|
Richard’s Correspondence On Mailing List ‘D’ with Correspondent No. 38 (Please make sure java-scripting is enabled in order for the mouse-hover tool-tips to function properly; mouse-hover on the yellow rectangular image to enlarge; left-click on the image to hold).
Re: Introversion, feelings and AF RESPONDENT: Hello, Richard, I’ve been practicing the actualism method since July 2011, with pretty good results. However, there is a challenge for me: I have difficulties to be with other people. A little background history: before knowing actualism, my relationship to people was always chiaroscuro, ambivalent, that is: part of me wanted to be alone and part of me wanted anxiously to seek social activity in order to have/to consolidate friends/a girlfriend. Clearly, it was in part due to passions: fear to people vs. fear to be alone, or: the security of being alone vs the anxiety of needing to go out and expose myself. Also, I’ve always been pretty introverted, with its usual symptoms such as aversion to small talk, time alone to recharge, preference of small and quite places, hanging with fewer people, etc. Now, after practice, I’m more ok than ever with the idea of being alone and embrace that introversion. I don’t feel the same attraction to people; I don’t feel the need to actively seek them, but, at the same time, I wonder if that is causing the effect of me retreating from the world as it is, with people as they are. I wonder how much of it is about autonomy and how much about fear and conformism. So, I’ve been doing a lot of investigation about my fear and my aggression towards people. Those parts of ‘me’ are indeed pretty cunning: for instance, the line between social anxiety and introversion seems pretty diffuse. But those investigations are never enough when ‘I’ am pretty present and the time of meeting people or go to work with people comes. At those times I feel a lot of tension and resentment with the pure idea of having to do that in the immediate future. My questions are (speaking of idiosyncratic vs species’ instincts, as in your last message to [No.
36]). * Now that the group is more peaceful, I hope you can answer the original post of this thread. I’ve been investigating those aspects and understanding a lot of things lately, but I want to know if I’m missing some point. The reasons of why this is important to me are...
I would appreciate your or anyone else’s insight here. RICHARD: G’day No. 38, Although I never thought of myself and/or described myself as being ‘introverted’ whilst a child, a youngster, a youth and a young man, I was most definitely not an extrovert (or any such word of that ilk) by any way of defining it. On the contrary, up until around 26 years of age I was beset by a rather debilitating shyness – a total cure was effected, within about 30 seconds flat circa mid-1973, by virtue of having taken on a job involving public speaking (on a passenger cruise-ship, amongst the islands and coral reefs off the north-eastern seaboard of Australia) – which was exacerbated in my early days by a pre-teen lisp. You may find the following to be of interest in regards your ‘introversion’ queries (and other, perhaps related, issues). Viz.: (Richard, List D, No. 19, 30 November 2009) I am happy to expand on what little I have already written – if you consider some aspect being fleshed-out will assist in answering your queries – but what I am making clear is, in effect, that if that sensitive/ shy/ day-dreaming/ cowardly/ appeasing/ prone-to-terror/ always pacifying/ romantic/ hyper-sexual feeling-being can become actually free of the human condition then anyone can. Oh, and ‘I’ was also a softie (as in, an easy touch), and not ‘hard-edged’ as another recently ascribed to ‘me’, and always optimistic (and, thus, not ‘cynical’ as was also erroneously attributed) regardless of whatever set-backs occurred. Ha ... my second wife (Devika/Irene) oft-times characterised me as ‘super-optimistic’ – but, then again, she was pessimistic by nature
– and often marvelled at the resilience she observed during that 30+ month period wherein the brain-cells of this flesh-and-blood body were (organically) reconfiguring
themselves Regards, Richard
Re: Moral cap and Authority RICHARD: (...), the better example is indeed ‘before civilisation’ as to ‘stake out a territory and start farming it’ marks the shift from a ‘free-range’ life-style to the ‘property-rights’ way of life (and, thereby, to the arising of a ‘peasant-mentality’). To explain: for a hunter-gatherer, the free-range life-style was epitomised by, basically, just helping oneself to whatever was available. With the advent of the property-rights way of life, however, any such ‘helping oneself’ transmogrified into being theft, larceny, stealing, despoliation, direption, and etcetera. Millennia later, all of this results in feeling-beings atavistically harbouring a deep, primordial *feeling* of being somehow disfranchised – the instinctual passions, being primeval, are still ‘wired’ for hunter-gathering – from some ancient ‘golden age’, wherein life was in some ill-defined way ‘free’ (e.g., ‘The Garden of Eden’), such as to affectively underpin all the class-wars (between the ‘haves and have-nots’) down through the ages. Unless this rudimentary *feeling* of disfranchisement – of *feeling* somehow deprived of a fundamental franchise (franchise = the territory or limits within which immunity, privileges, rights, powers, etcetera may be exercised) – is primarily understood (to the point of being viscerally felt, even) any explanation of ‘peasant-mentality’ will be of superficial use only. A footnote appended to a 2005 online response of mine is as good a place to start as any. Viz.: [...snip query...].
The following day another respondent queried me on my above response; in my clarification I referred to the term ‘wage-slave’ as being, perhaps
more correctly, ‘modern-day serfdom’. Viz.: [...snip text...]. Although, for persons taking out a house-mortgage – typically, these days, over a 30-35 year period
(whereafter they find they have paid for three-four houses, whilst only being allocated one, per favour usurious banking guilds having usurped, several centuries ago[†],
the sovereign power of a nation-state to emit Even more to the point: the fact that modern-day women demanded the legal right to enter into such ‘indentured servitude’ alongside the traditional male ‘bread-winner’ – most family-households these days are double-income households (hence necessitating publicly-subsidised childcare facilities) – and thus further enriching that already obscenely-rich ‘class of usurers’ amply demonstrates how the ‘peasant-mentality’ is not a male-only trait. [...snip remainder of post...]. RESPONDENT: Hello, Richard, thanks for your post. It really helps me to understand the radical changes I’ve been through these years. What specifically comes to mind is the need for the peasant to derive from work not only food, clothing and shelter but also a secondary, but very powerful, layers of meaning, both as in individual and as a member of society. RICHARD: G’day No. 38, Yes, back in the 1970’s it took quite a while for ‘me’ as soul/ spirit – as in (according to the Oxford Dictionary), the non-physical part of a person which is the seat of the emotions, or sentiments, and character – to intuitively come to terms with what ‘I’ as ego had been thoughtfully contemplating for a number of years before finally intuiting, viscerally, that vocational/ occupational meaning or purpose (be it paid employment or voluntary work) had no such intrinsic value as ascribed, either personally or communally, and that any and all sentiments or judgements of that nature had been passed-on, affectively and psychically, from generation-to-generation over millennia. In other words, long-dead ‘beings’ (‘me’ at the core of ‘my’ being is ‘being’ itself) from long-ago eras were dictating, affectively and psychically, how peoples alive today were to derive meaning and/or purpose despite the fact that the mechanisation/ robotisation/ computerisation of productive work demonstrated conclusively that no such intrinsic value could possibly subsist therein. (The day when machines, robots and computers derive meaning and/or purpose – as in, dignity and redemption through a *feeling* of self-worth/ self-value/ self-esteem/ and etcetera/ ad nauseam – from their prodigious output of productive work is the day when the age of the porcine aviators must surely be upon us). RESPONDENT: I’ll try to explain my past and current experience: The reason why I decided to study a humanities career is because the ‘rebel’ in me wanted to understand reality and break free from all their implicit chains. Therefore, once I got more conscious about the whole historical process and caught by the Marxist and anarchist fashions in college, the ideas of work, authority and the like become frowned upon. Indeed, me and my colleagues look resentfully at the millionaire and business crowd, only to acquire the belief that social change was the way to work against inequality. With other, more traditional, friends and relatives, one takes said mentality aboard and put the meaning in ‘working hard to earn an honest life’. In other words, the meritocratic idea that the exit to the ‘peasant Matrix’ is dependent on oneself and one’s effort only, by reaching the higher levels of the hierarchy. These and other ideas mean the bout of perpetuation and resentment of the idea of work, with the secondary layers as support/ result: the deeply felt necessity of being creative, of giving something to the world, of being of use, of being a good citizen, of being a good Christian, etc., but also of feeling special for the contrary: of being a rebel, of fighting for the rights of the vulnerable classes, of rearranging the world to return to the supposedly virginal and peaceful state of the world, etc. The implicit error here is thinking that doing and changing something for society is actually doing something for its best interest, while it actually just means playing along within the same box, of pushing and pulling the strings of the same system. Speaking again from a solutions perspective, I think that the most insidious influence of marxism/ postmodernism/ feminism is that everything is relative and comes only from social constructs. This influence just gives the illusion of change by activism and armchair philosophizing, when, in reality, it’s the same ol’ fight of the opposites (male vs. female, proletariat vs. bourgeois, and so on) ... RICHARD: Speaking of ‘social constructs’ and their ‘illusion of change by activism’: what I have noticed, whilst pottering around the world-wide-web, is that those of a sinistral statist ideology (such as your ‘marxism/ postmodernism/ feminism’ wording is suggestive of) are apparently extracting meaning and/or purpose from busying themselves in the redressment of systemic cultural ‘wrongs’, via the heavy hand of state compulsion, through retaining tight control of ‘the public narrative’ – having long-ago seized the high moral ground of minority-group injustice (as per your ‘fighting for the rights of the vulnerable classes’ words) – on a yet-to-be-demonstrated premiss that an equitable society can be legislated into existence (i.e., imposed on all citizens at the point of state-owned/ state-controlled guns), in a ‘majority-rules’ society, on a ‘minorities-rule’ basis. RESPONDENT: ... and being oblivious of the real solution, which is the releasing of the affective weapons and shields in the first place, and thus solving the problem of the human condition. Returning to my personal point, nowadays it feels very different: I have a more individualistic approach to life; I have less attachment and, at the same time, less resentment towards the idea of work, I don’t think of it as special of meaningful or fulfilling; in fact, it shocks me when people tell me that they want to work practically forever, otherwise they would be bored. RICHARD: Ha ... having lived through the 1960’s era, when a significant number of that generation were questioning and/or eschewing the entire ‘work ethic’ mentality, it is a particularly remarkable oddity how all the public discourse back then, about the increasing need for meaningful leisure-time activities in the then-foreseeable future (due to the mechanisation/ robotisation/ computerisation of productive work), has not only come to naught but how double-income households have become the new norm instead. It is as if the succeeding generations lost the plot completely, in their rush to be ‘upwardly mobile’ – viz.: ‘advancing or likely to advance in economic and social standing’ ~ (American Heritage Dictionary); ‘moving or aspiring to move to a higher social class or to a position of increased status or power’ ~ (Collins Dictionary) – so as to accrue evermore flashier lifestyles of ostentatious wealth consumption, to the point of condemning their forebears for (purportedly) being a burden on the economy.By way of illustrating that latter point: in this country the worker-funded old-age pension – payments for which have been compulsorily deducted from worker’s pay-packets, at the rate of 7.5% of gross income, since the 1st of January 1946 – has all-of-a-sudden been arbitrarily declared ‘welfare payments’ and, under the catch-cry of ‘The Age of Entitlement is Over’, is no longer to be paid-out at age 65, as per that ... um ... that ‘social contract’ of 1946, and has been reset, by governmental fiat, to age 67 (on a graduated increase to age 70) along with a clearly-signalled intent to have it erode in monetary value, over time, via inflation. Meanwhile, in other news, the number of known billionaires this country’s economy is supporting – in the midst of a much-publicised ‘global financial crisis’ such as to (supposedly) necessitate governmental ‘belt-tightening’ measures as above – has increased to 25-26 and counting. Viz.: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Australians_by_net_worth ‘Tis a laugh-a-minute observing all this sanity in action, world-wide, on my computer-screen. RESPONDENT: My current preference and aspiration is to simply use work to exit the rat race by becoming financially independent and living a modest life, sooner rather than later. I guess that if these ideas are so controversial and appalling (to both the worried capitalist resented at you for not indulging in materialism and not feeding the economy, and the worried liberal resented for your egotism, your conformity to the economical status quo and your lack of social activism and care) is a good sign of progress and salubrity, haha. RICHARD: This is an apt place to make it crystal-clear that I am apolitical – I have no position anywhere at all on the conservative-progressive political spectrum (such as your ‘worried capitalist’ and ‘worried liberal’ terms indicate) – as there are only a few brief references in this regard on my portion of The Actual Freedom Trust web site. For instance:
* (Richard, List B, No. 21, 28 March 1998). *
The reason for clarifying how completely apolitical I am is because the very process of discussing this subject matter – the ‘peasant-mentality’ – entails a degree of ‘social comment’ on my part which, as past experience has shown, some peoples can take to be indicative of a particular political leaning (which has no existence outside their skulls) such as to occasion them to be dismissive of the facts and actuality being pointed out. RESPONDENT: Gotta put more thought and attention into the ‘peasant mentality’ aspects that remain unseen in ‘me’, which are many, I suspect. RICHARD: Sure ... something [No. 32] recently posted is worth bearing in mind whilst you do so. Viz.:
Although I will be commenting more fully when I respond to that email, in its chronological order, suffice is it to say for now that when the identity inhabiting this flesh-and-blood body circa 1978-79 entered into a mortgage agreement for the purchase of a property – an ex-farmhouse on a couple of acres of land in the rural south-east of Australia – the question of ownership of the very earth beneath ‘his’ feet engaged ‘his’ attention to such a degree as to dynamically effect resolution somewhat along the above lines. What ‘he’ had really purchased, ‘he’ realised, via that state-sanctioned organ called a ‘mortgage’, was the state-ordained right to exclusive use (within certain state-defined parameters) of that state-controlled land – specifically the legal right to call upon state-remunerated armed guards (state-trained personnel with state-issued guns on their hips) to enforce the state-determined ‘no trespassing’ law which applies to such state-issued ‘fee simple’ (a.k.a. ‘freehold’) titles – and that no land anywhere on earth was, or could ever be, owned by anyone at all. Least of all by a ‘state’ (a legal fiction masquerading as a ‘body’). Regards,
Re: Moral cap and Authority RESPONDENT: Hi, Richard. I want to revive an old request from Claudiu, as his were exactly my doubts when I read your last post some months ago. I hope you can clarify. CLAUDIU wrote to you last time:
At the time, I tried to play a little with it by recalling indelible memories which are very attached to my mind both from traumatic/ romantic critical events and from PCE events. They both have in common that I can get back to ‘relive’ them by especific fragments, mostly a couple of static photos from those scenes. The interesting part comes with how things go from there: when recalling those traumatic/ romantic, I tend to get absorbed via strong feelings and thoughts and start from there into a journey of stream of consciousness, first going fully into the scene and experiencing those strong feelings, which later begin to mutate and extrapolate into other aspects of my life via thoughts (‘oh, man, you surely are stupid’, ‘I need to have sex’, etc.) In other words, I guess that mode of recalling strong experiences is the way we commonly start that progression from a very specific feeling to a very general mood. Indeed, it’s like living and amplifying in a whole different dimension. On the other hand, remembrance of PCEs produces a quite unique effect: it interrupts the flow of passions and its chain reaction; produces a sensation of clearance and centerlessness in the mind; triggers funny sensations below the navel; brings a organic smile to the face; overall, it feels like suddenly changing from a lane full of traffic and neurotic drivers to a lane in the middle of nowhere in which everything seems static, with feet closer to the road as an end, and not closer to those feelings that put you in a hurry to get to a certain place. Anyway, I think Claudiu’s question is a very important one as it seems, at first glance, that it could be a contradiction here. If the act of recalling/ remembering/ rememorating produces such different results... Is it because we access different aspects of memory with a similar recalling exercise? Or is it because the exercise itself is different? Or both are the same and what I experience is but with the difference of experiencieng felicitous/ innocuous/ naive feelings instead of the (most common) good/ bad ones? If this is the case, is it possible that all the actualist process is the equivalent of, say, a PTSD kind of phenomenon but with felicitous/ innocuous causes/ results? That is: instead of having ever lasting traumatic effects after experiencing something dramatic, could it be that what one experiences is an inevitable everlasting felicitous/innocuous effect (pure intent) after experiencing/ identifying a PCE? Interesting stuff! (Message 211xx, 16 Nov 2015) * RICHARD: G’day No. 38, A quick note whilst I am currently reading the ‘Yahoo Groups’ message-board online: the post you quote from is Message № 20129.
That email from Claudiu, posted on Sat, 18 Jul 2015, was in response to the first part of my Message № 20095 (posted on Wed, 15 Jul 2015). (Richard, List D, Claudiu3, 15 Jul 2015) The relevant section of that July 15th email of mine is contained in its 7th paragraph. Viz.: ’, ‘presentially’, and etcetera], I now have the linguistic means to vividly communicate how feeling-being ‘Richard’ (...) utilised that rememorative-presentiation process to imbue/ suffuse ‘his’ day-to-day life with the ambience/ the flavour/ the appeal of the PCE and thus invigorate and vitalise ‘his’ moment-to-moment experiencing as well. (Although, due to the total lack of precedence, ‘he’ increasingly infused it with the grandeur/ the glory / the allure of the ASC as well). [endquote].  (Richard,
List D, Claudiu3, 15 July 2015).
As I do not know why Claudiu interposed the word ‘non-affective’ – albeit in parenthesis – into my [quote] ‘the ambience/ the flavour/ the appeal of the PCE’ [endquote] words, when formulating his question, you might be better off addressing your revival of that ‘old request’ to him. Regards,
RETURN TO MAILING LIST ‘D’ 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.
Richard’s Text ©The Actual Freedom Trust:
1997-. All Rights Reserved.
Disclaimer |
