Is wanting to understand the Truth just an ego-desire?

[Leo Gura]

@captainamerica If you go chasing happiness, you will get neither Truth nor happiness.

If you forget about happiness and work towards the Truth with full earnestness, you will get Truth, which is ultimate happiness.

The problem is that your idea of what true happiness is, is totally wrong. So chasing your ideas of happiness will never lead you to true happiness and instead create more suffering.

It is not possible to even know what true happiness is without Truth.

[Moksha]

Anyone here consider The Buddha to be enlightened?  The Four Noble Truths are the essence of his teachings. They are 1) the truth of suffering, 2) the truth of the cause of suffering, 3) the truth of the end of suffering, and 4) the truth of the path that leads to the end of suffering.

A few good pointers from the Gita:

Quote

Good people come to worship me for different reasons. Some come to the spiritual life because of suffering, some in order to understand life; some come through a desire to achieve life’s purpose, and some come who are men and women of wisdom. Unwavering in devotion, always united with me, the man or woman of wisdom surpasses all the others…the wise who are always established in union, for whom there is no higher goal than me, may be regarded as my very Self…seeing me everywhere and in everything. Such great souls are very rare. (Bhagavad Gita 7:16-19)

Quote

Whatever you do, make it an offering to me – the food you eat, the sacrifices you make, the help you give, even your suffering. In this way you will be freed from the bondage of karma, and from its results both pleasant and painful. Then, firm in renunciation and yoga, with your heart free, you will come to me. (Bhagavad Gita 9:26-28)

Quote

Those who know truly are free from pride and deceit. They are gentle, forgiving, upright, and pure…they have learned the painful lesson of separate birth and suffering, old age, disease, and death…They are even-minded through good fortune and bad…enjoying solitude…This is true knowledge, to seek the Self as the true end of wisdom always. To seek anything else is ignorance. (Bhagavad Gita 13:7-11)

Edited November 9, 2020 by Moksha

[Leo Gura]

Fuck suffering. Fuck the Buddha.

Go directly for Truth/Love.

[Moksha]

1) Some come to the spiritual life because of suffering

2) Some in order to understand life

3) Some come through a desire to achieve life’s purpose

4) Some come who are men and women of wisdom

Consciousness wakes people up in different ways. It's creative that way. Peekaboo is boring if it's always the same wall.

[actualizing25]

@Leo Gura Then I guess, I will never reach enlightenment. But anyways thank you for being honest. Maybe the spiritual path isn't a path for me.

I always thought that you can awaken if you want to escape suffering or pursue happiness. I guess, I was wrong.

Edited November 9, 2020 by actualizing25

[Shin]

2 hours ago, actualizing25 said:

@Leo Gura Then I guess, I will never reach enlightenment. But anyways thank you for being honest. Maybe the spiritual path isn't a path for me.

I always thought that you can awaken if you want to escape suffering or pursue happiness. I guess, I was wrong.

The thing with "escaping suffering" is that you have an idea of a magic pill that will solve all your problem for you, without any pain or work necessary to do so.

You should want to work on your suffering, not hoping for a miracle.

How could you ever get to the ultimate truth if you're not even willing to do some basic shadow work to finally be at peace in your day to day life ?

[Member]

4 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Fuck suffering. Fuck the Buddha.

Go directly for Truth/Love.

?

[Thought Art]

The first 30ish pages of Religion of Tomrrow by Ken Wilber explain this pretty well. We are not in the first turning anymore folks. Have you heard a Tantra? We are now moving beyond Tantra into a new turn of the wheel!

[mandyjw]

9 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

That is precisely why 99% of people will never wake up.

The pursuit of happiness and relief from suffering is the biggest ego game of all.

If you want to be serious, stop caring about happiness and suffering.

In my experience all those things are all integrally, inseparably one. A huge part of my path was running from depression that would overtake me like a wave if I wasn't vigilant with things like diet, personal development, exercise, learning spiritually, mindfulness, etc. Eventually truth is heading straight into the suffering without any hint of resistance, letting the resistance bubble up and experiencing that resistance to love itself is the suffering. I wouldn't really call that "not caring" about it. If God is Love, then can you call seeing that truth by not caring?  I guess that some spiritual traditions use that as a pointer and it's true in a way, but it sounds like a neo-advaita approach to me. I guess it's about not believing your thoughts about happiness and suffering. 

Edited November 9, 2020 by mandyjw

[arlin]

13 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

There is more than one way to awaken. You can awaken through deep suffering, I just don't recommend it.

If a person like that would awaken he would not understand what is happening and his whole reaity would fall apart. 

So he would feel like he is going crazy and so are you saying that awakening can make things worse?

In this case?

Edited November 9, 2020 by arlin

[Nahm]

On 11/7/2020 at 10:48 AM, actualizing25 said:

Wanting to understand the Truth and wanting to escape suffering/experience heaven/peace are both coming from the ego.

There is One Source, and it is not “the ego”.

On 11/7/2020 at 10:48 AM, actualizing25 said:

Leo is always saying that this work isnt about liberating oneself from the ego or about experiencing heaven/deep peace,but rather it is about wanting to understand the Truth for its own sake. But in the end all desires are coming from the ego.

If desire is coming from the ego - the priority in regard to what is true, would by default be to see what ‘the ego’ which is being given so much credit, actually is. 

On 11/7/2020 at 10:48 AM, actualizing25 said:

So in that sense it doesnt matter what your motivation for this work is because in both cases you are operating from the ego. It will all lead to the same place- enlightenment/God/Love.

When you forget where your car keys are, is it “the ego’s” fault? 

Or do you look for them, ruling out all the places they are not?

[Moksha]

7 hours ago, actualizing25 said:

@Leo Gura Then I guess, I will never reach enlightenment. But anyways thank you for being honest. Maybe the spiritual path isn't a path for me.

I always thought that you can awaken if you want to escape suffering or pursue happiness. I guess, I was wrong.

There's nothing wrong with wanting to escape suffering, or pursue happiness. The desire alone doesn't guarantee enlightenment, but it can spur you along the path. Maybe Leo is warning people not to confuse the desire for the path itself.

The biggest obstacle to enlightenment is the ego, and the best way to dissolve the ego is by learning the lessons of suffering. People can realize mind-blowing truths about their identity, and their relationship with reality. But the realization by itself isn't enough. We still have to surrender the ego in order to be a vessel for Consciousness.

Enlightenment is transformation. It is realized through learning, through loving, through meditating, through humbling yourself, and through devoting yourself to the truth at all costs. Ultimately, it is a sacrificial act. The self is sacrificed on the altar of the Self. The experience, when it happens, is holy.

[Leo Gura]

As I have always said, there are many paths to awakening. Including many ass-backwards ones. But hey, if you can only awaken ass-backwards, do you.

[Moksha]

If The Buddha, Eckhart, St. John of the Cross, and others awakened ass-backwards count me in  

Edited November 9, 2020 by Moksha

[Member]

17 minutes ago, Moksha said:

If The Buddha, Eckhart, St. John of the Cross, and others awakened ass-backwards count me in  

This is my role-model

[mandyjw]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

As I have always said, there are many paths to awakening. Including many ass-backwards ones. But hey, if you can only awaken ass-backwards, do you.

Well, you have to have time and space in order to have direction. A snake eating its own tail is strange enough, no one stops and says "hey, isn't the snake supposed to be eating it's tail clockwise, why is it counter clockwise?" It's weird enough already. 

[Moksha]

@Member Love it  Moonwalking our way through awakening. 

@mandyjw Yes  The order of eating matters less than the meal itself.

Edited November 9, 2020 by Moksha

[SilentTears]

This is a great tread to people who have different paths towards awakening. 
 

shows how people can truly take random ass paths and end up at the same place. 
 

All was meant to be.

4 hours ago, Moksha said:

The biggest obstacle to enlightenment is the ego, and the best way to dissolve the ego is by learning the lessons of suffering.

Btw, I wouldn’t really agree with that. I’ve seen people who suffered nothing and got awakened. They took the Hindu path sure, however I saw them not suffering(doesn’t mean they all won’t suffer). 
 

I suffered a shit ton to awaken. Not a big deal, but I would like to point out this bs. 
it’s just one path(edit: It is just one path that thinks about suffering is the best way to devolve the ego. Don’t get lost in stupid and toxic beliefs) . To newbies this stupid belief can be taken on dogmatically really quickly so don’t get lost in it. YOU DONT NEED TO SUFFER. 
And even if you do no worries. Suffering can be fun. Once it is done you can look back and laugh. 

 
lol, I would like to say that many people in spirituality have a lot of mixed Buddha beliefs which I see hold them back. Such as not killing, love, and other stuff. These aren’t bad they are just one pointer to purity. Question your own beliefs. Budddha path is not meant for a lot of people. It’s kinda girly too.(I reread this and I saw how this can be taken wrongly to the girly folks. This isn’t shitting on Buddha’s. I love em. They take a path in which I cannot.) 
 

Have you ever seen a truly masculine path? 
(Lol I wouldn’t consider this a super masculine path, however you know people kill impure people and get awoken? It’s a legit path.)

Edited November 9, 2020 by SilentTears

[SilentTears]

6 hours ago, mandyjw said:

In my experience all those things are all integrally, inseparably one. A huge part of my path was running from depression that would overtake me like a wave if I wasn't vigilant with things like diet, personal development, exercise, learning spiritually, mindfulness, etc. Eventually truth is heading straight into the suffering without any hint of resistance, letting the resistance bubble up and experiencing that resistance to love itself is the suffering. I wouldn't really call that "not caring" about it. If God is Love, then can you call seeing that truth by not caring?  I guess that some spiritual traditions use that as a pointer and it's true in a way, but it sounds like a neo-advaita approach to me. I guess it's about not believing your thoughts about happiness and suffering.

Lol don’t mind him. He is advocating the path which works best for him. You took a different kinda path(kinda). Of course you guys are spirituality differently. 
 

always do what’s best intuitively for you.

[Moksha]

23 minutes ago, SilentTears said:

Btw, I wouldn’t really agree with that. I’ve seen people who suffered nothing and got awakened. They took the Hindu path sure, however I saw them not suffering(doesn’t mean they all won’t suffer).

Yes  There are many paths, and it is wise to avoid ultimatums. Saying "this way" is the "only way" or even the "best way" is your sneaky as fuck ego climbing onto the enlightenment pedestal and striking a victory pose.

*swats at his ego*

Shoo.

Edited November 9, 2020 by Moksha