Actual Freedom – The Actual Freedom Mailing List Correspondence

RESPONDENT: I wonder then, what is it that stops most spiritual seekers from going the final yard?

RICHARD: Quite possibly it is the narcissistic nature of ‘being’ itself (plus it is incredibly difficult to resist being the ‘Chosen One’).

RESPONDENT: Is it because the intermediate state brings with it a marvellous sense of having arrived, and you have no idea at the time that there is further to go?

RICHARD: Yes ... there was the overwhelming feeling of having ‘Come Home’.

RESPONDENT: Or do you feel that if you go any further you’ll surely (physically) die?

RICHARD: Indeed so ... once in the tenacious grip of that exalted state the only thing beyond enlightenment is the physical death that will bring final release (as in ‘Parinirvana’ and ‘Mahasamadhi’ for instance) and one has to first fulfil one’s Mission as the Saviour of Humankind.

RESPONDENT: Or maybe it’s because there is no cultural precedent for a state beyond enlightenment, other than physical death?

RICHARD: Yes ... which lack of a precedent is the very reason why The Actual Freedom Trust, and thus the web site and this mailing list, exists.

*

RESPONDENT: A practical question: if what I’m doing happens to kick-start the physiological process (which hasn’t happened yet), is there anything you would recommend doing, or not doing, if it begins?

RICHARD: In brief: never, ever, overlook the pristine purity of this actual world (as evidenced in the PCE) ... and forsake each and every blandishment to be the latest Saviour of Humankind.

RESPONDENT: Not to pre-empt things too much, but it must be extremely hard not to ‘pike out’ when things start to get very intense.

RICHARD: Ha ... it is years since I have heard that expression.

RESPONDENT: There would be the fear of spinning out completely, physically dying, or worst of all, leaving oneself a neurological omelette (as U G Krishnamurti seems to me to be).

RICHARD: You do have an expressive way of putting it ... but, yes, there is a very real fear of spinning out, becoming a basket case, or whatever, and pulling back in urgent alarum to the (supposed) safety of the already-known.

RESPONDENT: I’d guess you’d favour the ‘boots and all’ approach, but just to be sure, is there anything one should be specially careful of?

RICHARD: Hesitancy (an opportunity is quite often a very rare thing).

RESPONDENT: Am I understanding you correctly that, once the process begins, you throw caution to the wind and just go all the way, come what may?

RICHARD: Provided there be pure intent (and that is no little proviso) ... yes.

*

RESPONDENT: Aside: I can imagine that these fears sound a tad ridiculous after the fact.

RICHARD: Oh, indeed so – there is no fear in actuality – but I am well aware that before the fact those fears are very, very real ... so real as to have kept humankind in thralldom for millennia.

I do not make light of them.

RESPONDENT: There have been times on acid trips when I’ve felt I was certain to be psychically blown apart completely; but I let go, let it happen, and within a few seconds I was laughing my guts out, feeling like a neurotic little drama queen for being so anxious.

RICHARD: Exactly.

RESPONDENT: A recurring theme in those trips: an immense and overwhelming rush of geometrical imagery interwoven with unimaginably rich mythological content is threatening to engulf or annihilate me. I can’t take it any more, I surrender – then, a moment later, the whole thing is shown to be a mirage; it’s dangling from the end of a puppeteer’s string; it’s nothing but the manipulations of some idiotic, leering, winking carnival illusionist, a pure con-artist. Perhaps that’s the brain showing ‘me’ an apt metaphor of my ‘self’ ;-)) (I know this is well and truly in the realm of the ASC, just mentioning it for interest’s sake).

RICHARD: Ah yes ... all manner of hallucinatory/psychic manifestations can occur – I had many bizarre things happen such as electrical bolts of lightning dazzling on the eyeballs; pressure-pains in the base of the neck; surges of power travelling up the spine and up over the back and the top of the head down to the forehead; convulsive twitching of limbs; energy surges from the pit of the stomach up through the diaphragm into the chest cavity through to the throat producing intense nausea; a vivid blue light, an internal blue of rapturous bliss, behind the eyebrows; an all-knowing cyclopean eye in the sky watching my every move and many, many other weird things – none of which are important in themselves (some people get caught up in them, and manifest psychic powers, thus never proceeding to the final goal) as what is important is to take them only as a sign that a process is underway and thus proceed with all dispatch via one’s active consent.

*

RICHARD: The ‘invisible membrane’ I can relate to ... as can some other people I have spoken to over the years.

RESPONDENT: Something else that accompanied the experience of passing through this ‘invisible membrane’ was a peculiar sense that I’d entered into a new ‘day’. Hard to describe, but you probably know exactly what I mean.

RICHARD: As in even though everything is familiar it has never been before – all is novel, never boring, all is new, never old, all is fresh, never stale – and never will be again?

Or, as someone wrote on a now-defunct mailing list some time ago, when describing such an experience: ‘jamais vu is a feeling that you have never seen anything around you; it seems like everything around you is new and you’ve never been there before – as opposed to déjà vu when everything seems like you’ve lived it before – and you feel that you’ve never done this particular thing before, even when you know you have’.

RESPONDENT: I knew perfectly well it was the same day that I’d set out for my morning walk, but the ‘me’ who had set out for a walk that morning seemed to be aeons ago (metaphorically, not literally) – an artefact of a different time altogether.

RICHARD: It is more that the ‘different time’ is an artefact of ‘my’ making ... time itself is the arena, as it were, in which all things happen.

RESPONDENT: (But there was no loss of common sense. I knew it was still ‘today’).

RICHARD: In fact commonsense operates better than ever, eh?

*

RICHARD: ... essentially ‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’ meant ‘what is preventing the PCE from happening at this very moment’ to me back in 1981 ...

RESPONDENT: Ok, great. I’m working on the same thing now.

RICHARD: In effect it is a win-win situation: if the magical event which enables an actual freedom from the human condition does not immediately occur there is a truly remarkable virtual freedom that incrementally develops as a matter of course due to such exquisite attentiveness awareness-cum-attentiveness to this very moment ... the only moment one is ever alive.

RESPONDENT: And now I know precisely what you mean by ‘apperception’. This is encouraging.

RICHARD: Yes ... for it is your own experience which is your guiding light or lodestone, so to speak, and not me and/or my words: me and/or my words provide confirmation ... and affirmation in that a fellow human being has safely negotiated the wide and wondrous path to an actual freedom from the human condition.

*

RESPONDENT: For me, the PCE didn’t jog any specific memories at the time, but looking back now, there have been a few times over the years when a sensation (especially an unexpected smell or sound) has instantly brought back a flood of ... not memories exactly; that is, not memories of a specific event or experience, but memories of a particular way of experiencing that was characteristic of my early childhood, and pretty much identical to that ‘bubble of perfection’. (I don’t think mum was feeding me magic mushrooms back then).

RICHARD: You may find the following to be of interest then:

• ‘One summer day, 40 years ago or so, I was walking along a residential street when an rich, earthy scent wafted my way and triggered, as smells are wont to do, a vivid recollection. Like Dorothy, stepping out of her front door into the Technicolor Land of Oz, I remembered another summer’s day when I was 4 years old, playing in a bank of warm, black dirt in the back yard of my home. I had a little red toy car for which I’d made a road slanting up the face of the dirt bank and, in my recollection, I was ‘driving’ the car up this mountain road while making motor noises. That’s all there was, no real action, yet the memory, in the few seconds before it faded away, was redolent with the smell and feel of the warm dirt, the bright colour of the toy, the hot sun – with simple but intensely pleasurable sensory experience. When I read Aldous Huxley’s account of his mescaline experience, of his feeling that the colours, shapes, and textures of his books on the shelves across the room were as intense an experience as he could bear and that he dared not look outside at the flowers in the garden, I thought of my brief revisitation of my childhood’. (Chapter 1, ‘Happiness: The Nature and Nurture of Joy and Contentment’; David Lykken; www.psych.umn.edu/psyfac/emeritus_sr/Lykken/HapChap%201.htm#_edn3).

Various people I have discussed these matters with over the years have invariably recalled similar ‘Technicolor Land’ experiences in childhood ... sometimes referred to as a ‘nature experience’, a ‘peak experience’, a ‘jamais vu experience’, or even an ‘aesthetic experience’. And not only have I witnessed children having such an experience, and spoken with them about while it is happening, but recall having the same myself on many an occasion: often in early childhood there would be a ‘slippage’ of the brain, somewhat analogous to an automatic transmission changing into a higher gear too soon, and the magical world where time had no workaday meaning would emerge in all its sparkling wonder ... where I could wander for hours at a time in gay abandon with whatever was happening.

*

RICHARD: Or, to put that another way, it [‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’] meant ‘what is preventing the already always existing peace-on-earth (as evidenced in the PCE) from being apparent’ ... and it usually was either a feeling or a feeling-fed thought (as in a belief ... oft-times cunningly disguised as a truth). The PCE demonstrates that the pristine perfection of the actual world is just here – right now – for the very asking.

RESPONDENT: Yes indeed. Thanks for this. It gives me confidence that the whole endeavour is both possible and extremely worthwhile.

RICHARD: In view of the continuing parlous state of both individual and world affairs it is most certainly worthwhile – I have oft-times said it is worth almost anything in terms of personal discomfort/private disturbance to have happen – and the distinct possibility of more and more outbreaks of individual peace-on-earth (be they virtual or actual) bodes well for humankind at large ... given the twentieth century’s unprecedented move towards the eventual democratisation of all sovereign states it only takes 51% of a population to be living in an actual or a virtual peace and harmony for groundswell changes to take effect.

What was previously only the stuff of pipe-dreams is now entirely possible.

December 25 2003

RESPONDENT: Richard, I use the words ‘mind’ and ‘psyche’ interchangeably, but I see you do not. Could you please clarify the difference between them, as you see it?

RICHARD: Put simply: the mind is physical (material) and the psyche is metaphysical (non-material).

To explain: the word ‘mind’ (Middle English ‘minde’/‘münde’), from the Gothic ‘gamunds’ (via Old English ‘gemynd’ which corresponds to Old High German ‘gimunt’) and meaning ‘memory’, basically refers to the human brain in action, in the human skull, remembering, reflecting, and so on (giving heed to, perceiving, noticing, contemplating, being careful about), and which ceases to operate at physical death ... whereas the word ‘psyche’, a Latin word from the Greek ‘psukhe’ meaning ‘breath’, ‘life’, ‘soul’ (relating to ‘psukhein’ meaning ‘breathe’, ‘blow’), is associated with breath and breathing and thus to life and living (as in ‘taking your first breath’) as opposed to death and dying (as in ‘taking your last breath’). Such a focus on breath and breathing has corollaries in other cultures (‘chi’ in China, pronounced ‘ki’ in Japan) and is also known as ‘vitalism’ (popular in Europe in the early twentieth century) or ‘vital élan’ ... also the Indian word ‘prana’ (meaning ‘vital air’, from the root ‘pran’ meaning ‘to breathe’), refers to what is known as the vital energy or vital force or life principle. For many early peoples what animated the body was breath (air, vital air, vital force, life force, life principle and so on) because when a person stopped breathing they were dead ... their soul, their very ‘being’, had left their body *as* their last breath. In the animistic religions of the Bronze Age, and earlier, spirit was everywhere, especially in the air (aka in the ‘ether’), and it is no coincidence that the ‘etheric body’ is considered the ‘vital body’ or ‘essential body’ (the Sanskrit ‘akasha’ means the same as the Greek ‘ether’ ... hence ‘akashic’ and ‘etheric’ refer to a similar psychic phenomenon).

Speaking of psychic phenomenon, and just as a matter of related interest, someone once asked for an explanation of my usage of the word ‘psychic’:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘I am writing vis à vis one and only one word you use and I do not understand its usage by you. From your site (snip quote). Would you mind explaining, Richard, your usage of the word ‘psychic’ in this context, thank you.
• [Richard]: ‘All sentient beings, to a greater or lesser extent, are connected via a psychic web ... a network of energies or currents that range from ‘good’ to ‘bad’. Feeling threatened or intimidated can result from the obvious cues – the offering of physical violence and/or verbal violence – or from the less obvious ... ‘vibe’ violence (to use a ‘60’s term) and/or psychic violence. Similarly, feeling accepted can occur via the same signals or intimations. Power trips – coercion or manipulation of any kind – whether for ‘good’ or ‘bad’ purposes, are all psychic at root ... the psychic currents are the most effective power plays for they are the most insidious (charisma, for example).
Generally speaking, the word psychic or psychical in virtually any context refers to anything of or pertaining to the energies of the psyche or being itself – the soul, the spirit or the self parasitically inhabiting the flesh and blood body – any non-material, incorporeal, other-worldly, unworldly, unearthly, non-human or inhuman currents or emanations. Any energy flow which is ethereal, ephemeral, intangible, cryptic, inexplicable, enigmatic, unfathomable and which is instinctual, intuitive, prescient, telekinetic, telepathic or clairvoyant ... anything extrasensory.
It can refer to anything occult, arcane, esoteric or ghostly – anything to do with witchcraft, sorcery or wizardry (be it either white magic or black magic) – everything supernatural, supernormal, preternatural, preternormal, transcendental or numinous ... anything religious, spiritual, mystical or metaphysical. The metaphysical includes the hallowed, consecrated, sanctified, deified, beatific, holy, divine, heavenly and sacred – including anything saintly, cherubic or angelic – and the sinful, black-hearted, damnable, sinister, fiendish, infernal, diabolical ... anything demonic, devilish, hellish, satanic and evil.
Terror and respect – awe and dread – are the ultimate rule in the human world. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 12c, 7 September 2000).

When he first stepped out of the gondola, face down with arms and legs akimbo, his immediate thought was that something had gone wrong in their calculations about the extent of the effect of the gravitational field and that he would be suspended in space forever as he had absolutely no sense of speed for he could not hear any of the whooshing or whistling of the wind of his descent, so familiar from previous free-falling experiences at a lower altitude, nor see or feel any buffeting of his pressure suit. And when he flipped over and looked back at the balloon – and the space above it was black as night whilst he and it were bathed in sunshine – he initially took it to be streaking away from him at hundreds of miles per hour (whereas it had been ascending at less than ten miles an hour while he was on board) but he quickly realised that it was he who was streaking away from the balloon.

In other words he (objectively) knew he was falling – moving towards the surface of the earth in a gravitational field – even though his (subjective) interpretation of what was actually occurring had been that he was suspended in space ... which objectivity was certainly justified because 13 minutes 45 seconds later he landed on the surface of the earth.

As would the observer falling freely from the roof of a house in the happiest thought of Mr. Albert Einstein’s life.

January 16 2004

RESPONDENT: Richard, regarding the cerebral agitation you experienced after waking up from enlightenment: Was it caused by excess dopamine ...

RICHARD: Yes (although I do not describe it as waking up).

RESPONDENT: ... or was it caused by not knowing how to interpret what had happened to ‘you’?

RICHARD: No.

RESPONDENT: Did the elevated dopamine subside to a more manageable level over 2 years ...

RICHARD: Yes.

RESPONDENT: ... or did the agitation quickly subside when you were able to make sense of what had happened?

RICHARD: No.

RESPONDENT: I remember(?) reading that you experienced something like this in 1981, but it was only a passing reference. Have you written about it in detail?

RICHARD: Yes.

RESPONDENT: If so, where can I read about it?

RICHARD: Here is one instance:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘... what ‘process’ was going on for six months in 1981 and thirty months in 1993-4 when you were ‘unstable as all get out’?
• [Richard]: ‘The medical diagnosis was that there was an excess of dopamine in the post-synaptic receptors ... an excitation of the brain cells, which was happening of its own accord irregardless of events, and thus not under voluntary control.
These days I am in agreement with that determination as some considerable light was thrown upon it all a few years ago when I drank three cups of strong coffee (I only drink decaffeinated coffee nowadays) in a two-hour period and it set-off a psychotropic episode lasting 5-6 hours ... an episode indistinguishable from what was occurring in 1981 and 1993-1994.
I have since found out that caffeine is a chemical cousin to cocaine (chemical not biological) ... and, as a similar episode occurred a couple of years ago as a result of having a dental injection to anaesthetise the jaw, I now make sure the dentist uses a procaine mixture which does not contain adrenaline, which most such mixtures do, because its effect is also psychotropic.
I am also hypersensitive to alcohol ... even a liqueur chocolate has a deleterious effect. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 50, 24 September 2003).

And here is another:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Richard, you have said that caffeinated coffee sets off a psychotropic experience for you. Can you elaborate please?
• [Richard]: ‘As I understand it, and I am not a pharmacologist, caffeine is a chemical cousin to cocaine (having never ingested the latter I cannot provide an experiential comparison) in that its chemical sum formula is similar:

• caffeine: (chem.) a crystalline alkaloid, C8H10N4O2, which is found esp. in tea and coffee plants and is a central nervous system stimulant; caffeinism: n. headache, sleeplessness, and palpitations caused by excessive intake of caffeine.
• cocaine: an alkaloid, C17H21NO4, which is present in the leaves and other parts of the coca shrub and is used as a local anaesthetic and as a stimulant; cocainism: n. (the condition due to) excessive use of or addiction to cocaine. (Oxford Dictionary).

A psychiatrist (who, unlike a psychologist, has a medical degree) once explained to me that my on-going day-to-day experience is because of an excess of dopamine in the post-synaptic receptors – similar to the effect cocaine or amphetamine or lysergic acid diethylamide produce – hence my understanding is that to ingest caffeine on top of this moment-to-moment experiencing is somewhat similar to overdosing on those substances ... primarily the main symptom is a saturated sensuosity of such brilliance and vividity (as in psychedelic), which satiation can be likened to a television set receiving 4 or 5 channels all at once (inasmuch thought, and thus speech, is unable to keep up with the resultant cacophonic ‘white noise’), that the brain cells themselves undergo a non-volitional (chemical) excitation of such a magnitude as to be almost impossible for awareness to sustain itself (as in too much to bear).
It is altogether unpleasant, to say the least.
Some peoples I have spoken to about this have initially been rather envious (given that having a cup or two of strong java, then, is the equivalent of dropping a tab of acid (or snorting a line of coke) until I explain that to OD on LSD (aka ‘have a bad trip’) on maybe a thrice-daily basis is not a particularly pleasant way of living a life.
As I have not taken either amphetamine nor methamphetamine, which are also classified as central nervous system (CNS) stimulants, I cannot make an experiential comparison there either but I have read, for example, that methylphenidate (such as ‘Ritalin’) – also a CNS stimulant – is a dopamine reuptake inhibitor ... which means that it increases the level of the dopamine neurotransmitter in the brain by partially blocking the transporters that remove it from the synapses. Consequently I have found the following to be of interest as I am also hypersensitive to adrenaline:

• dopamine: an amine that occurs esp. in nervous and peripheral tissue as a neurotransmitter and a precursor of noradrenaline, adrenalin, and melanin. (Oxford Dictionary).

Here is an example of what dopamine can do in a normal person:

• Dopamine in the basal ganglia plays a critical role in the way our brain controls our movements. Thus, shortage of dopamine is a cause of Parkinson’s disease, in which a person loses the ability to execute smooth, controlled movements. In the frontal lobes, dopamine plays a role in controlling the flow of information from other areas of the brain. Dopamine disorders in the frontal lobes can cause incoherent thought and even schizophrenia. One of the most effective treatments for schizophrenia is the use of antipsychotic drugs which act as antagonists at dopamine D2 receptors. Shortage of dopamine in the frontal lobes may lead to poor memory. Dopamine also acts in the limbic system, which controls our emotions. Overabundance of dopamine in the limbic system is believed to cause paranoia. In addition, dopamine is involved in the chemistry of pleasure. Release of dopamine into that part of the limbic system known as the ‘pleasure centre’ (an area just below the thalamus) causes pleasure. Although meant to reward vital activities such as eating and sex, this same mechanism is responsible for the craving connected with addiction to drugs, cocaine for example. Dopamine is also a hormone released by the hypothalamus. Its main function is to inhibit the release of prolactin from the anterior lobe of the pituitary. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dopamine).

As there are no emotions/passions operating in this flesh and blood body – no affective faculty at all – there is no ‘pleasure centre’ (which should read ‘pleasure/pain centre’) for dopamine to act upon hedonistically ... thus there is no craving whatsoever such as to occasion addiction.
• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Is this [caffeine setting off a psychotropic experience] true for all humans?
• [Richard]: ‘Not that I am cognisant of ... the normal symptoms of caffeine intoxication are restlessness, nervousness, excitement, insomnia, flushed face, diuresis, gastrointestinal complaints, muscle twitching, rambling flow of thought and speech, cardiac arrhythmia, and psychomotor agitation.

• Caffeine (...) causes the release of the hormone epinephrine, which in turn leads to several effects such as higher heart rate, increased blood pressure, increased blood flow to muscles, decreased blood flow to the skin and inner organs, and release of glucose by the liver. In addition, caffeine, similar to amphetamines, increases the levels of the neurotransmitter dopamine in the brain. (...) Caffeine intoxication can lead to symptoms similar to panic disorder and generalized anxiety disorder. (http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine).

Some years ago, whilst undergoing caffeine intoxication, I attended an out-patients clinic and had all the vital signs tested – blood pressure, pulse rate, and so on – all of which were found to be normal and nor were there any palpitations, agitations, and so on, either ... let alone anxiety and/or panic.
Caffeine, of course, is also present in brewed tea (2.5-3.5mg per ounce), cocoa/hot chocolate (0.5mg per ounce), caffeinated soft drinks (3-8mg per ounce), Guarana, (2.5mg per ounce), Yerba Mate (280-425mg per ounce), sports/energy drinks (10mg per ounce), and chocolate (25mg per ounce) ... and, as a matter of interest only, chocolate is very mildly psychoactive since, as well as caffeine, it contains theobromine, tryptophan, and small quantities of anandamide (arachidonylethanolamine), an endogenous cannabinoid compound found in the brain of mammals (the name anandamide is taken from the Sanskrit word ananda, which means ‘bliss’).
An affective reaction, in other words, is the main attraction. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 53, 20 November 2003).

Before the incident with the caffeine overdose here is an example of how I described the 1993-94 experience:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘How did you experience the mental anguish from the perspective of actual freedom?
• [Richard]: ‘As a severe cerebral agitation ... it all happened only in the brain cells. There was perfect sensate experiencing: the direct, startlingly intimate sensuousness of the eyes seeing, the ears hearing, the skin feeling, the nose smelling and the tongue tasting all of their own accord (deliciously unfettered by a ‘me’ or an ‘I’) yet the cognitive faculty was face-to-face with the stark fact that it had been living a deluded dissociative state for eleven years ... and that religion – fuelled by its spirituality and mysticism – was nothing short of institutionalised insanity. That this disconcerting perplexity was only cerebral was evidenced by no sweaty palms, no increased heartbeat, no rapid breathing, no palpations in the solar plexus ... none of those things connected with the existential angst of being a contingent ‘being’. If I were to look in a mirror during that period and ask ‘who am I’ there was no answer – not even ‘the silence that speaks louder than words’ that had been experienced for eleven years – yet the answer to ‘what am I’ was patently obvious and undeniable ... I am this flesh and blood body.
In psychiatric terms the neurons were agitated: energised and excited with an excess of dopamine in the post-synaptic receptors, described as being similar to the effect of amphetamines, cocaine or LSD ... yet nothing could be done about it with psychiatry’s extensive arsenal of anti-psychotic drugs. Initially I had no alternative but to seek resolution in terms of either ‘the known’ (psychiatry) and/or ‘the unknown’ (mysticism) ... and I knew from eleven years experience that no mystic could be of any assistance whatsoever. I was truly on my own. The mental anguish was in determining the validity of uncharted territory – 5,000 years of recorded history and perhaps 50,000 years of oral tradition made no mention of this dimension of human experience – for I was irreversibly plunked fair-square in the midst of either ‘insanity’ (the psychiatric model) or ‘the unknowable’ (the metaphysical model) ... which is something else entirely. In the context of metaphysical human experience this condition is only achievable after physical death: the Buddhists call it ‘Parinirvana’ and the Hindus call it ‘Mahasamadhi’. (...).
It was extremely uncomfortable and very disconcerting, perplexing and bewildering. It was also distressing for my companion and caused considerable disturbance in her ... she was a constant witness to my endeavour to come to grips with what had happened and what was going on. Despite the fact she was a qualified nursing sister this was beyond her ken and altogether too much to handle in the first few months. I must emphasise the immediacy and urgency of the dilemma: how could I be right and 5.8 billion peoples then currently alive (and maybe 4.0 billion once living) be wrong? This was an outrageous supposition to contemplate – as I remarked in my previous E-Mail I thought that I had lost the plot – yet all about people were hurting and being hurt: bickering, quarrelling, arguing, fighting and then applying band-aid solutions such as the cycle of guilt, remorse, repentance, forgiveness, empathy, trust, compassion through to love ... until next time.
There were 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 and the such-like to account for ... and all the Gurus and the God-Men, the Masters and the Messiahs, the Avatars and the Saviours, and the Saints and the Sages and the Seers, did not have peace-on-earth on their agenda. Obviously someone had to be the first ... and this fact was thrilling to the nth degree. It meant that an actual freedom from the human condition, here on earth in this lifetime, as this flesh and blood body had been discovered and could be demonstrated and described ... no one else need ever take that route again (and I would not wish upon anyone to have to follow in my footsteps and run that full gamut of existential angst to break through to what lay beyond). (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 7, 14 June 2000).

And before the incident with the caffeine overdose here is an example of how I described the 1981 experience:

• [Richard]: ‘I had a constant pressure-pain in the base of my skull for six months after my 1981 experience (and for thirty months after my 1992 experience). This pressure-pain waxed and waned in intensity and would produce a convulsive jerking of my left leg for periods varying from five minutes to an hour. I have had flashing lights ‘zapping’ in front of my eyes; I have had ‘rushes’ of energy surging up through my diaphragm; I have had intense tingling sensations on the surface of my skin; I have had liquid sounds ‘gurgling’ through my brain; I have had singing in my ears; I have been telepathic; I have been telemetric; I have accessed the ‘Akashic Record’; I have ... the list goes on and on.
They all amount to nothing in the end – they are but physical, emotional, mental and psychic adumbrations that indicate merely that a ‘process’ is going on. It is important to not get hung up on these manifestations and to go with what is happening to the very end. (Richard, Konrad Correspondence, A Dialogue One, 22 February 1998).

I see that I expanded upon this list in an e-mail to you last month:

• [Richard]: ‘... I had many bizarre things happen such as electrical bolts of lightning dazzling on the eyeballs; pressure-pains in the base of the neck; surges of power travelling up the spine and up over the back and the top of the head down to the forehead; convulsive twitching of limbs; energy surges from the pit of the stomach up through the diaphragm into the chest cavity through to the throat producing intense nausea; a vivid blue light, an internal blue of rapturous bliss, behind the eyebrows; an all-knowing cyclopean eye in the sky watching my every move and many, many other weird things – none of which are important in themselves (some people get caught up in them, and manifest psychic powers, thus never proceeding to the final goal) as what is important is to take them only as a sign that a process is underway and thus proceed with all dispatch via one’s active consent. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 60, 3 December 2003).

Given the part dopamine plays in the chemistry of felicitous feelings you may find the following to be of related interest:

• [Richard]: ‘... What the wide and wondrous path to an actual freedom is on about is a virtual freedom wherein the ‘good’ feelings – the affectionate and desirable emotions and passions (those that are loving and trusting) are minimised along with the ‘bad’ feelings – the hostile and invidious emotions and passions (those that are hateful and fearful) – so that one is free to be feeling good, feeling happy and harmless and feeling excellent/perfect for 99% of the time. If one deactivates the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ feelings and activates the felicitous/ innocuous feelings (happiness, delight, joie de vivre/ bonhomie, friendliness, amiability and so on) with this freed-up affective energy, in conjunction with sensuousness (delectation, enjoyment, appreciation, relish, zest, gusto and so on), then the ensuing sense of amazement, marvel and wonder can result in apperceptiveness (unmediated perception).
Delight is what is humanly possible, given sufficient pure intent obtained from the felicity/ innocuity born of the pure consciousness experience, and from the position of delight, one can vitalise one’s joie de vivre by the amazement at the fun of it all ... and then one can – with sufficient abandon – become over-joyed and move into marvelling at being here and doing this business called being alive now. Then one is no longer intuitively making sense of life ... the delicious wonder of it all drives any such instinctive meaning away. Such luscious wonder fosters the innate condition of naiveté – the nourishing of which is essential if fascination in it all is to occur – and the charm of life itself easily engages dedication to peace-on-earth. Then, as one gazes intently at the world about by glancing lightly with sensuously caressing eyes, out of the corner of one’s eye comes – sweetly – the magical fairy-tale-like paradise that this verdant earth actually is ... and one is the experiencing of what is happening.
But refrain from possessing it and making it your own ... or else ‘twill vanish as softly as it appeared. (Richard, Articles, A Précis of Actual Freedom).

January 20 2004

RESPONDENT: Peter, your (or Richard’s) criticisms of Einstein sound anything but down-to-earth or sensible at this stage. I think Respondent No. 56’s phrase ‘boneheaded absolutism’ describes it somewhat more accurately.

RICHARD: I am somewhat bemused as to why you would say that what I wrote regarding Mr. Albert Einstein sounds anything but down-to-earth or sensible ... let alone endorsing another’s phrase ‘boneheaded absolutism’ as describing it more accurately. Viz.:

• boneheaded:. (slang) thick-headed, stupid. (Oxford Dictionary).
• absolutism: an absolute doctrine, principle, or standard. (American Heritage® Dictionary).

Whereabouts in my e-mail discussion with you have I ever departed from being down-to-earth or sensible ... let alone been a thick-headed, stupid, person who holds an absolute doctrine, principle, or standard?