How Do I Know, I'm Not Lying To Myself?

[Lorcan]

I was just recently talking to my friend, At one point I was telling him about meditation and my experience with meditation. He had an argument that I just believe what other people say and then think it is true, and therefore my experience with meditation is me lying to myself believing that meditation was having some sort of positive effect on me.

Is this true? Am I lying to myself? How do I know my experience with meditation is authentic? Not just some sort of placebo effect from lying to myself believing meditation will help me in some way.

I would like some insight into this.

I don't like lying to myself. I feel like my experiences from meditation are authentic? Or are these experiences generated from me believing that meditation will help me in some way?

 

[Lorcan]

29 minutes ago, Piotr said:

@Lorcan if you listen to his words you will prove him right, won't you?

Prove who right? Leo's words. My friend words? . My words?

[Mal]

Actually, this is a great example of what I've been recently talking about.

The ego playing the role of skeptic.

How can the ego be skeptical of it's own thinking?  This kind of process is a complete waste of time.

The only thing that can unveil the illusion of thoughts is awareness.

Real awareness.  And real awareness is not another thought doubting itself.

Septicism is another scam created by the ego to imagine itself in some kind of control.

[Infinite]

@Lorcan It seems to me like your friend holds certain beliefs about meditation that are in conflict with your experiences. This then created cognitive dissonance in his mind when speaking to him about your experiences, and so, to maintain the status quo of his belief system, he deludes himself by telling you that you're the one deluding yourself. 

[Extreme Z7]

@Lorcan There's a very simple yet tricky way to see if you're lying to yourself, raise awareness of your monkey mind! If you have a lot of monkey chatter, I can almost guarantee that you're going to lie to yourself about different things during the day and sometimes do some pretty irrational stuff on varying degrees. If you have little monkey chatter, that makes you a little closer to truth than most people.

[Salaam]

@Lorcan

How do we know we're not deluding ourselves?

I think that's a great question and a very serious consideration.

How can we trust the interpretations we add onto our experiences?
How can we trust the interpretations of others?
How do we deal with the meeting ground in between what is commonly accepted as valid and what is beyond the edge of current human comprehension?
How do we reconcile that dynamic ground with the ever-expanding range of our awareness and capability and our ever present limitations of awareness and capability?

All these questions in my experience require a rigorous standard of accountability.

For me, I realized that the only thing I could really trust in was movement and balance. So I worked on tracking how things moved and in what kinds of ways things moved, not just as patterns of movement, but movement in relation or connection to other things. What influences what? What forces are at play? How are these forces influencing my perception of things? What structures are needed to balance and synergize the best being I can be? What happens when one or more is missing or under-developed and how does that affect my ability to perceive and draw conclusions about my experience?

These our questions we have to explore in some way as we build our standards and methods of inquiry.

Did you know the emotion or feeling of certainty around a belief has an accompanying chemical response that can build up over time, making a person more and more close-minded to possibilities that lie outside the acceptable range of attractive chemistry with that belief? Wouldn't that be an important consideration to track and be accountable for so we don't delude ourselves? Yet, not many people are aware of such a reality or have standards in place that protect from such distortion... nor do they make it a point to explore and grow familiar with other distortions and learn how to counter-balance their influence.

 

[Mal]

1 hour ago, Piotr said:

@Mal I agree. Any 'awareness' insight had in clarity of mind with no thought, can be turned into a memory and a concept..

Yeah, I notice myself seeing without analyzing, and it instantly says "that's not true".

Like a seer of beliefs, or long held constructs, things I have been taught that were supposed to be "true".

However, as this insight comes into being and I record my thought on here, I can also sense that I'm creating a new belief off the back of the new insight which just knocked an old belief out.

So.. how to stop creating beliefs?

Or is this just a process of growing the witness until no objects are left obscuring the view?  I mean, literally just knocking belief after belief out until there is nothing left but "I"??

[Mal]

@Piotr Did you notice that within 19 hours nobody fucking answered the question LOL

Because nobody here actually knows.  

[Consept]

1 hour ago, Mal said:

@Piotr Did you notice that within 19 hours nobody fucking answered the question LOL

Because nobody here actually knows.  

Haha its pretty much always gonna be the case with these questions, we're all trying to explain something that exists solely as an experiential phoneme nom. Basically all thoughts are not you and bullshit, but i always get caught up in them even though I know that, thats why practicing awareness is the most important thing

[Ayla]

On 7/19/2016 at 10:37 PM, Lorcan said:

Is this true? Am I lying to myself? How do I know my experience with meditation is authentic? Not just some sort of placebo effect from lying to myself believing meditation will help me in some way.

Is that important? Really think about it. If it helps you, is it important if it was the placebo or the meditation itself? 

For further help, you might want to read this post: 

 

[Mal]

2 hours ago, Consept said:

Haha its pretty much always gonna be the case with these questions, we're all trying to explain something that exists solely as an experiential phoneme nom. Basically all thoughts are not you and bullshit, but i always get caught up in them even though I know that, thats why practicing awareness is the most important thing

How can a forum with enlightened people not respond to a question I'm asking about something they have allegedly already gone through?

It is because they have not passed through that process, and are just handing out advice that means jack shit that they picked up from their favorite youtube guru.

Even Gura cant answer a question on something he has not yet had the time to study.

This is not a real self development site, it's an ego parade.

[Lorcan]

Thank you all for commenting your insight has been somewhat helpful....

I will continue meditation until I start seeing these exponential results leo talks about and the only reason I meditating is because leo stresses is it as the most important thing, and his biggest regret being not meditating when he was younger.

So beliveing what he has said in his videos.(I mean his argument about why you should meditate seems pretty convincing and his videos shows that he is quite passionate about what he does)

I being 14 decided to jump on the choo-choo train of enlightment nice early so I can reap the big rewards in my 20's.

Even if I the benefits from meditation come from me lying to myslef, I think Aryla mentioned it doesnt even matter if you lying to yourself. Even if it is a placebo effect.

But I thought I must be dedicated to the truth? If I am lying to myself surely it will always be in the back of my mind.

I beleive mal said something around the lines about the ego doubting itself or aomethingvwhich I couldnt quite grasp as I havent watch leos vid on the ego yet.

 

My question is still unanswered, and honestly I didnt exspect it to, but the insight was good( this forum is amazing)

I will carry on to meditate how I normally meditate without thinking that it will help me and just belive that it will help me if this leo guy is right. I will have await for some experiance that will confirm that leo was right.

So far its a pure experiment for me,does it actually do shit?

So no "It will work guaranteed" bias invovled as that would lead me lying to myself.

Ive been meditating for 3 montjs btw. Mostly 20 min session, some 25   some 40. I did an hour session once.

I will just have to wait in see in maybe a year or 2 years time.

 

 

 

[Infinite]

@Mal I don't think that a single person here has actually claimed to have gone entirely through the process, and if they did then they're more than likely full of shit. This is not a forum of enlightened people, nor should anyone think it is. Everyone here is deluded, but the whole point is that we're using this site to share information that assists us in seeing through our own delusions, together. Be wary of falling into the trap of putting yourself on a pedestal by talking about how egoic you perceive others to be. I do agree with you in many ways though, but what else do you expect? Where is there not an ego parade? The entire world is an ego parade.

I also agree with @Piotr. Speaking about enlightenment in any way, shape, or form is a huge trap. All you're doing is layering concepts over an experience, which conceptualizes the experience itself and turns it into just another thing to place within the false identity. And like he said, if you aren't weakening the illusory structure, then you're strengthening it. Every time you speak of something that "you" experienced, and you aren't aware enough to recognize that the "you" that supposedly experienced it is a fiction, you're strengthening the structure of the illusion. Who is this "I" that had an enlightenment experience? It's far better to not speak about any of this at all. Like Mal said, this is just a massive ego parade, but it's far better than what you'd get in any other forum, or what you'd get out of speaking to 99% of people in the world.  

Edited July 20, 2016 by Infinite

[Mal]

7 minutes ago, Infinite said:

@Mal Be wary of falling into the trap of putting yourself on a pedestal by talking about how egoic you perceive others to be. 

It not that, it's just that I cannot help but talk about this stuff.

I don't think I'm playing a game, I actually feel as if I'm shedding layers of nonsense while I'm here.  This is why I do it.

 

Edited July 20, 2016 by Mal

[Mal]

38 minutes ago, Piotr said:

 Awakening, realization whatever... you wouldn't even want to talk about it to people. You wouldn't even care to describe... Cause you would know that every second you are doing it if it wasn't full transcendence, you are strenghtening that which is keeping you away from it. 

I'm not strengthening ego.  I'm getting closer to something that I did not even know was possible.

I keep having to explain myself to everyone, ignore me, block me, don't listen to me.  Or do.  I personally couldn't care about what other people do with my words, it seems people twist my words anyway.  All I care about is this process, and the continuity is important.  

I'm not here to play games, or part take in human bonding, I am here to do away with that because it is false.  How can I continue to play these social games and at the same time strip myself of programming?  Its a paradox!

Tell me if I should tip toe around egos, or be myself?

 

[Infinite]

7 minutes ago, Mal said:

It not that, it's just that I cannot help but talk about this stuff.

I don't think I'm playing a game, I actually feel as if I'm shedding layers of nonsense while I'm here.  This is why I do it.

@Mal It feels to me like I'm playing a self deceptive game every time I speak to people, but maybe that's just me. Even in the way that I phrase the things that I am saying, it's all subtly with the intent to project a certain image of what I perceive myself to be, and how I want others to perceive me. There's seemingly infinite ego traps to be aware of in speaking alone.

[Infinite]

10 minutes ago, Mal said:

I'm not strengthening ego.  I'm getting closer to something that I did not even know was possible.

I keep having to explain myself to everyone, ignore me, block me, don't listen to me.  Or do.  I personally couldn't care about what other people do with my words, it seems people twist my words anyway.  All I care about is this process, and the continuity is important.  

I'm not here to play games, or part take in human bonding, I am here to do away with that because it is false.  How can I continue to play these social games and at the same time strip myself of programming?  Its a paradox!

Tell me if I should tip toe around egos, or be myself?

@Mal Never tip toe around egos. Ignore what everyone is telling you, so long as what you are doing is leading you closer to realizing Truth, rather than further away. Honestly, all you are doing is exposing to them the deluded aspects of themselves when they reject you for what you say and do. 

Edited July 21, 2016 by Infinite

[Mal]

19 minutes ago, Piotr said:

is there an end to bullshit

 

 

Edited July 21, 2016 by Mal

[Infinite]

@Mal I saw what you said before editing it out  

[Lorcan]

Thank you.
Thread closed.