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Selected Writings from Peter’s Journal on Actual Freedom
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 flesh and blood body only, am able to experience with my physical senses the
perfection and purity of the universe, totally free of any psychological and psychic entity within. I am also
free of the delusion that this 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 a direct and unfettered involvement,
every moment.
A genuine freedom from the Human Condition has to be an actual freedom, easily and readily liveable by anyone, in the world as-it-is, with people as-they-are, and not some imaginary escape or transcendence into a ‘spiritual world’ peopled with ‘higher-evolved’ ethereal beings. Actual Freedom is, per definition, both non-spiritual and down-to-earth, and as such, is a both a freedom from the need to believe in an after-life and an authentic freedom from the fear of death. Peter’s Journal, ‘Death’
Actual Freedom offers for the first time the experiential evidence that this instinctual programming can not only be radically altered, but completely eliminated. The price paid is a complete eradication of one’s ‘self’ – the alien psychological and psychic entity within the body. This eradication allows an actual freedom from the instinctual passions, that are evidenced as the Human Condition of malice and sorrow. Being free of malice and sorrow, one is able, for the first time, to be actually innocent, pure, perfect and benevolent, to wallow in the sensual delights of the actual world – this paradisiacal magical physical universe. As we became aware of the ‘big picture’ of the Human Condition
there remained the issue of how to apply this to changing ourselves such that we could instigate a freedom
from malice and sorrow within ourselves. We found that by concentrating on ‘How am I experiencing this
moment of being alive’ we immediately had the particular issue at hand. If something, some feeling, some
thought, some worry, an annoyance, an aggravation, etc. was preventing my happiness now then that issue was
the one to track down, to find the source, to investigate, to discover, to uncover. Relationships between men
and women present a veritable goldmine of issues to look at, a fact I was well aware of when first
propositioning Vineeto. One can feign and pretend being happy and harmless in a cave, a monastery or in a
crowd, but the ‘test of fire’ is one on one. If one cannot live with one other person 24 hours a day in
equity, peace and harmony, then all the theories, beliefs, ideals, sacred teachings, and holy feelings are but
unliveable dreams and ancient fairy-stories. It’s called ‘putting your money where your mouth is’... to
put it bluntly!
Richard had got himself Enlightened some seventeen years before by an intensive method aimed at finding the state he had experienced some time earlier in a ‘peak experience’. He achieved an altered state of consciousness complete with feelings of Oneness and Timelessness, Love for all, Compassion, and a drive to spread his Message. What in fact he had been aiming for was what he had experienced previously – a direct experience of the purity and perfection of the physical universe, but what he had attained he eventually called ‘Absolute Freedom’ – an extraordinary state of bliss and self-aggrandisement. He became at one with God or the ‘Absolute’, as he named it. As he began to talk to people they told him that what he was saying was very like what the spiritual Masters were saying, and he then discovered that he was in a state known in the East as Enlightenment. Despite the extraordinary wonderful feelings, a few doubts remained simmering beneath the surface: why was this state different to what he had aimed for, why was he driven to save mankind, why did he feel timeless when the clock still ticked away? He travelled to the East seeking answers but came back even more troubled. Over a period of twelve years he was to question all of the sacred tenets of the Enlightened Ones – the massive delusion as he puts it – and emerged some six years ago into what he now calls ‘Actual Freedom’. The man I sat talking with for hours and hours in his suburban living room had actually forsaken the Glamour, the Glory and the Glitz of Enlightenment! In Eastern Spiritual terms, he had eliminated not only the ‘self’ but the ‘Self’ as well, not only the ego but the soul. I thought his credentials were impeccable, and he was willing and able to talk clearly about his experiences and discoveries. He had had a female companion for the last eleven years and together they have investigated what is called the ‘Human Condition’ – that set of beliefs, conditioning and instincts that is the program by which human beings have operated ever since they emerged from the caves or trees. Further, they had developed a method for actually ridding oneself of malice and sorrow, the very core of the Human Condition. To become happy and harmless was the term I liked. It seemed to me an eminently sensible aim in life! Peter’s Journal, ‘God’
Therein lies the cause of the problems that Richard calls the ‘institutionalised insanity’ of the spiritual and religious worlds. That delusion is definitely not what I refer to as peace of mind. What I experience now is a lack of anything that causes any disruptions, neurosis, worries, emotions or feelings. Waking up in the morning knowing I will have a perfect day is what I call peace of mind. This contrasts markedly with the so-called peace or transcendence of the Enlightened Ones, some of whom I have personally witnessed as being angry, frustrated and wearied. Reading biographies of others served to shatter the myths of those ‘held in esteem’, and I do not regard the legends of the long dead ones as worth the stone they were supposedly chiselled on (...or the rice-paper they were supposedly written on!) The actual, continuous experience of the much sought after ‘peace of mind’ is proof that this method works. The total elimination of malice and sorrow is now an option. There is now a third alternative available for the adventurous and caring. Now it is simply a matter of choice. The remarkable thing about actual freedom is that it indeed does make peace a fact for me. Not only to be happy but to be harmless as well is to enjoy peace for myself and to be a non-contributor to suffering and malice in the world. So why not ‘give peace a chance...’, for yourself and others? Peter’s Journal, ‘Peace’
So I’m writing my story, as an ordinary human being, one of 5.8 billion others on the planet. I’m not driven to proselytise or save the planet – it’s just that somewhere there may be another Peter or Vineeto who would risk trying something new. I was, after all, lost, lonely, frightened and very, very cunning – the only difference is that I chose to admit it. I accepted responsibility for actively contributing to the endemic violence and suffering. And I wanted to change. I knew, as everybody else does, that something was wrong. Why when I had everything I wanted, wasn’t I happy? And why, despite my best efforts, did I hurt other people? And why did the tried and true methods to find happiness – religion and spirituality – fail again and again? So in the end it simply meant going off down a new track – trying something new. I literally had ‘nothing left to lose’ except more and more of the same second rate life – and then I’d die. I did ask for a while ‘well, why me?’ and ‘how come no one else?’ But when I started to reap the benefits of freeing myself the question of doubts or delays were irrelevant. It is in the end a willing extinction of what one comes to see as a malicious and sorrowful entity that is totally opposed to my being here, as this body. With a bare awareness of the senses, able to think and reflect and communicate to others. To tell my story, how I see the world of people, events and things. This is an extraordinary infinite physical universe of such variety, complexity and delight in all its manifestations including me, this body. So I am writing of my own experiences, of the facts of being a human being, and of what sense I have made of living on this wonderful planet. The very act of writing this book is indeed part of that making sense. I am very aware it is something I do for myself, a sorting out at the end of an exhilarating journey down ‘a wide and wondrous path’. And it may well be that this story offers someone else a ‘crack in the door’ of the insidious belief system that plagues humanity. If not you, then there will be others – this evolutionary change is destined to eventually spread throughout the world like a chain letter. Peter’s Journal, ‘Evolution’
I am now actually becoming a free autonomous human being. The idea of causing harm to another human being has simply disappeared: I am free of malice. And also the idea that this wondrous, bountiful, beautiful earth is a miserable place to be has simply disappeared: I am free of sorrow. This is indeed a perfect, delightful universe I am in, and I experience myself as perfect and delightful. After all, what else could I be? I am, after all, one of the ‘human being bits’ of this marvellous universe, made of the same stuff as the universe. So it is possible for me to evolve myself. And it beats sitting around waiting for Godot. It’s the most thrilling and fascinating journey ... I can’t recommend it highly enough. This is a new, non-spiritual path to a down-to-earth freedom – an actual freedom. All my wishes have come true and more. Life was meant to be easy, friendly, comfortable, peaceful, harmonious, ever-changing, fresh each moment, direct, obvious, and my senses allow my intimate involvement with each person I meet, each event happening, each place I am in. And I can think, reflect, talk and write about what sense I have made of living as a human being ... pure delight... It is a fact that it is possible for any human being to live without malice and sorrow. And I now await the day for the change to be ‘set in concrete’, as it were. For that curious happening in the brain-stem that Richard has experienced. That bit obviously can’t be ‘my’ doing, but I’ve given it one hundred percent, so success is guaranteed. And it is thrilling to know that the moment is coming. Peter’s Journal, ‘Evolution’
It is a fact that men and women can live together in peace and harmony; I have proven that with Vineeto. It is a fact that peace and harmony is possible on
earth. Freedom from the Human Condition – Happy and Harmless © The Actual Freedom Trust |
