Actual Freedom – A Request from Konrad Swart

September 09 1998:

KONRAD: I do not crave for recognition as an individual that is special in whatever way, for such matters are (finally) unimportant to me. I do not desire to become known as somebody special.

RICHARD: All this being humble business smacks of vanity ... and fools no-one other than yourself. If one has discovered something no other person in human history has discovered ... this is being special.

KONRAD: The discovery is special, yes. But is therefore the person who discovers it special? Smart, okay. But special in the sense that others have to listen to him, and give up their own freedom in the process?

RICHARD: If you are talking about me ... nobody has to listen to me. I simply tell my story about my life and the discoveries that I have made ... and the other person does with that what they will. It is up to each individual person as to how they live their life; as long as they obey the legal laws and observe the social protocol, they are free to live as sensibly or as foolishly as they wish. Only they reap the rewards or pay the consequences for any action or inaction that they may or may not do. And as for ‘giving up their own freedom’ ... what freedom? They are trapped within the human condition ... so any ‘freedom’ they like to think they may have is only a specious freedom anyway.

KONRAD: A discovery should be able to stand on its own, and not being dependent on a ‘carrier’ in the form of an individual. I meant it in the sense, that, if this individual is gone, that what he represents is gone, too.

RICHARD: A discovery stands on its own only in the living of it in a human being twenty four hours a day ... otherwise it is but an undemonstrated theory. I am not a ‘carrier’ (which is another word for ‘teacher’ or ‘channeller’) I live what I talk of ... what I say comes out of my on-going experience. As for when I am dead ... if my words adequately describe what I am living then anyone vitally interested in themselves – in life, the universe and what it is to be a human being – will benefit immeasurably. This is because I do not ‘represent’ anything ... I live it.

*

KONRAD: One of the differences between you and me is that I am not against emotions. I think both you and K are wrong in this respect. I do not have to ignore my emotions. Why should you get rid of them, if the underlying principle is sound? Only the fact that one loses control might be a problem. I can also tell you this. The thinkers of almost every culture saw emotions as something bad. I think they are as wrong about it as denying the difference in need of sexuality between men and women. To add something personal, it was quite a relief to accept this. For in the past I wanted to be some model for others, and therefore I denied that I had them, as you still do. But now, now I know that emotions are connected to principles, and we cannot function properly without principles, I do not deny them any more. It is, intellectually speaking, far more difficult to program yourself in such a way that the emotions you have guide you to truth, knowledge, proper action, beauty etc, then to deny all of them just because some of them (maybe all) cause much problems.

RICHARD: I would never, ever countenance denying emotions ... repression is silly. Nor do I advise expressing them, either. I talk of the elimination of the cause of the emotions ... which is ‘me’ at the core of ‘being’. Then there is nothing to control ... nor a controller to do any controlling anyway. With no feelings – and especially passions – running the show, then there is no need for principles ... nor morals or values or ethics or any of those coping mechanisms. Because with the extinction of ‘me’ in ‘my’ totality I am always happy and harmless. Whatever the circumstances, I am always able to spontaneously act in the way that is of optimum benefit to one and all. I can rely upon myself completely, totally, absolutely. All my thoughts are benevolent ... always. For example: I do not have to ‘think loving thoughts’ because I never think hateful thoughts ... and so on. No feelings whatsoever (by which I mean also those instinctual passions) means no ‘thinker’ ... because there is no ‘feeler’ polluting thought.

*

KONRAD: My vision is completely clear, and complete. Especially the connection between ‘the process’ and its structural origin is then clear.

RICHARD: Hmm ... ‘completely clear and complete’ until the next time you change your mind, eh?

KONRAD: Well, Richard. Time will tell. The beautiful thing about my approach is, that it has become independent of all this mumbo jumbo like ‘Satsang’, ‘Shradda’, and more of these terms demanding that a master is necessary. If it is complete enough to accomplish this, who cares how inaccurate it is?

RICHARD: Well, obviously you do not. Speaking personally, I could never live with such dissimulation.

KONRAD: And another thing. I accept that I am a being that grows continuously. I am not, as you think you are, a life form that is perfect. For perfectness means that everything that was potentially present has now become actual.

RICHARD: That is correct ... it is completion, utter fulfilment and ultimate satisfaction. It is what all human being yearn for.

KONRAD: But this denies the essence of Man, namely that he is between potentiality and actuality.

RICHARD: If you say so, Konrad ... yet that is not my experience. For me, the essence of being a human being is an actual perfection here and now ... otherwise you are always becoming and never arriving. And so the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides go on and on. Is this what you wish upon both yourself and your fellow human being. There has been 160,000,000 people killed in wars this century ... is that what you want to give to the residents of the next century?

KONRAD: You are very consistent. Love, for example, has no place in your actualism. I am not surprised about it. For love is the recognition and the acknowledgement of the potential part of every fellow human being. It makes you realize, that love consists of giving others room to make their always present potential actual.

RICHARD: Well, here you directly contradict what you have just stated above. To wit: ‘but this [actual perfection here and now] denies the essence of Man, namely that he is between potentiality and actuality’. Your love apparently allows other people the room to make their potential actual ... but you will not make your own potential actual yourself. Wow! Could you make up your mind, please, as to just what your position is?

KONRAD: So, what you see as a flaw in me, in the above, I consider one of my virtues. I hope I shall never stop changing my mind. For if I stop doing that, this means that the potential part of me has been denied. This will make me stop being a human being.

RICHARD: But, if you will, please do stop ... and the sooner the better. Look at all the misery and mayhem it has caused and is causing and will continue to cause. Or do you fatalistically accept that all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides are an intrinsic and necessary condition of living life on this planet and that there will never be an end to them. If so, you are talking to the wrong person.

*

RICHARD: My communication with others is simply based upon the fact that we are all fellow human beings ... and they tell me that they are suffering. Now, I know – from my on-going experience – that all suffering is self-induced and self-inflicted ... and I see the results of this unnecessary suffering in action in the world about. It all stems from the instincts that blind nature endows all sentient beings with at birth ... fear and aggression and nurture and desire. Out of this a passionate ‘me’ in the heart is born, giving rise to an emotional ‘I’ in the head. Thus there is no need for all the wars, rapes, murders, tortures, domestic violence, child abuse, sadness, loneliness, grief, depression and suicide.

KONRAD: Okay. But the following question will continue to come up: ‘How come that you act in a way that looks like something has to be done about it when everything is perfect in actualism?’

RICHARD: Life as-it-is is already always perfect for me ... but not for you, you say. This is why I talk and write ... we are all fellow human beings and others tell me that they are suffering. Now, I know – from my on-going experience – that all suffering is self-induced and self-inflicted ... and I see the results of this unnecessary suffering in action in the world about. It is this simple.

KONRAD: Then you can always say, from the intervidual perspective: ‘I exist, therefore I communicate. And since I am what I am, others can interact. And from this interaction the unnecessary nature of all suffering can become clear to others, too’. In essence that is what you do. Only you do not bring a term forward that puts it into perspective. By introducing the intevidualism idea you can become much clearer to others. At least, you are observed as an identity with less contradictions.

RICHARD: But I do use a term ... and continuously. I say: ‘we are all fellow human beings’. If that does not put it into perspective, then nothing will.

*

RICHARD: You say you have made some discoveries about the ‘process’, especially in relation to a question I asked: ‘is it a form of going beyond ... is it some intermediate state to something else ... is it a state of imbalance?’ Although you never do get around to directly answering this, you do say in the beginning: ‘it is separated from consciousness, but it has a relation with it’.

KONRAD: But I HAVE given a clear answer. What I say is that there is a level in understanding, that is so abstract that understanding itself becomes totally understood. When that happens understanding becomes totally self-referential. This self-reference takes so much energy, that it is felt in the body as a sensate flow from the whole body to the brains. This is why it is felt as a flow TO the brains. Something I have wondered about from the first moment it was present. It looks somewhat like lightning striking its own beginning. It then goes on and on and on along the same trajectory as long as there is enough energy present. There is a mathematical term for such a process. It is called a ‘soliton’. Solitons are stable structures as long as there is enough energy present to sustain it. The nature of it is such, that it sustains itself. Therefore enlightenment is a form of understanding understanding that upholds itself in existence due to the self-referential nature of it. This makes this form of understanding completely effortless.

RICHARD: Okay ... I do read what you say, you know, and now that you have put it into a one-paragraph summary all that you have written becomes clear and concise. Good. Now, you say that it ‘takes so much energy, that it is felt in the body as a sensate flow from the whole body to the brains’. The key words are ‘it is felt ... as a sensate flow’. This is why I wrote about being affective in its origin in my previous E-Mail. Viz.:

• [Konrad]: ‘Thoughts exist in the mind, but the energy of thoughts that are in control is supplied with the body’.
• [Richard]: ‘The energy of ‘I’ thinking – not thoughts of themselves – is affective. It is all feeling induced, at root’.
• [Konrad]: ‘A self-reference that needs so much energy from the body that the flow of this energy is experienced as a constant sensate process’.
• [Richard]: ‘Yet it is affective, if you examine it closely. It can have a sensate effect, of course, but it is affective at its source’.

This is because ‘I’ am affective in origin ... ‘I’ am a passionate entity. Yet, ‘I’ can bring about the ‘death’ of ‘me’ in that ‘I’ deliberately and consciously and with knowledge aforethought set in motion a ‘process’ that will ensure ‘my’ demise. This ‘process’ is essential in that ‘I’ cannot do not do the deed itself ... for an ‘I’ cannot end itself. What ‘I’ do, voluntarily and intentionally, is to press the button which precipitates an oft-times alarming but always thrilling momentum that will result in ‘my’ inevitable self-immolation. This momentum is affective, for it is the source of ‘me’ (of course it has a sensate effect – all emotions and passions do – and the Indians call these effects ‘kriyas’ and ‘mudras’).

What one does is that one dedicates oneself to the challenge of being here as the universe’s experience of itself. When ‘I’ freely and cheerfully sacrifice ‘myself’ – the psychological and psychic entity residing inside this body – ‘I’ am gladly making ‘my’ most supreme donation, for ‘I’ am what ‘I’ hold most dear.

And the ‘process’ will do that ... if one stops holding onto it as an end in itself.

*

RICHARD: The ‘process’ is only separate from consciousness inasmuch as you relate the feeling of being ‘I’ as being consciousness itself. As this is the case for you, obviously the ‘process’ is indeed experienced as being [quote] ‘separated from consciousness, but has a relation with it’ [endquote] ... it being the device that will free consciousness from the insidious ‘I’ that has a parasitical residence within. In other words, if ‘I’ am felt to be consciousness itself, then the ‘process’ – being impersonal – is definitely separated from ‘I’ (when all of consciousness itself is taken to be nothing but an ‘I’, as is the case with you, it shows the startling degree of identification that this insidious entity has managed to usurp).

KONRAD: And there you go wrong. An ‘I’ in whatever form is something that is able to act, to behave purposefully. Therefore it has (is) identity.

RICHARD: I can agree about the identity ... where do you see that I go wrong?

KONRAD: Having (being) identity it has (is) information. Therefore it is not a tautology. Since the self reference of understanding of understanding is not only tautological, but contains ALL tautologies, it is NOT a form of ‘I’. For even a tautology does not have information. Let alone understanding understanding, the ultimate tautology.

RICHARD: And this is your new discovery ... I get what you are referring to. However, it does not bring about peace-on-earth for you, now does it? You still need to control yourself when you get infuriated, for example, and as you write above: ‘emotions are connected to principles, and we cannot function properly without principles’.

KONRAD: Let me make a more differentiated remark about it. A tautology can change into something that DOES represent information, by making it a part of a larger context. In this larger context this thing that was previously tautological, represents a distinction, and therefore is informational. However, the understanding of understanding leads to an expansion into a domain that is identical with the domain expanded from. This makes it on the one hand totally self-referential, and on the other hand, due to its tautological nature, impossible to contain information.

RICHARD: This starts to smack of an ingenious sleight of hand ... or should I say ‘sleight of mind’. Can you rely upon yourself totally to never become sorrowful or malicious because of this new understanding? And if you can rely completely ... can you guarantee it lasting for the rest of your life?

Otherwise, what is it worth?

*

RICHARD: The relation betwixt the ‘process’ and ‘I’ (which for you is consciousness itself) is that ‘I’ need an impersonal ‘process’ to ensure the ending of ‘me’ as ‘I’ cannot do it of ‘my’ own accord (being without this ‘process’ would be akin to that old adage of being unable to pull oneself up by one’s bootstraps ... which is why these Gurus say that a relationship with a Master is essential for those who have not been able to implement it for themselves).

KONRAD: And that is what I find so good about my discovery. No Master necessary. Just continuing to try to understand, until understanding itself is understood. All understanding, whatever its beginning, ends with itself. And then it becomes self-referential, and causes this process as a side-effect. So enlightenment is just a state of development.

RICHARD: Oh dear ... you have really lost the plot here. Okay ... a state of development leading to what?

What is your goal?

KONRAD: There is a relation between the intensity of consciousness and its contents. The more skills, know-how, understanding and knowledge you have and are active at a certain moment, the more intense consciousness is.

RICHARD: Aye ... and the more intense the ‘I’ is too, because you equate ‘I’ with the totality of consciousness itself.

KONRAD: As explained, there you misunderstand.

RICHARD: I do not misunderstand at all ... ‘you’ are consciousness itself. You said so in your last post ... look, it is in the next paragraph: ‘for there is no difference between consciousness and its contents’. Where else do you locate ‘I’ ... in your big toe?

*

RICHARD: I found this statement from you intriguing: ‘for there is no difference between consciousness and its contents’. As this is a direct take from Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti (‘consciousness is its contents’), I wonder what you mean by it. He would go on to say that the emptying of the contents is the ending of consciousness itself ... by which he meant ‘I’, of course’ (obviously ‘of course’ because there was consciousness operating for him as he was not catatonic – in Samadhi – all of the time).

KONRAD: This is not taken from Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti. I know, he has said it. But I always disagreed with it, until I saw that he was right. So I am not parroting him, but talk from my own understanding.

RICHARD: So you have ‘emptied the contents of consciousness’ have you? There is no ‘I’ extant in the flesh and blood body called Konrad? Or is your ‘understanding’ an intellectual understanding? The only understanding worthy of the name is the living of it in one’s daily life ... from moment to moment. Otherwise it is theoretical.

You need to demonstrate it in action for it to cease being parroting.

*

KONRAD: Since the contents of consciousness can also be an understanding, this insight extends to understanding. This makes, among other things, every understanding a form of thought. So, to give a simple example, if you understand that you ARE your body, then this understanding is a form of thought. Without thought this understanding is impossible. Your claim, that it is possible to realize that you are your body without thought processing going on that make that clear is therefore nonsense.

RICHARD: Okay ... but only if you take consciousness to be ‘contents as thought’ and not ‘contents as ‘I’’. With apperception – which is when there is no ‘I’ or ‘me’ extant – consciousness is pure awareness. That is: devoid of content – content as ‘I’ – yet with thinking operating as required by the circumstances. Thought needs no ‘I’ to operate and function. This is the same as the eyes seeing by themselves; the ears hearing autonomously; the skin feeling independently; the nose smelling of its own accord and the tongue tasting freely ... all unfettered by a ‘me’ or an ‘I’.

KONRAD: And THAT, my friend (no sarcasm intended), is YOUR tautology. This is exactly the point where you betray that you do not understand my discovery. The state of understanding is a state whereby there is only the energy of the tautology present. In this state there is consciousness. This consciousness is caused by a tautology.

RICHARD: But I do understand your discovery ... I just do not agree with it as being efficacious in bringing about peace-on-earth. And it is not complete, as you have already indicated above, where you say that you are ‘between potentiality and actuality’.

KONRAD: This tautology consists of a kind of ‘mozaique’ of all kinds of thoughts that fit completely together, so that all of these thoughts silence each other. But there is NO thought that controls the body in this state. And therefore there is NO I that is in command. Your actualism is a complete tautology that causes you to be conscious, without an ‘I’ in command.

RICHARD: Good.

KONRAD: But also without a self reference being present that needs enough energy so that this flow of energy can be felt clearly.

RICHARD: Aye ... and the energy is affective in origin.

KONRAD: In fact, there is nothing you have said about your condition that cannot be understood in the terms of this tautology approach. Everything you say about it is vindicated. (In fact, it is the reason why I believe everything you say about it.)

RICHARD: Good. Your tautology approach obviously enables you to logically understand enough of me to be able to say that.

KONRAD: Still, there is something missing. It is the self-reference that manifests itself as a clearly felt process.

RICHARD: Yes ... because the clearly felt process was affective at its source.

*

RICHARD: Thus, for this flesh and blood body called Richard, thought operates in apperception and observes that there is no ‘I’ or ‘me’ in existence in this body ... hence I can say that what I am is this body. I use the first person pronoun to conveniently refer to this flesh and blood body being conscious ... but with no ‘I’ in the driver’s seat.

KONRAD: Correct.

RICHARD: If this is what the enlightened masters said I would agree ... but as their ‘being’ is intact then there is still an identity steering the boat (‘I am The Self’ or ‘I am All’ or ‘I am God’ or ‘I am The Absolute’ or ‘I am The Buddha’ being but some of the many forms this identity can assume).

KONRAD: But this is THEIR tautology. It makes them indeed ‘I’-less in exactly the same sense that it makes you ‘I’-less.

RICHARD: Not so ... no master or guru has ever said: ‘I am this body only’ or ‘I am only this flesh and blood body being conscious’. Quite the obverse for they say words to the effect: ‘You are not the body; you are not the mind; you are The Self that exists beyond time and space; you are unborn and undying; when this body dies you will cast it off as with an old suit of clothes’.

KONRAD: Yes. But they have in common with you the tautological nature of that what they put forward. And therefore the contents may differ, but the peace of mind that follows from what they say is identical to that of yours.

RICHARD: Oh, come on now, Konrad, it is not identical ... as you well know by now. It is 180 degrees different. Their peace of mind is affective with a ‘feeler’ intact. Mine is sensate only ... sans ‘feeler’ and all feelings (emotions, passions and calenture). Plus their sapience is way off the mark ... they posit a metaphysical dimension, as being primary to this physical universe, whence they will go after their physical death!

*

KONRAD: Einstein was once asked whether he was able to explain his general relativity as simple as possible. He said, that the essence was that classical physicists believed, that if you remove all matter from the universe, you are left with space, devoid of matter. But according to general relativity when you remove all matter from space, then space itself has disappeared, too. The same relation exists between thought and consciousness. I have discovered, that if all thoughts are removed from consciousness, then consciousness itself has disappeared too. Apparently consciousness requires thoughts in order to exist, in the same way as space requires matter in order to exist. Without matter no space; without thoughts no consciousness.

RICHARD: The only problem with Mr. Albert Einstein’s theory is that it is just that ... a theory. You cannot ‘remove all matter from space’ no matter how many bull-dozers and dump-trucks you bring into action. Where would you put all that matter? Dump it somewhere outside of the universe? There must be an ‘outside’ for Mr. Albert Einstein to even think up this nonsense ... more abstract hypothesising once again.

KONRAD: You calling this vision nonsense only betrays that you are not able to think in the abstract, or understand that the abstract has very real consequences. E = mc^2 is the basic equation of the atomic bomb. This abstract formula has caused the very concrete destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And it caused the very concrete other atomic explosions that have taken place since then.

RICHARD: As I understand it, it was Mr. Neils Bohr’s understanding of the atomic nucleus, which he likened to a liquid droplet, that was a key step in the understanding of many nuclear processes, and not Mr. Albert Einstein’s famous equation. In particular, in 1939 Mr. Neils Bohr’s formulations played an essential part in the understanding of the splitting of a heavy nucleus into two parts, almost equal in mass, with the release of a tremendous amount of energy ... thus nuclear fission. In fact, in 1943 Mr. Neils Bohr and one of his sons, Mr. Aage Bohr took part in the projects for making a nuclear fission bomb. They worked in England for several months and then moved to Los Alamos in the USA with a British research team. Mr. Albert Einstein greatly admired Mr. Neils Bohr’s early work, referring to it as ‘the highest form of musicality in the sphere of thought’, but he never accepted Mr. Neils Bohr’s claim that quantum mechanics was the ‘rational generalisation of classical physics’ demanded for the understanding of atomic phenomena. They discussed the fundamental questions of physics on a number of occasions, sometimes brought together by a close mutual friend, Mr. Paul Ehrenfest, professor of theoretical physics at the University of Leiden ... but they never came to basic agreement. Be that as it may ... the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were killed by applied physics and not abstract concepts. Mr. Albert Einstein’s famous concept is yet to be demonstrated ... let alone used. It remains – like most of his theories – conceptual in nature and not established in fact. His concept of curved space-time, for example, is still only a mathematical formulation ... and unable to be demonstrated.

KONRAD: The question is not whether such a scheme like removing all matter can be practically done, but whether this hypothesis can cause predictions of phenomena formerly thought to be unrelated. And indeed it does. The basic equation of Einstein’s general relativity G = 8 Pi T, states that all of space, (spacetime) represented by G is connected with all of the energy T (stress-energy) through this equation. This equation then explained a connection between the perihelic motion of Mercury, the red shift of heavy stars, and the fact that clocks run more slowly when the gravitational field is more intense. Predictions that were all quantitatively vindicated. Consider also this: concretely speaking it is incomprehensible that the colour of light can be connected with motions of planets, and those two things can be connected to running clocks, and still this equation says that these phenomena ARE connected. Not only that, this equation even says something quantitatively about it, and this is then indeed found, this equation is therefore proved as good as anything can be proved in physics.

RICHARD: Aye ... well said: ‘as good as anything that can be proved in physics’. There are as many theories expressly contradicting the above as there is supporting it. Physicists just do not know these things for certain ... they are experimental models only (and the more honest physicists state this clearly).

KONRAD: In other words, that these things are connected in the way that Einstein says is 100% certain. But then his statement about the connection between all space and all energy is also 100% certain.

RICHARD: Only if you say so, Konrad ... you obviously believe in him like many physicists do. Believing in Mr. Albert Einstein amounts to a religious-like certitude for the faithful.

*

RICHARD: All this can never be demonstrated ... such idle speculation brings so-called ‘discoveries’ that may be very satisfying to the logically-trained mind that is desperately searching for answers from within the human condition, but it does nothing to bring about an end to malice and sorrow in the person who dreams up these schemes. He did not bring about peace-on-earth, in his life-time, for himself. Why quote him to ‘prove’ your point? What, for all of his dialogues with prominent Indians, is his contribution to the study of human consciousness worth? Zilch.

KONRAD: You cannot reproach somebody who has found a cure for gangrene that his method is not a way to repair a radio. But that is what you are doing here.

RICHARD: Not so ... it was you who bought Mr. Albert Einstein into a discussion about the nature of consciousness in order to substantiate your point, not me. As he is your authority, he thus has to be able to deliver the goods in order for me to see that he knows what he is talking about ... and he does not.

KONRAD: It betrays your own naiveness. You believe in ONE solution for ALL of the problems of Man. That is simply naive.

RICHARD: No, I do not. I am on record as saying that I am not an expert on everything ... and that I have no intention of becoming one. My expertise lies in the nature of consciousness and how to end malice and sorrow forever. I have the solution for things like wars, rapes, murders, tortures, domestic violence, child abuse, sadness, loneliness, grief, depression and suicide and so on ... not things like quantum theory sub-atomic particles and the such-like.

KONRAD: It is as naive as believing that it is possible that there is a carpenter who can do every carpeting job with just one tool. I see this differently. Every understanding is an extra tool with which progress can be made. We can only make more and more problems disappear. We cannot solve all of our problems in one stroke. This naivety is something all gurus and those who promise to have found a way to happiness have in common. I deny that such a thing as one solution to all problems can exist.

RICHARD: I know you do ... and your denial – which comes out of your belief that it is not possible – is erroneous.

KONRAD: Not just because I believe this, but for a very concrete reason. As I have stated above, Man is not only actuality, but he is also potentiality. My point of view is that what makes Man, Man is that he IS a continuous movement from potentiality to actuality. If there is such a thing as a solution to all of his problems, then this is at the same time the end of his potentiality. And this makes him stop to be Man.

RICHARD: Precisely ... and the sooner the better. 160,000,000 people killed ... all because people like you are determined to remain ‘Man’ at all costs!

*

KONRAD: I want to add something else. This is the ‘intuition’ that was behind my, admittedly ridiculous, theory of you having discovered some ‘ape switch’.

RICHARD: I cannot do anything with this comment ... you will have to elaborate.

*

RICHARD: My experience is that consciousness continues with or without thought operating ... and on an on-going daily basis, too. How do you explain that away?

KONRAD: Because these thoughts are all within a tautological structure wherein no thought dominates. This structure is, as a whole, not informational. And therefore it is experienced as pure consciousness.

RICHARD: Yeah ... quite so, eh? I figured that you would have some neat explanation ... you have demonstrated a remarkable ability to explain away everything. So explain this away then: why do wars, rapes, murders, tortures, domestic violence, child abuse, sadness, loneliness, grief, depression and suicide continue to exist on this fair planet called earth?

KONRAD: Consciousness in general can be defined as the presence of thoughts in our minds that contain energy. Energy, that is supplied by the body.

RICHARD: Only if an ‘I’ or ‘me’ is in charge ... for this ‘energy’ is affective (be it emotion or passion or calenture). The thought operating here as I type these words contains no energy whatsoever.

KONRAD: Oh no? How then can your fingers move? E = mc^2-m0c^2 = (approximately) ½ mv^2. (v standing for speed, i.e. movement.) Therefore, there where is movement there is energy. Without energy no movement. So even in the sense of physics you are wrong here. If there is indeed no energy present in that thought, then your fingers are not able to move, and therefore certainly are not able to type.

RICHARD: Okay ... you have me there for writing too loosely. I wrote ‘the thought operating here as I type these words contains no energy whatsoever’ instead of ‘the thought operating here as I type these words contains no affective energy whatsoever’ (see above for context ... I was talking about affective energy, when all is said and done, you will notice).

*

KONRAD: Any particular realization is also an understanding, and therefore a thought. Or, to put it differently, there is no such thing as a PCE.

RICHARD: This is just crazy ... everyone I have ever questioned has reported at least one PCE in their life. Usually more than one ... and they can last from as little as one-two seconds to several hours. One woman I spoke with had it last all afternoon and night, finally going to sleep at 2.00 AM ... only to find it still happening upon waking. It gradually diminished during the course of the morning. And it is not only my observation ... many are the accounts I have read of this ... the subject is currently being discussed around the world in the fields of academia. It comes up in the new study (of the last fifteen years or so) called ‘Consciousness Studies’. This is where I obtained the phrase ‘PCE’ from ... I had called it a ‘Peak Experience’ (after Mr. Abraham Maslow) until then. Oh, there are many, many websites discussing the nature of consciousness itself ... one such site is called ‘The Journal Of Consciousness Studies’ and operates out of Cambridge University in the UK ... if my memory serves me correct.

KONRAD: I am not impressed. I happen to know, that psychology is absolutely not yet a science. Even economy is beyond many academics, and that is even more basic.

RICHARD: Goodness me, Konrad, I am not talking psychology here ... I am not impressed by psychology myself. What I am doing is drawing your attention to the reports of all those peoples who have had PCE’s of sufficient intensity that they can remember them. Now, all people have PCE’s ... it is just that feelings do not operate during such a peak experience, so that the PCE cannot be put away in the scrolls of affective memory in order to be bought out again in reverie and nostalgia later on. It is important that enough people have been able to remember that a PCE happened ... or else no credence would be paid to the PCE’s existence (just like you give them no credence). The ‘Journal Of Consciousness Studies’ is just one such web-site that discusses these matters ... I am not saying that their conclusions are valid. It is just that they are investigating the phenomena.

*

KONRAD: So although the experience of going beyond looks like leaving the structural domain, it is not. It is the expansion of the old in a situation the old is understood of a special case of the condition you are in after the expansion. You can also express this by saying that what originally is experienced as your total situation, is after the expansion experienced as a special case of a new situation. And therefore this expansion extends the possibilities of action. In this sense, and ONLY in this sense it is freedom.

RICHARD: And a rather paltry freedom at that, do you not concede?

KONRAD: Not when you consider that it is the only form of freedom there is.

RICHARD: You may consider it to be the only form of freedom ... but it is not. Something far, far more immense is lying here right under your nose ... if only you would look.

KONRAD: There is no other form of freeing of something than this. There is no other form of freedom than this. So freedom is the result of consisting of more complex, more elaborate, more subtle, more differentiated STRUCTURES. This makes freedom to be identical with freeing. Freedom is therefore something dynamic, not something static. Freedom and freeing yourself are identical.

RICHARD: Freedom is to be living at this moment in time and this place in space as this body only – bereft of any ever-lasting identity – and as this moment and place are anything but static then an actual freedom is indeed dynamic. An actual freedom has nothing to do with structures whatsoever.

KONRAD: It only seems that way when you do not understand that understanding is tautological in nature.

RICHARD: I am not talking of understanding in the intellectual sense ... I am speaking of an actual understanding. I live freely, each moment again, and tautology had nothing to do with bringing about – or maintaining – this actual freedom from the human condition.

KONRAD: This discovery as such has radical consequences. It is IMPOSSIBLE to go ‘beyond thought’. In whatever form our consciousness exists, consciousness is only possible due to the existence of structures in our mind.

RICHARD: I could agree with this depending upon exactly what structures you are referring to. If you are indicating the electro-chemical firing of neurones ... or the physical action in the post-synaptic receptors ... yes. I would not call this activity a ‘structure’, though.

KONRAD: I mean structures in the informational sense.

RICHARD: Then I cannot agree ... my on-going experience confutes this logical conclusion that you have arrived at.

KONRAD: And all of these structures are forms of thought.

RICHARD: Ah ... not so. Have you not come across apperception? This is where ‘I’ fall into abeyance and the mind becomes aware of itself (not ‘I’ becoming aware of the mind’s perceptions ... the mind being aware of itself without any self-referential feed-back loop at all).

KONRAD: As said above, this is also not excluded. Only, it is a self-referential structure of tautologies that is complete and consistent.

RICHARD: Come now, Konrad ... you are going to have to do better than this to put forward a convincing argument. Apperception only occurs when ‘I’ am not existing ... so how can it be a ‘self-referential structure of tautologies’ ... whether they be ‘complete and consistent’ or not? You just threw this line in here without even thinking about it. Apperception is much, much more than what you so casually dismiss as yet more tautology.

Good grief, how about some intellectual rigour?

*

KONRAD: You can also say this differently. Consciousness is only possible because in the mind there is a structure, consisting of a skill or of knowledge, that demands energy from the body.

RICHARD: Once again, it is ‘I’ that demands energy from the body ... and this energy is affective.

KONRAD: If there is no such structure in the mind, the result is not consciousness without thought, but the result is absence of consciousness. For the existence of some structure in the mind is a NECESSARY condition for consciousness.

RICHARD: This is your experience of a form of catatonia known in India as ‘Going into Samadhi’. It is useless as in regards operating and functioning in the world of people, things and events. The Indians prize it highly, however. I, too, experienced this back in 1981 for four hours ... my current condition has nothing of that coma-like nature at all. Here consciousness operates of its own accord ... whether thinking is happening or not. Without an ‘I’, thinking is a pleasure and a delight ... yet all the while there is an apperceptive consciousness occurring.

KONRAD: This catatonia you describe is something I have never experienced. While I write this. OF COURSE I have never experienced it, for experience requires consciousness. How stupid of me.

RICHARD: I cannot do anything with this comment ... you have not applied yourself to the question at all. You wrote to me detailing such experiences some time ago, remember?

*

KONRAD: But is a ‘completely still mind’ then impossible? No, it is not. Only the way it is accomplishes is a very special condition of the structures that are present in it. It is possible, that nothing has to be done, because the owner of the brains sees that ‘everything is as it should be’. This special state can be arrived by adopting a structure, that is either completely tautological in nature, or it is completely contradictory in nature. The structure that is completely tautological in nature consists of a conglomerate of thoughts that, taken together form a ‘mosaic’ that represents the tautology completely.

RICHARD: You will do anything – anything logically possible – in order to justify the continued existence of ‘I’. You have taken to this ‘tautological’ theory of yours like a duck to water. So, everything is a ‘tautology’, eh? Is this not the same as those who say that everything is ‘relative’? They think that they are saying something profound, yet it is only intellectual masturbation.

KONRAD: The above is just a personal attack. Not an argument. It just betrays that you do not understand what I say, for if you did you would put something forward that contradicts it.

RICHARD: Of course it is personal ... we are talking about you as you currently live your life ... how much more personal can we get? Or is all this merely an academic dialogue for your amusement and entertainment? Are you genuinely wishing to understand the nature of your own consciousness sufficient so as to effect a lasting change for the better or not? We are not just having an argument ... or are we? Are you sincere about finding out about yourself, life, the universe and what it is to be a human being living in this world as it is with people as they are? And ... I did put something forward that contradicts it. I will copy and paste for you:

• [Richard] ‘So, everything is a ‘tautology’, eh? Is this not the same as those who say that everything is ‘relative’?

KONRAD: Your ideology of ‘being the body’ is also of this form. It is tautological, for it contains obviously everything you are in a tautological manner. The proof of this is that it cannot be denied, for if you deny it, it is the action of the body that is talking, and saying that it denies it. So if you deny that you are your body, you use the body, and in this way you deny implicitly what you say. A tautology consists, after all, of a denial of a denial. So the realization of being your body is a tautological completeness that manifests itself as a condition that makes everything still, and appears as some form of PCE.

RICHARD: Goodness me. Is this what logic does to a person? Do you not see that male logic is as useless as female intuition when it comes to ascertaining the mystery of life?

KONRAD: No, I do not. Very poetic, this statement of yours, but just nonsensical emotionalism. And that from somebody who thinks he is free from emotions.

RICHARD: And just how does it qualify as being ‘nonsensical emotionalism’? It was a straight-forward question ... great thinkers have been applying logical thought to the problem of the human condition for thousands of years ... and there is still as much suffering now as back then. Logical thought – and intuitive thought – just have not worked ... another tool is required. How about apperceptive thought? That is: thinking without the ‘thinker’ or the ‘feeler’? Another way of describing it is direct seeing (not visual seeing). That is, seeing that is unmediated by a censor or an interpreter. Another way of describing it could be unconditioned thinking ... and there are more ways of description.

*

KONRAD: The second form of this condition is the denial of this tautology. Buddhism, Taoism are examples of this. They talk about ‘going beyond’. But that what they go beyond is perfectly clear to them. It is referred to by the word ‘everything’. So they talk about ‘going beyond everything’. And THIS then becomes the thought that causes no thought in particular to be the thought that controls the body. And it therefore leads to exactly the same state of stillness that is described above. Only now NO thought is allowed to control the body, so the implicit connection that is present in Hindu-like religions is absent. However, the followers of both of these religions do not see, that they have in common that their stillness is the result of a particular state of mind. A state of mind, wherein there is some balance present of all the thoughts that can control the body, but none of them being able to do this, because some structure that is the representation of all of them is in command. This makes ALL talking about a state of consciousness that is beyond thought illusory. There is NO state of consciousness that does NOT involve some form of thought and thinking. This makes ALL talking about something that is beyond thought complete bogus.

RICHARD: It is the Krishnamurtiites you should be saying this to ... not me. I talk of eliminating ‘the thinker’ – not thought – and then thinking can occur spontaneously as required (of course ‘the feeler’ goes along with the ending of ‘being’ ... this is what makes an actual freedom distinctly different to enlightenment).

KONRAD: Well, I agree on the following point. When the total tautology is present, there is no controller of the body. And therefore there is no reaction from the principles. And therefore there are no emotions. So your observation is correct, but your understanding of what is really happening is wrong.

RICHARD: Well ... you come half-way toward seeing what I am getting at by observing that there is indeed no controller or emotions. Good. Let us proceed ... if you are at all sincere.

*

KONRAD: Okay. So far, so good. When I arrived at this insight, one thing remained to be explained. What, then, is the true identity of ‘the process’ I am feeling? It is a sensation I cannot deny. I can also see, that whenever it is more intense, everything within consciousness is more clear. How can this be, I asked myself, if consciousness itself is completely structural? Or to ask the question in another way: if all states of consciousness are the result of some form of thought and thinking, some form of energy-demanding structure, what kind of structure can give rise to a ‘process’? Meditating on this puzzle I saw the answer. To see the answer I had to make a distinction between thoughts and the energy contained within them.

RICHARD: Why will you not look at the ‘thinker’? Why suspect thought so much? Is not this ‘energy’ ‘I’ itself? Is not this ‘energy’ affective? Therefore, am ‘I’ nothing but an emotional/ mental construct? ‘I’ may be real – very real at times depending upon the ‘energy’ – but am ‘I’ actual?

KONRAD: The above is a wider context than the context of ‘I’. Therefore your rhetorical questions are meaningless, and therefore unanswerable .

RICHARD: This is a cop-out ... you said ‘I had to make a distinction between thoughts and the energy contained within them’ and I suggest that the ‘energy’ is an entity. But you dismiss this as being ‘rhetorical’ ... and therefore ‘meaningless’ and ‘unanswerable’. By categorising the question away you avoid having to look at what may very well be the crux of the matter ... why this avoidance? What have you got to lose ... except your very identity?

KONRAD: Thoughts exist in the mind, but the energy of thoughts that are in control is supplied with the body.

RICHARD: The ‘energy’ of ‘I’ thinking – not thoughts of themselves – is affective. It is all feeling induced, at root.

KONRAD: A self-reference that needs so much energy from the body that the flow of this energy is experienced as a constant sensate process.

RICHARD: Yet it is affective, if you examine it closely. It can have a sensate effect, of course, but it is affective at its source.

KONRAD: These kinds of sentences make clear to me, that ‘the process’ I am talking about is not the same process you have experienced in those months you talked about. I have studied it with all of my attention, intellect, energy, hypotheses. And ONE thing is completely clear. ‘The process’ I am talking about is experienced completely as sensate, devoid of ANY emotion. There is NO AFFECTION WHATSOEVER in it.

RICHARD: Except that I did not say ‘affection’ ... I said ‘affective’. Now it may just be the English/Dutch language problem so let me provide the dictionary definition of the word ‘affective’ (‘affective’ as contrasted with ‘sensate’ and ‘cerebral’, which are the other two of the three tools available for experiencing ... unless we allow ‘psychic’ in as a valid tool).

• affective: adjective; 1: arising from, relating to, or influencing feelings or emotions. 2: emotional disorders. 3: expressing emotion; affectivity: noun; emotional susceptibility.
• affection: noun; 1: an emotion, a feeling.; especially feeling as opposed to reason; passion, lust. 2 disposition towards something, bent, inclination. 3 goodwill, kindly feeling, love.

KONRAD: In fact, it is experienced as a pressure wave moving from below the spine up, and penetrating the skull. There it causes the head to feel as if it is filled with water under pressure, and it feels like it pushes against the skull from the inside out. On top of it there is a frequency associated with this pressure wave, that makes it more intense and then diminishing with a rhythm that is exactly twice the period of the heart beat. All of this is pure sensate. No affection whatsoever present in it.

RICHARD: Look, I have no wish to invalidate your experience ... I can only suggest that you look more closely – more deeply – so as to ascertain the origin of this pressure wave. If you do, you may very well discover it to originate in fear ... which is the most basic, primal instinctive emotion/passion that any sentient being has. Out of fear comes the instinct for survival ... which is why people avoid exploring it. What ‘I’ am, at root, is pure fear. ‘My’ very ‘being’ as a rudimentary or an animal ‘self’ is fear itself ... all creatures are this.

KONRAD: Next to this, it is periodical, because it is somewhat comparable with a microphone picking up the sound of a loud-speaker, that is amplified and therefore made audible by the speaker, and therefore picked up by the microphone etc. Something similar happens with consciousness when it becomes completely self-referential. The ENERGY of the insight is then moving into a periodic process of self-reference. This level of self-reference can be the result not only of studies of logic, but it can be the result of a development wherein this abstract domain of thinking is reached from many other routes. In fact, whatever route somebody takes, if he continues to develop his abstract capacity of thought and thinking, he will inevitably arrive at this state of continuous self-reference. This level of self-reference is therefore something everybody can reach, whatever his starting point. The only condition is his preparedness to continue to develop his understanding.

RICHARD: Yet an ‘understanding’ is not the living of it ... it is an intellectual understanding. If it is understood deeply enough – as in a realisation – it is reinforced by feelings ... and it becomes a felt understanding. The living of it – where no self-referent ‘I’ is extant – is an actual understanding ... except that the word ‘understanding’ does not adequately describe the experience. The word ‘apperception’ is the most appropriate word to describe an actual understanding

KONRAD: You are probably talking about something else.

RICHARD: Oh yes ... it is indeed ‘something else’. Would you care to explore?

*

KONRAD: It is a mistake to think, that it is possible to go ‘beyond thought and thinking’. Believing this will HALT the development of anybody who buys into it. THIS is the danger that is present in people like J. Krishnamurti. For although J. Krishnamurti has reached this state of self-reference, his puzzlement of what it was caused him to stop studying, and even expressing the opinion that real insight cannot be found in studying. In this he was utterly and totally wrong. This message even causes his sympathisers to close themselves to the ONLY way people have to develop themselves. The result is self-inflicted stupidity. And therefore very dangerous.

RICHARD: It is dangerous, yes ... but not for your reason. It is dangerous because it is based upon an affective response to life’s exigencies.

KONRAD: Again, you are talking about something else. For ‘the process’ is NOT affective.

RICHARD: Well, let us find out, shall we? Do you wish to proceed?

*

RICHARD: We all know just how reliable feelings are. Even deeper feelings – Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti constantly espouses Love and Compassion – are notoriously ineffective.

KONRAD: Agreed. Still, he was pure potential. Therefore he was pure love. I do not say that this is good or bad. It is just the way it was with him. With me, however, it is different. I am not just pure potentiality, as Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti was. But I am also not just pure actuality either, as you might be. Therefore, I am between him and you.

RICHARD: Ahh ... so you equate ‘pure potential’ with ‘pure love’, eh? Well, well, well ... the hoary subject of love rears its head ... certain things about you become a little clearer. No wonder you wish to remain a potential ... and forever avoid being actual. Good, now we can get down to business ... if you so desire. Do you want to?

*

RICHARD: Just look at all the recorded instances of anger in the many Masters that have paraded their stuff throughout history. Just look at all the religious wars that follow the emergence of any charismatic saviour. Why do you think they all have to advocate pacifism, if they can actually trust their precious state of ‘being’ so much, eh?

KONRAD: Right! And that is why I do not follow that course. I am angry at times, and I do not deny it. I deny, however, that enlightenment is a way to end all anger once and for all. I consider that nonsense.

RICHARD: So do I ... the altered state of consciousness called spiritual enlightenment does not end anger. An actual freedom does, however, which is one of the many reason why it is superior to enlightenment. I may be a lot of things, but I am not silly. I lived enlightenment for eleven years and irritation came up in me four times (once peeved and three time annoyed). These days I do not even get peeved ... and have not done so since 1992.

*

KONRAD: I can also explain, why ‘the process’ can be a temporary phenomenon, as has been the case with you.

RICHARD: I know you can, Konrad. But because it is based in male logic ... it misses the mark completely. Your explanation has nothing to do with how I experience living this life here.

KONRAD: Agreed. For your process is clearly different from that of me.

RICHARD: Perhaps, after reading what I have to say above – and with your subsequent self-investigation – you may be discovering that it is not different.

KONRAD: Since you ended with the realization, that you are your body, your ‘process’ ended into a structural conclusion that looks at itself as something essentially from the outside.

RICHARD: Yet my ‘process’ did not end with a realisation ... it ended when ‘I’ ended.

KONRAD: Yes, it ended in a tautology. And, yes, this is a state without an ‘I’ being in command. No, it is not independent of thought and thinking. For there MUST be thoughts present, at least in the form of a tautology, if there is also consciousness.

RICHARD: Hmm ... you are back to your latest discovery again, I see. Maybe, by experimenting, you may discover for yourself that it is possible to be conscious without thoughts thinking in any way, shape or form. Also, it is a delicious and luscious experiencing of yourself, life and this universe. Anything that you do – or think – is a bonus of pleasure on top of this utterly happy and harmless way of being here now.

*

RICHARD: Herein lies the unmistakable distinction between this condition, which I call actual freedom, and the Enlightened State: I am no longer driven by a Divine Sense Of Mission to bring The Truth, Universal Love and Divine Compassion to the world. I am free to speak with whomsoever is genuinely interested in solving the ‘Mystery of Life’ and becoming totally free of the Human Condition.

KONRAD: Yes, that is what we have in common. Only, your belief in a once and for all solution is in contradiction with human nature.

RICHARD: Yes ... most definitely in contradiction with human nature! It is within human nature to kill one’s fellow human being, you see. Aggression is quite natural. I did something very unnatural ... I make no secret of this fact.

*

KONRAD: My background is science of the Popper kind. His basic assertion is, that we can never be certain about anything positive.

RICHARD: Well, he is wrong.

KONRAD: Agreed .

RICHARD: He is wrong just like you.

KONRAD: By describing the process as affective you show that you cannot really know that. For you are obviously not talking about the same thing.

RICHARD: Are you so sure of that?

KONRAD: No amount of positive evidence can prove a general statement. However, we CAN be certain of something negative, for only ONE counterexample is enough to disprove the generality of a general statement.

RICHARD: Yes it can ... one thing you can be certain of is that you are going to die. People are dying everywhere. There is not one single person alive today that is born more than 150 years ago. Ergo: every person’s inevitable death is an absolute and positive statement. So it looks as if I have just given you something positive that you will never be able to give a ‘counterexample’ to, eh? For who do you know that is 60,000 plus years old?

KONRAD: I was talking about the Popperian school of thinking. I did not say that I back it up. So here I agree with you. I agree that I was not clear enough in my dismissal of it. So this misunderstanding is my responsibility. No discussion. You are simply right here.

RICHARD: If you do not back it up then why introduce it? You are just wasting time ... both yours and mine. However, I consider you are ducking for cover as you made quite a big thing of this theory on the Mailing List last week ... or were you just playing with people? Can we have a consistently honest discussion? I do not wish to have to spend my time reading each sentence you write and trying to ascertain whether you mean it or not. Have you not been told that child-hood story about the boy who cried wolf? No one will take you seriously when you need to be taken seriously if you play clever games at other times.

*

KONRAD: In all of our conversations you have never demonstrated any ability to observe from the Buddhist perspective. Of course, you had an OPINION about it (it is bogus), but this is not the same as understanding it.

RICHARD: Oh, I understand it all right ... from the inside. I lived in the enlightened state for eleven years. My scholastic study of the teachings of Buddhism are indeed very limited ... I simply cannot be bothered studying too much of what is essentially a delusion. I have read only enough to get me by in discussions with erudite practitioners. The same applies to what I know of logic ... I have only a cursory knowledge that is sufficient for as far as it goes. I have no intention of being an expert on everything.

KONRAD: This is a pity in the Buddhist sense. For Buddha HAS discovered a process you have now clearly demonstrated in this letter not to understand.

RICHARD: If you say so ... but I wonder whether you stand behind this statement as you have qualified it with ‘in the Buddhist sense’ which I am starting to understand is your way of indicating that you do not mean it for yourself. My living experience of enlightenment still stands regardless of what you think of it, anyway.

I know it from the inside.

KONRAD: This proves, that you have not understood the essence of Buddhism.

RICHARD: No ... I lived it instead of studying it.

KONRAD: Oh no you haven’t. For else you would NEVER have described it as affective. This shows clearly, to me at least, and anyone else in who ‘the process’ Buddha has discovered is going on, that you do not understand. Affective, really!

RICHARD: Now you reveal your ignorance ... he was not known as ‘The Compassionate One’ for nothing. And compassion is affective.

KONRAD: Therefore I was always able to understand far more of you (something you have admitted yourself) than you of me.

RICHARD: I have never, ever admitted any such thing. Where do you get all these fantasies about me from?

KONRAD: Once, in a very humorous mood you said, that although we have our differences, you said about me that I understood you perfectly. Remember? It was when I wished you good luck, but added that you probably did not need it. Something to that effect, at least. (I am not going to look it up.)

RICHARD: You are referring to this exchange:

• [Konrad] ‘I do not have to say to you: ‘keep up the good work’, for in this sentence there are, of course, two mistakes in your eyes. Firstly, do not need any encouragement, and, secondly, what you are doing is definitely no work in your eyes’.
• [Richard] ‘I am pleased to see that you do, in fact, understand me quite well despite our differences regarding infinitude!’

You will see that I was saying that you understood me in regard to not needing encouragement or experiencing writing as work. You had commented in a letter to another respondent that I was ‘playful’ ... to that extent you ‘understand me quite well’ ... but that is all. You have made it into something much, much more than the light-hearted joshing that I have just pasted. Why are you so keen to have people think that you understand them?

You are going to have to move radically from your current position to understand me.

*

KONRAD: I want to add one personal thing. Since all of this has become clear, the ‘cramp-like’ movements of my body have stopped completely, and ‘The process’ has even more intensified, and become ‘smoother’.

RICHARD: Ah ... so something may very well be happening that will take you further along the road to an ultimate freedom. What is your current appraisal? What is your plan?

KONRAD: Not your ultimate freedom. For this is against human nature, as I have explained now.

RICHARD: And so all the wars, rapes, murders, tortures, domestic violence, child abuse, sadness, loneliness, grief, depression and suicides will go on.

Ahh ... such is human nature, eh?

*

KONRAD: The continuous self-reference that is occurring makes it the solution of the ‘eye-problem’.

RICHARD: You have referred to this ‘eye-problem’ before ... and any analogy eventually falls short of what it seeks to explain. I saw my ‘self’ back in 1980 and knew intimately what I had to be free of. So I was indeed able to see what is behind the ‘eye’ (to use your borrowed analogy).

KONRAD: A tautology, because it is identical with an understanding without an ‘I’ being present, is able to understand every part of itself, and recognize it as a potential ‘I’-ness. However, the tautology has then not yet become visible to itself. There is understanding. But there is not yet understanding of understanding.

RICHARD: No, Konrad, you are way off the mark here. In 1980 I saw ‘me’ as ‘I’ was ... and ‘I’ was lost, lonely, frightened and confused. I saw ‘myself’ as ‘I’ was ... and that seeing was the beginning of the end of ‘me’. I have written about this in ‘A Brief Personal History’ (which I sent to you at the beginning of our correspondence) and also have posted on my Web Page. The description is at the beginning of ‘Appendix One’.

*

KONRAD: Funny, that it dawns on me the moment that I do not want to be special anymore.

RICHARD: Speaking personally, I did want to be special. I had had enough of the ‘Tried and True’ with all its wars, rapes, murders, tortures, domestic violence, child abuse, sadness, loneliness, grief, depression and suicide. Something new – and something that works – is indeed very special.

KONRAD: Agreed. As long as you do not look upon yourself as a saviour of mankind. But probably you do. For that is what ALL people up till now have done who believe in one single solution for the human condition.

RICHARD: I set my sights further than being a mere saviour of humankind, all those years ago when I was determined to be free of the human condition, and I am not likely to fall back into that position now that I have succeeded. Human beings need something else than re-hashes of the ‘Tried and True’ if there is to be global peace-on-earth.

KONRAD: For this I am grateful for the discussions I have had with you. I am especially relieved to see, that this is completely explainable, and that therefore psychological tricks like those in Zen are not necessary to make this point clear. For everything that is rational, can be explained unambiguously.

RICHARD: Yes ... but can it be lived successfully? Does it bring individual peace-on-earth? Will it lead to a global peace-on-earth?

KONRAD: I do not think so. For no single solution will ever be enough. However, every single solution is able to contribute. I find the cultural generally agreed upon theory about there being a difference between theory and practice to be bogus. Correct theories are those that supply that in practice what you expect of them.

RICHARD: And do your theories supply ‘that in practice what you expect of them’? What do you expect? What is your goal?

*

KONRAD: By describing ‘the process’ as affective you have made perfectly clear to me, that you do not really understand what I am talking about. This point is immediately clear by anyone in whom this process is present. No one in whom it is really present will ever describe it as affective, because it is so very clear that it is not. It is only sensate. Please do not dismiss this remark as being a sign that I have misunderstood you, and that I am deluding myself on this point. I cannot emphasize enough that this is a very clear mistake you have made. A mistake that makes clear that you do NOT know what Buddhism is all about, despite you believing you do.

RICHARD: Yes, well we will see how you proceed on this score, eh?

KONRAD: And another thing. Do not think that I have not learned from this letter. I have just reread it, and there is one point that you make that is particularly interesting. If somebody has discovered something really marvellous, then him telling it to others cannot fail to make him special. If he denies this, then this is misplaced modesty. Thanks for making this clear to me.

RICHARD: You are very welcome, Konrad. Just make sure that what you have discovered is not only ‘really marvellous’ but is also something totally new that no other human being has ever discovered before.

Rehashes of the ‘Tried and True’ are so pathetic.