When you want me to like your post, it seems like you’re trying to get me to, and I don’t want to! When I see something that resonates for me I like it.
It’s ok if not everything resonates. Maybe I don’t have experience with something, or maybe I disagree about something.
No amount of likes on posts will cause either of us to become free, it takes something else. I prefer for it to be genuine because then a more genuine conversation can happen.
I don’t have any ill will for you - I want the very best for you! But I thought I might explain
Something that might help here… … is to see that you are your feelings, and your feelings are you. Even though you might experience yourself as something other than your feelings, as an entity that “has” feelings… the fact is that you actually are those very feelings. Your feelings don’t ‘want’ anything separate from what ‘you’ want… what your feelings want is what you want. And you can deny this but that doesn’t change the fact
So if I were to re-write your post here with this in mind it would look more like this.
If you think of it more like this… then it might be clearer what it is you want and why you want it!
About “i want to get rid of me”, I can relate to this feeling, but… you can’t get rid of yourself! It’s simply impossible. So… you just have to learn to live with yourself . We can read the reports of people who have successfully self-immolated, and know that it’s possible to be conscious without a ‘self’, but… that isn’t done by ‘me’ getting rid of ‘myself’. It’s something else that happens.
So until that happens… given that you are ‘forced’ to live with yourself, 24/7… it makes sense to try and be your own best friend, to be on good terms with yourself, treat yourself with kindness, don’t be so hard on yourself, etc… You won’t ‘lose’ anything of value by doing it.
This is basically being ‘harmless’ to yourself. (being harmless is very crucial and it consists of both being harmless to yourself and being harmless to others). And because of this being harmless to yourself, you’ll be a lot happier! And by being happier, you will have better interactions with the people around you, and they will probably be happier too, and more harmless, etc…
That’s good! When you’re feeling ok is a good time to go back in and try and analyze the difficult feelings from yesterday. You may find that it’s easier to make sense of the situation today
There is no need to be ashamed, these are all things that we all experience and get up to. It’s the baseline of where we all start from
There is nothing for it but to get going toward feeling good, however you can do that. Continue toward understanding yourself, as I’ve seen you doing. Little by little you’re figuring it out
i realized that i am addicted to think about the past , and not being here [now] !!!
last night i was sitting upright in my bed , looking at the window and the sky , i realized that instead of being here , all my attention is on what i wrote here , or what i did before , the things that i had written , and so on , so that i giggle or i feel ashamed or even to feel being cute , to have bad or good feelings ! instead of being here [ now ] !
maybe that is why i made or i make a lot of dramas !?because i relive in the past ! i was telling myself " but i can not have any PCEs if i don’t be here [ now ] ! imitating the actual means living this moment , or let this moment live you [ now ] …
and at that time of this realization i could say that " i am actually my feelings and this is me that keeps me away from here [ now ] , by making stories , that who said what and why he did not say hi …i am addicted to escape from here , from now …because i feel now is not enough .me does not want now …it wants to perpetuate sadness …the hurts , the endless suffering of the past , because it is itself sadness …
i see that this me is keeping me busy with these fantasies , with these schemes , these stories !
It’s very simple basically, but it feels much deeper of course. Validation means beeing seen, beeing heard, beeing accepted. This in return means security within a group. People will stand up for you, protect you and later even your offspring. Without validation we don’t really know where we stand. If it’s secure for me in this “harsh world”. Basically you are raising your survival chances and that feels good, right, correct. Feelings arise, but they don’t last for too long. So we go on seeking it from others. The next click, the next dose, the next high. It’s a addiction that a vast number of people share today. Especially prominent in the internet social age. You have seen this correctly. But this is nothing to be ashamed of at all. It’s something to keep in mind and be observant of while doing it. Look at your feelings, look at your body movements when your hand reaches your phone etc. Be aware of it in real-time. It feels funny, but it is helpful to see this whole process happening in front of your eyes. Do it by any means. But be aware of it while doing it and check your emotional responses. This might give you some insights into it. Be patient and kind to yourself. It takes time. Don’t jump the gun here.
i am reading these question and answers from 2017 , and i see that James is one of the questioners . i cant believe , not even i gave him a lecture for his situation with his wife ,but also i told him to introduce himself to this moment !!! how silly this me is !!
@leila I don’t get your meaning here. What are you saying? I really want to know . This could be important to me.
You sound like you’re in a bit of a feedback loop. You notice that you want recognition and then become alarmed at it, and then become alarmed at becoming alarmed and so on.
Anyway, I’m sure @Srinath would love some help at spell-checking the website so what I’d suggest doing is making a google doc of what you catch and where on the page it is and once you have your list ready you could send it to him.
i had to go and search the meaning of this phrase …i did not know the meaning of the bind !
haha , you have no idea how many times i am in the bind ! i feel like they can make a movie out of [ me ] !
Looking up definitions of words embodies the self-sufficient spirit of an actualist. I’m proud of you.
It seemed like you wanted to help srinath, but you also were questioning your motives for doing so. You couldn’t move in one direction or the other. I see that theme repeated a lot in your writing. It’s truly a tricky puzzle but I think a lot of your fuss probably stems from wanting to be a good person but then realizing you have selfish instincts. I think the coolest part about you is that you want to be good and you could probably find a lot of naivete there.
The self is so special precisely because it doesnt need any good reasons for feeling resentful or angry. It just creates them out of thin air. If outside triggers dont arise, then I trigger myself. I needs to stay in movement, otherwise it dies in the stillness of the actual world. Since sarrow is my basic feeling - my ground of beeing - I must inevitably create conflict. Making drama is my way of “staying alive”. With no drama I would simply end. That would be a tragedy, wouldn’t it!
I have nothing further to add regarding investigation only that you’ll learn it naturally by observing yourself and reading about it. Investigation is however not a must to enjoy beeing alive. Investigation is merely the by-product of feeling good. It shifts into view when feeling good is boycotted by me. Also one doesnt need to investigate every little freckel when it arises if one is able to somehow remain the baseline of feeling good or okay. Then one naturally starts to look into the other direction anyways (the actual world).
And interesting aspect of feelings/emotions I experianced may however help you with investigations:
When a feeling is intens/prominent then investigation can become very, very difficult (but also very fruitful!). Its usually better to wait for a shift, a decrease or do something about it externally (walking, sports, hobbies, friends, etc). The insidious thing about feelings is that they color perception in a way we are usually not aware of. A feeling doesnt just appear as merly happening “in the moment” or for a short duration, but rather the whole “timeline of an entity” as in “past/present/future” gets affected and warped by it. So especially an intense feeling goes way beyond its “expected area” (minutes, hours, few days) in its appearance. It feels like eternity when happening.
It appears to stretch from birth to projected death, the whole timeline from birth to death gets tainted by it. Thats because a feeling doesn’t appear merely as an event, but rather a state. It becomes only a “thing” when it vanishes again and we later reflect upon it. In practice it can look like this: While a strong emotion arises (intense anger or sarrow) and you “look back at your life at large” you will notice that your whole life is a mess, always has been. When you “look into the future” you will see that its hopeless. You will never escape that sarrow, it will always be there. You may intelectually know that this isnt true, but the feeling of it beeing true perists. It’s obviously bogus, but it doesnt feel like it. Thats one of the reasons why investigating feelings while in full charge is so difficult. You have very little room to move and investigate properly. To find a firm position in such a case is… uff, an art. One has to know what one is doing. I don’t think that such an approach is necessary to become actually free. Dismanteling beliefs and understanding feelings can easily happen while feeling good and one has a certain distance to it. I did the most of it while outside of high charged feelings. But in some pernicious cases I had to stay with it, feel it and go deep diving.
The good thing about feelings however is that they are dynamic and always changing. In a normal human beeing they usually dont last for too long (minutes/hours/ a few days). When they change to good again, and after the first relief, one can see why they are so insidious. Now everthing seems possible again, one is laughing about the last issue, it was really nothing in disguise, a chimera. And the great and wonderous thing about that is that feeling good, feeling felicious, feeling peaceful is much, much nearer to actuallity then feeling bad, sad etc. Especially after a PCE this is so blatantly obvious and clear. Now imagine a universe where the obverse was true! Aint life grand!
This is an amazing post, full of useful information on how the method is applied in practice. I was reflecting today on how when I am in a worried/fearful state, I will deploy thought as a weapon to calm/get rid of the feelings. This may seem like investigation, but it’s a ruse by me to keep on worrying. I don’t want to give up worrying. The tragic thing is, when I am worried/anxious, I am disproportionately amplifying the weight/important of a certain issue; making it akin to life/death. My vision narrows and my perception is coloured with fear. When the weight of the decision goes up like this, I can find it very difficult to find an answer or make a decision (what if I make the wrong one?). The inability to find a clear answer using thought (i.e. worrying) increases anxiety, which I then try to combat by deploying even more cognitive power. In anxiety terms, deploying thought in such a manner is called rumination. It is a compulsion that keeps you locked tight in the cycle of anxiety. The thinking isn’t the problem, but it is the weapon through which “I” as the feeling being keeps on perpetuating myself. That being said though, even when feeling bad, with sincerity you can check your intentions and determine whether you actually want to get back to feeling good, or are you rather focused on trying to solve your real-world issues by thinking about them compulsively (worrying).
