My question is: what if whatever “that” is, is not the critical element? So that if the land of unicorns is what one comes upon after the “gut-level feeling of personal being, along with all its branches, the entire affective system” has ceased to exist, then that simply is what it is. What if the dissolution of the entire psyche and affective system is the essential criteria for being actually free from the human condition, with all else being up for grabs?
That there exist differences to how these two individuals appear to experience or at least articulate their respective conditions of having gone beyond not only ego-death but beyond what they both say was the death of psyche/ elimination of affect, is fruit for further study.
While their writings diverge in many areas, both Bernadette and Richard are emphatic that they are not just talking about what’s left after the ego dissolves:
Bernadette wrote prodigiously about this important distinction. I’ll leave things here for now with an uncut excerpt from the introduction of her book What is Self? where she articulated the very same dilemma faced by Richard upon coming across a dearth of literature pertaining to what lay beyond the extinction of identity in toto (both the lower and higher self):
It strikes me as more than coincidence that she would use “marketplace” at the end of this excerpt.
I am currently reading her writing.
Being an ex Christian with many experiences of being one with the divine, it was very interesting to read her call this parallel to emotional integration.
The immediate idea is of course that of one directly or indirectly influencing the other, but there could be a much weirder explanation.
What if, as Richard maintains, the interconnected psychic Web is indeed one big ‘humanity’. I remember reading Jung years ago about the collective consciousness of dreams and feelings.
The date is also an amazing thing. 1982.
If i were an historian looking at the writings of the period after this book was published, there is no doubt Roberts and Richard have more than passing similarities.
What is the basis for Richard’s conviction that he was the first to become Actually Free?
The core of his conviction I think to be the following.
RICHARD: …furthermore, in the ensuing years, as I proceeded to penetrate deeper and deeper into the state of being known as spiritual enlightenment, the psychic footprints, as it were, of those who had explored some of the further reaches of ‘Being’ itself gradually became less and less in number and finally petered out altogether leaving only virgin territory wherever the (psychic) eye would look.(…) I was truly on my own … no one had ventured into this terrain before.
Such was his experience, that there were no footprints there - which to him means that he was the first to venture such territory.
RESPONDENT:It could be, that there are simply no ‘footprints being made’ by those who are on that condition. RICHARD: Why could it be?
Or, more to the point, what intimate knowledge do you have of such footprints to be able to make such a supposition?
Indeed, what does “respondent” or myself know about such footprints? What do any of us? I’ve never been to that place, or even remotely to any comparable place, nor will I ever. It was Richard’s experience that there were no footprints, and it was his assumption that there would have been if that territory had been crossed before…
What is the source of that assumption?
RICHARD: …an apotheosised field of consciousness wherein metaphysical knowledge is directly attainable
I know nothing of that. Beyond a general good-will towards Richard’s statements about things I know nothing about nor ever will (on the basis on what he said about things I knew nothing about, which I later got to experience and turned out to be true), I simply can’t say anything about that. Nor will I ever. Nor, probably, will any of you (unless one of you somehow ends up following Richard’s steps through enlightenment, get to that liminal place, and see Richard’s footsteps there).
So it appears the core of Richard’s conviction is simply out of reach.
The second element of his conviction (that he was the first to become Actually Free) is the time and diligence he has spent researching other people accounts of their experience, looking for a description of someone’s path and resulting condition indicating that they indeed became Actually Free before him.
That I can do. It’s only a matter of comparing reports, right?
But I was never enlightened, a fortiori never fully enlightened. So there is an element of Richard directly recognizing that condition in other people’s reports, despite elements that might might make it look like they’re describing Actual Freedom, which is (again) out of reach to me.
RICHARD: I lived that/was that, which those words aptly refer to, night and day for eleven years
I never lived that/was that.
My ability to directly recognize it in others is at best suspect.
I can pass some judgment on the probability of Actual Freedom being one’s condition based on the reported process that got one there… At least I can certainly if that report is of someone following the route I followed, the ‘direct route’, for I have intimate knowledge of that. But in the case of someone who got there through enlightenment… And since any examined ‘candidate’ previous to Richard can be assumed to have gone through enlightenment…
The only thing I have going for me in that endeavor, is that being actually free, I can recognize that condition in someone’s report, or a minima recognize elements of such a report which are incompatible with the condition of Actual Freedom. This is not to be understated.
But considering all of the above it appears that my ability to pass judgment on whether person X was actually free before Richard (or after him, but independently), is still quite limited. In practice, it’s pretty much restricted to things like: « Does that sound right?… Does that fit?… It this enough to disqualify?… etc. »
These are relative criteria, that can be put on a range, a range of how much one would be willing to ‘squint one’s eyes’ to ‘make it fit’.
Let’s define two extremes.
No squinting allowed at all. Put a matchstick in your eyes and scrutinize. Any one quote can disqualify. Terminology differences will not be tolerated (e.g. one mention of the word ‘God’ and the person is out). The only accepted match really, would be the discovery of an exact AFT website print, to the comma, in an archeological dig.
Squint as much as you want. In fact, just close your eyes and don’t even read. Say all paths lead to the same summit, say all traditions point to the same truth. Saying that, you can pick any one path for yourself which is cool; or mix and match eh, why not. Say that and bam, not only was Richard not the first, but any kinda spiritual dude you can name before him was already ‘actually free’. Ain’t that nice. This is, perhaps not surprisingly, quite a frequent position.
Now, how much are we willing to squint our eyes? This was, as I remember it, the core of our discussion with Craig, on that particular case of Bernadette Roberts as well as about others.
Since I’m not gonna read Bernadette Roberts again, extract tons of quotes, and write a 10 pages post… let me make a general and somehow approximative statement. It’s gonna be disappointing.
There is in my opinion less squinting of the eyes required to make Bernadette Roberts’ condition fit, than for most other ‘candidates’ - yet it is still much more squinting than warranted. Again, these are relative criteria. Craig was, at the time, perhaps a bit more willing to squint than I was (not much though), and it’s safe to say that Richard is very much less willing to squint than I am (again, he has access to other avenues for his conviction).
I could say that it’s up to everyone to decide for themselves how much they’re willing to squint, if there wasn’t the much more pressing matter to investigate for each and everyone of you as to why exactly you’d pursue such endeavor as to ascertain whether X or Y is or was in fact actually free. What’s in it for ‘you’?
A last point.
EVEN IF one was to come to the personal conclusion that Richard wasn’t the first to go ‘beyond enlightenment’ to Actual Freedom, it would still remain that Richard was the first to devise a method to get there through a ‘direct route’, the wide and wondrous path (“gentrified and secure”), and for all practical matters that makes all the difference in the world.
Or you could decide that Bernadette Roberts is your guru, and go book a room in a monastery for the next 50 years to attain not only what only the most accomplished Christian mystics and contemplatives have achieved in history, but go straight beyond that into what only Bernadette Roberts has achieved, with the tremendous pitfalls and drama and seclusion and dark nights and danger of physical death that she faced.
@rick I can’t speak to your intentions of course, be they devious or otherwise - and I have to point out that it’s notoriously difficult to distinguish between ignorance and malice - but I can go by what you’ve written here and elsewhere and I can fully appreciate (as in understand) the consequences and ramifications of what you are doing.
Firstly, regardless whether it was your intent or not, or whether you are aware of it or not – both of which are besides the point with regards to what your actions entail – you have presented this topic in a devious manner (devious: “not straightforward : cunning” , “deceptive”; cunning: “characterized by wiliness and trickery”).
It is not straightforward to present a selection of quotes from someone’s account, that all apparently agree with the experience of being actually free, and to not present any other quotes from that person’s account that reveal the differences. (By the way, cherry-picking does not refer to just snipping parts of quotes, but rather, also to presenting a limited selection of quotes, even full ones, that in and of themselves don’t present the full picture.)
It is not straightforward to leave out the author’s name such as to deprive people of the context, if they have heard of this person before, which context would allow them to fully appreciate what that person is saying.
It is not straightforward to then put a disclaimer in the post that essentially amounts to “once you know more about the person you can dismiss them so only read what I’ve written here to form your opinion”. (I’ll point out that, even though you wrote “Once the identity of this author is revealed… [they can be] politely dismissed” – in my first post I did not reveal the identity of the author, but rather, quoted more of what they wrote from the same source you quoted from – which you then replied to as if I had revealed the identity of the author. So it was not actually the identity of the author you wanted to hide from people, but also other things that they wrote… i.e. you wanted to prevent a full understanding of where the author is coming from.)
It is also not straightforward to claim your intent was to merely “share something of interest for, if nothing else, enjoyment” when what you’ve later written indicates that your intent was more than just that.
Because though that is the stated goal at first, you later attempt to evoke fascination with the account (“C’mon this doesn’t spark anyone’s fascination?”), to have your correspondents engage with the subject matter. And to what end? One stated reason is “for keeping humankind’s chronicle of events nice and accurate”, later elaborated with “Accuracy in posterity, record-keeping, facts, data, etc.”.
Now this is a real doozy, because you must certainly have already been aware of all of the discussions regarding the author (Bernadette Roberts) that have already occurred and been archived on the AFT website (link: Selected Correspondence: Ms. Bernadette Roberts), which AFT site, as Richard put it:
And you already must surely have been aware that Richard had not only discussed Bernadette Roberts thoroughly, but concluded that her authentic reports , descriptions, and explanations agree, coincide with, find concordance with, and concur with his experience of being Enlightened, not of being actually free:
So by providing a deviously-cherry-picked version of a person’s account and mis-presenting it as an account of an actual freedom from the human condition as described on the AFT website – when that very AFT website (that is “guaranteed-to-be-accurate”) already contains conversations covering that very same person and elucidates how what they experience is not an actual freedom but rather is Spiritual Enlightenment – for the purposes of “keeping humankind’s chronicle of events nice and accurate”, what you are saying is that the AFT website is… not accurate.
And specifically in this case, you are saying Richard is not accurate, in his evaluation of Bernadette Robert’s state.
That is, you are saying that you, Rick, the feeling-being who is neither awakened, Enlightened, nor actually free, and thus do not have much experiential knowledge of the matters being discussed are accurate about Bernadette Robert’s state being an actual freedom and not Enlightenment… while Richard, who was fully Enlightened for 11 years and was actually free for 13 years at the time of the latest quote and thus has intimate experiential experience on these matters is not accurate.
The continuation of the last quote from Richard is particularly apropos:
Now, although this is your intent or not, and whether you are aware of it or not, to undermine the accuracy of the AFT site like this is quite insidious (insidious: “proceeding in a gradual, subtle way, but with very harmful effects.”) and highly damaging with regards to others becoming free of the human condition.
Of course, it is the PCE, and the pure intent one connects with from there, is what ultimately guides someone to an actual freedom from the human condition. The AFT site could go up in flames, or be hacked to write “Richard is a delirious poopface”, and that wouldn’t change what the facts of the matter are, as in what a PCE is, and what an actual freedom is.
And the people that wrote the material on the AFT site are humans, they are fallible, capable of making mistakes. Which is why for example they went through all the writings to correct misuses of the “pure intent” that cropped up over the years. If there is something that is inaccurate on the site, then the authors are entirely amenable to correcting it, as they do not want to mislead their fellow human beings.
But the AFT site, such as it is, is of vital importance to enable people who have not yet gotten a firm connection to pure intent to accurately establish what it is that a PCE is, and to know when they experience what is not a PCE, so that they can follow the it there.
And by undermining either the capabilities or the integrity of those whose writings are archived on the AFT site (i.e. either they are either mistaken/incompetent/incapable of correctly discerning things, or they purposefully/willfully misrepresent things to make an inaccurate point), one opens the door for people to simply pick and choose whatever they want from it, ignore other parts, and foolishly claim that they are experiencing precisely that which is written there.
And it is not just me saying that this is what would happen, you yourself literally wrote it in the very next sentence:
Though you say this is of “less importance” and this is only “incidental”, this is precisely what is most insidious about this. As it opens the door to people being misled and misinformed as to what an actual freedom is.
In essence you have joined the ranks of the affers from ~2010-2012, who, as Richard put it, reacted to the ‘good news’ of Peter and Vineeto and the others becoming free with “a subversive attempt to maintain the status-quo vis-á-vis the human condition”.
That is, whether this is your intent or not, and whether you are aware of it or not, you are making the same claim the affers did (albeit by different means) that actual freedom == spiritual Enlightenment:
That is, you are saying that any differences one might find between a spiritually Enlightened person, and an actually free person, as “trivial. Inconsequential.” As in, they are essentially the same thing.
And I know the consequences of such a thing from personal experience, as I was one of the many people that those affers misled into believing that actual freedom == Enlightenment, and that therefore I can follow the usual paths to Enlightenment in order to become free – much like one could read Bernadette Robert’s report, mistake her end-point to be actual freedom, and then go ahead and follow her path towards what she called the mid-point of bliss and unity, etc., only to then further go into the delusion of what she called no-self.
And I also remember immediately realizing, as soon as it dawned on me the Richard and Vineeto were right about the affers and that what they were doing were misinforming and misleading people, that I myself was also misinforming and misleading people by the words that I spoke and wrote and the actions I took indicating that actual freedom == Enlightenment. And with that realization, there was no further choice to be made - I simply could not continue to mislead my fellow human beings.
Luckily the damage is not so great now as it might have been in the past, going on what most fo the other forum-goers here are writing… but it is clear not everybody has been immunized.
Incidentally, it has not escaped my notice that one of the “incidental implications regarding the value of the assurances that people may give about what is or is not factual” is nothing other than that emotions, feelings, passions, and ‘me’ in ‘my’ entirety as a ‘self’, do actually exist, are indeed actual and factual… which implications would mean that therefore nothing has to be done with regards to ‘Rick’ self-immolating, in order to experience the actual world (as properly described on the AFT site and by other genuinely actually free people)… as such all of this “hoopla” likely stems from nothing more and nothing less than that self-centered survival mechanism that we are all genetically endowed with at birth.
Also as this idea (actualism/actual freedom == spirituality/Enlightenment) is clearly out there (also likely fueled at its source by that very same self-centered survival mechanism), and very strong and vibrant, in the collective psyche - as evidenced by the increasingly aversive and nonsensical reactions on the DhO thread - Richard’s words here are apropos:
In any case, I urge you @rick to take a close look at what has been written here, and to similarly cease misleading your fellow human beings… the effect of which is to deprive them of the ability to experience, for themselves, that which they read on the AFT site of what’s reported to be PCEs and actual freedom.
On a slightly different note, as a matter of curious interest only, Richard (in a footnote on this page) writes about Bernadette Roberts:
i.e. she describes that ‘will’ is the center of what she calls the feeling-self/‘being’ (which vanished upon her second movement, and which of course is not what feeling-being refers to in actualism terms).
Now while talking with Richard about his decryption/translation of the Pali canon, he told me that he figured out the meaning of an often-used but highly misunderstood term in Buddhism, sankharas. They are usually translated as ‘formations’ or ‘fabrications’, but Richard indicated the best translation he could come up with was “willfulness”, as in “a willful child”. (willful: “(of a bad or harmful act) intentional; deliberate.”, “having or showing a stubborn and determined intention to do as one wants, regardless of the consequences.”).
Now, the Buddhist Pratītyasamutpāda (i.e. “dependent origination”), describes the origins of dukkha and how to end dukkha, where dukkha properly means “being apart from / asunder from the Absolute” (or God, in Christian terms).
The first link in the chain is “Avijja”, i.e. ignorance, which entails ignorance of dukkha (i.e. not knowing what apartness-from-the-Absolute/apartness-from-God means), not knowing the origination of dukkha (i.e. what causes dukkha in the first place), not knowing how to end dukkha (i.e. how to end apartness-from-God / how to first unite with God and then become God), nor the path to ending dukkha.
The second link in the chain, which necessarily arises from the first, is none other than… Sankhara! I.e. willfulness.
Thus in Buddhist terms, with the ending of ignorance, comes the ending of willfulness… i.e. with knowing dukkha and how to end it, dukkha thus ends, and as a necessary consequence, so too does willfulness.
And with the ending of willfulness comes the ending of everything else following on the chain, which relate roughly to consciousness, hedonic-tone, ‘existence’, birth, old age and death, though I am not so confident of the translations… but in any case with the ending of will, so too does everything after will also end, which caught my eye when I read Bernadette’s description here:
i.e. what she calls emotions / affective branches (which are not as comprehensive as what is called the affective faculty on the AFT site) do not disappear instantly (as the affective faculty does upon actual freedom), but rather, fade and disappear, because the ‘souce’ of their power (i.e. will) has been ‘made immovable’… which is very much in parallel with the ‘link’ of willfulness disappearing, and therefore the following links also withering/dying due to a lack of being fueled.
In any case, this is more curiosity and only an apparent parallel - I don’t have the experiential experience with Enlightenment or the study of Pali enough to fully understand it. But the parallel is interesting.
If you mean moderation-wise, then no - I realize I can’t control people, and better than resort to bans or warnings or whatever, is to reply to the content of what’s written, so people can see for themselves.
But I am sincere in what I wrote – people can and do listen to the words we write, it is not harmless to mislead people. Of course I understand you don’t think you are misleading people, but that doesn’t change the fact .
That being said it’s ultimately up to the person reading to be misled or not - though others can make it easier or harder for them. If someone wants to allow themselves to be misled that is up to them… and there’s less chances of what we can generously call ‘honest mistakes’ now than there were even in 2012, with all the information and reports of people having more success with actualism.
Ultimately speaking you are another fellow human being, one who is interested in actualism, and actual freedom, and one who doesn’t quite ‘see’ it yet… ultimately the only person you mislead is yourself, ultimately you’re the one that misses out on it. So my response is as much for you as it is for the other people here. Do with it what you will
I downloaded and started to read the original text. My initial impression seems to hold true, in that the vitality and sensuous is just not in her writing.
The exegesis of “wilfulness” actually echoes this. She in her own words, began to lack “personal energies”. She had trouble doing simple chores.
Now, i know this very well from my present life, so i certainly don’t need any help in lacking “personal energies”.
Having said that, i find the discussion useful.
One thing which has marked the last decade for me was the lack of anything unusual in my perceptions.
No more “experiences”.
I actually rebel and conform almost simultaneously to what you write @claudiu.
There is something about the “no dirty trick too dirty” which to my religious mind makes me very orthodox. Despite my public recalcitrance.
This is a “dirty trick” in and of itself.
I actually have enjoyed reading BR. Something about her non-dramatic and matter of fact attitude to God and Christianity also confronts me.
She talks about God so impersonally. So amazingly selfishly. Like, just another thing, like a car she owns or a particular set of trousers she like to work in the garden wearing.
Utilitarian.
I was, for next to 30 years, so passionately “personal” with god. Even as a new ager before Buddhism, and many times after, God was a person to me. Not a thing. Or a means to an end. Or something to be hedonisticly indulged in (as she writes at one point).
I actually like reading it. How God is just a means to an end for her.
I like, really like, the parallel she draws between “emotional integration” and being “one with god”.
In layman terms, i think this is just being centred and determined. Liking oneself.
Being “one with god” is really just liking oneself. Thatt “rosy pearl” of one’s own being, has to be on board with all of this.
I think the timing of Ricks post, and Srinaths post of the “weird” are quite nice.
Sometimes there is a third, forth or fifth alternative, and sometimes there is an infinitude of them.
As far as being misleading, i think the way Rick presented it was fun. I seriously thought it was Krishnamaturi. (spelling?).
Aa far as Richard’s evidence, i also remember him hinting at an Australian aboriginal saying something of the sort, (that he was the first). It’s a vague memory of something i may have read on the AFT.
I had experiences on a trip to Alice Springs (middle of Australia) when i was 17 and an older aboriginal couple that were travelling with me had me convinced i was some very special prophet. It was a church trip to the area my father grew up in as the adopted son of missionaries. I was an extreme pentacostal Christian at that stage (the whole package, including prophecy, speaking in tongues, visions etc).
As far as connection with the psychic world (which Srinath hinted had much evidence of turning “matter is alive” into myths of spiritual creatures), the aboriginals have few peers. The stories from that trip would make your hairs dance.
Sadly, for all that spiritual gymnastics, i also remember from that trip my brother (second born, who suicided in 2003) crying his eyes out because he had no friends. We were all travelling on my fathers MCI coach bus. I remember leaning over the seat and seeing him crying.
So much for Christians really. 40 people on a bus all claiming to know the god of everything, and they could not see a broken 15 year old in need of help.
On the topic of “wilfulness”, i can vouch that Richard has a fully intact Will. He is very determined, despite age and physical pain.
I helped him build a modification to the bed in Vineeto’s houseboat. He was very determined and had plenty of energy, despite the pain from his back.
He would say he was lazy, but certainly not more than i am. If a lack of will was the requirement for enlightenment, then i am in very real danger of being the “next big thing” on the guru circuit.
There are two of those, with quite different ‘vibes’.
One I always found entertaining to listen to. The one Richard once said comes “closer” to what he has to report. U.G. He’s such a funny dead-end.
The other one (Jiddu, or K.), I can’t say I was ever interested.
In the end, it’s 3 1/2 pounds of gooey stuff doing gooey stuff thinking and feeling. How can anyone say that this gooey thing is the same as that one?
BRs writing about spending 2 decades “enlightened” and then going beyond to be “without an affective system” and “no self” is definitely going to be filed on the same shelf as Richard’s diary when alien archaeologists are digging us up.
Honestly, i think i need a break from reading and writing. Just have chats. So much reading. Aghh.
I am only at page 93 of the pdf i downloaded of BR, and already i am suffering to read it.
There is no excitement in her. Nothing vital, or joyously exploring being alive. She talks of not have a “self” to help her deal with the nothingness and silence. She continues to question what is perceiving this emptiness and nothingness? The eye?
Definitely not actual freedom. There is a extreme egoism in it. Despite experiencing “no self or Other”, what Is, is capitalised. What Is, is God. Not a personal God. But God.
I know this territory. The outskirts of it anyway. A huge mindjob. Getting lost in “what is”, her body “melting away”. This is exactly what she claims it isn’t. It is the self making everything self. So “self” , that there is no self perceived. She capitalised the “One”, and “It”, like a newage bookshop window display.
Ok must just have been me that didn’t find it amusing . After reading the initial post, and then googling to find the author, upon seeing the name I felt deceived, hoodwinked.
I really had a rough time coming out of the spiritual trap. While in Australia as it was dawning to me that I had been totally misled I said “It’s like I’m coming out of a dream”. And for many months after I experienced intense cognitive dissonance as I integrated the new knowledge of actualism and as it conflicted intensely with what I had thought was actualism but was just “affism”, which was spirituality in another, very devious, guise.
So I find myself being hyper-vigilant (“Hypervigilance — the elevated state of constantly assessing potential threats around you — is often the result of a trauma.”) and particularly upset when I see people as mish-mashing actualism with spirituality, because of the effect this had on me.
That being said this wasn’t the first time nor will it be the last time that the topic is discussed, so it is silly for me to get upset about it – that’s when I recognized that I can’t control people, so doesn’t make sense to try to do so. But it is sensible to investigate the claim and point out in a factual and straightforward manner whether it is accurate. And I think sensible to point out the potential harm this can have.
The topic certainly stirred a lot of discussion, I’m glad that people found it interesting And I did find it interesting the parallel between BR’s description and the Buddhist description of it.
With all that being said I do share Richard’s apparent incredulity that people think they know better than him what it is he experienced. But I remember when first having that pointed out to me on the AFT site, it didn’t do much to change my opinion, as I thought he was mistaken about it. And it seemed like he just wanted people to believe him. It didn’t occur to me that logically if I think he’s mistaken about Enlightenment, then it doesn’t make sense to listen to what he has to say about actual freedom. It’s not a matter of belief, but rather, a question of, does it make sense to consider what this person has to say? If he is so wrong in a vital respect then it doesn’t…
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