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Richard’s Selected Correspondence On Pure Consciousness Experiences
RESPONDENT: Richard, do you have the transcript of a dialogue in which you probed someone for a recollection of a PCE? RICHARD: No ... literally millions of words have disappeared into thin air. RESPONDENT: I am interested in probing myself for this. Do you have any suggestions? RICHARD: Just for starters the following may be of assistance (a written-at-a-later-date section of my version of a discussion with another many years ago):
RESPONDENT: Richard, in what way is the ‘sagacity’ of a PCE different than the ‘wisdom’ of God (ASC) or to the ordinary, intermediated ‘understanding’ of the Normal CE? RICHARD: Discernment is unmediated (and therefore perspicuous). RESPONDENT: I’ve read somewhere on your portion of the site that the PCE has some sort of in-built ... umm ... ‘ wisdom’ for lack of a better term. RICHARD: The better term would be perspicacity. RESPONDENT: Do you derive understanding/comprehension in a different way than a scientist/enlightened/self-realized person does? RICHARD: Yes ... perspicaciously. RESPONDENT: That seems obvious to me from your writing. You seem to come as from another league on this mailing list in regard to discerning the facts of the matter. I guess that when the ‘inside’ clears, the ‘outside’ clarifies as well ... I can only speculate about what happens when both of these categories vanish and intelligence works directly, unmediated by any ‘thinker’/’feeler’. Does that mean that what you write is always and naturally factual/actual (as it comes directly from the experience of experiencing)? RICHARD: In regards the direct experiencing itself ... yes (bar oversights that is); in regards other matters, such as historical review, current affairs, prospective evaluation, and so forth, being matters of opinion (mostly ill-informed) ... no. RESPONDENT: A request for an estimated guess not related to the above ... when was the human animal first capable to experience a PCE? RICHARD: The current human animal is known as homo sapiens (tool-making fire-using symbol-writing hominids) dating back to perhaps 100 thousand BCE; prior to that was homo erectus (tool-making fire-using hominids) dating back to perhaps 1.6 million BCE; prior to that was homo-habilis (tool-making hominids) dating back to perhaps 2.0 million BCE; prior to that was the genus australopithecus (small-brained hominids) dating back to perhaps 5.0 million BCE: prior to that were the hominoids strepsherinni/ haplorini (from which hominids arose) dating back to perhaps 70 million BCE. Thus my estimated guess would be to place it at maybe 70,002,004 years ago ... give or take a year or two. RESPONDENT: It is not necessary when you write of millions to say BCE as you’ll give or take a few thousand years at max. RICHARD: I was not giving or taking ‘a few thousand years at max’ ... my ‘give or take a year or two’ was only in deference to the (proposed) birth date of a saviour of humanity, from whence the arbitrary number 2004 CE (Common Era) is derived, being at least as early as 4 BCE (Before Common Era) – and thus corresponding to the (historical) death date of a contemporary ruler – plus an allowance for the fact there is no designated year zero in that particular calendar ... even though planet earth continued to orbit its radiant star all the while. And the point of such precision about such imprecise dating? Simply this: whatever date it is that archaeologists/ palaeontologists/ scholars may come up with, as being the earliest emergence of hominids/hominoids, then that is the date I would estimate the human animal being first capable of having a pure consciousness experience (PCE). RESPONDENT: What’s the differentiating factor than, if not intelligence, between the early hominids and let’s say a wolf or a giraffe in terms of actualizing a PCE? RICHARD: I am none too sure there is any differentiating factor – the primary factor for pure consciousness experiencing (direct sensate experiencing) is sentience – and as they are feeling beings I see no reason why a wolf or a giraffe cannot have a PCE. * RESPONDENT: I was thinking that such an event (PCE) is possible precisely because of the intelligence developing in the human animal. RICHARD: No, it is an actual freedom from the human condition which is possible because of the development of intelligence ... only an animal with that cognitive faculty of understanding and comprehending (as in intellect and sagacity) – which means the cerebral ability to sensibly and thus judiciously think, reflect, appraise, plan, and implement considered activity for beneficial reasons (and to be able to rationally convey reasoned information to others of its species so that coherent knowledge can accumulate around the world and to the next generations) – can afford to dispense with the instinctual survival passions. RESPONDENT: As a PCE makes the instinctual self redundant, there should be no wonder as to why it has not happened to other animals ... including the different ‘less human than animal’ sub-species that lived < 70 million years ago. RICHARD: It is an actual freedom from the human condition which renders the instinctual ‘self’ redundant ... in a PCE the ‘self’ is merely in abeyance (which means ‘a state of suspension or temporary disuse; a dormant condition liable to revival’ according to the Oxford Dictionary). RESPONDENT: Given the fact that >100.000.000.000 homo sapiens lived on this earth, it is a real mystery as to why none of these tool making, condom using, symbol writing hominids (who presumably all had a temporary PCE and usually more – the best thing since sliced bear) haven’t managed (accidentally or purposely) to live a freedom from the ‘homo sapiens condition’, both tribal and instinctual. Don’t you find this a bit strange? RICHARD: Not nowadays ... no; some years ago ... yes (and exceedingly odd at that). RESPONDENT: I mean ... 1 in 100 billion, close to the number of stars in the milky way. Now, taking the enlightenment ratio, which is close to 1 in a million, and using some mathematical symbols, the afore-mentioned conditioned condition delivers somewhere close to 100.000 enlightened sapiens and only one big delightus ... you’re the man, eh? RICHARD: For as far as I have been able to ascertain ... yes. As a point of related interest: the human species has been doing its thing for at least 50,000 years or so – no essential difference has been discerned between the Cro-Magnon human and Modern-Day human – and may very well continue to do its thing for, say, another 50,000 years or so ... it matters not, in what has been described as ‘the vast scheme of things’ or ‘the big picture’, and so on, whether none, one or many peoples become actually free from the human condition (this planet, indeed the entire solar system, is going to cease to exist in its current form about 4.5 billion years from now). All these words – yours, mine, and others (all the dictionaries, encyclopaedias, scholarly tomes and so on) – will perish and all the monuments, all the statues, all the tombstones, all the sacred sites, all the carefully conserved/carefully restored memorabilia, will vanish as if they had never existed ... nothing will remain of any human endeavour (including yours truly). Nothing at all ... nil, zero, zilch. Which means that nothing really matters in the long run and, as nothing really does matter (in this ultimate sense) it is simply not possible to take life seriously ... sincerely, yes, but seriously? No way ... life is much too much fun to be serious! RESPONDENT: Yes, I see your point as I remember instances of original comedy in my life, although in the real-world where I currently reside, it’s a serious and sometimes deadly business, mainly because people take themselves so seriously (survival takes precedent over enjoying). RICHARD: And therein lies the nub of the issue (in the real-world life is indeed a serious and sometimes deadly business). RESPONDENT: When the potential for freedom is actualized, there’s no need to build another freedom site or to write a book dedicated to the same subject as it is extensively covered, all the while considering myself a factualist instead of an actualist with all the branding and neo- prefixes. I can simply disappear over the horizon if I so wish when ‘The Game’ is over. RICHARD: As an actual freedom from the human condition requires an all-inclusive altruism to effect – and altruism wipes away selfism completely – it would be a contradiction, not only in terms, but in effect to not pass on a report, by whatever means, of the discovery of the already always existing peace-on-earth to one’s fellow human beings. In other words, if for no other reason than simply because of the inherent character of fellowship regard, here in this actual world, were you not to share your experiencing of what life is in actuality – that is, kept it to yourself, for yourself, whilst all about misery and mayhem rages unabated (plus all the branding and neo-prefixing for that matter) – then it would not be an actual freedom from the human condition. Feeling beings do not have a corner on caring. RESPONDENT: I wonder how all these astronauts, who have seen the Earth from space, haven’t seen the folly of the humans below or if they have seen it why didn’t they say loud and clear what stupidity is played down here everyday. RICHARD: Presuming that you are assuming some of them have a PCE – because of the sheer impact of seeing this azure and verdant planet from such a privileged vantage point perchance – then basically you are asking why anyone who is having a PCE is not saying, loud and clear, why all the misery and mayhem being played-out all around the globe is unnecessary. Speaking personally, that is the very thing I would say, all those years ago whenever the ‘I’ who was inhabiting this body went into abeyance, and anybody I have been with since then, whilst they were having a PCE, has expressed variations on the same theme. RESPONDENT: How can they re-become so easily ‘normal’ with only a whisper about their experience? RICHARD: For the same reason why an actual freedom from the human condition is new to human history ... the persistence, and thus dominance, of identity. RESPONDENT: Let me pose a couple possible PCE’s to see if you could tell me whether either of them seem to be right on. 1. I’m sitting on the steps of the library on my university campus. It’s the last half hour of daylight, with the rays of the sun and the shadows from trees and buildings creating a special light for the stage that I observe. In front of me, my fellow students cross the stage that is my field of vision, coming from left and right, moving on. As I watch I have no concerns that they might observe me or evaluate me or have any judgments in mind. As I look from person to person, it occurs to me that they are all very pleasant-looking. If one’s nose would normally seem ‘too big,’ for instance, now it seems to go perfectly with the rest of their features, even their gait. No one is inferior or superior – these thoughts don’t even come to mind. We are who we are and we are there, for the moment. 2. I’ve just left a little store in Bern, Switzerland. Having travelled an hour by train from Lausanne, I have finally gotten into my hands the marijuana that I have so badly wanted. My days are normally long drug-induced journeys into the subconscious, into the strange world of language and culture as I learn and speak French, and I regularly marvel at the beauty of lake Geneva and the mountains on the other side. But today, with this marijuana in my satchel, headed toward the central park where hippies and the like normally sit on the grass smoking their weed, I decide to wait. I will not drug myself, but enjoy the beautiful city that I am in, for I will not always be able to be here. Nearly as soon as I decide to wander and explore, I am struck with a sense of awe about everything. It’s like my brain is so prepped up to get stoned and to battle losing consciousness that I’m skyrocketed into a very intense consciousness. As I walk, gravity is barely an issue. Everywhere I turn my eyes there is intense beauty, but not because I say so, just because it is strange and wonderful. I look at two young women passing by on the street and wonder if they realize how wonderful everything is. They look back at me and it doesn’t seem to matter if they realize it or not because I’ll never know anyway. Nevertheless, there seems to be a brightness there in their eyes that I don’t usually notice in my fellow man. I don’t know what it would be like to live in #2. It seems it would be overwhelming. As for #1, well it was nice to be out of the usual judging/critical/worrisome mode ... well, actually, #2 might have been especially nice because of the sort of exotic environment I was in. RICHARD: The key-words in description No. 1 would seem to be ‘no one is inferior or superior’ (hence the lack of concern over others observing, evaluating, or judging you) and what stands out in description No. 2 is ‘how wonderful everything is’ … however the references to ‘a sense of awe’ and the lightness of being (as expressed in your ‘gravity is barely an issue’ phrasing) and ‘there is intense beauty’ may be an indication of an altered state of consciousness (ASC) rather than a pure consciousness experience (PCE). Needless is it to add the qualifier that there actually is insufficient information for me to comment meaningfully? Besides which I am somewhat reluctant to appraise another’s description anyway (unless it be strikingly obvious just what it was) as experience has shown that when another asks whether such-and-such is a PCE or not it is, generally speaking, not … in a PCE it is startlingly apparent to the experient that is indeed a PCE. For just one example:
RESPONDENT: Thanks for your consideration. RICHARD: You are very welcome … and it is at this stage I usually append a stock-standard disclaimer such as this: I am simply reporting my experience and it is entirely up to the other to do with it what they will ... and I stress that it is the PCE that is one’s guiding light – one’s authority or one’s teacher – and not me or my description of a PCE. The evidence of human history demonstrates that there is a distinct possibility that things can go awry wherever the human psyche is being subjectively investigated. Yet there are some notable people (or notorious people) in this field of endeavour who have rashly promised that they will take care of everything if only the person investigating will believe them and/or have faith in them and/or trust them and/or surrender to them and/or obey them ... and so on. And there are more than a few of these gullible persons currently occupying places in psychiatric wards as a direct result ... and the person who promised to ‘take care of everything’ is remarkably unforthcoming (it is counsellors and therapists and psychologists and psychiatrists who have to pick up the pieces). I cannot save anybody at all. RESPONDENT: So ... here it is the AF site & mailing list, an opportunity. Who can make a satisfactory use of this opportunity? RICHARD: Anybody who is vitally interested in finding out about life, the universe, and what it is to be a human being living in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are. RESPONDENT: Only those who can remember a PCE? RICHARD: No ... I often put it that there is sufficient information on offer on The Actual Freedom Trust web site to establish a prima facie case worthy of further investigation ... and not capricious dismissal. Furthermore I invite anyone to make a critical examination of all the words I advance so as to ascertain if they be intrinsically self-explanatory ... and if they are all seen to be inherently consistent with what is being spoken about, then the facts speak for themselves. Then one will have reason to remember a pure conscious experience (PCE), which all peoples I have spoken to at length have had, and thus verify by direct experience the facticity of what is written (which personal experiencing is the only proof worthy of the name). The PCE occurs globally ... across cultures and down through the ages irregardless of gender, race or age. I also make it clear that what I write is (mostly) expressive prose – it is not a thesis – as I am conveying the lavish exhilaration of life itself. My writing is not intended to stand literary scrutiny for scholarly style and grammatical form and so on – the academics would have a field-day with it – for it is an active catalyst which will catapult the reader, who reads with all their being, into this magical wonder-land that this verdant and azure planet is. Then actuality speaks for itself. RESPONDENT: I cannot recall a PCE in the sense that I cannot look into the past and say with absolute certainty ‘that was a PCE’ using actualist description as a standard. On the other hand, I can remember an ASC and I can definitely say ‘that was an out-of-the-ordinary consciousness experience’ and it was an ASC by actualist standards. Where are the PCE’s stored? RICHARD: Presumably you are referring to this:
And this:
It would appear that your (affective) memory of the ASC is blocking access to (cognitive) memory of a PCE ... experience with other people over the years has shown that ‘me’ at the core of ‘my’ being – which is ‘being’ itself – has, more often than not, both a vested interest in remembering an ASC and in being amnestic about a PCE. RESPONDENT: I understand that it is a cognitive memory, but what type of memory is that? RICHARD: A non-affective memory ... a memory sans feeling-tones. RESPONDENT: What other memories are stored there? RICHARD: The following may throw some light on the subject:
And:
RESPONDENT: I can only relate ‘cognitive’ with the ability to know something, does a PCE allows you a different type of knowledge? RICHARD: No (unless untainted knowledge can be classified as a different type of knowledge). RESPONDENT: And there is the memory of the ASC, of course ... how could it not be?.... but I cannot detect emotionality when remembering it and it cannot be represented anyhow. Could you represent in your mind a PCE when living an ASC? RICHARD: Not ‘represent’ ... it can be intellectually remembered (indeed such a memory of the pure consciousness experience (PCE) is what helped me escape from a lifetime of being stuck in the permanent altered state of consciousness (ASC) known as spiritual enlightenment). * RESPONDENT: In my case and other participants on the mailing list it’s not easy to remember one. RICHARD: This could very well be because if ‘I’ were to actively remember a PCE it could be the beginning of the end of ‘me’. RESPONDENT: Hmm ... the end of ‘me’? RICHARD: Yep ... everything one instinctively knows oneself to be – what one deeply feels and thus intuitively thinks oneself to be – can and will vanish in an instant ... never to ‘be’ again. Never, ever. RESPONDENT: I have always thought that this universe is infinite (even as a child when watching TV documentaries) simply because all the other explanations seemed so silly. And I spoke to other non-scientific & non-spiritual people and surprisingly they also said that they believe it to be infinite. But when asked to explain why they think so, they couldn’t say it. I wrote this as you explained that it’s the connection between this infinity and myself that eliminates ‘me’ and delivers the goods. That this connection is an active force (‘pure intent’). I sense this is the missing link ... to live each moment fully realizing that I live in an infinite and perfect universe. I don’t think remembering a PCE creates ‘the fatal attraction’ ... RICHARD: The following may elucidate what I mean by a connection with the peerless purity of infinitude:
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: I ask this as I don’t want to fool myself practicing a method without knowing where it leads. I guess it leads to a PCE, but what’s that? RICHARD: Presumably you are speaking of experientially knowing where it leads ... intellectually knowing cannot provide the fatal attraction, so to speak, which experiential knowledge provides and which is essential for success. I am, of course, referring to pure intent. RESPONDENT: As a consequence of all this, I set my aim to be happy & harmless and not to live in a PCE (I don’t know how it’s like). RICHARD: A very sensible approach indeed ... being sorrowful and malicious (and thus antidotally loving and compassionate) is not at all conducive to a PCE occurring. RESPONDENT: What’s on offer here, is both valuable and sensible in my view and it reflects, explains my personal experiences and observations in a very satisfactory and comprehensive way. But these words (aka thoughts) are derived from PCE’s. They can provide guidance, direction and assistance in the DIY process of dismantling the identity and help one assess which are the facts and which are the beliefs. But they cannot induce/produce a PCE ... RICHARD: If I may interject? More than a few persons have had a PCE occur whilst listening to me/reading my words ... which is why I explained (further above) that my expressive writing is an active catalyst which will catapult the reader, who reads with all their being, into this magical wonder-land that this verdant and azure planet is. ‘Tis the ‘all of their being’ which is the key. RESPONDENT: Well, I’ve read your writings extensively and intensively ... I intellectually agree with them, but you know that there is a world of difference between intellectual and experiential understanding. And no PCE’s occurred, although there were many realizations. RICHARD: Okay ... a realisation is not to be sneezed at, of course, where it sets one free of a habit of a lifetime. * RESPONDENT: ... as 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: The results derived by practicing this method is that I’m cleaner day-by-day, but a ‘pure’ individual does not necessarily mean pure consciousness, eh? RICHARD: There is no such thing as a pure identity (if that is what you mean). RESPONDENT: I fully engaged myself on the spiritual path as a consequence of an ASC. Is it vital to remember/live a PCE in order to successfully practice actualism? RICHARD: Eventually ... yes; in the interim ... I would say not (going by another’s report). RESPONDENT: I would say it is essential to live a PCE otherwise all these discussions will degenerate sooner then later into intellectualisations rather then conveying individual experiences. RICHARD: Not while there are some that do recall a PCE ... even one such person could keep a discussion on track (keep it in accord with what this mailing list is set-up for). RESPONDENT: This is already happening on the mailing list, circles in a circus. RICHARD: Speaking personally I find the input from peoples of a religio-spiritual/mystico-metaphysical persuasion (if that is what you are referring to by your ‘circles in a circus’ phrasing) to be a salutary example – a real-life practical illustration – that the ‘Tried and True’ is indeed the ‘Tried and Failed’. There is nothing like a practical demonstration to drive the point home. RESPONDENT: What I’m doing right now is to sensibly use the information supplied here for daily use, see if it can stand practical life exposure and eventually create the favourable circumstances for a different CE to occur. RICHARD: A very sensible approach indeed ... intellectualising is not at all conducive to a PCE occurring. 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 [quote] ‘cannot induce/produce a PCE as this experience escapes any reference frame of thought’ [endquote] 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. RICHARD: I did not substitute/rephrase what I ‘think’ you were saying for what you were saying at all (let alone getting it altogether wrong or changing the meaning in the process or then claiming that my rephrasing of your words is in fact your misrepresentation of my words) as I explicitly state I took the liberty of rephrasing your comment so it be in accord with what I actually say (and not what you make of what I say) in order to make it clear why I intervened, as you put it, when you wrote to another that to tie the value of a pure consciousness experience (PCE) and actualism to a particular model of the universe is just stupid and that it is just plain silly to tie actualism up to a particular world view. In short: I have made it clear all along that actualism is experiential – the direct experience of the actual world/universe such as in a PCE – and not intellectual (such as in a particular model of the universe/a particular world view) and my ‘example only’ rephrasing was nothing other than another way of expressing this clarity. RESPONDENT: All without any apparent awareness of the irony in the above. RICHARD: Hmm ... why you would be using irony – ‘dissimulation/pretence; esp. the pretence of ignorance practised by Socrates as a step towards confuting an adversary’ (Oxford Dictionary) – when you later say that you know what I am offering to my fellow human being begins and ends with the direct experience of this actual universe (and that you know it is not a conceptual model and that you know I am not advocating a mere belief in the infinitude of the universe and that you know I am recommending that people test my words out experientially) is beyond me. Or, to put that another way, why you would be using irony – ‘discrepancy between the expected and the actual state of affairs; a contradictory or ill-timed outcome of events as if in mockery of the fitness of things’ (Oxford Dictionary) – when you later say that you know what I am offering to my fellow human being begins and ends with the direct experience of this actual universe (and that you know it is not a conceptual model and that you know I am not advocating a mere belief in the infinitude of the universe and that you know I am recommending that people test my words out experientially) has got me beat. Especially as you experientially know this moment in time has no duration in a PCE anyway:
And that you experientially know this place in space has no location:
Yet when I report/describe the same or similar I am, it seems to you (further above), a recovering spiritualist particularly prone to swinging between extremes with crappy logic which is impervious to reason such as to betray the fanatic’s heart which is probably the same emotional tendency that led to me being long-term spiritualist in the first place ... here is but one example out of many:
And even more recently you have reported the following experience:
May I ask? Where in all this is the crappy logic which is impervious to reason such as to betray the fanatic’s heart? RESPONDENT: The ‘provoked spontaneous onsets of PCE’s’ via drugs owe their first lyrical descriptions to Aldous Huxley in The Doors of Perception which you undoubtedly know, he was, however (well or badly, what do you think?), prepared by his previous assembly of a collage of mystics from all times and religions, the ‘Perennial philosophy’. RICHARD: It really does not matter whether Mr. Aldous Huxley was well or badly prepared by his prior understanding of the ‘perennial philosophy’ – the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago had no such understanding at all yet, even so, wound up in the enlightened/awakened state of being anyway – as what does matter is that there now is, finally, a body of work which clearly explicates just what a PCE is ... and what it is not. Thus no-one need traipse eagerly down the ‘Tried and True’ path ever again (unless they so desire of course). RESPONDENT: Watts picked up quite a lot from Huxley. But I want to get to something else: The PCE’s experienced from taking mushrooms (or did you take the psilocybin in some other form in 1980?) ... RICHARD: No. RESPONDENT: ... remind me of the ‘flow’ experienced by artists while creating or actually anybody merging completely with his activity, as recently again described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. RICHARD: I have located the following description of how it feels to be in ‘the flow’:
I have reported experiencing the same or similar ... for instance:
And:
And:
RESPONDENT: I have the impression that Actual Freedom could be defined as experiencing the whole life as such a ‘flow’, experiencing the sensory ‘input’ (into what, anyway?) only. RICHARD: There is no ‘input’ ... sensory perception is immediate (direct). RESPONDENT: Closely connected to this is what you name ‘apperception’ ... RICHARD: I found the word in the Oxford Dictionary in 1997, when I was assembling an ad hoc collection of articles into some semblance of being a book form so as to be suitable for publishing, which simply said (as the first of several meanings):
It was that definition – as contrasted to the normal ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious type of perception – which appealed ... and not any historical usage of the word. RESPONDENT: [These should be enough examples of ...] your insincerity to own up to what you have written multiple times, for now. RICHARD: The two quotes you provided are not examples of insincerity as they are nothing other than the way the English language is commonly used. For example:
RESPONDENT: At that time I had been reading your words and had tried out your trick/device/method aka haietmoba ... that experience was couched in your words & your lingo and was exactly what you had written regarding what you labelled a PCE ... RICHARD: Are you saying that when you wrote [quote] ‘I had what I labelled as a PCE ...’ [endquote] it was because you had read those two quotes you provided, where I say that only an identity can have a PCE, and couched it accordingly (albeit in the past tense)? RESPONDENT: No ... RICHARD: In which case, then, your usage of the past tense of the word have – as in your [quote] ‘I had what I labelled as a PCE ...’ [endquote] phrasing – must surely be nothing other than the way the English language is commonly used, eh? RESPONDENT: ... I was using your terminology, your lingo. RICHARD: The word had – the past tense of the word have – is not my terminology, my lingo, at all ... it the way the English language is commonly used. RESPONDENT: The word ‘PCE’ is your lingo. RICHARD: The fact that the acronym for the phrase ‘pure consciousness experience’ is my lingo does nothing to detract from the fact that your own usage of the past tense of the word ‘have’ demonstrates that this entire argument of yours, about double talk, lack of clarity of communication, and insincerity in owning up to what was written (twice), was a beat-up from the get-go. And even only three and a half hours ago you demonstrated that same thing (the way the English language is commonly used) in your e-mail to another. Vis.:
Now, I know what you are wanting to convey – and presumably your co-respondent does too – because surely, having just enquired as to what had the PCE if the identity was not present, you are not referring to the identity snapping out of the PCE. Incidentally, as the answer to that query of yours is, of course, that the flesh and blood body (in which identity is abeyant) is what had the PCE then what the identity snaps out of is abeyance – ‘a state of suspension or temporary disuse; dormant condition liable to revival’ (Oxford Dictionary) – upon which re-emergence its problems recommence. Only upon extinction will its problems cease forever. RESPONDENT: Just as an aside to your PCE thing. You have said that the PCE is one’s guiding light ... RICHARD: This is the way I usually put it:
RESPONDENT: I’ll agree ... what I learned from those few hours that fit your description of a PCE is; that what is on offer here are your 2nd hand experiences ... if that is what one is after, then they’ve come to the right place ... personally, one such experience was enough ... all religions are born with the petty experiences of certain people. RICHARD: As what you experienced for those few hours was not a PCE
Footnote: (1.)what you experienced for those few hours was not a PCE:
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 |
