Fear of extreme suffering

[spiritual dreams]

One of the major things preventing me from letting go is the fear of extreme suffering. I am confident that I can transcend almost all of the suffering that a normal person can experience. However, the extreme suffering that is possible still frightens me. I'm talking about war ,torture, rape, my loved ones dying out of nowhere, mutilation and extreme disability. It is possible that all of this could happen and in fact it is happening. I spend a lot of time worrying about this shit, I don't think any amount of awakening will allow me to transcend this kind of suffering.

 

I saw a post about a gifted spiritual prodigy who achieved insane levels of awakening and was able to transcend intense physical pain and yet they experiences something unspeakable and they became permanently traumatized and suicidal and have yet to recover. Isn't awakening supposed to make you immune to this sort of stuff? I'm unable to fully let go because I cannot accept such extreme levels of suffering.

 

To those who disagree, watch a mexican cartel torture video and come back and tell me you can accept that. You might understand where I'm coming from.

[Phil]

1 hour ago, spiritual dreams said:

One of the major things preventing me from letting go

From letting go of what? 

[Mandy]

Have you ever experienced the past as the past, have you ever experienced the future as the future?'

 

If you keep thinking about things that don't feel good, take a out a notebook, write down what you don't want, write an X next to it, then write what you do want and check it. 

 

X Torture, disability, an unfair world.

 

✔️ Peace, art, appreciation, give to charity that helps victims of crimes and war. 

 

From the checked things you might go into any sort of direction you're inspired to, you might allow yourself the peace you wish for others in this very moment for yourself, you might create something that expresses how you feel about war, you might look into charities and set up a donation. 

 

If we instead continue to focus on what we don't want we entirely miss the alchemy. That's how you poison yourself, when you eat the lead, thinking you'll turn it to gold by digesting it. Don't take it upon yourself, don't eat it, don't try to digest, don't try to absorb, it UNTIL you've done the alchemy first. Know what I don't want, know what I do want. It's so simple. 

[spiritual dreams]

14 hours ago, Phil said:

From letting go of what? 

resistance to the universe guess. Surrender.

[spiritual dreams]

3 hours ago, Mandy said:

If we instead continue to focus on what we don't want we entirely miss the alchemy. That's how you poison yourself, when you eat the lead, thinking you'll turn it to gold by digesting it. Don't take it upon yourself, don't eat it, don't try to digest, don't try to absorb, it UNTIL you've done the alchemy first. Know what I don't want, know what I do want. It's so simple. 

I've eaten the lead a long time ago :(. It's difficult to stop thinking about it. There's always that 'what if' in my mind preventing me from letting go of it. There is a compulsion in me to keep ruminating over it. I've visualised myself and people I love suffering the most fucked up ways so many times that it feels like it could manifest. But the more I resist these visualizations, the more energy I feel like I am giving it.

[Mandy]

1 minute ago, spiritual dreams said:

I've eaten the lead a long time ago :(. 

Why ignore my first question?

3 hours ago, Mandy said:

Have you ever experienced the past as the past, have you ever experienced the future as the future?'

 

2 minutes ago, spiritual dreams said:

But the more I resist these visualizations, the more energy I feel like I am giving it.

You can't exclude anything, when we are thinking "I don't want to think about purple elephants!", we think of purple elephants. What DO you want to focus on? 

[spiritual dreams]

4 minutes ago, Mandy said:

Why ignore my first question?

I thought it was rhetorical 😂.

5 minutes ago, Mandy said:

You can't exclude anything, when we are thinking "I don't want to think about purple elephants!", we think of purple elephants. What DO you want to focus on? 

I guess I could focus on things that I want but wouldn't that strengthen my attachments to them?

[Phil]

23 minutes ago, spiritual dreams said:

resistance to the universe guess. Surrender.

To be resistant to anything is know what that anything is.

What is the universe? 

What exactly is it which is surrendered?

[spiritual dreams]

2 minutes ago, Phil said:

To be resistant to anything is know what that anything is.

What is the universe? 

What exactly is it which is surrendered?

It's difficult to answer these questions using symbolic thought. To surrender to reality is to let go of all notions of what reality 'ought' to be like and accept it for what it is. And I can potentially do that for most things except the edge cases of extreme suffering which is just wayyy to much.

[Blessed2]

17 hours ago, spiritual dreams said:

One of the major things preventing me from letting go is the fear of extreme suffering. I am confident that I can transcend almost all of the suffering that a normal person can experience. However, the extreme suffering that is possible still frightens me. I'm talking about war ,torture, rape, my loved ones dying out of nowhere, mutilation and extreme disability. It is possible that all of this could happen and in fact it is happening. I spend a lot of time worrying about this shit, I don't think any amount of awakening will allow me to transcend this kind of suffering.

 

Practically, in simple terms, what do you mean with "transcending suffering"? What does that mean?

 

17 hours ago, spiritual dreams said:

To those who disagree, watch a mexican cartel torture video and come back and tell me you can accept that. You might understand where I'm coming from.

 

You're not supposed to "accept" "that".

 

"That" (a mexican cartel torture video, war, rape) is not a "thing in a world". You don't really percieve a mexican cartel torture video. You percieve your thoughts. In other words, you are mis-percieving, which is why the worry, fear etc. is experienced.

 

You cannot "accept that thing, torture" cause there is no such thing as torture. Everyone would feel the same if they focused or believed that same thought. The "high levels of spiritual development" is just bullcrap, manipulation.

 

As Phil has said a couple of times, at first it seems like the thought feels discordant because it's true. But then it is noticed that it feels discordant precisely because it's not true.

 

This sounds quite familiar. As in very similar assumptions, belief and conjecture as shared on a certain another forum. The idea that there is a self who accepts or does not accept, surrenders or does not surrender, fears or does not fear, avoids truth or does not avoid truth etc. This is just belief, dogma, ideology, manipulation.

 

As if some people were too stupid or fearful for God. This is ego's projection. Cause the ego cannot grasp perfect unconditional love, which is what God actually is.

 

Even reading that 👆 might come with a feeling of fear, because of how the ego thinks.

 

"There must be something I need to do, or some way I need to be different, for God."

 

And perfect infinite unconditional love is like "nope."

 

Are you familair with ACIM? I think you'd find it helpful. It might be uncomfortable at first though cause sometimes the ego goes a bit (more) crazy and projects the hell out of it when profound clarity is encountered. So I recommend reading or listening a good in-a-nutshell summary on it before reading the source material. Kenneth Wapnick is pretty good, you can find videos from him on youtube.

Edited February 9, 2023 by Blessed2

[Mandy]

30 minutes ago, spiritual dreams said:

I thought it was rhetorical 😂.

I guess I could focus on things that I want but wouldn't that strengthen my attachments to them?

That whole "now" thing clears up a lot. Attachment to ice cream means I'm willing to suffer for ice cream. This does not mean that in the moment I can't enjoy an ice cream. Appreciation, directly felt is not attachment. Attachment is when I believe I need ice cream to make future me happy, and I suffer. 

 

Are we attached to not having attachments? 🤔

 

Does letting yourself have pleasure feel vulnerable to you? Is that vulnerability scary? 

[Phil]

48 minutes ago, spiritual dreams said:

It's difficult to answer these questions using symbolic thought. To surrender to reality is to let go of all notions of what reality 'ought' to be like and accept it for what it is.
 

Is acceptance not symbolic thought? 

[spiritual dreams]

3 hours ago, Mandy said:

Are we attached to not having attachments? 🤔

Well I definitely am. It's difficult to focus on what I want without attachment precisely because I don't have it. And by focusing on it, I might get it in the future.

 

3 hours ago, Mandy said:

Does letting yourself have pleasure feel vulnerable to you? Is that vulnerability scary? 

Yes and yes. It's absolutely terrifying.

[spiritual dreams]

3 hours ago, Blessed2 said:

Practically, in simple terms, what do you mean with "transcending suffering"? What does that mean?

I'm talking about the stuff that eckhart tolle, alan watts etc. talk about. I've had temporary states where I realised all suffering is an illusion

 

3 hours ago, Blessed2 said:

You cannot "accept that thing, torture" cause there is no such thing as torture. Everyone would feel the same if they focused or believed that same thought. The "high levels of spiritual development" is just bullcrap, manipulation.

That is probably true in the absolute sense but it would not be of any comfort to anyone actually being tortured.

 

3 hours ago, Blessed2 said:

The idea that there is a self who accepts or does not accept, surrenders or does not surrender, fears or does not fear, avoids truth or does not avoid truth etc. This is just belief, dogma, ideology, manipulation.

Yes this is an illusion, but its one that is difficult to transcend. even if there is no self to transcend it.

3 hours ago, Blessed2 said:

 

Are you familair with ACIM? I think you'd find it helpful. It might be uncomfortable at first though cause sometimes the ego goes a bit (more) crazy and projects the hell out of it when profound clarity is encountered. So I recommend reading or listening a good in-a-nutshell summary on it before reading the source material. Kenneth Wapnick is pretty good, you can find videos from him on youtube

I'll give it a look. Thanks.

[spiritual dreams]

3 hours ago, Phil said:

Is acceptance not symbolic thought? 

the concept of acceptance is but acceptance itself isn't. It's more fundamental that concepts I think.

[Phil]

@spiritual dreams

Is more fundamental not symbolic thought?

[spiritual dreams]

1 minute ago, Phil said:

@spiritual dreams

Is more fundamental not symbolic thought?

Its not symbolic. but to communicate about it, symbols must be used

[Phil]

1 minute ago, spiritual dreams said:

Its not symbolic. but to communicate about it, symbols must be used

To communicate about what?

[spiritual dreams]

1 minute ago, Phil said:

To communicate about what?

acceptance

[Phil]

Just now, spiritual dreams said:

acceptance

What symbols are used to communicate about acceptance?