Enlightenment Bullshit

[Thought Art]

In Leo's most recent blog post he says this man discussed enlightenment is full of bullshit and self deception. 

Personally, it sounds to me like he is discussing aspects of a sober state, and how someone can develop mastery over their body mind. How, we can begin to understand the differences of and idea and actuality, our story vs actuality, and how physiology and energy plays a major role in our state/ how we feel. To me these are all aspects of a sober enlightenment, or spiritual/ perosnal development. Basically how to be sane.

He isn't a psychonaut becoming God Realized that is for sure. But is he full of shit? I don't think so. There are different facets and aspects to life and not everyone will go as deep or develop the same toolkits and goals with their spirituality.

However, I also recognize Leo's statements are coming from someone who's goal are to totally awaken, and teach and share God Realization. 

If all you listen to is channels like the one Leo critiques though... that is a glass ceiling you put on yourself. 

 

https://www.actualized.org/insights/enlightenment-bullshit

 

Edited October 30, 2022 by Thought Art

[Carl-Richard]

Leo "Have you tried 5-MeO-DMT?" Gura ?

[Leo Gura]

How you feel and your energy is irrelevant to comprehension of reality.

Being present does not guarantee any degree of comprehension of awareness of God.

A cat has no story. But is also doesn't comprehend a damn thing, and it is as far away from understanding God as can be.

Becoming a cat is not the goal of spirituality, contrary to what meditators have told you.

Edited October 30, 2022 by Leo Gura

[Carl-Richard]

9 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

How you feel and your energy is irrelevant to comprehension of reality.

Only if you rely on drugs. If I feel like shit, my engagement with reality will be colored by that. Pain literally contracts your focus.

[Leo Gura]

6 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Only if you rely on drugs. If I feel like shit, my engagement with reality will be colored by that. Pain literally contracts your focus.

Why are you making this about drugs? That's irrelevant. If you take the right drug you will have a heart attack. So what? What does this prove?

You can feel like shit with or without drugs. You think a cat cannot feel like shit?

Let's say you do so many years of meditation you become a cat. Now what?

Edited October 30, 2022 by Leo Gura

[Someone here]

6 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

A cat has no story. But is also doesn't comprehend a damn thing, and it is as far away from understanding God as can be.

Becoming a cat is not the goal of spirituality, contrary to what meditators have told you

Hehe ?

It would not really matter, wouldn't it?  Suppose all cats are enlightened or can gain enlightenment, then what? They speak cat  language and we find that hard to comprehend. We understand only the basics and the clear signs. It would not help us in any way. So maybe a cat can achieve cat enlightenment. 

Also animals tend to have a quit mind relative to humans .A mind that is quiet, not attached to the past, or to projections of the future from the past can see the present moment as it is without the domination of the past experiences.

If it sees someone is crying then it will attempt to comfort them if it’s possible, if it sees someone is yelling at them it will try to learn why without any desire to escape or transcend the situation. If it feels it is doing something that is not helpful, it will stop doing it.

When there is no personal agenda attached to a situation, the situation is seen in its entirety and not from a limited motive, that is the small difference in seeing between human minds and animal  minds. 

But you are right in that it lacks the conceptual understanding ..but does it really matter?  Do you prefer to have peace of mind and inner bliss for the rest of your life or to gain a complete conceptual understanding of all reality? 

Think about it deeply .its no easy question. 

[Carl-Richard]

1 minute ago, Leo Gura said:

Why are you making this about drugs? That's irrelevant. If you take the right drug you will have a heart attack. So what? What does this prove?

You can feel like shit with or without drugs.

I'm just saying how it is. If your source of comprehension of reality mainly comes from a drug experience which severely alters your state, then of course how you feel in your baseline state is not as relevant.

[Thought Art]

47 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

How you feel and your energy is irrelevant to comprehension of reality.

Being present does not guarantee any degree of comprehension of awareness of God.

A cat has no story. But is also doesn't comprehend a damn thing, and it is as far away from understanding God as can be.

Becoming a cat is not the goal of spirituality, contrary to what meditators have told you.

I am wondering if this is a strawman and if you could self reflect a little bit. 

Many people spend their whole lives caught in the grips of their story, their assumptions, their beliefs systems. Connecting with actuality is important for mastering emotions, epistomology, thinking clearly, making high quality distinctions. You sort of included aspects, or at least tangental elements of what that man shared in your defintion of intelligence from you "Socializing makes you stupid video". I don't think he said "Don't think". He said, gain more awareness and understanding of your consciousness and physiology. As a Qigong teacher ( I am not teaching God Realization obviously because It's going to take more time for me to understand your teachings)... I teach people how to relax, ground themselves, increase their energy, body and energy awareness, understanding of the mind body connection, etc etc.. All very basic stuff. But, I also use elements what this man said. None of that is God Realization, which if your main focus I know.

These aspects of spiritual development are not about becoming as cat. But, understanding how your conciousness, thoughts, ego work. Also, there is lots to learn about more basic aspects of reality from stopping thoughts, feeling, relaxing, grounding yourself, being present, not constantly worrying about the past or future. These are all valid things to understand and develop.

He probably doesn't even know what God realization is. God realization is something far deeper. You've said it yourself recently that enlightenment isn't a thing. 

I don't really know what God Realization is. I am just saying, as a human who is spending most of my time being sober, building my life that developing emotional mastery (which is mostly what he was saying enlightenment was) is valid. He obviously hasn't had such deep awakenings. What he spoke about, is a facet of enlightenment and aspects of certain mountains you can climb out of the mountain range of mountains. As far as human 'sober' day to day living goes.

Maybe you have climbed the highest mountain and so everyone elses climbing efforts look foolish. I would like to be able to see your perspective, and his. I don't really resonate at this moment with calling what he said bullshit. There are elements to it I thought had value for many people just getting into meditating, spirituality, and even psychedelics. 

I also have a mind that just weaves and weaves. If you take him as a full on explanation I wouldn't say that is enlightenment. It clearly isn't what you have expressed about God Realization either, but no one is saying it is.

It's also false to say Buddhism is about stopping thoughts when many of the foundational heart aspects of Buddha's teaching include "Right Thought" as one of the eight limbs. 

A lot of people who talk about Buddhism and even Toaism are simply ignorant. These are broad spiritual schools. Zen, is like one of them. These schools aren't God Realization. But mostly everyone on the forum still has a bad understanding of them.

 

Edited October 30, 2022 by Thought Art

[Thought Art]

1 hour ago, Carl-Richard said:

Leo "Have you tried 5-MeO-DMT?" Gura ?

Carl, have YOU tried it?

When you do

It goes without saying

"Namaste"

[Carl-Richard]

19 minutes ago, Thought Art said:

Carl, have YOU tried it?

When you do

It goes without saying

"Namaste"

What goes?

[Breakingthewall]

he means being enlightened to be present, to stop the analytical mind that filters and labels. this is fine because the modern human is completely in the mind, but it is not enlightenment. If it were, it would be like saying that a prehistoric hunter was enlightened, because he did not think, he only felt his body, the smells, the vision of the prey, etc. or a 3 year old kid. It is true that the hunter and the child have a much more satisfying and authentic experience than the average guy stuck in his mental histories today. And I suppose that the prehistoric hunter will have much more possibilities of having awakenings than a retired person addicted to Netflix, but enlightenment is going beyond this finite experience, it is opening up to infinity. and I suppose more than that, to understand that you are god creating this concrete experience and to understand how it is happening

Edited October 30, 2022 by Breakingthewall

[Gesundheit2]

Enlightenment is not Leo's property. He doesn't own it, neither did he invent it in the first place. And it's definitely not something that he can verify for others or not.

The guy in the video is correct, he is talking about what the word enlightenment means in the traditional Buddhist and broadly spiritual sense, which is the original and correct meaning that Leo is distorting.

Be careful of Leo, he is co-opting the idea of enlightenment and trying to bend the concept to fit his philosophical narrative (subjective idealism), which he didn't invent either. He doesn't distinguish between his thoughts and reality, and yet he wants to make this work into a one-upmanship game where he places God-realization as the real thing above everything else.

The truth is that God-realization is not enlightenment, and enlightenment is not God-realization. And neither one is better than the other. They're simply two different things. You can seek and have both or neither, it's your choice.

In simple terms, God-realization is the feeling of spiritual awe that you get when you experience something profound. That's the rawest and cleanest definition without any baggage.

Leo's version of God-realization is that + solipsism.

[Thought Art]

@Breakingthewall I agree. 
 

However, enlightenment isn’t a word with a single definition. 
 

What he describes reminds me a lot of Michael Singers work. 
 

There are more than one mountain. 
 

What he said wasn’t ‘wrong’ though limited

a hunter or three year old kid is not what this man is describing either and I think that’s a misunderstanding. There’s a difference between being a person whose mind was never conditioned me a modern adult with all its complexities… and then becoming an uncarved block while still developing right thinking in today’s complexity. 
 

Anyway, this is fruitless

Edited October 30, 2022 by Thought Art

[Thought Art]

I’ll know more clearly when I have my God Realization and continue to develop my emotional mastery

[Thought Art]

Ultimately, if you wanna continue to swear, use profanity and point out the flaws in others like a child your teachings will never be as pure as you want them to be. 
 

It’s time to self reflect and actually improve your communication which you keep talking about doing.

Purify the teachings of you want to. 

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, Gesundheit2 said:

In simple terms, God-realization is the feeling of spiritual awe that you get when you experience something profound. That's the rawest and cleanest definition without any baggage.

Leo's version of God-realization is that + solipsism.

I wouldn't claim to know what Leo's idea of God-realization actually is.

[Ulax]

Pride comes before the fall

[Gesundheit2]

27 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

I wouldn't claim to know what Leo's idea of God-realization actually is.

It's really not that hard to know.

You are God:

1. You: The ego, the person, the center of experience, etc.
2. Are: Verb of being, reference to existence, state of being, etc.
3. God: The magical uncaused superpower that underlies all of reality.

No need for speculation. Just connect the dots and this will become obvious in all of his communications.

[Thought Art]

@Gesundheit2 Yeah, but those are just ideas. 

[Kuba Powiertowski]

That is why the distinction between "the experience" and "experience filtered by ego-mind" is essential.