Hey,this is Leo
for actualized.org
and in this episode, I'm going to be talking about the meditation technique called Strong Determination sitting
and I'm gonna show you how to use this one technique to supercharge your existing meditation practice
Let's talk about Strong Determination Sitting
This is a technique that's very, very simple
but also incredibly powerful if you can apply it in your life
and I'm gonna show you exactly how to apply it right here
I learned this technique from Shinzen Young,who's a Zen master
but he's a very interesting Zen master because he's a Westerner
and in the 1960's and 70's he went to Japan and he actually became an ordained Buddhist monk
and he was in the Zen monasteries and he learned everything there
and then also what he did he started studying enlightenment
and other spiritual traditions around the whole world and he basically came up with this model
for mindfulness which is just amazing,you can go learn it from him
but anyways...what I wanna talk about here is this Strong Determination Sitting
which I learned from him, and he's a proponent of this
in fact, the whole Zen tradition is a big proponent of Strong Determination Sitting
what I love about this technique is that it shows you just how weak our minds are in Western cultures
So, in cultures that don't have any strong spiritual or meditation traditions
so, basically cultures outside of China,India,Nepal,Japan
and Southeast Asia, where meditation is very seriously practiced
cultures outside of that generally are extremely ignorant about what's possible with the human mind
what's possible with human consciousness,it's incredible
and...Shinzen Young, he likes to talk about the Marathon Monks
and there was actually a book written about this
in the late '80's, it's called 'The Marathon Monks of Mount Hiei'
and this is just incredible what these monks can do
these monks have endurance beyond what you would think is humanly possible
what these monks do is that they isolate themselves for a period of twelve years
on this cold mountain near Kioto,it's called Mount Hiei
this is a process that you enter into, and you make a lifelong vow
of celibacy, so you abstain from sex
and you abstain from drinking and all that kind of stuff
but...that's just the beginning of it
they enter this for twelve years, for twelve years they live on that mountain
and they have pretty much no contact with anybody else
and all they do is they train hardcore Zen Buddhism
and, the things that these monks go through as a training process is incredible
the way that it works is that every year that they're on that mountain
they have a 100-day cycle per year
and what they have to do, is they have to make a journey all the way down the mountain
they have to walk or run down the mountain in these straw, wooden sandles that they're wearing
they walk for 30 to 60 kilometers
in one day, down the mountain, and then through the city and into the temples
and then they make like offerings in the temples
and as they're doing all this, they have to be meditating towards enlightenment the whole time
and then they make that round trip down and then up the mountain
they have to do this in one day,they have to walk like
30 to 60 kilometers
it takes them twenty hours to do this walk
as they're walking...they're not eating,they're not drinking, they're not resting,they're not sleeping
they're in a meditative enlightenment trance the whole way
now that's one day...they do that for a 100 days in a row
and then they do that each year,and then like during one of the years
they have to do it I think for like 200 days,and they're doing like 60 kilometers
per day
it's incredible, it's a feat that trained professional athletes could not accomplish
it's more than running one marathon,except they do it 100 times in a row
and sometimes they do a double marathon
not only that, but then what else they have during these years
is they have these sits where they have to sit
and what they have to do is they have to sit motionless while they're reciting a mantra and they're meditating
and they have to sit there and they have two monks who are sitting next to the one monk
who's doing this process
and they watch him
and he has to sit there, he can't eat,sleep,drink water, or move
for 7 and a half days
imagine that...how long do we think we need water before we die?
3 days?4 days?That's usually what they tell you in the books
These monks can sit for 7 and a half days without water,without sleep and without food
and basically without motion...they get up once at 2 am per day
in order to travel 200 meters to make some sort of ritual offering of water
somewhere in the fountain, and then they come back and they sit back down
and then 2 monks sit there and make sure that this monk is not falling asleep during this process
not only do they do that,but they're not sitting there and grinding through this
but they're actually sitting there with a smile on their face and enjoying this process
because they're completely in this otherworldy enlightenment trance
they're just trained so rigorously for this...they do this for 12 years
not only that...but as they're making that walk down and up the mountain for 100 days
they're given a knife, a small knife that they carry with them
and if ever they should get the urge to quit or to stop this walk
then they're supposed to cut themselves open and kill themselves
So, those are the marathon monks
Now...what I like about hearing these kinds of stories is like
holy fuck,first of all it's incredible that it's even physically
and medically possible to do for a human body
you would think it pushes the limit of what science tells us we can do
by the way, you can actually watch monks performing this ritual of sitting for 7 and a half days
So, it's not just some tall tale that they tell you,like sometimes they'll tell you some tall tails about
Spiritual things that people have done like yogis have done this or done that
No this is actually a public process you can actually watch them doing this
So...it's not just a tall tale
but, what's great about these kinds of stories is it tells you about how serious you can be about this process
of Enlightenment,also how serious you can be about meditation
and how far that can take you
So...let's talk about Strong Determination Sitting...what is this?
Well it's not quite as intense as what these monks do
but it's a little bit towards the intense side of what you can do with meditation
and this right here can be a fast track path towards Enlightenment
if you're really interested in that,and you know,before...in my previous episodes
I've talked about how you can reach Enlightenment through something called self Inquiry
or what I call 'the looking process', and I've done other videos on other meditation techniques
but here, Shinzen Young told me that this might be the most quickest way that he knows
for how to get to Enlightenment,it's Strong Determination Sitting
Here's the technique...very simple:You get a timer
You set it for something like 1 or 2 hours or more, you need a long chunk of time
You sit in a lotus like position,full lotus,half lotus,whatever, kind of legs crossed...
or, you know, if you're just starting this process
and you haven't gotten used to sitting crossed legged,then you just might want to sit in a chair
that works as well, and you're sitting with your eyes open
Take one or two minutes now to adjust yourself in your seat
Just get into your meditative bubble, so that you're sitting there "ok now I'm gonna do meditation"
And then what you do is...you do not move
For the full length of your meditation
You don't move at all...
You don't move to reposition yourself...
You don't move to scratch an itch on your face...
You don't move to adjust your back if it gets tired...
You don't move if your legs fall asleep...
You don't move if you're in excruciating pain...
You don't move if you're about to claw your eyes out
from boredom,or from anxiety,or from frustration
or from any physical ailments that your body is producing...
and,you know,if you ever try anything even close to this, what you're gonna realize is
Just how incredibly difficult this is of a meditation
So what you have to do is you have to sit there,you sit there for 1 hour,2 hours...
3 hours, 4 hours completely motionless,for as long as you can
and that's the entire meditation
pretty intense stuff
If you've never even tried this before,I really encourage you to try it at least once in your life
just to see what the hell I'm talking about here...
just to see what these monks are doing and what they're putting themselves through
because what you're gonna discover very quickly if you try this even once
is that you can't even do 30 minutes of it...
let alone an hour, you can't do an hour at all...
two hours?Inconceivable that you could do two hours of this without training
4 hours?That's like flying to the moon!
It's just crazy...
The furthest that I've been able to go, and I've been meditating for 2 and a half years now consistently...
and I've been meditating for one hour a day
and the most that I can do that I've ever done so far with Strong Determination Sitting is 90 minutes straight
and I actually did that just the other week
and it was an amazing 90 minutes,let me tell you...
The amount of concentration and calmness of mind and focus that you get
when you sit perfectly motionless and still
for 90 whole minutes
and you sit through all the aches and pains and itches and scratches
and all the boredom and all the tediousness and all that crap
you sit through all that
Man...it's like you go into a totally different world,it's incredible!
Especially if you couple this technique with some of the other techniques that I've shown you, for example
if you're doing the Self-Inquiry process
and you're investigating who it is that you actually are...and you're looking into that
Well, try doing that also while you're sitting there perfectly motionless
and you're doing this Strong Determination Sit
Or also what you could do is you could combine this technique here
with the technique that I also describe called "Do nothing"
So that you're sitting there and you're practicing "do nothing"
But you're sitting perfectly motionless and you're sitting for a very long period of time
So I don't mean just do nothing for ten minutes or 20 minutes
For a Strong Determination Sit you need at least an hour
as your goal...
and then try 90 minutes,try 2 hours
and just try pushing and just see how difficult it really is
It's almost unimaginable before you try this just how difficult it really is
and that's one of the things that I really love about this technique is because it shows you
just how rotten your mind has become
Just how low we set the bar in Western societies and cultures...
We really set the bar so fucking low for our minds and for our consciousness
that it's really pathetic
Your mind has just been completely rotted away by modern culture
By Television, by internet, by your smartphone,by your friends
By the way you do business,by your career,by your family,by all of that
And it shows you that there's something deeply flawed within you
If you cannot sit still,perfectly still, for just one hour
And you're gonna notice real quick that there's something wrong with you
What you're gonna see is that actually you're incapable of being happy
I've talked about this before in some of my other videos about happiness
Deep and true happiness,the true meaning of happiness is not what we in the west think of it as
It's not entertainment, that's not happiness...
It's not stimulation and it's not excitement
And it's not love
What it is it's complete presence in the moment right now
It's being one with reality,it's being able to be calm and peaceful
with no matter what is happening with your body or with your mind
or with the circumstances around you
So, it's complete unconditional happiness
And this is the kind of happiness that very few people have ever tasted
And this is true happiness,we've really done a disservice to the word 'happiness' by using it
for all sorts of crap that's not true happiness
And,you know,since the whole objective of your life and everything you do in your life
is basically to make yourself happy,that's why you do everything you do
There's nothing in your life that you do that you don't think will make you happy
So,if that's true, and it is...
yet,you're unhappy all the time,and you are...
I guarantee that you are...
And how can we prove this?Well...by having you sit for one hour
Can you sit for one hour,motionless,and be happy at the same time?
If you can't, you might think like 'well Leo,that's just uhh
that's just some stupid monk stuff, like they just sit there
and they train their whole lives,and that's very extreme
They're torturing themselves
and you know,what does this have to do with happiness?
It has nothing to do with happiness'.Actually,it has everything to do with happiness...
Because,on a very deep level,what these monks are doing is they're training themselves to be completely
at ease and non-resistant to what's happening in the present moment
no matter what that is
Now,sometimes that's a very positive thing and you can easily be happy with something very positive
you know,if I give you 100,000 dollars tomorrow,then you're gonna be very happy
just naturally...it's easy to be happy when you have someone hand you a huge batch of money
But...how are you gonna feel when...
your ass hurts?How are you gonna feel when you have an ache in your back?
How are you gonna feel when you have arthritis?
How are you gonna feel when your cat dies?How are you gonna feel when your kid breaks his leg?
How are you gonna feel when your girlfriend or boyfriend
leaves you for somebody more attractive than you?
How are you gonna feel when you lose your job?
How are you gonna feel when your business collapses with the bad turn in the economy?
How are you gonna feel when your competitors out-compete you?
How are you gonna feel when you're working on that project and then your computer crashes and you lose
all the data on your hard drive that you've been working on for two years?
How are you gonna feel then?happy?
Probably not...
one of the secrets to life is to train yourself...
to be happy in the moment regardless of anything else
and this is a discipline and this is a training
and this is basically what the aim of all meditation is
Someone once asked me in a comment under one of my videos he said something like
'Leo...what's the goal and objective of meditation?'
and that was an interesting question...because there's different ways you can answer that...
and I thought about that and I was asking myself like
Well,yeah that's a good question,what is the essence of meditation really?
I mean...why are we sitting down and doing this thing of just...
removing ourselves from the world and...
focusing our minds and clearing our minds of thoughts,why are we doing all this?
and the aim of it is,my answer is...
that you wanna merge with reality, to me that's the essence of meditation,it's merging into reality
That's kind of a funny answer...
What does it mean to 'merge into reality'?It sounds mystical...
It sounds weird...
Well,when you start studying Enlightenment what you start discovering is
that actually,that's a real possibility...
is for you to merge with reality
and I'm not going to go into the depth of all the details that are involved with that
umm...just wanted to kind of share that insight with you,but also to connect it with happiness,right?
because when you're totally merged with reality
the funny thing is is that you become completely happy!
Levels of happiness are possible that you have never experienced in your life
You can just get 30 seconds of this kind of happiness and it's not just happiness it's really bliss
It's pure bliss...
I've been lucky to just get like a little hit of it here and there
in my meditation practice...
Man...this is not something you've ever felt,this is not something an ordinary human being has ever felt
this is why people become monks
You might wonder like 'well why become a monk?
why renounce sex and alcohol and all this and live on a cold ass mountain
for 12 years and be beaten with sticks and go through these crazy ordeals...why do all that?
Because counter-intuitively that makes you the happiest human being you could possibly be
Now that's fucked up!
But what's even more fucked up is that's true
and what I encourage you to do is I encourage you to...
reconcile that with your western worldview
because your western worldview does not admit of this truth
It does not admit of this truth that...
'Oh shit...these people who are monks,they're actually onto something!
These people who meditate really hardcore they're actually happy human beings!
They're not neurotic human beings like most of us are I mean they're not perfect
They've got their issues,granted, but...
but they're doing this for happiness
Now,you might say 'well Leo, that's a crazy way to go about getting happiness!'
Well...they could say the same thing about what you're doing!
and you know what?They're gonna be more right because if we take a look at your life...
What are you doing to get happiness?What have you been doing for the last 20 years...
In your life to get happiness?
and how well has it been working?
Can you sit for an hour and be happy?
If you can't sit for an hour and just be happy,with whatever's going on,
and if you go into monkey mind and you start getting neurotic and crazy and your face starts itching
and you wanna claw your eyes out
Well that just shows you what psychological state you're in...
That kind of psyche can never be happy!
And so you wonder,you know,'Well,gee why am I depressed and why am I always
anxious and why do I worry and why do I have fears
and why does that job that I got didn't make me happy?
What about that money?I got that money that didn't make me happy
I bought a new house that didn't make me happy
My girlfriend doesn't make me happy,my husband doesn't make me happy
My kids,are supposed to make me happy but they don't really make me happy...
Why is that?
Well,I would submit to you that it's because you have a rotten mind,
you have a rotten psyche,and that really what you are is you're a soft,lazy twat
is what you are...
Here's a cool thing that I learned from Shinzen Young also...
is that...
if you can sit and be calm and happy this is actually a really good litmus test for Enlightenment
People sometimes ask me also in the comment section
'Well Leo,how can you prove that someone is Enlightened?'
And while you can't conclusively prove that someone is Enlightened...
because it's an inner realization,an inner state...
and until you can go into someone's mind,you can't really prove it...
because you're not them,but...what you can do is you can just give them a simple test
If you're Enlightened you should be able to sit at ease for 4 hours
no problem
Can you do that?
Try it yourself
Try it tonight...set aside an hour and just see can you sit even for one hour?
and just be happy
and not need to move,not need to scratch yourself,not need to think about anything,just sit there and be happy
What you're gonna notice is that you can't!
Not even close...like not even 1 percent
In the first 5 minutes you're already gonna be trying to claw your eyes out
That's what the average Westerner will notice
This is a very sobering realization
which is why I want you to actually try this at least once in your life even if you don't turn it into a habit
Try it at least once...just to see how bad you are!
and just to get your mind to start to have to reconcile this fact of like 'holy shit...
I've really let my mind rot away,there's something wrong with that
and if what I'm trying to do my whole life is trying to pursue happiness...
and I haven't gotten it...
Could it possibly be that the techniques and strategies that I've been employing up till now...
will never,ever,ever work?
because I can't even sit and be at peace for one hour...doing nothing
Now this might seem like self-torture...
If you sit down and you actually do this practice
What you might discover is like 'Holy shit...this is like torturing yourself!'
'Leo,why are you making me torture myself?I don't like this!'
'I want nice and comfy meditation...'
It's not torturing you...what it's actually doing is it's forcing your mind
to reconcile to the absolute present moment,which is reality
you understand that reality is what's happening in the present moment right now?
Reality is like this flowing concert...it's always changing and it's always shifting!
The problem,the fundamental problem of the human psyche
is that it resists this flowing reality...
what it does is it tries to cling and hold on to various facets of reality
and it tries to hold it so that it doesn't change and flow away!
We do this with our family,we do this with our career,we do this in business...
We do this with everything, and in fact we do it as we're sitting in a chair
just...trying to enjoy the present moment we do it!
right?because what happens like an itch goes on your face,and then you want to scratch that itch...
already you wanting to scratch that itch is you resisting reality
Now what happens if you prohibit yourself,hold yourself back from scratching that itch?
well actually what this does is...it seems like it's maybe self-torture or it seems like it's just some sort of like...
you know...
harsh discipline that a monk would use for who knows what kind of silly religious purposes...
that's not what it really is though,you have to understand why they do this...
they do this because they've discovered a very powerful law of the psyche
and this is also something that I've learned from Shinzen Young
and this law is like a formula
and what it says is the following:
there's multiple facets to this formula
but one formulation of it is like this:
purification=pain * mindfulness
purification equals pain multiplied by mindfulness...what is purification?
purification is the purification of your subconscious mind...
and your psyche...see...
your subconscious mind is filled with a bunch of garbage
and from your very birth it's been resisting the present moment!
That's basically what your life has been as an adult
As a teenager and an adult,is moving away from the present moment into your fantasy land...
and that's where you presently live
because if the mind goes into fantasy land,then it doesn't have to be in reality
and when you force the mind to actually be
in touch with what's happening in the present moment with reality
it doesn't like this because it finds the fantasy land so much more comfortable
so one way to actually purify your subconscious mind is to endure pain!
and as you endure the pain,and you apply mindfulness to the pain...
and you don't try to run away from the pain,but you kind of surrender to the pain...
then what you find is that it purifies your mind
and purification here is not in some sort of like moral sense
it's in a very,uhh...
it's in a very like almost physical sense!
because your mind is this complex cybernetic system...
with a lot of feedback loops and triggers
what has to happen and what does happen with meditation is that the mind is forced to sit still
and as it does that,the brainwaves in your mind have to go from very fast...
to slower and slower and slower so your mind calms down!
it gets in touch with the present moment
For this to happen,the psyche has to purge material
and basically what's happening when you meditate is it's like...
psychotherapy...but not on a macro level,but on a micro level!
So what is psychotherapy?Psychotherapy is basically you go into an office...
and you talk about some crap that happened to you in your past
maybe your mom was mean to you when you were a kid,so you talk about it,you get it out of your system
You have an emotional release, a catharsis
the therapist kind of hears you out and gives you some encouragement...
and then what happens is that the next day you feel better,you feel lighter because you got that shit
which was stuck in the back of your mind,you got it out!
and then maybe you get enough of it out that you don't even have to think about it anymore
and you're just kind of calm and cool with it
Well...that's exactly what meditation does except on a micro level
not with like a big event in the past,like your mom...
being mean to you,now it's in the present moment
it forces your mind to actually just release and surrender itself to the present moment
which your mind is very subtly resisting...
100 or a 1000 times a day,you don't even notice how much your mind...
resists the present moment until you start practicing some more meditation!
So...I encourage you to...
change your opinions about how you view monks
How you view some of these hardcore spiritual disciplines...
they're really not religious disciplines...
They're psychological disciplines
The reason that people take their spirituality so seriously in the Eastern world
is because they've actually developed techniques that are more effective than psychotherapy in the west
and these techniques purify the subconscious mind
in very powerful and profound ways...
and this is nothing hokey or New Age,you can actually try this yourself tonight...
You can try it for a month and you'll see that it has...
Very practical, powerful effects
It calms your mind down and makes you happier!
which is what you've been wanting in your whole life all this time,except you didn't really know...
a real legitimate technique that would get you there,well...here it is...I'm presenting it to you
So...
purification is pain times mindfulness...
also what you notice is that suffering is pain times resistance!
So,the amount of suffering you have in your life...
depends not just on the pain you have,but actually on how much you resist the pain
If you're able to drop your resistance to 0...
in a very incredible and unbelievable way what happens...
is that your pain drops to zero!
Now you might say 'Leo...well what about,you know,if I break my leg?'
'Or my tooth hurts?I mean,are you saying that that pain isn't real?'
Well let me just tell you a little anecdote that...
Peter Ralston told me when I was at his workshop and Peter Ralston's a...
a very Enlightened guy, a really,really hardcore Enlightened guy
he's been doing this for like 40 years...
he's been Enlightened since his 20's
and he just kept going deeper and deeper and deeper with it
what he told us as we're sitting there and he says 'well...
one time what I decided to do is I decided to go to the dentist and get a root canal
but I told the dentist not to use any novocain as he was about to drill and extract my root...
do you understand what a root canal is?
If you've ever had a root canal it's probably,even with novocain,it's the most disturbing process!
I've had one done...
What they do is they drill your tooth,but they don't just drill like a cavity...
they drill all the way down through the root
and then what they do is they take pliars and they pull the root out of your tooth!
they take the whole root out...
and then they kind of numb down,kind of grind down your whole tooth and they put a crown on it
that's a root canal
He had this done with no novocain!
Now,he told us that the dentist thought that...
Ralston was trying to be like macho
and that he was trying to sit there and just kind of like prove his machoness,but that's not what was happening
What was happening was that he sat there with like a smile on his face
as this was happening
he wasn't...holding in the pain...
and coping with the suffering,what he did is he actually eliminated the suffering and the pain entirely
sheerly through mindfulness!
imagine having such a...clear perception of the present moment
that what you or I would normally call physical pain,excruciating physical pain...
ceases to be excruciating physical pain...
because you become that pain so completely and thoroughly...
that you understand what it really is as a phenomenon...
no worse and no different than any other phenomenon
no different than the pressure of your ass sitting on your seat,which feels kind of comfy...right?
well,imagine that applied to a root canal!
People sometimes ask me like
'Well Leo,Enlightenment...like,you're talking about Enlightenment,what does Enlightenment really mean?'
'can we even measure it?'
'It seems like just some philosophy or some,you know,religious doctrine...'
'Some belief system?' But see?no...it's none of that!
What it is it's the ability to be fully present in the moment without resisting it
It's the ability to have a complete experience of reality
without a self!
because there is no self experiencing reality...
there is just reality BEING...
reality just BEING
So,one,you know,way that you can test if you're Enlightened is...go get a root canal
without novocain...can you do it?
It shows you how Enlightened you are...
See there's not just one Enlightenment,there's actually degrees of Enlightenment...
There's degrees of mindfulness,and what's really incredible...
is just how far you can take your mindfulness!
You think if you've been practicing mindfulness for a few years that you've kind of like made some big gains?
Naw!
Try...getting Enlightened and then practicing mindfulness and getting further Enlightenments...
for 40 fucking years!
and then see where you are,and what you can do
It's incredible what some of these people can practically do
See if you can sit there for 4 hours...
See if you can sit there for 8 hours...
an Enlightened person really should have no problems sitting there for 8 hours without motion
It just shows you how out of touch you are with reality
It's very sobering...
very sobering...completely changes your relationship to pain and to suffering
Which is actually a very important facet of spiritual work
because you know what?How can you be happy...
if you can't tolerate pain and suffering?
you actually can't because what's gonna be happening is you're gonna be running away all the time
you're gonna be in fear all the time!
why do you think you're anxious all the time?
It's because you fear suffering and pain
It's because you're trying to run away from it,and you are not able to surrender yourself to it!
What's incredible is that these people can not only do these amazing feats...
of just sitting there and getting a root canal or something like that...
but they can do it with a smile on their face!
They're actually happy with it
it's not like...
YOU would do it...like if I tell you to sit there for an hour
maybe you'll sit there for an hour,but what will happen to you is you'll be like...
grinding your teeth the whole time,and you'll be like enduring it
you're gonna be about to scream at the top of your lungs!
maybe you'll make it,but that's not what these people are doing...
These people are sitting there and...they're not feeling the pain or the suffering
because what happens is that when you can reduce your...
resistance to 0...the suffering actually disappears and it turns into pleasure!
and this is something that I want you to experience with this technique of...
Strong Determination Sitting
So your assignment is to sit for an hour,or 2,or 3,or 4,however long do you want to...
test yourself with...
Sit there and you're gonna have physical pains and discomforts,your legs are gonna fall asleep...
this is gonna be miserable...it's gonna be the worst experience of your life
and your job is to sit there through all that suffering and all that pain...
and what you can do is you can achieve this moment where you actually have this breakthrough...
where you have this intense intense suffering
and then what happens is that just instantaneously the suffering completely releases...
because your ego,your ego stops resisting
and this is a very magical moment if you can reach this moment with your sit...
because for the first time perhaps in your life you'll get a new appreciation,and a new...
understanding of...how pain and suffering function
they don't function the way we typically think that they function
The Western notions of pain and suffering are completely...
just factually false,really...factually false
So that's your job...is to sit there and endure that!
and you know what?
if your legs fall asleep and you're afraid that that's gonna hurt you somehow...
Just remember the monks who sit for 7 and a half days without food...
without water,without sleep,without moving!
What the human body and the human mind can do...
is incredible!
and it just shows you how low we set the bar for ourselves
as non-meditators...extremely low...
So this practice here will show you just how low your bar is set...
and maybe...it'll convince you that hey...
maybe my life would go better if I raised the bar a few notches!
you know...I'm probably not gonna go become a marathon monk,but if I can just...
train myself maybe to sit for 2 hours...
everyday,in silence,without moving,and being happy,if I can reach that state...
maybe that might have some extraordinary and profound
ramifications for the quality of my life!
maybe that's more worthwhile to pursue than pursuing...
that promotion at work...or pursuing that next...
phase in my business,or pursuing some more sex
or going getting married
or having children,maybe this is what I gotta do first before I do all that other stuff!
So what I recommend for you is to actually try this,start with an hour if you're just new...
You probably won't make it,but that's ok you can fail at this,it's fine,I failed many times at this...
so how do you take it...to the next level?How do you take your meditation to the next level?
Here's another practical suggestion...
try to do a one hour sit totally motionless...
The other thing I recommend and this is something that I've just been
experimenting with in the last couple weeks in my life and it's been giving me...incredible gains!
mindfulness-wise but also towards Enlightenment
Do four one-hour sits per day
do that for a whole week
that's basically a retreat right there,you can do it in the comfort of your own home...
you don't need to go anywhere fancy or pay a lot of money for it
Just try this,maybe try this on a weekend,try it for just even 2 days,try it for one Saturday and one Sunday
what this is is you sit for one hour...
doing whatever technique you want meditation-wise,just sit there for an hour...
then you can get up and have your meal and go to the bathroom and stuff...but then...
sit for another hour...
get up do your stuff,sit for another hour,get up do your stuff,sit for another hour,do that four times!
What you're gonna notice is that 'man...this just super-charges...'
'the meditation that I've been doing!'
If you've been only doing 20 minutes of meditation per day...
try this for one weekend...
See how much you're missing...by not doing this more consistently...
it's incredible what you get with really long,concentrated meditation sessions!
Alright,that's it!That's my assignment for you,try some of these techniques out...
maybe combine this with some of the other techniques that I've taught you...
like 'do nothing' or 'self-inquiry',and you will be...
moving towards Enlightenment pretty quickly!Also...
you will be building your mindfulness muscles really quickly
and that's gonna help you in all the ordinary everyday situations in life!
This is not just about...proving how tough you are sitting on a cushion...
this is really about...being able to be happy in everyday life
Alright...I'm signing off,go ahead post your comments down below...
click the like button please...share this video with a friend...
and lastly,come check out Actualized.org right here...
this is my website,it's got a lot of free content on it
also got some courses on it that you might find very useful...
The reason I want you to follow along with Actualized.org and there's a free newsletter there too...
is that I'm really excited about delivering...
these like deep insights,deep psychological insights that will help you to actually generate...
true happiness in your life!
I want to help you to self-actualize,I want to help you to understand yourself and other human beings...
psychologically...
to degrees that almost nobody knows about...you're gonna have a deeper and...
more powerful understanding of psychology than psychology professors do!
if you take the information that I'm giving to you for free...
if you take it seriously,and you actually practice this and you take some action towards it...
and you apply this stuff...
and you stick around every single week for new episodes...
I promise you that even just in a few years you'll have a deeper understanding...
not just conceptually and theoretically,but very practically you'll have...
both an understanding and also the ability to practice...
self awareness and self control in ways that virtually nobody on this planet knows!
and this will give you powers that will seem...
magical to those around you...
and this will allow you to construct whatever kind of life you want
with relationships,with your business,with money,with everything!
but most importantly,with your mood
you're gonna actually finally gonna get a taste of true happiness!
which is something that I'm really excited about having you experience...
Anyways...sign up and I'll see you soon!
