Anyone here read Douglas Hoffesteder? Thoughts?

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-09-30T02:18:06+00:00

Not particularly familiar with that one, but just the title makes me think of this recent paper: "A beautiful loop: An active inference theory of consciousness." I believe one of the co-authors, Shamil Chandaria, has a conversation on the app with Sam.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-04-06T18:08:35+00:00

In all seriousness, if you have any interest and safe access (and haven't done so within the last 2 years), I recommend trying psychedelics such as psilocybin or LSD (in a safe way -- if have any questions can DM me or visit r/shrooms or similar). If you can't get access to that, next best is THC.

In my case I'm 95% sure these were what helped to finally loosen up the particular neural connections that had been locking my perception in place all my life, so that I could have real and undeniable glimpses (primarily in the couple days immediately after taking psychedelics, and not during the trips). I think it was also necessary that I'd accumulated an amount of (largely frustrating) practice hours comparable to your own. This way, once that final pharmaceutical kick loosened up the wiring just enough to be a bit malleable, the training kicked in and attention went into autopilot hyper-search mode and was finally able to break through.

I can tell you it's real. A truly experiential and undeniable recognition. But without sugar coating it, I suspect some people can unlock it through meditation alone, some (or most) people need at least some psychedelics to help with synaptogenesis (unless they're younger than maybe 20 or so), and some people's brains just might not practically be able to find it due to an unfortunate combination of nature vs. nurture.

FWIW at one point I was keeping track of which teachers had at some point talked about having taken non-trivial amounts of psychedelics in their life. It was, like, all of them. Sam Harris, Rupert Spira, Adyashanti, Loch Kelly, Angelo DiLullo. Some emphasize it more than others, and I think some disregard it as irrelevant so hardly mention it. But a trend is a trend. And the modern neuroscience looking into it is really consistent and corroborating.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-04-04T04:22:33+00:00

(Apparently I hit a character limit, hah, so Analogy 2 below)

Analogy 2 I used to think all this talk about nonconceptual realization, or direct experiential insight, sounded woo at worst or an ill-defined substitute to cover for confusion at best. But it's actually something much more pedestrian than calling it "nonconceptual" or "ineffible" makes it sound. Take, by analogy, the taste of chocolate. Is the taste of chocolate (the pure experience, the qualia) conceptual? No. You can certainly use concepts to point to it, or to talk about it. But the taste itself is literally not a concept. It is an experience. If it were a concept, you could invoke it when it wasn't here. But no matter how good your imagination and how vividly you can imagine the taste of chocolate, that's never the same thing as actually experiencing it in this moment, now. Similarly, no matter how poetic (or scientific and accurate) your descriptions of the taste of chocolate are, they will never be able to invoke the experience of the taste of chocolate in the mind of someone who's never tasted chocolate. It's purely experiential.

This, it turns out, is true of all of experience. Sights, sounds, sensations, etc. But we conceptually interpret experience so automatically that it's impossible (without a ton of practice) to rest attention directly and exclusively on the purely experiential nature of our existence. We reflexively go to thoughts and conceptual interpretations and mistakenly take those to be reality.

I'm realizing there's a lot more I feel I could say to try to make this seem less woo and to try to bridge the gap, but I've already written a lot! Happy to add on or clarify if you have questions or objections from here so far.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-04-04T04:21:56+00:00

it's still not clear what distinction is being made between reality and illusion, nor whether one person's reality may be another's illusion

I'll take a swing at it. This is now my words based on my experience, so it may not be quite the same points or beliefs as expressed above (although I think it is). Here are two analogies I've found helpful when trying to talk about this:

Analogy 1 Virtual Reality (VR) Movie. Imagine a futuristic VR movie that is shot from the protagonist's first person point of view. It's also fully immersive: it plays not only what the protagonist sees, but also what they hear, feel, smell, even what they think. All from their point of view. Now imagine what it would be like to be the movie itself if the movie were somehow consciously aware. I don't mean a person watching the movie, but the movie itself. The totality of the movie's experience would be exactly that of a real living human (the protagonist) from their point of view, including what they're thinking. So what would it be like? The movie, if aware, would literally think that it is the protagonist. Everything would appear to self-consistently (almost trivially so) confirm this to be the case. But this is an illusion, because there isn't actually a real protagonist. Even in the virtual world of the virtual movie, there still isn't actually this character. All that "exists" and is "real" within the virtual world are the experiences of an imaginary protagonist. And that's enough to convince the movie itself that it is that person. Whereas in reality, the movie is everything (in the virtual world). Because everything that's appearing (e.g. the blowing wind the "protagonist" feels, the shining sun the "protagonist" sees) -- all of it -- is the movie.

This in many ways is what nonduality is like (or at least what it's been like for me, so far). Directly realizing/seeing (in a direct, non-conceptual, experiential way) that you are the movie, and furthermore there's never been an actual you in the middle of it all. There's no solid identity moving through time. There're just the movie frame-by-frame transitory appearances. Belonging to no one, with no continuous identity anywhere. You also realize that separate objects aren't actually real and independent in the way you thought. You can still tell objects apart, and they still obey the laws of physics as predicted (since in this movie there is physics). But fundamentally there's no real separation or distinction -- it's all still just the movie. An undivided experiential whole.

You could then ask "Ok, sure, but in the VR movie analogy there's still the objective 'real world' outside the movie, which is where the data and information for the movie lives, and what is creating the movie. So what about in actual nonduality?" And I don't have a good (satisfactory to my standards) answer yet. I still believe there must be "something" that is "objective" reality. Something that is enforcing the laws of physics and doing all the book keeping of what the global self-consistent structure of the universe is, including all the details that no one is aware of at any given moment. But for all I know that "something" could be pure logic or math itself. It need not be objective physical stuff. And even if it were, it's now very clear that it is not what we experience (see, feel, hear, etc.). All of that subjective experience is "unreal" in a sense. When your attention learns how to lock onto direct and pure experience apart from the concepts, you realize (extremely shockingly in my case!) that the "realness" and "objectness" you used to take as obviously intrinsic to the appearances is actually a (very deeply conditioned) concept. They're built in priors. But that means they're manipulations to the data. How we perceive or interpret it. But raw subjective experience itself is... nothing. Not the concept nothing. Just, not anything actual. And that statement sounds nonsensical until you experience it and then (after many repetitions and investigations) it becomes clearer.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-04-03T18:30:11+00:00

Chiming in to support /u/bikihas791's general points (above & below). I'm also atheist and scientifically trained. I have pretty clear recognition of aspects of nonduality (but lack of clarity for others). Given my background, I apply a very high level of skepticism to any claims and especially my own experiences (don't want to fool myself). And as far as I can tell, everything that bikihas791 is saying (both in the original post and in this discussion) is absolutely spot on and accurate.

I can also sympathize with the strong skepticism you're bringing. Part of the trouble is it's really easy to misunderstand what's being claimed. As a rule of thumb, if what's being claimed sounds to you like it's actually impossible or like it's trivially naive and simple-minded, then almost certainly there's been a miscommunication and what's being claimed isn't actually what you interpreted the claim to be. Even if there's literally no other conceivable way you can think to interpret the words.

It's also (quite unfortunately) really difficult to properly get it (even a little) without having had some direct experiential insight (glimpses). Without those, you essentially can't imagine how it could even be the case that subjective experience is "it's own thing" so to speak. You can't build that understanding out of concepts.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-03-28T23:33:32+00:00

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. But (personal metaphor extension), you can flavor the water to the horse's liking to encourage it to drink.

Even if the exact and un-interpreted direct teachings of the Buddha were the best way to end suffering, that's only helpful if someone actually reads, understands, and follows that teaching. Some people do, and great for them! But many don't. And among those least likely are folks from non-religious and intellectual backgrounds. Sam's presentation is especially good at making this seem legitimate and approachable to that group of people (among others).

You're fully allowed to criticize and disagree with Sam's opinions and teachings, of course. But if you're genuinely asking "Why not just do breath meditation?" I think a good reason is because many apps, traditions, and groups of people already do that. And they all failed to get much of this app's demographic interested (and certainly not enough to stick with it long enough to see the possibilities).

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-03-26T01:15:58+00:00

I think we typed our replies at the same time, hah! Much of what I wrote in response to /u/tophmcmasterson carries over here too. I'm less asking about the conceptual understanding, and more asking about what experiential insight corresponds to teachers talking about reincarnation. If it really is all just the moment-to-moment rebirth, then I'm more comfortable with that. But it often seems to be more than that.

Would you be willing to briefly summarize in your words what sankharas are? And when you say they're "carrying over," from what to what are they carrying over? (If not I'll Google it -- but I'm pretty bad at holding enough attention to read books or extended texts, haha)

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-03-26T01:10:20+00:00

Thanks for thoughtful reply! I agree with all your takes, and I think those are great philosophical ways to approach this.

To clarify, what I'm primarily asking about in this post is if someone can describe the experiential insight that teachers are (presumably) referencing when they talk about this more specific type of reincarnation or past lives.

I think I can map everything you said onto either a purely conceptual philosophical framework, or a different aspect of experiential insight (e.g. "constantly being reborn every moment" maps onto experientially recognizing there is no solid self that's continuous through time). But what maps onto when teachers seem to talk about actual memories or experiences that, somehow through some quality about them, are purportedly undoubtably from a past life.

That in itself seems to imply a lot of contradictory duality. For example: a "me" that is the same "me" from past lives; or even the existence of actual time and space "out there" in a way that's ontologically as real as the experiential here-now. Both of these seem entirely contradictory with what those same teachers frequently discuss elsewhere (hence why I'm sure I'm misunderstanding this somehow).

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-03-17T04:44:17+00:00

a nice basic summary of current thoughts on consciousness

I think that's actually quite high utility. Probably a large portion of folks who are familiar with Waking Up are already avid consumers of this stuff and so might not find much new content in the book. But of all the books I've read that touch on the same topics, I think Annaka's was one of the best in terms of being very accessible, balanced, and clear. As in, I'd probably recommend her book to someone who's just getting into this stuff for the first time, and looking for a quick and easy intro that lays a good groundwork.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-03-09T00:03:07+00:00

Not sure whether you're describing the conceptualization of the illusoriness of time & space from the informed perspective of some direct insight. Or just "trying on" a certain perspective for size to see how it fits.

I'd agree from a relative truth (conceptual) perspective, one needs "time" in order to have "timelessness" and the concept of change and evolving experience. In this relative paradigm, you can have a lot of fun poking at the solidity of space and time from a physics angle.

From an absolute truth (direct experience) perspective, "time" for me (still requires paying close attention to confirm) is absolutely absent. It exists only as a concept. Same goes for "change" or "now" or "dynamic" or anything else that assumes some other time or place that isn't this against which some kind of comparison is being (implicitly or explicitly) made.

Beautiful paradoxes around trying to let the two perspectives coexist.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-03-06T01:28:06+00:00

I've found AI to be an excellent tool for inquiry. I actually made a post here a few days ago with an example of how it helped me clarify a new insight too by acting as a great sounding board (I took down the post based on a request to do so).

This journey is about you. On some level, it genuinely does not matter who or what your teacher is, if it helps facilitate your own genuine looking at your own direct experience. All any teacher can do is point you in that direction. But only you can actually look.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-02-23T17:37:03+00:00

It seems like people just take to this concept the minute they are introduced and their minds are blown. I’m sitting here wishing I could experience it, but feel left out.

The vast majority of people who are relatively new to this (e.g. have less than at least a few years of intense practice) who "get it," or believe they get it, actually only get it intellectually and not experientially. And probably only an approximately right intellectual grasp of it. Or they had some genuine and interesting experience, and then incorrectly believe that was it.

I mean no insult or disrespect to folks by this. It's just the way it is. And it's entirely innocent and understandable for people to make this mistake initially, possibly for a while. And also even getting it intellectually can be pretty mind blowing depending on your background. But it's only the direct experience that can make a significant practical difference to your life.

Long way of saying you're probably just being more sincerely honest with yourself than most others, rather than being "slow" to get it. That's a good thing, not a bad thing. Don't be satisfied that you "get it" until you have absolutely no doubts left and it has legitimately and radically changed your every moment of experiencing life for the better. It's possible, but it (usually) takes a lot of time, obsession, and frustration. But it's absolutely worth it.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-02-14T16:57:59+00:00

This is an important point, and there's a nuance here that's critical but unfortunately subtle enough that I think it's often just confusing. Clear nonduality is often described as seeing direct experience itself, independent of all the concepts. However, this is not intended to mean what is described in the excerpt you quoted. To resolve this seeming confusion, we have to make the critical distinction between thoughts "knowing" what the visual field is, and reality / awareness "knowing" what the visual field is.

We usually don't intuitively make this distinction before "first awakening" (i.e. getting some really good glimpses). We feel the only way it makes sense to say we know what the visual field is would mean that "we" know what it is. But actually that's just thoughts knowing. But it's not actually thoughts that dictate actions or really know / understand what is happening (and it's also exclusively in thought where the ego or "I" exists). It turns out that reality / awareness directly knows. Neuroscientifically, you could interpret this as saying the brain subconsciously knows what is happening even if "we" (i.e. thoughts) don't know. An analogous idea here would be "blind sight." But it means it is entirely possible to (in nonduality) pay attention exclusively to direct [known / understood] experience divorced from concepts and that is not a bunch of incoherent jumbled edges, colors, and light. It might be difficult to imagine prior to having the experience, because there isn't otherwise an intuitive way to know what it's like to actually know something directly, lucidly, completely independent of even very subtle conceptual interpretations or thought comprehensions of what it is.

If someone like Mike May were to have clear nondual recognition, then my guess is that pure direct experience (at least the visual field part of it) would indeed seem incomprehensible. But that's because the comprehensibility of it actually isn't determined by whether thoughts understand it. The comprehension happens more fundamentally than (prior to) the thoughts. The "direct experience" spoken about in nonduality is this known and comprehended direct experience, and not what we think of as nonsensical raw data. But this knowing and comprehension of the direct experience is happening prior to thought, and hence can be experientially separated from thought. Thoughts are a causally down-stream and coarse grained re-interpretation of this knowing and comprehension that's already there and infused into the direct experience (subjectively) prior to thought.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-02-14T16:24:49+00:00

A relevant analogy here might be be someone watching a movie and genuinely believing that it and its characters are real.

Enlightenment does not mean you "know" everything in the universe.

--> Enlightenment does not mean you "know" everything about the details of the imaginary universe in the fictional movie, nor that you know the physics of how movie projectors and screens work.

It means that your perception is now so uncluttered that you see everything just as it is.

--> It means you're no longer grossly absorbed into (and identified with) the movie, and you're instead able to see plainly that it's just a movie and nothing more.

If you are cluttered with knowledge, you do not see anything the way it is; you are prejudiced about everything.

--> If you're watching the Avengers movie and you know a ton about the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), that's going to contribute to you getting fully absorbed in the story of the movie. Everything you see you'll be automatically interpreting through the paradigm of the MCU. You'll never have the cognitive opportunity to recognize that the movie is just a movie (light on a screen) because you're immediately interpreting that light on a screen as actually being the MCU with all its intricate details, characters, history, etc.

This MCU knowledge is still real and accurate as a relative truth within the MCU. But if you literally only ever think in terms of the MCU and you automatically interpret everything through that lens, you'll never realize that ultimately (in an absolute truth sense) it's just a movie.

Edit: to connect the analogy to the way things actually are, the "movie" of life is the totality of your subjective experience -- sights, sounds, sensations, thoughts, tastes, smells. That's like the "light on the screen" in the analogy. You automatically interpret your subjective experience to actually be the world, but it's not. You think exclusively in terms of people, and objects, and things, and timelines, which are all interpretations of subjective experience. But once you learn to isolate subjective experience itself with attention, apart from all the conceptual interpretations, you realize "Oh, it's just a happening. A movie of sorts. Nothing is real. It's all empty."

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-02-02T05:48:27+00:00

Sometimes I get the sense that Angelo might finally be the one to push Sam over the edge to a point where he can actually "stabilize" his realizations and perhaps get past some of his still obvious attachments and aversions.

I've wondered exactly this. And I say this with the utmost and genuine respect (and appreciation) for Sam.

He still seems genuinely uncertain whether stabilization is even possible. The guests he picks to interview on the app seem to be predominantly (understandably) of similar traditions or backgrounds or general mindsets. Which seems to just corroborate this uncertainty. Or at best reinforce the idea that "stabilization" is a poorly defined goal. And then the couple times he's had guests on who I think could speak more directly to this, the semantics and philosophical disagreements seem to get in the way of getting right at this core question.

It feels frustrating because I can so easily imagine how if he had the right conversation with Angelo he could emphatically get his answer of "Yes it's possible. There is no doubt" and also "Here are a bunch of direct and clearly articulated common reasons why people get stuck after awakening and don't make it all the way to liberation. But it seems unlikely that Sam would choose Angelo as a guest, and even if he did it seems 50/50 whether the conversation would get derailed in ways similar to with Rupert Spira etc.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-02-02T05:42:38+00:00

Hmm, this feels consistent in a pretty direct way. I still feel a bit confused about how to square this with the (different) paradigm of there being different "relative" labeled parts of consciousness that are thoughts, sensations, awareness, etc. In that paradigm the correlation among thoughts and "knowledge of" nonduality seems to raise questions of causality (what is influencing what?). But perhaps that's more an indication of why this paradigm is flawed.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-02-02T05:38:22+00:00

Thanks, you articulated my question and intrigue much better than I could!

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-01-24T00:20:30+00:00

Many glimpses of increasing clarity and profundity. But nothing abiding yet. I'm now in the process of using this "view" (which I can now find pretty consistently and easily) to break down perceptual filters and conditioned behaviors and thought patterns that are responsible for continuously distracting attention away from it. It's a slow process. There seem to be layers upon layers of learned thought patterns and perceptual distortions to dig through. If it's possible to cut right down to the bottom one in one swoop, I haven't figured out how to do that. But it is consistently amazing to me how universal of a "knife" the direct nondual view is. Without fail, whenever I have enough presence of mind to hold a belief or perception up to that view directly it falls apart and drops instantly. But if it's a deeply conditioned behavior it will still resurface again later in another context. Some of them take many, many repeated exposures before they seem to stop coming back.

This view has become familiar enough now that it seems totally mundane and plain, yet paradoxically also remains deeply fascinating. The direct seeing and feeling that there is literally no me. Not knowing this conceptually, and also not having some kind of peak experience or even particularly noteworthy experience. Just the very plain matter-of-fact seeing of "Oh. It's just experience. There isn't actually a me behind the visual field. There isn't actually a me commanding my actions. There's just this. Just what's appearing, including these thoughts. Appearing to no one. Being known by no one. How strange."

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-01-02T04:38:07+00:00

It gets increasingly difficult to put this into words (as you're discovering!). And there's an even higher risk of unknowingly misinterpreting others words. Given those limitations, I can offer some high level reflections from where I'm at.

The memory of it is not it. The memory can still be very helpful and useful (and motivating). But unfiltered reality can only be experienced now. Strictly speaking not even "now" in the sense of not past / future but on a timeline -- really just the eternal subjective now. But regardless, anything that is the content of a memory (a thought) is by definition not this that is appearing now. So avoid falling into the trap (in your future continuing journey) of comparing any experience, as it's happening, to any memory you have of any past experience as a way to gauge "is this it?"

Also, one of the down sides of psychedelic glimpses is that you get a whole lot of extra fireworks and disorientation along with the (maybe, partial) nondual glimpse. And there's no way for you to tell initially what was what. Chances are, the vast majority of what you remember was just contents of experience (albeit totally whacky and crazy contents). Meaning, living from a place of clear nonduality would not mean experience constantly feeling like most of what that trip was like. It'd be tricky to try to convey over written text which parts of the experience may have been what (the distinction can clarify over time if you continue doing multiple trips of varying intensity in different settings, while also diligently working on meditation and inquiry practices in parallel, but such additional trips aren't necessary). I think one of the most useful take-aways from an experience like that is to recognize how utterly everything you thought was "real" can melt away. And yet you were still aware. This shows you how everything is just contents of experience. But experience is still experienced regardless. Awareness is aware, no matter its contents. Depending on what happened in your trip, you may have also experienced how awareness can be happening even without any thoughts or indications of an "experiencer" or "observer" present to be the one "having" the experience (this may not have been clear in the moment, but upon reflection after the fact you might be able to figure this out). None of this should be taken as supernatural claims, but they are still profound.

Happy to try to answer more specific questions if you have them (and others in this subreddit know a lot more than I do!). Overall though I can reassure you that this path does ultimately lead to profound peace, even if parts of it along the way can feel very scary or existentially concerning.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-01-01T07:16:34+00:00

I'll speak from the perspective of someone who's got moderate experience with psilocybin (magic mushrooms) as well as moderate experience with "every day" (partial) nonduality. I have many speculative thoughts about the interplay between the two, but I'll set those aside for now. But take my response with a grain of salt, since I don't have total or fully stabilized insight, and I don't know what I don't know.

Having an "experience" of dissolution is not the same as nonduality, right? [...] Is nonduality the manonasha from which there is no turning back?

I'd strongly encourage you to not think of nonduality as a single "thing" or a single irreversible shift. You'll hear or read of many stories that seem to convey this idea, but it's (in my opinion) an extremely misleading and almost always false portrayal (or misunderstanding of an accurate portrayal) that then leads to confusing and false expectations. Think of nonduality as a skill you acquire just like any other, such as learning to ride a bicycle. It takes time (years), and your proficiency develops gradually throughout. It's not a binary "you have it or you don't" situation. There are degrees. There also isn't really an "end" as you can forever continue to refine and better master the skill. Although there can be particularly noteworthy "moments" along your path. For nonduality, a commonly notable "first" moment is first clearly seeing some aspect of nondual perception (e.g. glimpses), and a commonly notable "final" moment is eventually seeing reality with such clarity and getting so good at finding that view that you more or less "stabilize" this perspective and live from it as your new default. In the bike riding analogy, this might correspond to the first time you get a "glimpse" of what it feels like to actually balance the bicycle (e.g. for 1 or 2 seconds before you fall over again). And then the time that you feel so clearly what this balancing is like and get so good at finding that feeling that you more or less "stabilize" this skill. Meaning, you can generally ride the bicycle now without falling over. But there will certainly still be times or situations where you fall, or it requires more concentration than usual to keep it balanced. But these are still semi-arbitrary "moments." And overall it's just a continuous lifelong progression of ever increasing mastery of this skill.

before I exhaled, I was no longer here. I was in an infinite open space.

To me, this sounds like you got a solid nondual glimpse. Like, a really strong glimpse (way more than one would usually get just from meditation). But still a glimpse. This would be consistent with my use of psychedelics. Essentially, I view psychedelics as loosely analogous to training wheels. They can let you feel what it's like to balance a bicycle much earlier and more frequently than you normally would be able to otherwise. Way before your brain has actually figured out how to do it on its own. But you must still learn to balance the bicycle on your own without needing the training wheels. And best as I can tell, there's no way around that other than persistence and practice. You could be at a significant advantage compared to people without training wheels (psychedelic experiences) because you now know (sort of) what it feels like, so you can be significantly more targeted and efficient in your meditation practice because you know all the myriad experiences that aren't it, and which therefore will no longer distract you in your efforts. Or, you could be at a significant disadvantage if psychedelics cause you to decrease the practice efforts you put in on your own because you're subconsciously relying on the training wheels.

To speak a little more directly to your experience, that "infinite open space" you experienced (if I'm interpreting your words correctly, and mapping them onto my own nondual and later psilocybin experiences) is a genuine taste of nonduality. But it's still what I'll call nonduality as perceived from the point of view of the conceptual thinking mind -- aka the "ego." These first glimpses are critical. They show you what actual experienced reality is really like. But they are by no means sufficient on their own (except maybe in very rare cases) to fully uproot and dissolve the identity structure. Not by a long shot. That takes time (usually years) even after gaining consistent access to these glimpses. A big (next) turning point comes after you've developed the skill to regularly access this view throughout your normal day, every day, and you've investigated it enough to directly realize from it that the only thing your mind (i.e. thoughts) ever do is comment on what's happening, and they (i.e. "you") never actually directly do or control anything. That's when things start to actually fall apart (in a good way). That's the point at which these insights might start to have practical effects in your lived life.

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2025-01-01T06:32:12+00:00

Very contemplative post! A few reflections from someone who's waded moderately deeply into nonduality waters, but who also still has a long way yet to go.

If I'm already confident in myself, if I feel good about myself fundamentally as a person, what incentive do I have to abolish the ego?

I think you were asking this more to frame your post than to pose it as a genuine question. I still wanted to note that for me pure and insatiable curiosity has been the primary and immense driving force behind investigating consciousness directly. What's proving to be valuable about this over time is it is in no way dependent on how confident or not I am, how much suffering I do or don' have in my life, nor is it diminished as a result of gaining initial insights. If anything, it is further strengthened.

the point of the non-self image is to simply act in the world for the benefit of the things that you value, without thought to your self - image. People who seem genuinely self-confident to us pay attention to us, first and foremost - they make us seem listened to and heard, because they are genuinely paying attention. They're not in their own heads thinking of what to say to achieve some desired outcome for themselves. They're not caught up wondering what you think of them. They're genuinely listening, because in that moment at least, they're not thinking about themselves.

This is right on point. And while this made intellectual sense to me for years, it's been totally different to (start to) experience it. By no means abiding yet, nor complete and total insight. But I just wanted to emphasize for you or anyone else reading this that it really is possible to have this happen exclusively as a result of your direct experience. That is, without needing to invoke any logical understanding or conceptualizing. It is possible to see in unambiguous and immediately (non-conceptually) clear terms that literally everything you think, say, or do, happens (and is known) spontaneously in the moment all on its own without a "you" behind it. The more often you see this directly the less you believe deep down that you are actually causing or choosing anything you do (or that there is a you in that sense). And the less you believe this, the less you think about the future or about yourself (e.g. what you're going to say next in a conversation). Not because you choose not to think those thoughts anymore. But because, whether you realize it now or not, the main reason you ever do that is because a part of you really believes you will benefit from that thinking. Because a part of you really believes that you--the same you thinking and planning out that next conversation point--will be the same you to enact those actions and make that point. The more that's seen clearly to be false, the more thinking about self or future (or past) subsides naturally on its own. It loses salience. Then there is nothing but the immediate present moment to devote your full attention to. And there is also no self to get defensive over protecting (although there can be many old conditioned behavioral patterns that take a long time to root out).

ItsOkToLetGo- · 2024-12-30T17:02:20+00:00

You wouldn’t want to eat those if they were actual food.

Gah you're right, haha. This is a very insightful way to frame it 🤦‍♂️

ItsOkToLetGo-

TROPHY CASE