VINEETO: As I have nothing to add to your last post on addiction, I’ll jump to respond to this one. This way I am also avoiding being always one post or more behind ... maybe.

GARY: Some issues are coming up lately at work where it has been pointed out to me that seemingly I do not ‘fit in’ with the team or organization. In a couple of ‘cards on the table’ discussions with my supervisor, I got the impression that, while my actual work performance is not being criticized, I am incurring his displeasure and possibly the displeasure of others for ‘not sharing the same mission that we all have’, a perception that I readily concurred with, come what may. Quite a lot of fears have been coming up for me recently as a result of these discussions, with confusion and turmoil on my part over the extent to which I even desire to ‘fit in’ anywhere, issues of authority, happiness at work, and wondering if I might not be happier somewhere else where people would leave me alone and not expect me to conform to what everyone else is doing (if there is such a place in the work world, would someone please let me know where it is so I can apply?). I know the ‘grass always seems greener on the other side’, according to the oft-quoted psittacism. I had decided that there was no earthly reason why I could not be happy doing the job I am doing right now and working with other people exactly as they are: the salary is not bad, certainly enough to live on, I usually enjoy the work, and there are enough ‘downtimes’ in the job not to make it seem too mercenary. I am also free from any kind of leadership or supervisory responsibilities, something I have never found much to my liking.

VINEETO: I am reminded of a time when I had investigated Actual Freedom to the point that I was getting some tangible results. At the time I worked in a company owned and run by Sannyasins and was reasonably happy in my job as secretary and bookkeeper. However, the more I started questioning my former spiritual beliefs and understood that it was impossible to marry the search for enlightenment with the discoveries of Actual Freedom, the more I became fearful that soon I would be exposed as a traitor and a heretic. My fear became so overpowering that one morning while driving to work I decided to face this particular fear once and for all – and, to my own surprise, arriving at work I gave notice. At the time I did not know any other solution to get rid of my fear than to precipitate what I feared most – losing my job. Since then I have worked occasionally in this company for holiday replacement and whenever they were short of staff, but never again full time. My sudden notice had created a certain shock for the others, but after this had worn off I had no problem relating to them as I had made my non-spiritual position quite clear and they had agreed to employ me again anyway. For me it had been important to openly take a stand in order to be able to disentangle myself from the grip that the spiritual world had on me.

This story is in no way a suggestion of how to deal with a similar situation because I cannot possibly know what is appropriate for anyone. You say that ‘there was no earthly reason why I could not be happy doing the job I am doing right now and working with other people exactly as they are’ – however, there may be times when one needs to step out of a situation in order to break a pattern that is continuously reinforced by being in that particular situation.

GARY: To try to make a long story short, I have been investigating the animal instinctual passion of sorrow. I noticed that when I pulled up in my car to park in front of the office yesterday, that there was a familiar let-down kind of feeling, a feeling of like ‘Oh Boy, here we go again’. Since I have been running the ‘How am I...’ question pretty frequently, it really got my attention when that feeling crept in. The feeling or emotion itself was one of sorrow. It is something that I know very well. I have only recently really been questioning and looking in to these things. It has been easier for me to understand malice, I mean understand in the sense of where it comes from, what its evolutionary function would be: to attack and destroy one’s enemies in order to survive and propagate the species. But it has been harder for me to understand where sorrow fits into the picture.

VINEETO: I would not call sorrow an instinct in itself but an emotion arising out of being separated from the magnificence and purity of the actual world due to the instinctually driven ‘self’-centred alien entity inside of this body. Malice, once one dares to acknowledge it, is a pretty clear emotion while we humans seem to be drenched in sorrow as sorrow is an essential part of our identity. The resentment of having to be here as in ‘I did not asked to be born’ lies at the core of all the various forms of sorrow.

Thinking about the relation of sorrow and the instinctual need to belong, one connection seems obvious – sorrow is the both the glue and the price we pay in order to be part of the herd. We relate most closely to other human beings in sorrow, feeling sympathy and empathy and always looking for someone to lean on, and share with, in hard times. Once I questioned sorrow itself, the main feature of connecting with others was disappearing – either I come back to the herd and feel sorrow with others and for others, or I am on my own. Being more and more happy, I found myself at a loss how to connect and relate to former friends – all we had shared was glee over other’s misery, common beliefs, commiseration, sexual flirtation or sympathy. I simply lost interest in friendships the more I discovered the delight of a direct intimacy to fellow human beings, which was so much more rewarding and fascinating that the feeling relationships I used to have.

GARY: I read about Sorrow in the AF glossary pages. One thing that rang my bell, in particular, was when it said:

This instinct [of the need to belong], implanted by blind nature to ensure the survival of the species, pumps the body with chemicals that induce the feeling of fear whenever one is straying too far away from the herd, abandoning other members of the family or group or being on one’s own. The Actual Freedom Trust Library

So what I am seeing here, from the reading in the glossary and thinking about it on my own, is that sorrow is a pre-birth programmed instinct to keep one in line with one’s group, tribe, work group, family group, etc. It is a way to insure that humans will conform with the wretched status quo even if that means being peevish, unhappy, or malevolent.

VINEETO: I found it useful to make a clear distinction between sorrow and the need to belong although they have common aspects. Leaving the herd created fear in me many times, popping up at regular intervals whenever the immensity of becoming actually free hit home.

The first layer of sorrow was closely linked to my social identity, to being a social being. I found that questioning common beliefs, i.e. how I should be and how things should be, and particularly questioning my spiritual beliefs, i.e. we are all here to suffer because it is God’s will, were essential to leaving the sticky sorrow-soup that is the glue holding humanity together.

Later I discovered the second layer of sorrow – compassion. Once my personal sorrow had disappeared out of my life and everything was running smoothly due to my rapidly diminishing social identity, I became more and more sensitive to, and aware of, the immensity of human suffering and sorrow. Compassion, the bittersweet feeling arising out of the nurture instinct, is very seductive in that is fulfils the need to belong without the tedious self-centred struggles of day-to-day sorrowful relationships. One simply lies on the couch and, watching the stark news in the world, feels connected to all the suffering people out there. Of course, nobody but me receives any benefit from this feeling – which proves, despite common belief, that compassion is an utterly selfish feeling.

When all is said and done it is simply so much more sensible to be happy and harmless – even if stepping out of the human program is frightening at times.

GARY: Everything about sorrow says to me ‘You will never leave us. You will always carry this sadness around with you. You cannot be happy. Whatever you do in life or no matter how far you travel, you will always have me to remind you of who you are’.

A little further on in the glossary, it says the following:

From my investigations and experiences it is obvious that ‘who’ I think and feel I am – ‘me’ at the core – encompasses both a deep-set feeling of separateness from others and the world as perceived by the senses as well as a deep-set feeling of needing to ‘belong’.

This over-arching feeling of separateness – of being a ‘separate self’, who is forever yearning to ‘belong’ – is the root cause of personal sorrow and the all encompassing ‘ocean’ of human sorrow in the world. The Actual Freedom Trust Library

It is hard for me to admit that I want to belong, that I am not free from this herding instinct.

VINEETO: I found that the need to belong was slowly, slowly replaced by my judgement of silly and sensible and the obvious tangible benefits I gained from not belonging to a miserable group, race or battling gender. Of course, it is invaluable to have someone to talk or write to and share common sense and the experience of success without being continuously cut down to size, a behaviour directly linked to the herding instinct. Everyone who is not aware of his or her instinctual need to belong can only judge you as a competitor to the present leader or leaders or a lonely madman the moment it becomes apparent that you are walking tall in the world. Watching herding behaviour in animals has been very useful research material for understanding my own feelings and behaviour and that of other people towards me.

GARY: Perhaps outwardly I behave as if it does not affect me that much, but the fears that I experienced when ‘I’ am under scrutiny for apparently not ‘fitting in’ are telling a different story. I think that it will be important for me to investigate this instinct. So, the basic thrust of the instinct, as I understand it so far, is to ensure loyalty and conformity to the group? Is that it? Or is there something that I am missing? I would welcome feedback from anybody who has dealt with or is dealing with this sort of thing. I have wondered if what I am experiencing is the ostracization or rejection by the group that others talk about, you know, the ‘you just don’t seem like everybody else here – what’s the matter with you?’ How have other people dealt with this?

VINEETO: I have found two aspects to ‘ostracization’ – one was my own fear of being on my own and the other was the actual withdrawal, resentment and sometimes attack from others for leaving the commonly agreed terrain of malice and sorrow.

I could eventually tackle the fear of being on my own, because of the memories from my pure consciousness experiences where any separation magically disappears the moment the ‘self’ goes in abeyance. In a PCE it is clear that I have always been on my own and lived my own life without great problems. It is the feeling of separation, fear and worry arising from a ‘self’ that makes the feeling of ostracization a common reaction. In the end it was not so much that others avoided me but I who lost interest in belonging to a Humanity that ardently insists on keeping the status quo of malice and sorrow. One can do nothing about the sceptical, disinterested or outright aggressive reaction from others except being practical and sensible and such reactions are an inevitable by-product of being a pioneer.

But then, peace on earth, in this lifetime, is worth overcoming such obstacles, isn’t it?

19.8.2000

GARY: This is exactly how it has been happening to me: there is some instinct that I am hung up on, I investigate deeply into it, there is a sense of confusion, turmoil, etc, and voila – there it is, a PCE occurs. But, yes, like you said, you really have to dig your teeth into it, investigating it without the usual escapes and diversions. I have not had the ‘sneaking up’ variety of PCE yet – only the hard won type.

VINEETO: In hindsight it makes sense to me that in the beginning one has to apply effort to work oneself through the curtain while once you know the trick it becomes easier and more effortless. As I described in Peter’s journal, the day after my first PCE we walked over the local market and the shock of seeing people selling their beliefs along with their knick-knacks almost knocked me off my feet. I had never been free of the act of believing and suddenly I saw how everybody lived wholly in their own imaginary world. It was comparable to an experience of walking through a madhouse, only that this was an ordinary local market with ordinary local people and common garden variety of New Age beliefs. The contrast and the utter novelty of the experience outside of all belief systems was outstanding – the opposite to ‘sneaking up’. It has to be that way until the actual becomes the familiar and the affective-imaginary becomes the exception. It takes a few synapse in the brain to be un-plucked ... that’s all.

GARY: Another thing you said rings true – ‘it is like a veil in my perception opens to reveal the actual world.’ It occurred to me that, in the past when this has happened to me, the experience has been rather disturbing. I think I have had it before at times, many years ago, but felt perhaps I was having LSD flashbacks (if such things do actually occur), or that I was losing my mind, so the experience has always been accompanied by a kind of fear or uneasiness, like part of me is saying ‘You’re really losing it Gary’. But now I look forward to these PCEs, I do not feel frightened at all.

VINEETO: Well, you are ‘really losing it, Gary’ – there is no doubt about it because by inquiring into emotions and instinctual passions and aiming for a permanent entry into the actual world one is losing one’s grip on ‘reality’, the emotional and imaginary reality of six billion people. But now you ‘do not feel frightened at all’, that’s the significant difference.

After I had a few PCEs secured in my memory as to the quality of the experiences, I searched for earlier memories of a PCE and found a few. They had all been put into the ‘enlightenment’ basket at the time, interpreted as a spiritual experience and added to the image of what enlightenment must be like. After I had three longer lasting altered states of consciousness about 18 months ago I now know the difference between the actual world and the imaginary feeling world of the Enlightened Ones – and those ASCs were clearly in the category of what enlightened masters describe.

*

VINEETO: Most of the stunning insights that happened in my early PCEs about Human Nature and my conditioning have now been forgotten, as all of the realizations and understandings are integrated in my daily life and are experienced as normal as going shopping. All the seemingly complex realizations and understandings about the human psychology and psyche had only one purpose – to get out of it, to leave it behind.

GARY: Yesterday is a case in point. I went through all this stuff related to work. I finally felt that I had come to some peace within myself about it. Yesterday, as I set off for work, I knew I was going to have a perfect day and told myself such. In our supervisor meeting, the staff members were pulling their hair out and grumbling about their resentment towards the administration, and there were numerous put-downs of the ‘higher-ups’.

People were complaining about feeling dis-empowered and there was much discussion about how to make a change in the organization. I sat through this gripe session marvellously unaffected by what was going on – I realized that I do not have the slightest resentment nor negative feelings towards anybody in the organization. I do not belong, nor have any loyalty, to any clique, subgroup, or camp. It seemed to me like the age-old story: people dividing up into separate camps, drawing the battle-lines, and clamouring for their ‘rights’. It was wonderful to realize that I am completely free from any feeling of anger, resentment, pity, sympathy, or any other such feelings in this situation. I did not feel inclined to support any one else, form alliances to combat the evil administration, nor take any sides in the situation. Later, on my lunch hour, I was feeling marvellous.

VINEETO: Yes, it is a marvellous trick to tell oneself that one will have a perfect day. To resist taking sides and giving emotional support seems cold, callous and unfeeling to most people, and that’s exactly what Richard, Peter and I have been accused of many times. Particularly women, myself included in the past, use this type of accusation as a potent weapon against men, but as every human being is at the core of their identity a feeling being, everyone will feel irritated, threatened or ignored when they don’t receive an appropriate emotional response. The emotional identity is the ultimate addiction to step out from.

GARY: Walking along the street with the cool breezes caressing my face and hair, the bright sunshine streaming down, the veil in my perception opened and I noticed, first, with stunning detail, every minute facet, crevice, and feature in a brick wall. Here I was again in fairy-tale land, seeing the actual. Everything was wonderfully interesting and engaging. I knew and sensed that my hard work had resulted in this handsome reward, and that further there had been the pure intent to have this happen again, though not to make it happen, a crucial distinction. The experience lasted a while, though not as long as the last time.

I particularly related to something Richard wrote in his journal, and could not agree more. He says, and I would like to quote him from pg. 46:

[Richard]: ‘...emotions equip one with a disability. They are a hindrance, not a help. Feelings – emotions and passions – are a liability; life is infinitely cleaner and clearer upon their demise. It is not a popular view, however, for people are attached to their feelings; they believe – they think and feel – that feelings are the touchstone of actuality. Nothing could be further from the fact. They keep reality alive.’ Richard’s Journal, Article 6, Confidence and Certainty Renders Trust and Faith Irrelevant, Richard, Selected Writings, Affective Feelings

It has taken me a long time to come around to this view, but my experiences of late have all pointed to this one fact: that feelings and emotions obscure and cover over the actual world. When ‘I’ as feeler am not, the actual world rises to sight, and what a glorious sight it is indeed! But it is not something that people want to see because, as the passage indicates, people are amazingly attached to their feelings. It is felt that it is this that makes us feel alive, and that without them, we would be like necktop computers, devoid of ‘humanity’. Feelings are indeed where the Human Condition lives on, unchanged, in all its wretched misery and sorrow.

VINEETO: Yes, it’s 180 degrees in the opposite direction to where we humans have searched for solutions. In the course of my exploration into what my ‘self’ and the Human Condition consist of I was amazed how many times I found ‘180 degrees opposite’ the appropriate expression. Just a few such opposites as an example:

• emotions – no ‘self’ and therefore no emotions
• being self-centred and feeling unselfish – altruistic
• spiritual – tangible
• imaginary – factual
• believing the right belief – no belief at all
• belief in soul – extinction of soul
• love/hate – fellow human beings
• beauty – actuality
• affective feeling – extinguish ‘self’ and therefore emotions
• becoming your natural self – extinguish instinctual passions
• search for the meaning of life – delight in the fact that I am already here
• feeling of Oneness – actual intimacy
• thought is the culprit – the feeling entity is the problem
• you can’t change human nature – you step out of Humanity
• sex is evil – sex is pleasure
• striving to do the right and the good – self-immolation
• god, heaven, divine, Existence – this all-prevailing belief is merely a fervent imagination ...

Only by looking again and again in the opposite direction did I find the actual world hidden beneath my preconceived ideas, concepts and beliefs and my ‘self’-centred attachment to being an emotional-instinctual being.

*

VINEETO: As the actual world is already always here one is bound to stumble upon it by diligently removing the obstacles in front of one’s ‘psychic eyes’ that we have inherited by default – through no fault of ours.

GARY: Yes... ‘stumble upon it’, an apt description of serendipity. Had I not participated on [Mailing List B], I would not have been acquainted with Richard’s experiences, nor those of any of the others of you. At the time, I was wallowing around in the morass of choiceless awareness and was frequently confused and in turmoil. It seemed to be a bottomless pit, and as with Krishnamurti, there is no ‘way’, no method, I was loath to find a way out. But I was looking for a way out in spite of ‘the teachings’.

VINEETO: Yes, serendipity is taking the opportunity that comes along – you have been the only one so far of all the fifty people who Richard corresponded with on that list and maybe 50 more who read what he wrote. We have given away 40 of Peter’s journals and sold 25 of Richard’s journal, written on several mailing lists and I am always stunned by the disinterest and the amount of petty or virulent objections to becoming happy and harmless. It obviously takes the right ingredients to be daring and willing to take up the challenge – watching your exploration into actualism I understand more and more what kind of ingredients one needs.

And yes, Eastern spirituality is a bottomless pit and Krishnamurti’s teaching has the particular twist that you should listen but not interpret, listen but not follow, aspire but never reach. What an insidious legacy, keeping everyone small and ignorant – and this is called Compassion! But then, no belief has common sense in it; otherwise it would not require belief.

*

VINEETO: When and how and why PCEs occur is one of the things in actualism that I cannot make sense of yet and maybe never will. I have a few guesses as to why the intensity and frequency of PCEs has changed – one reason could be that I expect my final extinction to happen at any time and this expectation causes ‘me’ to be on guard. Another speculation is that PCEs are a glitch in the brain-circuit and, as the brain becomes rewired, those glitches, born out of contrast, are less frequent. A third option is that PCEs now vanish out of memory the moment they are over. However, as there are no records about the ‘workings’ of PCEs in actualism other than reports from Peter, Alan and me, this is simply not enough information for a scientific judgement. Frequency and memory of PCEs could merely be a personal attribute.

GARY: At first, I questioned your use of the word ‘expectation’, but I see that in the context in which you use the word, it is entirely fitting. Why not ‘expect’ (ie. look forward to, anticipate) this? Interesting speculation, the bit about glitches in the activity of the brain, perhaps rewiring of neuronal circuits, by-passing the cascading in the amygdala. I wonder if the technology of the MRI might reveal subtle differences in brain activity in the PCE vs. post-PCE ‘normal’ brain? – or what about EEG representations of brain wave activity? – I wonder what these would reveal. Just guessing. It is doubtful at this point that any medical researchers would become sufficiently interested in this area to undertake empirical investigations – but maybe...?

VINEETO: Expectation is certainly not the full description of my attitude towards extinction, obsession is a more appropriate word to use. It is one of the widespread spiritual requirements that one should not aspire, desire, expect but wait for the grace of Existence to grant fulfillment of one’s dreams. But as actualism is about the actual and not about some spurious feeling-state granted by some even more spurious Energy, I can be straight forward with wanting Actual Freedom, desiring it, expecting it to happen and doing everything I can to achieve it, just like people in the normal world aspire tangible, non-spiritual values like riches, a car, a position or a woman. What I mean is that I am the only person who can bring about my freedom from malice and sorrow and I am the only one who can rewire my brain to facilitate self-immolation. The last bit of the undoing is, as Richard points out, not of ‘my’ doing but I will remove every obstacle I find and every objection I might still have in order to allow this to happen. Yes, I expect it, I look forward to it, I have nothing else on my mind, I am sure it will happen and I am obsessed with it. Extinction is the only item on my laundry list.

As for MRI and EEG – in the beginning we speculated a bit about possible physical evidence in an altered amygdala. However, since such possible evidence would not (yet?) change anything as far as people’s objections to investigate their own malice and sorrow are concerned, it seems a premature conjecture. One day, when Actual Freedom has attracted more interest, there may be some keen pioneer who wants to physically map the events in an actually free brain in a similar manner to Peter who has mapped actualism with his experiential description of the path.

*

VINEETO: Gary, I don’t know if that answers your questions or if my information is of any use to you. With your own outstanding PCE you are now becoming your own expert and it will be your reports that are contributing to the research we are conducting on the project of ‘Freedom from the Human Condition’. It’s the latest science, people simply have not twigged to it yet...

GARY: It has been helpful. ‘Your’ final extinction will be glorious, I am sure, and I can hardly wait to hear all about it.

VINEETO: Well, I don’t know at all how it will be, as nobody has done it before. It could be everything from a grand finale to a quiet little poop. Richard’s experience is only partly applicable as he pioneered the torturous route through enlightenment. But if you stick around you sure will hear all about it.

GARY: Who was Mark? Is he still around?

VINEETO: He wrote on the list from February to June last year and I don’t know if he is still around. He might be quietly listening. Maybe he is having an extended ‘picnic’ at a particularly delightful spot on the path?

GARY: Oh, and another question. <snip> Are there any other German language translations of letters or other materials on Actual Freedom?

VINEETO: Nope, that’s the only one – I’m surprised you found it and can understand the language. My German is fading so much so that each letter is becoming a major enterprise, therefore don’t rely on my syntax or grammar to learn the proper use of the language. I have now ordered Microsoft Proofing Tools for further communication with this particular correspondent – and who knows, one day I might translate something.

PS: Have you had luck with the archives yet?

VINEETO: I have lived in spiritual communes for 10 years where everyone had the ideal to solve conflicts in open discussion, group decisions, crisis meetings and the like. In the end I found these procedures were going endlessly round in circles, and to be invitations for exchanging spite and resentment or indulging in blame and forgiveness and were a mere waste of time.

GARY: I still cherish the idea that conflicts can be dealt with openly and that it is not a waste of time to do so. But, on further reflection, it is meaningless to attempt to do so without intensive investigation of the beliefs, feelings, and passions involved for one at the same time. I have found that much can be done to resolve a conflict by openly discussing with another exactly what one’s position or stake in a matter is, in a respectful and considerate manner, whilst paying close attention to listen to another’s point of view. If one has intensively investigated a particular issue that comes up, say, in a work situation, and understood the instincts and passions that are involved in contributing to conflict with others, then one is in a good position to mend a relationship with another. All too often, and I think this may form the basis of your objection to dealing with things ‘out in the open’, however, the ‘open and honest’ approach is really just a way of scoring points on the game field by insistently pushing one’s point or one’s agenda on the other. If one is angry, for instance, one may merely want to make the other person guilty by airing one’s grievance in the open. If one does not have that scrupulous honesty by which every feeling, belief, or passion is rigorously investigated, then attempting to resolve conflicts will automatically go awry, and the ‘out in the open’ approach will not be so out in the open but subject to manipulation and game-playing. To be entirely honest with myself first, and then to give others the consideration which is their due, is often the best way to deal with conflict. But if the conflict is persistent and does not go away no matter how intensively one investigates it, then other measures, like respectful and level-headed discussion with the parties to the conflict, is indicated.

VINEETO: What I found works best for me when I have any emotional issue is that I always take it that I have something to look at in me. When someone else’s emotion triggers a reaction in me, again, I have something to look at in me. This way there is no conflict that needs to be dealt with ‘out in the open’. If I am not emotionally affected, the situation is not a conflict and the issue on hand can easily be dealt with according to what is silly and sensible in order to find a win-win solution for everyone. Should the others insist on their emotions, which they often do, it is not in my hands to convince them otherwise.

*

VINEETO: The less I became busy with my own worries, the more I was able to extend my range of attention – which meant that I also became increasingly aware of the amount of suffering and malice there is all around. In my spiritual years I had stuck my head in the clouds because I did not want to cope with the feelings of desperation that are the inevitable result when one first acknowledges one’s own situation and the situation of one’s fellow human beings. One then usually escapes into the ‘trap of compassion’ and is seduced to be content with the compassionate feeling of Oneness and Love for all and misses out on the opportunity of doing something ‘hands-on’ about malice and sorrow – in oneself.’

GARY: True again. One often has a corresponding sense of being on a mission to save other less fortunate souls. As I work in the social work field, I can see that social workers often have a sense of missionary zeal that is closely linked to Christian morality and ethics, harkening back to the time of Manifest Destiny, and the emergence of the social work field due, in large part, to the appalling poverty and social conditions during the Industrial Revolution. One sees over and over again that Compassion fails to deliver the goods. I am shocked sometimes by the anger that I see fellow workers express to the very clients they are charged with taking care of. I myself, when younger, worked in a mental institution and witnessed scenes of violence by the caretakers towards the patients and was violent myself towards my institutional charges. One sees the (and it is so-labelled) familiar ‘Compassion Fatigue’ among mental health field workers. A curious expression, it points up the fact that Compassion is phoney, not substantial, and is based on a sense of mission stemming from the professional and personal identity. It so easily turns to anger when others don’t live up to one’s expectations or when one’s sense of grandiosity is not fulfilled. One also sees the pity that fellow workers lavish on themselves by complaining that they are burdened and ‘burned out’ by taking care of so many people. Such a sense of exhaustion immediately relates back to the imperative in the field of being loving and compassionate, denying one’s anger and hostility towards the work, the institutional setting, and (oftentimes) one’s clients.

VINEETO: When I took up actualism, one of the first things I encountered was a feeling of guilt for being selfish, i.e. for not complying with the Christian and spiritual ethics of being unselfish. The idea of this so-called unselfishness is based on the instinct of nurture and the corresponding morals and ethics that are meant to balance our natural greed and aggression. You are taught to help others in need on the shaky premise that they will help you when you are in need – whereas it is so much more sensible if everyone first tended to themselves and cleaned up their own act. In order to clean up my act I had to stop getting involved in other people’s lives – as in giving advice, commiserating, being busy with everyone’s emotions or exchanging resentments about how tough life is. I became very ‘self’-obsessed, only concerned about my own emotions and how I can investigate and eliminate them.

About a year into the process it became apparent that, in becoming less and less of an emotionally driven being and therefore less ‘self’-centred, my range of perception and attention had broadened. It was then that I understood that altruism has nothing to do with my former ethical ideal of unselfishness but that it arises out of the fact that we are all fellow human beings and that I want the best for me and every other human being. When one is honest and sincere, the best contribution to peace-on-earth means freeing myself and others from the burden of my animal instinctual passions – ‘self’-immolation.

*

GARY: When I got involved in actualism, I thought something like the following: ‘OK, I am dismantling the social identity, exposing and extinguishing the instincts. Eventually, if I go far enough along this course, I am going to self-immolate. What do I have to look forward to? Being declared officially insane like Richard? Yeh, right. Losing my job, my home, my mate? Being a blithering blithe and carefree individual, walking the streets alone? What am I – crazy for pursuing this method?’

VINEETO: If people knew what you were doing they would certainly consider you crazy – it is utterly new in human history to attempt to diminish and eradicate one’s instinctual passions. Even exploring and acknowledging that we are instinctual beings is a very, very recent and tentative science.

GARY: I have the sense not to advertise the extremely interesting field of Actual Freedom. I have put out tentative ‘feelers’ to one or two, but judging from the reactions I encountered, I decided not to proceed any further. I do not enjoy debating with or trying to influence other people. I have told my partner more about it than anyone else.

VINEETO: I found it necessary to have a firm basis of palpable and reliable success in my life, before I could even consider going public about a topic that is threatening and frightening to others by its very nature. It is an essential part of our survival instinct to fend against anything new, particularly when it involves dismantling one’s very ‘self’.

But when Peter was about to publish his Journal I could not keep quiet about the success I am having with this new alternative and I simply enjoy raving about it ever since.

GARY: Recently the issue of ‘love’ came up in our relationship. My partner expressed the fear that I would lose interest in her and pass on, presumably to someone else, if this method eventuated with my demise. She expressed the fear of losing our relationship. I have had these very fears myself. However, I have often questioned when either she or I say ‘I love you’. Just what exactly does that mean? She agreed that I have been changing and have been a lot happy and more at ease since starting in this. I assured her that I enjoy her company greatly and that I have no intention of leaving her or losing interest in her. I, somewhat reticently, suggested she might read a section of your correspondence on the website about love, which she did, and she said there were quite a few things that she related to personally. I do not feel that I am ‘in love’ although I care a great deal about my partner and want us to have a good relationship.

VINEETO: Upon investigating love I found that the feeling of love in a relationship has many symptoms and facets – possessiveness, jealousy, gratitude, idealizing and beautifying the other, resentment, expectation, seeking attention, taking for granted, being hurt, demand, guilt, dependency, authority, favouritism and an unspoken unclear contract with many, many conditions. One does not necessarily always feel love for the other but that immediately changes when the relationship seems threatened and jealousy and dependency kick in.

When feeling love I projected my feelings and my fantasy images on to the other and was thus not able to even notice the human being in front of me, let alone be intimate moment to moment. I found love one of the stickiest of my emotions – being in the category of ‘good’ – and in later stages I discovered subtler versions of love like admiration, gratitude, a rose-coloured mood, missing his company or seeking special attention. I guess you have read all about my explorations on the subject already in ‘my bit’ of Peter’s Journal. Overcoming the romantic dream and the initial shock of questioning the highest of human values was the biggest step – after that, it’s a lot of tidying up one’s habitual beliefs and conditioning about one’s gender identity and moral-ethical convictions. It took several months of thoroughly checking out all the ingredients of gender, love, authority and dependency before the first glimpses of actual intimacy sparked and opened a whole new world of relating to Peter and consequently to others.

GARY: What we are doing and discussing here is so radically different from anything I have encountered before that it keeps pulling me in for more. When I read Richard’s Journal, the intelligence and fundamental grasp of people and of life just pours from the pages.

Since the fears about work have settled down, with the attendant sense of dread, I am so free and loose. It was my experience today, when I attended a conference in our largest city. Life used to be such a struggle, with complications and conundrums abounding in every direction. Now life seems so easy, so natural, with scarcely any disturbance. And if a disturbance occurs, I know that it is just more ‘grist for the mill’ of finding out who I am and bringing my intent to bear on my eventual demise. I want to be happy and harmless more than anything else. It has become my overall goal and aim. Oftentimes, I am as light as a feather, held down by no loyalties, burdened by no group memberships, overwhelmed by no sense of duty or obligation, unconstrained by any ‘self-image’ that needs constant preening and pruning. Life can be a breeze and very sweet indeed.

VINEETO: Yes, I do know what you mean – it’s indubitably the best game to play in town.

28.8.2000

VINEETO: Upon investigating love I found that the feeling of love in a relationship has many symptoms and facets – possessiveness, jealousy, gratitude, idealizing and beautifying the other, resentment, expectation, seeking attention, taking for granted, being hurt, demand, guilt, dependency, authority, favouritism and an unspoken unclear contract with many, many conditions. One does not necessarily always feel love for the other but that immediately changes when the relationship seems threatened and jealousy and dependency kick in.

GARY: Love has been all these things from my own experience and that is why I always question it. In my family, we never said ‘I love you’, and it is just as well because love is undependable. In fact, it is a fiction. It is only dependency in disguise, jealousy, possessiveness, etc. So I don’t tell my partner that I love her and I do not get the feeling that she expects it of me. Things are much better that way. I have no hold on her and would not wish to do so. Since this issue of ‘love’ came up between us, I can honestly say that it doesn’t seem to be an issue any longer. Since getting involved with actualism, many so-called issues are that way: they come up, are investigated into, and then are laid to rest. There is no sense of them lingering behind the scenes. At other times in my life, I seemed to deal with issues by going over them over and over again like a broken record. Now I feel that some basic issues are getting resolved (perhaps ‘resolved’ is a poor choice of words – I wonder if there is a better one, maybe ‘dissolved’) and then laid to rest. I wonder if you have noticed this too? I don’t know if I am describing it well.

VINEETO: It might well be that you are investigating the nurture part of human relationship via the negative feelings of jealousy, dependency, possessiveness and exploring the desire part via sexual passions and taboos. In exploring what male and female conditioning consisted of I learnt a lot about male conditioning – by having a companion who was a eager and willing to tell me about the secrets of the other camp and who assisted my understanding of this former ‘alien’ species. I was keen to learn about the ingredients of a relationship between a man and woman when they live together.

What were the issues that arise from living together when the covering layer of love was questioned because it had not worked? Apart from the very obvious power struggle between man and woman I found that what is called ‘love’ or ‘in love’ is merely a generic term for the combination of surging feelings of sexual passion, differing male and female nurture instincts, proprietorial demands on the other, dreams of fulfillment, moral and ethical gender-specific conditioning and a confusing array of spiritual ideals. Each of those issues I had to investigate separately as they arose – and they only came to the surface because I had questioned the very ideal of loving the other as the pinnacle of human relating. Love is such a pure substitute for the sparkling, fascinating and ever fresh intimacy that is possible between human beings.

*

VINEETO: When feeling love I projected my feelings and my fantasy images on to the other and was thus not able to even notice the human being in front of me, let alone be intimate moment to moment. I found love one of the stickiest of my emotions – being in the category of ‘good’ – and in later stages I discovered subtler versions of love like admiration, gratitude, a rose-coloured mood, missing his company or seeking special attention. I guess you have read all about my explorations on the subject already in ‘my bit’ of Peter’s Journal. Overcoming the romantic dream and the initial shock of questioning the highest of human values was the biggest step – after that, it’s a lot of tidying up one’s habitual beliefs and conditioning about one’s gender identity and moral-ethical convictions. It took several months of thoroughly checking out all the ingredients of gender, love, authority and dependency before the first glimpses of actual intimacy sparked and opened a whole new world of relating to Peter and consequently to others.

GARY: Human love is pretty much a self-evident lie to me. Divine Love, on the other hand, is something few dare to question. The idea that there is a loving god or a loving force that permeates the universe is an idea that is so entrenched in our thinking and takes so much nerve to begin to question and reject. I still see my thinking going along those lines, kind of automatically, and when that happens, I am alert and on guard to see where this is taking me. The idea that there is a loving god or such a thing as God’s Love to make this veil of sorrow bearable is an idea that has a firm hold on humanity. To dare to question this and reject the notion that there is a Czar of the heavens, is very heady stuff indeed. There is still for me, I think, that cautious sense of ‘Oops, I’m in trouble now’ by rejecting God and all that other spiritual baloney. And really in a way, ‘I’ am in deep do-do. In fact, ‘I’ am doomed.

VINEETO: I found that my dream of ‘human love’ and my search for ‘divine love’ had the same source – my feelings of separation due to me being an the alien entity inside this body and my feelings of desperation for ‘having to be here’. When human love failed I went off to the East to look for the master’s love, which was seen and felt as God’s love in a man’s body. My relationship with my partner turned into a triangle, for the love for my master was always priority. One could compare one’s love for the master to unrequited love because the ideal of one’s feelings is never tested in day-to-day life and can therefore easily be maintained in its idealistic glory.

To ‘reject the notion’ that there is a God is the beginning of questioning your belief. However, when you persist questioning and explore further, common sense will facilitate seeing that a physical universe that is eternal and infinite has no outside to it. So where is God then? Where would the ‘creator and ruler of the world’ sit? He would have to sit outside of his creation, don’t you think? As there exists no such place for his chair above or outside of an infinite universe, the only place where God can exist is in human passionate imagination. And human passionate imagination ceases to exist the moment I ask myself ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ and bring my awareness to whatever feeling or imagination is happening. Bingo. Poof.

But you are right – you are in deep trouble when you irrevocably stop believing in God, when the belief resolves in the light of facts. A part of your social identity flies out the window and because of this, some instinctual fear is activated and causes yet another storm in the teacup.

For me, the end of God was at the same time the end of hope, trust, faith and postponement, the end of debilitating waiting and cowardly pondering, the end of humbling myself in the face of an almighty invisible power, the end of a stupefying fear of God’s judgement of my right and wrong deeds. The end of my belief in God also freed me of the belief in and loyalty for His representatives, my former master and all the moral authorities that I had followed and/or rebelled against. The end of my belief in God and an afterlife marked the beginning of standing on my own two feet with dignity and relying on my intelligence and common sense to find out what is silly and sensible. Ah, what serendipity.

*

VINEETO: PS I looked up ‘resolve’ – it seems to be the perfect word for what you describe. Vis –

resolve – 1 Melt, dissolve 2 Disintegrate, decompose; separate (a thing) into constituent parts or elements 3 Med. Soften (a hard growth); disperse or dissipate (accumulated matter, a swelling, etc.); remove (inflammation) by resolution. Formerly also, dissipate or allay (pain etc.). 4 Relax (a limb etc.); weaken. 5 Cause (strife) to cease. 6 Decompose or dissolve (a thing) into another form; reduce (a thing) into separate parts. 7 a Reduce (a subject, statement, etc.) by mental analysis into a more elementary form, a set of principles, etc. 8 Of a thing: dissolve, separate, or change (itself) into another (freq. less complex) form. 9 Answer (a question, argument, etc.); solve (a problem). 10 Determine or decide on (a course of action etc.). 11 a Make up one’s mind; rare free (oneself) of a doubt. b Assure or satisfy (oneself) on a question, matter, etc. 12 Free (a person) from doubt or perplexity; bring to a clear understanding of a doubtful point, matter, etc. 13 Remove, dispel (a doubt, difficulty, etc.). Formerly also (rare), dispel (fear). 14 Decide, determine (a doubtful point); settle (something) in one’s mind. Oxford Dictionary

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