thursday

Having been on medication for 5/6 years and then off again, I think I can see both how it is helpful to be on & also how hard it can be to taper off. I take pride in having tapered off and everything, so no real shame except for the things I did back then sometimes still haunt me.. Maybe it's fear to have a relapse that reminds me to stay cautious and keep safe to center. Without the kind folks and nurses at the hospital (didn't always see it like that at the time!) and afterwards my spiritual teachers and family, I would have never been the same again.. So it's good to remind myself that there's no such thing as a definite enemy.. Just karma, obstructions to move through.. In that way I feel a lot of gratitude and hope to assist others too. edit: hearing stories from others, I often come back to realize that there are many people whom have had things far worse.. & there's all kinds of horror people can go through, mental illness or other kinds of stuff, I count myself as one of the more fortunate.. There is a lot of taboo on being different, but it doesn't have to define us in a bad way..

Trying to be selfless seems like gets in the way of your goal a bit, ironically.. You have got to start with where you are and for most of us that is far from being saintly, well at least speaking for myself! It seems like over time you get to see more closely the results of actions taken in daily life and meditation, which gradually give you the insight to set aside "self centeredness", not because you want to fit into the spiritual idea of saintliness, but because you'll be curious enough to see what it does for you to make changes.. Time and time again my teacher had said that the obvious, mundane stuff has all the elements right there to progress.. It's just that we often expect special effects like in that new Marvel series Iron Fist, so we struggle because of distractions.. When walking, try to walk with mindfulness, notice what is there, like your body moving, heat, cold, frustration, hope, happy, sad.. Nothing special to look for and when you do look for something special, remind yourself of that as another thing that is happening, not bad or good, just there and looking further..

Having been diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, I have had some difficulties with things.. While medication was necessary at some point for me, it's probably not a good thing to be dependent on it for decades like many have been told.. When first put on them (forced) I kind of felt like it was changing me, and things gradually seemed to get worse, like more psychotic instead of less.. So I'm still not sure, I could have died without close supervision, so for people too far out, I would recommend they listen to their doctor too.. On an another forum someone wrote that neutral observation meditation allows the brain/body to heal itself. To me that seems to be right. Using the software Right (meditation) to gradually allow the hardware (brain) to normalize.. Which can still be hard, but seems like it's doable. Meditation combined with physical exercise has been what helped a lot for me. It's harder to "get away" from the label that you get once you've been hospitalized..

Do you feel like there is a message for you and your friend in this happening? It makes me think of a tiny recent situation myself.. I admire your generosity by the way!

Hm yes, but it's not just that it connects you with deeper aspects of yourself, but imo also with the deeper aspects of the alchemist and if that person is off in some way, even with positive intents from them.. It may become too much to handle, but I guess a lot depends on how sensitive you are and expectations.. I went in with a rather skeptical attitude, but it felt undeniably that something powerful was taking place.. then I lost myself in that, gave my power away in a sense.. YMMV.. Getting your bodies to work cooperatively seems to be very important for anyone, not just spiritual minded people.. I don't know if much can be gained from these substances in that way. It seems too forceful or adding things that get in the way rather than help.. It must also depend on the alchemist, I tried ormus from ebay once and that didn't seem to do anything at all except for some tingles.. Good luck either way and stay well too!

I won't name the vendor as I don't want to get into any trouble, but I took it daily for two weeks or so if I remember correctly, just a pinch. Didn't even have to take half a gram to start my first episode.. Oh and I can't say it turned me as a healthy person (physically I was very healthy btw) into an unhealthy one as that would be too simplified. With saying that it was probably in my karma, I meant that I probably was going to have difficulties anyway.. It's just that the alchemy was so 'powerful' that I lost myself quite easily.. It doesn't have to be catastrophic for everyone, just saying for me it was and I heard other things from other people too. Psychosis seems like a rather common thing with these things, that is from personal experience and hearsay, so take it as you want it..

My experience with that kind of alchemy has been both positive and negative. Positive that it seemed to help detach myself and it seemed like a fun experience.. Negative in that it was so volatile that the "detachment" kept on going and I thought I was going to literally die, all turned black and I didn't go heaven, I went to hospital, I lost my job, my friends, my mental health.. Maybe it was just my karma anyway, but I highly recommend to stay away at all costs.. When I made the decision to not buy and ingest that stuff anymore and instead meditate daily, I have been able to somewhat recover from what I went through.. I kid you not, my doctor at that time told my parents it would be likely that I'd stay in that state of being or hospital forever. Seven years later now, off the gold and also off the meds for almost two years now, have a job, time to meditate.. It's still hard sometimes of course, but I will manage.

Projecting an emotional state or love or unconditional love towards someone doesn't mean that other person will feel it consciously.. Projecting things often goes unnoticed while the effects are there on the environment.. Love is not like slavery that is done to people.. People have a choice to see for themselves.. Unconditional love is a core thing and I don't think it can even be called on to project as that would add to the state and make it conditional.. Imo, it's just what remains when all reactions are owned.. This can only be seen by the person that wants to make it happen, no matter how much outside help of enlightened beings..

I don't know qicat.. Where did things go wrong? Having lived with mental illness, I can see clearly that two faced stuff going on with myself too and sometimes it's quicker than myself and I make the wrong decisions.. Just got to be real honest to myself and see which one "face" would be most beneficial to feed and work from there. It's been said too many times that doing good deeds leads to good things, and plenty of opportunities for that, but we are humans and we can all struggle with that, sometimes even crashing down.. But everyone can turn back to the light regardless of the darkest circumstances.. Like my friend whom recently said something about a cat being flexi enough to get through the smallest openings, to a safer side.. You can always find a way ..

Different cultures and subcultures have different positive and negative patterns, some may be more dark than others.. Injustice happens all the time, and we can get caught up in this when it happens to us or others we care for.. Getting caught up then restricts our ability to release and move past. Our internal narratives shift towards denser stuff, which manifests corresponding events in perception to further accumulate stuff, to be right, which is what fear wants, and it can be very convincing.. That is not to say that we have to let injustice happen! Just got to see where we can intervene, set things straight and where better to just move along.. I know it's even worse when people that do injustice towards others get praise for it.. It may be subtle injustice or very obvious, but it happens often under the guise of what some people mistake for humor.. Life is hard, sometimes cruel .. Just got to move on through..

Hm, quite a few times I have projected things on other people/situations based on my own distrust.. It is strange how personality/histories can twist current reality, accumulating stuff that leads to darkness.. Afterwards realizing words could actually start destroying what I worked so hard to create..

Liminal_luke: can you yawn on command? Sometimes when I read () or see other people yawning, I do get drawn to yawn too.. I've always wondered how it can be contagious like that

Apeiron&Peiron, you seem to have knowledge of things.. Like you said, I guess also that there are dual cultivation systems for different purposes, I wouldn't want to be part of the darker themed ones.. My guess is that certain lineages have reconnected to share lost knowledge and transmissions.. Anything could have happened, don't you think?

Apeiron&Peiron, why do you think dual cultivation is only in Tibet these days or are you talking about a specific practise?

Welcome ! It's been hard for me here to not take some things personal here, but you have to see for yourself and use your intuition.. It's not because someone seemingly has a lot of experience that they know everything better.. Everyone has blind spots .. That said, I know nothing, but generally speaking, forcing things with practise doesn't help much, so I see some of the advice I read here could be useful to you..

Sure, if you're a teacher, you can eliminate the money aspect and just agree for yourself that donations from students are good enough. As a student I could only politely try to inquire a potential teacher for help if I can't afford things at the normal rate. "Mind reading" seems like a difficult ability to get under control, so until then a good teacher to me would be open to common decency in normal language.. It may still be difficult to really trust though.. Everyone willing to be a student has got to figure things out themselves and make it happen too..

I don't know.. It's often been said that requiring things to be for free stems from an entitlement issue/attitude. I can see how that is true for many things, but I can also see how giving large amounts of money for teachings may make someone feel confused and question the teachings, even if they are logical and seem like the ideal thing to follow through on..

Observing the damage in myself, there is still a lot of work to do.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USR3bX_PtU4 [One of Us - Joan Osborne]

What is not nature? Human kind may have gone far from their original "normal", but everything in reality could still be thought of as nature. One of my teachers said that suffering is the most loyal teacher because it is a constant thing till Enlightenment. Still without a teacher whom has walked the path, it may be much harder to even get a basic idea of spirit because of how nature has come to be.. So I for one think I am glad that there are things like human teachers I've been able to contact via a man made internet.. Wether or not my time is wasted has still to be seen, but it seems like I get a good feeling that it is my path & one with a lot of obstacles.. The fact that I feel reluctant to go all the way is probably a good indicator that I have to and that I get an estimate of how valuable it is.. A path that promises to be easy all the time seems like another drug to take, obscuring clarity/reality/spirit..

Centertime, I created this topic in response to your question in the other thread. The specifics of the meditations I've been trying to help me heal myself from mental illness (which is more like a list of things with schizophrenia as the general conclusion of my doctors at the time) ... may not be as important as the effort I put into making things a routine. So even if all else seemed/seems to go dark, I made/make sure I get my sessions done. To expand on that, just trying to focus/listen on/to the lower dantian probably helped me most to not lose my mind. However I had already a little experience with meditation before my first psychotic episode, which helped to strengthen my belief in that I could in time heal/stabilize without meds. Also the knowing that everything changes all the time, so things would always get better no matter how bad things could go. So for me a good routine helped, a long with knowing things always change. The worst thing that could happen is that I got taken back to the hospital and I already survived that. It wasn't necessarily a horrible experience all of the time there either, I met a lot of good people there when I was mentally coherent enough to participate in therapy. In the end the universe only wants the best for us, I like to believe.. Maybe other people here have experience with recovery from things like this?

It's good to know that I'm not the only one still seeking Cauvery! It may take me a long time till I get there, but I feel like it would be worth it. I guess there will always be good and bad, but it sounds like that from the point that silent thunder and others have come to, it gets increasingly easier to make good choices. My teacher once wrote to me, well actually probably more than once in different ways ( !!) that the time it takes to get to that point has a lot to do with how much value is given to sincere practise..

Thanks silent thunder, it is good to read that.. Especially the way you put it with "nothing would be or could be wasted". There are moments that I feel closer to having a chance of reaching that point some time and it always seems to be when I allow myself to follow instructions more precisely, like you put it with "paying more attention to small changes".. Then at other times, maybe most of the time, my mind is protesting heavily against it.. Actually I have noticed that it's probably not protesting as much as before and that certain negative patterns have burned themselves out over time.. Maybe there are things going on beneath my conscious awareness or I believe they are going on because observing cause and effect in things during daily life, I can only come to the conclusion that there's no other way to my goal than trying to do better with things in life.. Why would I want suffering if I can produce solutions that benefit not only myself, but also the greater good?

Cauvery, I agree and I think Roger probably agrees too.. One of my teachers once wrote to me that effort is needed to gain enough momentum to get to the tipping point.. From that point onwards peace and expansion/vibration rise will only increase naturally and time spent in formal meditation will not be as necessary anymore as before.. Until reaching that point it's still "hard work".. I guess it's like Spotless wrote in another thread that at some point the seeker stops seeking.. That it could be the same or similar what he meant?

Thank you Roger, that is advice I should take to heart! Sounds like you have made really good changes in your life, that is great.. It still seems like a hard thing for me to just trust, but I think I get what you mean.. Just don't seem to be doing it much yet.. I say do because I see there is a choice to be made, nobody is going to do it for me, I reap what I sow, so I better start understanding that.

Thanks guys.. .. Guess I'm not doing too badly when my psych gave me another extra 4 months till we have another appointment, while it used to be every 2 months or so!