Boredom is the Solution

[IJB063]

So I was listening to this video last week "10 Important Things You Don't Know You Want" and I realized when Leo starts talking about the "first time childlike intense magic experience" around the 8 minute mark, that this is something that I want.

Things were more much more lucid ,vivid and life was generally more enjoyable when I was younger. The older I get the more boring life seems to become as I become more and more acquainted with it, and everything I do seems to always trying to induce that new feeling to life again. So as I was watching this video I remembered two separate videos on different topics but still somewhat interlinked, which are ADHD and Dopamine Detox's.

If you put into YouTube "Dopamine Detox" a bunch of videos appear going over similar themes which are basically to deprive yourself of any form of gratification and eventually you'll regain that lucid childlike state again. I recently been attempting intermittent fasting, and after you experience a similar sensation as you starve yourself the first food you taste is heaven, even something like steamed broccoli beats chocolate. Same logic applies elsewhere, what is meditation if not boring yourself into submission to the point that your own breath becomes interesting. So my current plan is to gradually start boring myself more, to get that new life state of mind, this according to one video I watched gives you "dopaminergic ammo" to re give you the neuro chemical desire to actually step outside of your comfort zone and to "experience life", so basically to escape escapism.

So what does this have to do with ADHD, well our culture is what was called a "novelty culture" in this video, which is basically a culture built about hooking in to your brain and keeping you constantly stimulated in a zombie like trance. More and more people are getting diagnosed with ADHD, as I was. But it seems to in reality that ADHD is a result and reaction to this culture of over stimulation and constant entertainment. The inability to sit still and focus is because we get bored so quickly because we are so used to constantly being simulated. Which makes us sensitized to boredom as a result. Its not like ADHD is a recent genetic mutation, its environmental, caused by a culture of novelty, which results in the medicalising of boredom, so high schools can justify what is the drugging of overly bored and misbehaving children with hard stimulants, anyway I'm rambling. So I think my ADHD is bullshit, I'm going try a dopamine detox over the next few days and see what it does for me. There's a book referenced in one of the videos called "The Science of Boredom by Dr Sandi Mann" that I'm going to read, and is probably a insightful if anyone else is interested in this topic. 

Anyway this is my first post on Actualised forum, I've been meaning to start using the forum for a while (became a member January of 2019) but just haven't got to it, so I just decided I'd write whatever. Anyway if anyone's got any advice on how to get the "first time childlike intense magic experience" it'd be much appreciate, Cheers

https://www.bookdepository.com/Science-Boredom-Dr-Sandi-Mann/9781472135988

 

 

[Mongu9719]

@IJB063 Psychedelics and meditation are the best way to reconnect

[IJB063]

@Mongu9719 Yeah, they probably really are the best ways to readjust, I'm gonna stay away from psychedelics for awhile though, they tend to cause more problems for me than they solve, I'm starting to do meditation more seriously and holotropic breathwork, Wim Hof....

[Forestluv]

I hear ya on the instant gratification, dopamine impulses and adhd. Learning to be ok with boredom can be helpful and I'm not discouraging that. Many spiritual practices like meditation involve periods of boredom.

At a deeper level, I would consider why boredom is so uncomfortable. I would drop the idea of dopamine deficiency for a bit. . . If I just sit her and stare at a wall why is that boredom so uncomfortable? If I go and sit in nature, why is that boredom so uncomfortable? . . . One thing I've learned about myself is that simply sitting Now, without any distractions, is uncomfortable. It was uncomfortable for me for many years and still is at times. At first, just being present Now is boring and uncomfortable, yet with practice and time - being Now can get very interesting, regardless of what is happening. This is a freedom.

You mentioned the joy you had as a child. Right now I am reflecting on the joy of a child. Was not this joy being free in Now? As a child, my two greatest joys were climbing trees and going to the creek to catch turtles, fish, dragonflies etc. It was pure prescence in the moment. It was pure curiosity and engaging with the moment. It was freedom. I didn't care about what people thought of me. I wasn't worried about whether I was good enough. I wasn't worried about getting a girlfriend, making my parents proud, being successful etc. . . .Then, the programming started. . . my grades weren't good enough, I was a disappointment, on this track I wouldn't get a good job. Lots of religious dogma. Who the good and bad people are. What is moral and immoral. What I should do. Who I should be. . . . Then the story of "me" was created and I got deeper and deeper immersed into that story. 

Part of the solution may be learning to be ok with boredom. Yet for me, a big part of the story is to deprogram all that programming I got. In doing so, I can return Home to Now. And that's been my deepest true desire since I was a kid. To just be Here Now, engaging in the moment. To be ok with whatever is happening Now.

[Natasha]

@IJB063 One of my favorites of Leo's that I rewatch periodically. Other good ones on this subject are his vids about The Root Cause of Every Addiction and on Distraction.

[Codrina]

I guess people long for what they are missing. I am much like the child I remember myself to be. I am 32 and still just spending my time between drawing, painting, loving boys, running over the hills (today I ran over the hills for 2 1/2 hours, through forests, with my dog, laughing like a child, through mud and snow, had a swim in an ice cold -literally had to brake the ice for a bath - lake and did the whole thing all over again all the way home). I asked myself at one point on my journey:  how many 32 year old women do this?  how much of a woman and how much of a child am I ?

Some days, I wished I was more responsible, more like an adult. The rest of the time I am grateful for this amazing experience, whatever it has to bring me, even boredom  

[Gili Trawangan]

The realization of no-self has created in "me" this sense of childlike wonder you speak of. It comes and goes, but there's always the possibility of it showing up again precisely because there is no self. You can be reborn at every single moment, but the (illusory) entity that thinks it knows life and therefore gets bored cannot be identified with. All of this is experiential, it's infinity! Just keep chipping away the layers of ego.. 

[IJB063]

 

I've just started reading a book called "Mastery" by Robert Greene on my commute to and from college, found and highlighted bits in this passage that relates to this topic of how to have the that "childlike intense experience". Robert says that most people experience this intense experience and it takes the form of a idiosyncratic interest in our lives, which emerge particularly in our childhood. "For Einstein, it was not physics but a fascination with invisible forces that governed the universe; for Bergman, it was not film but the sensation of creating and animating life; for Coltrane, it was not music but giving voice to powerful emotions." We lose touch with this experience because of the conditions of our lives. Found a really good Charles Bukowski quote on this

“Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be?”

So here are the quotes from the book.

"Eventually, you will hit upon a particular field, niche, or opportunity that suits you perfectly. You will recognize it when you find it because it will spark that childlike sense of wonder (note this isn't in the quote, but this was what I was trying to get at when I started this thread) and excitement; it will feel right. Once found, everything will fall into place. You will learn more quickly and more deeply. Your skill level will reach a point where you will be able to claim your independence from within the group you work for and move out on your own. In a world in which there is so much we cannot control, this will bring you the ultimate form of power. You will determine your circumstances."

"These childhood attractions are hard to put into words and are more like sensations—that of deep wonder, sensual pleasure, power, and heightened awareness. The importance of recognizing these preverbal inclinations is that they are clear indications of an attraction that is not infected by the desires of other people. They are not something embedded in you by your parents, which come with a more superficial connection, something more verbal and conscious. Coming instead from somewhere deeper, they can only be your own, reflections of your unique chemistry."

"As you become more sophisticated, you often lose touch with these signals from your primal core. They can be buried beneath all of the other subjects you have studied. Your power and future can depend on reconnecting with this core and returning to your origins. You must dig for signs of such inclinations in your earliest years. Look for its traces in visceral reactions to something simple; a desire to repeat an activity that you never tired of; a subject that stimulated an unusual degree of curiosity; feelings of power attached to particular actions. It is already there within you. You have nothing to create; you merely need to dig and refind what has been buried inside of you all along. If you reconnect with this core at any age, some element of that primitive attraction will spark back to life, indicating a path that can ultimately become your Life’s Task."

So I prefer the reframing of the childhood wonder to "primal core" as it comes across as less pathetic (not saying its pathetic just saying thats the way it comes across), its I feel esoteric to say I want to regain that "childhood wonder" and most people will see it as wanting to escape responsibilities of adulthood, which I obviously do not want to do, I instead just want to find something I'm genuinely  interested in, the way Robert frames it in this book, as Leo puts it to have fresh new eyes on life. Though there's nothing necessarily wrong with those childlike desires and framing of the world like @Codrina mentions

On 2/26/2020 at 3:27 AM, Codrina said:

I guess people long for what they are missing.

&

On 2/26/2020 at 3:27 AM, Codrina said:

how much of a woman and how much of a child am I ?

and I feel you're dead right with people longing for what there missing, I was yesterday listening to this BBC 2 interview on youtube of Russel Brand interviewing Steve Morrissey and he makes the exact point you're making so I had to screenshot the time stamp for the video, if you're interested links below, starting where Morrissey makes the point.

 

[IJB063]

 @Natasha Thanks for the recommendation of "The Root Cause of Every Addiction and on Distraction." video, I've listened to it twice to day and I can see why you come back to it. It literally the perfect recommendation for what I wanted so cheers, its really appreciated.

So above I linked the video to the timestamp where @Leo Gura diagnoses the root cause of addiction. I linked Leo if he sees this because I've just last Sunday finished Essays and Aphorisms by Arthur Schopenhauer and I found it eerie the parallels made by Leo and Schopenhauer in his essay "The Vanity of Existence" in this essay to the point it sent shivers down my spine, and gave me that light bulb moment I was looking for, so maybe Leos interested in the similarity's.  I recommend reading the link of the essay below and watching the video and comparing the points made. I think its important to mention Arthur Schopenhauer was one of the first Western Philosophers who took seriously Eastern Philosophy and traditions and venerated them.  The entire point of the video (I think Leo's making) is that the fear of boredom stems from an fundamental existential dread that we run away from in the form of distractions, this "emptiness of existence" which Schopenhauer instead uses the term "vanity of existence", the two mean similar things.

Here's the essay link, its not the original, but I can't be bothered to transcribe from the book the exact quotations so I'm just gonna copy and paste here, its a simplified and shortened version of the essay.

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/On_the_Vanity_of_Existence

"In the ever-passing present moment as the only mode of actual existence; in the interdependence and relativity of all things; in continual Becoming without ever Being; in constant wishing and never being satisfied; in the long battle which forms the history of life, where every effort is checked by difficulties, and stopped until they are overcome. Time is that in which all things pass away"

The quote above is practically making the same point about the transient present that we empty to escape from, Leo makes this point at the 10 minute mark

10:00 "You can't really be satisfied in life without sitting in an empty room without cravings" - Leo

"The whole foundation on which our existence rests is the present--the ever-fleeting present. It lies, then, in the very nature of our existence to take the form of constant motion, and to offer no possibility of our ever attaining the rest for which we are always striving. We are like a man running downhill, who cannot keep on his legs unless he runs on, and will inevitably fall if he stops"

"The scenes of our life are like pictures done in rough mosaic. Looked at close, they produce no effect. There is nothing beautiful to be found in them, unless you stand some distance off. So, to gain anything we have longed for is only to discover how vain and empty it is; and even though we are always living in expectation of better things, at the same time we often repent and long to have the past back again. We look upon the present as something to be put up with while it lasts, and serving only as the way towards our goal. Hence most people, if they glance back when they come to the end of life, will find that all along they have been living ad interim: they will be surprised to find that the very thing they disregarded and let slip by unenjoyed, was just the life in the expectation of which they passed all their time. Of how many a man may it not be said that hope made a fool of him until he danced into the arms of death!"

"Life presents itself chiefly as a task--the task, I mean, of subsisting at all, gagner sa vie. If this is accomplished, life is a burden, and then there comes the second task of doing something with that which has been won--of warding off boredom, which, like a bird of prey, hovers over us, ready to fall wherever it sees a life secure from need. The first task is to win something; the second, to banish the feeling that it has been won; otherwise it is a burden"

13:00 "You can't fill that emptiness of being with more doing or with material external passions or activity, no matter how much you try you can't do it" - Leo

"The nature of being itself is emptiness" - Leo

On 2/25/2020 at 10:59 PM, Serotoninluv said:

At a deeper level, I would consider why boredom is so uncomfortable.

This is why at the deepest level I think boredom is uncomfortable because boredom is the realization of the emptiness of existence.

14:28 "Nature of being itself is emptiness but see most people don't like this idea at first it seems kind of negative and it seems depressing actually it's not it's a very beautiful and incredible experience to fully realize the emptiness of being and to be one with it this is a very profound experiences of what spirituality is based upon but most people aren't mature enough to grasp this" - Leo

"And even sensual pleasure itself means nothing but a struggle and aspiration, ceasing the moment its aim is attained. Whenever we are not occupied in one of these ways, but cast upon existence itself, its vain and worthless nature is brought home to us; and this is what we mean by boredom. The hankering after what is strange and uncommon--an innate and ineradicable tendency of human nature--shows how glad we are at any interruption of that natural course of affairs which is so very tedious."

19:15 This is where Leo gives the solution to all addiction which is to sit with the emptiness of existence.

23:00 Amazing quote on the very basis of this addiction, is the avoidance of the realization of our ambiguous, fleeting and dream like existence, and instead we choose to distract ourselves with base hedonic pursuits. This is the fundamental root of addiction, and that this is why we can't cure our addictions by doing the very thing that caused them in the first thing. This bit of the video was an epiphany moment and ties in great with my book notes.

I think tying in with my current reading of Mastery, the avoidance of boredom and the avoidance of the emptiness of existence is in it of its self the tool to reclaim that "first time childlike intense magic experience", as what sitting does chip away those layers of ego as @Gili Trawanganmentions but bring about that necessary silence as to hear the noise that is the primal core of your being that actually gives life meaning, if that makes any sense.

On 2/25/2020 at 10:59 PM, Serotoninluv said:

To just be Here Now, engaging in the moment. To be ok with whatever is happening Now.

Here some quotes on found in my googling

“Boredom is the root of all evil. It is very curious that boredom, which itself has such a calm and sedate nature, can have such a capacity to initiate motion. The effect that boredom brings about is absolutely magical, but this effect is one not of attraction but of repulsion.” - Kierkegaard

“Human life must be some kind of mistake. The truth of this will be sufficiently obvious if we only remember that man is a compound of needs and necessities hard to satisfy; and that even when they are satisfied, all he obtains is a state of painlessness, where nothing remains to him but abandonment to boredom. This is direct proof that existence has no real value in itself; for what is boredom but the feeling of the emptiness of life? If life—the craving for which is the very essence of our being—were possessed of any positive intrinsic value, there would be no such thing as boredom at all: mere existence would satisfy us in itself, and we should want for nothing.”  - Schopenhauer

“Boredom is certainly not an evil to be taken lightly: it will ultimately etch lines of true despair onto a face. It makes beings with as little love for each other as humans nonetheless seek each other with such intensity, and in this way becomes the source of sociability.”  - Schopenhauer

"Want and Boredom are the twin poles of human life"  - Schopenhauer

Thanks again for the responses

 

[Gili Trawangan]

You misunderstand emptiness. It's Love. The mind cannot get it, it has to be felt. Underneath all the layers of ego is love without cause or object. Or as Rupert Spira says, "the knowing of your own being". Which is NOT an intellectual understanding, it's in the heart.

Keep chipping away at the ego, and don't take those philosophers' words seriously, they missed something very big.

[IJB063]

Shouldn't we attempt to explicate this feeling, this is the entire point of actualised.org, to attempt to convey the physiology of ego dissolution.

[IJB063]

Anyway I'm going to bed it eleven and I got shit to do tomorrow, and I've spent the last hour and a half going over the "overcoming addiction" video and my book notes, so anyway goodnight & godspeed

[Pell]

2 hours ago, IJB063 said:

Shouldn't we attempt to explicate this feeling, this is the entire point of actualised.org, to attempt to convey the physiology of ego dissolution.

Emptiness = Infinite relativity = Love

Far better to experience than to explicate. 

I recommend checking out the meditation guide over at 

https://www.reddit.com/r/streamentry/wiki/beginners-guide

[IJB063]

@Pell Thanks to the link to the guide, I'll give it a read later.

11 hours ago, Pell said:

Far better to experience than to explicate. 

From the same book just a different essay "On thinking for yourself"

"People who pass their lives in reading and acquire their wisdom from books are like those who learn about a country from travel descriptions: they can impart information about a great number of things, but at the bottom they possess no connected clear, thorough knowledge of what the country is like. On the other hand, people who pass their lives in thinking (thinking = experiencing) are like those who have visited the country themselves: they alone are really familiar with it, possess connected knowledge of it and are truly at home with it."

I agree 100% its better to experience than to explicate, but was is that guide if not a travel description/explication

[Ingit]

@Serotoninluv i saw me When you mentioned abput climbing trees and catching flies...... I have one question Can Boredom become a gate to presence?

[Forestluv]

2 hours ago, Ingit said:

@Serotoninluv i saw me When you mentioned abput climbing trees and catching flies...... I have one question Can Boredom become a gate to presence?

Hmm hat's a good question. . . I would say yes with a caveat. . . When I feel entertained and engaged with what's happening now. I don't want to change now, I'm enjoying what's happening now. For me, boredom is a form of dissatisfaction with what's happening now. It's not enough. There is a desire to have a better now. This might motivate me to take some action to entertain myself and get relief from the boredom. Or I might sulk in the boredom. 

I like how you phrased it as "Can boredom become a gate to presence?". Rather than the gate to presence. I'd say it is a gate to the presence of now (yet not the only gate). Boredom is a gate, because it is resistance to now. . . . Consider the experience many people have with meditation. Often the monkey mind gets lost in thought and a person might feel frustrated. It's also common for new meditators to feel bored. That is often how being presence of now is perceived. The mind is conditioned to perceive in terms of past and future. When past and future dissolves, now is often perceived as boring. Thoughts like "Is this it? Staring at a wall? What's supposed to happen?". . . Working through this boredom can be a gate of entry into deeper levels of now - what is happening now is infinite - with infinite exploration (just as much as past and future exploration) - yet at first now can seem so ordinary thats its boring. In a way, boredom is a guardian of deeper truth. 

[Pell]

 

@IJB063 I totally agree with you. Maps and readings/study are actually pretty important. Without teachings we are more lost that not. But, not completely because awakening is our birthright and intrinsic. I was drawn to your post because I find myself drawn to distractions more than turning inward, even though I do meditate at least 30 minutes everyday and contemplate alot. But, this is not enough -- my practice becomes a leaky bucket when I fill the rest of those 23hrs with distraction. It was when I became a teenager that I had a screen blasting my face more often than not. I as well miss my childhood freshness and that's why I'm on this path. Here's another blog that might interest you:

http://thehamiltonproject.blogspot.com/2012/04/yogi-toolbox-gathering-momentum-at-work.html?m=1

 

I've scoured Reddit, books, and this blog for answers and I've learned so much. I'm grateful. But, also feel that I need to stop seeking and practice more. It's so simple what it's boiled down to: self-inquiry, the three characteristics, and collectedness/mental stillness. Much could really be said about all three. I recommend checking out these books: The Mind Illuminated, Seeing That Frees, and Mastering the Core Teachings of Buddha(don't focus too much on the dark night stuff or the super fast noting he describes, he has a speedy mind and it's not necessary to do that).

There's also this resource for self-inquiry, check out the ebooks on the sidebar : http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2010/10/quietening-inner-chatter.html?m=1

I'm excited for you because you seem really sincere and ardent about awakening before you die. I've scoured Reddit and this blog for answers and I've learned so much. I'm grateful. If you wanna talk more, feel free to shoot me a reply/direct message. I don't want anyone to use up too much time reading when getting down to practice is of greater importance as you see. 

More: 

https://albigen.com/uarelove/most_rapid/contents.htm

 

 

https://www.personalpowermeditation.com/awareness-watching-awareness-better-than-any-sight-any-sound/

Edited February 28, 2020 by Pell

[IJB063]

@Pell Thanks buddy its appreciated, I've just been scrolling through that Reddit guide, I'll check the rest of those links out as well and get back to once I do, I'll reply to you in this thread cause I wanna keep this thread going in case anyone else is interested or wants to make some points

[Ingit]

1 hour ago, Serotoninluv said:

. When past and future dissolves, now is often perceived as boring.  can seem so ordinary thats its boring. In a way, boredom is a guardian of deeper truth. 

?? I would say Boredom to a conditioned mind.... 

[Pell]

@IJB063 Sweet! Just one more thing I forgot to mention. Having retreat time is monumental. 

ery simple guidelines, not rules:

don't waste time on tv, gaming, or social media... makes it mentally hard to do retreats

45min-1hour a day, everyday, mostly at the same time of day -- protect this time for your practice

one day retreat every 2 to 4 months - block out the day on the calendar and protect it

a weekend retreat every 4 to 8 months - block out the weekend on the calendar and protect it

one long retreat every 6 to 12 months - send in your deposit and block out the retreat on the calendar and protect it

I wouldn't really even waste time sitting unless it can be done every day, with the very rare missed day.

I wouldn't really think of streamentry unless retreats seemed interesting and were possible. Some people don't need the retreats, but I would say 90% do.

Hope this helps. Regardless of what anyone else thinks, trust your self and learn through trial and error and correction --- there is no predicting how a specific person's path will go.