I don't know what to do.

[Matteo]

Here is where I’m at in my life:

 

three years ago, after having done two years os psychoanalysis without much results, I started watching actualized.org because I was trying to come out of a almost life long depression that I had since I was 12 probably (now I’m 24). I started reading books and experimenting with mindfulness, concentration practice, strong determination sitting, do nothing, self inquiry, breath awareness, but I didn’t really get anything out of it.

 

Then Leo introduced psychedelics, and I was very excited about that. I did 1P-LSD about 10 times, trying to follow Leo’s guidelines as close as possible. I stopped doing psychedelics because I was very much involved with Sadhguru’s teachings, and I heard him saying that psychedelics can break your energy system and cause you problems of various kinds. I also heard Jeffery Martin saying that it emerged from the research he is doing on non-symbolic consciousness that subjects who had psychedelic usage in the past, struggle more in transitioning into permanent states of non-symbolic consciousness.

 

Moreover, I noticed that the insights I got while tripping would become meaningless after the trip was over. I would become deluded about what I saw and experienced. Then I started suffering because I was craving those states of consciousness in my daily life, which looked meaningless compared to those states.

 

After that, I did one 10 days Vipassana retreat, which gave me some moments of “LSD like consciousness” during the retreat, but nothing beyond that.

 

I was very involved with Rupert Spira and Fred Davis also, I even went to a satsang with Rupert in England and attended some online satsangs with him. Still I wasn’t getting much out of it, and the teacher who made more sense to me was Sadhguru.

 

For that reason, I decided to move to his Ashram in India. I went there this august and my plan was to be there for 7 months, but I ended up being there only for 3 months. I went away because it was too uncomfortable and again I wasn’t getting anything out of it. I was doing many hours of yoga every morning, did several advanced courses, going to the temples which are supposed to be very powerful, but I was pretty much suffering all the time. The atmosphere over there was quite disturbing to me, because you have very few chances of meeting the Guru himself, and even if you do it’s inside huge satsangs with 10.000 people, so there is no real guidance. Also there is no room there for reading, doing gnana yoga, and thinking as a tool for spiritual growth is very much discouraged. I’m extremely mind oriented, so that was a problem. Also, most people there know and trust Sadhguru only, and tend to thing that he got everything right and all other teachers got everything wrong, so I couldn’t really seek help from other practitioners, Bramacharis (monks) or teachers. They would just tell me “just keep doing the practices”, which I did, without much results.

 

In October I decided to go back to Italy. I’m still doing some of the practices they taught me, but it’s mostly because the thought of having wasted so much time and money in that experience makes me want to at least not throw away everything they taught me, because one day in the future it may do something for me.

 

At this point, after have listened to hundreds of teachers, tried several practices, read many books and watched many videos, I’m almost getting disgusted by this whole thing called spirituality. I feel angry and confused because teachers are contradicting each other all the time. One says that to realize your true nature is not difficult, another says that it’s extra difficult, one says to use the mind, another to absolutely not use it, another says psychedelics are useful, another says they’re dangerous and a waste of time.

 

I don’t know who to trust, and I feel incapable of trusting teachers at this point. Even if I want to experiment with other teachers in person, which I would like to do, I don’t have money to do retreats and travel. For that reason I’m trying to get back again into the music production business, which is the thing I’m best at, but it’s difficult because I feel demotivated and not really involved into it, if not sporadically.

 

I thought that it may be a good idea to at least dedicate myself to some meaningful activities, with the purpose of creating a more pleasant situation within me where at least I am happy to wake up in the morning and know that it wouldn’t be another useless unfulfilling day. This was suggested by Sadhguru in an online article and by Om Swami in the book “when all is not well”.

 

I haven’t found those activities yet, I’m still doing experiments. The thought of meditation is still present in my mind. I’m doing a meditation practice that they initiated me into at the ashram, but I feel that it’s not enough. I feel like I should meditate and I’m curious to try Jeffery Martins’s approach because it feels to me like a shortcut, but not a stupid one. At the same time, I feel a lot of resistance to the idea of starting again meditation for one hour a day, because often meditation feels like torture to me.

 

At this point I have no clear idea of what I want. I feel hopeless, but not completely. There is still a voice in me that says that something can be done, but I don’t know what that is.

 

Probably there are many other things to be said, but I don’t want this post to be too long. I would like to hear your thoughts about what I said. Thank you.

[Bauer1977]

All I can really say is that whole experience sounds awful. I feel for you. I have been through depression myself. It went undiagnosed for 4 years before I cracked/broke down and went to see a doctor. I took Zoloft for 8 months. It helped a lot. All I can do is suggest that you see a doctor to get your depression treated first. Don't worry about the other stuff until you get back to a state of mental health.

Edited November 30, 2018 by Bauer1977
spelling error

[ground]

Thanks for your report. I think that it may be helpful for those cultivating unrealistic ideas about India and gurus etc. Also your experience with psychedelics may be a warning for others. So you have done a good deed.

Of a course manifest depression should be treated.  Advice like "Take a rest" or "Relax for some time" would certainly appear just as shallow wording although a break certainly is necessary to get things straight and to reorientate.

All the best!

[K VIL]

A lot of progress is intangible. You've gone further than most, trusted teachers, and taken great leaps.

Life is ups and downs. We call those heartbeats. Don't expect the exercises to give you high rewards with low efforts. If that was the case, there would be less need for the teacher.

If an expensive lesson, you've learned how to not outsource your life problems to an ideology or guru.

That doesn't mean you don't trust on the same level, or don't invest with the same amounts. It means you can let go of certain expectations and entertain refined ones.

When you says "there's something that can be done". Done about what? There's lots of things to be done but what's nagging at you?

[winterknight]

@MatteoIt sounds like your untreated depression is preventing you from making any progress. You say you did psychoanalysis? You mean actual analysis? 3-5x/week? 

Edited November 30, 2018 by winterknight

[Pilgrim]

I suffer from depression myself as well and as you I am a very mind-oriented person. I think that this intellectual tendency might be a culprit for depression. From what you were writing I can see that you took a lot of action, which is great. It's honestly pretty impressive. I do however also get a feeling of resistance coming from you. You want to defeat your depression by all means and you are using your analytical mind to find the best strategy. That's honestly exactly what I am doing as well and it sounds so reasonable. So why isn't it working? 

It really might be the resistance that is created. The hardest part is acceptance. I cannot really say much to this, because I am not there yet myself. All I know is that I am fighting my depression similarly as you. I do not want to accept it by any means. I mean of course not, it's horrible and torturing. How can we accept something like that? But acceptance doesn't mean doing nothing. It means loving the weak and vulnerable part in you. Loving your dark side. Accepting what is and not fighting what is.   

[Matteo]

11 minutes ago, winterknight said:

@MatteoIt sounds like your untreated depression is preventing you from making any progress. You say you did psychoanalysis? You mean actual analysis? 3-5x/week? 

I don't know if it was psychoanalysis. At that time I was just looking for a psychologist because I was in a really bad situation. In my town there aren't many of them and some of them are too expensive, so I just followed a suggestion by someone and went to this psychologist. I think she was specialized in family therapy, and she was getting trained in mindfulness meditation when I left therapy. I went there initially once a week for three months, then twice a month for a while, then once a month. The whole thing lasted for more than a year, maybe almost two years, but I don't really remember. She was nice, but I felt that the results were too intangible for what I was paying. I thought "there's got to be something more effective than this. If I continue this way, I may get reasonably non-depressed by the time I'm 40. 

[winterknight]

7 minutes ago, Matteo said:

I don't know if it was psychoanalysis. At that time I was just looking for a psychologist because I was in a really bad situation. In my town there aren't many of them and some of them are too expensive, so I just followed a suggestion by someone and went to this psychologist. I think she was specialized in family therapy, and she was getting trained in mindfulness meditation when I left therapy. I went there initially once a week for three months, then twice a month for a while, then once a month. The whole thing lasted for more than a year, maybe almost two years, but I don't really remember. She was nice, but I felt that the results were too intangible for what I was paying. I thought "there's got to be something more effective than this. If I continue this way, I may get reasonably non-depressed by the time I'm 40. 

Yeah, that's not psychoanalysis. That's just a random bit of random therapy.

You have to realize that really good therapy or analysis -- particularly for deeply rooted depression like it sounds like you have -- is going to take a LOT more time and effort than "once a week for three months, then twice a month for a while, then once a month."

Think about it. The therapist is trying to get to know you. How long have you spent with people that you know closely? Thousands of hours? Tens of thousands of hours? Over years or decades?

How is a therapist going to get to know you in what sounds like a few dozen sessions? Not gonna happen.

If you're really interested in a journey of self-discovery, realize it will take time... and google "psychoanalytic institute <your city>" and call them and ask for a referral. Ask me if you need more help on this point.

If you're really serious -- and it sounds like you are -- prepare yourself to spend 1-2x/week, and preferably 3-5x/week, for AT LEAST a year, if not several years. That's how long actual healing takes.

Be realistic.

Edited November 30, 2018 by winterknight

[ivory]

4 hours ago, Matteo said:

At this point, after have listened to hundreds of teachers, tried several practices, read many books and watched many videos, I’m almost getting disgusted by this whole thing called spirituality. I feel angry and confused because teachers are contradicting each other all the time.

I experienced this as well. There comes a time on the spiritual path when you have to let go of teachings for a while and really come to know yourself through direct experience. Confusion arises because you don't know yourself (values, challenges, etc). There is no one size fits all in spirituality and that is why there is so much contradiction. Once you know yourself you can use discernment to pick the right teacher, books, etc. Then stuff will make sense because you have insight. I second what @winterknight says regarding therapy.

[purerogue]

You are looking for wrong answers, it is your ego delusion that makes you depressed.

 

Example: Meditated and was  happy, or I saw something that made me happy 

Now you are out of that experience and ego starts to conflict itself , what if it was just chemicals that brain released meditating that made me happy, what if  this experience was just imagination, so none of it is true and you become sad, because ego conflicts and thinks that it is not true, so you delude yourself in believing that you should not be happy about something that is not absolute truth. 

Example:You think life has no meaning, or just trying to find absolute meaning, truth of life 

Now , your ego constantly conflicts itself because it is information out of its reach, or it shifts as experience from one perspective to another, again your ego is not happy , because for some reason it can't be happy if he does not know absolute meaning, truth of life, because experience of happiness, peace , for some reason can't be enough of a truth if he does not know everything. 

 

[Salvijus]

@Matteo ha

There's a huge chance I met you in the ashram. I've been there from september to october. 

But I don't recognize you by your photo unfortunatelly.  tho, I do remember someone like you but he was from Germany. Are you sure you're not for Germany

 

 

 

This is a photo of me made during the stay. maybe you'll remember

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 30, 2018 by Salvijus

[Matteo]

3 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

@Matteo ha

There's a huge chance I met you in the ashram. I've been there from september to october. 

But I don't recognize you by your photo unfortunatelly.  tho, I do remember someone like you but he was from Germany. Are you sure you're not for Germany

 

 

 

This is a photo of me made during the stay. maybe you'll remember

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I do remember you. We never spoke, but I saw you hanging around several times. 

[Salvijus]

That's nice

Talking about your post. I'm not too worried about your future. If you've been to Dhyanalinga and been initiated in Shoonya. Your life's pretty much made

Seed of liberation is in you now. Just have to wait for it to blossom

"Once you are in the sphere of the Dhyanalinga, the seed of spiritual liberation is sown into you. Whether you are willing or not, a believer or non-believer, whether you have come to investigate or surrender, it does not matter. When people sit in this space, this impression will definitely happen, knowingly or unknowingly." #sadhguru 

[Matteo]

@Leo Gura I would like to have your perspective on this, if possible. Thank you.

[Evelyn]

I went through a similar situation. I grew up in a terrible family and had depression very early, but then during college I did several years of psychoanalysis. It really helped and I also learned to do it to myself alone.

However, I also got really obsessed with enlightenment and the search, to the point I was getting depressed again... I was suffering so much that I was not going anywhere or doing any progress. Then, the best thing I did was to give up the search. The moment I did, I realized there is nothing you can really find or achieve. The search is futile. You already are what you search every moment of it. Now I just want to be myself. Just be without any restraints. It feels so much liberating than "searching for enlightenment". Searching for it puts such a strain on you, while being yourself, just being is quite simple, you are actually doing it all the time . And I had the insight that that is enlightenment, we just cannot see it with our minds churning in the background... 

Edited December 1, 2018 by Evelyn

[Matteo]

2 hours ago, Evelyn said:

I went through a similar situation. I grew up in a terrible family and had depression very early, but then during college I did several years of psychoanalysis. It really helped and I also learned to do it to myself alone.

However, I also got really obsessed with enlightenment and the search, to the point I was getting depressed again... I was suffering so much that I was not going anywhere or doing any progress. Then, the best thing I did was to give up the search. The moment I did, I realized there is nothing you can really find or achieve. The search is futile. You already are what you search every moment of it. Now I just want to be myself. Just be without any restraints. It feels so much liberating than "searching for enlightenment". Searching for it puts such a strain on you, while being yourself, just being is quite simple, you are actually doing it all the time . And I had the insight that that is enlightenment, we just cannot see it with our minds churning in the background... 

But is that really true? I agree with you when you say that the search puts a strain on you, I can feel that strain very clearly. But what about realizing that everything is one, that consciousness is universal, that the universe is a mind, and all that stuff? Does the dropping of the search make you realize that? I don't really get the second part of what you said.

[Evelyn]

@Matteo No, it does not make you realize that, but it stops the suffering of trying to get enlightened. This trying to achieve it is actually what keeps us from realizing it, I think. Because it implies we are not already what we seek, we look to the future, to something else, instead of just being here and now. Simple being. I think that is enlightenment in a nutshell. I had small glimpses of it when I did basically nothing, just relaxed profoundly. In those moments I also managed to have a still mind somehow . I know now that it's always there, it is basically you, but you keep identifying with the mind, your feelings, etc. and cannot see it. This is my biggest problem too. I have a terrible monkey mind and unconciously identify with my thoughts, feeling, emotions, body, etc. It is not about what you have to do, more about what we have to stop doing. This is what is very hard. 

When I had those glimpses I felt like enlightenment is the easiest thing you could do, the most simple and obvious. So much so that we cannot see it .

Edited December 1, 2018 by Evelyn

[Nexeternity]

I wrote a post once about stuff that helped me with my depression,

 

I did psychoanalisis too... its good stuff but it didnt do it for me...  It works for others though.

 

[Nahm]

@Matteo You’ve been going along in an acquiring manor.      You never ‘emptied your cup’.

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

the insights I got while tripping would become meaningless

The path is deconstruction, less and less meaning empties the mind, reduces thinking, and realization can arise in this space.

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

Then I started suffering because I was craving those states of consciousness

The final dissapointment, is the teachings. There is a full circle, completed in renouncing all ‘spirituality’. Without the fore mentioned emptiness, with a head full of teachings, one teacher after another - where can nondual realization arise?

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

but I was pretty much suffering all the time.

Suffering is thinking, over thinking.

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

The atmosphere over there was quite disturbing to me, because you have very few chances of meeting the Guru himself

There’s no such thing as gurus. That is a deeply rooted thought, a projection. Again, it must be emptied, surrendered. Where can nonduality arise?

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

I’m extremely mind oriented, so that was a problem

That is the “problem”. That statement is NOT TRUE. You don’t know what you are. “I don’t know what I am”, is true for you. Don’t blow it off as semantical. This is the false belief you are repeating in different ways, which is the root of your seeking and suffering.  Trade thinking for stomach breathing, for good, never look back. If you have a deeper trauma, from 12 or younger, get therapy. If not, you may just be experiencing the power of overthinking and having identified such. How will you realize what you are, while you’re claiming you already know? 

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

it’s mostly because the thought of having wasted so much time and money

RIght, why would you have that thought, when it feels bad? Not trying to poke at you, just trying to help you see what you’ve missed. The ego, thinking, is one notch, one degree more cleaver than you. You will never beat the ego. You must surrender - from this moment on, stomach breathing. Notice when you consciously do it, you go unconscious in seconds and are mentally distracted, and you forgot. Practice it all day everyday, every minute no matter what you’re doing. (If what you want, is consciousness) Thinking will reduce more every day, until it literally stops one day. 

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

I don’t know who to trust, and I feel incapable of trusting teachers at this point

Good! Why are you thinking you need to trust someone, some person, some maya? What is nonduality?

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

I feel like I should meditate and I’m curious to try Jeffery Martins’s approach because it feels to me like a shortcut,

No more looking for shortcuts. You can not over think and breathe from your stomach at the same time. See this in your direct experience. None of those teachers mentioned this, or you did not commit to this?

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

At this point I have no clear idea of what I want. I feel hopeless, but not completely. There is still a voice in me that says that something can be done, but I don’t know what that is.

 

Stop looking for thinking to resolve thinking. Stop looking for clear ideas. “Hopeless” is also a thought.  Surrender yourself to that voice within you, the unthinking, un-figuring-out, un-idea-maker. Surrender the finite (thinking) mind. What comes is the realization of infinity, nothing, Samadhi. It’s waiting, patiently, until you’ve done. It will never infringe. You must surrender to it. 

On 11/30/2018 at 8:30 AM, Matteo said:

I would like to hear your thoughts about what I said

Trust me, what you really want, is not to hear any thoughts. 

22 hours ago, Matteo said:

I thought "there's got to be something more effective than this

There is. Can’t blow past it and go right into thinking, or you’ve already missed it.  Breath / Awareness - do you see, in your own experience, these are prior to thinking? If not, pm me and I can quickly help you realize this in your own experience. It’s literally been right under your nose this entire time, you are looking once you’re already past what you are really looking for. It’s like you’ve been playing that Headbands game for 12 years, and your word is, “ineffable”. 

[Truth Addict]

@Matteo

My advice for you is to search for beauty!

Beauty can cure your depression, find out whatever you think is beautiful and look closely at it. Keep looking until it penetrates you and heal you from the inside.

You will eventually see the beauty of your depression and it will stop looking like depression anymore, it will turn into Beauty!

Good luck there, much love.