Andrew

Journals
1329

Andrew: I don’t like the feeling of being better than others. I want everyone to be special, and to enjoy that. I don’t like people being left behind. I don’t enjoy being infatuated, but to be honest, I do enjoy people being infatuated with me, for a moment at least, because then it’s in my power to be nice to them. To enjoy their blind desire towards me.
I am only thinking of a single person when I wrote that last part! Haha
Edit: no, I just experienced really strongly once. I do get it day to day. I like being nice to people who ‘desire’ me, because usually I see them feeling they need me somehow.
Musing aside, I realise that I am perpetually stuck on a single issue.
It’s related to the above musings, but more towards how I can’t motivate myself anymore. I don’t have any answers for this central issue of motivation.
In context, everything that motivated me was , as Vineeto touched on, a fight or flight, eat or be eaten, reproduce and survive type of life.
Even my precious music!
All of it.
In other news, there has been far more moments of just being a human, “pre-religion” in the last few weeks.
I really wanted to ask a question, but I forgot what it was I wanted to know as soon as I started typing.
Asking others for help has always been a huge problem for me. I feel I should be helping everyone else, but I just don’t have anything to give anymore. (link)

Hi Andrew,

You had a big insight – “pre-religion” – and you most likely still digest all the ramifications and consequences of that. Until this settles down, any “motivation” for action is likely to be a mental/ moral construct.

So instead of looking for others “blind desire towards me” why not start with being friendly with yourself and perhaps be sincere and honest with yourself enough that you can get to the point where you genuinely and naïvely like yourself.

Andrew: I guess I can do better than that.
The last few weeks, after Vineeto pointed out that all me religious fears were essentially the “eat or be eaten” fears of blind nature, I had the experience of “popping out” the other side of the bulbous growth that religious belief is in my life.
Like some vine infected along its length with a parasite, all that heightened dramatic and complex Dante’s circles of hell, was seen as an inflammatory response.
My question is; how does one care enough about oneself to do anything about one’s happiness? (…) (link)

Exactly – that’s why I suggested to do something you may not have done before – be friends with yourself. Here is a practical example –

Q: And notice how often you put yourself down.
R: Tell yourself off.
Q(1): For thinking it!
R: One discovers that the way one tells oneself off; if one were to talk to another person like that – a friend – one would not have any friends left. You have to live with yourself twenty four hours a day; if you are talking to yourself in such a way that you are not a good friend to yourself, then what are you doing? If I were to talk like that to you, be sharp with you, you would have nothing to do with me. Are you not sharp upon yourself?
Q(1): I am very sharp upon myself.
R: It is a good thing to become friends with yourself, to decide not to tell yourself off any more: ‘Okay, I will make mistakes from time to time, because I am still human, but if I ‘goof-up’ I will not exacerbate the situation by imposing a condemnation upon myself.’ One always has another chance, another moment in which to do better, to make it work this time. It is always a quick thought, a swift reproach: ‘Oh, you fool!’ or ‘You shouldn’t do that!’ or ‘How stupid!’
Q: Or you’re not good enough: ‘You should know better than that!’
R: It is good to cease doing that because only you live with yourself for the twenty four hours of the day. Everybody else comes and goes, but you remain, ever constant … for the rest of your life. I can not stress enough how important it is for you to be your own best friend. For then you get to know yourself – you are no longer against yourself. You can discover things about your own make-up: ‘Oh, isn’t that interesting’ or ‘I like that one’ or ‘I didn’t know I was carrying that’ or ‘I’m glad that one is out of the way’. Sometimes, of course, something can come back, three days, three weeks or three months later: ‘Goodness me, I thought I had eliminated that one’. See how vital it is that you are your own best ‘buddy’? You say: ‘Well, I thought I had dealt with that but never mind, I have another moment here, another chance’. This way you work with yourself, instead of in opposition. It is very important.
And it is such good fun! Then, everything you do in your daily life, moment to moment, is taking advantage of multiple opportunities. Every moment again is an occasion to improve your lot … when you are interacting with someone, either face to face or on the telephone … or a back-ache: ‘Oh god, how terrible!’ … another opportunity. It is bad enough to feel pain, why make it worse by adding an emotional suffering like ‘I feel terrible’? To feel terrible, emotionally, on top of the physical pain is simply silly when it is possible to disentangle oneself, emotionally, and still feel good about being alive, about being here. This is being sensible, is it not? To feel good, if not happy, all the time?
(…)
R: Nor for anything. Please, do not use ‘silly’ and ‘sensible’ as a substitute for moralistic values … that would defeat the purpose. It is a practical, everyday, common-sense thing: ‘How am I feeling at this moment?’ or ‘Am I feeling good?’ or ‘Am I feeling bad?’ … ‘Oh that’s silly, I’ll do something about myself until I feel good’. Simply, it is sensible to feel good. This is my moment of being alive – I am not alive five minutes ago, nor am I alive five minutes ahead. This is my only moment of being here. How am I experiencing this moment? If I am not experiencing it well now, when will I? It will be a ‘now’ moment when I do, so why not make this ‘now’ moment … this one that is happening right now. Why waste it by feeling rotten? Why not enjoy it?
It works! I am not merely talking theory, this is what I did back in ‘81. I have not missed a moment for sixteen years … it is always this moment. What a misspent life, to waste each moment waiting for a future happiness … to sit around feeling rotten, berating oneself, feeling guilty, and so on.
And another way to be rid of … Do you want me to go on?
Q(1): I’m digesting, I’m listening.
R: On a slightly different track … another way of operating is to put everything on a ‘it does not matter’ basis – you know, where you prefer to do something rather than have to? (Richard, Audio-taped Dialogues, Silly or Sensible).

Cheers Vineeto

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Thanks Vineeto,

It’s such a lovely post to read, again. Especially it stands out to me that the harshness is automatic. The belief that I really should be better than I am.

Hmm. Yes, it’s a nonverbal question, an acceptance. It was only the other day, after a week of really only thinking about the single line “emotionally accepting the intellectually unacceptable “ that it finally dawned on me that the acceptance was the opposite of rejection!

I spend so much time emotionally rejecting everything! Including myself in whatever form I perceive myself.

I am not exaggerating when I say I was, in terms of Actualism interest, thinking of just this one saying Richard liked. I was determined that something he liked should be something I understood, instead of rejecting it, or glossing past it.

Cheers,
Andrew

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Andrew: Thanks Vineeto,
It’s such a lovely post to read, again. Especially it stands out to me that the harshness is automatic. The belief that I really should be better than I am.
Hmm. Yes, it’s a nonverbal question, an acceptance. It was only the other day, after a week of really only thinking about the single line “emotionally accepting the intellectually unacceptable” that it finally dawned on me that the acceptance was the opposite of rejection!
I spend so much time emotionally rejecting everything! Including myself in whatever form I perceive myself.
I am not exaggerating when I say I was, in terms of Actualism interest, thinking of just this one saying Richard liked. I was determined that something he liked should be something I understood, instead of rejecting it, or glossing past it. (link)

Hi Andrew,

It is a good idea to start “emotionally accepting the intellectually unacceptable”. That, of course, includes accepting yourself as you are, i.e. being friends with yourself. If that is too difficult right away, you can start with something easier – the weather, for instance. And with more practice of observing and acknowledging some of the things you are “emotionally rejecting”, get back to feeling good and then think about it how it makes no sense to make yourself feel bad (that’s what rejection does) about all kinds of things, which are not in your control.

What is in your control is how you feel – and you can bit by bit choose to be a different feeling, a more happy and harmless feeling. Simply because it feels good to feel good.

• [Richard]: ‘Given that people are as-they-are and that the world is as-it-is there are more than a few things which are ‘unacceptable’ (child abuse, rape, murder, torture and so on). What worked for me twenty-odd years ago, as a preliminary step, was to rephrase the question so that it makes sense (rather than vainly apply any of those unliveable ‘unconditional acceptance’ type injunctions): Can I emotionally accept that which is intellectually unacceptable?
• [Respondent]: ‘What do you mean by ‘emotionally accept?’
• [Richard]: ‘To cease emotionally objecting, resisting, rejecting (or denying) and to be emotionally welcoming, consenting, receiving (or acknowledging) … without being emotionally aloof, indifferent, apathetic (or vacillating).
• [Respondent]: ‘Do you mean to say that you accepted (saw) that you were ‘emotional’ and reacted to persons and events in an emotional way (over 20 years ago)?
• [Richard]: ‘Yes … this is the crux of the issue: ‘I’ am a feeling ‘being’ (‘I’ am ‘my’ feelings and ‘my’ feelings are ‘me’). (Richard, List B, No. 19h, 19 Aug 2001).

Richard: Which is why I suggest that it is advisable to emotionally accept that which is intellectually unacceptable so that one’s native intelligence can emerge into full view of its own accord. In the jargon it is known as ‘being open’ (as in the ‘unlimited possibility of anything being possible’ ) … inasmuch as one will be embracing each situation that life provides by emotionally welcoming, readily consenting to, receiving fully and unabashedly acknowledging every circumstance so as to find out, once and for all, just what is going on … and to discover what intelligence actually is. This is because one needs to somehow enable an intellectual openness … so as to circumvent/ break through what is known as ‘cognitive dissonance’ (link).
Intelligence will thus no longer be crippled. (Richard, List B, No. 19h, 22 Aug 2001).

If you find that it works to emotionally accept some of the things you emotionally rejected, you can then expand the list of resentments and give attention them to reduce them bit by bit – you will find that the resentment against liking yourself will simultaneously diminish as well.

It’s an adventure, Andrew, and with increasing success it will increasingly be fun too.

Remember what you said about the Global Warming controversy, after you had discussed and investigated it for facts for a while –

Andrew: “Despite whatever other dramas I am having in life, it’s lovely to look up at the sky these days without the doom and gloom of the AGW beliefs clouding my appreciation”. (link)

Cheers Vineeto

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Thanks Vineeto.

There has been an interesting and very strong emotional charge that I have had my whole life around creativity. My mother reported it to me being very obvious even at two years old!

If I can’t immediately master something I give up! The side effect is I try extremely hard to get it right. Which, given a natural talent for music and art, and by extension anything that involves 3 dimensional mental understandings, I excel at these endeavours, without putting in “hard yards”.

I started feeling it again a lot lately while trying to get back into creating musical recordings. I bought equipment which I thought would do the job, but it is far more complex and unintuitive that that old “two year old” reaction was there!

Given your recent reminders about “fight or flight, eat or be eaten” , I.e. the blind natural basis of a feeling being, I am now wondering what this particular emotional rejection around putting effort “over time” into creativity.

Still pondering this. It’s a strong reaction.

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I have been listening to a favourite band a lot lately, while letting this understandings sink in; there is a simple answer to the question, once the parade of religion has passed. (Hah, made that line up just then, but I like it).

That is, this objection to putting in effort is mixed in with plenty of “after the fact” beliefs about it.

Basically, my own private religion around “getting it right the first time” but also, never being better than anyone else, but craving the love of everyone.

Ok, that’s still complex, but it feels ridiculous! So, it seems the correct track.

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Andrew: Thanks Vineeto.
There has been an interesting and very strong emotional charge that I have had my whole life around creativity. My mother reported it to me being very obvious even at two years old!
If I can’t immediately master something I give up! The side effect is I try extremely hard to get it right. Which, given a natural talent for music and art, and by extension anything that involves 3 dimensional mental understandings, I excel at these endeavours, without putting in “hard yards”.
I started feeling it again a lot lately while trying to get back into creating musical recordings. I bought equipment which I thought would do the job, but it is far more complex and unintuitive that that old “two-year-old” reaction was there!
Given your recent reminders about “fight or flight, eat or be eaten”, i.e. the blind natural basis of a feeling being, I am now wondering what this particular emotional rejection around putting effort “over time” into creativity.
Still pondering this. It’s a strong reaction. (link)

Hi Andrew,

It looks like you came across your first major obstacle to put everything on a preference basis.

You say there is a “very strong emotional charge” to “immediately master something”, otherwise “I give up” and that you had this “strong charge” since you were “two years old”.

Now since that time as a toddler you have most likely experienced other “very strong emotional” charges. Are you equally compelled to obey those “very strong emotional” charges or only this particular one. Why this one? Why do you allow this two-year-old toddler’s “emotional charge” to continue to dominate your life today?

You could let this emotional charge subside whenever it appears, until you are back to feeling good, and then calmly think about it – does it not look silly to you? Naturally, it’s a long-standing habit, but that does not mean it cannot be changed – if you have the intent to no longer let it control your life. Wouldn’t it make sense to address this dominating emotional charge so it no longer prevents you from succeeding in mastering something, anything you want to do?

Andrew: I have been listening to a favourite band a lot lately, while letting this understandings sink in; there is a simple answer to the question, once the parade of religion has passed. (Hah, made that line up just then, but I like it).
That is, this objection to putting in effort is mixed in with plenty of “after the fact” beliefs about it.
Basically, my own private religion around “getting it right the first time” but also, never being better than anyone else, but craving the love of everyone.
Ok, that’s still complex, but it feels ridiculous! So, it seems the correct track. (snipped video). (link)

Ha, you identified two beliefs from your “own private religion” which contribute to the “very strong emotional charge” to “immediately master something”, apart from that it also needs to be perfect –

  • “getting it right the first time”
  • “never being better than anyone else” .

It indeed “feels ridiculous” .

Well spotted. It’s time to proceed removing these beliefs of your “private religion” from your personal emotional database, don’t you think?

As for “craving the love of everyone” – have you recently remembered to be friends with yourself, and appreciating your nous [common sense] when you discovered, and consequently dismantled, some obstacle to feeling good? Liking yourself does a lot to diminish the need for everyone else to like (love) you.

Cheers Vineeto

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Thanks Vineeto,

Firstly, I am starting to look at the “why” would be so invested in rejecting effort over time when mastering anything? Is it simply a two year old tantrum? Without actually being originally a tantrum?

I think it’s in the class of all those primordial type feelings and morals which form into religion, as you were writing about.

This is such a powerful paradigm to see all of the elaborate stories I tell myself about who I am!

It seems to me that it’s in the class of feelings which are very egalitarian, giving rise to the injunctions of humility etc.

Being excellent at something naturally can’t be helped, but trying and practicing and putting in effort seems to be cheating.

It sounds ridiculous, because it is ridiculous!

However, there is the aspect that excellence of skill for the purpose of feeling better than others, or seeking love, fame , recognition, also goes against some primordial “leveling “ morality.

An ancient “tall poppy syndrome “.

Perhaps it’s just the modern version. I am Australian after all.

Thanks for the encouragement. It is really giving me the space to look at this from a new perspective.

Cheers

Andrew

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Andrew: Thanks Vineeto,
Firstly, I am starting to look at the “why” would be so invested in rejecting effort over time when mastering anything? Is it simply a two year old tantrum? Without actually being originally a tantrum? I think it’s in the class of all those primordial type feelings and morals which form into religion, as you were writing about. This is such a powerful paradigm to see all of the elaborate stories I tell myself about who I am!

Hi Andrew,

Ok, you found “all those primordial type feelings and morals which form into religion” – firm beliefs that look like the unviable truth. Yet when you say “I think”, which is not the same as saying ‘I know’, you show that your contemplative exploration can go further until you reach the point when you can say “it clicked” – possibly even when such a “clicked” realisation can lead to the disappearance of the hold that these firm beliefs have on your life.

Andrew: It seems to me that it’s in the class of feelings which are very egalitarian, giving rise to the injunctions of humility etc.
Being excellent at something naturally can’t be helped, but trying and practicing and putting in effort seems to be cheating.
It sounds ridiculous, because it is ridiculous!

Perhaps you are not sure (“it seems”). Keep exploring until you get to the bottom of it.

Regarding those so-called “egalitarian” feelings such as “humility” – these words describe virtuous feelings, part of the ‘good’ desirable feelings, those that are loving and trusting and virtue-signalling. As you have probably been finding out during your life so far, those are just as detrimental to your (and others’) wellbeing as those more easily detectable hostile and fearful feelings.

Here is Richard’s comment on humility, which is merely pride standing on its head –

Respondent: ‘I’ took all my glasses off years ago. Concern and hope may push or pull ‘me’ towards an AF ‘belief system’ and it binds while ‘I’, (and others), persist in being superior, inferior, unequal instinct-ridden or problem-ridden.
Richard: What ‘glasses’ did you ‘take off years ago’? I only ask because what part does ‘hope’ have to play in one who has no glasses? Also, what is an ‘AF ‘belief system’’ when it is at home? Is it that bogus ‘belief system’ which ‘binds’ or is it the ‘hope’ that ties? Lastly, as an actual freedom from the human condition is so superior to anything any other human being has ever lived, it leaves any ‘being superior, inferior, unequal’ posturing in the litigious ‘Land Of Lament’ for dead. It has always amused me, whenever some spiritual aspirant takes me to task for being superior, that they praise the humility of their current hero … all the whilst apparently not noticing that their ‘humble saviour’ is swanning about busily being ‘God On Earth’ or a ‘Supreme Being’ by any other name! (Richard, AF List, No. 2, #superior).

Andrew: However, there is the aspect that excellence of skill for the purpose of feeling better than others, or seeking love, fame, recognition, also goes against some primordial “levelling” morality. An ancient “tall poppy syndrome”. Perhaps it’s just the modern version. I am Australian after all.

Ah, I understand now the uncommon directive that “putting in effort seems to be cheating” and that only natural excellence is permitted. It is there to prevent pride – of course, if you never achieve anything by not putting in effect, you have never anything to be proud of!

What you can do instead of repressing your pride by being ineffective in your actions is to gain some dignity and autonomy by choosing a different path to the Tried and Failed altogether with the intention to become happy and harmless. Then remember to pat yourself on the back whenever you succeed in finding and dismantling an obstacle to feeling good and discovering how you tick –

Jonathan: … but it his [Richard’s] point about patting yourself on the back which is most pertinent here.
Richard: The following is a quote which will serve to illustrate just what it is you are referring to. Viz.:
• [Co-Respondent]: I can’t thank you enough for reiterating how to use HAIETMOBA?. I have read it fifty times, but this time it clicked. There is something to watch out for, which is the feeling of upset. I am just used to living with my upsetting feelings by ignoring them or repressing them, because I shouldn’t get upset … you know? … it’s not right to be upset, etc. So to go looking for the incident like you suggest wasn’t working because … I’m always upset! due to repressing or analysing why I shouldn’t have the bad feeling. I mean, where would I start? When I saw this about myself I was happy and from there I was able to locate an upsetting incident that day.
• [Richard]: Good … and once one gets the knack of it (it does take diligence and application and patience and perseverance in the beginning) it all becomes such fun to find out, each moment again, how one ticks.
One thing I did, way back when I started doing that method, was to make sure I would never, ever, tell myself off for slipping back into the old ways – after all ‘I am only human’ and it is bound to happen from time-to-time – and instead I would pat myself on the back for being astute enough to notice that I had slipped back and thus get on with the business of being happy and harmless again … and feeling good about myself for being able to do so.
It is important to be friends with oneself – only I get to live with myself twenty four hours of the day (other people can and do move away) – and if I am at war with myself, disciplining myself, telling myself off, I am alienating the only person who can truly help me in all this.
In short: be nice to yourself, not nasty … there are already enough people doing that anyway. (Richard, AF List, No. 50, 11 Oct 2003).
(…)
Jonathan: So it is a very good idea to pat yourself on the back whenever it will promote felicity or get you feeling excellent so you can move on to wide eyed wonder.
Richard: No, what is a very good idea (to use your phrasing) is to pat yourself on the back whenever you succeed in finding out just what it is which is preventing this moment of being alive – the only moment you are ever actually alive – from being lived at its optimum.
In doing so you get to find out how you operate and function (just what it is that makes you ‘tick’ as it were) each moment again.
Jonathan: So if you are a salesman and just made a big sale, pat yourself on the back with the aim of increasing your current happiness so you can on move to feeling excellent and then to wide eyed wonder.
Richard: No, I neither said that nor anything of that nature (I am clearly talking of success, no matter how slight it may be, regarding consciousness and not in regards to materialistic success). [Emphases added]. (Richard, List D, Jonathan, 4 Aug 2013).

The beginning of this correspondence also clarifies the issue of pride and humility.

By the way, there is no such thing as a “primordial “leveling” morality” – the “primordial morality” is the law of the jungle. Morals and ethics were put in place to curb the worst excesses of the instinctual passions.

I highly recommend reading both “the Formation and Persistence of the Social Identity” and Richard’s selected correspondence on “Peasant Mentality” and follow-up, because this might help you understand how this peasant mentality operates in feeling beings, what you erroneously label the “primordial “leveling” morality”. It might be a similar eye-opening understanding as the previous one regarding guilt (link)

It can help you to take another look at your “class of feelings which are very egalitarian” including their impractical “injunctions” and possibly replace them with more sensible options. While equity and parity prevail in Terra Actualis, these clearly don’t happen via repressing pride or stifling sensible action, but by enjoying and appreciating being alive and being naiveté (liking yourself and liking one’s fellow human beings).

Please remember, only when pure intent is dedicatorily in place – as an overriding/ overarching life-devotional goal which takes absolute precedence over all else – can you begin whittling away of the otherwise essential general societal/ cultural conditioning. Else it would be both harmful to you and others to haphazardly switch around your morals/ethics from one “ridiculous” lot, as you called them, to another.

Richard: It is an utterly fundamental proviso that pure intent be dedicatorily in place – as an overriding/ overarching life-devotional goal which takes absolute precedence over all else – before any such whittling away of the otherwise essential societal/ cultural conditioning be undertaken. (Richard in Library, Social Identity, #warning).

Andrew: Thanks for the encouragement. It is really giving me the space to look at this from a new perspective. (link)

You are welcome, Andrew. There is so much more to discover about the wide and wondrous path, and you seem now to be ready to clear the workbench and start afresh … and already have some success.

Cheers Vineeto

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Cheers Vineeto!

So much to contemplate! I really enjoy all these perspectives and insights that have not be available to me because I was making Actualism into a religion.

I, like my late friend Alan, “skipped ahead” on many topics. For me, definitely it was skipping ahead on religion. It was obvious that I wasn’t even vaguely free of religious patterns of belief, that is, the submission of oneself to the authority. I even wrote about this back in the yahoo days. How I couldn’t seperate Richard from “God-man” authority.

This definitely clicks! It’s the ultimate submission to blind nature. Wow.

This will definitely benefit me to contemplate more. The guilt and turmoil of being “something desirable “ while not being enough to feel the “ultimate fulfilment “ .

Hmm.

In many ways, it’s a case of “you are old enough to know better “ injunctions, which have caused me to pretend to myself and all in sundry that I do “know better “, without ever knowing much at all!

Many little threads of understanding branch off while I read your words, there are some slight objections, but I need to sit with that first. There is something in this assertion that triggers me;

However, on pasting the quote, it’s obvious that ‘I’ want myself to be primordially correct! As in morality came from me.

But…hmm. Still something more to contemplate.

Thanks

Andrew

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I particularly like your distinction between “I think” and “I know”.

Cheers

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One of the many threads that are sprawling out around this question of a life long aversion to putting in effort to self improvement/talent, is this ; fear. Nothing more, nothing less. Afraid of not being able to measure up to the example given.

My days are strange. I am interested in these questions. Actually interested. I am not making any effort to feel good, I just remind myself to “accept “ things as they are, emotionally. That alone is quite a paradigm shift. The outcome is I feel generally better. That something gentle is happening.

There was always desperation in all my efforts. I wonder sometimes about something Kuba mused at one point, that this is all an “old persons” game. That Actualism was something that happened to older people, 40 plus.

there is something in that, but not necessarily because of age itself, but rather having exhausted so many desires . It does become obvious as one’s hair greys, and one doesn’t move like one used to (my weekly basketball sessions with guys half my age prove that!) which slows the blind ambition down.

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It also obvious that I was never especially disadvantaged in this endeavour. Given the many multitudes of people who have been interested in actualism, and are as successful as I am , that is, not actually free, it’s a level of acceptance that I am happy to have.

The world as it is, people, including myself, as we are.

Strange also is the realisation of how decades are far shorter when looking back. I spent half my life a devoted Christian. 25 out of nearly 50 years. Such numbers give scale to the problem of the human condition. Acceptance that it’s the case that a decade (plus) of Actualism interest seems a long time, but in context of my life, it’s still less than half of the conditioning of my most formative years, and compared to human history, an impossible to calculate fraction of a percentage of how long ‘I’ have been around.

It makes sense that Richard was pleased and surprised at how well things are going in terms of those who had become free.

In raw numbers, which I am paid to appreciate, things are going extremely well.

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Since Vineeto recently endorsed again the Indian woman who became actually free within 48 hours of landing and meeting with the pioneers of this endeavour, and exactly how crucial this event is in the assessment that there are no pre-conditions to actual freedom, at least not in the ways we normally think of ( “X” amount of effort over “Y” amount of time, in “z” specific ways); I have to ask the obvious! …

What happened to her and has she ever communicated with anyone after the event?

I remind myself often of this “no preconditions “ assertion, for obvious reasons. It would be a decisive blow to all doubts if the mystery woman of the subcontinent had anything to say about her experience.

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Andrew: One of the many threads that are sprawling out around this question of a life long aversion to putting in effort to self improvement/ talent, is this: fear. Nothing more, nothing less. Afraid of not being able to measure up to the example given.
My days are strange. I am interested in these questions. Actually interested. I am not making any effort to feel good, I just remind myself to “accept” things as they are, emotionally. That alone is quite a paradigm shift. The outcome is I feel generally better. That something gentle is happening.
There was always desperation in all my efforts. I wonder sometimes about something Kuba mused at one point, that this is all an “old persons” game. That Actualism was something that happened to older people, 40 plus.
There is something in that, but not necessarily because of age itself, but rather having exhausted so many desires. It does become obvious as one’s hair greys, and one doesn’t move like one used to (my weekly basketball sessions with guys half my age prove that!) which slows the blind ambition down. (link)
Since Vineeto recently endorsed again the Indian woman who became actually free within 48 hours of landing and meeting with the pioneers of this endeavour, and exactly how crucial this event is in the assessment that there are no pre-conditions to actual freedom, at least not in the ways we normally think of ( “X” amount of effort over “Y” amount of time, in “z” specific ways); I have to ask the obvious!
…
What happened to her and has she ever communicated with anyone after the event?
I remind myself often of this “no preconditions” assertion, for obvious reasons. It would be a decisive blow to all doubts if the mystery woman of the subcontinent had anything to say about her experience. (link)

Hi Andrew,

This is the information on the Actual Freedom website about the person of Indian birth you are talking about –

Richard to No. 6: Given that you say ‘I want to be free and will like to set up a meeting’ I am going to make it clear up-front that there is no guarantee being made here – be it either expressed or implied – other than to say that, when the conditions are ripe, magic happens.
For instance, a couple of months ago a person of Indian birth and upbringing flew into Coolangatta Airport late one night on a prearranged agreement to meet in person so as to talk about her life and to gain clarity in her life-style/ her livelihood situation.
Less than 24 hours after landing she was actually free of blind nature’s instinctual passions/ the feeling-being formed thereof.
In other words, the person who landed at the airport (that feeling being who needed to gain clarity in her life-style/ her livelihood situation) vanished without a trace, in a matter of seconds, the following afternoon.
She is now living the ‘peace-on-earth’ actual freedom (as per the reports on The Actual Freedom Trust website) which will, after a suitable transitional period of acclimatisation and accommodation and accustomisation (which period took 30+ months for me all those years ago), presumably also segue into the ‘meaning-of-life’ actual freedom (as per the reports on The Actual Freedom Trust website), and which is known colloquially as the ‘magical wonderland’ (a fairy tale-like pristine paradise where peerless purity abounds), given the requisite pure intent, of course. [Emphasis added]. (Richard, List D, No. 6, 19 Dec 2011).

That is all the information available.

Here is the occasion where I wrote what you called “Vineeto recently endorsed again” –

Kuba: OK so the only solution worth entertaining is that which comes from a deeply passionate and caring involvement?
Vineeto: Yes, this is what your naïve inquiry into a cause worth sacrificing your ‘self’ for has produced. I keep thinking of Richard’s quote –
Richard: No, I am more making the point that only altruism – self-sacrificial humanitarianism – will provide the enormous energy necessary for ‘self’-immolation … the instinct for individual survival is only exceeded by the instinct for group survival.
It takes a powerful instinct to overcome a powerful instinct. [Emphases added]. ( Richard, List B, James3, 28 Oct 2002a)
In case you discover a passionate doubt or fear or any other deeply felt obstacle to your desired aim, then you can harness the passionate energy by staying with the thrill whilst allowing pure intent to bring you closer and closer to your aim – “to offer (and demonstrate) a solid alternative to the hypocrisy, the lack of equity, the ignorant irresponsibility and the harm that was being done by all”.
The solution, as I can only surmise at this point, is accumulating and fostering this “enormous energy” required, which is a passionate energy (without frittering it away by doubt and confusion).
I have seen it happen with the woman of Indian birth. (Richard, List D, Rick, 23 Dec 2011). During the intense interaction which preceded her moment of becoming actually free she first talked about her deeply felt universal sorrow for all feeling beings including animals and her urgent question why that was so, and after Richard and I explained the nature of universal sorrow, her feelings turned to doubt, which was then followed by fear. As the conversation went on, she arrived back at her question of ‘why’ there is universal sorrow, only to be followed again by doubt and then fear once more, followed then by cycling back to her question of ‘why’. This pattern went on several times until I was able to point out how she was going round and round in a circle with the same question and the same feelings. She went another round, and was able to recognize the pattern herself … and her mind became very quiet.
Richard was then able to talk to her about actual time – that it is always now and that the person who arrived at the airport no longer existed, even the person who walked through the door a couple of hours ago no longer existed. She agreed and as she agreed she experienced time standing still … and the rest is history.
I am not sure if that made things clearer for you. [Emphases added]. (Vineeto to Kuba, 14 Mar 2025)

What you call ‘endorsement’ was me highlighting the situation “when the conditions are ripe, magic happens” – an enormous energy, in this case sourced in the “deeply felt universal sorrow for all feeling beings” and, amongst other unknown factors, of course, a full agreement to have it happen now.

Richard made it clear, in the interactions reported by Dona and Alan during their visit that “there are no conditions to become actually free”. Here is a forum discussion about this –

Kuba: I remember there was the lady of Indian descent who became actually free 24 hours after visiting Richard and Vineeto. In the past there was disbelief at this as ‘I’ had felt somewhat cheated. I am not actually sure if she did much in the way of applying the actualism method before hand. But the point is that ultimately it doesn’t matter, the method is an “in the meantime” method. That “last bit” or for some maybe the “first bit” haha – it is all the same.
VINEETO: Richard was always clear that the actualism method is what you do in the meantime. Also –
Vineeto: One of the major topics of this three-week event of answers to questions from forum members in 2017 was that there are no conditions to become actually free. [these two links give valuable contemplation of what this means to an actualist].
“Richard said there is no connection at all between feeling good each moment again and actual freedom. You can become actually free right now. But … In the meantime, while you’re living your life not actually free, why not feel good? As he says, this is your only moment of being alive, why waste it feeling bad?”
I found the whole message worth a re-read.
As for the “somewhat cheated” feeling, it is entirely self-induced. In fact, when “applying the actualism method” with the aim of becoming actually free you have deceived yourself, as you now discover, that you have not yet agreed to the last step. It is all par for the course when one sets out to untangle and extract oneself from the maze of the human condition. (Kuba, 9 Jul 2025).

You can probably work out how all the above applies to your personal situation –

Now that you discovered your fear of moving one step further because of being “afraid of not being able to measure up to the example given” – you muse how despite (or because?) this obstacle you can become actually free right away?

There are no conditions from the actual world, it is right here, happening right now. The question is, are the conditions right from ‘your’ side? Do you, without reservation, joyfully agree to ‘your’ demise? Or is this only a fantasy built from another’s experience as a way of avoiding your fear of not fulfilling ‘your’ standards, examples, conditions, should you decide to take the practical step of changing your ‘being’ to being more happy and more harmless?

You can also look at it thisaway – you want to be actually free because you don’t like being here –

Respondent: I think I’ve been trying to do it without really becoming a happy ‘being’ first.
Richard: As the general thrust of your e-mails has been that the ‘self’-immolation in toto, as described on The Actual Freedom Trust web site, is not [quote] ‘a new concept’ [endquote] it would appear that whatever it is you have been trying to do it has had nothing to do with what actualism is on about.
Respondent: I have (big) issues to sort out first before I will be able to make the leap.
Richard: As there is no ‘leap’ – an actual freedom is not a spiritual freedom – it would indeed appear so.
Respondent: I guess there are no shortcuts.
Richard: What I find telling – and this is a general observation – is just how much peoples object to being happy and harmless … the vast majority of the correspondence in the archives is, in fact, a cutting indictment on the human condition itself.
Do you realise – and this is a personal observation – you have just said, in effect, that you guess you will have to become a happy ‘being’ before you can become actually free from the human condition (as if were there a way to be thus free without having to do so you would not)?
Whereas it is actually such a delight to finally be able to be happy (and harmless) … and a relief. (Richard, AF List, No. 54, 27 Nov 2003).

Cheers Vineeto

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Ah this makes sense now, if ‘I’ am treating actual freedom as a desperate escape plan for ‘me’ then it is merely a self-centred involvement borne of ‘my’ resentment to being here, it’s selfism driving the attempt and so it is bound to go round in circles.

As Richard wrote - “Only altruism – self-sacrificial humanitarianism – will provide the enormous energy necessary for ‘self’-immolation”.

When gloomy and grumpy ‘I’ am certainly not concerned with much else other than ‘me’. I find that ongoing felicity and innocuity does naturally engage dedication to peace on earth, it broadens the scope of ‘my’ caring and it demonstrates/reminds ‘me’ just how precious the end of suffering - for all - is.

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Andrew: I remind myself often of this “no preconditions” assertion, for obvious reasons. It would be a decisive blow to all doubts if the mystery woman of the subcontinent had anything to say about her experience. (link)

Vineeto to Andrew: You can also look at it thisaway – you want to be actually free because you don’t like being here –

Kuba: Ah this makes sense now, if ‘I’ am treating actual freedom as a desperate escape plan for ‘me’ then it is merely a self-centred involvement borne of ‘my’ resentment to being here, its selfism driving the attempt and so it is bound to go round in circles.
As Richard wrote – “Only altruism – self-sacrificial humanitarianism – will provide the enormous energy necessary for ‘self’-immolation”.
When gloomy and grumpy ‘I’ am certainly not concerned with much else other than ‘me’. I find that ongoing felicity and innocuity does naturally engage dedication to peace on earth, it broadens the scope of ‘my’ caring and it demonstrates/ reminds ‘me’ just how precious the end of suffering – for all – is. (link)

Hi Andrew, hi Kuba,

I like to expand on this topic of Richard saying “when the conditions are ripe, magic happens” (Richard, List D, No. 6, 19 Dec 2011) and when he said to Dona and Alan “there are no conditions to become actually free”. (Dona and Alan Report, 30 Oct 2017).

Richard expanded on the “no condition” elsewhere –

Richard: The words and writings promulgated and promoted by The Actual Freedom Trust explicate the workings of an actual freedom from the human condition and a virtual freedom in practice in the market place. There is no meditating in silence or living in a monastery shut away from the world. There are no celibacy or obedience requirements. There are no dietary demands or daily regimes of exercise. No one is excluded by age or racial or gender origins. There are no prescribed books to study … upwards of maybe two million words are available [in the year 2000] for free on The Actual Freedom Web Page. There are no courses to follow or therapies to undergo or workshops to endure. There are no fees to pay or any clique to join … there are no rules at all’. (Richard, AF List, No. 12d, 23 Nov 2000).

So why does not everyone become actually free instantly as has apparently happened for “the mystery woman of the subcontinent”?

It is simple – the actual world is already here, has always been and will always be. It becomes apparent when ‘I’/ ‘me’ go temporarily in abeyance. Ergo – ‘I’/ ‘me’, the passionate, imaginary identity needs to disappear/ voluntarily go extinct for the Terra Actualis to become apparent permanently.

However, when you wonder why it ‘you’ don’t disappear/ voluntarily go extinct tomorrow or the day after because it is such a good idea, consider what, of your own free will, you are intending to leave behind – all your hopes and doubts and fears, your hostile feelings as well as your loving and trusting feelings, all of your beliefs and trusted concepts, your grand castles made of imagination, your (borrowed) standards of right and wrong, good and bad and your sense of ‘being’ someone. Recognizing the scope, be friendly and kind towards yourself, and enjoy and appreciate every instant when your intelligence and your intent to be more felicitous and more innocuous gives you a greater range of freedom to do so and be so. And be aware that you are not alone in this grandest of adventures in your life –

Richard: ‘I’ am not alone in this endeavour because ‘I’ can tap into the purity and perfection of the infinitude of this physical universe with a pure intent born out of the PCE that one has during a peak experience. Pure intent is a palpable life-force; an actually occurring stream of benevolence and benignity that originates in the vast and utter stillness that is the essential character of the universe itself. Once set in motion, it is no longer a matter of choice: it is an irresistible pull. It is the adventure of a lifetime to embark upon a voyage of exploration and discovery; to not only seek but to find. And once found, it is here for the term of one’s natural life … it is an irreversible mutation in consciousness. Once launched it is impossible to turn back and resume one’s normal life … one has to be absolutely sure that this is what one truly wants. (Richard, This Moment of Being Alive)

The “the enormous energy necessary for ‘self’-immolation”, provided by altruism “when the conditions are ripe” is required because of the powerful passionate energy of the self-survival instinct.

Richard: … the instinct for individual survival is only exceeded by the instinct for group survival. It takes a powerful instinct to overcome a powerful instinct. (Richard, List B, James3, 28 Oct 2002a).

There are no conditions how to bring this about, how slowly or instantly, it is entirely in ‘your’ hands. Everyone is a pioneer in this exhilarating, sometimes thrilling adventure of engendering this new epoch in human consciousness.

Richard also commented during Dona and Alan’s visit –

Richard: “there’s nothing you can do to become actually free, and there’s nothing you can’t do”. (Dona and Alan Report, 9 Nov 2017).

And here is what you can do in the meantime, because –

Richard: The way to an actual freedom from the human condition is the same as an actual freedom from the human condition – the means to the end are not different from the end – inasmuch that where one is happy and harmless as an on-going modus operandi benevolence operates of its own accord. (Richard, AF List, No. 27d, 6 Dec 2002).

Cheers Vineeto

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This is so good to read!

“There are no conditions from the actual world”.

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Hi Vineeto,

I remember the first few months of my involvement with actualism I wrote a post about how I found myself in such a weird situation. It was as if ‘my’ whole life ‘I’ had been stuck in this dark and cold cave with monsters all around, and now with actualism I found a way out of the cave where light was shining and where freedom was located.
And ‘I’ was looking at the way out from within the cave and ‘I’ found ‘myself’ perversely addicted to remaining! That dark, cold cave with monsters all around was ‘my’ home, it was where (through a bizarre instinctual passionate logic) ‘safety’ was apparently located.

And it is such a weird scenario, because there are now people outside of that cave, such as yourself, waving a flag, and to top it all off they have also gentrified the way out of the cave so that it is not perilous. And ‘we’ know all this and yet in the cave ‘we’ remain!

The addiction to ‘being’ ie suffering is quite something.

I am immensely appreciative of what has been done thus far by fellow human beings to arrive at this current situation. Being the next to “step out” is of course the best thing that ‘I’ can do for humankind.

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Kub933's Journal
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One must realise the fact; There is no cave, neo. :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes::joy:

1348

This has been living in my head “rent free” as the millennials say.

The actual world has no conditions on becoming actually free, or in the mean time enjoy life, however ‘I’ am indeed looking for a “fresh identity “.

I like the simplicity of this.