Hmm this is something I need to think about in terms of how it happens for me. Richard’s quote mentions that once feeling neutral, the step to feeling good is not such a big step, but it does not specify how the little step happens. For me it seems that once I am feeling somewhat neutral, I can allow myself to start moving towards feeling good again, is this the same step as ‘seeing the silliness of feeling bad’? What do you guys think?
Reading the quote you attached though, I think having it as a HTML linking back to AFT passages would be awesome, so that each step can be clarified further as needed.
Hmm good question and it might work different ways for different people…
I brought it up because of a trigger that happened for me 2 days ago. I was severely triggered and plunged deep into feeling bad and stressed. I couldn’t find my way out of it.
I couldn’t find my way back to feeling good… I couldn’t see the silliness of feeling bad. I was able to immediately identify the event itself that triggered the feeling bad, but it seemed hard to find out why in particular it triggered me, it was like a multi-layered thing that I wasn’t able to ‘get at’. At first I tried investigating while in the middle of it (I didn’t follow the flow chart !!) and that didn’t work, I only sort of swam around in the murk. I tried getting back to neutral, but that didn’t lead to feeling good.
The next day in the morning I was essentially back to neutral, and then while walking outside I revisited the triggering event and then was able to immediately see that it was silly to spend hours feeling bad about this one thing. I didn’t have to delve deeply and thoroughly dismantle every aspect of my identity related to it - it was just silly in and of itself to spend so much time feeling bad about it, and only now after seeing the silliness, finally, was I free from the hold that trigger had on me.
So then I looked up and re-read the passage, and this time around it seemed that the ‘step’ from being neutral to feeling good lies in the “suss out where, when, how, why - and what for - the general sense of well-being (feeling good) ceased occurring”, from that platform of neutral.
Yes that works, the reason why I didn’t put ‘identify’ trigger to begin with is because there are times when I find myself derailed into feeling bad however when it is a smaller blip often it is just the realisation that I am not feeling good which puts me back to feeling good. So I guess that is the simplest expression of ‘see the silliness of feeling bad’. There are other times like you found where I need to find out what it was that triggered me to feel bad in the first place, but I always thought this could come more under ‘investigation’.
So the pathway that I usually take is like this - Trigger - nipped in the bud - if not nipped then see if I can get back to feeling good by seeing that it’s silly to feel bad - if feeling bad more complex/persistent I ensure I am feeling somewhat good and then look at the specific trigger - then at any point I might choose to do more of an investigation into the whole thing.
There is also the importance of identifying the trigger so that it can be nipped in the bud the next time but this seems better once I am back to feeling good and not so much as a way to get back to feeling good.
This is where doing the chart is helping my clarify things for myself too, it’s really interesting to see where if anywhere our approaches differ and maybe where each one can do things in a different/more effective way.
It would be useful if any of the other guys could comment on how this plays out for them and I can amend the chart if there is a general consensus that that is the more effective way.
Ahh interesting – for me I distinguish between identifying the trigger, and investigating it.
I see it as, see what it is that triggered me, then see the silliness of that - without investigating. As in it’s just silly in and of itself. But I can’t see it is silly if I don’t know what it is. Its interesting that seeing its silly to feel bad can work in and of itself, but for me it is seeing the silliness of letting X, Y or Z take away from enjoying and appreciating , that works. That is a mouthful but when I do see it it takes an instant.
So for me its - notice I am not feeling good anymore . See if I can spot the trigger. Once I spot it I can see it’s silly. And the new bit of info I got rereading the page is that even spotting the trigger is worth doing just once neutral, otherwise it is too much.
Once feeling good then it’s no longer even necessary to investigate. I think Richard alluded to this one day - you kind of have to remind yourself to still do the investigation or it’ll come back. Which is a far cry from feeling it’s necessary while in the grips of feeling bad …
I think these aren’t hard and fast rules though. It is a wide and wondrous path, not a straight and narrow. So instead of a strict “you must do this” flowchart it’s more of a general guide of what works.
But I like us getting to the real nitty grittty of exactly how it works or what doesn’t work for us. I think there hasn’t been much of this generally. Maybe we can make a body of work of practical guides of these tools actually working for people , examples to follow - “Descriptions of the Tools Working” to complement descriptions of PCEs
I am eager to make a interactive page version of the method. Will see if I have time and how it turns out !
For someone who is still learning how to apply the method, this is very helpful indeed. However, I get triggered a lot, and once the initial strong feelings pass, I get stuck in this limbo neutral-bad state where it’s still a struggle to try and feel good, but also I’m not emotionally overwhelmed. Yet there’s a light bad feeling. In this state, if I try to feel good it sometimes backfires me into feeling bad. So usually I just go do something else. Eventually it lifts and I get back to feeling neutral, until another trigger comes. I cycle between trigger, feeling bad, neutral-bad, and neutral and spend most of my time in neutral-bad, which sucks because I am waiting around for most of the time. It’s frustrating. Would appreciate some advice on how to get beyond this block.
My understanding is it’s “get back to feeling good however you can accomplish that,” it’s a little different for everyone
As far as investigation goes it’s a little interesting because we can learn a lot while in the throes of emotion too, it’s just learning about ‘me’ rather than learning about the actual. I think this is a necessary stage to get around to removing ‘me’ later
But then the kind of investigation that informs how we’d like to be, how we’d like to operate, what is possible, can only happen from feeling good.
I´ve gathered some quotes from previous posts to comment them based on my experience:
Although it is true that “seeing the silliness” is easier and more effective than before for me to feel neutral or good, I consider that it is common for the actualist to become neutral by seeing the trigger but without seeing its sillines (that is, by applying other ways or resources).
In my experience, then, no: it’s not required to see the silliness of feeling bad to move toward feeling good from neutral (for example, I used to resort more to HAIETMOBA and to pay atention to my senses, especially when a part of “me” not only didn’t see the silliness of feeling bad but instead justified my discomfort as the opposite of silly).
The phrase I highlighted in bold is another resource that we tend to disregard in actual practice, often speaking from an idealized practice (I do not qualify it at this point as good or bad; I simply describe it as part of the process we experience): it is time.
Frequently the transition to neutral is provided by the mere passage of time (sometimes minutes, more often hours) and although it is common to notice then the silliness of the event, it is not unusual moving to feel good by other means (even by merely elapsing more time, when we suddenly find ourselves feeling good without having noticed the process).
I quote this honest description of @frank_otto as representative of what I described before, but also as descriptive of another reality that perhaps you want included in the diagram: how common it is that also from neutral the triggers lead us to feeling bad, without allowing us to get to feel good.
Lots of good points here, I’m busy with work this weekend but I’ve been considering everything that’s been written and I’ve also been trying to observe myself to see just what exact process I use.
The one thing that became obvious from observing myself today that it doesn’t seem to be a cookie cutter recipe.
For example I had times today when I started to feel myself verging off into feeling bad, and that in itself was enough to remind myself to guide myself back into feeling felicitous and innocuous as I was feeling that a way a few minutes back. So in that scenario there wasn’t much tracing back and finding the trigger. More a noticing that I am shifting towards feeling bad and an intent to shift towards feeling good.
Other times the feeling bad kept coming back which then gave me reason to trace back and find out what was the thought/event which set this into motion and what it was about.
Other times even this didn’t work and I abandoned that approach with the intent of simply taking my time as @Miguel pointed put, to get to neutral and from there once more attempt to move into feeling good.
Interspersed with that was a bit of investigation/contemplation about the issues that were present. But that was not really forced but rather happened of its own accord as I was making sense of what was going on.
Then other times I found myself simply feeling good and then just enjoying and appreciating.
Haha this could be like an episode of a ‘day in the life of an actualist’ .
So I think even with this sort of diagram in place, anyone attempting to apply the method will have to learn on the go, how to mix and apply different tools in order to get back to feeling good. Even if at times this is just feeling natural-good or not feeling bad as much as previously.
@frank_otto I remember going through a very similar time to what you describe, mostly feeling somewhat neutral and then dipping into bad, not really having much success with feeling good a lot of the time though. I wonder if it is just a case of continuing to chip away, and essentially doing whatever you can. Because especially at the beginning there is just so much in the way of feeling good, ones entire life and upbringing sets one up away from feeling good, so it is quite the task to turn around and face the other way.
Some advice that may help, that I have found helpful for me (and have often inadvertently done) is – simply, do something fun! Go rock climbing, hang out with friends, do an activity (bowling? ping pong? pool?), something sporty, walk in nature, etc. Just do something that takes you out of your usual routine (i.e. the one that keeps you feeling neutral, neutral-bad and bad), something that you personally, that you yourself, like to do. It doesn’t need to be “Actualist Approved” (if there was such a thing) - just something you like.
For me it would be something like a physical activity or a social one, something that gets me out of the house - as opposed to say watching movies, binging YouTube or playing video games.
Then while you are simply having fun in the usual way, put a pin in that, emotionally. Make an agreement with yourself that you’ll intuitively/instinctually remember what this feeling good/having fun feels like.
Then when you find yourself feeling neutral again, you can rememorate that feeling good, which will help show you how to get back to that feeling good from your feeling neutral.
Caveat that this isn’t guaranteed to work and it probably won’t work 100% of the time, but I find that frequently when I’ve been in a funk and simply did something fun, that served to get me back on track quite effectively.
So I’ve been thinking about how to incorporate what @claudiu has mentioned :
In terms of what role ‘finding the trigger’ plays in getting back to feeling good and whether it is a necessary step.
In terms of using ‘find the trigger’ to get from neutral to good after a period of feeling overwhelmed by a complex issue.
Regarding 2) I definitely remember times when after being derailed by a complex issue I would be stuck at neutral until I was able to find out what the trigger was to begin with, this would help me to move into feeling good again once the trigger was pinpointed. So I do think it could be useful to have this added on, maybe as a link from ‘feeling neutral’ to ‘seeing the silliness’. Which then gives one the option of either moving from neutral to good if possible or going through ‘see the silliness’ if there is a need for an extra step to make the transition easier.
Regarding number 1) This is where it gets complex! My current understanding is that in its simplest expression ‘seeing the silliness of feeling bad’ can take the form of an instant seeing, without the need to trace back and find the trigger. In fact it seems that this is what primarily happens in a virtual freedom. I remember asking Alan how he experienced himself day by day and I remember him saying something to the effect that often just noticing that he is feeling bad is enough to set him back to feeling good, and that it was really as simple as that - it is silly to be feeling bad when one can be feeling good. A lot of this also seems to be with habituation, once feeling good is habituated to be more or less the norm, it is easier to move back into it without extra steps.
What I have come to conclude is the role of ‘finding the trigger’ is to help one to see the silliness of feeling bad. This is because this seeing can only be genuine, if there is a part of ‘me’ that does not agree to move into feeling good in a way that is sincere THEN it is necessary to find the trigger to show ‘myself’ that it is silly to let this thing spoil my enjoyment and appreciation.
Of course the other reason to find the trigger is so that the issue can be nipped in the bud the next time, but what I have found personally is that daily there are many small blips in feeling good which do not require this, it seems overkill to trace back to find the trigger each time there is the slightest diminution in feeling good.
If ‘finding the trigger’ is not sufficient, if there is a part of ‘me’ that is still clinging on despite finding the trigger THEN it is likely that some form of investigation may be warranted as a way to help clear the issue.
The thing that stands out for me in all those cases (in varying degree) is the sincere intent to feel good and a genuine seeing that it is silly to let X take away your enjoyment and appreciation of being alive. Finding the trigger is one tool which helps to arrive at those things.
One of the reasons that I did not want to put - feeling bad → find the trigger → see the silliness is because it could appear that ‘finding the trigger’ is a condition which needs to be met in order to feel good.
When I first started with Actualism I went down that path and I believed that if I only follow a recipe of A->B->C then I would magically be granted feeling good. Of course this did not work, and as I understand now the reason this did not work was because I had removed myself from the equation, I removed the sincere intent to feel good and the genuine seeing that it is silly to feel bad. Those are the primary drivers responsible for moving from feeling bad to feeling good.
Those are just my recent thoughts, I haven’t really come to a proper conclusion yet but it’s been really interesting to delve so deep into the nitty gritty of applying the different tools.
Hmm that’s interesting and it makes sense. The entire point of it is to feel good. Someone can follow the steps without really wanting to feel good, only to then blame the steps for not working, and be missing the point entirely. This seems to be what happened with HAIETMOBA initially - people took asking HAIETMOBA in and of itself to be the method. I suspect Richard never imagined people would do that, as it was so clear to him the point is to feel good.
This is where actualism gets tricky to convey I think. It is really about sincerely wanting to feel good, to generally enjoy being alive. The tools are just things to help one fulfill this intention. Without the intention, nothing will work anyway, as that isn’t what one is wanting to do. But I don’t know how to convey the parts of “how to get to wanting to sincerely feel good” other than “well you just have to want it” lol . And that that’s up to each person to figure out. It may not be possible to formulate this… you just have to see it. If someone sincerely wants to see it they’ll keep digging until they do, and then the information here and the flow charts and the AFT site provide all the necessary info. If they don’t then they don’t. And there are people who sincerely want to see it but haven’t, yet… and then it’s just a matter of keeping to go at it.
When I first read this my first impulse was agreement. There are times recently when I have been, essentially surfing the wave of sheer enjoyment and appreciation, for hours or days at a time. It is very different than normal, and it’s relatively easy to stay surfing there. And I wanted to initially say that yes, in such a state just seeing my feeling good is diminished, was enough to get back to feeling good / keep surfing.
But thinking about it more, I don’t think that’s the case. I think rather it’s that I was feeling so good, that I would immediately notice any little thing that would take away from it — and that noticing was in and of itself enough to continue feeling good, but that noticing entailed seeing that it was silly to let that particular trigger take away from feeling good. It was easier because it was more immediate, but it entailed seeing the trigger.
And I speak from experience that usually the way this surfing-wave-of-being-alive goes away for me, is, I find the feeling-good diminished, and then I don’t actually successfully see the triggering event as silly. I sort of pretend it is just to get back to feeling good, but then I’m not feeling good as I was before. And eventually it builds, then other things come in, and before I know it I am off the wave. So I would say that unsuccessfully seeing the trigger , or not seeing it as silly , is what leads to that ending.
While it is theoretically true that as a blanket statement “nothing is worth feeling bad about”… in practice it never worked that way for me. I always had to find the specific trigger and address it specifically… or just wait until I forget about it, enough time passes, I’m having fun anyway, etc.
Perhaps because such a blanket statement can only ever be an intellectual one – while “not any one thing” is worth feeling bad about, I am not currently experiencing “any one thing”, I am experiencing “a particular thing”, and that is the particular thing to see as silly… and if I can’t do that, then that means I do not actually see it as silly.
Note well on the article, "Once the specific moment of ceasing to feel good is pin-pointed, and the silliness of having such an incident as that (no matter what it is) take away one’s enjoyment and appreciation of this only moment of being alive is seen for what it is – usually some habitual reactive response – one is once more feeling good … "
i.e. pinpoint the moment, see the silliness of that specific incident, and then one is feeling good again.
And in practice this is how it has worked for me.
So to re-visit this again, I would say finding the trigger is a necessary but not a sufficient step, to get back to feeling good now (as opposed to some future moment, i.e. via just waiting it out, doing something else).
The missing piece in what you describe here, as you wrote, is “the genuine seeing that it is silly to feel bad” or specifically the genuine seeing that it is silly to let that incident in particular take away from one’s enjoying and appreciating of being alive.
And indeed following the recipe – which I also tried doing unsuccessfully as well at first – does not lead to automatically seeing the silliness. You really have to see the silliness.
“How do I see the silliness?” that is the tricky / un-recipie-fiable (for now) bit .
“Why am I not feeling good?” (the answer to this question is the trigger… the reason)
Deciding that’s not a good enough reason to feel ‘good(loving) or bad feelings’ - even if temporarily for the sake of investigation (tabling the issue)
Feeling good
Investigating the previous trigger if necessary
I agree with @claudiu that seeing the trigger/reason is a necessary step if only for being sincere with oneself: if I’m feeling bad, I inherently feel that there’s some justified reason for it. Trying to ‘push away’/dismiss that reason out of hand ends up with splitting of self
Ooh this is really interesting I am inclined to agree with you @claudiu and @henryyyyyyyyyy after reading your posts. @claudiu what you mentioned about surfing the wave and being able to spot the triggers almost immediately then see them as silly. I have wondered wether my experience with those minor blips in feeling good that can be corrected almost automatically happens in the same way. That as soon as there is the slightest diminishment of feeling good, attentiveness automatically jumps in and attends to the situation at hand, the process is as you said tho - identify the trigger → see it as silly.
I think you guys are correct on this one, it’s really exciting for me that I have been able to clarify so many things to myself in this thread, thanks for your input.
So looks like the best thing to do with the diagram would be to add the ‘identify trigger’ box as you drew on paper @claudiu and maybe I will add a little text box if there is space which will include Richards words describing the process of identifying the trigger and seeing it as silly.
As I had said, @claudiu said and then @henryyyyyyyyyy summarized, if one doesn’t take some of the less effective paths that don’t require identifying the trigger to get back to feeling good (such as just letting time pass, doing fun activities until mood change, etc.), seeing the trigger tends to be the best step to move to feeling good more quickly, lastingly, etc.
However, almost everyone seems to agree that seeing the trigger and considering it silly go hand in hand (other than me before, just @claudiu mentioned that sometimes he is able to see the trigger but fail to see it silly -with the consequences he described-).
But I want to know if my understanding of your experience is correct: so for most of you seeing the trigger implies almost automatically considering it silly, and because of that in the new diagram “identify the trigger” should be followed by “see the silliness”?
I wouldn’t quite say that, because when I’m still feeling bad I’m far more likely to see the trigger as justified. But, with requisite sincerity, I can at least recognize the trigger as being what caused the erosion of purity.
It is NOT necessary to see the trigger as silly, to do something else to get back to feeling good. Essentially, setting aside the trigger for a moment for the purpose of feeling good.
I do that because investigation is much more effective when feeling good.
When I’ve gotten back to feeling good, and re-entered investigation, then I’m far more likely to make the breakthrough. Sometimes it’s a snap, and the trigger is immediately seen as silly. Sometimes, the trigger is of sufficient strength to trip me up once again.
That’s usually the case when there’s a ‘complex’ happening. A trigger that comes back over and over again.
It’s with repeated investigation, always from as clear a space as possible, with as much sincerity as possible, that gradually such a trigger can be removed.
Speaking for myself, I have many triggers which I’ve attacked repeatedly for years now but are still extant. I think that’s par for the course. But over those repeated offenses, I’ve chipped away at the issues, weakened them somewhat, and learned a lot about what works better and worse in my investigation process.
And then, when the conditions are right, the magical event happens where something which had always existed in ‘me’ evaporates, never to be seen again
In my experience identifying the trigger does not imply finding it silly so thanks for pointing this out @Miguel. If I amend the chart as I described in my last post then it would appear that ‘seeing the silliness’ somehow comes automatically from ‘identifying the trigger’, which it does not. Then to demonstrate what happens when ‘identify the trigger’ does not lead to ‘seeing the silliness’ would start to get a bit too complex I think.
As @claudiu mentioned, seeing the silliness takes a genuine seeing that it is silly to let X take away from ones enjoyment and appreciation, finding the trigger allows one to know what X is, but in itself it is not sufficient.
Without finding the trigger I do not know what I am upset about (what X is) so as @henryyyyyyyyyy pointed out I cannot genuinely see it as silly, I can only begin to split myself.
I have been thinking about how best to go ahead in that case and I think I will leave the chart as it is (without adding the new ‘identity the trigger’ box) I will instead include a text box which will explain the ‘see the silliness box’ further, it will have something to the effect of :
Once the specific moment of ceasing to feel good is pin-pointed, and the silliness of having such an incident as that (no matter what it is) take away one’s enjoyment and appreciation of this only moment of being alive is seen for what it is – usually some habitual reactive response – one is once more feeling good
This should have the effect of explaining just what one does to ‘see the silliness of feeling bad’ but still leaving the diagram somewhat open and without increasingly more complex pathways.
I will however add an additional connection from ‘feeling neutral’ to ‘seeing the silliness’ as this does appear to be a very useful step to come out of a particularly funky feeling pattern once one has managed to at least feel neutral.
Hmm I don’t think so – that would also imply that feeling good automatically leads to a trigger automatically leads to bad feelings which automatically leads to ‘overwhelmed by emotion’ which automatically leads to ‘this sucks, abandon actualism’ … i.e. the arrows don’t mean you necessarily go that way, to me it’s clear each step is a choice or a thing that may happen.
Be that as it may, maybe instead of “see the silliness of feeling bad” it can be re-worded to “see the silliness of allowing that trigger to take away from feeling good” ?
Then that will make it clear it’s to see the silliness of a specific thing… and when worded that way it makes it obvious that you would have to know what the trigger is, to see the silliness of letting that detract from feeling good.
then it also works whether one is feeling neutral or feeling bad, as both are less than “feeling good”
agreed makes sense
Some more thoughts (no shortage of thoughts or ideas lol )
what about arrow from ‘focus on getting back to neutral’ back to ‘bad feelings’ and/or ‘overwhelmed’? as often while going about doing so i can sink back into overwhelmed…
and lastly the “just wait it out” or “do something else” might warrant its own box? like from feeling bad or from overwhelmed, to a box like “really stuck? set it aside, wait it out, do something fun, until you naturally find yourself feeling good” … which then goes to ‘feeling good’ box. this is the ‘escape hatch’ of not quite abandoning actualism but also sort of re-setting for the next opportunity
Yes I think I used the wrong word, instead of automatically I should have said that it offers only 1 option to follow.
So for example in the case of feeling good one either goes to ‘enjoy and appreciate’, ‘investigate’ or ‘trigger’ which more or less covers all the main directions one can go in when feeling good.
If I have a pathway which is strictly ‘identify trigger’ → ‘see the silliness’ this will be the only 1 path that is available to take once one arrives at ‘identify the trigger’. So in a situation where one has identified the trigger but it has not allowed one to see the silliness of feeling bad one may have to do some investigation, or maybe identifying the trigger has made one go deeper into the emotion and one needs to first ‘get back to neutral’ etc.
The scenario I have in mind is someone following the diagram… They have located the trigger but they cannot see it as silly, yet they are stuck at what to do as it appears going from ‘trigger’ to ‘see as silly’ is the only option presented to them and they cannot go back either so its a dead end.
Maybe if I do include ‘identify the trigger box’ it could go in 2 ways :
'Identify the trigger → ‘see as silly’ (the preferred way)
'Identify the trigger → ‘overwhelmed by emotion’ (plan B). As in one has found the trigger but this didn’t really ‘do the trick’, one is still feeling bad and cannot sincerely see that it is silly to continue feeling bad, so one takes the option of going back to neutral, maybe re-attempting to ‘see silliness’ once in neutral or allowing oneself to move towards feeling good once in neutral.
Ah I see what you mean. Yea that makes sense. And good to be clear about it I think, because I also used to hold the belief that just identifying the trigger would magically work.
Another downside of it as a separate box is that one might know the trigger already but go back to feeling bad repeatedly. So then it seems redundant to go through identify each time …
That being said practically I find it helpful to revisit the specific trigger as I might have misidentified it, when it initially triggered me - like misidentify what it is specifically that bothered me.
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I like the idea of having it go back out to other boxes. It might work. And if you do add the “set it aside” box that can be another direction to go besides “see the silliness”. Though the downside of that box is if someone does only that all the time they will be missing the point so maybe it would be a gray box too.
Or maybe better to label the box “I can’t see the silliness”, in which case the advice can be to set it aside until feeling good and then revisit ?
No strong opinions … just brainstorm. Tough to balance precision with accuracy with flexibility with making it simple enough
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I am inclined to agree with you 
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so its a dead end.