Actual Freedom ~ Frequently Asked Questions

RESPONDENT: For me ‘timelessness is the truth’ and what you are saying: ‘this moment in time has no duration’ are same statements. That is why I mentioned it the first time.

RICHARD: Yes, I was aware of this ... which is why I wrote what I did in my initial post to you. I say that being here now as this flesh and blood body only – sans identity – enables the infinitude of the universe to be apparent. I say that this physical universe’s time is eternal, its space is infinite and its matter is perpetual ... this is what ‘infinitude’ means. Now there is a distinct difference between the word ‘eternal’ and the word ‘timeless’. The word ‘timeless’ is very explicit ... no time (just like ‘selfless’ means no self) as in not subject to time, not affected by the passage of time, out of time, without reference to time and independent of the passage of time. The word ‘eternal’ means all time, as in that which will always exist, that which has always existed, that which is without a beginning or an end in time, that which is everlasting, permanent, enduring, persistent, recurring, incessant, indestructible, imperishable, constant, continuous, continual, unbroken and thus interminable and valid for all time. However, just as there are those who corrupt ‘selfless’ into meaning ‘a not selfish self’, there are those who corrupt ‘timeless’ into meaning ageless, ceaseless, changeless ... which are time-words more applicable to ‘eternal’. Even dictionaries do this. However, when viewed honestly, the word ‘timeless’ selfishly means ‘undying and immutable’ as in ‘immortal and deathless’. Take the modern physicists, for an example of honesty, when they posit their ‘nothingness’ prior to their mathematical ‘Big Bang’. Even though influenced by the pervasive eastern mysticism, they still have enough intellectual rigour to mostly resist using the word ‘eternal’ to refer to that ‘before time began’ fantasy ... they usually say ‘timeless’.

As time is eternal – just as space is infinite and matter is perpetual – to be here now as this flesh and blood body only is to be living an ongoing experiencing of this infinitude of this very material universe (I am using the word ‘infinitude’ in its ‘a boundless expanse and an unlimited time’ meaning). Therefore, infinitude – having no opposite and thus being perfection itself – is personified as me ... a flesh and blood body only. Hence my oft-repeated refrain: ‘I am the material universe experiencing itself as a sensate and reflective human being’ or ‘I am the experience of infinitude’. The infinite character of physical space, coupled with the eternal character of time and the perpetual character of matter, produces a here and now infinitude that can be understood experientially by one who is apperceptive. To grasp the character of infinitude with certainty, the reasoning mind must forsake its favoured process of intellectual understanding through logical and/or intuitive imagination and enter into the realm of a pure consciousness experience (apperception). In a PCE – which is where there is no ‘I’ or ‘me’ extant – the essential characteristics of infinitude are transparently obvious, lucidly self-evident, clearly apparent and open to view.

I will say it again this way: By being here now as-this-body one finds that this moment in time has no duration as in the normal ‘now’ and ‘then’ – because the immediate is the ultimate – and that this place in space has no distance as in the normal ‘here’ and ‘there’ – for the relative is the absolute – and form has no distinction as the normal ‘was’ and ‘will be’ – as matter is energy and energy is matter – and I am already here as it is always now.

And no ‘timelessness’ nor ‘truth’ to be seen at all.

RESPONDENT to No. 14: Now I understand the whole thing about PCE. Osho created situations in which we could get PCE’s and hence have a bench mark to work with. While Richard is asking us to remember a PCE, defined with a description, to take it as a bench mark.

RICHARD: My understanding (I have read about 80-90 ‘Osho’ books), is that Mr. Mohan Rajneesh ‘created situations’ so that his sannyasins could have the affective oceanic experience of the ‘oneness’ or ‘union’ that epitomises the ‘deathless state’ (gnosis, samadhi, satori and so on) ... not PCE’s. Mr. Mohan Rajneesh consistently stated that he ‘was not the body’ whereas in a PCE one is clearly this body only ... and in actual freedom death is the end. Finish. In a PCE there is the direct sensate experience of being here – at this place in infinite space – right now in this moment of eternal time ... there is no affective qualities like ‘Euphoria’ or ‘Bliss’ or ‘Ecstasy’ or ‘Rapture’ leading one to the transcendent ‘Goodness’ (‘Love’ and ‘Compassion’) and to the supramundane ‘Truth’ (‘Beauty’ and ‘Wholeness’) where the awesome ‘Sacred and Holy’ reigns in all its miraculous ‘Ineffability’. In a PCE one is now living – as I do – in the infinitude of this fairy-tale-like actual world with its sensuous quality of magical perfection and purity where everything and everyone has a lustre, a brilliance, a vividness, an intensity and a marvellous, wondrous, scintillating vitality that makes everything alive and sparkling ... even the very earth beneath one’s feet. The rocks, the concrete buildings, a piece of paper ... literally everything is as if it were alive (a rock is not, of course, alive as humans are, or as animals are, or as trees are). This ‘aliveness’ is the very actuality of all existence ... the ‘actualness’ of everything and everyone. We do not live in an inert universe ... but one cannot experience this whilst clinging to immortality.

I am mortal

RESPONDENT to Peter: Dynamic Meditation helped me get the first PCE and other Osho’s meditations helped me get consequent PCE’s. That is a fact, take it or leave it. Based on these experiences and one of Osho’s discourses I read early on made me write the statement that Osho was creating situations for us to have PCE’s.

RICHARD: Now you have caught my attention ... could you post the quote (giving the name of the book and the chapter number that the discourse is in) as I am always keen to read of another’s description of a PCE. I ask this because in the 80-90 books that I read I never came across him describing a PCE ... he consistently described the mystical experiences of being ‘unborn and undying’ in a metaphysical ‘herenow’ ... which is a ‘timeless and spaceless void’ or a ‘formless and deathless emptiness’ wherein reigns an ‘unknowable and immutable presence’ which is an ‘immortal and ceaseless being’ ... and so on. After all, he did dictate his own epitaph to be inscribed on enduring marble: ‘Never Born: Never Died; Only Visited This Planet’ ... did he not?

As I am vitally interested in facilitating the self-less and already always existing physical peace-on-earth to become apparent – and not in narcissistically chasing the self-centred and ‘tried and failed’ metaphysical ‘Peace That Passeth All Understanding’ – I do appreciate your interest, attention and input into this very important matter. Bringing about an end to all the wars and rapes and murders and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicide is such a fine way to spend a spring day.

Would you not agree?

RICHARD: Of course it does not ‘take away from the truth’ . This is because ‘the truth’ is not actual ... therefore it can be whatever one thinks that one feels it to be. Feelings are notoriously unreliable in determining facticity.

RESPONDENT: Actually, I don’t have problem with the words ‘truth’, ‘reality’ and ‘actual’. They are rather quite interchangeable. I don’t know why you nit-pick the difference.

RICHARD: As you have asked this question several times before – and I have answered it several times before – I do wonder at the point of answering it again. Nevertheless, it is easy to copy and paste:

• [Respondent]: ‘Why do you get so nit-picky about the meaning of words and go to dictionaries to try to prove a point?

• [Richard]: ‘I get ‘nit-picky’ about the meaning of words because people so dearly love to cover up their ineptitude by using words in a slippery manner. No one, it seems, likes to be pinned down to a clear-cut definition. I also get this a lot in my face-to-face discussions with people here ... they like to ‘keep things open’ or ‘be flexible’ or ‘don’t be so fixed’ or ‘things aren’t black and white’ and so on. I happen to like the English language ... it has upwards of 650,000 words in it and one can clearly communicate with another if a little rigour is applied. However, people like to hide behind words; they like to utter pithy aphorisms like: ‘The Truth is Ineffable’. It is up to me to make sure that the other understands what I am saying – whether they agree with me or not – because if I assume that they have the same meaning to a word as I do is just plain silly. A dictionary is a handy reference point to establish a meaning ... if we want to give a particular twist or meaning to a word we can ... but we need to know what base we start from. Otherwise anything means whatever we want it too ... and confusion reigns supreme’.

And ‘confusion’ is the current situation.

RESPONDENT: Real means having no imaginary part.

RICHARD: If only it did. Then I would be able to use it freely, instead of having to nit-pick by using ‘actual’ ... and having to give my definition of it rather than the dictionary definition.

RESPONDENT: Actual means factual.

RICHARD: Yes ... if by ‘factual’ you mean what is ascertained sensately and thus demonstrably true.

RESPONDENT: Truth means ‘what is’.

RICHARD: Again ... if only it did mean what is actual. ‘What is’ – a phrase Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti used a lot – means different things to different people. For some it is a surrogate phrase for ‘Thy Will be done on earth as it is in Heaven’.

RESPONDENT: Truth does not mean that whatever one thinks is the truth. That is totally ridiculous.

RICHARD: Actually I wrote: ‘therefore it can be whatever one thinks that one feels it to be’. This is because people rely upon feelings to be the final arbiter of truth ... and feelings are notoriously unreliable in ascertaining facticity. Your whole tirade against thought is nothing but an attempt to avoid looking at your feelings.

RESPONDENT: One is separate from reality because in reality there is no psychological time. ‘I’ do not exist in reality. In actuality, we function in time. Verbalisation is time. Thought is time. In reality, verbalisation, the word, naming, does not exist unless it is necessary for it to function. The truth is ‘what is’, and whatever one thinks will not change that. If one is deceiving oneself about what is truth, the truth of the matter is that one is deceiving oneself, but that fact does not make the deceit truth. That deceit is totally thought. Let’s not enter into word games but try to get to the reality behind the words.

RICHARD: Sure can ... the ‘reality behind the words’ is that ‘I’ will do anything to stay in existence. After all, ‘I’ have been charged by blind nature to survive at any cost with the powerful instinct for survival. Thus ‘I’ will blame thought so as to distract attention away from the real culprit ... ‘I’ the ‘thinker’. When the attention becomes too great I the ‘thinker – ego ‘I’ – can disappear ... only to reappear as ‘me’ in the heart. Of course ‘I’ will be as humble as all get-out in the hope that no one will notice that ‘I’ am still in existence. A loving self is still a self, nevertheless. This is why no one will examine their feelings with the scrutiny they apply to their thoughts.

RESPONDENT: You have proven, Richard, that you are far superior in your knowledge to all of the tried and true ways of seeking whatever it was that you were/are seeking. You have made the point that ‘your’ knowledge is superior to other knowledge. I would not argue with you in the least, for, fortunately, I never became involved in all of the Eastern methods of which you are so knowledgeable.

RICHARD: Dream on ... your posts give me the impression that you revere Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti and his words are as icons to you. Thus I would venture to guess that you are immersed in Eastern Mysticism up to the neck without realising it ... like a lot of other Westerners.

RICHARD: Actual means ‘things’ ascertained sensately ... divinity (being heavenly as opposed to earthly) can never be apprehended by the senses. Thus the divine is not actual.

RESPONDENT: The term ‘actual’ seems to be key in describing your present ongoing state of mind: ‘actual’ existing in act and not merely potentially; not false or apparent; existing or occurring at the time. Would you say that ‘things’ ascertained sensately really exist and are not apparent?

RICHARD: Yes. No deep thought or penetrating insight at all is required to determine any ‘things’ self-evident factuality. There is a simple three-step experiment that will demonstrate the actuality of objective reality in a way that a thousand words would not:

1. Place a large spring-clip upon your nose.
2. Place a large piece of sticking plaster over your mouth.
3. Wait five minutes.

Now, as you rip the plaster from your mouth and gulp in that oh-so-sweet and actual air, I ask you: Do you still believe that it is thought merely imputing a reality to ‘things’?

Seeing this fact will set you free to live in actuality.

RESPONDENT: Would the actual be things that are impermanent, permanent or neither?

RICHARD: The form ‘things’ take is impermanent ... the matter they are made of is permanent. Things are material ... matter itself arranges and re-arranges itself endlessly into differing forms. This planet we all live on is matter that had a beginning as this particular form called ‘The Earth’; this form grows; this form ages and this form ends ... but only as this particular form (somewhat like this physical body). This planet’s matter re-arranges itself into another form when this solar system, as its particular form, implodes or explodes or whatever it does. This goes on for galaxy after uncountable galaxy ... this material universe’s space is infinite and its time is eternal. This physical universe endlessly re-arranges itself into multitudinous different forms ... just like the particular physical matter of the body does after physical death and did before physical birth. Because the universe is eternal – the universe is here now and it always has been and it always will be – it is therefore permanent. This universe never began and will never finish. It is truly the ‘Unborn and Undying’ ... I see no need to invent a metaphysical god to have these characteristics.

Except, of course, that ‘I’ wish to be Immortal.

Why do ‘I’ wish immortality? ‘I’ am a product of blind nature’s ‘software’ (not ‘hardware’) package of instinctual survival passions ... like fear and aggression and nurture and desire. These passions fashion an affective self that has been charged by blind nature with a survival instinct. Out of this an ‘I’ is formed ... sentient beings are not born with an ‘I’ ... they are born with a rudimentary self. (Which is a non-verbal awareness of bodily self as distinct from other bodies and the environment at large ... this can be observed in animals). Blind nature equips sentient beings with those instinctual passions as basic survival instincts. These passions can be observed in animal infants ... and in human babies before they can think and talk. Thus malice and sorrow are intrinsic and are not dependent upon conditioning as the ‘Wise Ones’ would have us believe. (These kind of things can be seen in the comfort of one’s own living-room via those fascinating National Geographic videos of the apes. These animals display passions and behaviour that is almost uncanny in their – albeit very basic – similarity to the human species.)

But as this is a ‘software’ package it can be deleted. This ‘deletion’ – psychological and psychic self-immolation – reveals the pristine actuality that has always been here all along ... it was overlaid with a ‘reality’ created by ‘I’ as ego (and the ‘Greater Reality’ was created by ‘me’ as soul). Without the ‘I’ as ego and the ‘me’ as soul there is apperceptive awareness. As this apperceptive flesh and blood body, which is made of the same ‘stuff’ as the universe, I am this material universe being able to consciously experience itself as a sensate and reflective human being. Thus infinitude experiences itself as me here and now.

It sure beats any spurious ‘Immortality’ in a specious ‘After-Life’.

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