My peers aren't even doing consciousness work and their life seems better

[fopylo]

This has bothered me for quite a while. All the people I know don't do really self actualization work (I don't know 100 percent but it's an easy estimate). I, on the other hand, take this work more serious and have been practicing 30 minutes of mindfulness meditation for the past week and a half, ~30 minutes of the self acceptance exercise guided by one of Leo's videos for the last 2 weeks, and on top of that I've been doing regular meditation every morning for about 20 minutes for a bit over a year. All of that is nice, but I don't seem to have a much better life than just normal dudes who go out with their friends and have fun time.
It also seems like many of the normal people I see aren't as much in their heads when engaging in a conversation or a different experience. It's as if they have practiced mindfulness meditation or something, but something just feels wrong...
Don't get me wrong. I am feeling better on my own from all these benefits, but still, I don't yet feel the degree of love and flow and peace when engaging with other people, as much as they have. I still feel quite behind in terms of how much I'm resisting reality.
Could it be that those people have a higher level of consciousness than me while they are not even aware of it? (lol)
Or could it be that my resistance to reality was so bad that I haven't even realized how terrible it was, and now it's starting to just become normal level again?
In any case, I feel like I'm missing some part of the equation, like maybe something that's getting me stuck.

To give a better explanation of how this mindfulness and self acceptance have helped me:
So I have always been sucked into youtube going through rabbit holes of self help (for mental masturbation, obviously), and pretty much spent my day thinking about improving, and believing I'm improving by hardly doing a thing. My mind was very very weak and I was literally not able to do almost any activity that required my input, it was just to threatening. I'm talking about even fear of playing a video game, which I still do (because it's an emerging into a new world and I might lose myself, if it makes more sense). But I have managed to play the piano a bit (it became easier for me to be present and to risk the dirty process of learning and making mistakes and becoming creative and committing).
All of this is nice and great, but it feels for me like those things are very easy and natural to many other people. And yet, I am the one working on raising my consciousness! How could it be that I'm still behind?

[Seraphim]

People are different, some are very balanced and functional even though they have a low level of consciousness. I was always very anxious and neurotic, probably inherited it from my mom, and it didn't disappear when I started meditating and evolving. I was able to raise my level of consciousness but I still had strong anxieties, but then I found my beloved teacher who removed my fears and distortions for me, if I tried to do it alone it would have taken a very long time. So don't expect fast results, and maybe don't try to do it all by yourself, a true teacher is hard to find but if you want to you will find your destined teacher who will help you a lot.

Edited April 18, 2021 by Seraphim

[fopylo]

@Seraphim How did the teacher help remove those fears?

[Username]

People are desensitized, this is why they seem to be ok. If you look in close enough you will see that they act compulsively without even realizing it. Most people are ok only because of ignorance.

I also feel like I'm below average but I suspect it's untrue. Unconscious patternsn are becoming conscious. Some time is needed to clean things up.

[Seraphim]

6 minutes ago, fopylo said:

@Seraphim How did the teacher help remove those fears?

With strong shaktipat meditations that he sends to his students.

@Username Yes that's probably true!

[Michal__]

Bro, you have to take a lot of action in the material world too!

Learn business & pick up, your life will be way better than theirs.

The type of meditation that translates the best to the material world is concentration.

Also, use affirmations regularly! That's another way to transfer your spiritual success to material success.

[tatsumaru]

"Blessed is he who has a soul, blessed is he who has none, but woe and grief to him who has it in embryo." - Gurdjieff

[fopylo]

@Username I mean, they don't seem to having such a bad time. This wouldn't be the case since many groups of friends meet quite often and they don't seem to come to it from a neurotic approach. But since it seems they can interact with the outside world with more flow and love, I can imagine that they must be more mindful with less resistance.

45 minutes ago, Username said:

Some time is needed to clean things up.

What do you mean by this? 

[fopylo]

@Michal__

27 minutes ago, Michal__ said:

Learn business & pick up, your life will be way better than theirs.

Reading this felt a bit uncomfortable since it goes against what Leo talks about. I guess it could be nice to have those skills but I need to first build my foundation. This is why I've became interested in raising my consciousness. I've tried starting a business but quickly realized I have many mental blocks and it was too painful for me (such as having the pressure for choosing a niche and not knowing what to go with, doubting if this is even something I want to pursue...), and so I decided that I need to build a strong inner foundation.

 

30 minutes ago, Michal__ said:

The type of meditation that translates the best to the material world is concentration.

How? What does this even mean?

 

30 minutes ago, Michal__ said:

Also, use affirmations regularly! That's another way to transfer your spiritual success to material success.

Oh man, you have no idea. I've tried using affirmations for like a month (quite a while ago). It felt good for like a week at most. I've took it seriously and put emotion and imagination into it. Overtime it just became very overwhelming (because of the effort I put into repeating it with emotion) and I just had to let it go. I didn't see any improvements from it at the time being. But, I might be open to it again sometime

[SamC]

1: Contemplate why you compare yourself so much with other people.

2: You don't know how they feel or how their life is.  You're just assuming shit.

3: I understand that it is super frustrating to feel like you're not getting the thing you seek ( self acceptance/ self love). It must feel very discouraging and disappointing. 

Relize that the journey is long and that it entails going thorough a lot of shit and pain. Sometimes you will feel 100 times worse than your friends a couple of days/ months because you're on this exact journey. Shredding your ego

TAKES.FUCKING.TIME.

Lastly

Focus on the material stuff more. Don't meditate 4 hours a day. Do that later. Make some goals, discover what you want, take Leo's LP course, do shadow work, seek out a therapist and get your basics rolling.

Gl man, I am rooting for you. I know it's though, but hang in there.

Edited April 18, 2021 by SamC

[Reciprocality]

One could almost say: there are reasons these people do not find the self actualization work neccesary, and a reason that you do.

[Leo Gura]

3 hours ago, fopylo said:

All of that is nice, but I don't seem to have a much better life than just normal dudes who go out with their friends and have fun time.

Ignorance is bliss -- in the short term.

But also, don't underestimate how bad your friends' lives are. Your friends are miserable deep down and their lives are a house of cards which can easily get knocked over.

Quote

It also seems like many of the normal people I see aren't as much in their heads when engaging in a conversation or a different experience. It's as if they have practiced mindfulness meditation or something.

They have been practicing mindlessness. That's why. When you don't contemplate life, life is easier. You just live like animal.

Quote

I don't yet feel the degree of love and flow and peace when engaging with other people, as much as they have. I still feel quite behind in terms of how much I'm resisting reality.

Takes years and decades to develop that.

It is a mistake to compare yourself to others, compare yourself to your old self.

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Could it be that those people have a higher level of consciousness than me while they are not even aware of it? (lol)

No! They are morons. Which, oddly, makes them happier.

Quote

In any case, I feel like I'm missing some part of the equation, like maybe something that's getting me stuck.

Living a contemplative life is hard.

Which is why your friends aren't doing it.

Quote

To give a better explanation of how this mindfulness and self acceptance have helped me:
So I have always been sucked into youtube going through rabbit holes of self help (for mental masturbation, obviously), and pretty much spent my day thinking about improving, and believing I'm improving by hardly doing a thing. My mind was very very weak and I was literally not able to do almost any activity that required my input, it was just to threatening. I'm talking about even fear of playing a video game, which I still do (because it's an emerging into a new world and I might lose myself, if it makes more sense). But I have managed to play the piano a bit (it became easier for me to be present and to risk the dirty process of learning and making mistakes and becoming creative and committing).
All of this is nice and great, but it feels for me like those things are very easy and natural to many other people. And yet, I am the one working on raising my consciousness! How could it be that I'm still behind?

The reality is that you have hardly even begun to do consciousness work. You think you're doing it, but you've only dipped your toe in the water, hence you don't have much results.

If you are going to pursue a conscious life, you have to hold yourself to very different standards than average people. You take on WAY more responsibility.

But also: Don't forget to have fun too! Don't be too serious about life.

[Reciprocality]

Think about it in its egocentric function, we are all centered around something, this something seems varying to some extent but everyone calls it the self and the ego.

When most people, your typical person think about themself they do so regarding how other people percieve them and that becomes their identity. In doing so they seem easygoing and appears calm, sincere and authentic when socializing, now this identity of theirs are already settled and thus their actions can reflect without thought the very past with which their identity at first were designated. This requires very little thinking, it requires very little self-awareness and quriosity. 

Other again, think about themselves trough introspection, they value and judge for themselves trough which habit they can have minimal understanding of how other people think of them, and although they do not assign other people with the authoirty of being their judge they can not help thinking how they are percieved and understood. 

And although the latter group must regulate their actions to fit within they grouping they are themselves diachronicaly opposed to the set behaviour as already elaborated on, whether or not they are metacognizant of that or not. 

 

To be egocentric/selfcentric is a mode of both groups, its just that they vary so deeply in their constitution. The people you describe are NOT egocentric when socializing (in the act), you are, i am, most people here are. This if because we are thinking and introspecting, we are lesser of a pre-arranged algorithms. And it overwhelms us sometimes, so we self actualize while they're coping silently (now some are not even that). To the latter point, pre-arranged behaviour likely numbed them down, in which sense we can assume they must chase some cheese.

[Fadl]

The people around you are ego tripping, they think that they are happy, but when the moment arrives they will be shocked, it is like when a drug addict wakes up from his sleep. 

The problem with spiritual practices is that there is no pleasure, at least at the beginning.

Later sth bigger than pleasure will arise.

[Merkabah]

2 hours ago, fopylo said:

@Username I mean, they don't seem to having such a bad time. This wouldn't be the case since many groups of friends meet quite often and they don't seem to come to it from a neurotic approach. But since it seems they can interact with the outside world with more flow and love, I can imagine that they must be more mindful with less resistance.

What do you mean by this? 

@fopylo

My friend!  Depending on how you might view it, you are blessed/cursed with a different type of brain; Social interactions are surely a challenge along with many other areas that involve fast-paced activities. Your brain tends to be slow in processing and integrating info in general. You tend to have an analyzing mind which approaches matters more DEEPLY as opposed to QUICKLY and EFFICIENTLY. Nowhere is this more in display than social occasions where fluidity is KEY to functioning well. There are such challenges. BUT the important thing is first: KNOW that you are wired differently and accept it as part of your make up. seek advice from therapists specialized in coaching people with HSP .  Second: HSP traits come with many upsides. educate yourself on those in order to chart a better course for your life going forward. Third: Go into professions that are well-suited to your strengths and talents which are plenty I'm sure. 

Sorry if it came off as too blunt or harsh. But I think at the end, despite it being a random, unsolicited advice coming from anonymous guy, it's the right thing to do  

[Bando]

You sound pretty young, set aside the spirituality except for mediation and focus on Foundational self help, like making money, making friends, getting girls, fitness, diet ect. This is the real foundation not sitting around contemplating about stuff and mental masturbating to different topics, this is called spiritual bypassing which will turn you into a hippie with no substance.

Spirituality is supposed to come after you've transcended you survival needs or at least burned out through a majority of it, take it easy thats why you got 80+ years to live

[universe]

7 hours ago, fopylo said:

It also seems like many of the normal people I see aren't as much in their heads when engaging in a conversation or a different experience. It's as if they have practiced mindfulness meditation or something, but something just feels wrong...

You are in your head because you have a need to control, get something out of or being safe in the conversation. Feel these needs and let them go via the Sedona Method. Realize that you are never in control ever and that you are already complete. Know that you will be ok. Feel your body, your arms, your legs, your torso. Get in there and feel the subtle emotional changes during a conversation, be with them.

[Snader]

They are ignorant and not interested in anything that's under the surface. That makes it so much easier to do socialization because the frame is so much smaller.

If you look at their lives with magnifier you can see how sad their life actually is. You only see their highlights when the vibe is up, sun is shining and it's all rainbows and butterflies. This reminds me of Michelangelo's quote: ''If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all.'' Same goes with those people, if you saw how much they suffer, their happy moments wouldn't make their life look so great. There is always something happening below the surface which is responsible for the outcome they show to others.

Also, if the people you normally socialize with are not doing personal development but living in their bubble with their common cultural and social values, changes are that you don't really have much to talk about with them. You might have a phase when you need to strengthen your own inner game and you don't really get anything from those social circles. Their close-mindedness and unconsciousness might even disgust you. Then it's important to admit it, accept it and keep working on yourself with a good conscience. After you've done enough personal development so that you are grounded in your values and your mission in life, then it is much easier to socialize even with lower consciousness people without any guilt, because you are grown and you can see down and understand the route of development.

You are most likely on a phase when your values are taking a shift and you are rebuilding your new identity on some level. That means that in your social situations you will probably think about how you want to show up, what you want others to think of you and how to act to fulfill those expectations. All that will settle once you grow and develop self-trust and self-acceptance.

Don't quit social life completely by any means, but keep using it as a meter. Learn to read your feelings while socializing. They will give you the most honest feedback you need.

You are sitting on a gold mine by doing the work instead of settling and living as a sheep, and you will discover that.

[Consept]

I see this a lot where people want a 'better' life and as you've framed it, that means going out with friends, doing fun stuff, not being in your head etc. What you're trying to do is to not have to deal with getting better at this stuff through spiritually bypassing the need for it. In my experience this can kinda work but what you'll find is even if you do this successfully, unaddressed issues will rear their head. 

What you need to do is the hard work of sorting out traumas and mental blocks, then you need to actually do the physical work of improving the areas of your life you want to improve ie finances, relationships, social etc. These are do able things but require work. 

Your current strategy seems to be 'become mindful and enlightened and everything will be perfect'. While that can be true for some it won't be for most, so get going on some tangible things and the rest will come. Moreover you can still practice mindfulness whilst doing the material stuff. 

[Advocate]

@fopylo I can totally relate to you. I have felt the same for many years. I tried so hard and yet everything seemed to be so much easier for other. In fact,  “being in the head, trying hard and not getting the results” is the consequence of my birth trauma, the most deep-seated trauma I discovered so far. 

So I’d advise you to keep up the hope and keep digging and dissolving traumas! Good luck and much love.