SEEK.
If you join LiveReal, here's what you'll get.
- Full access to all member-only content
- The Perennial Psychology book (in pdf format)
- "An Introduction to Inner Work" Online Course
- "Foundations of a Life Philosophy" | Full Content
- The John Horgan Audio Interview
- "Avoid Being Manipulated" Mini-Course
- A Private, Members-Only Discussion Forum
- A List of Our Recommended Books and Products
You'll also probably get that warm feeling of satisfaction that comes from supporting a free and independent voice that's working to make things a bit clearer and lighter around here. No extra charge.
If you need more details on all this, here you go.
Lots of folks are interested in the topics we explore.
"The Big Questions." Avoiding deathbed regrets. "Human potential." Really "living" instead of just "surviving." Various "games of life," and which ones are worth playing.
Stuff like that.
Life isn't easy. Things like genuine happiness, relationships that aren't train wrecks, mental and emotional strength, and genuine spiritual clarity in this crazy world don't usually just drop in your lap.
They take effort.
A "normal" day can sometimes feel like an existential street brawl.
At the same time, lots of folks are navigating this treacherous terrain completely alone. And they're sometimes doing it with inaccurate and outdated maps, broken compasses, and leaky old canteens. They're wrestling existential monsters armed only with a pocket full of Jell-O and a plastic spork. Which is sometimes the only things the modern world has armed them with.
So, lots of folks think about this stuff.
But it's often secret, hidden away, tucked far back there.
They often don’t talk about it. It’s like a hidden little pocket of unspoken, forbidden thoughts and questions. And it's understandable: after all, it can be hard to bring it up sometimes. Especially in a culture often obsessed with inconsequential nonsense.
A major obstacle to figuring all this stuff out is going at it alone, with no support system.
Meanwhile, when it comes to exploring this stuff out in the world…
It’s the Wild West out there.
If you’ve been at this a while, you know what we’re talking about. The flood of noise, hype, fragmentary scraps of knowledge and downright misinformation - coming from both "experts" and amateurs - can be a huge challenge.
That said, a lot of folks have also been exploring this kind of stuff for a long time.
They've been around the block more than a few times. They have experience. They have a huge load of lessons they’ve learned the hard way. They could probably help some folks, and save them some trouble, by passing on some of what they've learned.
Yet, they're often being passed by and ignored.
So…
LiveReal is a place where folks who are interested in this stuff can meet up.
It’s a place where like-minded folks can compare notes, trade tips, swap advice, and quite possibly, help each other figure a lot more things out, a lot faster.
Lots of individuals are dissatisfied with toothless, bumper sticker sound-byte philosophies and bland, market-tested slogans as their sole guide to life.
They know that appearance isn't reality. Just the opposite, in fact: if you want the truth, you have to dig for it.
In other words, some folks are "Seekers."
LiveReal is a headquarters for Seekers.
Our approach is practical, no-nonsense, see-for-yourself, take-what-you-like-and-leave-the-rest.
We strive to be open-minded yet tough-minded, truth-seeking but fair. It’s where religion and science meet common sense.
So if you’re interested in this kind of stuff too…welcome aboard.
You’re among friendlies here.
So this is where we’re supposed to give you a big fancy sales pitch.
But instead of doing that, we’re just going to say this:
Just the Course
$245 (one-time)
- "An Introduction to Inner Work" Course
Not happy? We have a 60-day refund guarantee,
hassle-free, no questions asked.
Become a Member
$36 / year
- Full access to all member-only content
- The Perennial Psychology book (in pdf format)
- "An Introduction to Inner Work" Online Course
- "Foundations of a Life Philosophy" | Full Content
- The John Horgan Audio Interview
- "Avoid Being Manipulated" Mini-Course
- A Private, Members-Only Discussion Forum
- A List of Our Recommended Books and Products
Your pricing will never increase as long as you're a member.
60-day refund guarantee,
hassle-free, no questions asked.
That's how we keep the lights on.
We aren't asking for donations or handouts. Our goal is to provide value to you that far exceeds what you put into it.
We don't have to answer to any Daddy Warbucks who tells us what we can and can't say. We have no academic department heads, white-wig-wearing Council of Elders, or corporate overlords telling us what we're allowed to explore or not. We aren't trust-fund babies. We explore to wherever weird crannies the evidence leads us to. And then we bring it all back here and share it with you.
We also don't collect information about you and sell it. And we never will. There's also no upselling, no secret “upgrade to the Super-Mega-MEGA-$10k-Level for the real stuff.” Nope.
It's just us - our hearty, scrappy little ragtag team of underdogs - and you, and other folks like you.
So, what do I get if I join?
Great question.
LIVEREAL MEMBERS GET MORE.
Immediate, Full Access to the Entire Site
A backstage, all-access pass to mingle with the stars. (Umm, and by “stars,” we mean our private, members-only content.)
The Perennial Psychology, The Full Book
A timeless approach to understanding human nature, in pdf format for members.
More about the book here, and available at Amazon here.
“An Introduction to 'Inner Work'” | The Online Course
This is the online course (more details below) that lays the foundation, sets the stage, cuts a path through the jungle with a machete to help make way for more advanced conversations to come.
It’s also the fruit of decades of research, investigation and painstaking experimentation. It’s an introductory-level course, but it’s also a huge amount of clear, no-nonsense content on some difficult topics that could save you years of wandering in the wilderness.
More about the course below, or a more in-depth description here.
"How To Not Be Manipulated: The Basics In 15 Minutes"
A lot of folks out there want to manipulate you. This is how to defend yourself. More on this here.
Audio Interview: "The Limits of Science" with John Horgan of Scientific American
We sat down for a rollicking interview with John Horgan, Senior Writer at Scientific American and author of The End of Science, The Undiscovered Mind, and Rational Mysticism. More on this here.
Access to our Recommended Products
Working on yourself and really figuring yourself out is hard enough when you get great advice and rock-solid information.
But with bad advice and confusing, badly-communicated, slippery misinformation and sloganeering, it’s way more difficult. In fact, it can even make things worse.
There’s a flood of hype, noise, and expertly-marketed, well-intentioned nonsense out there. But the real risk: just few bad ideas can throw you off course for years. (We've learned a few things the hard way.) Even good ideas – but at the wrong time, or used in the wrong way – can turn into time-wasting detours and time spent barking up wrong existential trees.
To help remedy this, we’ve gathered a list of resources we recommend that, in our opinions, are solid, trusty, or least-likely-to-send-you-on-a-misguided-and-unnecessary-odyssey. Think of it as a kind of “Consumer’s Reports” guide for The Big Stuff.
A Community / Cavalry / Reinforcements to help put this stuff into practice
We’re all drowning in information overload these days. But mere information just clutters the place up…unless you apply it, translate it into understanding, integrate it into real life.
So, how are we attempting to help remedy that? By helping you, to the degree that we can, to put this into practice. Through…
A Cozy Gathering Spot/Stomping Ground/Headquarters for folks who are interested in this stuff
A group of folks who are interested in the same things, on the same page, working together to help everyone succeed…?
Crazy, wild idea, we know.
Let’s face it: the culture these days isn’t exactly fertile soil for contemplative thought.
Enough of this can convince a lot of thoughtful folks to “go at it” all alone. And we all wind up poorer because of it.
So, Join the Rebels.
If this sounds at all familiar, you probably understand what we’re trying to get at. This is all no small part why we’ve created this site: as a crash-pad for thoughtful seekers, seeking thinkers, and the spiritually homeless where folks who are interested in this stuff can get together in…
A Private, Members-Only Discussion Forum
A lost art: good, old-fashioned conversation.
We feature a private, members-only Discussion Board where you can ask questions, have conversations, share tips, rant a little, compare notes, get (and give) reality checks, get stuff off your chest, tell dumb jokes and get weird in a friendly and supportive environment with other folks who are interested in this stuff. We've told search engines to stay out, so it’s just us.
Like Nietzsche said: “One person seeks a midwife for his thoughts…Here is the origin of a good conversation.”
At any rate, the culture here is designed to support mutual respect, reasoned dialogue, fruitful discussions, friendly disagreements, lively interactions, support, honesty, tough love, and…did we mention ultracool, interesting, fun, intelligent and highly attractive people? Oh yeah - that too.
Extra Members-Only content.
For example:
5 Big Ideas That All Major Spiritual Traditions, and Atheists, and Agnostics Agree On
The #1 Reason Why Self-Help Fails So Often (and How To Overcome It)
2 Important Names Worth Knowing When It Comes To Understanding Relationships (That You Might Not Have Heard Of)
…and more.
Complete and total spiritual enlightenment. Which is nice.
(Yes, we’re kidding.)
The good vibe that comes from being a Patron of a good cause
We’re working to make ourselves a bit more wise, a little more sane, fulfilled, compassionate and all kinds of fairly mushy stuff.
But this isn’t all about mush.
We’re also working to solve serious problems. The topics we explore touch on deal with things real people are struggling with. Meaninglessness, angst, nihilism, depression, anxiety, suicide, relationship problems, existential crisis, stress, and good old-fashioned “the world just doesn’t make sense” syndrome.
We’re working to explore no-nonsense, practical, workable, affordable solutions to situations like these. Because sometimes (despite what some nameless corporate overlords might say), the answer isn’t simply a matter of finding the right happy pill. It takes some hard thinking, and figuring stuff out, and soul-searching.
We’ve been working on figuring some of this out quite some time now. And we’re still working on it.
But we want to do more. We have a pretty big storehouse of unpublished stuff that’s in-progress but isn’t ready for prime time yet. The vast amounts of time, energy and expense it takes to create all this is painstakingly, vividly real to us.
But by becoming a Highly Esteemed Patron, you help us do more.
Those are the high points.
There are other ways we think about what we’re trying to do here.
In a way, it's kind of like:
• your own private Think-Tank.
• your own team of Information Brokers.
• your own personal Support Network.
• your own community of Core Inner Strength Trainers.
• your own Secret Club of Like-Minded Folks.
…but we won’t go into all that here. (We’re trying to keep this short. Unsuccessfully.)
Except maybe one thing…
“Your own Secret Club of Like-Minded Folks.”
What's that about?
We could point to how “The Concord Quartet” (Emerson, Thoreau, Alcott and Hawthorne) used to compare notes and read each others’ stuff. J. R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis and others hung out together, drank beer, and eventually wrote some of the greatest books of all time. The “Beats” (Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs and others) used to collaborate. Socrates and Plato weren't strangers. Plato and Aristotle probably crossed paths more than a few times. And so on.
Meaning, this:
Folks working together can often get better results than folks working separately.
A good community of people giving you feedback, reality checks, suggestions, support and so on can make a difference on the scale of an entirely new order of magnitude.
Finding a good community can be hard. But if you find one, it can save years of efforts, tons of energy, a lot of sanity, assuming it's built on a good foundation. (“Good foundation” meaning stuff like good conversation, respectful back-and-forth, free-thinking logic, clear-minded reasoning, healthy dialogue, open-mindedness combined with rigorous thought, friendly argumentation, and so on.)
This is the kind of community we’re working to build here.
(Just to be clear: we aren’t promising that you’ll write the next Hobbit or Walden immediately after joining. (Then again, who knows?))
Stuff Folks Have Said About LiveReal
"I've been cruising around LiveReal. I'm mightily impressed with your professionalism, ambition and erudition, especially given that it's all served up with such appealing humor and self-deprecation... I coulda used LiveReal when I was a messed up 20 (or 30) year old, it might've saved me a lot of grief. Or not. But I woulda felt like I had more company on my path..."
- John Horgan, Senior Writer at Scientific American, author of The End of Science, The Undiscovered Mind, Rational Mysticism, and The End of War
"LiveReal is a true gem, tackling the most vitally important issues of the modern world in a way that desperately needs to be heard. I believe LiveReal has the potential to truly become a force to be reckoned with in psychology and spirituality."
- Barnet Bain, author of The Third Story, producer of What Dreams May Come, Milton's Secret and Homeless to Harvard
"One of the best websites I have ever experienced."
- Ernie, Winnipeg, MB, Canada
"Finally everything I think about in one website/place!"
- Stephanie, 21, Converse, TX
"Exactly what I am looking for. A real group of people concerned about spending time concentrating on what is really important…"
- Barbara, 54, Spring Hill, FL
"I think about things like this all the time. Usually by myself. Nice to see that others think like me."
- Fahad K
"IT IS THE ONLY HONEST THING I'VE SEEN ON THE NET"
- MaryAnn, Scottsville, KY
"It is inside my head. It is asking and answering crucial questions that no one else seems to have except me."
- Neil, 43, Elgin, TX
"It seems like it was made for me, like this may be exactly what I need at this point in my journey. I feel like this web portal will make me a better person, and help me to make things better for others."
- Michael, 33, Lewes, DE
"...I can't stop saying how excited I am about this site... I want to suck the articles in, contemplate them for myself, and then tell others about them....I love having the opportunity to contemplate for myself questions I have never considered until LiveReal got me aware of them..."
- Ami, 19, Tuczon, AZ
"Plain truth as if somebody has put down my thoughts."
- Rahul, 28, New Delhi, India
"I've read a couple of articles and they were real, honest with no bullshit and that corresponded to my pain and made feel like I'm not recluse in my suffering."
- Khaled, 20, Cairo, Egypt
"Great Articles.....a focus on something truly practical. Something normal people can grasp which isn't rooted in esoterica and vague theoretical mumbo jumbo. And yet, a site which acknowledges that there's got to be something more, something beyond the mundane grit of everyday."
- Jackie, New York, NY
"I have never run across anything like this. Never have I been invited to join and communicate with other people who understand the true nature of this bizarre place that we call "Alive""
- Jefferson, 20, U North Alabama, Florence, AL
"It's unlike ANYTHING I thought I'd ever find on the internet, but it seems like EVERYTHING I've been looking for in life can be found here."
- Christopher, 20, Los Angeles, CA
"...a discussion of ideas that I consider to be fundamentally important...It feels like an oasis of sanity and reason and a force for good in an online world that is so often none of those things."
- Matthew, 41, London, UK
"From what I've seen so far, has given me something. What that something is I couldn't tell you, describe it, but it's something. Knowledge maybe? Peace of mind? I haven't a clue. But there's something here and I'm being held back from more of it."
- Erik, 30, New Windsor, NY
(Note: The above quotes come from real folks, not paid actors. They refer to an earlier version of the site, before it evolved into the even better version you see before you here. 🙂 Anyway, we'll stop for now. We're trying to be humble here. )
FAQ
Do the courses have video, audio and written materials?
Right now, the courses are in a written format only. They're both digital and printable. We might create audio and video versions later, if enough folks want them.
What if I join, and then suddenly change my mind and decide you suck?
No problem. You can cancel any time. We promise to do everything we can to be nice and hassle-free about it. (We might as you why, so maybe we can fix it, but that's it. Really.)
So, can I definitely cancel at any time?
Yes.
What about a refund?
A bit jittery, are we? Ha - no problem. Totally understandable. Seriously, our plan is not to take your eighty-nine bucks and hightail it to Tijuana. So…yes. If you join and decide it’s not a good fit, then we’ll give you a 30-day, easy refund, no sweat.
Why a community? Why not just a blog?
Sometimes interacting with other actual human beings instead of navigating through piles of information by yourself can make all the difference. Especially with stuff as important, personal, and sensitive as this. There’s a major, vital difference between, say, merely reading an article about losing weight and the experience of being in a weight-watchers group, or merely reading an article about alcoholism and the experience of being in an AA meeting. So we thought it just made sense to have a place where folks who are all interested in this stuff can get together and talk/interact/share tips without trolls, spam, or weird looks. (OK, we still give each other weird looks sometimes, but it's all in good fun.)
Is there any kind of secret, hidden agenda here?
OK, let’s be extremely clear about this: we love and are all about open, rational, free, clear, reasonable thinking. We encourage disagreement. We’re less about “what” folks “should” think, more about good, clear, rigorous thinking, period. If trolls, troublemakers or folks with other agendas show up, we’ll ask them to leave. Anyone is free to leave whenever they want. It’s hard to prove a negative, but well, we’d encourage you to poke around on the rest of the site. Hopefully you can get a vibe that we are what we say we are. (And who are we, ultimately? Ha. Something to explore…another time.)
Is anyone secretly controlling you behind the scenes?
LiveReal is secretly owned by some sinister, shady corporate supervillain that’s part of some elaborate and diabolical plot.
Yes, we’re kidding again.
Nope. It’s just us.
LiveReal is 100% free of that kind of stuff. We are fully and completely funded and operated, 100%, by us – the creators – and you – our revered Patrons. We create it, control it, operate it, steer it, own it.
Which means we have no corporate boss telling us what we can say and not say.
No university department head dangling tenure in front of us, telling us what we can research and what we can't.
No angry sergeant pounding his desk, yelling that he's been getting lots of heat because of the questions we've been asking, telling us we're off the case, asking for our guns and badges, ordering us to to stop sniffing around and causing trouble.
No fat-cat Sugar Daddy Warbucks paying us to come to certain conclusions and not others, to hype certain results and bury others. (cough cough pharmaceuticals! cough)
We follow the evidence down wherever weird, twisty trails it leads, and bring it back here for you to poke and ponder.
And that is our plan: to keep be able to continue to follow the truth, as we find it, wherever it leads.
Are you promising to cure all my problems?
No.
We think of this as kind of like a gym. A gym doesn’t promise to lift the weights for you. That part's up to you.
In the same way that nobody can eat, drink, sleep, breathe and etc for you, nobody can “work on yourself” for you. But we’ll do our best to give you the tools, give you a clean, dry, supportive place to work, hopefully surround you with other folks who are doing the same thing so you can swap pointers, discuss finer points of stuff, spot for you, tell you to maybe avoid the month-old lo mien in the refrigerator, and high-five you every so often.
So, at long last, here’s the offer:
Just the Course
$245 (one-time)
- "An Introduction to Inner Work" Course
Full 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee.
Join LiveReal
$36 / year
- Full access to the entire site
- The Perennial Psychology book (in pdf format)
- "An Introduction to Inner Work" Online Course
- "Foundations of a Life Philosophy" | Full Content
- The John Horgan Audio Interview
- "Avoid Being Manipulated" Mini-Course
- A Private Members-Only Discussion Forum
- A List of our Recommended Products
Your pricing will never increase as long as you're a member.
Not happy? We have a 60-day refund guarantee,
hassle-free, no questions asked.
SO, WHAT'S IN THE "INTRODUCTION TO INNER WORK" COURSE?
That is yet another great question.
Below is a partial Table of Contents. Or, you can get a more in-depth description here.
Inner Work: A Brief Overview
A Basic Introduction to "Inner Work"
A Basic Introduction to "Peak Experiences"
Peak Experiences as "Glimpses"
How to Cultivate Peak Experiences
Foundations: 5 Approaches to Inner Work
1) Our Core Personal Narrative and The Big Questions
2) Our "Core Delusion"
3) Our Inner Body Parts (...and horses...?)
4) A Theory of Human Nature in 5 Words
5) "Human Potential": A Brief, Non-Cheesy Version
A Brief Overview of Techniques, Methods, Practices
A Few Ground Rules on Techniques
Major Techniques
Minor Techniques
A Basic Overview of Meditation
Important Notes About Techniques, Methods, Exercises
"What's the best technique?"
The limits of techniques
"Process verses Content"
Don't bring a spoon to a cannon fight
All of these techniques can be misused
...and more.
The Fruit of Inner Work
Where To Go From Here
What's the format of the course?
It's an online learning system - something like the rest of the content on the site, but the ability to mark your progress through the various chapters and topics (mentioned above.)
To be clear: it's not currently video or audio. In its current form, it's content that is 1) digital (online), and 2) a downloadable pdf that you can read as one single document or print.
How long is the course?
The pdf by itself is 192 pages. There's a really clear and handy Table of Contents that allows you read everything in order or skip around if that's your style.
So, one last time...
Just the Course
$245 (one-time)
- "An Introduction to Inner Work" Course
Not happy? We have a 60-day refund guarantee,
hassle-free, no questions asked.
Become a Member
$36 / year
- Full access to all member-only content
- The Perennial Psychology book (in pdf format)
- "An Introduction to Inner Work" Online Course
- Additional Audio Interview and Mini-Course
- A Private Members-Only Discussion Forum
- A List of our Recommended Products
Your pricing will never increase as long as you're a member.
Not happy? We have a 60-day refund guarantee,
hassle-free, no questions asked.
So, that's our fancy sales pitch. (That's about as fancy as it gets around here.)
Hope to see you around.
Until then,
Jonathan
LiveReal.com | The last great frontier is yourself