Hello all

[H0listic6989]

Hi, I'm a 22 year old from America who began my spiritual journey about four years ago. Let me begin by saying I am not a typical American girl, so please push judgments aside. I was raised Catholic and have rejected religious doctrines since I was a child. Growing up, I knew I was different from my peers but struggled because i thought that was a bad thing. I would continually write in my journal that I wanted to go "home" but wasn't sure where it was. I felt isolated and fell into a deep depression in middle school, which later gave way to anxiety and insomnia. After several years of unsuccessful conventional treatment (I now fully understand why it was unsuccessful), I tried psilocybin cubenesis with my boyfriend of three years and had an eight hour epiphany. My worldview changed over night and I began seeing countless examples of how modern society is destroying the earth and severing the bonds between humans and the universe. I feel this has lead to a world filled mostly with thoughtless clones who live for the material world. Once I realized that in this situation, it is good to be in the minority, my depression lifted. I began exploring traditional yoga and meditation, and learned that we have the power to control the physiological processes related to anxiety. My self esteem issues disappeared as I began to open the connection to my inner being. I was distracted by my academic studies for a couple years, and more weight was lifted as I began working on my connection to the earth. In the last year I have been exploring metaphysics in an attempt to strengthen and expand this connection beyond the earthly realm. My main interest right now is in metaphysics and ancient Eastern philosophy, but I am open to anything. I hope to learn from this forum and help others through their own journey.

[chaz wyman]

Hi, I'm a 22 year old from America who began my spiritual journey about four years ago. Let me begin by saying I am not a typical American girl, so please push judgments aside. I was raised Catholic and have rejected religious doctrines since I was a child. Growing up, I knew I was different from my peers but struggled because i thought that was a bad thing. I would continually write in my journal that I wanted to go "home" but wasn't sure where it was. I felt isolated and fell into a deep depression in middle school, which later gave way to anxiety and insomnia. After several years of unsuccessful conventional treatment (I now fully understand why it was unsuccessful), I tried psilocybin cubenesis with my boyfriend of three years and had an eight hour epiphany. My worldview changed over night and I began seeing countless examples of how modern society is destroying the earth and severing the bonds between humans and the universe. I feel this has lead to a world filled mostly with thoughtless clones who live for the material world. Once I realized that in this situation, it is good to be in the minority, my depression lifted. I began exploring traditional yoga and meditation, and learned that we have the power to control the physiological processes related to anxiety. My self esteem issues disappeared as I began to open the connection to my inner being. I was distracted by my academic studies for a couple years, and more weight was lifted as I began working on my connection to the earth. In the last year I have been exploring metaphysics in an attempt to strengthen and expand this connection beyond the earthly realm. My main interest right now is in metaphysics and ancient Eastern philosophy, but I am open to anything. I hope to learn from this forum and help others through their own journey.

It sounds like you have come the the wrong place - this is Philosophy, not Spirituality.
Philosophy questions the proposition of things you have accepted as self evident.
Philosophy is not for expressing values it is for examining them; it is not to become aware but to use awareness to understand and question beliefs. It is not for pushing beliefs but for unpacking them.
What makes you think there is anything 'beyond this earthy realm"? I thought you had rejected religious doctrines. What you seem to have done is simple replace one set of faith based assertions with another set that are equally suspect.

[EDK]

I suggest you read my submission at the top of this list, labeled metaphysics/physics. I am a 93 year old woman, who was in a state similar to yours at 22. I suspect you may be a metaphysicist at heart, so I suggest you not look for activities to join, but to look within yourself for answers to "What is all this about?" ; gradually the pain will leave as your pursuit of insight continues and eventually broadens beyond your self . The beginning of your pursuit will be auto-analysis, which can be a painful process, the persistence of which requires courage. The pursuit of insight can be lifelong, but inwardly satisfying. Perhaps you, too, may live into your nineties and write a metaphysical/physical Treatise of your own. Good Luck. EDK

[chaz wyman]

I suggest you read my submission at the top of this list, labeled metaphysics/physics. I am a 93 year old woman, who was in a state similar to yours at 22. I suspect you may be a metaphysicist at heart, so I suggest you not look for activities to join, but to look within yourself for answers to "What is all this about?" ; gradually the pain will leave as your pursuit of insight continues and eventually broadens beyond your self . The beginning of your pursuit will be auto-analysis, which can be a painful process, the persistence of which requires courage. The pursuit of insight can be lifelong, but inwardly satisfying. Perhaps you, too, may live into your nineties and write a metaphysical/physical Treatise of your own. Good Luck. EDK

I felt the hopelessness of existence when I was about 16; what Sartre would have called angst ridden with ennui. What was the point of life , when it was so obvious that it would end? Despite this inertia and lack of meaning those thoughts gradually dissipated as I got on with things turning from an emotionally restricting state to an intellectual oddity.
These feelings briefly re-surfaced 3 years ago when i got throat cancer, but they were no longer debilitating- I suppose the intervening 32 years had provide me with a sense of stoicism.
I think this sort of thing hits us from time to time and I tend to think it is, in fact, closer to a real understanding of our true situation. But you cannot live your life continually reminding yourself that it is soon to end, conversely, if we beleived we lived forever we would never get things done. Such are the paradoxes of being alive.

[duszek]

Usually being alive is better than being dead.
Homer illustrates this problem in his poem when Ulyssus goes into the realm of the dead. The souls of the dead all run to the hero and try to cling to him, try to get some of his life, of his blood. They are forever in the realm of shadows and he is in the realm of light.

Sometimes life can be worse than the realm of the dead, I think, being a woman in certain countries for instance.

[chaz wyman]

Usually being alive is better than being dead.
Homer illustrates this problem in his poem when Ulyssus goes into the realm of the dead. The souls of the dead all run to the hero and try to cling to him, try to get some of his life, of his blood. They are forever in the realm of shadows and he is in the realm of light.

Sometimes life can be worse than the realm of the dead, I think, being a woman in certain countries for instance.

Don't you mean Odysseus?

[John Kelly]

Usually being alive is better than being dead.
Homer illustrates this problem in his poem when Ulyssus goes into the realm of the dead. The souls of the dead all run to the hero and try to cling to him, try to get some of his life, of his blood. They are forever in the realm of shadows and he is in the realm of light.

Sometimes life can be worse than the realm of the dead, I think, being a woman in certain countries for instance.

Don't you mean Odysseus?

Isn't he the same guy, just with a Latinized name?

[chaz wyman]

Usually being alive is better than being dead.
Homer illustrates this problem in his poem when Ulyssus goes into the realm of the dead. The souls of the dead all run to the hero and try to cling to him, try to get some of his life, of his blood. They are forever in the realm of shadows and he is in the realm of light.

Sometimes life can be worse than the realm of the dead, I think, being a woman in certain countries for instance.

Don't you mean Odysseus?

Isn't he the same guy, just with a Latinized name?

No, he is the right guy with the proper Greek name.