Others ~ Selected Correspondence

Spiritualism

I can’t believe it, I’m actually discovering now, how the spiritual enlightenment is such a delusion. Such a fantasy. The Truth. And it’s the ultimate truth of the human reality. Oh man. Damn! I have just saw a movie that my spiritual enlightened guru have advised me to see (Vanilla Sky) saying (the spiritual teacher) how the movie helps to see the concept of awakening from the dream of mundane living to the greater reality, The Truth, (to fall into the truth of my self) and I see that it’s such an ego trip. And the most fascinating and uncomfortable for now thing for me is that spiritual enlightenment is the ultimate truth of the human condition, and it shapes all the other believe systems and values.

Damn. And this genuinely enlightened guy talks about how after one have awakened to the real truth, everything is cool, life is just a dream, he can as well swing in his hammock to the rest of his life, he is the Self, live is a dream, he is enjoying that now he sees it’s a dream and others still don’t, and since he is not this body anyway, he just can wait until time finishes him. And I thought it’s the ultimate life can be!

And just a few months ago I’ve read his writings with such an enthusiasm! The excitement was that I’m heading to the final truth and I’ll find the truth after all and will be saved! Now I’m starting to see that it is such a self centred trip that is empowered by the instincts of wanting power and self glory, (to such an un-fun place) and those instincts (the drive behind the direction to self - who am the real I) aren’t even questioned!

Part of me can’t believe just how far away actualism and spiritual enlightenment are. The distance is actuality, this sensible life, this infinite universe vs. imagination. I see how heading toward actuality is such a turn away from the human reality and from the spiritual reality. The actuality is just here and the awakened self just sees the hierarchy of reality which persons like him give status quo to and stand on the top of this whole direction.

What an ego tripper I was, heading to a world that is more and more inner, accepting the physical universe and everything as a hologram, as some infinite equation, which in the final truth I am. But big part of me is still automatically heading there, but now the instinctual drive starting to be more noticed. Self sucks me in from being here now to an imaginable (real) source.

It’s seem like a very scary thing to give up all reality completely. No 104, 2.9.2006

So, are you a Christian? Do you agree with what you have offered as the ‘Christian view?’

What I am and what I agree to is completely irrelevant for the fact that the actualist’s claims regards ‘the entity as soul’ are based on mis-information and are mis-information themselves.

Just so there is no room for misunderstanding – would you state clearly exactly what the ‘mis-information’ is that you are referring to?

Exactly what are the actualist claims regarding ‘the entity as soul?’ that you are saying are incorrect?

They might be talking about something when they talk about the ‘entity’, but they have incorrectly equated it with the notions ‘soul’ and ‘spirit’; the ‘entity’ correlates with ‘Satan’ [‘adversary’] as understood in orthodox theology and none other.

Here’s a definition from dictionary.com...

en·ti·ty

1. Something that exists as a particular and discrete unit: Persons and corporations are equivalent entities under the law.

2. The fact of existence; being.

3. The existence of something considered apart from its properties.

Certainly nothing there about Satan or ‘adversary.’

Do you think it would matter one bit what meanings that orthodox theology would correlate with the word ‘entity.’ In my experience, Richard pretty much sticks with dictionary usage.

My understanding of the word ‘entity’ is that it is basically a synonym for ‘being’ or ‘presence.’ It is the being or ‘essence’ of a person.

This all proves once again that R has no clue whatsoever about true religion and true metaphysics How does it do that? Also, notice that in order to claim there is such a thing as ‘true religion’ and ‘true metaphysics’ – that such things must exist in contrast to ‘false’ religion and ‘false’ metaphysics.

Since you are claiming there is ‘true religion’ and ‘true metaphysics’ – it is relevant what you believe, since what you believe determines your view of what is true or false.

...and all his confused attributions about the ‘entity’ are strongly biased by his former mystical inclinations;

How so?

...equally, their followers understanding about spirituality, religion and metaphysics is more than questionable, which shows in many unqualified comments; most likely due to their long-time exposure to Bhagwan’s maddening syncretism.

It might be helpful to name specific people rather than painting all ‘followers’ with the same brush. I can only guess here that you are really referring solely to Peter and Vineeto – otherwise, you are hoping to use this explanation as a sleight of hand to stand in for other ‘followers’ as well.

[copied from the URL]: ‘In the real world, the human psyche or entity that dwells within the physical body is defined as being permanent and real and, as such, deemed to be actual. This entity as soul, spirit or mind is a non-corporeal entity that is ‘inside’ the physical flesh and blood body, looking out through the eyes, hearing through the ears, smelling through the nose, etc.’

Here again to contrast these wrong attributions of the ‘entity’ as ‘soul’ or ‘spirit’ [and also certainly not as ‘mind’]:

Again, would you state clearly why these attributions are wrong?

‘According to the Christian view the human person is not a soul temporarily enclosed in a body, ...’

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Or – do you side with the ‘perennialists’ – like Rene Guenon? or both?

I’m curious why you would quote both the ‘Christian view’ as well as from people like Guenon, Coomaraswamy, and Schuon at the same time, unless you see them as being in harmony.

Being that you are attempting to reduce actualism to a spiritual framework

I am not attempting anything here.

You most certainly are ‘attempting’ something here.

Regardless whether you succeed or fail – one must make an attempt in order to demonstrate something.

Perhaps you mean that you are not ‘merely’ attempting?

I demonstrated how actualism is neither metaphysics, philosophy, religion, science, but a body of dogmatic assertions about sense perceptions, immunised by an improper application of certain metaphysical principles; like for example the identity of subject (report) and object (reported), or the consubstantiality of body, perception apparatus, and universe, overlayed with attributions properly belonging to the Absolute.

Being that you are reading actualism as a belief system, it is no surprise that you think you have demonstrated that it is a ‘body of dogmatic assertions about sense perceptions...’

In brief: actualism is not a belief system. And since dogma requires belief – it cannot be a body of dogmatic assertions either.

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– do you care to lay your cards on the table as to what you actually believe?

What I believe or not believe is totally irrelevant.

If only that were the case, huh? But you see – you are claiming that there is such a thing as ‘true religion’ and ‘true metaphysics’ – so you cannot get off the hook so easily. In order for you to claim there is ‘true religion’ and ‘true metaphysics’ – you would be required to fess up to what you actually believe – in order to support those claims. Otherwise your claims rest on ... zilch. No 37 to No 81, 25.9.2005

I also showed that the only one who could uncover such an ‘Absolute in disguise’ is someone who is entity-free; but such a person [like BR for example] will not be acknowledged as an ‘authority’ by R for the very reason that s/he wouldn’t make the same dogmatic assertions about sense perceptions, hence, so prescribes the perverse logic [based on the immunising fallacy: report = reported], s/he cannot be entity-free and must be in ASC!

You say that you ‘showed that the only one who could uncover such an ‘Absolute in disguise’ is someone who is entity-free’ but you are claiming to have uncovered it yourself. So, either you are contradicting yourself, or you are ‘entity-free.’

Which is it? No 37 to No 81, 25.9.2005a

Yes, they have the same source in the old brain. What I am saying is that it has to be unravelled. I can’t just see that one connection and disappear all of it. I might have thought that when I was spiritual but it goes deeper than that.

Yes that is the crux of the matter for me I suppose. I don’t see this as a spiritual versus actual problem. I use to be a big J. Krishnamurti reader. I was an atheist and a naturalist long before I ever read him and afterwards this did not change. I tried to read between the lines. It seemed to me that what the man was speaking of was a real state, only a brain state or change what have you and nothing spiritual about it. In simply watching all of my thoughts and emotions non-judgmentally I found myself by necessity going into the thought and or emotion to discover its cause. That is why I see actualism as just a rewording of the old.

Yes, this is the crux of the matter to see the difference between spiritual and actual. I also use to think that K was not spiritual but now I see that he is spiritual to the core. By experiencing the actual world one can see that there is nothing spiritual about it. The spiritual is all in ones psyche in the form of beliefs and feelings which do not exist in the actual world. No 16 to No 87, 6+8.9.2005

I was involved in what you would can the ‘initiatic’ tradition for around 8 years.

1) Many (if not all) of the Orthodox Christian initiates (Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Palamas, Symeon the New Theologian, Theophan the Recluse, Clement of Alexandria, and all the Church fathers and mothers) believed in ‘actual’ demonic and angelic beings. I’m not sure who is providing you with misleading counter information. Hint: I do know some ‘perenialist’ writers will distort things to fit their ‘vision’.

2) Regardless of your or anyone’s ‘opinion’, at the end of the day there is this: The initiate tradition advocates disassociative practices like personal prayer, liturgical prayer, contemplation on ‘heaven’ and ‘hell’, sitting in silence for prolonged periods, fasting, and asceticism in general. Actualism advocates none of this. It brings non-spiritual attentiveness to one’s moment by moment experience of life. The ‘closest’ actualism comes to any of that is sitting down with a feeling and fully feeling it and then investigating it, but even that is fundamentally different than the above.

If after carefully reading all the initiates lives, one can ‘think’ that even one of them had extinguished their ego/soul or social identity/instinctual self, and live in the actual world of the senses only, then one did not read the very clear account in their own words that shows without any doubt that they do not live in the actual world.

Living in caves, monasteries, or being a priest involved in the liturgy (i.e. almost all of the ‘initiates’ were monks, hermits, or priests-think about it, No 81), is not a path to the actual. I’ll end with this: actualism is farther away from the ‘initiatic’ tradition than Christianity is from Satanism. Think about it. If you fully understand these paths, then my statement is obvious.

Good luck in breaking free from the bondage of your spiritual ‘learning’ and conditioning.

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I was involved in what you would can the ‘initiatic’ tradition for around 8 years.

Hi, I would appreciate if you could elaborate your experiences a little bit.

Here is part of my first few posts to this list:

‘Oddly enough I stumbled upon it with the Google search ‘Buddhism and watchfulness’ or close to it. So, it was not really something I was looking for but I have been intrigued and challenged by my reading. Just to let you know where I’m coming from (and how hard it will be for me to ‘go all the way’) I’m a practicing Eastern Orthodox Christian – i.e. I have a morning and evening prayer rule before my altar of Icons, pray before eating, travelling, undertaking work, have two spiritual reading times where I read the Lives of the Saints, The Scriptures, and the writings of the Saints, and practice times of stillness throughout the day in general. I practice the ‘Fourth Way’ as a natural complement to Eastern Christianity. There is my bias.

However, in the end what seems to be most important is to be at peace and harmless to my fellow man.

Those were the reasons I became Orthodox in the first place after studying and practicing Protestant Fundamentalism (Nazarene), New Ageism, Judaism, Islam, (Eastern Orthodoxy), Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and back to Orthodoxy (all this is in chronological order). I think that my investigation and practice of Eastern religion and my discovery that they were certainly inferior to Orthodoxy and far as happy and harmless goes will be a stumbling block in my communication with Peter and Richard because they only experienced the indeed sick religion of Western Christianity and found it obviously less healthy than Eastern Religion.

But I have read enough of the site to give a real jumping into this for 6-12 months to see where it goes. I stopped going to Church (even though the chanting in Church is my favourite part of my week), praying (though it gives me peace), and meditating for now. I have many questions of course but this is a long message and if anyone has a response I’ll hold off in writing more.’

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1) Many (if not all) of the Orthodox Christian initiates (Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Palamas, Symeon the New Theologian, Theophan the Recluse, Clement of Alexandria, and all the Church fathers and mothers) believed in ‘actual’ demonic and angelic beings.

Yes. I noticed this as well. I have the Philokalia at hand ,-)))

Oh, the Philokalia ... hey he ... All five volumes? I tortured my poor mind with going through all five ... whew! Or was it four? Well it felt like five!

Accordingly to Rene Guenon, …

Father Seraphim Rose, Orthodox Monk, was enamoured with Guenon, and he became Orthodox, so be attentive. Personally, I would not recommend trusting a ‘traditionalist’ who works outside of the existing traditions. Such a person is bound to be a walking bag of contradiction.

…though, there is a difference between ‘metaphysics’ and ‘religion’ between ‘exoteric’ and ‘esoteric’ teaching.

So he says ... I’ve had contact with Praxis Press, founded by Robin Amos Amis, author of A Different Christianity and quite frankly the Orthodox Tradition, which is both esoteric and exoteric, does not really have that sharp of a distinction.

And in metaphysics (esoteric teachings) the angels and demons symbolise mental states.

Well, there is no evidence in the Christian tradition that the writers of the ‘esoteric’ texts dis not believe in real angels and demons. Its clear they do.

In religion (exoteric teaching) it is completely different.

I think this is a ploy by Rene and others to ‘update’ the tradition to not make it look so silly to moderns.

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I’m not sure who is providing you with misleading counter information. Hint: I do know some ‘perenialist’ writers will distort things to fit their ‘vision.’

I assume you allude to Frithjof Schuon.

Yes I was.

I have most of my information from Rene Guenon and Ananda Coomaraswamy and some others like Mircea Tamas.

Guenon will not be helpful in becoming virtually, let alone actually free.

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2) Regardless of your or anyone’s ‘opinion’, at the end of the day there is this: The initiate tradition advocates disassociative practices like personal prayer, liturgical prayer, contemplation on ‘heaven’ and ‘hell’, sitting in silence for prolonged periods, fasting, and asceticism in general.

This is indeed something I cannot reconcile.

Good, it is all a big waste of time.

I have never done these practises.

You’re only missing some weird experiences and temporary highs and that’s the ‘good’ part.

The AF method is the first time that I actually practise anything.

That’s amazing to me, but I find that interesting.

Before that I read and tried to gain an intellectual understanding about ‘spiritual realisation’ …

Which leads nowhere, as I’ve been there too.

… and the different traditions: Hinduism & Vedanta, Buddhism, Zen, Taoism, Christianity & Gnosis, Islam & Sufism, Judaism & Kabbala. I did Jungian dream analyses with some success.

I’ve experimented and read about these too.

Had also some visions and OOBEs.

No OOBE’s for me, but I think some are neurologically predisposed to such things.

I studied a lot of symbolism and metaphorical geometry etc.

I was getting into this right before I stumbled upon actualism.

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Actualism advocates none of this. It brings nonspiritual attentiveness to one’s moment-by-moment experience of life. The ‘closest’ actualism comes to any of that is sitting down with a feeling and fully feeling it and then investigating it, but even that is fundamentally different than the above.

I understand.

Ok

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If after carefully reading all the initiates lives, one can ‘think’ that even one of them had extinguished their ego/soul or social identity/instinctual self, and live in the actual world of the senses only, then one did not read the very clear account in their own words that shows without any doubt that they do not live in the actual world.

Living in caves, monasteries, or being a priest involved in the liturgy (i.e. almost all of the ‘initiates’ were monks, hermits, or priests-think about it, No 81), is not a path to the actual.

I tend to agree.

If you find an exception, do tell. :)

What made me wondering was, for example, that Ibn Arabi (by some called the Greatest of all Masters in the Sufi tradition) said:

‘Spiritual men attach importance only to a higher degree of knowledge of God. That is all they seek. Their thoughts take no account of what happens in the phenomenal world. Test the truth of what we say.’ (Seal of the Saints, Prophethood and Sainthood in the Doctrine of Ibn Arabi, Michael Chodkiewicz)

Ibn Arabi was also the writer of some 500 (!) books. In one of these he made the following statements:

This indeed sounds like Love/Agape, Self-Aggrandisement, and Narcissism!

Bada bing, No 81.

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I’ll end with this: actualism is farther away from the ‘initiatic’ tradition than Christianity is from Satanism. Think about it. If you fully understand these paths, then my statement is obvious. Good luck in breaking free from the bondage of your spiritual ‘learning’ and conditioning.

Thank you very much!

You seem to have much enthusiasm and to be well read, your explorations into actualism will be interesting I think.

Maybe you can help me.

Whatever you gain from actualism will be the fruits of your own labours. Perhaps I will write something that will be used by you, perhaps not.

What were your key revelations? You said you were involved in initiatic traditions for 8 years? How did you break free? What couldn’t you reconcile? What make you change?

From studying History, Psychology, Philosophy, cognitive science, evolutionary psychology, behavioural genetics, the spiritual view seemed weaker and weaker. Unfortunately they have no real answers for living one’s life better … actualism does ... the rest is ‘history’. The next big turning point was when I realized that Love/Compassion were part of the problem, not the answer (i.e. they are pathetic and narcissistic).

I stopped all ‘my’ practices, got rid of all my spiritual books, and started anew. Burning that bridge decisively was important for me, such was my total dependency, attachment, commitment to the spiritual path. Needless to say, I’m very pleased to be fully on my own now, attempting to live in peace and harmony and increasingly becoming free, beholden to no one or thing.

I’m just beginning, and yet I’d could never have imagined living like this. What a thrilling adventure!

I clearly see how the denial mechanism works in me. For example, a year ago (at the same time I started reading the AF webpage) I had the urge to end my intellectual search and associate myself to an initiatic tradition.

As an aside, I found the ‘Fourth Way’ to be the most sensible non-actualist way around (well besides engaging in emotional integration methods, like emo-clear), but obviously I left it for actualism.

Hence I decided to visit a notable Sufi ‘Sheikh’ (the equivalent of a ‘guru’ in the Islamic tradition) and asked him for the requirements of an initiation. He showed me his prayer room full of pictures with saints, masters, avatars, and holy men of different traditions.

Sufi, Orthodox monk ... sounds similar ...

In the hallway he had a large portrait of the (de facto dictatorial) leader of one of the eastern European countries of which he was a great admirer. By coincidence, his daughter was visiting him the same day. To make it short: She would finally start crying in front of my wife and saying he was abusing her as a child (while he was absent and gone for the toilet) and she was at her wit’s end (basically at the brink of a nerve-breakdown). She was recently divorcing from her second husband and single-parent. Her child had really bad manners and was suffering from hyperactivity. At one time the wife of the Sufi master screamed at the child: ‘I think you are insane.’ My wife and I left shaken, actually shocked. We couldn’t believe it. This family was more disturbed than the average family,

Not that uncommon in obsessively spiritual families.

… but still he was a ‘Sheikh’!!! I couldn’t reconcile what I saw [fact] and what I had thought [belief] about the life and qualities of a ‘spiritual master’.

As the modern ‘masters’ lives are so different than the lives of the ‘saints’ in the books, it makes one wonder how honest the books are ...

In Sufism the Sheikh (guru) has not to be enlightened and he certainly was not. At some time I thought I seem to know more about ‘spiritual realisation’ (intellectually not experientially) than he did.

You may well have, I know I ‘knew’ a lot more than some of my ‘spiritual fathers’ who were monks and priests. They had experienced more though.

And even my wife noticed that he couldn’t give definite answers to quite simple questions. I must not say that this was my first and last attempt to make contact with a master of the initiatic traditions.

I have friend who has been to Mount Athos, and I nearly went myself. I know a monk who is indeed a ‘living saint’, and all that is heady (and hearty) stuff. Yet, I also know that his compassion leads him to experience useless sorrow, and his love leaves aggression alive in him (if only to hate sin. Though I have seen him ‘sharp’ with some of his nuns ... it seemed like he was irritated – i.e. hence angry – to me).

But denial kicked in and I bought for more than USD 2000 books on Sufism …

I’ve likely spent thousands on spiritual material as well and I ended up just giving it all away to a spiritual friend of mine, who has since severed our fellowship.

… and most of it is ‘alienating’ to say the least.

I spent so many years, ignoring the ‘dark side’ of spiritualism. I see it clearly now ... and seeing is the END of believing.’ No 66 to No 81, 3.4.2005

Some thoughts on what it means to be ‘spiritual.’

On the one hand, being ‘spiritual’ can mean believing in a god, truth (by whatever name), the afterlife, etc. i.e. – belief in the supernatural.

On the other hand, being ‘spiritual’ can refer to an attitude or outlook on life which values such things as family, community and community service, a feeling of unity with the universe and all peoples and beings.

It is this second sense of the word ‘spiritual’ that everyone inevitably shares to some extent. As a feeling being ‘I’ cannot help but attempt to unite my ‘self’ with other ‘selves’ for security and fortification. It is ‘my’ very nature to do so.

I used to attend a Unitarian Universalist church some years ago where ‘spiritual beliefs’ were de-emphasized and the ‘spiritual outlook’ was the focus. In other words, what Unitarian Universalists have done is to strip away ‘spiritual’ beliefs from the ‘spiritual’ outlook everyone shares to some extent and attempt to use this commonality to be ‘tolerant’ of the various diverging spiritual beliefs, so that everyone lives under the same roof relatively peacefully – as long as it is agreed that shared spirituality and values are what is really important, as opposed to the particular beliefs people have (Agnosticism and Doubt are Virtues). This way, the unity amongst peoples can be felt, and the atrocities and indulgences of various religions and philosophies and teachings can be ignored, as long as the essential ‘spirituality’ is sanctified.

Not too long ago, I attended a single Humanist meeting. I was surprised to find out that on the one hand, spiritual beliefs were shunned as primitive belief, yet ‘spirituality’ (as in community, connection with all beings, etc) was quite important. So, even in a room where I presume were mostly atheists, spirituality was accepted and sacrosanct.

As I see it, this is the reason why it is an important insight that virtually everyone is ‘spiritual’ at least in their desire to connect with others, the truth, the universe, or whatever. It is the ‘real’ existence of the psychic web which makes the feeling of unity possible and the search for this unity in whatever form the essence of the ‘spiritual.’ No 37

Good to see you are still hanging around the list. We went through a dry spell there for a while huh?

After looking at the site http://www.theabsolute.net and seeing Otto Weininger extolled as a ‘genius’ – I am beginning to see more clearly the parallels between what it is to be a ‘guru’ and a ‘genius’.

I had to think of other ‘geniuses’, like Plato, Aristotle, Spinoza, Kant, Einstein, Freud, Wittgenstein, Sartre, etc. Being a ‘genius’ is a kind of cult.

The guru uses their spiritual insight to discern Truth intuitively as revealed by the Divine, whereas the genius uses their heroic mind to intuitively/rationally discern the truth as revealed by Reason. Both are taking a very similar approach ...

What I mean is that they are both using an intuitive/revelatory method only their purported ‘source’ that they ‘tap in to’ is different. The guru tunes him/herself into the Divine Source, whereas the genius tunes (normally himself instead of herself) to Reason, such as the laws of the universe, laws of morality, platonic forms, karma, psychological insight, etc.

Briefly, it could be said that both the guru and genius are ‘seers’ or ‘prophetic voices’ that tap into an ‘extraordinary’ source of wisdom.

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... except that generally the guru uses Divine Inspiration, and the genius uses Reason with capital ‘R’ to tune into the Truth.

Is the above explanation sufficient?

Possibly even more clearly...

They both tune into a higher authority that is above and beyond what the normal person is supposed to be able to know, in order discern the secrets of the universe – ‘except’ for the fact that one source of authority is the ‘Divine’ and the other ‘Reason.’ Of course, there is often an overlap.

Keep in mind that I am using the word ‘genius’ in the sense it is often used in the real world – namely, to describe men of history that occupy exalted regions of the mind and who are supposed to be heroes of sorts.

There is another usage of the word ‘genius’ that just means a really intelligent person – that’s not what I’m referring to. When I referred to the ‘cult of the genius’ – I’m talking about the hero worship that often goes along with ‘the classics,’ ‘great philosophers’ and the general tendency to idolize ‘great thinkers’. No 37 to No 60

You will likely get other responses, but I thought I’d take a crack at your questions.

A good place on the actual freedom website to find out why actualism is ‘180 degrees opposite to spirituality’ is here –

And a illustrative diagram. The bottom line on the actualism vs spirituality is that the spiritual solution of enlightenment is an institutionalized delusion born out of an illusion. In enlightenment, the ‘self’ vanishes, only the reveal the ‘Self’ – or a spiritual union. In actualism, both the ‘self’ and any trace of a ‘Self’ vanishes, and the experience is actual, not imaginary.

Another way of understanding it is that the spiritual solutions advocate dissociation and transcendence – while actualism advocates immediate involvement in this actual world with not a trace of transcendence.

Richard is better qualified to answer this question than I am. As I understand it, fear, aggression, and the rest of the instinctual passions are still there in the background – only sublimated and transcended – otherwise, what’s the need for love or compassion, as love needs sorrow in order to exist at all.

Do you know of any ‘serious meditators,’ gurus, teachers, spiritualists, etc that do not have a Dark Side? I’ve never encountered one. Da Free John, UG Krishnamurti, Jiddu Krishnamurti, Meher Baba – that is only to mention a few with obvious dark sides. And so many others that have been involved in scams, chicanery, and deceptions.

Is there a single tradition that puts the blame on our genetic evolutionary history, rather than on some notion of karma or original sin?

I would be curious to see the text you state is on the actualism website that claims that spirituality claims that one is born innocent? I would appreciate if you would provide that text so we can look at it more closely.

Spiritualism may generally want ‘peace-on-earth,’ but as I see it, the question is whether they have delivered such. Remember, the phrase is not only ‘peace’ – but ‘peace-on-earth.’ Which means actual, pragmatic, functional, factual, peace – while one is on this very planet, in this lifetime. Spiritualists often see this world as illusory, or fallen, with ‘peace’ residing in some transcendent world – so their rendition of ‘peace-on-earth’ is actually something like ‘imaginary peace somewhere else other than this planet earth.’

If you wonder why I say ‘imaginary peace’ – think about whether you know of any enlightened person without a dark side.

It is not the case that there is ‘nothing to be done.’ In both spiritualism and actualism there is much being done – if you haven’t noticed. According to Richard, someone in actual freedom, doesn’t ‘desire’ or ‘need’ anything to be done – since the actual world is already perfect – but that by no means entails that there is ‘nothing to be done.’

If that were the case, I don’t think you would have ever arrived at this website.

The question is ‘where’ and ‘what’ is the ‘perfection?’ For the spiritualist, ‘where’ is somewhere else other than this planet – and ‘what’ is an imaginary God, or Being, or the Transcendent. Also, actualism does not see ‘suffering [as being] an indiviudal malady born of ignorance of one’s true nature,’ rather it is recognized as the inborn (genetic) human condition, developed through evolution by natural selection.

That is not the ‘sole criticism,’ but to posit a ‘real perfection’ after bodily death is obviously not only not perfect, but it’s also not even remotely ‘peace-on-earth.’

If Nirvana or Moksha is the final attainment, why hasn’t it delivered peace on earth after thousands of years? Why are there dark sides to so many of the enlightened? Why are so many who claim to have arrived not only not peaceful, but deceptive and harmful? Why are there so few people who have actually become enlightened? No 37 to No 71

As I understand it, fear, aggression, and the rest of the instinctual passions are still there in the background – only sublimated and transcended – otherwise, what’s the need for love or compassion, as love needs sorrow in order to exist at all.

No 71: 1. One’s own sorrow can have finished and still the perception of all-round sorrow can bring about this love/compassion. Is there any logical reason why the extinguishing of one’s own sorrow should mean one stops perceiving other’s sorrow.

‘Perceiving’ other’s sorrow as in understanding it is different than ‘feeling’ other’s sorrow – and love/compassion is not only understanding another’s sorrow, but feeling it as well. I am personally not interested in ‘logical’ reasons, since ‘logical’ reasoning about these things is to take an arm-chair approach – what I am interested in is experiential understanding, and experientially – love/compassion involves feeling sorrow – if you doubt it, look at it in yourself.

Your statement that love and sorrow are related does find mention in Krishnamurti’s teachings:

I think the two are related – sorrow and love. And to understand what love is, one has to feel the immensity of sorrow. (1962, 7^th Public Talk, Saanen)

OK, but actualism is concerned with understanding the connection between love/compassion and sorrow experientially, for yourself – not by taking Krishnamurti’s word for it. What good is somebody else’s teaching, if one doesn’t understand it experientially?

It doesn’t matter one bit what Krishnamurti had to say, except to demonstrate that he still felt sorrow. Actualism is about completely ridding oneself from sorrow and malice.

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Do you know of any ‘serious meditators,’ gurus, teachers, spiritualists, etc that do not have a Dark Side? I’ve never encountered one. Da Free John, UG Krishnamurti, Jiddu Krishnamurti, Meher Baba – that is only to mention a few with obvious dark sides. And so many others that have been involved in scams, chicanery, and deceptions.

1. Yes. If by dark side you mean ‘scams, chicanery and deceptions’ …

No, I don’t mean by ‘dark side’ – ‘scams, chicanery and deceptions.’ That is only part of what I meant by the words ‘dark side.’ A dark side includes any feeling of sorrow, malice, aggression, etc. – expressed or unexpressed.

… and the like I don’t think Ramana Maharishi had a dark side. I don’t think the Buddha had a dark side. I don’t think I personally am involved in scams, chicanery, deception etc. And many of my friends are like this as well. I/They may be misguided in our pursuit of clarity and happiness but we are open to the possibility of our being on the wrong track and do not try to tell others that ours is the absolute unique real path to happiness nor do we exploit others in any way.

I will leave it up to you to speculate about Ramana Maharshi and the Buddha, etc. not having a dark side. Remember, by dark side I mean that person feels sorrow and malice, and Love/Compassion is a sure sign that they feel sorrow and malice.

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Is there a single tradition that puts the blame on our genetic evolutionary history, rather than on some notion of karma or original sin?

For one, Krishnamurti does not blame Karma.

The obvious fact is that – with our greed, jealousy, possessiveness, fear, with our sentimentality, our fleeting pleasures, our purr of self-satisfaction – we are animals, highly evolved animals. If you watch an animal you will see it has the same conflicts that we have. The anthropoid apes are jealous and have their matrimonial difficulties. They unite in groups – first the family, then the tribe, and all that business – just as we do; and someone was saying the other day that these apes could sit in the United Nations quite as well as any human being! It is an obvious fact that our character, our devotion, our courage, our fear, our wars, our so-called peace, our struggles, all spring from this animal background. You don’t have to dispute this with me. The biologists, the anthropologists are saying it is so – if you want authorities. (1964, 6^th public talk, Saanen)

By watching the animal – its violence, its devotion, its pleasures – I learn, because I am part of the animal; my whole background is derived from the higher apes and all the rest of it. At least that is what the scientists say. Or the others will say, no, you are straight from God. Have I got to watch the animal to learn about myself? Have I got to watch you to learn about myself? (From 1969, 2^nd public dialogue in Brockwood Park)

Well, I asked whether there was a ‘single tradition’ that puts blame on our (genetic) evolutionary history. Krishnamurti is not a ‘tradition.’ He is an individual who lived in the last century. Krishnamurti may (note: ‘may’) have hit the nail on the head in this passage (as far as where our instinctual passions come from), but the result – his ‘solution’ was certainly not to get rid of those inborn instinctual passions, rather to transcend them.

But this must be kept in mind that the concept of genetics is a very recent concept, born of modern scientific research. In the time of the Buddha (say), since they had no microscopes and such, maybe they called this repository of our animal background Karma. I am only guessing, mind you.

Yes, I understand it is only a guess. I personally don’t see the value of such speculation though, since ‘in the time of the Buddha’ – nobody had any idea about our evolutionary history and how it works.

This is probably a good point to add – it’s not so much just the concept of genetics that is important – rather it is the understanding that our instinctual identity evolved by a blind process of natural selection.

I personally know many Advaita Vedantians who claim that the concept of Karma (as in result of deeds in your past life) is a clever device knowingly invented by some spiritualists in the past to scare people from doing socially reprehensible things. When I asked them what was then the basis of my inborn instincts, they said it is due to my ancestory (in other words, genetic history).

‘Ancestory’ doesn’t necessarily imply ‘genetic history.’ It is much more common to blame ‘conditioning’ than ‘genetic history.’ When I hear the word ‘ancestory’ as the culprit, coming from a spiritualist, it normally means ‘conditioning,’ which is nothing but social conditioning.

Just because some illiterate spiritualist does not know of the word ‘genetics’ does not mean he does not have an understanding that we are born with certain traits which we have gotten from the animal realm.

Correct, but an ‘animal realm’ is a far cry from understanding the blind process of natural selection and evolutionary history.

It is another matter that most of them consider this evolution to be not through genes but through the transmigration of the soul from an animal body to a human body. This is decidedly superstitious.

Glad you agree.

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I would be curious to see the text you state is on the actualism website that claims that spirituality claims that one is born innocent? I would appreciate if you would provide that text so we can look at it more closely.

From http://www.actualfreedom.com.au/library/topics/gurus.htm and http://www.actualfreedom.com.au/introduction/spiritualsolutions3.htm At the core of the Eastern religious view of the world is the concept that all humans are born ‘innocent and have only been conditioned with ‘evil thoughts’ since birth. It is further believed that it is possible for a chosen few to regain this mythical ‘natural’ innocence, in this lifetime on earth, hence the search to find one’s ‘original face’ or Divine Self.

That quotation (I am told) was written by Peter – so you might want to ask him about that – whether he would still agree with that statement. I’m sure there are some Eastern religious views that would agree with the ‘blank slate’ theory, but I also am aware of quite different ideas, like Meher Baba’s ‘sanskaras,’ for example.

Good thing about actualism is that there is no dogma. If Peter was wrong, then so be it. Of course, he may want to explain what he meant by ‘the core of the Eastern religious view.’ There should be no problem admitting a mistake, if and when an error is made.

A point to be made about that passage though is that there is a fact in what Peter was saying. I would say it this way: At the core of the Eastern religious view of the world is the concept that all humans originated from the Divine, the One, Brahman, Tao, Original Nature, or whatever you want to call it – which doesn’t necessarily mean that they were born ‘innocent’ in this life, rather that each person has a ‘fallen’ nature which occurred either as a result of conditioning, or as an inevitable consequence of being born into this world. So, the ‘core’ Peter is referring to is a fact, maybe somewhat sloppily stated, yet I think it is fair to say that the main idea/belief is that one has fallen from the Divine, and enlightenment/union/ or whatever is the way back Home.

From http://www.actualfreedom.com.au/actualism/peter/selected-correspondence/corr-religion2.htm

Do realize that this is no little thing to agree to because it is completely at odds with all of the spiritual teachings that have it that we are born innocent beings and only corrupted by conditioning or that we are all blank slate souls who have to suffer the trails of being trapped in a corporeal body in an alien physical world?

I am surprised that you stopped your quotation at that point. If you would have continued reading, you would have found:

No 59: It’s true to say that the genetic coding is supplied complete to each individual.

Peter: Oh, good. Can we agree then that the instinctual survival mechanism – that which gives rise to the instinctual passions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire in human beings – ‘is supplied complete’ to each and every member of the human species?

Do realize that this is no little thing to agree to because it is completely at odds with all of the spiritual teachings that have it that we are born innocent beings and only corrupted by conditioning or that we are all blank slate souls who have to suffer the trails of being trapped in a corporeal body in an alien physical world?

No 49: I don’t see spiritualists as all saying children are born as blank slates. I’ve had people from two different Christian sects (Jehova’s Witness and Mormon) – those who go about knocking on doors looking for converts – tell me that children are born with original sin, and they each offered as an example the obvious anger displayed by infants who are not getting their way. They offer religious salvation solutions for this sin.

Peter: Yeah, point taken. It was a bit sloppy of me. I forgot about the fire-and-brimstone ‘repent ye sinners and ye shall be saved’, which really means ‘ye better join our group … or else …’. Peter, List AF, No 49, 22.11.2003

So, you see that Peter immediately admitted that his original rendition was ‘a bit sloppy’ thus, incorrect. It might be better to say that many spiritual teachings hold that we ‘originated’ as innocent beings, rather than ‘born’ as innocent beings. If it is put this way, then even the doctrine of original sin allows for a time where the human being was innocent, prior to the fairy tale Fall in the Garden of Eden.

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If you wonder why I say ‘imaginary peace’ – think about whether you know of any enlightened person without sorrow and malice. Also, what use is it to have a ‘peace’ based upon an illusion?

Nanak, Buddha, Ramana Maharishi. JK too, except for the one instance in his life when he tried to hide a personal matter from public knowledge (his affair with Rosalind Rajgopal).

Again, I will leave you to speculate, but the fact that you bring up an ‘except’ case for JK tells me he was not rid of sorrow and malice.

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Why are there so few people who have actually become enlightened?

Same can be said about actualism.

Again, to compare the ‘fruits’ of spiritual enlightenment and actualism is to compare apples and oranges. The same could be asked about actualism, but there is a ready answer – it hasn’t had the thousands of years that spiritualism has had – rather, it is brand new to human history.

Let me rephrase my question – why, out of the millions or billions of spiritual people who have sought enlightenment in some thousands of years, have so few actually become enlightened?

To ask a similar question of actualism, one would need to ask, why, out of the (unspecified) relatively small number of people who are aware of and have actually given actualism a try, has only 1 become actually free, and only a handful virtually free?

Maybe you will see now that an actualist has a much easier time with that question?

Even one enlightened being in a million is a great success as compared to actualism, which has only one till date.

That is like saying that the book of Genesis story is a great success compared to Darwin’s theory of evolution, merely because more people have believed it to be true.

When Darwin came up with the theory of evolution (before publishing), only a handful (if that) of people saw it to be a factual account – nevertheless, the more successful theory is not the one that millions have given credence to – rather it is the one that only a handful (if that) of people had discovered at the time.

In other words, it is the fact that determines ‘success’.

In evolutionary theory, it is posited that when a certain evolutionary mutation has to occur, it occurs sporadically in many individuals of that species in the same era. I.e. if the time for actualism has come, then we can ‘hope’ to see some more folks totally free from the human condition. But whether this is only a hope based on illusion or an actual anticipation based on facts, only time will tell.

Hoping for actualism to spread is a waste of time. ‘I’ am the only one that can change ‘myself.’ Nobody else can save ‘me’ – it is up to each ‘me’ whether or not actualism spreads in the years to come. It is each person’s choice how they want to live. No 37 to No 71

I took a peak at the link you provided (http://64.225.88.61/kdocs.htm) and while I hardly have the time or the inclination to read it all, I did ‘enjoy’ skimming through it, although not for the same reasons I used to enjoy reading K writings. Of course, what you provided was ‘early’ Krishnamurti, and I see it is not long after his completion of the ‘process’ (about 6 years in fact), that mystical opening of the Third Eye and kundalini energy described in the Mary Lutyens book ‘Krishnamurti: The Years of Awakening’ (1975).

The reason I ‘enjoyed’ reading some of it was that it took me no time at all to locate passages which leave their unmistakable spiritual imprint and place Krishnamurti undeniably in the mystical/spiritual camp, despite his avid denials in later years. Take for instance this passage, off of page 12:

Krishnamurti: The point is that, at the root of both wanting and giving, there is a going outwards away from yourself, and this is what you have to resist. But, if you do, what is left? When you are not giving or wanting something, what are you? You are Being, the only positive thing in man.

Being is fearless and does not depend on anything outside itself: hence, it does not cast a shadow. It knows no separation and it is immortal. And so, when you as an individual enter into that pure Being, you become the delight of life’s expression, because you have been through everything. Such Being is life’s fulfillment. That is what everyone is seeking: to be himself: no to depend on external things for his wanting or giving. When you are such Being, you are as the sunshine in which all things grow and in which there is nothing that is either evil or good, bad or indifferent.

So do not seek to understand this Being through any one particular channel. It is far above all these petty creations of illusion. Seek it by casting out all fear, for when that is done life will show you what it means you to be. (http://64.225.88.61/kdocs.htm) pg 12

While the excerpt is off of page 12, one would not have to look that far to find those silly capitalized words, ie. Truth, Being, Beauty, etc. I still cannot believe that I once eagerly lapped up this nonsense. When I first approached the Actual Freedom writings, I thought that Richard was being too strident in blaming all the enlightened beings down through history for all the wars, misery, torture, rapes, etc. I thought this was certainly going too far, and that there must still be something ‘good’ in these spiritual teachings, or in the teachers themselves. After a little while longer, it became evident to me that I was still hanging onto the tattered threads of my spiritual beliefs and that I still did not want to abandon my spiritual teachers. But I no longer think thusly.

One of the things I enjoy nowadays is being able to see clearly the lie of Enlightenment. I enjoy having the discernment to see that Krishnamurti, while his readings are interesting, belongs in the same camp with all the snake-charmers, charlatans, preachers, God-men, and God-women down through history. To my mind, he is not different from some back-country evangelical preacher preaching to his congregation in a tidewater chapel. I do indeed enjoy having the intelligence nowadays to question the validity of what he is talking about. It is satisfying to be able to see through his sermons.

I think if you are a spiritualist yourself (and there are some indications that that is so), you will no doubt enjoy reading K, but for quite different reasons. Gary to No 44

I hear many people around me talk about the importance, indeed, the primacy of having relationships in one’s life. The longer I practice actualism, the less and less important ‘relationships’ seem to be to me. This sometimes causes the reflection that I am indeed an outcast and I sometimes experience anxiety to realize that I am no longer part of any particular group, nor do I want to be. However, the anxiety is only occasional, and at other times there is this enormous sense of freedom and ease, a freedom that can only come when one is free from the obligations of being a member of a particular group, a family, a profession, a community, etc, etc. There is a tremendous comfort for me in just being alone, just sitting in my chair, for instance, doing nothing in particular.

Yes, I found that to be so also. When I quit the Quakers and, awhile afterward, quit AA, it was at first disconcerting, as there was nothing to replace it and there were fears that I was in for some sort of extreme reaction. Since people at AA are pretty much brainwashed into believing that they will relapse and return to drinking if ever they stray from the fold, there were the usual fears of ending up drunk or using drugs again. I have to say, however, that nothing along this line has materialized, and I think I am even doing much better since I stopped herding into the rooms of AA for my ‘spiritual’ fix.

Once my spiritual beliefs collapsed, it was a natural step to quit frequenting a program that is so outspokenly spiritual. Nowadays while there is occasionally that cognizance of an emotional void needing filling or feelings of boredom, I recognize these as opportunities to delve into in order to pump as much information as I can about ‘me’, rather than as negative emotional states that I either need to flee from or seek the emotional solace of others in order to soothe. What happens is that in fairly short order, the feelings dissipate and I can return to the fascinating business of being here: a really outstanding, second-to-none happening.

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I find myself rarely ever thinking about or talking with anyone about ‘spiritual’ issues.

That all seems so far away from me now. I know that most of the people I work with are spiritually inclined if not outright religious believers. Talk of reading the Bible, or going to church, crop up in conversations from time to time. I’ve never had anyone ‘put me on the spot’ and question me about religion. I know that some of the children I work with as clients believe in God or pray or what-have-you. Other children are entirely turned off to the thought of there being any God whatsoever and they remind me of myself in my younger years. First there was the entire rejection of the whole edifice of religious belief and practice with a kind of nihilistic atheism, albeit with a deep resentment of the idea of God or anything associated with religion. In later years, as I approached my late 30s and 40s, there was the spiritual quest, perhaps brought on by the Zeitgeist of Eastern spirituality. Now there is a fascination and a wholesale obsession with experiencing the present moment apperceptively, without any intervening beliefs or feelings to clutter things up. I know what it is like to experience the very best possible and that is now my constant benchmark, you might say. Gary to Peter

The love of the Master (in my case the Christian Jesus) replaced the missing love of the wife who was long gone, the father’s love, the family, etc. It seemed so stimulating to think that I was loved by Jesus and even known by him personally, that I had a direct line to the love of God, to put it plainly. It was so self-evidently self-aggrandizing, I can see that now, but I could not see it then. But yes, there is the underlying feeling of separation that fuels this search for Love. Now, I must say, I do not feel that way. I know there is a wonderful actual world there, and even if I am not intensely experiencing it at the moment, ‘I’ am getting in the way and only need let go of the controls and get out of the way to have the actual world rise to my sight.

No, I am not into defending these ideals and I will not. It was hard for me, looking back at it in retrospect, to admit of my former hero’s (Krishnamurti’s) debauches with his friend’s wife. At the time, I did not see the relevance of inquiring into what he did or didn’t do. But I am looking at that differently now. I think the critical thing is to be harmless. What an enormous hypocrisy to say things out of one side of your mouth while practising something differently in your personal life. I will not be disingenuous.

I too had been interested in all of the New Age gobbledygook. The more bizarre the better. I am still on quite a few New Age type of mailing lists and get catalogues and such in the mail. I throw them in the trash. Gary to Vineeto

I was using the word ‘avoid’ in the sense of this ‘nipping the feeling in the bud’ that you and Richard are talking about, not so much in the sense of avoiding the Glory and Glitz of Enlightenment. I can see now that ‘nipping the feeling in the bud’ is nowhere near the same as suppressing a feeling. For instance, one can nip the feeling of anger in the bud by recognizing a situation as one in which anger has been habitually experienced or expressed. Given that one has experientially investigated into anger and aggression and understood how anger, in any and all forms, blocks the path to freedom, one has a definite choice as to what to do and experience in a given situation.

This is not at all the same thing that spiritual seekers do as in ‘turning the other cheek’ when angry or offended, which is really just a supercilious and hypocritical suppression of one’s feeling state. The actualist experientially investigates feelings and emotions as they come up, whereas the spiritualist is intent upon following spiritual or moral precepts as a way of controlling the wayward instincts. The actualist is concerned to bring about the always existing peace-on-earth in himself/herself and for others through eradication and extirpation of the rudimentary animal instincts with their corresponding sense of ‘being’, whereas the spiritualist merely substitutes ‘Being’ for ‘being’ in a self-aggrandizing grab for the Glory of Enlightenment. No wonder spiritual people remain so violent and arrogant.

At least that has been my experience. Had I not been able to see for myself the deception underneath the hype of religious and spiritual life, I would not be here. Had I not been able to observe and experience in myself the violence, the arrogance, the passion underlying religious life, I would not be here. I have seen for myself, first hand as it were, what has fuelled the religious wars that have occurred down through the ages.

When I first encountered Richard’s writings on the Krishnamurti listening-l list, it was an eye-opening experience. Here was a man talking about war, rape, child abuse, suicide, murder and proposing a practical solution, not just mouthing the usual mystical and spiritual fluff. It got my attention but I could not comprehend at first what he was talking about. The interest lay dormant in my mind for a good long while. I could see and experience in myself firsthand the violence of the list, and participated myself in various ‘wars’ on the list. One could see the web of alliances, feel the quickness of anger when one’s cherished opinions and beliefs were assailed by others. I could not at the time, however, connect the violence of the list with its avowed purpose – I could not understand how a mailing list set up under the auspices of studying Krishnamurti’s teachings could be so violent and chaotic. I think I understand it better and I have refused to be a part of it. Gary to Vineeto

Yes, it seems to be working that way. Rejecting God and all the other spiritual and religious stuff that I have been fed and fed myself has indeed been the real start for me of this whole thing. Had I known before I really approached Actual Freedom that I would give up my spiritual and religious beliefs, I doubt seriously that I would have persisted in the venture. But the time was right and the ‘handwriting was on the wall’ so to speak.

I have rejected all of that now and I am better off for it. The house of cards did not collapse, as I feared. Nothing really happened at all. There were no thunderbolts and divine punishments to be endured. I am better off without believing in God because now I can think for myself and, what’s more, these fears that were the basis for my fervent belief can be examined ‘out in the open’ without the pacifier of prayer and religious ritual.

Now I can really see the seduction of the belief in an afterlife, the belief in a Heavenly Father or Mother or Whatever. It is all an enormous illusion. How blind I have been! I remember thinking something similar when I adopted the belief in a Metaphysical Realm.

Now, it is completely in the opposite direction.

It is the much touted ‘Fear of God’ that makes a person a righteous, religious soul. I have no fear of God now, and hence, I think there is that ‘indifference to hierarchy’ mentioned in the actualism writings. With the core fear of death and fear of God faced directly, I am getting over my fears of the authority of others as well as questioning my own authority. The whole warp and weave of the structure of the ‘self’ is coming unravelled, and I am finding that the atavistic fears are subsiding, to be replaced with a deep sense of freedom and peace. Perhaps I will face renewed onslaughts of the atavistic fears, as the psyche is still intact but withering away, or so I think. A question in my mind at this point is whether I have the guts and intestinal fortitude to stick it out to the end of ‘me’, in other words putting the same effort into ending ‘me’ that I have invested in maintaining this social identity, or whether I will settle for a second rate life. Gary to Vineeto

Richard, about Landmark – I don’t think I suggested that actualism be ‘fit into the weekend workshop/group therapy transaction genre’ format, but even so, Landmark’s format for their technology is really a continual conversation that reviews how the participants use the technology presented in the initial course (the Forum) in their day to day life and what it is producing. This is done in weekly 3-hr. seminars, with other long-weekend courses along the way to present more technology. Participants are therefore in a continual ‘inquiry’ into their way of being, while the initial course (the Forum) does it’s best to have participants (through dialoguing with a Forum leader)

experience their own philosophical contexts, their epistemology, their ontology, etc., to the point of transcending their ‘survival mechanisms’ (what they call Mind) and realizing ‘satisfaction’ (Self), wherein ‘the moment is sufficient unto itself’. Obviously they really mean wherein the Feeling is sufficient unto itself – but whose quibbling? ME! That’s the reason I want to talk to a Forum leader about AF; they think transformation is the height of consciousness and as such are ripping off ignorant people. From what’s in the book, Werner Erhard’s transforming experience is a jumbled up ASC. He says part of it was the realization he knew nothing, because all the knowledge he had amassed up till then was skewed toward survival, success, making it. Then in the next instant he realized he knew everything, and not from having learned it, but from his experience (does he mean his feeling?)

He ‘saw that everything was going to be all right, that it was all right, that it had always been all right, that it always would be all right and I didn’t think this – I KNEW it. It was so stupidly, blindingly simple I simply could not believe it...I was no longer even concerned with achieving ... I WAS satisfied...’ (because he felt good?) ...’I was concerned only with the truth... experience is not who I am, it is simply evidence that I am here, who I am is the source of my experience ...’ (his feelings?) ...’All identities are false...’ (only feelings matter?) O.K., it was a flat-out ASC. The part that threw me for so long was the ‘everything all right’ part but now that I read it with both eyes I can see his ‘I KNEW it’ is really via his feeling.

That organization has processed about one million people now, since 1972. And before getting restructured when Werner left it was a one hundred forty million plus dollar a year company, not 50 million like now. So I just think they should know that they are not the height of consciousness and that something else actually is. I probably will not be able to get a Forum leader to speak with me because they are so busy and I am nobody. My idea is to mail your The Third Alternative to a Forum Leader in the San Francisco Area Centre and ask them to read it. I can’t see how it could not shake them up if they read it with both eyes, on account of them being so into Being. Then, I’m hoping they will be willing to discuss it with you online. No 50 to Richard

Recently, I have not read spiritual books (maybe just one in half a year). I would over indulge, ‘feed’ on them in the past. They made me feel good. I was on a path to the goal of enlightenment and most importantly, immortality. I don’t try to meditate nor I follow any gurus any more.

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Also, I think that there is nobody in heavens stuffing our physical bodies with some recycled immortal souls. Therefore my brain or this personal entity manufactured by the brain based on the social blueprint has arisen at random, by chance only, depending on which sperm participated in the beginning of the life. My personality was determined by the physical features of this brain. No 7

If one person could become free from the Human Condition, maybe, just maybe, I can too. I have had to determine for myself if what Richard is talking about is indeed the genuine article, no small task for one living in the Human Condition. Not having met him, nor the rest of you, I can only determine this through the written words in the books, the writings, and on this list. In a recent post I expressed my doubts about it all, and also the fear that the words seemingly inspired. One other sense that I had, which I have from time to time, is that the whole thing is an elaborate hoax. At one time, I (early on I think) I even imagined Richard laughing his ass off at me, a damn fool, buying his pitch. This is, I think, an indication that one is approaching the Actual Freedom writings on the basis of trust and faith , rather than simply whether they make sense or not. At this later point, it is difficult for me to understand the state of mind of those who think that Richard is forcing them to adopt his ‘viewpoint’ (which it is not), because it has never been my experience that he is forcing anyone to do anything. If one wishes to remain miserable, sorrowful, and malicious, then that is the end of the matter. But for those who are vitally interested in an Actual Freedom from the Human Condition, he, and the others on this list for that matter too, are more than accommodating in his/their writings. One cannot approach Actual Freedom on the basis of faith and trust, but that is probably exactly what spiritual seekers will do, imagining this to be some kind of cult or new religion. Since the spiritual search is all about faith and trust, with spiritual seekers eagerly lapping up the most absurd notions spoon fed to them by the God-men and God women, it is not surprising that spiritual seekers will impose their background of belief on Actual Freedom, turning it into some kind of religion, or turn Richard into some kind of Guru. Gary to Peter

Realizations still seem important to me. One of the realizations I had recently, after all the business of quitting my job, was that spiritual values, or spiritual-type thinking still has a hold on me. I still have within me, probably from hundreds of thousands of years of conditioning, the tendency to think of myself as a flawed ‘sinner’, which results in considerable ‘self’-castigation and ‘self’-loathing. I thought I saw this rather clearly in operation when I was filled with ‘self’-recriminations and ‘self’-criticism after leaving the job. I measure myself to an impossible standard of perfection, and naturally do not measure up and then berate myself most strenuously. I literally flagellate myself. It is, I think, a hangover from my spiritual days. It is form of behaviour which characterizes spiritual believers who blame themselves when they do not measure up to the impossible standards of their chosen spiritual teachings. I observed myself doing the same thing with actualism. Turning it into some kind of Almighty system that I had to measure myself against and then berating myself because I didn’t measure up. It is something that was quite literally operating in my own psyche and not something that I have picked up from actualism. This is, I think an important insight, and I have caught myself up to the same shenanigans from time to time since then and I am quicker on the uptake this time. So, I think I am still extricating myself from the spiritual world, even though I do not hold any blatant spiritual beliefs, I do still have spiritual-like thinking and behaviour which causes me to berate myself mercilessly. I’m about sick of it and want something better for myself. Gary to Peter

And what you mention here: ‘ to seek solace in the hope of an other-worldly paradise ’, in other words, the despisal of life on earth, the despisal of being a human being, the hatred of this flesh-and-blood body and other flesh-and-blood bodies and even this physical universe has been a spur to violence and mayhem for countless hundreds of thousands of years. Thus, we have the priest blessing the battleship, the minister exhorting the troops massed for battle, and the dying words of millions ‘I am going to a better place than this’. If these examples seem too extreme, one need only consider that the logical outcome of the view that ‘peace on earth is ultimately impossible’ is the very destruction of life on earth. But spiritual people and spiritual leaders are more cunning than that, and they will make a great show of being concerned about peace – thus, spiritual people will have ‘prayer-ins’ for peace, involve themselves in peace movements, lobbying against defence expenditures, marches for peace, etc. All these collective activities make people feel that they are doing something to bring about peace on earth, but the upshot of it all is that the root cause of war and violence has not been uncovered and addressed – the Human Condition. Not to mention the fact of the violence inherent in these so-called ‘peaceful’ activities.

I can well relate to your period of discipleship and the bizarreness of your complete immersion in the spiritual community. While perhaps I did not go to some of the extremes that you did, I can easily relate to the emotion of devotion, and unquestioning obedience of the Master, and the complete suspension of intelligent and critical thinking that goes along with being a religious and spiritual follower. And one can well see, given the reverence with which spiritual figures are treated, how Jonestowns and Wacos are possible, no...not only possible, but almost inevitable. The descent into madness begins, I think, when one ties their fate with another – the spiritual leader- one develops a love for, an admiration of the one leading the spiritual community, and the die is cast when Cupid strikes his arrow into the heart because this type of love and veneration is lethal...witness the many object lessons that the long and bloody history of religion have to show us. To tie one’s fate to any other human being is to be deluded...and peace on earth can scarcely come to one so deluded. It may seem like I am bashing spirituality, but it is like a breath of fresh air to be free from all the ridiculous beliefs and practices which characterize the spiritual world. I still, at times, cannot believe my own complete foolishness in being sucked into it all, and I sometimes cannot believe that it was actually me that believed in all those nonsensical propositions. It is a wonderful experience – being free from the spiritual world, realizing that one need not suspend their own native intelligence for the sake of the apparent security of religious/spiritual practice. I still am rather overjoyed that I am free from all of that. Gary to Peter

I still sometimes find when the going gets rough, ie. during periods of anxiety or dread, that there is a slight stirring of the old spiritual beliefs, usually in the form of wanting to pray for deliverance or guidance. I experienced this in fact yesterday when I became greatly confused and anxious – I was aware of a desire to pray as a way of getting out of it all – kind of like taking a drink for relief. At that point, I just remained aware of what was going on, and began focusing more on this feeling of anxiety I was experiencing.

Eventually, through bringing attention and awareness to the feelings and emotions that were storming inside me, the anxiety wore itself out, and I was much calmer. This morning, as I was preparing my usual cup of coffee, I became aware that in the past month or so, my intake of caffeine has been sharply increased, so much so in fact that I am wondering if that may be part of the reason I am experiencing anxiety. Caffeine has been a trigger for me in the past and it is an insidious kind of thing – it kind of sneaks up on me without my realizing it. So I am planning on cutting down on the coffee and see what happens.

I never clearly conceived that there were only two alternatives to human existence, until I was introduced to the third. Now it makes sense but I never thought of it that way before. The underlying passions, whether they be fear, confusion, dread, terror, etc, that fuel spiritual belief are laid bare and exposed when one chucks their spiritual beliefs. So much so that the underlying feelings that made up the reason for the beliefs in the first place are experienced much more directly and intimately than before. Now they are out in the open where you can get at them, so to speak. And there is nothing else to do, and nowhere to go but to pick up the tools and dig into them. The solution offered by spiritual approaches – life on the basis of faith, belief, and trust – are a sop to the anxiety, horror, and despair of living in the grim reality of normal human existence. They do work, in the limited sense that they make people feel better – they are tranquillisers that calm the feelings and ‘sooth the soul’. I think it is only when one sees very clearly that they do not alleviate malice and sorrow, but just cover it up, that one begins to look around for an alternative – then it becomes plain that they don’t work – not that they really did to begin with. Gary to Peter

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