Becoming anonymous

Actualism
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So I am currently injured and unable to train, also work is quiet so I have more time to do some writing :smiley: The below is just what has been going on for me recently.

Lately a lot of my experiences have been centred around the experience of becoming gradually more anonymous, no longer striving to be a ‘someone’.
It is interesting that this is actually what ‘I’ have always feared the most, all of ‘my’ energy is usually directed towards being a ‘someone’, and more importantly with ‘being’ in general.
‘I’ want ‘my’ outlines to be as strong as possible so that ‘I’ can be real and more substantial, this is how ‘I’ generate ‘my’ security, of course this never quite works to produce anything resembling actual security as ‘I’ am a fake, the security ‘I’ generate is more of a constant shuttling back and forth from hope to despair.
No longer being a ‘someone’ is initially seen as undesirable and somehow wrong and dangerous. This is where memories of PCEs have been useful in reminding me that living sans identity is actually a blithe and benevolent state to be in.

Lately a new understanding is developing, I am starting to see that in order to be completely free from sorrow and malice ‘I’ need to forsake being a ‘someone’ and also to give up ‘being’ in general.
When I am being anonymous there is an instant ease that is bestowed upon me which ‘I’ as identity never reach.
I have been seeing more and more clearly that the very essence of what ‘being’ is, is rotten to the very core. ‘being’ itself is the root cause of suffering.
This has been becoming clear because more and more time is spent with ‘being’ dissolving away to whatever degree and allowing purity.

There is still a resistance, it is actually like a constant back and forth that I have been going through. It goes like - ‘being’ taking a step back → experiencing purity → something happens that triggers ‘being’ back into action → this ‘something’ is looked at until it is seen as silly → ‘being’ takes a step back again → back to purity.

However this is not just a going round in circles but it does seem to be more of a spiral, each time purity is easier to find and I am drawn closer and closer to it, as well as towards seeing the actual/factual nature of things. This has been expressing itself primarily in seeing that ‘me’ along with the ‘real world’ and ‘humanity’, are illusionary constructs, they have no actual existence, so what is all this madness for?

What has become clear recently also, which I never saw clearly in the past is that the ‘others’ that I have been relating to and taking as genuinely existing entities, also have no actual existence. Those identities are manufactured by ‘me’, they are a projection, this has been really fascinating to see, it’s also given me more confidence to continue going towards purity, to contemplate abandoning humanity by seeing clearly what it is ie a vast illusionary construct causing untold suffering and conflict and all centred around ‘entities’ which have no existence.

Other than that I have been in a lot of constant pain recently (which is slowly going away now) due to a bad neck injury and more recently a torn ligament in my knee, it’s been really cool to see how I have not gone down the path of continuing to feel bad though, not for long periods anyways and when I was feeling bad it was nothing like what I would have been like prior to actualism.
Mostly I observed that ‘the victim’ or the ‘poor me persona’ is largely minimised which means that the intense pain could be dealt with without the additional problem of continuing to feel sorrowful/malicious on top of it.

Mods if you think this sort of post is better for the Journals category, feel free to move it.

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It its pretty hard to see ones boundaries as a self or an identity until something threatens it. Physical injury and ill-health are big ones, as they threaten the integrity of the self like almost nothing else - especially if you are young methinks or have an identity that is about being sporty/athletic etc. Constant pain is even more trying.

The spiral thing sounds familiar to me and I think you are right that this is not just about going around in circles.

I have found it helpful not to dismiss this ‘victim’ identity and associated feelings in times like this too readily but to go into it and explore it’s feeling world. As always its that thing where you need to find the balance between investigation and feeling good. The balance is constantly shifting depending on what you are going through.

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Yes that is on point Srinath, I was actually talking to Sonya about this the other day, how pain and illness for me are perceived as a threat to my strong/healthy/athletic identity, it highlights all the good feelings I otherwise enjoy, feelings of being mighty and powerful which are threatened when I am no longer physically capable.

The constant pain was definitely a handful, at the peak of it all my attention was consumed by it. I remember thinking that if this continues long term I don’t know how I could ever become actually free, it was very overwhelming and all my focus was on just managing the pain. But still I managed to be emotionally more or less ok which I was surprised by.

Hmm this is interesting because I have gone down the path of that victim mentality in the past and this time around it just seemed like there was no sense going down there again, so I nipped it in the bud and managed to feel pretty ok despite the pain and injury. But I will keep that in mind and dig around a little next time it comes up :grin:

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Well I guess this is where the art and individual judgement in the actualism method comes into play i.e. when to see something as silly and set it aside vs. when to see that further investigation is needed

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By the way, about

I don’t think so. What did cross my mind was to move it to the end of Contemplating self-immolation, because of their similarity.

But in any case it’s a great topic that should also exist on its own, apart from any journal.

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Theres something else that has clarified itself a little yesterday, it’s related to my previous post mentioning that the ‘others’ have no actual existence.
I was having a discussion with a friend who is very much into all matters spiritual, you could say I unapologetically made my position clear, I am aware that she experienced it as an attack on her belief system.

Afterwards I noticed I was experiencing a certain level of fear/anxiety, now I am wary that this could easily become a distancing act, as in “it was not me it was them” but after looking at what could have caused these feelings in me I could not find anything.

I have noticed this happen before when I would feel sorrowfull around others even though there was no discernible trigger and I was otherwise feeling good.

The bizarre/fascinating thing is that in those situations I am not able to discern where ‘my’ feelings begin and ‘theirs’ end, it seems to be one and the same thing, all part of the psychic web. This has been playing on my mind since the morning and its super interesting to explore. I can see how having a spiritual viewpoint could turn this discovery into something along the lines of ‘we are all one consciousness’.

What appears to be the case though is that ‘I’ and ‘them’ are actually not discernible from each other at all, it is a shifting psychic web that is individually experienced as ‘me’ and then projected onto others as ‘them’, at root there is no differentiation, or this is how it is appearing to me at the moment. I am guessing this is also what makes possible the delusion of enlightenment.

The clear takeaway from this is that the very nature of being ‘human’ and relating to ‘others’ will forever keep malice and sorrow alive to some degree, the simple act of relating to another identity via feeling them out means I am part of the same pool of malice and sorrow, or in fact ‘I’ am ‘it’ as much as ‘they’ are.

This is why self-immolation is necessary in order to end sorrow and malice, there must be no ‘me’ at all who could potentially feel out a ‘them’, and actually the ‘me’ and ‘them’ is one and the same thing anyways!

Which leads me to my next point… What I was experiencing last night after contemplating all this was the realisation that when ‘I’ self immolate, ‘they’ do not remain either (one and the same thing). As Richard writes the end of ‘me’ is the end of the species called ‘humanity’. Then there is only the flesh and blood bodies existing on this planet earth which is already the case anyways!

This has been really fascinating to contemplate, the more practical application of all the above has been happening since this morning. Each time I have been drifting away and beginning to indulge in some feeling fed fantasy I keep coming back to the seeing that those ‘personas’ I am currently experiencing have no existence what so ever, this cuts those fantasies down almost immediately and I am back to feeling at ease.

It is really fascinating that the clearer I am able to see the actual situation the more bizarre the human condition becomes.

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Yes, this is quite a trip. It is a normal part of trying to be someone that we think other already are someone.

Forgive my warped sense of humour, but it’s “pimps all the way down”. :rofl:

Each being imagining that other beings are more real, each prostituting themselves for more of the “being” pie. Selling themselves and giving the proceeds to those they see as more real than themselves.

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There is another thing which has come up today which actually relates to @claudiu’s DHO post about his experience with anxiety so thanks for sharing Claudiu.

I have noticed I still have a tendency to play out various scenarios in my head, of how I should act for X to perceive me in a certain way. There is that need to appear to be a someone in particular and a fear or failing to live up to the role, mostly and I mean probably 90% of the time it is related to my training and coaching.

The realisation that the ‘others’ are my own projection and have no actual existence has been mulling over in my mind the past few days. It is really kinda weird/funny that my whole life I am relating to ‘ghosts’, even writing this now there is an image of ‘actualists’ reading this post or me saying it to ‘them’ its a whole little theatre play in my head! :smiley: But those ‘actualists’ are merely a creation of the psyche, the actual human beings who might or might not read this post are invisible to ‘me’.

So here I am constantly going through these training/coaching scenarios, relating to made up entities and fearing how those made up entities might feel about my competence as a coach/athlete :laughing: And this whole play is how I look to generate my security, confidence, self esteem etc.

The other funny thing is that I actually have no way of knowing what those other people are thinking or through which particular lens they perceive me, most likely they are seeing a ‘me’ as part their own affectively fed reality, that ‘me’ also has no basis in Actuality… So why try to be perceived in this or that way when actually I have absolutely no control over this. They are equally in their own self centred bubble of existence, their own theatre play. In the same way that I currently am.

Contemplating all this has been bringing more and more of a sense of ease and freedom in my life, because if all of the above is understood completely, then I am utterly free to live my life exactly how I wish for it to be lived :smiley:

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