A breakdown

I just had a small breakdown. A very minor one. But I immediately knew, because whenever I am in that breakdown space, I feel like running away from the office.

So, putting aside all my work, I tried to think on what really happened. As soon as I started to recount the events, my little voice jumped in and it just won't let me think. It kept on saying things like " .. but ultimately this is what happened ..", "is there a point to it?", "why are we doing this?" and "we are wasting our time". And all these conversations just won't let me think. My head felt heavy again,and I felt miserable. So I left everything completely and did a little mind exercise. I concentrated on the complete sequence of events. And there it was ... the reason I had taken the action in the first place. The story came crumbling down. It fell flat on it's face. Just needed a bit of mind exercise. And that is what we usually escape from.

Now I feel the lightness again. The clarity of thought and happiness.

What is completion?

In the whole of the Forum and the Advanced Course, you hear a lot of the term 'completion'. For almost all of the Forum, I couldn't understand what it meant. Even in the beginning of the Advanced Course, I felt I had only a vague idea of it. But now I think I know exactly what it means.

Here's what it does not mean:

• Accepting that someone was right in the past and you were wrong, even if you still don't feel that way. Nope that is not it!
• Telling the person that you always thought him to be stupid/ bad/ whatever. Not necessarily.

Completion is all about letting go of the past. It is about re-joining the bonds you broke because something happened. I don't need to complete with George Bush, even though I feel he was wrong. That is because there is no bond between us. But I would complete with someone I only briefly met, because in that moment I felt a bond with him/ her. Completion is about re-establishing that bond. It is about brining the possibility that relationship offers, back in life.

After the completion, your relationship with someone should be extraordinary. No taints of the past. If you are in that space with someone, then you are complete with him or her.

To my act

"Oh, I know you're still there... cause I can feel you dying. I can hear you tapping me... for a little nutrition. Now who's looking for a fix? It gets a little tight in here, do you? Well, you're not wrong... cause the walls are moving in. No food here. Not today, sunshine. My eyes are open and the restaurant's closed. Jog on. Slide off. Find someone else to fill your pipe. Someone, who won't see you coming... or know, when you're there."

- Jake Green in Revolver.

Approval Junkies

From Revolver:

"There is something about yourself that you don't know. Something that you will deny even exists, until it's too late to do anything about it. It's the only reason you get up in the morning. The only reason you suffer the shitty puss, the blood, the sweat and the tears. This is because you want people to know how good, attractive, generous, funny, wild and clever you really are. Fear or revere me, but please, think I'm special. We share an addiction. We're approval junkies. We're all in it for the slap on the back and the gold watch. The hip-hip-hoo-fuckin' rah. Look at the clever boy with the badge, polishing his trophy. Shine on you crazy diamond, because we're just monkeys wrapped in suits, begging for the approval of others. "

From the time I saw the movie, I have found myself wondering if it is really bad in being an approval junkie. See ... if you read this dialog carefully, you would notice that it does not say it is bad. But that is how it occurred to me. It occurred to me as something totally loser-ish. So, for a time, I just stopped taking any credit for anything. I went to lengths to avoid getting any 'slap on the back'. But it didn't do any good. Then I thought a little more. I thought .. that maybe Guy Ritchie was wrong (someone had to be wrong, innit?). I reasoned that it is not possible to live without expecting approval from others. It is the ultimate prize, the ultimate thing that drives all human beings on this planet. So what can I do about it? Guy Ritchie isn't stupid, is he? So? ("Maybe I am stupid"). So I thought that by pretending not to be an approval junkie, I could come across as cool. So I started being inauthentic about, what Landmark calls, my 'looking good'.

Landmark told us that everyone is trying to look good, and we are inauthentic about how we are trying to look good. So I read this dialog from Revolver again today. Here is what it says .. "Something that you will deny even exists, until it's too late ..". He doesn't say it is bad. He just says that we are inauthentic about it.

We won't even admit it to ourselves. Why?

Doesn't it sound too shallow that you are not really that great but put up a show of being great for others to applaud? Would you admit being shallow to yourself?

No .. because that'll make you look bad.

Why do we need to be present to this fact that we are trying to look good?

I have been thinking on it for some time. What if I am inauthentic about trying to look good all the time?

Well .. if I don't admit that I want other people's approval, then I try to draw power from other people's approval. And if someone does not approve, then it takes away my power. Then who has the real power?

If I admit it, I can control how other people's approval/ disapproval makes me feel. Then I have the power.

If I am authentic about it, then at least I don't have to work hard on covering my inauthenticity. Being authentic about it gives me power. If I am authentic about it, I don't have to add stories and meanings to justify something I did.

I think this topic requires a little more intellectual exercise on my part. It is yet to come up in my Seminar series. Maybe that'll help.

Enlightenment

Here is my experience. This is how I came to be spiritually inclined.

I drank some potent bhaang, earlier this year. Now what bhaang does to you is, it allows you to focus your mental faculties on a particular thing. And it is very difficult to un-focus your mind then. I just happened to just notice that my brain was behaving in the most wonderful fashion. It was drawing connections all over my mind. Every incident of my mind was seemingly getting connected to some other incident, all in random fashion. It was superb. So I just began exploring the working of the mind. In the end I arrived at the conclusion that my mind was the creator of this world. My mind was everything. Nothing else existed or mattered.

All that may sound like some drug induced madness, but I remember clearly deducing everything. Each step was a logical step after the last one. It seemed maddening and wonderful at the same time.

I happened to come across a text on Vipassana meditation then, which was again based on the mind-body connection and the power of the mind over everything else. It was very interesting.

During the Landmark Forum, and the advanced course I realized how powerful the mind is. It builds a prison, lives in it, and then laments that is has been imprisoned. It is wonderful how it works. Is it the avoidance of mind exercise that leads us in that direction? It is my guess. The mind is so afraid of the labor of thinking excessively, that is simply makes up a world of it's own. It alters the reality for itself, gives reasons and meanings in everything, and then lives in it without exercise, fat and comfortable.


From Revolver:

“You do all the hard work, and I just help you along. The art is for me to feed pieces to you and let you believe you took those pieces because you are smarter and I am dumber. In every game and con there is always an opponent and a victim. The more control a victim thinks he has, the less he actually has. Gradually he will hang himself. I as the opponent just help him along.”

“the formula has infinite depth in its efficacy and application. But it is staggeringly simple and completely consistent. Rule one of any game or con, you can only get smarter by playing a smarter opponent. The more sophisticated the game, the more sophisticated the opponent. If the opponent is very good, he will place his victim inside an environment he can control. The bigger the environment, the easier the control. Toss the dog a bone, find their weakness, give them just a little of what they think they want. So the opponent simply distracts the victim by getting them consumed with their own consumption. The bigger the trick, and older the trick, the easier it is to pull. They think it cant be that old, and it can’t be that big, for so many people to have fallen for it. Eventually, when the opponent is challenged or questioned, it means the victim's investment and thus his intelligence is questioned. No-one can accept that. Not even to themselves. You’ll always find a very good opponent in the last place you would ever look.”

Who are you?

This was the earliest question I remember our Forum Leader asked. A simple question: Who are you?

Are you your body? This meat bag? What if you lose a hand? Will you be a little less of you? No? Then who are you?
Are your your thoughts? What if someone puts a gun to your head? Your thoughts will change immediately. But you won't. Then who are you?

You are not your body. You have a body.
You are not your thoughts. You have thoughts.
Does 'I' really die? Or is it just the body?

I had read concept before Landmark. I had partially understood it then. I am still trying to grip it. But the concept in itself is very powerful. For if you know the real you, would you ever let the act play? Would there be any misery then? Nisargadatta Maharaj and a few more like him claim to have achieved enlightenment even, just pondering on the question: "Who am I?".

Sympathy

Sympathy is just a story we make. It is not real.

Sympathy is mostly confused with two emotions - Love or Pity. People who confuse it with love, tend to offer and expect other people's sympathies. People who confuse it with pity tend to avoid sympathies and don't like it altogether. Pity too can sometimes be confused with love.

Sympathy is always an attempt in sincerity. And sincerity is just an act.

The possibility of love

I met her yesterday. She looked beautiful. I couldn't get to sit with her though. And she had some other guy who was with her. I felt a bit not-so-nice about that, but it didn't matter much.

Evening went by as planned. After the end of the evening, just when she was leaving, I had the following conversation with her:

Me : "So how about that coffee? Tomorrow?"

Her: "Tomorrow my mom is coming over, then I got office, then I'll be leaving for my home in xxx city. I'll come back in 2-3 weeks"

Me : "Ok ... give me a call when you do"

Her: Something like "Sure" or "ok" or "I will".

I don't remember clearly what she said in the end. I wasn't 'listening'. We said a Goodbye, and that was that.

So my mind started to make all kinds of stories. First it wanted to totally kill the possibility of any relationship with her, to avoid this pain in the future (quote from Revolver: "He hides behind your pain Jake."). Then the mind made up a story that it 'meant' she didn't want to go out with me, or that she didn't like me and my act chipped in with 'you are stupid' thing. First the 'you are stupid' to think she felt anything about you in the first place, then 'you are stupid' to doubt her reasons. Then it began giving me hope with other stories ... the what if scenarios.

I felt like the possibility closed on me. But then I realized that all this drama was in my head. She said what she said and that was exactly what it meant. All other are stories. The future too will be what it will be. It will either work or it won't. No stories or meanings can cause any of these to happen.

Above all, the possibility of love is not closed.

Catching the act

Yesterday, I did something which later proved to be wrong. Immediately my act came up. It told me that I was stupid to have done that. When in that zone, I even forgot the reason why I had taken the decision.

A couple of minutes later, I was doing some other work and the act had subsided. Without any thinking, I just began explaining why I did what I did, and it was crystal clear then. It was a decision taken based on something, and not because I was my act.

Catching the act is pretty difficult. Training to do that is my aim.

What is Landmark Education?

The Education is a set of distinctions, some formulas you can say. It has infinite depth in its efficacy and application, but it is staggeringly simple and completely consistent. That is why everybody gets it. But there is always more. Turn it into an intellectual exercise and you begin to realize that the rabbit hole goes much deeper.

Have you seen the movie Revolver by Guy Ritchie? The movie deals with a lot of what they give you in Landmark Education. The ideas presented in both are simply brilliant.

The act

There are so many negative reviews about Landmark Education. People go through the education and then their act proves that everything was wrong. The act cannot stay in the background too long unless a conscious effort is made to make it stay permanently in the background. Once it comes in the foreground, it clashes with everything you did while it was in the background. There is an inconsistency then. How do you resolve an inconsistency? Well ... one thing has to be wrong, one thing has to be right, and you should have all the correct reasons to prove it wrong. So, when the act is in control, it causes the whole Landmark thing look like a sham to justify what it did. If it does not do so, the inconsistency will remain and you will not be able to rest. At this point, if the 'you' takes over, it'll accept what the act did and you'll be at rest again. If the act takes over, it'll prove you wrong. The act makes (or rather proves) the possibility, an impossibility. And it tells you how everything you learnt then, was wrong. It fills meanings in an empty and meaningless life. It gives you a 'reasonable' life. It is comfortable. You want to live it because there is less head pain, less effort in taming your act. Isn't it simply beautiful how this works?

So one can definitely ask the question: who is right, the act or you?

I answered it by asking myself which of the two made me more miserable. The answer was simple. And then I realized that there is no right and wrong.

Crisis

A crisis that is bigger than your current crisis, helps you deal powerfully with any of the current crisis. If your reason to be on this planet, your vision, is bigger than anything else, will you really stop to look at little problems. Will you get stuck anywhere?

If someone you love is seriously injured and in the hospital, will you stop if your car breaks down?

What crisis did I chose for myself? I want to transform this world now. I want everyone to realize what true happiness can be, free from constraints imposed by self. That is my true calling.

Reality

We have a very poor relationship with reality. Most of the time we think we are present in reality, we are actually living in the past or the future as a function of the past. We are never in the now. And this causes your identity to screw-up everything for you.

What I saw in the Forum Leader was that he has an amazing relationship with reality. He is able to control when to go into the past and when to be in the present. Hence, he is able to understand almost anything anyone has to say. I found myself sometimes interpreting what someone just said in my own way, but the Forum Leader got it exactly as meant, almost every time. Other times, nobody got anything.

What I got from the Landmark Advanced Course & Forum

SPOILERS ALERT: Please do not read this unless you have done the Advanced Course yourself.

On a Friday morning, I sat in the auditorium, unsure of what I had signed up for. I was sure it would be incredible, but I had simply chosen to forget what I got in the Landmark Forum. Hence, I was a little skeptical. But what happened in the next three days was extraordinary.

We discussed that the Advanced Course works at the level of group/ community and not at the level of Individual (like the Landmark Forum). Like the Landmark Forum, we were asked to keep completing with people we hadn't as yet, and also to enroll other people in the possibility we created for ourselves.

I was very apprehensive about this completion and enrollment business. I almost hadn't completed with anyone in the Forum. I had still got the popping feeling on Sunday night of the Forum though. The feeling of being truly at peace. The feeling of being transformed. And here is how that had happened. I remembered the girl, to whom I had confessed being nuts for. She didn't feel that way and from that time on, things had been very awkward between us since then. I always thought that she must think of me as a total loser for doing what I did, and never talked to her too much after that. But while driving back from the Forum on Sunday, I realized that it really bothered me that we weren't communicating and that all the loser thing was just a story in my head. I also thought that she must have been impacted by that thing as well. I decided to complete with her and was absolutely sure of what to say. As soon as I thought about it, a possibility opened for me and I "popped". What a night it was! I wanted to call everyone there and then, talk to them. I hadn't felt happier ever. So I wrote her an email and asked her to talk to me on Skype. I could barely get to sleep that day.

The next day I lost the possibility that had opened up for me and I felt most stupid. I couldn't even go online the whole day in fear of running into her. I was devastated by what I had written to people the night before. And in my mind, I just threw the whole experience of Landmark Forum out of the Window. I just concentrated on holding on to the 'popping' feeling .... without wanting to actually think what caused it. I couldn't remember what I had created for myself in there.

But my relationship with my mom definitely improved. I became present to her world, and the helped me breakthrough. So I took her to the Tuesday evening. Attending the Tuesday evening, some of the Forum came back to me and I felt better. On Wednesday, I finally met that girl on chat and completed with her. I told her all I had thought of telling her, for completion. It worked! The possibility opened up again and I felt relieved to the core.

I had signed up for the Advanced Course on Tuesday, because my Coach said so, and I believed him.

The month between the Forum and the Advanced Course had its ups and downs. I realized that the two areas in my life where I felt loss of power were that even with many girlfriends, I did not have any intimate relationship with anyone. I had never had any in the 25 years of my life. Also, in my business, I never felt like doing too much, and blamed my dad (who is with me in the business) for it. I was putting in 50% in my business.

My Seminar series started, and those helped me get in touch with the Forum again. I began analyzing the problems. In my business I realized that it was the relationship with my dad that was troubling me. In my other problem, I always had this thing: Whenever I met a girl, I would judger her to be either too good or worthless. I felt stupid in approaching an awesome girl (my judgement) and didn't want to approach someone whom I deemed worthless. So all my energies were spent in being perfect in everything, so that I always come across as awesome. It wasn't working at all. I used the same judgement evaluation on myself and would always end up feeling loser-ish in something or the other. And I never realized this vicious circle.

So, after about a month, my Advanced Course came up. My favorite Forum Leader, BS Sodhi was leading it. I was excited purely on this account.

It began with Sodhi telling everyone to have completion and enrollment conversations. This time, however, I was much more coach-able than in the Forum. I knew the power of this education and the power in me. So this time, I did the assignments mostly, all the time. What followed, blew me completely.

The first day, the divided us into groups. The division was done row-wise. There was a girl sitting 4-5 seats down the line, in the next block. I quite liked the way she looked and I wished with all my heart that she be in my group. For once, God listened to me! She and I were in the same group. So in the subsequent meal break, I struck a conversation with her and I found her to be a wonderful person. I liked her! No evaluation judgments whatsoever.

The first day we learnt about how the world occurs to us, the action we take as a result of that and the result that action produces. The Distinction was simply amazing. Very profound, like the rest of the Advanced Course.

Anyways .. I remember if I did the first day assignment, but I can't remember what it was. I think it was about having an enrollment Conversation with someone. I remember calling up my dad in the morning on the Second day. It was like the most difficult thing I did. I felt so utterly stupid in doing it. But my coach had said that I had to do it, and my group & my buddy gave me a lot of courage, so I finally did call him. I told him that at times I thought that he thought that I was worthless and stupid and that it was there in my mind at a certain level. I told him I loved him and was sorry about not putting my 100% in the business. I committed to him that I'll now put my everything into the business. He was happy. When I hung up, I felt so relieved and light that I cursed myself for not having done it earlier. It feels wonderful in reliving that moment now too.

I then called up a friend, who had gone with me on my Forum's Tuesday evening session. I shared with him the possibility I invented for myself and told him what he could gain from this education. It felt great to finally be so authentic about it.

So, the second day progressed. Sodhi told us what Enrollment really meant. People shared things on the mic. I was sitting almost next to that girl I liked. It was fun and great. Sometime in the afternoon, I noticed that that girl had a couple of rings on her right hand's ring finger. My heart sank. I finally liked someone, could talk to her, saw a possibility, and here she was, most probably engaged. My only hope was that the correct hand for engagement rings is not the right hand, but the left hand. I thought I'll text my friend in the next break to confirm the correct hand in which engagement rings are worn. But just before the next (long) break, I noticed that the rings were actually on the left hand. Then my heart sank, like properly. I was like half dead when I went to the meal break with her and the rest of the group. I didn't enjoy the meal at all, even though I was sitting with her. It was because, I had closed the possibility for myself. But still, this time I thought that I'll go ahead and ask her, rather than live with a possibility I closed based on an assumption. So when I came back, I asked her if she was engaged. To my surprise, they were just normal rings. No engagement or anything. I could have stood-up and danced then. The possibility was wide open!

So I decided that now I'll take more chances and ask her out. I was, in my opinion, not getting negative vibes from her. I would have interpreted them as positive, but I had been wrong about that before. Anyways, my occurring about her was that she liked me too. So I planned that 'asking out' for the meal break on the third day. Her occurring for me from then on became awesomer and awesomer! I sat next to her on a number of occasions then and it felt so great.

That night I called up a friend in US and had a long chat with her. I told her about Landmark and also told her how much I appreciated and treasured the friendship with her. It felt wonderful. It was like as if a new communication channel opened between us. I told her about this girl in the course and the whole engagement ring thing. It was wonderful. We kept chatting till almost 3 in the night (about 1 hour). I finally had to hang up because I had to reach for the third day at 9 AM the next day.

Of course I reached on time the next day. :)

The third day of the Advanced course is unparalleled. It is the day probably none of the participants will ever forget. The third day is simply brilliant.

Third day we got the distinction of the 'Ultimate Test of Reality' (after Personal & Interim tests on day 1 & 2). We had a meal break after that and finally the big moment had come for me. After trying to work up the courage several times, I stopped working on the courage part and went to her straight and asked her if she was seeing someone. She said no (!!!!). So I asked her if she would have coffee with me the next day. She said sure, but that she was busy the next day, and if she would be able to make it, she would give me a call. I was like in the seventh heaven. She asked me what had coffee got to do with seeing someone, I told her that I was just asking. :)

We had our meal then and contrary to all my expectations, nothing was awkward! I quickly finished my meal and then called up my two friends to enroll them in the possibility I had gotten. I also felt that as many people knew about it, their intentionality in me achieving that would be there. Plus it felt great and wonderful.

So I called up my friend who had attended the Tuesday evening of the Forum with me, and told him about it. It felt great to me because earlier I had been inauthentic about the whole thing and always felt awkward in sharing such things with friends. He was happy for me and said that he would love to do the Forum as well! I then called up another friend and shared it with her. I first completed with her, told her about Landmark Education, told her how I much appreciated her friendship, and what always held me back in expressing it earlier. The conversation was great and my friendship with her now is simply extraordinary.

It is wonderful to think now that everything I did was because of my act: "You are Stupid". My act pervaded through all the areas of my life. ALL the areas. Everything I did was determined by this act. Every time I saw someone new, my act would come right up. It either told me that this someone new is Stupid, or if not, then you are stupid. I never shared most of the things with anyone because of this. It is wonderful that I know it now and can alter my occurrence of this world.

After the meal break, the best part of the day began. We discussed how everything arises from Language. Language is the source of the occurrence of the world and our reality. Reality cannot exist without Language. Language is the source of reality. What power it gave me? It gave me all the power in the world.

I went to the microphone for the first time in the entire course (Forum + Advanced Course). It didn't feel stupid, weird or anything. It was like I could have been talking to one person, 160 people or the whole world. It didn't matter then. I was at peace and had all the power. There was no fear. Fear was a story written by me. If I could use Language to take my power away from me, I could use it to give myself all the power in the world. So I went to the mic and shared that if Hitler could use Language to enroll almost all of Germany to kill people, I could enroll all the world to save itself. I had my Vision in front of me clearly. I shared how the Forum was incomplete without the Advanced Course. In fact, Forum is just a tool to make you ready for the Advanced Course. Advanced Course is simply amazing! I shared how I 'popped' in the Forum an then felt 'un-popped' the next day. I tried to enroll everyone in the possibility of what they could get from SELP. It felt out of this world then.

One thing to remember. Language here does not necessarily mean Hindi or English or any other language. Language could also mean something we express ourselves in or the language we use in our thoughts.

After that, we did an exercise to remove fear of being with other people. This exercise was extraordinary. My fear was already far removed, but people had a completely different energy after the exercise. On my part, I felt like dancing after that exercise.

Finally, the time came for the final thing in the Advanced Course. The time to Invent ourselves. That moment was profound. The energy in the room after this was unbelievable. Everyone was jumping, hooting, applauding, people won't leave the mic alone!

I sat with her again and spent the final moments of the Advanced Course with her. I, along with most of my group (and her), registered for the SELP for the same dates.

Finally the Advanced Course ended at about 1:30 in the night. After that I felt that I had forgotten everything (part of my act), but no. Everything was there and it all came back I am not letting it go the next time.

Today we have the Tuesday evening of the Advanced Course. I was supposed to have my big first date yesterday, but she didn't call. And she didn't call because she didn't call. There is no other meaning to that. We are meaning making machines, something I learnt in the Forum, and would like to give meaning to everything. But no, she didn't call because she didn't call. Life is empty and meaningless and we are the ones who attach all the meanings.

Today I am going to ask her again for the Coffee I was promised. I'll enroll her into the possibility of being with me (!!!). This possibility I won't let go.

What I wanted to Get from Landmark:

• A breakthrough in the way my business was going and the way I felt about it.
• A change in how I felt when I met new people.
• To have an intimate relationship with someone.

What I got:

• I realized that the way I felt about my business had every thing to do with how I felt about my dad.
• I then realized that how I felt about other people had everything to do with my act. Infact, every time I felt powerful or powerless was due to my act. It is wonderful how when your act gives you power, you start to rely on it, and then it takes away your power too. It is like someone you consider your best friend stabs you in your back. "The greatest con he ever pulled was making you believe he is you".
• I finally have what it takes to work on beginning an intimate relationship. How I go from there is to be seen.
• I have realized that from the Business point of view, probably, me and my father's Visions are not the same. That is a major worry. Unless that is aligned, we can not continue doing this. And I feel no fear in the eventuality of us going separate ways in terms of Business.
• "From nothing, who I am right now, is the possibility of transformation & happiness".
• I want to go on and become an Introduction Leader now, to enroll everyone in the possibility of happiness through transformation.