# Actual Freedom – Selected Correspondence by Topic

Richard’s Selected Correspondence ## On Freedom from the Human Condition RESPONDENT: Are some people inherently flawed from birth (omitting from the discussion those with obvious mental defects), or do they become that way? RICHARD: All people are inherently flawed from birth ... it is called the human condition. RICHARD: The solution to all the ills of humankind requires one to step out of the grim and glum ‘real world’ (the everyday ‘reality’ for 6.0 billion peoples pasted as a veneer over the pristine and consummate actual world by the affective faculty) into the actual world of the sensate faculty as is evidenced in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) ... and leave ‘yourself’ behind in that blood-soaked ‘Land Of Lament’ where ‘you’ belong. RESPONDENT: I don’t really know much about the ‘human condition’ or the 6 billion – be more down-to-earth. RICHARD: The last time I checked it out all the 6.0 billion people were still on earth (complete with their human condition intact) ... how much more ‘down-to-earth’ can I be than discussing the animal instinctual passions? RESPONDENT: Just exactly how did you enquire into the condition of 6 billion people when you haven’t left Byron Bay? RICHARD: The same way that I ascertain anything about anybody and everybody ... I ask and I listen. Plus I read about other people’s experiences in books, journals, magazines, newspapers and on the internet. I watch TV, videos, films ... whatever media is available. I travelled the country – and overseas – talking with many and varied peoples from all walks of life and have been scouring the books for nineteen years now for information on an actual freedom from the human condition ... but to no avail. This is because, despite of the fact that every single human being has had at least one pure consciousness experience (PCE) – and usually more – in their lifetime, they somehow can not differentiate between that peak experience of apperception (wherein ‘I’ and ‘me’, the thought and felt ‘being’, temporarily quits the scene and the actual world becomes apparent) and their pre-conceived notions that everyday reality is an illusion disguising some metaphysical ‘Greater Reality’. The Glamour and the Glory and the Glitz of the Altered State Of Consciousness has a tenacious grip upon the minds and hearts of a benighted humanity. It is indeed strange, to the point of being bizarre, that so many persons will turn their backs on the purity of the perfection of being here – of being fully alive – at this moment in time. Here in this actual world, which is where this flesh and blood body is living anyway, is the peace that everyone says they are searching for. All that is required is that one comes to one’s senses – both literally and metaphorically – and spend the rest of one’s life without malice and sorrow. One will then be blithe and benign, gay and carefree. RICHARD (to No. 31): I consistently delineate the nature of human beings with the term ‘Human Condition’ ... which is a well-established philosophical term that refers to the situation that all human beings find themselves in when they emerge here as babies. The term refers to the contrary and perverse nature of all peoples of all races and all cultures. There is ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in everyone ... all humans have a ‘dark side’ to their nature and a ‘light side’. The battle betwixt ‘Good and Evil’ has raged down through the centuries and it requires constant vigilance lest evil gets the upper hand. Morals and ethics seek to control the wayward self that lurks deep within the human breast ... and some semblance of what is called ‘peace’ prevails for the main. Where morality and ethicality fails to curb the ‘savage beast’, law and order is maintained ... at the point of a gun (Richard, List B, No. 31a, 21 May 1999). RESPONDENT: Yes. This is a very concise and accurate description of the ‘Human Condition’ as I, too, understand it. RICHARD: Good ... speaking personally, my questioning of life, the universe and what it is to be a human being all started in a war-torn country in June 1966 at age nineteen – when there was an identity inhabiting this body complete with a full suite of feelings – and a Buddhist monk killed himself in a most gruesome way. There was I, a callow youth dressed in a jungle-green uniform and with a loaded rifle in my hand, representing the secular way to peace. There was a fellow human being, dressed in religious robes dowsed with petrol and with a cigarette lighter in hand, representing the spiritual way to peace. I was aghast at what we were both doing ... and I sought to find a third alternative to being either ‘human’ or ‘divine’. This was to be the turning point of my life, for up until then I was a typical western youth, raised to believe in God, Queen and Country. Humanity’s inhumanity to humanity – society’s treatment of its subject citizens – was driven home to me, there and then, in a way that left me appalled, horrified, terrified and repulsed to the core of my being with a sick revulsion. I saw that no one knew what was going on and – most importantly – that no one was ‘in charge’ of the world. There was nobody to ‘save’ the human race ... all gods were but a figment of a feverish imagination. Out of a despairing desperation, which was collectively shared by my fellow humans, I saw and understood that I was as ‘guilty’ as any one else. For in me – as is in everyone – was both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ ... it was that some people were better than others at controlling their ‘dark side’. However, in a war, there is no way anyone can consistently control any longer ... ‘evil’ ran rampant. I saw that fear and aggression and nurture and desire ruled the world ... and that these were instincts one was born with. Thus started my search for freedom from the ‘Human Condition’ ... and my attitude, all those years ago was this: I was only interested in changing myself fundamentally, radically, completely and utterly. * RICHARD (to No. 31): The ending of all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides requires the ending of malice and sorrow ... which involves getting one’s head out of the clouds – and beyond – and coming down-to-earth where the flesh and blood bodies called human beings actually live. Obviously, the solution to all the ills of humankind can only be found here in space and now in time. The Gurus and God-men have had 3,000 to 5,000 years to produce the goods with their ‘Timeless and Spaceless and Formless’ solution ... their ‘Tried and True’ is the ‘Tried and Failed’. So, the question is: is it possible to be free of the human condition, here on earth, in this life-time, as this flesh and blood body? (Richard, List B, No. 31a, 21 May 1999). RESPONDENT: I agree with what you say here, with some differences. Perhaps we can get back to this in another post. RICHARD: Please do ... as the problem of ‘The Human Condition’ is happening here on earth (in space) each moment again (in time) in these flesh and blood bodies (as form) called human beings, then the solution to ‘The Human Condition’ quite obviously can only be found here in space and now in time as form. Thus far in human history one has had only two choices: being human or being divine. Neither option has brought about peace on earth. There is a third alternative. RESPONDENT: I tell you all above because for focusing in three points which I feel No. 25 and me are very interested, if it’s possible to talk about them in any way: 1. Human mind, seems to be individual or collective? 2. Human conscience, seems to be individual or collective? 3. Human sorrow, seems to be individual or collective? RICHARD: In actuality the human mind is individual and there is no ‘collective mind’ or ‘universal mind’ or ‘universal consciousness’ and so on; in actuality there is no innate ‘individual human conscience’ nor any ‘collective human conscience’; in actuality there is no individual ‘human sorrow’ nor any ‘collective sorrow’ or ‘universal sorrow’ or ‘universal compassion’ and so on. RICHARD: Fear and aggression and nurture and desire are built into the ‘Human Condition’ ... this is the ‘human nature’ that is said ‘cannot be changed’. These intrinsic urges and drives are known as the ‘instinct for survival’. RESPONDENT: Fear and aggression aren’t intrinsic (if they were, you wouldn’t have been able to overcome them) – they are produced causally. Some of the causes predate an individual’s birth. RICHARD: I beg to differ. All creatures are born with the instinct for survival, which manifests itself as fear and aggression ... which gives birth to a rudimentary self (which those people who study these things have reported observing in the animals they studied) and this is known, in humans, as ‘The Human Condition’. Thus nobody is born innocent – which means free from sin – and I use the word ‘sin’ because fear and aggression combine to form malice ... which is another word for ‘Evil’. Hence my usage of the expressive phrase ‘all humans are ‘guilty’ at conception’. And for as long as a person can become angry, hateful, jealous, envious, spiteful, vindictive and so on and so on, they are guilty. And, yes, it is possible to not only ‘overcome them’ but to eliminate them entirely. Then one is free to act appropriately according to the circumstances – and not out of an instinctual reaction. Instincts are not set in stone, they are simply ‘blind nature’s’ way of ensuing survival. With our thinking, reflective brain we can improve on nature in this respect, as we have done in so many other ways. Any instinctual drive can be eradicated. (Where you say ‘Some of the causes predate an individual’s birth’, you are not hinting at those hoary myths of pre-determination or re-incarnation, surely?) RICHARD: ‘Automatism’? ‘Criminal actions’? ‘Instinctual’? What are you talking about? I do not operate from instincts, for I have eliminated them. RESPONDENT: Okay, I’m a mere mortal and you’re not. RICHARD: ‘Okay, I’m a mere mortal and you’re not.’ Thus all the wars, murders, rapes, domestic violence and child abuse go on ... not to mention all the loneliness, sadness, grief, depression, despair and suicide ... all this is the result of remaining a ‘mere mortal’. So many people have said: ‘I’m only human’, or: ‘So I’ve made a mistake, nobody’s perfect’, or: ‘In an ideal world this wouldn’t happen’. These excuses for misdemeanours are readily forthcoming whenever someone’s integrity is questioned. It is generally accepted that all humans have an inherent fault, a ‘dark side’ to their nature. Consequently: ‘You just have to accept people as they are’. I do not ‘just have to accept people as they are’ because I know, from personal experience, that it is possible to change – and change radically, fundamentally. I have never accepted that I am condemned to remain as I was and I have enquired into myself and into the ‘Human Condition’, with gratifying results. I have been without an ego for fifteen years and without a soul for the last four ... thus I am at peace and in harmony with myself and with others. So I know what I talk of; it is not theory, it is not idealistic, it is not a ‘pie in the sky’. It is possible for one human being to state, honestly and factually, that perfection is not only highly desirable but it is essential. I am not ‘merely human’ for I am, in fact, no longer normal. I do not have a ‘dark side’ ... nor do I have a ‘good side’. There is no battle betwixt Good and Evil raging inside this body, for there is simply purity abounding in all directions. The ego that died all those years ago has never reappeared and the extirpation of the soul that persisted for another eleven years after that event, made the extinction of the entity final. I have never been here before, I am perpetually new. I appear as this moment appears. As each moment is fresh, new, so too am I novel, artless and innocent. I can never gather dust, as it were, for I cast no shadow. I have no presence, no being. I do not exist, psychologically speaking. With no entity within to mess things up, I am actually perfection personified, pure and simple, through no effort at all. I can take no credit for my unimpeachable character, it all happens of itself as the universe intends it to. RESPONDENT: This may be the great flaw with AF ... the premise that the identity (often incorrectly called the Human Condition) can be eliminated. For instance, pain can’t be eliminated, but the attachment to pain (aka suffering) may be. RICHARD: It is not a ‘premise’ ... it is an experiential report, written as it is happening, that no identity whatsoever has residence in this flesh and blood body (and this has been the case, ever since a seminal event at a particular time and place witnessed by another, for more than a decade now). It is not ‘often incorrectly called the Human Condition’ ... simultaneous with ‘self’-immolation in toto, more than a decade ago now, the human condition likewise vanished and is nowhere to be found. Your analogy to physical pain conveys that identity cannot be eliminated but the attachment to identity can ... which, apart from being yet more of the ‘Tried and True’ (attachment-detachment-dissociation-enlightenment), amounts to being a foregone conclusion and effectively shuts the door on that which is actual ever being apparent. ‘Tis not for nothing identity is described as being very, very cunning. * RESPONDENT: Mother nature has figured out that more complex beings are more likely to breed and bring to viability the young. Which, of course, is the only purpose/ meaning of life. If any find that last statement disturbing, prove to me otherwise pls. RICHARD: It may very well be the only purpose, if that is the right word, of what you call ‘mother nature’ yet there is more to life than bringing to viability the young (for the young in turn similarly bring to viability another generation of young who in turn do likewise and so on and so on) ... much, much more. Incidentally, the ‘being’ who possessed this flesh and blood body all those years ago found it quite disturbing when he realised, one fine afternoon after the birth of ‘his’ fourth and last child, that to be born, to learn to walk, talk, and so on, to go to school, to get a job/ obtain a career, to get married/ be in a relationship, to acquire a home, to have children, to teach them to walk, talk, and so on, to send them to school, to have them get a job/ obtain a career, to ensure they get married/ have a relationship, to have them acquire a home, to encourage them have children, to see them teach their children to walk, talk, and so on – and so on and so on almost ad infinitum – was nothing other than an instinctual treadmill, an inborn/ inherent conveyor belt which carried generation after generation inexorably from birth to death, stretching all the way back from an indeterminate inception and heading towards an open-ended conclusion ... and all for what? If it were not for that ‘being’ having that realisation then the actual purpose/ meaning of life may quite possibly not be apparent today. RESPONDENT: That aside, my point is: you believe in your method ... RICHARD: It is neither my method nor do I believe in it: it is the method devised by the identity who used to inhabit this flesh and blood body all those years ago and, as ‘his’ method worked to deliver the goods (which no method before in human history has), its proven track-record means there is no need to believe in it. RESPONDENT: ... you claim it delivers the goods, unlike what the LDM’s have left for us in their respective wakes ... RICHARD: As the many and varied sages, saints, and seers were/ are still subject to anger and anguish (usually elevated to the status of a Righteous Wrath and a Sacred Sorrow by some-such name) – and thus still subject to the antidotal pacifiers love and compassion (usually elevated to the status of a Love Agapé and a Divine Compassion by some-such name) – one does not have to be a genius to suss out that the altered state of consciousness (ASC) popularly known as spiritual enlightenment does not deliver the goods ... presuming, of course, that the goods in question be peace on earth and not some spurious Peace That Passeth All Understanding in some specious timeless and spaceless and formless realm where there is no dratted body to stuff things up. And as their mystico-religious answer lies not in the world, but away from it, there is no prize for guessing what their goods really are. RESPONDENT: ... and as I have said, you have a nice, easily digestible, presentable format ... RICHARD: If I may point out? As what you have to say (further below) demonstrates you have not the slightest notion of what is on offer on The Actual Freedom Trust web site it would appear that it is only the presentable formats/ perfect frameworks/ slideshow-like styles that you find easily digestible ... and as the phrase ‘all style and no substance’ epitomises your posts to this list it is no wonder. RESPONDENT: ... you believe in its contents and its subsequent effects on the problems of humans as you have pointed out in your text. RICHARD: If you can provide the instances – or even one instance – of the text where I have ever said I ‘believe’ in the contents and its effects I will most certainly address your comment ... until then I will take this to be the male bovine faecal matter it is and move on without further remark. * RESPONDENT: Currently we have an educational system that prepares you to earn a livelihood and a religious system that perpetuates the ‘human condition’, and is so enmeshed, inter-twined and is currently the software that is running the human machine – if I have interpreted what you have written correctly. RICHARD: Why interpret what I have to report ... why not take it at face value? Viz.: • [Richard]: ‘Being a ‘self’ is because the only way into this world of people, things and events is via the human spermatozoa fertilising the human ova ... thus every human being is endowed, by blind nature, with the basic instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire. Thus ‘I’ am the end-point of myriads of survivors passing on their genes. ‘I’ am the product of the ‘success story’ of blind nature’s fear and aggression and nurture and desire. Being born of the biologically inherited instincts genetically encoded in the germ cells of the spermatozoa and the ova, ‘I’ am – genetically – umpteen tens of thousands of years old ... ‘my’ origins are lost in the mists of pre-history. ‘I’ am so anciently old that ‘I’ may well have always existed ... carried along on the reproductive cell-line, over countless millennia, from generation to generation. And ‘I’ am thus passed on into an inconceivably open-ended and hereditably transmissible future. In other words: ‘I’ am fear and fear is ‘me’ and ‘I’ am aggression and aggression is ‘me’ and ‘I’ am nurture and nurture is ‘me’ and ‘I’ am desire and desire is ‘me’. The instinctual passions are the very energy source of the rudimentary animal self ... the base consciousness of ‘self’ and ‘other’ that all sentient beings have. The human animal – with its unique ability to be aware of its own death – transforms this ‘reptilian brain’ rudimentary core of ‘being’ (an animal ‘self’) into being a feeling ‘me’ (as soul in the heart) and the ‘feeler’ then infiltrates into thought to become the ‘thinker’ ... a thinking ‘I’ (as ego in the head). No other animal can do this. *That this process is aided and abetted by the human beings who were already on this planet when one was born – which is conditioning and programming and is part and parcel of the socialising process – is but the tip of the iceberg and not the main issue at all*. All the different types of conditioning are well-meant endeavours by countless peoples over countless aeons to seek to curb the instinctual passions. Now, while most people paddle around on the surface and re-arrange the conditioning to ease their lot somewhat, some people – seeking to be free of all human conditioning – fondly imagine that by putting on a face-mask and snorkel that they have gone deep-sea diving with a scuba outfit ... deep into the human condition. They have not ... they have gone deep only into the human conditioning. When they tip upon the instincts – which are both savage (fear and aggression) and tender (nurture and desire) – they grab for the tender (the ‘good’ side) and blow them up all out of proportion. If they succeed in this self-aggrandising hallucination they start talking twaddle dressed up as sagacity such as: ‘There is a good that knows no evil’ or ‘There is a love that knows no opposite’ or ‘There is a compassion that sorrow has never touched’ and so on. Which means that the ‘Enlightened Beings’ advise dissociation (wherein painful reality is transformed into a bad dream) as being the most effective means to deal with all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides and the such-like. Just as a traumatised victim of an horrific and terrifying event makes the experience unreal in order to cope with the ordeal, the ‘Enlightened Beings’ have desperately done precisely this thing ... during what is sometimes called ‘the dark night of the soul’. This is because it takes nerves of steel to don such an aqua-lung and plunge deep in the stygian depths of the human psyche ... it is not for the faint of heart or the weak of knee. This is because past the human conditioning is the human condition itself ... that which caused the conditioning in the first place. *To end this condition, the deletion of blind nature’s software package which gave rise to the rudimentary animal ‘self’ is required*. This is the elimination of ‘me’ at the core of ‘being’. The complete and utter extinction of ‘being’ is the end to all the ills of humankind. [emphases added]. (Richard, Homepage). As this is on the home page of my portion of The Actual Freedom Trust web site I am being right up-front and out-in-the-open as to what is ‘the software that is running the human machine’ ... how you can interpret that as meaning the ‘so enmeshed, inter-twined’ educational system/ religious system (let alone why you would) instead of taking it at face value has got me stumped. Furthermore, all of the above is graphically spelled out in the ... um ... pretty impressive presentable format/ perfect framework/ slideshow-like ‘Introducing Actual Freedom’ presentation for those who find [quote] ‘wordy, verbose prose’ [endquote] off-putting. RESPONDENT: You have said the current software needs deleting and your method is the anti-virus software necessary to do the job, so to speak. RICHARD: As what you say I call ‘the current’ software is not only as old as humankind itself, but even predating the first humanoid, you are way, way off the mark as to what manner of deletion my discovery entails and, if I may make the observation, typical of what was made fashionable by none other than Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti. And this is because nowhere does he come even anywhere near comprehending that the root cause of all the misery and mayhem which epitomises the human condition is genetically-encoded ... rather than being caused by the conditioning (be it societal, familial, or peer-group conditioning) which he sought to remedy by starting his own religiously-orientated schools. For an example of this ignorance: (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 51, 30 September 2003). RESPONDENT: Why not have it as part of the current widespread educational system to rewire the human being for peace on earth? RICHARD: As a suggestion only: first find out what actualism is on about, and then test the actualism method for efficacy in your day-to-day life, before proffering advice as to how best it be promulgated as the third alternative to either materialism or spiritualism. ‘Tis only a suggestion, though. RICHARD: Third, what needs to happen so that it ceases ‘standing out’ as humans epitomised by malice and sorrow and starts ‘standing out’ as humans epitomised by happiness and harmlessness? RESPONDENT: There is nothing that ‘needs’ to happen. RICHARD: Except that you go on (just below) to sing to me the song which sings what does indeed need to happen. RESPONDENT: When a human being begins to realize that he/ she IS the disease of malice and sorrow, that human being will do everything possible to completely understand that disease, regardless of whatever fears are there. RICHARD: Do you not see that if a human being does not begin to realise that ‘he/ she IS the disease of malice and sorrow’ then they will never, ever ‘do everything possible to completely understand that disease, regardless of whatever fears are there’? Do you also not see that if this does not happen then all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and suicides will go on forever and a day? Do you now see that something indeed needs to happen so that the not-worthless nature of that which informs the song which you sing ceases ‘standing out’ as humans epitomised by malice and sorrow and starts ‘standing out’ as humans epitomised by happiness and harmlessness? Or are you suggesting that the not-worthless nature of that which informs the song which you sing does not have any need to care about all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides? If so, then that is the very proof which demonstrates its worthless nature. GARY: You say ‘equity and parity is the key to success’. RICHARD: Yes, the ‘theory of mind’ signifies both equity and parity to be involuntarily automatic in any social situation. [Dictionary Definition]: equity: even-handed dealing; fairness, impartiality; unbiased. [Dictionary Definition]: parity: on a par; equivalence; similarity; correspondence. The question is: what is preventing this spontaneous recognition of being fellow human beings from flowing-on into all areas in common? GARY: I don’t know what the ‘theory of mind’ is, but it seems to me that we are conditioned to automatically perceive differences and act in certain ways towards others based on that social conditioning. In other words, we are biased. RICHARD: It is deeper than socialisation ... it is a normal part of the maturation of the human brain: the ‘theory of mind’ is a term which basically denotes that human communal interaction, as contrasted to animals’ communal interaction, depends primarily upon one’s knowledge about other people’s consciousness (the recognition of a mind in other people similar to one’s own). There is more to it than just this, though: normal adult humans have a ‘theory of mind’ in that they understand that (a) other humans have wants, ideas and intentions that may differ from one’s own; (b) that desires and ideals are different from plans and actions; (c) that concepts may or may not correspond with what is actually occurring in the world. To put it simply, for an example, because one has a ‘theory of mind’ one understands that one can simultaneously (1) know that Santa Claus does not exist and (2) know that for a child the child knows that Santa Claus exists and (3) know that the child’s ‘knowing’ is actually believing. Experiments have been done in order to determine when the ‘theory of mind’ develops in children (which research is important to take personally because all adults were children before they were adults); typically, by age four to four and a half, children can basically (a) distinguish between physical and mental objects (an orange is different from the thought of an orange), (b) reason about ideas, (c) ascribe false knowing (beliefs) in others, (d) engage in pretence (deceive and cheat). Interestingly enough, it is this last point (deceit) which most of all signals the ‘theory of mind’ as having become established. Primatologists have determined that while monkeys do not have a ‘theory of mind’, chimpanzees may very well have a rudimentary ‘theory of mind’ in that they can deliberately deceive other chimpanzees (pretence) by hiding food so as to be able eat it all on their own. Incidentally, it is considered that autism is best characterised as ‘mind-blindness’; in other words, autistic individuals generally lack a ‘theory of mind’. To comprehend the importance of ‘theory of mind’, one only has to consider the task the ‘artificial intelligence’ theorists face in building a computerised model that would communicate like a human: they have to consider what kind of thoughts such a machine would have to be capable of to interact meaningfully with humans and how these kinds of thoughts could be modelled ... let alone inputting feelings. GARY: I don’t know why you say that equity and parity are involuntarily automatic in any social situation. RICHARD: Concurrent with the recognition of the other creature being a fellow human being comes a tacit ‘of course’ that one treats the other with the same consideration as one treats oneself ... it is the implicit acknowledgment of ‘similarity’ (like knows like). However, this involuntarily automatic attribution of equity and parity (which is consideration for the needs of both oneself and the other simultaneously) is, as I go on to say further below, hijacked, subverted, sabotaged. GARY: It seems quite the opposite to me. This conditioning is deep: one is trained from an early age to be obedient to authority, to do as one is told, to ‘respect’ one’s betters, etc. RICHARD: Yes ... but this is not the deepest layer of hijacking, subversion and sabotage: investigating hierarchical socialisation is relatively superficial to one who seeks to explore the human psyche in its totality. GARY: At least I was. Recognizing the baleful consequences of this social conditioning (wars, bestiality, oppression) ... RICHARD: If I may interject: social conditioning does not, of course, cause ‘wars, bestiality, oppression’ ... it is a contributing factor only. GARY: ... one first rebels or resists but then realizes one is a part of this background of conditioning and the harder one fights to resist it, the stronger it gets. In fact, one is this background, one is not separate from it. RICHARD: There is much more to one’s background than conditioning ... and a rebel only reinforces the conditioning by keeping it alive through reacting anyway. One begins to comprehend that all the different types of socialisation (peer-group conditioning, parental conditioning and societal conditioning in general) are well-meant endeavours by countless peoples over innumerable aeons to seek to curb the instinctual animal passions. Now, while most people paddle around on the surface and re-arrange the conditioning to ease their lot somewhat, some people – seeking to be free of all human conditioning – fondly imagine that by putting on a face-mask and snorkel that they have gone deep-sea diving with a scuba outfit ... deep into the human condition. They have not ... they have gone deep only into the human conditioning. When they tip upon the instinctual passions – which are both savage (fear and aggression) and tender (nurture and desire) – they grab for the tender (the ‘good’ side) and blow them up all out of proportion as an antidote, as compensating pacifiers ... and the investigation ceases. It takes nerves of steel to don such an aqua-lung and plunge deep in the stygian depths of the human psyche ... it is not for the faint of heart or the weak of knee. This is because below or behind the conditioning is the human condition itself ... that which necessitated the controls (conditioning) in the first place. Thus the conditioning can prevent the investigation of the human condition itself. * GARY: The notions of equity and parity are seemingly at the core of democratic institutions, with the idea that ‘all men are created equal’ and that there are certain ‘natural’ rights of human beings, stemming from the thinking of philosophers like John Locke. RICHARD: I questioned whether all humans are born equal ... there are talents one has which leads to an ease in the acquisition of skills that another has to struggle to master and vice versa. The rapid shuffling of the DNA at conception (before the doubling takes place) leads to a difference betwixt one foetus and another. The same applies to physical stature (muscularity, stamina and so on) which all combine to produce a staggering array of differences ... and none of this I have detailed so far has anything to do with where one is born (climate) or in what era (progress) let alone social inequality such as what class of society one is born into (educational and career opportunities) and so on. GARY: Just because there are differences between people, in strengths, abilities, aptitudes, etc., it doesn’t have to become the basis of a thorough-going inequality and mistreatment of others. RICHARD: It is important to remember, that when one questions a principle (such as equality) and its opposite (inequality) becomes obvious as a result of the question, that nothing has changed except that a belief has disappeared ... inequality was always happening anyway. GARY: I could never understand, for instance, why we want to rule others and have power over others. Sometimes my musing on this question leads to the following question: ‘what gives another the ‘right’ to tell one what to do’? But then, this may be a wrong question, because the concept of ‘right’ is embodied into the question, and as you pointed out, what is given can be taken away. RICHARD: Yes ... ‘might is right’ in the real world. * GARY: As an aside, the thinking of a Krishnamurti seems strikingly similar to the thinking of a previous philosopher, Hobbes, who maintained that human beings are basically selfish and that governments are a contract between individuals, motivated primarily by self-interest, and the corporate whole. RICHARD: Again, any philosophical thinking that starts with a false premise is going to produce an elaborately false outcome and Mr. Thomas Hobbes is no exception with his version of a ‘social contract’ theory. GARY: Yes, you are quite right. I had not seen that before but it makes sense. To say ‘this is the way it is ... human beings are basically greedy ...’, to start with an assumption like this rather than leaving the question open and starting with inquiry, as we (sometimes) do here, however imperfectly, is bound to produce a whole system based on false premises. It is an approach designed to produce a particular end. Now, I hear you saying that equity and parity are involuntarily automatic when we recognize others as our fellow human beings. RICHARD: Yes, if one says that human beings are only ‘basically greedy’ or only ‘basically selfish’ and there is nothing else ... then an investigation is stymied before it gets off the ground (for then it is all over: ‘this is a sorry world’; ‘the universe is a sick joke’; ‘life is a bitch and then you die’ ... and so on and so on). Then one has no alternative but to construct evermore elaborate coping mechanisms ... as I remarked regarding Mr. Thomas Hobbes’ version of a ‘social contract’ theory: • [Richard]: ‘the fatal flaw in his theory is that, as everyone is born into an already-existing society, they are dragooned into ‘signing’ the sick ‘social contract’ that was already here ... and nothing of worth is gained through coercion. The ‘with rights comes obligations’ central point of this enforced ‘social contract’ is the main sticking point: state rights take precedence over individual rights and individual obligations far exceeds state obligations in practice ... equity and parity are nowhere to be seen. Ergo: resentment’. (Richard, List B, Gary, 16 March 2000). GARY: The trouble is that we do not, we don’t recognize the humanity of others, we don’t see others clearly, we see sick images of others based on our conditioning, in other words, images put together by thought. RICHARD: I would question whether ‘sick images of others’ are only ‘based on our conditioning’ ... before concluding that images are only ‘put together by thought’. * GARY: So, where do equity and parity come into the picture? RICHARD: Only unilateral action will do the trick. GARY: Action as in not of thought? Care to expound? RICHARD: By ‘unilateral’ I mean that living with equity and parity is something one does entirely on one’s own ... it does not depend upon the cooperation of others. What they do is their business (as long as they comply with the legal laws and observe the social protocol, they are left alone to live their lives as wisely or as foolishly as they choose). One does not have to concern oneself about any other person’s modus operandi at all ... they can carry on being grotty if that is what turns them on. Therefore, one’s basic starting point is this: how can one live with equity and parity in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are? The integrity of intent born out of the intensity of this once-in-a-lifetime ‘starting-point’ question precipitates unilateral action which is not of ‘my’ doing once set in motion ... because, at root, it is ‘me’ who is the problem. Thus thought may or may not play a part in it depending upon the circumstances, each moment again, in one’s daily life. This ‘action’ is a neurological process occurring in the skull (specifically at the top of the brain-stem) that gathers a momentum of its own accord ... ‘me’ thinking and feeling may aid or hinder this process from time-to-time but essentially, once one sets the action in motion, the neurological process does the trick itself. It is the pure intent to live in peace and harmony (equity and parity) irregardless of other’s intentions that fuels the process. * GARY: My sense is that equity and parity do not come unless one is singularly vigilant to the violence in one’s life and in one’s relationships (of course one’s life is one’s relationships). That would be watching oneself very carefully in every situation and basically seeing every movement as it comes up. RICHARD: Yes ... one’s aggression is primal and hijacks, subverts and sabotages equity and parity time and time again. GARY: So, you are saying aggression is primal. Would you say aggression is innate, implying in-born in the human species? Or is it acquired? If it can be extinguished, as you seem to claim it has been in you, does that not imply that it has not been hard-wired into the human species, that it may have a largely acquired characteristic? RICHARD: The very fact that aggression is common to all peoples of all races, all eras, all cultures and both genders indicates that it is highly unlikely to be a ‘largely acquired characteristic’ ... such a global incidence bespeaks an innate trait. One can gain additional confirmation for this hypothesis by observing other sentient beings in the ‘animal kingdom’ ... especially those that hatch out on their own and make their own way in the world without parents or siblings or peers to condition them. Therefore, it appears to be, as you say, ‘hard-wired into the human species’ ... just as it is with all other sentient species. This is epitomised by the oft-repeated refrains ‘I am only human’ or ‘to err is to be human’ or ‘you can’t change human nature’ ... and thus many and varied coping mechanisms (conditionings) are put into place simply because peoples thus give up before they start. Which means that, by concluding that it is ‘hard-wired’, one likewise concludes that it is fixed in situ forever and a day ... and correspondingly that one is fated to be malicious and sorrowful for the remainder of one’s life. In other words: one concludes that peace is not possible on earth. But what if the instinctual passions are a ‘software package’ and not ‘hardware’? One can delete redundant ‘software’ and, if there is no ‘recycle bin’, it will never, ever re-install itself. RESPONDENT: Richard, could you summarise please? RICHARD: The single root cause of all the mayhem and misery that epitomises the human condition is the persistent feeling of being an identity inhabiting the body: an affective ‘entity’ as in a deep, abiding and profound feeling of being an occupant, a tenant, a squatter or a phantom hiding behind a façade, a mask, a persona; as a subjective emotional psychological ‘self’ and/or a passionate psychic ‘being’ (‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul) inhabiting the psyche; a deep feeling of being a ‘spirit’; a consciousness of the immanence of ‘presence’ (which exists immortally); an awareness of being an autological ‘being’ ... the realisation of ‘Being’ itself. In other words: everything you think, feel and instinctually know yourself to be ... is to be an alien in an alien world. The complete and utter extinction of ‘being’ is the end to all the ills of humankind. Becoming free of the human condition is an irrevocable occurrence, wherein the ‘lizard-brain’ mutates out of its primeval state ... but if this mutation is not allowed its completion one becomes enlightened. To become spiritually free the ego-self (‘I’ as ego) must die/ dissolve ... all genuinely enlightened beings point to a single edifying moment of awakening (with a variety of descriptions) wherein the personal self (or ‘being’) transmogrifies into the impersonal self or ‘being’ (or non-self) ... and which ‘being’ (often capitalised as ‘Being’) exists timelessly, spacelessly and formlessly. To become actually free the soul-self (‘me’ as soul) must also die/ dissolve ... the total elimination of ‘being’ (and thus ‘Being’) itself. In a word: extinction. To explain: in my investigations into life, the universe and what it is to be a human being living in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are I first started by examining thought, thoughts and thinking ... then very soon moved on to examining feelings (first the emotions and then the deeper feelings). When I dug down into these passions and calentures (into the core of ‘my’ being then into ‘being’ itself) I stumbled across the instincts ... and found the origin of not only the affective faculty but the psyche itself. I found ‘me’ at the core of ‘being’ ... which is the instinctual rudimentary animal self common to all sentient beings (otherwise mistakenly known as the ‘original face’ and is what gives rise to the feeling of ‘oneness’ with all other sentient beings). It is a very, very ancient genetic memory ... but hoariness does not make it automatically wise, however, despite desperate belief to the contrary. Being a ‘self’ is because the only way into this world of people, things and events is via the human spermatozoa fertilising the human ova ... thus every human being is endowed, by blind nature, with the basic instinctual passions of fear and aggression and nurture and desire. Thus ‘I’ am the end-point of myriads of survivors passing on their genes. ‘I’ am the product of the ‘success story’ of blind nature’s fear and aggression and nurture and desire. Being born of the biologically inherited instincts genetically encoded in the germ cells of the spermatozoa and the ova, ‘I’ am – genetically – umpteen tens of thousands of years old ... ‘my’ origins are lost in the mists of pre-history. ‘I’ am so anciently old that ‘I’ may well have always existed ... carried along on the reproductive cell-line, over countless millennia, from generation to generation. And ‘I’ am thus passed on into an inconceivably open-ended and hereditably transmissible future. In other words: ‘I’ am fear and fear is ‘me’ and ‘I’ am aggression and aggression is ‘me’ and ‘I’ am nurture and nurture is ‘me’ and ‘I’ am desire and desire is ‘me’. These passions are the very energy source of the rudimentary animal self ... the base consciousness of ‘self’ and ‘other’ that all sentient beings have. The human animal – with its unique ability to be aware of its own death – transforms this ‘reptilian brain’ rudimentary core of ‘being’ (an animal ‘self’) into being a feeling ‘me’ (as soul in the heart) and the ‘feeler’ then infiltrates into thought to become the ‘thinker’ ... a thinking ‘I’ (as ego in the head). No other animal can do this. That this process is aided and abetted by the human beings who were already on this planet when one was born – which is conditioning and programming and is part and parcel of the socialising process – is but the tip of the ice-burg and not the main issue at all. All the different types of conditioning are well-meant endeavours by countless peoples over countless aeons to seek to curb the instinctual passions. Now, while most people paddle around on the surface and re-arrange the conditioning to ease their lot somewhat, some people – seeking to be free of all human conditioning – fondly imagine that by putting on a face-mask and snorkel that they have gone deep-sea diving with a scuba outfit ... deep into the human condition. They have not ... they have gone deep only into the human conditioning. When they tip upon the instincts – which are both savage (fear and aggression) and tender (nurture and desire) – they grab for the tender (the ‘good’ side) and blow them up all out of proportion. If they succeed in this self-aggrandising hallucination they start talking twaddle dressed up as sagacity such as: ‘There is a good that knows no evil’ or ‘There is a love that knows no opposite’ or ‘There is a compassion that sorrow has never touched’ and so on. This is because it takes nerves of steel to don such an aqua-lung and plunge deep in the stygian depths of the human psyche ... it is not for the faint of heart or the weak of knee. This is because past the conditioning is the human condition itself ... which caused the conditioning. To end this condition, the deletion of blind nature’s software package which gave rise to the rudimentary animal ‘self’ is required. This is the extinction of ‘me’ at the core of ‘being’. Which means that ‘being’ itself expires ... thus the physical cause necessitates a physical solution (the extinction of the instinctual ‘being’ itself) and will not eventuate unless the temporary absence or abeyance of the physically inherited cause (a genetically inherited instinctual animal ‘self’) which created the problem of the human condition is intimately experienced, remembered and activated. This peak experience is known as a pure consciousness experience (PCE) and is essential to the process of freeing oneself from one’s fate and attaining to one’s destiny. * RESPONDENT: Richard, could you summarise it even more? RICHARD: The human condition, as is epitomised by all the misery and mayhem throughout human history due to each and every human being nursing malice and sorrow to their bosom, has a single root cause: the persistent feeling of being but an identity – a ‘being’ – inhabiting the body. The solution to all the ills of humankind requires one to step out of the grim and glum ‘real world’ (the everyday ‘reality’ for 6.0 billion peoples pasted as a veneer over the pristine and consummate actual world by the affective faculty) into the actual world of the sensate faculty as is evidenced in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) ... and leave ‘yourself’ behind in that blood-soaked ‘Land Of Lament’ where ‘you’ belong. The mystics have been transmogrifying the real world ‘reality’ into a ‘True Reality’ via the epiphenomenal imaginative/ intuitive facility born of the psyche (which is formed by the instinctual passions genetically endowed by blind nature for survival purposes) for millennia. Such dissociation is a psychotic sickness culturally institutionalised into a head-in-the-sand escapist ‘solution’ to all the ills of humankind ... hence the divine perpetuation of all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides and the such-like across the millennia through a belief in karma or samsara or some-such metaphysical reason being the cause of such aberrant behaviour (that people need to be raped etc., because they raped in a supposed past-life and so on). Mysticism is nothing more and nothing less than a frantic coping-mechanism, institutionalised into a cultural metaphysics over thousands and thousands of years, known psychiatrically as ‘dissociation’ ... especially if accompanied by dissociative states such as ‘derealisation’ and ‘alternate personality disorder’ and others. It is also known as ‘disassociation’, or ‘disassociative identity disorder’ and dissociative reactions are attempts to escape from excessive trauma tension and anxiety by separating off parts of personality function from the rest of cognition as an attempt to isolate something that arouses anxiety and gain distance from it. For example, in everyday life, mild and temporary dissociation, sometimes hard to distinguish from repression and isolation, is a relatively common and normal device used to escape from severe emotional tension and anxiety. Temporary episodes of transient estrangement, depersonalisation and derealisation are often experienced by normal persons when they first feel the initial impact of bad news, for instance. Everything suddenly looks strange and different; things seem unnatural and distant; events can be indistinct and vaporous; often the person feels that they themselves are unreal and everything takes on a dream-like quality. Dissociation becomes abnormal when the once mild or transient expedient becomes too intense, lasts too long, or escapes from a person’s control ... and leads to a separation from the surroundings which seriously disturbs object relations. In object estrangement the once familiar world of ordinary objects – the world of people, things and events – seems to have undergone a disturbing and often indescribable change. I am fully conversant with that hallucinogenic and delusory ‘Timeless and Spaceless and Formless’ realm from my own intimate experience over eleven years ... its understanding is vital if there is to be peace-on-earth. RESPONDENT: Thinking buffers the ‘freedom from the human condition’. Richard said: ‘thought, thoughts and thinking are vital for both individual and communal well-being’. This is absolutely untrue. RICHARD: The human animal is the only species so far to have evolved the amazing of faculty of intelligence (the cognitive ability to recognise, remember, compare, appraise, reflect and propose considered action for beneficial reasons). This contemplative ability is what sets the human animal apart from all other animals and thought, thoughts and thinking are vital for both individual and communal well-being in that only the human animal can investigate its own instinctual passions with the view to enabling both personal and collective salubrity ... no other animal can do this. The human animal is nature in action ... and nature is nothing more or less than carbon-based life-forms. The process of evolution is such that the species most fitted to their environment prosper and those no longer fitted languish. This process of nature is such that if the human animal does not mutate – which mutation is a process of nature – there is a fair chance that the human species will kill itself off after many more abysmal trials and tribulations. Which means that, even though the carbon-based life-form called human beings are the only aspect of nature to so far evolve intelligence, if the intelligence thus bestowed is not used appropriately then all the long evolutionary process will have come to naught. Not that this is of any concern to nature ... another carbon-based life-form will eventually evolve intelligence in the fullness of time and maybe that carbon-based life-form will not be so stupefied as the carbon-based life-form as is epitomised by those who scorn the very faculty of investigation which enables them to be able to scorn it in the first place. Nature has all the time in the universe to manifest perfection ... and that is infinite time. Whereas each human being has perhaps seventy-eighty odd years. RESPONDENT: First of all I like to notice that I have no idea what the impact of this petition at this point has had in the cyber world let alone the long term consequences only time will tell. So say if over the next days a change in the political weather should happen and if this is a change that I have anticipated on (hoped for) it is fair that say that this me (as a flesh body phenomenon) is moving into a chosen direction and the manifestation as such a phenomenon is the result of sequential events of which some are the result of carefully made choices to either act or not act. So ... to put It more clearly the action has the intent to explore the possibility of the existence in which a Universe exists where the Agenda of the warlords is effectively destroyed and/or hindered and replaced with an agenda that I think might contain a better selection of options for global change in other words more fun to be in that reality for me and the people I am with and the next generation. RICHARD: You seem to be using the word ‘warlords’ as a pejorative term for the currently pro-war member nations (those presently advocating the resumption of one specific war) of the Security Council of the United Nations whereas I was being entirely even-handed in my characterisation ... it was a categorical reference to all of the member nations – and particularly the five nations which have a permanent position with the power of veto – which includes those currently proposing an anti-war (presently opposed to the resumption of one specific war) resolution. And I use the term ‘warlords’ advisedly (since time immemorial the victors of armed conflict have sat around campfires arguing the pros and cons of their next move) and the ... um ... the hereditary five, manipulating and manoeuvring for supremacy in their elite group just as they have done for 50-plus years, are but the victors of the last major conflict which engulfed much of the world. Technological advancements have changed the setting (central heating renders campfires redundant) but nothing else has changed ... and unless one fully comprehends that the human world, at root, runs on fear and is ruled by physical force/ restraint – anyone who has been a child will know this and anyone who is, or has been, a parent/ guardian will know this twice over – one may become drawn into arguing the pros and cons of their next move oneself and thus lose sight of how peace-on-earth is enabled. This is how I have described the human condition: • [Richard]: ‘The term ‘Human Condition’ is a well-established philosophical term that refers to the situation that all human beings find themselves in when they emerge here as babies. The term refers to the contrary and perverse nature of all peoples of all races and all cultures. There is ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in everyone ... all humans have a ‘dark side’ to their nature and a ‘light side’. The battle betwixt ‘Good and Evil’ has raged down through the centuries and it requires constant vigilance lest evil gets the upper hand. Morals and ethics seek to control the wayward self that lurks deep within the human breast ... and some semblance of what is called ‘peace’ prevails for the main. Where morality and ethicality fails to curb the ‘savage beast’, law and order is maintained ... at the point of a gun. (Richard, Homepage). It is the human condition which is being displayed on television screens for all the world to see. RESPONDENT: I have some doubts regarding the term ‘Human Condition’ ... you say: [quote] ‘The Human Condition is a term that refers to the situation that all human beings find themselves in when they emerge here as babies. The term refers to the contrary and perverse nature of all peoples of all races and all cultures’. [endquote]. I don’t see the relation between the two sentences ... does the term mean the worldview prior to ‘human conditioning’ (which I understand)? RICHARD: No … the term means the (intrinsic) state of being prior to human conditioning. RESPONDENT: Is ‘human nature’ an equivalent term? RICHARD: Yes … as in such popular expressions as ‘you can’t change human nature’. RESPONDENT: [quote] ‘There is ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in everyone ... all humans have a ‘dark side’ to their nature and a ‘light side’. [endquote]. The ‘good’ people (observing from outside) seem to be well behaved in most of the circumstances and show no/ little signs of ‘bad’ ... I am at a loss validating this statement (unless I use my own self). RICHARD: Such terms refer to the affective impulses characterised, for the sake of simplicity, as malice and sorrow (the ‘dark side’) and their antidotal pacifiers love and compassion (the ‘light side’): as I am yet to see, hear about, or read of, someone – anyone – who shows no sign whatsoever of being malicious and sorrowful (and being loving and compassionate is a sure sign) I do look askance at your observation. RESPONDENT: Now you go on and say your ‘experiences’ after the 11 years of enlightenment is ‘beyond that (that which the masters of the different traditions speak of)’. I, of course, cannot dispute that but ... RICHARD: If I might stop you just there, before the headiness which the dismissive power a negative conjunction can invoke puts you into another place, so as to ask the outstanding question? Why do you immediately (or maybe even automatically) want to dispute that? Is there not sufficient information on The Actual Freedom Trust web site to establish a prima facie case worthy of further investigation (rather than capricious dismissal)? Is it really beyond the stretch of credibility to even entertain the possibility that spiritual enlightenment/ mystical awakenment/ self-realisation not only can be gone beyond but needs to be? Has not the evidence of the aeons abundantly demonstrated that the religious/ spiritual/ mystical/ metaphysical solution to all the ills of humankind has not, is not, and will not deliver peace on earth? Have not the millions upon millions – if not billions – of earnest, decent, and otherwise intelligent, peoples assiduously practicing same amply shown that those tried and true solutions are the tried and failed? There is as much anguish and animosity, as much misery and mayhem, nowadays as there was back then ... when is enough enough? Intelligence in action is the acknowledgement that something which has not produced the goods, despite at least 3,000-5,000 years for it to work its wisdom in, is never going to deliver on its spurious promise and that it is high time to clear the work-bench and start afresh ... to learn from those that have gone before and move on. Just for starters: one needs to fully acknowledge the biological imperative (the instinctual passions) which are the root cause of all the ills of humankind. The genetically inherited passions (such as fear and aggression and nurture and desire) give rise to malice and sorrow and their antidotal pacifiers love and compassion: these negative and positive feelings are intrinsically connected and constitute what is known as ‘The Human Condition’. The term ‘Human Condition’ is a well-established philosophical term that refers to the situation that all human beings find themselves in when they emerge here as babies. The term refers to the contrary and perverse nature of all peoples of all races and all cultures. There is ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in everyone ... all humans have a ‘dark side’ to their nature and a ‘light side’. The battle betwixt ‘Good and Evil’ has raged down through the centuries and it requires constant vigilance lest evil gets the upper hand. Morals and ethics seek to control the wayward self that lurks deep within the human breast ... and some semblance of what is called ‘peace’ prevails for the main. Where morality and ethicality fails to curb the ‘savage beast’, law and order is maintained ... at the point of a gun. The ending of malice and sorrow, and their antidotal pacifiers love and compassion, involves getting one’s head out of the clouds – and beyond – and coming down-to-earth where the flesh and blood bodies called human beings actually live. Obviously, peace on earth can only be found here in space and now in time as this material body. Then the question is: is it possible to be free of the human condition, here on earth, in this life-time, as this flesh and blood body? Which means: how on earth can one live happily and harmlessly, in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are, whilst one nurses malice and sorrow, and their antidotal pacifiers love and compassion, in one’s bosom? RICHARD: As for seeing that it could be difficult for one in the ‘real’ world to see their life as pathetic from within: from what I recall the entity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago could see – albeit dimly – that ‘his’ existence was indeed pathetic (as in emotional and passional and liable to suffer) and that, therefore, it was indeed pathetic (as in either miserably inadequate, feeble or useless) ... and my conversations with various peoples these days show that mostly they too can see it (even if also somewhat dimly to start off with) although there are those who decline to acknowledge it for whatever reason. RESPONDENT: I think my confusion of your meaning here was a result of thinking you meant that the existence of a ‘self’ is ‘pathetic’ as in miserably inadequate, feeble, or useless – as in (my paraphrase) meaningless and pointless. Now you have clarified in a previous post regarding the ‘meaning of life’ that you are certainly not saying that a life as a ‘human’ is meaningless or pointless (which by the way I was having a predictably hard time reconciling with an ability to be ‘reasonably happy’). It is indeed quite easy for me to see that ‘my’ life is pathetic (as in emotional and passional and liable to suffer) – but it doesn’t seem to follow for me that it is then pointless or useless. (That sort of interpretation is what would be hard to see by a ‘human’.) Now your reference that you were seeing this inference only ‘dimly’ means to me that you must mean the conclusion was based on a dim glimpse of actual freedom and perfection. So you must be saying that ‘my’ existence is pathetic (as in miserably inadequate, feeble, or useless) merely because it is possible to be rid of the self and in fact ‘I’ am blocking the meaning of life from being apparent. So I take it that this second sense of pathetic would be virtually interchangeable with ‘superfluous, redundant, or unnecessary, or in the way’, and so forth. So you could say (spelled out) that ‘I’ am miserably inadequate for total fulfilment and peace-on-earth, a feeble excuse for perfection, and useless as in superfluous or ‘blocking’ the meaning of life. Is this fairly accurate? RICHARD: Yes ... it is in regards to issues of an ultimate nature (such as total fulfilment, peace-on-earth, perfection, meaning of life) where it can be seen – if only dimly to start off with – that even ‘my’ best endeavours (via personal growth, social change, political reform and so on) are miserably inadequate or feeble or useless. Seeing that the word ‘useless’ has joined the list of other ‘-less’ words this may be an opportune moment to re-visit an earlier e-mail: • [Respondent]: ‘... I don’t take it you think that it is ‘pointless’ for a person who is still ‘human’ to live? • [Richard]: ‘No, not at all ... but what is indeed pointless is to search for the meaning of life in the ‘real world’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27b, 16 July 2002). I could have as easily said that it is useless, worthless, meaningless, or any other word of that ilk, to try to find the meaning of life in the ‘real world’ ... just as I could have said that it is useless, worthless, meaningless, pointless, etcetera, to seek to establish peace on earth whilst remaining ‘human’. In short: no ultimate solution to the human condition can be found in the ‘real world’. * RICHARD: As for your comment regarding comparison: whenever I discuss these matters with my fellow human beings there is indeed always a comparison with life in the ‘real’ world as contrasted to life in the actual world ... it is what I came onto the internet for. RESPONDENT: Yes, I have no problem with comparison – it would be pointless not to compare the two. What would be pointless is render those in virtual and actual freedom as the only people on the planet who have a life worth living. And this is indeed what I was beginning to wonder if you were saying is the case. What is indeed difficult to swallow is that one’s life is useless – as in pointless or meaningless. It would hardly seem worthwhile to actualise an actual freedom amongst others whose lives are pointless or meaningless anyway. Writing this out makes this interpretation look pretty silly, but it also doesn’t seem so far-fetched when one’s life is called ‘pathetic’ or ‘useless’. RICHARD: As an actual freedom is complete unto itself it would not matter that one was living ‘amongst others whose lives are pointless or meaningless’ (if that were to be the case which it is not) if only because an actual intimacy is not dependent upon either reciprocation or cooperation. There is much that is meaningful or worthwhile in normal human life ... as I have already touched upon in an earlier e-mail: • [Respondent]: ‘... what about the meanings that we ‘humans’ experience on a daily basis? Like the ‘point’ of something – for example, the point of going to the grocery store is to get groceries to sustain oneself. • [Richard]: ‘I can concur with what you say here ... sustaining oneself (and one’s family if there is one) is certainly not pointless. Furthermore there are many meaningful experiences in everyday life: providing shelter (building, buying or renting a home); being married (aka being in a relationship); raising a family (preparing children for adult life); having a career (job satisfaction); achieving something (successfully pursuing a hobby) and so on. However, to rely upon transient experience to provide an enduring meaning to life is to invite disappointment. • [Respondent]: ‘I can see that the ‘meaning’ that ‘I’ experience would be only an illusion of ‘the secret to life’ – but when you say that any meaning other than the actual meaning is meaningless – does that mean our lives are ‘pointless’? • [Richard]: ‘No ... but again what is certainly pointless is to expect to find the secret to life in the ‘real world’. • [Respondent]: ‘Isn’t there relative meaning (real)?? • [Richard]: ‘Such relative meaning as to be found in the everyday experiences (as discussed above) ... yes. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27b, 16 July 2002). If this relative/ ultimate issue is now clarified satisfactorily I will take this opportunity to point out that there is, however, one area where ‘I’ am not useless (in the ultimate sense) for it is only ‘me’ who can enable both the meaning of life and the already always existing peace-on-earth into becoming apparent ... by either going into abeyance (as in a pure consciousness experience) or by altruistic ‘self’-immolation (as in an actual freedom from the human condition). The (future) quality of human life is all in ‘my’ hands. * RESPONDENT: ... let’s take an example where I am in a car accident and I am deemed ‘guilty’. Now, in this case I am guilty because I am at fault – I ‘caused’ the accident. Yet it would seem to do no good whatsoever for me to blame myself for being the guilty party in the accident. Rather it would be better for me to understand the causes of my negligence and work towards correcting it. I take it you are saying something similar about being ‘guilty at conception’. It is not my fault that I am born as a ‘being’. And it doesn’t help to wallow in feeling guilty, rather one should understand how to rectify one’s negligence and flawed nature. A question arises about this sort of guilt. Does it help to feel guilty? RICHARD: No ... which is the whole point of realising that it is not ‘my’ fault and that ‘I’ am not to blame: it makes no more sense to feel guilty about being born with the human condition in situ than it does to feel guilty about the colour of one’s skin, for example, or any other characteristic which is determined at conception. The same would apply to feeling shame. It is pertinent to point out at this stage that I am not advocating immorality but rather the elimination of the cause of that which requires morality to keep in check ... then one is automatically amoral (neither moral nor immoral). In a word: innocent. RESPONDENT: No one is to blame, so I’m assuming it doesn’t really help to ‘feel guilty’ – so you are not trying to put a ‘guilt trip’ on anyone, rather pointing out the insalubrity of being a ‘being’. RICHARD: I am not only pointing out the insalubrity of being a ‘being’ but also the social reprehensibility of being insalubrious. RESPONDENT: I find that feeling guilt doesn’t help me at all to rectify anything, but seeing the silliness of something and aiming to be more sensible does indeed help. Maybe what is happening here is that you are using language like ‘reprehensible’ and ‘guilty’ and ‘blameworthy’ and ‘culpable’ where all these words normally imply a feeling of guilt – then you come back and say that no-one is to blame – which for me, is a bit confusing. RICHARD: All I mean by the word guilty in the phrase ‘guilty at conception’ is not-innocent ... and I only use the word because so many people over the years have told me that children are born innocent and that adults have lost their childhood innocence (the Tabula Rasa theory). I see that I first used the term ‘guilty at conception’ – and in that very context – in ‘Richard’s Journal’ many years ago: • ‘None of the supposed ‘innocence of children’ comes anywhere near to the matchless purity of the innocence of the actual. Nor does the assumed ‘innocence’ in the status generously and wrongly attributed to those old men, women and children classified as ‘innocent victims of war’; for these ‘victims’ are all guilty of instinctive anger and vicious urges themselves. As much as one might be sensitively considerate about their suffering, they cannot be labelled as innocent whilst they remain being ‘human’. *They are not to blame: nobody is born innocent, all humans are already ‘guilty’ at conception*. Fear and aggression and nurture and desire are built into the ‘Human Condition’ ... this is the ‘human nature’ that is said ‘cannot be changed’. These intrinsic urges and drives are known as the ‘instinct for survival’. [emphasis added]. (pages 127-7, ‘Richard’s Journal’; ©1997, The Actual Freedom Trust). Not only did I preface it with ‘they are not to blame’ but I see that I even put the word ‘guilty’ in scare quotes to indicate that I did not mean it in the normal sense (a practice which I seem to have later dropped). * RESPONDENT: ... Rather than leave my conclusion vague, let me summarize. I agree that being a ‘being’ is ‘personally insalubrious’ – as in being a much better decision for one’s own and other’s sake(s) to self-immolate. One is better off whittling away at the social identity and instinctual passions. RICHARD: I do not see how you can draw the conclusion that it is a much better decision for ‘other’s sake(s)’ from the term ‘personally insalubrious’ only ... if there be no term referring to the communal benefit it would be (correctly) seen as being a selfish enterprise to ‘self’-immolate for personal reasons alone. Besides which the necessary ingredient for ‘self’-immolation – altruism – would be missing thus rendering any such endeavour powerless and doomed to failure from the start. I mean it when I say that, with the pristine nature of peace-on-earth being impeccable, nothing dirty can get in. RESPONDENT: Personally, I would stay away from phrases like ‘guilty at conception’ or ‘socially reprehensible’ to describe human nature because they imply blame. RICHARD: I am well aware that words such as ‘guilty’ and ‘reprehensible’ have blaming implications ... and I invite you to undertake the exercise in futility of putting the blame where it rightly belongs (onto blind nature) so that you can see for yourself how human beings have been unnecessarily berating themselves since time immemorial for something they are simply not to blame for. What I have observed over many years is that a normal person has a propensity to blame – to find fault rather than to find causes – when it comes to dealing with the human condition ... if for no other reason than that finding the cause means the end of ‘me’ (or the beginning of the end of ‘me’). Whereas endlessly repeating mea culpa keeps ‘me’ in existence. RESPONDENT: For me, ‘guilty’ is merely a term pointing to a person who caused something (also it is a legal term) – but it has much room for confusion, since one must qualify how it is possible to be ‘guilty’ without ‘blame’. RICHARD: I am at a loss to see how my qualification has ‘much room for confusion’ as I am quite specific about what I mean by the term ‘guilty at conception’ (meaning not innocent at conception let alone born innocent) ... and even without qualification surely it is obvious that one is not personally to blame for that which is determined at conception? RESPONDENT: ‘Reprehensible’ to me carries moral underpinnings. RICHARD: A lot of words can carry ‘moral underpinnings’ – after all they were coined by peoples trapped within the human condition without knowing how or why – yet even so I would rather stay with existing words rather than coining new words. RESPONDENT: There are indeed atrocious and not so atrocious acts and vibes that might be termed ‘reprehensible’, but I don’t see the value in saying that we are ‘socially reprehensible’ at birth or ‘guilty at conception’. RICHARD: Just for starters the value of it lies in setting the record straight in regards the erroneous claims that children are born innocent (and thus irreprehensible) ... which means it has value inasmuch one will cease reaching back into childhood – or back into some projected ‘Golden Age’ – for that which is simply not there ... innocence (and hence irreprehensibility) is entirely new to human history and exists only in the actual world. It has value in that the way is cleared to see what has been just here right now all along. * RESPONDENT: Richard, I have been considering what you mean by the following statement – (located at listb37): [Richard] ‘I was normal for 34 years ... and it is the pits; and because (b) I was abnormal for 11 years ... and it sucks’. [endquote]. I have a lot of experience being normal – so I have a general idea of why you say being normal is ‘the pits’, but I’m perplexed why you say that your period of enlightenment ‘sucks’. Taking a stab at it – being ‘normal’ is ‘the pits’ because of the human condition – bickering, arguing, fighting, unreasonableness, debilitating feelings and so forth. Yet it’s possible that humans find a reasonable amount of happiness even within the human condition – evidenced by the fact that people don’t walk around in ‘the pits’ (emotionally) all the time. Most people in the ‘real’ world that are ‘normal’ would not say their life is ‘the pits’. Why is there a discrepancy between how ‘normal’ people evaluate being ‘normal’ (mostly pretty good, but sometimes ‘the pits’) and how you evaluate being ‘normal?’ Thinking about this myself, I’m wondering if the discrepancy is due to the fact that ‘normal’ people feel out the meaning and value of their lives – that is, they get a sense of it’s value via feeling – which can feel wonderful at times – though certainly not unmixed with feelings of sorrow and malice, and that your statement about being ‘normal’ as ‘the pits’ is based upon factual evaluation – that much of human life consists in bickering, arguing, fighting, fear and aggression – and that peace on earth is nowhere to be found? So that when you say that being ‘normal’ is ‘the pits’ – you don’t mean that each ‘normal’ person feels their life to be ‘the pits’, but if they were only to look at it accurately and factually, they would see it as ‘the pits’ and look for something much better? In other words, it appears you are not using the term ‘the pits’ in an affective or emotional connotation, but as a factual evaluation (non-affective). Is this basically correct? I would appreciate if you would explain further. Also, since you say that being enlightened ‘sucks’, precisely what do you mean by that? Are you referring specifically to the quality of enlightenment – which I understand is supposed to be quite wonderful, even glorious I think you’ve called it – or are you referring specifically to the ‘inflated’ and ‘vain-gloriousness’ of it? Precisely, what sucks about being enlightened? My current investigation consists in unravelling many of my misconceptions I originally had about actualism. Hanging around for the last almost two years has given me ample opportunity to reflect on the kinds of conversations that happen on this mailing list and why there is such a ‘divide’ and often an inability to understand what is being written as a factual report – what is said is so often taken quite personally or different from the intention behind the words (the current discussion about the uniqueness of an actual freedom being a case in point). There were many things that I encountered that gave me trouble, personally. Most of those have been cleared up now, but one of those that has given me trouble is this evaluation of being ‘normal’ as ‘the pits’. My trouble has taken a few different forms: 1) I have two children and am concerned for their well-being – so I have to come to terms with both the importance of actualism for myself and them, as well as be ok with them doing whatever they want with it – which means that I have to willing raise my kids in a world where there is a good possibility that they will spend most or all their years in the ‘normal’ world which you call ‘the pits’. The best I can do is give them an opportunity to be free. 2) Living in the world with other ‘normal’ humans and seeing their lives as ‘the pits’ can be gut-wrenching at times. 3) The term ‘the pits’ can be taken as an affective term – meaning that every ‘normal’ person walks around basically miserable and depressed all the time – which conflicts with my own experience – so this can create a sort of cognitive dissonance. If the phrase ‘the pits’ is taken as evaluative only, it can be seen that being ‘normal’ can be ‘the pits’ – yet one can feel one’s life to be pretty good, in spite of it. RICHARD: When I reviewed the exchange where the quote of mine comes from I see it was in response to a question about sanity/ insanity and why I was looking to go beyond being both a normal being and an abnormal being in the context of a discussion about the extent and range of other human beings’ experience and solutions (specifically psychology/ psychiatry and philosophy/ spirituality) and the failure of such fields of human endeavour to deliver an actual freedom from the human condition. I generally use modern-day expressive colloquialisms, such as ‘the pits’ and ‘it sucks’, so as to emphasise that there is something far, far better right under everybody’s nose, as it were, by thus vividly drawing attention to the fact that the habituated settling for second-best – as in the ‘you can’t change human nature’ factoid for instance – has desensitised people to the suffering which epitomises the human condition ... to the extent that wisdom such as ‘suffering is good for you’ is oft-times sagely proffered (whereas in my experience the only good thing about suffering is when it comes to an end, permanently). Now, being normal is the pits only in comparison with being actually free from the human condition (just as being abnormal sucks only in contrast to an actual freedom from the human condition) and when I was a normal being, for 34 years, I lived what I then called a great life – it was not the pits by any description back then as I lived such a life to the full (with quite an adventurous lifestyle) – and when I was an abnormal being, for 11 years, I lived what I then called a glorious life ... and neither did it suck at the time as I lived that life to the full as well (with an even more adventurous lifestyle). Yet I could not deny that all the while there must be/ surely was something better, far better, than either the great life or the glorious life – thus I would not, could not, and did not, settle for second best – and that is precisely what I am conveying to my fellow human beings: whatever you do, do not ever settle for second best. For the best is just here, right now, where it already has been, all along, and always will be. •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• P.S.: It is the pits to nurse malice and sorrow to one’s bosom, period, and it sucks to keep on nursing malice and sorrow to one’s bosom, so as to activate their antidotal pacifiers love and compassion, and pretend they are not still there whilst proclaiming the pacifistic antidotes to be the solution to all the ills of humankind. •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• RETURN TO RICHARD’S SELECTED CORRESPONDENCE INDEX RICHARD’S HOME PAGE 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- . All Rights Reserved. Disclaimer and Use Restrictions and Guarantee of Authenticity