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thank you for that!

zOHgchen or ZOGchen?

fascinating comment

re: the question of if one should have a teacher, what I care most about is for when there is a teacher, that they follow some compassionate, responsible safety/ethical protocols that take into account set & setting, not indiscriminately, promoting risky practices/pathways in a blanketed way to the general public, and often highly vulnerable demographics 🙏🏼

not yet, but I hear it's coming soon ;) I'll be hosting an online Q & A event with him next month actually, where you could ask him directly :) if you'd like to get updated on the details of that, feel free to join my newsletter eepurl.com/h9IvVf or if you want to send me your email address I can make a note to message you with the details once they are confirmed!

It's always refreshing to hear someone say that, despite how obvious it seems!

I did not suggset that people stop exploring or teaching. My call is for a more discerning, responsible, and compassioante approach-one that, like guides for people wanting to experience ego dissolution on psychedelics, takes precautions as you would with any powerful practice. Imagine if a doctor handed out potent anti-depressants with common severe adverse side effects, to everyone, indiscriminately, and then said, well if you experienced those you just couldn't handle it! Sharing what one finds to be true isn’t weakened by ethical sharing, and if non-dual guides really stands for what they claim to, then, at least the compassionate among them, should have no fear of acknowledging harm and teaching with care. Also, non-dual traditions being appropriated and de-contextualized today, were not shy about talking about the inherent risks in direct ego dissolution pointers, teachings, and paths, that negligence is a new phenomenon we're seeing today! Have a look www.thegloriousbothand.com/traditions-speak-of-dangers.html Psychedelics can lead people naturally to have ego dissolution experiences, and plant medicine is natural, yet there's vast care put into ethical protocols around guiding people into those experiences, which many would say bring people to perceive the "truth," and implementing basic safeguards. There's no good faith reason to not do the same in guiding "non-dual" ego-dissolution pointers

Agree. Suicides? Correlation is not causation

@ in this case, it’s often causation to the point that there are many people Who would still be alive today if they hadn’t gotten involved with this type of spiritual path. Nuances abound, of course. Happy to share with you more about this phenomenon, evidence, etc *doesn’t deny that there are also some people who might not be alive if they hadn’t

@@stephengough9694 Ouroboros

@@thegloriousbothand Many people would be alive if they hadn't got involved with... politics, media, banks, religion, etc... This conversation is devoring its own tail.

In my understanding of this, if one has a so-called "direct" experience of a pre-given truth claim AFTER being taught by someone first that it IS the unquestionable ultimate truth, followed by being pointed to a way of perceiving reality such that it seems to be true (experientially) - i.e. that it seems to "check out" in your own experience, through whatever methods/pointing out, etc. - the entire experience of discovering the pre-given truth to be self-evidently Absolute, is inextricably entangled with the pre-given teachings - that's not necessarily a bad thing, but it's how it happened for every one of the teachers today who cites sages like maharshi and maharaj whose teachings they poured over before having their so called DIRECT revelation of what they were describing as Absolute Truth...the teachings always inform the experience...now, perhaps what you were more pointing to is the fact that some people start believing X claim is The Truth, purely intellectually, without perceiving reality that way, like being able to describe what a mango tastes like but never having tasted it yet. That's common, that people go around just parroting things with no shift in their perception, however what I'm suggesting is that just because someone has the intended perceptual shift ("direct" experience as its said) they were set up to have with the pointers for example, that in itself doesn't make X claim The Truth. It might be, but "direct perception" doesn't = it's absolutely True, that's how I now see it. Still makes the perceptual shift profound, for better or worse depending on the person. A real way of experiencing reality, among a multitude.

@@thegloriousbothand Thanks.

And "cigarettes can be bad for your health/kill you, if your lungs aren't resilient!" This is a radical over-simplification of the complexities discussed, which include toxic cult-like dynamics in a new-age spiritual movement where spiritualized mental illness, exploiting the vulnerable, and thinly veiled narcissistic abuse runs rampant. Perhaps you would find the book The Guru Papers enlightening. Highly recommended.

It took me several years, to be honest. It still surprises me sometimes to realize that I've actually disentangled from that worldview/experience of reality, given how deeply entrenched I was in it for quite awhile! It's been a combination of de-constructing that worldview (I don't know which particular set of teachings about self/reality you have followed, and I'm aware that there are many variations under the neo-advaita and modern 'non-duality' umbrella!) in tandem with discovering more compelling perspectives on the nature of the self and existence that affirm both individual, personal reality and oneness for example (you might check out some of my conversations with Tim Freke about this), re-thinking spiritual ideals and what brings meaning to life - i.e. no longer seeing escaping suffering as the point of it, lots of physical grounding (dance, movement, embodiment practices) and I did have to initially force myself to engage/participate socially (like you, I became profoundly withdrawn and socially crippled), since that drive had been so eroded, and essentially needed to not just re-learn how to be a fully human person within this world, but to see newfound preciousness/significance in this! I don't mean to throw lots of links at you, but I do talk more about my journey of return to humanity in this batgap conversation ruclips.net/video/BDTGO-tqzUk/видео.html I really relate to what you've shared! If you'd like to connect feel free to email me at thegloriousbothand@gmail.com or send me your email :) I'll be doing some online events soon that focus on this recovery/return to humanity path, if you'd want to hear about those feel free to join my newsletter eepurl.com/h9IvVf - or I'll just share the details with you if we connect over email! I hope some of what I share helps even a little bit!

Sending much love to you friend, we've been there too! Thankful to hear that you're recovering too 🙏🏼💚 Thank you for being you!

Yes, it's extremely deceptive and often self-deceptive, and sadly very easy to get swept up in, hence the need for more support for folks who are caught up and suffering from. it

Yep 18 minutes in. To make that choice. Like in that film Anatomy of a Fall. The young blind boy is told " you don't know. You choose what you believe" that's the nature of faith I guess. Its like psychodynamic therapy - the therapist is always right and you can't question it. I've gone back to my Christian roots. But the mystic Christian stuff. I feel that the non dual idea is one way of looking at it. I always look at the lifestyle and social milieu of the teacher. They are mostly men. were tgey revered in society and looked up to ? What did thet have to do work wise in the world? What were their childhood like? So yep I'm questioning it. But j. Krishnamurti said question everything - but here is the thing - only if you want to! I believe the will is sacred. What you want is important. Your desire is such a part of you. And I feel we are told not to trust ourselves, not encouraged to.

Thanks so much for this! I had depersonalization- not from non duality- but from a breakdown ( after a dogmatic therapist I felt bullied by). It wasn't pleasant. I couldn't work. I felt awful. Anyway I got through it and I'm a holistic therapist which I love! I believe in having fun and joyful effort. Not ridiculous work ethic prevalent In modern life. I love make up and having fun! I think the neo advaita people shouldn't purport it to be such a wow fantastic amazing thing. They really do need to say that it's just a way of looking at it. Absolutely!

45 minutes in. Yes absolutely. It's all interpretation but the non dual idea would say that it's beyond interpretation. the teachers make out that it's thev" highest truth". I've heard Rupert spira say that. But surely that's luring people to stick at his classes cos we all want the highest truth! It's very alluring. Non duality has helped me not take things personally but other thought systems can do that too- Transactional analysis to name but one

@@arunagreen8119 thank you for this!

Thanks for engaging, and I'm so happy to hear that you found this valuable! I used to hold a similar perspective on the self, however now my view is that self-image, along with our bodies, our personalities, conscious and unconscious ego are all *parts* of what we are, but none on their own are the totality. I also now relate to what's aware, as our entire let's say mind-body system, I see it kind of like an ecosystem that is greater than the sum of it's parts, and has the ability to be aware of itself, of it's thoughts, feelings etc., rather than there being a separated out awareness that = what we really are. I get how what you describe is effective and helpful for you/what your goal with it is. It was like that for me for awhile too, but ended up leading to some really imbalanced, unhealthy and even damaging fragmentation (partly from an either/or view that I am the background but not the foreground, I am the awareness, but not what awareness is aware of/the personal is the false self and impersonal the "True" self, etc.) and also left me socially, relationally handicapped partly because I'd wiped out my sense of self so dramatically, there was no one here left to relate/be in relationship with. So yeah, it went from something that felt 1000% only positive, to something that became totally de-humanizing. I know that I went really extreme and not everyone does that, but what I did do exactly what I was taught from the "non-dual" teachers I followed. I so appreciate you sharing here, and it's inspiring to know that we're reaching people!

@@thegloriousbothand Thanks for articulating your experience, I think we are not saying something that different! I don't view awareness as the whole thing or the "true self" either, when I say "what is here" I mean the totality of experience/experiencer in any particular moment. For me this yields a totally different perception/experience/perspective of everything than the perception from the point of view of what I would call my conditioned "sense of self" which is a point of view that I can see arise or not arise. From the totality view I can see the profound limitations and tendency towards interpretive illusion of that limited point of view, and that's what is so helpful to see for me so that I am no longer automatically at the mercy of that limited view. Not to just flat out deny it but to be able to consider the situation from a more open and I would say wiser view, in my personal experience. So much profound learning and healing has came from being able to see that personal pov from an unconditionally loving "totality" view, so to speak. Maybe the key point here is I don't mean to deny the personality or the life/journey of the individual manifestation at all, just being able to see around the singular point of view of it to an open unattached view I find to be probably the most useful thing I've ever learned in life. Don't know if this makes it more or less in conflict with your view 😂but it's fun to chat about it!

You are wonderful :)

hello! I'm familiar with him, yes. I was into him a bit awhile ago. I don't mean to say that he has nothing to offer, but I will say that I've heard him cited by some of the folks who have connected with me after feeling those damages...and I do know that many of the current teachers who people harmed are influenced by have been influenced by Krishnamurti. What I've found is that it's not just about specific teachers, but the fall-out and impact of self and world negating (or along some lines of illusorizing/trivializing/denying etc.) spirituality, as many of the let's say "adverse effects" people experience from the deconstructive radical shifts in sense of self and reality seem to be par for the course in my experience, and people being blindsided by them - which for me leads to my biggest concern being indiscriminate dissemination - as in, promoting it in a blanketed way, without full disclosures of the risks involved, commonly experienced adverse effects, and support resources fully in place. I think of it a bit like psychedelic facilitation where the importance of considering set & setting (some kind of assessment of one's personal circumstances, mental health, etc.) including preparation for the fall-out, and integration support is tantamount. Thank you for engaging here! You might find this an insightful piece of research called "Losing Oneself: Persistent Nonduality, Depersonalization, Dissociation, Mental Health, and Memory"www.proquest.com/openview/d9819f5f1eaca55e0a340395c2831cc5/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y

@@thegloriousbothand That's a great answer! Krishnamurti gave out his teachings like stocks. I was lucky to get the right message at the right time, so it worked out for me. But I can see the possibility of getting into pitfalls. Unfortunately, he like a lot of the greats, is dead, so you can't ask them about issues on the path. I think a lot of people who cite him as an "influence" have misunderstood his teachings. He isn't really a "nondualist." I've only seen him mention "duality" in maybe one or two of his hundreds of hours of talks. I don't think he'd be keen on the RUclips McVaita Vedanta movement online.

not sure what ya mean! there's something important there in what you're saying about "investigating the answers that come from the pointers." My view now is that there are multiple "answers" - let's call them interpretations - from the experience that the pointers can point you to. And my view is that there isn't just one right answer which = ultimate truth and all the other ones are "false," in contrast to what the pointer-outers tell you, and what I once was convinced of myself. The experiences pointed to are 100% real experiences, and may or may not be of value to someone, and they are in my view now, unique ways of perceiving reality that in themselves do not prove something called absolute truth, nor are the conclusions drawn from them unquestionable. This has been very liberating for me, and for a lot of people who eventually felt constricted by what I see as a mistaken belief that "I experienced it that way, so it's self-evidently unquestionable absolute truth" and if I want to explore reality in another way, then I'm going into ignorance and delusion. There's few things more limiting of our perception than that!

​@@thegloriousbothand yeah the limitation was getting stuck in an experience and trying to get back to it or thinking its the end , then hiding the cracks when it turns out unreliable . so in total privacy I would frantically go back to the drawing board in order to find a better pointer that leads to a better more whole experience . and its true that this occurs in non duality and specially Neo-advaita because of its terminological constraints set by Tony parsons :) . but for example if you watch at Papaji whom although is considered a neo-advaitan you'll find him more loose in using terminology and tries to hit the diamond from different directions and may also suggest practice . that said its true that its liberating that no-one had received the immortality pill . but that liberation itself that you also stated is itself it :D . the purpose of the whole pointers thing is to hit and forget , meaning its not made to be used again and again or to be mindful of , once you hear who am I , its finished , but its not always so because our minds are imaginative and can easily create a state out of it like the dead soul thing you speak about . so if we say take that state then look into it deeper or ask further questions on it there is potential to discover something deeper that also creates a deeper more convincing state to the mind , eventually leading to love and from love to silence which is so fast it may break the idea of experience and experiencer as being fundamentally true , they're true&false on all sides of the diamond and on all of its deeper levels of abstraction , but with infinite depth and infinite surface its completely free . That is what the buddhists do in Vipassana which means insight through penetration , they first remember/be mindful of something then penetrate/investigate it for more wholesome states , < that's the ultimate ego rescue operation :D ,the western mindfulness meditation takes only the passana/seeing aspect without emphasising Vi/into/through aspect. that makes the pointers more "effective" lets say in pointing , like removing the shade to figure out the finger had been pointing at the sun ,. and infinitely it goes since behind the sun there is nothing :D . iam always free to share as well :) , here is my email : osarious2@gmail.com

I see more often that abandoning/trying to annihilate it is a trauma response

It's unfortunate when someone feels the need to belittle another's journey.

We weren't attempting to disprove anything other than challenging the notion that having an experience that seems to confirm "directly" a pre-given truth claim, means you have realized something called Absolute Truth. "Because I experienced it that way, X is the Final truth and any other conclusions are automatically false" is fundamentalism. Doesn't negate the value of such experiences.

Sending you lots of love, I know the painful depths of that process, but it’s a step in a healthier direction that I know!

I share all of your concerns and it’s reassuring to here from folks like you that there’s others out there picking up on this! I think the whole nondual ego dissolution thing should be treated like psychedelic facilitation - set and setting, same ethical protocols, etc. so many people getting hurt from the indiscriminate dissemination of self negation and as you said the utopian advertisement that omits all of the adverse effects that are clearly known by now. There are so many people who go in another direction after having an ongoing self negation experience, there’s so many lies and gaslighting in that community it’s profoundly toxic and strewn with misconceptions and myths

@@thegloriousbothand I agree. Thank you so much for the work you do. I think it’s important to highlight also that there are people (like myself) where these teachings only did harm. Never one positive benefit. I unfortunately came to these teachings because of an existential crisis, OCD, and completely got swept up. Thinking I had to just accept and find a way to have these experiences, or else my suffering was never going to end. It made everything so much worse, and pushed my OCD even further into DpDr/solipsism. Yours were the first videos or website with your message. I didn’t believe anyone else was out there. So for the 10th time tysm! 💜❤️

@@andreasantoyo2441 wow thank for sharing this with me, it touches me deeply as I know there are many folks in that same boat and there’s so much tragic damage that gets done by the way these teachings are being blanketly spread today and particularly the message that “this is the only way to be free/stop suffering, all else is delusion and more suffering” , as in, there’s only one source of all problems and only one solution - and if you don’t do this, you’re condemned to endless suffering. There’s a real manipulation in that whether it’s intentional or not, especially when folks are in crisis and desperation, which is a high percentage of folks absorbing these teachings and that the teachings are geared towards. It does need to be openly discussed how they very often exacerbate suffering and even leave folks worse off than they started. Solipsism is a big one that doesn’t get talked about enough, but is a very common result of absorbing these paradigms. I hope you’re feeling in a better place these days and if you ever want to talk feel free to email me at thegloriousbothand@gmail.com 💚

Wow- that you also heard it! Jeff was a big influence on my path of “dropping the burden of being somebody” and “becoming no one” and then years later he started teaching self compassion and befriending the self, calling himself out for having been wrong, and I grieved so deeply for having followed him and others into self erasure despite it having been incredibly positive and liberating *for a time* - the whole thing suddenly seemed so tragically misguided and I’d lost SO much of my humanity to it. It would be interesting to speak with him. Not easy to get a hold of him though I imagine!

I’m so sorry about your family member and that sense of loss you’re going through, I can tell you that I hear from many folks for whom this has happened 💔you’re not alone. It’s possible they will snap out of it at some point. Many do. It just doesn’t get talked about enough. And your insights into this, the non relationality and authoritarianism, are extremely sharp and clear. If you ever want to talk you can email me at thegloriousbothand@gmail.com 💚

I had a similar trajectory with him! I find some of his social/political views really intelligently articulated but it utterly shocks me that he is so authoritarian and dogmatic when it comes to his no-self shtick and as you say so close minded and unable to see it. I especially am appalled by his lack of ethical integrity in mass promoting in an indiscriminate way, ego death practices that often have dangerous effects, and preaching self-negation as a blanket ideal for humanity and the pinnacle of human well-being and development.

I very much welcome that footnote! And yes, tragically this self-negation/eradication is what most of modern "non-dual" spirituality that is so popular today is promoting and glorifying, hence not surprisingly I'm in touch with so much people for whom it has led to (sometimes in addition to bliss!) the most nightmarish types of fragmented, de-personalized inner hell. It may not surprise you to hear that there are increasing reports of folks committing from it 💔 Doing what we can to spread awareness and reach folks before they fall down this rabbithole, or while they're in it, with encouragement to see self-negating non-duality as misguided, and offering compelling alternate perspectives that are humanistic, and affirm a reality where oneness AND real individual people go hand in hand! Thanks for engaging with this!!

Actually, there's a wide range of paradigms, traditions, people that describe themselves as "non-dual", each with different perspectives on what it points to, and many of them have little or nothing to do with the dissolution of the personal self. I used to see it as you do, but not anymore. I want to point something out that I realized - what you just said is squarely dogmatic - you said that there are people who experience reality a certain way, and the way they interpret it (what it's told me to me as) is "the way it is" - meaning that they believe that because they experienced reality in a certain way (a way that I used to), it is automatically "absolute" truth. There's another possibility here - what we're experiencing, is a real way to experience/perceive reality, out of many ways humans can do so, that's it. The interpretations of those experiences might or might not be "the truth" but it's authoritarian to suggest that the way you perceive, and what you conclude about reality = the unquestionable truth, and anyone who questions it is ignorant and wrong. And I want to also add that I never ever want to be "unphaseable" again. That felt utterly freeing at first, and then ultimately de-humanizing. I want to feel touched and move by this bittersweet life, and the full range of fully aliveness, emotions and all, not indifferent, dis-effected etc. I no longer see such a thing as an ideal, and definitely not a "spiritual" ideal!

you might find something of value in this conversation with a guy who used to teach non-dual "ultimate" "truth" pointers ruclips.net/video/DonsKYcp94w/видео.htmlsi=ctOn7EUA6IFXKR6J

also, to your suggestion that I didn't "get it," I only have this youtube channel because I went so deeply into my own dissolution, for several years, and experienced it eventually as a double-edged sword. My understandings about all of it have changed, but I used to understand it the way you describe understanding it.

Hi there! I've lost the thread of where and about what we were interacting previously ☹️ About Tim, I like the whale comment. I'm hoping to get more people to join in riding that whale and bringing it up through the surface more and more!!

Hello! Thanks for sharing this. I like the emphasis on returning, more uplifted and positively engaged. Much of non-dual teachings that are popular today teach a permanent not just detachment but permanent loss of one's personal sense of self. Something that does happen for many people is that they find themselves stuck in either a detachment mode or totally impersonalized mode, and struggle to come back into the personal self and engage fully from selfhood, and part of this is due to teachings that don't emphasize that return/let's say being able to toggle back and forth, since they teach any "going back" the personal as going back into delusion, ignorance, and endless suffering. So this is one dynamic that is really causing people suffering and damage. It would be amazing to see more of a shift towards what you are describing - a sort of constructive detachment that can give us insights into how to live a healthier, more positive personal life, but there'd need to be a major shift in the common "non-duality" paradigm of permanent radical detachment from/disintegration of the personhood. Again, thank you for lending your balanced view :)

there's no consensus on free will, and a lot of the studies people point to, when you look into them, have been debunked, or at least shown to be non-conclusive in the ways they claim to be. if we smash our heads together, i guarantee you will feel our separateness, lol!

@@thegloriousbothand the science and psychology studies into free will show that free will is an afterthought. And, that it is better for a person’s well being to believe they have complete free Will…this is not the case! You must have read different studies to me! 🤔🤷‍♂☯

@@advaitawho I think one of the major studies you're talking about is Libet's. I used to find that study about afterthought compelling, but then I found this other interpretation of what may be happening, and definitely worth taking into account www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/09/free-will-bereitschaftspotential/597736/

@@thegloriousbothand ahh thanks I will take a goosey gander 👍😁

"there's nothing to do" and "no one to do it" is a very common message. some say what you just said above, but the fact remains that the whole path taught, led to such a radical kind of detached serenity that I got to a point that I had no motivation to do anything, and could literally have just sat on a bench and not gotten up again for the rest of my life. Maybe that sounds ideal to some people, but I'd say be very careful what you wish for.

@@thegloriousbothand absolutely, ignorance is bliss! 😂☯ I too have lost all motivation, so I know what you mean. 🫤

I went through a phase of what I now think of as blissful nihilism. I wonder how long you've been exposed to folks like Jim Newman?

Hi there, yes I did, I found it felt utterly liberating in the beginning, but it was a kind of honeymoon phase, as while I'd gained this access to what felt like boundless serenity, I'd eventually found I'd become a rather zombified, lobotomized, vacuous empty shell who had extinguished her soul in exchange for a kind of freedom that required losing so much of my precious humanity. I discovered it had been a kind of deal with the devil, indeed. And also, it's really not that we no longer have a personal story, it's more like we forget it, we've detached it from it radically and aren't putting our attention it...but our history is still there to be described at any moment. And do we really stop having beliefs? For one, there's the belief that we have no beliefs...that it's better to not have beliefs or a personal story, it's a belief that there is no free will, that there is no self, even if these convictions are based on something we call "direct experience," all of these things we say are interpretations drawn from them. I point this out humbly, that most of your comments here include beliefs, and perspectives (which I don't see as a bad thing!) - "there are no conditions to nonduality" "there is no free will" etc. I ended up deciding that I don't need to stop having beliefs, but to change how I relate to my beliefs, and hold healthier, less limiting ones!

@@thegloriousbothand detachment is not the same as there being no one! 🤔☯ And if there is no separation, what is there to detach from?

it seems like what you're calling non-duality is conditional on a lot of things, like there being no free will, the self and separateness being an illusion, and is based heavily on excluding things from reality, not including. for me non-duality points to a unity of opposites, not the negation of one end of an inter-dependent polarity.

@@thegloriousbothand no free will is not a condition, it is a symptom of being human! You already have no free will with or without the knowing of it. 🤔☯ Separateness is not an illusion, it is apparent! The only illusion is the individual. The neti, neti approach is not what I’m talking about. There is no separation…therefore a unity, as you say, is all there is. 😁

@@advaitawho you're claiming that these are unquestionable truths, that most would agree are not conclusive - and that whether or not we have free will is not provable in the end. You are here again stating things that you believe are true, when you've also said there's no truth. Do you see that? How could there be unity with nothing to unify?

@@thegloriousbothand absolutely 👍😁☯ How could there be unity with nothing to unify!?! 🤷‍♂

how does this pertain to the topics discussed?

there tend to be variations among what these "speakers" say, they are not all saying exactly the same thing

@@thegloriousbothand the radical non duality speakers all say the same thing. There is no free will. The individual is an illusion. Nothing is separate. ☯ The non duality teachers all say different things and turn it into a spiritual quest, which is bullshit! 😂☯