Please note that Peter’s correspondence below was written by the feeling-being ‘Peter’ while ‘he’ lived in a pragmatic (methodological), still-in-control/same-way-of-being Virtual Freedom before becoming actually free.
Selected Correspondence Peter What is Actual Freedom RESPONDENT: I do want to bring up a concern that has been going over and over in my mind. I don’t know what to do with it ... so I’ll just spit it out and maybe it will dissolve in the ethers of cyberspace! Here it is... Richard claims to be the first one on the planet to experience Actual Freedom: How can he or anyone know this to be a fact? PETER: Well, for a start there is no evidence to the contrary. Richard himself has done a good deal of trolling through the writings of others and all he has ever found is evidence of people who have experienced a spiritual freedom of the soul and not an actual freedom from the soul. I have also satisfied myself that this is so by my own investigations – I remember at one stage realizing that not only was Richard the only one who was actually free of the human condition, he was also the only genuine atheist on the planet. In other words I take it as a reasonable assumption of fact because there is, thus far, not a skerrick of empirical evidence to the contrary. RESPONDENT: Maybe there was a culture eons ago that discovered this ... maybe just one person ... and maybe the culture was in no way receptive to Actual Freedom ... so this individual kept it to his or her self. PETER: Contrary to popular belief, speculations such as ‘maybes’ or ‘what ifs’ are not empirical evidence – no matter how many speculations or how many speculators there are. I don’t know whether your reference to ‘a culture eons ago’ refers to the widely-held notion that there was somehow a Golden Age or that at sometime, somewhere on the planet, there existed a peaceful tribe of uncorrupted innocents. If so, there is no evidence that supports this notion in any way – the archaeological and anthropological evidence is that all tribes and all cultures were deeply fear-ridden, dominated by superstition, enraptured in mythology, fiercely territorial, and so on. I fail to see such tribes and cultures as being fertile ground for someone to be able to take the time and make the effort to become free of malice and sorrow. The other notion – that maybe someone became free of the human condition and kept it to his self or her self – has been floated before but it is my experience that this theory lacks any credibility – simply because the intent needed to become free of the human condition is pure in that one does it not only for this body but for ever other body. Or to put it another way, the very process of wanting to become harmless is motivated by a genuine concern and caring for all of one’s fellow human beings and this alone makes the idea of keeping the discovery of an actual freedom to oneself a red herring. RESPONDENT: You said: ... he (Richard) was also the only genuine atheist on the planet. In other words I take it as a reasonable assumption of fact because there is, thus far, not a skerrick of empirical evidence to the contrary. The problem is that a reasonable assumption of fact is still not a fact. PETER: I experientially understood that Richard was the only (genuine) atheist on the planet when I had a pure consciousness experience of the actual world – the physical-only world that has no room in it for any meta-physical entity, force or energy. Atheist : 1. A person who denies or disbelieves the existence of God or gods. Opp. Theist. 2. A person who denies God morally; a godless person. Oxford Dictionary Richard neither believes nor disbelieves the existence of Gods or gods – he permanently lives in the actual world where there are no Gods or gods. In other words he is a genuine atheist not a philosophical atheist, or an agnostic, and nor is he in denial. I realize the semanticists and pedantocrats on the list will have a field day with my use of word atheist – I thought it meant someone who has no beliefs in Gods or anything metaphysical – but it appears that at least some on the list had no trouble in understanding my meaning. By the way, I see the rumour that Vineeto said Richard was the only atheist on the planet has taken hold, but in an effort to lay it to rest before it gathers even more legs and becomes a factoid, I offer the following piece from my journal. [Peter]: ‘I was looking for evidence and facts – not hopes or beliefs. The case for the defence was definitely not looking good, but I still found myself defending at least something of the spiritual and hanging on grimly. Surely there was a ‘Something’ else? Was it possible that I, and everyone else on earth up until now, had got it wrong and that only Richard was right? I had been reading widely throughout this time to check out the facts of what Richard was saying and what I found was astounding. I found that the whole of philosophy, psychology, sociology, anthropology, astronomy, physics, indeed all of man’s knowledge, and wisdom is based on an underlying assumption of a ‘something more’ than the physical universe. A belief in the meta-physical permeates all human thinking and wisdom. If one eliminated this assumption or belief the whole lot comes crashing down like those card stacks I used to make as a kid. Then it all started to make sense to me, to fit the facts – everyone has got it 180 degrees wrong – everyone! There has been no actual evidence nor factual proof after thousands of years to support the belief that there is a God or a Something else. The cry in the churches, temples, ashrams and satsang halls is still one of trust, faith and hope to maintain the belief in a Something else. It was as though I was able to begin to see through the whole charade and fantasy of the spirit-ual world – to be able to see things from another perspective. It was like a mist or a veil clearing. It was then that I realised that Richard was the only atheist I had met and seemingly the only one that has ever been.’ Peter’s Journal, God RESPONDENT: From what you and Richard say ... you are both well-read and experienced in many spiritual circles. There are, however, many teachers who’s words have not been published and are relatively unknown. Given this fact ... PETER: Given that you claim this to be a given fact – perhaps you could supply some names of these relatively unknown teachers whose words have not been published in order that we can all check them out. Thus far, many people have made the claim that there are other teachers who are talking about an actual freedom from the human condition and that there are other methods that offer a way to become actually free from the human condition and all of the claims have thus far proved to be bogus – including the most recent to this list. RESPONDENT: Given this fact ... it still seems quite a stretch for Richard to make these claims ... Richard could only make this claim as genuine fact if he had read everything that had ever been written and has somehow eavesdropped on every teaching that had ever been heard ... and examined the result of that teaching ... to see if the fruit was ‘actual’. PETER: I think Richard has since directly addressed this matter but I would re-iterate that I never had any trouble at all with his claim. But then again, I do acknowledge that I am naïve. RESPONDENT: Actualism may be genuine and real ... rather actual. PETER: I’ll pass on that one. The statement makes no sense to me whatsoever. RESPONDENT: I am applying the process ... time will tell. I just have an issue with these claims ... which are similar to so many other carrots that have been dangled in the past. PETER: The only proof ultimately worthwhile is one’s own experiential evidence that it is so. I found naiveté was the key to remaining open to taking Richards claim being genuine and being able to see ‘my’ doubts to be precisely what they were – ‘my’ doubts. It was then that I discovered that my doubtful feelings have their roots in fear. * RESPONDENT: And, even if Richard’s claim is true ... why make it? I mean no disrespect ... but I would like some feedback from anyone ... including Richard ... so I can go on with my life!!! PETER: I remember that I could not but write my journal in order to tell others that the actualism method worked in that it produced down-to-earth results – that it was possible to live with a companion in utter peace and harmony and that it was possible to be virtually free of malice and sorrow. To imagine that one could keep an actual freedom to oneself beggars belief... RESPONDENT: My question was, and perhaps I wasn’t clear, why does Richard make the claim that he was the first person on the planet or in the universe to discover and live Actualism? Even if he was ... and he knew it factually, why state it? PETER: I did answer your question but I phrased it by using an example from my own experience. It may have been a bit obtuse but I was saying that I completely understand why Richard has gone public with his discovery that it is possible to become actually free from the human condition, in toto. I must admit that I have trouble relating to your objection. Would you take a scientist to task for claiming he had discovered a cure for a disease you had that was thought by everyone else to be incurable? Or would you take the time, and make the effort, to find out if his claims were valid. If not, why would you take to task someone who claims to have discovered a way of becoming actually free of the human condition of malice and sorrow? Because I wanted to be free of the human condition, I naively took his words at face value and set out to prove that his discovery is repeatable. And, if I take your words at face value – ‘I am applying the process ... time will tell’ – I take it that this is what you are also doing. I didn’t, and couldn’t, wait for the end of the process to happen before going public with the news that the actualism method can – as Richard said it would – lead to anyone with the required commitment becoming virtually free of malice and sorrow. I did not see any sense at all in withholding such a discovery from my fellow human beings. And cynics, sceptics, naysayers, red flag wavers, flat-earthers, deconstructionists and destructionists aside, if I take what others are reporting on this mailing list at face value there is evidence that others are using the actualism method and finding that it produces tangible results. I would say that not only is actualism proving to be effective in that it is producing repeatable results but also that its growth is proving to be exponential – which is what the phrase ‘spread like a chain-letter’ means to me. But then again, I do acknowledge I am naïve. RESPONDENT: I’m beginning to read Joseph LeDoux’s books to better understand the relevance of his work on emotion to Actual Freedom. PETER: The only relevance that I can ascertain is his experimental confirmation that feeling precedes thought. RESPONDENT: Besides that – I’m looking at a book by Antonio Damasio – titled ‘Descartes’ Error’. Now I have no well-formed views on what he is saying, but what I’m gathering so far is that Damasio’s work (he looks specifically at the case of Phineas Gage and others with frontal lobe damage) is a confirmation of LeDoux’s work, and in that sense may be of use to actualists. PETER: It pays to remember that neither LeDoux nor Damasio are interested in becoming free of the human condition and, as such, they are interested in explaining what is, rather than what is possible. RESPONDENT: Interestingly enough, Damasio seems to be saying that emotion and feeling is integral to experience as a self (both social and instinctual) – but since he dealt with people with frontal lobe damage, he seems to be saying that loss of self is dangerous and maladaptive. PETER: Which is but confirmation of the status quo. RESPONDENT: So he is trying to correct the ‘Cartesian Error’ that reasoning and cognition is without feeling or emotion – so he is afraid of the idea of a ‘selfless cognition.’ PETER: ‘Not at all interested in ‘the idea of a ‘selfless cognition’’ may be a better way of describing it. RESPONDENT: So, on the one hand he seems to support the actualist affirmation of the instinctual self, yet he also claims that loss of self is disorienting and disturbing. PETER: It is useful to consider that an actual freedom from the human condition is not considered normal by the psychological and psychiatric standards applicable to the human condition. But then again, that is to be expected, is it not. The other relevant point to consider is that Richard is not someone who has suffered brain damage but is someone who has managed by his own efforts to rid himself of malice and sorrow – an event that coincided with the extinction of all traces of either a psychological or psychic ‘self’. RESPONDENT: My hunch is that may be due to the fact that he has studied what he calls ‘secondary emotion’ – that is the processing of the frontal lobe with the functioning of the amygdala still intact. Anyway, this is mostly a pre-formed opinion since I haven’t had sufficient time to mull over the ideas, but I’m wondering if others have read Damasio’s work and what thoughts you might have. PETER: I remember several times being hooked in by the experimental work and theories of neuro-scientists and the like, until I remembered that all they are studying is the functioning of the human brain – the hardware if you like – within the current functioning of the human psyche – the software programming if you like. And that, unlike actualists, they have no interest whatsoever in changing the social and instinctual programming that is the very cause of all the misery and mayhem among human beings on the planet. PETER to No 3: It has only now become possible to become free of the Human Condition because of the extraordinary change that has occurred in the last 40 or so years, as a significant proportion of the population does not now have to fight for survival – be it territory, food, defence, battling rampant diseases or the like. The actual world is a safe and benign world – we have won the fight over marauding wild animals, we have tamed most deadly plagues, we produce enough food, we enjoy good living standards, but still humans suffer from sorrow and inflict malice on others. The only ‘solution to date for temporary relief from instinctual fear and aggression has been to conjure up ‘good’ feelings of compassion – feeling sad for others – and love – desperately trying to feel good about, and be ‘kind’ to, at least one other person on the planet. Isn’t it so bloody good, so liberating, to know the reason for sorrow and malice, to not feel guilty about it, to have a method for eliminating the buggers and to get on with the job? To see clearly that the whole instinctual package was only necessary for the survival of the species and that it is now redundant. Not only redundant but plainly lethal in that most of the 160,000,000 that died in wars this century died not fighting for survival but for passionate feelings such as Honour, Country, God, Justice, etc. And all the murders, rapes, tortures, suicides, sadness and despair occur only because of the ‘animal’ still wired within each of us. What a grand thing to journey out of sadness and fear, spite and envy, deception and confusion – to more and more experience the sensate delights of this very actual world, happening right now. The only way that such a journey is possible is because one is eliminating all that is in the way of experiencing what is actual – the process is one of elimination, not of building a new belief or concept about how to be, how to cope or how to escape from the world as-it-is and people as-they-are. As such, each step on the path is a factual step, a sincere investigation, a fact replacing a belief, with more and more happy and harmless moments replacing fearful, sad or angry ones. One would not proceed ‘where few have gone before’ without a glimpse of the paradise that this actual world is – a Pure Consciousness Experience. It is not enough to rely on others’ stories, for then it is only yet another belief, and with belief comes doubt, hand in hand, and the subsequent need for trust, hope, and faith. Merely adopting another belief will not instill the necessary pure intent to guide one through the maze of one’s own psyche. RESPONDENT: I was interested in the article you posted by Lorenz: [Phil Goetz]: We have learned how complex is the interaction of different drives. It would have quite unpredictable consequences if one of them – and one of the strongest – were to disappear entirely. We do not know how many important behaviour patterns of man include aggression as a motivating factor, but I believe it occurs in a great many. What is certain is that, with the elimination of aggression, the ‘aggredi’ in the original and widest sense, the tackling of a task or problem, the self-respect without which everything that a man does from morning till evening, from the morning shave to the sublimest artistic or scientific creations, would lose all impetus; everything associated with ambition, ranking order, and countless other equally indispensable behaviour patterns would probably also disappear from human life. In the same way, a very important and specifically human faculty would probably disappear also: laughter. (p. 278) A Review by Phil Goetz of ‘On Aggression’ by Konrad Lorenz. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag 1963 First English translation 1966 Reprinted by MJF Books. This seems like a common line of defence when considering doing away with instincts and goes thus ‘emotions and instincts give meaning to our lives and without them life would be robotic and meaningless’. This idea conjures up just more instinct namely fear of meaninglessness, though it may well be worthwhile looking into ‘meaningful’. Well, firstly it seems that ‘meaningful’ to me has both sensible and emotional content in that something meaningful should firstly make some sense and secondly satisfy some emotional need. Unfortunately it is a juggling act which more often than not falls towards the emotional leaving what sense was made, somewhere in the background, out of sight. Now I am asking myself ‘Why must my life be meaningful’ and I am finding this question particularly interesting. There is some fear of reservation but beyond that I would say that, having to be meaningful is not much of an issue for me, which I find somewhat astounding, as I realize that the shackles have been loosened a bit more. What I think is more important than meaningful, is being stimulated by sensory input and removing anything that actively goes towards preventing that. (Within reason of course!) PETER: I seem to have commented on this already. What I did was to make becoming happy and harmless my immediate aim with the ultimate goal of becoming actually free of the Human Condition. This then became my sole aim and meaning in life – a passionate burning ambition. I thought I had abandoned both my real-world meanings and then spiritual-world meanings in life but the residue of both does take some weeding out. These traditional life-meanings, usually instilled as morals or ethics, or genetically-implanted as instinctual passions, are gradually abandoned as they are seen to be silly, not applicable to my aim in life, or an impediment to being happy and harmless. As Richard pointed out, an actualist doesn’t aim for a self stripped of emotions and, as such, it is vitally important, firstly to crank up Actual Freedom as one’s meaning in life and secondly not to strangle this passion by suppressing it. This is where the constant remembering of a pure consciousness experience becomes absolutely essential as one’s constant guiding light and aim in life. This memory will serve to keep you on course as you weave your way through the maze and it will prevent you from settling for second best. This passion for Actual Freedom is exactly why I wrote my journal – to capture the excitement and thrill of the early period of breaking free from the two traditional life-paths within the Human Condition. But I do know what you mean – the falling away of all the traditional meanings of life is a fascinating business, to make sense of the meanings our parents and peers have told us are important and then to discover how blind nature has programmed us to implicitly feel, think and act. The socially instilled meanings vary from tribe to tribe, and produce cultural variations to our basic instinctual programming designed solely to continue the propagation of the species – hence the over-arching predominance of the sexual drive. The other predominant instinct, the fear of death, fuels the search for security, fame and wealth in the real world and security, fame and immortality in the spiritual world. In exploring the brute animal instinctual passions, one soon discovers that blind nature cares not a fig for your being happy and harmless – quite the opposite, in fact. Yet, as all these meanings, drives and passions drop away, it is vital to remember that the third alternative is definitely not a passionless path. I distinctly remember a period where life seemed so devoid of meaning that I discovered a stark grey reality – not as a desperation but more of a pointlessness. This proved to be but a passing phase whereby I had left the familiar meanings, feelings and worries behind and began the real business of cranking up sensate delight, a joie de vive and a resounding Yes to being here in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are. I found this was initially like daily swimming against what felt like a tide of my own resistance and that of Humanity as a whole. Then came a point where I realized that it was only ‘me’ who had the foot on the brakes, so to speak, and then the whole business became even more thrilling and fascinating. So, the ending of the animal instinctual passions is a passionate affair, as life becomes brim-full with meaning and purpose. PETER: Sometimes when I sit back and reflect upon what is actually happening with the setting up of The Actual Freedom Trust website and with the discussions on this mailing list, the sheer enormity of it is beyond comprehension. It is common to talk of human development going through certain stages such as the agricultural revolution, the industrial revolution and currently we are in what has been called, amongst other things, the information revolution. To think that the next revolution will see an end to animosity, duplicity, resentment, unhappiness and despair and herald an ongoing era of sensitivity, sincerity, cooperation and joie de vive in short peace on earth& It is almost unimaginable except for the fact that the very beginnings of this era are happening right now. RESPONDENT: Initially is was hard to imagine that no one else had achieved actual freedom before, perhaps it’s more to do with the demands on instincts up till the last few hundred years. PETER: I think this is good a part of the reason but not the whole reason. I definitely have lived in a time of unprecedented safety, comfort, leisure and pleasure the likes of which would have been inconceivable to my father’s generation and which is still inaccessible to many on the planet. As such I have been able to pursue freedom rather than struggle for survival but this has also been the case for many, many people throughout history, but all have either bowed down or buckled under to tradition. The East has a very ancient tradition of supporting gurus, teachers, monks and sannyasins by the millions so that they are free to contemplate upon the meaning of human existence on earth and stuff-all of practical use to humanity has resulted. In China a stifling social, ethical and moral belief system is the result, in Japan a regimented warrior-religion of such life-negating ferocity that ritual suicide is lauded and in India there is a mind-boggling potpourri of beliefs whose only commonality is a total negation of thinking per se. In the West a similarly privileged class squandered their opportunity to find a way to personal freedom and global peace on earth by a combination of intellectual navel-gazing and a fascination with mysticism which also managed to infuse the physical sciences with a whole meta-physical bent – the cunningly named theoretical sciences. A few brave attempts have been made to break free of the power of the church and seductive lure of spiritual belief but threat of ostracization, persecution and even imprisonment, torture and death served to silence any sensible debate, let alone individual outbreaks of freedom from spirituality. However the prime reason that no-one up until now has discovered actual freedom is that the instinctual lure of narcissism is far, far more attractive than a nothing-in-it-for-‘me’ extinction. And the only reason it was discovered when it was, was that the ultimate state of narcissism, known as Enlightenment, did not sit at all well with Richard. After all, he was a country boy from the farm who knew nothing at all about Eastern Spirituality in his early life. When his personal search for freedom catapulted him into in a glorious altered state of consciousness, he naturally thought he had discovered the ultimate state of human existence. As he talked to people about his state, he gradually realized that he was in a state commonly known as Enlightenment in the East. Although he makes no bones about the Glory of living in an altered state of consciousness –and there can be nothing more glorious than swanning along feeling like you are God – he remained suss of the ‘other-worldly’ aspects such as feeling immortal, feeling omnipresent and omnipotent and the fact that the ‘worldly’ passions of fear, anger, nurture and desire were still present. It took him 11 more years of ‘Self’-investigation, running the question ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ before this Altar-Ego collapsed, thereby finally completing the process of ‘self’-immolation. RESPONDENT: I agree with the enormity of actual freedom and am looking forward to seeing the next event of self -immolation as it goes one step closer to proving actual freedom as being something available to virtually anyone willing to go the distance. PETER: I termed it ‘willing to stick my head above the parapet’ which has proved an apt description given the pie-throwing reaction of most of the several hundred people who so far know of existence of actualism. RESPONDENT: I am also toying with the idea of a survey of each participant in AF and their time spent versus results gained given the different backgrounds and ongoing conditions so as to provide some researched results for those considering AF. This could be made even more interesting by including any disabilities (usually used as an excuse) so that it can be seen that an incremental improvement is available to any who persist with AF. (AF as used here means Actual Freedom methodology). PETER: That is exactly why I wrote my journal and have rarely stopped writing since then, and that is also why Vineeto writes. It’s part of sticking your hand up to be counted. Writing on this list is a direct and simple way of reporting success, investigating beliefs, sharing information, discussing issues and following threads. This way you don’t need to do a survey because the original accounts are available for anyone else who may be interested. RESPONDENT: Just on another note I would like to suggest that any participants of AF try to avoid any physical condition (ie over sleeping, over exertion, etc) which might contribute towards a reduced ability to be self-aware. Toughing it out physically usually doesn’t really help AF much. Of course I have not included all the psychosomatic causes. If these adverse physical influences can be reduced then the effectiveness of AF can be increased somewhat. PETER: I think I know what you are getting at but self-awareness is not a precious thing to be cultivated within a cocoon of one’s own making. Being actively and thoroughly involved in the business of living in the market place is what tests an actualist. During the whole period of investigation that I described in my journal, I moved houses several times, I began living with a woman, had a very active sex life, designed, supervised and built a house and spent several hours a day listening to what Richard had to say about actualism and actual freedom. Being careful, as in being considerate for your own safety and of those around you, and keeping one’s hands in one’s pockets, as in avoiding acting on any extreme passions that may be stirred is certainly essential, but the dare in actualism is to start living fully for the first time in your life and not to play safe any more. At the risk of flogging a point, ‘self’-awareness is not about keeping the lid on your feelings, it is about reducing the debilitating effects of the extremes of malice and sorrow and cranking up the felicitous feelings – feeling good, feeling really good, feeling excellent, tipping over into amazement and wonder at doing this business of being alive, while being aware that we are alive, on this paradisiacal planet. It’s about cranking up an unconditional joie de vie – i.e. not conditional on the circumstances of your life right now, on changing the world as-it-is or changing people as-they-are. This cranking up feeling good about being here can often feel like trying to get out of a vat of thick glue – the glue being one’s social/ religious/ spiritual conditioning and one’s instinctual bondage to the rest of Humanity. The trick is first to become free of feeling you are stuck in a glue pot, which is to get yourself to the stage where you are virtually unencumbered by malice and sorrow. The price one pays for becoming virtually free of malice and sorrow is that one needs to become virtually free of one’s social identity and all that this implies. Cherished emotional bonds and empathetic relationships will be sacrificed together with all loyalties, allegiances, dependencies, bondages, etc. Aside from the practical and sensible family responsibilities which are usually easily met and prudently obeying the laws of the land, one needs to aim at becoming autonomous rather than remain shackled to being ‘who’ other people wanted you to be or still want you to be. This becoming autonomous can seem a daunting task but the rewards of relieving those closest from having to suffer the burden of ‘me’ and ‘my’ moods and ‘my’ resentment is palpable, as is the feeling of being free from the social compulsion of having to think, feel and act exactly as one’s peers do. It’s that Yippee stage that moved me to write my journal to trumpet the benefits of actualism and the joys of virtual freedom in particular. Having said all that, in my usual long-winded style, I do appreciate your comments for they are a timely warning. Actualism, by its very nature, is a tumultuous process and consideration for others and one’s own safety should always be paramount – which is where common sense comes in. ‘Keep your hands in your pockets and drive safely’ would be my advice based on experience to date but I would add ‘avoid seriousness, avoid playing safe and go for gay abandon’ as well while I am at it. It’s a matter of keeping your feet firmly on the ground and flying at the same time, which takes a bit of getting used to at first. Richard terms it as living at ‘the cutting edge of reality’ and I have described it as always being ‘right at the front of the stage’, as opposed to sitting in the audience, hiding in the chorus line or wafting around in the fly gallery with the Gods and Goddesses. PETER: Personally, I did not have to dredge this deep to cut the ties to sorrow but I did explore fear to its limits of dread and terror. It does seem that exploring and experiencing the extreme limits of some of the passions may come about on the path to becoming free of them, but as more information and experiences are logged up this may well be unnecessary for many who follow. I can remember after my dread and terror experience saying that I had done that and didn’t need to explore any further. GARY: I think there is a lot of variance in what people experience based on their life circumstances, their ‘personality’, physical constitution, life experiences, etc, etc. If other people can get through pain and suffering more quickly than I, then my hat is off to them. I do have the sense sometimes of banging my head into a brick wall. I don’t think it is necessary to go to the utter limit and experience the feelings and passions to their fullest all the time. Sometimes I just get to a state of being numb, and I can’t take any further investigation into it. Sometimes it’s a good idea to break it off and have a laugh at yourself, take walk outside, get some fresh air, or whatever turns you on. PETER: I’ve made a fairly close assessment of the particular qualities that Richard has that enabled him to break free from the Human Condition – to have rid himself of any social or instinctual identity whatsoever. What sticks out for me is stubborn persistence – an adamant refusal to ever give up. Curiously enough, this attribute is common to all pioneering explorers – all human advancements have been founded on this very attitude. The difference between Richard and any others who are following him is that there is such a good descriptive map of the path to freedom laid out now. We know by our own pure consciousness experiences that ‘self’-lessness is possible and we now know how to make it incrementally happen. We also know by our own pure consciousness experiences that peace-on-earth exists right here, right now and that only ‘I’ stand in the way of experiencing it. Some parts of the journey can indeed be intense and difficult but it is useful to remind yourself every now and again that all the turmoil and intensity is only going on in your head and heart – the actual world is always perfect and always peaceful. You will find that the further you travel along the path the more you will understand this dichotomy between real and actual and the more you will get to experience the perfection and purity that is always ever here. ALAN: (...) We are currently having an extremely violent demonstration of the ‘sickness’ of the human condition, which you have probably seen in the media. Blacks, Asians and gays have so far been targeted – watch out, actualists could be next! Which, of course, could never happen – with no beliefs to defend, there is nothing to attack – and all that is required is to come to one’s senses! PETER: Well ... It is pretty certain, given the Human Condition, that, as Actual freedom gains momentum, the ‘shit will hit the fan’ at some stage. Probably the most virulent and vitriolic of objectors will be those who protest at the elimination of feelings, despite the fact that these feelings are sorrow and malice. The cute thing about Actual Freedom is that one becomes anonymous – a nobody – and one does whatever one can to sensibly maintain this anonymity. The Net is ideal for this – we could pass each other on the street and not know that we both are actualist. The checkout girl at the local checkout hasn’t a clue that I am not a part of the ‘real’ world, exactly as my former spiritual friends have not a clue that I am no longer in the ‘spiritual’ world. The anonymity is delicious, and I will do my utmost to sensibly preserve it. Still, I fully expect that the ‘shit will hit the fan’ one day ... (...) * ALAN: Yes, I did nothing to either ‘get into’ my feelings, nor to ‘get rid’ of them. An awareness of what I was feeling, an examination of what was occurring, an investigation into what caused the feeling (usually a belief) led to the particular emotion disappearing without, as you say, ‘me’ being aware of it happening. Do you think it is ridding oneself of beliefs that causes the emotions to vanish? Unlike emotions, I was usually aware of the disappearance of a belief – a ‘getting it’, which I have written of previously. PETER: I just wrote to No 3 on this matter as to how I see belief, feeling and emotion. It might be useful and may address your question – let me know if it doesn’t. I would only add that one doesn’t eliminate feelings totally until the ‘lot’ goes – until the fat lady has sung, so to speak. But the ‘vanishing’ of emotions from one’s daily life such that one has a 99% perfect day, day after day, is the base camp for the final event to happen. So, it’s back to the couch for me, after all, life was meant to be easy. I always thought what a marvellous time it was to be right in the middle of the formation of a religion when in my spiritual days and now I get to see the beginnings (or continuation) of a war on TV. Such fascinating times to be alive – to see the cultural identities we have been imbibed with, to see the religious myths, to see the Human Condition as a totality. Actual Freedom has never been possible before as it was physically impossible to obtain an overview of various social identities and tribal groupings, as well as an overview of the effects of instinctual-driven passions. There has been an explosion of knowledge and information that makes believing in Ancient Wisdom an insult to intelligence. In the past there was always a maybe, always a possibility that someone had a solution somewhere and it was just a matter of finding it. Nowadays you can just log-on or tune-in, and all of Humanity’s wisdom is available for perusal and scrutiny. For the first time in history one has sufficient information to sort out for oneself what is silly and sensible without having to believe what others say. All that is needed is a willingness to find out for oneself what it is to be a human being. It’s about as simple as falling off a log. * PETER: The path to an Actual Freedom is to devote one’s life to being the universe experiencing itself as a flesh and blood human being, and if undertaken with scrupulous integrity, will inevitably and inexorably lead to one’s self-immolation. This final act will be one of self-sacrifice for it is evident from the Pure Consciousness experience that only ‘I’ stand in the way of the perfection and purity of the universe being experienced as this flesh and blood body called Peter. This full-blooded devotion, as in ... ‘An end to which someone or something is devoted; a purpose, an intent’, or ‘earnest application; zealous or exclusive attachment’ Oxford Dictionary ... has recently resulted in heady glimpses and experiences of the infinitude of the physical universe. These experiences of vastness and limitless freedom offer tantalizing previews of an inevitable destiny after ‘my’ extinction and have had the unmistakable ring of the authenticity of my first ‘self’-less PCE. The other clue as to their genuineness is the recognition of the seductive parallel of the Altered State of Consciousness whereby ‘I’ am tempted to instinctually grab to become the experience. Thus, ‘I’ become infinite and eternal, whereas in the PCE it is startlingly clear that it is the universe that is infinite and eternal, and what I am is this mortal flesh and blood body, well able and equipped to think and reflect and go oooh and ahhh at the perfection and purity that is obviously apparent when ‘I’ cease to rule the roost. But that won’t happen to me – it’s but a cheap cop-out once you have tasted the actual. These glimpses are the direct result of this boots and all approach and send a thrill up one’s spine, a tingling in the skull, or an involuntary wobble of the head. It’s fascinating to see that the fear that was there in the days of thinking about the end of ‘me’, or trying to imagine the end of ‘me’, is now replaced by a physical thrill as in – this is what I am doing, or this is what is happening. This is no esoteric explanation and has parallels in the prosaic activities that involve fear or danger whereby, when you get to the stage of actually doing something rather than thinking or worrying about it, one is then too busy with the doing of it that one has no time for fears or worries. And it’s not as though the experience is frantic, or too much – I am at present doing normal things like doing a job, earning a living and reporting, as accurately as I can, on what is going on inside with ‘me’ as it happens. Utterly down-to-earth, normal and anonymous. Cute, Hey.... And what a hoot it is at the cutting edge.
PETER to Alan: As you can see, the title is ‘What I am vs. Who I am’, and the diagram essentially addresses the issue of the process of the extinction of ‘who’ I am – the psychological and psychic entity and the emergence of ‘what I am’ – this flesh and blood body only, actually free of ‘who I think and feel I am’. The diagram quite deliberately separates out the active diminishing and eventual extinction of ‘who I am’ – and the emergence and eventual freedom of ‘what I am’. ‘What I am’ has always been here, it is just that it has been obscured and totally dominated by ‘who I am’ – and it is only by systematically and methodically daring to peel back the layers of social conditioning, beliefs, morals, ethics, psittacisms and instinctual passions that ‘what I am’ is more and more able to become apparent. ‘What I am’ thus becomes incrementally freed, strengthened, gaining confidence from the surety of facts, the increasingly unfettered intelligence and the heightened senses – all actual, down to earth, sensible and verifiable experiences. ‘What I am’ is not a new creation, a new identity – it is simply what remains when the ‘who I am’ disappears in total. To put it another way, the ‘who I was’ when I first met Richard will never meet the ‘what I am’ that will emerge when ‘I’ become extinct. Of course, one has glimpses of this ‘self’-less state in the PCE, when for a period ‘who I am’ exits the stage, or is temporarily absent, but ‘what I am’ can only be totally free when ‘who I am’ ceases to exist permanently. ‘Who I am’ is capable of resurrection or fighting back at any stage – indeed it is passionately driven to do anything possible to survive – including selling off Grandmother if need be – which is where the middle line of the diagram comes into play. This is a simple representation of the wide and wondrous path to Actual Freedom – from naiveté to Actual Freedom. We have started the line with naiveté, for it surely requires naiveté to not only consider that an actual freedom from the Human Condition is possible, but that you, personally, are the one who can do it. To fly in the face of the Wisdom of the Ancients – ‘to go where no man has gone before’ in Star Trek terms, as I put it in my Journal. I conveniently ignored Richard in my dramatization as I figured that the next pioneers were plotting a brand new course – avoiding the instinctual seduction of the Rock of Enlightenment that had dashed the efforts of all before. The other point about naiveté is that the spiritually cynical and the worldly cunning, by their very attitude, exclude themselves from the adventure, and this has been evidenced by the many who have met Richard, or read a bit about Actual Freedom, and turned away. For those willing to consider the possibility of an actual freedom, the next step is to tap into pure intent – an intent to make it something one is willing to dedicate one’s life to and a purity such that one will settle for nothing less than the purity and perfection so obviously experienced in a Pure Consciousness Experience. If it is possible for a brief time it must be possible as a permanent state – purity and perfection is possible as a flesh and blood human being, it requires one’s sincere intent to become a ‘self’ consuming passion in life. As an ongoing experience one moves into a state of Virtual Freedom whereby one goes to sleep at night time knowing one has had a perfect day and that tomorrow will also be a perfect day. This perfection is not the perfection of Actual Freedom but a 99.9% perfection and the hic-ups or stumbles are so minor and brief, that they fail to daunt one on the journey. Serendipity abounds and a fascination with life activates delight and sensuousness as one does all one can to mimic the perfection and purity that becomes increasingly apparent all around in the physical world. One’s mind, more and more freed of imagination and the chemical influence of instinctual passions, is capable of great clarity, and as apperceptive awareness replaces self-centred neurosis one knows one’s days are numbered. By this total and sincere dedication to what is actual, pure and perfect, one abandons control, so to speak, whereby the very process of self-immolation is set in motion – then it is not a process that one has any control over, it is happening by itself. The ending of ‘me’, when seen dispassionately, is the amygdala doing its survival thing – one encounters surges of chemicals from an obsolete program playing out its death throes – fighting for its very survival as it is programmed to do. This last stages of the ending of ‘me’ is both a psychic and psychological affair, thus accompanying the chemical rushes (fear) one also experiences the psychological equivalent (angst), but one is committed by now – there is no ‘back door’, no turning back, no phoenix to rise from the ashes. ‘My’ end is nigh. However, to even get to the point where one abandons control requires sincere intent, lest one settles for second-best. Sincere intent is one’s companion on the journey from beginning to end. RESPONDENT: My next interest is to read about PCE. I read quite a bit of your journal in Dec./Jan. but it was not useful for things I was looking for at the time. I will go over the PCE section, if there is one, in it again. PETER: I wrote my journal as I was coming out of the ‘spiritual’ world and wrote of the things that interested me as flesh and blood human being, as opposed to a spiritual one. As my interest in, and experience of, the actual world increased I wrote of what I was interested in – death / living with a woman in peace, harmony and equity / exploring the failure of love and discovering something better / exploring and discovering the unfettered and free sensuous enjoyment of sex / ridding myself of the insidious delusion of anything spirit-ual, religious or ‘other’-worldly / freeing my intelligence from the act of believing / finding a personal peace and a solution that offered genuine global peace / being able to live peacefully in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are / eliminating fear as a constant underlying instinctual emotion / de-bunking the mythical and mystical perception of the physical universe, time and human existence. But it is only useful for someone who is interested in Actual Freedom as it is a journal of how to become Virtually Free – a necessary pre-requisite if one is to avoid the ‘Rock of Enlightenment’ that has sunk all previous attempts at finding an actual freedom. Actual Freedom is, after all, a new, down-to-earth, non-spiritual freedom. New as in never been discovered before. Down-to-earth as in able to be comfortably, effortlessly and easily liveable by anyone in the world as-it-is, with people as-they-are. Non-spiritual in that it is both self-less and Self-less – it is most definitely not an Altered State of Consciousness based on earthly denial and heavenly transcendence. Freedom as in free of the Human Condition of malice and sorrow – an actual and demonstrative freedom from instinctually-driven passions of fear and aggression, as opposed to the delusion of a spirit-ual freedom, based on Ancient Wisdom’s fairy-tale-battles of good and evil, Gods and Demons. Well, I’ve done my ‘shop assistant’s’ bit – extolled the benefits of the products available in the ‘How to become Happy and Harmless’ shop. So, happy browsing ... RESPONDENT: I have seen my possibility in the presence of Rajneesh. And I think you have seen your possibility in the presence of Richard, Peter and Vineeto. PETER: I found your proposition intriguing, particularly the words ‘in the presence of’. The Eastern tradition of Moksha or freedom is always a transmission of a ‘feeling’ of liberation from the world-as-it-is into the spiritual world – an escape from reality into a Greater Reality. Being ‘in the presence of’ one who has realised this Greater Reality is regarded as the best way to facilitate the necessary spiritual feelings of Unconditional Love, Unity, Oneness, etc. The initiation into disciplehood and the formation of Ashrams, Sanghas, Monasteries or other spiritual communities was a way of reinforcing the feelings of escaping into a Greater Reality – of ‘coming home’, ‘being chosen’, being lovers of the Master and being loved by the Master. The possibility offered was that the follower or disciple too could become like the Master, despite the overwhelming evidence that those who became Enlightened did so by their own efforts and not by being mere disciples of other Masters. The ‘being in the presence of’ is the great attraction of being around a living Master, and ‘belonging’ to His group is the similar attraction with dead Masters. The wide and wondrous path to Actual Freedom neither contains nor entertains any of these religious authoritarian and hierarchical structures. It is free of any power of one over the other, be it the psychic power and strangleholds of worship, surrender, gratitude, loyalty, devotion and prayer that binds the disciple to the Master, or the necessity to belong to the group, contribute to the movement, pay your dues in time or money, support the ideals, and defend the Master. Those involved in Actual Freedom are those intrepid individuals who have taken it upon themselves to change the only person they can change – themselves. Their motive is a personal peace for themselves – a freedom from malice and sorrow – and to prove that global peace is possible, as in – ‘if I can do it, and I am nobody special, then anyone can rid themselves of malice and sorrow’. There is no ‘in the presence of’ in Actual Freedom. This is it. A few Web-sites, a mailing list and about a million words so far. The story of how one man escaped from the delusion of Enlightenment, the method he devised to become free of the Human Condition and the writing of others reporting their success in applying the method. Also documented are the countless objections of many correspondents to the new and radical discovery that human beings can be actually happy and harmless, and the detailed and considered responses to these objections. Anyone can now be free of the Human Condition (including the belief in a spiritual ‘other-world’ and a life after death), as sufficient words conveying the method, the results, the pitfalls, and the objections are now accessible on the Net. The ‘possibility’ I saw when I met Richard was that I could live with a woman in peace and harmony, and for me that was a prerequisite to finding a personal peace and there ever being a chance of global peace. If I could not live with one person peacefully and harmoniously then how could I ever expect there to be peace on earth – then life was indeed a sick joke. The other possibility I saw was that I could live the PCE I had experienced as an ongoing state 24 hrs. a day every day. I knew it would prove the death of ‘me’ but I was getting very tired of ‘me’ by then anyway. The effort of maintaining a social identity and the being ‘on-guard’ constantly against instinctual passions arising was both debilitating and shackling – a second rate life. An actual freedom was what I sought, and I’d settle for nothing less. So, I wanted to throw some light on the differences between the spiritual path in practice and the path to actual freedom in practice. The nuts and bolts of how both work and the factual differences between the two paths. PETER to Konrad: Actual freedom or actualism is of course not merely a theory or philosophy but a new, down-to-earth non-spiritual path to freedom – an actual freedom from the Human Condition of malice and sorrow. Now actual means it works. It means that given sufficient effort and intent that one can virtually eliminate sorrow and malice from the human body. This means in practical terms that one no longer suffers from feelings of sadness, melancholy, boredom, neediness, sympathy, empathy, despair or fear, let alone annoyance, offence, anger, revenge or violence. It is then possible by practical demonstration to live with a companion in total equity, delighting in freely and mutually enjoyed sex, discussion and physical intimacy. The physical pleasures build and build, as does the awareness of the immeasurable and limitless perfection and purity of it all, increasing off the scales. One literally ‘buckles at the knees’ as the paltry attempts of the old ‘I’ to fearfully hang on wither in the helter skelter slide to freedom. And all this is actual, sensate – as evidenced by the physical senses – not merely cerebral or affective. You know, things like the smell of a woman’s armpit during sex, the feel of the breast or bum, the way you can tease a nipple to hardness, the fresh unique journey that is each sexual encounter as a literal salubrious smorgasbord of sensuality unfolds as wave after wave of pleasure engulfs us both. To feel a woman as equally sexual such that you don’t know who is thrusting or who is wiggling or where you end and she begins. To ride wave after wave of pleasure of such intensity that ejaculation is but a side order, not the main meal. And after ... to lie back and chat about how it was for each of us, to compare notes, to discuss the nuances, pleasures, particularly delicious bits, or just to lay back in that state where all the cells of the body are sexually alive and tingling and drift off into a delicious half asleep state. To drift off entirely or to eventually surface and wobble to the shower where you realise that to have hot water on tap to pour over your body is a simple pleasure that rivals any. Then maybe a cup of freshly ground coffee and a post-coital cigarette, and wonder what other pleasures are next, and in what order they will come. Hedonism has got nothing on this. Freedom is this and much more, Konrad, much more. Can’t I tease you into considering the possibility of living in paradise, here, now, on earth. It is a paradise not only of physical pleasure as it also offers a stillness and purity wherein one is no longer driven by the instincts, where the mind is a perfectly clear and delightful and playful thing and the usual feelings of fear and aggression are replaced by a consuming sense of well being and benignity. And loneliness disappears as one immensely enjoys ones own company. Good Hey.... So Konrad, unlike the other metaphysical and philosophical theories of freedom this one works and delivers and as such easily rebuffs charlatans and frauds. The proof is in the actual and in my experience if you can prove an end to malice and sorrow in equitable one-on-one companionship you have ‘put your money where your mouth is’. There is no greater test of fire than sexual freedom and equity, than for man and woman to live together in utter peace and harmony – not in theory but in practice. The Gurus have failed to deliver, they have had their day. The old ancient, long dead ones have eschewed morals and ethical precepts for their followers who have fought horrendous wars as to the Rightness of their masters or own particular God’s vision. And as for the modern Gurus, I know them well to be pretenders. I have seen the despair that ravages their private lives and those around them. The chaos and duplicity of their personal lives, their sexuality, their treatment of women, the psychic powers and the entrapment, surrender and eventual total emotional dependency and enslavement of their disciples is but a sad useless re-run of all that has gone before. No wonder the spiritual or religious pursuits require bucket-loads of faith, trust and hope – it is needed in the face of its continual failure to produce the goods – peace on earth. So, of course actual freedom will have no gurus, no pretenders as the proof will be in the pudding, so to speak. The Americans say: ‘can you walk the talk?’ Australians say: ‘Can you put your money where your mouth is?’ And its success will be that it is actual, it does work, it does bring change that is tangible. So I will watch with amusements your attempts at hobbling a bit of actual freedom talk into your philosophy – you are doomed to failure, but what the heck! What I am saying to you is that Enlightenment is finished, now that Richard has exposed it from the ‘inside’. Discipleship and the Spiritual Path are also finished and Vineeto and I have exposed the fraud that it is anything other than Eastern Religion masquerading in sheep’s clothing. So maybe, just maybe it is worth while considering that everybody (including yourself) has got it 180 degrees wrong. Not just a bit wrong but all wrong. It can be an enormous blow to pride, particularly male pride – I know it was for me – but I am immensely pleased I let go of the ‘tried and failed’. I did however have to acknowledge I was neither happy nor harmless in order to even begin to become free of the crippling Wisdom of the Past. And then I got to be a pioneer on the path to actual freedom and I always liked to do a bit of pioneering occasionally, to dare to be authentic and original is such a hoot. It’s such good fun being a human being. RESPONDENT: I thought this topic was over and done with among Christians. God created man in his own image and gave us the freedom of choice out of love for the humans, one can’t blame God for us making the wrong choices. PETER: Methinks I was right in suggesting that one can only be interested in an actual freedom from the human condition if one has had sufficient experience with, and knowledge of, the spiritual path in order to understand its central message and why it has not, and never can, deliver peace on earth in this lifetime for anyone – let alone everyone. Your statement is another classic example of human beings forever blaming themselves – and not daring to even question the Gods or the God-men. This belief is so drummed into humans as guilt for our sins or penance for our very existence on earth that it is a miracle that someone has broken free and others are rapidly following. RESPONDENT: Who said that life was supposed to be easy!? PETER: Who said life was not meant to be easy and why do you believe them? Just because God said so or Siddhartha Gautama said so or some Johnny come lately God-man repeated it doesn’t mean it is true or True. Of course life was meant to be easy and we all know it except we live in fear of the wrath of God or the scorn of our peers. The cute thing is once you stop believing in God you are free to stop believing that life was meant to be about suffering rightly. This then frees your senses to a literal smorgasbord of sensual delight that is on offer in this day and age on this cornucopian planet. Life was meant to be easy – only a masochist would believe otherwise. RESPONDENT: Living life is extremely challenging and what else could it be? PETER: As humans, we are all subject to physical dangers, ill-health, accidents, earthquakes, floods, fires, etc. which can cause loss and pain. But to have, and actively indulge in, emotional suffering additional to the hardship is to compound the situation to such an extent that the resulting feelings are usually far worse than dealing with the facts of the situation. What impresses me is the extraordinary steps taken in wealthy, materialistic countries to not only reduce the hardship caused by physical dangers but to prevent them from happening in the first place. Early warning systems for fire, flood and storm, earthquake and storm proof buildings, emergency services, evacuation and relief plans, etc. all help to minimize and in many cases negate hardship, loss, injury and physical suffering. RESPONDENT: Malice and sorrow are absent from the world of this one. Freedom is what one experiences when living in Agapé, which occurs when one accepts unconditionally all that is. The human condition contains many experiences, none of which are better than any other; just different. PETER: Fair enough. Many people have gained a freedom from the world as it is, with all its violence, suffering, loneliness, despair, and depression. The cultivation of an ‘inner’ world of peace and tranquillity through meditative practices combined with a detached acceptance of the human condition can eventually lead to Altered States of Consciousness such as Agapé, Self-Realization, Awakened, Enlightenment etc. I, too, travelled this track to the point of having experiences of being Divine Love or Love Agapé, but I found myself increasingly isolated from the world as it is, and curiously removed from any intimacy with those around me. It was as though I saw and experienced everything through a veil of detachment. When the heartfelt experiences were full-on it was indeed glorious but... What nagged me was that I would end up an Enlightened guru and I didn’t like their lifestyles, I didn’t like how they were with their women, and I didn’t like the whole system of God-man and worshippers. It was a tough task to give up the spiritual world but I wanted an actual freedom that is applicable in the marketplace, available to all, perfect and pure, untainted by power and authority. Something that was down-to-earth, not ethereal or other-worldly, something that would deliver not only peace for me but offer the solution to the Human Condition of malice and sorrow for all others. Such that one day, albeit centuries away, an actual peace will eventuate on earth between all humans with no more warring tribes and religious factions. The amazing thing is that the actual world of perfection and purity, infinite, eternal and happening at this very moment is available to all – at this very moment. It is not an invention or a mental construct. To be here in the actual world, fully committed to living this moment, to be doing what is happening, is to be on the cutting edge – fully alive as a sensate, reflective, flesh and blood human being. Being here this way is to be here without a self, ego or soul, as there simply is no room for a ‘me’ in any form. There is, in fact, no difference between me doing something and it happening, so intimate and directly experienced is this very moment. What I am describing is not consensual reality, it is the actual, the physical. This is the world that the believers in God apparently regard as Evil or inhuman – hence the comments about ‘don’t feed the animals’. For me, I figured that neither the real world nor the spiritual world were sane places, and I went off chasing the actual world that I had experienced and evidenced in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) From a ‘real’ world point of view I have gone ‘mad’ and from the spiritual world point of view ‘I have sold my soul to the Devil’. I thoroughly recommend an escape from both these fantasies and illusions into the actual world of purity and perfection, innocence and delight. I am having the time of my life ... * RESPONDENT: Can not more be done by example, by walking the talk rather than talking the talk? PETER: Precisely my point about the Enlightened Ones when I said ‘I didn’t like their lifestyles, I didn’t like how they were with their women and I didn’t like the whole God-man / disciple business. But when you really look at where Eastern spirituality, and dare I say Osho, was pointing to, it is that you would end up single, celibate and become God. That is ‘walking the talk’ in the East. If there are any women around, their role is as servants and worshipping carers. For me, I wanted to walk the talk here on earth, as this flesh and blood body, here, now. That’s a major reason why I wanted to live with a woman in peace, harmony and equity – the fire test. That is why I invite scrutiny on this list – the fire test. No Truth that cannot be spoken, no secrets, all open, simple, direct and obvious. I think sometimes people are looking for some hidden agenda, some weird cult or something, some trap. No, I mean what I am saying. I am simply a fellow human being, reporting on what it is like here in the actual world. And to get here I followed the well mapped out path to the new, non-spiritual, down-to-earth freedom – an actual freedom from the Human Condition. All my wishes have come true and much, much more. Life was meant to be easy, friendly, comfortable, peaceful, harmonious, ever-changing, fresh each moment, direct and obvious – and my senses allow my intimate involvement with each person I meet, each event happening, each place I am in. And I can think, reflect, talk and write about what sense I have made of living as a human being – happy and harmless ... Pure delight... PETER: I see you are beginning to have some interesting experiences digging into yourself. RESPONDENT: Thanks. It is very warm here, too. Unusually warm for New York in December (65F)!!! I have got an urge to investigate/ watch myself for quite some time. Actually, reading Osho books have triggered this in me 10 years ago back in Poland, as far as I remember. PETER: From my experience my ‘digging into myself’ has had two distinct phases. The spiritual search Conducted over some 17 years and involving living and working in ashrams, countless hours of meditation, therapy groups, listening to various masters, and reasonably extensive reading. The culmination occurred after a period of living alone when I had a what would be described as a substantial Satori experience wherein I experienced a lack of ‘self’ such that I was ‘Love’ and ‘at one with Existence’. It was an extraordinary heartfelt experience and I experienced a distinct shift of my identity from the head to the heart. It was indeed Glorious. The problem was that having experienced the workings of the spiritual world and met some of the Enlightened Ones, I was able to question – ‘was this what I really wanted?’ The honest answer was no. I had seen enough to know that a system of slavery (discipleship) was inherently flawed and a system of surrender to God-men or Gurus was little more than dictatorship. Admittedly for the supposed Good rather than Evil, but it was still institutionalised insanity never the less. The experiences I had in meditation, in the presence of masters or self-induced, involved little more than a transcendence of the base emotions and instincts in me such that I caused a shift of my identity from the head to the heart, from the ego to the soul. This shift is well known as an Altered State of Consciousness (ASC). Therein lies the fatal flaw with the spiritual search as ‘I’ as an identity remain intact – in fact now Super Inflated by grand feelings into believing that I was God or at One with God. And yet another Guru would emerge into the world and had I been a successful enough Guru yet another Religion would have been born with all it’s horrendous ramifications. The search for an Actual Freedom Having met Richard and quizzed him extensively and read his writings, it became painfully and shockingly obvious that I had merely scratched the surface of becoming free. The first essential step was to question all that I had taken to be the Truth, a process that was to demolish entirely any pride I felt about ‘my’ achievements and realizations on the spiritual path. I discovered that it was necessary to eliminate the ‘self’ in its entirety – both ego and soul, both who ‘I’ thought I was and who ‘I’ felt I was. The essential guiding principle is the pure consciousness experience or PCE. This experience is one that everybody has had in their lives wherein one directly experiences the innate perfection and purity of the physical universe free of any ‘self’ whatsoever. No ego and no soul sullies the unfiltered sensate experience of the actual. I have written of the PCE that I was able to recall, but it did take some digging to remember it, as it had no emotional imprint on my memory, such was its purity – and ‘I’ was not present as an emotional experiencer or interpreter. The PCE is the essential reference point in the search for an Actual Freedom as opposed to merely a synthetic spiritual freedom or ASC. Even then the lure of the power and authority afforded by Enlightenment is a potent force to be battled with. The only danger that exists on the wide and wondrous path to actual freedom is that you may become Enlightened, but the path is becoming a little more well trodden now – a mere handful admittedly, but sufficient to provide written information to other intrepid travellers. So the point of this is that it is essential to have an intent as to what it is you want to do with your ‘digging in’. What is your aim, what is your goal, what is it you want to do with your life? As with any activity or action in life an intent is essential. For me it was become the best I can be, to live in the state I experienced in the peak experience (PCE) as a constant 24 hrs. a day, on-going experience. To be the universe experiencing itself as a flesh and blood mortal body, free of any psychological and psychic entity whatsoever. RESPONDENT: I got bored reading all the reams of information you put out before, that is not your fault. I just don’t like to spend that much time reading emails. I would like you to try to tell me in no more than 30 words what it is you are saying in your book! PETER: Step out of the real world (5.8 billion ‘selves’ battling it out for ‘survival’), into the actual world, and leave your ‘self’ (and ‘Self’ – a mere delusion anyway) behind. 30 words and as it’s my post, and I am having such fun, you can have another 30 words (at no extra cost – bar the effort of reading) For those desperate and daring enough, Actual Freedom actually delivers the much-sought personal peace and sensate delight, utterly free of malice and sorrow, utterly liveable in the market place. 29 words Actualism Homepage
Peter’s Selected Correspondence Index | Library – Actual Freedom
Freedom from the Human Condition – Happy and Harmless Peter’s Text ©The Actual Freedom Trust: 1997- . All Rights Reserved. Disclaimer and Use Restrictions and Guarantee of Authenticity