuroses. Although it is usually a big leap in the right direction.”) ?

 

199. Summary: Enlightenment FAQ - Part 2

This is the second part to Enlightenment FAQ - Part 1.  Summary is here.   

1) “What are the benefits of enlightenment?”

-Breaking free from your mental prison.  You stop being a slave to your thoughts and to your emotions and you get a deep, meaningful tranquility in your life, which is something you’ve been searching for your whole life without realizing it.

              You can experience tranquility, regardless of external circumstances (breakups, getting fired, losing loved ones, poverty, rejection, etc.)  How cool would it be if you could keep your cool throughout that without getting crazy agitated?

-A deeper understanding of reality and truth.  Understanding how your consciousness works is the key that unlocks it all.

-You’ll still have moments of sadness, loneliness, frustration, anger and annoyance.  However, your relationship to these emotions changes completely.  These upsetting emotions no longer become a source of suffering.  They just become another experience, not really any worse or any better that any other experience.  That’s freedom.

-Relief from your self-image problems, like shyness, lack of confidence, low self-esteem, worrying about how you look, trying to live up to certain people’s expectations.  You get rid of that by getting rid of the self.

-There’s a whole video that answers this question.  (ep: Benefits Of Enlightenment.)  Summary is here.

 

2) ”Does this mean I’ll have complete control over my emotions once I’m enlightened?”

-The truth here is there’s no self. There is no you.  So, who’s going to have complete control over his or her emotions?  Nobody.  If you think that's going to happen, here's some bad news: you have zero control over your emotions because you do not exist.

              Paradoxically and counter-intuitively, once you surrender yourself to this fact, you get complete peace and calm with your emotions.  You get pseudo-control, you get the appearance of control. It’s as though you have total control but, in fact, you have zero control.

-The biggest reason you need control is you’re a slave to your emotions.  Once you realize that there is no “you” who’s experiencing emotions and no “you” to control emotions, you get calm and cool with whatever emotion is happening.

-Enlightenment doesn’t make you emotionless. There will be plenty of emotions, but your relationship to them will change completely.  So, you will appear to have complete control over your emotions or a lot more control than the average person.

-The reason other people suffer from emotions is because they believe there’s a “them” inside who’s being threatened by the external world. Once that notion is removed, life flows very, very smoothly.

 

3) “Why pursue enlightenment?  What if I’m already happy in my life?”

-Well, another bitter pill for you to swallow is, you’re not actually happy.  You’re lying to yourself and saying you’re happy, but you’re not. 

-Currently, your happiness is contingent upon external circumstances.  So, even if you’re happy right now, in this moment — maybe your career, relationship and fitness are going great.  If we remove any of that, you’re going to be very, very miserable.  So, your happiness is extremely contingent.  You got to be very careful about saying that you’re “happy.”

-It’s not possible to be truly happy without being enlightened.  So, unless you’re enlightened, you can’t be happy.  It’s psychologically impossible.  Why?  Because there's a falsehood that you’re living. You’re telling yourself you exist when, in fact, you don’t.

-That’s reflected in your entire life.  You’ve never been able to have consistent, true happiness.  What you’ve had is this rollercoaster ride, because external circumstances change all the time.

-Well, you’re happy right now, if we take one snapshot, but how happy are you going to be five minutes later? You’re not going to be very happy.  That’s basically your current condition in life.

 

 

 

 

4) “But, Leo, why don’t I just earn millions of dollars and wait until everything is perfect?  Won’t that sort everything out?”

-That’s a delusion.  Even if you get so much money and power that you’re “untouchable,” you’re still going to face disease, loneliness and death. In the end, your life is going to end in misery, no matter how happy you think you are right now. So, really, you’re not happy.

-Even if you have a great relationship, career and great health, on a minute-to-minute, hour-to-hour basis, your mind is driving you nuts.  You’re having insane thoughts. You’re sabotaging yourself, you’re getting angry, you’re jealous, you’re fearful.

-It’s not possible for you to be happy because you actually believe if you lose these things you will be unhappy.  You have a false paradigm in place. You must get aware of how your mind tricks you into a false sense of happiness.

-Part of enlightenment work is to realize you’re lying to yourself all the time about how well this egoic paradigm is working for you. The ego keeps telling you it’s working and you should continue using this paradigm.  If you look carefully, you can see this paradigm is rotten.  It’s not working, if you’re very honest.

 

5) “Should I stop pursuing goals in my career, relationships, fitness and health and with my hobbies?”

-Becoming enlightened doesn’t mean you no longer have any relationships, or hobbies, or an exercise routine.   Enlightenment is an inner knowing and a realization, it’s not any lifestyle per se and it’s not any particular external situation.

            If you really, authentically want a relationship, be in a relationship.  If you authentically want good health, go get good health.  If you want to live in your house and be able to pay your electricity bill, then you should probably have a job.  If you enjoy some particular hobby, like playing basketball on the weekend, or you like sailing or surfing or whatever, those are probably fine hobbies.

-The problem is that a lot of people have egoic goals.  You’re pursuing these goals because you think they will make you truly happy.  So you’re like an addict. You’re a career addict, a relationship addict, a health & fitness addict, and you think that that’s going to be your salvation.

              Those are the wrong reasons, so you should probably stop. Why? Because they are not going to make you happy and they are an opportunity cost.  They are taking time away from your ability to do inner mental development and find what would truly make you happy.

-Everyone will have to judge for themselves which goals are authentic and which are not.  This is a very tricky process.  You don’t really know!

• eg: You might tell yourself that going to the gym is an authentic goal of yours, but you might discover the only reason you’re going is to uphold a self-image as a hot ripped dude. Authentically, if you weren’t trying to uphold that self-image you probably wouldn’t need to go to the gym as much.

 

6) “Isn’t enlightenment dangerous?  Couldn’t it be eroding the foundations of a happy, healthy, normal life?”

-The only danger, really, is the current egoic paradigm that you’re living under.  All the evils in the world don’t come from enlightened people, they come from selfish people. 

              If you think you can be above the egoic paradigm while still living from the egoic paradigm, you’re kidding yourself.  If you think you’re not capable of evil (crime, theft, rape, murder, genocide, bigotry, racism, getting angry at people, and violence of all sorts), it’s only because you’re sitting in a cushy position in life where you’re not being threatened.

-You would commit all those evils under the right circumstances. As soon as your ego is threatened sufficiently, you will resort to all those evils.  Why? Because, fundamentally, you think you exist and that you need to be protected and defended. How do we overcome this? By removing the notion that you exist. In fact, there’s nothing that needs defending.

-This can seem dangerous and threatening to talk about because it goes against a lot of your worldviews and cultural assumptions.

              It can seem like a negative process.  Destroying the mental concepts in your mind can feel like you’re eroding the moral fabric of your being, that it’ll lead to nihilism, insanity or make you anti-social.  (clip: Nihilism and Confusion [9 mins]. ep: Nihilism)  In fact, all those bad things are just the ego paradigm run amok.

              That’s who you presently are, but you’re just masking it. The enlightenment paradigm frees you up from all that.  This makes you the least dangerous person to yourself, to society and to everyone around you.  When you have nothing to defend and protect, you have no need to go out and hurt people, or commit suicide or do anything dangerous.

-Insane people, criminals and serial killers have monkey chatter in their mind all the time. This is the exact opposite of enlightenment. Enlightenment is the silencing of the monkey chatter. When you’re perfectly calm, present and happy in the moment, who are you going to bother? What’s the danger?

              You can easily discover this in meditation. When you’re meditating and very focused, you’re in a totally peaceful, innocent, innocuous state.  It’s the ego that tells you this is dangerous.  It’s how the ego defends itself.  This is a defense mechanism. Watch out for that trap.

 

7) Is Enlightenment really for everyone?  Isn’t it only for a very small segment of the population?

-No! Enlightenment is one of the most universal things that people ought to pursue. Things like marriage, kids, a six-figure income, scuba-diving, marmite, cheese and mayo on fries, a Chris Evans film festival, are all particular things that some people might like and some might not.

              If you want to live to your full potential, if you want to be happy and peaceful, if you want to experience the truth of your being on a profound level, then this is for you. This is not just for monks or hard-core self-help junkies.

-Leo feels very comfortable saying: You should become enlightened.  No matter who you are, no matter what culture, location, religion, scientific background, age, income, family situation you come from.

              Why? Because this is one of the most fundamental truths of your existence — understanding your true nature.  Your true nature is not what you’ve been told by society. It’s not this entity, this body or this mind. Your true nature is, actually, nothingness, but you need to discover this.

              Anyone with normal mental health can discover this.  If everyone discovered this, society would be completely transformed.  It would be the biggest shift that human civilization could experience, bigger than anything we have invented.

-This would be more powerful because it would change the whole world’s orientation towards life. This would give you the happiness and peace that you really, really want. So, this is not for radical people.

-One thing you can find universally, across all cultures and peoples, is that they have monkey chatter and drive themselves crazy with it.  They have emotional, neurotic problems and can’t be happy.  Because happiness is the objective of life, this is for everyone.

              The only reason you do anything, that anyone does anything, is they believe it will make them happy.  The problem is that most people do things that will not make them happy, but they don’t realize it yet and they don’t want to admit this fact.

 

8) ”Won’t spirituality make me a tree-hugging, hippie slacker?  How do I stay on the right track and avoid bongo drumming, singing Kumbaya and smelling like patchouli oil?”

-This is a stereotype. In fact, hippie tree-huggers are not enlightened. Slackers are not enlightened.  Leo’s doesn’t identify as a hippie, New Age thinker.  He doesn’t like that sub-culture.  He’s not a slacker.  He’s very productive and wants to achieve stuff in his life.

              If you actually go and meet a real, enlightened person, you’ll see that they are not a tree-hugging hippie slacker. These people are productive when they want to be.  This hippie sub-culture seems spiritual, but it’s actually a false spirituality.  They live their lives incongruently.  It’s one of the things Leo doesn’t like about hippies.

-If a hippie was really living congruently, they would become enlightened and then counter-intuitively, they would drop a lot of their hippie ways. Hippies are reacting against a certain element of society, and this creates another element, a philosophy, a mind-set, belief systems, and a world-view.  Enlightenment is about wiping that slate clean, emptying yourself of those cultural reactions and world-views.  It’s just a calm, peaceful neutral. So, don’t worry about becoming a hippie slacker.

 

9) “I enjoy my vices (sex, alcohol, drugs, food).  Sometimes I like to combine them in unique and interesting ways.  I also enjoy my career.  If I have to give that up why would I want to become enlightened?”

-Enlightenment is not a particular lifestyle. It’s an understanding, a realization. Vices aren’t in and of themselves wrong, bad, evil, or even anti-spiritual.  They’re not compatible with enlightenment.

              In fact your sex will become more amazing after enlightenment, if you choose to have it. You’ll appreciate alcohol, drugs and food more.  You’re also less likely to get addicted to them.  Why? Because you’re able to stay focused and in the moment, and you’re able to get rid of the monkey-chatter.

              You can perform amazingly well at work, because you no longer worry, doubt or have to protect your ego.  You won’t need to look after your self image or be fearful about money.  You could just focus on doing great work and be more creative too. So, none of these things need to be given up.

-Enlightenment unhooks you from needing these things. So, if you do these things you’ll do it consciously, deliberately, because you want to.  Your capacity to appreciate it will be much more expanded than it ever was in the past.  Right now, you’re a drug addict.  You’re probably going to give up addictions if you become enlightened because you’ll feel less pain all around.

-So, you don’t really need to give up sex, good food, money or a great career.  Although, Leo doesn’t recommend alcohol and non-psychedelic drugs because they aren’t healthy.

 

10) “My vices are immoral (sex, alcohol and drugs).  Isn’t making money bad and evil too?  If I become spiritually enlightened will I have to stop these activities?

-Why are you so attached to engaging in these activities?  It’s probably for egoic reasons.  Even if you think these things are evil, you still probably have a hidden urge to do them.  Maybe you guilt yourself for having sex, drugs, or cheating people out of money.

              The fact is that none of these vices are bad in and of themselves.  In fact, this is a really blanket, outrageous statement, but…there’s nothing wrong with any action that you choose to do at all.  The question is: why are you doing it?  What’s the motivation behind it? It’s always about the motivation.

-When you get the motivation right, when you remove the ego and act selflessly, without addiction and clinginess, then you can engage in these things and they will be of value in your life.  They won’t have all the negative repercussions that these things generally have.

-You can use drugs and alcohol in moderation after enlightenment.  You can have amazing, enlightened sex and lots of money if you feel that’s something worth doing.  So, don’t worry about losing that stuff, you just won’t cling to it.

 

11) ”I’ve already had an enlightenment experience using drugs or meditation.  Isn’t that enough (mushrooms, DMT, meditation retreats, etc)?  That’s the truth of no-self, right?”

-Enlightenment is tricky.  When you start on this journey you get little moments of enlightenment.   Like on a very cloudy day, and the sun starts beaming.  All of a sudden, the clouds open up and there’s little beam of light breaking through. But then, quickly, the clouds come back and close up and the light beam goes away.

              You’ll have mini, brief, tiny moments of no-self, maybe for five seconds here, for a whole hour here, maybe for a whole day, but you’re not going to be able to hold on to them.  It’s frustrating.

-This is like an expansion of consciousness. Your consciousness dilates like the lens on a camera, it zooms in and out. When the lens dilates up, you get this expansion, but then it closes back down and falls into its default state.

             So, what I’m really interested in here is not in a temporary expansion of your consciousness.  I’m more interested in the permanent removing of the clouds.  What I really mean when I say “enlightenment” is: the clouds are completely gone and you’ve just got light shinning all the time.  You’re not trying, or holding on or struggling to make it work. You don’t even have to meditate anymore. You’re permanently enlightened.

              This is possible. This is a real state. Thousands of people have achieved this state, so it can be done. Any normal human being, as far as we know, can do it with enough work, but it takes quite a bit of work.  A thousand hours of work is a ballpark figure.

-Generally speaking, a drug will never give you permanent enlightenment. I don’t really know of any people who have become permanently enlightened off drugs. It can only give you a couple hours of enlightenment-like experience.

-Meditation is more helpful.  I recommend you start doing a lot of meditation.  If you’re starting to experience enlightenment-like experiences with meditation, that’s great — but don’t just stop because you think you’ve “made it.”  You haven’t made it yet.  Keep meditating until you get the real, permanent deal.

-Don’t assume that because you’ve had a little experience with drugs, you know what enlightenment will be like.  In the end, enlightenment will probably turn out very different than you expect it to.

 

12) “What about my friends and family?  Will I stop caring about them after enlightenment because I’m so detached from everything?”

-It depends. A lot of people have very dysfunctional families and friends. So, if you’re hanging around in a gang or some horrible friends and you become enlightened, you’ll probably abandon those friends.  They weren’t very healthy and now you don’t have much in common.

-There’s nothing inherently wrong with family or with friends.  If you have a good family and friends who bring you authentic joy, you’ll probably keep them. In fact, your relationships with them will improve.

-You keep dysfunctional relationships because you have buttons that those people push.  Your ego is involved in those relationships. When you take the ego out, it’s not going to bother you anymore. You’ll be capable of having compassion for them. You won’t need to be mean to them.

-Also, if you’re in a romantic relationship with someone, enlightenment will make you independent of that relationship. So, if the relationship serves you, you will stay.  If the relationship stops serving you, or becomes toxic, won’t have any hesitation walking away.  That is what neediness does — it produces a toxic attachment.  Having healthy boundaries doesn’t make you a monster or a bitch.

-Living with toxic attachments is very unhealthy.  Cutting them out is a good thing, not a bad thing. In general, your friendships and relationships with the right people will be significantly amplified and improved with enlightenment.

 

13) “How does love play into all this?”

-What you call love right now, is not true love.  It’s egoic love.  That’s another bitter pill to swallow.  You don’t really have an experience of true love.  What you call love now, even in your most sacred relationships, is still egoic love.

              You love those people, but only on your terms.  It’s a selfish love that serves you in some sneaky, underhanded way that you don’t like to admit.  You try to change them, manipulate them in subtle ways, to make sure you’re getting the love you want.

-If you want real, true love, all you have to do is break down the ego. Without the ego, you can love everything as much as you, right now, love yourself.

              Imagine how kind you would be to your family, friends, partner, and even people in general if you honestly believed that your body was not separate from their body.  That you and them are literally one and the same.

              That’s the true meaning of the Golden rule. The Golden rule says: do onto others as you would do onto yourself. You can’t do that when you actually believe that you are here and everyone is separate and out there.  If you really care about true love, you should definitely want to become enlightened.

-You can only live the Golden rule when you truly believe there’s no separation between you and everything.  So, you’re kind, compassionate, and loving towards everything. You’re here, there and everywhere, so you treat everything as though it’s you, which enlightenment shows to be true.  That’s what real love is.  Almost no one knows this practically because of their unenlightened state.

 

14) “Doing regular personal development has filled me with doubt.  It’s created a lot of confusion about my life, my ambitions, my relationships and my business.”

-In a sense, that’s exactly what we’re doing here. Because enlightenment is not about building up more of your ego, it’s about cutting out the ego. And this is going to feel scary, threatening and emotionally disturbing. It’s not going to be pleasant. That’s why so few people are enlightened.

-Your mind wants clarity and certainty at all times. Your mind hates being confused and doubting itself.  You need to get comfortable with uncertainty, because enlightenment is not ultimate certainty. It’s actually getting comfortable with ultimate uncertainty. It’s about realizing that there’s nothing to cling to and that there is no truth. The truth of no truth. Again, very paradoxical and fascinating how this works.

-The problem with most people is that they are too certain and too afraid of getting confused once in a while.  They’re also too afraid of questioning their world-view. If you’re doubting yourself, good.  Stop trying to be certain all the time.  This is what an intelligent, open-minded, intellectually honest human beings do- purposefully put themselves into situations where they doubts themselves.  This is healthy, this is building you up, not tearing you down.

 

15) “Isn’t it better to hold off on this enlightenment until I’m older (50s, 60s) or retired?  Isn’t it better to spend the first half of my life partying, running a business and traveling the world?”

-No!  Your ego’s procrastinating!  The longer you put it off, the more suffering you will have in your life.  Why would you delay happiness?  You’re asking, “wouldn’t it be better to spend the next twenty years suffering and then finally be happy when I retire?”

-In fact, many people who become enlightened report that it’s the most positive experience they’ve ever had.  They wish they’d had it earlier in their life.

-Some people become enlightened in their forties and their fifties, but then they have very bad experiences in their twenties and thirties, because they are just emotionally all over the place. There’s monkey chatter going around. This goes back to the earlier question of: Are you truly happy? The answer is that you’re not.

-Realize that you’re closing your mind down. You don’t want to do a self-honest inquiry.  You don’t really want to put the effort into this process.

-Realize that your life is going to end in a very bitter way no matter how successful you are. You're going to die, you're going to have disease, and you're going to have bad relationships.  All this stuff is going to disturb you a lot.

-What you’re really saying is you’re at the lower stages of your development and you haven’t gone to the higher stages yet.

-Normal is a very bad standard. The normal life is really a crazy, dysfunctional life.  It might be necessary for you to do some stupid stuff, waste ten, twenty years, and suffer.  Hopefully, you have the wisdom to short-circuit all that nonsense.

 

16) “But, Leo, what if you’re wrong?  Are you enlightened? And if you’re not, how can you be talking about enlightenment? Aren’t you being a hypocrite?”

-Leo isn’t enlightened, but he feels he can offer valuable information.  He’s gone through the initial, early stages: the fight, the resistance to this idea of enlightenment. (This video came out more than 6 years ago).  Enlightenment is a long journey.  Leo can point out the traps.  A lot of these questions in the FAQ are issues he had to struggle through.

-Leo’s a normal person you can identify with, not some hippie or spiritual guru or Indian yogi who meditates in the woods for ten hours a day, everyday.  He’s not a Buddhist monk, or the Dalai Lama.

              Those people might be more knowledgeable about this stuff, but those monks live very differently than you.  Their lifestyle is probably very incongruent with the way you live your life. You probably live a much more normal social existence.

-With personal development, once you move to the next level all the other levels suddenly make so much more sense.  It’s so clear when you look backwards on your life and the lives of people around you who haven’t advanced yet, why they’re stuck.

-If you’re very advanced, then maybe you want to go to some very advanced teacher. If you’re starting off and you like a very no-nonsense, non-mystical, non-religious, somewhat logical and scientific approach to enlightenment, that’s Leo.  That’s his bias and perspective he’s bringing to you, which can be rare to find in a teacher.

-As for the objection that he might be wrong: an intelligent person always has to leave room for the possibility that he might be wrong.  Smart people are always revising their worldview and growing.

              Also, the same is true with everyone that you listen to. Whether it’s a scientist, a religious person, the Dalai Lama or the Buddha himself — they could always be wrong. That’s just a fact of life and a fact of communication.  Even after enlightenment there’s still more to discover about consciousness.

-Don’t believe this on blind faith.  Verify it for yourself.  Use your intelligence, your rational faculties, think critically but also self-honestly.  Not with monkey chatter and ego defenses.  Prove it to yourself.  That’s how you know what’s real, through direct experience (clip: Validate Absolute Truth For Yourself [10 mins]).

Edited October 10, 2021 by FlyingLotus
Fail again, fail better.

[FlyingLotus]

483.  Summary: The Top Dangers Of Using Psychedelics

Resources on Psychedelics and Safety:

• ? Actualized.org on Psychedelics ?
• PsychonauntWiki is a good resource for researching.

Episode:

• Episode 268: How To Use Psychedelics For Personal Development (49 mins).  Summary is here.

Blog posts:

• Top Dangers of Using Psychedelics
• How to Research Psychedelics
• The Antidote For PreTrip Anxiety
• No Trip Sitters

Blog Videos:

• What It's Like To Smoke Salvia Divinorum (43 min)
• crazy salvia trip, fooor real (6 min)
• Salvia Trip Report (16 min)
• DON’T DO SALVIA OR DATURA!!

 

-This is going to be a lopsided episode.  Leo’s not covering any of the good stuff about psychedelics here.  He’s done other videos on that.  He’s also not trying to convince you to do psychedelics.  That’s a decision you have to make all by yourself.

-This episode is about the necessary precautions and information you need if you're going to be tripping seriously.  Leo’s such a huge advocate of psychedelics that he cares about how they’re misused and abused by people. 

-This episode focuses exclusively on the negatives and the dangers.  There are a lot of immature people who don't research or think through potential dangers.  The majority of these dangers can be very easily avoided if you are responsible, thoughtful and careful.  Keep in mind, you can make anything sound sinister if you emphasize only the negatives.  (eg: The Dangers of Dihydrogen Monoxide!?!?!)

-Leo has loads of experience with psychedelics, so he has a lot of insight about the dangers and risks.

• He’s taken over 100 trips, from low dosages to very very high.  He’s done everything from mushrooms, LSD, DPT, DMT, 5MeO DMT, 4AcO-DMT, Salvia, and even experimental research chemicals that most people don't know about.
• He’s also studied this field a lot theoretically.  He’s read a lot of trip reports, interacted and watched a lot of people who do psychedelics, dealt with people on the forum who report trips and the various problem that arise for them.  He’s also had bad trips himself.

-This list of 32 dangers is quite comprehensive.

 

1) Overdosing (3:20)

   The extreme version: taking so much that you kill yourself.

• The lethal dose for MDMA is pretty low, so that’s a serious danger.  Same goes for certain research chemicals.  However, od'ing on LSD or shrooms is pretty difficult.
• Find out what the lethal dosage is for the psychedelic you’re taking and stay far away from that dose.  Also make sure you’re accurately measuring the dose you’re taking.

   The mild version: simply taking a dose that's too high.

• This is more common.  The reason this happens is people are not carefully weighing their doses with a milligram scale.  They're just popping stuff hoping they get it right.
• This is extremely reckless and will lead to dangerous situations.  You might lose bodily function or pass out.  You could fall over and crack your skull open.  You could be seriously disoriented for a few hours, leading to all sorts of psychological problems and an existential crisis.

   The solution: stay within a low to moderate dose range.

• People can get cocky.  They overestimate how much they can handle and underestimate how powerful psychedelics are.  No mater how “tough” you are, there’s a dose that you won’t be able to handle.  It will freak you out and be a net negative for your development, personally and spiritually.
• There’s no need to do crazy high dosages.  Keep them in the moderate to low range.
• People try to outdo themselves, thinking that the more they do the sooner they'll deconstruct their ego or reach enlightenment.  Some just want bragging rights on online forums.  In practice, this will only set you back and you'll regret it.  Nothing is gained.  There’s nobody you need to one-up, not even yourself.
• Progress isn’t about taking high dosages.  It's about increasing consciousness, which is easier to accomplish with low to moderate doses.
• High dose trips can get too crazy to be productive.  Your mind can’t make sense of the trip or even integrate and remember it.  What really matters is letting the psychedelic transform your everyday life, not bragging on some forum.  Check your ego at the door.

 

2) Physical Harm (7:10)

• All sorts of physical harm is possible, especially if you're taking high doses.  You could become disoriented and lose control of your body.  You could run around in a reckless manner.  There are trip reports of people jumping around naked through the streets.  Falling over, hurting their arms and legs.
• Discipline yourself to sit still and contemplate when you're tripping.

 

3) Tripping in Dangerous Locations (7:30)

• Location, location, location.  Generally, you want to do psychedelics in an indoor environment where it's safe.  A comfortable room with no one to interfere is great.
• Stay indoors.  No balconies, no ledges, no rooftops, no sharp objects, no sharp corners where you can fall from a dangerous height or crack your skull open.
• Stay away from loud, crowded recreational areas, like parties, raves, nightclubs, music festivals, bars.  They’ll create problems.  Same with tripping outdoors in the woods where there are wild animals.  If it’s nighttime outdoors, your vision will be compromised too.

 

4) Vomiting (8:40)

• People commonly report vomiting while on psychedelics.  They do psychedelics after eating, which is why they vomit, especially if they take a high dose.  Vomiting and passing out at the same time creates a potentially lethal situation.
• Leo's done more than 100 trips and he’s never vomited once, so it’s a matter of being careful with your protocol.
• So, don't take psychedelics within four hours of eating anything.  Make it a rule.  It ensures you have an empty stomach and then there's nothing to vomit even if you feel like vomiting.

 

5) Really, Really, Really Bad Trips (9:48)

• There are different degrees of bad trips.  There's bad trips and there's really really really bad trips, which you especially want to avoid.  People underestimate how bad a trip can get because they underestimate the power of consciousness.
• Consciousness is all powerful and infinite.  Consciousness is rendering your entire sense of reality and everything you've ever seen or known.  Consciousness can conjure up anything, including the worst nightmares ever.  So imagine that nightmare being manifested as real or even realer than this physical reality that you're in right now.
• Also, when you're in these psychedelic peaks, there's no notion of time, so they can last for eternity.  A really, really, really bad trip is like being stuck in the worst possible hellish nightmare you can imagine, where you're being tortured and devils are coming at you and you're in total madness and it seems like you'll never return to normal life.
• It's not like a usual bad trip where you can just convince yourself you’ll be okay, that you’ll be back to normal in a few hours.  In a really, really bad trip there won't be any reassurance.  You’ll actually believe that this nightmare is your new reality. 
• You can completely lose memory of your old reality.  You can forget all about material existence.  You’re going to be in this new, hellish reality with no control.  Your ego won’t be able to manipulate it.  You're going to be stuck in this downward, infinite spiral into hell.  That is possible.  (Don’t do salvia or datura!)

      Solution:

• You can avoid that by keeping your doses low to medium.  Those kind of bad trips usually happen when your dosage is too high.
• You also need to ground yourself and be psychologically healthy so that you don't have a paranoid mind.  The more paranoid, depressive and negative your mind is, the more likely you are to lose control, spiral into negativity and even into states of madness.
• If you have trouble dwelling on negativity and cutting off negative thoughts in general, then your doses need to be low.

 

6) Facing Repressed Fear and Trauma (13:10)

• If you have a lot of trauma and shadow material that you've been repressing, it's gonna come out.  Psychedelics will get you to confront traumas, the shadow side of your psyche that you've been repressing and hiding.
• Most people who get involved with psychedelics are fairly immature and also tend to have quite a bit of trauma in their life from childhood and adolescence.  They also tend to be fairly fearful.
• Since psychedelics deconstructs your mind and your reality, they will screw with your sense of what you think is real and unreal.
• Forcing that to come out is actually a good thing.  It’s necessary for your personal and spiritual growth, but that doesn't mean it's going to feel good.  Your ego might not be prepared to handle it.  It depends on how much pain is brought up and how quickly.
• Keeping your dosages low to moderate means you can face your fears and traumas gradually, at a rate you can handle.  If you just jack up the dose, it's going to be more than you can handle and this is going to set you back.
• It’s like going to the gym.  If you try to bench press 200 pounds on your first day, like you see other people doing, because you don't want to look like a wimp, you’re going to seriously injure yourself.  This will force you to stay out of the gym for the next few months, or even years. Counterintuitively this will slow your progress.
• One of the biggest problems you see is people taking “heroic doses,” because they want to prove their “machoness.”[/b]  They freak themselves out, too much trauma comes up and this scares them away for years.
• The proper approach is to go slow and steady and gradually build yourself up, and deconstruct your ego, over a period of months and years.
• It does very little good to go to the gym once.  That doesn't really change you.  What works is doing a little bit consistently, over months and years.  It’s the same thing with psychedelics.
• As you're doing psychedelics, make sure you don't freak yourself out so much that you get PTSD, anxiety, nightmares, depression or fall into solipsism or have an existential crisis that stops you from doing regular personal development work and consciousness practices.

 

7) The Potential for Psychological Instability (17:30)

•  All of these can happen: deconstructing your mind, nihilism, a loss of your sense of reality, a loss of your illusions, depersonalization, ungrounding and losing your mind, even going insane.
• Although, we’re trying to deconstruct the mind, the rate at which you do it matters a lot.  If it happens bit by bit, you can handle it.  If you get too much all at once your life can spiral out of control.  You could even have a psychotic break that leads you to making rash, life decisions you will later regret.
•  You can end up in a mental institution.  You can spiral into depression or nihilism where nothing matters and you lose joy for life and all sense of meaning.  This can cascade throughout your life, into your family and career.
• So, try to deconstruct your psyche at a slow, healthy rate. 

 

8) Confusion (19:25)

• Psychedelics can make you very confused about reality and what's really going on in life.  This confusion can be emotionally stressful and difficult to cope with.  It can last for months or years depending on how much tripping you're doing and what kind of confusion you have.
• Generally, confusion is actually a good thing.  Confusion is not bad per se, as long as it doesn't make you do stupid, rash things. (ep: How to deal with Confusion)

 

9) Can Exacerbate Mental illness (20:23)

• If you have mental illnesses, you need to be very careful because psychedelics can crank those up to 11.  Stuff like bipolar disorder, schizophrenic tendencies, depression, PTSD, anxiety and so forth.
• You could end up at a mental institution where they'll over medicate you and imbalance your body and mind even more.  You could even get addicted to those medications and it'll take months or years to wean yourself off them.
• If you have a mild one, you can still take psychedelics.  They can actually help, but you have to be extra extra careful and keep your doses low to moderate.
• If you have some severe mental illnesses, then perhaps stay away from psychedelics altogether.
• Research your mental illness very deeply (blog post: How to Research Psychedelics).  Read reports from people with the same mental illness who have been taking psychedelics.  Learn how they’ve been handling it.  What’s worked and what hasn’t.  You can see their dosages, effects they've been experiencing, whether it was positive or negative.

eg: Do a google search on: reddit.com bipolar disorder LSD (or whatever psychedelic you're planning on taking)

• That gives you an idea of what to expect.  Even then there's no guarantees and the more severe your mental illness is the more things can go wrong.
• Also, if you're stuck in a profound mental illness and there's no cure and you've tried everything and nothing’s helped you, consider the possibility that psychedelics can help.
• Now it depends on what kind of illness you have.  What kind of psychedelic you use.  How you use it and so forth, but you can also do research into various academic studies, programs and clinical treatments around the world that do help with depression, PTSD and anxiety.
• There's some really good science behind that.  Very soon we're going to have the first FDA approved use of psychedelics for treatment of depression, PTSD and other things.  There's going to be legit treatments available through various clinics and licensed doctors.  So it's real science.  It works.  It's not just hippie mumbo jumbo.

 

10) Can Interfere With Pursuing Success (23:25)

• If you're really into selfhelp, if you're in that spiral dynamics stage orange phase where you’re working really hard on your business or your dating life and you've built up a lot of momentum, be careful with psychedelics because they can derail that.
• It’s both a downside and an upside.  Psychedelics take you beyond the material existence, so they're going to make all that material stuff seem very petty and meaningless.
• That’s sort of the point.  It’s what transcendence is about.  But for a lot of people, they're so immature and underdeveloped that they’re not ready to transcend the material domain.  They need maybe ten years focused on meeting their survival needs in a conscious, effective way.
• So, if you have all these goals, but then start doing shrooms, you might rethink those goals.  On one hand, that might be a good thing if your life’s miserable and you need to reevaluate.  On the other hand, maybe your goals are spot on and it’s in your best interest to keep working towards them. 
• Psychedelics can make you second guess yourself and make you less productive because productivity loses its meaning.  You realize you're in a rat race and you're never going to be satisfied.
• It might be a good idea to start doing psychedelics when you can afford to coast in your business or life goals.  When you have the luxury of shifting priorities from productivity to spirituality.
• Understand that they’ll be a financial cost to prioritizing consciousness work over productivity.  You could also say that less money but more spirituality is better for you in the long run.
• Your priorities will be different if you have a spouse and kids that you’re responsible for.  You don’t necessarily know how psychedelics will affect that.

 

11) Using Psychedelics to Avoid Building a Good Life (28:38)

• You could potentially use psychedelics to escape tackling the problem of survival and building a good life.  Most people who watch Leo’s videos have a more immediate problem of trying to master survival in an excellent way. So, their main problem isn’t a lack of enlightenment.
• If you're struggling to build a career, or get laid, or manage your emotions (loneliness, anger, depression, anxiety), those are very basic problems.  Jumping deep into psychedelic territory might compel you to not worry about any of that material stuff.

“But Leo, who cares about building a good life?  That's just dreams and the illusion of Maya, bro.  I'm gonna go into the mystical realms, because that's where the good stuff's at, right?” 

• That can be a very big trap, because no matter how high you go into the mystical realms, no matter how deep of a God realization you get or what insights DMT alien entities download into you, you’re eventually going to come back down into mundane, material reality where you have bills to pay, children to feed, a house to clean, a physical body to take care and all those other obligations.
• Survival and building a good life is not something you want to do poorly.  That is something you want to face head on and master ?.
• No matter what nondual experiences you have, you’ll still need some degree of success in physical, material reality.  Otherwise, you’ll live miserably on the material plane.  That’s not something you want and it will negatively impact your spiritual pursuits.
• So, you want to keep one eye on the mystical domain and the other eye on building a good life.  Become financially secure, get a good job so you’re not anxious about basic physical survival or homeless.

 

12) Becoming Too Isolated (32:30)

• Psychedelics can make you go deeper and deeper into yourself, withdrawing into your mind and psyche, especially if you do them chronically.
• You could stop talking to your friends and family and trap yourself in this solipsistic echo chamber.  That can spiral out of control, then nobody is there to help you or keep you grounded.  You can even start to hate the world, especially if you misinterpret your psychedelic visions.
• So, balance out psychedelics with some sort of social life so you don’t become a total recluse.

 

13) Making Rash Decisions (33:25)

• After a profound, breakthrough trip, you might decide to divorce your wife, leave your children, quit your job, tell your boss to go screw himself, walk away from your business partners, go travel the world, sell your house, give away all your money to charity and this can really end up biting you in the ass.
• Even though a psychedelic trip only lasts at most 12 hours and the next day you're going to be completely down from the trip, the lingering after effects of the chemicals will still remain in your psyche for at least a week, especially after a deep trip.  So for the rest of that week you can be having thoughts that are not typically the kind of thoughts you would be having, which can cause you to make rash decisions.
• The best safety measure against this is to have a rule that after you trip you're not going to make any rash or bold decisions for the next week.  Make sure that your mind comes back down all the way and you're sober.  You're totally stabilized and then you can make your decisions.  Until then, you’re probably not thinking straight.

 

14) Feeling Demotivated about Meditation (35:35)

• Psychedelics can take you into levels of consciousness that are really high, that meditation clearly cannot.  This can be demotivating for your meditation or yoga practice, because “what's the point?”
• In a sense, it's easier to fool yourself into meditating when you don't know about the peaks that psychedelics are capable of producing.  (This is one of the secret reasons why a lot of Buddhist and yoga practitioners instinctively stay away from psychedelics.)
• The thing is, meditation, yoga and self inquiry are important for raising your baseline level of consciousness.  Psychedelics are not gonna raise your baseline level of consciousness that much.  You're gonna come back down at the end of the day, so that kind of leaves you nowhere.
• Even if you do psychedelics, you still need daily manual practices to raise your baseline state of consciousness over a period of years and decades (yoga, meditation, self inquiry).  Then on top of that, you’ll be getting these spikes with psychedelics that take you to crazy peaks.

 

15) Chronic Usage (39:25)

• Yes, Leo’s broken that rule.  He did 30 days straight of 5MeODMT (ep: 30 Awakenings In 30 Days.)  But, that was done in a very deliberate almost scientific way, and now he can teach from that wisdom.
• Using psychedelics chronically will erode your mind and sense of reality.  It will turn your life upside down and you’ll stop being able to think straight.  That’s what happened to Leo during his 30day trial of using 5MeODMT.  He was constantly high and it was really really interfering with his mind and sense of reality.  If it had continued any further it would have been a disaster.
• Leo recommends taking long periods between trips to integrate insights.  Even doing psychedelics twice a month is too much if you do that consistently.  You’re still not going to be able to integrate everything, so be careful about that.
• Chronic use will turn psychedelics into a crutch, an addiction, an escape from doing the real, manual labor to develop yourself.  So, don’t use psychedelics more than once every two weeks. 

 

16) Misinterpreting Mystical Visions (42:05)

• You're going to have all sorts of visions and insights, but when you come back down the ego is still going to be there.
• The ego is going to try to make sense of all these crazy experiences you've had.  It's going to corrupt them.  It's going to try to co-opt them and use them towards it's own selfish purposes.  Here is where you run into the problem of Zen devilry, or false notions of enlightenment and a messiah complex (ep: Becoming a Zen Devil.  Summary here.)
• You start to proclaim yourself to be God and telling everyone how great and powerful you are.  You think you have abilities to heal people, to change the world, to awaken everybody.  This can get very dangerous.  You might get the idea to build a cult.  You might think you're qualified to teach people, and if you do, you’ll be teaching them some corrupt version of the truth.  So just be very careful because your mind is very self-deceptive, especially when you come down from a high mystical experience.
• These mystical visions don't necessarily mean what you think they mean at face value.  Your mind can easily imagine and hallucinate all sorts of stuff.
• Maybe because you’re Christian, you experience Jesus delivering a personal message to you.  So you start to believe you are Jesus’ messenger here on Earth.  Then you come back down from the trip and actually believe that you have been ordained to convert all the heathens to Christianity or something like that.
• Psychedelics will exacerbate any biases and self-deceptions you have in your mind.  For you to gain the most out of psychedelics, it's very important that you have a pure mind, a mind that has inquired into itself outside of the psychedelic trip.
• Clear out your mind, purge your selfishness, your various biases, egotisms and shadow sides.  If you have a dirty, corrupt mind your mystical visions will be corrupted and misinterpreted by the impurities in your mind.
• You won't be able to separate the truth of the mystical vision from the selfish, personal needs you have.  All of your egotism and shadow side will turn your non-dual experience into a toxic, fake-mystical stew.  Then you'll run around trying to infect everybody else with it.  This is Zen devilry.
• It’s also possible that having awakenings cause you to think you fully understand reality when you don’t.  You only saw a small facet of the truth, not the whole truth (ep: The Many Facets of Awakening.)  It usually takes you multiple trips over a period of months and years to assemble a big picture of the truth.
• Be aware that you can deceive yourself about awakenings and mystical visions.  You can misinterpret them badly and infect others with those misunderstandings, so be very careful.

 

17) The Pain of Being Disconnected From God (46:55)

• If you're doing psychedelics properly, you’ll eventually become conscious of God.  This will be one of the most important, beautiful and profound experiences you've ever had.  Then you'll fall back down to earth the next day.
• You’ll want to get back to God.  It’ll become the thing you chase.  You’ll be intoxicated with God, with becoming God or being one with God or feeling God's love.  Infinite love is so intoxicating that it's going to pain you to go through everyday life disconnected from God and from infinite love.  This could potentially get so bad you become suicidal.

“What’s the point of this material existence?  My crappy job, my crafty family, my crappy life.  I should be up there in heaven with God.”

• You might also spend your days dreaming about the next time you can do psychedelics.  Then it becomes an addiction, an escape from material existence, obligations and survival.
• Counterintuitively, the most profound, beautiful mystical experiences can actually lower the quality of your life.  Because before psychedelics your mundane, boring life was all you knew.  You were blissful ignorant about the beauty of infinite love.  You can’t inhabit that 24/7, so your ordinary life seems very pale by comparison.  Basically, you have to relearn to appreciate the paleness of mundane existence.  That’s challenging to cope with.
• Although you can't really get physically addicted to psychedelics, you can become psychologically addicted, especially if your ordinary life kind of sucks.  If you’ve got nothing going on for you in ordinary life, then you can definitely see how these psychedelic peaks can become an escape and your sole purpose for living.  That’s not healthy or sustainable in the long term.

 

18) Suicide (50:35)

• If you're taking psychedelics and you notice yourself having suicidal thoughts, then the first thing you should do is completely discontinue psychedelics for at least three to six months.  Don't do them.  Reground yourself in ordinary life.  Remember, suicide is just a temporary trick of your ego-mind.
• Don’t harm your body.  Make a commitment to yourself to not harm your body.  Don't even consider suicide as a possibility.  If you maintain at least one avenue of hope in life, you can keep going.  (clip: A Spiritual Perspective On Suicide [11 min])
• Psychedelics can make some people suicidal for various reasons.  You can feel like you're losing your mind, or plunge you into a nihilistic, solipsistic funk.  You could misinterpret a vision or insight.  You could experienced derealization and get stuck.  Basically, you don't want to work on the material plane and you think suicide will give you a shortcut to God.
• Psychedelics done properly can actually be the cure.  They can show you something beyond the material domain, beyond depression and pain.  If you're dissatisfied with the material domain, which a lot of suicidal people are, then what you're really looking for is the spiritual domain, but you don't know how to access it.  If you can't meditate, do yoga, self inquiry, if you don't have those skills built up, psychedelics can help you deal with trauma.  A lot of suicide is rooted in trauma.  Psychedelics can show you the miracle of life, of love, of consciousness of God.  In this sense psychedelics can prevent suicide, but they can also cause it.  It depends on how you them.

 

19) The Illegal Side of Things (53:00)

• Familiarize yourself with the legal nuances of these substances.  What are the legal ramifications for getting caught with them?  Which substances are legal in your area and which are not?

eg: Think very, very, very, carefully before doing drugs in Singapore.  Maid sentenced to 25 years in prison for trafficking marijuana.

• This requires research depends on where you live.  These substances are illegal in many parts of the world, but not all parts.  How you're handling these substances.  How are you driving around with them?  How you're carrying them?  What the policing situation is like?
• Be very careful about supplying psychedelics to your friends.  There’s a big difference between getting caught as a user versus as a dealer.
• When you start using psychedelics you might want to share them with all your friends and your family.  You might start inviting them over for psychedelics or sending them gifts.  Eventually, what happens is people start talking and you get caught.
• In that situation they're to going to try you as a dealer, not as a user who has a little bit of psychedelics for personal use.  It's very very important to take precautions so that there’s no links between what you're doing and dealing to others.
• Make sure that you take responsibility for the legal consequences.  Do you understand how many years in jail you could spend if you get caught?  Researching that will sober your mind to the realities of things.  There’s a big difference between a few months versus 10 years in jail, but you didn't even consider that because you didn’t do your research.
• There are also legal ways to do psychedelics.  There’s also a variety of quasi-legal grey areas too that you can explore.  It all depends on your risk tolerance.  eg: Ibogaine clinics that treat drug addiction.
• Leo’s not your lawyer and he’s not telling you what you should or shouldn't do.  He’s just saying you need to study this stuff so you know what you're getting into.  Then you can avoid the most serious dangers.

 

20) Taking the Wrong Substance (56:58)

• Don’t take unknown substances.  Sometimes in trip reports, people just take some unknown drug.  Don't take random pills from people you don’t know.  You have to know what your substance is!  Know the dosage and the source of where you got it from.  You have to be reasonably confident about the dosage being accurate.  It should come from a quasi-reliable source at the very least, if not a reliable one.

 

21) Toxicity From Impure Substances (58:00)

• Toxicity comes from impure substances.  This depends on if you're getting your substance from a trusted source then this shouldn't be a problem.
• Certain substances can contain fairly high impurities, especially things like MDMA or LSD, especially if you get it at a rave or a music festival.  Those can be notoriously impure.

 

22) Physically Damaging Your Body with Chemicals (58:38)

• There are certain kinds of psychedelics that are chemically damaging to your body, like ketamine, MDMA, DMX, NBOMes, nitrous oxide, and others.  (Of course, it depends on how much you take and how often.)  These substances aren’t even considered classic psychedelics.
• Solution: stick to the classic psychedelics that will not physically damage your body, like mushrooms, DMT, mescaline, LSD.  They’re not physically damaging in most cases for normal people.  They're the safest and most field tested.

eg: MDMA permanently rewires your brain if you take it too much.  It can lead to neurological damage.  Ketamine can lead to bladder or kidney damage.

• There are some substances that you shouldn't take at all.  Leo's taken salvia, but doesn’t recommend it.  It screws with your motor control and creates very very chaotic trips.  Datura’s even worse.
• Leo’s not doing reverse psychology here.  Don’t take salvia or datura.  There’s better stuff that’s way safer.

 

23) Bad Interactions Between Psychedelics and Medication (1:00:40)

• If you're on SSRIs don't combine that with psychedelics.  SSRIs are frequently used among depressed people.
• If you're on antipsychotics or any other medication, you have to seriously research potential conflicts, side effects and interactions between your medication and psychedelics.  These combinations can be potentially lethal.

 

24) Mixing Substances (1:01:30)

• When you mix two or more chemical substances together they can have a synergistic effect either positive or negative.  That can lead to side effects and drug interactions you didn't anticipate.
• There have been reported deaths from people taking 5MeODMT plus a medication they were on.  Combining 5MeODMT with MAOIs, like you do with ayahuasca, could also be a lethal combination.
• Combining various medications and supplements with psychedelics, and/or taking multiple psychedelics together is dangerous territory.  Stick to one chemical at a time so you clearly know what effect which substance is having on your mind.

 

25) Psychedelics Can Be a Gateway to Hard Drugs (1:02:50)

• They can lead to other recreational, hard drugs like cocaine, heroin, meth, crack and so forth.  It doesn't have to be that way, but it can be that way.
• Psychedelics aren’t ridiculously addictive like meth, so the line can get blurry.  You might underestimate how addictive hard drugs are.  Also, the sources that are getting you psychedelics might also offer you recreational drugs.
• Psychedelics will open your mind.  You might think, “they're not so bad.  They're not hurting my body.  Why not try some other stuff too?”  Then your heroin turns out to be laced with fentanyl and you kill yourself.
• You have to draw a real hard line between the recreational stuff and psychedelics.  Only stick to the psychedelics for personal and spiritual growth, not partying.

 

26) Chronic Weed Addiction (1:04:10)

• According to trip reports, some people like to combine psychedelics with weed.  They do it to calm themselves down.  This can actually make your trips more paranoid and synergize in a negative way.  So keep that in mind.
• Read Leo’s blog post on pre-trip anxiety.
• Unlike psychedelics, weed is more addictive and easier to use daily.  Even if you’re only using psychedelics once a month, if you get into a habit of using weed frequently, that's not going to be good for your development.  Leo recommends avoiding weed altogether.

 

27) Experimenting with Research Chemicals (1:06:00)

• There’s dozens of different research chemicals.  There’s always new ones being released and you might want to experiment with them.  The problem is the newer the chemical, the less it’s been field tested, and the more dangerous it is.  You could potentially stumble upon something very harmful, so you got to be careful with research chemicals.
• Also, you might order some research chemicals they end up sending you the wrong batch, which is potentially quite problematic.

 

28) Hallucinogen Persistent Perception Disorder (HPPD) (1:07:05)

• HPPD happens when you do so much psychedelics at such high doses that the psychedelic effects linger on your visual and auditory field.  Something gets rewired in your brain long after the trip.
• They can last for months or years or a lifetime.  The most common symptom might be tinnitus, which is a ringing in the ears.  You can also get tracers or other kinds of distortions in your visual field.  This can last an entire lifetime.  It can be quite distressing and interferes with one’s ability to enjoy life.  So just be aware of that.
• This happens to a very small percentage of people, but it does happen and you don't know if that’s going to be you.  Especially if you do a lot of psychedelics or high doses. Nobody’s sure what causes it, if it’s genetics, or a side effect of mixing psychedelics with medication.
• You can research plenty of case studies about HPPD online or in the forums on reddit and so forth.  Leo’s never had it, but he’s very careful about dosing and not overusing.

 

29) Extracting, Synthesizing and Dealing (1:09:09)

• The more you get into psychedelics, you might want to try growing your own shrooms, or extracting DMT, or trying to synthesize your own LSD.
• You might get some crazy ideas about growing, extracting and synthesizing.  At that point you’re running a drug lab and if the cops catch you they're not going to charge you as a user.  They're not even going to charge you as a dealer.  They’re going to charge you as a drug lab.
• Don’t do anything reckless.  It's not worth going to prison for twenty years just to extract a few grams of DMT.  They will easily charge you heavily if they catch you.  So you have been forewarned.

 

30) Online Scams (1:10:25)

• Leo's heard stories of people buying stuff from random websites and not getting their product.  Their money gets stolen by fake websites and shady dealers.

 

31) Driving intoxicated (1:10:50)

• Have a rule that you won’t be driving or getting into a car.
• There are trip reports of really irresponsible people taking LSD then getting in a car to buy snacks, then the psychedelic hits while they’re in the car and now they can’t even see straight, much less drive.
• Once you've taken the psychedelic sit down, pay attention, contemplate.  Don't think about anything else.  Focus on your trip.  Don’t run off somewhere.  Sit through the trip until it's all gone, and then you can use your car again.

 

32) Thinking You’re Invincible (1:16:10)

• You might start to think, “I’m God and God is immortal.”  Well, God is immortal and invincible, but your human life isn’t.  There are consequences in the relative, material domain, so watch out.

 

-Remember, this list was only focusing on the worst of the worst parts about psychedelics.  You might be turned off because of all the dangers and problems.  Keep in mind that the majority of these dangers can be very easily avoided if you are responsible, thoughtful and careful. 

-Leo’s given you very quick solutions to many of these problems, so you can avoid many of them.  No, you can't avoid all of them.  If you're very very risk averse person then psychedelics are simply not for you.

-Don’t forget that all of life is risk.  If you did a list of all the risks and problems of driving or sex or business or relationships, you would never do any of that.

• Dangers in business.  You can get sued, your partners can scam you, your products can kill people.
• Dangers with sex.  You could catch an STD.  You could get a girl pregnant and pay alimony for the rest of your life.  You could be impregnated and the guy could abandon you.
• Dangers in relationships.  Your partner could have a crazy ex.  She could cheat on you, infect you with an std, hurt you emotionally and steal all your money.  He could abuse you, rape you, brainwash and manipulate you, even kill you.

-Life is full of risk.  It's about managing the risk.  You don't want to be paranoid, but you want to take reasonable precautions.  You're not invincible.

 

Top Mistakes in a Nutshell

1) Not taking psychedelics seriously seriously enough.  Treating them like toys.

2) Being immature about the whole process.  Being immature period.  Maturity is one of the most important factors to using psychedelics productively and not destructively.  If you're immature don't do them at all.

3) Doing large doses and not measuring them accurately.

4) Frequent and chronic usage.

5) Tripping with friends in dangerous environments, with a lot of noise and distraction around.

6) Not sitting still and contemplating because you’re too immature.  If you can't control yourself, don't trip.

     There are trip reports of people who take shrooms, strip off all their clothes and run down the street screaming.  This is very immature.

               “But Leo, I’m tripping!!  I’m supposed to be free.  I wanna let myself gooooo.” 

     Well, you shouldn't let yourself go so much that you jump off a balcony.  If it’s too much to ask of yourself to not do reckless, dangerous things, then don't trip.

7) When mentally ill, mentally unstable and immature people getting into psychedelics.  Their mental illness just gets worse and they spiral out of control, and end up taking more to feel better.

8) Zen Devilry.  (ep: Becoming a Zen Devil.  Summary is here)

9) Not enough theoretical foundation or consciousness work.  Learn the metaphysics, the epistemology, spiritual theory, non-dual theory, and so forth.  Actualized.org covers all that stuff.

10) Not doing the manual labor of personally developing yourself.  Assuming that psychedelics will handle everything, including your physical health and spiritual growth.  Substituting drugs for meditation, contemplation, reading, learning, watching Actualized.org, and other spiritual practices.  If you just fly by the seat of your pants and do psychedelics, your life will be a disaster.

11) Doin a few trips and thinking you’ve got it all figured out.  If you've only done five or ten trips or even 20 trips you have no clue what psychedelics are really like.  You're just a widdle baby.

      It requires about a hundred trips just to start to get your bearings on what psychedelics are, how they work and their potential for spiritual growth.  You have to spread your trips out.  Treat this as a longterm, multiyear process.  Don’t do a bunch of trips back to back.  Because you're spreading it out, a lot of work is involved.

      Follow safe protocols.  The more you do something dangerous, the more risk is incurred, so the more you do it, the more careful and methodical you have to be..

 

Actualized.org and Psychedelics Moving Forward

-Leo’s not trying to convince you to do psychedelics.  Contemplate these dangers.  Take them seriously.  Taking psychedelics is a decision you need to make for yourself, not because you think Leo told you to.  In the past he’s talked about the benefits, so now he’s providing a balanced perspective.

-In the future, Leo wants to emphasize the importance of psychedelics in this work.  Emphasizing psychedelics is controversial and people will criticize him for that, which is why he released this episode.  So that you’re doing psychedelics in a responsible way. 

-He finds that psychedelics are the most direct path.  They can give you the deepest, clearest understanding of what reality is.  So, forget about permanent enlightenment.  It’s enormously beneficial to directly experience truth, God, Love, reality and consciousness for yourself.  For a lot of people, psychedelics are the only way they will ever experience that.

            A lot of people get lost in mental masturbation, theorizing about metaphysics and solipsism.  It's very important that you actually do the work or you'll get nowhere.  (Yoga, meditation, self inquiry, psychedelics, etc)  Again, Leo’s not pushing psychedelics on anyone.  You don't have to do them.  You can still access God, love, consciousness, truth and epistemology independent of psychedelics.  But if there’s a direct, easy way to access it, why not use it?  Most people aren't devoted enough to meditate for ten years, or do intense ten day retreats.  Or they're not spiritually gifted enough.  So how do we deliver these understandings to them?

-Leo says the depth of his understanding and the quality of his work would be impossible without psychedelics.  These tools can reveal non-duality to you quickly, effortlessly, directly and yet they're misused and demonized.  As a society we cannot afford to have these amazing tools get so abused.  We need to build a responsible path towards psychedelic use, not just a clinical path to only use them for PTSD, depression and addiction. 

-A lot of people who teach psychedelics don't connect it to the highest, purest metaphysical understanding of reality, or to epistemology or developmental psychology.  Actualized.org is in a position to do that or at least play a role in that.  There’s a non-dual path through psychedelics.  This path doesn't exclude other practices.  It just adds an extra dimension of psychedelics on top of it.  That's how Leo sees spirituality being done in the future.  He feels it’s his responsibility to help actualize ? it.  He also acknowledges that he’s standing on the shoulders of giants in the psychedelic community.  (Pioneers like Terence Mckenna, Alexander Shulgin, Martin Ball, James Auroch all deserve credit.)
              There’s also the challenge of popularizing the responsible use of psychedelics.  This is about changing culture, changing how society at large views psychedelics.

-It’s very important for you to be ridiculously responsible about how you do psychedelics.  If you’re doing this in an irresponsible manner with a bunch of Zen devilry, crazy antics, misuse, abuse, harm to yourself and others, Leo will denounce you and kick you off the forum and the comments section.  He’s not gonna tolerate any of that stuff, because there's a larger game here and that Zen devilry is not gonna fly.

-So just be responsible.  Be conscious and get excited about some amazing discoveries in the future.

Edited November 8, 2021 by FlyingLotus

[FlyingLotus]

@Loving Radiance Thanks for letting me know

Edited November 8, 2021 by FlyingLotus

[Ismael]

471. How Survival Shapes Who You Are

 

https://youtu.be/mPIVZtxYHJc

 

You became how you survived.

 

Builds on survival part 1 & 2.

 

"Who you are today was shaped by your early survival demands just like the shape of a snake was gradually formed over millions and billions of years of evolution, of natural selection."

We completely forget how much we were shaped by all of the environments, especially during the first 20 years.

The base layers of your psyche go "unconscious" and you assume that this is just who you are now.

"Psychic archeology" can help you remember how and why some of the dysfunctional base layers were built.

 

Start to really notice:

• How much survival demands from your environment shaped you 
• The kind of survival strategies you had to adapt as coping mechanisms to deal with whatever situation you were faced with.
  • The software is more important than the hardware in the context of survival.
  • Culture, family, schooling, work environment shape, etc. shaping mind, psyche, beliefs, worldviews, morality, values.
• Human survival varies enormously around the globe.

 

Your personal survival situations:

• Creates huge blind spots in your psyche.
• Limits your ability to understand others.
• Limits your ability to grow, succeed, and transcend to higher levels.

 

The wounds, and scars, karma, samskaras you incurred as you were growing up stay with you and influence how you behave.

They can corrupt:

• Desires
• Goals, ambitions in life
• Fears, insecurities, lead to overreacting emotionally to certain things

Can give you:

• Biases
• Predilections
• Aversions

…all of these fundamentally shaping how your life unfolds.

…and if your life is unfolding in ways you don't like. With bad habits, addictions, and stuckness, you have to look back and see what's sourcing that.

…probably early childhood survival situations that you didn't quite know fully how to deal with, and you might have dealt with them in unholistic ways, and now those became ingrained in your psyche and now you still keep acting from that place.

…it becomes more difficult to change as you get into your 30s, 40s, and beyond.

 

We tend to assume that humans have lived the same way:

When you're studying history you have to really put yourself in the shoes of the people that were living in that culture at that time.

To live 2000 years ago was such a starkly different way of surviving than today and even a hundred years ago survival was so different for your great grandparents than it is for you today. Just a single generation is actually very significant.

 

Visualize:

How different would you be today if…

Your father was a drug dealer,

You were raped by your father,

You were a Mormon in a Mormon family + community,

You were gay or confused about your sexuality,

You were bullied in school because you were ugly,

You were born in an Eskimo tribe,

You grew up in a foster home without parents.

You grew up with a chronic illness instead of a healthy body, maybe in a wheelchair,

You were a hot pretty girl, and everyone admired you and lavished attention on you,

You grew up in a war zone,

You grew up in a small rural village,

You grew up as a woman in Saudi Arabia,

You grew up in a royal family with a palace,

You grew up seeing mystical visions as a child,

You would be a different person.

 

Humans survive in very different ways, yet we judge others for how we survive, we're very judgmental about the survival strategies of other people.

Because ours so deeply shaped who we are and how we see reality it's difficult to see beyond that.

 

Example:

Who Hitler was and what he did were merely the reflection of his mind.

And Hitler's mind was merely a reflection of the survival challenges he faced during his youth.

 

List out:

The core survival challenges that shaped your mind.

Go all the way back to your earliest years and try to remember them.

Examples:

• Learning how to eat without spilling food everywhere, learning how to chew & not bite your tongue.
• Maintaining your temperature and dealing with heat and cold.
• Learning how to dress for different weathers.
• Think about sexuality and how it was formed until 20, what struggles existed that are still with you today.
• Kinesthetically working how your body works, injuring/bruising/cutting yourself constantly.
• Dangerous situations you faced. With strangers trying to pick you up, with cars, bicycles, weather.
• Times when you cried from age 0 to 20, what were you crying about? What wounds did that leave?
• Challenges of learning language properly or learning what time is, not knowing what the arrows mean.
• Struggling through school. Learning mathematics. Socializing with children of your own age.
• Remember getting in trouble, all the rules you broke, the detentions you got, all the scolding and punishments you got from your environment, and how that affected you.
• The struggle of fitting in, of being cool.
• Academic achievement and how felt about your own sense of intelligence and self-esteem related to that.
• Struggles with sports.
• Fights with your family, rebelling against your parents, or conforming to your parents.
• Trying to gain approval or love from your parents and friends.
• Divorce in your family is a huge one.
• How your identity was forged, playing with different identities and friends.
• Various interests you explored, struggling with different hobbies.
• The challenge of learning concepts.
• The struggle of being lazy or disciplined.
• Being bored and what you did during your spare time.
• Religion.
• Philosophical questions that you struggled with, what is life, what is death, first time seeing your parents and you too are going to die.
• Debates and disagreements you had with your parents, elders, friends, and colleagues.
• Mentors who influenced you in positive ways negative ways.
• The music you listened to.
• Lack or abundance of money.
• Other kinds of family dysfunctions you struggled with.
• Early romances you had.
• Pregnancy or abortion if early.
• Being denied or rejected for things. Sports team, early job position, school, or university.

How did you adapt and cope with all of the above?

The suffering that you incurred when you were young and very impressionable left very deep samskaras [wounds] in your psyche, which you're probably still compensating for today.

 

The "fill in the blank" exercise: (pause for 20-30 mins)

Fill in that blank with the first things that pop into your mind, don't overthink it too much.

Life is…

The opposite sex is…

Happiness is…

Success is… (where did your definition of success come from?)

Money is…

Sex is…

Science/religion is…

Spirituality is…

Work is…

School is…

Government is…

I am…

Humans are…

 

Key question: How did early survival shape who you are today?

• Likes and dislikes.
• Believes, convictions, principles, pet-theories, firmly held opinions, your worldview.
• Your morality, your judgments, and the things you hate.

How they came about as a function of survival and how they served survival.

**Not just physical survival but as a psyche, as an ego.

• Notice your political and economic philosophy.
• Your sexual identity.
• Your views of men and women.
• Your social behaviors, tendencies, and attitudes towards other people.
• Your career.
• Your strengths, weaknesses, fears, and insecurities. (the ladder two only come from survival struggles, spend serious time looking at those and where they came from)
• Your defense mechanisms.
• Your values.
• Your life philosophy. (implicitly we all have a life philosophy)
• The kind of food you eat, the books you read, the media you consume, the work you do, and how all of this was shaped by early survival.
• The way you react to strangers in social situations, how social you are, and how you socialize, even down to the facial expressions you make when you are dealing with people in social situations.
• The muscle tension in your body.
• Your darkest thoughts.
• Your nightly dreams, your nightmares.
• Your highest goals, your highest dreams for your life.
• How you handle money.
• How you dress, what you consider appropriate.
• What you guilt yourself over.

 

 Notice how little of it was chosen consciously and yet all of the above basically constitutes who you are.

"Is it really your true self? Or is it just an accretion of a bunch of random stuff that happened to you as you were bumbling through life just trying to survive by the skin of your teeth?"

The mind is very good at backward rationalizing to itself the way you are and how it is for very good reasons and doesn't need to be questioned.

If you aren't really willing to change yourself at the identity level, how can you expect to get any significant, meaningful change in your life?

The deeper you go the more it feels like some part of you is dying, and the more results you can get, it's very counter-intuitive.

Half the battle is noticing and accepting that that part of you has to change.

 

Notice how your choices were shaped by survival demands

Spend a lot of time contemplating who you are as a result of the love you didn't receive when you were young.

**None of this is good or bad, it just is survival. Don't judge yourself, it'll interfere with your psychic archaeology, do it neutrally.

...Sometimes it's something very simplistic, sometimes convoluted, but it stayed with you to this day.

• Forced to go to church
  • Now you hate or love religion.
  • The difference between those two paths can be razor-thin, as little as a single word, one wrong or right word.
• Got approval for acting the class clown
  • Now are very extroverted and social.
• Approval for getting good grades in school
  • Pleasing authority figures, it's how you learned to get love.
• Approval for being pretty
  • Now obsessed with playing that up.
• Maybe your first girlfriend cheated on you
  • Developed an anti-feminist, anti-women ideology.
• Maybe your mom/dad wasn't loving, so you developed…survival strategy/coping mechanism/fear/insecurity.
• Your dad was a businessman.
  • You changed your identity to earn his respect.
• Grew up rich/poor
• White/black/asian
• Fighting with your parents or had divorced parents
• Grew up with animals
• Reading lots of books
• Watching lots of TV or playing lots of video games
• Hung out with certain kinds of friends
• Bullied in school
• Laughed at for your height
• Mother yelled at you and criticized you constantly
• Father was inept/inefficient/ineffective provider for your family
• Father was very critical of you
• Household was religious
• The whole family ate junk food
• Were an only child
• Less good looking than average kids in school

 

All of this creates biases in your mind and compensation mechanisms.

Many inadequacies could be misperceptions, complete illusions, sourced from some childhood interpretation.

Distorting your perception of reality because you can't even imagine living without them anymore since survival is such a serious matter.

 

Examples from Leo's life - 1:23:20

Leo had to learn American culture and fake it until he made it to fit in socially as a child while learning English as a foreigner after moving to the U.S.

This lead to constant second-guessing in social situations, overcompensating, people-pleasing, introversion, and not enjoying socializing as much.

It both has very big pros and cons and trade-offs.

 

**Genetics also play a significant role, they have to be accepted and only the survival situations and cultural programming can really be changed.

 

Psychopaths, sociopaths, criminals, narcissists, multiple personality disorders, schizophrenics, alcoholics, what do all these people have in common?

All of these are the result of survival situations.

Much of your core identity was created around the avoidance of deep suffering.

 

What shaped you the most are the sources of the deepest suffering during the first 20 years of your life and the sources of the deepest love in your life.

Closest family members probably were some of the biggest sources of your deepest suffering and love.

 

Mind says: "Yes, it's dysfunctional and it creates suffering but not as much suffering as I would have gotten if I hadn't created it."

It takes courage to take down your armor, but you can upgrade your armor and find healthier coping mechanisms, healthier survival strategies.

 

Be careful about where you try to get love from because you can try to get it from very dysfunctional places. 

From authority figures, from external sources

You want to be able to feed yourself your own carrots.

 

Replace the ways in which you get love.

The partial and contingent ways that you have developed for more holistic expansive ways 

Episodes: Self-love, What Is Love part 1 & 2

 

Bottom line:

You are confusing your survival patterns and strategies with who you are.

You become attached to them because you formed an identity out of them you have in other words become your survival.

This is a problem because survival always ultimately fails. In the long term as they say we're all dead.

 

It's to show you just how contingent your worldview is, how arbitrary, how precarious.

 

This helps you to detach from your worldview and to stop treating your worldview as this special.

It's not who you really are and it's not how reality actually is

Science is not how reality actually is science is a survival strategy.

 

For the most part, it's fantasies, and houses of cards you've built that allow you to barely survive.

You are acting out deep survival patterns that are deeply unconscious within you without realizing that you're doing so.

So you're justifying them as important, true, and real. They aren't, they're a fantasy.

This is just the beginning of the unraveling of self-deception.

 

Start to recognize how your survival strategies limit you.

The biggest mistake people make is that they confuse survival with truth or with goodness or with love.

Survival is a thing holding you back from truth goodness and love.

The more seriously you take this process the more you do the exercises the more you will dilate that bottleneck

 

Anything that allows you to survive and to thrive especially thrive gets backwards rationalized by the ego-mind as true valid and good.

It's always the ego's job to rationalize whatever it's doing as being good, your mind is doing this every day.

The ego is carving out its own version of Goodness but it's always a finite piece of the pie.

Hitler basically said: "I only like this much of the pie."

People carve out different sizes of pie but all of them are still less than one percent of the whole pie.

What nobody understands is that the entire pie is Absolutely good

The entire piece, the entire pie, is just Love. The pie is Love itself, it's infinite Love, an infinite Love pie.

You can't love the whole pie because it'll kill you. So you love little pieces of it that don't threaten you.

 

Key questions:

How are your top fears and insecurities shaped by your early survival challenges?

How did your early survival challenges shape your values?

What strategies did you invent to get love?

In what ways are you still overcompensating?

What are some outdated survival patterns, armors, and defense mechanisms that you still act out today?

How have they served you well in the past? How are they limiting you today?

What would it look like if you let them go?

What are you afraid would happen if you let them go?

 

Have compassion for your early survival situations.

You just did the best you could.

You can do better now with more knowledge, more experience, more consciousness, higher teachings that you didn't have back then.

It's easier to do this when you're young.

 

As you have compassion for your own early situation have compassion for the early situations of others who probably had it worse than you.

Hitler had very little choice about his early situation.

Whenever you see somebody doing something you don't like or that you hate ask:

"What was the early survival situation that he was cornered into where he was forced to learn these bad habits these dysfunctional survival strategies?"

 

Can you see why people's world views are so different, why people don't get along and why people don't understand each other?

They had such different survival situations.

 

"All the evil people in the world that are doing stuff you don't like that you hate all they're doing is they're just surviving in the only way they know how the best way they know how.

Their survival situation and their environment offered them no opportunities to know more. Opportunities for education, for spiritual work, for personal development advice, for these kinds of videos, for mentors, and gurus, and teachers who are loving, and kind, and wise, and truthful, and unbiased, and who could guide them, but this is extremely rare. It's much more common to have mentors, and teachers, and adults who abuse you, exploit you, manipulate you, control you, mislead you, feed you fantasies, brainwash you, use you selfishly to serve their own survival."

 

 

In conclusion, you are a robot acting out a survival script, 99% of you.

Spirituality is about transcending that script.

 

Once you see everyone is just acting out their survival script you stop taking things personally.

All the ways you struggled to survive as a kid left karma, patterns, scars, wounds, and insecurities, and samskaras in your psyche, and now you're left coping with those scars.

Spirituality is about purifying and healing those scars, transcending survival altogether, and finding aspects of life that are beyond survival.

Development is about finding more nuanced and functional ways of surviving. As important or even more important than the spiritual work.

 

Every generation faces new survival challenges and develops unique coping mechanisms with unique blind spots and limits and trade-offs.

A never-ending cycle of growth into more consciousness, and love, and various limitations and biases and resistance that holds us back from doing that individually and collectively.

 

Key distinction:

Notice how most people around you are surviving reactively not consciously.

 

Opportunistic/reactive survival vs conscious survival.

Stop surviving opportunistically because down that road lies evil and devilry.

Follow a higher purpose, live life for a higher purpose, you will be rewarded for it. There are trade-offs and it's harder at first.

 

**The majority of you listening to me are missing survival. Handle your survival, get good at mastering survival.

Don't get too far ahead of your skis with the spiritual stuff.

[FlyingLotus]

@Ismael Thanks .  I was hoping someone would summarize that one.  It's a good episode!

[Ismael]

9 minutes ago, FlyingLotus said:

It's a good episode!

Definitely, I’ll have to contemplate this one for a good while. 

Someone actually stole one of my families’ bicycles while I was taking notes on this one today. 
Perfect timing I guess. 

 

Edited July 28, 2021 by Ismael
Typo

[FlyingLotus]

20 Dream Killers

1. Fear of failure

“What if I fail? All that work and time for nothing."

     The Truth: So your proposed alternative is settling for mediocrity? Life is not as simple as you think. There is rarely true failure. Sure, there is no guarantee that your next business venture will succeed, but you are discounting the valuable insights and progress you'd make even if you failed in the short-term. You're looking at failure in a completely unresourceful and limiting way. Failure is how the best people in the world succeed. You fail, fail, fail... then you get success.

 

2. Stuck in comfort

"I've got a decent life already. It's not perfect, but I can tolerate that."

     The Truth: Then you will never be truly happy. You will never truly tap into the greatest joys in life. You will also feel a background hum of discontentment because:

     1) You know you're capable of more but refuse to heed the call.

     2) You will grow tired of tolerating things.

     Minor discomforts fester into major resentments. Comfort is good, but you can't even fathom right now how amazing you are capable of feeling. Feeling comfortable is selling yourself so short. You are killing off all the greatest peak experiences in life.

 

3. This isn't me

"This is not who I am. I'm not that type of person. I'm not a type-A personality."

     The Truth: "Who you are" is a greatly misunderstood concept, as are personality types. Who you are changes every day and your personality type does not dictate your future. There is no eternal, immutable "you". Your brain is rewiring itself all the time. Who you are today is not who you were 10 years ago. Who you are is going to change in the next 10 years regardless. The question is, will you direct that change consciously or follow media, friends, and co-workers? Living a life of vision and passion is not merely for some people, it's for everyone. Everyone gets joy out of having something meaningful to work towards.

 

4. Setting small goals

"I'll set 'realistic' goals. After all, I don't want to disappoint myself."

    The Truth: The danger is not in setting your goals too big, but setting them too small! You MUST create a compelling vision of your future. It must inspire and excite you or it's not bold enough. Most people fail at their goals because their goals are not inspiring. Having the courage to come up with a bold vision isn't easy, but it is the key to creating an extraordinary life. Don't get caught up in "but-how-will-I-do-it?!" thinking. Generate some courage.

 

5. Fear that you are not enough

"What if I'm just not good enough to rise to the challenge?"

    The Truth: Your potential — everyone's potential — is nearly infinite. You can't even fathom what you could accomplish in your life if you just set your mind to it. This is not just wishful thinking. Think of all the immense challenges you've overcome throughout your whole life. Really! Think about how much you had to summon of yourself. While you can't rise to meet every challenge, you are far more resourceful than you give yourself credit for. Unless you have a physical disease, you can do it, and certainly so if there is at least one other person in history who has. The only question is, will you try? Will you give it your all?

 

6. Lack of time

"I'm too busy with work and family. I don't have time for this."

    The Truth: You're too busy to strategize and design an extraordinary, influential, and rich life? Nonsense! You are too busy with the wrong things. In reality, you simply don't know how to manage and prioritize your schedule effectively. Stop living other people's agendas and start imposing your own. If you've got to hold down an existing job, that's fine, but you've got time to work on this during your evenings or weekends.

 

7. Lack of capital

"I'm barely paying my rent. Finding a purpose is a 'luxury' I can't afford."

    The Truth: That's exactly why you are struggling! You think too small. Living an extraordinary life isn't a luxury, it's the best strategy for achieving financial independence. There are opportunities out there that don't require a lot of start-up capital. You can simply get more income from your current job by building yourself up to the point where management sees that you have more value to offer.

 

8. Too old

"I'm too old. It's too late for me to make big changes."

    The Truth: This is a flat out excuse. Total nonsense! Everyone feels this way at times, regardless of their biological age. I've felt "too old" when I was 25! What a load of bullshit my mind was feeding me! Other people only start to feel "too old" in their 40s or 60s. Unless you've got a serious disease, neuroscience shows that we are fully capable of learning new things and changing everything about your psychology up until death. There is no reason why you can't make a big impact and create an extraordinary life in your 40s, 50s, 60s, and even 70s. In fact, studies show that creative people, and people with a purpose, live much longer.

 

9. Too invested

"So everything I've been doing up to now has been wrong? I can't throw all that away!"

    The Truth: It can be hard to admit that you've been going down the wrong path, especially if you've been going down it for a long time. This takes courage. Unless you're about to die, imagine how much time you still have left to live and how much better that can be if you decide to shift tracks. Also, don't discount the experience and wisdom you've developed with that "wrong track". You will advance much faster in your new endeavours because experiences are transferable.

 

10. Fear of success

"Success won't be that great anyways. I'll have more responsibilities and more stress."

    The Truth: It depends on what you mean by success. I'm talking about feelings — the ultimate goal. You have no idea how much better you can feel when you're living a fully engaged life. It's not a matter of having more money or a prestigious position. When you're on purpose and living your vision, you will feel a deep sense of pride, satisfaction, joy, excitement, and gratitude. Your fear of death will melt away. These are the greatest feelings in the world and cannot be bought with any amount of money. This level of success IS much more than it's cracked up to be. If you're just after money, then you're probably right, it won't be that fulfilling. As far as stress goes, 95% of stress depends completely on your inner game, not external circumstances. There are many ways to deal with stress.

 

11. Up to fate

"If it was meant to be, it will happen 'naturally' on its own. I shouldn't force it."

    The Truth: Total defeatist, fatalistic nonsense! Successful people are self-made. Be proactive! People who want something must go out and get it. Rarely does something valuable just fall in your lap. Stop putting yourself at the mercy of luck, circumstance, or God. If you have a compelling vision of your life, you will be so eager to jump into action that you'll have a hard time sleeping. God helps those who help themselves. Afterall, you don't pray for God to fill up your gas tank or to do your dishes for you. You do it yourself. Neither should you pray for success or happiness.

 

12. Maybe later

"This is great! But I'll start later..."

    The Truth: While there may not be an immediate rush, the real problem is procrastination. You are just using this as a veiled excuse for not getting started. You simply have resistance to getting started. Acknowledge your resistance, don't hand-wave it off as "what's the rush?" The fact is, you could die tomorrow. What is the point of not starting to live up to your full potential today? Right now!!! If you can't summon the discipline to start right now — while this information is fresh in your mind — let's face it, when will you?

 

13. I can't change

"I can't change. I've tried so many times in the past and failed."

    The Truth: This is perhaps the worst limiting belief of all time! The fact is, the past does not equal to the future. We've all been there. We've all tried and failed to make changes in our lives in the past. But we've also all made changes successfully. Make sure you're giving yourself credit for the big changes you have been able to make. If you keep struggling to make a change, it's probably because you aren't using the right strategies or simply don't know enough about the topic. Change is always possible.

 

14. Fear of work

"It's going to be too much work."

    The Truth: You can't be sure exactly how much work there will be or what the work will entail. Actually, it's not really work that you fear, it's the pain of work. But pain is a relative thing and depends entirely on your mindset. If your mindsets and skill levels change, what seemed like painful work can become the greatest joy. Too often we blow the pain of work out of all proportion. Once you're on track with your greatest vision, the idea of grinding through work melts away. That is in fact why pursuing your dreams is so important. You will work x5 harder but feel like you're working half as much as you are in a boring, dead-end job.

 

15. This is wishful thinking

"Living your dream is a fantasy. The real world is harsh and you gotta kill to live!"

    The Truth: The real world can be harsh, but it can also be beautiful and easy. Millions of people right now are living extraordinarily engaged, happy lives. If that's not you, if you're struggling to survive and having to "kill" just to make a space for yourself in this world, and you live in a 1st world country, you are doing something wrong. With a different strategy you can work yourself into a place where life becomes easy. Don't be discouraged if life is hard for you right now. And don't think that there is no light at the end of the tunnel. There is!

 

16. Lack of talent

"I'm not talented or gifted like others. It's easy for them, it's really hard for me."

    The Truth: Talent is a myth! This has been scientifically proven. Most of the people we think of as "great" or "talented" were no more pre-disposed to greatness than others, they just put in more hours. Talent is a matter of diligent effort. It takes about 10,000 hours of experience to grow yourself to a world-class level in any domain of life. If you're willing to put in the hours, you are virtually guaranteed to become excellent. And developing expertise is challenging for everyone. No one has it easy. All the world's greatest experts went through really difficult growth situations.

 

17. Success won't last

"Even if I succeed, it won't last any ways. It will be impossible to maintain."

    The Truth: This is simply a limiting belief and often a self-fulfilling prophecy. While some achievement may require continual maintenance work to keep, the problem can be entirely overcome or greatly reduced by using the right strategies. For examples, maintaining a healthy weight isn't as hard as it first seems because your tastes and thoughts about food change. While many fail at making sustainable changes, that is only because they use the wrong strategies.

 

18. Obligations

"I have important obligations at work and at home. This is selfish and irresponsible."

    The Truth: You have an unhealthy, socially-conditioned negative belief about selfishness and responsibility. You are biologically wired to be selfish. This is a good thing! Counter-intuitively, taking care of yourself first and giving your agenda and happiness top priority is going to make you a better provider for others. Most people cannot help others for extended lengths of time because they are unhappy themselves, or don't have the emotional capacity, or don't have the resources. Once you have an exciting, happy, abundant life, you will naturally want to help others and you will have the resources and knowledge to do it much more effectively.

 

19. What will people think of me

"None of my friends or family is doing this 'personal development' stuff. I feel weird talking about it."

    The Truth: That's probably the chief reason you're not more successful right now... because no one has ever shared these strategies with you. Be open-minded. This is a HUGE opportunity for you to grow and disseminate your findings to friends and family. Once you use these strategies to get results, your friends and family will take notice and support you. You will also get more and more comfortable as you use them and prove their power to yourself. And, sometimes you have to go it alone too, and that can be very rewarding and pleasant.

 

20. Fear of change

"But this means I will have to radically change my life around!”

    The Truth: Yes, you probably do have to make some big changes in your life, and they will probably take lots of time and effort. But, change is good! Your life is too boring, too dry, too mundane as it is. When you bite the bullet and start making these changes, you will feel a sense of relief, and a sense of pride for acting on your dreams. Your best memories in life will be of these times of big change. You will be so happy and thankful a few years from now that today you decided to really invest in yourself. Just picture how amazing your life will be in a few years after you make these changes.

_______________________________________________________________________

 

 

11 hours ago, Ismael said:

Someone actually stole one of my families’ bicycles while I was taking notes on this one today.

Oh no, that sucks!  Sending you positive vibes ✨ ? ✨

Edited July 29, 2021 by FlyingLotus

[StarStruck]

Does anybody have the summary of the trauma forgiving video?

[FlyingLotus]

@StarStruck

 

There it is.

Edited October 9, 2021 by FlyingLotus

[FlyingLotus]

(Part of this summary comes from the Actualized.org textbook.  I also have a youtube video of just the Meditation part.  You can also download it here.)

231. Summary:  How to Deal with Strong Negative Emotions

“The tendency to avoid emotional suffering is the cause of all mental illness. 

To lead a healthy spiritual life we must face problems directly and experience the pain involved.”

—Scott Peck “The Road Less Travelled”

 

-The master key to dealing with strong negative emotions is to allow yourself to fully feel the emotions.  This works on all sorts of strong negative emotions (sadness, hurt, anger, resentment, betrayal, fear, anxiety, shame, demoralization, boredom, even numbness.)

-This solution is very counter-intuitive. (ep: The Counter-Intuitive Nature Of Life.  clip: Emotions and Counter-Intuitiveness.)  A counter-intuitive solution is when the most effective path ends up being the opposite of what you’d naively expect.  Obvious routes can be foolish and shortsighted.  The wisdom of crowds doesn’t work if the crowd is full of fools .

-Success often comes from counterintuitive moves.  You have to do the opposite of what your psyche wants to do or finds comfortable.  Allowing negative emotion to wash over you and feel it fully is counter-intuitive because we don’t want to be vulnerable.  We think vulnerability makes us weak.  Ironically, it's the opposite.

eg: Instead of running away from an assailant, you charge at him.  To impress a girl, instead of bragging about how rich you are, you jokingly say you clean toilets at Arby's.

-Your ego’s mandate is to avoid pain and seek out pleasure.  So, it doesn’t want to feel the full impact of strong negative emotions.  It feels too dangerous.  It doesn't want vegetables; it wants to gobble down candy.

 

     It’s Okay To Be Vulnerable

-The first step to artfully handling strong, negative emotions is to allow yourself to be vulnerable. There’s no shame in it.  It’s not weak.  It’s the human condition.

“But Leo, I was vulnerable in the past and I got hurt.  Why go through that again?”

-You’re right, in a sense.  Your psychology consists of wounds you received in childhood, especially if you have a neurotic psychology.

            As a child, you were vulnerable and got hurt.  The hurt was so painful you had to shut down.  You erected defenses, survival strategies and various shields to protect against emotion.  Now you spend a lot of mental energy maintaining those defense mechanisms.

• clip: Your Mind Distorts Reality to Survive (8 mins). 
• clip: Transcend Your Script (6 mins). 
• clip: What Shapes You Most (5 mins).

            These defense mechanisms are a sham.  A big part of becoming a mature emotionally healthy adult is to dismantle all the defense mechanisms that you erected in your formative years, because they are now weighing you down.

-The real truth is that you’ve been denying you are vulnerable, no matter how much power you have or try to amass.

• Even if you’re a super muscular, juiced up, macho guy, swaggering around the gym, trash talking other guys, you could still die from a bullet to the head.
• Even the richest person in the world or a military dictator with thousands of bodyguards is still vulnerable.  In fact, the reason he needs all those bodyguards is because his power makes him more vulnerable.

 

     Become a Super Conductor

A superconductor is a material that allows current to pass through it with zero resistance.  This is real.  You can create a wire and pass current through it, over very long distances and not a single drop of power is lost to resistance!

            This is what self-actualizing people do, they become better and better super conductors of negative emotions and all emotions in general.  This is what developing emotional maturity means.

-Instead of resisting and denying emotions, truth, or reality, become a super conductor.  Have zero resistance to negative emotion..  The standard automatic ego reaction is to resist every negative emotion.

 

     Four Automatic Ego Reaction

Because your ego doesn't want to accept and feel pain, it will…

1. Act stoic and cool.  At the first little stab of negative emotion your ego’s knee-jerk reaction is to act cool.  Deny the feelings, deny what’s happening and sweep it under the rug until the rug starts to stink.
2. Distract.  Entertainment, drugs, food, sex, etc.
3. Suck in pain and tense up.  You tense all your muscles and hold in the pain.  You become tense and  emotionally constipated.
4. Control and manipulate.  Rather than feel emotions, you start to invent schemes to weasel your way out of it.

-These four things kill your ability to become a super conductor, because they create resistance.  That resistance creates most of your suffering in life.  We’re going to “fight” that resistance by opening up and allowing the pain in and letting it flow through.  You need to train your mind for that.

 

     Process for Strong Negative Emotions

-Guided Meditation starts at 13:18.  A video of just the mediation is here (if Leo wants me to take it down, I will.)  This process is simple, but challenging.

1. Conjure up one of your strong negative emotions.
2. Relax your body.
3. Get in touch with the present moment.
4. Connect with your body and feel where that negative emotion resides. Feel it deeply.
5. Don’t judge anything that’s there, fully feel it. Let it in.
6. Allow the emotion, accept it, don’t resist it.
7. Observe with curiosity what’s flowing through you.
8. Allow it again, don’t begin resisting as you observe the emotion.
9. Do nothing. Sit down and FEEL. FEEL IT. FEEL IT FULLY and ALLOW it. Conduct the emotion, let it pass through you.

-It will come in waves, every time you get hit by a wave just repeat this process.  Notice the tension and tightness in your body.  Relax your body – belly, shoulders, hands, and arms, jaw.  Breathe deep.  Breathe into your belly.

-Observe your emotions with curiosity.  Not just in this exercise, but in life.

-Don’t distract yourself. Don't go order a pizza, or have sex, or have sex with the pizza delivery guy.  Don’t go into fantasyland about your emotions.  Just sit there and allow them.

-Your job is to be a superconductor and nothing else. Being a super conductor is not fancy or attention grabbing.  It’s just lying there and letting current pass through.  The ego has difficulty being passive.

-Notice how much tension and tightness is in your body.  This is how resistance happens.  You’ll forget as you go about your day.  With awareness you’ll remember to relax your body and relax into your emotions. 

-This is a skill, a practice you have to develop over time.  You’re developing more awareness and consciousness through this practice.

-So, you don't need to “get rid” of negative emotions.  Emotions will go through you, disappear and come back and disappear again.  Likes waves in the ocean.  That's how emotions are.  You don’t need to do anything about them other than fully feel them.  This is the behavior of a self-actualized, emotionally mature individual, the opposite of a neurotic one.  What's a neurotic individual?  Someone who resists and denies reality.

 

     Labelling and Resistance

-Recognize that you have a habit of resisting and negatively labelling emotions.

-You have been resisting and labelling emotions your whole life. This habit is strongly ingrained.  Anytime you feel something you don't like, even just a little bit, you automatically label it as “bad or evil or negative” and you immediately say, “No!”

-Negative emotions aren’t “bad.”  There’s actually no such thing as a negative or bad emotion.  An emotion is just a sensation coursing through some part of your body, along with some mental imagery and verbal labels.

            “Bad” is a judgment.  If you feel hurt, notice that the hurt itself is not “bad.”  That's just the ego’s judgment (ep: Evil Doesn’t Exist.)  Bad and evil are just problems of perception.

           When you label, you create a separation between that thing and yourself.  You then feel compelled to resist, deny and fight against it.  (clip: The Universe Is Selfless [8 min])  If you want to develop real emotional maturity you have to stop labeling things as bad, negative or evil.

-This isn’t some “positive thinking” or magical thinking or just soothing yourself.  This goes much deeper.

 

     Live In Truth

-Denying your emotions and the present moment is to deny reality.  You’re dissociating from your body by going into your mind or into fairytale land.  This process helps you face reality instead of resist it.

           When you relax your body instead of tense up, when you feel your emotions freely, that's facing reality.  Your emotions are “What Is.”  That’s aligning with the truth.

-What’s here in reality is not bad: it just is.  So stop resisting your emotions.  Stop labelling them.  Falsehood is when you call things bad because of fairytales in your mind.

-It’ll take lots and lots of practice to do this, but it'll be very worth it.  Meditation is a very good habit because it teaches you mindfulness. 

“But Leo, couldn't I cause myself some kind of psychological damage by feeling emotions?”

-The feeling of hurt doesn’t actually hurt you.  Psychological damage is caused by resistance.  A superconductor is not damaged by the power that surges through it.  Electricity doesn’t damage a lightning rod because it has such low resistance.  The electricity goes straight into the ground, or gets channelled into the clocktower to charge the Delorean.

(This is also why you can’t destroy a waterfall with a wrecking ball.  @Emerald has an excellent video on the power of non-resistance.  So, don’t go punching waterfalls, please stick to the rivers and the lakes that you’re used to…)

-If you feel an emotion that's causing a lot of suffering, that means you’re resisting it on some level.  Pain is inevitable; suffering is optional.

-DO NOT avoid the emotional labour.  The ego wants you to waste time searching for a magic pill that lets you resist, deny and disconnect from reality.  Allowing your emotions is the exact opposite of what you really wanted, but the nice thing is it’s a real solution. 

-Fake solutions sweep dirt under the rug until the dirt starts to stink, fester and create a lot of problems.  A real solution cleans away the smelly dirt and leads to true freedom, but it takes courage.

-See the bigger picture here.  Don’t do this just to solve one problem.  To get over some boyfriend or girlfriend who cheated on you, or some business partner who screwed you over.  That will pass anyway.

-Can you imagine what every facet of your life could look like if you became an emotional super conductor!!

• What would your relationships look like?
• What would your career look like or your business?
• How much more money could you earn?
• How much more competitive could you be?
• How much more would you enjoy reality?
• How much self-confidence would you have?
• How would you relate differently to your family and your children?
• How much more resourceful would you be?
• How much more effective would you be in the world?
• How much stronger of a leader would you be?
• How much more could you contribute to the world?
• How much more impact could you have on the world?

-That’s why you want to master your emotions.  The quality of your life is determined by the quality of your emotions.  That's why becoming an emotional superconductor will lead you to your dream life.

Edited August 2, 2021 by FlyingLotus

[FlyingLotus]

484.  Summary: The Root Solution To People Pleasing & Loneliness

 

           -This episode is about giving you a root solution to the problem of people pleasing, and loneliness.  It’s an advanced solution, but simple enough to implement.  This will not be ordinary, shallow self-help advice.

           -Leo’s struggled with people pleasing and coming up with solutions to that problem for decades.  When he moved to America he had difficulty acclimating, which led to a people pleasing strategy that started in childhood.  He’s also had epiphanies about loneliness because of his recent advancements in consciousness.

 

People Pleasing is a Survival Strategy

           -For the first 20 years of life we start off with the cognitive development of little animals who have to adapt and fit into society.  Society is a collective game and you learn to play by the collective rules or else you’ll run into problems.  As a child you were acculturated, domesticated.  This isn’t bad; it’s necessary.  Society can't have children biting and yelling at each other like zoo animals.

            To live in a healthy society we need to civilize ourselves, but there are certain costs that come with that.  One of the costs is you start to develop extrinsic reward mechanisms in order to satisfy yourself, rather than just making yourself happy.  Basically, you learn to behave in ways that get approval, love and satisfaction from others.

            When your reward mechanism is extrinsic instead of intrinsic, your sense of happiness gets handed over to others.  They dole out little bits of happiness when you please them, turning you into a Pavlovian dog.  So, you jump through hoops to get the love, satisfaction and approval you desperately want.

 

           -One bad habit Leo developed that took a long time for him to unwire is getting approval through good grades.  At school Leo was very into academics and developed a reward mechanism where he needed to get As to feel good.  It was a way to get praise from the authority figures in his life (I didn't know Leo’s parents were Asian, East Indian & Jewish ).  Good marks became an ego thing and a big driver in his life.

            Sure, there were good side effects, like discipline and getting educated, but he was basically performing academic tricks for people.  Once he left school, it became difficult for him to find his sense of satisfaction in life, because there were no more teachers or universities giving him grades or rewards.  He felt empty.

            If he’d been less self aware he could’ve substituted teachers and grades for a girlfriend and money.  Then he would’ve been expecting rewards, praise and As from his girlfriend or bosses.  Luckily that didn’t happen to Leo, but that’s what happens to most people on the treadmill of approval

• (Aaron Abke has a great video on why achievement and approval cannot equal love.)

 

-You have to be very careful about what extrinsic reward mechanisms your ego-mind develops. If other people hold the goodies that dictate your behavior, then you constantly have to do stuff for them to get your reward.  This will never lead to a satisfying life.

• clip: Your Mind Distorts Reality to Survive [8 mins]. 
• clip: Transcend Your Script [6 mins]. 
• clip: What Shapes You Most [5 mins].

 

-If you're a people pleaser, you’ve adopted the habit of getting your happiness extrinsically from others. It’s a problem for everyone, but even more so for women.  Generally, women derive more of their satisfaction from building social bonds and networks than men.   Women tend to be helpers and caretakers, especially the more feminine they are.

            So it becomes this giant social game where you only feel good when you please others (clients, co-workers, bosses, children, your partner, likes on Tweetbookagram, etc.)  Also, with people pleasing, it’s easy to fool yourself into thinking you’re being selfless and spiritual by “serving others,” when you’re really just seeking approval.

-The problem is it never lasts, no matter how much approval you get or people you please.  It just becomes another material pursuit, in the same way that men chase money or sex.  It's never going to deeply satisfy you, so you just keep chasing for more.

 

-The solution is to take back control and sovereignty over your own reward mechanism.  To make it completely intrinsic, so that the satisfaction, love and praise you want you give to yourself.  You need to rewire your mind.  (10:13)

-Your mind might be objecting and resisting this because you've built this extrinsic circuit, which means that stuff has to happen in the outer world for you to feel good.  “I have to see ______ happen and it has to match my personal standards.  I can only allow myself to be happy if…”

            These extrinsic reward cycles happen no matter what you're pursuing (business success, sexual conquests, the valuation of the stock of your company, pleasing your husband, getting your children into Harvard, etc).  It's all the same thing, structurally speaking.

            The solution is to short-circuit all that and go directly to giving yourself the happiness and love you want.  That’s how you really apply spirituality to get a deep sense of satisfaction.

-It’s a very counterintuitive solution.  (A counter-intuitive solution is when the most effective path ends up being the opposite of what you’d naively expect.)  Obvious routes can be foolish and shortsighted.  The wisdom of crowds doesn’t work if the crowd is full of fools.

 

Make Your Own Doggy Treats

• “But Leo, sure I can bullshit myself into feeling happy and giving myself rewards, but it's not the same as getting an actual, external, objective reward.  It’s new age, self-help, positive thinking bullshit.  It's not the real kind of happiness that depends on external conditions being met, like X amount of dollars in my bank account, or helping people in the real world, or having sex…”

-It almost feels like you're cheating when you do this and in a sense you are.  These are the cheat codes to life.

-Most people grow up in a survival situation where they had to please others, like their family, teachers, classmates, authority figures, adults at church and so forth.  So the idea that you can just give yourself happiness and approval directly without any middlemen seems crazy.  It feels like you’re not working hard enough to get your doggy treats.

 

-Consider that there's actually something very deep that you're fundamentally missing here.  You’re giving away your sovereignty to others by letting them define what is true and what’s not. You’ve looked up to authority figures to validate reality for you, instead of going inside and sovereignly telling yourself what’s true.  (ep: How Authority Works)

           Well, the same thing happens with satisfaction, happiness and love.  You've given away your authority and now you can’t feel satisfied because you're looking for other people to satisfy you.

 

-You’ve turned this into an aspect of your ego.  Your ego has a self-image of being good, or selfless, or hard-working or generous.  In order to live up to that image, you have to constantly work and work and bend over backwards to feel good enough.  You might even feel guilty for allowing yourself to feel loved for no reason at all.  You’ve invented standards and conditions for what you think you must do to "deserve love.”

 

-No matter how many nice things you do for your clients, your husband or children, you're never going to be deeply satisfied by that. You're caught in this trap of constant struggle to get that drug of approval, of gratitude, of praise, of satisfaction from others.

            Maybe you have an expectation that you can only feel love when somebody thanks you or tells you you’re a good person. Now that you've set this standard for yourself, you’re a slave.  You’ll be bending backwards for others until they thank you or tell you you’re a good person.

            If they don't give you what you think you deserve, you’ll get bitter because you've been denied the reward.  You're like a dog who jumped through a hoop, but the master didn't see it and didn't give you a treat, and now you're upset at the master.

 

-It’s the same with career success.  A lot of people are scared of being satisfied with their career.  They think being happy will stop them from working hard, from growing their company to $20 million, or $50 million, and that they can’t be satisfied if their company's only worth $20 million….the problem is once your company does reach $50 million, you still won’t be satisfied.  You’ll want $100 million and then a billion and where does it end?  It doesn’t, that's the problem.

 

-This is not a very intelligent situation that you've placed yourself in.  Wouldn’t it be much nicer to take back your sovereignty and control?  Take back full responsibility for the reward mechanisms that make you feel happy and satisfied with yourself.  To stop letting other people from having control over that.  To be your own master.  To make your own doggy treats.

 

Happiness: Dual versus Non-Dual Approaches

-The dual approach says there's a self and others, and you become happy by doing things for others.  This makes the other responsible for your happiness.  The other could be a family member, a lover, an animal, an institution you work for, etc.

-The non-dual approach says what if you integrated all others into yourself?  That’s what you're doing when you practice non-duality.  You realize everything is One, that there are no boundaries between self and other.  Non-duality lets you realize if you and others are one, why don’t you just give yourself the doggy treats?  At first this feels fake or like cheating, but recognize that this is a more advanced way of living life.  It's even more difficult to take responsibility for making yourself feel happy.  This is actually a sign of maturity and growth.  It takes quite a bit of consciousness just to open your mind to this possibility.

• “But Leo if I can make myself feel happy, loved, praised, then I don't need the $50 million company, or my children, or my wife to make me happy.  If I don't need the awards and achievements, then why not sit around basking in my own happiness?  Doesn’t that short circuit all of life!?!”

That's the genius of this method. (20:35) This is a feature, not a bug.  You want to be autonomous, to free yourself up from depending on others’ good opinion.  If you're a people pleaser it means you derive your happiness externally, you’re acting manipulatively to get those doggy treats.

 

-If you took back responsibility for your happiness, you would be so full of love and satisfaction that it would naturally pour out of you and back out into the world.  You could behave without attachment or fear. You’d be truly coming from a place of of fullness.  From happiness, not emptiness.

            When you come from neediness, you'll manipulate others to get them to meet your desperate needs.  But when you no longer need their treats, you can act in the highest good. You can act according to your authentic values, then you're truly free and autonomous.

-Then when somebody doesn't give you something, it's okay.  You’re not attached so you don't get needy, bitter and resentful with them.  You don't judge them for not acknowledging you.

-The solution here is very simple: take back ownership of your reward mechanisms and satisfy yourself.

 

Non-Duality Epiphanies About Other People

-Over the last 10 years Leo’s gotten a lot of satisfaction through his life purpose, which is doing his work at Actualized.org.  He shares deep insights and understandings with others, like you reading this right now ?.  He gets enormous amounts of satisfaction from this, but after some years he’s started to notice there's a problem.

• First, he has to constantly release new videos, otherwise he won’t get the pleasure of the feedback, of delivering wisdom.  This puts him in a perpetual quasi-slavery to doing this work.
• Second, no matter how many videos he releases (over 500 now) he never feels fully satisfied.  He’s still gotta release the next one and the next one and the next one to keep getting that satisfaction.
• Third, he’s reached such profound levels of consciousness, understanding and insight that it’s beyond the point of being able to share them with anybody.  There's almost nobody who is conscious enough for Leo to communicate his deepest insights about reality too.
• In the past his discoveries and wisdom were at a level where he could communicate them to us.  Now, he can't even share them with us anymore.  Lately, he’s come face to face with the realization that he won't ever be able to share his insights with any other human in the universe.  At those super high levels of insight there's no sense of other that exists to communicate with.  It’s a very deep degree of non-duality.

-So, the highest levels of insight Leo achieves will be totally unshareable, incommunicable.  He’s had to resign himself to that.  It’s been a bummer because sharing profound insight was where he got the most juice out of life.

 

The Trap of Sharing

-There’s actually a trap of trying to share with others.  A lot of the happiness we get in life is from sharing.  Which is why people share things on social media.  They enjoy laughing together.  Same with experiencing some achievement in life.  You share it with your loved ones and they congratulate you.  Sharing makes your achievement feel much better and juicier.  Whereas if you have nobody to share it with, then your achievement sort of falls flat.  Like, what’s the point of winning an Olympic gold medal if none of your friends, family or anyone in your life will ever know about it?

            In consciousness work, when you reach the gold medal, nobody else knows you've reached it.  That’s the bittersweet tragedy of doing really deep consciousness work.  Nobody will understand or know when they look at you that you’ve just had this massive God realization.  Only you will know.

 

-That’s ultimately because only God can know itself.  Only God can appreciate its own beauty, its own infinitude, its own goodness and its own intelligence.  That’s not a bug, that’s a feature.  So Leo bit the bullet about his consciousness work and said,

            “I’m going to keep having these very very deep awakenings, and I have to be okay with them being incommunicable.  I have to rewire my own thinking and my own reward mechanism, such that I just bask in my own infinitude and my own self-realization.

            It’s not going to be about other people praising me or even helping others achieve it themselves, because the levels of insight that I've reached, that I'm trying to actualize, nobody else who follows my work will ever reach.  It's just impossible.

            I’ve given up on any possible satisfaction from teaching it, therefore I can only get satisfaction from basking in it myself.  I have to be at peace with that and enjoy it.  Just allow myself to be satisfied at my own self-understanding.  It’s literally self-indulgence.”

-That’s actually where true satisfaction and happiness comes from.  It's not about sharing with others, pleasing others, achieving goals or getting rewards from others.  It boils down to: what is your capacity for self-satisfaction?

-Do you want to be happy in life?  Do you want to experience the highest levels of love?  Well, it can't be extrinsic; it must be intrinsic.  You must be able to sit and just bask in your own joy of yourself, in the beauty of existence that you're conscious of.

            Just sit quietly, silently.  Don’t try to share it with others or spoil it by writing or shooting a video or taking a selfie.  Just bask in it.  That's harder to do than it seems, because most of us have been conditioned to talk about it or share it.  When you do that you're actually creating a subtle sense of other and you're not deepening your appreciation of what that thing is.

-I want you to notice that.  So, next time you find some cool video online or something funny, instead of sharing it with your friends, pause and don’t share it at all.  Just enjoy and appreciate it, all by yourself.  Recognize that it's just really really funny for you.  Recognize that you don't need the entire social matrix to validate it for you.

 

What About Loneliness? (33:10)

-When your reward mechanism goes from extrinsic to intrinsic, it's almost like locking yourself in a solipsistic bubble.  That sounds negative, but it’s not.  You become your own source of truth, happiness, love and praise.  Your own source of humor.  You’re fully happy being the only person in the world laughing at something.  A lot of people wouldn't be satisfied with that because when they laugh, they want others to laugh too.

 

-It’s very counter-intuitive to deliberately, consciously lock yourself in a solipsistic bubble.  As a thought experiment, imagine you were the last person on Earth.  Could you still enjoy life?  If the answer is no, that's a problem.  It shows that you've built a lot of extrinsic reward mechanisms.

• “But Leo, that’s a horrible situation.  I would want to kill myself if that ever happened.”

That just shows the depth of the rot in your mind.  That thought experiment takes away all the external sources of validation and enjoyment for you.  You would be forced to find other ways to please yourself in this situation.

 

-What you want to do is reach a point where, if you were the last person on Earth, you could still be totally joyful, happy and live out the rest of your days by yourself, just basking in the beauty of reality.

            In that situation, reality hasn't gone anywhere.  The social aspect to life is not really where the deepest joy comes from.  The deepest joy comes from appreciating existence itself. The beauty and intelligence and majesty of it.  Building that connection, that metaphysical connection to reality is what spirituality is all about. (ep: What is Spirituality.  Summary is here.)

            You want to build such a deep metaphysical connection, such a personal connection with the raw fabric of reality itself, that it makes you complete in and of itself.  Everything else is just the cherry on top.  You don't need people, or comedy, entertainment, sex, your family, you can just be happy by yourself.  Make yourself satisfied.  Doing that will simultaneously solve being a people pleaser and being lonely.   

-The reason you feel lonely is because you haven't built a deep metaphysical connection with yourself and reality.  If you get lonely easily that shows you haven't spent enough time in solitude, connecting with yourself.  You've built a lot of reward mechanisms that have to do with getting approval, validation, love, entertainment and humor from others, but you’re not truly able to enjoy life by yourself.  This is a problem.

 

The Greatest Love of All

• “But Leo, I’m being selfless and sharing with friends, with my children and my spouse.  What’s so wrong with that?”

-What’s wrong is that you're giving your power away.  You're giving your sovereignty away and making yourself a slave to them.  Remember, they will never ever, ever, be able to validate the deepest form of love for you.  The deepest truths, the deepest satisfaction in reality can only exist within yourself.  That's not something you can transmit to anyone else.  You can only experience it within yourself.

 

-Your friends and family are not going to validate or celebrate your awakening with you.  They are not going to be conscious enough to rise to the level that you will rise to through this work.  Almost nobody you know will be conscious enough to understand or appreciate what you've accomplished other than yourself.  You need to start changing your reward mechanism such that you feel complete with your own self-recognition and self-understanding.

            You don’t need to feel lonely, isolated or misunderstood because of this.  Ultimately, God is the only entity in the universe, so it must acknowledge and bask in itself as what it is.  This is crucial for you to reach the highest levels of satisfaction in life.  You can recognize your own innate love, goodness and consciousness.

            By the time you accomplish this you will no longer be a people pleaser and you will no longer be lonely, at least not in the ways you used to be.

 

-Leo’s not telling you to leave your family or to never be social again, or to be mean and bitter towards people.  He thinks it’s important you maintain some degree of socialization so you don't become a total recluse.  It’s just that your primary source of life satisfaction must come from a deep, meaningful relationship to reality and not your relationships to others.

 

-Ultimately you want to get to a point where the deepest love, satisfaction and joy you get in life comes only from yourself, when you’re in solitude.  You can still go to a party, or a club, or pick up girls, have children, socialize with your family, but when you're doing that it’ll just be the icing on the cake.  You need to be your own cake.  The common mistake is to make other people the cake, when they should just be the icing.

            The core of your being has to be grounded within yourself, not out there in the hands of others.  Otherwise you’ll be in this dysfunctional relationship where you have to please others, or sacrifice your own values and truth, or lie and manipulate, or construct fictions to play these social games.  Even if you do all that, it will still never fully satisfy you.  The only true satisfaction is within your own self.  So start building towards that.

 

Developing a Deep Connection to Reality

-So how do you do all this?  You practice by feeling love within yourself for no reason at all.  Appreciate yourself as the conscious entity that you are.  Appreciate yourself as the universe, as God, as infinity, as absolute love, as absolute truth, as pure awareness.  You should be able to deeply appreciate the very fabric of existence itself, even if you’re just sitting in an empty room.  That's what spirituality is really about.

            That creates the foundation of happiness upon which everything else is built.  If you don’t have that fundamental kernel of happiness you will never be satisfied.  No amount of houses, cars, sex or children will correct for that.  No amount of good deeds either.

 

-There’s a lot of creative ways you can come up with to practice.  You could do a good deed for somebody without them knowing about it.  Just keep it to yourself.  Normally, you’d tell someone to get praise or credit, but don’t do that.  Be the only person in the universe that knows you did that good thing.

            Let’s say you leave $500 in someone’s mailbox or donate it to a worthy cause.  The next day, when you're sitting there reflecting on your life, just feel good and bask in the fact that you did that because you are good. That act was an expression of your own universal goodness.  Realizing your own innate goodness is worth infinitely more than your spouse or friends telling you how good you are for doing that thing.

 

-When others they tell you how good you are they're coming from a very materialistic perspective.  They don't have a deep spiritual connection to the actual goodness of the universe or to the goodness within you that drives you to love and take action in the world.

            So the kind of praise they give you will be superficial praise.  It will be highly dependent upon their judgments of you, because as soon as you do something that they disagree with they will stop praising you.

            In fact, they might even chastise you for this good act.  They might tell you to spend that money on yourself, or give it to your family instead of some random neighbor.  This might make you feel bad.  You expected praise, but got called foolish.  Then you're going to feel bad.  Whereas if you didn't tell anyone and you could just bask in your own goodness.  You know what you did is good and selfless, even though others may not agree.

            So why do you need them to acknowledge you?  Cut that umbilical cord.  Stop needing others to acknowledge your inner goodness, your love, selflessness, consciousness and intelligence.  It should be enough for you to recognize these things simply within yourself.

 

-This is harder to do than you think.  First, it requires self-reflection.  Second, it requires slowing your life down such that you actually have time for solitude.  Most people don't even have time to contemplate the good things they've done all week because they're too busy chasing the next thing.

            That's how absurd this situation is.  If you can’t even be grateful for the good things you do for yourself, how can you expect others to do that for you? You don't even recognize your own innate goodness, then you get bitter at others for not doing so either.  Of course others don't recognize it in themselves too, because to recognize one's own innate goodness takes a high level of consciousness and maturity.

 

-Most people feel so unlovable, so broken, so undeserving, so guilty that they don't even allow themselves to take in praise.  The survival conditions they were raised in were so severe that praise was considered a luxury.  So a lot of people motivate themselves by brow beating themselves, by telling them how bad they are and then this becomes an entire way of life.  You feel bad about yourself, even though you do good things, but it’s never enough.

 

-So imagine reaching a state of consciousness and spiritual development where you're able to just sit in an empty room and be fully satisfied.  Without having to do anything.  Where you’re so in awe and in love with the sheer existence of the room, by the raw physical fabric of reality itself.  You are so appreciative of your direct experience and of existence itself that it's enough to satisfy you.

            The more you contemplate and bask in the absolute truth and the absolute love of the present moment, the more conscious you become of the spiritual nature of reality.  The deeper and deeper sense of bliss you experience and then you bliss out literally on just existence itself and that becomes the best part of your day.  This is the ultimate level of true satisfaction.

 

-It’s very different than the way you live now.  Where you begin the day by downing some coffee, then rushing off to work and doing this thing and that thing, taking care of the kids and by the end of the day you're exhausted.  Maybe you even feel like you've been productive and therefore you allow yourself a little bit of happiness.

            So instead of all that, just come back home, sit in a room by yourself and luxuriate in the glory of existence that you are.  All those external activities are actually distractions to this bliss.

 

What About Selfishness?

• “But Leo but isn't this extremely selfish to live in this solipsistic bubble?  I'm just sitting there and sort of fellating myself in my own mind.  It seems almost dysfunctional!”

-It seems dysfunctional only compared to how most people pursue happiness.  The true dysfunction is running around trying to please others, to buy stuff or achieve goals to get happy.

-What you're not understanding is that if you're able to reach this level of happiness and self-satisfaction, when you do go out there and socialize or run errands, which you'll still do, you’ll be coming from a much deeper place than you are now.  You're not going to be a thirsty dog running around looking for a little bit of satisfaction from someone else.  You have taken responsibility for giving yourself the satisfaction and love that you deserve.

            Then when you're out in the world, you're gonna be so satisfied, so full of love you’ll naturally pour that love out to others and be naturally selfless.

 

-By withdrawing into yourself, you might become isolated, solipsistic and even selfish for a period of time.  As you withdraw and cut off some of those social connections you might not be there for your friends and family as much as you would have when you were their little lap dog.  That's true, but later you're gonna come back on your own terms, as a truly sovereign conscious being and then after having helped yourself, now you will be in a position to help others.  You can't really help others when you're enslaved to them.

 

-This is very counter-intuitive.  It’s paradoxical.  To live the most selfless life you must first live very selfishly by withdrawing into yourself.

            Look at the classic story of the Buddha.  He supposedly lived a life of luxury and privilege.  He had a whole palace full of family members, uncles, aunts, a father and mother.  He had a wife and a child and one day, in the middle of the night, he walked out on all of them.  Didn't even say goodbye.

            Imagine how betrayed they must have felt.  Then he wandered through the woods for seven years meditating, pursuing awakening until finally he came back.  So he didn't abandon them forever, but he needed to go through that period of selfishness.  That selfishness was to realize the infinite self, the selfless self.

            When he realized that, he came back and helped them realize it too.  You can't really help others to love unless you're able to realize love for yourself.

            A problem many people pleasers and women in abusive relationships face is they get stuck.  Ladies can have this self-image of being very loving and selfless, but it's not true love.  It's not true selflessness, at least it's not the deepest, non-dual form of it.

 

-What you'll realize if you do the spiritual work deeply and you awaken is that love is not something you do.  Love is something you are.  Goodness is not something you acquire through good deeds, charity and bending over backwards.  Goodness is what you are.

-It’s not easy to raise your capacity for love, to cultivate and recognize your own goodness, to allow yourself to feel satisfied for no reason other than the consciousness of existence itself.

             Your mind will not want to do this.  Your ego-mind controls you by setting up all these conditions for happiness so that you perform for it.  That's how it gets you to do all manner of survival activities.  The fact that you need to trick yourself in order to get stuff done shows you that you’re not coming from the highest level of motivation.

 

The External, Material World is Illusory

• “But Leo, this sounds like self brainwashing.  You're just sitting in a room bullshitting yourself into happiness.  That's not truth, that's just new-age, wishful thinking stuff.  If I build a $50 million company, that's objective, that's tangible."

• “When I get happiness for building that company or getting a million dollars or having sex with some hottie or raising beautiful children, that’s tangible material stuff.  That’s what deserves true satisfaction, not sitting in a room doing nothing.  That's cheating.”

-Part of the materialist worldview is thinking that the external world is truer than your inner nature.  It’s actually the opposite.  The truest thing is your existence, your consciousness, your God nature, your intrinsic beauty, yourself as the universe.  That's the real, absolute truth. (59:00)

            So, your money, children and good deeds aren’t what's objectively real.  That’s all derivative, second order stuff.  They’re all illusions.  Its meaning and existence are predicated upon the fact that you exist, that you are God dreaming up the universe.  The objective, tangible world is a figment of your imagination.

 

-You need to recognize and re-collect your sovereignty.  Use that as the anchor point from which you feel, think and take action.  If you do that you will overcome the problem of  loneliness, of people pleasing.  You will overcome the problem of endlessly chasing things that never satisfy you.

            You will also overcome the ultimate problem of being unable to communicate the infinite beauty of the universe to other people.  Only you can recognize the infinite beauty of the universe with your mind's eye, through your own consciousness.  Nobody can do this for you. You can share bits and pieces of it, but you can’t fully transplant the infinite beauty of the universe into other people’s experience of life.

 

Tips for Application

-Keep building and building this type of solitary satisfaction until it gives you near-orgasmic levels of pleasure.

• Do good deeds for their own sake, not to get praise from others.
• Appreciate the world around you more.  Gratitude turns what you have into enough.
• Start doing things by yourself, especially the things you’d normally only do with others (going to the movies, a restaurant, a waterpark, etc).  Appreciate it without needing to share the experience or get validation from others.
• Enjoy a scenic place by yourself.  Go to a national park, a beach, a beautiful city and just walk around.  Luxuriate in your solitude, in this beautiful, kind of melancholic, solipsistic bubble.  Don't talk to anyone.  Appreciate and soak in the beauty that's there.  Let that be enough to satisfy you.
• Dine at a beautiful restaurant by yourself.  Order a really nice meal, maybe something special or exotic, and eat it slowly, deliberately.  Appreciate and enjoy the heck out of it in a way that you never would with friends.  When you’re eating with friends you’re too distracted to even notice the thing that you're eating.
• Go to the movies by yourself.  Enjoy it just as much as you would with friends, or even more because friends can distract you by talking or eating popcorn.  When you're done watching the movie, don't talk about it with anybody.  Resist the instinct to text your friend about it.  Just appreciate the movie as it is, by yourself.
• Appreciate solitude, period.  There’s a positive, melancholic side to solitude.  It’s nice to be alone with your thoughts, to contemplate and appreciate what’s in the present moment. 

-If you’re alone, but feeling lonely, learning to appreciate the alone times will make you more grateful when that special person does arrive.  So let that craving go.  Ideally you want to be satisfied with others and by yourself.  Only when you’re coming from that place of self-love can you be authentic.  You won’t need to control or manipulate others to stay with you.  If they come, great.  If not, you can still enjoy yourself.

-These tips are deep spiritual work.  If doing any of them makes you feel like a loser, it shows how addicted you are to external rewards.

 

-Building up the muscle of beingness, of wonder, of awe at the universe will make you appreciate other people and activities so much more.

            Leo’s not saying you should never spend time with other people.  It’s good to maintain a healthy social life.  He’s just saying you can turn solitary travel into a practice to build your satisfaction for life.  You're still going to socialize, but you’ll do it from a deeper place of satisfaction, not desperation.

 

-The fundamental truth is that, in the end, you are the only conscious entity in the universe.  So if you don't appreciate the universe who will?

            This episode is trying to guide you towards a very deep, profound appreciation of existence, of reality that can only be done by you.  It’s not going to be done by your unconscious friends and family who take existence for granted.

            This appreciation of reality requires training.  It’s not something you learn in a weekend.  Most people won't to do it.  They don't even know they should be doing it.  So, you’re one of the few humans on the planet that’s going to do this, if you do it.

 

-You can’t imagine the level of satisfaction and joy this will bring, especially if you keep it up over ten, twenty years and beyond.  You’re going to have a level of joy that nobody around you can understand.  You’re also not going to be able to share that with anybody but yourself.  But it’s not going to be a problem, because you've trained yourself to luxuriate in your own joy and you will finally feel complete.

 

Feeling Unloveable

-Most people feel they don't deserve love.  You solve that problem by giving yourself more and more and more love until you realize you are love.  Then you're always conscious of the love that you are, that the universe is.  Then you don't need other people to give you love and you don't feel unlovable anymore.  This solves all your self-esteem problems too.

• (Aaron Abke has a good video on self-love.)

-This solution is very counterintuitive because the ego mind has co-opted true love, happiness and satisfaction to manipulate you into doing its survival bidding.

              If you don't take ownership over that process you're never going to be satisfied in life.  Survival and the mechanisms your ego mind has constructed aren’t about happiness.  The ego-mind is about surviving, not thriving.  The ego’s not designed to make you happy.  That’s why no matter how good you are at surviving, it's never going to make you happy. (1:10:30)

              You can't pay someone to appreciate life for you.  If you can't appreciate life you're going to be miserable and depressed.

 

-You will not be satisfied with anything shy of infinite love because that's what you are.  Deep down consciousness knows what it is and consciousness is seeking to reunite with its true nature which is infinite love.

              You have love, beauty, intelligence and goodness inside you, but they have been obscured by layers of fear, shame, survival scripts and social conditioning.  You're out of touch with your own divine nature within.  You’ve got to discover that and when you do, that's what you will really want.

              All the external stuff you've been chasing has been a poor substitute for what you were really seeking, the divine nature within.  Discovering that is the root solution to people pleasing and to loneliness.

 

-Now that you know all this, what are you going to do?  If you don't do the work nothing's going to happen.  Ten, twenty years will go by and you’ll be even more miserable, because you’ll wish you’d started this work much earlier, but then it's gonna be too late.

-So start now. Come up with ways to start practicing this.  Ultimately, you’ll have to have some enlightenment experiences to your true inner nature as love, God and absolute truth.  That will make you more present, grounded and appreciative of the beauty that is here. (1:13:50)  That will build a metaphysical connection to reality and you’ll appreciate reality more and more and more and more.

            These days, Leo can just look at a fork and marvel at the intelligence of it.  This might sound absurd, and if somebody told Leo five years ago that a fork had any intelligence to it, he’d think you’re some crazy, new age hippy.

• (I always though this scene was silly until I learned about non-duality:  The Matrix’s Spoon boy)

 

-These days when Leo looks at an ordinary dinner fork it baffles him that most people can’t see the infinite intelligence. So everything gets turned upside down and then life just becomes so profound.

            The depth of life is true richness, not money or external possessions.  It’s really about your capacity to appreciate the intelligence of the design, of this entire dream that you're in.  Then just looking at reality makes you feel full of delight and joy, because what was just an ordinary fork, car, person, cat, place, you see for what it really is: a finite manifestation of God, of the infinite mind that you are a projection of. Then you can see and appreciate its innate beauty, intelligence, goodness and its connection to the whole universe.

 

Shallow vs Deep Solutions

          - Notice that many of the problems in your life can be solved at multiple levels.  You can find a lot of shallow solutions to the problem of loneliness or people pleasing.  This episode presents a very deep solution.  Deep solutions are more difficult to understand, implement and they take longer.  They’re a long term investment instead of a quick fix.

          - When you make deep, long-term investments that solve a problem at the root, you don't have to keep fighting the problem over and over again for years.  You won't have to live with the problem anymore.

            Shallow solutions will never hit a problem at the root.  Quick fixes will waste your time, money and won’t stop the problem from reappearing, maybe even for the rest of your life.

           -Life is designed in such a way that you get out of it what you put into it.  In this way life is fair.  So, how much do you want to put into it and get out of it?  How deep do you want your life to be?  Do you want to have a really deep profound experience of life?  Well then you're going to have to dig deep and do the work, because it’s not going to just land on your lap.

          - Everything Leo teaches is predicated on the idea that you want to live a more profound life than the average person.  If you don't want that, you’re wasting your time at Actualized.org.  You should go watch someone else.  The depth in your life that's possible is so profound, none of you can fathom it.  It’s truly infinite and impossible to communicate.  Hence, how deep you go depends on how deep you want to go.

Edited August 5, 2021 by FlyingLotus

[RickyFitts]

Amazing work, @FlyingLotus, thanks so much 

[cjoseph90]

@FlyingLotus Thanks for your hard work, really intresting. great summarys

[FlyingLotus]

 

 

Every Spiral Dynamics Infinity Stone Color has now been collected: 

Stage Red and Stages Blue, Orange, Green, Yellow, Turquoise. 

So, when you’re done reading, snap your fingers like Tony Stark and say, “I…am…Spiral Dynamics Man ? "

 

449. Summary: Spiral Dynamics - Stage Purple

“The child who is not embraced by the village

will burn it down to feel its warmth.”

—African proverb

-This comes from the work of Claire Graves, Don Beck and Christopher Cohen who developed Spiral Dynamics (ep: Spiral Dynamics.)  Spiral Dynamics is a developmental model that looks at the evolution of culture and human psychology throughout time, both at an individual and collective level.

-This model is extremely useful for understanding the development of yourself, of people around you and of different cultures and societies.  It will help you make sense of the crazy cultural stuff that's happening around you.

-Each stage corresponds to a set of values and a level of and moral cognitive development of the psyche.  As we're going up the spiral, there’s an increase in the level of consciousness and complexity to the culture and to one's psyche.

 -You can’t skip stages.  You have to go through each stage to get to the next stage.  Also, no one stage is “better” than any other stage.

eg: Genghis Khan went from a stage Purple upbringing to being a stage Red warlord.  Genghis Khan (6 mins).  

      His rule also created a foundation for Stage Blue and even Orange (2 mins).  His empire established the Silk Road.  He also allowed people to keep their religion, as long as they agreed to also pray to Genghis Khan.  His story is the basis for Danerys Targaryen and the Dothraki in Game of Thrones.

-Throughout life we try to evolve up these stages as quickly as we can, trying to get to tier two which is Yellow and Turquoise.

-Stage Purple is tribalistic, animistic, mystical.  Life is both magical and fragile, because the elements are harsh.  It has primitive, yet deep mystical wisdom and traditions.  It’s 10% of the world population and 1% of world influence because it’s so archaic and out of touch with technology and modern society.

-If you’re living in a relatively developed part of the world, you’re probably around Stage Blue/Orange, maybe even Orange/Green.  At this level of development, modern culture has indoctrinated us with individuality, materialism and consumerism.  (Five Things about Libertarianism [5 mins].)

-There’s a Libertarian myth that each person is a rugged individual, a John Wayne cowboy-type, who survives by himself, no society necessary.  (ep: Why Libertarianism is Nonsense)

“I have the right to my property, my house and my guns.  I want to be left alone and I want things my way!!”

-However, Libertarianism is not how most of humanity lives or has historically lived. The majority of human history was communal life where you lived as part of a tribe.  Having an individual identity is something that's relatively modern.  It's maybe a couple hundred years old to a thousand years old.  In most developed parts of the world, we forget that humans are a tribal species and this leads to all sort of Libertarian absurdities.

 

Stage Purple emerges with the beginning of homo sapiens.

• There’s never been a time in the history of humans where we lived as individuals in the wilderness.  Mother Nature is too brutal to survive it alone.  So, we’ve always been part of a tribe.
• If you look at our nearest ancestors the chimpanzees and the bonobos, you see that they don't survive by themselves.  Bonobo tribe . 
  • They even have a highly social, highly communal, primitive culture, like using tools, grooming each other’s hair, learning from each other.  You don’t see a lone monkey or gorilla surviving by himself in the jungle.  He’d get eaten.  (Learning from Bonobos.)

 

Stage Purple is about being a member of a tribe.

• The Stage Purple tribe is how mankind began and how it has lived for hundreds of thousands of years.  If your tribe dies out nothing else is possible.  Your tribe is your whole life, your whole identity.  Identity is the crux of all development.

 

Contribution and self-sacrifice to the tribe are paramount.

• The individual sacrifices for the tribe.  The tribe trumps the desires of your ego, or to have sex, or to hoard all the coconuts.  Competitive individualists are looked down on because they put the tribe in danger.

 

Life is magical and mystical.

• There's an element of spirituality and mysticism (we also see that at stage Turquoise.) 
• Being with the tribe feels like living in an enchanted magical village.
  • Disney movies do this a lot:  Mulan’s ”Honor to Us All.”  Pocahontas’ ”Colors of the Wind”.  Moana.  Tarzan’s ”You'll Be In My Heart”.  Belle's  “Provincial Life” ?

 

The Stage Purple Family

Stage Purple is a natural extension of the family unit.

• If you take the family as the basic unit of human survival, expand on that and you have a collection of families living together, which constitutes a tribe.  Basically the tribe is one big extended family.
• Like in the family unit, if your mom needs help with her computer, you don’t bill her for your services.  You do it, no problem, because she’s family.  In a tribe, that attitude extends to everyone.  Everybody helps everyone out.  There’s no cold, calculating, business-like transaction where you’re trying to profit from someone else in the tribe.
• The tribe is small enough for everybody to know everyone and their personal business.  There's no sense of alienation and anonymity, which exists today.  If you're living in a big city you probably don't even know your neighbours.
• As a tribe we can hunt together, share new inventions and develop a shared culture, which becomes very powerful as we develop up the spiral.

 

The tribe gives life meaning.

• There's a deep emotional bonding between members of the tribe just like in a family.  You don't want to let your tribe down, so it’s important to contribute.  Contributing isn’t some burden that's imposed by a dictator from up above.
• At the end of the day, once you're done all your survival activities, you can tell stories around the campfire, dance, do art, drumming, music, drink and party, which adds spice to life.  There are group ceremonies, rituals and celebrations.  It’s much better than being alone in a shelter trying to not die.

 

The Stage Purple View of the Universe

Purple seeks harmony with Mother Nature.

• Purple reveres the power of Mother Nature.  Nature is mystical and wise.
• Knowing the environment is a matter of life or death.  Knowing when the sun sets and rises tells you where to plant crops.  You need to predict rainfall.  Studying the stars and sky lets you navigate through the mountains.  You need to find good hunting grounds.  Adds to the animistic sense of spirituality.
• Time is cyclical, based on the seasons.  Not linear time, but a cyclical sense of time.  Time is connected to the movement of the sun, stars, seasons, zodiac sign.

 

Polytheistic.

• There isn’t just one God.  There’s usually a multiplicity of spirits that you have to appease and work with.  There are conflicting spirits, some good, some bad, some petty, some mischievous. You can find these figures throughout mythology.

 

Animistic: everything has a spiritual essence.

• Animism is the belief that objects, places, and creatures all possess a distinct spiritual essence.  Purple obeys the desires of mystical spirit beings in nature. They have a life force and intentionality of their own.  (The sun spirit, the water spirit, the plant spirit, etc.)
  • eg: If we anger the river, the river will stop flowing and we’ll die of drought.  We must appease the river by praying to it and performing rituals.  The tree spirit in our oak tree is good and watches over us at night, but the tree spirit in the enemy tribe’s willow trees are bad.

 

A mystical sense of cause and effect.

• Without science, it’s unknown how nature functions, which makes it deeply mysterious and mystical.  Purple can draw false conclusions about causes and effects in nature.
• There's no theorizing about the logic behind performing a rain dance for the crops, or trying out different dances to get different results.  That’s not how Stage Purple sees things.
  • eg: The shaman might do a rain dance and believe he caused the rain to fall.  The crops might go bad, and the tribe might think it must have dishonoured their ancestors in some way.  Earthquakes and lightning probably come from earth, wind and fire spirits who demand a weekly vigorous, ceremonial, tribal dance ?.

 

Stage Purple Mindset

Stage Purple is more right-brained than left-brained.

• Purple is more intuitive, feeling-oriented, body-centred versus logical, rational and scientific.
• There’s no formal science at this stage of development. There's no writing system, so you can’t document and codify your understanding of the world.  The logical mind is more about analyzing and categorizing things, which is good for scientific purposes or writing a book, but it's not so good for survival in the jungle.

 

Stage Purple uses intuition to navigate through life and reality.

• Gut instincts are better for survival than logic.  You'd be surprised how far you can get with intuition and instinct.
  • eg: Stage Purple people who are very experienced, like a shaman or a medicine man, can have very keen senses and extraordinary perception which comes from massive experience.  The Shaman’s been living in the jungle for 50 years, going on hunts and gathering plants.  He’s become very very attuned to tracking animals, reading footprints, looking at weather patterns, predicting where lightning is going to come from, when rain is going to fall.  He can hear different animal sounds or bird calls and based on that he can predict whether it's spring or fall, or if there are predators nearby.
• The shaman has become very very perceptive through intuition and feeling. This allows him to survive much better than logic would.  All the logic in the world won’t help a scientist with three Phds survive in the Amazon.

 

Following tradition keeps you alive.

• Survival at Stage Purple is very precarious because of the harsh environment.   Traditions have been tested for hundreds and thousands of years by your ancestors and by their ancestors.  They figured out to navigate the jungle through trial and error.  Many of them died figuring out where to get clean water or safe shelter.  Now you are relying upon their traditions to help you survive, so you follow them faithfully.  So there's a great value placed upon retaining ancestral and tribal memory.
• Your survival literally depends upon your ancestors.  It's not just nostalgia.  That shared ancestral memory, knowledge and wisdom of how nature works is the tribe’s version of google (or Actualized.org ?).

 

Purple’s rigid attachment to tradition leads to its downfall.

• They’re closed-minded and unable to adapt to other cultures and perspectives.  They’re too rigid to co-operate with other tribes, which leads to conflict, battle and death.  It also leads to the need for Stage Red’s ruthless, warlike individualism.

 

Stage Purple Culture

The tribe relies on a verbally shared history to pass down wisdom.

• Because Purple is usually pre-literate, they can’t create a manual on how to survive the elements.  Without science, they also don’t know how nature really works.  So, the tribe has a collective memory with rigid rules and rituals on how to behave.  Without these traditions you could easily do something that kills you.
• You could eat the wrong plant and get poisoned.  You could hunt the wrong animal and get eaten.  If you do anything the wrong way you could die, and you can’t just call 911.

 

Traditional customs are extremely important.

• The tribe relies on traditions and history to give people a sense of grounding and a sense of identity.  The culture tells you who you are, where you came from and how you're supposed to behave.
• Because everything is traditional, there's not a lot of creativity or innovation.  You just learn and obey the traditions.  There’s a traditional, “right” way to hunt, cook, cure disease, make medicine, dance, celebrate, handle funerals and the death of loved ones, etc.  It’s also important to know what’s taboo, what not to do.

 

Vivid myths, parables, legends and telling stories.

• Storytelling is extremely important for pre-literate cultures.  They existed before writing systems were invented.  So, the history and wisdom of the tribe was memorized through stories and myths that were passed down from ancestor to ancestor to ancestor.
• To make sure those stories were kept intact and not corrupted, there wasn't a lot of room for creativity or embellishment.  You had to learn those ancestral as faithfully as possible.  So, a lot of emphasis is placed upon the history of the tribe.
• This actually plays a very important existential role in one's psyche. It’s important to retain a track record of where you came from.  Tribes do this through mythology and sharing of stories.
• Today, modern science tells us where we came from.  There’s a sperm and an egg, a genealogical record of ancestors and so forth.  But science doesn’t exist at Stage Purple.  There was no historical record you could google.  You had no clue what happened 5000 years ago, except through the tribe’s stories.

 

Culturally rich in folk stories, songs, dances, artwork and crafts.

• They compensate for a lack of writing with other art forms, which can be very beautiful and sophisticated.  A lot of anthropology is about collecting these cultural artifacts and putting them in museums.
  • eg: Sacred objects, traditional songs and dances,  costumes and traditional dresses.  Family relics, masks, tattoos, jewelry and other adornments.

 

Has many folk stories about mystical creatures.

• Each culture has their own stories of mystical creatures who are often mischievous tricksters who have to be appeased or reckoned with.  Spirits, sprites, pixies, elves, gnomes, trolls and magical creatures come from basically every culture.

 

There are unwritten rules about how the tribe works.

• Because there's a deep sense of tribal history, there's lots of implicit rules that get developed over centuries of survival.  Rules about hunting, dancing, celebrating, talking, eating, etc.  One of the challenges anthropologists face when they discover a new tribe is there are implicit rules and customs you have to follow in order to not offend the tribe.
• So one of the challenges is they have to spend years really going “full native,” as it's said, living and learning within that tribe, through trial and error.  Once they learn these unwritten rules, they can fit in and function.
• These rules are usually not rational or scientific. They’re sort of intuitive heuristics for survival in that particular environment.  It also varies depending on the unique environment the tribe developed in.  (re: Survival heuristics.  The Himba tribe in Namibia can detect multiple, imperceptibly different shades of green, but have difficulty seeing the difference between green and blue.)

 

Words have magical powers.

• Words are sacred, magical and powerful.  Prayers, blessings and hexes.  Words are used in dances and rituals.
• Communication with the spirit realm.  Out of Body Experiences.  Astral realms.  Psychic Abilities are considered real.
• Summoning nature spirits and ancestors.  

 

Ordinary events are seen as mystical signs or omens. Superstition runs rampant.

 

Purple doesn’t realize culture is an arbitrary construction.

• The tribe’s culture was created unconsciously as part of its survival activity.   It’s not chosen, it just is.  It’s helped their people survive for thousands, if not tens of thousands, of years.  Survival is so brutal at Stage Purple that they’re loathe to change.
• It takes many stages above Purple to get to a point where culture is seen as something that's socially constructed and malleable.  Purple also doesn’t see how culture can be counterproductive, destructive or a form of brainwashing.

 

Purple thinks its culture is the only way, not just another way.

• Stage Purple has difficulty imagining other ways of living. Once other tribes starts interacting with it, the tribe's isolated bubble gets punctured.  This creates a problem.  Purple feels threatened by diversity and alternative perspectives about culture, rituals, gods and methods of handling survival.
• If another tribe performs a rain dance differently, it’s not just different, it’s “bad and evil.”   It’s definitely not better than our raindance.  Our tribe’s traditions came from our ancestors and we value our ancestors.  We don't value their ancestors.

 

Stage Purple is the early origin point of all religions.

• These ancient traditions got co-opted by religions that came later.  They became systematized, orthodox, and stripped of mysticism.
  • eg: Not eating pork or shellfish.  It’s a carryover from Pagan customs from a time when eating either of those was dangerous because they carried disease.
  • eg: Christmas was originally the Winter Solstice, which was an important date for hunter gatherer tribes.  It’s the peak of winter, after that it starts going towards spring.

 

Stage Purple Social Roles

Fixed social roles.

• There are fixed social roles, the chieftain, the medicine man, the shaman, the hunter, the warrior, the fertile young bride, etc.  Everybody's playing their role.  These roles are very fixed.  Cooperation is necessary for survival.

 

Gender-based division of labor.

• There’s usually a gender-based division of labor.  Women do the cooking and maybe gathering plants, whereas the men go hunting and manage the defensive perimeter.  The men go on group hunts to increase their chances of victory, instead of going alone.
• There’s an emphasis on protecting fertile women. Women have many many children because half those children will probably die from lack of sanitation or lack of food.  Not all the children will even make it to adulthood.

 

Preference for boys.

• There’s lots of needed manual labor because survival is difficult.  Boys tend to be physically stronger and better at survival than girls.

 

Arranged marriages and selling daughters.

• Arranged marriages and selling of daughters is very common, usually when they're only 12 to 15 years old.  The more beautiful the girl, the more reproductive value, the higher the dowry.  The girl doesn't have any choice about this.
• The dowry is sort of the extra payment that the parents get for nurturing and raising a girl instead of a boy.  Because she was physically weaker than the boy, but to compensate she has reproductive value.

 

Sexuality is free and not taboo.

• Tribespeople are very comfortable with their sexuality and nudity.  Sex is not seen as bad or dirty.  It’s why you see half naked women in those National Geographic documentaries.  These cultures also tend to be polygamous and have lots of children.
• The repression of sexuality comes at Stage Blue with the advent of orthodox religion and morality.

 

Raising children communally.

• The child isn’t just raised by the mother and father, but by the entire village.  It helps to socialize children and get them used to interacting with lots of people.  Whereas modern society is isolating and young people don’t have as many social bonds, which leads to mental illness and socialization problems.

 

Respect for the Elderly.

• Modern society tends to discount the elderly as feeble.  In our modern culture we can go to google or some Harvard Phd and get information in books, or from other humans who lived 1000s of years ago.  You don't have that in a pre-literate society, so literally it's the most experienced person who's still alive.
• At Stage Purple, there’s a lot of value placed upon the elderly.  There tends to be naturally emerging leaders based on seniority and experience.           
• There's a council of elders who are well respected and they serve the tribe selflessly.  They coordinate things, but not in an autocratic way.  Leaders emerge from seniority.  It's not dictatorial or a bunch of power hungry monarchs, like a Stage Red mafia boss.

 

A Chief instead of politicians.

• So the chieftain tends to be old, very experienced, has survived many battles, went on many hunts and has a lot of wisdom.  When you can’t write down knowledge in a book, you can see how valuable life experience is.
• The chieftain is not a dictator. He's there to selflessly serve the tribe and pass on wisdom.  He's not in it for personal gain.  The chief is going to be on a close emotionally bonded basis with everyone he's dealing with.  Unlike a corporation or mafia boss, he’s not trying to leech wealth from everyone underneath him.

 

Stage Purple Resource Gathering/“Economy”

Stage Purple is basically small-scale communism.

• It's pre-industrial, hunter-gatherer and usually pre-agricultural, although it’s capable of being agricultural on a small scale. (Generally as humans became highly agricultural they settled down and moved to stage Red and Blue.)
• There’s no formal legal system, court system, laws, military, taxation, or formal market.  So, it’s the dinosaur of governments.
• The chief or elders usually distribute goods based on the needs of the people.  It’s not about climbing a corporate ladder and becoming the richest and most powerful.

 

Sharing of resources.

• There's a strong emphasis on the value of reciprocity, sharing and cooperative interdependence.  Resources are distributed based on need.  The tribe shares its resources, food and property to maximize tribe efficiency.
• Sharing is a necessity for survival in a harsh environment.  This creates a natural insurance policy.  If I can’t find fish today, maybe you’ll share some of your surplus with me, then I’ll cook dinner for you next week.  There’s no sense of profit motive.

         

Communal or Tribe property.

• There’s so much collaboration and cooperation that property is communal, not private.  There's no strong sense of individual property rights. You could own your own house, but it’s also the entire village's house.

 

Social bonds > Business & Profits

• There's not much to do in a Purple society other than social bonding.  So that's the most valuable thing, moreso than wealth acquisition or collecting material objects.
• Purple isn’t very materially productive.  That's not something they prioritize.  Life isn’t about how much money you can earn or working 14 hours a day to get ahead, to buy stuff you can’t afford to impress people you don’t like.  They’re not buying the latest technology or cool gadget or a new purse, like Stage Orange.
• Being on “Island Time.”  Business schedules aren’t as important as social bonds, which is annoying for people with stage Orange goals.
  • When Westerners do business in a Purple culture, like India, Jamaica, even rural Nova Scotia, stuff probably won’t get done on time, or quickly compared to an Orange culture like New York.  Purple will prioritize a community celebration, or their niece’s wedding, or public holidays.  (Chinese culture doesn't do that)
• Nepotism is also rampant, because Purple is so family oriented and social bonds are more important than profit.  Blood bonds trump competence.

 

Tribal warfare.  Us vs Them.

• Stage Purple is so deeply tribal that there's an intense in-group/out-group dynamic, which leads to tribal warfare, blood feuds, racial violence and potentially ethnic cleansing.  This is where Purple starts to phase into Stage Red.
  • eg: Genghis Khan went from a stage Purple upbringing to being a stage Red warlord.  Genghis Khan (6 mins).

 

A Purple tribe can’t stay little forever.

• They will grow, take up more resources and more of the environment.  Soon more tribes pop up and will start to interact.  That’s when you get tribal conflict.  There's a very deep social and emotional bond within a tribe, but when another tribe comes along they're seen as foreigners.
• Especially because each tribe is so beholden to its own traditions; they’re each very very inflexible.  Each tribe is close-minded and traditional, so they clash with each other.  They can't see the relativity of each other traditions that comes much further up the spiral.
• The other tribes are threatening.  They have different traditions, values, culture, ancestry, appearance, etc.  How do you make the tribes cooperate?  This creates a very serious problem which ultimately leads to the necessity of higher stages of the spiral.

 

Examples of Stage Purple

-There's a lot of profound, effective and practical wisdom to be found within these Purple mystical spiritual traditions.  It’s not all fairy tales and magical thinking.

-People think non-duality is a modern, advanced thing, so it's amazing to see our ancestors from thousands of years ago already had it figured out (like with Aztec philosophy and Teotl.)

-There’s tons of examples, here’s just a sampling.

Tribes in…

• Sentinel Island:  The Sentinelese Tribe - Untouched For 60,000 Years.
• Amazon:  Korubo tribe.  Documentary about the Huaoaranis tribe.  Tribe that inspired Avatar.
• African tribes:  Zulu, Bwiti, Surma, Hadza.
  • The movie Black Panther drew inspiration from Stage Purple tribes. 
  • Black women leaving Christianity for traditions from their homeland
• Indonesia:  Korowai tribe.  Top 7 Indonesian tribes.
• Papua New Guinea:  Chimbu Skeleton Tribe.
• Native American tribes:  The Comanches.  Lakota.  The Apache.
• The Middle East: Afghanistan’s Koochi Tribes.  Saudi Arabia. Iraq. Syria. Uzbekistan.  Bedouin tribes in Oman.
• Russia:  Chukchi people in Chukotka.  Altai people.
• South East Asia: Bajau Laut tribe.
• India: Jawawa tribe.  Jarawa's message for the world (10 mins)
• Siberia:  Nenetses clan. Becoming a man in Siberia.
• Australia: Aborigines documentary (50 min).  The Purple prototype.
• New Zealand: Maori.  Maori Warriors.

Cannibal tribes.

• Korowai tribe in West Papau, Indonesia.  CNN reporter almost gets eaten by an Aghori.  Although that often gets exaggerated because of Western stereotypes.

Hawaiian culture

• Various Hawaiian ceremonies:  Kahunas, luaus, leis, ceremonial food, cookouts.  Aquaman does a Haka.

Indian culture and spirituality is very tribalistic.

• India has 100s of tribes, each with their own language.  Being so fragmented has created a barrier for business and modernization.  It’s tough to pick a primary language for the country when each tribe wants their own language to be the dominant one.
  • Lots of strange arcane spiritual traditions, based on herbal medicine, psychedelics, witchcraft, black magic in places like Mayong, Assam.
  •  Ayurveda.  The Healthy Gamer channel covers this subject a lot.  (It’s a great channel.)

East Asian cultures:

• Tibetan spirituality.
• Nepal’s Kumari, the Living (child) Goddess.
• Japan’s Shinto religion.  It’s separate and distinct from Buddhism.  Very ritualistic, worships Kami who’s the disembodied life spirit that pervades everything, rather than a monotheistic God.  Similar to the force in Star Wars.  What is Shinto?
• The Maneki Neko. A golden cat with the paw that moves back and forth. A good luck charm.  ლ(=ↀωↀ=)ლ
• Fortune cookies.  A superstitious holdover from Purple.  Something can be Purple and still have a recent origin.  A lot of Purple stuff gets discovered and reinvented.
• Acupuncture.  Chi energy.

 

Teotl and Nawa notions of spirituality

• Very profound, effective and practical wisdom.  Turns out non-duality’s been figured out for thousands of years. 
  • (ep: Aztec Nonduality).

 

Cultural Practices

• The "Circle of Life" ? from The Lion King.  The sacred Tree of Life.
• The gift economy and sharing of resources is a Purple idea.  Used at Burning Man and various burns around the world.
• Old spiritual texts and scriptures.
• Ancient mythologies.  Sun worship.
• Animal gods and spirits.  Animals have a spirit and life force of their own, which is pagan and sort of anti-Christianity.  Stage Blue treats animals as just personal property, which is not the case at Stage Purple.

 

Ceremonies

• Tattoos that the Maori of New Zealand paint on.  If you take magic mushrooms and look in the mirror, you can see those patterns on your face and body.
• The Day of the Dead
• Shrines.  Ancient burial grounds.  Burial rituals.
• Stonehenge.  There are lots of different stone circles around the world.

 

Art & Music

• The Paleolithic cave paintings like you see at Lascaux, France and other places in Spain and elsewhere in Europe.
• Folk tales and fairy tales.
• Chanting in drum music.  Drum circles.  Traditional songs and dances.
• Sweat lodges.  Vision quests.
• Tribal tattoos.  Face paint.  Masks.
• Symbolic costumes and ceremonial dress.  Jewelry.
• Totem poles.
• Sacred objects.  Family relics.

 

Superstitions

• Knocking on wood.  The lucky rabbit's foot.  Black cats.  Prayer altars.
• The Evil Eye.  Urban legends.  Astrology.  Secret handshakes.

 

Magick

-Leo tried various alternative healing modalities (alternative health stuff starts at 30min) to diagnose and treat what turned out to be SIBO.  Very interesting ?.

• Crystals and gems.  Teal Swan on Crystals.
• Witchcraft.  Romanian witches.  Modern Witch in Brooklyn.
• Wicca.  Modern day Wicca.  Gerald Gardner.
• Protection Magick.  Protection from other people.  Banishing spells.
• Shamanism.  Neo-shamanism.  Paganism.
• Voodoo. Modern day Voodoo.  Voodoo and possession.  Haitian Vodou at the Haus of Hoodoo .  Voodoo Museum in New Orleans.
• Curses and hexes.  Casting curses on politicians.
• Magical healers.  Summoning healing spirits in Haiti.
• Sage cleansing in Native American tribes.
• Lovespells.  Warnings about Love Spells.  Wiccan.  Voodoo.  In modern Salem.  Witches in modern day Massachusetts! ?

 

War and Tribal Conquest

• The Haka.  Originally used to rev up tribesmen before war.  It’s is used today for cultural performances and revving up testosterone in sports.  Maori All Blacks Haka.  “Cheerleading” at an all-boys prep school.  Try doing this before a work out!
• Animal sacrifice.  Human sacrifice.  Blood oaths.
• Cannibalism.  Eating one's enemies.  It's a trope where you defeat your enemy, cut out his heart and eat it while it’s still beating.
• Suicide bombing.  This happens in very underdeveloped parts of the Middle East that are very tribal, very clannish.  The culture, the value system there is that you sacrifice for your tribe.  So if your tribe is getting exterminated you will gladly strap a bomb to your chest in the defense of your tribe.
  • Suicide bombing is a hijacking of that stage Purple “sacrifice for the tribe” value system.  It combines with toxic stage Red and gets weaponized.  It seems irrational to Westerners, but not if you look at it using spiral dynamics.
• Kamikaze pilots in World War II is a similar thing.  It’s a very self-sacrificing force that was part of Japanese culture.

 

Psychedelics & Plant Medicines

• Herbal medicines.  Ayahuasca mushrooms + peyote combo.  Amino muscaria mushrooms.
• Ayahuasca ceremonies.  Peyote ceremonies.
• Mexican shamans used Salvia divinorum for divining purposes in witchcraft.  Magic mushrooms and datura are used in ceremonies.
• Boiti African tribes use iboga for ceremonies.

 

Rites of Passage

• South Korean coming of age rituals.
• Fulani tribe in Benin (trigger warning ?).

-Boys becoming Men

• 5 Shocking Ceremonies (trigger warning ?).
• Navajo ceremony.
• Bar mitzvahs.
• Boiti tribe use amanita muscaria mushrooms for this rite of passage.

 

-Girls becoming Women

• 5 Shocking Ceremonies (? trigger warning ?).
• In the Apache tribe.  Apache endurance test.  Navajo ceremony.  Hoopa Valley tribe in Northern California.
• Teeth filing in Indonesia.
• Amazonian tribe in Belem.
• Bat Mitzvahs.  Debutante balls (last 60s NSFW).

 

-Elaborate mating and marriage ceremonies

• Click here to watch Leo describe a sex act no one would enjoy, not even with the most beautiful person in the world ?❤️‍??.
• Bosniak Bridal tradition in Kosovo.
• Dowries.  Fertility goddesses.

 

Purple in Modern Culture

There’s tons of examples, here’s just a few.

• The whole idea of the “noble savage.”
• Missionaries going to tribes to spread Christianity.  The missionaries are stage Blue going to Purple tribes to “convert the heathens.”
• In modern society, Stage Purple lessons start getting integrated in kindergarten, when you’re thrown into a group of other kids.  You learn how to share and play with others.  High school is all about playing political games of who's the coolest kid in school.  There are all these different tribes of kids based on where they sit in the cafeteria.
• Small company work environments, like a startup or team of 10 people.  It's a modern invention, but has a tribal, communal stage Purple dynamic.  Like an extended family.   

 

Books:

• Don Miguel Ruiz’s “The Four Agreements.”  Ancient Mexican Toltec wisdom.
• Paulo Coelho’s “The Alchemist.”
• Joseph Campbell’s “The Hero with a Thousand Faces” covers Purple mythology.
• Carlos Castaneda’s books, especially “Don Juan.”  Carlos Castaneda books arose after the 1960s psychedelic revolution.  Amazing books filled with lots of ancient, tribal wisdom.
  • Don Juan has a very animistic worldview.  He’s reading signs into a crow flying over his head.  He’s attributing mystical things to that crow, and it’s because he’s from Stage Purple.  He’s both naive and wise, like a Purple shaman.

 

Movies & TV:

• James Cameron's “Avatar.”  The Navi, those Blue cat looking creatures are a ripoff of the Native Americans.
• ”The Medicine Man” with Sean Connery.
• "Dances with Wolves."
• Miyazaki films are heavily influenced by Shinto and spiritual animism.  Is Miyazaki Inspired By Shinto? (13 mins).  “Spirited Away" is a must watch, awesome film.
• Many Disney films and songs.  Mulan’s ”Honor to Us All.”  Pocahontas’ "Colors of the Wind."  Moana.    Tarzan’s ”You'll Be In My Heart”.  Belle's "Provincial Life" ?.

 

Games:

• Patapon is a rhythm game about controlling a little group of tribal guys who go to war against other tribes and defeat creatures.  (Very cute and catchy.)
• Turok the Dinosaur Hunter.  The treasure hunting elements in Tombraider and the Uncharted series (for us non-boomers ?)   
• Legend of Zelda. It’s set in an animistic, mystical world, with influences from the Shinto religion.  It has shrines, various water and fire spirits.  The world has a magical, mysterious vibe with artifacts and different races of half-animal, half-humans.
• Ghosts of Tsushima has a strong Shinto element in the game.  (It’s also very beautiful and fun to play.)
• Horizon Zero Dawn.  Also a fun game to play, and beautiful.  (Tripcaster is OP.)

 

Stage Green Incorporating Stage Purple

• Stage Green tries to integrate our Purple ancestors’ tribal wisdom, harmony with nature, sharing of resources and a communal way of living.
  • eg: The hippie “Envision” Festival in Costa Rica.  Stage Green with a lot of Purple influence.  Modern hippie stuff is heavily stage Purple.  Same with Burning Man.
• Stage Green is also reacting against the materialism of stage Orange.  It looks back fondly on the sharing of resources and the gift economy.
• There’s been a reevaluation of psychedelics, plant medicines, organic farming, sustainable agriculture, the value of shamanism and mysticism.
• It overly romanticizes Purple.  Purple doesn’t scale with billions of people and modern technology, like nuclear weapons, tanks, airplanes, internet.  It also can’t account for the environmental impact of a Stage Blue/Orange/Green and society.

 

Slogans/Phrases/quotes

• Ubuntu is Zulu for “I am because we are” or “A person is a person through other persons.”
• All for one, one for all.
• Don't say it or it might come true
• There’s no place like home.
• We are all part of Mother Nature
• Blood is thicker than water.
• You'll jinx us.
• This is how we do things around here.
• Honor the ancestors.
• That will upset the spirits.

 

What Triggers Stage Purple (1:34:42)

• Disrespecting tradition, elders, ancestor and spirits.  Life is so fragile at stage Purple that disregarding “common sense” could get the tribe killed.
• Lack of bonding and lack of reciprocity.  Not being a team player.
• Libertarianism.  Trying to do your own thing.  It’s considered selfish and rude and puts the tribe in jeopardy.
• Arrogance, greed, ambition, selfishness.  Like a Wall Street trader trying to bribe a shaman at an Ayahuasca retreat for a better room.  The shaman will be disgusted because he seeks wisdom, not money.
• Other tribes/cultures.  Threatening and confusing.  A danger to the tribe.
• Domination, exploitation, dehumanizing work schedules.  The desire for materialism and productivity.  It breaks social bonds which is a much bigger priority in the tribe.   
• Innovation and progress.  The tribe wants to keep things traditional, the way the ancestors have always done them, even at the expense of progress.  A shaman would never try 5MeO-DMT for example.
  • This is the downfall of Purple, the inability to adapt, especially since Orange is all about science, technology and evolution.

 

Downsides and Unhealthy Aspects of Stage Purple

1) Tribalism.

            Probably the biggest downside.  When people are deeply tribal this devolves into tribal warfare, blood feuds, ethnic cleansing and genocide in the worst case scenarios.

2) Extremely isolated and fearful of outsiders.

3) Narrow worldview.

4) Inability to adapt to modern society.

            The nature of life is constant evolution.  You can't put technology back in the bottle.[/b]  You have to work with the new technology that is available and integrate multiple cultures into your own.  The globe is one interconnected system.

            A lot of old traditions and customs aren’t going to withstand the industrialized modern Western technological machine that is society. Stage Purple needs to let go of those old, outdated ways of living if they want to integrate with modern society.

5) Overly traditional and conservative.

6) Overly superstitious.  Too much magical thinking versus rational thinking.

            There’s value to mysticism, but there's also value to being rational, practical and material at times.  Sometimes you need to have simple rational plans and goals and be pragmatic.

7) Fearful of natural phenomenon.

            It can overly mystify natural phenomenon and treat it as though it’s not understandable through science.

8) Too slow to adapt technology.

            It can resist or reject technology, even when it’s more effective, which is a shame.

            eg: Psychedelics and the spiritual community.  Modern chemical synthetic psychedelics are a new technology, invented in the last 60 or 70 years.  They’re also more effective than yoga, meditation or even Ayahuasca in the jungle.  They can get someone decades of results in 15mins.

            Part of the spiritual community says it’s “not real” or invalid to use for healing trauma, or personal development because it’s based on a drug.  It’s a rejection of new technology.  They’re not thinking about the potential that this technology can can offer us because it’s not the traditional way of doing things.

9) Doesn’t integrate information from outsiders.

            eg: Yoga.  Strict yogis have a particular yogic system.  (Yoga comes from Stage Purple.)  Originally there were hundreds of different yoga systems, all with their own dogmas and rituals.  Each one says it’s the best and only correct method of doing yoga.  This can't possibly be true, because there's lots of yogis who've used lots of these different systems to become awake.

            None of them are communicating with each other and combining the best of each tradition to create a super-souped up version of yoga, like Bruce Lee’s Wing Chun.

            (Bruce Lee learned every fighting style, combined the best parts and created Wing Chun.  It’s where the saying “absorb what is useful, discard what is not, add what is uniquely your own” comes from.  Stage Purple doesn’t do this.)

10) Isn’t really “environmentally conscious.”

            If they were we’d see this awareness in Red, Blue and Orange, but we don’t.    Their carbon footprint is too small for them to be polluters.  They don’t have to deal with cars, or power plants, dumping toxic chemicals in the water or modern technology.

            True environmental consciousness only evolves at a high level of Stage Green.

11) Only works at small scales, in tribes.

            Not with millions of people, like in a city.  Breaks down.  Doesn’t scale.

12) Not innovative enough.

            Not creative, adaptable or progressive enough.  It can’t work in the modern world.  That's why Purple is dying off.  It also has a lot of valuable wisdom that needs to be mined before it dies off.

 

Stage Purple Wisdom for Incels

            Incels struggle to get laid simply because they don't know how to socialize.  It's not that women don't want to sleep with you. It's not that you're not hot looking enough.   It's not that you don't have a square enough jaw, a small dick or other incel excuses.  The fundamental problem is that incels are so alienated.  They spend so much time playing video games, watching anime, reading toxic incel forums, masturbating about how women don't like them, that they don't spend any time socializing with women face to face.

            If you want to get laid you need to start socializing.  Many of these these incels didn't learn how to socialize properly when they were younger.  Now they suffer from that.

            If you grew up in a proper healthy Stage Purple culture you would have learned these things by the time you were a teen and your life would be a lot more fulfilling.  You'd be a lot less suicidal and you'd be a lot less depressed.

 

            Connecting with intuition and emotions.  Incels are so “logical,” everything is about science and facts over feelings, this is nonsense.  Actually, the quality of your life is much more contingent upon the quality of your emotions, and your intuition rather than your logic.  Talking to and attracting girls requires being much more emotional and intuitive rather than logical and stuck in your head.

 

            The value of living in harmony with nature.  For incels who keep writing troll comments about women and how they're depressed and want to kill themselves, when was the last time you were out in nature?  Hiked in the forest while listening to the birds, basking at the sun, looking at the stars, without all the light pollution of the city?  Probably not in years.

            You would feel a lot better about yourself if you did that. It’d be even better if you did that with some friends, as part of a group.  So try camping with your friends instead of playing an MMO.

 

Top Lessons from Stage Purple (1:49:50)

-We live in a Blue/Orange/Green culture, so you probably have gaps in the lower stages like Purple, Red, Blue.  Stuff you haven’t fully integrated, lack experience with or that you've turned into a shadow.

 

1) Be grateful for modern technology and creature comforts.

            Appreciate how much we take survival for granted in the modern world. 

• eg: Primitive skills video.

 

2) Building intimate social bonds.  Learning how to socialize.  Being comfortable with socialization.

            Socialization is fulfilling.  It helps you get friends, romantic partners, a spouse.  A lot of people struggle with socializing today, partly because of the internet.  We’re alienated.  We didn't get properly socialized for whatever reason.  That leads to social anxiety, bullying or being bullied and having an axe to grind.

 

3) Humans are a deeply communal species.

            Stage Orange Libertarian types think they are rugged individualists, that they can live life all by themselves.  That mankind is supposed to live like a lone wolf.  Well, those people haven’t learned the lessons of Stage Purple.  They have to go back and learn that.

            If you're a Libertarian, start to appreciate what it really means to be human.  You’re part of a larger global phenomenon that's happening.  A larger society and community.  To be part of a community means making sacrifices.  It’s not all about you and what you need. It’s also about what you're willing to contribute to society. What kind of sacrifices are you willing to make.

            Then you wouldn't have these silly views of taxation being theft. Taxation is necessary to build everything you like about a developed democracy.  That’s a much healthier point of view to have.

 

4) Caring for the entire community.

            Treating the entire human species as a family rather than treating other humans as strangers, aliens or illegals.  Treating other races as equal instead of inferior, with lower IQs and all that nonsense in the alt-right.

            Start to see that we're all in the same boat.  We're all part of Earth, the greater spirit of Gaia.  All our actions collectively add up to what our community is doing.  What we should be doing is building a global, multi-racial, multi-ethnic community.

            Imagine if you treated every race, every gender, every sexual orientation, every social class, as though they were members of your own family.  If you embraced them with love and kindness instead of scapegoating and demonizing them.  Imagine trying to distribute resources fairly, amongst everyone.  Wouldn't that be something?

 

5) There’s more to life than individual profit.

            Many of us are lost in the trap of materialism and chasing profit at the expense of everything else.  The quality of your life is determined by your social bonds and emotions, much more than the material objects your chase.

 

6) The value of living in harmony with nature and living more organically.

            There’s a spiritual quality to just being out in nature, which a lot of us are disconnected from, especially if you live in a big city.  Try going out in nature more, communing with Mother Earth, so to speak.  Go for hikes, go to the desert, the mountains, the forest, the jungle.  Soak in the beauty, the fresh air.  Make it a walking meditation.

 

7) Connecting with Intuition and Emotions

            Connect to your emotions and intuition, not just your logic.  Live from your body and your heart, not just your head.  Psychedelics can help open up your heart and get in touch with your body and out of your head.

• clip: Life Revolves Around Love, Not Logic or Science (6 mins).
• clip: Passion Is Not A Luxury (3 mins).

 

8) Psychedelics.

            We can turn them into modern technologies for deep healing and personal development.

 

9) The importance of spirituality, mysticism and psychic powers.

            This isn’t just wishful, magical thinking or the placebo effect.  There's something very profound in spirituality and mysticism.  Psychic powers are real and you can develop them to various degrees.  Start taking that seriously as a possibility.

 

10) Simplifying life.  Being rather than doing. 

            Slowing down your life.  Declutter and minimize.  “Does this spark joy?”  Getting rid of all unnecessary distractions.  Spending less time online.  Spending more time spiritually connected to nature and people.  Start appreciating nature and you’ll see the quality of your life improve, especially if you move away from chasing material pleasures and being stuck in survival mode.  Get into Being mode

 

11) Listening to the wisdom of your elders.

           Learn the wisdom of ancient traditions.  Listen to the elders of your community, seek out their wisdom.  Implement it in your life.  Ancient traditions aren’t just silly superstition.  There can be deep wisdom there.

 

12) A natural wholesome organic diet.

           Start eating veggies and organic, grass fed beef and you'll feel much better and live better.

           The whole organic foods movement gets criticized as elitist, but it’s also healthier.  Our Stage Purple ancestors lived on organic food and they didn't have much cancer, heart disease, depression, AHDH, acne, eczema, erectile dysfunction, autoimmune disorders, and so forth.  A lot of modern diseases comes from the toxic diets we’re eating.

 

Transcending and Integrating Stage Purple

-You’ve already transcended it.  For sake of comprehensiveness, to transcend Purple you’ll have to develop a sense of personal ambition which will lead you to Stage Red. You can’t skip Red and go to Blue.

-Stage Purple is not good or bad.  No stage is “good” or “bad,” not even Red .    

-Question tradition.  Let go of tradition.  Question your ancestors.

-Expose yourself to many different cultures and tribes.  Travel and open your mind to the world, to new experiences.  Broaden your horizons.

-Let go of magical thinking and start to think more rationally, more strategically and more scientifically.  Study some Western philosophy

-There’s a lot of spiritual wisdom that you can find within Purple cultures.

-Although it’s fairly primitive by today's standards, but there's also a lot of amazing stuff worth studying and reading about.  Great documentaries too, even for free on youtube.

 

Wrap Up

-Most of Actualized.org’s viewers are roughly Orange/Green.  At that stage it’s easy to take the lower stages for granted, so don’t forget to integrate them (Purple, Red, Blue.)  Also try to avoid all the toxic elements of these stages.

           (Healthy) Stage Purple: Connection to nature.  Community and a communal mindset.  Socializing effortlessly and naturally.

           (Healthy) Stage Red: Assertiveness.  Courage.  Personal Ambition.

           (Healthy) Stage Blue: Self-discipline.  Work ethic.

-You need to spend a good five to ten years building a solid foundation for yourself with Stages Purple, Red, Blue and Orange.

-You need a strong foundation where your survival and material needs are met in an effective, healthy way.  Then, when you’re solid with that, you can start to work on enlightenment, awakening and advanced metaphysical subjects.

Edited October 10, 2021 by FlyingLotus
crossing ties and dotting e's

[FlyingLotus]

@RickyFitts @cjoseph90 You're both very welcome ??  Hope it helps with your journey.

[FlyingLotus]

(This summary’s been done before, but it’s such an important episode it deserves a super thorough summary.)

257. Summary: How To Stop Being A Victim - Part 2 - What All Victims Fail To Understand

-This is one of the most foundational episodes. It’s the follow up to one of Leo’s most popular videos: How to Stop Being a Victim.  Summary is here.

-Have you ever wondered why you get stuck in a victim mindset?  Being a victim happens whenever you start thinking:

• I can’t.
• It's impossible.
• It just won't work in this situation.
• I've already tried everything.
• It's just not going to happen.
• There's no way it's going to work.
• I don't know how.
• My genetics aren't going to allow me.
• My life situation is just such that I can't do it.
• My boss is holding me back.
• My husband is holding me back.
• My girlfriend is holding me back.
• My children are eating up all my time.
• There's not enough time in the day.
• I don't have enough money.

-For this episode, select one area in your life where you feel stuck like a victim.  This could be your diet, fitness, health, mental health, money, relationships, marriage, upbringing, children, career, business, talent, intelligence, appearance, personal development goals, etc.

-So where in your life do you feel like you're really stuck, like there’s some outer circumstance that’s really holding you back?  Most people feel like a victim in some area.  It could be one specific area or your whole life where you feel like a victim.

-So, what makes a victim a victim?  Basically, a victim thinks that the external world is a greater obstacle to him than he is to himself.  This is a very profound insight.

 

A victim is a victim, because he thinks

the external world is a greater obstacle to him 

than he is to himself.

_____________

You are the only obstacle.

 

-It’s critical that you grasp this.  This is such a deep insight…

-That’s right!! There are no other obstacles but you!  Anything that you think is an external obstacle is actually an illusion (money, time, jerk boss, spouse, bad luck, bad genes, etc.)

-It’s your mind that's the obstacle.  This is always, always the case.  This is one of the most bedrock foundational principles of all self-development.

-You need to realize that this is true.  Of course, the problem is if you're a victim you don't believe this.  When you hear this your mind comes up with all sorts of objections, logic and counter examples, which you naively believe.

 

-Keep in mind, there are different levels at which you can grasp this truth.

     Surface Level Understanding: You hear, “You are the only obstacle” and you get it intellectually, but pretty much think it’s bullshit.

     Intermediate Level Understanding:  You kinda, sorta, maybe get convinced this might not be 100% bullshit.

     Deep Level of Understanding:  This is true!  The only bullshit here is me thinking it’s bullshit when it’s actually, totally true!

You see how this is true, why it's true and how it’s working in your life.  You also see it working in the lives of everyone around you and recognize it as a general principle of life.  Once again...

 

A victim is a victim, because he thinks

the external world is a greater obstacle to him 

than he is to himself.

 

-Victims don't realize that “the mind is the only obstacle.”  They don't see all the ramifications that such a statement has.  The victim fails to appreciate how much their own mind is deceiving them.  They underestimate the possibility and impact of self-deception.  Victims don’t take those things seriously enough.

-Self-deception is one of the biggest dangers in life that you have to guard against.  There’s layers to which your mind is the obstacle because your mind has layers of self-deception baked into it.

• ep: Self-Deception I.
• ep: Self-Deception II - 60+ Self-Deception Mechanisms.
• ep: Self-Deception III.
• Summaries for all three are here.
• clip: Overcome A Victim Mentality With Mindfulness (7 min).

 

Things That Are Way Less Dangerous Than Self-Deception:

       Things in the external world, like…

• Your boss holding you back.
• Enemies that you have.
• Business competitors out there.
• The bad economy.
• Your spouse holding you back.
• Your genetics like you weren't born beautiful.
• Being born with a lack of confidence.
• Bad parents.
• A bad upbringing or childhood.

Things You Should Actually Be Worried About:

• Your mental filters.
• Your attitude.
• Your limiting beliefs.
• Your judgments.
• Unquestioned assumptions you have about reality.
• Your lack of introspection.
• Visualization or the images that you run through your mind.
• Your monkey mind and how it chatters and prattles on and on and on without stopping without any control.
• Your model of reality as a whole.
• Your emotional reactions and how your thoughts and your beliefs are charged by emotional reactions.
• Your judgments, of yourself and others.
• The self-constructed model of morality that you have. 
• What you view as right and wrong and good and evil.
• The habits that you cultivate or fail to cultivate.
• Your self-talk.  What words do you use?  What’s the tone of the language you use?  Don’t forget, self-talk is largely subconscious or outside of your everyday awareness.
• Your awareness and consciousness.
• How little mindfulness you have.
• Your ego.
• The effects of ego on your relationship to other people, the outer world and to yourself.

-Unfortunately, as a victim you tend to discount all this stuff.  You don't spend much time thinking or strategizing about it.  Instead, you spend most of your time worrying about the external world rather than the internal world.  You spend too much time worrying about physics versus psychology.

-The external world is actually a projection of your internal world.  You don't acknowledge how much external reality is warped by your psychology.

-Victim thinking is difficult to extract from your psyche, because you have a belief that says:

• “How I think about the world is not that significant.  Reality just is what it is.  The physical world is all that matters."  
• "I’ve got real problems!  Changing belief systems is some silly new age theory.  That’s not real and tangible, like getting money or hot babes.”

-So you have a faulty, disempowering belief system going on inside you, and when you believe something like that you're really stuck.

 

Why You’re Stuck

1) The victim mindset is totally false. 

It's a false belief, because how you think is extremely significant.  Reality is not just physical.   Reality is not just “what it appears to be.”  Your problems are not just "real world problems.”  So, victim thinking is just factually, flat out wrong.

 

2) The victim mindset is totally self-deceptive and self-reinforcing. 

-When you believe that your worldview isn’t that significant, notice how ingeniously deceptive this is.  It's deceptive to the point of beauty.  It means you're not going to take any action to introspect and think about your thoughts.

            You're not going to be reflective.  Your attention’s always going to be focused "out there” at the external world.  It’s never going to want to turn in on itself and really investigate itself.

            That's what victims tend to do.  The reason victims stay stuck is they don't look inside to see how these “real problems” are actually being created by the victim's mind, by their beliefs, attitudes and perspectives.

 

-The reality is that there are no real problems.  Problems are not things that exist in the external world, even though it seems that way.

            A problem is a feature of the mind.  They are all projections of your mind, whatever the nature of the problem is (financial, family, relationship, business, etc).

            That’s because, it’s you who attributes meaning to situations in the external world. It’s you who then creates goals, objectives and wants to accomplish things.  Notice that all those things are parameters of the self, of your mind, of how you hold yourself relative to reality.  There is no problem without the mind.

 

-Not only that, but a problem has to be actively created and sustained by your mind.  Your mind has to actually burn calories to create problems.

           It’s an active process.  A problem is like a little rodent living in your head.  You're feeding it all the time, but you're not aware that you're feeding it.  This rodent is living in your head rent-free.  It’s consuming precious time and energy, while making you disempowered and miserable.  However, it doesn't seem like your money problems could be a little guinea pig nibbling away at your brain.  It seems like the money problem is “out there” in the external world.

 

-It’s very critical that you grasp this.  See the ramifications of what’s being said about the victim mindset and how it's true in your life.  You have to recognize that you are creating these problems.  Until you recognize that, you won’t be able to let go of your problems.  You’re not really self-actualizing until you grasp what’s being said here.  That’s how foundational this concept is.

-Until you grasp that “the mind is the only obstacle,” your world will appear hostile, unfair, depressing and cruel.  In fact, that's how most victims feel about the world.

 

-If you don't feel that way about life and the world, you probably feel that way about some area of life.

• Maybe you feel like you were dealt an unfair hand with your heredity or genetics, and because of that the world is hostile, unfair and cruel. 
• Maybe at work your boss has more power than you, and you feel like business is depressing and cruel. 
• Maybe you keep trying to get into a relationship with a good person, but you’re in a pattern where each new relationship goes bad after a few months, every single time.  Then you say to yourself, “this is just how relationships/guys/girls/Capricorns are.”

None of that is true.  You’re creating all that, even if you’re not aware of how you're creating that.

 

-It will take you some time and work to realize how you're creating it.  The reason it'll take you so long is because you're unconscious and resisting what’s being said here.  So, this is the beginning of the becoming more conscious process.

-It’s really sad to see people who don't grasp what’s being said here.  It becomes almost impossible to help them.  It becomes impossible for friends and family to help a victim.  A victim gets really stuck, because every avenue of a solution that comes his way will be denied by his mind.  That’s because a victim’s mind is searching for the answers in the wrong place!

 

Thought Experiment Time! 

As a victim, you currently, believe that the outer world is all that really matters and the inner world is not very significant.  So let's flip that around.

            As a thought experiment, consider a life where the inner world is all that matters.  So, changing things in the outer world wouldn't really matter, because by definition the inner world is all that matters.  So any problem you try to fix in the outer world is not going to get fixed.  It's going to keep recurring over and over again.  So, you’re just going to become more and more frustrated.  It's going to feel like an unsolvable, no-win situation.

            So, are you imagining that?  Good, now what's funny is didn’t we just describe exactly the situation in which you find yourself being a victim?

            Isn't that exactly what your problematic situation is like right now?  You keep changing the outer world or at least you try and the problem just keeps repeating over and over and over and over and over again.  Maybe there’s slight variation, but basically it just keeps repeating.  Again, if you're honest, isn't that your situation?  So shouldn't that clue you into the fact that it's the inner world that matters?

 

-If you don't change the inner world and correct problems there, they will keep being projected out into the outer world.

            It's almost like if you're at a movie with those old fashioned projectors, and you see a smudge on the screen.  You walk up to the screen, you try to clean it up, but the smudge doesn't clean up, because the smudge is a dust particle on the lens of the projector, which is getting projected onto the screen.

            So you can clean the screen all you want, but if you really want to remove the smudge you have to go clean the lens in the projector room. You have to sorta turn inward, the eye has to look back on itself, so to speak.

            That's what you have to do with your mind.  So, you shouldn’t worry so much about the outer world.  You should not fear the outer world.  You should fear yourself more than any outer world problem.  Your self-deception is the thing you need to fear.  Your mind, you have to recognize, is not your friend.

 

-Stop gullibly believing your mind.  That needs to stop.  You need to question it.  The reason you're stuck in life is you've been naively believing yourself, and the self is a tricky bastard.

-Stop allowing your mind to frame control you.  Frame controlling is how your mind sets reference points for everything you judge.  It sets the parameters of what you expect.

eg: Guess how many episodes of Star Trek: DS9 were made.

The answer is somewhere between 150-600.

What number did you guess?   

…

…

…

…

…

…

What if I told you there were 22 episodes of ST: The Animated Series, 98 episodes of ST: Enterprise and 79 episodes of ST: Original Recipe.

Now how many episodes would you guess?

…

…

…

Notice that your guess is probably a lot higher in the first case than the second case.  In the first case you were primed to consider much higher numbers, between 150-600.  In the second case, you were primed to consider much lower numbers, around 22, 79 and 98.

 

The real answer is…

 

176.

In university, I had to participate in a frame control study where students had to guess the amounts of different collections while researchers suggested numbers.  They asked me a bunch of Star Trek questions.  Problem is they had to throw out my “estimates” because I knew the actual answers and wasn’t guessing ???

 

-Be aware that you’re probably not conscious of how people frame control you.  Advertisers frame control you with their prices.  It’s a very classic sleazy marketing tactic.  It’s actually similar to the Star Trek example above.

            Let's say the price of the product costs $100.  To make that price look like a great deal, they’ll say the product actually costs $300, but it’s on sale!

            “This normally costs $300, but we’re slashing it to $200, and if you act now you can get it for $99, or four easy payments of $19.99.”  So, by the time the price gets to $100 your mind says, “$100 is so cheap compared to $300.”

 

-Marketers and advertisers frame control you like crazy.  (Classical Conditioning and Pavlov’s dogs.)

            Beer commercials will show a sexy woman next to a beer bottle.  She’s smiling and your heart starts racing from arousal.  Those excited, happy feelings then get paired to the beer.  You don’t realize it’s happening because it’s “just normal” to see a sexy woman drinking beer in a commercial.  Your mind is being frame controlled to associate something positive with that particular brand of alcohol.

• eg: The multiple award winning show “Mad Men" covers the creation of desire and how unhappy people sell happiness.  It’s brilliant.  Mark Your Man.  Advertising and Happiness.  Carousel.  (Man, I need to rewatch Mad Men.)

            All of this sinks into your mind below the radar of your awareness.  That's how advertisers frame control your buying habits, and frankly many of the standards in your life. 

 

-So notice how your own mind frame controls you, especially in situations where you feel like a victim. Basically, your beliefs about reality are very distorted.  You need to start taking your beliefs very seriously, especially the whole process of belief creation that you go through.  When you start to acknowledge and truly grasp what’s being said in this episode, the following things will become relevant to you:

 

Things You Should Take Very Seriously:

• Psychology
• Philosophy
• Contemplation
• Meditation
• Mindfulness
• Non-duality
• Intuition
• Wisdom
• Truth

-If you're a victim these things won’t be important to you.  They’ll seem abstract or like they can’t impact the burning issues in your life.  But, as soon as you grasp what’s here, a very important shift will happen.

            You'll start to take everything on that list very seriously.  They will become very relevant and fascinating to you.  You'll become an eager, dedicated student of these things.  They’ll be the most burning issues in your mind.  They'll become paramount.

            Only then can you really get the full value out of the videos at Actualized.org.  Until then you’ll be skimming the surface, looking for shallow tidbits of advice here and there, but you'll be missing all the juicy meat that’s available.

 

Exercise Time!

        1)  Select one area in your life where you think you are a victim.  Be specific about it.

        2)  Write it down at the top of a piece of paper.

        3)  Now write down:

                a) All your justifications for why you can't change in this area.

                b) Why this situation is impossible.

                c) Why this situation or problem is not your fault.

        4)  Write down how this situation seems like an external problem.

        5)  Now write down how this situation is actually an internal problem.

        (It’s going to seem like this problem is external, but it’s actually internal.  So find that contrast.  Your mind will throw up all kinds of excuses.  Don’t give in.  You can have your excuses or you can have a great life, but you can’t have both.  So, don’t believe the lies.)

    Now ask yourself:

        6)  How am I creating this obstacle?

        7)  What am I avoiding by creating this obstacle?

        8)  What must I believe to be a victim?

 

-If you do this you're going to get a lot of insight into everything in this episode about the victim mindset.

            You need to find out how your mind is hiding the fact that your “external problem” is actually an internal problem.  Watch out for those justifications.  They are robbing you of your life.  Maybe you even agree with everything in this episode so far, but when it comes to your specific problem you’ll want to dispute it.

-This is a pretty complex exercise, so you should really sit with it and contemplate it.  You may also want to review this episode again.

-You’re going to see exactly how victim thinking applies to your particular situation.  Hopefully that will jumpstart your awareness of how self-deceptive the ego-mind is.  Getting clear on how this works will carry over to all your future personal development efforts.

 

Areas that Uprooting Your Victim Mindset Will Impact:

• Removing limiting beliefs.
• Understanding how you deceive yourself (and stopping it).
• Becoming more aware and mindful. Installing positive habits.
• Avoiding mental traps that get you stuck in victim mindset.
• Becoming more successful in a fulfilling way, not just a superficial way.
• Developing your mind to the point where it can no longer deceive you.
• Turning your mind into your greatest ally, instead of your inner enemy.
• Becoming the Master of Your Fate, the Captain of Your Soul.

-You can’t imagine the incredible places you’ll go if you learn how to counter the deceptive nature of your mind.  This journey will take years of practice, but it's extraordinarily worthwhile.  So, Upgrade Your Mindset.

Edited August 14, 2021 by FlyingLotus
my ascendant is in Virgo

[FlyingLotus]

 

439. Summary for "Life Advice For Young People Pt. 1" from @john1

Edited August 12, 2021 by FlyingLotus