Naval

Stephen

 Two more books, kind of introducing you to the idea of psychedelics and altered state of 

 consciousness is Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley and How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan.

 Two great books, kind of give you an idea of what 

 could be facing in your psychedelic trips coming up.

 They complement James Fadiman's book very well.

 Following those books, I would recommend Know Yourself by Awad Balyani. This is the best book

 a little short thing. You could read it in

 maybe an hour or two hours. I've read it I 

 know how many times and I've given away I don't

 know how many copies of this book. I have 

 several just laying around on my bookshelf at any given

 moment just to give them out. This is my number one highly 

 recommended book to read on spirituality. It explains samadhi very very well.

 Following that I'd read The Joyous Cosmology by Alan Watts. Alan Watts

 beautifully describes wu-wei which is do nothing and no mind which is mu-shin.

 This is just an awesome book and and it leaves you feeling great and then it

 kind of shows you how to practice this in your everyday life because it

 describes it so well you'll just start feeling it on your in in your day-to-day life.

 Actually, um, Alan Watts is so good. I would recommend 

 anything by Alan Watts, but two books in specific are specifics are

 The book the taboo against knowing who you are. That's a great book and

 The way of Zen is just awesome because Zen is beautiful

 Zen is is it's just beautiful in so many 

 ways and it's just a joy to read that book and

 By this time, you're probably gonna know everything 

 you need to know about spirituality to be honest with you

 But it's just a joy to read and Zen, you know, Zen is

 Zen is is entertaining Yeah, it's just highly entertaining and it's 

 you could you could just fall in love with Zen I don't know if it really

 Leads to enlightenment or whatever But it's just a joy to to be exposed 

 to Zen ideas and and not to say Zen masters aren't enlightened or whatever

 But yeah, I really really love the way is in

 not do six deep mushroom trips in one year

 And then smoking weed as much as you can for five hours a day

 Every single day. I mean, you're just gonna lose 

 your mind at that point. So no, I would not do that

 I would probably max out at one psychedelic trip 

 year and then you know cannabis use at once a week

 Anything beyond that is just unnecessary Even even psychedelics in general are not necessary

 I'm sure you know this already, but if you're going to do 

 use psychedelics, I would not do it more than once per year

 and said, if you see the Buddha, kill him.

 my friend sent me a text and he goes, if you see the Buddha, kill him.

 Diana asks, why was I so obsessed? Why the extreme amount of obsession?

 Really the reason why I was so obsessed is because I was so insecure.

 I had everything that I thought I knew ripped out from under me.

 I didn't know what was true. I didn't know if my direct experience was true.

 For myself, I had an urgent need to get to these answers.

 Because if you feel like other people are just figments of your imagination

 and they're not conscious themselves, it's an unnerving feeling.

 My dad actually was interested in taking psychedelics.

 He's older. He's in his 70s. I go, you know, I don't know.

 ways, I don't know if he could handle it.

 I don't know if you're 70 years old plus,

 and you just have everything that you thought you knew just ripped out from under you,

 and your reality completely shifts. I don't know if somebody who's 70 years old plus,

 I don't know if they could handle such a thing.

 Because I was in my 30s and I could barely handle it.

 And, um, why do I talk about it? Well, um, I 

 just felt compelled to talk about it. You know,

 the funny, the funny thing is, is I was texting 

 my friends my ideas and I was just having so many

 creative ideas and so many ideas in general. I 

 was just spamming all my friends via text message

 and one of my friends says, dude, you need to get a YouTube.

 And, uh, so I, I, I made a Twitter and I 

 just started sharing my ideas on Twitter.

 And, um, there's a really good book. It's 

 show your work. I forget the name of the author,

 but, uh, when you show your work, the great 

 thing is, is you find people who are like-minded

 and I've been so blessed to meet all these people who are like-minded and,

 and many of them have corrected my errors. 

 on this whole journey, I've kind of shared it

 on Twitter and, uh, people have pointed, 

 out every time I've been wrong, not every time,

 but many of the times I've been wrong. And 

 it saved me so much time in heartache, just,

 um, sharing my ideas and getting my ideas corrected and criticized.

 How would you recommend to go through the process till you get people 

 care about your work enough to criticize it and to get you that feedback?

 It has been hard for me. It's hard, you know, it's hard to get 

 people to care about what you do, even if you are truthful with it.

 Do you find it difficult to shift from knowing that you're part of an infinite consciousness

 to knowing that you can just be yourself or your ego?

 I mean, for example, you love your wife.

 If I were married, I would have lots of 

 difficulty thinking that my wife is also part of this

 infinite consciousness. And therefore everybody loves my 

 wife, I feel like I would just want to be selfish and should

 only be me that loves my wife, if that makes sense.

 I love how you answered Steven about the 

 protocol of birth but I don't think and this is my

 opinion obviously there is no protocol to get enlightened quote unquote I think enlightened

 days that people feel like okay enlightened

 space you do not so there is no other space

 that we get to but obviously I appreciate

 the books and I strongly recommend those books that you have recommended in this conversation

 to Baruch but Baruch there is no protocol protocol by definition means a set of rules

 there are no a set of rules to get to the 

 truth there are no set of rules to get enlightened

 if you want to get enlightened you just have to have a 

 strong desire for it and that's it that will take you there

 Hey Stephen, thanks again for being so patient with the questions and giving us

 these wonderful insights. One question I had around the topic of obsession that

 you talk about is, is this obsession the extension of the same desire that we

 have for normal things like fame, money and even the 

 desire to be loved just channeled towards knowing the truth?

 And a supplementary question I had on the same lines is, at the time that you

 were obsessed with it, is there a way of knowing that after a certain threshold

 this obsession can turn against you? Like you mentioned that if you had to do it

 differently you would not do as many mushroom trips as you did. Is there a way

 of knowing that while you are obsessed with knowing and getting to the truth?

 I'm curious what you think about identity branding and packaging as it relates to

 the world of spirituality and self-help. I think that a lot of people miss the

 message because they are hung up on the messenger and I think it's a fatal flaw

 of the industry honestly the way that it's been packaged only really to

 resonate with people who are seekers who have crashed who are desperate and

 obsessed with truth and it kind of repels everybody else who's not who

 thinks that you know you're trying to make a quick buck manufacturing wisdom

 or it's all woo-woo but those people are people too and they would benefit from a

 lot of the information maybe if it was communicated differently in a way that's

 more accessible something that they can relate to and understand or maybe through

 the people that they trust you know creators influencers whatever so I'm

 curious how you think about you know decreasing suffering in the world

 through just through the distribution of insight and how do you deliver those

 insights to more people before they crash and how you think about branding

 and packaging and your own identity you know your profile picture on Twitter is

 not you but you do share videos of you and you know that definitely builds

 trust with your audience and allows you to air correct like you said but I guess

 how do you how do you think about you know these faceless entities they're all

 over the internet you know kind of sharing similar insights in different

 ways you know trying to make money and and then people who are just you know

 down to be themselves and talk about the same things

 Hello Stephen, Do you have kids? If not, are you planning to 

 have them and why? In your view, what is the point of having kids?

 And how were the circumstances of your life as you 

 were going through this obsession to know the truth?

 Were you able to have a job and live life as a normal human?

 Or it used your whole attention and it was hard to function?

 Hey Stephen, I have two questions for you.

 First, do you think enlightened people make mistakes?

 And second, what do you think is the difference between 

 enlightened and knowledgeable people, someone who has a lot of knowledge?

 Faris asks if it could be difficult to transition from an infinite

 consciousness to a finite consciousness or you know a non-dual state to a dual

 state and go back to the ego self. Yeah, this journey leaves you

 in an extremely insecure position. So if you're around people who support you and

 if you're around people who have experienced these profound states,

 non-dual states, that's going to be extremely beneficial to you

 because if you're solo and you have nobody else who understands what you're

 going through, you could just be left feeling extremely lonely and

 insecure. So being around the right people could be very helpful.

 Talking to people who have gone through this journey could be extremely

 could leave you in a bad spot just going

 It takes a while to get used to for sure

 obsessed with seeking the truth in the first 

 place. It was just a matter of extreme insecurity.

 And I'll also add This is why people feel such an immense amount of love

 For their spiritual guide or for their guru or for their mentor or whatever

 because when it when you experience these 

 non-dual states you feel like your guru is you and

 And it's without a doubt and you've been guiding 

 yourself to this enlightened experience the entire time

 It's almost like an extreme sense of paranoia. Like you've been secretly guiding yourself

 To this perfect Liberated state the whole time and it's all been a game

 the Hindu mythology Hindu mythology says that 

 existence is you know, Maya an illusion or deception and

 If it's all if it's all a deception the the main

 Deception is hide-and-seek. You're just hiding from yourself. So when you find yourself you get startled

 It's like, you know a kid jumping out from the 

 corner and running behind you saying boo, right?

 And you get super scared so when you go for the 

 you experience the infinite self you get spooked and

 being around people especially a guru or especially somebody who's

 Could empathize and understand your situation is invaluable for sure

 Donkey DJ asks if I have kids if I plan 

 on having kids and what's the purpose of

 having kids and what's the point we might have kids Amanda we have 17 eggs

 time we just hire a surrogate and have kids

 no problem and I think the point of having kids is just like like making

 music or listening to music I mean you just enjoy people enjoy pets right a

 kid is like a pet a little bit different of course but you just enjoy

 their presence you enjoy being around you enjoy sharing love and you just want

 do kind of see the appeal of having kids 

 I mean if you really love life and you're

 just just love the birds in the sky and 

 the beach and the you know and all these

 games humans play and all the entertainment that's going on all these

 great movies and and and all these great all the the wonderful benefits of

 existence itself and when you have a kid you're sharing that so I could see

 the appeal in sharing that and and you could share it with the closest bond

 that you could possibly possibly have maybe besides a guru you might have a

 but if you have a kid you're really just

 sharing love you're sharing love and the love of existence I mean nothing wrong

 could could kind of be a pain in the butt to

 whatever but that's all right so yeah we might

 have kids it's not gonna happen right now but but we have that option and I

 years we decided to go ahead and have a couple