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Richard’s Correspondence On The Actual Freedom Mailing List with Correspondent No. 60
(...) RICHARD: It is not my version of the hymnic ‘peace on earth/ good will to all mankind’ which is on offer on The Actual Freedom Trust web site at all: it is, rather, the already always existing peace-on-earth of this actual world – as evidenced in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) – where it is startling obvious that it be something which no amount of behavioural pattern alteration will ever bring about. RESPONDENT: No kidding? RICHARD: I am not kidding when I report how startling obvious it is in a PCE that to be superficially altering behavioural patterns – such as being a vegetarian, a vegan, a fruitarian, or a pacifist (aka practicing non-violence/ ahimsa) – will ever bring about that already always existing peace-on-earth.
RESPONDENT: I am not sure I understand the actualist attitude toward vegetarianism. RICHARD: As one can eat meat, or not eat meat, and still classify themself as an actualist there is no [quote] ‘actualist attitude’ [endquote] to either understand or not understand ... as clearly expressed in the explanation of mine which that vegetarians versus omnivores diatribe you are buying into was cooked-up out of. Viz.:
I even give examples of what such a choice might be based upon:
And that ‘act of freedom’ I speak about there refers back to the second paragraph in that explanation:
RESPONDENT: Once the predator within is no longer extant ... RICHARD: That explanation of mine is all about malice being no longer extant. Viz.:
Has it not occurred to you that in order for an act to be classified as [quote] ‘a malicious act’ [endquote] it must, perforce, contain malice? For example:
And here are some synonyms:
RESPONDENT: ... I would have thought the main reasons we cause unnecessary suffering to our fellow sentient beings would go with them. RICHARD: No domesticated animal need ever suffer (let alone unnecessarily) – and I speak from first-hand knowledge here as I was born and raised on a farm – nor any animal hunted in the wild, either, for that matter (and again I speak from personal experience). RESPONDENT: Are feeling/ belief the only reasons to want to spare a fellow mammal the experience of an abattoir? I don’t get this. RICHARD: There is nothing to get ... that entire vegetarians versus omnivores diatribe you are buying into is/was a beat-up from the very start.
(...) CO-RESPONDENT: I don’t at all think that the P/V/R are unfriendly – the contrary actually ... most the correspondents resort to all kinds of things sooner or later once the initial sugar coated responses don’t work. Whereas R/P/V are consistent from the beginning to the end – they don’t play favourites mostly. Why should I demand friendliness from them? Can’t I take the bare facts? I think I can. If I clearly see that what they are saying is not factual, would it produce so much bitterness in me? etc. RESPONDENT: Yes, I see no reason why not. Example only: while you clearly see that what they are saying is not factual, you are utterly unable to point this out in a way that makes a difference, and your inability to do so makes further meaningful dialogue impossible. And all the while it is portrayed as/regarded as your problem and your problem only. (See No. 89’s fruitless conversations with the actualists re the nature of matter, for example. RICHARD: Those conversations regarding the nature of matter were only fruitless because they were stymied right from the start with the assertion, in an e-mail entitled [quote] ‘Matter does not mean anything at all’ [endquote], that matter does not appear anywhere in phenomenal space and has no phenomenal meaning. Viz.:
If I may ask? How is that an example of you clearly seeing that what they [Peter, Vineeto, Richard] are saying is not factual; that you are utterly unable to point this out in a way that makes a difference; that your inability to do so makes further meaningful dialogue impossible; that all the while it is portrayed as/regarded as your problem and your problem only? RESPONDENT: See No. 90’s frustrated and futile attempts to get straight answers about how Richard can know he was the first to be actually free from the HC, for another example. RICHARD: Here is what I was actually asked :
As it is blatantly obvious, given that no historical records exist, that a person designated as being a male (and not a female) living in a tribe (and not living alone) on the eastern half (and not the western half) of the land-mass nowadays known as New Guinea (the western half is currently called Irian Jaya) in the year 10005 BCE (and not some other date) is but an invention, a hypothetical person, an intellectual creation, an abstract entity, a theoretical personage, an imaginative figure, then it is remarkably easy to know how ... to wit: only flesh and blood bodies can be actually free from the human condition. If I might again ask? How is that an example of you clearly seeing that what they [Peter, Vineeto, Richard] are saying is not factual; that you are utterly unable to point this out in a way that makes a difference; that your inability to do so makes further meaningful dialogue impossible; that all the while it is portrayed as/regarded as your problem and your problem only? RESPONDENT: Those kind of interactions can produce frustration, and the frustration is not necessarily a result of the actualists being in possession of the ‘bare facts’. RICHARD: As the ‘bare fact’ in your first example is that matter does indeed exist in space and
time So as to forestall the obvious rejoinder: yes, that is indeed me portraying it as/regarding it as your problem and your problem only.
CO-RESPONDENT: I don’t at all think that the P/V/R are unfriendly – the contrary actually ... most the correspondents resort to all kinds of things sooner or later once the initial sugar coated responses don’t work. Whereas R/P/V are consistent from the beginning to the end – they don’t play favourites mostly. Why should I demand friendliness from them? Can’t I take the bare facts? I think I can. If I clearly see that what they are saying is not factual, would it produce so much bitterness in me? etc. RESPONDENT: Yes, I see no reason why not. Example only: while you clearly see that what they are saying is not factual, you are utterly unable to point this out in a way that makes a difference, and your inability to do so makes further meaningful dialogue impossible. And all the while it is portrayed as/regarded as your problem and your problem only. (See No. 89’s fruitless conversations with the actualists re the nature of matter, for example. RICHARD: Those conversations regarding the nature of matter were only fruitless because they were stymied right from the start with the assertion, in an e-mail entitled [quote] ‘Matter does not mean anything at all’ [endquote], that matter does not appear anywhere in phenomenal space and has no phenomenal meaning. RESPONDENT: No, that is not what stymied them right from the start; it began long before that ... RICHARD: If I might interject? In that case, and as generalisations without substance are pointless, which conversations long before that, regarding the nature of matter, are you now proposing as an example of you clearly seeing that what Peter, Vineeto, and Richard are saying is not factual? * RICHARD: Viz.:
If I may ask? How is that an example of you clearly seeing that what they [Peter, Vineeto, Richard] are saying is not factual; that you are utterly unable to point this out in a way that makes a difference; that your inability to do so makes further meaningful dialogue impossible; that all the while it is portrayed as/regarded as your problem and your problem only? RESPONDENT: Heh, if you think I’m going to even *try* to succeed where No. 89 has failed, no way ... RICHARD: Am I to take it that you, too, assert that matter does not appear anywhere in phenomenal space and has no phenomenal meaning? RESPONDENT: ... I’ll not bloody my forehead against that wall. RICHARD: Then why make the claim, that you clearly see what Peter, Vineeto, and Richard are saying is not factual, in the first place if you are not prepared to follow through with it? * RESPONDENT: See No. 90’s frustrated and futile attempts to get straight answers about how Richard can know he was the first to be actually free from the HC, for another example. RICHARD: Here is what I was actually asked :
As it is blatantly obvious, given that no historical records exist, that a person designated as being a male (and not a female) living in a tribe (and not living alone) on the eastern half (and not the western half) of the land-mass nowadays known as New Guinea (the western half is currently called Irian Jaya) in the year 10005 BCE (and not some other date) is but an invention, a hypothetical person, an intellectual creation, an abstract entity, a theoretical personage, an imaginative figure, then it is remarkably easy to know how ... to wit: only flesh and blood bodies can be actually free from the human condition. If I might again ask? How is that an example of you clearly seeing that what they [Peter, Vineeto, Richard] are saying is not factual; that you are utterly unable to point this out in a way that makes a difference; that your inability to do so makes further meaningful dialogue impossible; that all the while it is portrayed as/regarded as your problem and your problem only? RESPONDENT: Those kind of interactions can produce frustration, and the frustration is not necessarily a result of the actualists being in possession of the ‘bare facts’. RICHARD: As the ‘bare fact’ in your first example is that matter does indeed exist in space and time, and as the ‘bare fact’ in your second example is that invented peoples, hypothetical persons, intellectual creations, abstract entities, theoretical personages, imaginative figures, cannot ever actually be anything (let alone actually free from the human condition), then it would appear that looking elsewhere for the source of your frustration may very well be a more beneficial line of enquiry to pursue. So as to forestall the obvious rejoinder: yes, that is indeed me portraying it as/regarding it as your problem and your problem only. RESPONDENT: Yes, of course ... RICHARD: Good ... I am pleased that, if nothing else, that is clear, then. RESPONDENT: ... even if there were hundreds of people with the same problem, it’d still be their problem ‘only’. Oh, and theirs. And theirs. And theirs. Each one uniquely the same. RICHARD: Not uniquely, no ... only each one with the same frustration in common. RESPONDENT: ‘Woof! Woof!’ RICHARD: Whilst a commonly experienced frustration, when faced with a new paradigm, could indeed be a conditioned response there are other possible reasons for such an occurrence. Just plain old sour-grapes, for instance, as in the ‘tall-poppy’ syndrome ... otherwise known as invidia
CO-RESPONDENT: Can’t I take the bare facts? I think I can. If I clearly see that what [people] are saying is not factual, would it produce so much bitterness in me? etc. RESPONDENT: Yes, I see no reason why not. <specific example snipped, will revisit if necessary> Richard, would you say that if Fred feels bitter about what Joan is saying, it must be because Joan is speaking the truth, and Fred doesn’t like it? Yes? No? RICHARD: No (simply because a fact just sits there, as it were, effectively rendering any feelings about it null and void): a quite plausible reason why there is dislike could very well be because of much-repeated instances of same ... nothing quite galls the way being virtually forever offside does (especially when it is somehow known that it is the indefensible which is being defended anyway). That particular insight, by the way, into one of the more wackier workings of ‘me’ comes per favour my previous companion.
RESPONDENT: Does translation/ interpretation stop with ‘me’? RICHARD: Yes. RESPONDENT: Aren’t all other contents of consciousness, including sensation, similarly constrained by the impossibility of stepping outside the perceiving apparatus? RICHARD: There is no constraint: as a flesh and blood body only one is the perceiving apparatus (to use your phrasing) and, as flesh and blood bodies are not separate from that which they form themself with, one is the infinite and eternal and perpetual universe experiencing itself apperceptively ... as such it is stunningly aware of its own infinitude. And this is truly wonderful. RESPONDENT: It seems to me the crux of the disagreement/ misunderstanding between No. 89 and actualists. (Or maybe it’s mine alone) ;-) RICHARD: Oh, there is no misunderstanding here.
RESPONDENT: Richard, before I hit the road again, I have a question that seems pretty important. Re-reading some of your selected writings, I rediscovered this:
If the activation of love, compassion, humility, goodness, moral purity, and a passionate faith in the Divine Order etc is not 180 degrees opposite from what you now recommend, it’s pretty damn close, no? RICHARD: What I now recommend is essentially no different to what I have recommended ever since first becoming apparent on the thirtieth of October 1992 and which is basically the same as what the identity in residence recommended, to anyone prepared to listen at the time, when ‘he’ set about imitating the actual – as evidenced in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) in late July 1980 – on and after the first of January 1981 ... to wit: being relentlessly attentive to, each moment again, and scrupulously honest about, how that only moment of ever being alive was experienced so as to feel as happy and as harmless (as free of malice and sorrow) as was humanly possible inasmuch any deviation from such felicity/innocuity was attended to with the utmost dispatch in order to live as peacefully and as harmoniously as ‘he’ could with ‘his’ then wife and children, in particular, and with anyone and everyone who came into ‘his’ presence. And all that came about – albeit nowhere nearly spelled-out so clearly and concisely Furthermore, that way of living was so successful, for the first three months or so of that year, that ‘he’ was wont to exclaim, to all and sundry, that ‘he’ had discovered the secret to life (for that is how far beyond normal human expectations the felicitous/ innocuous state which has nowadays become known as being virtually free truly is) and ‘he’ was perplexed as to why, it being such a simple thing to do, no-one had ever done it before. Then an event occurred of such impact as to be the turning-point, in regards no longer going directly to what numerous PCE’s evidenced (namely that what is now known as an actual freedom from the human condition was possible here on earth, in this lifetime, as this flesh and blood body), and relates back to the initial PCE which set in motion the whole process wherein, unbeknownst to the experiencing due to a total lack of any precedent, it had devolved into an altered state of consciousness (ASC) when a new identity had all-of-a-sudden come into existence ... a grand ‘Me’, a glorious ‘Me’, a fulfilled ‘Me’ who was none other than the long-awaited Saviour Of Humankind! That impactive event took place whilst keenly watching the sunrise casting its brilliant rays earthward, one otherwise-experienced-as-perfect morning in mid-autumn, upon seeing an ornamental bush thus lit, in the garden alongside the ex-farmhouse, luminously aglow, fiercely afire from within as it were, wherefrom it was revealed to ‘Me’ that there was to be a death and a rebirth and, consequently, a catatonic state ensued that resulted in ‘Me’ being carted off to hospital, and kept under intensive care for four hours, until coming out of it in a state of Radiant Bliss (which quite overwhelmed the duty-nurse by the way). ‘He’ was never to be the same again, as Divinity had been working on ‘him’ whilst catatonic, and from that date forward ‘he’ was permanently in a state of human bliss and love ... ‘he’ could do no wrong. As ‘he’ had surrendered to, and thus lived in, love and oneness ‘he’ moved in and out of sacred states of Heavenly Bliss, Love Agapé and Divine Compassion; ‘he’ immersed ‘himself’ in the entire process with dedication and resolution; ‘he’ adopted the principle of pacifism (‘turn the other cheek’) and developed a goodness of the highest order; ‘he’ cleansed and purified ‘himself’ of all impure thoughts and deeds; ‘he’ worked both hard and industriously in ‘his’ daily work; ‘he’ practised honesty and humility in all ‘his’ interactions; ‘he’ pondered the significance and ramifications of the Divine Order; ‘he’ totally believed in and had supreme faith in The Absolute – ‘he’ never doubted the ability of That to bring about the Peace On Earth so long promised – and that ‘he’ was to play the central role in that Divine Plan no longer came as a surprise to ‘him’ as ‘he’ realised that ‘he’ had long yearned to be part of the Salvation Process. The following more or less sums it up:
RESPONDENT: The method you now recommend (minimising ‘good’/’bad’ feelings, activating felicity/ sensuousness) is what you used only after the ego had already dissolved. RICHARD: The method I now recommend is essentially no different to the course of action I have recommended ever since first becoming apparent and which is basically the same as the way the identity in residence recommended a normal life be lived, when ‘he’ first devised and put into practice what has now become known as the actualism method, on and after the first of January 1981. Incidentally, that way of living/that course of action did not ... um ... officially become a method until early 1998. And it only came about because of being told to either send more information or draw a clearer map to paradise, on a mailing list set-up under the auspices of the teachings Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti brought into the world, for no other reason than (despite the fact that they are rife throughout most, if not all, of those teachings) any and all methods, ways, paths, and so on, were anathema to his readers/listeners. Viz.:
RESPONDENT: It worked, but *only when you were in an Altered State Of Being*, having permanently dissolved your sense of personal identity in an oceanic feeling of oneness with all creation. RICHARD: Just so that there is no misunderstanding: what really worked, when the identity was that ‘Altered State Of Being’, was
And it was that last-named – the wide-eyed wonder of naiveté – which resulted in apperceptiveness (unmediated perception). RESPONDENT: To put it mildly, that [an altered state of being] is not my starting point ... RICHARD: Neither was it ‘my’ starting point ... for instance:
And for another instance:
RESPONDENT: ... and neither is it the starting point of anyone else around here. RICHARD: I have had on-line discussions with quite a few self-realised beings (albeit mostly of the just-add-water-and-stir-thoroughly variety) ... plus several face-to-face discussions over the years. Quite simply: one starts wherever one is at. RESPONDENT: I well understand that you reject enlightenment as a tried and failed solution to the ills of humankind, and I understand why. BUT, my question concerns the method, not the goal. In one of our early conversations, you said to me that when your ego ‘died’ you were only seconds away from an actual freedom, if only you had known at the time that such a thing was possible:
So ... you activated the process of self-immolation by activating powerful passions. RICHARD: The identity inhabiting this body activated the process of *partial* ‘self’-immolation – the ego-dissolution, or death of the ego, referred to in the above exchange – by activating love and compassion (and rapture and euphoria and ecstasy and bliss and so on) ... whereas the process of ‘self’-immolation *in toto* involved the deactivation of those antidotal pacifiers for malice and sorrow (and all those others). RESPONDENT: Not innocuous felicitous feelings but powerful, red-hot passions. RICHARD: The felicitous/ innocuous feelings are in no way docile, lack-lustre affections ... in conjunction with sensuosity they make for an extremely forceful/ potent combination as, with all of the affective energy channelled into being as happy and harmless as is humanly possible (and no longer being frittered away on love and compassion/ malice and sorrow), the full effect of ‘me’ at the core of ‘my’ being – which is ‘being’ itself – is dynamically enabled for one purpose and one purpose alone. RESPONDENT: No wonder you were able to engage the whole of your being in this process. RICHARD: So as to inject a modicum of commonsense into your train of thought: the identity inhabiting this body was able to engage the whole of ‘his’ being in the process which led to ‘self’-immolation in toto, via first undergoing an ego-death/ ego-dissolution, primarily and ultimately because of pure intent. And the key to unlocking such naiveté is sincerity, pure and simple. RESPONDENT: And from where I stand, there’s little wonder that no-one else has. RICHARD: Where one stands does, of course, determine what one sees. RESPONDENT: (9 months of intense ‘self’-immolation vs. 10 years of mere reconditioning is what it comes down to as I see it). RICHARD: Ha ... there is much more to an entirely-new model than just ripping the engine of the ole hog apart and giving it a reco so that it will be good for another few hundred thou or so. Much, much more ... do you realise that what you are saying, in effect, is that all what is required for any realised/ enlightened/ awakened being, to become actually free from the human condition, is but a re-working what remains of identity (the deeper and most fundament part) after partial ‘self’-immolation? RESPONDENT: So why, if you were mere seconds away from ‘self’-immolation using the original method, do you now recommend an altogether different one (almost 180 degrees opposite) that only worked after your ego had dissolved? RICHARD: Hmm ... if what you really want is to become realised/ enlightened/ awakened
And if that intense human love cannot immediately be felt (as in step No. 1 above) then the quickest way to activate it is to go deeply into personal sorrow (which can readily be done just by feeling sad about the whole sorry mess which is the human condition and empathy will take over) until it becomes universal sorrow – the essential pathos of all sentient creatures – whereupon it flips over and turns into compassion ... which passion, upon fully flowering in all its goodness and charity, becomes a radiant love for all suffering beings. Then move on to step No. 2. RESPONDENT: It seems to me that using the first method would be *heaps* more potent than second because it engages the passions instead of (trying to) systematically undermine them – which, in my personal experience, only takes the wind out of one’s sails. RICHARD: The actualism method is not about undermining the passions ... on the contrary, it is about directing all of that affective energy into being the felicitous/ innocuous feelings (that is, ‘me’ at the core of ‘my’ being, which is ‘being’ itself) in order to effect a deliberate imitation of the actual, as evidenced in a PCE, so as to feel as happy and as harmless (as free of malice and sorrow) as is humanly possible whilst remaining a ‘self’. Such imitative felicity/ innocuity, in conjunction with sensuosity, readily evokes amazement, marvel, and delight – a state of wide-eyed wonder best expressed by the word naiveté (the nearest a ‘self’ can come to innocence whilst being a ‘self’) – and which allows the overarching benignity and benevolence inherent to the infinitude, which this infinite and eternal and perpetual universe actually is, to operate more and more freely. This intrinsic benignity and benevolence, which has nothing to do with the imitative affective happiness and harmlessness, will do the rest. All that was required was ‘my’ cheerful, and thus willing, concurrence.
CO-RESPONDENT: Practically speaking: How do you see that something needs to be done? RICHARD: The way something is seen to be needing to be done, sans the imaginative/ intuitive facility, is by virtue of the cognitive, ratiocinative/ conceptive and insightful faculty being able to operate freely under an overall apperceptive attentiveness/ awareness. (...) CO-RESPONDENT: I would like to ask, lastly, if we have also reached agreement in our example that an observer, looking comparatively at you and a person still equipped with an identity put in the same situation, would not be able to see any difference between the two reactions to the approaching car. RICHARD: The illustrative example provided in my initial response was just that (an illustrative example) ... as I neither drive nor own such a vehicle as you mention – I do not even have a driver’s licence – I am unable to answer your query. CO-RESPONDENT: Let the illustrative example be that you’re not driving, but standing on the road, and that a car is suddenly coming at you with high speed. RICHARD: As I am not wont to be standing on those black ribbons of death and destruction (whereon a cross between Russian roulette and Vatican roulette gets played out around the clock) – will it suffice to substitute one of those occasions of being about to step onto a pedestrian crossing only to have a pedestrian-expurgator (a pedestrian who has amnesia about having been just that the moment they get behind the wheel) suddenly appear, as if out of nowhere and with both feet firmly planted on the gas-pedal, for your example? RESPONDENT: A tangential question if I may? Do you avoid those black ribbons of death mainly/entirely as a personal choice (practical reasons, risk assessment, cost, pollution, etc) ... RICHARD: Yes ... and here is a query which will bring your tangential question back on topic (how things are seen sans the imaginative/ intuitive facility) in a trice: as it is far, far safer (in terms of risk to life and limb) to be in the ocean – swimming, diving, surfing, and so on – than on the roads then why would those peoples terrified of sharks not be mega-terrified of motor vehicles? The same, of course, applies to walking through long grass (venomous reptiles), poking around in odd areas (poisonous arthropods), being in exposed places in a storm (lightning strikes), living in densely foliated/ forested areas (wildfires), and so forth. What price rationality
CO-RESPONDENT: Reported saying of the Buddha, in Bahiya Sutta: ‘Then, Bahiya, you should train yourself thus: In reference to the seen, there will be only the seen. In reference to the heard, only the heard. In reference to the sensed, only the sensed. In reference to the cognized, only the cognized. That is how you should train yourself. When for you there will be only the seen in reference to the seen, only the heard in reference to the heard, only the sensed in reference to the sensed, only the cognized in reference to the cognized, then, Bahiya, there is no you in terms of that. When there is no you in terms of that, there is no you there. When there is no you there, you are neither here nor yonder nor between the two. This, just this, is the end of stress’. ‘Monks, Bahiya of the Bark-cloth was wise. He practiced the Dhamma in accordance with the Dhamma and did not pester me with issues related to the Dhamma. Bahiya of the Bark-cloth, monks, is totally unbound’. Then, on realizing the significance of that, the Blessed One on that occasion exclaimed: Where water, earth, fire, & wind have no footing: There the stars do not shine, the sun is not visible, the moon does not appear, darkness is not found. And when a sage, a brahman through sagacity, has known [this] for himself, then from form & formless, from bliss & pain, he is freed’. [endquote]. I like Buddha, because (some of) what he says has just the right mix of matter-of-fact-ness an poetry. As it all has been said so often, as I think I have found the form of life that makes the problem of life disappear, as I can only thank all the people on this list – and so many other, in fact, the whole universe – there’s nothing left to say. What a lovely holiday. RESPONDENT: Yeah, me too. When all’s said and done, it really is very simple. It’s about finding out, from experience, whatever it is one needs to know. Then it’s only a matter of being it, doing it, living it. Nice to have ‘met’ you, No 103; you sure livened things up around here! RICHARD: Somehow I am reminded of the following perspicacious words (deliberately left un-attributed for reasons which may become apparent):
CORRESPONDENT No. 60 (Part Eight) RETURN TO THE ACTUAL FREEDOM MAILING LIST INDEX RETURN TO RICHARD’S CORRESPONDENCE INDEX The Third Alternative (Peace On Earth In This Life Time As This Flesh And Blood Body) Here is an actual freedom from the Human Condition, surpassing Spiritual Enlightenment and any other Altered State Of Consciousness, and challenging all philosophy, psychiatry, metaphysics (including quantum physics with its mystic cosmogony), anthropology, sociology ... and any religion along with its paranormal theology. Discarding all of the beliefs that have held humankind in thralldom for aeons, the way has now been discovered that cuts through the ‘Tried and True’ and enables anyone to be, for the first time, a fully free and autonomous individual living in utter peace and tranquillity, beholden to no-one.
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