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Peter’s Correspondence on the Actual Freedom List with Alan
Hi Alan, Again just a few random comments re you last post – From the descriptions by you, Richard, Vineeto, Gary and others, extricating oneself from the beliefs of spiritualism is one of the most daunting tasks facing anyone starting on the road to an actual freedom. Sure, I had to investigate a few myself, but nothing like what you had to do. Of course the final discovery – that there is no-body or no-thing in charge of the universe – is the same for all and I acknowledge the achievement that you and other ‘spiritualists’ make in realising this fact. A finding from a recent study investigating the causes of human depression might be relevant. One of the major reasons given for feeling depressed by participants in the study was that they felt that nobody was in charge of the human species – no leader or group of leaders, no faceless men, no secret cartel. This feeling of ‘it’s all out of control and there is nothing that can be done about it’ evidently plunged many people into helplessness, depression and despair. The study dealt with one end of the spectrum of the human condition – the hopeless despair of grim reality when stripped of the hopeful fantasy of a greater reality – but what I found most revealing was the reason offered by many for their depression. What fascinated me for long time in my own investigations was the human instinctual need for a controlling or nurturing being – a daddy or a mummy figure of some description – be it terrestrial or extraterrestrial, corporeal or fantasy, physical or psychic. This need for a mummy or daddy is obviously very real in childhood but adult humans have never quite managed to unshackle themselves from the both the physical and emotional dependency ingrained at childhood. Adolescence heralds the commencement of one’s instinctual reproductive compulsion and the associated responsibilities and is a time of either unquestioning acquiescence to, or blind against, one’s societal conditioning. Whilst some manage to keep up the rebellion, anger and frustration for most of their adult lives – unless they waft into Acceptance – they in fact do nothing than overtly or covertly spread the seeds of resentment at, and despair of, ‘society’ to the next generation. And so the cycle goes on and on and on ... as the human condition is actively perpetuated by yet another sad and sorry generation. As I began to become fascinated with the workings of the human condition, both in its animal-instinctual roots and in its tribal-social perpetuation via childhood reward and punishment, I simultaneously started to become fascinated with the workings of ‘me’. How had ‘I’, as a social identity, been created? What particular morals, ethics, values, beliefs and psittacisms had been implanted by others and what morals, ethics, values, beliefs and psittacisms had I adopted as ‘mine’ simply because they appealed to me at the time or because they were part and parcel of some social group I aligned myself with? This fascination lead me to actively investigate ‘I’, the controller – the social identity, the ‘good boy’, whose job when he grew up was not only to be a fit member of society but whose life-long responsibility was to constantly monitor, check and control – lest the dark side of ‘me’ should run amok. When I started to peel back the layers of social conditioning, I did indeed start to discover an instinctual ‘me’ – the raw animal ‘me’, programmed by blind nature to be nothing more than a seed-implanting, propagator of the species. This raw animal ‘self’ may well have both savage and tender passions but these passions, whether they be selfishly ‘self’-protective or unselfishly species-protective, are neither intelligent nor are they benign. It is these raw animal survival instinctual passions, genetically-encoded by blind nature in every member of the human species, that warrant that human existence will forever remain a grim and senseless, human vs. human, battle for survival. By simple experiential observation of these animal passions in action in myself and in other animal species it becomes clear and explicit that to remain a slave to these passions makes it is impossible for me, this corporeal-only body, to ever be a happy body, let alone a harmless body. But, as you noted, the beginning of this process of active ‘self’-discovery is the observation that there ‘is no-body or no-thing in charge of the universe’ . If one really takes this observation fully on board, a wonder-full and utterly ‘self’-less experience can result whereby one directly experiences that there ‘is no-body or no-thing in charge of the universe .’ One then can unequivocally experience that the puerile ancient spirit-ridden beliefs about the universe – those that still pass for wisdom, even to this day – are nought but fear-filled fairy tales that should be confined to the dustbin of history. In such a pure consciousness experience of the infinitude of this physical-only universe and of its this-moment-only happening, it then becomes patently obvious what a folly it is to believe that all this magnificence was created by, or is controlled by, a some-body or a some-thing. It is this temporary glimpse of ‘self’-less experience that then provides one’s life with substance, meaning, purpose, focus and direction and one then yearns to start the process of actively participating in the happening of this moment, for the first time in one’s life – and most definitely not as a dis-embodied observer, nor as a back-seat passenger. It becomes clear from such an experience that the way to do this is to ask oneself, each moment again, ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive? – for one will then focus one’s attention on how one is experiencing this very moment of being alive, the only moment one can experience. The process of actualism itself then becomes rich in meaning, purpose and direction. The process of actualism can never be off in the future and there is never an opportunity lost in the past, for it is immediately happening the moment one asks oneself the question ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ What will inevitably come to light over time in this momentary investigation are all the morals, ethics, values, beliefs and psittacisms that constitute ‘me’ as a social identity and all of the instinctual passions that give substance to ‘me’ as an instinctual being. Thus by one’s own curiosity, one’s own attentiveness, one’s own investigations and one’s own experiences, one actively conspires in one’s own ‘self’-immolation. But just to flag a warning – This process of actualism is not effortless, for if it was the human condition would not still be exemplified by malice and sorrow. Millions of people have searched for a genuine freedom for thousands of years but the priests, shamans, wise men and Gurus have always taught, by carrot and stick, the effortless paths of devotion or surrender. It is because of this religious/spiritual conditioning that most of the people thus far who have been attracted to actualism, including those who have ‘seen the light’ and stopped their spiritual seeking, invariably cool themselves down when they realize that actualism is not an effortless path. Effort is required in actualism and none more so than to begin the process. Once started, effort is still required to sustain it in the face of the occasional adversities as well as the persistent adversaries. The effort required is in no way super-human – it simply requires that you make becoming free of malice and sorrow the most important thing in your life and to not stop until the job is done. To regard freedom from malice and sorrow as effortless is to demean the efforts of the countless human beings who have searched for, and are still searching for, a way to bring peace to this fair planet. That freedom should be effortless is one of the most insidious and deepest ingrained of all spiritual beliefs for one invariably imagines freedom to be one’s God-given right. For an actualist it is essential to break free from the iron grip of ‘effortless’ belief, fully grasp the fact that there is ‘no-one or no-thing’ stopping one from being free, shout halleluiah, roll up one’s sleeves and become fully committed to making peace on earth a fact rather than a dream. * And the last 9 months. I have posted little to this mailing list and have spent little time in reflective contemplation. Whether this is because all the discoveries have been made and, as I said to Vineeto, ‘I certainly have had a sense of, there is nothing new to write or report – and maybe that, in itself, is worth reporting’. Personally, I find spending little time in reflective contemplation difficult to relate to because it is not my experience. Perhaps your meaning is different to mine so I will define what reflective contemplation means to me. The ability to reflect is innate in all human beings. In animals, a primitive instinctual memory of past events is evident – a dog nuzzling up for food, a lion returning to a favourite hunting spot, a cat being wary in a place where it was attacked before. Humans have not only this primitive instinctual memory but also a reasonably detailed factual memory which, when combined with thinking, forms intelligence. The action of thinking without the ability to reflect would leave us unable to gain the practical benefit of life-experience – one would be not only immature but one would be unable to learn from one’s life experiences. Given that the aim of actualism is to be here in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are, reflective contemplation is an essential activity for an actualist. I think we mean the same thing by ‘reflective contemplation’. Perhaps I should have said ‘pure contemplation’, viz: –
Perhaps another way of putting it is that reflective contemplation is part of the work that ‘I’ do in order to investigate and eliminate the ‘human’ beliefs and ideals that actively conspire to prevent pure contemplation from happening. * Virtual freedom is by no means a permanent state, it is only a stepping stone on the path. To stop at any stage on the path is to risk losing all that one has gained from one’s hard work, but to push on requires a passionate dedication and obsession that can only be fuelled by altruism – the innate unselfishness that is programmed into all human beings as part of the survival instincts. When one takes the blind senselessness out of altruism then one’s ‘self’-sacrifice is made for peace on earth, not God or country. Actualism is about peace on earth – bringing an end to war, murder, rape, torture, domestic violence, corruption and child abuse. Interesting what you say about altruism in view of my last post to Vineeto. I disagree that it is unselfish, however. Surely most, if not all, altruistic acts are done to obtain recognition, praise and glory for being unselfish – LOL. We may well be talking of different things for I was talking about the blind passion of altruism – an intrinsic aspect of the pre-programmed survival instinct in humans that is ultimately configured to ensure the survival of the species and not any particular individual. I can remember two distinct experiences of the overwhelming power of altruism and neither had anything to do with recognition, praise or glory. The first occasion was clear-cut and concerned the death of my son. As soon as the first wave of grief subsided I was struck with an urge to sacrifice my own life if it would bring him back. This urge was so powerful that I have no doubt that I would have thrown the switch to make this happen if it were possible. He was the future and I was the past – he was the species’ future and I was merely its past – for ‘I’, as an instinctual animal, am genetically programmed to be northing other than a progenerator of the species. Thus my biological imperative to reproduce was completed and the blind urge to sacrifice my life in order that my offspring survived kicked in. The second experience is somewhat less clear for the blind altruistic drive was clouded and complicated by my tribal-social conditioning. This relates to the life-threatening situation at the end of Rajneeshpuram in Oregon where I felt distinct urges to sacrifice my life in order that my God would survive. Given that I was living in one of his communes at the time and not at Rajneeshpuram and that the crisis passed without conflict, the experience was not as strong and as immediate as the first one. When taken to extremes, the simplistic altruistic impulse of species-first survival is so perverted by social conditioning that some humans will willingly even commit suicide for a cause, belief, ideal, principle, conviction or faith. Altruism is evident in many forms and expressed in many ways in the human species. As you say, many acts that appear to be altruistic at first glance are very often done for totally self-serving reasons – to gain recognition, fame, praise and glory. But for each of these acts there are countless others that are unrecognised, unsung and mundane. We in the West would not be enjoying the current level of safety, comfort, leisure and pleasure were it not for altruism. Many people deliberately choose to devote their life’s work for the betterment of others, be they scientists, doctors, nurses, carers, engineers, inventors or the like, and the result of their efforts is literally breathtaking. One can debate the usefulness or ulterior motives of some people and some work but the fact remains that altruism is a powerful motivating force for betterment within the human species. Given that actualism is about bringing an end to malice and sorrow in the human species, I fail to see how anyone would be prepared to devote their life to making it work without being motivated by altruism. Actualism and altruism go hand in glove – for unless one taps into the unselfish motivation of altruism one’s search for freedom is bound to remain self-motivated, as in spiritual freedom. Speaking personally, two events stand out in my life that may well throw some light on the motivating power of altruism. I have written about both in my journal but they may well be worth repeating here. The first was when I initially became attracted to Eastern spiritualism and I clearly remember that one of the major attractions for me was the notion of communal living – the proposition that a spiritual commune based on love and devotion would mean people living together in peace and harmony. And further that these communes would become working models to demonstrate what was possible, and that these communes would spread around the world and everybody would end up living in peace and harmony. Therefore my initial prime motivation in taking up Eastern spiritualism was altruistic – even though I was eventually to discover that my ulterior motive was completely selfish. The other event was when my son died and I clearly remember standing beside his coffin and an urge welled up in me to find the answer to the mystery of why human life was so angst-ridden, so conflict-ridden and so unfulfilling that people needed to court danger for thrills or patiently wait until death before they are finally free of suffering. This urge to devote my life to finding a way to end human suffering was altruistic because I had the urge to do it for all the teenagers who suffer the angst of leaving the relative shelter of childhood and who are then confronted with a dog-eat-dog world that is bereft of answers to bring an end to the madness and horrors of the human condition. Immediately after this urge came a burning desire for freedom that was to herald the real beginning of my search for freedom but what is relevant is that the unselfishness of altruism kicked in before the selfishness of personal freedom. As I am writing this other examples come to mind. When I first came across actualism I was particularly moved by the challenge – ‘If I can’t live with one other person in utter peace and harmony, then how can I ever expect there to be peace on earth’. It was altruism that made me stand up and be counted, to prove that it was possible for others because not only were my own relationships less than perfect, ridden with sad compromise, sullen withdrawal and testy conflicts but I knew by experience and observation that this was the norm. Nowhere did I see people living together in peace and harmony, quite the contrary, I saw compromise and conflict, so I decided to accept the challenge and prove that it was possible – come what may. The motivation to prove it is possible to live with another person in utter peace and harmony was altruistic because billions of people live in dysfunctional relationships, domestic violence, be it covert or overt, is rampant and child abuse is all too common. And finally, it is altruism that serves one whilst on the path to freedom for if you take the blind senselessness out of altruism you are left with a pure unselfish intent. How this is evident in actualism is, as I wrote recently, that one invariably keeps becoming harmless slightly ahead of becoming happy in one’s priorities. Altruism, combined with integrity, also serves one to get over the instinctual narcissistic urge to become the next world teacher and it is altruism that then pushes one on to finally prove that actualism does work – that it is a fact that I can live in the world as-it-is, with people as-they-are, totally bereft of any malice and sorrow whatsoever. I do like exploring these issues because I have never so completely comprehended the extent to which the passion of altruism is interlinked with actualism – they do indeed go hand in glove. With the benefit of hindsight the connection is very clear, but I do note that it was not something I mentioned in my journal, so it was obviously not so apparent at the beginning of my explorations. I have mentioned effort many times in my journal but I may well make specific mention of altruism in a postscript given that it is what steers one in the completely opposite direction to the narcissism inherent in the spiritual path. Nice to chat with you again.
Hi Alan – ‘But’ is an extremely useful tool for discovering some home truths and something I used a lot in my ‘personal growth’ days. It is also useful, as you pointed out, for seeing what others are up to. Either the statement before or, the statement following a ‘but’ is a lie – nearly always works. For example, your statement:
Which was the lie:
An amusing example but a serious point. Ahh well. No wonder you moved on from the personal growth movement if this is an example of what they were on about. If part of their philosophy is that ‘the statement before or, the statement following a ‘but’ is a lie’ and it is applied to a simple qualifying statement such as mine it makes no sense because neither statement was a lie. However, if you apply the same personal growth movement rule to statements such as ‘I am happy, but I am a bit annoyed with ...’, or ‘I am happy, but I’m feeling a bit bored right now’ then the effect can be quite significant. Given that one’s intention in applying the rule is personal growth, as in ‘my’ growth, the statement ‘I am happy’ would naturally be regarded as true and ‘I am pissed off’ or ‘I am feeling a bit bored’ would then be regarded as a lie, as in not true. By applying this ‘nearly always’ rule it follows that whatever ‘I’ think would nearly always be true and the feelings of anger, boredom, and the like would nearly always be a lie or an untruth. Momentary personal ‘growth’ would nearly always result, as in temporarily inflating one’s ego and repressing one’s unwanted feelings. Under the same rule, ‘I’ would nearly always be right and whenever another person said ‘but ...’ they would nearly always be wrong. One would conceivably be ‘right’ more of the time and therefore more able to stand up for one’s ‘rights’ or ‘truths’, one could ‘grow’ stronger and be more able to cope, one would feel more ‘self’-confident and more ‘self’-enhanced, be more able to trust one’s feelings as true and generally be more in love with one’s ‘self’. No doubt such a philosophy could offer some temporary boost to a flagging ego every now and again and it could also be useful as a quick fix to temporarily get out of a bout of depression or low ‘self’-esteem but it falls into the usual therapy category of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. If this is a typical example of the teachings of the ‘personal growth’ movement, it is easy to see that it was a natural transition for many to move on to the self’-inflating teachings of Eastern philosophy/religion – because there can be no more inflated a ‘self’ than a ‘Self’. To think and feel oneself to be a God or Goddess is as good as narcissism gets – unless one totally loses all grip on reality and believes oneself to be the Only-God. I can see why you went searching for something that works to permanently eliminate the ‘but’ from ‘I am happy, but ...’ rather than stay with a teaching whose rules only serve to dismiss the unwanted and undesirable feelings by either suppression or transcendence.
Hi Alan, I was a bit surprised by your last post to me. It seems you may have lost your sense of humour? As in my closing two lines: An amusing example but a serious point. Ahh well. ‘Ahh wells’ never did sit well with me, so let’s have a look at my last post together, shall we? * ‘But’ is an extremely useful tool for discovering some home truths and something I used a lot in my ‘personal growth’ days. It is also useful, as you pointed out, for seeing what others are up to. Either the statement before or, the statement following a ‘but’ is a lie – nearly always works. For example, your statement:
Which was the lie:
An amusing example but a serious point. No wonder you moved on from the personal growth movement if this is an example of what they were on about. If part of their philosophy is that ‘the statement before or, the statement following a ‘but’ is a lie’ and it is applied to a simple qualifying statement such as mine it makes no sense because neither statement was a lie. As stated, it was intended as an amusing example (or was it a serious point?). I leave it to you to decide whether you ‘left it at that’ and did not ‘get long winded’? It was not any part of anyone’s ‘philosophy’ (whoever ‘they’ were) so far as I am aware. Perhaps I am losing the plot. The reason I replied was because you had said it was a serious point, so I didn’t just leave it at that but made the most of the opportunity to say something of substance about it, in what most people seem to regard as a long winded way. I wasn’t being serious but sincere, because surely this is what this list is about. What else are we on this mailing list for, if not to mutually explore these psittacisms, tools, sayings, adages and the like that pass for wisdom in the real-world and the spiritual world? As for your second point, surely a saying such as this must be part of someone’s philosophy, if not the personal growth movement? You yourself said you have found it an extremely useful tool in the past, which in itself makes it worthy of investigation on this list, does it not? * However, if you apply the same personal growth movement rule to statements such as ‘I am happy, but I am a bit annoyed with ...’, or ‘I am happy, but I’m feeling a bit bored right now’ then the effect can be quite significant. Given that one’s intention in applying the rule is personal growth, as in ‘my’ growth, the statement ‘I am happy’ would naturally be regarded as true and ‘I am pissed off’ or ‘I am feeling a bit bored’ would then be regarded as a lie, as in not true. No. The lie would be ‘I am happy’ given that one was either annoyed or bored. And I did not state it was a ‘rule’, merely a ‘tool’. Okay. What I was getting at in what I said above was the intention of using the tool for one’s own ‘personal growth’, as in making a stronger ‘me’. I would suggest that any investigation of either ‘the lie’ or ‘the truth’ with such an intent in mind could only lead to a superficial investigation at best – with the aim of growing or strengthening ‘me’, not diminishing or weakening ‘me’. Does this make sense? If personal growth aflicionados used such a tool, or anyone else for that matter, and it worked, then surely the world would be brimming with happy and harmless ‘self’-less people by now? I would also throw in that ‘a tool’ is another word for ‘a rule’ that is not necessarily applied religiously so as not to appear to be a moral. * By applying this ‘nearly always’ rule it follows that whatever ‘I’ think would nearly always be true and the feelings of anger, boredom, and the like would nearly always be a lie or an untruth. Momentary personal ‘growth’ would nearly always result, as in temporarily inflating one’s ego and repressing one’s unwanted feelings. No. The feelings of ‘anger, boredom and the like’ would be ‘true’ and ‘I’ would not be happy. If the ‘tool’ were applied to the statement ‘I am happy, but angry (or bored)’ then the feelings would be explored, not repressed, and one’s ego would be deflated a bit more. Given that I was talking about the tool, or rule, being used in the context of the personal growth movement, you seem to be arguing that intention of the personal growth movement was not personal growth but personal reduction. This does seem to be stretching a point somewhat. What would happen if one used the tool ‘either the statement before or, the statement following a ‘but’ is a lie’ and applied it to an observation such as ‘I am annoyed, but it’s because of what someone said to me’. Which part would be true and which part would be a lie and would the result be explored feelings and a deflated ‘self’? Or if one applied the tool to an observation such as ‘I am feeling sad, but the reason is I just watched a sad movie?’ Which part would be true and which part would be a lie and would the result be explored feelings and a deflated ‘self’? * I can see why you went searching for something that works to permanently eliminate the ‘but’ from ‘I am happy, but ...’ rather than stay with a teaching whose rules only serve to dismiss the unwanted and undesirable feelings by either suppression or transcendence. I certainly did wish to eliminate the ‘but’ – so as to make the first statement ‘I am happy’ true (where it had been a lie) and the second statement ‘annoyed or bored’ a lie (where it had been a true). There was no suppression or transcendence of undesirable feelings involved – by realising that ‘I am happy’ is the lie, one has an opportunity to examine the statement following the ‘but’ as being true, i.e. ‘I am annoyed’ or ‘I am bored’ – which is what I thought you were pointing out in your post to No 3, viz:
And I was simply pointing out the fundamental flaws in the tool you said ‘is extremely useful for discovering some home truths’. You also said that it ‘is also useful, as you pointed out, for seeing what others are up to’ whereas I have said nothing at all about the usefulness of the tool you are talking about, au contraire. The tool you are talking of is a sieve with holes big enough to drive a London bus through. It is a moralistic aphorism used to arbitrarily separate likes and dislikes, rights and wrongs, goods and bads, truths and lies to ‘my’ satisfaction and for ‘my’ growth. As such, its use can only be ‘self’-sustaining and ‘self’-serving and definitely not ‘self’ eradicating. What I was talking to Gary about was the devastating simplicity of running the question ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ If used assiduously there is no way ‘I’ can get off the hook with ‘my’ buts which is why ‘I’ have such a reluctance to use it. I would give another example, but my sense of humour might be misinterpreted. Ahh well. Another example would be welcome if it serves to throw more light on what you called a serious point. It is sometimes difficult to keep a thread going but it is the only way to investigate exactly why all these other methods, movements, beliefs, therapies, tools, aphorisms, morals, ethics, psittacisms and the like have failed to produce the goods – human beings who can live together in utter peace and harmony. Billions have trod these paths before looking for answers and for things that work and peace on earth still remains a forlorn dream. Once you firmly grasp this fact that there is no solution to be had within the human condition you cease the fruitless task of racking over the flotsam of history’s failed methods and beliefs looking for the answer and, even more significantly, you stop defending the indefensible. This Ah Ha means you can then begin the thrilling business of looking for why it has all been going horribly wrong and still is. This investigation, if undertaken with gusto, will inevitable lead to one becoming free of the human condition, or to put it another way, to one’s own self’-immolation which is exactly what you have said you are so ardently seeking. Once an actualist fully takes these facts on board, then he or she can begin the business of actively questioning all those methods, movements, beliefs, therapies, tools, aphorisms, morals, ethics, psittacisms that have failed to elicit peace on earth and begin understanding why they have failed. This process of questioning, investigating and understanding is not a comfortable business for ‘I’, as a social identity, is made up of nothing other than the beliefs ‘I’ was taught or that ‘I’ hold to my bosom as ‘mine’ – hence it is simultaneously a process of ‘self’-immolation. Many an actualist has fallen for the trap of thinking that what actualism is about is eliminating feelings – a misconstruing that can only lead to some form of catatonic introversion – while blithely ignoring the fact that the real work to be done initially is to become aware of the extent and nature of one’s own beliefs, and then begin the uncomfortable and oft alarming process of replacing belief with fact. The only way to walk the path to freedom is on the firm footing of facts – they are quite literally the stepping-stones to the actual world. Once you get the knack of this process of investigating beliefs, the path to freedom becomes indeed wide and indeed wondrous.
I chose happy and harmless. And, if I may say so, an excellent choice. When I came across Richard, I too made the same choice – to become happy and harmless. In choosing to become actually happy and harmless, I was also aware that it would be committing myself to eliminating ‘me’ and ‘my’ malice and sorrow, i.e. that I was committing myself to a path that would lead to irrevocable change. It did mean turning my back on the dreams and promises of the metaphysical world, avoiding the temptation to simply return to normal reality and daring to come down to earth where we human beings actually live. The first stage of this journey, as you know, involves beginning the process of divesting oneself of the beliefs, morals, ethics, values, principles and psittacisms that bind one to both the spiritual and real worlds. At some point one will most likely come across a seminal individualistic issue, a particular emotional tie, a personal matter of principle or the like that will present one with a momentous decision – whether one is going to devote one’s life to becoming free the human condition ... or not. It is as though one is hanging on to the past while wanting to move on to freedom and this period of ambivalence can be one of considerable angst unless one then makes a 100% commitment to actualism or turns back to being normal again. This act of leaving the past behind is the real beginning of the journey for one soon finds oneself beyond the shallows and familiar territory and into deeper waters and unfamiliar territory. Having cast off, as it were, there is then no turning back and the only guide one has, apart from the accounts of others who have travelled the same path, is one’s own experience of one’s goal – one’s own pure consciousness experience of the perfection and purity of this actual physical world we flesh and blood humans all live in. Ultimately it is one’s own pure consciousness experience of the physical world that is benign and delightful, utterly bereft of malice and sorrow, that provides both the vitality and motivation to fully devote oneself to the process of eliminating one’s own malice and sorrow – to ‘self’-immolate. Those who imagine the process of becoming happy and harmless – eliminating one’s own malice and sorrow – is effortless are those who see actualism from a spiritual viewpoint. Choosing to do anything of substance in life is but the start of an intensive process of learning and in a similar vein choosing to become happy and harmless is but the start of an intensive process of removing all the impediments that societal conditioning and blind nature have implanted so as to prevent one from achieving one’s aim. To merely think or feel oneself to be free of malice and sorrow is a far cry from actually being free of malice and sorrow, in the world as-it-is, with people as-they-are. This process of becoming free of malice and sorrow took the first person some 12 years of intense effort and for those following some 3½ years to date. There is little doubt that the path will get progressively easier for those others who follow as there is now a veritable library of information and personal accounts available that will serve as an invaluable aid in the difficult, oft alarming but always thrilling adventure. It’s no little thing to devote one’s life to becoming free of malice and sorrow, for one will be continuously challenged by people, things and events to demonstrate the purity of one’s intent and the mettle of one’s integrity. And who would have it any other way ...
Peter’s Text © The Actual Freedom Trust |
