Serious Question, Why Does It Seem Everyone In This Forum Trust Leo ?

[kuwaynej]

I'm not trolling, I'm genuinely asking why does everyone in this forum including myself, trust Leo ? Most of us have never met him, but in a sense most of us completely trust him. Its like we're all running on emotion. Leo could be a pedophile for all we know, but we don't care, we still love him, a total stranger. So why don't we feel this same emotion towards other strangers? Is it because we feel a sense of: loyalty or obligation toward Leo. I Know for a Fact that there are some people on this forum that will start a Fighting and Troll other YouTube channels for his sake. But this is how religions are started, we think someone else is better than us and have more Spiritual wisdom; so we put them on a pedestal and at this point we're ready to take up arms against someone for the sake of that special person. We need to accept the fact that Leo is not more special that any of us. And the Leo we know and love  is indeed an Ego, that have it's own selfish agenda. The sooner we a realize that Leo is not perfect or special, the emotion we have towards Leo (The Ego) will start to change, and that's the interesting part.

1) Why do we feel positive emotion to towards people that we perceive to be better than us.

2) Why can't we feel the same way toward other strangers? 

3) why is it, that this question have never occurred  to must of ?

 

 

Edited February 4, 2017 by kuwaynej

[Colin]

There is no denying that the hours upon hours that we have spent seeing Leo's face and hearing his voice has given us a sense of familiarity with him. We are smart enough to recognize that he his smart. Smart recognizes smart. Do you perceive Leo to be better than you? Also Leo has done enormous good for most of us, so we appreciate it.

[Martin123]

@kuwaynej thats called good marketing 

[Prabhaker]

5 hours ago, kuwaynej said:

I'm genuinely asking why does everyone in this forum including myself, trust Leo ? 

He is honest, he never claims that he is enlightened. He intellectually knows a lot of things about enlightenment, he can easily claim that he is enlightened and exploit others like most of spiritual teachers are doing. I know about many of his limitations but his intentions are not bad. I have learned many things during my long spiritual journey of more than twenty years, from my experience I can say that he never makes false claims. 

[Visionary]

The (radical) open mindedness he has developed makes me trust him a lot. Plus i think he could choose to exploit the personal growth market to the max, but he has chosen not to. Would not condemn him otherwise, but this gives a certain perspective about his motives. Sharing with the world.

Nevertheless trusting someone does not mean copy everything he does or says. I would not prefer to live a life of a sage for example. He's a big inspiration in many ways. Nothing more, nothing less.

Edited February 4, 2017 by Visionary

[Telepresent]

Speaking as someone who doesn't trust Leo, I find this an interesting question.  When I say I don't trust him, I mean that I won't take anything he says on faith, or as gospel.  I recognise that he's done a huge amount of research - much more than I have - and that I can use that as a shortcut into discovering about areas and ideas that I think are worth exploring, but I won't take what he says as true, or right, and neither should anyone else.  At best we should take them as hypotheses to be investigated.

But I think the answer to your question is (kind of) hidden within what you wrote:

7 hours ago, kuwaynej said:

And the Leo we know and love  is indeed an Ego, that have it's own selfish agenda

Sort of, but not in the way you think.  It goes back to the idea of projection: the Leo you 'know and love' has almost nothing to do with Leo, or Leo's ego.  It's your ego.  The ego takes another person, and it projects its own wants, desires, and needs upon them.  It translates what they are doing on its own terms.  This is how two people can see the same action, and one person reads it as aggressive and another as merely assertive.  The action is the same, but the interpretation of it changes.

So I think what happens in these sorts of arena is that people subconsciously project all sorts of things onto Leo (or equivalent), and confuse what they want him to be with what he is.  So people who take up arms in the name of Gura are doing so because of their need to believe that he is always right and true, and not really because of anything to do with Leo at all.  He's a red herring.  Of course, all of this is deeply subconscious and emotional, and will be hidden underneath layers of justification, so I'm sure most people don't think that's what they're doing, and that they have rational arguments as to why.  But for those who are deeply emotionally invested in Leo and Actualized.org, I suspect this is at least a large part of why.

 

 

[Life Coach]

Why I don't really trust him. His own video about false prophets and critical thinking taught me to be aware. I don't know him and I don't know what he is up to, neither do I know if he is actually right in anything that he claims. Actually he even got more suspicious to me in the last year.

 

[Elzhi]

I think that there's a distinction that needs to be made between "trusting" and blindly following whatever a person says.

I don't blindly follow or agree with anything any teacher, including Leo, has to say but I have enough trust in him to be open to his opinions and to at least attempt to implement some of his teachings

I don't by any means put complete trust in any person or institution and based on Leo's content, he would say the same. Leo DOESN'T want me, you or anyone else to completely trust him. 

Leo consistently demonstrates a sense of integrity, humility, honesty and open-mindedness that is rare among teachers. That's why we should at least hear him out.

[Elzhi]

Also, the people who go and attack other Youtube channels are doing the complete opposite of what Leo would advocate. That's a very "ego-driven" response. It's literally a your-perspective-differs-from-mine-so-i-will-now-attack-you response. 

If anyone is starting a cult because of Leo, that's their own fucking fault. They're literally doing the exact opposite of what Leo teaches which is completely buying into one belief system or guru. 

Leo talks about transcending the ego, being a skeptic, etc. and yet look at people's behavior...

Edited February 4, 2017 by Elzhi

[Christian]

@kuwaynej

I trust that the things he are telling me about enlightenment, relationships, life purpose, and what habits I should implement are mostly true. 

Firstly, I trust in his enlightenment videos because I have had a 1st hand experience into what enlightenment is on a deeper level and he describes what I saw in a precise and structured way. 

I trust in his the majority of his relationship advice mostly because I've reflected on what he says especially in regards to being co-dependent, needy, and what it takes to get good at relationships. And I've seen the principles function in real life. 

I've seen that if you are needy, people are repelled and that abundance and non-neediness attracts people. That humor and authentic confidence makes you magnetic. 

But, I know I could be wrong and my skepticism goes so deep that I am skeptical of my own skepticism too. I do not care about authority; I want the truth and if what Leo says is clearly misaligned with my direct experience, I will adjust my model of the world accordingly. 

[jse]

8 hours ago, kuwaynej said:

Why Does It Seem Everyone In This Forum Trust Leo ?

Truth is, it's not so much that we trust Leo, it's more like we play along. 

Trust your intuition, backed by critical thinking.

[Dodo]

Because Leo speaks the truth. Never had a reason to doubt.

[The White Belt]

It's quite an assumption to say everybody seems to trust him.

The truth is he inspires trust in many because almost everything he says can be cross referenced. 

You can find dozens of reputable sources that say similar, or exactly the same thing, on psychedelics, meditation, enlightenment etc. 

Leo just puts it in his own way, that a lot of people resonate with because he's so down to earth, and adds his own findings, that you certainly aren't required to take on board, but you may have found those same things yourself. 

[Natasha]

@kuwaynej I highly resonate with what Leo has to communicate. There are many other teachers/ gurus I resonate with as well - Ralph Smart, Adyashanti, Mooji, Sadghuru, Lisa Cairns, Tony Parsons, etc. It's not about a person/ego, it's about the information that is being communicated and resonated with.

Edited February 4, 2017 by Natasha

[ajasatya]

sincerity CANNOT be faked. if you actually start practicing complete honesty in your life, you'll see the same phenomenon happening to you.

it has nothing to do with being better or worse than someone else. it's about having the courage to always confront one's own bullshit.

[Galyna]

I feel like I can relate to a lot of things he teaches. Plus he mentions not to create authority but use the information as a key to get out of the comfort zone. Don't put label or category: bad or good, false or truth. Manipulate with the information he gives to grow. He is just  a messenger,  like many others. You don't have to trust him, in fact creating authority would not make any good for you. Use him as a source to improve your life and if you see the results the question about trust will resolve itself.

Edited February 4, 2017 by Galyna

[Azrael]

11 hours ago, kuwaynej said:

1) Why do we feel positive emotion to towards people that we perceive to be better than us.

I'd say this is the classic "This is my hero"-feeling. This lowers - in my experience - the more you get to the state your hero is at. For example when I started out with enlightenment / meditation work I looked at all these gurus, teachers and people like they lived in a complete other world compared to my one (and this is to some degree very true I find). As I made my first experiences and went on and on with the journey the relationship to these gurus started to go from a parental to a kind of brotherly level. Kind of like an older brother. So, just see for yourself. But there's nothing wrong with that. Even worshipping can be to some extend benefiting to your journey when you transcend this at some point.

I worshipped in the past Alan Watts, Leo, Rupert Spira, Shinzen Young. I worshipped them to the degree that I started to mimic how they think, talk and react (I know this is crazy - but it's the truth) and I fell in love with their teachings and world views. This brought me to the place where I totally got what they were talking about, mastered their techniques and then went on. The thing here is, I went on. And when you do that with some people over some time, you'll finally get to a place where your own life is your teaching and everything you do is your technique. But you start out as a baby and want to be a master in this field. So climbing on the shoulders of some teachers for some while will probably help you.

And yes, I am conscious of the fact that there are teachers who say bullshit, who lead you in the wrong direction and want to create a following to worship them. I naturally don't tend to follow such people and I always follow my gut instinct and what I know as a fact when it comes to choosing teachers.

11 hours ago, kuwaynej said:

2) Why can't we feel the same way toward other strangers?

Because they don't offer us the things we want. And we do wanna be better. That's our eternal problem as humans. Because at some point we started to play the game "What if I weren't perfect from the beginning of things and needed these other things to be happy?".

11 hours ago, kuwaynej said:

3) why is it, that this question have never occurred  to must of ?

It has. You are just putting your opinion on everybody else and probably don't know us all, right?

[kuwaynej]

@Azrael  LoL true...

Just want to raise  awareness for some of the people  just starting out.... 

Our Emotions let us behave the way we do... Just try to observe  anyone around  you emotion plays a big part on how we behave.... this is our auto pilot  phase. 

[FirstglimpseOMG]

Well, he does come across as authentic to me. I think for most it's not hard to recognize that in others, just as the bullshitters are pretty quickly apparent as such. 

I've caught moments of emotion in a Leo vid or two where it's pretty obvious that he just gives a shit & wants the best experiences and the best, most happy and fulfilled life for his audience. I guess it's his higher purpose showing through in his demeanor & his actions. 

Plus it helps that he seems not to want us to trust him on his content. He often says not to believe him or take him at his word, but to investigate and see for ourselves what's up.

[Robert66]

I trust Leo as much as I trust anyone, including complete strangers and dead people who left us a record of their thoughts, which may be true or not, but can be tested by my own experiences with said thoughts through personal experimentation.  That is to say, I trust everyone until I am given a reason by them not to trust them and this trust is never blind but, again, based on past experiences where my trust was burned by the other's actions.