18.5.1998

PETER: Hi Alan

Good-day to you!

The cheese and ham croissants are because we had them for breakfast and the taste is still in my mouth. Yum...

So you found Richard’s Website by accident – most extraordinary: the find of a lifetime really. The man has impeccable credentials having been there, done that, survived, questioned and emerged from the delusion of Enlightenment to report that all is indeed rotten in the world of Gods and Spirits. It was amazing for me, at that stage, to find someone who said ‘Keep questioning – deeper and deeper – dare to question Every belief. No matter how sacred, no matter how dear to me.’ It was also good to find Vineeto to investigate all the gender / sexual / love beliefs and conditionings and understand them not only intellectually but practically: down-to-earth if you like. The discoveries, realizations and sorting out of the full extent of the Human Condition is indeed a fascinating journey. To challenge and go beyond what human beings have believed to be the Limit – beyond Human Nature is quite something.

But I’ve also held that once one did it, then it is easier for the next, even easier for the next and so on. Not that this is a movement with Richard as a leader – the latest saviour – it’s just that there is increasingly more information, more words, a broad map of common sense if you like. In the context of these maps each person is then able, with increasing confidence, to undertake a journey within to rid themselves of the Human Condition. That was what motivated me to write, to try and describe in words, in practical terms, so it was good to hear you enjoyed it.

And, of course, it is extraordinary that everyone does it by themselves, for themselves.

You asked about being here... For me ‘How am I experiencing myself now?’ translates into the optimum when I am so here in this moment that there is no room for anything else – doubt, emotion, feeling, love, etc. I am fully engaged in and aware of what is happening. I am fully involved sensually in doing what is happening. No room for sitting back on the fence feeling or observing. Not to say that I am not considerate or sensible in my words or actions: they then become naturally appropriate to the situation. Then each moment is indeed delightful, sensual, immediate, apparent and obvious.

Occasionally I have pulses of fear race through as the audacity of living this way strikes a primordial chord – like a cosmic chorus of ‘how dare you ...’ thundering from somewhere, but lately I experience this as a good and thrilling sign. What a journey ... as one makes sense of the Human Condition and actively wills its demise in oneself.

Nuf’ for now ... just wanted to say Hi really, as does Vineeto. So, good to hear from you, and that you are having fun.

29.7.1998

PETER: Alan ...

The books have finally emerged from the printers and look good.

Richard’s Journal is priced at Aus $29.95 and mine is Aus $25.00. Postage to the U.K. is as follows –

Figures in brackets for Economy Air –  about 3 weeks longer.

Richard’s Journal = 310g. Peter’s = 290g.

At this stage we need to recover the money Vineeto has put up and to finance more books so we are not prepared to offer books on consignment or reduced rates to bookshops. Maybe later when additional print runs will reduce the cost per items. I mention this as Richard said you were keen to try bookshops. Fine, but they will have to put their margin on top of the costs given.

If you want copies of the books please pay in Aus $ to

The Actual Freedom Trust, PO Box 1404, Byron Bay NSW 2481 [now changed], Australia

I’m also in need of the address and post code for Cambridge University –  no idea what dept. so just the general admin. I guess.

So it’s good night from me ... and probably good morning to you ...

6.8.1998

PETER: Alan ... We mailed off a copy of both books for you today and investigated a couple of ways for you to pay.

The options appear to be – International Transfer : bank to bank – costs us Au$6 which needs to be added to your payment if you chose to go that way, or International Bank draft in Au $ : free of charges this end. So cost to you – 2 books ($55) plus postage ($19) plus any cost incurred above from receiving money our end. Hope this is clear and make payment to Vineeto as she has funded the books being printed.

I think the flood gates are about to open: it’s such good fun to be actually doing this. Trying to seduce people into becoming Happy and Harmless. To be here – in the actual sensate physical world and not dwelling in some imagination or another. I appreciate your courage and sense in tackling this process and I can assure you that it does come to an end. Eventually one does stop the journeying and one does arrive. For me any sense of being has become like those flaky mists that one gets on the moors. An occasional light wisp is all that is apparent on rare occasions to take an edge off the clarity and purity and sensual delight. Of course it whisks away in the face of the question ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ Then it just seems silly not to be here. So good on you – keep out the broom until the cupboard is clear.

Richard reminded me the other day that it was only about 12 months ago that I first suggested to him about a Web site, and here we are mailing books to people on the other side of the planet. We are actually doing this, as are you of course. Beats being ‘Normal’ and ‘Sane’ any day. Cute ... Hey!

So it’s goodbye from me ...

14.8.1998

PETER: Well done! A site up and running so soon. It’s so good to see in writing someone else’s experience of the turmoil that erupts in one’s stable and safe belief systems when one begins the process of dismantling the psychological within. I tried to relate your experiences to my own and fully understood the bewilderment as I often felt I was digging the very ground out from underneath me. Dismantling and eliminating everything I held dear to me. I remember well scouring around all the writings, wisdoms and truths of Humanity desperately trying to find something to hold on to. At least something that made sense. But in the end I saw that everyone had got it 180 degrees wrong. There was indeed nothing of the Human Condition – be it values, ethics, morals, ideals, hopes, faiths or beliefs – that had any worth at all, quite the contrary. And as each crumbled the earth would appear to shudder – great realizations or slow dawnings would happen, usually accompanied by: ‘How could I have been So Stupid’ or ‘How come no one has seen this before ?’

It is delightful to read of your PCEs or peak experiences on your website. For me the difference between a PCE and a Satori or Religious Experience is quite clear and describable. The Spiritual Experience as usually induced by meditation, the Master’s presence or some other trigger is accompanied by Heartful feelings of love or bliss or oneness. These experiences are sublime, seductive, ‘self’ gratifying and if persisted with can ultimately create that grand Self. There are few more pious than those who have tasted success and power on the spiritual path. The PCE on the other hand is sensual, sensate and lacking in any emotional baggage. There is no ‘self’ as an interpreter, censor or spoiler. All is evidenced by the senses to be pure, perfect, delightful. And my intelligence is freed of any emotions and feelings – thoughts and thinking become benign clear and concise – free of malice and sorrow. This of course makes the need for morals, ethics, or any need for ‘self’ control redundant. With intelligence operating thus ‘I’ am seen for what ‘I’ am – the very cause of suffering and malice.

This physical universe of people, events and things are seen to be perfect and it is obvious that it is only what goes on in our heads – the disease called the Human Condition that is manifest in each of us as a separate, personal ‘self’ – that is the cause of the appalling malice and sorrow that humans exude. What has always been avoided up until now is the fact that what goes on in the heart is the real problem – the loves, loyalties, passions, ideals and beliefs that humans are willing to kill or die for. The problem lies in feelings and emotions and the PCE confirms this experientially.

That is why it is so good to write of these experiences – the ordinary everyday experiences when experienced by our senses free of emotions and feelings do indeed become extraordinary, clear, bright, gay, delightful, friendly, benign and, to use that wonderful word, ambrosial. Enlightenment lies in the opposite direction – in the world of spirits, gods, feelings and emotions. What a delight to come to my senses – what an achievement. It still seems unbelievable. I still keep pinching myself and checking out this new way of living but it is perfect, flawless, actual, and continually amazing.

So ... I’ve gone off on a bit of a rave as I’m prone to but again, well done!!!!

23.8.1998

PETER: Good to discuss with you these matters. I think the operative word here is pure, as I have discovered. The PCE offers a glimpse or window out from the ‘real’ world everyone is born into (and therefore assumes this to be all there is), and suddenly one finds oneself in the unimaginable actual fairytale-like physical universe. My experience was that each time this occurred I was increasingly able to feel comfortable, at ease, as this new ‘me’ – this flesh and blood body. And every time these glimpses had a different experience to them as I explored carefully the actual physical universe that ‘I’ had normally perceived (like every other human being) to be a place of sadness, fear and aggression. Initially the contrast between the actual, benign, safe, and delightful, and the imaginary world of churning emotions, raging hormones and consuming passions is so startling that the memory is either buried or the experience appears wondrous and awesome. With a sincere intent operating to want to live the experience of the PCE every moment, 24 hrs. every day I was able to use the time when I wasn’t actually here living the PCE to root around in the Human Condition – to investigate, discuss, read, think and contemplate on all those instinctual urges and social Truths, Wisdoms and accepted beliefs that made up the particular psychological and psychic entity that dwelled in me and which had taken ‘me’ over. No wonder humans feel alien on the planet.

So, for me the PCE sparkled like a diamond, and when it wasn’t there it meant that I wasn’t here – I was being angry, sad, impatient, proud, humble, fearful or whatever. So then I had something to do – something to firstly acknowledge existed in me and then work to eliminate it by whatever means appropriate. Neither repression or expression will satisfy anyone with sufficient sincere intent. Elimination by contemplation – rooting around to eliminate the very cause, the source. And then to have confirmation by the actual experience of emotions and feelings (both the Good and the Bad) disappearing like a strange fantasy that once played out inside my head and was taken by me to be actual by the hormonal reactions in this body. To experience it working is fascinating beyond normal belief. But then the actual always is.

I found in the end the best and surest way to invoke a PCE was to deliberately, steadfastly, and bloody-mindedly clean myself up. Free myself of the disease called the Human Condition – that mutually agreed acceptance that we are above all ‘feeling’ beings, the only trouble is the hallowed feelings are, at the core, malice and sorrow. Competition, aggression, revenge, retribution, violence, murder, rape, war and torture not to mention sadness, resentment, sorrow, depression, despair and suicide are the inevitable result of being a normal human. It was so good that I always had something to do – to clear the dirt from the diamond – to clean myself up so that I can take my rightful place, play my delightful role, doing what is happening now, as a happy and harmless human free of malice and sorrow. Confident that malice and sorrow have had their day.

But it is excellent to have something that works, a way out of the insanity of misery and violence, fear and aggression.

So that is my experience, I have written about it before but it’s nice to have the chance to write of it again. It is such an adventure and can be both weird and fearful business particularly being among the first to pioneer a method of becoming actually free.

I’ll send you a joke I think you might get a giggle out of.

[Quote]: It started out innocently enough. I began to think at parties now and then just to loosen up. Inevitably though, one thought led to another, and soon I was more than just a social thinker.

I began to think alone – to relax I told myself – but I knew it wasn’t true. Thinking became more and more important to me, and finally I was thinking all the time.

I began to think on the job. I knew that thinking and employment don’t mix, but I couldn’t stop myself.

I began to avoid friends at lunchtime so I could read Thoreau and Kafka. I would return to the office dizzied and confused, asking, ‘What is it exactly we are doing here?’

Things weren’t going so great at home either. One evening I had turned off the TV and asked my wife about the meaning of life. She spent that night at her mother’s.

I soon had a reputation as a heavy thinker. One day the boss called me in. He said, ‘Look, I like you, and it hurts me to say this, but your thinking has become a real problem. If you don’t stop thinking on the job, you’ll have to find another job.’ This gave me a lot to think about.

I came home early after my conversation with the boss. ‘Sweetheart,’ I confessed, ‘I’ve been thinking ... ‘

‘I know you’ve been thinking,’ she said, ‘and I want a divorce!’

‘But, surely it’s not that serious.’

‘It is serious,’ she said, lower lip aquiver. ‘Your thinking too much ... if you keep on thinking we won’t have any money!’

‘That’s faulty thinking,’ I said impatiently, and she began to cry. I’d had enough. ‘I’m going to the library,’ I snarled as I stomped out the door.

I headed for the library, in the mood for some Nietzsche. I roared into the parking lot and ran up to the big glass doors ... they didn’t open. The library was closed.

To this day, I believe that a Higher Power was looking out for me that night.

As I sank to the ground clawing at the unfeeling glass, whimpering for Zarathustra, a poster caught my eye. ‘Friend, is heavy thinking ruining your life?’ it asked. You probably recognise that line. It comes from the standard Thinker’s Anonymous poster.

Which is why I am what I am today: a recovering thinker. I never miss a TA meeting. At each meeting we watch a non-educational video. Then we share experiences about how we avoided thinking since the last meeting.

I still have my job, and things are a lot better at home.

Life just seemed ... well easier, somehow, as soon as I stopped thinking. [endquote].

8.9.1998

PETER: Thought I’d let you know how things are going in the business of trying to seduce people into being happy and harmless. The paperback versions of both Richard’s and Peter’s Journals have been out for about a month and bookshops are refusing to stock them, so radical is their content. About 40 copies have gone out, usually to a deafening silence. I sent copies to many of my friends from my spiritual days but from the lack of response I suspect they have either abandoned the search for freedom or have invested too heavily in the ‘spiritual’ to even consider an alternative. But it does, at this stage, take someone willing to be a pioneer, an explorer of the human condition, to travel a new path rather than the same old well-worn track of the East. Recently I heard a lunatic defined as someone who continues to do something again and again despite the fact that it doesn’t work.

Comments on my journal include ‘it’s too simplistic’, ‘it needs editing’, ‘you have gone too far the other way – I’ll wait till you come back to the middle before I’ll stock your books in my shop’, ‘sounds like a perpetual, not to say antiseptic happiness, like a boring paradise’. I sent copies to a few Gurus I know and the silence is deafening! All have too much invested to even stoop to any discussion or comment, of course. They are a bit like the Dinosaurs of Deceit as they have had their day.

For Richard’s journal comments include ‘too many words’ and ‘why does he talk about ordinary things?’

The next book planned is a book of ‘Objections to being happy and harmless’!

So things are going extraordinarily well. The numbers of people interested is growing exponentially as a confidence gathers as many can see that the practical benefits to themselves of becoming happy and the relief of becoming harmless to others. It does seem that the essential first step is for people to be honest enough to admit that they are not happy, whereas to admit that they are harmful to others is seemingly impossible. It is always the others fault or the fault of ‘society’ or the ‘system’.

It’s such an amazing thing to do to actually undo all of the conditioning that sullied this brain and to disconnect from the animal instincts that have run amok within me. To clean off the ‘shonky’ programming such that there exists no malice or sorrow within me. What a freedom! And yet many remain cynical, clinging proudly to their beliefs despite not disputing the facts that are presented in the journals and on the Web-sites. The more I study the human condition the more fascinating and perverse it is.

So that’s my report – thought you might like to know what’s going on at this end.

*

P.S. – Heard this recently – ‘Between grief and nothing, I chose grief...’ – some French philosopher whose name I missed. Sums it up, really, the stubborn insistence on maintaining grief and sorrow as a Noble human trait.

1.10.1998

PETER: Just a note to let you know how it goes on this side of the planet. It’s tough living down-under: it takes great effort just to hang on to the globe without falling off. Guess that’s what happens to the enlightened – they just flip out into the cosmos and play with the Gods. Trouble is they miss out on the pleasures and delights of sex, meat, coffee, companionship, lazy-long lunches, afternoon naps, etc. etc. and tend to be prone to that disease of Guru-ship leading to the formation of yet another Religion resulting in ...

I am having a little break from writing at the moment. I wrote to an old Guru I once followed, warning him of the impending demise of his profession but I think he has too much investment in his job. Once you are convinced you are God or at One with Him it would be a big come-down to admit to being ‘merely mortal’.

I also sent a book to a woman who runs a TV program that investigates and discusses the meaning of life. She wrote back thanking me and declared she had a ‘mature faith’. I think that is like a belief set in concrete. Sort of like dying with both fingers crossed hoping there is a heaven to go to as you have put all your eggs in one basket.

The Guru accused me of being a Guru, of course, but he will have a bit of trouble with Vineeto’s book when it comes out as that will demolish the silly male Gurus with their heads in the clouds, their fear of women, sex and pleasure. It’s a definite disadvantage being a male in saying you have discovered an actual freedom from fear and aggression not just a repression or transcendence. The male of the species has a deservedly bad reputation in actually achieving either. Of course I now know that the answer lies in eradicating all male social conditioning and instinctual drives – becoming free of the male prison. And isn’t it a hoot that Vineeto is the first woman free from the shackles of being a woman. She has a tentative line in the book title that goes ‘woman’s liberation from being a woman’. Cute Hey.

Nothing like a fully sexual woman to keep your feet on the ground – even if your knees do wobble a bit!

No wonder Mr. Buddha and his mates all deny sex as evil and women’s sexuality as immoral. Guilt and shame make awful bed-mates. So as you can see I’m wallowing in sex, food, leisure and pleasure.

22.2.1999

PETER: I thought I would drop you a note since I seemed to have been ‘otherwise occupied’ for a while. As you know Vineeto and I ‘dropped in’ on the Sannyas mailing list for a few months. We had heard that my journal had been discussed on the list, but the rumour seemed to be a false one. We watched for a while, Vineeto wrote a few things, and after a while I couldn’t resist. I opened by innocuously questioning a quote from Mr. Rajneesh talking of two worlds – real and spiritual. I pointed out there were three worlds – real, spiritual and actual ... and away it went! About 150,000 words and 3 months later we were finally cut off after I dared to question not only the teachings but the Teacher!

There was a sort of a pretence that it was okay to question the teachings, but when it comes to questioning Him, Himself, then the lines are drawn. It was a fascinating exercise to see the limits that one can go in challenging Religious Dogma and Ancient Wisdom. It is a good thing that it was on the Net and not actually outside the temple gates. And it’s a good thing the spiritual people only throw brown rice and not stones as in the good old days. For me, it was another opportunity to test the wide and wondrous path to Actual Freedom, to write of facts in the face of belief and test both the facts and my motives, intentions and reactions to those who wrote.

I give both Actual Freedom and myself a 100% rating.

I always like to test things out, give it a run around the block, so to speak. A bit of gay abandon, stepping out a bit, letting one’s hair down, as one can do when malice and sorrow are having their swan song. Speaking of which it is a while since I have heard of them at all. Which is why I was able to write as I did on the list, with a confidence firmly rooted in the fact that what we are into is an outstanding change in Human Nature the likes of which defies any paltry imagination or idealism.

As far as standing up to the scrutiny of spiritual pundits, when faced with the facts about the spiritual world, some weird and strange arguments emerge as you will have noticed. Much frantic back-peddling and denial is obvious. I do understand we were spoiling their game, but it is a game that needs spoiling if peace is to come to this fair planet. And as you well know, to become actually free is now the only game to play in town – the Gurus have had their day.

Well, this is a bit of a loose, late night ramble but I’m enjoying writing on ‘home turf’, so to speak. We have the list-writing on our web-site, as you know, and the next exercise is to sort it by topics so as to make it more useful and convenient for anyone who is interested. It was interesting to look back at the objections that we came across. I stated early on in the correspondence that I had begun the spiritual path with the ideal of peace of mind for me and the ideal of peace on earth. I was howled down for this and it soon became obvious that for those remaining in the group that love for the Master was the only remaining ideal that anyone could cling to, all else had failed. When push comes to shove – love for the Master (or God) is wheeled out as the fall back position, Never Ever to be questioned. To the point of being willing to sacrifice one’s life for, or kill for, although few would admit to it. It all seems to boil down to a desperate need to belong to some group or other, to believe in some higher authority, some better life somewhere else – anywhere but here, now, as this flesh and blood body only.

The other thing that was very evident was the total lack of interest in discussions about peace on earth. Total self-interest, remoteness and detachment to the point of cynicism and beyond were apparent, which took me aback on occasions. The creation of the ‘watcher’, in psychiatric terms is called dis-association, when one is willing to kill or do a criminal act without any feelings what-so-ever. The revelations of Zen at War (http://www.darkzen.com/) reveal this to an appalling extent. It was an eye opener for me.

It became so glaringly obvious that not only is there no solution to the human dilemma within the spiritual world, but that no one even imagines there is. It is completely and utterly a selfish undertaking. Beneath the noble poetic rhetoric lies self-interest, cynicism and hypocrisy which rivals any in the real world. There is none so self-righteous as the man or woman of God.

So, life is bloody excellent here – a small but significant wedge is being driven in the door of the spiritual temples and an enormous door is swinging opening to the actual world of sensibility and sensate experiencing for human beings.

And the prize is not only peace and freedom for oneself, but ... peace on earth.

To quote no better source than yourself – ain’t life grand!

1.3.1999

PETER: Yes it is good to be back writing on ‘home turf’, so to speak. Here on the Actual Freedom mailing list at least we can talk of something more substantial than petty objections to even considering becoming happy and harmless and discuss and swap experiences as to the actual doing of it.

So, let’s get on with it –

*

PETER to Richard: This first process had two components – an intellectual understanding such that the fact of being a human being made sense, and this involved a rigorous, challenging, exciting and revealing investigation into the Human Condition and its bedrock of Ancient Wisdom. This is essentially the understanding of the non-spiritual nature of Actual Freedom. The second component was the practical day to day stuff (and what else is there anyway?) of what it is to be a human being – the theory into practice if you like. The experience that Actual Freedom is not a philosophy, not a theory, but a down-to-earth experience as a flesh and blood body. Peter to Richard, 25.2.1999

ALAN: Couldn’t agree more. The combination of the two is vital – and perhaps inevitable. Sort of convincing ‘me’ that it is possible, while experiencing its actuality.

PETER: Just to clarify my post. Up until now the only path to freedom has been a spiritual path to a spiritual freedom – the traditional path of denial, renunciation and transcendence leading to an Altered State of Consciousness known as Enlightenment. The path leads to There – another dimension, a metaphysical realm.

The aim of the path to Actual Freedom is to come here to the actual world. The actual world is that which is evidenced and apparent in the PCE or peak experience and that is where the path to Actual Freedom leads. The actual world is the world as-it-is, stripped of the veneer of reality or Reality that the ‘self’ or ‘Self’ layers over it.

However, as the aim is to come here and be happy and harmless, one always has an immediate goal and aim every moment – to be as happy and harmless as one can possibly be right now. ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ is the key to firstly ascertaining how one is doing relative to one’s aim in life and, if necessary, finding out what is inhibiting my happiness, in this moment. This gives ‘me’ something to do – ‘I’ clean myself up as much as possible by rigorously and remorselessly examining all the beliefs that constitute the Human Condition – all the truths and Truths that form my social identity, and the instinctual behavioural patterns that blindly run ‘me’. This process, if undertaken with a sincere intent, will inevitably lead to a state of Virtual Freedom. One then goes to bed in the evening knowing that one has had a perfect day, and knowing that tomorrow, without doubt, will also be a perfect day. Unless one is willing to contemplate being happy and harmless, free of malice and sorrow, 99% of the time – then forget the whole business. One is back aiming for some ‘pie in the sky’, some miracle event to ‘make it all better’. And the Sannyas list was an eye opener as far as that was concerned. When offered an alternative to ‘getting out of it’, such that being happy and harmless became one’s aim in life – none were interested in this aspect; peace on earth got a similar response, living with a companion in peace and harmony hardly raised a murmur. Nobody believes that it is possible to be happy and harmless in the world as-it-is, on earth, here, now, as a flesh and blood body. This is, after all, the core of Ancient Wisdom – the sacred and inviolate centre-piece of the Human Condition.

*

PETER to Richard: I have always had a cautious reluctance to state that there is a definable state called Virtual Freedom whereby one is virtually free of the Human Condition – a 99% state or the best one can do while still remaining a ‘self’. I think that the point is that this state is not irreversible – unless there is a sincere intent and a desire to evince the best possible one could waver. Peter to Richard, 25.2.1999

ALAN: I have always been a bit unsure what ‘Virtual Freedom’ is, so I read your comments with interest.

I have also read what Richard has written on this, though it is not something I consider of great importance – the fact that one’s life is improved and the knowledge of one’s ultimate goal (to experience the perfection and purity 24 hours of the day) are the important points for me. If this is ‘Virtual Freedom’ then fine – I’m enjoying it. One possible benefit of ‘Virtual Freedom’, I did discover, was that it threw ‘me’ into a blue funk, at one stage. ‘I’ wanted to know if ‘I’ had managed to achieve Virtual Freedom, was ‘I’ doing well, had you and Vineeto managed it and I hadn’t? Now, I could not care less – this is my life and what another is doing or achieving is of no consequence at all.

PETER: I guess my experience of talking to people on the Sannyas mailing list has tipped me into valuing Virtual Freedom more and more. It is another of the factors that makes the path to Actual Freedom so delightful, so delicious, such a wondrous culmination of ‘normal’ human existence. If one can’t or won’t contemplate living in a Virtual Freedom then an Actual Freedom will forever remain a ‘pie in the sky’, a spiritual-type, far-off, far-out freedom for those who persist with this outmoded way of thinking.

Virtual Freedom is available for everyone and anyone who has the sincere intent to be happy and harmless. If someone is not willing to make that level of ‘self’ sacrifice then any interest in an Actual Freedom would remain a purely cerebral exercise. That is what I meant by ‘two stages’ – you sort out what it is to be a human being – delve into the Human Condition and then you put what you discover into practice. If it is not put into practice demonstratively then one is fooling oneself – as is common practice on the spiritual path. An immediate aim for a Virtual Freedom will ensure one of sincere intent – any gross grubbiness, power plays or self deception will become painfully obvious to oneself and others.

Given the perfection and purity of the physical universe and its propensity to evolve to the best possible, it is no mere coincidence that a journal outlining the simplicity and down-to-earthness of Virtual Freedom is now available as a companion volume to Richard’s Journal. To ignore the obvious, the simple, the direct, the immediate in favour of always contemplating the future is to commit the mistakes of the past ‘tried and failed’ approaches. Not that there isn’t a future goal – Actual Freedom – but the practical and down-to-earth first essential step is the obtaining of and living in Virtual Freedom for a substantial period. The establishing of a base camp if you like.

One of the vital points about Virtual Freedom is that it gives one a realistic down-to-earth achievable aim. Virtual Freedom is an obtainable, realistic goal available for anyone – and is an essential step on the path to Actual Freedom. It seems to me that the traditional path has always put the Goal off into the future – some day I will, or maybe it will happen, or it’s too difficult, or .. With the firm knowledge that a Virtual Freedom is readily obtainable, the immediate and the actual becomes the focus, as this is, after all, the only moment I can experience of being alive – so if I’m not happy now then I have something to look at. Unlike the spiritual where one has only a ‘far off’ goal with a 0.0001% chance of success of achieving a permanent ASC, the path to Actual Freedom delivers the goods – one eliminates the impediments to one’s happiness incrementally and as such one has incremental success. The immediate and realistic aim being to get to the point where one goes to bed at night having had a perfect day and knowing tomorrow will be equally perfect. The ‘bar gets raised’ and tomorrow may well turn out to be even more perfect. This is not to deny that Actual Freedom is not the eventual aim – but ‘I’ have to do it and this is the way to do it. What ‘I’ can do is to become virtually free.

This is 180 degrees opposite to the spiritual path where going ‘There’ is the only goal and consequently one withdraws from any thoughts of happiness now, and certainly any mundane considerations such as being harmless, being in the world as-it-is, living with one’s companion in peace, harmony and equity, being sensible, questioning beliefs and investigating the facts, etc.

*

PETER to Richard: ... – unless there is a sincere intent and a desire to evince the best possible one could waver. It simply means I will be the best I can, and if one has had a peak experience then the best is glaringly obvious. Peter to Richard, 25.2.1999

ALAN: Yeah, well, it is something I have had difficulty with and I am still not sure. Richard has described it as ‘Pure intent is a palpable life-force; an actually occurring stream of benignity that originates in the perfect and vast stillness that is the essential character of the infinitude of the universe. It is no longer a matter of choice ... it is an irresistible pull.’ and ‘Pure intent is the connection between the intimate aspect of oneself, that one usually keeps hidden away for fear of seeming foolish, and the purity of the peak experience.’ Now, while I understand both of these statements – and writing and reading this, maybe I have just ‘got’ what pure intent is – it is my innate and non-affective connection to the purity and perfection as seen in the PCE. It is what ‘obliges’ me to continue, to keep going in the face of all the fears and provides the courage to ‘break from the herd’. I know what is possible and ‘pure intent’ will not let me ignore it. How does that sound?

PETER: Those who follow, as opposed to those who first discover, have a decidedly easier time of things. There is no doubt one does this thing of becoming free of the Human Condition oneself but Richard has laid such a wonderful word-strewn path that one would need to be a fool to diverge from it, or try to invent ‘new’ problems or new ‘sub’-paths. One keeps one’s wits about oneself, of course – the way I did that was to check out the facts for myself. One doesn’t ‘blindly’ follow, a little reading, or a scoot around the Net, quickly enables one to discern and confirm the facts as opposed to the commonly held ‘truth’ or belief about something. The proof of anything is – does it work?

The only trap is that one can end up Enlightened and this is now easily avoidable as Enlightenment is such a second-rate, foolish, inane and childish delusion that it defies intelligent consideration as an option to Actual Freedom.

By keeping one’s aspirations and goals immediate and mundane as opposed to eternal and celestial, success is guaranteed – one edges inevitably and perceptively closer to one’s destiny and has a heck of a time on the way. The immediate is the focus, here, now, in the world as-it-is. The sincere and honest tackling of the beliefs that make up one’s social identity will lob one firmly and delightfully in a Virtual Freedom whereby one is happy and harmless 99% of the time. And don’t forget the harmless bit, for one can’t be happy without being harmless.

*

PETER to Richard: Despite the fact of having had a substantial peak experience (PCE) some 15 years ago and a substantial experience of Divine Love (ASC) some 3 years ago ... Peter to Richard, 25.2.1999

ALAN: In view of my current conversation with Richard, I am interested to hear anything you may care to contribute on the differences between the two.

PETER: What occurred to me follows on from what I have been saying about Virtual Freedom. With an Altered State of Consciousness it was always experienced as ‘I’ went Somewhere Else – a world of blissful feelings, an ‘escape’ from the world as-it-is. With a peak experience the world as-it-is, is experienced as perfect and pure, and I, this flesh and blood body, was as perfect and as pure as the actual world. The closest one can get to this, whilst remaining normal, is to live in Virtual Freedom – whereby the necessity to have a feeling or affective distance from the world as-it-is is eventually reduced to paper thinness. When someone asks me if I am free yet, I find myself raising my hand with thumb touching first finger and saying ‘that close’. It is a sign that ‘I’am doing the most ‘I’ can to precipitate it.

*

PETER to Richard: The other nagging issue was a feeling of the unfairness or even perversity of being born into the Human Condition, of being who I thought and felt I was, finding out it was a pretty rotten mess and then having to die, or self-immolate in order to be free <snipped for space>. Peter to Richard, 25.2.1999

ALAN: This is something I can relate to. I find it to be linked with the ‘stuckness’ I have been discussing with Vineeto – why should I put in all this effort just to disappear. ‘I’ do not know what else ‘I’ can do. ‘I’ want to stick around to enjoy the show.

PETER: Given that the aim of the game is Actual Freedom, there is no way with sincere intent operating that this can happen. Simply hanging in on this mailing list will ensure that, exactly like the leaves being swept down the gutters in the torrential downpour outside right now – Alan will disappear. It would mean that all of this – the vast, silent, perfect and pure universe, of such magnificence and grandness – has been set up for us all to suffer and fight in. To live a second-rate life of continual failure to achieve a personal peace – to be forever miserable and fearful ...

I think you can pass on that one, Alan.

*

PETER to Richard: The other morning a peak experience snuck up on me – after a particularly good ‘romp’ with Vineeto. It was one of particular clarity marked by a complete absence of any sense of ‘self’ or ‘being’ within my body. All was perfect and pure with a magical intensity that was palpable. Not merely static – a sense of the whole universe happening at this moment with a vibrancy that was sensately experienced. <snip> Peter to Richard, 25.2.1999

ALAN: Your description was excellent, Peter, and I would like to explore further as this is the crux of what we are all aiming for. You seem to be saying that there is a difference in ‘degree’ of the PCE. My view (up to now) is that there cannot be such a difference – when one is experiencing a PCE how can perfection be improved upon? If one experiences that this moment is the ultimate, what else is there? As I write this I am very, very close to a PCE – but it is not a PCE. The words are writing themselves, tumbling out deliciously on to the screen, delightful music is playing in the background and I am almost the living of this moment. And that is the point – almost. I know (or perhaps pure intent knows) that this is not the ultimate – delightful, wonderful and delicious as it may be. When this moment is living me, then that is what I would call a PCE. Having said that, I have no recollection of experiencing what you did, regarding the existence of ‘me’, in a PCE.

However, the next time I have a PCE, I will try to remember and have a look at ‘what is ‘me’’. The difficulty is (and this is recollection) when I am in a PCE all these questions become unimportant – I am too ‘busy’ simply enjoying being here. But it is fascinating to explore, is it not? And the rock of enlightenment is a very real danger and not to be underestimated. As you wrote in your journal, I too have imagined ‘myself’ filling lecture halls and basking in the Glory – seductive, ain’t it – but only to an unprepared ‘self’ – and this, I guess, is where ‘pure intent’ comes in (I think I have got that now).

PETER: I do agree that my route is very different to Richard’s torturous and lone adventure, but from now on we will all follow a very simple and direct path to Actual Freedom. It may have slight eccentricities for different people, but there is no other ‘way’ or other ‘path’. It will become easier and easier as more is written, as more people come along, as the ‘long grass’ is trampled, as the ‘Demons’ are laid to rest, as the traps and fears are exposed for the illusion they are.

The other point is that it is becoming very clear to me that everyone is influenced by Eastern Spirituality, for the simple reason that up until now it has been the only thing that has pointed to the possibility of freedom before physical death. The falsehoods, myths and lies propagated confirm the fact that it offers nothing other than a delusionary and imaginary escape only, but the influences of the ‘Spiritual Search’ is universal, atavistic, pervasive and intrusive on all human beings.

Thus we look to the PCE in the same way we look to the ASC – a way to ‘get out of it’. We look for and actively pursue it as some sort of ‘relief’ from our ‘normal’ human existence and pursue it as such. In the spiritual world one does a group, goes to an ashram or sits and meditates to escape from, or obtain some relief from the ‘real’ world and from the churning thoughts, feelings and emotions that make up ‘who’ we think and feel we are. The path to Actual Freedom involves assiduously and deliberately challenging the bundle of thoughts, feelings and emotions that are actually what ‘I’ am made of, and simultaneously challenging the instilled overriding and primitive belief that this physical world, as-it-is, is a miserable and frightening place to be in. To do this means one will soon end up living and enjoying a Virtual Freedom, where one will live in a state that is the closest ‘humanly’ possible to a peak experience, for 99% of the time. Then, and only then, will the genuine article of a PCE just slip in the door, or waft in on the breeze. And you may well get to have a PCE in the mean time – but you haven’t wasted (too much) time in worrying about it all in the mean time. You will get to live in Virtual Freedom, which is way beyond ‘normal’ human expectations anyway, so much so that you will have no emotional memories of ‘who’ you were before you started on this wide and wondrous path. The aim of the exercise is, after all, to live in the world as-it-is, free of malice and sorrow – to be here – not There, as in an ASC.

To treat the PCE as one would a spiritual ASC or epiphany is to mix a ‘bit of spiritual’ in Actual Freedom and, as we know, they simply don’t mix. The path to Actual Freedom bears no resemblance to the spiritual path – they run in opposite directions. The aim of one is to ‘get out of it’ – the other is to get fully into it, this business of being alive as a flesh and blood mortal human being – to be an ‘earthling’, as I wrote to someone the other day.

Well, I’ve got off on to one of my raves again, Alan. I’ve got no idea if this answers any of your questions, but it is how I experience this wide and wondrous path to Actual Freedom. Alan, these comments are not personally ‘aimed’ at you for I know not your circumstances or life experience or situation – they are my experiences and those of Vineeto which I am simply passing on. And a little plug for the down-to-earthness of my journal as well, don’t be fooled by the apparent simpleness of it all – life was meant to be easy, after all. We humans have got so used to sticking our heads in the sand, or in the clouds, for so, so long, with all the complicated and torturous mythical explanations and philosophies about human existence... we are not at all used to simply seeing what is under our very noses ...

*

PETER: I thought I would drop you a note since I seemed to have been ‘otherwise occupied’ for a while. As you know Vineeto and I ‘dropped in’ on the Sannyas mailing list for a few months. We had heard that my journal had been discussed on the list, but the rumour seemed to be a false one. We watched for a while, Vineeto wrote a few things, and after a while I couldn’t resist. I opened by innocuously questioning a quote from Mr. Rajneesh talking of two worlds – real and spiritual. I pointed out there were three worlds – real, spiritual and actual ... and away it went! About 150,000 words and 3 months later we were finally cut off after I dared to question not only the teachings but the Teacher!

ALAN: Is your ‘questioning of the teacher’ on your web site yet?

PETER: PS: The ‘questioning of the teacher’ basically consisted in my stating that Rajneesh had failed as a Guru. It particularly upset the correspondent who then repeated the passage on the list several times to flag everyone’s attention and shortly after that we were cyber-executed.

13.3.1999

PETER: Just a note to your last post –

ALAN: I wrote the above almost two weeks ago and since then have been in a real ‘zombie’ state. There has been an overwhelming sense of ‘what is the point of it all?’ and by that I mean what is the point in doing anything when I know it is all a fantasy of ‘my’ creation – what is the point of writing this, when I know it is only ‘my’ imagination. Perhaps the above realisation was too much to take all at once, perhaps it was getting, for the first time, that as ‘I’ was all that was standing in the way of peace on earth, ‘I’ had to go before this peace on earth could actually be realised. Maybe this is the beginning of the end of ‘me’ – I’ll let you know what transpires.

PETER: I have been tootling along with a few more words and a bit of tidying up of the Glossary on the web-site recently, and the latest word was ‘benevolent’. I found myself writing it slanted a bit towards naiveté – that ‘oh so, so essential’ ingredient on the path to freedom. It takes a bucketful and more to counter one’s personal fears and resistance and a mountain full to overcome the cynicism, despair and gloom of Humanity. One needs to concoct it, remember it, access it, resurrect it, find it, dig it up, fuel it, play with it, carry it in your pocket, stash a bit under the bed, season your meals with it, and stock up on it as much as possible from a peak experience.

Be foolish, gullible, silly and extremely naïve in ‘real-world’ terms for you are actually doing what is foolish, gullible, silly and extremely naïve in real-world terms – not to mention ‘spiritual-world’ terms – you are becoming free of the Human Condition. One needs to be naïve to believe it is possible in the first place, but as one gets into it you find your naiveté is supported by facts and incremental success (ie. finding that it works). This then produces confidence which then grows into surety, then an obsession takes over, naiveté‚ blossoms, and a benevolent inevitability ensues.

For me, naiveté was absolutely essential to counter any fear that arises. With pure intent as a golden cord, as Richard saw it, and naiveté‚ as a constant companion, becoming free of the Human Condition of malice and sorrow is inevitable. It would be foolish to think otherwise.

I’ll leave you with the bit I wrote on benevolence –

benevolence — Disposition to kindness, generosity, and goodwill towards one’s fellow human beings. Oxford Dictionary

Peter: Benevolence is the innate disposition or quality of the actual world and, as such, is the innate disposition of anyone who is actually free from the Human Condition.

Any attempt to appreciate the benevolent quality of the actual world requires one to cultivate and maintain naiveté, which is the closest human quality possible to actual innocence. One needs to abandon the cynical and resentful ‘real world views’ epitomized by such sayings as ‘Life wasn’t meant to be easy’ and ‘Life’s a bitch and then you die’. Similarly one needs to abandon the spiritual mind-set that merely affirms the ‘real world views’ while cultivating an affective fairy-tale ‘inner world’ of denial and fantasy, complete with its seductive promise of a greater Reality and a ‘better life’, after death.

The naiveté required to question the gloom and doom of ‘real-world reality’ and the seductive delusion of ‘spiritual-world Reality’ is accessed from the actual innocence of the peak experience or PCE, when the perfection, purity and innate benevolence of the physical universe is readily and obviously apparent. Benevolence is then seen clearly for what it is – an intrinsic quality of the actual universe, and not, as is commonly imagined, a quality bequeathed or bestowed by some mythical Creator-God or some meta-physical energy of a sprit-ridden Mother-Earth, or some other esoteric Divine force.

In the actual world, benevolence is a palpable and innate disposition of the growth force to attain the best possible result in any situation. At its simplest level it is readily seen in plants, as each does the best to adapt, survive and thrive in different situations. In animals, this tendency can be seen as a more sophisticated reaction as the options for action, mobility and adaptability are increased in a more complex life-form. In human beings, with the marvellous intelligence of the brain operating, we see this innate benevolence at its most stunning. The technological developments in agriculture, health, communications, transport, services, etc. all move inexorably and inevitably towards more comfort, more safety, more pleasure, more leisure and more ease. This is benevolence in action, the direct result of the human brain in action – the only intelligence in the universe – and has nought to do with any Gods, Energies, Intelligence, Force or the like.

And the time has now come for the next stunning breakthrough in benevolence in action – an actual freedom from the Human Condition of malice and sorrow is now possible. This will have the benevolent result of a gradual reduction and eventual elimination of human violence and suffering – an end to malice and sorrow – as each individual does it for his or herself.

The benevolence of the actual physical universe is the very ‘engine’ for this new discovery of Actual Freedom, and the cultivation of naiveté, based on the experience of the PCE, is the key for anyone wishing to access it. The Actual Freedom Trust Library, Benevolence

So Alan, always good to get a post from the over there ...

17.3.1999

PETER: Just a couple of points from your last post to Vineeto I would like to comment on and pass on my experience on the path to freedom.

ALAN: On my way to cash & carry this morning I was continuing to contemplate the realisation which I had about a fortnight ago – ‘I’ was all that was standing in the way of peace on earth. I suddenly realised (‘got’) that ‘I’ had to go in ‘my’ entirety to achieve actual freedom. Not almost all of ‘me’, not 99%, not just the beliefs, but every single smidgen of the personality which considered itself to be Alan.

PETER: The ‘not 99%’ bit twigged me, as I take it the 99% comment relates to my last post to you where I used the phrase in connection to Virtual Freedom.

‘This process, if undertaken with a sincere intent, will inevitably lead to a state of Virtual Freedom. One then goes to bed in the evening knowing that one has had a perfect day, and knowing that tomorrow, without doubt, will also be a perfect day. Unless one is willing to contemplate being happy and harmless, free of malice and sorrow, 99% of the time – then forget the whole business.’

While it is both fascinating and intriguing to contemplate upon an Actual Freedom – what would it be like, how would it be, etc. – it must always remain unknowable to ‘me’ as I am now. The only thing ‘I’ can actually do to facilitate an actual freedom from malice and sorrow is to get myself to a state of Virtual Freedom as rapidly as possible. This involves ridding myself of my social identity and instinctual-based sense of ‘self’ as much as is ‘humanly’ possible. To get to the 99% stage is what ‘I’ can do to facilitate ‘my’ demise. There is work to be done and plenty of it, for continual perfect days are well beyond normal human expectations anyway – for one becomes virtually happy and harmless, 24 hrs a day, every day. Depression, sadness, loneliness, boredom, resentment, anger, animosity, annoyance become but vague memories as ‘I’ become less and less substantial, less of the one who is experiencing, less of the one who is controlling, less of the one who is thinking and feeling. Apperception, naiveté and sensate experience replace confusion, doubt, fear and alienation.

The other facet to the path to Actual Freedom – to the 99% stage – is that realisations are clearly seen for what they are, sudden and dramatic flashes or glimpses of a belief exposed as merely fictitious and not factual. These realisation have a feeling ‘high’ associated with it, as a sense of liberation and startling clarity is affectively interpreted and experienced. While extremely useful and ‘par for the course’, as beliefs are exposed and eliminated, it is what one does with the realization, what action or change is evinced, that is important and significant, not the realization itself, per se. One needs to be aware of realisation addiction, to put it bluntly, as one can spend an inordinate amount of time and effort looking or waiting for them and as such ‘not being here’. They are but curiosities and will eventually subside – to have had their day, exactly as will the rest of impassioned feelings and irrational imagination, if peace is one’s aim. A personal peace in the world-as-it-is, with people as-they-are, that is.

I wrote a bit in my journal about realisations that may be useful –

[Peter]: ‘This process of identifying various aspects of the human condition within me became a full-time occupation. Whenever I was not experiencing myself at the optimum level possible at the time, I had something, some aspect of the Human Condition, to look at. This constant looking within myself – my psyche – would then expose that particular belief or instinctual passion as silly, not sensible, and it would eventually disappear. Often the change was sudden and dramatic with a corresponding thrill of freedom, while other issues brought a slow, sluggish release. Often I found myself impatient at an apparent lack of progress, just to realise that this was exactly the issue to look at – perhaps the desire for excitement and achievement, or good old boredom. It was extraordinary that the next thing would come along, and the right circumstances and events would occur, confronting and aiding me. Sometimes, seeing through some part of ‘me’ as a mere belief or instinctual pattern would come as a flash of realisation, sometimes as a slow painful dawning, which I would fight tooth and nail, reluctant to even acknowledge, let alone throw out. But gradually I could notice the psychological entity becoming thinner, actually weakening its hold over me. It then became apparent to me that I was indeed fixing myself up as much as ‘I’ could!’ Peter’s Journal, ‘Intelligence’

So Alan, hope this has some relevance to your current experiences and may be of some use.

It is a most fascinating business, this pioneering trail-blazing. The cute thing is we get to do it with absolutely no physical hardship – on the contrary, hedonism and physical delight abounds and abounds...

Says he as the smell of bacon and eggs and fresh brewed coffee calls him away ...

26.3.1999

PETER: Just to add a finishing line to Mr. Otis’ Wisdom. The Mystics are notorious in appearing wise and leaving their solution unspoken, indicated with silence or one of those All-Knowing looks...

ALAN: An older student came to Otis and said, ‘I have been to see a great number of teachers and I have given up a great number of pleasures, I have fasted, been celibate and stayed awake nights seeking enlightenment. I have given up everything I was asked to give up and I have suffered, but I have not been enlightened. What should I do?’ Otis replied, ‘Give up suffering.’

PETER: ‘... and realise that you are God’ is the implied message.

And upon realising you are God, the personal feeling of suffering is magically transformed into compassion for others. Of course, since one is now full of the Divine, one feels Divine compassion for those poor sentient beings who are mere mortals and still suffering from the illusion that the body, mind and world are real. I always liked the Tibetan Buddhists who are so blatant about it. The Dalai Lama is venerated as the re-incarnation of ‘the Lord who looks down with compassion on the world of sentient beings’. He was the God-King of Tibet and all of the wealth and power of the country was located in the temples. This Theocracy ensured that the poor stayed poor, while temples – and dead Lamas – were coated in gold.

A genuine end to the feeling of suffering (sorrow) is also an end to the feeling of compassion. Sorrow and its noble companion, compassion are the very foundation of both Western and Eastern Religion. The whole concept of a spiritual world, another life, another realm is based on a denial of the very real suffering of human beings and are nothing but an imaginary escape from it’s consequences both personally and globally. One needs to make a distinction between the feeling of suffering and real suffering. Suffering in the world is real – there are actual wars, rapes, murders, tortures, domestic violence happening as I type these words. But to continue to believe the likes of the Mr. Otis’ of this world is to actively contribute to the continuation of real suffering. This not only maintains the whole religious-spiritual belief system with its resultant wars, persecutions, repressions, denial and duplicity but actively reinforces the whole concept of good and evil, right and wrong, passion and feeling, malice and sorrow – the prevailing Human Condition based on Ancient Wisdom.

The last thing Mr. Otis really wanted was an end to the feeling of suffering or real suffering for he would have no Wisdom, no students, no fame, no power, no need for Zen. No feeling of suffering – no need for the feeling of escape or the feeling of compassion with its implied Holy feeling of superiority.

I recently watched a TV program on Ladakh, and the Buddhist monks pray to the ‘spirits’ to bring a good harvest and to keep the wolves away, evoke the ‘good’ spirits for healing and give potions to drive out the ‘evil’ spirits from the sick and ill. This is their main business as shamans and medicine men and Mr. Buddha was a bit of a side issue. In the West we have merely taken on the Eastern shamans for a bit of feel-good or to feel compassion in order to offset the in-built feelings of malice and sorrow.

It’s so good to be getting free of all this – to come to one’s senses. To be able to live in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are. To be personally free of malice and sorrow – the root of all our emotions.

To be free of sadness, resentment, anger, annoyance, hate, depression, melancholy, loneliness, etc.

27.3.1999

PETER: Boy, isn’t this business the most thrilling, most amazing thing to be doing with one’s life. The only game to play in town, as I have call it. Says he with not a skerrick of humility nor pride, those twin shackles of Humanity.

You wrote a bit to No 4 that intrigued me –

ALAN: Your understanding that ‘I’ am not a fact was something I commented on ‘getting’ in my last post. Like you, I agreed and ‘understood’ that ‘I’ am not a fact – ‘I’ am a belief – and ‘I’ fervently believe in ‘myself’. But, getting this fact is a bit like going straight for the 64,000 dollar question – maybe you have some ‘easier’ beliefs you could work on first? Not that I would wish to dissuade anyone from jumping straight in – the ‘boots and all’ approach, as Richard calls it. It is just that, from my recent experience, this is such a whammer, so earth shattering a realisation, that it is probably the equivalent of a novice climber deciding his first climb is to be Mount Everest!

PETER: I like what you wrote. This impassioned version of the death of ‘me’ always had the ring of the spiritual to me and as such I have been always been a bit suss of it. This is not to deny the fact that a psychic and psychological death is a factual necessity for Actual Freedom. This fact is made glaringly obvious and apparent in the PCE – where the absence of self-ish or self-centred thoughts or feelings and any sense of being is evidenced. What I am talking about is the degree of passion and emotion associated with the event – the more the psychological and psychic fear the more the risk of getting on a sort of emotional swing whereby one swings from dread into awe. Where one makes an instinctual grab for Glory as a reward for suffering, or to overcome the dread. The other way is that one could make an impassioned sacrifice for the Good of the Whole and as such one would want reward and recognition for one’s sacrifice – the good old delusion of Enlightenment again.

The way I see it – i.e. I am just reporting what I see and experience – is that by living in Virtual Freedom for an appropriate amount of time one has noticeably less feelings and passions operating. The instinctual emotions – fear, aggression, nurture and desire are less substantial, less evident, dis-used, atrophied, almost fizzed out. Thus the final act of self-immolation is seen for what it is – an imminent inevitably, a soon-to-happen fact. And, as we know from the continual experience of Virtual Freedom, it is silly to fear a fact – it just spoils your day, or your moment. In the light of bare awareness, or apperceptive thought, fear is experienced more as a bodily sensation rather than as ‘my’ fear. So let me repeat, this is not to deny the fact of self-immolation, it is to put it in its perspective, freed of the greater part of ‘my’ affectation, fear – and Virtual Freedom does that very job. What it also means is that anyone who is sincerely willing to get to a point of a continuos Virtual Freedom for a substantial period of time can then become Actually Free. It would then be available for anyone. One would not need to be special, a freak, a fanatic, a genius – it could be anyone... The other definitely not-to-be-overlooked advantage is that the instinctual passionate grab for survival that occurs with self-immolation is weakened in proportion to the reduction of the instinctual passions.

This is a bit of an interpretation on my part – an observation of ‘work in progress’, but I do detect a similarity in our collective experiences which gives credence to it. Could we say it makes sense? I know I err on the side of caution and the facts aren’t all in yet, but I like the ordinary availability of it. I took on Actual Freedom knowing it would be the end of ‘me’ but I figured I would cross that bridge (or not cross the bridge...) when I came to it. In the meantime I always had something to do – question beliefs, investigate, read, contemplate – to de-bunk the myths, discover the facts for myself, strip the layers of belief and superstition that make up both the ‘real’ world and the ‘spiritual’ world.

Well that’s it from me – time for a meal and a touch of fascinating war-watching or whatever ... 2 by 6 KB is an excellent day for me at the moment. It’s good to weigh your writing, I’ve discovered.

P.S. – A line from a movie that caught my attention – ‘She fell in love with suffering’. Cute Hey.

21.4.1999

PETER: Hi Alan,

Goodtahearfomya, as its said in the local dialect over here. Thanks very much for picking up the errors, I do appreciate it. It’s interesting going back over my journal. my understanding and experience is so much more complete now and writing and talking has sure sharpened up ‘leaving any loopholes’. As you have picked up I am really enjoying writing on the list – ‘home turf’ as I put it is much more fun and meaty than the Sannyas list. It’s such a wonderful medium, the written word, compared to casual talk, discourse and the like. The challenge of conciseness, to make sense, convey a new paradigm, present a fact, nail the bugger down, bring the discussion back to the point, head ‘em off at the pass, stick a bit of humour in and have fun.

I used to suffer comparisonitis with Richard’s writings but I have simply got my own style firmly based on my own experiences which are different than Richards. I can afford to be a bit looser and casual for I ‘stand on his shoulders’ as it were. He has written the ‘text book’ so I can be anecdotal and talk more of the ‘how to’, theory into practice. Training as an architect/ builder is good grounding. If you are into writing there is a life-time of writing ahead. I do like it that the last of wanting to change people, thinking they should change, or worrying about others has gone. There is such an ease and delight in being with people as-they-are and then if they are interested in what I’m interested in ... even better. The twig for me to sort it out was a question Richard asked as he was coming out of Enlightenment – ‘What am I in relation to other people?’

Vineeto is working for about 6 weeks so I am house mum for a bit, so the web-site re-vamp will slow down a bit. Looks as though I will get some drawing work soon which is good as my monitor needs replacing – the edges are getting frayed and blurred! So that’s it from me –

Good to have you around ...

28.4.1999

PETER: Just a rave about a few things –

I have been watching a bit of afternoon TV lately and have been particularly fascinated by the nature programs. In my childhood the word ‘environment’ was not even known. 40 years ago human beings on the planet simply used and often abused the land, water and air. Resources needed for human survival were seen as endless, and it was only with world-wide communications that more people are aware of the fact that we are very much a planet bound species – we are earthlings. This global view allowed the majority of humans to think about pollution and overpopulation. We are moving from a position of being hunters and gatherers on the planet into one of sensible custodianship. I use the word custodianship in the sense that humans are the predominant and intelligent species. This whole set-up is, after all, for our enjoyment, our delight as free humans. The tough business of early human beings – the very real struggle to survival involved fighting for territory, struggling for food, struggling against disease and sickness, etc. Despite the romantic ideal that ‘things were better in the old days’ or ‘in Ancient Times’ the facts point to millennia of warfare, plagues and famines – a constant battle to survive.

Now the ‘tough battle’ for human beings is to accept the challenge of being happy and harmless – to put an end to the battle to survive and rid ourselves of malice and sorrow. It is now possible for us to send people to Mars on a space ship but the major difficulty is that the voyage would be 18 months long and it’s impossible for the crew to live together without fighting for so long a time. The main problem is the human inability to relate to each other, let alone live together, in peace and harmony. The elimination of the very source of malice and sorrow is the next and vital stage in human evolution. This is the very cutting edge – an actual freedom from the Human Condition – the ending of a species.

It’s cute, isn’t it. We first have to stop believing the fairy tales of the God’s and God-men that we are meant to suffer on earth and that there is a ‘some-where’ else, and then we can get on with the job of ‘cleaning’ ourselves up.

And what a great adventure, what an extraordinary thrill to find it is possible, and what sensate, sensual pleasures and delights become increasingly obvious on the way. I was commenting to Richard the other day that the path to Actual Freedom is like a journey out of sorrow, and I would add, a journey out of fear. The amazing thing one becomes aware of is that sorrow is so endemic in Humanity that the only way is to make a complete break – nothing less will do. To rid oneself of malice and sorrow one has to step outside Humanity, or to quote Richard – to step out of the real world into the actual world and leave yourself behind.

I remember a period where I would look for a solution to the human dilemma within Humanity – the ‘If only everyone would stop fighting’ or ‘Look, if only everyone would ...’ or ‘Why can’t we just get along with each other?’ T’was just another way of blaming someone else or expecting someone to sort it out. Well, if you count out God, you will see that there is no one in charge of human beings on the planet – we are still fighting it out – then it’s up to me to abandon ship – to free myself of Humanity’s insidious grip.

To devote one’s life to being happy and harmless is no little thing we do.

Just to get back to the environmental issues – bit of a jump – but I told you this was a rave.

I was struck by the effort and care to prevent pollution happening from the accident – something almost unheard of 40 years ago.

The yacht moved on, midst more talk of ‘threats’, so I watched on. They visited an island in an inlet that was a significant breeding ground, not only for penguins but for many bird species as well. It was this island that was threatened and they then revealed the nature of the ‘threat’. It appears that the scientists of a nearby research station were interested in putting a hut on this island in order to study the island and its inhabitants more closely. The yacht people felt that this represented a threat to the penguins and birds – the ‘threat’ was in being studied by humans, not hunted, not polluted nor driven off their territory.

Now that wasn’t the case 40 years ago – we hunted, polluted and conquered of necessity for our own survival.

I watched another program where a turtle had been rescued from a fishing net in the Mediterranean and taken to a Turtle study facility. It was placed on an operating table – X-rayed, given a video lapo-something-or-other – video tube down the gullet – and operated on by 2 veterinarians and 2 nurses to remove a fish hook. He was then put into a hypo-aerobic chamber to get a super-oxygenated environment to aid his healing and then they heated his tank with special heaters to aid his recovery. 40 years ago it would have made a delicious meal for someone – now it got better medical attention than half the humans on the planet could expect.

A good deal of environmental extremism is tainted with theories lacking any factual evidence, a rampant belief that the physical planet is somehow Divine, Godly or Maternal, and a debilitating fascination with Doomsday-ism – but then again this global awareness is indicative of the enormous changes that are occurring in our lifetimes.

These are amazing times to be alive as a human being – and it’s a hoot to be at the cutting edge.

Well that’s it from me – might mosey on over to the couch again.

Good to talk to you ... it’s been fun.

4.5.1999

PETER: A comment on your post and to a point you raised in a post to Vineeto.

ALAN: I discovered something interesting – I seem to have ‘lost’ my ability to ‘imagine’ – I remember Richard wrote something about this on either the genius or listening mailing list, when someone asked him to imagine his partner having sex with several strapping men and he said he could not do it. I thought it a bit strange at the time but can, perhaps, now understand what he meant.

Anyone else lost the ability to ‘imagine’?

PETER: Yes, anything apart from what is actual is imaginary, exactly as only this moment exists. Sort of puts you on the spot just thinking about it, doesn’t it?

*

PETER to No 3: I soon came to see that there were two identities preventing me being happy and harmless – the ‘normal Peter’ who was father, man, architect, etc. and the ‘spiritual Peter’ – the believer, searcher, superior one, etc. So I set about dismantling both these ‘I’s by actively challenging the beliefs, feelings, emotions and instincts that gave substance to both the psychological and psychic entity that was ‘me’. What I increasingly discovered was that the brain of this flesh and blood body has an inherent ability to be aware of itself, an ability of apperception. When I ask ‘What am I thinking?’ or ‘What am I feeling?’ or ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ it is this apperceptive awareness that can provide the answer. It was enormously difficult and bewildering sometimes at the start but as fact replaced belief, clarity replaced confusion and sincere intent replaced ‘open-ness’ and listlessness, ‘what’ I am – not ‘who’ I am – gradually emerged and became apparent. At first, the whole exercise can feel like a weird ‘self trying to dismantle self’ exercise, but soon one realizes that it is fact dismantling belief, apperceptive awareness dismantling self that is happening.

So for me, in hindsight, it was apperceptive awareness – the ability of the brain to be aware of itself – that does the job, dismantles and demolishes both the normal and spiritual, both the psychological and psychic entity. When one has a realization about a belief and ‘sees’ the facts there is an actualisation that can occur which is not of ‘my’ doing. In the face of the blinding and glaringly obvious fact, sensible down-to-earth action can ensue.

ALAN: The quote from Peter was helpful, though I seem to have stopped questioning who, or what, is doing the doing – for the moment, at least. I understand, and agree, intellectually with what you said, Peter. You state that ‘in hindsight it was apperceptive awareness’. Is this now a ‘knowing’, or just an intellectual understanding? And what did you think at the time?

PETER: No, it’s just looking back, reflecting, and trying to make sense out of what was happening. As I said, at first the whole process can feel weird, intense and disorienting. One is, after all, venturing into areas which society considers ‘best left alone’ and psychiatrists would warn you against meddling in. Maintaining a ‘healthy’ self is prescribed by normal society while finding your ‘true’ Self is the fantasy escape into the world of imagination. The other common NDA-Oprah theme is to ‘love’ your self.

No-one, but no-one, is saying you are better off without a self altogether – both ego and soul.

Nobody, apart from us actualists, advocates that self-immolation – total, radical and irrevocable change – is the obvious and only way to become actually free from the Human Condition.

To actively and passionately pursue self-immolation to the point that ‘I’ become unsustainable as an imagination.

Then the joint really starts jumping ...

I don’t know if I answered anything there, Alan. But I had a lot of fun trying to describe this living on the edge ...

Freedom from the Human Condition – Happy and Harmless

Peter’s & Richard’s Text ©The Actual Freedom Trust: 1997-. All Rights Reserved.