Actual Freedom – The Actual Freedom Mailing List Correspondence

Richard’s Correspondence

On The Actual Freedom Mailing List

with Correspondent No. 44


May 03 2004

RESPONDENT: Yesterday I was searching through a search engine (Copernicus agent) for something, and out of the blue I came in a site of actual freedom, that included one conversation we had me Peter and Richard two years ago. I read it again, and I am still astonished for the reason I could not convey a simple thing.

(...)

If there is no I can sadness or anger it’s self ASSOCIATES OR DISSOCIATES FROM ITS SELF? THERE IS ONLY THAT FULL STOP.

So in the moment the self the I the me does not exist, is anybody that can do anything to escape or transform this sadness etc?

No. Exist only that, sadness (without name) or anger or whatever else.

Then no action can take place. Nothing can be done. The only action that can take place is from this energy that we call sadness or anger or whatever. And because the energy is not static will transform. In what? Do it and you will see.

RICHARD: There is no need to ‘do it and you will see’ as the person who devised this method has already made this transformation ... with oh-so-predictable results. Vis.:

• [Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti]: ‘There is this thing called sorrow [aka sadness], which is pain, grief, loneliness, a sense of total isolation, no hope, no sense of relationship or communication, total isolation. Mankind has lived with this great thing and perhaps cultivated it because he does not know how to resolve it. (...) Now if you don’t escape, that is if there is no rationalising, no avoiding, no justifying, just remaining with that totality of suffering, without the movement of thought [aka not naming it], then you have all the energy to comprehend the thing you call sorrow. If you remain without a single movement of thought, with that which you have called sorrow, there comes a transformation in that which you have called sorrow. That becomes passion. The root meaning of sorrow is passion. When you escape from it, you lose that quality which comes from sorrow, which is complete passion, which is totally different from lust and desire. When you have an insight into sorrow and remain with that thing completely, without a single movement of thought, out of that comes this strange flame of passion. And you must have passion, otherwise you can’t create anything. Out of passion comes compassion. Compassion means passion for all things, for all human beings. So there is an ending to sorrow, and only then you will begin to understand what it means to love’. (‘A Relationship with the World’, Public Talks; Ojai, California; April 11 1976; ©1976/1996 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust, Ltd.).

And what is the nature of this love you will begin to understand when you have (supposedly) ended sorrow/sadness by having the (thoughtless) energy to transform it into the strange flame of passion:

• [Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti]: ‘We talk of love as being either carnal or spiritual and have set a battle going between the sacred and the profane. We have divided what love is from what love should be, so we never know what love is. Love, surely, is *a total feeling* that is not sentimental and in which there is no sense of separation. It is *complete purity of feeling* without the separative, fragmenting quality of the intellect’. [emphasises added]. (page 76, ‘On Living and Dying’; Chennai [Madras], 9 December 1959; ©1992 Krishnamurti Foundation of America).

In a word:

• ‘Love is *passion*’. [emphasis added]. (page 153,‘The Wholeness Of Life’; Part II, Chapter III: ‘Out Of Negation Comes The Positive Called Love’; ©1979 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust Ltd.).

Its main characteristic is its timeless quality:

• ‘When there is love, which is its own eternity, then there is no search for God, because *love is God*. [emphasis added]. (page 281, ‘The First and Last Freedom’; ©1954 Krishnamurti Foundation of America).

And, of course, its immediate conferrence of immortality:

• [Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti]: ‘I am God’. (page 65, Krishnamurti, ‘The Path’, 3rd Edition, Star Publishing Trust: Ommen 1930).

Thus there is no need to be astonished, as you say further above, ‘for the reason I could not convey a simple thing’ as you will find that your (borrowed) wisdom is already understood ... only all too well.

May 03 2004

RESPONDENT: Richard, I speak you for potatoes and you answer for tomatoes.

I did not aspect that from you, because you always speak with the dictionary definitions, you are with the dictionary in pocket.

In what use are to you all this definitions, if not for us (all the people to understand each other)?

And after so many definitions and exactness in words, I speak you for potatoes and you answer for tomatoes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

P.S.: Instead to look in what I am writing you are answering with a biography of Jiddu Krishnamurti.

If you say 2+2=4 to me, shall I see if what you are saying is right or wrong? Or shall I answer you with a biography of your math teacher?

RICHARD: Why on earth do you want me to ‘look in’ what you are writing when I lived that/was that, night and day, for eleven years?

This is a mailing list about going beyond spiritual enlightenment ... not going back into it.

May 06 2004

RESPONDENT: Richard, may I ask you please, to do a favour for me and probably for all of as in this list? The demand is, can you dedicate half an hour and make one abridgement, overview in sort of your invention, so we don’t have to read all these actual freedom sites and correspondences?

Can you make a clear overview of what you invented and how?

Let’s say there is not any site of actual freedom and you try to explain at one friend your invention and the way you think nature universe cosmogony and everything else is.

Can you do it please?

You spent anyway big amount of time in answering emails. So can you dedicate one day just to explain everything afresh, without redirections to this or that site?

RICHARD: First and foremost: I have not invented anything ... an actual freedom from the human condition is not an invention (it is what happens when identity in toto ‘self’-immolates for the benefit of this body and that body and every body).

Second, a précis of what I have to report/ describe/ explain already exists ... but as I am not to redirect you to this or that site you will just have to locate it for yourself.

Third, what I write regarding the way this actual world operates is not the way I ‘think’ it is but the way it actually is ... it is no different to, say, looking at the clock when somebody asks me what the time is and I reply 3.06 PM (or whatever it is).

Last, but by no means least, as what I write about life here in this actual world is a report coming immediately from the direct experience of this beginningless and endless moment – there is this which is actually happening and the words form themselves in accord to the very thing being referred to as it is occurring – it makes no difference in regards freshness on what occasion they are written.

In other words: being already always fresh the words are an active catalyst which will catapult the reader, who reads with all their being, into the magical wonder-land this verdant and azure planet actually is.

Then actuality speaks for itself.

May 06 2004

RICHARD: ... as what I write about life here in this actual world is a report coming immediately from the direct experience of this beginningless and endless moment – there is this which is actually happening and the words form themselves in accord to the very thing being referred to as it is occurring – it makes no difference in regards freshness on what occasion they are written. In other words: being already always fresh the words are an active catalyst which will catapult the reader, who reads with all their being, into the magical wonder-land this verdant and azure planet actually is. Then actuality speaks for itself.

RESPONDENT: Richard do you understand that the words you are saying after they left your mouth are already old?

RICHARD: Respondent, do you understand that this is a flesh and blood body you are conversing with – one living in this actual world where time itself has no duration – and not an enlightened being living (albeit in a massive delusion) in the real world?

RESPONDENT: My kindly asking was Can you make one overview?

RICHARD: And my response is, as before, that a précis of what I have to report/describe/explain already exists.

RESPONDENT: Let’s say you met a friend in a bar and you try to explain him your way of seeing things, as you done with Vineeto and Peter.

RICHARD: Now here is an interesting thing: Peter was the first person who listened with both ears (aka listened afresh) to what I had to report/describe/explain ... so much so that he was able to successfully explain it to Vineeto before she even met me.

You see, he was able to drop, at an instant and for that instant, all his spiritual experience and learning/conditioning ... he never told me, for instance, with (borrowed) wisdom that the words that I was saying, after they left my mouth, were already old.

In short: he was ripe and ready for something new.

RESPONDENT: Can you do it once more?

RICHARD: Ahh ... but can you be another Peter (so to speak)?

RESPONDENT: So that we will begin to deal from there and avoid all these thousands of redirections?

RICHARD: Ha ... as I only deal from here – where what ‘all these thousands of redirections’ link to are ever-fresh – it would appear you are avoiding that which has been here all this while. Vis.:

May 07 2004

RESPONDENT: And a second question for not write another email. You are speaking about PCE’s. What is consciousness?

RICHARD: It is exactly the same as when you asked me exactly the same question – ‘what is consciousness’ – on another occasion. Vis.:

• [Respondent]: ‘What is consciousness?
• [Richard]: ‘Here is how I have explained it before: [Respondent]: ‘I should like to tell you, that the moment you are speaking about consciousness (...)’. [Richard]: ‘(...) When I am speaking about consciousness I am referring to the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious (the suffix ‘-ness’ forms a noun meaning a state or condition) as in being alive, not dead, awake, not asleep, and sensible, not insensible (comatose) ...’. 
What is there about that description you are having difficulty in comprehending?

What is it about that description you are still having difficulty in comprehending?

May 08 2004

RESPONDENT: And a second question for not write another email. You are speaking about PCE’s. What is consciousness?

RICHARD: It is exactly the same as when you asked me exactly the same question – ‘what is consciousness’ – on another occasion. Vis.:

 [Respondent No. 44]: ‘What is consciousness?
[Richard]: ‘Here is how I have explained it before:
[Respondent No. 44]: ‘I should like to tell you, that the moment you are speaking about consciousness (...)’.
[Richard]: ‘(...) When I am speaking about consciousness I am referring to the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious (the suffix ‘-ness’ forms a noun meaning a state or condition) as in being alive, not dead, awake, not asleep, and sensible, not insensible (comatose) ...’.
What is there about that description you are having difficulty in comprehending?

What is it about that description you are still having difficulty in comprehending?

RESPONDENT: You are explaining me the manifestation of consciousness.

RICHARD: As consciousness is the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious – which is to be alive, not dead, awake, not asleep, and sensible, not insensible (comatose) – in what way is that an explanation of ‘the manifestation of consciousness’ and not an explanation of what consciousness is?

RESPONDENT: I had asked you what is consciousness per se, in itself.

RICHARD: As consciousness – the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious – is indistinguishable from what a body is (when it is alive, awake, and sensible) then to suggest that consciousness is something other than that, that which is indeed what it is per se, in itself, just does not make sense.

What is the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious, then, if not what consciousness is per se, in itself?

May 13 2004

RESPONDENT: My kindly asking was Can you make one overview? Let’s say you met a friend in a bar and you try to explain him your way of seeing things, as you done with Vineeto and Peter.

RICHARD: Now here is an interesting thing: Peter was the first person who listened with both ears (aka listened afresh) to what I had to report/describe/explain ... so much so that he was able to successfully explain it to Vineeto before she even met me. You see, he was able to drop, at an instant and for that instant, all his spiritual experience and learning/conditioning ... he never told me, for instance, with (borrowed) wisdom that the words that I was saying, after they left my mouth, were already old. In short: he was ripe and ready for something new.

RESPONDENT: Can you do it once more?

RICHARD: Ahh ... but can you be another Peter (so to speak)?

RESPONDENT: It reminds me of the answer Ramana Maharshi gave to U.G.:

U.G.: (for the truth) Can you give it to me?
R.M.: Yes but can you take it?

After this answer U.G. left (considering it a stupid one).

RICHARD: I am none too sure why my response reminds you of that ... here is a scenario for you (it could be anyone asking):

• [Anyone]: (for an actual freedom from the human condition) Can you give it to me?
• [Richard]: No, your freedom is in your hands ... and your hands alone.

If that sounds familiar to you it could be because of the following exchange:

• [Respondent]: ‘And I think that this [the real change] will happen when the time will be right.
• [Richard]: ‘In the final analysis it is your life you are living and, provided you comply with the legal laws and observe the social protocols, you will be left alone to live your life as wisely or as foolishly as you wish ... only you get to reap the rewards or pay the consequences for any action or inaction you may or may not do.
Your freedom is in your hands and your hands alone.

RESPONDENT: Should it be ok if I had to comment on your answer as a ‘borrowed wisdom’ one?

RICHARD: You had asked me to explain afresh – even though words are dead as far as you are concerned the moment they issue forth from this keyboard – so I pointed out that words written here in this actual world are always fresh and that reading them afresh was the key to comprehension.

As you had given the example of Peter and Vineeto it was apposite to flesh-out why they can so readily hear/read what I have to report/ describe/ explain ... and to then ask you if you can do the same (given that you had asked me to do the same with you as I had done with them).

And yet what is your response?

None other than asking me should it be okay to comment on my answer as a ‘borrowed wisdom’ one.

RESPONDENT: Or it should be such an action against my self respect?

RICHARD: As it is your self respect it is up to you what you do with it.

*

RESPONDENT: I always say to my self not to answer but, for some reason or the other in the end I give it a try. I should like just to make one question only: What is this reaction we call IRONY and how it comes into being, from what feeling is it originate?

RICHARD: If you are meaning the word in its ‘dissimulation, pretence; especially the pretence of ignorance practised by Socrates as a step towards confuting an adversary’ primary meaning (Oxford Dictionary) you may very well intellectually know by now.

If you are meaning the word in its ‘discrepancy between the expected and the actual state of affairs’ figurative meaning (Oxford Dictionary) you may very well experientially know by now.

If you are meaning the word in its ‘mockery, ridicule, derision, scorn, wryness, sarcasm’ synonymic meaning (Oxford Dictionary) this may be an apt moment to point out that such is designed to make the recipient feel the effects of ridicule – humility via humiliation – as in the repentance engendered by the remorse of feeling rueful.

If it is indeed the latter you are on a hiding to nowhere pursuing that line with me.

RESPONDENT: I am referring of course to this BORROWED WISDOM, which became out fashioned and very trivial.

RICHARD: All spiritual wisdom, borrowed or not, is not worth what it is recorded on.

RESPONDENT: Seems you are stuck with the past and be repetitive as much as we do, but we don’t claim that we are anything new, this is the difference.

RICHARD: How easy it is to turn a vice into a virtue, eh?

May 29 2004

RESPONDENT: Richard, I still wait for your answer, but never mind, another time.

RICHARD: Seeing that you have entitled this e-mail ‘Second question for Richard’ it would appear you are referring to this query:

• [Respondent]: ‘Richard, I should like to ask you the following question. If the universe was always existing, then AS what was the universe experiencing itself, prior to the appearance of conscious species? (‘One question for Richard’; Tue 25/05/04).

As the word ‘experiencing’ refers to a sentient creature participating personally in events or activities then it would appear that what you are asking is, in effect, what the universe sans such an organism could experience itself as.

If this is what you are asking then surely you can work it out for yourself?

And the reason why I respond in this manner is because when – or, rather, if – you do so you may just come to realise what the meaning of life is (or ‘the riddle of existence’ or ‘the purpose of the universe’ or however one’s quest in life be expressed).

RESPONDENT: May I ask you by the way something else? Somebody is trying to become happy. He does not know what this means, but he tries. Now is not funny that somebody tries to find something, that never had and never lost?

RICHARD: What I find funny (as in ‘peculiar’ and not ‘ha-ha’) is how you set up your question – asking me whether it is funny that a person would try to find a happiness they never had/never lost/know nothing about – when it is made crystal clear on The Actual Freedom Trust web site, and its associated mailing list, that it is the pure consciousness experience (PCE) which indubitably informs what an actual happiness is, where it is located, and what is required for it to be apparent 24/7.

RESPONDENT: Logically in the moment he tries to find something he does not know, means he believed somebody, who told him so. So he is conditioned by him. Should not therefore the first attempt should be, to decondition himself from the person, that conditioned him to try to find happiness?

RICHARD: Again you have set-up a question which has no relevance to what is on offer on The Actual Freedom Trust web site and its associated mailing list ... where it is specifically stressed how vital it is that a person see for themselves what is reported/described/explained in regards an actual freedom from the human condition.

RESPONDENT: The question is: Is somebody trying to be happy because he is unhappy, or is unhappy because he tries to be happy?

RICHARD: In regard to what is on offer on The Actual Freedom Trust web site and its associated mailing list: a person is actively engaged in becoming happy (and harmless) because they (a) experientially know what an actual happiness is (per favour the PCE) ... and (b) where it is located (thus they are no longer seeking) ...and (c) what is required for it to be apparent 24/7 (for the remainder of their life).

In regards to your set-up question: as long as you continue typing-out your queries single-handedly you will continue to be incapable of reading afresh what is on offer on The Actual Freedom Trust web site and its associated mailing list.

July 06 2004

RESPONDENT No. 4: (...) For me, the moment in which event ‘A’ happens is a different ‘this moment’ than the one in which event ‘B’ happens.

RICHARD: Are you so sure, upon reflection, that both the event (event ‘A’) and the moment (this moment) are, in fact, different from both the event (event ‘B’) and the moment (this moment) in which that other event happens ... or is it only the events which are different?

RESPONDENT: The events can not be different, because if event B exist then event A does not exist. To say that they are different must coexist to compare them. In relation to what is the event B different, if the event A does not exist?

RICHARD: In relation to the same thing which your response about renewal (immediately below) refers to of course ... that which precedes it. Vis.:

• ‘renew: make new again; restore to the same condition as when new, young, or fresh’. (Oxford Dictionary).
• ‘renew: to make like new: restore to freshness, vigour, or perfection’. (Merriam-Webster Dictionary).
• ‘renew: make something new again: to make something new or as if new again’. (Encarta® Dictionary).
• ‘renew: ‘to make new or as if new again; restore’. (American Heritage® Dictionary).
• ‘renew: ‘re-establish on a new, usually improved, basis or make new or like new; regenerate’. (WordNet 2.0).

*

RESPONDENT No. 4: In other words even though it is always ‘this moment’, each ‘this moment’ is different from the other.

RICHARD: If, for you, this moment is indeed different from the other – from any other moment – then it is not ‘always’ this moment after all (for you) as what you are saying, in effect, is that it is always this (different) moment ... which is but another way of saying ‘this ever-changing moment’.

RESPONDENT: Not changing, renewing itself.

RICHARD: Whether a moment is experienced as ever-renewing or ever-different or ever-changing, or any other expression of that ilk, the effect is still the same: one cannot say that it is always this moment (as in ‘it is never not this moment’).

The qualifier – be it ‘renewing’ or ‘different’ or ‘changing’ and so on – makes a world of difference (pun intended) to what is being experienced/conveyed.

*

RICHARD (to Respondent No. 4): Yet it is what happens in this moment which is always different (ever-changing) is it not?

RESPONDENT: Ever changing is not different. Renewing.

RICHARD: Hmm ... as you took exception to me saying that ‘this ever-changing moment’ is but another way of saying ‘it is always this (different) moment’ – with your ‘not changing, renewing itself’ comment – it does seem rather odd that you would now say that ‘ever changing’ is not different after all ... that it is ‘renewing’.

RESPONDENT: Different needs point of reference.

RICHARD: If I may point out? So too does ‘renewing’ need a point of reference – that which precedes it – else the word is meaningless.

RESPONDENT: And the point of reference exist only in your memory.

RICHARD: The point of reference for an event which is not currently occurring can also be recorded in video/audio/print format (to name but a few examples ... fossilised records are another instance).

This moment, however, cannot be remembered/recorded as it is never not this moment.

RESPONDENT: If exist in your memory only, you can not speak about actuality, because actual means what is happening NOW.

RICHARD: The whole thrust of this e-mail exchange you have entered into revolves around the question of whether this moment – which is ‘what is happening NOW’ – is always this moment (without qualification), or not, and whether it is only the events which change/flow/move ... or not.

I am reporting/ describing/ explaining that, here in this actual world, the world of sensation, it is always this moment – that this moment does not change/flow/move (and neither does it renew itself either) – which means that this moment is what is always actual.

Thus I am indeed speaking about actuality.

July 08 2004

RESPONDENT: About a month ago, or so, I had asked Richard the following question: ‘AS what was the universe experiencing itself before conscious being were existing’? He answered to me ‘I leave it up to you to find out’.

RICHARD: What I actually wrote was ‘surely you can work it out for yourself?’ Vis.:

• [Respondent]: ‘Richard, I should like to ask you the following question. If the universe was always existing, then AS what was the universe experiencing itself, prior to the appearance of conscious species?
• [Richard]: ‘As the word ‘experiencing’ refers to a sentient creature participating personally in events or activities then it would appear that what you are asking is, in effect, what the universe sans such an organism could experience itself as.
If this is what you are asking then surely you can work it out for yourself?
And the reason why I respond in this manner is because when – or, rather, if – you do so you may just come to realise what the meaning of life is (or ‘the riddle of existence’ or ‘the purpose of the universe’ or however one’s quest in life be expressed).

RESPONDENT: I repeated my question with no answer.

RICHARD: Perhaps if I were to put it this way then: surely you can work it out, for yourself, that there is no way the universe sans sentient creatures can experience itself (given that the word ‘experiencing’ refers to a sentient creature participating personally in events or activities).

RESPONDENT: My question was a burning question for me at list, and within the immediate subject of this list. And although so I did not get till today one answer.

RICHARD: I do have a life apart from writing to this mailing list – I have been out of town, and thus away from the computer, for most days these last few weeks and have just now got around to attending to (some) of my correspondence – plus there is no way I either can or will respond to each and every e-mail which comes into my mailbox anyway.

RESPONDENT: From the other hand though he is very ready to answer questions about relativity theory, Plank’s quanta etc.

RICHARD: Au contraire ... there is many an occasion where I have not responded to such e-mails.

RESPONDENT: Subjects that are of course related with the subject of this list *because life is uniform* but not of immediate and direct value.

RICHARD: The following will explain what the actual reason is:

• [Richard]: ‘... I will take this opportunity to point out that if it were not for those who seek to disallow the direct experience of infinitude the matter [of relativity theory] would not be a topic on this mailing list.
I have had to research all manner of things for other people since I first went public with my discovery.

RESPONDENT: This to me seems a paradox of the way he thinks.

RICHARD: As there is no such ‘paradox’ (other than that of your own making) I will pass without further comment.

July 08 2004

RESPONDENT: Richard, today I gave a new look to actualfreedom website. You are saying: [quote] ‘‘My’ demise was as fictitious as ‘my’ apparent presence. I have always been here, I realize, it was that ‘I’ only imagined that ‘I’ existed. It was all an emotional play in a fertile imagination ... which was, however, fuelled by an actual hormonal substance triggered off from within the brain-stem because of the instinctual passions bestowed by blind nature. Thus the psyche – the entire affective faculty born of the instincts itself – is wiped out forever and one is finally what one actually is … this thoughtful flesh-and-blood body simply brimming with sense organs, delighting in this sensuous world of actual experience. I am this very material universe experiencing itself as a sensate and reflective human being’. [endquote]. You are stating that ‘I have always been here’ and then you say ‘one is finally what one actually is … this thoughtful flesh-and-blood body simply brimming with sense organs, delighting in this sensuous world of actual experience’. After the above statements, I should like to ask you: 1) Who is making the statement ‘I have always been here’? Who is this I that always has been here?

RICHARD: It is not a question of ‘who’ is making the statement but rather what ... as in the ‘one is finally *what* one actually is’ (emphasis added) phrasing in the quote you have provided.

RESPONDENT: 2) If (you=A) (‘always have been here’=B) and if ‘(you=A) (are actually ‘this thoughtful flesh-and-blood body simply brimming with sense organs, delighting in this sensuous world of actual experience’=C), then follows logically that – this thoughtful flesh-and-blood body simply brimming with sense organs, delighting in this sensuous world of actual experience – always has been here. Because if A=B and A=C then follows that B=C. Can you see the nonsense (no sense) of what you are stating?

RICHARD: Why is it ‘nonsense (no sense)’ to report that, as this flesh and blood body only (sans identity in toto), I have been here all along ... all the while there was both the illusion of being an ego-self and the delusion of being a soul-self/spirit-self operating within per favour blind nature’s instinctual passions?

RESPONDENT: 3) In the moment all our body faculties are fuelled by actual hormonal substances and are actual, why then the ‘I’, which also, as you say ‘is fuelled by an actual hormonal substance triggered off from within the brain-stem because of the instinctual passions bestowed by blind nature’, you considered an alien and an imagination?

RICHARD: If you were to re-read what you have quoted (further above) you will see that it is [quote] ‘an emotional play in a fertile imagination’ [endquote] which is fuelled by an actual hormonal substance ... and there is no way that an emotional play in a fertile imagination is, as you make out, actual (as in your ‘and are actual’ conclusion).

To give an obvious example: for about a week, in the early days of being enlightened, I was ‘The Parousia’ and it was not until I met another person who was similarly afflicted that it dawned upon me it was but an emotional play in a fertile imagination ... there was sufficient rationality operating to comprehend there could not be two (simultaneous) manifestations of the ‘Second Coming’.

Incidentally, this other person was far more deluded than I was ... they had manifested the typical stigmata.

RESPONDENT: To your words ‘‘I’ only imagined that ‘I’ existed’ with your logic also thought must be an imagination and delight must be an imagination, because also delight is fuelled by hormonal substances, endorphins or whatever, triggered from parts of the brain which is actual.

RICHARD: If I may point out? It is your logic ... not mine (by and large I leave logic to the logicians).

RESPONDENT: 4) Finally you are saying: ‘I am this very material universe experiencing itself as a sensate and reflective human being’ which is equivalent to ‘I am this very material universe experiencing itself as this thoughtful flesh-and-blood body simply brimming with sense organs, delighting in this sensuous world of actual experience’. Is this not one identification with the universe?

RICHARD: No ... and we have already discussed this topic previously:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘If you are no ‘being’ what are you?
• [Richard]: ‘What I am is this infinite and eternal and perpetual universe experiencing itself as an apperceptive human being ... as such the universe is stunningly aware of its own infinitude. And this is truly wonderful.
• [Respondent]: ‘Pure identification then with the universe. For eleven years, you were identified with the absolute. Now you say ‘I am ...’, you made a shift to the universe, only the subject of identification changed.
• [Richard]: ‘Did you not read the question I was responding to? Perhaps if I were to put it this way then: for eleven years, night and day, it was the ‘being’ within the body who identified with ‘The Absolute’ ... whereas what I am, as this flesh and blood body only (sans ‘being’ itself), is this universe experiencing itself as an apperceptive human being.
As the universe also experiences itself as a cat, a dog, and so on, and so on, what you are saying, in effect, is that every body is identifying themselves with the universe ... which is patently silly (if only because no body needs to identify with what they actually are).
It is this simple: the very stuff of this body (and all bodies) is the very same-same stuff as the stuff of the universe in that it comes out of the ground in the form of the carrots and lettuce and milk and cheese, and whatever else is consumed, in conjunction with the air breathed and the water drunk and the sunlight absorbed.
I am nothing other than that ... that is what I am, literally.

RESPONDENT: Instead like other stating that they are the higher self or Atman and are identified with it, or with the universal consciousness, you have identify your self with the universe. ‘I am the universe ...’ you say.

RICHARD: I say no such thing.

RESPONDENT: If this is not identification what the heck it is?

RICHARD: A misrepresentation on your part, obviously.

RESPONDENT: And all these because of a PCE as you call this state. The other people that identify themselves with Atman Brahma etc also had their PCE’s.

RICHARD: They had no such thing ... there is a vast difference between pure consciousness experiences (PCE’s) and altered states of consciousness (ASC’s).

RESPONDENT: Only the object with which you have identify changed, the mechanism is the same.

RICHARD: The ‘mechanism’ is not the same: in a PCE there is a total absence of identity (whereas in an ASC there is only identity).

RESPONDENT: But you can not see it, because you subtly have projected your self in the union with the universe.

RICHARD: The reason I cannot see it is because I have done no such thing.

RESPONDENT: You say you are selfless, but is it so?

RICHARD: It is indeed so.

RESPONDENT: I don’t state that you are a fraud, you are in delusion.

RICHARD: You can, of course, state anything you like ... the stating of it does not miraculously make it so, however.

*

RESPONDENT: You have qualities. In the main page of the actualfreedom website, is written: ‘in this area are miscellaneous corespondents with the DISCOVERER of the method’ so you are something.

RICHARD: You can only be referring to the following (copy-pasted from the main page):

• ‘This website [‘The Third Alternative’] encompasses selections from the writings of the ‘discoverer’ of actual freedom and includes a substantial, wide-ranging correspondence. The journey into the institutionalised insanity of Spiritual Enlightenment and the emergence of actual freedom is clearly described in unambiguous terms’.

RESPONDENT: You are a discoverer ...

RICHARD: The word ‘discoverer’ is put in scare-quotes because I never discovered anything – it was the identity within that did all the work – as well you already know. Vis.:

• [Respondent]: ‘Richard, one sentence attracted my attention in your email. [quote]: ‘I never discovered anything ... the ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul discovered both the actualism method and the wide and wondrous path’. [endquote]. So it follows logically that ...’.

Apart from that ... are you really suggesting that discovering something – anything – proves that a flesh and blood body is not ‘self’-less (aka sans ‘self’ in toto)?

RESPONDENT: ... and then you are giving lessons to as to eliminate our social identity.

RICHARD: I am doing no such thing ... this is what I am doing:

• [Richard]: ‘... what I offer is a do-it-yourself method with a proven track-record, plus an unambiguous report of my experience, clear descriptions of life here in this actual world, lucid explanations of how and why, and clarifications of misunderstandings. For an example: I always make it clear that there cannot be happiness without harmlessness ... and there cannot be harmlessness without happiness. What another does with the method, my report, my descriptions, my explanations, and my clarifications is their business, of course.

RESPONDENT: Is this not one illusion and one hypocrisy? Even if you are not aware about it?

RICHARD: As ‘this’ is not happening your queries have no substance.

*

RESPONDENT: You are acting with methodology, to put down any of your competitors.

RICHARD: I am doing no such thing.

RESPONDENT: For example, I have provided you with more than five quotes of JK speaking against reincarnation, stating that you are believing to it because of fear etc, I can not understand why you believe in reincarnation, but you do etc. And I can provide you another hundred quotes of him on this subject with dates. Although you still in your website speaking against him for believing in reincarnation.

RICHARD: As reincarnation/rebirth is not a fact, despite Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti stating that it is, it is indeed a belief he was living out (albeit as a living reality for him).

RESPONDENT: How can I call this? Stubbornness or dishonesty?

RICHARD: You can, of course, call it anything you like ... however, merely calling it something does not miraculously make it so.

RESPONDENT: Personally to me, you have my word for it, you did not say NOTHING, not even ONE WORD, that JK have not said.

RICHARD: If you say so then it is so ... for you, that is. As you have already demonstrated, in previous e-mails on the topic, an inability to comprehend such a simple thing as the distinction between believing in something and the living-out of that belief, as a reality, I will keep my own counsel on the matter.

RESPONDENT: I should like to have the time to put what you say and what he says side to side.

RICHARD: If I may point out? We have already done just that over the course of various e-mails.

*

RESPONDENT: Any way now you have your authority which is the so called your method of which you as you say are the discoverer.

RICHARD: Why would you say that the actualism method – asking oneself, each moment again, how one is experiencing this moment of being alive (the only moment one is ever alive) – is an ‘authority’ (irregardless of who discovered it) when it is simply the only method thus far which has worked to deliver the goods?

RESPONDENT: Instead to have an outside authority you are caught in your own method authority and everybody can notice how you are defending it.

RICHARD: How on earth can I be ‘caught’ in something I do not use, have never used, and never will use?

RESPONDENT: Your method is purely super-materialistic. You are saying ‘this material universe ...’, ‘this material body’. What happened to the energy? Matter is crystallised energy working repetitively in a certain pattern.

RICHARD: As you are saying that the actualism method – asking oneself, each moment again, how one is experiencing this moment of being alive (the only moment one is ever alive) – is ‘super-materialistic’ then what you are saying, in effect, is that such an at-the-moment attentiveness is super-crystallised energy working repetitively in a certain pattern.

I am not even going to try and sort that lot out.

RESPONDENT: IS THE UNIVERSE INTELLIGENT?

RICHARD: Given that the word ‘intelligent’ refers to the cognitive faculty of understanding and comprehending (as in intellect and sagacity) – which means the cerebral ability to sensibly and thus judiciously think, reflect, appraise, plan, and implement considered activity for beneficial reasons (and to be able to rationally convey reasoned information to other human beings so that coherent knowledge can accumulate around the world and to the next generations) – then ... no.

RESPONDENT: IS MATTER INTELLIGENT?

RICHARD: Other than matter in the form of human beings ... no.

RESPONDENT: IF MATTER IS NOT INTELLIGENT, THEN THIS MATERIAL UNIVERSE AS YOU CALL IT, MUST BE WITHOUT INTELLIGENCE.

RICHARD: Indeed so.

RESPONDENT: And if it is without intelligence, how can experience itself AS anything?

RICHARD: It does not require the cognitive faculty of understanding and comprehending (as in intellect and sagacity) to experience itself as something.

RESPONDENT: I am very afraid that you really took everything 180 degrees opposite of what it is actual.

RICHARD: Ha ... nice try, No 44, nice try indeed.

*

RESPONDENT: What is enlightenment? No the definition with dictionaries. Per se.

RICHARD: In short: an institutionalised insanity (each society reveres its god-men/god-women in various ways).

RESPONDENT: Can you say if someone is enlightened?

RICHARD: Generally speaking ... yes.

RESPONDENT: If yes how?

RICHARD: Via the intimate knowledge of such a state of being which comes from living that/being that, night and day, for eleven years.

RESPONDENT: Are you him?

RICHARD: No ... nor her.

RESPONDENT: If you were enlightened as you declare for 11 years, that means that you supposed to have lost your self 11 years ago ...

RICHARD: The ego-self (aka ‘the thinker’) ... yes: 23 years ago.

RESPONDENT: ... because I never heard about a person being enlightened genuinely and have a self.

RICHARD: Have an ego-self ... indeed not.

RESPONDENT: But the way you write in the web site, you give the impression that you lost your self through actual freedom.

RICHARD: Lost the soul-self/spirit-self (aka ‘the feeler’) ... yes: 12 years ago.

RESPONDENT: That proves that you were not enlightened but in one state of illusion.

RICHARD: It does no such thing.

RESPONDENT: If so, why you continue to say that you were enlightened for 11 years? Are you calling the illusion enlightenment?

RICHARD: No.

*

RESPONDENT: When I asked you what is consciousness, you answered to me, to be conscious, no comatose.

RICHARD: This is what I actually wrote:

• [Richard]: ‘the word ‘consciousness’ refers to the state or condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious (the suffix ‘-ness’ forms a noun expressing a state or condition) and to be conscious is to be alive, not dead, awake, not asleep, and sensible, not insensible (comatose).

RESPONDENT: I am asking you is your consciousness different from mine, in which way?

RICHARD: The condition of this flesh and blood body being conscious is marked by a total absence of any identity whatsoever.

RESPONDENT: I am not comatose.

RICHARD: Obviously not.

RESPONDENT: If you answer me that your consciousness is pure consciousness, then you differentiate between states of consciousness.

RICHARD: The word ‘pure’ in the phrase a pure consciousness experience (PCE) is synonymic with ‘unadulterated’, ‘uncontaminated’, ‘unpolluted’, and so on, thus a PCE is the condition of a flesh and blood body being conscious sans an adulterant, a contaminant, a pollutant, and so on ... specifically an identity (both ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul).

RESPONDENT: Are you conscious now?

RICHARD: Yes.

RESPONDENT: Conscious of what?

RICHARD: Primarily, of the infinitude this physical universe actually is ... as this flesh and blood body only (sans identity in toto) I am proprioceptively conscious of being just here, right now and, as such, the other somatic perceptions currently in operation – tactile, olfactive, visual, audile – are direct: this skin is savouring the touch, the caress, of the mid-winter ambience; these nostrils are rejoicing in the abundance of aromas and scents drifting fragrantly all about; these retinas are delighting in the profusion of colour and texture and form; these eardrums are revelling in the cadence of tones as their resonance and timbre fills the air.

Further to that this mind, other than the sheer enjoyment and appreciation of being alive as this flesh and blood body, is ambling along in neutral as all the while there is the apperceptive wonder that this marvellous paradise actually exists in all its vast array.

RESPONDENT: How you know you are not in an altered state of consciousness?

RICHARD: Because of eleven years of experiencing, night and day, what an altered state of consciousness (ASC) really is ... as a living reality.

RESPONDENT: Because the one who is in an altered state of consciousness, does not have any means to know it.

RICHARD: As I am not in an ASC your (borrowed) wisdom has no application.


CORRESPONDENT No. 44 (Part Nine)

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The Third Alternative

(Peace On Earth In This Life Time As This Flesh And Blood Body)

Here is an actual freedom from the Human Condition, surpassing Spiritual Enlightenment and any other Altered State Of Consciousness, and challenging all philosophy, psychiatry, metaphysics (including quantum physics with its mystic cosmogony), anthropology, sociology ... and any religion along with its paranormal theology. Discarding all of the beliefs that have held humankind in thralldom for aeons, the way has now been discovered that cuts through the ‘Tried and True’ and enables anyone to be, for the first time, a fully free and autonomous individual living in utter peace and tranquillity, beholden to no-one.

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