gringo

Breaking the negative thought cycles

Last night, called my grandma. She was reading a book about a Hazara refugee who had escaped Afghanistan and come to our country at 5 years old. She was dealing with intense pain in her knee. Yet, she was happy and smiley.

This morning. Woke up, felt tired, and also instantly felt negative. It occurred to me that for a brief moment I was happy or at least unencumbered, at least before I remembered the reality I was dealing with. Interesting.

I then tried my best to stay in the moment, focus on the present, and generally felt good.

Unearned wisdom, prayer, fasting.

I've noticed that I feel better when I think of psychedelics as potentially helpful, yet also potentially unhelpful substances, that God put on Earth for a reason. They aren't meant to be relied on for spiritual experiences.

Spiritual enlightenment should (or perhaps only can be) reached via doing the homework. Day to day work. Prayer. Behaviour improvement. Charity. Meditation. Fasting.

Whereas when I start getting into A Course in Miracles, numerology (ascension), Buddhism, ayahuasca-ism (if that concept exists), psychonaut-ism – I feel anxious and uncomfortable.

And I don't think I feel uncomfortable in a good way, in a “this is growing me” way. I feel at risk of psychosis. I feel I am slipping into delusions of grandeur.

At the very least, I feel like I've stumbled across wisdom I haven't earned.

I'm going to start a fast tomorrow (or rather, tonight?)

I won't tell anyone I don't need to (Matthew 6:16–18.)

I will also avoid all technology I can. Definitely social media. Maybe I'll allow in some messages and podcasts, but that's it.

During this time I'll exercise lightly, pray, and meditate.

I don't like the idea of identifying with God. It doesn't make me feel stronger. It doesn't increase my compassion. It doesn't bring anything except fear and confusion.

I am a Christian. Whether or not my family were devout – in fact I don't believe I was christened – it's the way of the culture into which I was born, the way I was raised. Christianity was deeply important to my Dad as a young man, and I think it played an important role in my Mum's childhood too.

I need something to do with my energy and my love. Devoting it to God, asking what God wants of me, pursuing the highest purpose God can give me, is one of the best ways to live.

Anxiety stopped me sleeping last night.

Was it caused by researching earthquakes, domestic violence, a massacre?

Probably.

Perhaps the key to avoiding anxiety is refusing to ingest information about scary/sad things?

Or limiting the amount of scary/sad things I study?

Another solution I’ve considered is reverting to believing consensus reality is real.

Believing that I have some special protections against the worst life has to offer.

Believing God will save me from the most terrible things.

A concept of God reduces anxiety.

There are many things we can’t control. Tsunamis, drunk drivers, robbers, earthquakes, volcanos, etc.

A psychedelic trip – or meditation – might lead you to recognising everything as a dream/illusion.

But that’s very difficult to deal with when you’re operating in consensus reality.

If you are sober, if you are developing or expanding an ego, then it helps to have a concept of God that you can pray to, not understand, ask for guidance and courage, etc.

Bad stuff will still happen. Good things will end. But you’ll be able to find meaning in them.

Today is/was my last day of employment.

I have not done much. I woke up and did a call with my CTO. Then I had a call with an investor. I spent the rest of the day reading, mostly on my phone. I helped my wife with some computer stuff. I ate late. I made decaf coffee. I drank water. I worked out.

Now its 6:11pm and I’m about to have my first shower. I made more decaf in a tea pot. I will work, yes… and then I’m finished tonight. Right?

Yes. I won’t work another day for this company.

So, I’ve gotta say, it’s a bit strange that I’m leaving it so late, but I suppose I needed to make a deadline to ensure I got anything done at all.

I would like to have sex.

For some reason, listening to this crazy story has made me feel calmer.

Kevin May… a dude who got put in the ICU, and experienced a “hell realm” with hallucinations that felt 100% real.

A terrifying game-show that made him feel like his friends were being tortured to diminish his torture… a constant desire to escape the hospital, take off his tubes…, they needed to even install a guard for him… he was convinced all the hospital workers were part of a SAW-like torture regime.

https://open.spotify.com/episode/1jPhx6RQLtpBXi1boP0u3y

And yet… he seems like a fairly happy dude.

And he’s got this website which seems generally quite positive and uplifting: SacredStoryWeavers.net

It does make me a little scared to think… ok here’s this guy with a generally quite positive outlook on life, he seems kind… and he got put into hell?

What am I in for???

Maybe I went through this during my ceremony?

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SECOND BARDO: THE PERIOD OF HALLUCINATIONS (Chonyid Bardo) Introduction

If the Primary Clear Light is not recognized, there remains the possibility of maintaining the Secondary Clear Light. If that is lost, then comes the Chonyid Bardo, the period of karmic illusions or intense hallucinatory mixtures of game reality. It is very important that the instructions be remembered – they can have great influence and effect.

During this period, the flow of consciousness, microscopically clear and intense, is interrupted by fleeting attempts to rationalize and interpret. But the normal game-playing ego is not functioning effectively. There exist, therefore, unlimited possibilities for, on the one hand, delightful sensuous, intellectual and emotional novelties if one floats with the current; and, on the other hand, fearful ambuscades of confusion and terror if one tries to impose his will on the experience.

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The experienced person will be able to maintain the recognition that all perceptions come from within and will be able to sit quietly, controlling his expanded awareness like a phantasmagoric multi-dimensional television set: the most acute and sensitive hallucinations – visual, auditory, touch, smell, physical and bodily; the most exquisite reactions, compassionate insight into the self, the world. The key is inaction: passive integration with all that occurs around you. If you try to impose your will, use your mind, rationalize, seek explanations, you will get caught in hallucinatory whirlpools. The motto: peace, acceptance. It is all an ever-changing panorama. You are temporarily removed from the world of game. Enjoy it.

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The inexperienced and those to who ego control is important may find this passivity impossible. If you cannot remain inactive and subdue your will, then the one certain activity which can reduce panic and pull you out of hallucinatory mind-games is physical contact with another person. Go to the guide or to another participant and put your head on his lap or chest; put your face next to his and concentrate on the movement and sound of his inspiration. Breathe deeply and feel the air rush in and the sighing release. This is the oldest form of living communication; the brotherhood of breath. The guide’s hand on your forehead may add to the relaxation.

Contact with another participant may be misunderstood and provoke sexual hallucinations. For this reason, helping contact should be made explicit by prearrangement.

Unprepared participants may impose sexual fears or fantasies on the contact. Turn them off; they are karmic illusory productions.

The tender, gentle, supportive huddling together of participants is a natural development during the second phase. Do not try to rationalize this contact. Human beings and, for that matter, most all mobile terrestrial creatures have been huddling together during long, dark confused nights for several hundred thousand years.

Breathe in and breathe out with you companions. We are all one! That’s what your breath is telling you.

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I never saw it so perfectly described:

O nobly born, listen carefully: You were unable to maintain the perfect Clear Light of the First Bardo. Or the serene peaceful visions of the Second. You are now entering Second Bardo nightmares. Recognize them. They are your own thought-forms made visible and audible. They are products of your own mind with its back to the wall. They indicate that you are close to liberation. Do not fear them. No harm can come to you from these hallucinations. They are your own thoughts in frightening aspect. They are old friends.

Welcome them. Merge with them. Join them. Lose yourself in them. They are yours. Whatever you see, no matter how strange and terrifying, remember above all that it comes from within you. Hold onto that knowledge. As soon as you recognize that, you will obtain liberation. If you do not recognize them, torture and punishment will ensue. But these too are but the radiances of your own intellect. They are immaterial. Voidness cannot injure voidness. None of the peaceful or wrathful visions, blood-drinking demons, machines, monsters, or devils, exist in reality only within your skull. This will dissipate your fear. Remember it well.

Chimera states?

I had a dream in which I was told I have a high chimeric load in my brain and this could cause cancer.

Of course I accepted this as true because it was a dream.

But when I looked up the concept of chimeric load later I was surprised…

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30236492/

the coexistence of coherent and incoherent states, known as chimera states or simply chimeras

Chimeras have also been linked to the Parkinson's disease, epileptic seizures, and even to schizophrenia

What if my experimentation with psychedelics has lead to a chimeric brain?

Where I coexist between coherent and incoherent?

Or where I frequently enter into chimeric states?

2 ways to look at reality.

Both offer a type of relief, but bring their own anxieties.

1. Entropy exists but God somehow prevents it from extinguishing everything.

You can’t contemplate God directly. Only pray to him. You can’t understand why certain things happen.

You find a meaning behind suffering, or via your goals, or via gratitude.

You overestimate man, to ensure he ends up as he actually is (instead of estimating man as he is, and watching him become worse.)

You have hope for the future. You don’t avoid feeling good. You believe good will win.

You never fully understand. You are saddened when good things end. You feel guilty when you sin.

1. Nonduality.

The creation of good implies the creation of evil.

Hell necessarily implies heaven.

Everything is in a constant cycle and regenerating.

You feel generally at peace. Each bad experience is a relief because it implies good is coming.

You don’t let yourself feel good. You let people do bad shit. You deal with loneliness.

The boulder isn’t heavy if you don’t pick it up.

From: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3dUiVjgcHnXzLeNMxXmSC9

Maybe you can observe pain and not “pick it up”?

Hell is probably a bottomless pit.

The deeper we go into hell the more we go into heaven?

Now is the place to focus?

But is it the case that the now is heaven, whereas hell is focusing on the past and future?

In that case…

Can’t get the satisfaction of focusing on the now if you don’t get the suffering of focusing on the future/past.

Damn it.