VINEETO: You wrote at the end of your post –

RESPONDENT: P.S. You are free to post this on the website if you wish, I have as yet not decided if I would like to be in the discussion group or not. Again I appreciate when/if you have the time to respond to this email.

VINEETO: Given that you gave the permission I will post my answer to the Actual Freedom mailing list. Welcome.

RESPONDENT: Thanks for the email. To be honest I was pondering whether or not to join the discussion list. I haven’t decided as yet. Several things have occurred to me since writing you the first email. The main thing I noticed was that I played down the occurrence of the event that happened at the back of my brain – if was at the top of the neck, bottom of the brain – it was exactly what Richard described as a ‘turning over’ of something in the brain stem. I have had this experience and much has changed since. Like I mentioned the ‘deprogramming’ – all this is occurring at a fast rate and my actions are totally factually based as before.

I know that No 81 is having conversations with the group online to question the language being used by yourself ‘matter and energy’. He came to me at breakfast to talk about his ideas about this and to explain it to me. To be honest if the turning over in the back of the brain is the process to AF, then I think I am in AF and am actually now removing all the ‘old behaviour’ that I had.

VINEETO: It is pertinent to note that Richard described having this experience of ‘something turning over’ when he became enlightened, not when he became actually free –

Richard: About six weeks prior to the sixth of September 1981 I had a revelation that I was going to really die this time, not become catatonic again, and that I was to prepare myself for it. I mustered all of my faith and resolution, renewed all of my trust and dedication, and awaited the day. The night before I could hardly maintain myself as a thinking, functioning human being as a blistering hot and cold burning sensation crept up the back of my spine and entered into the base of my neck just under the brain itself. I went to bed in desperation and frustration at my apparent inability to be good enough to carry this ‘process’ through to its supreme conclusion.

The next morning I awoke and all was calm and quiet. Expressing relief at the cessation of the intensifying ‘process’ that had reached an unbearable level the night before, I lay back on my pillows to watch the rising sun (my bedroom faced east) through the large bedroom windows. All of a sudden I was gripped with the realisation that this was the moment! I was going to die! An intense fear raced throughout my body, rising in crescendo until I could scarcely take any more. As it reached a peak of stark terror, I realised that I had nothing to worry about and that I was to go with the ‘process’. In an instant all fear left me and I travelled deep into the depths of my very being. All of a sudden I was sitting bolt upright, laughing, as I realised that this that was IT! was such a simple thing ... all I had to do was die ... and that was the easiest thing in the world to do. Then the thought of leaving my family and friends overwhelmed me and I was thrust back on the bed sobbing. Then I was bolt upright once more laughing my head off ... then I was back on the pillows sobbing my heart out ... upright, laughing ... pillows sobbing ... upright laughing ... pillows sobbing. At the fifth or sixth time something turned over in the base of my brain – in the top of the brain-stem. I likened it to turning over a L.P. record in order to play the other side ... with the vital exception that it would never, ever turn back again. Richard, Articles, A Brief Personal History

RESPONDENT: I think my experience is a little different to yourself and Richard and Peter because you all had a longer period to ‘deprogram’ over years. I think in my case it has happened much quicker – in a period of a couple of weeks because I was brought up to be happy and harmless and my experiences of the world is really done through the eyes of a child and with naiveté and so in a way I was given less to decondition – I just turned 30. I have written this in my diary this morning and was wondering if you could show it to Richard to see if his interpretation of AF is the same:

VINEETO: I have forwarded your post to Richard as requested.

RESPONDENT: So this is what I have been thinking over the course of the morning: What I found is that when I am on STANDBY, I feel that I am not different from anything in the whole Universe – not in terms of material, but in terms of something that is not describable. When I go from STANDBY to ON, there needs to be a question that is asked, such as if I am slouching in STANDBY mode, then my back may ache and I will automatically correct my posture, but the asking of the question ‘How can I reduce my slouching posture?’ is the first part of the process of switching myself ON – it is task orientated.

After speaking with No 81 this morning, I would say that the problem of all religions doesn’t come from this idea of being in this state/ place of STANDBY and relishing this moment of wonder, but rather it comes when I get switched on by asking ‘What am I?’ If you can ask Richard to test the following out like I have this morning, then we may be able to discover something – and we can test whether I am in AF or VF.

VINEETO: Going by my own experience I would not rule out the possibility of some sort of an Altered State of Consciousness experience. You may be interested in this link to an article in which I described several ASCs I had.

RESPONDENT: If Richard just sits there without thinking anything – then when I did this, I felt no thoughts, I just heard things – so my senses were operating, but I was not ‘interpreting’ them, it was just sensations, but sensations that were not given meaning – they were things that could not be given names or words attached to them.

Then when No 81 asked me ‘What were you experiencing’ I switched myself ON and tried to communicate, however it is at this moment that all ‘interpretations’ come into play. I initially had no words for it, so I said I was the body, but then I realised I could not be. In the moment of being in STANDBY I was like everything else in the Universe. There is no label here. I cannot be the body, this comes from the interpretation I gave it when I switched from STANDBY to ON.

VINEETO: When I have a pure consciousness experience which is a ‘self’-less experience I have no doubt that I am indeed this body and I have no problems to put labels on the sensate experiencing of this body.

RESPONDENT: You can ask Richard to try the same experiment as I did. I sat there with my eyes closed. A porcelain cup was in front of me. I touched the cup and did nothing to interpret the cup, I asked no questions. By doing this I could not tell you the shape, form, temperature, size or anything of the cup, I could not even tell you it was a cup or that there were sensations. So in this state/place, no words could be applied to what it was that was being experienced as there was no experience. It is when coming from STANDBY to ON, that you can conclude, that if all you could do was touching or hearing that you are the body. But at this particular moment I would probably disagree with you and say, actually no, in my experience it is something that I cannot say in words. No 81 tells me that the word for this is ‘Brahma’. I am not interested in the words to explain it, but from what he describes it seems to be accurate, but it is also a term and one that in this STANDBY state/place makes no sense because it is an experience that cannot be experienced – I could not say what I was. If Richard could also look into this I would be grateful, as I am not sure that saying that he is the body is actually it...

VINEETO: I have forwarded your post to Richard as requested but it is pertinent to point out that actualism is utterly non-spiritual and that Actual Freedom is diametrically opposite to any of the altered states of consciousness.

RESPONDENT: If we continue with my experience so far, I see what makes sense to me is that all religions and so on came into being when someone was in AF and said, ‘What is this state that cannot experience itself?’ and all the ideas came out of this ... and this is where all the people get into conflict because it is all concepts, models and hypothesis.

VINEETO: As an actual freedom from the human condition is something entirely new to human experience – no one has previously discovered that one can change human nature such that one can free oneself from the instinctual passions as well as from one’s social identity – an Actual Freedom cannot be the foundation of ‘all religions’ for it is the antithesis of all religions.

What is the foundation of all religions is the experience of a permanent Altered State of Consciousness whereby ‘I’ as ‘Being’ expand into ‘the Greater Self’, also described as becoming One with the Divine, the Truth, God-Consciousness, the Absolute, etc.

RESPONDENT: To be honest, if I am in this state of AF (and I think I am, I am just ‘delayering, disrobing, deprogramming’ old habits that are in play) then I like this state of STANDBY so much that I am not really interested in doing much else than staying in it – maybe this is what the others (the people in the ‘ancient’ past) got wrong when they got to this stage, maybe they got too caught up in the ideas caused by their instincts that they couldn’t stay in this wonderful place ... they thought there must be a better one.

VINEETO: Yes, they got it wrong in that they remained stuck in the glorious affective experience of ‘Self’-aggrandizement. Richard, who lived in an Altered State of Consciousness for eleven years, described this bane of humankind in the introduction to his Journal.

RESPONDENT: If you could pass on the exercise to Richard I would be grateful, then maybe we can see if we are both in AF and if he could see what he thinks about my experience. I think that the old religions have got the metaphysics right but what does this all help when you can’t enjoy the place where you are one part of the whole of the Universe? Also it may be as time goes on that my experience in STANDBY extends to ON as the delayering continues.

VINEETO: It may be of interest to you that in a ‘self’-less experiencing of the universe, either in a temporary PCE or a permanent Actual Freedom there is no such thing as meta-physics – in the actual world there is simply no room for any human-created escapist fantasies. All there is, is the physical universe in all its splendour.

17.4.2005

RESPONDENT: Several things have occurred to me since writing you the first email. The main thing I noticed was that I played down the occurrence of the event that happened at the back of my brain – if was at the top of the neck, bottom of the brain – it was exactly what Richard described as a ‘turning over’ of something in the brain stem. I have had this experience and much has changed since. Like I mentioned the ‘deprogramming’ – all this is occurring at a fast rate and my actions are totally factually based as before.

I know that No 81 is having conversations with the group online to question the language being used by yourself ‘matter and energy’. He came to me at breakfast to talk about his ideas about this and to explain it to me. To be honest if the turning over in the back of the brain is the process to AF, then I think I am in AF and am actually now removing all the ‘old behaviour’ that I had.

VINEETO: It is pertinent to note that Richard described having this experience of ‘something turning over’ when he became enlightened, not when he became actually free –

Richard: About six weeks prior to the sixth of September 1981 I had a revelation that I was going to really die this time, not become catatonic again, and that I was to prepare myself for it. I mustered all of my faith and resolution, renewed all of my trust and dedication, and awaited the day. The night before I could hardly maintain myself as a thinking, functioning human being as a blistering hot and cold burning sensation crept up the back of my spine and entered into the base of my neck just under the brain itself. I went to bed in desperation and frustration at my apparent inability to be good enough to carry this ‘process’ through to its supreme conclusion.

The next morning I awoke and all was calm and quiet. Expressing relief at the cessation of the intensifying ‘process’ that had reached an unbearable level the night before, I lay back on my pillows to watch the rising sun (my bedroom faced east) through the large bedroom windows. All of a sudden I was gripped with the realisation that this was the moment! I was going to die! An intense fear raced throughout my body, rising in crescendo until I could scarcely take any more. As it reached a peak of stark terror, I realised that I had nothing to worry about and that I was to go with the ‘process’. In an instant all fear left me and I travelled deep into the depths of my very being. All of a sudden I was sitting bolt upright, laughing, as I realised that this that was IT! was such a simple thing ... all I had to do was die ... and that was the easiest thing in the world to do. Then the thought of leaving my family and friends overwhelmed me and I was thrust back on the bed sobbing. Then I was bolt upright once more laughing my head off ... then I was back on the pillows sobbing my heart out ... upright, laughing ... pillows sobbing ... upright laughing ... pillows sobbing. At the fifth or sixth time something turned over in the base of my brain – in the top of the brain-stem. I likened it to turning over a L.P. record in order to play the other side ... with the vital exception that it would never, ever turn back again. Richard, Articles, A Brief Personal History

RESPONDENT: Please go to link ../introduction/actualfreedom4.htm where I quote from The Actual Freedom Trust presentation guide section ‘Actual Freedom from the Human Condition’:

Richard: ‘The day finally dawns when something irrevocable happens inside the skull. In an ecstatic moment of being present, ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul expire … the entire identity ceases to exist, permanently. There is a sensation inside the top of the brain-stem that is experienced as a physical ‘turning over’ of some kind ... something that can never, ever, turn back.’ [Editor's note: after Peter and Vineeto became actually free this article needed to be re-written on line, see new version below.]

Richard: The day finally dawns where the definitive moment of being here, right now, conclusively arrives; something irrevocable takes place and every thing and every body and every event is different, somehow, although the same physically; something immutable occurs and every thing and every body and every event is all-of-a-sudden undeniably actual, in and of itself, as a fact; something irreversible happens and an immaculate perfection and a pristine purity permeates every thing and every body and every event; something has changed forever, although it is as if nothing has happened, except that the entire world is a magical fairytale-like playground full of incredible gladness and a delight which is never-ending.

This is what happened to me, and from the above I have assumed that this is the ‘final’ condition required to be in AF. Is this not the case as nothing more is mentioned in the guide? Perhaps I should also ask if there is a different type of ‘turning over’ between the ‘enlightened Richard’ and the ‘AF Richard’ and if so, perhaps you can amend the guide to reflect this?

VINEETO: In Richard’s article ‘A Brief Personal History’ the link to which I provided to you in my last post, Richard described in detail both his experiences – becoming enlightened and becoming actually free. Given that he is the only one who has become actually free so far, his is the only description of someone becoming actually free from both ‘self’ and ‘Self’ that we have to go by. ….

As the ‘physical ‘turning over’ of some kind’ happened to Richard when he became enlightened there are obviously other criteria to take into consideration if one wants to genuinely determine if one has become actually free or not. As it is your experience it is obvious that nobody can do this assessment for you.

This snippet from Richard’s correspondence might also be of interest to you –

Co-Respondent: A few more questions: 1. Richard, what is the physiological nature of the ‘process’ that you (and J Krishnamurti, Konrad Swart and numerous others) underwent during ego dissolution?

Richard: In a word: electrochemical (the spinal cord, through which all the main nerve fibres go, transmits all kinds of electrochemical signals ... which can result in all manner of psychic manifestations on occasion).

In the Indian Tradition they are known as ‘Kriyas’.

Co-Respondent: (…) 2. Is ego dissolution a necessary precursor to ‘soul death’ ...

Richard: No ... if I had known, back in 1981 at the moment of ego-dissolution, what I now know I would not have let the process stop halfway through its happening.

Co-Respondent: ... or would ego dissolution be an automatic consequence of dissolving the affective self first?

Richard: Yes ... by my reckoning it would have all been over in a matter of maybe 6-10 seconds (rather than 6 seconds plus eleven years).

Co-Respondent: 3. Do you think it is possible to experience the complete dissolution of ego (leaving affective self intact) without lapsing into a delusory ASC?

Richard: No ... the soul-self is extremely powerful (affectively powerful that is).

Co-Respondent: In other words, is ‘spiritual enlightenment’ a necessary consequence of ego death (sans soul death) ...

Richard: Yes ... without the ego-self to keep the soul-self under some semblance of control it runs rampant and totally rules the roost.

Co-Respondent: ... or is ‘enlightenment’ simply a risk of same?

Richard: No ... some form of an altered state of consciousness (ASC) would immediately establish itself. [emphasis added] Richard, The Actual Freedom Trust Mailing List, No 60, 29.11.2003

*

RESPONDENT: So this is what I have been thinking over the course of the morning: What I found is that when I am on STANDBY, I feel that I am not different from anything in the whole Universe – not in terms of material, but in terms of something that is not describable. When I go from STANDBY to ON, there needs to be a question that is asked, such as if I am slouching in STANDBY mode, then my back may ache and I will automatically correct my posture, but the asking of the question ‘How can I reduce my slouching posture?’ is the first part of the process of switching myself ON – it is task orientated.

After speaking with No 81 this morning, I would say that the problem of all religions doesn’t come from this idea of being in this state/ place of STANDBY and relishing this moment of wonder, but rather it comes when I get switched on by asking ‘What am I?’ If you can ask Richard to test the following out like I have this morning, then we may be able to discover something – and we can test whether I am in AF or VF.

VINEETO: Going by my own experience I would not rule out the possibility of some sort of an Altered State of Consciousness experience. You may be interested in this link to an article in which I described several ASCs I had.

RESPONDENT: I also don’t believe I am in any ASC, ‘I’ have never more been here!

VINEETO: Considering that you describe your experiences as –

[Respondent]: There is no label here. I cannot be the body, this comes from the interpretation I gave it when I switched from STANDBY to ON. [emphasis added] No 83, Experiences of the Method, 11.4.2005

– it seems somewhat strange to ask Richard to comment on an experience that you yourself cannot accurately describe in words, let alone label.

[Respondent]: No 81 tells me that the word for this is ‘Brahma’. I am not interested in the words to explain it, but from what he describes it seems to be accurate, but it is also a term and one that in this STANDBY state/place makes no sense because it is an experience that cannot be experienced – I could not say what I was. If Richard could also look into this I would be grateful, as I am not sure that saying that he is the body is actually it... No 83, Experiences of the Method, 11.4.2005

Richard is very clear throughout all the descriptions of his experience of an actual freedom from the human condition that he is the physical body and nothing but the physical body and that he can easily write about (i.e. label) his ongoing experience. As such it appears that you are, by your own words attempting to liken chalk to cheese.

Actualism Homepage

Freedom from the Human Condition – Happy and Harmless

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