Leo's Practical Guide To Enlightenment

[Not a shaolin monk]

@Leo Gura is silence and nothing  different words for the same thing? if that is true is enlightenment  simple as  realizing that are you silence? 

[Leo Gura]

@Not a shaolin monk No

It's best to treat the word "Nothing" as X -- an unknown variable. You have no idea what Nothing is, and there's no way you can imagine it. Any ideas of it you can conjure are certainly wrong and are holding you back.

You cannot symbolize the entire omniverse with a mental image. You have to become it. ACTUALLY!

Believe it or not, that is within your power to do. You are God after all. You created it all.

[Leo Gura]

@John Flores Less speculating, more inquiring.

[Guest username]

34 minutes ago, John Flores said:

Ok, but I'd rather not inquire and do it my own way, which is helping people realize what our goal is.

What does that mean?

[FirstglimpseOMG]

I think I'd rather get closer to BEing the source than getting further away from it by looking at source/God/awareness, consiousness, etc., as something separate. In other words... DUALITY. 

[Trond]

Get to the bottom of whats true. Everything else is false. Very simple, but takes time and you need to really want to find out

[Leo Gura]

@Outer Fun? Self-inquiry is brutal. You should feel like you're going insane. If you expect it to be like video games, you might as well not even start.

Ask the questions in whatever language you want. Doesn't matter. They are not complicated questions. You're just making excuses to not do the work.

[Martin123]

@Leo Gura What is your opinion of different people resonating with different methods?
I have been finding myself not really benefiting from self-enquiry, but rather resting in the infinite presence that is always there, sort of relentless mindfulness.
I might be just throwing excuses at myself though, I will see how I progress. 

[Leo Gura]

@Martin123 Of course different people resonate with different methods.

Just be careful not to trick yourself. This work is extremely emotionally taxing. So of course the mind will exploit this point to get you to stop doing the work. Your mind will come up with all kinds of excuses like, "Oh, I'm not resonating with this." or, "I'm already enlightened.", etc.

But in the end, only you can know what's truly right for you.

Just remember, there's a good reason why 99.9999% of the population isn't enlightened. And your mind probably thinks along the same lines as them. You're very likely to end up just like them unless you take extraordinary measures.

[FirstglimpseOMG]

@John Flores I hear ya. I'm pretty sure of my own slow, sorta steady growth lately, but until only recently I had no clue how to move the cause forward in any real way outside of sharing the joy of it all with a few people close to me. It's crazy though, lately I've walked backwards into a number of pretty solid ideas about how to help more, much more, than just a few folks around me. Bigger thinking is great fun when you're not used to it, but I now have a lifetime of work to do, in a thousand not so little ways lol. I do have a real hard time with even remaining aware of the unconditional love thing, let alone cultivating it with any consistency, allowing it to become more & more natural. I find it tough to balance love with the practical side of things, and I'm learning that eventually, happy thoughts & personal spiritual realizations aren't going to be enough to improve the dream of this world. God I ramble, have an awesome, and I mean AWESOME day!

[Trond]

Anyone familiar with Jed McKenna's method of self-inquiry, Spiritual Autolysis? Where you write down what you know until you know instead of doing it in your head. 

I feel that it can be of use and it can definitely be as frustrating when you simply can't write anything. 

[Leo Gura]

7 hours ago, Outer said:

Self-inquiry is a pretty intellectual thing then if you are thinking about what you are? So I'll sit there close my eyes and ask what I am and find nothing and then I might have the realization what I am is what I found which I don't have now. Aka the sample of instructions.

How do I cultivate presence in the process if I am set for an hour a day for example "Self-inquiry for an hour a day no matter what". I guess simply putting a timer and focus on it, when the timer finishes and dings (if a bell one), go on about my day and 'reality'.

Maybe it's worth it to have this habit or even necessary. I do think a little bit about if I do a 60 min timer a day it becomes a little like a chore and 'Enlightenment' something you grind, like working a job.

It starts pretty intellectual because that's where you're at. Over the months and years it will become less intellectual and more being-based.

That's exactly right, create a daily habit using a timer.

Yes, waking up is a chore. You have no idea yet how much of a chore. Which is why hardly anyone wakes up.

5 hours ago, unknownworld said:

Thank you for posting this amazing guide Leo. I have a couple of questions:

1) Since the self doesn't exist, does that mean that the concept of past lives is fallacious?

2) What is your opinion of Shamans? Are some of them enlightened? Or would taking a shamanic path lead you closer to enlightenment? I would think that they have non-dualistic views since they do entheogens (for example those in the Amazon).

1) No

2) Some of them could be. But most likely they aren't fully enlightened. They've probably had some deep mystical experiences and are more conscious than most people. But I doubt they're Buddhas. There is probably a huge range of shamans, from deluded ones to fully enlightened ones. The fully enlightened ones would probably be the ones who've spent thousands of hours just sitting and doing nothing.

[bobbyward]

2 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

It starts pretty intellectual because that's where you're at. Over the months and years it will become less intellectual and more being-based.

what does it mean for self inquiry to be being based??

[Leo Gura]

32 minutes ago, bobbyward said:

what does it mean for self inquiry to be being based??

Just sit and do nothing. Do that long enough, and enlightenment will reveal itself.

6 minutes ago, unknownworld said:

Could you please explain the concept of past lives then? Some people claim to know who they were in their past lives.

Consciousness is infinite. It is everything possible. It can enfold into anything, create virtual partitions of itself, and become anything. Consciousness seems to store memories holographically as part of its infinite evolution process.

[Leo Gura]

@unknownworld Nonduality includes duality. Absolute Infinity subdivides in infinite ways.

Universalized consciousness is individualizing and "living" through specific forms which are different creatures.

[Natasha]

On 2/3/2017 at 3:26 PM, Empty said:

@Leo Gura In your video, the dark side of meditation, you said that one who works deeply on enlightenment will surely face a feeling of loss or lost, how does one overcome that feeling?  Thanks!

This might help:

 

[Leo Gura]

@unknownworld Atman is Brahman, Brahman is Atman.

You're getting ahead of yourself.

Have a direct experience of Atman first.

Then have a direct experience of Brahman.

Then things will be clear.

[Leo Gura]

@unknownworld You're getting lost in theory. You are not going to understand this by philosophizing about it.

Sit down and OBSERVE yourself. That is the only way.

You believe you exist. Now find yourself! What are you?!!!!!!

[PureExp]

Sorry if I'm butting in this nice discussion, I'm just curious

6 hours ago, unknownworld said:

Atman means individual soul, which seems contradictory to what is stated in this guide to enlightenment.

What is your exact understanding of the guide/teaching presented here on this forum? Hows it a contradiction?

6 hours ago, unknownworld said:

Buddhism and Carvaka school of Hinduism deny that there exists anything called "a soul" or a "self".

There are hundreds of "schools". How'd you decide which one is "right"?

I guess you are just asking why not everyone simply agrees on one thing. Can they agree? Wouldn't this earth turn into heaven if we all just agreed?

6 hours ago, unknownworld said:

Maybe you can share your experience and how you experienced both "atman" and "brahman" to verify this claim?

He took a drug

Anyhow, his experiences are private and subjective, so are mine and yours too. They cannot be shared. All individuals need to get their own experiences. If I claim that I have experienced what you say, I am "enlightened", it does nothing for you, it proves nothing. You will be left to either believe or disbelieve, take it on faith, and so will be reduced to the level of religion. So try to get your own experience, do not depend on what others say. Others will surely help you to get that experience, but cannot spoon-feed it.

[Empty]

@Natasha Thanks. It does help, indeed