Actual Freedom – Selected Correspondence by Topic

RESPONDENT: Ah, something comes back to me about last night – I was thinking about awareness, the lack of it and how to develop it, then I realised (again), it must be now and only now. That’s what started the closeness I think.

RICHARD: One of the main keys to success is a focus on time itself as a sensate experience. My oft-repeated refrain is this: ‘The first step to being free is the actual understanding that this moment in time is the only place where being alive happens. The past, although it was actual when it did happen, is not actual now. The future, although it will be actual when it does happen, is not actual now. Only now is actual and as it is always now then the purity of innocence is perpetually here already ... where time has no duration. Then what one is – as this body being apperceptively aware – is this material universe experiencing itself as a sensate, reflective human being. 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’.

To be the consciousness of the infinitude ... it is no little thing that one does.

RESPONDENT: For me ‘timelessness is the truth’ and what you are saying: ‘this moment in time has no duration’ are same statements. That is why I mentioned it the first time.

RICHARD: Yes, I was aware of this ... which is why I wrote what I did in my initial post to you. I say that being here now as this flesh and blood body only – sans identity – enables the infinitude of the universe to be apparent. I say that this physical universe’s time is eternal and it’s space is infinite ... this is what ‘infinitude’ means. Now there is a distinct difference between the word ‘eternal’ and the word ‘timeless’. The word ‘timeless’ is very explicit ... no time (just like ‘selfless’ means no self) as in not subject to time, not affected by the passage of time, out of time, without reference to time and independent of the passage of time. The word ‘eternal’ means all time, as in that which will always exist, that which has always existed, that which is without a beginning or an end in time, that which is everlasting, permanent, enduring, persistent, recurring, incessant, indestructible, imperishable, constant, continuous, continual, unbroken and thus interminable and valid for all time.

However, just as there are those who corrupt ‘selfless’ into meaning ‘a not selfish self’, there are those who corrupt ‘timeless’ into meaning ageless, ceaseless, changeless ... which are time-words more applicable to ‘eternal’. Even dictionaries do this. However, when viewed honestly, the word ‘timeless’ selfishly means ‘undying and immutable’ as in ‘immortal and deathless’. Take the modern physicists, for an example of honesty, when they posit their ‘nothingness’ prior to their mathematical ‘Big Bang’. Even though influenced by the pervasive eastern mysticism, they still have enough intellectual rigour to mostly resist using the word ‘eternal’ to refer to that ‘before time began’ fantasy ... they usually say ‘timeless’.

As time is eternal – just as space is infinite – to be here now as this flesh and blood body only is to be living an ongoing experiencing of this infinitude of this very material universe (I am using the word ‘infinitude in its ‘a boundless expanse and an unlimited time’ meaning). Therefore, infinitude – having no opposite and thus being perfection itself – is personified as me ... a flesh and blood body only. Hence my oft-repeated refrain: ‘I am the material universe experiencing itself as a sensate and reflective human being’ or ‘I am the experience of infinitude’. The infinite character of physical space, coupled with the eternal character of time, produces a here and now infinitude that can be understood experientially by one who is apperceptive. To grasp the character of infinitude with certainty, the reasoning mind must forsake its favoured process of intellectual understanding through logical and/or intuitive imagination and enter into the realm of a pure consciousness experience (apperception). In a PCE – which is where there is no ‘I’ or ‘me’ extant – the essential characteristics of infinitude are transparently obvious, lucidly self-evident, clearly apparent and open to view.

I will say it again this way: By being here now 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. I am always here and it is already now.

And no ‘timelessness’ nor ‘truth’ to be seen at all.

RESPONDENT: If there is no psychic entity in your body than you don’t know and don’t care what will happen next moment.

RICHARD: There is no next moment ... there is only this moment in eternal time and this place in infinite space. I can intellectually know that there possibly will be a now that is presumably going to happen (and that there was a series of past now-moments that did happen) and can plan according to the probability that certain events are likely to occur (that the banks will be open tomorrow at 9.30 AM, for example) based upon those past experiences. But there actually is no future (or past) whatsoever as I sit here now.

Living here, there is only now ... and it is always now. I care for the next moment inasmuch as sensible planning can ensure the optimum creature comforts and ease of life-style ... I purchased a carton of cream yesterday afternoon so that I can have some in this cup of coffee I am sipping now (3.36 AM) when all the shops are closed. Other than sensible planning it is simply silly to ‘care what will happen in the next moment’ (substitute ‘worry’ for ‘care’ ) as it is unknown in that it does not exist. The future is not ‘out there’ somewhere already formed and just waiting to happen ... it has no existence whatsoever until it happens. When the future happens it is called now ... hence there is no future at all.

RESPONDENT: So, your experience is always fresh and no boredom or fear is possible.

RICHARD: No boredom or fear whatsoever. This moment has never happened before and never will happen again ... thus life is always ever-fresh, novel, original, unique, peerless, matchless and impeccable.

RICHARD: Being here now is to put your money where your mouth is, as it were. All other actions are methods, devices, techniques ... which are, in effect, delaying tactics. The most sincere form of flattery is not, as is commonly practised, imitating all the other people’s performance of standing back and expressing a feeling. To feel an emotion or be passionate about life is nowhere near the same as actually being here now. In being here now one is completely involved. Being here now is total inclusion. One demonstrates one’s appreciation of life by partaking fully in existence ... by letting this moment live one so that one is doing what is happening. One dedicates oneself to the challenge of being here now as the universe’s experience of itself. When ‘I’ willingly and voluntarily sacrifice ‘myself’ – the psychological or psychic identity residing inside this body – ‘I’ am gladly making ‘my’ most supreme donation, for ‘I’ am what one holds most dear.

RESPONDENT: Did you read the ‘Being Here Now’ book by Ram Das? Do you recall the bit where the young Richard Alpert is off to find the truth and comes across a holy man who just is not interested in his stories of the past, in his emotions or imaginings, only in ‘Being Here Now’. Hence the title of the book. Could you explain how ‘your’ ‘Being Here Now’ is different than the ‘Being Here Now’ of Richard Alpert, who, I am assuming, is, in your estimation, one of those gurus who has caused the whole bloody mess this planet is in?

RICHARD: First off, I do not point the finger at the Gurus and God-men for creating all the mess but for perpetuating it forever and a day with their specious solution. It is ‘blind nature’ that is the root cause of all the anguish and animosity.

Secondly, Mr. Richard Alpert does not claim to be enlightened – or he did not the last time I looked at his work about 12 years ago – but his influence has encouraged many an otherwise intelligent person to trek eagerly off to the Himalayas for that permanent ‘high’. The phrase ‘being here now’ has become rather hackneyed, yet there is no other expression that conveys the immediacy of experiencing what ‘I’ used to call ‘the cutting edge of reality’ back in the days that there was an ‘I’ inhabiting this body ... and therein lies the clue to the difference: reality. Mr. Richard Alpert’s ‘being here now’ lies in a ‘Mystical Reality’ that is ‘spaceless and timeless’. This is where mystics deceive both themselves and their gullible listeners ... this blurring of distinction between the physical and the metaphysical. There is a lack intellectual rigour in all this in that time and space is actual and ‘being here now’ can only be at this place in space and this moment in time.

The confusion lies around the nature of time: time is eternal ... eternal as in physically without beginning and without end. Now I know that the word ‘timeless’ can mean eternal, but it is a metaphysical use of the word because it implies time stopping or vanishing. In that context, the mystics use it in conjunction with ‘spaceless’ ... ‘I am Timeless and Spaceless; Unborn and Undying; Birthless and Deathless’ and so on. As this physical body has a limited life-span, they can only be referring to a psychic entity receiving its post-mortem reward of immortality. Thus the reality of their psychic ‘being here now’ is vastly different to the actuality of sensately being here now.

There is no ‘spacelessness’ here or ‘timelessness’ now, in actuality. Living here, at this moment in time, there is only this moment that is actual. As it is already always this moment, time has no duration when ‘I’ am not ... and to the unaware it appears to be ‘timeless’. It is not. This moment is hanging in eternal time like this planet is hanging in infinite space. There is no beginning or end to the infinitude of this universe’s space and time, therefore there is no middle, no centre. Thus, here and now is nowhere in particular and one is easily always here as it is already now. In apperceptive awareness – which is this flesh and blood body being conscious sans ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul – there is the direct experience of the immediate being the ultimate and the relative being the absolute.

This is what I describe by saying ‘being here now’.

RESPONDENT: I am also not interested in standing frozen in awe of ‘me or my actuality’.

RICHARD: Who asked you to stand anywhere doing anything remotely like ‘standing in awe’, eh? Not me.

RESPONDENT: That would constitute a conclusion about the Actual Process. Which even in you ‘is’ a process (realising that you are here-now).

RICHARD: Not so ... an apperceptive awareness of being here now is not a ‘realisation’ ... it is a direct experience of actuality.

RESPONDENT: Process is fundamental in any-thing. And thought is it’s encapsulator.

RICHARD: Process is only fundamental to a ‘being’ who exists over time ... there is no process here. And if thought is its encapsulator, as you say, then that indicates the supremacy of the ego.

RESPONDENT: Look at your body, it is aging. Even actuality as you experience it is build upon a process. You need that process going on to be able to experience the here-now.

RICHARD: Yesterday, although it was actual while it was happening, is not actual now. Tomorrow, although it will be actual when it happens, is not actual now. This body is only actual now. I am this body ... therefore I am only actual now. Thus, no process, because a process is a movement over time. It is ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul that create the illusion of change and becoming. I am always here and it is already now ... no process at all. This is an actual completeness ... not that complex metaphysics you detailed.

RESPONDENT: No, you are throwing out the baby with the bath water. There is no denial of time operating in the physical world. You define what it is and then say that is false. I agree what you describe is false. The physical world of solid objects is real but it is not all that can be seen.

RICHARD: Then what baby is it that I am throwing out? The baby that produces the delusion that it exists in a timeless realm, of course. There is no ‘timeless realm’ here, in actuality. Living here, at this moment in time, there is only this moment that is actual. As it is already always this moment, to the unaware it appears to be ‘timeless’. It is not. This moment is hanging in time like this planet is hanging in space. Just as the universe’s space is infinite, so too is this universe’s time eternal. There is no beginning or end to the infinitude of this universe’s space and time, therefore there is no middle, no centre. Thus, one is always here and it is already now. And here and now is nowhere in particular.

This sure beats immortality any day.

*

RESPONDENT: Or is that being in time an illusion of thought?

RICHARD: No, time is not an illusion ... time – and space – are actual. However, mostly people are ‘out of time’ inasmuch as they miss out on being here where ‘their’ body is at this moment in time (and this place in space). As time is eternal – just as space is infinite – to be here now as this flesh and blood body only is to be living an ongoing experiencing of this infinitude of this very material universe. (I am using the word ‘infinitude in its ‘a boundless expanse and an unlimited time’ meaning). Therefore, infinitude – having no opposite and thus being perfection itself – is personified as me ... a flesh and blood body only. Hence my oft-repeated refrain: ‘I am the material universe experiencing itself as a sensate and reflective human being’. As me, the universe can be intelligent and observe and reflect upon itself. There is no ‘intelligence’ that is running this universe ... that is to commit the vulgar error of anthropomorphism.

What I am saying is that there is nothing prior to this tangible universe ... nothing that is ‘primary’ or ‘formless’ or ‘inchoate’ that gives rise to this palpable universe. In other words ‘noumenon’ is a fantasy ... there is only phenomenon in actuality.

And it is a phenomenal actuality ... if I may pun a little!

*

RESPONDENT: Is it that being in time an illusion of thought?

RICHARD: No, time is not an illusion ... time – and space – are actual. However, mostly people are ‘out of time’ inasmuch as they miss out on being here where ‘their’ body is at this moment in time (and this place in space).

RESPONDENT: The reference was to psychological time. There is an idea of an entity that is moving in time from one experience to the next. That idea is useful but the entity is but memory. It is not actual. Physical time seems to be an actual movement but it can not be known. It is remembered.

RICHARD: Only now is actual. Yesterday – when it was happening – was actual ... and was now. Tomorrow – when it does happen – will be actual ... and will be now. Thus it is already always now ... and it is all happening here. There is only this moment in time and this place in space. Experiencing this – which is only possible when ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul are not – is to apperceptively know infinitude. Thus physical time can indeed be known ... ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul will never know it, however.

RICHARD: May I ask? Why do you insist that this infinite and eternal universe is not actual despite massive amounts of evidence to the contrary? Like your eyes reading these words, for example, because if you reach out your hand you can touch the glass, which is but a few millimetres away from what this flesh and blood body called Richard has written, and your fingertips will verify that things like glass are more than an ‘appearance’.

RESPONDENT: What is known is impermanent, finite, structured in time.

RICHARD: Particular objects – both those already known to humans and those yet to be known to humans – are finite, yes. They exist over time in space for a period then re-arrange themselves into other objects ... over and over again ad infinitum. This glass on the monitor screen may very well revert to silica, given sufficient time and weathering, and if you were to live that long you could touch that silica with your finger-tips so as to verify that it is more than ‘mere appearance’ .

RESPONDENT: There is no material’ thing’ that does not have a beginning and an end.

RICHARD: The particular shape has a beginning and ending, yes ... the bits and pieces that the shapes form out of are beginningless and endless, however.

RESPONDENT: The perceived physical universe is neither infinite nor eternal.

RICHARD: In reality, the perceived universe can be whatever ‘I’ wants it to be as it is but an illusion pasted over actuality anyway. When only half of the identity dies – ‘I’ as ego – a delusion called the ‘Greater Reality’ hoves into view. The ‘Greater Reality’ is usually ‘Timeless’ and ‘Spaceless’ and the physical universe is seen to be not only finite and limited as some people in reality also believe ... but a now-grand illusion into the bargain! When the other half of the identity likewise dies – ‘me’ as soul – then the apperceived physical universe is not only known to be infinite and eternal, however ... it is also ascertained to be actual. It is ‘being’ itself that causes all the fuss.

RESPONDENT: What is of time is a dying phenomenon.

RICHARD: Objects in space coalesce at a particular time as a particular shape, exist for a period and break apart into their constituent bits and pieces only to re-arrange themselves with multitudinous other bits and pieces over and over again. A carbon-based life-form is physically born, exists for a period and physically dies. Its constituent bits and pieces re-arrange themselves with multitudinous other bits and pieces over and over again. That is: matter re-arranges itself ... matter cannot be destroyed. Thus ‘what is of time’ is not a ‘dying phenomenon’ at all ... unless one is so fearfully self-centred as to focus only on the particular and project from there an ‘undying’ and ‘unborn’ fantasy.

*

RESPONDENT: Any ‘arrangement’ is impermanent, i.e.: of time.

RICHARD: Yes ... but the bits and pieces that the ‘arrangement’ is formed from are not impermanent ... they exist forever and a day in the eternal time of this infinite universe.

*

RESPONDENT: Time as we conceive it is measurement through memory.

RICHARD: A clock face divided into twelve or twenty-four segments is an arbitrary human agreement. The varying positions of the sun in the sky throughout the day and the varying positions of stars at night is not an arbitrary human agreement. Time – like space – is actual. Memory is essential to know the varying positions ... amnesiacs have the dickens of a job operating and functioning in the world of people, things and events.

RESPONDENT: Physical time and space are not in question.

RICHARD: I beg to differ ... you have just written (above) ‘what is perceived as the physical world’. In the previous post you wrote: ‘the body is like the movement of a wave ... [it] has a appearance of a thing’. You are clearly saying that this physical world is not actual.

RESPONDENT: But is psychological time and space actual?

RICHARD: The everyday real-world affectively-created time and space is not actual, no (that is, the normal world that 5.8 billion people live in).

RESPONDENT: There is a changing physical body but is that body ‘me’?

RICHARD: No ... ‘me’ is a psychological/ psychic entity residing within the flesh and blood body creating an ‘inner’ world. Any identity is not this body.

RESPONDENT: Or is identity in time just a projection of thought through memory, i.e.: programming?

RICHARD: Yes ... but no just ‘thought through memory’ . Such an investigation is too shallow ... one needs to dive deeper. For starters, ‘I’ am an emotional-mental construct ... not just a mental construct. Why is there this reluctance to examine feelings?

RESPONDENT: Timeless refers to what is not of thought and memory so obviously it can not possibly be pictured.

RICHARD: If you are talking of the beginningless and endless duration in which physical bodies move through physical space then it would be handy if you used some other word ... like ‘eternal’. Eternity is the name for the infinitude of all time ... in all eastern mystical literature and experience the word ‘timeless’ means what it says: no time. That is, no movement of physical bodies through physical space ... no physical movement in any physical space at all. Meaning no actual time for any actual universe as in: no actual universe.

RESPONDENT: The ‘known’ physical universe is a construction of thought through memory.

RICHARD: Unless you are indulging in solipsism, this physical universe was here before the physical body called No. 12 was physically born ... there are more people than just you on this planet. Unless one is paranoid about a gigantic conspiracy to deceive one then their report that this is so is valid. Thus this physical universe will be here after the physical body called No. 12 physically dies. Consequently, this planet – and other planets and stars – are not thought constructions based upon your memory.

*

RESPONDENT: I understand timeless and eternal as the same.

RICHARD: Not so. The word ‘timeless’ is very explicit ... no time (just like ‘selfless’ means no self) as in not subject to time, not affected by the passage of time, out of time, without reference to time and independent of the passage of time. Eternal means ‘all time’, as in that which will always exist, that which has always existed, that which is without a beginning or an end in time, that which is everlasting, permanent, enduring, persistent, recurring, incessant, indestructible, imperishable, constant, continuous, continual, unbroken and thus interminable and valid for all time. However, just as there are those who corrupt ‘selfless’ into meaning ‘a not selfish self’, there are those who corrupt ‘timeless’ into meaning ageless, ceaseless, changeless ... which are time-words more applicable to ‘eternal’. Even dictionaries do this. However, when viewed honestly, the word ‘timeless’ selfishly means ‘undying and immutable’ as in ‘immortal and deathless’. Take the modern physicists, for an example of honesty, when they posit their ‘nothingness’ prior to their mathematical ‘Big Bang’. Even though influenced by the pervasive eastern mysticism, they still have enough intellectual rigour to mostly resist using the word ‘eternal’ to refer to that fantasy ... they usually say ‘timeless’.

RESPONDENT: Time is linear, chronological movement. What is timeless or eternal is free of that movement.

RICHARD: Time as measured on this planet – localised time – is chronological. Day becomes night which becomes day ... and spring becomes summer and so on. Hop into a rocket and move to what is popularly called ‘outer space’ or ‘deep space’ and leave your clocks behind ... you may then come closer to understanding eternity as meaning ‘all time’ (to actually understand you will have to leave your self behind with the clocks).

RESPONDENT: It has nothing to do with infinite continuity.

RICHARD: Actuality has everything to do with infinite continuity. Yet even modern physicists have fallen for this mystical cosmogony ... the ‘timeless and spaceless nothingness’ that the ‘Big Bang’ came out of. The nineteenth century was hopefully called the ‘Age of Enlightenment’ (knowledge enlightenment) until eastern mystics came onto the world stage with spiritual enlightenment busily being hell-bent on returning a burgeoning thoughtful part of humankind to the darkness of superstition.

RESPONDENT: Eternity can not be understood in terms of continuity.

RICHARD: Eternity is only here ... now. It does not exist in some other dimension before physical birth and after physical death. Hence it can only be known – experienced – whilst this flesh and blood body is alive and breathing. If you do not experience it now, you never will ... physical death is the end. Finish.

RESPONDENT: It does not depend on a particular body or brain.

RICHARD: Of course not ... that was not the question. It is the particular body and brain called No. 12 that is experiencing a ‘direct perception free of the known’ that we are discussing. When the particular body and brain called No. 12 ceases happening, that ‘direct perception free of the known’ will also cease ... will it not? In other words, is physical death the end? Finish? Oblivion? The universe will go on without you – it will manage perfectly well without your ‘direct perception free of the known’ – just like it did before you were born.

RESPONDENT: The being in time that is added by thought inevitably leaves a trace doesn’t it?

RICHARD: The ‘being’ that lives in the time of the ‘real world’ that 6.0 billion peoples inhabit is not ‘added by thought’ but is, primarily, a product of the instinctual passions ... the survival instincts of fear and aggression and nurture and desire. All sentient beings have this rudimentary feeling-sense of ‘self’. It is the human sentient being, however, with their ability to think and reflect upon their own mortality, that have transformed the rudimentary animal ‘self’ into an affectively felt ‘me’ – a feeling ‘being’ – whom I consistently call ‘me’ as soul for convenience. This ‘being’ – an (usually passive) identity in the heart – infiltrates thought and assumes an (usually active) identity in the head ... whom I consistently call ‘I’ as ego for convenience. ‘I’ as ego vaguely feels that it is trapped in extrinsic time, little realising that it is intrinsic time that is the culprit. This, in the jargon, is called: projection.

It is called projection because the time of the ‘real world’ is not actual time ... it is psychological time pasted as a veneer over the actual time of this very material universe where one lives. Now, this universe’s actual time – having no beginning or ending – is eternal ... just as this universe’s actual space – having no beginning or ending – is infinite. And there is a word for this eternal infinity: infinitude. (I am using the word ‘infinitude’ in its ‘boundlessness’ meaning – an infinite extent, amount and duration – as in an immeasurable expanse and an unlimited time). An identity, seeking to escape the trap of ‘real world’ time, can sometimes spontaneously go into abeyance and the apperceptive awareness, of the infinitude that this very material universe is, ensues ... this is called a pure consciousness experience (PCE) and is epitomised as immaculate perfection that has always been here, is always here and will always be here. Thus nothing is ‘going wrong’, has ever been ‘going wrong’ and will never be ‘going wrong’. This relief from the vicissitudes of life in the grim and glum ‘reality’ of the ‘real world’ is so intense that a warm rush of gratitude surges forth from the heart where ‘me’ as soul has been passively waiting ... and ‘I’ as ego is nowhere to be found.

So, rather than merely ‘leaving a trace’ one’s feeling-sense of identity shifts from the head to the heart and the clean, clear and pure perfection (an actual perfection) of the PCE devolves into the Glamorous and Glorious and Majestic Perfection (a mystical perfection) of an Altered State of Consciousness (ASC) called ‘Moksha’ or ‘Nirvana’ or ‘Samadhi’ or ‘Satori’ and so on in the East – popularised in the West as ‘Spiritual Enlightenment’ – and one is swept up into the Glamour, Glory and Glitz of the ‘Deathless State’. The material infinitude of this physical universe’s eternal time and infinite space is transmogrified into a ‘Formless Emptiness’ that is ‘Timeless and Spaceless’ ... and one is ‘Unborn’ and ‘Undying’ in a metaphysical ‘Greater Reality’ wherein reigns an ‘Unknowable and Immutable Presence’ which is an ‘Immortal and Ceaseless Being’ which bestows a vainglorious ‘Peace That Passeth All Understanding’.

And the already always existing peace-on-earth of this actual world is nowhere to be found.

RESPONDENT: When there is no thought or experience of being in time, is there concern about coming to an end?

RICHARD: Indeed not ... given that one is then the ‘Timeless and Spaceless and Formless Void’, there is no concern. Particularly no concern about peace-on-earth. This is a very selfish and self-centred approach to life on earth ... something that all metaphysical peoples are guilty of. The quest to secure one’s ‘Immortality’ is unambiguously selfish ... peace-on-earth is readily sacrificed for the supposed continuation of the imagined soul (by whatever name) after physical death. So much for their humanitarian ideals of peace, goodness, altruism, philanthropy and humaneness. All religious and spiritual and mystical quests amount to nothing more than a self-centred urge to perpetuate oneself for ever and a day. All religious and spiritual and mystical leaders and teachers fall foul of this existential dilemma. They pay lip-service to the notion of self-sacrifice – weeping crocodile tears at noble martyrdom – whilst selfishly pursuing the ‘Eternal After-Life’ (by whatever name). The root cause of all the ills of humankind can be sheeted home to this single, basic fact:

The overriding importance of the survival of ‘self’ (in whatever guise).

RESPONDENT: Obviously not, there is no such clinging.

RICHARD: Obviously not ... one has ceased ‘becoming’ and has become ‘being’. Then one is the ‘clinging’ as a state of being. It is called ‘immortality’ and comes from the survival instinct. One will stay in existence in any way, shape or form possible ... including a ridiculous ‘Nothingness’.

Even the modern-day cosmogonists – the bright boys at Quantumville – are having difficulty detailing the ‘nothingness’ that they say this universe came out of. They have had to invent ‘virtual’ time and space and form as being the constituents of the primeval particle-that-is-not-a-particle that initiated their pet ‘Big Bang’.

RESPONDENT: Now, as to your conclusion that the error of the religious approach lay with the promotion of finding a solution in the ‘Timeless and Spaceless and Formless’ I both agree and disagree. I agree insofar as these words have been subjected to much distortion because they are misunderstood.

RICHARD: I do say that this physical universe’s time is eternal and it’s space is infinite ... this is what ‘infinitude’ means (I am using the word ‘infinitude’ in its ‘a boundless expanse and an unlimited time’ meaning). However, there is a distinct difference between the word ‘eternal’ and the word ‘timeless’. The word ‘timeless’ is very explicit ... no time (just like ‘selfless’ means no self) as in not subject to time, not affected by the passage of time, out of time, without reference to time and independent of the passage of time ... like the state to which time has no application (the condition into which the soul enters at death) called the afterlife. Would this be a valid description?

Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti states that ‘timeless’ means ‘no time’ (and ‘no space’). Vis.:

• ‘You will find, if you have gone that far, that there is a movement of the unknown which is not recognised, which is not translatable, which cannot be put into words – then you will find that there is a movement which is of the immense. That movement is of the timeless because in that there is no time, nor is there space’. (The December Chapter; December 29: ‘The Book of Life: Daily Meditations with J. Krishnamurti’; Published by HarperSanFrancisco. ©1999 Krishnamurti Foundation of America).
• ‘Thought can never be tranquil; thought, which is the product of time, can never find that which is timeless, can never know that which is beyond time’. (The First and Last Freedom, by J. Krishnamurti, 1954: pp. 71-75).
• ‘Knowledge is destructive to discovery. Knowledge is always in time (...) this emptiness has no measurement; it’s the centre that measures, weighs, calculates. This emptiness is beyond time and space’. (Quote No. 073; ‘Krishnamurti’s Notebook’).

Whereas the word ‘eternal’ means all time, as in that which will always exist, that which has always existed, that which is without a beginning or an end in time, that which is everlasting time; enduring, persistent, recurring, incessant, constant, continuous and unbroken time; ageless and thus interminable and valid for all time ... like this physical, material universe is. Would this be a valid description? Shall we ask Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti himself? Vis.:

• K: ‘What we are trying to do is to penetrate into something beyond death’.
• B: ‘Beyond death?’
• K: ‘We three are trying to find to find out that which is beyond death’.
• S: ‘Right’.
• B: ‘There is that which is beyond death?’
• K: ‘Ah, absolutely’.
• B: ‘Would you say that is eternal, or ...’
• K: ‘I don’t want to use that word’.
• B: ‘I mean is it in some sense beyond time?’
• K: ‘Beyond time’.
• B: ‘Therefore eternal is not the best word’.
• K: ‘There is something beyond the superficial death, a movement that has no beginning and no ending’.
• B: ‘But it is a movement?’
• K: ‘It is a movement. Movement, not in time’.
• S: ‘What is the difference between a movement in time and a movement out of time?’
• K: ‘Sir, that which is constantly renewing, constantly – new isn’t the word – constantly fresh, endlessly flowering, that is timeless. But this word ‘flowering’ implies time’.
• B: ‘I think we can see the point’.
(‘The Wholeness of Life’; J. Krishnamurti; Copyright © 1979 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust; Publishers: HarperCollins, New York).

Yea verily ... I can easily ‘see the point’ too! Just as there are those who water down ‘selfless’ (no self) into meaning ‘unselfish’ (a not selfish self), there are those who corrupt ‘timeless’ (no time) into meaning ‘eternity’ (unlimited time). Even dictionaries do this. However, when viewed honestly, the word ‘timeless’ selfishly means ‘immortal or deathless’. Even modern physicists, when they posit their ‘nothingness’ prior to their mathematical ‘Big Bang’, have enough intellectual rigour to use the word ‘timeless’ to refer to that ‘before time began’ fantasy of theirs ... they never say ‘eternal’ because ‘eternal’ is a time-word.

The same applies to ‘spacelessness’ (no space) and ‘formlessness’ (no form). So, have the words ‘Timeless and Spaceless and Formless’ really been misunderstood? Because these words are actually quite clear ... there is something else going on in the human psyche about ‘misunderstanding’ these very apt and descriptive words ... and why is there all this disingenuousness? It is the avoidance of mortality and desire for immortality born out of the instinct for survival at all costs. Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti says that there is ‘something immortal’ and that it is located ‘beyond time’. Vis.:

• ‘To be completely alone implies that the mind is free of every kind of influence and is therefore uncontaminated by society; and it must be alone to understand what is religion – which is to find out for oneself whether there is something immortal, beyond time’. (The December Chapter; December 2: ‘The Book of Life: Daily Meditations with J. Krishnamurti’, Published by HarperSanFrancisco. ©1999 Krishnamurti Foundation of America).

Whereas I clearly and unambiguously say that it is this universe that is immortal, ageless, ceaseless, undying, deathless, immutable and indestructible ... not me. I am mortal.

*

RESPONDENT: As you say, in your own words, when describing apperceptive awareness: [quote]: ‘This physical universe is infinite and eternal. It 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. I am always here and it is already now’. [endquote]. Sounds ‘timeless, spaceless and formless’ to me.

RICHARD: Aye, but maybe by now you will be aware of what ‘timeless’ (time-less equals ‘no time’) and ‘spaceless’ (space-less equals ‘no space’) and ‘formless’ (form-less equals ‘no body’) really means to peoples. With this in mind you will easily observe in the above paragraph that I state clearly ‘this moment in time’ and ‘this place in space’ and ‘as-this-body’ .

Hence my oft-repeated refrain: ‘I am the material universe experiencing itself as a sensate and reflective human being’ or ‘I am the experience of the infinitude of this universe as this flesh and blood body being apperceptively aware’. The infinite character of physical space, coupled with the eternal character of time, produces a here and now infinitude that can be understood experientially by one who is apperceptive. To grasp the character of infinitude with certainty, the reasoning mind must forsake its favoured process of intellectual understanding through logical and/or intuitive imagination and enter into the realm of a pure consciousness experience (apperception). In a PCE – which is where there is no ‘I’ or ‘me’ extant – the essential characteristics of infinitude are transparently obvious, lucidly self-evident, clearly apparent and open to view.

This is a direct experiencing of the actual.

RESPONDENT: At a given moment, there is only that moment; no observer, none taking notes. But notes do get taken. Now, three days after the accident, I can recreate the accident. But I recreate the accident in the present, in here and now. This moment is as vivid and timeless as the moment of the impact. And thus life progresses, timelessly, from moment-to-moment. It is continuous as well as discrete, is continuously discrete. Immensely indescribable, but at the same time I can feel it cruising through my veins and all around me.

RICHARD: Apart from the ‘immensely indescribable’ bit (because you are describing it in a way that I can relate to) and the use of ‘timeless’ to describe this ever-fresh moment in time, I am in full agreement with what you report. Just look at what you wrote: ‘at a given moment, there is only that moment’ clearly indicates that this moment (the only one which is actually happening) is perpetually here in time ... now ... and now ... and now. Do you see this? Also with ‘this moment is as vivid and timeless as the moment of the impact’ there is no need to deny time by saying ‘timeless’ when one is living in this actual moment ... the only moment that is existing. This flesh and blood body, just like this moment, is ‘hanging’ or ‘floating’ in the eternal time of this universe just as this planet is ‘hanging’ or ‘floating’ in the infinite reaches of infinite space.

And again where you say ‘life progresses timelessly from moment-to-moment’ ... where one is being just here right now (which only happens when there is ‘no observer, none taking notes but notes do get taken’ ) there is only this moment each moment again. Again, there is no need to deny time by saying ‘timelessly’ even though only this moment exists as an actuality. This moment has no duration (as in then and now and then) because it is now and now and now ... and thus it initially seems that, as it takes no time-as-memory to occur, that it is ‘timeless’. It is not ... this moment and this place are in the realm of the infinitude of this actual physical universe. This moment is perennially here, not timelessly here. And I am perpetually here – for the term of my natural life – the same-same as this moment is ... with the marked exception that this moment’s natural life is forever. It is this moment that is eternal (immortal) and not me. I am mortal.

Also, what helps to create the feeling that this moment is timeless is that human beings – as an identity – are normally out of this universe’s eternal time. Yet time is as intimate as this body being here now at this moment. It is so intimate that I – as a body only – am not separate from it. Whereas ‘I’, as a ‘being’, have separated ‘myself’ from time by being an entity. To be an ontological ‘being’ is to mistakenly take this body being here as containing an ‘I’, a psychological or psychic entity. To autologically ‘be’ is to take this moment of being alive as being proof of ‘my’ subjective existence. ‘I’ am an illusion; if ‘I’ think and feel that ‘I’ do exist, then ‘I’ am outside of the eternity of time. ‘I’ am forever complaining that there is ‘not enough hours in the day’, or ‘I am always running out of time’, or ‘I am always catching up with time’, or ‘I am always behind time’.

Thus the PCE (which occurs globally across cultures and down through the ages irregardless of gender, race or age) is interpreted according to cultural beliefs – created and reinforced by the persistence of the instinctually created and survival oriented identity – and devolves into an altered state of consciousness (ASC). Then ‘I’ as ego – sublimated and transcended as ‘me’ as soul – manifest as ‘pure being’ (a god or a goddess or that which is ‘timeless and spaceless and formless’) which is ‘unborn and undying’ or ‘deathless’ and so on.

Lastly, where you say ‘it is continuous as well as discrete, is continuously discrete’ you are describing it accurately and concisely ... thus it is not that ‘it can not be said’ or ‘it is indescribable’ at all is it? This is communication at its best.

Good stuff this knowledge, eh?

RICHARD: If one lives fully – which is to actually be here as this body at this moment in the universe’s eternal time and this place in this universe’s infinite space – one experiences infinitude for twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, for the remainder of your life. It sure beats the specious immortality so beloved of the mystics ... who long for physical death to release them from this much-derided ‘finite’ existence. You can always use your logic on this one, Konrad, if eternity exists, where do you think it is located? Only before birth and after death? Does eternity stop happening whilst you are alive and breathing? What kind of eternity is that? Is it an intermittent eternity? No? Is it already here ... now? Yes? No? If no, then where is it?

KONRAD: Yes, and THIS reasoning is just one huge attack on the concept of time. THIS is where your Actualism falls flat on its face. In effect you are muddling with your time horizon with all of this talk about eternity, infinity, etc. It is all obfuscation. You do it in two steps. First you reduce the time horizon to zero, by only acknowledging the present, now.

RICHARD: I acknowledge what is actual, not what is abstract. And only this moment is actual. Yesterday was actual while it was happening and tomorrow will be actual when it is happening ... but only now is here. And it is always now ... and it is already here. I am not making this up ... this is not an invention. This is actually what is happening.

KONRAD: And in the second step you are trying to make the present, now, infinite.

RICHARD: I am not ‘trying’ to make time eternal ... it already is. And it is here now. Where else would eternity be?

RESPONDENT: The universe is in a state of creation. It is not ‘already always is’.

RICHARD: This physical universe’s space is infinite and its time is eternal ... which means that it has always been here and always will be. Thus it has no limits whatsoever ... which means that it does not have to be created for it already is.

RESPONDENT: The word ‘already’ implies ‘prior to something’, something prior to a past, present or future, and certainly creation is not ‘already’, in any kind of time.

RICHARD: Hmm ... what I mean by using the word ‘already’ is that one does not have to wait for the perfection of the infinitude of this physical universe to happen as it is already here now. Thus it needs no ‘creation’ because it is already ... and it always is, always has been and always will be. Where else do you place eternity? Before your birth and after your death? That is to be self-centred ... eternity is here now for it is already here.

RESPONDENT: When all time, psychological time, the ‘me’, is not present (and the ‘me’ is made up completely of time).

RICHARD: ‘Psychological time’ is made up of feelings ... emotions, passions and calenture. The affective faculties are the spanner in the works of memory. ‘I’ am emotion-backed thoughts and ‘me’ is instinct-bred feelings. Talk about confusion ... add a pinch of those psychic adumbrations and there you are ... totally confused.

*

RESPONDENT: In other words, is there no ‘spirit’ after physical death?

RICHARD: Where is eternity if it be not here? Can there actually be an ‘intermittent’ eternity (an eternity that stops when you are born and starts again after you die)?

What kind of an eternity is that!

RESPONDENT: Exactly, Richard. Eternity neither starts nor ends with our physical appearance here on this verdant, vibrantly alive planet.

RICHARD: This is indeed correct ... eternity is already here now where we humans are living, eh? And because ‘eternity neither starts nor ends with our physical appearance here on this verdant, vibrantly alive planet’ it means that time was already eternally here before I was born and time will be always eternally here after I am dead.

Because, as eternity is already here now it means that time always was and time always will be (‘time always was’ as in ‘no beginning’ and ‘time always will be’ as in ‘no ending’). As time always was and time always will be that means that time always is ... and time always is – eternally – already here now.

And no beginning to time and no ending to time means that there is no way one can be outside of time ... one always is here in time as time always is already here now. And as time and space are inextricably linked (one cannot be here in time without space to be here in now) it means that space always has been and space always will be ... space always is as time always is and space that always is, is space that always is everywhere. And space that always is everywhere is infinite space.

Infinite space means no edges to space. No edges to infinite space being eternally here means that there is no centre to this universe ... thus there is no way to locate oneself anywhere in particular and as one is nowhere in particular one is anywhere at all throughout infinite space and eternal time.

(Because just as one is anywhere at all throughout infinite space because one is nowhere in particular, one is anywhen at all throughout eternal time because one is nowhen in particular).

As space always is here it means infinity is always here and as time always is it means eternity is now and as I know that I am here, I know that I am here now where infinity always is already. And as I know that I am here now, I know that I am here now where eternity always is already.

I am already always here at this place of infinite space which is already always here now at this moment of eternal time ... where are you if you are not already always here and when are you here if you are not already always here now?

RICHARD: I am not ‘enlightened’ ... an actual freedom lies beyond enlightenment.

RESPONDENT: Is the ‘actual freedom’ the ever-changing sensate world or is it the permanent nature of the universe (whatever that may mean)?

RICHARD: The ‘permanent nature of the universe’ is that its time is always now (this moment ‘hangs’ in eternal time just as this planet ‘hangs’ in infinite space) and its space is always here (infinity ‘extends’ everywhere at once). Thus the ‘ever-changing sensate world’ is the universe’s ‘permanent nature’ ... there is no separation between the immediate and the ultimate and the relative and the absolute. For example: where would you place eternity? After your physical death? Before your physical birth? If so, this would mean that eternity is in suspension whilst you are alive ... which is clearly nonsensical. Eternity is here now ... it is already always here. So too with infinity.

Thus, when ‘I’ – which is a fictitious fixed point – cease to exist, then I become apparent (become visible, become obvious) as this flesh and blood body. As this flesh and blood body is ever-changing, there is no separation between me and the universe. Which is why I say: I am this physical universe experiencing itself as a sensate reflective human being. Thus the immediate is the ultimate and the relative is the absolute. When ‘I’ – as a fixed point – disappear, I am already always here ... where I have always been. It was only that there was a loud-mouthed ‘I’ dominating and I could not get a word in edgeways.

To give an analogy, it is as if there was a ‘walk-in’ inside this body ... and it packed its bags and left, leaving me to be here as-I-am.

RESPONDENT: In what manner does it lie beyond enlightenment?

RICHARD: In order to become enlightened, the ‘I’ as ego dies. In order to become actually free, the other half of the identity – ‘me’ as soul – must similarly die. Then I am here now, as this flesh and blood body, experiencing this moment in eternal time and this place in infinite space apperceptively for all the waking hours of the day. In other words: I am the experience of infinitude.

(Infinitude is the quality or attribute of being infinite and eternal and having no limit and means the same as ‘boundlessness’ ... is an infinite extent, amount and duration ... as in an immeasurable expanse and an unlimited time).

The infinite character of physical space, coupled with the eternal character of time, produces a here and now infinitude that can be understood experientially by one who is apperceptive. To grasp the character of infinitude with certainty, the reasoning mind must forsake its favoured process of intellectual understanding through logical and/or intuitive imagination and enter into the realm of a pure consciousness experience (apperception). In a PCE – which is where there is no ‘I’ or ‘me’ extant – the essential characteristics of infinitude are transparently obvious, lucidly self-evident, clearly apparent and open to view. It is understood experientially that this physical universe is infinite and eternal. It 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.

I will say it again this way: By being here now 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. I am always here and it is already now.

And nary a god or demon to be seen anywhere at all.

*

RESPONDENT: Since the true nature of this body and anything physical is timeless and impermanent and boundless and without separation, we cannot say any separate thing truly exists, as if it had some independent existence.

RICHARD: No, the true nature of this flesh and blood body is not timeless ... it is in time. Yes, the true nature of this flesh and blood body is impermanence ... it was born and will die. No, the true nature of this body is not boundlessness ... its apperceptive awareness is boundless. Yes, the true nature of this flesh and blood body is separation ... if by ‘separation’ you meant physically distinct from other bodies and the environment at large. You are mixing terminology there in a way that must be confusing for you.