Peter’s Correspondence on the Actual Freedom List

with Correspondent No 38

2.4.2003

Hi No 38,

Hello Peter and Vineeto...

Thanks for your recent responses to this most interesting thread. I’ve attempted to distil the essence, hopefully not obfuscating the contexts.

I notice that while you have addressed this post to both myself and Vineeto and have headed your post ‘The Magic of It All’ , the content relates to the content of a thread entitled ‘The universe’. So I have responded and maintained the previous title.

It seems I’ve been labelled an agnostic. In Peter’s definition...

...an agnostic is not someone who is free of belief; an agnostic is someone who remains ‘open’ to belief, who keeps his or her options open, who has a bet each way. In this case, you are keeping the option of a belief in creationism open by remaining open to some future new understanding of physics providing the necessary proof to turn the belief into a verifiable fact.

I dug up this definition from Webster’s:

That doctrine which, professing ignorance, neither asserts nor denies.

Note that I’m ignoring all common theistic inferences in this term and focusing on the root... a-gnostic.

Just to keep things clear, the root of the word agnostic is – gnoses (Gk gnosis) investigation, knowledge Oxford Dictionary and it appears that the prefix ‘a-’ then makes the word mean the opposite – agnosia (Gk agnosia) ignorance Oxford Dictionary.

It appears you do not object to the label agnostic, just to the definition that I had provided –

‘a person who is uncertain or non-committal about a particular thing.’

The reason I chose that particular definition was, given your interest in the writings of actualism, I assumed you were being an agnostic with regard to actualism – that someday you may want to abandon your agnostic stance in favour of becoming certain and being committed.

I note however, from what you say in this post, that your agnosticism runs deeper than that – it is the doctrine of ignorance and the principle of neither-nor, rather than merely being uncertain and non-committal. That’s a far bigger hole to dig yourself out of. Not that it makes it any more difficult, of course. I had to write off 17 years of spiritual indoctrination in order to become a practicing actualist and in retrospect it was easy – beliefs are after all only beliefs.

I might just take the opportunity of posting a little story from my journal because it describes an event in my life that helped me to understand the nature of beliefs –

‘I remember after the Ranch I was living in a seaside town that had a small Rajneesh centre. Rooms were available providing various people a chance to offer sessions in past lives, tarot, astrology, psychic readings and other divinations. A friend and I would often look at the notice board, fascinated at the ever-increasing variety on offer. One day we decided, as a prank, to place a fictitious advertisement in the community newsletter offering ‘Capology - the Ancient Tibetan Art of Knee-cap Reading’. It went on to describe that the knees are a critical junction point for the flow of ‘Quong energy’. We also offered half price to pensioners and amputees!

We gave the telephone number of the local Concerned Christians, a cult-busting group, which had occasionally given Rajneeshees a hard time. We thought nothing more of it until the editor of the newsletter bailed us up one day to tell us that the Concerned Christians had rung up to complain that they had had so many phone calls, and how come? Which made me think, even then, that people will believe anything. It just took me a while to admit to the fact that I was as gullible as everyone else.’ Peter’s Journal Fear

First, I don’t think this jibes with your usage of the term as being open to belief, rather it rejects all beliefs.

If you re-read your preferred definition you will find that it defines an agnostic as someone who maintains ‘that doctrine which, professing ignorance, neither asserts nor denies’. Webster Dictionary

Now whilst I may be somewhat of a layman in the finer points of English grammar, when I look up synonyms for the word ‘deny’, I find the words refute, negate and reject. As such, the doctrine could be reasonably paraphrased as ‘professing ignorance, neither asserting, nor rejecting’.

Given that we are talking about beliefs, it follows that an agnostic is someone who, while ‘professing ignorance, neither asserts nor rejects beliefs’ – in other words, an agnostic does not assert belief and does not reject belief.

In case you think that my use of the synonym reject for the word deny is a slight of hand, the definition could also be accurately restated as ‘that doctrine which, professing ignorance’, does not assert belief and does not deny belief.

Whilst you may think that agnosticism rejects all beliefs, the opposite is clearly the case.

Second, this definition is exactly what I’ve been talking about, so I guess you can call me a dictionary agnostic.

It appears to me that you are somewhat more than a dictionary agnostic (whatever that is) because you seem to hold to the doctrine of not denying or not rejecting belief as a practice, not only as a philosophy.

I notice that you said ‘I’m ignoring all common theistic inferences in this term’ but the philosophy of agnosticism, ‘the doctrine which, professing ignorance, neither asserts nor denies’ is not only rooted in theism, its continued existence as a philosophy sustains theistic belief, and its current popularity in some circles is, bizarrely enough, sustained by Eastern spiritual belief.

From my brief reading on the subject, the term agnostic was publicly coined by T.H Huxley, a biologist, philosopher and champion of Darwin’s evolutionary theories, at a meeting of the Metaphysical Society in London in 1869.

‘It came into my head as suggestively antithetical to the ‘Gnostic’ of Church history who professed to know so much about the very things of which I was ignorant.’ T.H.Huxley

Hence agnosticism, as a philosophy of professing ignorance, was rooted in opposition to those who claimed they had a special knowledge of spiritual mysteries, hence what some refer to as secular agnosticism owes its existence to theism – or to put it plainly, if you hold no theistic beliefs whatsoever there is no need to be agnostic to those beliefs.

The reason I say that the philosophy of agnosticism sustains theistic belief can be summarized by the following quote –

‘The Atheist asserts that there is no God, whereas the Agnostic maintains only that he does not know.’ Encyclopaedia Britannica

In other words, by maintaining he or she ‘does not know’ an agnostic leaves the door open to theistic belief.

Of course an actualist, whilst being an atheist, is not constrained to asserting that there is no God, he or she has, by the experiential evidence of a PCE, the direct knowledge that there is no God, by whatever name or gender – that any and all religious and spiritual belief is but impassioned fantasy.

That the current philosophy of agnosticism is sustained by Eastern spiritual belief can be seen from the following reference –

‘It is also possible to speak of a religious agnosticism. But if this expression is not to be contradictory, it has to be taken to refer to an acceptance of the agnostic principle, combined either with a conviction that at least some minimum of affirmative doctrine can be established on adequate grounds, or else with the sort of religion or religiousness that makes no very substantial or disputatious doctrinal demands. ...

The second possibility, that of an agnosticism that is religious as opposed to secular, was realized perhaps most strikingly in the Buddha (Gautama). Typically and traditionally, the ecclesiastical Christian has insisted that absolute certainty about some minimum approved list of propositions concerning God and the general divine scheme of things was wholly necessary to salvation. Equally typically, according to the tradition, the Buddha sidestepped all such speculative questions. At best they could only distract attention from the urgent business of salvation – salvation, of course, in his own very different interpretation.’ Nature and Kinds of Agnosticism. Encyclopaedia Britannica

If one believes the hand-me-down legends, Mr. Buddha remained agnostic about many issues that were of vital interest to his followers and this legend has served to imbed the principle of agnosticism within Buddhist philosophy – and therefore within much of Western philosophy of the last few centuries. In Buddhism agnosticism is exalted as a sign of great wisdom so much so that whenever a Buddhist professes ‘ignorance’ he or she is actually maintaining their feeling of superiority over others.

I suppose the difference here is that I maintain that matters such as the infinitude of the universe are fundamentally unknowable.

Rather than professing ignorance, neither asserting nor denying, what you are doing here is maintaining a belief – the belief ‘that matters such as the infinitude of the universe are fundamentally unknowable’.

In order to try and make this clearer I will juxtapose two of your statements –

‘Belief and superstition are not primary obstacles to me, ... I don’t believe either that the universe is finite or infinite, or that it is failed with gods or fairies.’ No 38 to Peter 16.2.2003

‘I suppose the difference here is that I maintain that matters such as the infinitude of the universe are fundamentally unknowable.’ No 38 to Peter 25.3.2003

Can you see that your second statement is a clear enunciation of what you believe to be true about the nature of the universe?

This is not an issue for you as

... my bothering to take the time and make the effort to question the theories of modern cosmogony lead me to a PCE wherein the fact that the universe is, was, and always will be, infinite and eternal became stunningly apparent as a direct and sensual experience.

This is the nub: you are talking from the POV of someone privy to an understanding that is alien to me.

As a practicing actualist, I do not have a point of view about the infinitude of the universe – I know by direct and sensual experience, from many temporary ‘self’-less experiences known as a PCEs, the infinitude of the universe. Even a virtual freedom from the human condition allows one to speak with the authority of experience about such matters. As for such an understanding being alien to you, you might contemplate on the fact that it is ‘you’ and ‘your’ belief that are preventing you from allowing the possibility of an intellectual understanding precipitating a pure consciousness experience of the infinitude of the universe.

Beliefs are the bane of human existence – not only do they cripple the free operation of intelligence, they also serve as a constant stimulant for one’s own instinctual malice and sorrow.

I have no idea how a ‘sensual experience’ of the universe can be rationalized with cosmological physics of any doctrine. No clue whatsoever, perhaps some day. In fact, from over here this sounds suspiciously akin to a religious experience, but I’ll take you at your word that is not the case.

When I first came across actualism it all sounded like spiritualism to me and I assumed that Richard was yet another of the many Gurus in town.

But the more I listened, the more I read, and the more I thought about what was written, the more I realized how radically different it was to spiritualism. The challenge actualism offered to me was to abandon the safe haven of my spiritual years – the belief that life, the universe and what it is to be a human being is, and always will be, an unfathomable mystery, ‘fundamentally unknowable’ – and to set about finding out about life, the universe and what it is to be a human being, no matter what the consequences of that search may be.

*

As for providing data to satisfy common sense, common sense tells me that the notion that the physical universe – all of matter, space and time – was created at some moment in time, in some place in space, out of nothing, makes no sense.

I spent some time considering ‘common sense’. I think this term is incompatible with the discussion at hand.

I would remind you that at one stage in this conversation you were upfront as to common sense –

‘At this point I do acknowledge that my common sense tells me that the universe is likely infinite in both time and space, but that is more opinion than scientific fact. ’ No 38 to Peter, 16.2.2003

In the course of this conversation, you seem to have abandoned what your common sense told you at some stage in favour of maintaining your belief that such matters are ‘fundamentally unknowable’. The reason I say this is because if you can see and acknowledge that this is so, you will also have an understanding as to why common sense is rarely to be found and why it so rarely is ever put into practice.

Belief prevents common sense from operating.

It certainly applies in such areas as ‘what’s a fair price for oranges today?’, but I think you have to be careful in this context. After all, it wasn’t long ago that common sense held that the earth is flat. The AF glossary chooses this definition of common sense:

Good sound practical sense in everyday matters; general sagacity. Oxford Dictionary

I wrote the AF Glossary specifically to flesh out the words and phrases – the terminology – that Richard used in his writing simply because in the early days of my interest I found many of them difficult to understand clearly, due not only to my spiritual conditioning but also due to my ignorance of such matters. Not a professed ignorance by the way, but a genuine ignorance.

So in the interest of the clarity, I will post the full definition from the AF Glossary –

common sense –

Good sound practical sense in everyday matters; general sagacity Oxford Dictionary

Something rarely practiced individually and almost unheard of in collective decision-making. Emotions, feelings, passions and beliefs – in short ‘self’ interest – always over-ride any possibility of common sense operating.

When ‘push comes to shove’ the veneer of moral and ethical restraint is wont to collapse in the face of surging instinctual passions, particularly evidenced in the horror of war time or whenever ‘law and order’ breaks down. Further, these same feelings and passions are the very cause of wars as they are inevitably fought for honour, pride, justice, ‘rights’, retribution and love.

On an individual level, given that the base feelings are malice and sorrow (anger, resentment, hate, sadness, depression, melancholy, loneliness, etc.), we desperately seek relief in the ‘good’ feelings (love, trust, compassion, ‘togetherness’, friendship, etc.). Thus one is forever a victim of one’s feelings, forever in a battle, forever in confusion, forever needing to be vigilant, forever trying to be good.

This constant flow of emotion-based thoughts actively conspires and prevents any possibility of common sense operating in the human brain. The circuits are literally jammed almost all of the time, swamped by the emotion-based thoughts of a fictitious alien entity fashioned upon the instinctual primitive ‘self ‘ wired in by Blind Nature. This alien psychological and psychic entity could be seen as analogous to computer software that corrupts the hardware and only upon its elimination can body and brain function optimally.

With the elimination of this ‘software program’ one is able to come to one’s senses both literally and figuratively, and common sense is then able to operate freely, uncorrupted by instinctual malice and sorrow. AF Glossary

The nature of the universe is hardly an everyday matter …

Well, it may not be to you but the nature of the universe is an everyday matter to me. I am left wondering where it is you live?

Do you regard the universe as being ‘out there’, somewhere in the sky? Do you think the universe somehow stops at the edge of the earth’s atmosphere and that this planet is separate from the universe? Does the universe stop at the edge of ‘your’ world or do you see that it might well include the city or town you live in, the trees and cars and dogs and people in the streets, the house or apartment you live, the room you are sitting in, the very chair you are sitting on reading these words.

You, as a flesh and blood body, can touch the stuff of the universe, smell the stuff of the universe, hear the stuff of the universe, taste the stuff of the universe – the ‘everyday matter’ of the universe. In fact you, as a flesh and blood body, are made of the very stuff of the universe – a finite arrangement of living cells that was produced by the process of a single cell being impregnated by another cell, neither of which were part of what has become you, but each of which were the stuff of the universe.

The only reason human flesh and blood bodies continue to exist is by breathing in the very stuff of the universe – ingesting the very stuff of the universe – the everyday matter of mineral matter, animal matter and vegetable matter. By contemplating on the actual nature of the universe you may well find that it is everyday matter.

And, if you take this contemplation a step further, you will find that what you regard as ‘your life’ is but an everyday event of everyday matter – getting out of bed in the morning, doing whatever it is that you do including the essential breathing in and ingesting bits of matter and then going back to bed to go back to sleep. The utter simplicity of the events of everyday life as the everyday matter of the universe does beg the question as to why one should waste so much of one’s life being unhappy and feeling malevolent when there is now an alternative available.

… and common sense is only one of the tools at hand in gaining understanding of such a meaty topic.

Indeed. If one has a materialistic understanding of the nature of the universe – neatly summarized as the belief that ‘life’s a bitch and then you die’ then one either succumbs to depression or one goes out and does battle with one’s fellow human beings in a grim instinctually-driven battle for survival. Or, if this isn’t one’s cup of tea, one can latch on to any one of the thousands of spiritual understandings about the nature of the universe and spend one’s life wandering around with one’s head in the clouds – being anywhere but here experiencing this place in infinite space and being sometime else other than experiencing this moment of eternal time.

Actualism offers a third alternative to these traditional purely-anthropocentric ways of understanding the nature of the universe – for those who are dissatisfied with living within the constraints of these understandings. I’ll post a section of the Glossary which may throw some light on the understanding of the nature of the universe that is inherent to actualism and why it is so radically different to the common understandings we have been taught to believe as being the only alternatives –

actual – existing in fact as evidenced by the physical senses, in action or existence at this time, existing in act and not merely potentially or apparently. Oxford Dictionary

Actual is that which is palpable, tangible, tactile, corporeal, physical and material. It is that which can be experienced by the physical senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch only. That which is actual, being in action or in existence at this moment in time, is not merely passive.

In comparison, that which is deemed to be real is merely the cerebral and affective interpretation of the actual and physical by the psychological and psychic (social and instinctual) entity that dwells within the human body.

In comparison, spiritual Reality while feeling super-real and ‘other-worldly’ is merely an affective, imaginary, hoped and longed for, fairy tale – a further illusion built upon the initial illusion of reality. The myth of a spiritual Reality was created in ancient times as an escape from the very real horror, and the imagined evil spirits, evident in everyday earthly reality. AF Glossary

actual freedom – Freedom from the Human Condition, as factually evidenced by the total elimination of instinctual malice and sorrow within an individual member of the species.

A down-to-earth, practical, matter-of-fact, sensual, sensately-evident freedom as opposed to any and all religious, spiritual, ethereal, metaphysical and mystical Altered States of Consciousness which merely masquerade as freedom. AF Glossary

actualism – (Now rare) the theory that nothing is merely passive. Oxford Dictionary

Actualism, as applied and put into action in Actual Freedom, is the experiential understanding that nothing is merely passive. It is the experience of being the universe experiencing itself as a sensate, thoughtful and reflective human being as opposed to a being a ‘self’ – a lost lonely, frightened and very, very cunning entity trapped within the flesh and blood body. This direct experience is available in brief glimpses known as Pure Consciousness Experiences and Actualism is the application of the method, and the undertaking of the process, which enables one to live this experience 24 hrs. a day, every day.

Thus applied, Actualism is no longer a dormant philosophical theory but is an innovative rule-breaking fact. AF Glossary

actualist – an advocate of Actualism Oxford Dictionary

On the path to Actual Freedom, to be a mere advocate of Actualism is a second-rate choice. An Actualist is someone who is actively, intently, stubbornly, full bloodedly, whole-heartedly and totally consumed in the pursuit of an individual actual freedom from the Human Condition. An Actualist is concerned with action not advocacy, and with practical implementation and radical change, not theoretical observation and superficial adaptation.

An Actualist is a relentless pursuer of what is factual and what is actual. AF Glossary

The residual question I have is why this is all so important. I don’t doubt the importance of the experience of the universe as magical and perfect, I just don’t understand what it has to do with its physical nature, and why you so tenaciously adhere to one particular theory (aka belief).

If you look back over our conversation, you will find that I have explained why understanding the nature of the universe is vital to understanding what actualism is about on many occasions. I would add that, unless one understands that the universe is eternal and infinite, then any pure consciousness experience of the universe being eternal and infinite that occurs can result in one being overwhelmed by the experience to the extent that the delusion that ‘I am eternal and infinite’ takes over.

My rubber duckies example was not meant to be glib, but rather to emphasize the point I was making, that the fundamental physical nature of the universe, while a fascinating subject for the curious mind, seems not pertinent to the real task at hand. But then, I’m an agnostic.

Maintaining an agnostic stance, be it a secular or religious agnosticism, thwarts any understanding of the fundamental physical nature of the universe and prevents the direct sensual experience of the actuality of the infinitude of the universe.

For me, common sense meant I had to tackle first things first in order to move in the direction that I wanted to move – taking on the task of becoming happy and harmless in order to become actually free of the human condition of malice and sorrow. And first things were my beliefs about the fundamental nature of the universe.

Speaking of first things first, whilst you keep insisting that ‘the fundamental physical nature of the universe’ is not pertinent to ‘the task at hand’, you might ponder on the fact that the ‘Introduction to Actual Freedom’ not only begins with the actual physical nature of the universe, it also ends with it. The words in between the beginning and end merely point to the lack of sagacity of human beings continuing to nurse malice and sorrow in their bosoms whilst offering a roadmap as to how it is possible, for any individual sufficiently motivated, to become actually free from these passions.

16.4.2003

Careful observation will reveal that the worry response emanating from instinctual fear is not fabricated – as in made-up or manufactured – but rather it is directly associated with the automatic instinctual response. The genetically programmed thoughtless instinctual response together with its immediate feeling aftermath, whether it lasts a few minutes or a few hours, are inseparable and any attempts to intellectually separate them can only result in dissociation.

I’ll just offer a comment on the matter of observation as it is relevant to all who have been attracted to Eastern spirituality or Eastern philosophy at some point in their lives. Vineeto and I have often discussed the fundamental differences between the Eastern practice of self-observation and the actualism practice of ‘self’-awareness as well as reflecting upon how difficult it was in the early days to stop being a dissociative observer and start becoming aware of exactly how I am experiencing this moment of being alive.

The fundamental difference between the two practices is due to the diametrically opposite intent of each of the practices – the aim of the spiritual practice is to cultivate a dissociated identity in order to avoid feeling the full range of instinctual passions, whereas the aim of actualism is to instigate radical change in order to become happy and harmless in the world-as-it-is, with people as-they-are.

Perhaps an example of how the actualism practice of ‘self’-awareness works in practice will serve to make this difference clear –

‘The final straw came as I waited to meet her one evening and she was late. As the time ticked away, so my mind raced away, and after about thirty minutes I was furious. How could she be late? How could anything else or anyone else be more important in her life than me? As my fury built and built, as my mind churned over countless possibilities as to why she was late, suddenly I began to see the stupidity of it all. Here I was, comfortably sitting at a seaside café, drink in hand, looking at a spectacular sunset on a warm summer’s evening. I’m involved in the adventure of a lifetime, I’ve found out more about what it is to be a human being in the last months than I have in a lifetime, there is this wonderful woman in my life – and I’m being neurotic because she is thirty minutes late! Gradually I came out of it and was able to be where I was, delighting in the balmy evening air and the gaiety of the scene as the last of the beach-goers drifted home.

When Vineeto arrived she apologised for being late, and I explained what had happened to me. We had a beach walk, dinner at a nearby restaurant, and tootled home to bed.

Over the next few days something continued to nag me. Why was it that this relationship seemed to be going off the rails? Why were there increasingly misunderstandings, petty conflicts and difficulties? Why was I becoming more and more obsessed about what Vineeto was doing when we weren’t together, and what she was thinking about when we were together? Over the next days I contemplated on what was wrong and suddenly it dawned on me that I was battling her and trying to force my opinions on her. Further, I realised that I had been jealous, possessive, demanding and obsessive with her. And, most appallingly, I saw how when the impossible demands of love are not fulfilled then it can all so quickly turn to disappointment, resentment and eventually hate. It had got to the stage where it was obvious to me that unless I changed my behaviour this relationship was heading exactly the same way as all my previous ones – doomed to failure. This was my last chance and I was watching it wilt away ... and I was actively causing it to happen. At this point I wasn’t interested so much in why I was acting this way, I realised I had to stop!

Armed with the conviction of the blindingly obvious, I confronted Vineeto with the news. I told her I was simply going to stop battling her and acting the way I had been. I remember her response as somewhat bewildered and unbelieving, but then again I knew that at least I had to stop the torment in me. What happened in the ensuing week was quite remarkable. I found that the strength of my intention made me able to completely drop this destructive behaviour. Somehow I knew this was the only course of action I could take to make this relationship work and I knew it was my last chance. If I was going to beat this thing I had to do it now!

A wonderful calmness came over me; no longer was I thinking about Vineeto when we were apart, and when I was with her I was no longer suspicious, doubtful, impatient or moody. I began to accept her as she was. I was no longer driven to change her. This then brought a corresponding ease in myself for I was able just to be me. After all, the only person I can change is me and I was working on exactly that.’ Peter’s Journal, Love

No philosophical umming and ahhing, no dissociating from unwanted feelings, no remaining aloof, no blaming others and so on – just the simple momentary awareness of the feelings that were preventing me from being happy coupled with an intense yearning to change in order to become actually harmless, come what may.

*

Thanks for your recent responses to this most interesting thread. I’ve attempted to distil the essence, hopefully not obfuscating the contexts.

I notice that while you have addressed this post to both myself and Vineeto and have headed your post ‘The Magic of It All’, the content relates to the content of a thread entitled ‘The universe’. So I have responded and maintained the previous title.

You are not alone in playing the devil’s advocate to the business of devoting one’s life to becoming happy and harmless. By far the bulk of the correspondence on the AF website are objectors.

Sounds a very reasonable approach if only because it is what I did. It became very obvious to me early on that actualism was not a philosophy or a non-spiritual belief but that it was solely – and I do mean solely – a pragmatic do-it-yourself business.

You may find ‘the universe’ chapter in my journal a useful aid in your contemplations about the nature of the universe, not for its academic argumentation but rather for its common sense.

Speaking personally, I never saw any sense at all in splitting ‘me’ and ‘my identity’ into two parts. I had tried that in my spiritual years and saw that it was a wank.

The actualism process – the sincere intent to become happy and harmless – will evince a ‘self’-awareness that then generates the necessary changes so that you incrementally become more happy and more harmless, in the world as-it-is, with people as-they-are. It’s a profoundly simple scientific process – detect cause, eliminate cause (as in instigate the necessary change), eliminate effect.

All ‘you’ have to do, if you really want to do it, is do it.

Nice to chat again …

 23.4.2003

Careful observation will reveal that the worry response emanating from instinctual fear is not fabricated – as in made-up or manufactured – but rather it is directly associated with the automatic instinctual response. The genetically programmed thoughtless instinctual response together with its immediate feeling aftermath, whether it lasts a few minutes or a few hours, are inseparable and any attempts to intellectually separate them can only result in dissociation.

And yet what I was pointing out that in the case of an instinctive fear reaction to physical danger, it makes no sense to divide the reaction into two parts. In my experience of observing the feeling of fear, whenever the feeling of fear kicks in, whether it is in response to an actual danger or an imaginary one, there is no two-part reaction – no discernable first stage and no discernable, fabricated or conditioned, second phase to the feeling.

It may also be worthwhile considering that the male of the human species has been conditioned by his peers to rationalize his feelings in lieu of deeply experiencing his feelings. The significant understanding for an actualist is that this tendency to rationalize or intellectualize is only social conditioning and, as such, this habitual behaviour can be quite easily abandoned.

Feelings and emotions on the other hand are a different matter – they are not the result of fabricated, conditioned nor taught behaviour. Feelings and emotions are rooted in the instinctual survival passions – an understanding that is vital to understanding the essential nature of the actualism process

Well, the first aspect is that your pigeon-holing of feelings seems to be intellectual rather than experiential and, as you would know from your engineering background, there is often a vast dichotomy betwixt theory and practice. Men in particular have been unwittingly taught since very early childhood to suppress, intellectualize or rationalize their feelings and emotions as a way of dissociating from their feelings. In the East, the God-men and monks simply took this taught behaviour to its extreme.

Secondly, keeping it simple is anathema to the human psyche – the confusion that arises from the combination of passion and imagination nearly always eclipses any chance of intelligence and common sense operating. The only way I found that I could utterly focus my attention on ‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’ was to keep it simple – I made this attentiveness my number one passion in life. There are countless examples in human history where individuals have devoted their lives, and their passion, to a single cause and by doing so have contributed mightily to the betterment of their fellow human beings. Richard’s single-minded intent and eventual discovery of a way to bring an end to the insidious influence of the instinctual passions is but one example.

*

I’ll just offer a comment on the matter of observation as it is relevant to all who have been attracted to Eastern spirituality or Eastern philosophy at some point in their lives. Vineeto and I have often discussed the fundamental differences between the Eastern practice of self-observation and the actualism practice of ‘self’-awareness as well as reflecting upon how difficult it was in the early days to stop being a dissociative observer and start becoming aware of exactly how I am experiencing this moment of being alive.

The fundamental difference between the two practices is due to the diametrically opposite intent of each of the practices – the aim of the spiritual practice is to cultivate a dissociated identity in order to avoid feeling the full range of instinctual passions, whereas the aim of actualism is to instigate radical change in order to become happy and harmless in the world-as-it-is, with people as-they-are.

Perhaps an example of how the actualism practice of ‘self’-awareness works in practice will serve to make this difference clear –

‘The final straw came as I waited to meet her one evening and she was late. As the time ticked away, so my mind raced away, and after about thirty minutes I was furious. How could she be late? How could anything else or anyone else be more important in her life than me? As my fury built and built, as my mind churned over countless possibilities as to why she was late, suddenly I began to see the stupidity of it all. Here I was, comfortably sitting at a seaside café, drink in hand, looking at a spectacular sunset on a warm summer’s evening. I’m involved in the adventure of a lifetime, I’ve found out more about what it is to be a human being in the last months than I have in a lifetime, there is this wonderful woman in my life – and I’m being neurotic because she is thirty minutes late! Gradually I came out of it and was able to be where I was, delighting in the balmy evening air and the gaiety of the scene as the last of the beach-goers drifted home.

When Vineeto arrived she apologised for being late, and I explained what had happened to me. We had a beach walk, dinner at a nearby restaurant, and tootled home to bed.

Over the next few days something continued to nag me. Why was it that this relationship seemed to be going off the rails? Why were there increasingly misunderstandings, petty conflicts and difficulties? Why was I becoming more and more obsessed about what Vineeto was doing when we weren’t together, and what she was thinking about when we were together? Over the next days I contemplated on what was wrong and suddenly it dawned on me that I was battling her and trying to force my opinions on her. Further, I realised that I had been jealous, possessive, demanding and obsessive with her. And, most appallingly, I saw how when the impossible demands of love are not fulfilled then it can all so quickly turn to disappointment, resentment and eventually hate. It had got to the stage where it was obvious to me that unless I changed my behaviour this relationship was heading exactly the same way as all my previous ones – doomed to failure. This was my last chance and I was watching it wilt away ... and I was actively causing it to happen. At this point I wasn’t interested so much in why I was acting this way, I realised I had to stop!

Armed with the conviction of the blindingly obvious, I confronted Vineeto with the news. I told her I was simply going to stop battling her and acting the way I had been. I remember her response as somewhat bewildered and unbelieving, but then again I knew that at least I had to stop the torment in me. What happened in the ensuing week was quite remarkable. I found that the strength of my intention made me able to completely drop this destructive behaviour. Somehow I knew this was the only course of action I could take to make this relationship work and I knew it was my last chance. If I was going to beat this thing I had to do it now!

A wonderful calmness came over me; no longer was I thinking about Vineeto when we were apart, and when I was with her I was no longer suspicious, doubtful, impatient or moody. I began to accept her as she was. I was no longer driven to change her. This then brought a corresponding ease in myself for I was able just to be me. After all, the only person I can change is me and I was working on exactly that.’ Peter’s Journal, Love

No philosophical umming and ahhing, no dissociating from unwanted feelings, no remaining aloof, no blaming others and so on – just the simple momentary awareness of the feelings that were preventing me from being happy coupled with an intense yearning to change in order to become actually harmless, come what may.

No, your quote is an example of normal ‘self’-centredness, and I do mean normal, as humans are instinctually programmed to be ‘self’-centred.

When I said ‘no dissociating from unwanted feelings’ I meant that I didn’t sit there at the seaside café thinking ‘I’ am feeling furious or ‘my identity’ is feeling furious or wasting my time by asking ‘who’ is feeling furious. I simply acknowledged that I was – in that very moment of being alive – feeling furious. Utterly simple and down-to-earth – no evasion, no dissociation.

It’s good to hear of successes. So much of the feed-back in these early years of actualism have been in the form of people objecting to using a method whose sole aim is to facilitate becoming more happy and less harmful to one’s fellow human beings. You may well find that persistence with the simplicity of the actualism method will move your success rating from ‘for the most part’ to an effortless 99.9% of the time and then you will find yourself virtually free of malice and sorrow.

Yep, I was born a male and brought up to be a man, which was the start of dissociation. Then I allowed myself to be sucked into Eastern religion, which only lead me further away from sensibility and the actual world of the senses.

The only reason I mentioned the Eastern practice of being a dissociated observer was that you had previously mentioned that you had found similarity between actualism and the writings and teachings of Bankei.

‘Most attractive were the very basic principles presented by Zen – I particularly liked Bankei, he seemed to have a grasp of the real essence. <…> I have since realized that what I was attracted to in Zen – that stripped down elemental simplicity – I have found in these parts. No 38 to Peter. 9.2.03

Of course the good thing is that none of this is set in concrete – all of this is nought but social programming and, as such, can be undone if one so desires. All that is needed to begin the process of undoing this programming is the simple acknowledgement that ‘I, along with everybody else, have got it 180 degrees wrong’. Only then can one stop defending ‘me as I am’ and get started on the job of de-programming.

A bit from my journal is relevant –

‘The case for the defence was definitely not looking good, but I still found myself defending at least something of the spiritual and hanging on grimly. Surely there was a ‘Something’ else? Was it possible that I, and everyone else on earth up until now, had got it wrong and that only Richard was right? I had been reading widely throughout this time to check out the facts of what Richard was saying and what I found was astounding.

I found that the whole of philosophy, psychology, sociology, anthropology, astronomy, physics, indeed all of man’s knowledge, and wisdom is based on an underlying assumption of a ‘something more’ than the physical universe. A belief in the meta-physical permeates all human thinking and wisdom. If one eliminated this assumption or belief the whole lot comes crashing down like those card stacks I used to make as a kid. Then it all started to make sense to me, to fit the facts – everyone has got it 180 degrees wrong – everyone!’ Peter’s Journal, Fear

As you can see, recognizing and abandoning beliefs whilst cultivating a commonsense-only approach to the business of being alive is by no means an impossible task – I always figured that if one human being can do it then others can. Similarly if one man can deliberately dismantle his male conditioning, then other men can too and it also follows that there is no reason why women cannot do the same. All that is required is the pure intent to become happy and harmless.

Given that you began this post with the subject of fear this bit from my journal is also relevant to our discussion –

‘That type of fear is obvious and readily understood – it is when there is an actual physical danger. I, as this body, did what it did – it blacked out awareness when needed. The emotions I felt were just the interpretation of the event as fear by my psyche. The fear that I faced at the start of this process of ridding myself of a psychic entity, and on the way through was psychic fear – fear that was present in my psyche. It is the very same fear that ruled my every action and thought for most of my life. The: ‘what does that person think of me?’, ‘what am I going to do next?’, ‘what if something goes wrong?’ – the instinct of fear I was born with. The fear we transform into doubt, and more doubt. I remember calling it the ‘what if’ syndrome at some point. In the face of it the most usual reaction is to freeze – not do anything.

I saw it as a bit like when you drive along a country road and a rabbit appears on the road. Blinded by the headlights he freezes, and splat – dead rabbit. The only difference for me when I met Richard was that wobbling around in doubt or freezing in fear meant simply more of the same – prolonging my ‘normal’ life of suffering and confusion. The suffering of knowing that something was seriously wrong in my life but staunchly denying it out of pride, or hoping that the latest guru or belief would work, when deep inside I had already seen it wouldn’t work. The confusion I was in at the time was because I had seen ‘behind the curtain’ of the spiritual world. I had seen the Gurus for what they were, and I had started to see that it was all the same ‘old time religion’. The facts didn’t gel with the beliefs and there was a certain discord; a ‘something’s not quite right’ – not that I knew what it was at the time.

So when I met Richard I found myself saying ‘I’ll give this a try, and I’ll make it the most important thing in my life’. That, as I look back, was my innate intelligence operating – the ‘if it doesn’t work, throw it out and find something that does’ or ‘don’t just freeze in the headlights’. Common sense, really. It wasn’t courage – it was common sense. I also had to retrieve my will and not ‘surrender’, leaving it up to Someone else or Existence – some imaginary roll of the cosmic dice. ‘Leaving it up to Existence’ is to accept being malicious and sorrowful – the dice are in fact loaded that way.’ Peter’s Journal, Fear

You might have also noticed that I mentioned the subject of pride in this chapter. Over the years of many people corresponding with Richard it has become apparent that the majority would rather hold to their feeling of pride rather than admit that they, along with everybody else, have got it 180 degrees wrong. Speaking personally, I got over this hurdle because I ranked integrity and sincerity above the ‘self’-centred and fickle feeling of pride.

*

Speaking personally, I never saw any sense at all in splitting ‘me’ and ‘my identity’ into two parts. I had tried that in my spiritual years and saw that it was a wank.

I can only suggest re-reading the first piece I posted from my journal again and considering again the utter simplicity of the potent mix of being aware of how I am experiencing this moment of being alive combined with the single-pointed intent to change such that I become as happy and harmless as possible.

You may then find that the simplest, most straight-forward, phrasing of your original question would be ‘am I bullshitting myself again?’ as opposed to ‘is my identity bullshitting me again?’ Common sense would then have it that your second question would be ‘am ‘I’ attempting to maintain ‘my’ existence at all costs?’ because actualism is about ‘self’-immolation and not the physical death of the corporal body called No 38.

You might have noticed by now that I make no distinction between I and ‘I’ when I am being a normal human being. I do intellectually understand the distinction – t’is writ large all over the AF web-site – but the only way I, or indeed anybody else, can actually experience this distinction is when ‘I’ am not strutting the stage as it were – when ‘I’ am temporarily in abeyance during a pure consciousness experience. To attempt to split yourself into two parts while remaining an identity is an act of dissociation – vis –

dissociation – A process, or the resulting condition, in which certain concepts or mental processes are separated from the conscious personality. Oxford Dictionary

This is the whole thrust of the spiritual search for freedom – split yourself into two identities, become free from ‘I’ as ego and Realize that ‘who’ you really are is ‘me’ as a disembodied soul. The spiritual process is to practice dissociating from ‘I’ as a personal ego, and from the illusion of a grim reality, whilst simultaneously aggrandizing the real ‘me’ until I get to the delusionary state of thinking and feeling I am best mates with some God or other or, in the Eastern tradition, thinking and feeling I am God Himself or Herself.

Whilst none of this is a problem – the tradition has been going on for thousands of years – t’would be a pity for someone who is genuinely interested in becoming actually free of malice and sorrow to unwittingly continue on with the age-old habit of dissociation.

No 37 recently put the whole issue of dissociation very succinctly –

‘Who does the identity belong to – if not to ‘me?’ If so, then you’ve got ‘me’ and ‘my identity’ which makes two. ‘I’ don’t ‘have’ an identity – ‘I’ am an identity.’ No 37 to No 38, 20.4.03

And on that note, I might leave it at that – it’s so refreshing to hear someone call a spade a spade.

Freedom from the Human Condition – Happy and Harmless

Peter’s Text © The Actual Freedom Trust