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Vineeto’s Correspondence on the Actual Freedom List Correspondent No 37
I enjoyed your report of your experience with actualism you wrote to No 38. One part of it I could particularly relate to – Yes, in the sense that my ‘search’ for truth has ended – and that is quite a relief. Also, my ‘relationships’ and dealings with people are virtually free of emotional entanglement, so they are much, much smoother. No, in the sense that actualism and the recognition of the human condition has brought some unanticipated downsides that I am still working through. Briefly, the downside I am referring to could be summarized like this: ‘I’ resent being here, and ‘I’ know it. So, I cannot definitively say that I am happier overall. If I understand you correctly, I can relate to your observation that ‘‘I’ resent being here, and ‘I’ know it’. When I discovered actualism and came to understand that the instinctual passions are the root cause of all human malice and sorrow I started to deliberately break my ingrained habits of dis-identifying and dissociating from my feelings and emotions – habits which had been part of my previous spiritual practice. I also began to watch television and read the newspapers to see what was going on in the world and to take notice of how I was in relation to other people. It wasn’t easy at the start because what I found was often not very pretty. When I took off my rose-colored glasses of dis-identification and dissociation I was at first overwhelmed with sorrow about the way people are with each other and, more importantly, I was shocked and appalled at the dark emotions I found within myself despite all my diligent spiritual practice and all my good intentions. In short, I discovered that I was as bad and as mad as everyone else, to paraphrase Peter’s description. One of the first of my previously-hidden feelings I became aware of was ‘my’ resentment of being here and the constant effort required to be ‘me’ and yet I was determined and committed to not let these negative emotions slip away into the background again, but I wanted to actively investigate these feelings, look for the reasons for my resentment, consider and apply any practical changes if possible and where necessary, break my habit of carelessly lapsing back into these feelings – in short do whatever was needed to break the back of this insidious spoiler of my enjoyment of this moment. I found that the commitment to enjoy this perpetual moment of being alive was already half the battle and stubborn determination to not let fear, confusion or doubt stop me, the other half. The practical and efficient tool – the actualism method – allowed me to not only become aware of my dark emotions but to examine them and incrementally disempower them, or, to put it differently, a tool that enabled me to become increasingly more happy and more harmless the more I uncovered the beliefs, morals, ethics, feelings and passions that prevented me from being happy and harmless. This tool, combined with Richard’s report of successfully applying it, meant that I increasingly dared to stop turning away from the dark side of the human condition, and to explore the darker recesses of my psyche in order that I could investigate the instinctual passions and then do whatever was necessary and appropriate in order to disempower them. The fact that my ‘search’ has ended and dealings with people have improved is clearly attributable to actualism. The unanticipated downsides have had to do with the fact that for most of the last two years, I have practiced actualism incorrectly. I have mostly looked at the human condition and my experience by trying to think through them and understand them. Unfortunately, though that approach gave me an intellectual understanding of the human condition, it has not allowed me to eradicate it in myself. I’ve only recently been able to discern the difference experientially, which has to do with examining emotions with attentiveness rather than attempting to analyze them intellectually. There is a big difference that can only be discerned experientially, and from what I can see, the trick is to remain with attentiveness rather than intellectualizing. Also, an important note – I’ve have long understood (intellectually) that there is a difference, but one has to understand this experientially. There have been a lot of misunderstandings about the phrase ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive.’ I’ve tried to focus on ‘what’ I am experiencing – a sort of passive awareness, ‘what’ I am sensing – passive awareness – ‘what’ I am feeling – passive awareness – and other variations on the ‘what’ theme. It is only with the recent distinction between ‘what’ and ‘how’ that I see the question is specifically designed to be a simple test of the quality of experience in whatever form. ‘How’ is the important part in that it puts attention on the quality of experience – the emotions and feelings underlying thoughts so that one understands them experientially with attentiveness, not intellectually. Ah, how simply you said it! ‘How’, not ‘what’ is indeed the clue to the difference between attentiveness with pure intent and the passive awareness of Eastern tradition. It had never occurred to me that it is this word that signifies the vital difference, but now that you said it is perfectly obvious – ‘how’ inquires into the quality of the experience and then the pure intent to improve the quality of this moment to be both more happy and more harmless indicates what needs to be done. Whereas ‘what’ simply takes stock of the content of one’s experience and by doing so one can either focus on sensate experiencing, thereby avoiding undesirable affective experiencing – trying to become an un-feeling ‘self’ – or one can focus on desirable affective experiencing, thereby regarding what one sensately experiences as being secondary or even illusionary – trying to become a non-thinking, dissociated ‘self’. Good to chat.
No 32: My question is simple: is it possible to live with two partners (instead of one) and commit himself/herself to live happy and harmlessly with them and then experience an actual intimacy with both? As one of the pioneers in this business, I personally set myself a simple down-to-earth challenge – being able to live with at least one other person in utter peace and harmony. If you aspire to the challenge of making that two persons at once, then why not, as No 37 said. On the face of it you are setting yourself a more difficult challenge, but for an actualist the end outcome is what is important – the ultimate ending of malice and sorrow. It might also be mentioned that as an actualist, one is already committing themselves to living in peace and harmony with every other person on the planet, regardless of where they live. It certainly may add a some extra challenges when one attempts to increase the number of partners, yet once one has gotten the ‘knack’ of what it takes to be peaceful, then it is not at all inconceivable that one can live in peace an harmony with more than one partner. A more challenging question to ask: Even though one has committed themselves to living in peace and harmony, how will things go between the additional partners if they haven’t committed themselves to living in peace and harmony? There’s the rub. When you say ‘there’s the rub’ I am reminded of a post from a correspondent on this mailing list a few years ago. He described well what it means to be confronted with the – quite predictable – problems of relationships within the human condition –
As for ‘once one has gotten the ‘knack’ of what it takes to be peaceful, then it is not at all inconceivable that one can live in peace an harmony with more than one partner’ – Richard describes in his journal that this is not only conceivable but eminently liveable as well –
I liked your post on agnosticism as you state the three options of believing quite clearly. I think the actualist approach to agnosticism is often misunderstood quite simply because there are normally only 3 positions on for example, God. 1) The Faithful stance – believes in God. 2) The Atheist or ‘Disbeliever’ stance – believes that there is no God. 3) Agnostic – doesn’t know what to ‘believe.’ You can take these 3 positions on virtually any issue – For, Against, and ‘I don’t know’ – but you might notice that they all involved belief – the 3rd is wondering about what to ‘believe.’ There is another kind of ‘agnostic’ – one who is not ‘open to believing’ – yet remains open to discovering the fact of the matter. That is where I am and where the only place I think that is sensible – since if one doesn’t know something – why believe either way – and why wonder about what to believe – just get rid of believing altogether. I also think that the reason why so many people get tripped up at this point is because they think that regular agnosticism is the only intelligent response to not knowing – then when they tout their precious agnosticism, they are befuddled to learn that they are not supported in that view by actualists. As I stated above, there are 2 ways to ‘not know’ – the most common way is to ‘not know what to believe,’ whereas another way is to ‘not know’ the facts. To further clarify what you so aptly called ‘their precious agnosticism’ I would like to add the Oxford Dictionary definition of an agnostic –
As such an agnostic not only doesn’t know what to believe but many who consider themselves agnostics passionately defend their stance that ‘one can never know’ or even that the answers to the mysteries of life can not be known. Thus maintaining an agnostic viewpoint is used as an excuse to shield the ‘Unknowable’ from being explored. I have seen many discussions by both Buddhists and the followers of Jiddu Krishnamurti in which they passionately defended the Unknowable as sacred threshold that should not be questioned, let alone be actively explored. To me an agnostic is someone, as you say, who does ‘not know what to believe’ but who also, as per his doctrine, does not want to find out the facts … and I am definitely not an agnostic.
No 66: Vineeto, I’m somewhat surprised it was you, because I would not think you could still ask ‘isn’t it selfish to leave the real world’ as I thought you’d be ‘certain’ that it’s not. Life is full of surprises. :) It is certainly not possible to know all of another person’s intentions, but in this context it may be important to remember that when people are on video, they aren’t always asking for themselves – but often for the sake of the audience. Especially since the video wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for the intended audience. Although I had an initial period of stage fright when first considering giving up some of my anonymity, fact is that during my video-taped conversation with Richard a potential audience was the least thing on my mind. In fact, the video-taping provided the opportunity to have a focussed uninterrupted hour-long conversation with Richard about my favourite topic – how to actually become free from the human condition – and I benefited immensely not only from the conversation itself but also from replaying it over and over in order to extract as much information from it as possible. Becoming virtually free from one’s social identity has the wonderful side effect in that I am nowadays scarcely concerned about what other people think about me. The hypocrisy of play-acting as an identity for an audience, any audience, let alone attempting to ‘know’ the intention and motivation of others in order to say or do something for their sake, is precisely the reason why I endeavoured to become free from my social identity in the first place. To put it succinctly – I was exploring the topic of being selfish/unselfish because at this point in the conversation it came up as an objection to my becoming actually free. The other pertinent point to note is because I personally benefited from the conversation I am confident that this video is worth publishing, as what was of benefit to me can also be of use to others who are interested in the same topic and who pursue the same goal in life as I do.
During my process of actualism there was a time when I watched the biography of many people who made it to being famous enough to have a biography report made about them. I wanted to find out what exactly it is that made people successful in what they wanted to achieve in life, be it a gold medal in an Olympic sport or the winner of the Tour de France, be it a successful business entrepreneur or a famous dancer or painter, be it a well-known architect or a renowned author or inventor or, in the spiritual realm of achievements, become an enlightened master. What all these people had in common was a burning passion to be successful at their chosen field of interest and an unwavering determination to do whatever it takes to reach their goal. No 23: This shows that likely you have not (yet) understood what a spiritual master is. I take it then that you have not read Mohan Rajneesh’s autobiography ‘The Golden Childhood’ or any other autobiography or biography from a genuine enlightened person? They all describe, without exception that they were pursuing enlightenment like all get-out for many years with a strict discipline of mediation, fasting, yoga and other spiritual disciplines and then, when after years of arduous practice they exhaustedly relaxed and gave up control enlightenment happened. Face it, Johan, there is no such thing as a free lunch – not even enlightenment happens on its own accord – you’d have to work really, really hard if you wanted to achieve it. Here are 3 cases for consideration that seem to me like ‘genuine enlightenment’ without the typical meditation and preparation that goes along with seeking it. Suzanne Segal – http://www.angelfire.com/realm/bodhisattva/segal.html John Wren-Lewis – http://www.spiritualteachers.org/john_wren_lewis.htm Meher Baba – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meher_Baba Let me start by saying that I fully agree with Richard that it would have been more accurate to use the word ‘and/or’ rather than ‘and’ in the second paragraph above – ‘with a strict discipline of mediation, fasting, yoga *and/or* other spiritual disciplines’. Apart from that I am actually fascinated if there is indeed an exception to my generalization that one has to put effort into becoming enlightened even though many report *after* their enlightenment that it was dead easy and one shouldn’t try so hard. As for your three examples, Suzanne Segal was one of the people on my mind when I wrote the above paragraph as I specifically bought her biographical book in order to find out what caused her to become enlightened while waiting for/ stepping on a bus. Here is what she says she wanted to achieve very early on in life from – she had a strong interest in the feeling of vastness –
She did have a burning passion to be successful at her chosen field of interest and she also had an unwavering determination to do whatever it takes to reach her goal – she attended TM meditation courses, went on to become a meditation teacher where, to use her own words, she did ‘many hours of meditation […], exposing ourselves to the large doses of what was clearly a powerful practice’ (p 16), she entrusted herself ‘to the ocean of transcendental meditation, letting my concerns float in its waters, lulled by the promise that I would wash up on the shores’ … (p 19), and then she says this –
And this is how she described the ‘siddhi course’ – ‘with the new siddhi practices, meditation, hatha yoga, and pranayama, we were now spending a total of three hours to complete one round.’ p29 After several years of being intimately involved she left the TM organization and in the ensuing busy life in the marketplace was able to enjoy her passion of meditating only once in a while. If my memory serves me right it was about 10 years after she left TM that the enlightenment incident on the bus stop occurred. * As for John Wren-Lewis – he was not a complete novice to religion and spirituality before his near death experience incident. He had developed strong interest in problems of relationship between science and religion, leading to frequent broadcasts and to over 300 articles in leading periodicals, as well as contributions to numerous books and he also developed a strong interest in psychology and religion, leading to publication of the now famous essay in Psychoanalysis Observed and to appointment as Advisor to the Association of Psychotherapists in the United Kingdom. In 1971 left industry to become Visiting Professor in Religious Studies at the University of California and thereafter at New College, Sarasota, Florida. His book, ‘What Shall We Tell the Children?’ is widely used as study of the basis of religious education in a scientifically oriented culture (excerpted from http://www.geocities.com/eckcult/lane_live/lotus_feet.html). Additionally he is married to, and very likely influenced by, Ann Faraday who is a self-realized person in her own right. Nevertheless, his near death experience after eating a poisoned lolly on a bus in Thailand did not make him enlightened as for instance Dan Sutera tries to make him out to be (http://www.selfdiscoveryportal.com/arConversation.htm). John Wren-Lewis himself describes the experience of ‘the Void’ as fluctuating in a Spiritual Magazine published in 1991 –
His NDE was rather the cataclysmic event that sparked an intense interest in enlightenment just as similar near death experiences have either initiated or intensified the search for enlightenment for other people. Ramana Maharshi and Mohan Rajneesh are examples that spring to mind. * I had to do some research on Merwan Sheriar Irani known as Meher Baba as, although I knew of him, I knew virtually nothing about his life before enlightenment. Here are some excerpts from a 20-volume biography (http://www.lordmeher.org/index.jsp?pageBase=text.jsp&nextPage=home) about his very early interests and aspirations in life –
Additionally, his father had been a dervish (a religious man who has taken vows of poverty and austerity, Oxford Dictionary) and was convinced of his son’s spiritual nature. (p160) In his youth, Merwan was in the habit of gazing at the stars and moon – sometimes for hours late into the night. (p160) Merwan had always been drawn to solitary places and derived such profound peace from these hours … (p171) Merwan and Ramnath [a devout Buddhist friend] became loyal companions and would go off to a secluded spot to meditate on God together. The two boys particularly liked going to the burning ghats, the Hindu crematory grounds, where they would sit repeating different names of God. The two boys usually went to meditate at night and sometimes stayed as late as ten o’clock at the ghats – exchanging their views on God, religion and spirituality. (p186) ‘One day in 1912, while Merwan was sitting outside his house, suddenly his inner sight opened. He saw the divine effulgence of God most clearly and immediately lost all bodily consciousness. Although his eyelids remained open, he was merged in divine bliss. (…) After that experience of the Noor state (the light of God) Merwan increasingly felt some great urge within – some powerful feeling that he was different from other men. This feeling of being different persisted, though he had no consciousness of his spiritual identity.’ (p195) Here is how the biography describes the famous ‘kiss’ –
So what the Wikipedia link you gave describes as Hazrat Babajan, ‘whose kiss unveiled him spiritually to his state of God-consciousness or God-realization’ was apparently an event that needs to be seen in the context of his religious upbringing, and at least seven on-going years of a passion for meditation, inner peace and the realization of ‘Eternity’. I have heard it said before that enlightened masters are seemingly able to transfer enlightenment to some of their disciples – in fact that is one of the reasons why disciples flock around spiritual masters – but what always seems to be required on the disciple’s part is a passion for enlightenment/ Divinity, an unwavering devotion and an unquestioning surrender to the master. Over to you.
During my process of actualism there was a time when I watched the biography of many people who made it to being famous enough to have a biography report made about them. I wanted to find out what exactly it is that made people successful in what they wanted to achieve in life, be it a gold medal in an Olympic sport or the winner of the Tour de France, be it a successful business entrepreneur or a famous dancer or painter, be it a well-known architect or a renowned author or inventor or, in the spiritual realm of achievements, become an enlightened master. What all these people had in common was a burning passion to be successful at their chosen field of interest and an unwavering determination to do whatever it takes to reach their goal. No 23: This shows that likely you have not (yet) understood what a spiritual master is. I take it then that you have not read Mohan Rajneesh’s autobiography ‘The Golden Childhood’ or any other autobiography or biography from a genuine enlightened person? They all describe, without exception that they were pursuing enlightenment like all get-out for many years with a strict discipline of mediation, fasting, yoga and other spiritual disciplines and then, when after years of arduous practice they exhaustedly relaxed and gave up control enlightenment happened. Face it, No 23, there is no such thing as a free lunch – not even enlightenment happens on its own accord – you’d have to work really, really hard if you wanted to achieve it. Here are 3 cases for consideration that seem to me like ‘genuine enlightenment’ without the typical meditation and preparation that goes along with seeking it. Suzanne Segal – http://www.angelfire.com/realm/bodhisattva/segal.html John Wren-Lewis – http://www.spiritualteachers.org/john_wren_lewis.htm Meher Baba – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meher_Baba (…) As for John Wren-Lewis – (…) his near death experience after eating a poisoned lolly on a bus in Thailand did not make him enlightened as for instance Dan Sutera tries to make him out to be (http://www.selfdiscoveryportal.com/arConversation.htm). John Wren-Lewis himself describes the experience of ‘the Void’ as fluctuating in a Spiritual Magazine published in 1991 –
His NDE was rather the cataclysmic event that sparked an intense interest in enlightenment just as similar near death experiences have either initiated or intensified the search for enlightenment for other people. Ramana Maharshi and Mohan Rajneesh are examples that spring to mind. What I do know of John Wren-Lewis is although he had an interest in science and religion, etc – he has often characterized his ‘enlightenment’ as being quite opposite in nature to his former dismissals of such. For example, from http://www.geocities.com/jiji_muge/dazzdark.html –
Yes, I came across this quote in my research on him. It goes to show that being skeptical is not the same thing as having investigated and abandoned one’s beliefs, doesn’t it? If one admits that the experience of John Wren-Lewis was a ‘genuine enlightenment’, … Why would you say ‘if one admits…’ when John Wren-Lewis himself admits that he still slips ‘back into that old clouded state frequently’? Do you have a different definition of enlightenment than that of a *permanent* altered state of consciousness, a *permanent* transcendence of the ego? … then it does certainly seem to be an exception. Of course, the wavering quality, its here now, gone now quality might lead some to disqualify it as genuine. I would certainly disqualify his experience as genuine enlightenment, but I
have come across a lot of people, particularly of the Advaita/Non-Dualistic persuasion who have a vested interest in
watering down genuine enlightenment into varying states of ‘self’-realization whereas all genuinely enlightened
beings point to a single edifying moment of awakening (with a variety of descriptions) (for 3 examples see * I had to do some research on Merwan Sheriar Irani known as Meher Baba as, although I knew of him, I knew virtually nothing about his life before enlightenment. Here are some excerpts from a 20-volume biography (http://www.lordmeher.org/index.jsp?pageBase=text.jsp&nextPage=home) about his very early interests and aspirations in life –
(…) Finally, Meher Baba. He certainly qualifies for one involved in and exposed to ‘spiritual disciplines’, so he definitely was primed by the culture, religious outlook, and his upbringing for what he experienced as a result of Babajan’s infamous kiss. From what I’ve read – I don’t see that he was involved in intense meditation such as someone like Suzanne Segal or those intentionally pursuing enlightenment. It was certainly more uncommon for a Westerner such as Suzanne Segal to be involved in spiritual discipline than for an Indian such as Meher Baba and therefore when an Indian boy practices meditation it may seem less significant. However, the 20-volume biography on Meher Baba is so detailed that it becomes obvious that he had a more than an average interest in the Transcendental – he had burning passion to ‘realize Eternity’ and to merge with the Divine and this passion expressed itself in long hours of meditation in various forms from an early age. Of course it is also part of popular legend that enlightened beings are no ordinary people, that they are chosen by (a) god, that they are special from birth, that they have an evolved soul earned through numerous virtuous past lives and that in their last life everything just falls into their lap. I know those myths well from tales of Mohan Rajneesh, tales that are deliberately promulgated in order to keep the mystery, the mystique and the superiority of enlightened beings alive. So, unless I see that he was involved in such arduous efforts over many years, it still seems to me as if he would be an exception in the case in which only the word ‘and’ is used in your statement above. Now that you have modified your statement to read ‘and/or,’ it appears that he may not be an exception under that understanding. I read quite a bit of his 20 volume official biography some years ago, but as my memory is often faulty – I don’t recall how much he was actually involved in spiritual disciplines himself – though he definitely showed ‘spiritual aptitude’ and a fascination with Divine states of mind. Well, to me he was no exception according to my modified ‘and/or’ statement in that he actively pursued spirituality and indulged in spiritual practices from a very early childhood and his enlightenment did not just happen on its own accord. Here are some more examples from the above-mentioned biography – ‘As if drawn by some strange force, Merwan would often go to the Tower of Silence from about ten until midnight. After the experience with Baily [his best friend], he continued to go there alone to sit for several hours. It is said that he saw many other ‘good’ and ‘pious’ spirits, thus gathering experiences similar to his father’s. Merwan had always been drawn to solitary places and derived such profound peace from these hours alone that at times he would joyously sing to himself.’ (p171) * ‘One day Ramnath showed Merwan a new book he had on the life of Gautama the Buddha entitled Buddha Bhagwan – Lord Buddha. Thumbing through the pages, Merwan came to a passage where Buddha said: ‘When I return to earth, I will be called Maitreya – the Merciful One.’ Instantly, Merwan felt that he was the very same Merciful One to which the passage referred! He looked at Buddha’s picture and felt within: ‘I am the Buddha!’ But he asked himself, ‘Am I really the Buddha?’ and his inner voice assured him: ‘Yes, Merwan, you are!’’ (p186) * ‘Life [after meeting Babajan] was now totally empty except for one person – that ancient woman. The only thing Merwan did regularly for the next seven months was to visit Babajan from that day, in May 1913, onward every evening. For hours he would sit by the old woman’s side – sometimes very late into the night. (…) His good name and admirable character were slandered. But it did not concern him, for with that one embrace from Babajan the merging of Merwan’s life in divinity began! The world had nothing to offer him and the world was becoming nothing to him! Only God existed and he was about to realize himself as God! When Babajan and Merwan would sit together under her tree they seldom spoke. One night during January 1914, as Merwan was about to leave, he kissed Babajan’s hands and she in turn held his face in her hands. The time had come.’ (pp196-7) Vineeto’s Text © The Actual Freedom Trust |
