Peter’s Correspondence on the Actual Freedom List

with Correspondent No 37

4.1.2002

Hi,

Welcome to the mailing list.

I’d like to introduce myself (or flesh and blood body) first. I was raised in a Christian home – lost my religious faith in college – began studying philosophy thereafter – became awestruck by Meher Baba, but also very confused and uncomfortable with many of his inconsistencies.

I have fearfully studied and read voraciously in order to find the freedom that I have only recently begun to explore with this notion of actual freedom. What I read here has a ‘gravitational pull’ that I find I cannot resist. Meeting Bernadette Roberts (author of ‘The ‘experience’ of No-Self’) last February, then learning and absorbing what I could of UG Krishnamurti and Suzanne Segal left me ripe to assimilate what I am reading here.

I spent many years on the spiritual path and also started off being awestruck, moved on through confusion and uncomfortableness and eventually graduated with a diploma in disillusionment. It was a priceless journey because I discovered what didn’t work ... and after I became an actualist, I discovered why.

By the way, the experience of ‘No-Self’ is a spiritual other-worldly experience whereas what is on offer here is a non-spiritual down-to-earth freedom – the antithesis of spirituality.

If I can pass on a bit of personal experience that you may find useful – it is important at the start to slowly read what is on offer on the AF web-site and think carefully about what is being said, rather than skim read assuming you already know what is being said. When I first came across Richard, I would listen to what he said and make many assumptions based upon my previous understandings. He had only written his Journal at that stage and I took home a printout for some supplementary reading, but I was soon to discover the advantage of the written word over the spoken word.

I found that I needed to slowly and carefully read what was written, often going back and back over sentences, in order to try and really understand what he was saying. Sometimes I would read a few sentences and then deliberately sit back and contemplate upon the matter. These contemplations often led to realizations of the fact that actualism and actuality is indeed totally 180 degrees opposite to spiritual belief in all respects.

These realizations sometimes even lead to a slow slide into pure consciousness experiences – brief sensual experiences of the peerless perfection and pristine purity of actuality. As long as you then don’t claim this sensate-only experience as ‘your’ own and turn it into an affective experience, you will then know – by direct experience – that there is a world of difference between ‘self’-lessness and ‘No-self’.

*

Given that others have also written to you, I’ll cut to some questions you have asked about a topic I have had some particular experience with.

Now – on to ‘relationships.’ I think I can ask this one pretty simply.

If one is slowly whittling away at love, compassion, nurture, desire – then is there still room for rearing children and ‘sticking with’ your marriage partner come what may?

Being virtually free, my experience is that once you free yourself of the shackles of your social-spiritual conditioning and are free of being driven by your instinctual passions, you are then free to do whatever you deem appropriate in any situation. If the situation is that you have children to rear then you do the job much, much better by being virtually free of malice and sorrow. Similarly, if you decide to ‘stick with’ your marriage partner come what may, at least you free your partner from the imposition of your moods and emotional demands.

Is the actuality of benevolence enough to keep people together as long as it’s a sensible thing to do?

When you tap into the already existing benevolence that lies crippled by your instinctual passions everything – including whatever obligations remain – becomes easy and effortless.

Or is there still some cultural factor that makes it ‘sensible’ to ‘care’ for spouse and child?

In virtual freedom from the human condition, no cultural factors remain to restrict or impede sensible action. These include the social, cultural and spiritual mores that conspire to lock one into any of the traditional social identities of being a father, mother, son or daughter. Remaining ensnared by this socially imbibed role-playing acts to prevent the possibility of an unfettered intimacy between what are, in fact, fellow human beings.

In other words, where does the ‘continuity’ required to care for a child come from in actual (or virtual) freedom (where ‘continuity’ doesn’t exist)?

‘Continuity’, as you put it, ceases to exist only when there is no psychological or psychic identity to harbour past hurts, nor to conjure any future expectations. It follows that the very best thing that you can do in caring for a child is to free him or her from ‘your’ hopes and fears as well as ‘your’ resentment, anger, frustration, sadness and misery.

It’s easy to think that caring for your child is only based on the nurturing instinct. Does the ability to raise a child necessarily disappear along with the nurturing instinct – or is the benevolence of virtual or actual freedom enough to maintain ‘parenthood’?

Speaking personally and in hindsight, the only reason I married was because it was the only socially acceptable way to have sex when I was young and randy. Having children came with the package, so to speak. Then the instinctual drive and passion of nurture took over my life, causing me no end of pain and suffering and causing me to inflict no end of pain and suffering on my wife and children.

As I came to become aware of what was going on, I deliberately aimed to suppress these feelings, to concentrate on the more pragmatic, practical aspects of caring and to allow my children as much freedom as possible to live their own lives. When their school years came, I realized that a peer-driven socialization process had kicked in and that my influence as a parent declined dramatically.

By then, it was simply a matter of providing food, shelter and money for as long as was needed. In hindsight, this was the best I could have done in the circumstances, given ‘who’ I was then. It is impossible to save children from the inevitability of being socially conditioned, and it is impossible to free them from their genetic-endowment of the instinctual passions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire.

The only advice my father ever gave me, apart from practical matters, was to ‘be happy’, but he didn’t tell me how because he didn’t know. He had also fought in the Second World War and consequently abhorred violence, something he passed on to me. This influence was to emerge in my spiritual search as I threw myself headlong into a search for happiness and peace, so conceivably my own influence on my children was that life was a search for happiness and peace.

When I became an actualist and found out how to be happy and where peace really lay, I wrote my Journal and sent my son a copy. What he does with what I have found out is his business, which is as it should be – and is – in this perfect actual world we live in.

It is as much an imposition to bring up a child as an actualist as it is to deliberately impose any beliefs on a child – for the simple fact that a child lacks sufficient life experience and erudition to distinguish between belief and fact, to know what works and what doesn’t work. The best an actualist can do is to provide practical care, pass on practical survival skills and ... eliminate his or her own malice and sorrow so as not to impose either on the child.

This best far outstrips what passes for parenthood in either the normal or spiritual worlds.

Does the fact of raising a child necessarily indicate the continuing presence of ‘nurture’?

Just as the elimination of the instinctual passion of aggression does not mean that one cannot defend oneself appropriately if physically attacked, the elimination of the instinctual passion of nurture does not stop one from rearing children. In both cases the job is done much better without the blind crude instinctual imperative operating. In a similar vein, the elimination of the instinctual passion of desire does not mean one ends up being a celibate monk – or a globe-trotting Guru – sponging off others for food, shelter and veneration.

Rather than suppressing or denying, a progressive elimination of all of the instinctual passions means one discovers that one is already living, and always has lived, in a sensual paradise, the earthy incomparable cornucopia of this planet we call Earth.

15.5.2002

I thought to respond to this post, even though you have since reported that you have had some insights about these issues.

I like it that you are having your own insights about the issues that are relevant to you in your life, and that you have had your own experience that has apparently shed some light on what is on offer in actualism. Whilst the writings about actualism and actual freedom are already quite extensive, broad ranging and catalogued, this source is but information to guide and aid your own personal investigations, insights and experiences on your own path to becoming free of the human condition. In other words, actualism is a do-it-yourself process, not a blindly follow-the-leader belief system.

Having said that, however, you are not alone in the process of actualism and much information can be gained from the experience of fellow human beings who have managed to rid themselves of malice and sorrow. I have learnt a good deal from observing Richard’s common sense approach to the business of being a flesh and blood human body in the world as-it-is, so I’ll pass on my experience about the consanguineous issues you have raised since I have been both a son and a father in my life. I’ve also written on this topic in my journal, so I’ll try and keep this brief.

Perhaps the most significant event that gave me cause to think about the whole issue of family happened a few years after my father died. Both my sister and I were at the age where we had left home and were capable of looking after ourselves financially and we then agreed that it would be good for our mother if we released her of her obligations to continue to provide for us. We told her that she had done a good job in looking after us whilst we were growing up but that now her time and money was hers again, to do with as she wished.

I remember at the time thinking what a freeing thing this decision was, both for my mother and for myself. This realization meant that later on, when I became a father, I did exactly the same. Although one of my sons died at an early age, I released the other son of the burden of the expectation that I would continue to provide for him beyond the point where he left the nest and also of the burden that he would have to provide for me in my old age. This simple unilateral action – one that can be taken by either a parent or an offspring – means that one is well on the path to seeing, and treating, one’s parents and children for what they really are – fellow human beings.

The only reason I was willing to take this step as a father was that I had by then set my sights on becoming happy and harmless and this meant that I had to release my son of my continually interfering in his life – of wanting him to do things my way. By setting my sights on becoming happy and harmless, I became aware of the issues around family that made me unhappy and the times when I did something or said something that caused ripples in other family member’s lives. As a practicing actualist, I came to see how both my societal and instinctual programming pervaded every aspect of my interactions with my son and how the combination of both actively conspired to prevent peace and harmony between us.

The first thing I found I needed to do was to become aware of what was going on, to understand the nature of this programming. The second was to see and acknowledge my part in the emotional turmoil that this programming generates, and the third and most important was to have the courage to change. Such radical change inevitably means going against what society regards as ‘normal’, ‘right’ and ‘good’ – the eons-old code of conduct based on the moral codes and ethical standards that have been unquestioningly passed down from generation to generation. This act of ‘breaking free of the mould’ then enabled me to clearly see and experience the underlying instinctual animal programming in action – those very crude, ‘self’-centred genetically-encoded compulsive drives that act to sabotage even the best of intentions of human beings to live together in peace and harmony. By being attentive to this genetic programming in action, I then became progressively less susceptible to the consuming power of both the savage and tender instinctual passions.

My experience is that once you have gone through this process with the major issues that prevent you from being happy and harmless, you then find yourself virtually happy and harmless – happy and harmless 99% of the time. At this stage the changes ‘I’ can instigate tend to be more minimal as ‘I’ have done most of the substantive work that ‘I’ can do and the resultant feelings of redundancy eventually lead to the realization that the extinction of ‘me’ is the next step to be taken.

As you know, this is a report of work in progress on the path to actual freedom, but I have always written on the basis that my experience will be of interest, and may be of use, to those interested in becoming free of the human condition, in toto.

The idea of change, or of tackling something new, usually generates a good deal of fear. From this feeling of fear can come doubt, reluctance, inertia, stuckness and so on, but the same feeling can also generate a sense of adventure, thrill, curiosity, fascination, determination and so on.

Several years ago, I experienced the same range of feelings when I gave up drawing with pen on paper on a drawing board and changed to CAD (computer aided drafting). At first I just wanted to muddle along in the old style that I had been taught in my youth, but then one day I realized I might still be drawing for a good many years to come and that, unless I changed to CAD, I would eventually end up a Neanderthal architect. After that came the resistance to starting something new, then came the trials and tribulations of having to throw out all I had learnt in the past about drawing and starting all over again. After a few weeks I found I had to actually get rid of my drawing board so that I fully committed myself to one thing only – learning a whole new way of drawing.

With hindsight, I had to undertake exactly the same process when I stopped being a Neanderthal spiritualist and wanted to become an actualist – the initial resistance, a period of trial and tribulation, the necessity to cut all ties with the past, and finally throwing myself in the deep end and getting on with it. Needless to say the effort, in both cases, has been worth it – but I do acknowledge that the process of change is, in itself, always a challenge.

Whilst the process of change is, in itself, always a challenge … the hardest part of all is making the decision to fully commit yourself to the process.

Well, if you are into Eastern mysticism and you want a delusionary state of spiritual freedom, there’s always the U.G. Krishnamurti way. From what I have read of U.G., his bottom line is a nihilistic acceptance of the inevitability of human suffering and misery on earth – a view rooted in the spiritual dogma that it is impossible to change human nature.

All spiritual teachers preach the doctrine of acceptance for the basic reason that the idea of men and women taking it upon themselves to become free of malice and sorrow is anathema to all religious and spiritual belief that there is an omnipresent and omnipotent God or Presence, by whatever name, who is really running the show. The priests and gurus wield the admonition of ‘acceptance’ like an axe in order to cut people down to size, to keep them humble and in their place – on their knees.

However, if you sincerely desire to become happy and harmless in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are – and you are not happy and harmless now – then you need to stop accepting your lot in life because it is obvious that there is work to be done and changes to be made.

The universal human desire for freedom is not an enemy, nor is it the cause of human misery, as the spiritualists would have us believe. The desire for freedom is based upon the experiential understanding that there is more to life than you normally experience. Whether you consciously remember these experiences or not – sometimes people find it difficult to remember their pure consciousness experiences – the disparity between these experiences of the perfection and purity of the actual world on one hand and your life as-it-is now on the other is the very source of the desire for freedom.

Thus far in human history, the shamans, gurus and Godmen have latched on to this innate human desire for freedom, peace and happiness and have cornered the market by peddling their alluring fairy tales of immortal souls and spirit worlds and seductive states of God-consciousness. However, in this newly emerging post-spiritual era, this sham can now be clearly seen for what it is – ancient superstitions and myths fabricated upon the urge for ‘self’-aggrandizement that is built into the animal instinctual survival program. Only when you come to fully understand the breathtaking scope of this scam are you able to finally free yourself from the spiritual platitudes and inanities that have squashed, crippled and perverted the human desire for freedom for millennia.

Then you are free to gaily crank up your own desire for a genuine freedom from malice and sorrow – free to roll up your sleeves and get stuck into the fascinating business of finding out exactly what is preventing you from being happy and harmless now.

And what a grand thing to do – to dare to head off on your own in a direction that is 180 degrees opposite to what everyone else accepts as being right and true – to experience that delicious feeling of committing yourself totally to your search for freedom, peace and happiness for the first time in your life.

17.6.2002

The only relevance that I can ascertain is his experimental confirmation that feeling precedes thought.

Besides that – I’m looking at a book by Antonio Damasio – titled ‘Descartes’ Error’. Now I have no well-formed views on what he is saying, but what I’m gathering so far is that Damasio’s work (he looks specifically at the case of Phineas Gage and others with frontal lobe damage) is a confirmation of LeDoux’s work, and in that sense may be of use to actualists.

It pays to remember that neither LeDoux nor Damasio are interested in becoming free of the human condition and, as such, they are interested in explaining what is, rather than what is possible.

Interestingly enough, Damasio seems to be saying that emotion and feeling is integral to experience as a self (both social and instinctual) – but since he dealt with people with frontal lobe damage, he seems to be saying that loss of self is dangerous and maladaptive.

Which is but confirmation of the status quo.

So he is trying to correct the ‘Cartesian Error’ that reasoning and cognition is without feeling or emotion – so he is afraid of the idea of a ‘selfless cognition.’

‘Not at all interested in ‘the idea of a ‘selfless cognition’’ may be a better way of describing it.

So, on the one hand he seems to support the actualist affirmation of the instinctual self, yet he also claims that loss of self is disorienting and disturbing.

It is useful to consider that an actual freedom from the human condition is not considered normal by the psychological and psychiatric standards applicable to the human condition. But then again, that is to be expected, is it not.

The other relevant point to consider is that Richard is not someone who has suffered brain damage but is someone who has managed by his own efforts to rid himself of malice and sorrow – an event that coincided with the extinction of all traces of either a psychological or psychic ‘self’.

My hunch is that may be due to the fact that he has studied what he calls ‘secondary emotion’ – that is the processing of the frontal lobe with the functioning of the amygdala still intact. Anyway, this is mostly a pre-formed opinion since I haven’t had sufficient time to mull over the ideas, but I’m wondering if others have read Damasio’s work and what thoughts you might have.

I remember several times being hooked in by the experimental work and theories of neuro-scientists and the like, until I remembered that all they are studying is the functioning of the human brain – the hardware if you like – within the current functioning of the human psyche – the software programming if you like. And that, unlike actualists, they have no interest whatsoever in changing the social and instinctual programming that is the very cause of all the misery and mayhem among human beings on the planet.

4.8.2002

You wrote, quoting something that I had written on the website –

I’m giving this one last go. I’ll state my case and be done with it.

The following is from the Library and Glossary entry of ‘How to become free from the Human Condition.’

‘...But the choice is simple. It is either a miserable, painful, death-like life of not fully living or a quick death of what is clearly seen as the problem in the peak experience – the ‘self’ or ‘psychological and psychic entity’ within.’ AF Library, How to Become Free

What I’d like to point out about this statement is the way it polarizes the path to actual freedom on the ‘happy’ side and the ‘human condition’ on the ‘miserable’ side. Richard tells me that a person in the ‘human’ world can be reasonably happy. Even Peter and Vineeto seem to think that a ‘human’ life can have value. Yet, there is absolutely none of this in the quoted statement above. If it were stated that ‘the choice is simple, it’s either a life with misery, pain, and not fully living or...’ – then a statement like that leaves room for even the value of a ‘human’ life. It’s just difficult for me to reconcile how one could even be ‘reasonably happy’ and also living a ‘death-like’ life.

Maybe it will be said that I’m not reading with ‘both eyes open.’ Or, that I am taking the words too seriously – since it’s experience after all that matters. Well, what happens when experience says that the words are just plain wrong? And possibly hazardous?

When I first started to be interested in actualism, I lead a normal human life and I was indeed ‘reasonably happy’. I had a job that I was good at and that I liked doing, I was living in the subtropics in a very nice little house within walking distance of the Pacific Ocean in a small town and I enjoyed all the comforts and pleasures of living by myself. When I began my investigations into the human condition, I discovered that I was reasonably happy only because I didn’t watch the evening news on television and my years of spiritual practice had furnished me with an armour of self-righteousness that meant that I blamed everyone else for the ills of the world while blithely denying my own contribution to the malice and sorrow of the human condition.

Having said that, I do take your point that for someone who is reasonably happy with his or her life as-it-is, then this statement can be quite shocking. The quote you posted is from the website Library entry ‘How to Become Free from the Human Condition’ but originally this passage came from my Journal. It perhaps reads better in its original context. I’ll post the relevant section for you to judge.

Broadly, what emerged that I could relate to was that I, as a human being, had been programmed since birth with a set of beliefs, which formed my identity, and that by identifying, challenging and investigating these beliefs they could be eliminated. Further, I had come into the world pre-programmed with a set of instincts, and these instincts too could be similarly eliminated. The ‘I’ that I think I am and that I feel I am, that troublesome psychological and psychic entity, was actually nothing more than the sum total of these beliefs and instincts! And the whole package could be got rid of! Not transcended as in the spiritual world, but actually annihilated. It sounded good to me … if a touch scary.

The essential method was to undertake a total investigation into anything that was preventing me from being happy now – after all, the point of living is to be happy now, not at some time in the future, or at some time in the past. The question to ask myself was, ‘How do I experience this moment of being alive?’ Now is, after all, the only time I can experience being happy. Any emotion such as anger, frustration or boredom that is preventing my happiness now, has to be traced back to its cause – the exact incident, thought, expectation or disappointment. At the root of this emotion is inevitably found a belief or an instinct. The ruthless challenging, exposing and understanding of these beliefs and instincts actually weakens their influence on my thoughts and behaviour. The process, if followed diligently and obsessively, will ultimately cause them to disappear completely. The idea, of course, being to eliminate the cause of my unhappiness, so that I can experience life at the optimum, here, now.

It soon presents success incrementally, as freedom from these beliefs and instincts is indeed an actual freedom that results in increased peace and harmony for myself and in my relating with those around me. The method does bring up fear and resistance, because one is dismantling one’s very ‘self’, those very beliefs one holds so dearly.

It sounds so simple, but most people who had talked to Richard were not even willing to take a small step along the way. Most people would seemingly like their life to be better, but faced with the prospect of actually having to do something themselves, or having to change the way they are, they soon turned away, only to re-run the ‘tried and failed’ methods. Of course, the major fear is that it will work and the ‘self’ will go! For me, I just figured that I had ‘nothing left to lose’, it was either a slow, miserable, painful, death-like life or a quick death of what I saw as the problem – the ‘self’ or ‘psychological and psychic entity’ within.

I remember one story that Richard told where he compared coming into the world to joining the army. You stand in a line, naked, and you are given, one by one, the various items you need for army life – underwear, shirts, trousers, helmet, shoes, bag, shaving gear, toothbrush and so on, and you emerge the other end ‘equipped’ for duty. Similarly, my parents, teachers and others had equipped me – as a new recruit to the human race – with the beliefs, values, morals and ethics necessary to join and play my part in the human race. This made sense to me, and I was soon immensely fascinated in uncovering, discussing and investigating each one of these beliefs. I was challenged to investigate the validity of each of them and to determine for myself the facts – what was sensible and what was silly? Had any of these beliefs and values worked, and if not, why not?

As human animals we also come into the world already equipped with the basic instincts of fear, aggression, nurture and desire, pre-wired into the brain. These instincts have been instilled by ‘Blind’ Nature to ensure the survival of the species and it is common wisdom that ‘you can’t change Human Nature’. ‘Of course you can – why not?’ said Richard, and I liked that. Why not indeed? Peters’ Journal, Introduction

As you can see, the passage you quoted was written at the time when I finally got my head out of the clouds and started to allow myself once again to become sensitive to the horrors of the human condition. I turned on the television again, started to became aware of the world as-it-is and started to allow myself to feel all those feelings I had cut off from or subjugated in my spiritual days. I started to feel my anger and indignation, self-righteousness, sadness and despair, fear and terror. In short, I started, for the first time, to get in touch with the full range of my feelings.

I also remembered what had started me being really serious about my search for freedom and that was a realization that I had had some years earlier. I had a vivid experience that I was living my life as if I was in a straight jacket from which I desperately yearned to be free. Not free as in needing to ‘wake up’ from my dream-like state and by doing so become Awakened as yet another Saviour of Mankind, but free as I had experienced freedom in a pure consciousness experience. In a pure consciousness experience, this flesh and blood body is suddenly magically freed of ‘me’, the parasitical entity that thinks and feels he lives ‘inside’ the body. In a PCE it is startlingly evident that ‘I’ do not exist as an actuality – it is as though ‘I’ had never existed.

I as this flesh and blood body sans any psychological or psychic entity whatsoever, suddenly found myself in the paradisiacal actual world of sensual delight. There was an utter stillness, a stillness that has a vibrant aliveness to it that is scintillating and sensately rich. There is an utter purity because there is no evil in the actual world, and there is an utter perfection for actual world is peerless. It is as though one is fully alive for the first time in one’s life, one’s senses are literally on stalks delighting in seeing, touching, hearing, smelling, tasting, thinking and reflecting and in being aware of the experience of being alive.

From the perspective of this experience of utter freedom from the human condition, brought on by the temporary disappearance of ‘me’, returning to being ‘normal’ is experienced as being once more cut off from the magnificence of the actual world. In other words, I experienced normal/spiritual life as a being a death-like state compared with the experience of being fully alive, as a flesh and blood body only, in the actual world.

I don’t know if this explanation helps to throw some light on the passage you objected to, but I thought putting it in context might help. When I look back on some of my previous writing, there are things I see now that I could have said better, or that could have been made clearer. I started going over some of my writings at one stage but the task became too daunting, particularly as I was also replying to correspondents as well. In the end, I decided that re-editing might also take some of the passionate flavour out of my descriptions of my early explorations and discoveries about the nature of the human condition and of the dawning of ‘my’ own instinctual complicity in the human condition – the discovery that I was as mad and as bad as everyone else, was how I described it at the time.

So, while I appreciate your feedback and comments, given what I’ve said above, I’ll let the passage stand as-it-is as an apt expression of my experience at that time in my early stages of actualism and the contrast between being reasonably happy with my life as it was and the experience of being fully alive as experienced in a PCE.

9.8.2002

I, as this flesh and blood body sans any psychological or psychic entity whatsoever, suddenly found myself in the paradisiacal actual world of sensual delight. There was an utter stillness, a stillness that has a vibrant aliveness to it that is scintillating and sensately rich. There is an utter purity because there is no evil in the actual world and there is an utter perfection for actual world is peerless. It is as though one is fully alive for the first time in one’s life, one’s senses are literally on stalks delighting in seeing, touching, hearing, smelling, tasting, thinking and reflecting and in being aware of the experience of being alive.

From the perspective of this experience of utter freedom from the human condition, brought on by the temporary disappearance of ‘me’, returning to being ‘normal’ is experienced as being once more cut off from the magnificence of the actual world. In other words, I experienced normal/spiritual life as a being a death-like state compared with the experience of being fully alive, as a flesh and blood body only, in the actual world.

I don’t know if this explanation helps to throw some light on the passage you objected to, but I thought putting it in context might help. <snip>

So, while I appreciate your feedback and comments, given what I’ve said above, I’ll let the passage stand as-it-is as an apt expression of my experience at that time in my early stages of actualism and the contrast between being reasonably happy with my life as it was and the experience of being fully alive as experienced in a PCE.

Thanks for putting the passage I objected to into context for me. I do find it helpful. It seems to me that you were using the phrase ‘death-like’ in the context of sort of a ‘crossroads’ experience – only two choices available – living fully or settling for being separated from the actual world – which can feel ‘death-like.’

Let’s not forget that what is on offer on this list is the third alternative. There are three choices – remaining normal where the best on offer is to be reasonably happy, or becoming spiritual where the best on offer is a dream-like utterly-selfish state of God-realization or a ‘God-and-I-are-best-mates’ scenario … or becoming actually free of the whole lot.

Put into context, I have no objection to your description. It is rather quite a good description when understood as your experience.

Not just my experience, but an experience that everyone has had at some times in their life.

I have to wonder though about how it is related in the entry ‘How to Become Free of the Human Condition.’

Let’s juxtapose the two statements... from your Journal...

‘For me, I just figured that I had ‘nothing left to lose’, it was either a slow, miserable, painful, death-like life or a quick death of what I saw as the problem – the ‘self’ or ‘psychological and psychic entity’ within.’ Peters’ Journal, Introduction

then from the entry, How to Become Free from the Human Condition...

‘But the choice is simple. It is either a miserable, painful, death-like life of not fully living or a quick death of what is clearly seen as the problem in the peak experience – the ‘self’ or ‘psychological and psychic entity’ within.’ AF Library, How to Become Free

I can appreciate the sensibility in reusing material that is already written. The second passage drops the reference to the personal, the ‘for me’ part. The way it reads then becomes universalised – as if this is the case for all.

Given that everybody has had a PCE at some stage in his or her life, what I am talking of is universal. I would remind you that you have written of having such an experience yourself –

‘The most defining part of the experience was that time seemed to slow down – I began to notice each and every detail – virtually effortlessly. There was virtually perfect calm. I did notice some ‘issues’ that I normally ‘struggle’ with, but they didn’t have their normal strength. The ‘strongest’ part of the experience probably lasted only about 15 seconds – it seemed like I had been taken into another world, though it was obviously the same world, but yet it was in sharp detail that I hadn’t completely noticed before. And it did have a benevolence about it. I remember feeling a bit overwhelmed by the wonder of it all, which may be what brought the most intense part to an end – but the calm and ‘presentness’ lasted the rest of the evening and a bit into the morning.’ No 37, ‘Getting’ the PCE 12.5.02

I would suggest from your description that you may well be able to relate to what I am saying. After all, you did open this conversation by saying –

‘Put into context, I have no objection to your description. It is rather quite a good description when understood as your experience.’

It also drops any sort of reference to your personally experienced PCE and the vitality of the actual world that you experienced. It seems to me that it was a vital part of your experience – both remembering a PCE and realizing that it is possible for you to make your way to the actual world – not to mention your personal life history and trajectory. So it seems to me that ‘death like’ phrase is ripe for misunderstanding if it didn’t refer back to your experience – which is not referenced in the entry ‘How to Become Free from the Human Condition.’

Are you implying that every passage I write has to be prefaced in this way when what I am talking about is universal, i.e. personal to everyone?

Wouldn’t it be an easy jump from reading the second passage to the idea that a life lived in the ‘real’ world is not a life worth living at all?

Apparently so, but then again, it never occurred to me that anyone who was genuinely interested in actualism would want to mount a defence of the ‘real’ world. I always assumed I was writing to someone who was dissatisfied with their life as-it-is in the ‘real’ world.

If I can put it another way – the passage you are objecting to is on the Actualism web-site in a section entitled ‘How to become free of the Human Condition’. It has not been spoken from a soapbox on a street corner, it is not in a pamphlet dropped into your letterbox. The location of the passage presupposes that the person reading it is interested in becoming free from the human condition and, as such, some plain talking would seem appropriate.

Now the reason this sort of question is important for me is because that I realized as I was putting the AF method in practice for me – it became very important how I considered the value of the lives of others.

Speaking personally, when I began to put the AF method into practice I simultaneously began to focus my attention on my own life. This was because I came to understand that the only person I can change, and need to change, is me. By doing so I took what Richard was saying personally whilst also regarding it as being universal in that I am but one of an estimated 6 billion human beings on the planet ensnared within the human condition.

Is it worth bringing children into the ‘real’ world?

It seems that you are a bit late in asking that question.

What sort of happiness can we want for them?

My experience is that children learn a lot from observing their parents.

This meant that, like it or not, I had to lead by example – which is why I found it impossible not to take up the offer to devote my life to becoming happy and harmless.

If one sees a life in the ‘real’ world as worthless – then it can get rather depressing – very quick.

If I may suggest, the alternative to becoming depressed is to make sure you do something worthwhile with your life.

Now, I don’t see you, Richard, and Vineeto as saying that a life lived in the ‘real’ world is without worth – yet it seems hard to reconcile a description of life in the ‘real’ world as ‘death-like’ with a description of life in the ‘real’ world as ‘valuable’ or ‘worthwhile.’ But, maybe I’m reading too much into the description of ‘death-like.’

If it’s possible to be both ‘reasonably happy’ and ‘death-like’ at the same time, then I suppose we can just call it a quirk of language and how our experience is expressed with language.

And yet you said at the start of this post –

‘Put into context, I have no objection to your description. It is rather quite a good description when understood as your experience.’

I don’t see your difficulties in reconciling living life in the ‘real’ world with the experience of being free of the human condition as a quirk of language at all, but rather that you are trying to reconcile the description in question from the standpoint of two distinct experiences. For someone who is reasonably happy with the experience of being a being in the ‘real’ world the description can be felt to be offensive, but for someone who remembers a PCE – the experience of being fully alive, sans identity, in the actual world – the description is a matter of fact statement.

Perhaps this will be of some use in understanding the nature of the quandary you seem to have arrived at, at this stage of your investigations. All sorts of doubts and hesitations arise whenever anyone is faced with chucking out the old and beginning something entirely new. Despite this resistance for things new, the universe itself has an inbuilt propensity for betterment that can be seen in action in the human species as a combination of daring, curiosity, naiveté, altruism and intelligence.

These qualities are what an actualist continually taps into on his or her path to becoming free of the well-and-truly-passed-its-use-by-date human condition.

13.8.2002

I’ve been reflecting on our conversation about my use of the phrase ‘death-like’ to describe the experience of normal living compared to the vibrancy of a pure consciousness experience. I questioned whether I was being stubborn about my use of the phrase and whether another term would be more appropriate in the ‘How to become free of the human condition’ section of Actualism. You seem to favour ‘not fully alive’ for normal living, whereas Richard uses the term ‘second-best’, and ‘second-rate’ is another that comes to mind. I tend to stay clear of terms that allude to the spiritual-affective altered states of consciousness when referring to a down-to-earth sensual experience of the actual world and to me ‘fully’ could have that connation, given that its opposite is empty.

However, it is useful to remember that what we are discussing is the appropriateness, or inappropriateness, of a term describing the radical difference between ‘normal’ self-centred experience and the self-less experience that everybody has briefly experienced at some time in their life in a PCE. Given that Richard and Vineeto have used other expressions to describe this difference, you may well also find another term more relevant to describe your own experience of the difference between normal life and a PCE. I have given a good deal of thought to the term ‘death-like’ and have decided to keep it as it is, as it is my description of the difference.

What is also apparent is that any objections to the writings of actualism by anyone who is genuinely interested in actualism can lead to discussions such as this – discussions which can only serve to provoke those subscribed to the mailing list into thinking a bit more deeply about what it really means to become free of the human condition.

It would be a pity to get bogged down in semantics in our discussion and risk losing sight of the bigger picture – actualizing peace on earth between human beings.

18.8.2002

I’ve been reflecting on our conversation about my use of the phrase ‘death-like’ to describe the experience of normal living compared to the vibrancy of a pure consciousness experience. I questioned whether I was being stubborn about my use of the phrase and whether another term would be more appropriate in the ‘How to become free of the human condition’ section of Actualism. You seem to favour ‘not fully alive’ for normal living, whereas Richard uses the term ‘second-best’, and ‘second-rate’ is another that comes to mind. I tend to stay clear of terms that allude to the spiritual-affective altered states of consciousness when referring to a down-to-earth sensual experience of the actual world and to me ‘fully’ could have that connation, given that its opposite is empty.

Given that actualism points to a freedom that is the polar opposite of the traditional spiritual freedom, it is inevitable that the majority of readers will read into the actualism writings either a personal or a general condemnation that is simply not there. The topics that are being talked about openly on this mailing list are by their very nature confrontational and as such will bring forth attitudes and feelings that are ‘polarising’. But to attempt to censure, water down or stifle these discussions in order to make the dialogues ‘pay off’ is to miss the whole point of actualism.

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However, it is useful to remember that what we are discussing is the appropriateness, or inappropriateness, of a term describing the radical difference between ‘normal’ self-centred experience and the self-less experience that everybody has briefly experienced at some time in their life in a PCE. Given that Richard and Vineeto have used other expressions to describe this difference, you may well also find another term more relevant to describe your own experience of the difference between normal life and a PCE. I have given a good deal of thought to the term ‘death-like’ and have decided to keep it as it is, as it is my description of the difference.

And I don’t have anything to add to what I have said previously.

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What is also apparent is that any objections to the writings of actualism by anyone who is genuinely interested in actualism can lead to discussions such as this – discussions which can only serve to provoke those subscribed to the mailing list into thinking a bit more deeply about what it really means to become free of the human condition.

It would be a pity to get bogged down in semantics in our discussion and risk losing sight of the bigger picture – actualizing peace on earth between human beings.

I have no idea what you are agreeing with. You seem to be skipping through the actualism writings in order to search for words that you object to. By reading in this fashion you run the risk of losing sight of the fact that Richard’s writings always describe actuality and always point to the bigger picture – the greatest challenge facing all human beings, actualizing peace on earth.

Personally I don’t relate to the idea of a bird’s eye view, let alone ‘the distinction of a ‘view from nowhere’ versus ‘what it’s like from the inside’’. When I recalled my first substantive PCE, I wrote about how I experienced the actual world and it was a sensual experience – as ‘down-to-earth’ an experience as you can get.

I remember walking in the shallow water marvelling at my magical fairy-tale-like surroundings. A vast blue sky overhead with an ever-changing array of wispy white clouds. The sun glistens on the tiny ripples of water washing gently over my feet. The sensual feel of the mud oozing between my toes as they sink into the muddy beach. Huge pelicans glide overhead and I liken them to the jumbo jets of the bird world as they come in to land on the water some distance out. The sun on my skin is warming me through and through, the breeze is ruffling my hair and tingling my forearms, and the water is cooling on my feet. It is so good to be alive, my senses bristling and everything is perfect. Absolutely no objections to being here – pure delight! Peter’s Journal Introduction

The other point that is relevant to your objections is how I experienced other human beings in my PCE – they were fellow human beings.

After a while I turn to my partner who is sitting in the shade beneath a wonderfully gnarled and ancient tree on the lake’s edge. There sits a fellow human being to whom I have no ‘relationship’. Any past or future disappears; she and I are simply here together, experiencing these perfect moments. The past five years that I have known her, with all the memories of good and bad times, simply do not exist. It is just delightful that she is here with me, and I do not even have any thoughts of ‘our’ future.

In short, everything is perfect, always has been, and always will be. It is an experience of actual freedom where I, as this body, am able to experience with my physical senses the perfection and purity of the universe, free of the psychological and psychic entity within. And also free of the delusion that it is all the work of some mythical maker to whom I owe gratitude for my being here. I am actually here, in the physical universe and enjoying every moment of it. Peter’s Journal Introduction

No matter what others read into the actualism writings, the intention of the Actual Freedom website has always been to simply convey information to fellow human beings that it is now possible to become actually free of the human condition. Speaking personally, an integral part of this process of becoming free of the human condition is the essential understanding that we are all fellow human beings and this understanding has always been an undercurrent in my intent in writing to others. Whilst others may instinctively react to what I am saying and feel it to be polarising in some way, what is in fact being offered is information that is invaluable to any of my fellow human beings who wish to become from free of the human condition of malice and sorrow.

I have commented on the matter of raising children in previous posts and received no reply so I had assumed you were not interested in pursuing the topic. If you want to pursue the subject further, just let me know. However, the main issue at hand on this list is not the raising of children but how adults can become first virtually, and then actually, free of the human condition. There is a belief amongst many that adults can learn a lot from the’ wisdom’ and ‘innocence’ of children – a belief that only points to the paucity of a sensible down-to-earth approach to the greatest challenge facing all human beings – actualizing peace on earth.

If adults are not willing to make the effort to do it by their own practical example, how can we ever expect our children to learn?

21.8.2002

It seems to me that this particular thread is coming to a close, so I took the liberty of only responding to one section of your last post, since my intention is to bring this particular discussion to an end.

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It would be a pity to get bogged down in semantics in our discussion and risk losing sight of the bigger picture – actualizing peace on earth between human beings.

Agreed. I’ve also run into similar issues with Richard’s usage of the word ‘pathetic.’ On the one hand, he’ll refer to life in the ‘real’ world as ‘pathetic’, yet on the other still possibly wonderful and meaningful. Such is semantics.

I have no idea what you are agreeing with.

I intended to agree with your statement that ‘It would be a pity to get bogged down in semantics in our discussion and risk losing sight of the bigger picture.’

Okay. It was just that your agreement was immediately followed by another example of focussing on particular words rather than on the bigger picture.

On reflection, I also see that my use of the word ‘semantics’ may have been inappropriate because wanting to be clear about the meaning of words is obviously a sensible thing to do. However in many cases correspondents have focussed their attention on particular words solely because they find them personally offensive – a fixation which only prevented them from being able to see the bigger picture of what is on offer in actualism. Vineeto calls this being hampered by a ‘myopic vision’ – the inevitable result of the innate ‘self’-centredness programmed into each and every human being.

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You seem to be skipping through the actualism writings in order to search for words that you object to.

This certainly has never been my intention.

It would appear that the many previous correspondents who were initially attracted to actualism never intended to go nit-picking through the writings but they ended up doing so anyway. T’is a strange phenomenon because I doubt if these same people ever bothered, let alone ever dared, to put the famed spiritual teachings to a similar scrutiny.

But then again, all one needs to do is believe the spiritual teachings and Holy Scriptures and one gets an instant feeling of belonging and self-gratification, whereas if one is at all interested in being fully alive, here in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are, then actualism becomes a confrontational challenge to one’s own ‘self’-centred thoughts and feelings.

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By reading in this fashion you run the risk of losing sight of the fact that Richard’s writings always describe actuality and always point to the bigger picture – the greatest challenge facing all human beings, actualizing peace on earth.

I agree with this statement as well – I am willing to disregard semantics, except when it interferes with understanding, and I see my concerns regarding semantics have been unconvincing – no problem.

As I said, my use of the word semantics was inappropriate, but I take your point.

I’m quite willing to get back to the main event ... actualizing peace on earth :o)

If I can just reiterate that I am not stymieing objections, doubts or questions – far from it. What I am saying is to be wary of not losing sight of the bigger picture on offer whilst making your investigations. The way to stay focussed is to have an aim or purpose to one’s investigations and for an actualist this aim is to become unconditionally happy and unconditionally harmless.

I used to spend days, weeks or months nutting out some particular issue or other until the ‘Ah! Yes’ clicked in and the issue was resolved such that it didn’t come back any more. Once I had an issue running I would not let up until it was resolved completely, not only intellectually but also experientially. I did this by becoming attentive to my emotional reactions to the issue – be they annoyance, frustration, angst, sorrow, indifference, apathy, acceptance, or whatever. This attentiveness inexorably led to an in-depth investigation and exposure of my precious morals, ethics, opinions and beliefs contiguous to the issue – which then allowed me to become aware of the animal instinctual passions that lay in stealth beneath my ‘self’-serving veneer of ‘goodness’.

When I finally came to clearly understand the facts of a particular issue – both intellectually and experientially – my normal ‘self’-centred reactions, objections, worries, feelings and passions about the issue disappeared such that I was more able to be happy and harmless more of the time – which in turn meant that I had more time to be more able to appreciate and savour the delights of being here in the world as-it-is with people as they are.

There is no better business than actualizing peace on earth.

Freedom from the Human Condition – Happy and Harmless

Peter’s Text © The Actual Freedom Trust