Transpersonal States: Awakening, Enlightenment, and the Ego | Vivian Dittmar

[@alexanderdenheijer565]

This was so beautiful John and Vivian. I’ve been wrestling with the idea of enlightenment as well through my work and I recognize very much how some conceptions of enlightenment can lead to spiritual bypassing. I remember being very inspired by the search for enlightenment until it started dawning on me that I was actually just longing to be free from something. I wanted to escape the dreadfulness of ordinary life. Until at some point it started dawning on me that liberation is not a freedom from ordinary life, but a freedom from the desire to escape ordinary life. As I started facing reality as on ongoing process, the idea of enlightenment started losing its appeal to me.

[@adamhope8689]

💯 most seeking "enlightenment" are simply trying to escape the stuff they are unwilling or not ready want to face

[@gunterappoldt3037]

In the most cases, seems to me, this search, resp. ultimate telos/aim was/is/will be “triggered“ by religio-philosophical institutions. Its is heavily and significantly “framed“ (E. Goffman) by “communitas“ (during ritual performances on the communal level) and the “organs“ of all kinds of social institutions.

[@47Gika]

I always thought that spirituality is nonsense, but Vivian and John are excellent in how they construct and deliver these ideas. Thank you for this precious conversation. ❤❤

[@roberts.4137]

John is an excellent host and honors and truly welcomes the guest.Not easy when one has so much to say, himself. Vivian is so authentic and wise.

[@eva-mariagass204]

Thanks to Vivian and John for this uniquely deep and releasing coversation. IT was incredbly valuable to me. You explained with words what I long was unablässig to find Word for. Now your Dialoge helped me to understand why. What i experienced was beyond terms and came from other realms or spaces. Now i feel very "erleichtert", so much ease and love. The Moment of both of you Breitling a Pause touched me deeply. Thanks for this! Stay blessed and alive and led by love and eternity. You are both amazing. Thanks!

[@StephenEmmons-mx5yz]

I would love to see a conversation with Loch Kelly. He is a spiritual teacher in the Buddhist tradition, having studied with Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche. But his teachings are around awake awareness and nonduality, not the Buddhist tradition exclusively. Would also love to see you talk with Eckhart Tolle, Sam Harris, Jayasāra, Gangaji, Adyashanti, Rupert Spira, Tara Brach, Steve Taylor, Richard Lang, or James Low. Any of those would be thrilling! Just love seeing more nonduality represented on this channel, and any of the traditions that espouse it (eg Advaita Vedanta, Dzogchen, mysticism, etc.) Keep it up! And thank you! Namaste and God bless.

[@brandis3309]

John, I always enjoy hearing you give sincere & heartfelt compliments to the people you speak with. Thank you both for this convo. I feel a sense of comfort when hearing Vivian speak 😊

[@headrat1]

One cannot be in the world but not of it without a basic sense of self. The ego is necessary no matter how transpersonal one's experience is. Some basic presence is needed to chop wood and carry water. Ego is a continuum between deficient emptiness and inflated narcissism. Balance between them is essential.

[@howiewhitehouse1202]

nicely concisely stated

[@knoweagle888]

Jung describes “Christ” as a symbol of the “Self”. After everything superficial has been stripped away that is what’s left. Which leads to another question! Does one deserve to be there? Have you cultivated enough embodiment to rest in that? A key difference between the Mystic and the Psychotic imo…

[@gunterappoldt3037]

Carl Gustav Jung developed the concept of “individuation“, which somehow seems to find a middle way between an “abstract, yet also holistic absolute“ and the “real realities of the manifold“. And as Jung had some fable for ancient Greece and Egypt, maybe he was inspired by the arch-symbol of the Ouroboros. - Some more stuff for further considerations on the whole vital/basic topic of the “consciousness of there-being“ (Heideggerian Selbst-Bewusstsein des Daseins auf der Lichtung des Seins). Makes sense, no sense, non-sense...? - Sokrates: “We searched for the truth. We could not find it. Let's talk again tomorrow!“

[@gunterappoldt3037]

Addendum: “seeks“ instead of “seems“, typo, sorry!

[@knoweagle888]

@@gunterappoldt3037 Truth is an alignment…

[@gloriaharbin1131]

Your dialogues with Vivian are always the most deeply heartfelt and meaningful for me. Thank you both so very much. Sending my love and gratitude.🙏

[@mills8102]

I have to say, I really admire Vivian. Her dedication to truth, beyond any kind of particular orthodoxy is truly admirable. I really enjoyed your last discussion and this one is starting off on a powerful footing. Thank you 🙏

[@BF-non]

There is something very authentic about this woman.

[@eqapo]

Although we have two higher beings engaging in the abstract concepts, tears are falling as memories of spiritual evolution come up right alongside this carefully "mapped" discussion

[@skippybe]

❤ This was a fantastic conversation and I especially loved orbiting more clearly defining what it really means to be “enlightened” and what real integration actually looks like. I think a lot of us intuitively know what this looks and feels like because we have so many examples of what it does not look like. We have a lot of work to do but conversations like these make me feel like we’re getting much closer to discovering some pretty profound truths about ourselves.

[@lifearttimes]

This! Great points Vivienne. Shine On, Vivienne & John✨

[@jonasskipper2706]

Hi John and Vivian . In relation to the development and experience of the transpersonal i would recommend being aware of the potential for losing ones way in two different manners other than inflation. When first experiencing the transpersonal the ego needs to be restructured like you touch upon, but in here is the possibility of "getting trapped" between a chaotic new experience of the transpersonal and a nonfunctional map to the outer world. This would result in a hellish state most likely not that long but can be extremely profound. The other way one can get lost is literally dissociating because of the shift in experience. You are probably aware but i just wanted to mention it. When the ego is restructured there is a similar opportunity to construct a map for the transpersonal. I dont know if you have touched upon that in other videos - this would include several access point for dialogue, construction of ability to move effectively, seeking understanding and gratitude. Lots of love, Jonas

[@emilthiels6256]

Hello, this was a very clear dialogue, and I can find myself in what have been said! To you John en Vivian I wish you a wonderful path and the energy of clarity, THANKS !

[@YouHaveNeverKnownMe]

Beautiful conversation

[@sean2662]

28:14 I personally can't sit in the middle of my heart space with the awareness of how deep this goes for long enough to study it.

[@RickDelmonico]

Eternity is not lots of time, it is an ever deepening relationship with your creator.

[@Jacob011]

Not happy to hear that Voices with Vervaeke will be retired. Maybe Vivian will start Voices with Vivian and John will be invited. 😅

[@imperfekt7905]

Seems unfortunate that there has been such a limited response to this presentation. As someone who has tried to live with zen for over 50 years, while interacting with the world as a person with a psychological point of view that involves complex neuroscience and phenomenological metaphors, this sounds like an attempt to integrate some or most of my efforts to understand reality, and live fully. John is a powerhouse of philosophical depth, and Vivian is a beautiful manifestation of intelligence and wisdom.

[@scottjrowan]

Brilliant. Thank you both so much 🙏

[@projectmalus]

Thanks for the conversation.

[@vellytothejelly]

Lovely Vivan and awesome John, What I'm kind of missing here is more metaphor and giving examples for the things you touch upon. The topics can get extremely abstract and, at the end of the day, you both expressed commitment to the applicability of your work. I would love it if your next conversations could be more graspable in the way that Awakening from the Meaning crisis argument was presented in a graspable and wrapping one's head around-able way. Thank you! 🙏

[@jakubsebo4236]

wow I needed this. Also you two are probably the two best teachers I ever encountered. I am thinking how to make art that would exemplify this wisdom. I am thinking of visual metaphors for IFS and also for this process of ego death, decomposition, and integration. I was thinking of something like: imagine the Whole Actor of the Body (a person) standing in the middle of an amfitheater stage. The stage would represent consciousness and would be surrounded by the auditorium of the unconscious, which is inhabited by parts, allies, and archetypes, and all of the uncoscious bodily and transpersonal processes. This amfitheater would be something like a cosmology of the body-mind-whole (I'm struggling with words). Also if I'm not mistaken you also said that the stage would be a good metaphor for consciousness. I thought of this concept that I call the Whole Actor of the Body. It would be like the body-mind-whole. The Whole Actor of the Body is the real you. It is the Self. I think of the enmeshement with your parts as a kind of posession of the body, or of the Self. But if we would view the body as the Self, then saying that the body gets posessed just sounds like the body is just a thing that gets controlled like a puppet. But that's why I say the Whole Actor of the Body. Also Actor fits the setting of the amfitheater. Also it might clarify a lot if we were to think of the body as the actor itself. Honestly now that I'm putting it in words it seems to me more and more obvious. But who knows, maybe there is such a thing as a soul regardless of our bodies. But one more thing might be that thinking of the body as the actor feels really grounding in a way. It might also be part of resolving our tendency of ignoring our bodies. I'm thinking if it the Whole Actor of the Body is what orchestrates the "possession" process by the parts and maybe even allies, or if the parts and allies have their own agency, or something in between. Anyway I would visually represent this Whole Actor of the Body (visually just a person standing on the stage) as made up of fragments, like a partly mended broken vase. Those fragments would represent the parts. Then the process of integration and becoming whole again would be represented somehow as mending the fragments back together better and better, until all the parts "return" to the whole. I make a lot of assumptions here and imply things about trauma, but so be it. Then the ego death could be something like the explosion or dissolving of the fragmented-vase-shell, with the Whole Actor of the Body revealed and unhurt. But then the surfacing of the parts could be like the shell coming back somehow, which would warrant further integration. Sounds kinda good to me. I was thinking that if there is anything that could be a good representation of a person's wholeness, it would be their body. Also viewing the Jungian Self really as the Body seems reasonable, and plausibly better than viewing the Self as some ethereal thing. Also it would free us from talking in very abstract terms. Not everyone might agree with the concept of the Self, but most people might agree, after argumentation (and maybe persuasion:), that the body is actually in a real sense the real identity of any person. I'm not sure about any of this, honestly it's just ideation, but I thought that maybe you'd find some inspiration in it. I'm also thinking that creating such metaphorical representations could be dangerous if the metaphor is really taken up by everyone, but the metaphor would have some grave mistakes inside it. But it also could be very useful and we kind of need it... Anyway that's a long way away for now... But I don't see a reason to postpone a conversation about this, especially if I'm going to pursue these ideas further. Hope for an answer soon. All the best!

[@oliverjamito9902]

Angels who persevere and heard the WORD will say keep watch!

[@colorfulbookmark]

I respect and honor people who have cares for people who need help. People's presence of this cares are what ameliorate people who need help, because there are people who can do this^^ The architecture of psychological model is difficult thing, people who can do this is what I would like to respect and honor. Of course, independent of my support feelings, Dr.Vervaeke and his fellows and guests are great people ^^ Dr.Peterson is also great man I honor and respect.

[@TheCoyotemonster]

My biggest bugaboo is waste. I believe waste is UGLY. But just lately, I have learned to accept that...waste happens. A person cannot survive without processing their waste, created from their living. I think this is an answer to perfection.

[@AngeloSomers]

This woman is the sauce 👏

[@shamanverse]

I wonder if the work of Dr Jeffrey Martin on persistent non symbolic experience can enhance further the distinctions explored here. Please consider bringing his considerable mappings on this topic to the conversation.

[@Jacob011]

I've had experiences that came upon me unbidden, without long history of meditation. I don't hot dog it around and many who do are BSing others, who BS themselves too for deeper reasons.

[@shivadasa]

Enlightenment is a thing. It doesn’t just happen; it takes a lot of internal work and not a small amount of courage.

[@projectmalus]

at 13 min the two meta drives for self, a transform between hourglass and spinning top, where the horizontal projection moves in and out. A cone origin reappearing in the vertically orientated increasing size of pipe example, where the projections of the diamond (of the spinning top) horizontally are cones when a circle is drawn around the tips, and where the hourglass opens to the vertical.

[@jutfaseweg9082]

I fully share the idea of the transpersonal as a state not of perfection, but a feeling of wholeness. Isn't the personal feeling bound to our epigenetics, to feel complete in the sense of joy when we can share our capacities perfectly with the world, even though we see our own limitations of things we will never have or be? For instance, some of us feel blessed to have good hands to be a good osteopath (as I am), without even the willingness to be in the twilight state of ‘enlightenment’. Isn't it all about discovering what on the soul level we are meant to be, to share your talents in the world with honor, which gives rise to bliss and a fullmeaning life. “Ikigai” (生き甲斐) or “Shokunin” (職人), the profound aesthetic and ethical commitment to one's talents. We are not all destined to become spiritual teachers, coaches, or 'light workers’, after one or two shakti experiences in an 40 degree heated Indian Ashram. Someone who cuts fish is also not a 'sushi master' overnight, or after a 3-month course with a chef. As Marcus Aurelius speaks; That which is allready there has no need of anything; not more than law (ethica), not more than truth, not more than benevolence or modesty.

[@elsawiegers1093]

how strange to see this name ,"jutfaseweg", it sort of makes long-forgotten memories bubble to the surface.....

[@jgarciajr82]

On the next conversation I wonder if you guys would be able to talk about if God is everything and how is God connected to evil or what is that relationship?

[@sean2662]

17:00 I really appreciate this perspective. I wonder if the implicit order auto updates every instance to keep its adherents safe from being ground to pulp by the chaos and human arbitration of explicit order. And if it does, who or what might be doing it? Is it silly to think entropy could fuel such a thing?

[@anthonytroia1]

My old friend Soryu Forall (a Zen monk) says you can tell one's enlightenment by how good a friend they are. It's as simple as that.

[@RickDelmonico]

I agree with some of this and wonder at some of the ideas presented.

[@RickDelmonico]

Imagine if everyone you knew were perfect. It is our flaws that make us unique.

[@AhmedSonOfKemet]

I like that Vivian stays silent when she has nothing to say. Some other people just try to fill the gaps with nonsense.

[@Schtoopot]

This was a good one

[@allenneher9136]

Epicurus, the Greek philosopher, said, "Why should I fear death? If I am, death is not. If death is, I am not. Why should I fear that which cannot exist when I do?"   

[@ClassPunkOnRumbleAndSubstack]

I make no claim of being enlightened, but I've lost count of the mystical experiences I've had through 16 years of meditation. So since it's related to the video subject, if anyone is interested, I wrote an 11,000+ word essay on my views on meditation and mystical experiences, including talking about people I believe to be fully enlightened in a meditation sense for current humans-- primarily talking about mystical experiences that always have bliss and phosphenes which I see as likely an absolute prerequisite to full enlightenment/sahaja samadhi/full kundalini awakening-- which I describe further in the essay. That's all the algorithm will probably allow me to say.

[@projectmalus]

Shear pin self, meant to be brittle and break properly, so when the perimeter which moves faster transmits a shock of energy back to the slower moving yet more powerful origin, the expensive and delicate unfolding mechanism next to the origin doesn't break. Not too soft and not too hard, reverse engineered three leaps as three pieces that leap together again, to be between the vertical as the horizontal, adding larger pipe outwards (UTOK model) in this vertically orientated spaces between, that self mediates and is mediated by, perimeter slowing and origin quickening. Could be useful in seeing anima for a masculine person as closer to the origin and powerful, with self mediating between anima and an objectified masculine perimeter (anime for the feminine expression) or the two hemispheres of the brain, etc. Trust is like a shear pin, but between people where they can take turns being rational and emotional for each other, where trust is also a bottle of wall dissolver that can be stolen while a wall is built, more of a individual in a patriarchical collective kind of way, by removing means of engagement for that individual.

[@RickDelmonico]

We put on knowledge like we put on clothing and hopefully these cloths continue to let the light in.

[@ElenaRoche]

John at 9:30. Tolstoi made it obvious from the beginning that Ivan Ilyich neither lived correctly nor well, but it only began to matter on his deathbed.

[@markobrien4332]

"Death happens in you, not to you." Bernardo Kastrupp talking to Rupert Spira on Consciousness.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Little ones will say, surrounding about as a little lights! Surrounding about the PARADISE! Gratitude and Honor

[@SaxonShore]

"How much ego do you need? Just enough that you don't get run over by a bus." Shunryu Suzuki

[@andreaw.3081]

Thanks for the great conversation! Unfortunately my english is not so good that I understand everything. I heard also between the sentences and beyond what Vivian mentioned in the end. A Question: the new book that you mentioned Vivian....is it already issued...or which one you mean?

[@Michlin-rp5iv]

Lots of great comments will be given, one I'd like to give quickly by pointing out the sacred pattern of time, by which I mean that simply the number one clip came out 6 months ago, n.2 three months ago, and now the trilogy episode. The sacred and the appreciation of ceremony is as important as sleeping and eating.

[@PhilGribbon]

1:17:39 the pause-respect post-ponderance here is truly touching. Latin sapere led to English sage; PIE *sap- to taste. Vi\;/ seems to ΞI`•_|-aura the taste of life. May IIIΞ flow along akin cx၁

[@lianaschill6132]

Lack of impulse-control is related to Sin. The inability to reflect on the impacts/consequences of impulsive actions on orher human beings causes Sin.

[@letsgococo288]

Wake up, sin doesn’t exist.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Time come here in front and remind!

[@sean2662]

Maybe virtualizing ourselves would be the ultimate act of mistaking the map for the territory.

[@gunterappoldt3037]

Master Kong Qiu: “not knowing life, how knowing death“ - a koan by master “Konfuzius“, as presented in the “Lunyu/Talks“. -Regards

[@khaderlander2429]

01:09:34. People are sleep when they die they are awoken, meaning they come to attention, regain consciousness. So practice the art of dying before your actual death. Consider yourself of the people of the grave. There is a substantial reality behind appearances. Remove the veil so you can witness beauty. The cosmos is meaning set up in images and anyone who understands that is among the people of discernment. Quran 50 (Verse 22) “You were indeed heedless of this. Now We have removed from you your cover; so today your sight is piercing.”

[@knoweagle888]

And God decided this person who has been sitting around meditating on nothing, breathing and stretching for decades. I’m just gonna enter him for 30seconds so he can write a book.

[@projectmalus]

Con-science, an inhuman power assuaged by a statistical knowing. Consilience thru science where objectification of self can be bounced off of, to move collectively, which is powerful and needs folding back into the world as care.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Students what is to lose touch? Mimic come here in front and remind!

[@ValentinBrutusBura]

"IT IS MISUNDERSTANDING" :))

[@Richard_Paradise]

❤✝️

[@oliverjamito9902]

Students remember thy shared "i" AM, came with sincere conversations given just for thee, and thy shared Feet resting upon. What is a REBELLIOUS HOUSE?

[@rocketproductions1441]

Chill out my dude! It ain't that serious

[@oliverjamito9902]

Pops FATHERS our Beautiful Mothers! If a SON OF MAN sitteth comes to thee all. Visitations unto all HIS SHARED FEET!

[@hernansoto2631]

Minute 52, "if I hear someone saying I´m enlightened, I will say: probably not" says John. I believe that's the reason why Sufists doesen´t say the are Sufi. It is against the tradition. You just embodies it.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Very tip of time will say

[@ejenkins4711]

Won goes up One falls down Two goes forever With four leaf plant i found 🍀🚪🦍

[@oliverjamito9902]

Why needed to remind unto all fed?

[@lianaschill6132]

How would a “healthy personality” deal with the egotistic would-be dictators, leaders running our geopolitical world? Is it wishful thinking to believe that a human being with a “healthy personality” can navigate the difficult realities of work, mortgages, responsibilities of children & parents, illness, accidents & injuries, etc.

[@ZL0WBEE]

The system definitely makes things harder but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive for wisdom and the embodiment of it

[@letsgococo288]

You ignore it. It’s just a movie playing in the background. It’s a scripted show on both sides. Shadows on the wall. You focus on yourself exiting this matrix.

[@Christoth2012]

It sounds to me that you are re creating the Tantric position, that is a non transcendental way of looking at enlightenment, perhaps you should talk to Rupert Spira or Christopher Wallis.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Students a little new minds Sons and Daughters will say?