Actual Freedom – Mailing List ‘A’ Correspondence

RESPONDENT: Richard, you remind me of U.G. Krishnamurti in many ways (note: not J. Krishnamurti). You’re not a disciple of his by any chance ?

RICHARD: No, I am not a disciple of Mr. Uppaluri Krishnamurti ... I only came across him a couple of months ago via your article about him. I had typed ‘Atheist’ into a search engine (I am new to computers and the Internet – only started this year) and, among other titles, the ‘Atheist Society Newsletter’ came up. This led me to your article and thus to this mailing list. Along the way I accessed the Mr. Uppaluri Krishnamurti page and read all the information with rapidly diminishing interest. Something fundamental happened to him that I can relate to – the total annihilation of any psychological entity whatsoever – but he clearly states that he himself does not know what it was that happened, unfortunately. He makes it clear that he has nothing to offer to advance humankind’s knowledge about itself, which makes his a hapless condition. He makes no bones about considering himself as being a ‘sport of nature’, which is not about to be repeated, so therefore he concludes that no good will be obtained by talking with him. Of course, I am in accord with his oft-repeated statements about Spiritual Enlightenment, but it is one thing to speak out against something – whilst offering nothing in its place – and another thing entirely to propose a viable, liveable and delightful alternative to what one is knocking down. I did not read him saying anything about how deliciously enjoyable it is to be finally free of the Human Condition; what a pleasure it is to be alive at this moment in time; how life is an adventure in itself by the simple fact of being here; what a felicitous experience it is to be the universe’s experience of itself as a human being; to be able to fully appreciate the infinite nature of being alive ... and so on. In short, what I read sounded existentialist and nihilistic and negative.

Since this E-Mail of yours arrived, I asked around among my friends for any videos of him and I was able to watch three of them last night. I stopped watching half-way through the third one as I had had enough and it was getting late. He acknowledges that there are still emotions ... but that it is the body that is having them ... fear and anger were two that I heard him say. I can not relate to this at all. Also, on one video, he says that he looks at a clock and wonders what it is; someone asks him what the time is and he answers ‘A quarter past three’ – or whatever – and then falls back into wondering what it is that he is looking at. I know perfectly well what a clock is. Apparently he has to knock his head against a wall to know that he is here; he slams kitchen doors shut for the same reason; he goes to a doctor who examines him and says that he is indeed alive ... whereas I know that I am alive and well and thoroughly enjoying myself ... and will continue to do so for the term of my natural life. It is a strange situation he is in and he seems to be very much on his own in it. I would guess – and this is only my opinion – that the reason that he goes around the world talking to people is that he can thus experience himself as being alive by the feed-back ... and maybe because he has nothing else to do with his life.

In a way it is all a bit dismal.

RESPONDENT: Like you, U.G. Krishnamurti did the following things: (1) He claims he underwent a transformation experience, which even changed his cellular structure, during which he totally lost his ‘self’. From that moment on, he claims, he lived in total perfection, without any kind of ego at all.

RICHARD: Yes, I have totally lost ‘self’ – ego, soul, spirit, atman, skandhas, Self, whatever ... plus any sense of identity at all. Without an ‘I’ there is no past or future – nor a present, which was but a psychological reality sandwiched betwixt the two. That leaves this moment in time bare of any periodicity. It is always this moment: it is never not this moment ... and the perfection of the infinity of the universe is apparent only at this moment. Thus I am ‘living in total perfection’ as is stated by Mr. Uppaluri Krishnamurti. I do not claim a change in cellular structure, although there was a physiological – that is, structural – change in the brain-stem, just under the base of the brain. With the aid of my extensive medical reading after the event, I propose that this change, which I experienced as a physical ‘turning over’, happened in what is known as the Substantia Nigra – held by some to be the organ of consciousness – which is located in the Reticular Activating System. However I am willing to be wrong in this as the emotions and passions disappeared also, which scientific research suggests being located in what is popularly known as the ‘Lizard Brain’.

RESPONDENT: (2) He dismisses all the wise men and gurus of history as total frauds, claiming they were little more than snake-oil salesmen .

RICHARD: I have been known to use the expression ‘snake-oil’ ... it is irresistible as it is so expressive! However, when questioned sincerely, I say they were well-meaning but misguided ... which is the facts of the matter. Thus I never say they were total frauds, but victims of the culture that nurtured them ... except those that are total frauds, like Mr. Sathyanarayana Raju (aka Sai Baba).

RESPONDENT: (3) He lived with a female companion for many years (and possibly still does) yet claimed he was totally unattached to her. I don’t know if ever experimented in group sex, but no doubt he would have been above it all if he had.

RICHARD: He did, but he does not any more as she is dead now. I have no idea about ‘group sex’ but on one of the videos he said that he had not had sex for the last seventeen years as ‘sex is pleasure’ and that he ‘wouldn’t use another person for gratification’ . I thoroughly enjoy physical – sensual – pleasure and mutual pleasure is a delight. We ‘use’ each other by agreement ... after all, our parts fit together so well ... and so deliciously.

RESPONDENT: (4) He too stood on his soap-box and preached against the preachers. He taught that he had nothing to teach and that all teachers were charlatans. Unfortunately, he was happy enough to have disciples looking after him.

RICHARD: I do not experience myself as ‘standing on a soap-box preaching against the preachers’ . The way I see it I wrote elsewhere:

• [Richard] ‘We are all fellow human beings who find ourselves here in the world as it was when we were born. We find war, murder, torture, rape, domestic violence and corruption to be endemic ... we notice that it is intrinsic to the human condition ... we set out to discover why this is so. We find sadness, loneliness, sorrow, grief, depression and suicide to be a global incidence ... and we gather that it is also inherent to the human condition ... and we want to know why. We all report to each other as to the nature of our discoveries for we are all well-meaning and seek to find a way out of this mess that we have landed in. Whether one believes in re-incarnation or not, we are all living this particular life for the very first time, and we wish to make sense of it. It is a challenge and the adventure of a life-time to enquire and to uncover, to seek and to find, to explore and to discover. All this being alive business is actually happening and we are totally involved in living it out ... whether we take the back seat or not, we are all still doing it’. [end quote].

No disciples are looking after me ... I have a hard-won pension to meet my few needs.

RESPONDENT: To my mind, the most revealing thing about U.G. Krishnamurti, and about you, is his broad-sweeping dismissal of all the great sages of the past. When a person attains to true wisdom, he can readily recognise the wisdom of others. Jesus, Hakuin, Kierkegaard, Lao Tzu, and a good many others, embodied the highest wisdom to a very large degree and this is reflected in many of the writings which were either from their own hand or which were about their own lives. To simply dismiss them all as a bunch of frauds indicates a deep insecurity and a desperate need to validate the significance of one’s ‘I’.

RICHARD: You say ‘when a person attains to true wisdom, he can readily recognise the wisdom of others’. Right on! I do not claim ‘true wisdom’ ... I am only interested in facts and actuality. I have not discovered ‘The Truth’ (which is where ‘true wisdom’ comes out of), therefore, of course I do not give any credence to the wisdom of others at all. To me, ‘The Truth’ is but a fantasy spun out of a delusion born out of an illusion. Therefore any ‘true wisdom’ is spurious and detrimental to the well-being of humankind. It is why there is so much warfare that is religiously and spiritually based.

I cannot agree with your diagnosis that I am suffering from ‘a deep insecurity and a desperate need to validate the significance of one’s ‘I’ . Anyone can find out about security and insecurity, as an actuality, by triggering off a peak experience. I have written elsewhere:

• [Richard] ‘When one learns the trick of having peak experiences, what one discovers, time and again, is that the personal boundaries that ‘I’, the psychological entity, feel so safely protected by, are made up of ‘my’ accrued beliefs as to who ‘I’ am. This is ‘my’ outline, as it were, shaped by other people’s description of ‘me’ – a construct which gives ‘me’ asylum in each different group into which ‘I’ wish to enter. Yet the outline of this construct creates, simultaneously, an enormous distance between ‘me’ and the world outside. At those times of peak experience, the distance disappears all of a sudden as ‘I’ vanish and this world is right here, so close that there is no distance any more. This is closer than any intimacy ‘I’ have ever longed for. This is a direct experience of actuality ... and I have always been here like this ... so safely here. The outline, the boundary that created the distance, was all in ‘my’ reality. ‘I’ created a substitute security for this original safety – a safety which has never known any threat, nor ever will. This genuine safety has no need for precautions’. [end quote].

As any ‘I’ whatsoever has entirely vanished, I hardly see how I could have a ‘desperate need to validate the significance of one’s ‘I’.’ How on earth would going public with a statement like ‘there is no ‘I’ whatsoever in this body’ validate one’s ‘I’? I am saying: I am not ‘only human’, I am the perfection of the stillness of infinitude personified. I know, from personal experience, that it is possible to change ... and change radically, fundamentally, completely and utterly. I have been without an ego since 1981 and without a soul since 1992. So I know what I talk of: it is not theoretical idealism ... actual freedom is no ‘pie in the sky’. It is possible for one human being to state, honestly and factually, that perfection is not only highly desirable but it is essential. This is not an idle claim, nor is it a vain boast ... who would be so silly as to do such a thing? I would be found out in a very short time and exposed for being a stupid charlatan. I consider it would, rather, invalidate ‘one’s ‘I’’ , would it not?

It is impossible to fake perfection, for my behaviour, my attitude, my responses, my general demeanour, is impeccable at all times, both easy and trying. I do not have a ‘dark side’ ... nor do I have a ‘good side’. There is no battle betwixt ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’ raging inside this body, for there is simply purity abounding in all directions. The ego that died all those years ago has never reappeared and the extirpation of the soul that persisted for another eleven years after that event, made the extinction of the identity final. I have never been here before, I am perpetually new. I appear as this moment appears. As each moment is fresh, new, so too am I novel, artless and innocent. I can never gather dust, as it were, for I cast no shadow. I have no ‘presence’, no ‘being’, no ‘spirit’. I do not exist, psychologically or psychically speaking. With no entities within to mess things up, I am actually living pure perfection through no effort at all.

I can take no credit for my unimpeachable character, it all happens of itself as the universe intends it to.

RICHARD: He [Mr. Uppaluri Krishnamurti] acknowledges that there are still emotions ... but that it is the body that is having them ... fear and anger were two that I heard him say. I can not relate to this at all.

RESPONDENT: Let me ask you this, Richard. Suppose one day that you visit your wife in the expectation of a little mutual pleasure. You arrive there, but instead of your wife assenting to some harmless hanky-panky, she instead tells you that she doesn’t want to see you any more because she has finally worked out that you are a fraud. She says that she had been blindly following you all these years, but now realises the error of her ways and doesn’t want to participate any longer in the sham. What do you think, Richard?

RICHARD: For a start I would not visit my wife ‘in the expectation of a little mutual pleasure’ for I have no expectations at all ... to have expectations of other people is to set yourself up for disappointment again and again. It is the same with trust: to trust someone – anyone at all – is to invite betrayal (or what is perceived to be betrayal by the one who is doing the trusting) from the one who is trusted. Also, to trust someone is to impose a demand upon them that they may not be able to live up to (or want to) ... and I never do that.

Secondly, she has gone through stages wherein she ‘has finally worked out that [I am] a fraud ... that she has been blindly following [me] all these years ... and doesn’t want to participate any longer in the sham’ (or words to that effect) so I can speak from personal experience. As I am not at all affected by other people’s opinion of me, I treat the occasions where she has praised me to the skies in the same way as when she criticises me for fraud. Her praise or blame impresses me not at all. What would impress me – and I would be delighted to be ‘affected’ then if I could be – would be her attainment of an actual freedom. I would be dancing down the hall with joy and delight!

Until that day happens, I remain unperturbed by anything that anyone says about me ... be it complimentary or condemning.

RESPONDENT: Furthermore, she also tells you that she is about to go off on an overseas holiday with her new boyfriend and won’t be back in the country for a month. Would you feel no emotions at all in this scenario?

RICHARD: No. And to forestall any further queries about feelings – emotions and passions and calentures – it would be useful for me to explain that not only do I have no feelings about this scenario, but I have none about any other you might like to propose. I do not experience feelings per se because I do not have any anywhere in this body at all ... this body lost that faculty entirely when ‘I’ became extinct. Thus to use the jargon: no one can ‘press my buttons’ as I do not have any buttons – nor any feelings under them – to be activated. Literally I feel nothing at all. Even when, say, watching a magnificent sunrise where some lofty clouds are shot through with splendid rays of golden light, transforming the morning sky into a blaze of glory ... I feel nothing at all. These eyes seeing it delight in the array of colour, and this brain contemplating its visual splendour can revel in the wonder of it all – but I can not feel the beauty of it in the emotional and passionate sense of the word feel.

Just as when a person becomes physically blind all their other senses are heightened, so too is it when all feelings vanish entirely. This body is simply brimming with sense organs which wallow in their own sensual delight. Visually, everything is intense, vivid, brilliant ... sensually everything is dynamic and alive with an actuality ... a matter-of-fact actual-ness. Everything is endowed with a purity that far exceeds the now-paltry feeling of beauty ... and an intimacy that surpasses the highest feeling of love. Love is actually a pathetic substitute for the perfection of actual intimacy. Actual intimacy is the direct experience of the pristine actuality of another, unmediated by any ‘I’ whatsoever.

*

RESPONDENT: He lived with a female companion for many years (and possibly still does) yet claimed he was totally unattached to her. I don’t know if ever experimented in group sex, but no doubt he would have been above it all if he had.

RICHARD: He did, but he does not any more as she is dead now. I have no idea about ‘group sex’ but on one of the videos he said that he had not had sex for the last seventeen years as ‘sex is pleasure’ and that he ‘wouldn’t use another person for gratification’ . I thoroughly enjoy physical – sensual – pleasure and mutual pleasure is a delight. We ‘use’ each other by agreement ... after all, our parts fit together so well ... and so deliciously.

RESPONDENT: Let me ask you this, Richard. Suppose you and your wife are living together, and you come home one day to find thirty men in your living room. Upon inquiry you find out that these men are all there to have sex with your wife, and that she is already in the bedroom busily engaging herself with three strapping young men. When you try to see her, she calls out that you’ll have to wait your turn, before resuming her attention upon the activity at hand, one which involves certain parts of the young men fitting very nicely into various parts of her body. I assume that this wouldn’t bother you, since (a) all parties are using each other by agreement, and (b) their parts are fitting together so deliciously well.

RICHARD: My word, you do have a vivid imagination! You say ‘thirty men’ ? Really? And ‘strapping’ at that? My companion did her best not to roll about the floor laughing when I described your lurid little sex-saga to her ... but I will forgo passing on her comments to you as you were asking the question of me and not her.

As I have no imagination whatsoever, I can not ‘suppose ... [that I] come home one day to find thirty men in [my] living room’. I can not envisage such a scenario as I am unable to visualise anything at all in my ‘mind’s-eye’ ... I lost that faculty as a result of becoming free of ‘I’. I can not generate images at all because the image-maker does not exist. However, ‘he’ would have probably been: Incredulous? Upset? Embarrassed? Disappointed? Jealous? Hurt? Enraged? Sickened? Envious? Something like that, I guess, because I actually can not remember in detail, but I do know that ‘he’ was ruled by these type of emotional and passionate thoughts. I do remember that ‘he’ was possessive ... ‘he’ foolishly thought that ‘he’ could own another person ... but ‘he’ had an experience of actuality one day and consequently self-immolated, psychologically.

Hence I am able to be here at this moment in time where only purity and perfection exist.

*

RESPONDENT: When a person attains to true wisdom, he can readily recognise the wisdom of others.

RICHARD: Right on! I do not claim ‘true wisdom’ ... I am only interested in facts and actuality. I have not discovered ‘The Truth’ (which is where ‘true wisdom’ comes out of), therefore, of course I do not give any credence to the wisdom of others at all. To me, ‘The Truth’ is but a fantasy spun out of a delusion born out of an illusion. Therefore any ‘true wisdom’ is spurious and detrimental to the well-being of humankind. It is why there is so much warfare that is religiously and spiritually based.

RESPONDENT: I’m afraid that you are merely engaging in empty semantics here. After all, you are here on this forum preaching a message, which basically reads: ‘I have reached perfection and virtually everyone else is deluded’. Thus you have a ‘True Wisdom’. You may think that it is a completely unreligious and unspiritual kind of wisdom, but it is still a ‘True Wisdom’ of sorts nonetheless. Thus, you would do well to recognise that you are no different to anyone else in this regard. We are all bound by words in our attempts to communicate.

RICHARD: I beg to differ: The words are not ‘empty semantics’ – an accusative phrase which, by the way, is the catch-cry of those who do not understand the reality that underlie words – for ‘true wisdom’ describes the very real experience of apparent sagacity that people have upon discovering ‘The Truth’. I espoused ‘true wisdom’ for eleven years for I, too, had discovered ‘The Truth’. These days I speak only of facts and actuality, hence it can not be ‘still a ‘True Wisdom’ of sorts nonetheless’ ... and the fact that you were impelled to add ‘of sorts’ implies that you recognise this. And I do not ‘think’ that it is ‘a completely unreligious and unspiritual kind of wisdom’, for I know that it is, as a fact.

RESPONDENT: Words can either be used wisely or foolishly. What a wise person means by a particular word is completely different to what an ignorant person means by it. Words like ‘wisdom’, ‘Truth’, ‘ego-less’, ‘perfection’, etc., each have entirely different meanings, depending on who is using them.

RICHARD: I know that ‘what a wise person means by a particular word is completely different to what an ignorant person means by it’ ... and this is the whole point of me writing and speaking about it. I know that I have written this elsewhere, but it bears repeating:

• [Richard] ‘Actual freedom is a tried and tested way of being here in the world as it actually is ... stripped of the veneer of reality that is super-imposed by the psychological entity within the body. This entity is that sense of identity and self that inhibits any freedom and sabotages every well-meant endeavour. Thus far one has had only two choices: being normal or being spiritual. Now there is a third alternative ... and it supersedes any Mystical Altered State.
• ‘Philosophical wisdom, Psychological knowledge and Spiritual enlightenment have had their day and are proving themselves to be inadequate to meet the requirements of this modern era. For thousands of years – maybe tens of thousands of years – humankind has known of no alternative manner of living life on this verdant planet. The passing parade of Philosophers and Preachers, Masters and Sages – geniuses and thinkers of all description – have failed abysmally to deliver their oft-promised ‘Peace On Earth’ ... in fact, instead of their much-vaunted love and virtue, they have left in their wake much hatred and bloodshed, the likes of which beggars description.
• ‘Millions of well-meaning followers have diligently put their Teachings into practice, prostrating and belittling themselves like all get-out in a hopeful attempt to live the unliveable. Yet no-one, it seems, dares to question the Teachings themselves; instead the humiliated penitents obligingly blame themselves for failing to achieve release from the human condition. To seek freedom via profound and lofty thought or sublime and exalted feelings is to blindly perpetuate all the horrors and sufferings that have plagued humankind since time immemorial. The time has come to put to an end, once and for all, the blight that has encumbered this fair earth for far too long. It behoves one to question all of the received ‘wisdom’ of the centuries, all of the revealed ‘truths’ ... all of the half-baked inanities that pass for understanding. Then, and only then, there is a fair chance that one can come to an actual freedom – a freedom the nature of which has never been before in human experience.
• ‘The blame for the continuation of human misery lies squarely in the lap of those inspired people who, although having sufficient courage to proceed into the Unknown, stopped short of the final goal – the Unknowable. Notwithstanding the cessation of a personal ego operating, they were unwilling to relinquish the Self ... and an ego-less Self is still an entity, nevertheless. In spite of the glamour and the glory of the Altered State Of Consciousness, closer examination reveals that these ‘Great’ persons had – and have – feet of clay. Bewitched and beguiled by the promise of majesty and mystery, they have led humankind astray. Preaching submission or supplication they keep a benighted humanity in appalling tribulation and distress’. [end quote].

The death of the ego is not sufficient: the extinction of the self in its entirety is the essential ingredient for peace and prosperity to reign over all and everyone.

RESPONDENT: Thus, it would be foolish to judge people simply on the fact that they use words like ‘God’ or ‘Truth’. Rather, they should always be judged on their understanding of these terms. To dismiss people purely on a semantic quibble is ludicrous to the extreme, as is dismissing all the words of the wise men in history simply because foolish people use them to justify war and slaughter.

RICHARD: I do not consider it ‘foolish to judge people simply on the fact that they use words like ‘God’ or ‘Truth’ for I know that judging them is the only sensible thing to do. ‘The Truth’ is simply the philosopher’s term for ‘God’; thus any wisdom designated ‘True Wisdom’ translates easily as ‘God’s Word’. The trouble with people who discard the god of Christianity is that they do not realise that by turning to the Eastern Spirituality they have effectively jumped out of the frying pan into the fire. Eastern spirituality is religion ... merely in a different form to what people in the West have been raised to believe in. Eastern philosophy sounds so convincing to the Western mind that is desperately looking for answers. The Christian conditioning actually sets up the situation for a thinking person to be susceptible to the insidious doctrines of the East. At the end of the line there is always a god of some description, lurking in disguise, wreaking its havoc with its ‘Teachings’.

As you so aptly said (in a different context): ‘Foolish people use them to justify war and slaughter’ .

RICHARD: To put it into a physical analogy, it was as if I was to gather up my meagre belongings, eradicate all marks of my stay on the island, and paddle away over the horizon, all the while not knowing whence I go ... and vanish without a trace, never to be seen again. As no one knew where I was, no one would know where I had gone. In fact, I would become as extinct as the dodo and with no skeletal remains. Psychologically, ‘I’ would cease to ‘be’ at all, I would have no ‘presence’. This was more than death of the ego, which is a major event by any definition; this was total annihilation. No ego, no soul – no ‘Self’. No more Heavenly Bliss, Love Agapé‚ or Divine Compassion. Only oblivion. It was not at all attractive, not at alluring, not at all desirable, yet I knew I was going to do it – one day – because it was the ultimate condition. Herein lay the secret to the ‘Mystery of Life’.

RESPONDENT: An interesting story [about fear and trembling], Richard. I’m a bit confused, though, about a couple of things: First off, you say that your ego ‘dissolved’ in 1981, but then you go on to say that in 1985 you experienced fear and dread at the perception of the ‘Great Beyond’. Furthermore, you said that this experience revealed that you had even further to go, that you had to go on and ‘annihilate’ the ego completely. Is there a difference between ‘dissolution’ and ‘annihilation’? Surely not. If your ego had truly dissolved in 1981, then I’m afraid it would have been impossible for you to have either (a) experienced fear and dread towards anything at all, and (b) perceived that you still had yet to annihilate your ego. For correct if I’m wrong, it is impossible to annihilate something which no longer exists.

RICHARD: It is indeed unfortunate that you are ‘a bit confused’ because I have already explained this matter clearly in more than several posts previous to this. But, never mind, I will re-capitulate:

• [Richard]: ‘Essentially, when a person becomes enlightened they say that their ego has dissolved – this is termed ‘Death of the ego’. I concur fully in this very valid description of what has happened. However, the ego is only one half of the self ... the other half being the soul. Then there is a sense of identity overlaid on top of the self. The enlightened person switches their sense of identity from the ego (which is now non-existent) to the soul and – in their own words – realise that they are ‘The Self’ existing beyond ‘Time and Space’ and that they are ‘Immortal and Eternal’ and that they are ‘Unborn and Undying’. In other words they identify as being ‘That’ by whatever name. (Also ‘The Void’, ‘Emptiness’, Beyond Form’ and so on and – if they are really astute – ‘Beyond Form and No-Form’). This is the second ‘I’ of Mr. Venkataraman Aiyer (aka Ramana) fame’. [endquote].

So where I wrote: [quote] ‘psychologically, ‘I’ would cease to ‘be’ at all, I would have no ‘presence’... this was more than death of the ego, which is a major event by any definition; this was total annihilation ... no ego, no soul – no ‘Self’ [unquote], this second ‘I’ is what I was referring to. I was very clearly not saying: ‘this experience revealed that you had even further to go, that you had to go on and ‘annihilate’ the ego completely’ as you attempt to make out that I was saying.

As for ‘fear and trembling’ ... I deliberately and accurately used the word ‘dread’ as it was an existential experience of the end of ‘being’ entirely – not just the fear and trembling produced by the contemplation of the death of the ego (wherein ‘I’ go on under a different disguise) – but a complete and utter annihilation of everything, including ‘The Absolute’ or ‘The Void’ or ‘The Whatever’. As a youth in 1966, I served my time in the military in a war-torn foreign country, so I knew the full gamut of nervousness, apprehension, anxiety, fear, terror, horror and dread ... and they go in that order of severity. This was a dread of the likes of which I had never experienced before ... perhaps it would be handy to call it ‘pure dread’, for emphasis. Pure dread is the worst nightmarish feeling one can possibly experience. And as I clearly explained that: ‘I was living in a state of Divine Bliss and Love Agapé‚ which protected me from all sorrow and malice, with its attendant fears and hates’, I consider that it is obvious that fear, for example, is transcended – not eliminated – with the ‘Death of the Ego’. Consequently, where you say: ‘if your ego had truly dissolved in 1981, then I’m afraid it would have been impossible for you to have ... experienced fear and dread towards anything at all’ , you are simply airing your understandable ignorance of matters transcendent in public.

RESPONDENT: My prognosis, then, is that your ego didn’t really dissolve in 1981, but that you simply fooled yourself into thinking this was the case. Most likely what had happened was that you had a powerful altered state of consciousness which empowered your ego, transforming it, so that you ceased to experience certain kinds of fears and worries which were gripping you beforehand. It was a relative awakening, if you will, not an absolute one. But in your particular case, your ego became stronger for the experience, not weaker. It certainly didn’t dissolve.

RICHARD: In light of what I have explained above it will be seen that your prognosis is not valid, as it is based upon in inaccurate premise.

RESPONDENT: Now, I had said in a previous post that I believed all you’ve had is a minor realisation of Truth and that it had simply gone straight to your head. The above description of your experience doesn’t alter this judgment of mine. What really happened was this: In 1985 you experienced an inkling of what it really means to be perfectly truthful and it deeply frightened you. This is entirely understandable, for it is truly an awesome insight. However, this experience scared you so deeply that you immediately turned your back on the ‘Great Beyond’ and re-entered the world (of pleasure) as quickly as possible. To be sure, a good deal of your ego was shattered by the experience, but like before, it wasn’t annihilated completely, but simply transformed. Your ego became even more empowered by it, and you became even more fearless (towards ordinary, everyday things) than ever before. But note that this fearlessness was (and still is) driven by a very deep fear of Truth.

RICHARD: Unfortunately you are building a more and more complex prognosis based upon the inaccurate premise.

RESPONDENT: What has happened to you sounds very much like what often happens to people who have a near-death-experience in a car accident or something like that. When a person has a brush with death, his life can be radically altered. Suddenly, previous worries and concerns, which once seemed so important, now seem so trivial and banal. One begins to appreciate the ‘little things in life’ and rediscovers the open curiosity that one used to have as a child. One appreciates each moment as if it were truly precious and fresh, knowing all the while that these moments could so easily have been denied one, had one died in the accident. In short, one becomes like a child again – happy, fearless, open to new experiences, etc.

RICHARD: Your more and more elaborate prognosis is reaching rather frantic proportions here. It was, most definitely, not like what happens to people after a ‘Near Death Experience’. Nor does my description remotely sound like that, to any discerning reader.

Really, the quality of your critique is slipping, in this post.

RESPONDENT: The only problem with this is that it has nothing to do with wisdom or true ego-lessness, something which can only be found by swimming over the horizon and disappearing into the Great Beyond. People like Kierkegaard and Hakuin faced this awesome task squarely and didn’t flinch from making steady progress into it, despite the tremendous suffering involved. They didn’t turn away as you did, Richard, and become ordinary hedonists, which is what you have become.

RICHARD: I was wondering when someone would introduce the label ‘Hedonist’ into this list – and who it would be. As ‘Hedonism’ is merely the opposite of ‘Asceticism’, (which, I understand, is your current path to obtain enlightenment) it is but an example of dualistic thinking.

Also, I would hardly say that Mr. Soren Kierkegaard has been acknowledged as being an enlightened being (as in dissolution of the ego) has he? If he has, then I have missed that in all my reading.

RICHARD: The enlightened person switches their sense of identity from the ego (which is now non-existent) to the soul and – in their own words – realise that they are ‘The Self’ existing beyond ‘Time and Space’ and that they are ‘Immortal and Eternal’ and that they are ‘Unborn and Undying’. In other words they identify as being ‘That’ by whatever name. (Also ‘The Void’, ‘Emptiness’, Beyond Form’ and so on and – if they are really astute – ‘Beyond Form and No-Form’). This is the second ‘I’ of Ventkataraman Aiyer (aka Ramana) fame.

RESPONDENT: Well, I personally don’t consider this to be enlightenment, but merely a minor realisation or insight. Recognising that one’s ‘self’ is not merely limited to the body or personality, but that it in fact encompasses the infinity of Nature is just the first step of a very long journey. It is still a long way short of enlightenment.

RICHARD: So being ‘Unborn and Undying, Immortal and Eternal and existing Beyond Time and Space’ is not enlightenment? It is ‘merely a minor realisation or insight’ ? If that description is not a description of the enlightened state then I would like to know what is. If that is the kind of thing you get from reading Mr. Soren Kierkegaard’s books, then it clearly demonstrates that his wisdom was not ‘True Wisdom’.

RESPONDENT: Unfortunately, you still haven’t cleared up my confusion for me. To recap, you said that your ego was dissolved in 1981 and that you consequently identified with a ‘Higher Self’ which exists beyond space and time, and which is eternal, immortal, unborn, undying, etc., etc. Now I ask you again, how could a self which is eternal and immortal possibly experience fear or dread? It is simply impossible! An immortal self cannot experience fear or dread, since by definition nothing can ever harm such an entity.

RICHARD: Where you say: ‘now I ask you again, how could a self which is eternal and immortal possibly experience fear or dread? It is simply impossible! An immortal self cannot experience fear or dread, since by definition nothing can ever harm such an entity’ , you are in direct contradiction of your definition (in the previous paragraph) of such a state as being ‘merely a minor realisation or insight’ . You seem to be very confused about your own understanding of enlightenment ... let alone having confusion about what I am saying.

If you do not know what constitutes enlightenment, then how can you begin to understand what is involved in going beyond enlightenment into the actual world?

RESPONDENT: And so I put it to you once more that your ego hadn’t really dissolved at all in 1981; all that had happened was that one small part of your ego had dissolved. The core of your ego remained, just as it remains today. What happened in your crisis in 1985 was that your attachment to this so-called ‘Higher Self’ (which in reality was the core of your ego) no longer sustained you emotionally and your ego floundered because of it.

RICHARD: And I will put it to you once more also: Your prognosis is not valid, as it is based upon in inaccurate premise.

RESPONDENT: At the very least, enlightenment (as opposed to perfection) is very achievable and there have been quite a few men in the past who have achieved it. An enlightened person is one who manages, for short periods at least, to eliminate every shred of falseness from his being (thus opening his mind to full consciousness of God), while a perfect person is one who effortlessly maintains this magnificent purity twenty-four hours a day.

RESPONDENT No. 15: I wish I had your faith! If we accept for the moment that what you are saying is for real, then I’m inclined to conclude that you have been there, to know as you do about it. If so, what can you tell us about the experience, the total letting-go. Was is both freeing and frightening?

RESPONDENT: It is like shedding ill-fitting clothing and relaxing in one’s natural state. As such, it is very tranquil, yet also very alive. The mind is infused with enormous power and can penetrate profound mysteries with ease. Nothing binds or constrains one, and there is no urge to be anywhere or to know anything in particular. At the same time, there is nothing static about enlightenment, for one is fully in tune with the endless process of the Universe reinventing itself at each moment. The mind experiences a steady stream of insights and intuitions. The experience of enlightenment itself is neither freeing or frightening, for it is truly beyond such things. However, as soon as the ego rears its ugly head (as it invariably does), then yes, it is here that one can experience feelings of freedom or fear, depending on the circumstances and also on one’s mood. At other times, I feel extremely free. Especially whenever I observe other people getting so emotionally tangled up in the world – married men, for example. Also, the more enlightened one becomes, the more one is free from things like boredom, anger, despair, depression, and so on. Enlightenment can be described as a temporary version of perfection.

RICHARD: Enlightenment can in no way be described as ‘a temporary version of perfection’ ... because Enlightenment is not a temporary anything. It is a permanent state of ego-lessness wherein the ego has dissolved forever. In the state of Enlightenment the ego will never again ‘rear its ugly head’. A temporary version of perfection is known as a ‘peak experience’.

If you attempt to rewrite definitions to suit your own needs you will only confuse the issue for yourself and remain ignorant by believing that you have achieved something that you have not ... and make a fool of yourself in public into the bargain with your notoriously dogmatic assertions.

RESPONDENT: I sometimes feel frightened when I sense that it is all too much for me. During these times, I regard enlightenment and the demands it makes upon me to be a huge burden and my fears revolve around the conviction that I cannot possibly live up to the high standards set before me. Here I sometimes feel a strong urge to want to escape the whole thing altogether.

RICHARD: If you are genuine about ‘wanting to escape the whole thing altogether’ you may be interested in actualising a condition that surpasses any Altered State Of Consciousness (such as Enlightenment) and is not at all frightening or demanding. There is an actual freedom wherein ‘high standards’ are not a ‘huge burden’ as they come effortlessly and freely. In actuality there is no ‘unenlightened self’ or ‘Enlightened Self’ present to prevent an on-going perfection happening spontaneously. It is essential to understand that, just as the ‘self’ is an illusion, in a like manner the ‘Self’ is a delusion born out of that illusion.

Enlightenment is a fantasy that has led humankind astray for aeons.

RICHARD: Enlightenment can in no way be described as ‘a temporary version of perfection’ ... because Enlightenment is not a temporary anything. It is a permanent state of ego-lessness wherein the ego has dissolved forever. In the state of Enlightenment the ego will never again ‘rear its ugly head’. A temporary version of perfection is known as a ‘peak experience’.

RESPONDENT: There’s no real point in arguing over labels. Labels clearly have no inherent meaning to them and are simply tools for practical usage. The important factor involved in deciding what labels to use should be whether or not they aid the communication of our understandings to others. I personally would never use the term ‘peak experience’ as it can be a very misleading label. It could easily cause people to think that I was merely referring to the ‘religious’ or ‘mystical’ experience or some other similarly limited attainment. But what I call enlightenment has nothing in common with altered states of this kind.

RICHARD: Yet you wrote, in a previous post: ‘An enlightened person is one who manages, for short periods at least, to eliminate every shred of falseness from his being (thus opening his mind to full consciousness of God)’ . Not ‘religious’? Not ‘mystical’? Who are you kidding? And let us include ‘spiritual’, ‘transcendental’ and ‘metaphysical’ experiences in the list too, for they are all of the same package.

Enlightenment is most definitely a consistent Altered State Of Consciousness wherein one realises an abiding Union with God (by whatever name ... ‘Reality’, ‘Nature’, ‘The All’, ‘Ultimate Reality’, ‘The Infinite’, ‘Truth’, ‘Tao’, ‘The Totality’ and so on). None of this is a ‘temporary version of perfection’. You are wrong in that your assertion has no basis in fact. Unless, of course, all of the Enlightened Beings that have ever existed are wrong in saying that their state (Enlightenment) is won only when it is permanent and that only you are right in allowing people who have had temporary experiences to enter into their fold. Enlightenment is an enduring condition in which the ego never again ‘rears its ugly head’ ... as yours does, by your own admission in a previous post. May I suggest that you cease using the word ‘Enlightenment’ to describe yourself, as it has a definitive meaning. That meaning is that Enlightenment is reached only when one has dissolved the ego permanently. A ‘temporary version of perfection’ is not Enlightenment.

And if you object to the western term: ‘peak experience’, then try substituting the Zen equivalent: ‘Satori experience’, or the Hindu term: ‘Samadhi experience’ or the Buddhist phrase: ‘Nirvanic experience’. These people are learned enough to apply the necessary humility to not fool themselves into believing that they have achieved Enlightenment no matter how many temporary experiences of Enlightenment they have had. Quibbling over labels, I have noticed, is your second-favourite ploy to stifle sincere discussion.

RESPONDENT: I believe I’m justified in using the word ‘enlightenment’ to describe my attainment because it tallies with the traditional use of the term .

RICHARD: It does not ‘tally’ at all, of course, but even by your own words you can not be justified in using the word ‘enlightenment’ to describe your attainment ‘because it tallies with the traditional use of the term’, as you have just stated that: ‘Labels clearly have no inherent meaning to them’. Make up your mind, please.

RESPONDENT: What I call enlightenment involves a tremendous breakthrough in consciousness in which one’s intellectual understanding of Reality reaches perfection, leading one to directly experience Reality itself. In this moment, the nature of the spiritual path is grasped, the scriptures are understood, the Zen Koans are solved, and one passes beyond all doubts, there being nowhere further to go. If the word ‘enlightenment’ is to have any meaning at all, it can only mean this.

RICHARD: Precisely. There is ‘no further to go’ . If, however, as you wrote about yourself ‘the ego rears its ugly head’ again, then you do have further to go. Therefore, you are not Enlightened. Wake up and smell the coffee.

RESPONDENT: However, this is only the beginning of a very long journey. For the rest of his life the spiritual person strives to deepen his realisation, allowing it to permeate the whole of his being.

RICHARD: ‘For the rest of his life’ ? But you have just said: ‘There being no further to go’ . My word, you are confused.

RESPONDENT: The eventual goal is to have all parts of himself in perfect harmony with the Ultimate Truth. This is what I call perfection. Unfortunately, this is not something which can be successfully accomplished overnight. In other words, it is simply not possible for us to suddenly eliminate the whole of our egos in one foul swoop. The ego is essentially a conglomeration of deeply ingrained false habits which have formed since the day of our birth, and possibly even earlier in the womb.

RICHARD: Strange indeed that all of the Enlightened Masters that I have read about, in their own words, point to a single edifying moment wherein their ego ‘dies’.

*

RICHARD: If you attempt to rewrite definitions to suit your own needs you will only confuse the issue for yourself and remain ignorant by believing that you have achieved something that you have not ... and make a fool of yourself in public into the bargain with your notoriously dogmatic assertions.

RESPONDENT: Are you so certain that it is not you who is making the fool out of himself?

RICHARD: I would venture to say that your response to my post is demonstrating who is the fool. You claim to be Enlightened yet all the while your ‘ego rears its ugly head (as it invariably does)’. You are digging yourself deeper and deeper into a mire of your own making ... and on your own list, too!

RESPONDENT: For the benefit of those list-members who have joined more recently, Richard believes that he has attained perfection and is totally without ego.

RICHARD: Please get your facts right. Not only the ego, but the soul as well. Not only the ‘self’ but the ‘Self’ also. There is no sense of identity whatsoever. Thus ‘God’, by any name, has also ceased to exist. Any ‘God’ is clearly a projection of the ‘self’ ... a fantasy, in other words. Unlike others who make false claims about their avowed atheism, I am a thorough-going atheist through and through.

RESPONDENT: I, on the other hand, believe that he has merely fallen victim to a common fallacy called ‘The Empty Pit of Perfection’. This occurs when a person has a shallow insight into the truth that everything is perfect and misinterprets it to mean that there is no spiritual path and no enlightenment. ‘We are already perfect’, these people exclaim. ‘There is no need to strive for anything. Enlightenment is a sham and all the gurus who preach it are charlatans’ ... and so on.

RICHARD: I have never said that Enlightenment is a ‘sham’. I have invariably stated that it is a delusion born out of the illusion of ‘self’. I have never said that Gurus are charlatans ... I describe them as well-meaning but deluded people ... that they have feet of clay. And I have never said: ‘There is no need to strive for anything’. In fact, I have written consistently about the intense level of patience, perseverance, application and diligence required in eliminating the root cause of all the wars, the murders, the tortures, the rapes, the domestic violence, the corruptions, the sadness, the loneliness, the sorrows, the depressions and the suicides ... ad infinitum.

It therefore follows that people are not perfect. You certainly know how to manipulate a clearly written paragraph to suit your own convenience. The ‘we are already perfect’ phrase describes what is seen, with apperception, in a peak experience. I am sure that anyone else who has read what I have written understands that this seeing is a goal to be achieved by eliminating both the ego and the soul – the ‘self’ and the ‘Self’. Why do you find this simple statement so difficult to comprehend? In case you can not read plain English unless the words are repeated over and over again, I will re-post what I wrote earlier in the rather pointless expectation that you actually read what people write to you:

‘In a peak experience everything is seen, with unparalleled clarity, to be already always perfect ... that humans are all living in purity ... if only one would act upon one’s seeing’.

Please note the ‘if only one would act upon one’s seeing’ bit.

RESPONDENT: The freedom that Richard experiences is a freedom from consciousness and purpose. He attains a type of consistency, not by eliminating everything that is false and contradictory with respect to the Truth, but simply by insisting that everything is already perfect. For example, the deeply ingrained habits that I talked about earlier – the ones caused by decades of deluded behaviour – magically cease to be deluded habits. For how can they possibly be deluded when everything is already perfect?

RICHARD: More of the same obfuscation. Blurring the issues convinces nobody but yourself that you know what you are talking of. Are you deliberately being disingenuous in order to appear to win an argument? Or are you – as I am beginning to consider – actually ignorant?

*

RICHARD: Enlightenment is a fantasy that has led humankind astray for aeons.

RESPONDENT: Deluded concepts of enlightenment continually lead humankind astray, yes. But a wise understanding of enlightenment can never do this, by definition.

RICHARD: ‘By definition’? Once again, when it suits you, you conveniently ignore your own advice. I will repeat it here for your own edification: ‘Well, there’s no real point in arguing over labels. Labels clearly have no inherent meaning to them’.

Touché. You are going to have to do a lot better than this to earn the appellation ‘wise’ or ‘genius’ ... let alone ‘Enlightened’.

RESPONDENT: You know, one of the things which disturbs me about you, Richard, is a lack of flexibility in the way you handle concepts. One only has to mention the word ‘God’, for example, and you go all into a flutter as if some great crime has been committed. This is very strange to see in a person who claims to be perfect. It is a very obvious point, once grasped, that words like ‘God’ or’ spiritual’ have no inherent meaning to them whatsoever. They mean whatever we want them to mean. Hence, when reading the words of another it is important to discern the meaning given by the author to words of this kind and not get distracted by the fact they are using them in the first place. A perfect person should have no trouble doing this at all. Words like ‘God’ and ‘Truth’ are very useful in that they press home the point that becoming enlightened is tremendously important, not only to the individual but to society as a whole. An enlightened person is perfectly capable of making use of these words without himself being fooled by them, for he is in complete control of the process. He is extremely flexible and adaptable in this regard. As I say, the apparent lack of adaptability in you is not a good sign at all.

RICHARD: It is unfortunate that you are disturbed by my handling of concepts because that disturbance will exacerbate your patent inability to perceive the facticity of what I write. Words like ‘God’, ‘Spiritual’ and ‘Truth’ – despite your denial – do indeed have inherent meaning inasmuch as they describe and convey a particular experience that one can have. What else are words for if not to validate meaning for oneself and communicate same to another? I do not ‘go all into a flutter’ but, yes, great crimes have been committed because of peoples believing in these very concepts that you treat in such a cavalier fashion. Just exactly how many wars, murders, tortures and rapes have been carried out by fervent believers we will never know ... but it runs into the hundreds of millions. That it is all unnecessary is what makes it so silly.

And I have read enough of your words over the previous months to satisfy myself that I can discern the meaning that you give to them ... I have no trouble at all in doing this as I have passed through that territory myself – experientially, not just intellectually. You are wrong in saying that an enlightened person is not fooled by them for enlightenment blinds a person to facts and actuality – they have surrendered their will and their chance for integrity to ‘The Truth’ and to the ‘Greater Reality’ and are thus ruled by the Supernatural Power and Authority that lies hidden within the psychic world.

As for your statement that ‘becoming enlightened is tremendously important, not only to the individual but to society as a whole’ ... I must demur. It is a catastrophe for society ... not to mention what it does for the individual. Living in a state of institutionalised insanity, ‘I’, the enlightened ‘Self’, am driven by ‘That’, the psychic Power and Authority behind the throne, to procure intermediaries in the form of believers to disseminate ‘My’ Word, to spread ‘My’ Message and to propagate ‘My’ Teaching. Little do ‘I’ realise the bloody ins and outs of founding yet another religious group of fervent believers. Somehow, enthralled by the bewitching enchantment of ‘My’ divine station, ‘I’ do not take the trouble to examine the chronicled history specifying the circumstances of the bloodshed and horrors of the Religious Wars that have come in the trail of ‘My’ illustrious forerunners: the ‘Awakened Ones’ from the most ‘Ancient Of Ancients’. Somehow ‘I’ am blinded by the Glory, the Glamour and the Glitz of the ‘Supernatural Promise’ – never fulfilled – and fail to behold the Diabolical sub-stratum that is fundamental to sustaining ‘My’ sublime disposition. One has to realise that ‘I’ have merely transcended the opposites ... not eliminated them.

So yes, I am incredibly inflexible when it comes to pandering to this Post-Modern nonsense about words having no inherent meaning. I have no tolerance in me whatsoever towards anything that causes such monstrous suffering.

*

RICHARD: Enlightenment is most definitely a consistent Altered State Of Consciousness wherein one realises an abiding Union with God (by whatever name ... ‘Reality’, ‘Nature’, ‘The All’, ‘Ultimate Reality’, ‘The Infinite’, ‘Truth’, ‘Tao’, ‘The Totality’ and so on). None of this is a ‘temporary version of perfection’ .

RESPONDENT: One can also say that perfection (or Enlightenment as you call it) is an altered state of consciousness in that it differs from ordinary deluded consciousness, albeit a permanent alteration. This is not to say, of course, that a perfect person is attached to any view, belief, concept or indeed any particular state of consciousness at all.

RICHARD: I wonder if you are in agreement ... you appear to be saying that enlightenment is a permanent altered state ... or are you? I note the conditional codicil – ‘(or Enlightenment as you call it)’ – so my question is this: Do you yourself now call Perfection (as defined by yourself) Enlightenment? That is, do you still claim to be Enlightened? Remember, you have just written ‘albeit a permanent alteration’ ?

RESPONDENT: Enlightenment (as I define it) is fundamentally different to ‘Satori’ or ‘Samadhi’. In my schema, these terms refer to blissful, heavenly states of consciousness in which a limited insight into the nature of Reality is gained. Enlightenment, on the other hand, is infinitely more subtle and profound. It involves seeing through utterly everything in the Universe; one perceives the true nature of all things completely and directly. In this way, it wholly transcends the bells and whistles and glamour of the Satori experience. Also, the effect of enlightenment is much more powerful than that of Satori. One’s entire ego is fundamentally altered by enlightenment; one comes out of it an entirely new person. Although the experience of Satori can also have a major impact on a person’s life, it doesn’t reach down to the very depths of one’s being like enlightenment does.

RICHARD: You see, here is why I have reason to consider that you know naught of what you write about. You say: ‘One’s ego is fundamentally altered by enlightenment’. Sorry to disappoint you but it is not ‘altered’ ... it is dissolved ... finished ... ended ... the ‘self’ dies. Enlightenment, as you define it, includes having the ‘ego rear its ugly head (as it invariably does)’. Given this, how on earth one can come out of it ‘an entirely new person’ – given that the word ‘entirely’ means completely, totally, fully or wholly? Having one’s ego rear its ugly head does not indicate ‘entirely’ to me.

It does not sound to me that you have ‘seen through utterly everything in the Universe’ . You do not write like one who ‘perceives the true nature of all things completely and directly’.

*

RICHARD: Strange indeed that all of the Enlightened Masters that I have read about, in their own words, point to a single edifying moment wherein their ego ‘dies’.

RESPONDENT: They’re simply kidding themselves. A part of the ego dies with enlightenment, but not all of it. One cannot overturn millions of years of bad karma overnight!

RICHARD: ‘Millions of years of bad karma’ ? So you believe in the Eastern metaphysical concept of karma and re-incarnation too? But you have just said that: ‘Enlightenment (as I define it) is fundamentally different to Satori or Samadhi ... in which a limited insight into the nature of Reality is gained’ . This belief in the traditional Hindu and Buddhist religious doctrine that you hold is an example of how you have not exceeded their ‘limited insight into the nature of Reality’ . It is the same old-same old.

So, you have lived before this incarnation as ‘No. 4’, eh? Well, well, well ... it would appear that you were dissembling all those weeks ago when you denied what I wrote about the delusion of Enlightenment being that one took oneself to be something other than this flesh-and-blood body ... ‘Spaceless and Timeless’ ... ‘Unborn and Undying’ ... ‘beyond Form and No-Form’ ... ‘beyond Self and No-Self’. Who is the ‘I’ that re-incarnates over millions of years? What happens to ‘you’ when this flesh-and-blood ‘No. 4’ dies?

Well, well, well ... perhaps now that your real beliefs have been flushed out into the open we can have a genuine discussion about the Buddhist belief in an After-life. Your running-mate No. 12 tried to convince me that there was no substantial difference between Nirvana and Parinirvana. Where do you stand on this issue?

RESPONDENT: Incidentally, who, other than yourself, is Enlightened (or perfect) in your view? Is there anyone from history whom you consider to have reached this supreme level?

RICHARD: But it is not a ‘supreme level’ because I am not Enlightened. I am in a condition I call actual freedom. I call it actual because it is located in this sensual world of physical phenomenon. It is not metaphysical at all as it is here on earth as this body only. I am this flesh-and-blood body – minus any identity at all. No ego or soul; no self or Self; no God or Truth ... simply the moment-to-moment apperception of myself as being this physical universe’s experience of itself as a sensate, reflective human being.

Nobody that I have read about from history has reported this condition.

*

RICHARD: I am a thorough-going atheist through and through.

RESPONDENT: Not thorough-going enough for my liking. You still treat words as gods, for example. Furthermore, keep in mind that the ‘non-existence of God’ is also projection of the self. From all appearances, you are as much attached to this projection as a fundamentalist is to his own wrathful deity.

RICHARD: You astound me! How on earth can the ‘non-existence of God’ be a ‘projection of the self’ ? This is such convoluted reasoning that it beggars description. Also, once again you are using your favourite ploy to stifle discussion ... that is, where you use the accusation that someone – other than yourself, of course – is ‘attached’ to something or another. You have used it and over-used it until it does not work any more ... not on me, at least.

And I am not a ‘thorough-going atheist’ because I ‘treat words as gods’ ? Here it is you who is ‘clutching at straws’.

RICHARD: Do you yourself now call Perfection (as defined by yourself) Enlightenment? That is, do you still claim to be Enlightened? Remember, you have just written ‘albeit a permanent alteration’ ?

RESPONDENT: An enlightened person is indeed permanently altered by his enlightenment in that his vision of life has been radically changed. All of his intellectual delusions have disappeared and his values have been given a tremendous shake-up. The difference between being unenlightened and enlightened is like the difference between hesitantly groping around in a dark foreign room and striding confidently about one’s own room with the light on. With the onset of enlightenment, one can see clearly what needs to be done and is placed in a strong position to be able to do it. This doesn’t mean that one is perfect, for the work involved has only just begun.

RICHARD: I would like to try re-writing your paragraph so that what you are saying can be understood in the context of how other people use words: ‘A person who has had a temporary enlightenment experience has had their perceptions altered by this experience in that their experience of life has been radically changed. Some of their intellectual delusions have disappeared and their values have been given a tremendous shake-up. The difference between not having had a temporary enlightenment experience and having had this enlightenment experience is like the difference between hesitantly groping around in a dark foreign room and striding confidently about one’s own room with the light on. With the onset of entering the spiritual path, after having had a temporary experience of enlightenment, one can see somewhat clearly what needs to be done and is placed in a reasonably strong position to be able to do it. This doesn’t mean that one is Enlightened, for the work involved has only just begun’.

Hey ... now I can agree with you wholeheartedly! Why did I not think of this before? If you wish, I can translate all of your posts so that anyone can easily understand where you are really at.

*

RICHARD: Enlightenment, as you define it, includes having the ‘ego rear its ugly head (as it invariably does)’ . Given this, how on earth one can come out of it ‘an entirely new person’ – given that the word ‘entirely’ means completely, totally, fully or wholly? Having one’s ego rear its ugly head does not indicate ‘entirely’ to me.

RESPONDENT: An entirely-altered ego rears its ugly head, but it is still an ego nonetheless. In other words, attachments still remain, but the things that one is now attached to and the nature of these attachments itself have changed. One’s inner relationship with all things in the Universe is fundamentally altered. It’s been described in Zen as having ‘your whole world turned inside out’ or ‘consciousness doing a 180 degree flip’, which are pretty decent descriptions of it. The ‘flip’ is permanent, and one is now in a position to begin travelling down the spiritual path.

RICHARD: Oh, I see ... foolish me. Enlightenment means having an ‘entirely-altered ego’ does it? And you seriously think that Zen supports this view? When I read Zen all those years ago it was very clear to me that they consider Enlightenment to have happened only after ego death – that is: No ego at all. But, of course, you would say they got it wrong.

RESPONDENT: The word ‘karma’ is like the word ‘God’. There is a wise way of understanding it – and many deluded ways. Needless to say, the populist views of karma and reincarnation are wildly off the mark.

RICHARD: No. 4’s method number five of stifling serious discussion: Calls anything challenging his view a ‘populist’ or ‘popular’ view. Only he (and Mr. Soren Kierkegaard and Mr. Otto Weinginger) has the inside dope.

*

RICHARD: So, you have lived before this incarnation as ‘No. 4’, eh?

RESPONDENT: I don’t even live now as ‘No. 4’, for I am literally without beginning or end.

RICHARD: Translation: ‘I, ‘No. 4’, am God ... literally’.

*

RICHARD: Who is the ‘I’ that re-incarnates over millions of years?

RESPONDENT: It is Nature itself.

RICHARD: And we all know from previous posts that ‘Nature’ (with a capital ‘N’) means God. Just as well that any god is a fantasy born out of an illusion otherwise this would be classified as ‘delusions of grandeur’.

*

RICHARD: Your running-mate (No. 12) tried to convince me that there was no substantial difference between Nirvana and Parinirvana. Where do you stand on this issue?

RESPONDENT: Apart from the obliteration of consciousness, there is no difference at all between the two. A perfect person (i.e. one who is permanently free of all attachments) cannot experience death. He is immortal. He cannot lose his life because he no longer possesses any life to lose. Death is incapable of taking anything away from him. Consciousness disappears at death, but since he has long since abandoned any attachment to consciousness the loss of it means nothing to him.

RICHARD: ‘He is immortal’ , eh? I suggest that this is a very selfish and self-centred approach to life on earth – something that all religions and spirituality are guilty of. The quest to secure one’s place in Eternity is unambiguously selfish ... peace-on-earth is readily sacrificed for the supposed continuation of the imagined soul after physical death. So much for the humanitarian ideals of peace, goodness, altruism, philanthropy and humaneness. All Religious and Spiritual Quests amount to nothing more than a self-centred urge to perpetuate oneself for ever and a day. All Religious and Spiritual Leaders fall foul of this existential dilemma. They pay lip-service to the notion of self-sacrifice – weeping crocodile tears at noble martyrdom – whilst selfishly pursuing Immortality. The root cause of all the ills of humankind can be sheeted home to this single, basic fact: the overriding importance of the survival of self on into an After-Life.

If it were not for all the suffering; the wars, the killings, the tortures, the rapes, the degradations, and the such-like, it would be entertainingly amusing, for the self does not exist in actuality. All this monstrous behaviour is about something fictitious. The self – and the Self – are only psychological entities ... phantasms in mundane reality and in a super-charged Reality. It is all much ado about nothing. However, it is no laughing matter – it is far too serious when appalling suffering is concerned. It behoves one to put aside the selfish ego-driven and soul-driven will to survive and look again at what exactly is occurring. One will no longer be entranced by the bewitching promises proffered so alluringly by these self-appointed guardians of virtue and morality – all self-serving, mind you. It is a must that one establish one’s integrity and set about ridding oneself of any psychological entity whatsoever.

*

RICHARD: I am this flesh-and-blood body – minus any identity at all.

RESPONDENT: If you are without identity, then why do you continue to identify with this flesh-and-blood body? After all, a true sage doesn’t identify with anything at all, apart from what he makes up for practical purposes. Despite your protestations to the contrary, you still seem very caught up in metaphysical illusions. The fact that you place so much emphasis on ‘this flesh-and-blood body’ and speak so vehemently and rigidly against all talk of ‘God’ is a clear indication of this. You’ve merely swung to the opposite end of the spectrum to Christians and therefore still bound by the same fundamental delusions as them.

RICHARD: But I do not ‘continue to identify with this flesh-and-blood body’ . If you had taken the trouble to read my previous posts on this issue you would already know my answer to that hoary question. And as I am not a ‘true sage’ , I could not care less what they ‘make up for practical purposes’ , for they are living in a massive delusion.

What metaphysical illusions am I caught up in? I am an atheistic, down-to-earth, practical pragmatist who eschews anything supernatural whatsoever. You guys invent ‘God’ and cry foul when someone suggests that your fantasy is just that – a fantasy. Of course I speak ‘so vehemently and rigidly against all talk of God’ because of the incredible suffering this ridiculous belief has caused over the centuries.

Rather than having ‘merely swung to the opposite end of the spectrum to Christians’ , I have dissolved the opposites altogether by ridding myself of any ‘I’ whatsoever.

*

RICHARD: I have no ego or soul; no self or Self; no God or Truth ... simply the moment-to-moment apperception of myself as being this physical universe’s experience of itself as a sensate, reflective human being.

RESPONDENT: This is commonly called ‘living in the moment’. Women and children are particularly good at this, while cows and dogs are even better.

RICHARD: I beg to differ. This is not called ‘living in the moment’ . No. 12 tried that accusation on me weeks and weeks ago. And cows and dogs have a ‘self’, albeit a rudimentary self at that. They are ruled by instincts such as fear and aggression just like humans are. I have eliminated these instinctual urges, so your attempt at a put-down by comparing me to animals again just does not work. Sorry about that.

Now you had written in an earlier post: [Respondent]: ‘Furthermore, keep in mind that the ‘non-existence of God’ is also projection of the self. From all appearances, you are as much attached to this projection as a fundamentalist is to his own wrathful deity’. To which I had replied: [Richard]: ‘You astound me! How on earth can the ‘non-existence of God’ be a ‘projection of the self’? This is such convoluted reasoning that it beggars description. Also, once again you are using your favourite ploy to stifle discussion ... that is, where you use the accusation that someone – other than yourself, of course – is ‘attached’ to something or another. You have used it and over-used it until it does not work any more ... not on me, at least. And you, undeterred, had tried again: [Respondent]: ‘As I say, you are as attached to the ‘non-existence of God’ as Christians are to the ‘existence of God’. Both are two sides of the one coin. You have yet to throw away the coin altogether. You’ve not yet ‘flipped’.

Goodness me, you love repeating yourself ... ‘As I say, you are as attached ...’ . Don’t you get it? Telling me that I am attached does not work on me. There is no ‘I’ to be either attached or detached. It is all over. Finished. There is no ‘I’ to throw anything away. Annihilation. There is no ‘I’ to flip anything. Extinction. All that remains is this flesh-and-blood body ... and with no ‘I’ there is an utter absence of malice and sorrow. With no animosity or anguish I am happy and harmless. Being happy and harmless, I experience an on-going peace-on-earth.

It is a most estimable condition to be in.

RICHARD: It is a popular misconception that one can do away with a ‘bad’ emotion whilst hanging on to the ‘good’ one.

RESPONDENT: Yes .

RICHARD: I am glad that we can finally agree on something ... for a while there I thought that we were going to take the record for having the longest lasting dissension on everything under the sun. Who knows what we might find in the future.

*

RICHARD: In actual freedom the third alternative always applies. Good and Bad, Right and Wrong, Virtue and Sin, Hope and Despair, Gratitude and Resentment, and so on, all disappear in the perfection of the purity of the actual.

RESPONDENT: No. For example, you yourself say that chasing enlightenment is Wrong, while giving up all spirituality in favour of ‘living in the actual’ is Right. Even a perfect person, it seems, cannot escape Right and Wrong. To the degree that he has a conscious mind and has to make decisions, he must necessarily differentiate right from wrong. A perfect person still has values and indeed spends his life promoting them. But he doesn’t get fooled by these values. He sees them exactly for what they are and harbours no attachment to them.

RICHARD: Actually, it is not a case of Right and Wrong with me about anything. Being pragmatic as I am, I am only interested in what works when it comes to making decisions. Thus I base my determination upon something being either silly or sensible and never upon moralistic injunctions ... which is what all values like Right and Wrong or Good and Bad are. Consequently, I have indeed escaped and hold no values whatsoever ... I do not have to waste my valuable time incessantly avoiding being fooled by – or being detached from – anything moralistic at all.

For example: It is sensible to be happy and harmless and silly to be sorrowful and malicious.