Sloppy Zhang

From my understanding, karma exists in this instance as well. It is just that the karma is not being attached to a single spiritual entity, which is added and subtracted to their karma balance, which is totaled up at their death. Rather, energies separate and come together in accordance with the various karmic factors that are around. "Dorian Black" might not inherently have a self. But an energetic configuration might exist such that it is one parts ignorant karma, one parts likes TTB's karma. But because this configuration ponders a lot, it might rid itself of the karma for being ignorant. But in the process, gain the karma for over-intellectualizing. All throughout, however, it maintains the karma for using The Tao Bums, so when it reincarnates it may be in the form of a different person, but simply be comming back to TTB's as a different energetic configuration. But it won't be "Dorian Black", per se, who reincarnates. It will be TTB karma + over-intellectualizing karma. You weren't tallied up at death and ordered to come back here. Then it may resolve its TTB karma, but retain the intellectualizing, so then become a college professor. Notice that none of these example inherently requires "death". And notice how at each point, it is never inherently something that has a type of karma ON in. It is never in possession of, or hidden by, karma. Rather, the thing IS the karma. However, it identifies, or is identified, as something like "bum" or "professor", etc. If the karma resolved/gets resolved, there is nothing.

Cruisin' that youtube.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZogOjKdV7Y http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2D6HneSScyo&feature=relmfu

Well I'm still wondering how I'd feel if I had heard the caller as I was driving in my car on the way home from school, and not on a ufo montage. As far as UFO vids are concerned, I think this one was good- as in, the video clips, audio cues, and images were well placed. It was powerful. But I feel that, in large part, has to do with a scintillating topic and good video production.

It would be less creepy without the background music. I'd like to see these reports on tv in the broad daylight as I'm eating my cereal, maybe I'd get less sucked in Will think on it some more, though.

Not only that, but people won't do stuff if they think the crowd will disapprove, or if they think they will be embarrassed. Things like the bystander effect explain why people just sit by and watch crimes happen- because someone else will do something about it. I've heard of studies where they get people in the room, taking a test or something, and they will let the smell of gas or something in a room. People won't even acknowledge the problem until they have some kind of confirmation from others (eye contacts, nods of the head, silent agreement, etc) that something is wrong before they speak up. So alone you might say "there is a gas leak, I should leave." In a group you think "Do I smell a gas leak? Does anyone else smell it? Should I say something? That would be embarrassing. What if I'm wrong? I'll wait and see if somebody else does." Then you've got effects like groupthink- everyone is rollin' with it, I don't want to be the one to kill the fun. I don't know if anyone has seen that 20/20 special called "What would you do?" They stage scenarios to see what people do. So if you see a couple arguing/getting abusive, would you say something, if you see kids bullying another kid, would you do something? It's interesting because a LOT of factors come out of straight forward scenarios- perceptions of race, class, social role, past experience, etc. It's scary stuff. People are scary. "A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals, and you know it."

Well in defense of cat: I know it's the wiki, but there is a source cited... Prior to actually ever looking it up just now, you know, word of mouth. You hear this and that as you go through life. Come to think of it, I might have heard it in a drama class after someone mentioned Charlie Chaplin's "Hitlerstache", and hearing the teacher respond with "you mean Hitler's Charlie Chaplin-stache?"

I had always heard he was trying to be in style by adopting the style of the famous actor, Charlie Chaplin.

First of all, that article you linked is riddled with ridiculous sexist assumptions (in both gender directions), all of which had already been arbitrarily defined and assumed to be universally true. Translation: it is probably applicable in a handful of cases, but not able to be generalized. So no, I would not say "normal sex" is sado masochistic. People aren't resistant to celibacy because they won't have anyone to dominate, or to dominate them. Further, much of the thinking you tend to cite does not account for the fluidity in human interactions. In mutually entered into human relationships (romantic or otherwise) there is constant, simultaneous give and take on BOTH sides. You can't say "well she does the dishes so she's obviously the submissive unit", or "he takes out the trash, he's obviously taking control of the situation" Just like it's silly to say "she likes to be on top, that means she's the man!", I mean what happens when he's on top tomorrow? Or "he's a woman because she asked him to move the car and he submitted to her request". This is a perfect example of attaching too much baggage to stuff. If she likes it on top and he likes her on top, it doesn't mean he harbors feminine, submissive, subconsciously masochistic tendencies. Maybe that's just the way it plays out when it happens. If this guy's article is your definition of normal sex, and you don't agree with it which is why you are going into celibacy, then again, I strongly encourage you to actually examine why you think this, and dare I say it, actually get out there and have some relationships (not necessarily romantic or sexual) with women (and people in general). Because your view of what is "normal" is actually kind of disturbing, and quite telling about where you're coming from.

Ralis had a good post where he talked about the research behind repression and getting people to go along with it with regards to the institution. And then I'll also throw out that there were Germans who helped Jews and such, so I can't say that they all agreed- so be careful about who is making the documentary, and what the message is saying (explicitly or implicitly). Then I'll say that there are a lot of factors that went into it. Nationalism is very interesting, but also very tricky. And don't forget apathy- common people just trying to live their lives. Oh look, another message from the overlords. Okay, well, I don't want to get evicted or arrested, so why stick my neck out? Each individual is thinking the same thing, so as a collective, nothing gets done. You can see it now with the war against extremist terrorists. In America people have freedom of speech and thought, right? People have the right to be innocent until proven guilty, right? But terrorists want to kill indiscriminately. They have done so, and will continue to do so. They have gotten past lax security, so we should increase the security. That makes sense, right? And we should look closely at illegal aliens- if they can get in, so can someone intent on causing real harm. So we should lock down the boarders. Okay, that makes sense. But these guys have global networks, they coordinate intel to kill soldiers and civilians. I mean, it's like war, and in war, you can't leave yourself defenseless, right? So you lock up those who might be in collusion with the terrorists. I mean, that's smart, it's war, right? You don't want Americans to die, right? And sure, they might not have broken a law YET, but we have same damn good evidence that they were going to. And this is war, right? Preemption is okay, right? I mean, you're on our side, right? And these guys are just the REALLY scary ones. We aren't arresting them just because they are religious conservatives and frequent places that are known to produce extremists. I mean, we aren't arresting "normal people", so you're okay. (Sloppy note: so now you've got the populace okay with arrests that aren't operating strictly by the book) Meanwhile we caught some more people trying to sneak bombs and weapons into planes. They are still gunning for us. I mean, what if they give us the slip? You don't want a 9/11 happening again, right? I mean, that was horrible. And look, it's uncomfortable, sure, but we aren't after innocent people. Just the suspicious ones. How do we define suspicious? You know. Kinda sketchy. You'll know it when you see it. Just lookin' for anything.... out of the ordinary. But look, we're just going to pat you down, just ignore the cameras and be on your way. I mean, we aren't trying to interfere with normal peoples' daily life. Just pretend we aren't here. (Sloppy note: so now the public is consenting to increased invasive security to protect against nebulously defined threats, you don't know exactly what they are, but they aren't you, and they prevent another 9/11). Oh and that internet, well, it helps us run the country. Security, finances. I mean, if bad guy were to go after it. Oh, who? Yeah, bad guys. You know, the ones who want to kill you. You know who they are, we arrested a few just the other day. And that person airport security caught. Yeah. I mean, we aren't worried about you, but someone could try to take us down by the internet. So the president should be able to shut it down to prevent an attack. Yup. But normal people don't need to worry. We aren't interested in you checking your e-mail or looking at pictures of naked ladies. We're after the real bad guys. Oh come on, we know you know who we're talking about.... the bad guys. (Is a Sloppy note even necessary here?) So despite rights being systematically revoked, the majority, the "normal people" don't have to worry- it's outside the sphere of their lives. And if they DO ask question, the rhetoric is set up that they, then, are sympathetic to the enemy, which makes THEM the enemy. And so you've got the soldier in your grocery store reading your report of your internet activities for the day asking if you've really got an uncle John in Tuscon, telling you that all the security checkpoints are helping the country succeed, and btw, if you see anybody reading a book, call the soldiers, because some crazies who liked to read just tried to tell some people that the government wasn't looking out for the public. Damn anarchist librarian bastards.

That sounds like censorship and artificially shaping the conversation!

To me, the best path to success is to consider it holistically- Taoist sexual practices are just one portion of the energy practices, just one portion of the physical practices, just one portion of the mental practices, etc, which are ALL part of the overall practice of cultivation. This applies to Mantak Chia's material as well. If you ONLY want to be a multi-orgasmic man, you will probably experience less success, and most likely a lot of physical unhealth. I don't know exactly what you practice, but in my experience a lot of what you listed does not look at the body that much. And even if they DO, even the best at the physical stuff, borrow a lot from other systems, and even then, don't always borrow it completely. Sexual practices aren't just working a part of the physical body, they are working a very sensitive, delicate, and powerful part of the physical and energetic body. This is PHYSICAL stuff. It has energy, but is physical. You must learn and be very familiar with your physical body. So now that I've bored you with all the front loaded information, here's what I'd suggest- If you're dead set on Chia's material, get all of Chia's material (and also look at Michael Winn's material). Inner Smile, microcosmic orbit, the foundation. Lean how the body and energy work by default, BEFORE you start running sexual energy. Taoist practices have developed a lot of knowledge about the physical body, a lot more than most other area's I've looked at- use it. Read the site Trunk linked, learn what is on it. Be familiar with all of the stuff it's talking about, as in, working knowledge. As you branch out in material, I suggest B.K. Frantzis' "Opening the Energy Gates of Your Body". It teaches you about the important points of your physical and energetic bodies, and how to work with them. Before you start on sex stuff, take stock of what's in your body to begin with, and learn what a healthy body is supposed to do. Be at a point where you can feel and circulate energy in your body smoothly (this in and of itself is an accomplishment). If you don't, in the best case nothing will happen, and in the worst case, you'll be damaging your body and won't know until it's too late because you won't know how to distinguish between what is right and what is wrong. You MUST be open, you MUST be healthy, you MUST know how to deal with problems with your baseline physical body BEFORE you start adding stress (sexual energy). If it feels like I'm telling you a lot, I am If it feels like I'm telling you everything EXCEPT sex, I kinda am too Sex work is a subcategory of a much bigger set, to ignore the bigger set is to ignore what makes sex work actually do something in the first place. And keep in mind that this is risky business even if you're doing it right. If ever there was a category where doing nothing is better than trying and failing, this would be that category. Because messin' up this stuff can lead to very bad things that are very hard, if even possible in the first place, to recover from.

They mentioned that an erect penis apparently helps store urine while you sleep. I do know that sexual arousal helps suppress the desire to urinate (I even read an article a long time ago that was like "if you really gotta pee, but aren't near a restroom, think about sex!") In which case, it is purely a physiological response in your body to take care of a natural body process- urination. It doesn't mean you are failing in your quest to purge sexual desires and get rid of your erections. Now don't even start about talking about urine retention to avoid erections having to do with that! What, that you get erections throughout the day? Of course it's natural. Didn't they teach you this in sex ed? "Your body is changing, you may start to get erections, sometimes these will happen at embarrassing moments, like in the middle of class." I bet your doc, TCM or otherwise, will tell you the same thing Saying you've had it ever since you were young is saying "my body has worked ever since I was young." And trying to stop it is trying to take your body into a state of non-health. Not good. It's not your body which is the problem, it's your mind which has attached a whole number of thoughts, theories, and ideological baggage to natural body processes. If you had been living in solitude your entire life (forget the logistics for a bit), you wouldn't be having these problems. You'd see that occasionally throughout the day you'd have an erection, then you'd let it go and just move on. But since you've been trying to resolve the conflicts you have in your life, you've started to take on a bunch of oppressive baggage which, in their proper context, can be HELPFUL, but since you're taking it all out of context, you're turning it around into something potentially harmful. Your body is not the enemy unless you make it your enemy. Your thoughts are not your enemy unless you make them your enemy. There ARE ways in which people take natural body mechanics, and work with them to cultivate their minds and bodies. But if you attempt to take a bunch of disparate factoids and try to do them, if you view the elements you're working with as volatile and harmful, how are they ever supposed to help you?

I like to stand up and take a big stretch, arms raised above my head, to get the blood flowing everywhere, sometimes prodding with my conscious, sometimes not. Sometimes this just makes the erection go all out. Keep in mind that an erection is blood in the penis- there is nothing inherently sexual in that, and it's good to let things circulate around. So don't go on a campaign against all erections! Try to separate erections and sex in your mind

Do it all the time Which is why I said if you "try" then you're in for a headache. To do, you have to not do. Then it'll get ya! This is the same rhetoric that Christians use AGAINST stillness meditation. "If you leave your mind open, the devil will come in!" It's one of the things that, in my opinion, prevents many Christians from making significant spiritual progress, even if they act out the right things- they aren't really doing anything with their baseline level of consciousness, so it takes a LOT to finally have an effect, and not all people are willing to run that many Church bake sales... This to me is too paradoxical, and is the reason, I think, for many people not getting the point. "stillness" is passive, waiting, observing. Destroying is active, doing something. If you sit down thinking you're going to destroy thoughts, that in and of itself will generate more thoughts. You will be shooting yourself in the foot prior to running a race! When you suppress, all of that content, all of those problems, are still there, waiting for you to mess up, and then they'll pounce on you. You have to treat yourself as the enemy. You are on guard 24/7. And when you mess up, it is brutal. It is a life of tension and being high strung. And for me, that just does not appeal to me. For the better part of a year I tried to fit into a regiment like that. It ruined my health, fried my nerves, and set me back further than I had started! Now I know that everyone is different, so maybe it'll all work out differently for others, but I'm saying that when I stopped obsessing over it, when I said it was okay to mess up- to ejaculate, to think, to be lazy for a bit- they stopped happening! Because I wasn't always obsessing over the next time I was going to fail, or ejaculate, or think, or do whatever. So it lost its power and draw. I became much happier and healthier. And guess what? When you free the content, and let it out, it's not there anymore to bother you. When you suppress it, it is. And that, to me, is a HUGE difference.

In my experience, the phrase that I first heard in "Zen Mind: beginners Mind" is applicable and highly effective: the best way to control your heard of cattle is to let them roam freely. If you try to pin them in and control them tightly, there will only be problems. If you treat your body like the enemy, you will always be fighting. When you learn to be friends, you'll find that many of you discipline problems disappear- so you'll go long periods of time in, say, celibacy, but it will be effortless and natural, without the mental shearing created by a forceful abstinence, and without your body always trying to sabotage you. And that to me just sounds better. Remember, Non, let it happen naturally, and it'll happen the easiest. When you get rid of your fear of ejaculation, at the same time it will lose its power and hold over you. If you hesitate, the dragon will bite you. If you jump down its throat, you won't get bit- the most dangerous sounding place is the safest. This entire posts reeks of attempting to self justify, and Non, I strongly advice AGAINST rationalizing out your behavior like this. If your goal is truly peace, you should be doing it because it makes sense to YOU and makes YOU feel better, not because it will make you "better than" other people- that state is fleeting, and ultimately will do you no good.

I'm not a yogi but...... I'm strong......

I know, I talk about that in the bottom of my post. My point is the same as yours- people get caught up in the knowledge, misapply it, and wind up suppressing stuff and causing stagnation. And what's worse, is they think they are doing it right because they are doing what they know is somewhere up the mountain, even if it is not right for them at the time.

The most stereotypically magic articles I can think of from those guys are this one on elemental magic which is from a class he taught, a lot of direct exercises (can download the full pdf on bottom of his post), a A treatise on elemental magic, more of a lecture, and this one on Ars Anima Gladius. Though William Misetele tends to categorize the Bardonian magician almost as more of a shaman- a lot less rigid than the yoga flavored guys at vsociety. He seems fairly receptive and responds well to inquiry, might want to drop him a line. And then I guess Rawn Clark has been up to a bit, his site has some new stuff on it, but I never got along with his flavor quite either (a bit on the kabbalistic side, perhaps?) Anyway, if you're looking for capable people, those are who I would start with. Bardon's is one of the few whose system actually directly says "do this, get magic", and then actually tells you step by step what to do. You just gotta take the time to do it. Take a bit of time. Anyway, sorry if it's all old news to you. But if we start playing around with "what's eastern?" and "what's western?" then who knows. I recall taomeow making a post where she divided things up based on a language classification- object or process oriented languages, so in that sense India would get lumped in with Europe So, I dunno, even the most "purely western" traditions that I can think of have some similarities or cross-pollinated with other cultures. People don't live in isolation, right? People moved around back then too.

But see it's all anecdotal. And there's a whole bunch if issues with that. Well as they and their understudies explain it, the magic system that Franz Bardon (at the very least) teaches is a type of yoga, or rather, it gets the energy going in sometimes new, sometimes the same ways. Here's what I wrote in the 6th element thread (from my understanding): Prophecy, Veos, and Bardon are some of the best that I've come across who teach stuff that is actually meant to be used. The thing is, a TON of responsibility is on the student. There is an articles section on that forum, there are some good articles by Veos and Prophecy. (here) It's just interesting, because proponents of western stuff is like "it's way more accessible than eastern stuff", and proponents of eastern stuff are saying the reverse.

But see, in my experience, TRYING to stop the thoughts is almost impossible. More often than not, it causes MORE thoughts. More tension. And more problems. People hear things like "samadhi", states of no thought, states of no breathing (! because thoughts are associated with breath, no breath = no thought, right?). And even if you manage to claw your way through, and get a second of clarity, you are worse off than you were before with all the mental and physical agony and backlash that are rebounding at you, so next time it will be harder for you and you'll get less done. That just doesn't seem like a very smart way to go about doing things, although some traditions do maintain that is how it is done- that when you get enlightened, who cares about what state your lesser body and mind are in? That the agony and torture you feel in your body is you lesser mind trying to fight your progress. These are instances in which repression and control start to harm you, but people have been told by various teaching that those are, in fact, "good". Well this stuff is all well and good for the 1 person every 10,000 years who manages to get enlightened in this way. For the other schmucks, they're screwed. They have ravaged bodies and minds- and that's assuming they have access to a complete set of teachings! What if you're just a dude on an internet forum trying to better your life? You're twisting your balls up in all these different ways, you are beating yourself up every time you think something "bad", you are ravaging your body and mind, and are you really getting anything out of it? Spiritual peace? Spiritual growth? More like just another stressful mechanism of control. IMHO. Thoughts slowing down and stopping happens, for me, anyway, as a result of o process of self inquiry and examination, as I try to get to the root of and resolve my stuff. Sometimes it means looking at my thought patterns. And sometimes it means looking at my body and going "well this guy just wants to fuck.... that explains it." But understanding and acceptance of something does NOT equate to allowing it. It just, for me, means you aren't trying to make something it isn't before you deal with it, and instead are going to deal with what it really is. But you have to find out what it really is first.

Reposting cat's questions and considerations: A repost of my initial thoughts on some distinctions: I don't profess to have a working map for people, but this is when red flags start going up for me- When your goals involve restricting or dominating something with your force of will in conjunction (because willpower alone isn't necessarily bad) with the demonizing of a systemic, effective, driving force within the body or mind- in this case, sex. Sexual thoughts and reactions with your sexual glands are a part of a healthy body. I don's know about other guys, but I get random, non-sex related erections throughout the day. And as far as I know, that's healthy and to be expected. Problems arise when we begin to obsess over these things because we view them as wrong, and get progressively worse as we ARTIFICIALLY ATTEMPT to change these processes ourselves. Furthermore, our minds come up with tens of thousands of thoughts a day. Some sexual, some not. And interestingly, when you try to avoid something, the more sensitized you become to it. The more you see it. And once you see it, the harder it is to let go. I suggest reading this article on intrusive thoughts, especially as they relate to OCD. Basically, things that would never have bothered you start to drive you nuts because you have become overly sensitized to their presence (though they've been there all along) and you suddenly can't let them go, so you start to come up with more and more elaborate (and sometimes even unhealthy) ways to get rid of these thoughts. And now you have a mild form of OCD. And some people would call that spiritual progress, and codify it into a system where others can do it too. Now earlier I mentioned artificial attempts to change things. This is in contrast to things occurring naturally. For instance, some people feel the need to go on a special diet when they are being spiritual. For me, spiritual practices have made me more aware of what I'm eating, why I'm eating it, and what it's actually doing to my body. Many of the foods I use to love physically repulse me now, because I actually know what's happening to my body. Now diets can be fairly low impact to very dramatic, but it can get more tricky- especially when it comes to the sex stuff. Trying to change a diet or change your sex routine from the get go is putting the cart before the horse. The horse is your practice, and things like diet and celibacy arise in their own due course as you start to change the core of your life. This way, you can do things because you WANT to do them, and not because you "should" do them (because it's what spiritual people do, because it's what your guru said, because it was in a book, yadda yadda) Loss of libido in conjunction with depression and things like that can be found by, well, looking to see if there are any other signs and symptoms of depression. The evolution would be just that- and evolution, a change in the way you perceive the game. You don't have to go through elaborate mental or physical hoops to avoid or get rid of your sexual thoughts- they just don't happen like they used to!

It is impossible to stay celibate for ANY significant period of time if all you think about is how you aren't engaging in sexual activity. How you aren't masturbating. How you aren't ejaculating. Notice what the focus is in all of those sentences? SEX. MASTURBATION. EJACULATION. There is a reason why self help books tell you to make affirmations in the positive. If you say "I don't want to be sad", then your focus is on sadness. If you say "I want to be happy", your focus is on happiness. It's why all of those methods for forcing yourself not to be something only work for the most rigid of personality types, and why, even then, they lead to health complications (systemic tension). Not to mention what they do to those who aren't already hard wired. The same goes for dieting and exercising, and things like that. You've got to change and build from the bottom up. If you try to suddenly do something drastic all at once, your body will push back and will most likely win. The body is a very powerful thing. It is much better to work with it than against it. It is much easier to change something piece by piece, from the bottom up, rather than to force something from the top down. Your body will ejaculate, your body will masturbate, LONG before you come even close to having to pay anything close to your life. And you will either rationalize it to accept it into your belief structure for why it is okay, or you will deem in an anomalous behavior and ignore all instances of it- basically you will enter into denial. I hope it works out.

I don't profess to have a working map for people, but this is when red flags start going up for me- When your goals involve restricting or dominating something with your force of will in conjunction (because willpower alone isn't necessarily bad) with the demonizing of a systemic, effective, driving force within the body or mind- in this case, sex. Sexual thoughts and reactions with your sexual glands are a part of a healthy body. I don's know about other guys, but I get random, non-sex related erections throughout the day. And as far as I know, that's healthy and to be expected. Problems arise when we begin to obsess over these things because we view them as wrong, and get progressively worse as we ARTIFICIALLY ATTEMPT to change these processes ourselves. Furthermore, our minds come up with tens of thousands of thoughts a day. Some sexual, some not. And interestingly, when you try to avoid something, the more sensitized you become to it. The more you see it. And once you see it, the harder it is to let go. I suggest reading this article on intrusive thoughts, especially as they relate to OCD. Basically, things that would never have bothered you start to drive you nuts because you have become overly sensitized to their presence (though they've been there all along) and you suddenly can't let them go, so you start to come up with more and more elaborate (and sometimes even unhealthy) ways to get rid of these thoughts. And now you have a mild form of OCD. And some people would call that spiritual progress, and codify it into a system where others can do it too. Now earlier I mentioned artificial attempts to change things. This is in contrast to things occurring naturally. For instance, some people feel the need to go on a special diet when they are being spiritual. For me, spiritual practices have made me more aware of what I'm eating, why I'm eating it, and what it's actually doing to my body. Many of the foods I use to love physically repulse me now, because I actually know what's happening to my body. Now diets can be fairly low impact to very dramatic, but it can get more tricky- especially when it comes to the sex stuff. Trying to change a diet or change your sex routine from the get go is putting the cart before the horse. The horse is your practice, and things like diet and celibacy arise in their own due course as you start to change the core of your life. This way, you can do things because you WANT to do them, and not because you "should" do them (because it's what spiritual people do, because it's what your guru said, because it was in a book, yadda yadda) The problem is these things are so insidious, it's had to tell what is what. What is what YOU want to do? What is what you have been convinced that you must be doing? How much of it is your ego resisting change, and how much is your body going "for the love of God, stop, you are killing me"? You've got to take a long, hard look at yourself. You've got to ask yourself some tough questions. You've got to examine your assumptions. And though we may come up with some different answers, you can tell when one has gone, or is willing to go through, such a process. I think that Non is getting there, and these threads are circling the same issues. I just don't think than Non has invested, and I don't know how much he is willing to invest, in actually trying to figure out where some things are coming from. There is a reason why people in past threads have suggested therapy- because a trained therapist can sit down, face to face, no hiding behind a computer screen, and walk through everything that needs to be done. Of course, you gotta watch out for the re-indoctrinating of "this is how you should feel about this" and yadda yadda. I think it is cool too, and I think these are some great questions that Non needs to ask, and examine the answers.

Right, because that makes sense. I'm the only one here, so obviously all of his posts are to me directly. That was sarcasm again. Your post makes no sense. He doesn't know what to do or think, so he keeps looking for external validation. He doesn't listen (something he has admitted to doing in the past), because he has not found the answers that he wants- when someone agrees with him, the tone of his posts change. That would not be the case for someone who was truly following their own, internal guidance. Again, I do not consider suicidal thoughts to be "perfectly fine", and am a little bothered by the fact you seem to be okay with this. *smirk* I understand, the truth is too much for you to handle. Your dinky little candle is no match for the blazing sun that is me. Is that why you are ignoring me now? Or is it because ignorance is bliss? It's much easier to win an argument when you ignore what other people say. Good luck on your spiritual journey with that attitude. As for this: It's clear the only one being rattled is you. After all, if my words didn't hurt your ego, you wouldn't have responded with ignoring me trying to protect your fragile little ego. You're a very tiny fish, I hope you enjoy the same walls of your fish tank, because with the attitude you've displayed in this thread, you're going to be there for a very looooooooooong time.

Non, if you can find a woman like this..... damn, son, you've got it made. I just want to save this quote. Just, you know...... so we all know who was here, in this thread, giving all that sage advice.