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Richard’s Correspondence On The Actual Freedom Mailing List with Correspondent No. 25
RESPONDENT: What do you mean by ‘world’, the world of people interactions – ‘society’ or something else? RICHARD: The physical world ... the world of this body and that body and every body; the world of the mountains and the streams; the world of the trees and the flowers; the world of the clouds in the sky by day and the stars in the firmament by night and so on and so on ad infinitum. RESPONDENT: Here is the world I live in: it has no streams, no trees, no flowers, no stars, yet it has plenty of people (6000 persons per square km as an average), millions of cars and concrete buildings; as a matter of fact it’s a concrete world, THE concrete world ... and it is a very polluted one. I wonder if this, the world I experience on a daily basis, is part of the actual world you talk so much about. RICHARD: No, it is not ... although each and every one of the 6,000 flesh and blood bodies, each and every one of the millions of cars, each and every one of the concrete buildings, and so on, are of course. RESPONDENT: It’s a grey world, but I wonder if it’s really grey because of ‘my’ worldview or this is its true colour. RICHARD: Ha ... it is not its actual colour. * RESPONDENT: ... how many people you spoke to at length who remembered a PCE haven’t continued with their life as usual, even though they aware of an opportunity? RICHARD: I have never kept count ... it would be the minority of them, though. RESPONDENT: If presented with the choice of 10 million dollars reward/seeing God/living in a PCE, how many would choose $64.000? RICHARD: Presumably ... the minority. RESPONDENT: So, the minority of those who remembered a PCE would choose a happy and harmless life. RICHARD: I did say ‘presumably’ ... when there is more than at present virtually free, or even another actually free from the human condition, that presumption is no longer valid, of course. RESPONDENT: How could Peace-on-Earth be possible if every new generation would be born with the same old, same old instinctual passions? RICHARD: The same way it is possible now. RESPONDENT: It would be a continuum ‘ad infinitum’ DIY process and some would simply refuse (for a million reasons) to conform to a happy and harmless life. RICHARD: Nobody is being asked to ‘conform’ to anything (as is the case with morality and/or ethicality) ... it is each and ever person’s choice, each moment again, how they experience this moment of being alive (the only moment they are ever alive). No one is preventing you from being happy and harmless but you. RESPONDENT: And they will be the minority report. RICHARD: Only until they become the majority report. RESPONDENT: Or would the actual free parents would give birth to instinctually free babes in a gradual evolutionary process that would stretch over thousands of years? RICHARD: As I had a vasectomy in my late thirties I am unable to test that theory. RESPONDENT: We’ve been here before, but this just doesn’t make sense to me. RICHARD: Maybe the following will be of assistance:
RESPONDENT: And even if actualism would be practiced by many people (say 500 millions), it would not be an identical process to everyone, as a matter-of-fact it would get distorted, it would degenerate as with everything which happened on a mass scale in the history of humankind and over an extended period of time. RICHARD: You are referring that which is new – thus without precedent – and which is actual, and not fantasy, and are comparing it to not only that which is old but that which is a massive delusion into the bargain, in order to come to your conclusions. RESPONDENT: Nothing remains the same. Yes, the PCE might be identical to everyone, but ... RICHARD: If I may interject (before you go on with your ‘but ...’)? If, as you say, nothing remains the same, how can you then say, in virtually the same breath, that the pure consciousness experience (PCE) be *identical* to everyone? RESPONDENT: ...[but] the process of becoming free will inevitably be distorted, there will be countless ‘branded’ versions of becoming free. RICHARD: As the PCE is essential to the process of becoming actually free from the human condition then any method other than the only one that has worked so far to deliver the goods will be similarly bench-marked ... ‘tis not for nothing that clarity in communication (what some classify as pedantic nit-picking) is the hall-mark of actualism words and writings. RESPONDENT: This will serve the innate human need for diversity and tolerance. RICHARD: Those that choose diversity and tolerance over happiness and harmlessness are simply wasting their only moment of being alive ... frittering a vital opportunity away on more of the ‘Tried and True’ in yet another guise. RESPONDENT: I lived part of my life in communism and I know on my personal skin the effects of idealist unicity, equality and freedom applied in practice. RICHARD: As actualism is not ‘idealist’ your comparison of it to an unfeasible (given the human condition) socio-political system is pointless. RESPONDENT: They have also thought to have found the ‘only and unique’ solution, never tried before. RICHARD: As no actualist has the ‘thought’ that they have found anything of the sort, but rather the direct experience of the actuality, your comparison is again pointless. RESPONDENT: I guess this is my version of ‘you can’t change human nature’ applied on a global scale, but that’s the way I see it in the long run. RICHARD: Okay ... it is your life you are living, when all is said and done, and how you see things is your business, of course. * RESPONDENT: ... this experience escapes any reference frame of thought, it’s pure consciousness as experienced by an individual. RICHARD: Hmm ... are you so sure that it does indeed escape ‘any’ reference frame of thought? RESPONDENT: You can easily and accurately describe how good it was last time you had sex with your partner. But these are only thoughts, they convey something ... but of what use they would be to me if I wouldn’t have any sexperiences? RICHARD: I was questioning your ‘escapes any reference frame of thought’ statement ... am I to take it that your analogy with the sexual experience indicates it does not escape ‘any’ reference frame of thought after all (as in thoughts which convey something)? RESPONDENT: Even Enlightenment can be described, that’s not the issue here. RICHARD: Oh? This is the issue I am responding to:
RESPONDENT: I have pointed out to the distinction between thoughts and experience. The experience gives rise to thoughts, not the other way around, otherwise I will live through quotation-marks. Your thoughts cannot give rise to a similar experience in me (a PCE for instance), they can describe it, yes, but they cannot produce/induce it. Simple as that. RICHARD: As ad hoc experience with other human beings has shown me there are some people, who listen to me/read my words with all of their being, that have been catapulted into the magical wonder-land that this verdant and azure planet is then what is (so far) the case for you is not the case for everybody. It is as simple as that. RESPONDENT: Everything can be described, take ‘torture’ for instance. It’s one thing to be tortured and another thing to intellectually understand torture as described by another person. Torture escapes ‘thought’ because it’s not an intellectual experience. You can describe it via thought but you can’t experience it via thought. RICHARD: Of course not ... it almost goes without saying that one cannot (sensately) experience a sensate experience cognitively. RESPONDENT: In this sense escapes thought, not in the sense that you can’t convey or describe it. RICHARD: Sure ... but what has this got to do with you saying that the actualism words and writings ‘cannot induce/produce a PCE as this experience escapes any reference frame of thought’ when they can do, and have done, that very thing (induced/produced a PCE)? It just does not make sense to say that something which has happened, and does happen, cannot happen. Vis.:
As I am the living evidence that practicing ‘it’ (the actualism method) does enable this actual world to become apparent it would appear that you are but tilting at windmills ... as is the following further on in the same e-mail:
Not all that surprisingly I am reminded of the following:
I will not, at this stage, ask you to provide the ‘million different ways’ you say the early morning blue sky can be uniquely described using the same words ... just 100 of them will do for now.
RESPONDENT: Richard, I wonder what the answer will be to Haietmoba© in the exact moment an asteroid hits the Earth? RICHARD: As each and every human being is but a missed heart-beat or two away from death, at any moment, there is no need to wait for a catastrophe to find the answer. RESPONDENT: Ain’t life grand!? RICHARD: Given that it provides such an opportunity each moment again ... indeed it is.
RESPONDENT: I have asked Richard if he thinks he is the only atheist and he said no. I wonder: why? This is contrary to what Vineeto wrote: she believes that Richard is the only atheist dead and/or alive. RICHARD: I copy-pasted <atheist> into this computer’s search-engine and sent it through everything I have ever written to you and this was the only hit:
If you could provide the passage you refer to it would be most appreciated.
RESPONDENT: I have asked Richard if he thinks he is the only atheist and he said no. I wonder: why? This is contrary to what Vineeto wrote: she believes that Richard is the only atheist dead and/or alive. RICHARD: I copy-pasted <atheist> into this computer’s search-engine and sent it through everything I have ever written to you and this was the only hit:
If you could provide the passage you refer to it would be most appreciated. RESPONDENT: I see, let me rephrase it then ... could it be that only someone who realized God and went beyond it can be rightfully called an atheist? RICHARD: No, anybody actively recalling a pure consciousness experience (PCE) experientially knows there is no god/goddess in actuality ... which personal experiencing is the only proof worthy of the name in regards consciousness studies. And, as a matter of related interest, such a person experientially knows there is no after-death state, either.
RESPONDENT: Richard, I find the below quote of interest (the different world as experienced by ‘Me’ and I). [quote] ‘The vital difference between that [‘I am That’] and the sensory experiencing here in this actual world – as evidenced in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) – is that, as this flesh and blood body only (sans identity in toto), one is not what is being sensorially experienced ... one is the experiencing of what is happening’. [endquote]. How is the world experienced by the ‘ego’ then, does it take a different ‘process’/route for the sensory data then that of the ‘soul’? RICHARD: In the perceptive process sensory perception is primary; affective perception is secondary; cognitive perception is tertiary. Given that the ego-self is ‘the thinker’ and the soul-self is ‘the feeler’ then the ego thinks it is doing the experience of what is happening (as an operant) whilst the soul feels that it is being the experience of what is happening (as in ‘I am That’) ... whereas the body is the experiencing of what is happening. RESPONDENT: I ask this as you and I experience the same world of the senses, but in my case ‘someone’ is hijacking that experience. Sensory information is received by the bodily senses and then ...what happens? RICHARD: Then it is affectively assessed by ‘the feeler’ micro-seconds (12-14 milliseconds) before
being cognitively appraised, if it gets through, by ‘the thinker’ (another 12-14 milliseconds) ... and even then it is
coloured RESPONDENT: What is the difference in the gustatory sensation of ice-cream coated in Suisse chocolate as experienced by you now and 23 years ago? RICHARD: As there is neither ego-self nor soul-self to either do or be the gustatory experience there is the direct (aka immediate) experiencing of gustation. RESPONDENT: In what way is the experience of watching TV different then mine? RICHARD: Put simply: as there is no (subjective) experiencer there is no separation ... no ‘inner world’/‘outer world’. RESPONDENT: If the images (presumably) are identical in quality, do you see them differently (e.g. in terms of clarity)? RICHARD: Yes ... and just as the moving picture is visually brilliant, vivid, sparkling, so too is the sound track aurally rich, vibrant, resonant. RESPONDENT: Is the image of a tridimensional object you see on TV as ‘clear & pristine’ as the tri-dimensional object experienced in your living-room? RICHARD: Given that it is a representation and not the object itself ... yes.
RESPONDENT: Richard, you say that Haietmoba is the only method you know of that delivered the goods. But when did it happen, when did you first start practicing it? RICHARD: Specifically: 01 January 1981. RESPONDENT: During the period when you were a normal person or when you were enlightened? RICHARD: That was when I was a normal person ... I was a family man with four children, then, and their grandmother had offered to have all of her grandchildren stay with her in the city for a three week holiday (which left my then wife and myself together, on our own, for the first time since the birth of the first child). I grasped the opportunity with both hands to, not only regain the honeymoon intimacy of 1966, but to enable the actual intimacy experienced six months prior during the four-hour pure consciousness experience (PCE) which had indubitably evidenced that peace-on-earth was already always here ... hence the on-going query ‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’ basically meant ‘what is preventing the PCE from happening right now,’ or, to put it another way, ‘what is preventing the pristine perfection (as evidenced in the PCE) from being apparent at this very moment’. It soon became a non-verbal attitude, a wordless approach, to each and every moment such that it never ceased to operate – which includes the eleven years of enlightenment – until the break-through into an actual freedom from the human condition in 1992. Here in this actual world, where this moment in time has no duration, no such question can (or needs to) be asked ... apperception, which happens automatically, renders any such moment-to-moment attentiveness redundant. It is all so easy here.
RICHARD: In the perceptive process sensory perception is primary; affective perception is secondary; cognitive perception is tertiary. Given that the ego-self is ‘the thinker’ and the soul-self is ‘the feeler’ then the ego thinks it is doing the experience of what is happening (as an operant) whilst the soul feels that it is being the experience of what is happening (as in ‘I am That’) ... whereas the body is the experiencing of what is happening. RESPONDENT: I am somehow reminded of that song of Sade, Smooth Operator ... ‘I’ do not consider myself as being the ‘doer’ of what is happening, it’s clear to me that what is happening in this moment is (mostly) sourced in the people, things and events around me. I can sometimes influence these ‘people’ to behave in a certain way, make some ‘things’ work (like driving a car) and thus initiate various ‘events’, but I’m in no way the doer of everything that happens in a certain moment. RICHARD: Indeed not ... as you had asked how the world is experienced by the ego – ‘does it take a different ‘process’/route for the sensory data then that of the soul’ – I was, of course, responding in terms of the thinking self being the doer (aka the operant) of the experience of what is happening and not in terms of that half of identity being ‘the doer of what is happening’. Thus in the perceptive process, where sensory perception is primary (the direct experience of what is happening), and where affective perception is secondary (being the experience of what is happening), and where cognitive perception is tertiary (doing the experience of what is happening), the ego-self – being twice-removed from what is happening – is the ‘doer’ of the affective experience of what is happening (which is once-removed from what is happening) and not the doer of what is happening. RESPONDENT: But how am ‘I’ doing the experience of what is happening (as an operant)? RICHARD: Bearing in mind that ‘I’ as ego is not just a cognitive self (a mental illusion) but an affective-cognitive self (an emotional/passional-cognitive construct) ‘I’ have arrogated the job of steering the ship, so to speak, so that it will not run onto the rocks. Thus, being the arrogant captain of the vessel RESPONDENT: It’s not clear to me what do you mean by ‘doing the experience’ ... am ‘I’ actively colouring the world so as to get the experience ‘I’ expect, altering the sensory information in order to suit ‘my’ world’s prejudices, and thus transforming it into an experience that would not constitute a threat to ‘my’ worldview and thus existence? RICHARD: ‘I’ as ego am not colouring the world per se – ‘me’ as soul is doing that by ‘my’ very presence – but am colouring the affective world ... it being the only world ‘I’ know. There is no ‘inner world’/‘outer world’ in actuality ... the ‘outer world’ is ‘my’ (affective) creation. RESPONDENT: ‘I’ cannot ‘do’ in the sense of changing/ expecting the world/ people/ myself to behave the way ‘I’ want/idealize them, so that I can have the experience that I want (e.g. in a relationship). This was a clear realization in my spiritual years, people often begin by trying to change the world (counselling drug-addicts, peace movements, finding the ideal partner etc.) only to realize that the world falls back into the same-old patterns of behaviour, then try to change themselves (psychotherapy, spirituality, being the ideal partner) so as to alter ‘their’ experience of the world (those rosy glasses and ASC’s). ‘I’ am very busy altering the experience of the world after I’ve realized that I couldn’t change it so as to suit my worldview by creating a different ‘I’... isn’t that cunning and funny? RICHARD: Are you referring to what is (currently) popularly known as re-inventing oneself? RESPONDENT: Gurdjieff made a big deal out of the realization that ‘we’ cannot do ... that everything happens to ‘us’. I guess he was referring to the ‘ego’ and the illusion ‘he’ is under that ‘he’ can do things the way ‘he’ wants (and thus by extension deriving the notion of free will and freedom). RICHARD: Are you referring to what is commonly known as fatalism? RESPONDENT: In my conversation with Peter it became clear that ‘I’ wasn’t free in the course of my life and that my choices were based mainly on the predispositions/needs and the degree of attraction towards certain opportunities that promised to fulfil those needs. RICHARD: This may be of assistance: I can recall, back in 1981, explaining to another that ‘I’ had realised – via pure consciousness experiences (PCE’s) – that ‘I’ was not needed to run the show (‘steer the ship’) because all decisions were already made deeper down anyway and that any decision ‘I’ appeared to make was an after-the-event usurpation ... albeit a split-second after-the-event arrogation of the decision-making process. In other words ‘I’ was the last person, as it were, who got to know what direction the vessel would take ... ‘I’ only had the appearance of being in charge. * RESPONDENT: I ask this [does the ‘ego’ take a different ‘process’/ route for the sensory data then that of the ‘soul’] as you and I experience the same world of the senses, but in my case ‘someone’ is hijacking that experience. Sensory information is received by the bodily senses and then ...what happens? RICHARD: Then it is affectively assessed by ‘the feeler’ micro-seconds (12-14 milliseconds) before being cognitively appraised, if it gets through, by ‘the thinker’ (another 12-14 milliseconds) ... and even then it is coloured by the affections. RESPONDENT: So, if it gets through ‘the feeler’ without being contaminated with affective contents and gets to ‘the thinker’ ... is it still coloured by the affections? RICHARD: What I meant by ‘if it gets through’ is that a vast amount of sensation never makes it to conscious attention ... it is all dealt with at a subconscious level. RESPONDENT: Can it escape ‘clean’ and further be processed by ‘the thinker’? RICHARD: No ... and as the thinker arises out of the feeler anyway ‘I’ cannot process it cleanly even if it did get through cleanly. * RESPONDENT: In what way is the experience of watching TV different then mine? RICHARD: Put simply: as there is no (subjective) experiencer there is no separation ... no ‘inner world’/ ‘outer world’. RESPONDENT: This might sound silly but when younger I wondered why is it that the image captured by a video camera is identical to that captured by the senses (sight)? And I also wondered if all the people see the world the same way I do. By watching TV I answered was yes, as there it was: an independent and objective confirmation. I didn’t imagined at the time that even the image on the TV screen can be seen differently. RICHARD: I am reminded of when I joined the military, at age seventeen, and met a person who was colour-blind (to the colour red) for the first time in my life: I was fascinated and asked all manner of questions – such as knowing how to stop at traffic lights – and soon found that it made no fundamental difference (he brought his car to a stop when the top light turned a brighter grey than it otherwise was for example). RESPONDENT: I’m most fascinated with photographs, they seem to capture the moment, when I look at them there is both a sense of wonder and a sense of loss accompanied by sadness. That moment is gone for ever ... what a pity for not fully living it! RICHARD: This regret, at not having fully experienced, is one of the most common things people report at the loss of a loved one. Incidentally it is the event which is captured, and not the moment, thus it is the event which is gone forever. Have you never noticed it is never not this moment? RESPONDENT: Even the most ordinary circumstances seem transformed in a photograph. RICHARD: Maybe it is having the leisure, as it were, to take it in more fully? * RESPONDENT: If the [television] images (presumably) are identical in quality, do you see them differently [than me] e.g. in terms of clarity? RICHARD: Yes ... and just as the moving picture is visually brilliant, vivid, sparkling, so too is the sound track aurally rich, vibrant, resonant. RESPONDENT: That’s interesting for an experiment ... it seems that by waking up (unaware of the experiment) and living in a (supposedly) artificial 3d perfectly IMAX v3000 simulated medium of your surroundings you could experience the same ‘visually brilliant, vivid, sparkling’ world. But the actual world would be hidden from your senses and you won’t realise that the world you’re in is only a representation, is that right? RICHARD: Hmm ... the representation itself is actual. To explain: a painting of something, for instance, is not the thing itself which is being represented (thus non-actual) but the paint itself is actual. * RESPONDENT: Is the image of a tridimensional object you see on TV as ‘clear & pristine’ as the tri-dimensional object experienced in your living-room? RICHARD: Given that it is a representation and not the object itself ... yes. RESPONDENT: I don’t understand. If it’s the same object, a vase, (experienced as a still image on TV and next to your TV the vase itself) what are the differences in the quality of the image? RICHARD: The degree of similitude is dependent upon the degree of precision-grinding the camera lens has, of course, but the quality of the photographic image itself (a photographic image exists in its own right) is of the same quality as the object itself. RESPONDENT: Is the vase on TV as clear & pristine as the vase itself? RICHARD: Given that it is a representation of the vase and not the vase itself ... yes.
RICHARD: Thus in the perceptive process, where sensory perception is primary (the direct experience of what is happening), and where affective perception is secondary (being the experience of what is happening), and where cognitive perception is tertiary (doing the experience of what is happening), the ego-self – being twice-removed from what is happening – is the ‘doer’ of the affective experience of what is happening (which is once-removed from what is happening) and not the doer of what is happening. RESPONDENT: But how am ‘I’ doing the experience of what is happening (as an operant)? RICHARD: Bearing in mind that ‘I’ as ego is not just a cognitive self (a mental illusion) but an affective-cognitive self (an emotional/ passional-mental construct) ‘I’ have arrogated the job of steering the ship, so to speak, so that it will not run onto the rocks. Thus, being the arrogant captain of the vessel, ‘I’ am vital in the task of guiding it safely on its journey through the sometimes tempestuous sometimes calm seas of the ocean called life. RESPONDENT: What I understand is that the ego-self controls the ship via its morals, ethical programming. RICHARD: The socialising process – the instilling of culturally approved values, principles, standards, morals/ethics, mores, and so on – is essential in order to provide some level of control over the wilful/ wayward self within, lest one run amok, and results in the creation of the social identity (aka the conscience). However, what I was referring to – in response to your query ‘how am ‘I’ doing the experience of
what is happening (as an operant)’ – is the ego-self proper (an emotional/ passional-mental construct) who arises out of
the soul-self (an inchoate affective ‘being’/amorphous ‘presence’ the instinctual passions automatically form themselves
into) somewhere around age two as the doer of the affective experience of what is happening ... as opposed to the beer And how ‘I’ am doing this (affective) experience of what is happening as an operant, in contrast to being the affective experience, is by arrogating the decision-making process (aka sensibly, and thus judiciously, thinking, reflecting, appraising, planning, and so on, in order to implement considered activity for beneficial reasons). RESPONDENT: I find it funny that although people publicly extol the virtues of marriage for instance, they nevertheless would very much like to have all sorts of sexual adventures. So, nurture comes in direct conflict with desire, the respective person feeling split in two, the result being emotional turmoil either way he/she decides and thus no peace in the respective relationship. ‘I’ have to dissociate and identify with either of the two due to ‘my’ ethical program or reach a compromise and become a swinger. The best deal within the Human Condition is the compromise. which preserves the ‘status-quo’. RICHARD: This compromise is oft-times described (with words to the effect) as ‘a well-adjusted ego balancing the conflicting demands of self and society’. * RICHARD: ‘I’ as ego am not colouring the world per se – ‘me’ as soul is doing that by ‘my’ very presence – but am colouring the affective world ... it being the only world ‘I’ know. There is no ‘inner world’/ ‘outer world’ in actuality ... the ‘outer world’ is ‘my’ (affective) creation. RESPONDENT: When I look at me from an outside perspective, like when being filmed, I’m just a part in the flow of events. RICHARD: The ‘flow of events’ is, of course, an affective flow of events (and not the actual flow of events). RESPONDENT: But when I’m looking through ‘my’ eyes, I feel separate and take myself very seriously precisely due to the survival imperative (my survival is paramount and above everything) which in turn alters most of my perceptions, thoughts and actions and renders them self-centred/serving thus making me feel separate. RICHARD: Feeling separate results from the ‘inner world’/‘outer world’ dichotomy ‘my’ very being, or presence, creates ... hence the seeking of union with all (‘my’) creation. RESPONDENT: I observed that most things people do and think (at least in this part of the world) are the direct result of the instinctual passions. If I were to follow ‘the beast trails’ I inevitably find that at the root, most people’s actions are about individual surviving and perpetuating the species. I sometimes wonder whether we as individuals exist only for re-producing purposes. The instinctual program is everywhere to be found, it permeates all areas of human endeavours, human beings know of no other way of functioning. Peace and happiness is definitely not on this program agenda, they look boring from its perspective... and happy & harmless cannot coexist with this program. I recently watched a one hour documentary on TV about the Universe. Not once during this documentary was there any mention of the possibility that the universe might be infinite. The scientists said instead that inevitably the Universe will become a dead and cold place due to its expansion. What is born must also die when gravity or dark matter cannot hold any longer the galaxies together... it was like they described the ‘self’ structure with their model. Why is it that scientists don’t take seriously the possibility that the Universe might be infinite? Is it because this realization will throw to the garbage bin a great deal of the current fantasies parading as truth and fact? RICHARD: Maybe this will be of assistance:
* RESPONDENT: ‘I’ cannot ‘do’ in the sense of changing/ expecting the world/ people/ myself to behave the way ‘I’ want/ idealize them, so that I can have the experience that I want (e.g. in a relationship). This was a clear realization in my spiritual years, people often begin by trying to change the world (counselling drug-addicts, peace movements, finding the ideal partner etc.) only to realize that the world falls back into the same-old patterns of behaviour, then try to change themselves (psychotherapy, spirituality, being the ideal partner) so as to alter ‘their’ experience of the world (those rosy glasses and ASC’s). ‘I’ am very busy altering the experience of the world after I’ve realized that I couldn’t change it so as to suit my worldview by creating a different ‘I’... isn’t that cunning and funny? RICHARD: Are you referring to what is (currently) popularly known as re-inventing oneself? RESPONDENT: I’m referring to spirituality, alcohol, drugs, entertainment, adrenaline, psychology, love, you name it, all that which can change the grey reality I’m experiencing each and every day into a cool and rosy place. RICHARD: I see ... yes, that is indeed cunning and funny (‘funny’ as in peculiar and not as in ha-ha). RESPONDENT: Why is it that drug-addicts never really come back to our world? RICHARD: Presumably for the same reason that anyone leaves the real-world, by whatever means, in the first place. * RESPONDENT: Gurdjieff made a big deal out of the realization that ‘we’ cannot do ... that everything happens to ‘us’. I guess he was referring to the ‘ego’ and the illusion ‘he’ is under that ‘he’ can do things the way ‘he’ wants (and thus by extension deriving the notion of free will and freedom). RICHARD: Are you referring to what is commonly known as fatalism? RESPONDENT: I’m referring to the spiritual strivings to become free, to become enlightened, etc. George said that this is an important realization on the path, that ‘I’ can do nothing. If out of this comes fatalism and ‘Make Thy Will’ and all sorts of other truisms is a side issue. What I’m interested is whether this is a fact or not and it seems that it is as long as ‘I’ (the ego-self) am only reactive to what happens. I’m a puppet on the strings believing myself to be the ‘operant’ of those strings. RICHARD: The realisation – ‘that ‘I’ can do nothing’ – in the context you are speaking of is the precursor to having ‘I’ as ego surrender/dissolve/die/whatever so that ‘me’ as soul (‘me’ at the core of ‘my’ being ... which is ‘being’ itself) can regain its rightful place on the throne which the ego-self has usurped. * RICHARD: ... I can recall, back in 1981, explaining to another that ‘I’ had realised – via pure consciousness experiences (PCE’s) – that ‘I’ was not needed to run the show (‘steer the ship’) because all decisions were already made deeper down anyway and that any decision ‘I’ appeared to make was an after-the-event usurpation ... albeit a split-second after-the-event arrogation of the decision-making process. In other words ‘I’ was the last person, as it were, who got to know what direction the vessel would take ... ‘I’ only had the appearance of being in charge. RESPONDENT: Yes, but it seems to me from what you say that ‘I’, the ego, is very necessary after all: to give direction, to orientate the ship, to react in the appropriate way when the situation demands it. Even if it’s a split second after the event but am ‘I’ not improving the situation/event to which I’m reacting? RICHARD: I was speaking in the context of normal, everyday people in normal, everyday society, of course, when I wrote that (further above) ... else the gaols would be full to overflowing. Unless one has the pure intent to be happy and harmless (free from malice and sorrow) one is well-advised to not let go of the controls. * RICHARD: Then it [sensation] is affectively assessed by ‘the feeler’ micro-seconds (12-14 milliseconds) before being cognitively appraised, if it gets through, by ‘the thinker’ (another 12-14 milliseconds) ... and even then it is coloured by the affections. RESPONDENT: So, if it gets through ‘the feeler’ without being contaminated with affective contents and gets to ‘the thinker’ ... is it still coloured by the affections? RICHARD: What I meant by ‘if it gets through’ is that a vast amount of sensation never makes it to conscious attention ... it is all dealt with at a subconscious level. RESPONDENT: Why is it dealt with only at a subconscious level? RICHARD: There are simply too many sensations happening at once for them all to gain conscious attention ... I read somewhere, many years ago, that there are something like 150,000 sensory impulses every second. RESPONDENT: Is the ‘sub-conscious level’ another name for the soul? RICHARD: No ... it is where the organism runs on auto-pilot, as it were. RESPONDENT: Do you perceive everything now at a conscious level? RICHARD: Ha ... I am very pleased to be running mostly on auto-pilot. * RESPONDENT: Can it [sensation] escape ‘clean’ and further be processed by ‘the thinker’? RICHARD: No ... and as the thinker arises out of the feeler anyway ‘I’ cannot process it cleanly even if it did get through cleanly. RESPONDENT: So the end-product is a world of ‘my’ own making. RICHARD: Exactly ... both ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul are forever locked-out of the actual world. RESPONDENT: I don’t understand your report that you have a 360 degrees awareness ... RICHARD: I presume you are referring to something like this:
RESPONDENT: ... do you have a more developed peripheral vision lacking focus/spotlight? RICHARD: No ... I specifically say it is *as if *one has eyes in the back of the head. RESPONDENT: I remember when enlightened that I could walk with my eyes shut, it was the ‘vision’ that somehow guided me. RICHARD: Okay. * RESPONDENT: I’m most fascinated with photographs, they seem to capture the moment (...) RICHARD: (...) it is the event which is captured, and not the moment, thus it is the event which is gone forever. Have you never noticed it is never not this moment? RESPONDENT: Oh yes, I have. But I’m not living it .... I’m de-phased so-to-speak, experiencing it split-of-a-second after it happened. RICHARD: As it is never not this moment you can only be referring to the event being experienced a split-of-a-second after it happened ... and even then it is not the actual event. RESPONDENT: Thus it is created the ‘outside/ inside’ worlds. RICHARD: ‘I’ create the ‘inner world’/ ‘outer world’ with ‘my’ very being or presence. * RESPONDENT: Even the most ordinary circumstances seem transformed in a photograph. RICHARD: Maybe it is having the leisure, as it were, to take it in more fully? RESPONDENT: I don’t know, maybe. But I suspect that it’s also because the ‘people!!!’ guard is off (no threat detected), I’m not preoccupied anymore with what those people will think/ feel about me, how do I look?, etc. – the constant background music. RICHARD: I see ... maybe that is why memories (as in nostalgia) also seem transformed. * RICHARD: ... a painting of something, for instance, is not the thing itself which is being represented (thus non-actual) but the paint itself is actual. RESPONDENT: I brought about this discussion about representation as some people think that with our senses we perceive only a fraction of the universe, the ‘visible universe’ so-to-speak. That the universe we perceive is real but that it’s not all there is, that there’s more to it then what the senses can perceive. That’s a much more insidious belief then the ‘life is only maya together with its mosquitos’ type, and allows ‘me’ the opportunity of keeping my options open, to remain an agnostic. This is primary the fault of the enlightened ones who reinforced the hope and belief in other dimensions. But it’s ‘our’ fault also, nobody is innocent, ‘we’ are all willing participants in the human play. During the ASC I was the Absolute but there was also the world of the senses present. The Absolute was ‘something’ that permeated the ‘visible universe’, it allowed insight, at the same time being the Universe. But its Presence didn’t exclude or invalidate the senses experience. This belief that might be more then what can be sensorially experienced is at the basis of our dissatisfaction or should I say the symptom. The facts for me that the universe is infinite and that death is The End means that I have nothing to lose and that freedom is possible. RICHARD: Hmm ... if ‘more then what can be sensorially experienced’ were to be written as ‘more than what ‘I’ can experience’ it would all fall into place.
CORRESPONDENT No. 25 (Part Seven) RETURN TO THE ACTUAL FREEDOM MAILING LIST INDEX RETURN TO RICHARD’S CORRESPONDENCE INDEX The Third Alternative (Peace On Earth In This Life Time As This Flesh And Blood Body) Here is an actual freedom from the Human Condition, surpassing Spiritual Enlightenment and any other Altered State Of Consciousness, and challenging all philosophy, psychiatry, metaphysics (including quantum physics with its mystic cosmogony), anthropology, sociology ... and any religion along with its paranormal theology. Discarding all of the beliefs that have held humankind in thralldom for aeons, the way has now been discovered that cuts through the ‘Tried and True’ and enables anyone to be, for the first time, a fully free and autonomous individual living in utter peace and tranquillity, beholden to no-one.
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