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Richard’s Selected Correspondence On Male and Female
RICHARD: To illustrate what I am getting at, I would make the analogy to the man/woman ‘battle of the sexes’. That is, logical thought versus intuitive thought. RESPONDENT: Notice you have brought in intuition here. The third part of the intellect-instinct categorisation. RICHARD: Actually, I was being polite ... I was referring to the ‘you’re just being logical’ and the ‘you’re just being illogical’ accusations that men and women throw at each other! (Men like to think that they are being rational when in fact they are being logical. Women like to think they are being intuitive when they are actually being irrational). * RICHARD: Neither man nor woman has got it right. Male logic is as useless as female intuition. Reflection needs to be neither logical nor intuitive in order to be reflective. RESPONDENT: But does it need to be affective in someway? Is there pure rationality outside of some mechanical calculus? RICHARD: Neither affective nor rational ... if by ‘rational’ you mean logic. I take ‘rational’ to mean ‘matter-of-fact’ or ‘common-sense’. Neither logic nor intuition fit this category. (Just because something is logical, it does not make it sensible. The same applies to intuition). RESPONDENT: Glimpsing from a structure is different than dropping the structure. RICHARD: The immediate question that springs to mind is who is dropping the structure? And please ... do not tell me that it is the mind merely imputing a ‘me’ ... we have flogged that subject to death. It is male bovine faecal matter and you know it is. RESPONDENT: To this interesting list, I wonder if any of you are complete, actualised, perfect, if so you may indeed see that the secret of life is to join and be joined by another and all of what you did and said would be to move towards this happening in order for it to happen. No. 10, Moving with and towards Sharon. RESPONDENT No. 12: If there is completeness, is there a movement to join or unite with some thing or someone else ‘out there’? By the way, No. 23 is relieved that you are not moving in on him. RESPONDENT: No not moving in on you, or any other, just seeing if a new way of being can be brought forth. If one becomes complete with themselves (perfect) a discovery may be made, we are a world of two, male and female, until we find a way (which is of what I speak) to join and become as one, this world will remain a violent, and ever deadening place. RICHARD: Surely you do not mean to imply that no matter what one does about eliminating one’s own malice and sorrow, that arises out of the instinctual fear and aggression and nurture and desire that all sentient beings are born with, there can be no peacefulness and liveliness until one attains union with a member of the other gender? You do say that until one does ‘this world will remain a violent, and ever deadening place’. That means that one’s own achievements can be nullified by the intransigence of another ... hardly a recipe for successfully living life freely according to one’s own honest endeavours. Why, it puts one at the mercy of another’s predilection and proclivity! And even if one were to achieve this oneness with one other, would the entire world then be miraculously transformed? If so, do it, man, do it ... No. 23 has been waiting for ages for someone like you to act. And other people, too ... I watched the BBC ‘Hard Talk’ interview with Mr Robert McNamara (US Secretary for Defence during the Vietnam War) a couple of nights ago. He estimated that 160,000,000 people have been killed in wars this century. I have always understood it to be 100,000,000 ... which was bad enough. I would suggest that you and Sharon better get your act together sooner rather than later if Peace On Earth depends upon your joining and becoming as one ... there are 29 wars going on at this moment. All joking aside – for it is all somewhat pathetic rather than amusing – you came onto this list trumpeting a new ‘Transformation’ that lay ‘Beyond Enlightenment’. You said it was what Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s Enlightenment ‘pointed to’ ... yet all I have seen written by you is ‘quantumised’ rehashes of the ‘Tried and True’ spiritual and metaphysical hocus-pocus which has been demonstrated to be the ‘Tried and Failed’ through thousands of years of appalling suffering by all who applied the revered and sacred ‘Teachings’ of ‘The Ancients’. Just what is so new and efficacious about oneness? RESPONDENT: Again, that shows the narrowness of your perspective. RICHARD: Whoops ... it was you wrote it, not me. Do you still maintain that someone who writes ‘this is all there is?’ has a ‘narrow perspective’? RESPONDENT: Oh, yes, you did write it. I asked you a point blank question: ‘are you saying, ‘this is all there is’’? And in your narrow perspective you contend that there is nothing but this blood and body. RICHARD: Do you actually read what I write? RESPONDENT: There is a vast dimension which has nothing to do with time and space, and your wanting to measure that from your small bones and blood body is an indication of your huge ego. RICHARD: Have you noticed – this is just something that I have noticed – that you dispense this ‘huge ego’ wisdom of yours rather liberally on this Mailing List ... and usually to posters with male names? Do you not have something less feminist to contribute? RESPONDENT: How low will you go? RICHARD: As low as you wish to go ... it is you who sets the pace. To the best of my recollection you have never used your ‘huge ego’ wisdom on a poster with a female name. You will write disparagingly about roosters strutting and fighting ... but never about hens preening themselves. IRENE: Every man desires a woman (or ‘chick for free’) who is willing to deny her feelings and intuitions, the very culprits for malice and sorrow ... as far as Richard is concerned, that is. RICHARD: What is with this ‘chick for free’ statement of yours ... are you upholding a woman’s traditional right to sell herself? Is that not degrading to women? Does this not reduce a woman to a commodity? A sex-object? A piece of meat? Do you wish to single-handedly put woman back into the dark ages after all that has been achieved through the whole woman’s liberation movement? Also, you cast archetypal aspersions upon the integrity of women who have dared to run the gamut of their peer’s calumny and obloquy. Your remark reads like being one of those snide digs that women unfortunately indulge in with their contemporaries in order to keep each other sexually repressed ... all the while blaming only men for a woman’s frustration. IRENE: Richard sees that feelings and intuitions are the main-cause for all misery and suffering in the world, and believes that women must be helped to get rid of these unfortunate and malicious tendencies ... and become like him. RICHARD: Why this one-eyed view? Why do you turn these discussions into a woman versus man issue? What is your agenda? I talk equally to man and woman ... men have intuition too (popularly known as ‘gut-feelings’ or ‘hunches’). When tested exhaustively, male intuition was demonstrated to be as unreliable as female intuition ... 50/50 on average (which is the same as guessing). The male clairvoyants – now there is proof that intuition is not the exclusive domain of the female of the species – could not better a 53.4% accuracy. Also ... men have feelings too. It is just that they express them differently to women ... a man knows what another man is feeling. We have discussed these issues before – you and I – and you came to recognise the ‘code’ that men use to convey feelings to each other. It is surprising to see so much recidivism in such a short time. RESPONDENT: The writers of the Bible were certainly offended at the notion that women who are regarded as leaders, who were doing astronomy, who are making the predictions, who are directing the planting and harvest times, who schedule the festivals, who teach the ways of civilisation, who taught how to have good sex, might actually be smart enough to figure out that the world is not flat! Perhaps we should take our cue from the Biblical writers who plagiarised their mythology and cosmology, making it patriarchal, and call them Jezebel’s, harlots, temple concubines. RICHARD: I get the impression that you have a romantic view of the ‘feminine principle’ ... as in it being superior to the ‘masculine principle’. Neither patriarchy nor matriarchy is better than the other ... they are both rotten to the core. Just as men can be – and are – patronising towards women ... so too are women ‘matronising’ towards men (to coin a word). If there is to be salubrity, it behoves one to clear the decks and start afresh. Chuck both models out and start thinking and acting as a fellow human being ... the ‘war between the sexes’ has gone on far too long. Women – just the same as men – are born with instinctual fear and aggression and nurture and desire. * RESPONDENT: Obviously the writers didn’t know as much about the sophisticated astronomy of the Babylonian priestesses whose cosmology they were borrowing. They should have asked ‘the prostitute woman whose name was Rahab’ Josh Chapter 2, to edit their draft. Sometimes the errors people make are very instructive to indicate their thinking. RICHARD: Ah, here is some more of your worship of the ‘feminine principle’ that you say I know so little about. ‘Sophisticated astronomy’ indeed ... where does it say that these priestesses knew the earth to be globular? Next you will be saying that they knew it to be an oblate spheroid. As for venerating the feminine principle ... please ponder upon this: women – just the same as men – are born with instinctual fear and aggression and nurture and desire. Thus they too have malice and sorrow in their bosom. RESPONDENT: Because women suffer ‘pain and anguish’ during childbirth (modern drugs to thwart that naturalness not withstanding) women historically have been less prone to the organized murder known as war. RICHARD: Uh huh ... why fight when you have stupefied men to do the fighting for you, eh? And quite often the fighting is instinct-run men fighting over you anyway ... which is quite ego-boosting, would you not say? RESPONDENT: Perhaps it is in that way of looking at it, but isn’t the reason men have been more likely to engage in life threatening activities such as war and hunting due to the fact that males are biologically more expendable gender? RICHARD: Yet females engage in life-threatening activities such as child-birth and defending their young ... why do you wish to make the female more important than the male via dubious theorising? Simply put, an unfertilised ovum is as useless as a spermatozoa all dressed-up but with nowhere to go. Some radical feminists may claim to have at last dispensed with the need for men because of cloning and the dildo ... but the vocal out-pourings of a disgruntled and tiny minority group gaining media publicity because of their desperate philosophical stance does not make a fact go away. The female of any species is born with the same instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire as the male ... do not get sucked into the ‘feminine principle’ (like Mr. Lao Tzu did) through overlooking covert hostility in favour of castigating only the more obvious overt hostility. RESPONDENT: Perhaps it is the unconscious recognition of this fact that make divided from life males prone to violence against the more biologically important gender? RICHARD: Why complicate things with unnecessary theories ... is it not simply the physically stronger bullying the physically weaker? There were official statistics published here in Australia a couple of years ago that showed that while in 94% of the domestic violence cases occasioning bodily harm males were the perpetrators, in 64% of the child abuse cases occasioning bodily harm females were the perpetrators which, whilst still leaving the male overall occasioning much more physical abuse, does point to physical violence being endemic irregardless of gender. But, statistics aside, as the female of any species is born with the same instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire, no female has any greater or easier access to peace-on-earth than males. Also, I do realise that this ‘divided from life’ phrase that you use refers to anyone who will not dumbly submit to their fate ... thus every time that you use it you demonstrate your main objection to being happy and harmless once again. RESPONDENT: They intuitively and experientially are in touch with how much sacrifice goes into creating a life. RICHARD: Aye ... just like men intuitively and experientially are in touch with how much sacrifice goes into preserving kith and kin. RESPONDENT: Males cannot historically compete with females when it comes to sacrifice to preserve kin. RICHARD: If you wish to make that claim then you need to produce the historical evidence and, as I have no intention of gathering the statistics to prove this one way or the other, until you do this impossible feat I will sensibly take it to be 50/50. Besides, are you aware that you have just shot down your own elaborate theory (‘the reason men have been more likely to engage in life threatening activities is that males are biologically more expendable gender’) in your rush to abase yourself before the feminine principle? Tugging the forelock has been a ‘survival tool extraordinaire’ since ancient times. RESPONDENT: So they are thereby less likely to get lost in the ignorance of destroying life without compassion. RICHARD: I cannot resist (it is probably only sentence structure) but are you saying that ‘destroying life without compassion’ is worse than ‘destroying life with compassion’? Then again ... maybe you do mean that? RESPONDENT: This is a man’s world put together by men for men and to be maintained by men, the women must ‘fit in’ and get by using the ‘men’s rule’. Can we ever ‘unite’ as long as this is true? RICHARD: Where on earth is your head at to repeat such asinine ‘radical feminist’ propaganda from the simmering ’sixties? Whilst it is true that men overtly ‘rule the roost’ and/or ‘hold the reins of power’ ... yet all the while women covertly ‘define the parameters and/or ‘dictate the rules’. Or, in the words of Ms. Arianna Stassinopoulos: [quote]: ‘Women are the carriers of society’s values ... men are deviant in the sense that many of the qualities admired in them are also one’s that society has to regard with disapproval ... Women’s Lib portrays society and morality as a male invention to coerce and punish women ... [yet] women are a virtuous group seeking to impose their moral standards on men’. [endquote]. ‘The Female Woman’; pps 134-135 © Arianna Stassinopoulos 1973; published by William Collins Sons & Coy Ltd Glascow). RESPONDENT: You seem to disagree then agree Richard. RICHARD: In case you did not notice ... I was disagreeing all the way through. RESPONDENT: I was speaking of what is here and now, not the sixties. RICHARD: Yet the point is that it is not ‘a man’s world’ now ... just as it never was in the ’sixties. * RICHARD: So as to assist in coming out of the ’sixties, where the battle of the sexes climbed sharply towards its zenith, and here into the ’noughties, where equity and parity is the key to success, you may or may not find the following URL helpful: www.jokeaday.com/nfweird014.shtml (Whomsoever finds scatological humour to be of questionable taste is advised not to access this URL). RESPONDENT: Your URL seems rather silly to me. RICHARD: I was simply acting upon your own advice. Vis.:
May I ask? What does it take for you to grasp that there may very well be something of worth to examine that does not fit your feminist point of view? You have complained to me in the past that I used too many words: [quote]: ‘Well Richard, at least now I can read you message without all of the errors, now can you at least shorten them, so I will read them?’ and again: ‘just a short answer would be perfect’ and again: ‘Damn Richard, a lot of words to say nothing’ [end quotes] ... so, after tossing and turning and laying awake all night, I suddenly saw the light: is it not said that ‘a picture paints a thousand words’? Apparently not, eh? * RICHARD: Bearing in mind that there may very well be something of worth to examine that does not fit a feminist point of view, the question is: what is being ‘pointed to’ in regards your statement (‘this is a man’s world ... the women must ‘fit in’ and get by using the ‘men’s rule’ ... can we ever ‘unite’ as long as this is true?) by my response? Ms. Arianna Stassinopoulos had something of value to say in defining the problem ... and this ‘battle of the sexes’ need no longer hold sway if the need for power is seen at its source. Maybe – just maybe – some reflecting and contemplating on this overt/covert ‘balance of power’ issue will throw some light on why you and your partner have been unable to ‘unite’. Because then equity and parity will be artless and free. RESPONDENT: This Arianna knows not of what she speaks ... RICHARD: Okay ... but what it is that Ms. Arianna Stassinopoulos ‘knows not of what she speaks’ and where and how? RESPONDENT: What makes the difference about what she said in 1973, I just responded given you posted it to prove your rightness. RICHARD: I am well aware that you ‘just responded’ ... yet you responded with a blanket dismissal (‘this Arianna knows not of what she speaks’) of what she observed. What I am asking is: what is it that is incorrect (according to you) in what I quoted of hers ... and where and how? RESPONDENT: Here and now Richard, she was just expounding her theory, for the profit, or other gain she was looking for RICHARD: Yet the question is not about what you think her motives for writing are, the question is this: what is it that is incorrect (according to you) in what I quoted of hers ... and where and how? * RESPONDENT: ... nor do you I say. RICHARD: Okay ... whereabouts in the few lines I wrote do I know not of what I speak according to you? Vis.: [Richard]: ‘whilst it is true that men overtly ‘rule the roost’ and/or ‘hold the reins of power’ ... yet all the while women covertly ‘define the parameters’ and/or ‘dictate the rules’. [endquote]. RESPONDENT: I said you know not of what you speak given you do not. RICHARD: Oh? Who decided that it is ‘given’ that I do not know of what I speak? RESPONDENT: Me.. RICHARD: Okay, seeing that I am aware, moment-to-moment, of what goes on in this brain (and that you are not privy to this hands-on inspection) how can you possibly ‘see’ that it is ‘given’ that I do not know of what I speak? * RESPONDENT: Your statement above seems correct and is why the male and female cannot unite. RICHARD: Are you saying that the overt/covert power battle between man and woman is the reason that ‘the male and female cannot unite’? RESPONDENT: No, it is only a tiny part. RICHARD: Okay, what is the major part? * RESPONDENT: The men’s club and the women’s club are not very well known, you know! RICHARD: Every woman I have ever spoken to is aware of what you call ‘the men’s club’ and every man I have ever spoken to is aware of what you call ‘the women’s club’ ... plus it is written about in books, newspapers, magazines and on the internet as well as being talked about on radio and television and in seminars. Therefore, is there something new you can contribute to aid human understanding? * RESPONDENT: To ‘unite’ all thought must be gone, and love from intelligence which has been created must be in order. RICHARD: May I ask? Why is it, then, that you and your partner have been unable to ‘unite’? RESPONDENT: There is no reason Richard, reason is for the thoughtful ones, those lost in reason, justification and explanation. RICHARD: Okay, let me put it this way: (1) has ‘all thought gone’ for you? (2) has ‘love from intelligence which has been created in order’ for you? RESPONDENT: All control that thought had is gone, thought is still here otherwise I could not respond. Love which is of Intelligence, born of Creation is Creating. RICHARD: Okay, I take it from this that you fit your detailed requirements to ‘unite’ ... yet it has not happened. Can you ‘see’ what is preventing ‘uniting’ from happening vis a vis you and your partner? * RESPONDENT: I know not what to do to put this in a ‘thought’ spoken way so it can be understood ... RICHARD: May I make a suggestion? First explain why you consider that ‘this is a man’s world put together by men for men and to be maintained by men, the women must ‘fit in’ and get by using the ‘men’s rule’ ... and see what happens, eh? You must have some explanation for having come to this conclusion ... or else you are just writing the first bit of propaganda that comes into your mind (which would make you a fool). RESPONDENT: Perfect Richard, you have hit upon it, I am a fool, a perfect one at that! RICHARD: Good ... now that it has been established that you are a fool who was sucked in badly by some ‘radical feminist’ propaganda from the ‘sixties we can proceed. Am I to take it that you now agree that power itself is the reason why man and woman cannot unite and not because ‘it’s a man’s world’ after all? RESPONDENT: Why do you add to my words? RICHARD: Where did I ‘add to your words’? I had said that unless you had an explanation for your conclusion that it is ‘a man’s world’ it would make you a fool to be just writing the first bit of propaganda that comes into your mind ... and you replied that I had ‘hit upon it, I am a fool’. Where, may I ask again, am I adding to your words? * RESPONDENT: Do you not know that knowledge cannot add to Intelligence? RICHARD: Are you telling me that you are ‘Intelligence’ itself now? The last time we corresponded you said you were an ‘empty vessel’ for ‘Intelligence’ to come through ... have you been taken over completely these days? * RESPONDENT: Power which the male has thus far is the cause of this insanity, if the power were to be given to the female the same result would be. RICHARD: How is this response of yours different from what I wrote (above)? Vis.: [Richard]: ‘power itself is the reason why man and woman cannot unite’. RESPONDENT No. 10: This is a man’s world put together by men for men and to be maintained by men, the women must ‘fit in’ and get by using the ‘men’s rule’. Can we ever ‘unite’ as long as this is true? RICHARD: Where on earth is your head at to repeat such asinine ‘radical feminist’ propaganda from the simmering ’sixties? Whilst it is true that men overtly ‘rule the roost’ and/or ‘hold the reins of power’ ... yet all the while women covertly ‘define the parameters’ and/or ‘dictate the rules’. Or, in the words of Ms. Arianna Stassinopoulos: [quote]: ‘Women are the carriers of society’s values ... men are deviant in the sense that many of the qualities admired in them are also one’s that society has to regard with disapproval ... Women’s Lib portrays society and morality as a male invention to coerce and punish women ... [yet] women are a virtuous group seeking to impose their moral standards on men’. [endquote]. ‘The Female Woman’; pps 134-135 © Arianna Stassinopoulos 1973; published by William Collins Sons & Coy Ltd Glascow). So as to assist in coming out of the ’sixties, where the battle of the sexes climbed sharply towards its zenith, and here into the ’noughties, where equity and parity is the key to success, you may or may not find the following URL helpful: www.jokeaday.com/nfweird014.shtml. (whomsoever finds scatological humour to be of questionable taste is advised not to access this URL). RESPONDENT: You’ve got it right. Covert leads to overt, and overt get into trouble while covert looks like an angel. Empower women over men and chaos is the result. RICHARD: Hmm ... the last time I looked chaos already reigned supreme. As for ‘empowering women over men’ (or empowering men over women): as neither women nor men can ever have the upper hand (it is only the overt/covert balance of power interaction that can ever change) you need not be concerned about your scenario coming to fruition (for men would covertly ‘define the parameters’ as women now do to keep excesses in check through holding the high moral ground if or when women ever overtly ‘hold the reins of power’). If you fondly imagine that you are currently ‘empowered’ over women then it is time to go back to your drawing board and redraft your thesis in accord with the facts (I take it that you either did not access the URL provided or did not find it informative if you did). It is the need for power itself that is the problem – not who currently overtly or covertly holds it – which is why I suggested coming out of the ’sixties and here into the ’noughties, where equity and parity is the key to success. The cathartic ‘airing one’s dirty linen in public’ of the ’sixties is over for those who actually looked at the dirt displayed. RESPONDENT: There is always a legitimate need for power in any family. RICHARD: Why? And where has outwardly dominating one’s partner (overt power) ever lead to peace and harmony? And where has outward subservience (covert power) towards one’s partner ever lead to peace and harmony? RESPONDENT: There is no such thing as parity. RICHARD: Why not? Do you have a problem with being on a par, in having equivalence, with your partner? If so, why do you need to outwardly dominate her (overt power)? Similarly, does your partner have a problem with being on a par, in having equivalence, with you? If so, why does she need to be outwardly subservient (covert power)? RESPONDENT: In every family one parent has more power than the other and it will always be that way. RICHARD: Hmm ... as you have already stated (further above) that to ‘empower women over men and chaos is the result’ then this politically correct sentence of yours now reads:
Other than because it says so in the Christian scriptures ... why do you consider this to be the way that ‘it will always be’? Where is the evidence of history to demonstrate that the man outwardly dominating the woman, and the woman outwardly submitting to the man, has evinced any peace and harmony ... let alone an enduring peace and harmony? Why do you want to insist on preserving the ‘tried and failed’ overt/covert power battle between the sexes? Is this not all sick? RESPONDENT: The idea that there is a 50-50 situation exists only in someone’s imagination. RICHARD: Yet the idea that ‘the man has more power than the woman’ only exists in someone’s imagination ... and presumably some patriarch’s imagination at that. Similarly, the idea that ‘the woman has more power than the man’ only exists in someone’s imagination ... and presumably some matriarch’s imagination. Why persist in a blind sickness? RESPONDENT: Of course there is also an illegitimate need for power. That is obvious. RICHARD: Why is it obvious? I do not see any basis for a ‘legitimate need for power’ ... let alone a basis for an ‘illegitimate need for power’: any and all power is a sickness, whether one be dominant (overt power) or subservient (covert power). RESPONDENT: In that case why are you trying to overpower people on the list through extensive verbiage? That is your prime endeavour here. RICHARD: Not so ... am I to take it that you have nothing further to contribute to the previous dialogue (above)? If so, are you in agreement or not? RESPONDENT: What happened to your wife? RICHARD: Which wife? RESPONDENT: Who won? RICHARD: Who won what? RESPONDENT: You know what. RICHARD: No ... I do not ‘know what’. I am not a mind-reader ... if I was I would not have asked for clarification as I am only to happy to discuss whatever you think may throw some light onto what is already a complex and complicated issue. If you actually want an answer you will have to be specific about both which wife you are referring to and plus whatever it was that you think someone won so as to find out who it was that won whatever it was that you think happened between myself and whichever wife it was that you think was involved. Meanwhile ... am I to take it that you have nothing further to contribute to the previous dialogue (much further above)? If so, are you in agreement or not? RESPONDENT: Either the man or the woman is going to have the dominant role in the relationship. I say that if it is the woman, it means serious problems for sure. If in your marriages, you did not see anything about this, I doubt I could convince you otherwise. You could have observed it. If you did not, I wonder why? RICHARD: Oh, but I did much more than merely ‘observe’ it: I lived it out (in my first marriage I was ‘masculine’; in my second marriage I was ‘feminine’). RESPONDENT: What happened was that you started out masculine ... RICHARD: Yes ... in my first marriage I was more or less like virtually any other man I met; I was a normal man, well bought-up and educated, a decent and responsible citizen in that I was a typical western youth, raised to believe in God, Queen and Country. I was what is called ‘happily married’ with four ‘lovely children’ owning my ‘own house’ and running my ‘own business’ successfully. People who were into things like what is discussed on this Mailing List were the ‘lunatic fringe’ and were not worth even listening to. All that ‘Love and Truth’ stuff was just ‘pie-in-the-sky’ idealism ... I knew better than they. Which is: if only other people would stop doing ... [insert whatever complaint here] ... then all would be well. In short, I was run by both an ego and a soul; I did not want to look at my instinctual passions or my sorrowful and malicious feelings or my corrupted thoughts or identity-controlled actions and behaviour at all. RESPONDENT: ... and wound up feminine ... RICHARD: Yes ... in the fourteenth year of my marriage I had an experience that showed me who ‘I’ was. ‘I’ was nothing but a lost, lonely, frightened and very, very cunning entity inside this flesh and blood body. So I acted upon this and, as the result of an earnest and intense process, my ‘ego’ disappeared entirely in an edifying moment of awakening to an Absolute Reality. That is, I underwent a monumental transformation into an Altered State Of Consciousness (ASC) which can only be described as ‘Spiritual Enlightenment’. I called this ASC an ‘Absolute Freedom’ because there was definitely a metaphysical Absolute in all this – as distinct from the temporal and spatial and material – that was ever-present, and this Divine state of being immediately imbued me with Love Agapé and Universal Compassion for all sentient beings. In short, I became very feminine indeed. RESPONDENT: ... so you found a masculine wife to match the new you. RICHARD: Yes, but that was not for another five years ... in the meanwhile I went through a time I call my ‘puritan period’. I whittled my worldly possessions down to three sarongs, three shirts, a cooking pot and bowl, a knife and a spoon, a bank book and a pair of nail scissors. I possessed nothing else anywhere in the world and cut all family ties. During that period I was homeless, itinerant, celibate, vegan, (no spices; not even salt and pepper), no drugs (no tobacco, no alcohol; not even tea or coffee), no hair cut, no shaving, no washing other than a dip in a river or the ocean ... which means: whatever I could eliminate from my life that was an encumbrance and an attachment, I had let go of. Then, one sunny morn, I met the woman who was to become my second wife on a long, deserted beach. She was determined to ‘unmask the guru’ (her words) and, whilst remarking that while it was certainly something outstanding to ‘love everybody and everything unconditionally’, could I love one person totally, completely and utterly. In short, could man and woman live together in peace and harmony twenty four hours a day. RESPONDENT: Did you live in harmony 24 hours a day? RICHARD: For the first six years of my second marriage I was still endeavouring to extract myself from the Altered State Of Consciousness (ASC) which is known as ‘Spiritual Enlightenment’ ... and as this divine ‘State Of Being’ imbued me with Love Agapé and Universal Compassion for all sentient beings, I was unable to live in total peace and harmony for the twenty four hours of the day. For the latter five years of the marriage, since going beyond enlightenment and breaking through into an actual freedom from the human condition (wherein malice and sorrow is eliminated and not transcended as in spiritual enlightenment), I have consistently lived in total peace and harmony. This has been my condition since 1992, thus I have had eight years to compare it with the enlightened state ... I can find no fault anywhere. In the enlightened state there were occasional ‘bleed-throughs’ from the transcended ‘I’ as ego entity ... brief flashes of fear, irritation, anguish, desire and so on (a close examination of what is written regarding various Enlightened Masters’ day-to-day lived experience will verify this as being typical). I have had nary a hint nor a glimmer or even a whiff of the faintest trace of a ‘bleed-through’ in actual freedom ... and I am relentless in my examination of myself. After all, I am going public with an outrageous and outstanding claim that could – and should – set the squalid complacency of the religious, spiritual, mystical and metaphysical communities on their ears ... and for those eleven years in the ASC I was determined to be ‘squeaky-clean’ before doing so. Five years without a single hitch satisfied me beyond any doubt whatsoever – not only beyond reasonable doubt – that this is that which is the answer to all the ills of humankind ... and I started writing of my experience in public. RESPONDENT: If so why was she your second wife? RICHARD: Because my first wife, being conventionally religious, and upon being faced with her husband’s spiritual enlightenment in the fifteenth year of a normal marriage, chose for the status-quo and, as far as I know, to this very day is still faithfully waiting for the ‘Second Coming’ of her God-Man (he who has a different notion of what a ‘generation’ means than virtually anyone else). RESPONDENT: What I meant was, why did you end your second marriage if you had found such a harmonious state of existence while with your second wife? RICHARD: Because my second wife, being mystically feministic, and upon being faced with her husband’s actual freedom from the human condition in the sixth year of an abnormal marriage, chose for ‘True Love’ (Matrilineal not Patrilineal) and, as far as I know, to this very day is still faithfully waiting for the ‘True Peace’, that only a female can manifest via ‘True Intimacy’, to manifest itself. RESPONDENT: What kind of peace are you talking about? RICHARD: The utter peace of the perfection of the purity welling endlessly as the infinitude this eternal and infinite universe actually is. RESPONDENT: Who made peace with who? RICHARD: There is no ‘who’ – ‘who’ can never, ever be at peace – it is me as-this-body that is peace personified ... and no one else, as far as I can ascertain, is experiencing this. And, as this peace is so perfect, it does not require anybody else’s cooperation ... mutuality and reciprocity in relationship neither adds to perfection nor does their absence detract from perfection. RESPONDENT: Were you both perfect? RICHARD: What is with this ‘were’ business? The identity in toto (both ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul) is extinct ... annihilated, expunged, liquidated, extirpated. As dead as the dodo but with no skeletal remains. There is no phoenix to arise from the ashes ... there are no ashes. This is final, complete and total. RESPONDENT: By the way, I really like how you deal with gender. What a relief! RICHARD: Aye, we are all fellow human beings irregardless of gender, race, age, era or culture ... as an actuality. RESPONDENT: Very unlike your countryman, Barry Long. Of course, Tantra is all the rage now. I find the idea that reality is fundamentally divided into the masculine and feminine principles totally ludicrous. Talk about never the twain shall meet! RICHARD: Yes, Taoism is the most widely known proponent of this puerile belief system that is not worth studying – except as a curiosity piece or to become free of it – yet this masculine/feminine dichotomy is global in its spread. Vis.:
RESPONDENT: I think an awful lot of inequities have stemmed from the masculine/feminine principles belief (masculine being consciousness, feminine being nature). It bothers me a lot that westerners embrace these philosophies blithely without taking a good look at the way males and females relate today in the countries these beliefs originate from. RICHARD: This blind acceptance of eastern wisdom is, in part, what inspires me to write so prodigiously instead of retiring to some idyllic isle and watching the fish leap in the lagoon. RESPONDENT: When I read that 3000 females a year are killed in India by their in-laws because their dowries are too small, then I find the idea that heaven is masculine and earth is feminine a little less fetching – especially when all spiritualities are trying to make us think their heaven is much more important than earth. If I get going on this one ... . RICHARD: By all means do get going ... it will save me doing same!
RETURN TO RICHARD’S SELECTED 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.
Richard’s Text ©The Actual Freedom Trust 1997-2001 |
