Actual Freedom – Selected Correspondence by Topic

RICHARD: The peak experience provides an objective standpoint to view ‘I’ from. It is easily seen from here that ‘I’ stand in the way of ultimate fulfilment ... of ‘my’ destiny. Pure contemplation is the means to provide one with repeated opportunities to make this examination thorough; all doubt is removed and only surety remains. This is the only way one will be convinced that ‘I’ must vanish altogether. This is why I can say, confidently, that the ‘death of the ego’ is not sufficient, for it only means substituting an impersonal ‘I’ – now called ‘Being’ – for the personal ‘I’. ‘Being’, whether it goes with a capital to denote Divinity or not, means an ‘I’ is still in existence. Therefore the ‘death of the ego’ people’s ‘discoveries’ about the fate of humanity are questionable, to say the least, and their ‘solutions’ to life’s problems are equally suspect. Unless there is an end to ‘being’, which is what death is, one can not say one has penetrated into the ‘Mystery of Life’, one has not found ultimate fulfilment, one has not achieved peace-on-earth. One is only fooling oneself – and some other gullible people – if one is so easily satisfied. Richard’s Journal, 1997, Article Fifteen

RICHARD: Oh, yes … it is a delicious sensation to be here; I experience myself as no-one in particular; I am simply a body enjoying this exquisite moment of being alive unimpeded by any ‘self’ within. Only this moment actually exists, for there is no lasting ‘I’ present which would make the past and future real. The freedom from enduring over time as the past, the present and the future, leaves one completely able to appreciate the impeccable purity of being here. This appreciation is the exclusive attention paid to being alive right here and now. This type of attention is best known as apperception, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself. Apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception is a way of seeing that can be arrived at by pure contemplation. Pure contemplation is when ‘I’ cease thinking ... and thinking takes place of its own accord. Such a mind, being free of the ‘thinker’ and the ‘feeler’ – ‘I’ as ego and soul – is capable of immense clarity and purity. All this is born only out of pure intent. Pure intent is derived from the PCE experienced during a peak experience, which all humans have had at some stage in their life. A peak experience is when ‘I’ spontaneously cease to ‘be’, temporarily, and this moment and place is here and now. Everything is seen to be perfect as-it-is. Diligent attention paid to the peak experience gives rise to pure intent. With pure intent running as a ‘golden thread’ through one’s life, reflective contemplation rapidly becomes more and more fascinating. When one is totally fascinated, reflective contemplation becomes pure awareness ... and then apperception happens of itself.

RICHARD: In order to mutate from the self-centred licentiousness to a self-less sensualism, one must have confidence in the ultimate beneficence of the universe. This confidence – this surety – can be gained from a peak experience, wherein ‘I’, the psychological entity, temporarily ceases to exist and reality becomes actuality. This is called a pure consciousness experience (PCE). Life is briefly seen to be already perfect and innocent ... it is a life-changing experience. One is physically experiencing first-hand, albeit momentarily, this actual world – a spontaneously benevolent world – that antedates the ‘normal’ world. The ‘normal’ world is commonly known as ‘the real world’ or ‘reality’. Repeated peak experiences can be brought about on virtually a daily basis with constant application of pure contemplation of the actual. In pure contemplation, ‘I’, the identity, cease seeing and seeing takes place of its own accord ... this is called apperception, which is defined as ‘the mind’s perception of itself’. Then this actual world – this benign world – that the ‘real world’ was superimposed over, becomes apparent ... except that ‘I’ am not here to experience it.

‘I’ can never be here in this actual world for ‘I’ am an interloper, an alien in psychic possession of the body. ‘I’ do not belong here. All this is impossible to imagine which is why it is essential to be confident that the actual world does exist. This confidence is born out of knowing, which is derived from the PCE in the peak experience, and is an essential ingredient to ensure success. One does not have to generate confidence oneself – as the religions require of one with regard to their blind faith – the purity of the actual world bestows this confidence upon one. The experience of purity is a benefaction. Out of this blessing comes that pure intent, which will consistently guide one through the travails of daily life, gently ushering in an increasing ease and generosity of character. With this growing magnanimity, one becomes more and more anonymous, more and more self-less. With this expanding altruism one becomes less and less self-centred, less and less egocentric and soul-oriented. Eventually the moment comes wherein something definitive happens, physically, inside the brain and ‘I’ am nevermore. ‘Being’ ceases – it was only a psychic apparition anyway – and malice and sorrow are gone, forever, in one human being. (pages 124-125: ‘Richard’s Journal’ ©The Actual Freedom Trust 1997).

RESPONDENT: I have tried ‘What am I’ and several other meditations. From your mails etc. I read you don’t need to meditate. If I don’t meditate my life gets clogged with intentions. The only ways to relieve myself are to sleep or to relax. Relaxation is a direct result from meditating. Another result is creative thought.

RICHARD: Be it far from me to advise you to stop meditating … Konrad is trying this at this moment with some interesting results. If you do, it is essential that you replace it with something else … something better. As you say that your life gets ‘clogged with intentions’ then channel this energy into one big intention: what I call pure intent.

Pure intent is derived from the pure consciousness experience (PCE) experienced during a peak experience, which all humans have had at some stage in their life. A peak experience is when ‘I’ spontaneously cease to ‘be’, temporarily, and this moment is. Everything is seen to be perfect as-it-is. One can bring about a benediction from that perfection and purity which is the essential character of the universe by contacting and cultivating one’s original state of naiveté. Naiveté is that intimate aspect of oneself that is the nearest approximation that one can have of actual innocence – there is no innocence so long as there is a self – and constant awareness of naive intimacy results in a continuing benediction. This blessing allows a connection to be made between oneself and the perfection and purity. This connection I call pure intent. Pure intent endows one with the ability to operate and function safely in society without the incumbent social identity with its ever-vigilant conscience. Thus reliably rendered virtually innocent and relatively harmless by the benefaction of the perfection and purity, one can begin to dismantle the now-redundant social identity.

Diligent attention paid to the peak experience ensures pure intent continuing to operate. With pure intent running as a ‘golden thread’ through one’s life, reflective contemplation – not meditation – rapidly becomes more and more fascinating. It is a matter of coming to one’s senses – both literally and figuratively – and one does this by understanding that only this moment is actual. When one is totally fascinated, reflective contemplation becomes pure awareness ... and then apperception happens of itself. With apperception operating more or less continuously in ‘my’ day-to-day life, ‘I’ find it harder and harder to maintain credibility. ‘I’ am increasingly seen as the usurper, an alien entity inhabiting this body and taking on an identity of its own. Mercilessly exposed in the bright light of awareness – apperception casts no shadows – ‘I’ can no longer find ‘my’ position tenable. ‘I’ can only live in obscuration, where ‘I’ lurk about, creating all sorts of mischief. ‘My’ time is speedily coming to an end, ‘I’ can barely maintain ‘myself’ any longer.

RESPONDENT: Now to my questions: As you have described your freedom stems from first the process and then something which is beyond that. Doesn’t this mean that I should try to attain or grow into the process first? For you seem to have needed it.

RICHARD: The process is triggered by developing apperception wherever and whenever possible. Apperceptive awareness can be evoked by paying exclusive attention to being alive now. This moment is your only moment of being alive … one is never alive at any other time than now. And, wherever you are, one is always here … even if you start walking over to there, along the way to there you are always here … and when you arrive ‘there’, it too is here. Thus attention becomes a fascination with the fact that one is always here … and it is already now. Fascination leads to reflective contemplation. As one is already here, and it is always now … then one has arrived before one starts. The potent combination of attention, fascination, reflection and contemplation produces apperception, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself. Apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception – a way of seeing that is arrived at by reflective and fascinating contemplative thought – is when ‘I’ cease thinking and thinking takes place of its own accord. Such a mind, being free of the thinker and the feeler – ‘I’ as ego and soul – is capable of immense clarity and purity.

RESPONDENT: If there is sadness or anger or whatever, it is included in the field of perception and examined with great interest as ‘what is’ reveals itself. See what I mean?

RICHARD: Yes, indeed I do. This is the essence of ‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’ The past – although being actual whilst it was happening – is not actual now. The future – although it will be actual when it happen – is not actual now. Only this moment is actual. If I am not happy and harmless here and now, then I am wasting this precious moment of being alive. Yesterday’s remembered happiness and harmlessness means nothing if one is not happy and harmless here and now ... and the same applies to tomorrow’s anticipated happiness and harmlessness.

If one is not happy and harmless now, then one has something to look at to discover why not ... and one keeps on looking until one is back on track. Being ‘on track’ means a general sense of well-being ... a grumpy person has no chance whatsoever of becoming free. Once one has established this base, one up-levels the ‘feeling happy and harmless’ experience to ‘feeling the sheer perfection of being alive here and now’. It is possible to experience this for ninety-nine percent of the time ... and the other one percent provides very little trouble. I call this a virtual freedom. Virtual freedom far exceeds normal human expectations anyway, so if nothing else happened one would be light years ahead of normal.

Virtual freedom is the essential springboard into an actual freedom. Through reflective thought and fascinated contemplation of the fact that one is already always here, one finds oneself stepping into the actual world of sensual delight ... leaving one’s ‘self’ behind in the ‘real’ world where it belongs. Fear – existential angst at finding oneself to be the contingent ‘being’ one always suspected oneself to be – is both the barrier and the way to freedom. Always included in fear is a thrilling aspect, and by focussing upon this and not fear itself, an energy gathers momentum which does the trick for one (thrilling as in an exciting sensation through the body, stirring, stimulating, electrifying, rousing, moving, gripping, hair-raising, riveting, joyful, pleasing, throbbing, trembling, tremulous, quivering, shivering, fluttering, shuddering and vibrating).

‘I’ cannot set ‘myself’ free ... but ‘I’ can set in motion a process that will lead to ‘my’ eventual demise.

RICHARD: Being ‘alive’ is to be paying attention – exclusive attention – to this moment in time and this place in space. This attention becomes fascination ... and fascination leads to reflective contemplation. Then – and only then – apperception can occur. Apperceptive awareness can be evoked by paying exclusive attention to being fully alive right now. This moment is your only moment of being alive ... one is never alive at any other time than now. And, wherever you are, one is always here ... even if you start walking over to ‘there’, along the way to ‘there’ you are always here ... and when you arrive ‘there’, it too is here. Thus attention becomes a fascination with the fact that one is always here ... and it is already now. Fascination leads to reflective contemplation. As one is already here, and it is always now ... then one has arrived before one starts.

The potent combination of attention, fascination, reflection and contemplation produces apperception, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself. Apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception – a way of seeing that is arrived at by reflective and fascinating contemplative thought – is when ‘I’ cease thinking and thinking takes place of its own accord ... and ‘me’ disappears along with all the feelings. Such a mind, being free of the thinker and the feeler – ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul – is capable of immense clarity and purity ... as a sensate body only, one is automatically benevolent and benign. Psychological self-immolation is the only sensible sacrifice that ‘I’ as ‘me’ being can make in order to reveal that which is actual. And that which is actual is a clear and clean and pure perfection.

Life is bursting with meaning when ‘I’ and ‘me’ are no longer present to mess things up. ‘I’ and ‘me’ stand in the way of the clarity and purity of the clean perfection of the actual being apparent. ‘My’ very presence prohibits this ever-present perfection being evident. ‘I’ as ‘me’ being prevents the very purity of life, that ‘I’ am searching for, from coming into plain view. With ‘my’ demise, this ever-fresh perfection is now manifest. Peace-on-earth was here in this actual world all the time. It is all so simple, in the actual world; no effort is needed to meet the requisite morality of society. I have no ‘dark nature’, no unconscious impulses to curb, to control, to restrain. It is all so easy, in the actual world; I can take no credit for my apparently virtuous behaviour because actual freedom automatically provides beneficial thoughts and deeds. It is all so spontaneous, in the actual world; I do not do it – it does itself. Vanity, egoism, selfishness – all self-centred activity has ceased to operate when ‘I’ as ‘me’ being ceased to be.

And it is all so peaceful, in the actual world; it is only in actualism that human beings can have peace-on-earth without toiling fruitlessly to be ‘good’. The answer to everything that has puzzled humankind for all of human history is readily elucidated when one is actually free. The ‘Mystery of Life’ has been penetrated and laid open for all those with the eyes to see. Life was meant to be easy. So: ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive’? It beats any pathetic mantra by a country mile.

RICHARD: Being ‘alive’ is to be paying attention – exclusive attention – to this moment in time and this place in space. This attention becomes fascination ... and fascination leads to reflective contemplation. Then – and only then – apperception can occur.

Apperceptive awareness can be evoked by paying exclusive attention to being fully alive right now. This moment is your only moment of being alive ... one is never alive at any other time than now. And, wherever you are, one is always here ... even if you start walking over to ‘there’, along the way to ‘there’ you are always here ... and when you arrive ‘there’, it too is here. Thus attention becomes a fascination with the fact that one is always here ... and it is already now. Fascination leads to reflective contemplation. As one is already here, and it is always now ... then one has arrived before one starts. The potent combination of attention, fascination, reflection and contemplation produces apperception, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself. Apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception – a way of seeing that is arrived at by reflective and fascinating contemplative thought – is when ‘I’ cease thinking and thinking takes place of its own accord ... and ‘me’ disappears along with all the feelings. Such a mind, being free of the thinker and the feeler – ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul – is capable of immense clarity and purity ... as a sensate body only, one is automatically benevolent and benign.

It is really important to understand about the soul ... getting into feelings like this – ‘perfect’ feelings – leaves one in imminent danger of the seductive snare of Love and Beauty, and, conveniently ignoring their opposites, becoming enlightened, or at least illuminated. ‘Me’ – that sense of ‘being’ that I call the soul – sugar coats itself with Love and Compassion and Beauty and Truth and swans along in a state of Blissful Euphoria. Thus one then goes off into some mystical State of Being in some metaphysical world and misses out on the clean and clear perfection of this actual world. It is very, very difficult to get out of the enlightened state and go ‘beyond it’ into this actual world of the senses.

Your sense of being – the real ‘me’ – is what is evidenced when one says: ‘But what about me, nobody loves me for me’! For a woman it is: ‘You only want me for my body ... and not for me’. For a man it is: ‘You only want me for my money ... and not for me’. For a child it is: ‘You only want to be my friend because of my toys (or sweets or whatever)’. This sense of ‘me’ – this being – arises out of the basic instincts that blind nature endowed us all with as a rough and ready ‘soft-ware’ package to make a start in life. These instincts – mainly fear and aggression and nurture and desire – appear as a rudimentary self. This is why it is felt to be one’s ‘Original Face’ – to use the Zen terminology – if one is open to ‘what is’.

You need to have a keen sense of humour. This business of becoming free is not – contrary to popular opinion – a serious business at all. Be totally sincere ... most definitely utterly sincere, as genuineness is essential. But serious ... no way. An actual freedom is all about having fun; about enjoying being here; about delighting in being alive. All that ‘being serious’ stuff actively works against peace-on-earth. One has to want to be here on this planet ... most people resent being here and wish to escape. This method will bring one into being more fully here than anyone has ever been before. If you do not want to be here, then forget it.

So: How am I experiencing this moment of being alive? It beats any pathetic mantra by a country mile ... because it is useful and effective.

RICHARD: The jumping in point is always here ... it is at this moment in time and this place in space. Thus, if you miss it this time around, hey presto ... you have another chance immediately. Life is excellent at providing opportunities like this.

RESPONDENT: You’re going to have to send more information or draw a clearer map to paradise.

RICHARD: Okay. It is essential for success to grasp the fact that this is your only moment of being alive. The past, although it did happen, is not actual now. The future, though it will happen, is not actual now. Only now is actual. Yesterday’s happiness does not mean a thing if one is miserable now ... and a hoped-for happiness tomorrow is to but waste this moment of being alive in waiting. All you get by waiting is more waiting.

Thus any ‘change’ can only happen now.

What ‘I’ did, eighteen years ago, was to devise a remarkably effective method of ridding this body of ‘me’. (Now I know that methods are to be actively discouraged, in some people’s eyes, but this one worked). ‘I’ asked myself, each moment again: ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive’?

It was a bit of a chore to start with, but as success after success started to multiply exponentially, it became automatic to have this question running as an on-going thing ... because it delivered the goods right here and now ... not off into some indeterminate future. Plus the successes were repeatable – almost on demand – and satisfied the ‘scientific method’.

As ‘I’ knew, from the PCE that started ‘me’ off into ridding this body of ‘me’, that it was possible to experience this moment in time and this place in space as perfection personified, ‘I’ set a minimum standard of experience for myself: feeling good. (‘Feeling good’ is an unambiguous term ... if anyone wants to argue about what feeling good means ... then do not even bother trying to do this at all.) If ‘I’ am not feeling good then ‘I’ have something to look at to find out why. What has happened, between the last time ‘I’ felt good and now? When did ‘I’ feel good last? Five minutes ago? Five hours ago? What happened to end that good feeling? Ah ... yes ... ‘he said that and ... ’, or ‘she didn’t do this and I ... ’, or ‘what I wanted was ... ... and I didn’t get it ... ’, and so on. One does not have to trace back into one’s childhood ... usually no more than yesterday afternoon at the most.

This way, the reward is immediate; by finding out what triggered off this loss of feeling good, one commences another period of enjoying this moment of being alive. You may remember what I wrote to you some days ago about attention, fascination, reflection, contemplation and apperception?

Apperceptive awareness can be evoked by paying exclusive attention to being alive now. This moment is your only moment of being alive ... one is never alive at any other time than now. And, wherever you are, one is always here ... even if you start walking over to there, along the way to there you are always here ... and when you arrive ‘there’, it too is here. Thus attention becomes a fascination with the fact that one is always here ... and it is already now. Fascination leads to reflective contemplation. As one is already here, and it is always now ... then one has arrived before one starts. The potent combination of attention, fascination, reflection and contemplation produces apperception, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself. Apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception – a way of seeing that is arrived at by reflective and fascinating contemplative thought – is when ‘I’ cease thinking and thinking takes place of its own accord. Such a mind, being free of the thinker and the feeler – ‘I’ as ego and soul – is capable of immense clarity and purity.

Okay, it is all about being here at this moment in time and this place in space ... and if you are not feeling good you have no chance whatsoever of being here. A grumpy person locks themselves out of the perfect purity of this moment and place. If you do not want to be here, then forget it.

Of course, once you get the knack of this, one up-levels ‘feeling good’, as a bottom line each moment again, to ‘feeling happy’. And after that: ‘feeling perfect’. These are all feelings, you will notice, this is not perfection personified yet ... but, then again, feeling perfect for twenty three hours and fifty nine minutes a day is way beyond normal human expectations anyway. Also, it is a very tricky way of both getting men fully into their feelings for the first time in their life and getting women to examine their feelings one by one instead of being run by a basketful of them all at once.

But one has to want to be here on this planet ... most people resent being here and wish to escape. This method will bring one into being more fully here than anyone has ever been before.

It is really important to understand the point I have been pushing about the soul ... getting into feelings like this – ‘perfect’ feelings – leaves one in imminent danger of the seductive snare of Love and Beauty, and, conveniently ignoring their opposites, becoming enlightened, or at least illuminated. ‘Me’ – that sense of ‘being’ that I call the soul – sugar coats itself with Love and Compassion and Beauty and Truth and swans along in a state of Blissful Euphoria. Thus one then goes off into some mystical State of Being in some metaphysical world and misses out on the clean and clear perfection of this actual world. It is very, very difficult to get out of the enlightened state and go ‘beyond it’ into this actual world of the senses.

So: ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive’? It beats any pathetic mantra by a country mile ... because it is useful.

RESPONDENT: The dualism of those who see versus those who don’t seems to rely on the same discriminating activity of thought as that of the division between ‘me’ and not ‘me’.

RICHARD: Okay, I think I get the picture now. One has, at various moments throughout one’s life, experiences wherein ‘I’ temporarily cease to be. We can call this experience: being not ‘me’. Then the moment is over and one reverts to being ‘me’ again, only now with a memory of being not ‘me’. Thus there is a division (separation?) between ‘me’ (which is how one is now) and not ‘me’ (which is how one was then). Is this correct so far? You then say there is the same division (separation?) between those who see and those who do not see. Then you say that this dualism seems to rely upon the same discriminating activity of thought as operates between ‘me’ and the memory of the experience of not ‘me’. If I have misunderstood you, then what follows is probably not applicable.

Is it actually the discriminating activity of thought that is at fault ... or is it the judgemental and condemning nature of the ‘thinker’, which is ‘me’? I ask this question sincerely, because the activity of thought itself is getting such a bad press. Thought is necessary – one can not operate and function in the world of people, things and events without thinking. And to think is to appraise – which is to discriminate, distinguish and differentiate. This is simply a fact, and anyone who proposes otherwise is believing a myth that has somehow been propagated down through the centuries about enlightened persons.

For sure one can stop thought – through meditation techniques; through profound contemplation; through pondering a koan; through fervent worship of a revered object; through following a thought right through to its end or even, spontaneously, at the viewing of a vista of great beauty. Without thought, one is in a state of wordless wonder ... and there is no discrimination. However, the object of stopping thought is not to produce a permanent thoughtless state of wordless wonder – it is aimed at stopping the ‘thinker’, at dissolving ‘me’. (The logic being: If thought stops then the ‘thinker’ also stops). Any such stoppage of thought is temporary, for thought invariably recommences ... as it must. Thus, when one reverts back to being ‘me’, thought cops the blame for being discriminating. This condemnation is based upon the above misunderstanding.

In a permanent condition of being able to live life without ‘me’, the ‘thinker’, there is no on-going state of wordless wonder (that is but a side-effect of thought stopping). One lives in a condition of perfection and purity wherein thought operates of its own accord ... and without ‘me’ to do the thinking, there is no judgemental condemning. Then, is there a division between the one who sees and the one who does not see? There is not ... there is no dualism and there can never be, for there is no ‘me’ in the one who does see to be dualistic. For sure, there is a division, a dualism, between the one who does not see and the one who does ... but that is the same as the division between ‘me’ and the memory of not ‘me’. In the temporary experience of not ‘me’, there was no dualism, no division, between not ‘me’ and ‘me’ ... for the same reason: ‘me’ did not exist then.

Is it not obvious that it is the ‘thinker’ that is the spanner in the works ... and not thought? Matter-of-fact thought (seeing the obvious) is an essential precursor to being able to be free enough to activate any realisation.

RICHARD: There is a wide and wondrous path to actual freedom: One asks oneself, each moment again, ‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’? This gives rise to apperception. Apperception is the outcome of the exclusive attention paid to being alive right here and now. Apperception is to be the senses as a bare awareness, a pure consciousness experience (PCE) of the world as-it-is, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself. Apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception is a way of seeing that can be arrived at by pure contemplation. Pure contemplation is when ‘I’ cease thinking ... and thinking takes place of its own accord. Such a mind, being free of the thinker – ‘I’ as ego – is capable of clarity. With pure intent operating more or less continuously, ‘I’ find it harder and harder to maintain credibility as ‘me’ feeling. ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul is increasingly seen as the usurper, an alien entity inhabiting this body and taking on an identity of its own. Mercilessly exposed in the bright light of awareness – apperception casts no shadows – ‘I’ can no longer find ‘my’ position tenable. ‘I’ can only live in ‘my’ obscuration, where ‘I’ lurk about as ‘me’, creating all sorts of mischief. ‘My’ time is speedily coming to an end; ‘I’ can barely maintain ‘myself’ any longer.

The day finally dawns where the definitive moment of being here, right now, conclusively arrives; something irrevocable takes place and every thing and every body and every event is different, somehow, although the same physically; something immutable occurs and every thing and every body and every event is all-of-a-sudden undeniably actual, in and of itself, as a fact; something irreversible happens and an immaculate perfection and a pristine purity permeates every thing and every body and every event; something has changed forever, although it is as if nothing has happened, except that the entire world is a magical fairytale-like playground full of incredible gladness and a delight which is never-ending. ‘My’ demise was as fictitious as ‘my’ apparent presence. I have always been here, I realise, it was that ‘I’ only imagined that ‘I’ existed. It was all an emotional play in a fertile imagination ... which was, however, fuelled by an actual hormonal substance triggered off from within the brain-stem because of the instinctual passions bestowed by blind nature.Richard’s Articles, A Précis of Actual Freedom

RESPONDENT: And, if possible, try to listen, i.e., have a meditative mind that grasps the truth of what is said.

RICHARD: I have no need of a ‘meditative mind’ … I have never meditated and never will. Normally people are once-removed from actuality … to meditate is to be twice-removed from actuality. I am listening to you the way I always already listen (to not only yourself, but to everybody, to everything, to every event) which is without an ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul. This way there is the freedom for remembrance, appraisal and decision (which is to compare, evaluate and judge) in every situation afresh, each moment again, with the full range of the brain’s innate cognitive ability.

RESPONDENT: You tend to be too pedantic, and, I think miss the essence of a discussion.

RICHARD: I am more than willing to discuss the issue of Richard being pedantic (synonyms: finicky, plodding, obscure, arcane, dull, doctrinaire, sophistic, hair-splitting, precise, precisionist, exact, scrupulous, overscrupulous, punctilious, meticulous, over-nice, perfectionist, formalist, dogmatic, literalist, literalistic, quibbling, hair-splitting, casuistic, casuistical, sophistical, pettifogging, nit-picking, intellectual, academic, scholastic, didactic, bookish, pedagogic, donnish, highbrow, pretentious, pompous, egghead, formal, stilted, stiff, stuffy, unimaginative, uninspired, rhetorical, bombastic, grandiloquent, high-flown, euphuistic, highfalutin) if you are interested enough to pursue the matter.

As for ‘missing the essence of a discussion’ – and please correct me if I am in error – the essence of what you are saying in this post (and a previous one where you talked reverently of ‘the silence between two thoughts’ ) is that you trust intuition to instinctually accept what is ‘true’ and instinctually reject what is ‘not true’ ... irregardless of facts. This way, what ‘me’ as soul (the ‘feeler’) wants, ‘me’ as soul (the ‘feeler’) gets ... and what ‘me’ as soul (the ‘feeler’) wants is for ‘I’ as ego (the ‘thinker’) to get out of the way so that ‘the silence that speaks louder than words’ (such as the silence between two thoughts) can reveal itself for ‘the truth’ that it is (irregardless of facts).

Which would be why you want for me to read what you have to say with a ‘meditative mind’ ... by which you would mean ‘meditative mind’ as in the inapt translation of the Eastern Spiritual practice (as epitomised by the word ‘dhyana’) rather than as in the Western meaning: ‘think upon; consider’. There is a vast difference: in the West to meditate means to be thoughtful; to engage in contemplation about, to exercise the mental faculties, contemplate, think about, think over, muse upon, ponder upon, reflect on, deliberate about, mull over, have in mind, plan by turning over in the mind, fix one’s attention on, observe intently or with interest, concentrate on, consider, ruminate, study, intend, project, design, devise, scheme or plot. And such meditation is continuous thought on one subject; a period of serious and sustained reflection or mental contemplation, consideration, reflection, deliberation, rumination, mulling over or being in reverie, musing, pondering or brooding.

Whereas in the East to meditate means to be thoughtless; meditation is the action or practice of a profound spiritual or religious state of consciousness for whose description words are considered to be totally inadequate. It is the highest state of consciousness, associated with direct mystic experience of reality and cannot be experienced until a condition of mindlessness has been created through the deliberate elimination of the objects of thought from consciousness. The organs of sense perception are so controlled that they no longer pass to the mind their reactions to what is perceived. The mind loses its identity by absorption into a higher state which precludes any awareness of duality, although a form of unitary awareness of the conventional world is retained. Entering into Eastern meditation, one experiences the heart as being wider than the universe and experiences infinite bliss and immeasurable power exceeding any occult power. It is a yogic state of formless ecstasy when there is absorption in divine reality and a loss of body sense ... and the ego has been transcended. In this state one rests in highest consciousness ... one has become lord and master of reality. Very few spiritual seekers have reached this level for one is manifesting God in every second, both consciously and perfectly. There is identification with the transcendent, radiant being in which all phenomena are seen as temporary, non-binding modifications of this all-inclusive divine being. The divine self is realised beyond the view point of the physical body, or the mind or the independent personal consciousness. When phenomena arise to notice from this formless and unqualified presence or love-bliss there is ecstasy of perfect spontaneity.

RESPONDENT: If you don’t mind my saying, reading your posts the expression that comes to my mind often is: ‘the operation was successful, but the patient died’.

RICHARD: That is my very intention … only when ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul altruistically self-immolate does the already always existing peace-on-earth become apparent (which is the only ‘success’ worthy of the name).

Thus the ‘operation’ is not yet ‘successful’ eh?

RESPONDENT: Thank you for this post Richard. I understand you to say that a PCE is experiencing the world as it actually is.

RICHARD: Yes, the direct (unmediated) experiencing of the actuality of people, things and events (the physical world) is a far, far cry from experiencing the ‘reality’ imposed as a veneer over the actual by who ‘I’ think and feel and instinctively ‘know’ that ‘I’ am. To be ‘normal’ is as if one has grey-coloured glasses on … when one takes them off (in this analogy) the world is bright, fresh and ever-new … one is now living in the infinitude of this fairy-tale-like actual universe with its sensuous quality of magical perfection and purity where everything and everyone has a lustre, a brilliance, a vividness, an intensity and a marvellous, wondrous, scintillating vitality that makes everything alive and sparkling. This ‘aliveness’ is the very actuality of all existence ... the actualness of everything and everyone.

In this analogy, to become enlightened is to put rose-coloured glasses (love and beauty) on over the top of the grey glasses.

RESPONDENT: This insight has certainly increased my awareness. Is the key to actual freedom then living as the senses which is distinct from having them?

RICHARD: Yes, sensuousness is the wondrous awareness of the marvel of being here now at this moment in time and this place in space – which awareness is combined with the fascination of contemplating that this moment is one’s only moment of being alive – and one is never alive at any other time than now. And, wherever one is … now … one is always here … now … even if one starts walking over to ‘there’ … now … along the way to ‘there’ … now … one is always here ... now … and when one arrives ‘there’ … now ... it too is here … now. Thus awareness is an attraction to the fact that one is always here – and it is already now – and as one is already here and it is always now then one has arrived before one starts. Such delicious wonder fosters the innate condition of naiveté (which is the closest ‘I’ can get to innocence) the nourishing of which is essential if the charm of it all is to occur. The potent combination of awareness – fascinated reflective contemplation – and sensuousness produces apperception, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself (‘I’ disappear). One is intimately aware that the physical space of this universe is infinite and its time is eternal ... thus the infinitude of this very material universe has no beginning and no ending and therefore no middle. There are no edges to this universe, which means that there is no centre, either. We are all coming from nowhere and are not going anywhere for there is nowhere to come from nor anywhere to go to. We are nowhere in particular ... which means we are anywhere at all. In the infinitude of the universe one finds oneself to be already here, and as it is always now, one can not get away from this place in space and this moment in time. By being here as-this-body one finds that this moment in time has no duration as in ‘now’ and ‘then’ – because the immediate is the ultimate – and that this place in space has no distance as in ‘here’ and ‘there’ – for the relative is the absolute.

In other words: one always here as it is already now.

RESPONDENT: I have been meditating, reading and investigating for about 10 years.

RICHARD: Okay ... do you mean ‘meditating’ as in the inapt translation of the Eastern Spiritual practice (as epitomised by the word ‘dhyana’) or as in the Western meaning: ‘think upon; consider’? There is a vast difference. In the West to meditate means to be thoughtful; to engage in contemplation about, to exercise the mental faculties, contemplate, think about, think over, muse upon, ponder upon, reflect on, deliberate about, mull over, have in mind, plan by turning over in the mind, fix one’s attention on, observe intently or with interest, concentrate on, consider, ruminate, study, intend, project, design, devise, scheme or plot. And meditation is continuous thought on one subject; a period of serious and sustained reflection or mental contemplation, consideration, reflection, deliberation, rumination, mulling over or being in reverie, musing, pondering or brooding. (Some examples of this use of the word are given by ‘The Oxford Dictionary’:

[Mr. J. R. Ackerly]: ‘My study was understood to be private ground where the great mind could meditate undisturbed’.

[Mr. A. Bell]: ‘He frequently meditated on the moral qualities of sound diet’.

[Mr. G. Sarton]: ‘We ought to meditate the immortal words of Pericles’.

[Mr. K. J. Dover]: ‘Philosophy was not the product of solitary meditation, to be communicated by a spell-binding orator’).

Whereas in the East to meditate means to be thoughtless; meditation is the action or practice of a profound spiritual or religious state of consciousness for whose description words are considered to be totally inadequate. It is the highest state of consciousness, associated with direct mystic experience of reality and cannot be experienced until a condition of mindlessness has been created through the deliberate elimination of the objects of thought from consciousness. The organs of sense perception are so controlled that they no longer pass to the mind their reactions to what is perceived. The mind loses its identity by absorption into a higher state which precludes any awareness of duality, although a form of unitary awareness of the conventional world is retained. Entering into Eastern meditation, one experiences the heart as being wider than the universe and experiences infinite bliss and immeasurable power exceeding any occult power. It is a yogic state of formless ecstasy when there is absorption in divine reality and a loss of body sense ... and the ego has been transcended. In this state one rests in highest consciousness ... one has become lord and master of reality. Very few spiritual seekers have reached this level for one is manifesting God in every second, both consciously and perfectly. There is identification with the transcendent, radiant being in which all phenomena are seen as temporary, non-binding modifications of this all-inclusive divine being. The divine self is realised beyond the view point of the physical body, or the mind or the independent personal consciousness. When phenomena arise to notice from this formless and unqualified presence or love-bliss there is ecstasy of perfect spontaneity. (Some examples of this use of the word are given by ‘The Oxford Dictionary’:

[Mr. J. Diski]: ‘I imagine myself walking silent cloisters, my head bent in meditation’.

[Mr. R. K. Narayan]: ‘He has renounced the world; he does nothing but meditate’.

[Mr. J. Hewitt]: ‘Buddhist meditation utilises Yoga which lays emphasis on the trance state’).

RICHARD: In the magical perfection of the PCE it is experienced that the emotions/ passions play no part whatsoever. The reward is immediate; it is all about being here now at this moment in time and this place in space ... one starts to feel ‘alive’ for the first time in one’s life. Being ‘alive’ is to be paying attention – exclusive attention – to this moment in time and this place in space. This attention becomes fascination.

RESPONDENT: Yes, all this is so. I have been having trouble understanding what you and the others who communicate with you, mean by PCE. Now I begin to understand, when you say that in the PCE emotions/passions play no part whatsoever. There is nothing blocking direct experiencing of this moment. I cannot directly perceive what these words mean to you as you write them but I can ‘go ‘Aha!’ This PCE is known to me. Yes, when there is no emotionality present, and I am paying attention to this moment, there is such a quiet joy, a deep sense of peace, a fascination with what is here. there is enough. More than enough.

RICHARD: Yet there is more ... much, much more. I get to comprehend what you mean by ‘actual reality’ each time you write ... it is a good description and I may borrow it, if I may, when writing to others about settling for second-best.

RESPONDENT: But on the whole, life is just me, here, now, seeing, hearing, smelling (not so much, my nose seems a bit weak!), tasting and touching. And thinking. Except that’s possibly the wrong word because it gives the impression of mental effort. Your ‘reflection’ is a better word, or ‘meditate’ in the western sense of considered contemplation.

[Editorial note: there can be no such thing as ‘actual reality’ in the actual world].

RICHARD: Yes, considered contemplation combined with fascination leads to reflective contemplation. Then – and only then – apperception can occur. Apperceptive awareness can be evoked by paying exclusive attention to being fully alive right now. This moment is your only moment of being alive ... one is never alive at any other time than now.

RESPONDENT: Yes. What you say makes sense to me. My sense of fascination is growing constantly. I am paying attention to this moment and as I do, the experience of the moment is enough in itself. There is no need for me to process the experience through a thinker or through a feeler.

RICHARD: Good. The essence of success in actualism – the wide and wondrous path to actual freedom – is to fully acknowledge that one is ‘human’ and to imitate the actual as far as is humanly possible. Whilst the ultimate goal is to be actually here – now – for the twenty four hours of a day, the immediate goal is to feel good each moment again. Continuing success then leads to feeling happy each moment again ... and then up-levelling it to feeling perfect for twenty three hours fifty nine minutes (99%) of the day. Thus, although thought and feeling are operating, the ‘thinker’ and ‘feeler’ hardly get a look-in other than this seductive cooperation in their own extinction. Occasionally they rise up and demand recognition ... but the habitual self-gratifying orgies of self-piteous indulgence lose their attraction.

RESPONDENT: Or is it that virtual freedom may help in having a PCE?

RICHARD: When one remembers a PCE – or precipitates another – then one is well on the way to freedom ... this is what actualism is all about. Scattered along the wide and wondrous path to an actual freedom are as many PCE’s as one may need ... repeated peak experiences may very well be brought about on maybe a daily basis with constant application of reflective and fascinated contemplation. In such pure contemplation, ‘I’ cease seeing and seeing takes place of its own accord. ‘I’ can never be here now in this actual world for ‘I’ am an interloper, an alien in psychic possession of the body. ‘I’ do not belong here. All this is impossible to imagine which is why it is essential to be confident that the actual world does exist. This confidence is born out of knowing, which is derived from the PCE, and is an essential ingredient to ensure success. One does not have to generate confidence oneself – as the religions require of one with regard to their blind faith – the purity of the actual world bestows this confidence upon one. The experience of purity is a benefaction. Out of this blessing comes pure intent, which will consistently guide one through daily life, gently ushering in an increasing ease and generosity of character. With this growing magnanimity, one becomes more and more anonymous, more and more self-less. With this expanding altruism one becomes less and less self-centred, less and less egocentric. Eventually the moment comes wherein something definitive happens, physically, inside the brain and ‘I’ am nevermore.

‘Being’ ceases – it was only a psychic apparition anyway – and war is over, forever, in one human being.