Outgrowing spirituality

[Karl-Heinz Mueller]

Hi Leo, Hi everyone,
 
I have been consuming your stuff for some time by now. I was actually wondering whether it would be worth the time here to write a lengthy comment. I really do think that many of your non-esoteric teachings on your channel are quite valuable and courageously unconventional. And I also think that we should develop ourselves, and grow and refine our consciousnesses. That is good stuff, I appreciate it! From what I know I think that you are amongst the top league of Youtube high consciousness content providers. And I pull off my hat for that fact that you put it out for free. Props for doing that!  
 
But! With all due respect, Leo,  in what follows I do not intend to adulate you, since that would be rather boring and not provide for a good discussion. I would like to share my overall critique of your teachings. And since other people also find the way you teach as somewhat aggressive, I say „If you dish it out, you have to be able to take it.‟ ;-)
I myself like to be outright and outspoken, so to me it is not such a big problem.  
My critique is not all-encompassing. I did not watch every single of your videos. But a good chunk of it.  
 
Don’t let being as good as you are delude you into believing that you are infallible (you not rarely sound as of you believe yourself to be that). In every of your videos I have to more or less frown at several points due to the flawed reasoning that you display, or I notice points where you contradict yourself, even to things that you mentioned minutes ago in the same video (I could cite examples if you are interested, but they are not my main point here). Well, that is all okay, we all make mistakes and err from time to time. Yet I would not expect such mistakes of someone who thinks he is „god‟ (even the way you define that catchword)…
It also sometimes seems to me that you wish to maintain a kind of „aura of enlightenment‟. You address too little self-doubt in your videos. Because you have to. Since if you would admit your doubts or occasional mistakes your teachings would not be as well received anymore (more on that later). Overall I get the impression that you – thanks to all the personal development and study you have done – have grown a huge, even somewhat arrogant and overbearing, spiritual ego. I miss humility a bit. This calling-yourself-god stuff is probably the most ludicrous outgrowth of it.

From the way you speak I get the impression that you regard yourself as highly spiritually advanced, but that does not make you being exempt from ordinary manners. Straight away, I think it would be honest if you would just admit that you are just some guy, a human being of material form with quite some clever insights into life and the world, but whose spiritual pursuit is at odds with materialist science.  
As to that topic: What made me very curious, and what for the sake of transparency I think everyone of us needs to know, is why you did not react to this guy’s invitation to discuss with him, which you yourself wanted to do.
Were you afraid? Was that one of your egoic defense mechanisms, afraid of transparency?
 
Of course, materialist science is your natural enemy, that is why bringing it into disrepute is part of your agenda. Polemically imitating your manner I can just as well say that: „that is all it is… a spiritual ego that tries to defend its own spiritual deceptions.‟
I myself come from a Buddhist background, but was thankfully able to outgrow that stuff. That, to my experience, not many spiritual people seem capable or willing (I guess: most probably capable, but not willing) of performing. But why?
 
Since we are at the topic: Why don’t you have a look at Early Buddhism?
I see all your spirituality as a piecing-together and blending of old brahmanic teachings with new age hippy stuff, making it your own kind of cult. From what I have seen you are completely oblivious to Early Buddhism, which would wipe out your beliefs about non-dualism, god, nothingness as god..
 
Anyway, I know what it is like. I do meditate, I went on meditation retreats, I used to believe in reincarnation, enlightenment, karma, non-material realms – the whole gamut. I was married to the spirituality for many years. So… I kind of know my craft. But my „spiritual ego‟ was not able to defend itself against the rough honesty of existential, materialist nihilism. Are you afraid of that?
Now, I know you well enough, you will probably say that I am deluded and don’t see the full picture, and so on. And what I reply to that is that you are not honest enough to see through your own spiritual craving. You deliberately picked out a form of spirituality that suited you and now take any bias to reinforce it.
 
I know that one problem about giving up long-cherished beliefs is losing one’s face. It was quite embarrassing for me to reveal to my social environment at some point that I had renounced my faith in the teachings of the Buddha. Since before for years I had been talking to people a lot about Buddhist philosophy and occasionally even tried to encourage other people to look at Buddhist teachings and win them over and so on, then at some point you having to admit that I found out that I was wrong and misguided was not all-too pleasant.  
And it was emotionally inconvenient as well. Since Buddhist spirituality guided my world-view and gave me purpose and direction, and then I had to realize that I was naked in the cold...  
Let us face the facts: I guess that in your situation it would be far more unpleasant, since you have created a huge identity around being „the spiritual guy‟ („god‟, that is...) along with even a long-standing Youtube channel were you have been delivering that stuff to the whole planet for a decade. If then at some point you have to realize that you were completely mistaken, admitting that would get you into big trouble. What is more: that would feed the trolls for years to come. So in a sense you are imprisoned  by now. You have invested so much into it that you now have to stick to that stuff, since contradicting it by now would be a huge mess. If you ask me, I would nonetheless encourage you to take that step …but I know how the ego works. ;-)
 
And when I now say that, I would not be surprised if spiritual people will try to ridicule me or come up with some clever paradoxical spiritual nonsense, or be ultra-loving (to show my non-compassion) or whatever ...since I „do not understand the spiritual complexity and succumb to the ego mechanisms‟ yada yada yada… the usual thought-terminating clichés, those knockout arguments which you in turn reproach the opposite side (the materialists) for, but generously commit yourself, and which, if you were able to let go of them, would enable you to see through your fallacies.  
„You see? You guys have spiritual egos trying to defend themselves. That’s all it is.‟  
 
Frankly, if you ask me than you can go and buy yourself a scoop of ice cream for the great „insights‟ that you had while under the influence of hallucinogenics.
Of course you can always claim that there is stuff that is not accessible to the rational mind. For obvious reasons: claiming that is a survival strategy. The rational mind is the natural enemy to your ridiculous beliefs. So for those beliefs to be able to survive, they need to delude people into thinking that there was anything that is not accessible to the rational mind... "You see? The ego trying to defend itself" ^^
If you were honest and careful in your arguments than you would admit that all that probably shows is that the brain seems to be able to perform fancy stuff while under the influence of drugs. Apply Occam’s Razor, for a change. There is no need to get spiritual about it. But if you go about it with the preconceived notion of non-duality, enlightenment, emptiness, and all that stuff, than of course that is what you can experience with drugs, it is just a confirmation bias. That’s all.
Just the fact that you, admittedly, can hardly (if at all – which I doubt) gain access to this stuff by non-material ways, that is, by not resorting to a material substance, should show you that what you experience is induced by a material cause, and belongs to the material world only. You yourself once mentioned something along the lines of „trying to achieve these states without hallucinogenics‟ would be „a waste of time‟. But I know the way the cookie crumbles. Your egoic spiritual defense mechanisms will that and come up with fantasy.  
 
Why would I deny and fight against spirituality? Because I want to defend my materialist ego? Actually, I would love to live in a world that is mystical, spiritual and somehow endowed with meaning and direction, but I am honest and experienced enough to no longer fall for that lie. I don’t like to kid myself. I would like to see materialism proven wrong, but none of that spiritual stuff convinces me anymore. If your thinking is sharp enough, you notice the fallacies and trick of your mind quite easily.  
 
And why should scientists think differently than I do? What agenda should fuel their disenchantment of the world other than the quest for truth?
Capitalism, perhaps? Lol. Ego business? How come? In fact, by disenchanting the world science has inflicted on us humans what Freud appropriately has called „narcissistic injuries‟. Narcissistic injuries neither serve capitalism nor the ego. They were simply inevitable with the progress of science.
 
What spirituality (as a backlash, so to speak) has been trying to do is to re-enchant the world. But since science is so good, spirituality these days has to resort to especially tricky things and esoteric reasoning, that are often, say, of epistemological nature and cannot be downright falsified. So then if anyone tries to attack that spirituality, these attacks are suffocated and ridiculed, thereby using the same defense mechanisms that you are blaming the materialists for using them. You will, for instance, call materialists narrow-minded, or say that science has an ego is just trying to maintain itself by putting down spirituality. If you ask me, that is what you are doing. Science is just disenchanting the world with the gloves off.  
 
I am not in the least bit intimidated by your teachings, if that is what you think. What worse could the world get than what science has turned it into? To use one of your favourite phrases: „Stop bullshitting yourself!‟.
 
In addition to that, I don’t know if you have ever noticed Leo, but what I personally don’t like about the way you teach is that you blurt some of your theories, for instance your series about the mechanisms of survival, as if you have realized something of ingenious brilliance and crazy significance, while in fact most people with some common sense or decent education are able to understand and are half-aware of this stuff, anyway. When I watched that episode I was literally just bored of it, even anticipating correctly what was to come. But you proclaim that stuff as if you speak from some kind of higher plane of existence.
 
In your episode „Is gender a social construct‟ you ask something like: Where in the nature you find gender? And that nature does not now any such categories. Well, that is a good point. But then again, where in the nature you see your „spiral dynamics‟? Nature does not know such stuff. Would you mind applying that same constructivist skepticism to your own ideas (Spiral Dynamics, in this case), for a change? What I see is just growing complexity amongst society, resulting in people of more complex consciousness, sometimes even more refined consciousness, if you will. But to argue that we are developing along lines of spiral dynamics and categorizing people into stages of spiral dynamics is a coarse generalization. Why is it that some people can embody a range of many stages in one person? Because that same persons spirals through many levels of consciousness in one mind?
Anyway, I do miss skepticism of you applied to your own teachings. You like what you teach and don’t bother to apply some skepticism to it, unless it serves your purposes. I think that you are over-confident, especially about your esoteric stuff, and it does not seem to me that you apply double standards, guided by your likes and dislikes. You proclaim your stuff without a shimmer of doubt, as if you were infallible, which I guess is necessarily to convince oneself and others of it.
 
And you do not even shy away from defending your own carnal craving for an intimate relationship with the opposite sex that you mentioned in the episode about „Burning through karma‟ by simply redefining the ancient idea of karma to suit your purposes. Please look up the definition of karma as it is understood in Early Buddhism and recognize that you just like to gerrymander your spiritual ideas to your liking. Just as you like it. Because it serves your purposes. It is all ego business.
 
Again, I think you have some quite valuable and insightful stuff on your channel.
But I would like to encourage you to outgrow spirituality. And to stop deluding people.
 
Alright, this shall do for now. I could go into this stuff with more detail, but I would like to hear an initial comment on it first.
 
Best
Karl-Heinz

[universe]

6 hours ago, Karl-Heinz Mueller said:

Actually, I would love to live in a world that is mystical, spiritual and somehow endowed with meaning and direction, but I am honest and experienced enough to no longer fall for that lie.

What is in your direct experience right now?

 

Great post!

 

Just wanted to clear this one up.

Spiral Dynamics is not Leos idea. The term was trademarked by the National Values Center, Inc.

You can find more about it here https://spiraldynamics.org/

[Thought Art]

7 hours ago, Karl-Heinz Mueller said:

Since we are at the topic: Why don’t you have a look at Early Buddhism?
I see all your spirituality as a piecing-together and blending of old brahmanic teachings with new age hippy stuff, making it your own kind of cult. From what I have seen you are completely oblivious to Early Buddhism, which would wipe out your beliefs about non-dualism, god, nothingness as god..
 

One authority to another though right?

Overly well thought out post.

Some of it seems a bit strange. I consider Leo a nihilist and someone who loves science. 

Cool to read someones perspectives. I personally find that science and spirituality are both important and have enough juice to excite me for the rest of my life. 

I personally don't know Leo but I feel like his videos opened my up to learning about all perspectives and not defending my own. I find it interesting when people accuse Leo of this, when he teaches others to be open. 

And, yeah, Why would he speak to Rob (Adeptus) when he frequently makes videos about him in a negative light. It's wisest to just do your thing in those situations. I personally like Robs content.

I am personally not a buddhist, but I love buddhist teachings. Lots of juicy stuff in that. I personally am not into having "Faith" in a teaching. But learning from as many as possible over the course of my life. Buddhism has a lot of great stuff in it. 

Edited January 25, 2022 by Thought Art

[Carl-Richard]

6 hours ago, Karl-Heinz Mueller said:

If you were honest and careful in your arguments than you would admit that all that probably shows is that the brain seems to be able to perform fancy stuff while under the influence of drugs. Apply Occam’s Razor, for a change. 

If you were a true fan of the flawed Occam's razor, you would choose ontological idealism over ontological materialism and treat the brain as just qualia ;D

[Thought Art]

2 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

If you were a true fan of the flawed Occam's razor, you would choose ontological idealism over ontological materialism and treat the brain as just qualia ;D

ooooooooooooo, lol got you there thats the simplest explanation instead of ending up with infinite feedback loops 

Edited January 25, 2022 by Thought Art

[Karl-Heinz Mueller]

6 hours ago, Thought Art said:

One authority to another though right?

Overly well thought out post.

 

 

Thank you!

Quote

Some of it seems a bit strange. I consider Leo a nihilist and someone who loves science.

Yeah, Leo is much more scientific than many other gurus out there, but still he has "put science in its place" whenever it crosses lines that he doesn't want it to cross.
A nihilist would talk not about immortality and god, and so on, in the way Leo does.

Quote

I am personally not a buddhist, but I love buddhist teachings. Lots of juicy stuff in that. I personally am not into having "Faith" in a teaching. But learning from as many as possible over the course of my life. Buddhism has a lot of great stuff in it.

I agree. Especially with regards to Early Buddhism. 

6 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

If you were a true fan of the flawed Occam's razor, you would choose ontological idealism over ontological materialism and treat the brain as just qualia ;D

I have heard of the qualia argument. That to me is the best anti-materialist argument that I could find.
But having such a duality (as ironically opposed to non-duality) of mind and matter does not automatically prove all that other spiritual stuff.

Anyway, I don't know what you want to tell me here. Would you mind expoundind that thought?

 

 

Edited January 25, 2022 by Karl-Heinz Mueller

[Leo Gura]

Why do we got 2 of these threads with different titles?

[Carl-Richard]

49 minutes ago, Karl-Heinz Mueller said:

I have heard of the qualia argument. That to me is the best anti-materialist argument that I could find.
But having such a duality (as ironically opposed to non-duality) of mind and matter does not automatically prove all that other spiritual stuff.

Bruh idealism is non-dual. Occam's Razor favors idealism over materialism because it skips strong emergence (creating mind from matter).