Interview with Frank Yang on the difference between Enlightenment and Psychedelics

[Enlightenment]

2 hours ago, Thought Art said:

don't doubt he understand meditation but 2 trips is not enough

I don't think agreeing with Leo is a matter of enough trips. Michael Taft who calls Leo a charlatan, supposedly have done ~700 LSD trips

 

[Thought Art]

@Enlightenment Okay, sure... But doing some LSD or a high dose of one psychedelic is not doing over 150 different kinds or doing 5meo. Radically different.

There is both state and structure we are dealing with here.

I am not saying Leo or Yang is right or wrong.

I think everyone is full of shit in some way.

Edited September 16, 2021 by Thought Art

[Adamq8]

@Enlightenment A charlatan ??

 

[Ry4n]

15 hours ago, Adamq8 said:

He has not anywhere near sufficent understanding of psychedelics even if he tripped 10 times, it is required atleast a 100 trips , seriously. 

I could make the same case that one doesn't understand the void until sufficient ketamine experience, it's all highly subjective. One who's at least seen the ox should be able to judge another's progress (somewhat) by the way they act and speak and describe these things, not by how many trips they've had. And then to argue a specific number of trips without elaborating on their conceptual knowledge, emotional stability and maturity, as well as everything else that goes into the person's background before said trip is overly simplistic and overly prescriptive, as if these things just work on everyone relatively the same way. I know you probably don't think this, but talking like this implies this very much so. 

Like Adya said a lot of people CLAIM big benefits, but you know what? I'm not really seeing it, and their belief in it only amplifies their lack of mature understanding on this stuff. 

14 hours ago, Thought Art said:

You are not experienced unless you have done at least 100 trips.

I would rather focus on the quality than quantity. Once again this is too simplistic. The process is infinitely more complicated than that. (Obviously you need a good amount of trips to understand psychedelics.)

14 hours ago, Thought Art said:

Don't speak as if you know something when you don't. I don't see it as one-upmanship. 

sigh. 

15 hours ago, Tim R said:

Also, how can people argue about the ineffable?? It never fails to make me chuckle when I see people argue about this attainment or that understanding, and how your insight is still not the deepest insight and on and on and on... 

Hahaha yea, kinda highlights the obvious doesn't it?

[Ry4n]

@Lauritz I love your channel! Thank you so much for doing that interview I've seen much older videos of yours and it's amazing to see your progress.

 

[Nos7algiK]

Frank is full of wisdom and I greatly both enjoy and appreciate his perspectives. It has always resonated with me very deeply. Thanks for the interview going to give it a listen while I do some things.

[Adamq8]

@Ry4n Hey man, yes I agree with you.

I know Frank is "real" so to speak.

He is legit, and i even practice vipassana thanks to him ?

But it is still a valid judgement to say that, psychedelics is an extremely broad subject and I don't agree that it is just mind games etc.

Psychedelics is a valid tool.

Ive noticed it on the path.

Meditation + Psychedelics is an awesome combo tbh.

It is not so black and white to put it into a box and say it is mind games etc.

Thats what humans love to do, put everything into boxes,  that is a mind game if anything ?

But is it truly bullshit to say that in order to understand something you need to spend time on it, same goes with meditation and everything else?

One can't possibly know all about Psychedelics or what it is after just 5-10 trips, and i do feel that, Leo's realizations is not either the typical psychedelics like experience people have with dmt entities etc, that why everybody has a different way of using them, and same goes for me, psychedelics is RADICAL NON DUAL/not even non duality.

Even so radical that all spirituality/philosophy/meditation/psychedelics is seen as an illusion and a dream as well ? there just is no such things as a path or enlightenment, it is all a dream, that's when it becomes radical, it is transcendent of everything/nothing, it is not zero, not infinity. But it is all of them, and it is however it is. 

And IT does not matter what anyone says after that really, it is so transcendent that there is no such thing as transcendence, no humans, no world, no awakening, no spirituality.

Hehe it is all pure imagination. I mean truly imagination, not even close to what people refer to as imagination. 

I mean "imagination" so radical that enlightenment is seen as a dream.

But then again everything is fantasy and it is real, since there is nothing else.

So who is to say that psychedelics is a mind game? Psychedelics transcends itself, there is no psychedelics, there is no others, even my girlfriend was seen through as a total illusion and dream, i could more or less control her and she turned into me and was waiting for me to wake up to being god, and she is not into this stuff at all, she was just not in there, her and my parents and everything else is a pure fiction.

So it is too broad of a stroke to say that they are mind games etc. 

It is as a valid tool as meditation or self inquiry etc.

I agree that for most people psychedelics is a delusion as well because they dont understand the significance of it, seeing aliens or whatever is not the point.

The only one i ever saw truly understands them is LEO.

And this has nothing to do with ego or moment to moment experience.

But that does not mean that I would stop doing vipassana or listen to Frank or Leo or anyone else, because there is no where to go.

To dream is to be alive.

There is only dreaming.

 

[herghly]

honestly frank seem's quite immature. I sense he still needs to do a lot of regular psychological ego work. honestly frank seem's quite immature. I sense he still needs to do a lot of regular psychological ego work. 

[Mafortu]

I appreciate Frank Yang to what he brings to the table, he is quite an interesting individual and he seems very genuine, but I can see how his high-energy bro-isms will be off-putting to some members here, but thats bias for ya.

Edited September 17, 2021 by Mafortu

[PurpleTree]

18 hours ago, Adamq8 said:

@Enlightenment A charlatan ??

 

haha yea i love that word, it's funny

21 hours ago, Tim R said:

Oh my god, why all this elitism about "do you even trip, bro?" in the psychedelic community?... Really unpleasant to be honest. 

 

"Oh you haven't done 5-MeO-DMT at least 100 times? Well then you're full of shit and you don't understand the deepest spiritual insights."

What a stupid game, it's embarrassing... 

 

Also, how can people argue about the ineffable?? It never fails to make me chuckle when I see people argue about this attainment or that understanding, and how your insight is still not the deepest insight and on and on and on... 

One-Upmanship at its best ?

i tend to agree with you here. this just seems like another form of "tribalism"

 

 

frank yang i haven't seen too much of his stuff, on one hand i find him inspiring because he's also really fit and a good violin player etc. and goes deep in on the consciousness stuff

he's smiling too much though, is he laughing at us, is he trying to portray a happy enlightened guy or is he just happy?  <--this isn't so serious

[Lauritz]

@Adamq8 those were basically my insights with psychedelics as well. It can be total clarity. Which may also feel like total insanity from the egos point of view, but it may feel very true as the experience is happening. 

But that is the last mindfuck I realized about psychedelics. No matter how significant and true something feels and appears to be on psychedelics, still does not mean that it is. The sense of what's true is just another parameter of consciousness that gets turned up by psychedelics. In the end, even these seemingly most true insights dissolve into the nothingness/consciousness they came out of. 

 

I also agree that it is easy to fall into traps with psychedelics precisely because the insights one has on them feel so significant and true. Doesn't mean they are. 

[Lauritz]

3 hours ago, PurpleTree said:

he's smiling too much though, is he laughing at us, is he trying to portray a happy enlightened guy or is he just happy?  <--this isn't so serious

From my conversation with him, also before and after the interview, that's his true personality. If you look back on his history you can see that he has always done crazy stuff. Now that he has all filters removed, his true self shines through his body and behavior in every moment it seems. To me it feels like he is genuine in his behavior and is not putting on an act.

[Nahm]

15 minutes ago, Lauritz said:

@Adamq8 those were basically my insights with psychedelics as well. It can be total clarity. Which may also feel like total insanity from the egos point of view, but it may feel very true as the experience is happening. 

But that is the last mindfuck I realized about psychedelics. No matter how significant and true something feels and appears to be on psychedelics, still does not mean that it is. The sense of what's true is just another parameter of consciousness that gets turned up by psychedelics. In the end, even these seemingly most true insights dissolve into the nothingness/consciousness they came out of. 

 

I also agree that it is easy to fall into traps with psychedelics precisely because the insights one has on them feel so significant and true. Doesn't mean they are. 

Well said. 

[Adamq8]

1 hour ago, Lauritz said:

@Adamq8 those were basically my insights with psychedelics as well. It can be total clarity. Which may also feel like total insanity from the egos point of view, but it may feel very true as the experience is happening. 

But that is the last mindfuck I realized about psychedelics. No matter how significant and true something feels and appears to be on psychedelics, still does not mean that it is. The sense of what's true is just another parameter of consciousness that gets turned up by psychedelics. In the end, even these seemingly most true insights dissolve into the nothingness/consciousness they came out of. 

 

I also agree that it is easy to fall into traps with psychedelics precisely because the insights one has on them feel so significant and true. Doesn't mean they are. 

Yes ofcourse but also, that goes with out saying that any insight might be "bullshit" according to that logic, whether it is meditation, vipassana, self inquiry.

But how far should one go to deny the insights?

Ofcourse they dissolve into conciousness since everything is conciousness ?

But you are also right ofcourse, they might have been bullshit, if it were the case that I alone had them, but in this case my GF also became GOD realized and awoke without tripping or any other drug for that matter.

How do you explain that one away?

Or rather, it was me talking to my self.

And we still talk about it to this day, now it is a memory ofcourse and im not in that state permanently which is a blessing tbh?

I am not saying that all of the trip was Absolute truth, since I know that psychedelics can easily delude, but the part where I truly woke up to what I am and my gf did it simultanously was not the deluded part, but the thoughts that came after that, yes they might have been deluded and the visual stuff etc.

But true nature is what we always are so could have realized it in meditation or just spontentously also ofcourse, but it happend on the psychedelic, but it was seen that it was not thanks to the psychedelic in a way, but they sure set the stage for realization so to speak

[Nahm]

@Adamq8

‘They’ don’t ‘dissolve into consciousness’. That’d be two. Nothing is undeniable. 

[Adamq8]

1 minute ago, Nahm said:

@Adamq8

‘They’ don’t ‘dissolve into consciousness’. That’d be two. Nothing is undeniable. 

Yes , language can be quite misleading and useless, dunno how to even speak about this things tbh ?

[Nahm]

@Adamq8

Once upon a time a screen thought there was a movie. 

?

[Adamq8]

9 minutes ago, Nahm said:

@Adamq8

Once upon a time a screen thought there was a movie. 

?

Beatiful, thanks ?

No more has to be said ?

[noticeom]

Wow, awesome interview! New found respect for Frank.

[Nos7algiK]

4 hours ago, Lauritz said:

@Adamq8 those were basically my insights with psychedelics as well. It can be total clarity. Which may also feel like total insanity from the egos point of view, but it may feel very true as the experience is happening. 

But that is the last mindfuck I realized about psychedelics. No matter how significant and true something feels and appears to be on psychedelics, still does not mean that it is. The sense of what's true is just another parameter of consciousness that gets turned up by psychedelics. In the end, even these seemingly most true insights dissolve into the nothingness/consciousness they came out of. 

 

I also agree that it is easy to fall into traps with psychedelics precisely because the insights one has on them feel so significant and true. Doesn't mean they are. 

Well said, that's where I was led as well so I let go of the attachments I had to my prior psychedelics experiences yet still hold an appreciation for the journey that led me here.

 

4 hours ago, Lauritz said:

From my conversation with him, also before and after the interview, that's his true personality. If you look back on his history you can see that he has always done crazy stuff. Now that he has all filters removed, his true self shines through his body and behavior in every moment it seems. To me it feels like he is genuine in his behavior and is not putting on an act.

Frank seems genuine here to me. Not because he's enlightened or anything, but I'd assume this is how he has naturally been for years. There is a lot fo charisma to his character and he seems quite warm and inviting when talking to others.

But, I finished the interview now and it was great content. You have a very calm and nice talking voice.