Discussion about spirituality

[Kali Yuga]

In the course of a year, i went from nihilistic and a scientific background to experiencing some kind of spirituality that brought an unprecedented peace and meaning to life. I went on to explore what I was experiencing to discover two things:

1. What I was experiencing/discovering was not limited to me, but had been known and written about in spiritual literature by many different cultures throughout history.

2. That my experience was also a common symptom of bipolar mania; feeling connected with the universe at large.

Ultimately, I'm left some what confused because though I have definitely crashed from my spiritual magical high in to the bipolar depression, I can not completely dismiss my experience as crazy or false. It introduced me to my spirit/soul/consciousness. And although in my current depression, I don't feel it in my soul, i still believe in it intellectually.

I do not believe death is the end. Even science states energy can not be created or destroyed, but transfers. This sways me toward believing in reincarnation.

I guess I'm just wondering if others consider the after life and what you all believe or expect after death?

Do you think a death by CTB will still experience the love and light reported by near death experiences?

I think Hindu and Buddhism believe that the soul must undergo suffering until it becomes "enlightened". Catholic believe in hell, which I think is a misunderstood metaphor used as a fear tactic. My question to Catholics would ask if non curable psychiatric conditions like bipolar were exempt from "hell"? Because in a way, mental illness can predict a death as "natural" as something like cancer

I've watched one YT vid where a medium discusses some kind of "lobby" the soul can hang out in with no suffering, where there's only peace and love until the soul is guided through its problems so it's ready to overcome the in the next life.

In no way am I preaching anything on anyone, I just wanted to discuss spirituality and suicide as there is limited info. I also wanted to know what others believe in. It's something that will be on my mind as I take my final breath

 

[Kali Yuga]

Yes. Everything you have said is spot on. While there are rare examples of spontaneous and permanent awakenings, most people go through a spiritual hangover/regression just like what you describe, which is a necessary part of the process. The ego-mind actually tends to get worse after the initial awakening experience because it is now fighting for its life like a wild animal that has been cornered. Its main trick is to get you to identify with it. In your case, it is unfortunate that you've lacked guidance through the process.

It is important to let go of the past memory/experience, except perhaps for using it for motivation to continue your practices. The mind will turn what you discovered about your true Self into an event in time which occurred to a 'me' and has now been lost. This is a complete distortion of the truth.

To proceed, we need to accept a bunch of paradoxes. For example, you are always the pure Self, and yet you need to put effort in to be what you already are. You've tasted your pure state, yet time does not exist and no thought - including this memory - is of value.

Attention needs to go towards ruthlessly questioning your 'I' in the immediate here/now. Who is this character who has the story about experiencing an advanced spiritual state then losing it? Can you locate the person who is speaking about battling various mental illnesses? (Of course, various energies, pressures, discomforts and sensations in the body are fine and can be left alone to pass in their own time.) Who is all this stuff happening to? What is observing it?

You are the uninvolved witness only; the silent one. You are not a person on a spiritual mission to find something of value, as that brings identity, intention, individuality and - worst of all - time/future into it. Your mind is sending you metaphorical e-mails about inheriting a Nigerian prince's fortune and you keep clicking on the link, that is all. Mind is a conman. The true value is inherent in your own Self and can never be lost.

For some further reading, I just had the intuition to check out the nondual Reddit channel and this was the first discussion that popped up. Has some further replies that are just right for you. Link

Yes. Everything you have said is spot on. While there are rare examples of spontaneous and permanent awakenings, most people go through a spiritual hangover/regression just like what you describe, which is a necessary part of the process. The ego-mind actually tends to get worse after the initial awakening experience because it is now fighting for its life like a wild animal that has been cornered. Its main trick is to get you to identify with it. In your case, it is unfortunate that you've lacked guidance through the process.

It is important to let go of the past memory/experience, except perhaps for using it for motivation to continue your practices. The mind will turn what you discovered about your true Self into an event in time which occurred to a 'me' and has now been lost. This is a complete distortion of the truth.

To proceed, we need to accept a bunch of paradoxes. For example, you are always the pure Self, and yet you need to put effort in to be what you already are. You've tasted your pure state, yet time does not exist and no thought - including this memory - is of value.

Attention needs to go towards ruthlessly questioning your 'I' in the immediate here/now. Who is this character who has the story about experiencing an advanced spiritual state then losing it? Can you locate the person who is speaking about battling various mental illnesses? (Of course, various energies, pressures, discomforts and sensations in the body are fine and can be left alone to pass in their own time.) Who is all this stuff happening to? What is observing it?

You are the uninvolved witness only; the silent one. You are not a person on a spiritual mission to find something of value, as that brings identity, intention, individuality and - worst of all - time/future into it. Your mind is sending you metaphorical e-mails about inheriting a Nigerian prince's fortune and you keep clicking on the link, that is all. Mind is a conman. The true value is inherent in your own Self and can never be lost.

For some further reading, I just had the intuition to check out the nondual Reddit channel and this was the first discussion that popped up. Has some further replies that are just right for you. Link

Yes. Everything you have said is spot on. While there are rare examples of spontaneous and permanent awakenings, most people go through a spiritual hangover/regression just like what you describe, which is a necessary part of the process. The ego-mind actually tends to get worse after the initial awakening experience because it is now fighting for its life like a wild animal that has been cornered. Its main trick is to get you to identify with it. In your case, it is unfortunate that you've lacked guidance through the process.

It is important to let go of the past memory/experience, except perhaps for using it for motivation to continue your practices. The mind will turn what you discovered about your true Self into an event in time which occurred to a 'me' and has now been lost. This is a complete distortion of the truth.

To proceed, we need to accept a bunch of paradoxes. For example, you are always the pure Self, and yet you need to put effort in to be what you already are. You've tasted your pure state, yet time does not exist and no thought - including this memory - is of value.

Attention needs to go towards ruthlessly questioning your 'I' in the immediate here/now. Who is this character who has the story about experiencing an advanced spiritual state then losing it? Can you locate the person who is speaking about battling various mental illnesses? (Of course, various energies, pressures, discomforts and sensations in the body are fine and can be left alone to pass in their own time.) Who is all this stuff happening to? What is observing it?

You are the uninvolved witness only; the silent one. You are not a person on a spiritual mission to find something of value, as that brings identity, intention, individuality and - worst of all - time/future into it. Your mind is sending you metaphorical e-mails about inheriting a Nigerian prince's fortune and you keep clicking on the link, that is all. Mind is a conman. The true value is inherent in your own Self and can never be lost.

For some further reading, I just had the intuition to check out the nondual Reddit channel and this was the first discussion that popped up. Has some further replies that are just right for you. Link

you seem to have the knowledge... do you experience the spiritual peace from practising awareness and not subscribe to the nigerian junk mail so to speak? lol

 

[Pluto]

you seem to have the knowledge... do you experience the spiritual peace from practising awareness and not subscribe to the nigerian junk mail so to speak? lol

haha that's a tough question. I haven't gone through the dramatic shift in identity so the sense of 'little me' is still there in daily life. But contemplating this topic brings a lot of peace and I am regularly doing what I can to help bring it about.

Generally, it's not an immediate eruption into some euphoria, and in fact the actual awakening is reportedly always different to what people expect. I'm still having to go through dealing with all sorts of practical issues past and present, which from a simplistic perspective should be unnecessary since the "I" doesn't exist. Right now, it's all going reasonably, though I definitely could do better in clearing my junk mail folder.

 

[Kali Yuga]

How does one feel with their soul? I've never discovered how to do this. In fact, i'm not at all convinced that i even have soul.

I guess what I meant was experiencing something completely; receiving it on a deeper level than how the logical mind can process it. Like art or music that communicates in a way that transcends language, in to an experience that bypasses thought and hits you somewhere else.
Or have you ever experienced a cliche that suddenly gave you an "i get it" epiphany? For example, say you're young and lost something and an elder says a cliche like, "you don't know what you have till it's gone". You hear this common phrase regularly, on the news, you're parents etc, but its just a common phrase people say. Its only later on in life, when you become older and have truly lost that this cliche saying takes on a whole different meaning and it's no longer just words. It's something that is now truth to you... wisdom, experience, an epiphany, an awareness, a deeper understanding that the words did their best to explain to you when you were younger but fell short of. I guess that's what living through thought is like, its very shallow and limited. we can THINK we understand something, but we really don't experience its true depth.
Einstein came up with relativity by experiencing the world in this deeper way; not through logical thought as such, but experiencing life through his "soul" - or awareness for a better term - just being still and observing.
Detuning the mind and dethroning it from sovereignty is a practice of Buddhism and can be exercised through meditation. Otherwise Yogis doing yoga, South American tribes doing ayahuasca, western kids doing acid aha. It seems we're all built in with whatever you call this state of awareness or soul that wants to find itself. You could try all of the above if you want to try experience this state.

I wonder what people mean when they say this. People who seem to believe "death is not the end" always say it like it's a good thing, i personally don't see anything good about the possibility of this. I base all my hopes on the possibility that death in fact is the end.

And this energy thing. What makes people think their existing, quite limited conscious minds would have anything to do with any possible "energies" that they leave after them?

What does the end look like to you?

..purgatory?

perhaps.

I can say this much: I fail to understand spirituality and spiritual mentality as anything else but as an expression of "group-mentality/groupthink".

What if nihilism was also a result of herd mentality. After all, it seems to be a popular mentality for a lot of young people, especially on social media. Any ''mentality" will gather like-MINDed people or could form a bandwagon, but spirituality and the spirit is separate from mentality and the mind. I imagine you are thinking of religion or cults that exploit human vulnerability.

To me, it's quite literally just worship of lies, it makes quite an impression to any person to witness a shitload of people of all ages, from all socio-economic backgrounds, showing obedience in front of a god/gods they know for a fact don't really exist. Those who are most susceptible to be impressed by this form of power are those most influenced by it. I see the most religious people as either somehow emotionally/mentally feeble, or as ruthless deranged pathological liars and users.

There is really nothing remotely interesting in spirituality/religion to me beyond these aspects. Going to church and seeing people praying is like witnessing a magic trick, there are those who immediately want to learn how it was done, and those who want to believe it was "just magic" that made them do it, and there is no reason to think of any of it any further than that. In other words, those who choose to think, and those who choose not to.

"those who choose to think and those who choose not to."
This is starting to get close to what spirituality is about :)

 

[JustSwingingTheD]

What does the end look like to you?

Dark. An endless, limitless, soothing, peaceful darkness. Nothing melancholy about it either.

 

[kitch]

Enjoyable thread ... :) (I may sound dismissively sceptical , but that's me confronting orthodoxy that I feel I have the right to do ... I see my criticism of the human "modeling fetish" as being misunderstood as an attack on traditional esoteric thinking , perhaps it is ... my hero is Saint Thomas who needed to touch the wound . The Doubter.)

I had a breakdown around twenty years ago ...

It was a symbolic thing : I embraced "genuine" christianity after a life time recovering from a cult childhood.

It wasn't long before I dumped the genuine version .

I experienced some ,what I would describe now as ,'raw' energy , perhaps.
It was also describable as "mania".

It is irritating that the two models are entwined.

Maybe it is connected to disengaging from our insane civilization temporarily ? A glimpse of sanity seems so jarring that it must be "insane" (mania).

I can remember some pleasant rushes of certainty .

My general position on "spirituality" , (the unexplained / mysterious ) runs parallel to my perception of humans on this planet. Humans are narcissistic. Everything is about us. I call bull shit.

I am tempted to extend that assessment of hubris to "spirituality".
We may care about it ... we may attempt to understand it ... but we have no more relevance than an elephant or a dolphin at the end of the day , and that is the hill I'm dieing on at the moment.
So , therefore , human cogitations about "ultimate" reality are anthropocentric fetishizations of our own sense of specialness.

I am not special . That is OK.

Maybe the mania of the "spiritual experience" is the lowering of the veil of the prefrontal cortex conscious 'modeling' machine . Briefly , an overwhelming immersion into the moment / isness of "being" ?
The liberating focus of our inconsequentiality (lol !) ?
The "relief" of powerlessness in the face of indescibable beyond understanding reality ?
The liberation of wonder?

Nothing is important and that is why it matters.
The Taoist / Zoroastrian paradox.
Everything is nothing.

 

[RUPA]

haha that's a tough question. I haven't gone through the dramatic shift in identity so the sense of 'little me' is still there in daily life. But contemplating this topic brings a lot of peace and I am regularly doing what I can to help bring it about.

Generally, it's not an immediate eruption into some euphoria, and in fact the actual awakening is reportedly always different to what people expect. I'm still having to go through dealing with all sorts of practical issues past and present, which from a simplistic perspective should be unnecessary since the "I" doesn't exist. Right now, it's all going reasonably, though I definitely could do better in clearing my junk mail folder.

I've never imagined I could encounter this kinda post in SS when I joined. If only I could ever experience "no self" !!
I can intellectually agree that human beings suffer because the existence of "I" "me" "self" is so real to them.
But I can never separate this material body, thoughts, emotions from my true self or no self or fundamental consciousness.
I'd like to listen to you more.

 

[Rounded Agony]

This seems to me like it should be in offtopic as opposed to suicide discussion; I don't think there are hard and fast "rules" but something very armchair like this doesn't belong to me. Practical things, vents, feelings, questions, and directly personal stuff are usually what goes here.

 

[Pluto]

This seems to me like it should be in offtopic as opposed to suicide discussion;

This is a fair point.

As an aside, I am often asked about the connection between suicide and spirituality. It is very common for people who have major spiritual experiences to have a backgrounds being suicidal, including chronic feelings of not belonging, tragic backgrounds, immense suffering and so on. Without suffering, nobody has any impetus to ask broader questions of the nature of life in the first place.

Secondly, both are systems for (hopefully) permanently eliminating suffering. In the case of suicide, it is via death of the body, while spirituality is about death of the ego. Both have their place depending on the situation, but whatever is ultimately true is an inevitable destination for everyone, regardless of what events transpire in this or any other lifetime.

I've never imagined I could encounter this kinda post in SS when I joined. If only I could ever experience "no self" !!

Make no mistake: there's never a dull moment in this place.

The short answer to your question is that the 'I' who yearns to experience the Self, the 'me' who agrees (or disagrees) with the unreality of the individual I, and the identity as a spiritual aspirant is the same one who is causing the insufferable mental noise in the first place. Ramana Maharshi used the analogy of a policeman who never quite catches the thief, because the policeman secretly is the thief. Even non-spiritual minds are on this same bandwagon, endlessly seeking ways to feel better, even though the mind itself is the original source of the misery in the first place.

So then, who is the witness to all this activity? Who is looking through your eyes right now? There is something there that is not participating in any of this, yet is normally in the habit of identifying with a virtual person constructed in the software of the brain.

The ultimate goal is not any particular experience, but a clarification of your true nature via a shift in identity. In practice, temporary glimpses or permanent shifts can happen via a variety of ways. Some are unintentional (in moments of crisis, during NDEs, psychedelic experiences, etc.) or there are various practical methods to work towards revealing the underlying reality (self-inquiry, time with a realised teacher, deep meditation, devotion/surrender, etc.). It's important to always remember that it the truth is hidden in your immediate present-moment reality, here and now, and you just need to know where to look; the mind will turn it into a glorious future event to aspire to which only perpetuates the aforementioned cat-chasing-tail scenario.

I did make a thread about this topic before which had some good contributions from others, as has this thread. Always happy to try and answer other questions to the best of my ability. This is pretty much all that's keeping 'me' alive at the moment, hence my enthusiasm!

 

[Forever Sleep]

Reincarnation as far as I have been able to research and determine is fact. It makes more sense to me that God the universe or whatever, would recycle souls, rather than to torture them for eternity in hell, or having them strum harps in heaven for eternity. When you hurt others maliciously, you can expect the hurts to be returned to you at or in some lifetime. If you cripple someone in another life, you too shall have life where you are crippled. The karmic energy is something like a mathematics equation, the equation must be balanced. Karma is met in either the letter of the law of karma, or the spirit of the law of karma. If you kill another in one life, you must pay in a future life. In the letter of the law of karma, you shall be killed the same way, but under the karmic law of grace, you might have a future life of bad health, instead of being killed. The karmic law of grace or spirit of the law of karma, is applied when one is sincerely sorry for a wrong they have committed.

Reincarnation makes a horrible amount of sense to me sometimes. I think the whole karma thing would make more sense- like you said- being cruel in one life is repaid in the next.

Still, I guess my hope is- if it really IS a thing- then it is a mechanism for good- that in each life, we strive to be better. In which case- wouldn't it be helpful to remember past lives so that we know where we need to improve? While some claim to remember previous existences, most of us don't. What's the point in factory re-setting us each time?

That makes me worry- that if reincarnation is real- then it's just as much a part of this sadistic experiment as everything else- giving everything bodies that degrade and fail, giving us a consciousness that is very aware of all the pain we are experiencing/ are likely to experience in the future. Over and over again...

 

[Kali Yuga]

Enjoyable thread ... :) (I may sound dismissively sceptical , but that's me confronting orthodoxy that I feel I have the right to do ... I see my criticism of the human "modeling fetish" as being misunderstood as an attack on traditional esoteric thinking , perhaps it is ... my hero is Saint Thomas who needed to touch the wound . The Doubter.)

I had a breakdown around twenty years ago ...

It was a symbolic thing : I embraced "genuine" christianity after a life time recovering from a cult childhood.

It wasn't long before I dumped the genuine version .

I experienced some ,what I would describe now as ,'raw' energy , perhaps.
It was also describable as "mania".

It is irritating that the two models are entwined.

Maybe it is connected to disengaging from our insane civilization temporarily ? A glimpse of sanity seems so jarring that it must be "insane" (mania).

I can remember some pleasant rushes of certainty .

My general position on "spirituality" , (the unexplained / mysterious ) runs parallel to my perception of humans on this planet. Humans are narcissistic. Everything is about us. I call bull shit.

I am tempted to extend that assessment of hubris to "spirituality".
We may care about it ... we may attempt to understand it ... but we have no more relevance than an elephant or a dolphin at the end of the day , and that is the hill I'm dieing on at the moment.
So , therefore , human cogitations about "ultimate" reality are anthropocentric fetishizations of our own sense of specialness.

I am not special . That is OK.

Maybe the mania of the "spiritual experience" is the lowering of the veil of the prefrontal cortex conscious 'modeling' machine . Briefly , an overwhelming immersion into the moment / isness of "being" ?
The liberating focus of our inconsequentiality (lol !) ?
The "relief" of powerlessness in the face of indescibable beyond understanding reality ?
The liberation of wonder?

Nothing is important and that is why it matters.
The Taoist / Zoroastrian paradox.
Everything is nothing.

You get it. I know what you mean about the mania. That feeling of "insanity" is the closest feeling to sanity whereby you realise it is the world that is in fact insane. A whole model of civilisation built around ego, punishment, suffering, etc. We trust teachers, scientists, government when really they are as naive as anyone else, following a narrative that fits the paradigm.

Narcissists seek self fulfilling ventures at the expense of others. Sociopaths who lack empathy naturally seek power and gravitate towards positions of power that rule and write the narrative. Politicians, bankers etc. But I refuse to believe that humans are all narcissistic. The modern world is a breeding ground for narcissism compared to our tribal roots. But many people overcome self fulfilment and even contest it at large to bring peace to the masses. Nelson Mandela, Buddha etc. Even a neighbour who gifts a simple but genuine smile. Light and love always prevail in time

 

[kitch]

You get it. I know what you mean about the mania. That feeling of "insanity" is the closest feeling to sanity whereby you realise it is the world that is in fact insane. A whole model of civilisation built around ego, punishment, suffering, etc. We trust teachers, scientists, government when really they are as naive as anyone else, following a narrative that fits the paradigm.

Narcissists seek self fulfilling ventures at the expense of others. Sociopaths who lack empathy naturally seek power and gravitate towards positions of power that rule and write the narrative. Politicians, bankers etc. But I refuse to believe that humans are all narcissistic. The modern world is a breeding ground for narcissism compared to our tribal roots. But many people overcome self fulfilment and even contest it at large to bring peace to the masses. Nelson Mandela, Buddha etc. Even a neighbour who gifts a simple but genuine smile. Light and love always prevail in time

Thanks for your reply , ( I was worried that I had been a bit of a nihilist vandal ... but my brutal "negativity" is something I feel I have to let out sometimes and I'm glad you seem to have "got it" . Phew ! )

I have recently connected with the "competition v co-operation" model of human interaction , a very simple over view .

We can either "get on with each other" (and relax) or fetishize our heirachy obsession and compete (and stress the F out constantly .... Robert Sapolsky Baboon studies style ).

I had a bit of a freaky day today ...
I had a negative interaction with a stranger ( I lost my cool , my bad) ... which led seamlessly into a very pleasant interaction with another stranger ... it was very odd ... and disturbingly (if I am to entertain such mysticism ) ( I just can't help myself) raised the old chestnut of a negative begetting a positive .

This is the kind of 'experiential' celebration/acceptance of suffering that I loath to the core ... so todays mild / lite version was kind of weird .

 

[Kali Yuga]

Thanks for your reply , ( I was worried that I had been a bit of a nihilist vandal ... but my brutal "negativity" is something I feel I have to let out sometimes and I'm glad you seem to have "got it" . Phew ! )

I have recently connected with the "competition v co-operation" model of human interaction , a very simple over view .

We can either "get on with each other" (and relax) or fetishize our heirachy obsession and compete (and stress the F out constantly .... Robert Sapolsky Baboon studies style ).

All good to vent. "Nihilist vandal" sounds almost poetic

This.... I know the studies you're referring to. It makes you realise how similar our civilisations can be to the hierarchy of tyrannical baboons who profit from others' stress. But again, good always overcome bad and not with replaced violence/punishment, but holding positive space for even newcomer aggressive baboons to adapt and evolve with the elevated new and improved collective way. And just like that, you have a shift in consciousness.

Even the whole Darwinian model being mistaken as competition and "survival of the fittest" is just another example of arrogant humans/naive science projecting its own ego on to the world at large. This is psychic contamination; To peer at the world through the myopic eyes of ego and lack the awareness to distinguish one's internal reality from the objective truth. I.e, "I compete with my neighbour to have a bigger house, therefore birds obviously compete with each other for the best tree like I would." Projection…
But nature is the most balanced force there is. There is as much take as there is give. All individual life operates collectively for the greater ecosystem to evolve forward… working selflessly and selfishly as one. All connected. operating on a principal many MODERN humans struggle to learn, "one for all and all for one" so to speak. Or "one IS all and all IS one". I say "modern" because our ancestors and also first peoples culture across the world understand this and do not compete or take advantage of the land or each other. This usually happens after a form of "civilisation" happens whereby hierarchy is established. Ironically the most uncivil times. But..! like the baboon colony, we're always slowly realising that our current way of life isn't working out for the majority and things are starting to change. we've already come so since the 50s let alone from the dark ages. I believe a peaceful Utopia will eventuate in time.

I had a bit of a freaky day today ...
I had a negative interaction with a stranger ( I lost my cool , my bad) ... which led seamlessly into a very pleasant interaction with another stranger ... it was very odd ... and disturbingly (if I am to entertain such mysticism ) ( I just can't help myself) raised the old chestnut of a negative begetting a positive .

That's interesting, usually for me negative energy only attracts more negative if I don't catch it in time. I've realised too many "coincidences" while holding rage within myself… e.g I start the day ruminating about how others have wronged me, then my day vibrates in a similar way that brings aggressive people with road rage, or a dog randomly barks aggressively at me etc. like attracts like. Even science recognises the power of "bias confirmation".

Why do you think you had a positive interaction after a negative one? Maybe after such an intense negative experience, you wanted to counteract it? Like trying to neutralise that weird and scary atmosphere a horror movie leaves for example. Or maybe people's niceness seemed exaggerated after such hostility?

I guess it's a part of bipolar, but I can get really REALLY angry which I'm only recently starting to understand the spiritual importance of working through. I always justified it logically, when people seemed undeniably at fault, but ive realised in their reality, they honestly can't see their wrongdoing and justice/punishment/violence will not raise their awareness but will only attempt to satisfy my ego. I've learnt that No reaction is the best reaction which is a game changer, because I always thought justice was the right thing, but justice is just another narrative of society. Almost mob mentality. Not saying legal justice doesn't have its place, but personal/social justice, even when undeniably wronged (e.g racism, bullying etc) only fuels punishment which is never constructive. Even The baboons knew this lol. Love/compassion is the only true way to evolve the collective. Nature is honestly one of the best teachers we have.

This is the kind of 'experiential' celebration/acceptance of suffering that I loath to the core ... so todays mild / lite version was kind of weird

What do you mean exactly? But yeah, you're right. "Acceptance" of suffering in a defeated or celebrated way is not the true acceptance that only brings peace not loathing.

On the extreme side, there's those who seem to befriend their suffering to the point of a histrionic like victimhood. I've seen this all too often in many homeless people… family too… Where their whole identity desperately tries to manipulate sympathy out of others or seeking validation of their delusional suffering to avoid any responsibly for their suffering endured and/or caused. People like this get my unconditional compassion, but I have encountered to many like this to let them manipulate my sympathy which only enables and does no favours.

I think we all can feel defeated and pessimistic. But I guess in a way that's a positive thing about bipolar, in which it at least gifts you goggles, albeit temporarily, to know that the world isn't complete nihilism and hopelessness. It can have its "Ups". And life has shown me too much good to deny that there is light and love out there if you can tune in to it. That brings me both peace and sadness

 

[Ihatemylife6]

In the course of a year, i went from nihilistic and a scientific background to experiencing some kind of spirituality that brought an unprecedented peace and meaning to life. I went on to explore what I was experiencing to discover two things:

1. What I was experiencing/discovering was not limited to me, but had been known and written about in spiritual literature by many different cultures throughout history.

2. That my experience was also a common symptom of bipolar mania; feeling connected with the universe at large.

Ultimately, I'm left some what confused because though I have definitely crashed from my spiritual magical high in to the bipolar depression, I can not completely dismiss my experience as crazy or false. It introduced me to my spirit/soul/consciousness. And although in my current depression, I don't feel it in my soul, i still believe in it intellectually.

I do not believe death is the end. Even science states energy can not be created or destroyed, but transfers. This sways me toward believing in reincarnation.

I guess I'm just wondering if others consider the after life and what you all believe or expect after death?

Do you think a death by CTB will still experience the love and light reported by near death experiences?

I think Hindu and Buddhism believe that the soul must undergo suffering until it becomes "enlightened". Catholic believe in hell, which I think is a misunderstood metaphor used as a fear tactic. My question to Catholics would ask if non curable psychiatric conditions like bipolar were exempt from "hell"? Because in a way, mental illness can predict a death as "natural" as something like cancer

I've watched one YT vid where a medium discusses some kind of "lobby" the soul can hang out in with no suffering, where there's only peace and love until the soul is guided through its problems so it's ready to overcome the in the next life.

In no way am I preaching anything on anyone, I just wanted to discuss spirituality and suicide as there is limited info. I also wanted to know what others believe in. It's something that will be on my mind as I take my final breath

I've always thought after we die it'd be nothing. Like before we were born, we didn't have an existence. That's my perspective of life, but again anything is possible. We will never know until one day hopefully I will find out soon.

 

[Kali Yuga]

I've always thought after we die it'd be nothing. Like before we were born, we didn't have an existence. That's my perspective of life, but again anything is possible. We will never know until one day hopefully I will find out soon.

Before we were born? Only few people in the world claim to be able to recall this time. Often it leads to tales of reincarnation. But I agree, we will never know with certainty