Vineeto: Nowhere could I find the term “acutely empathetic caring” so let me know where you got it from. It is certainly in conflict with a near-actual-caring or feeling good come what may.
Chrono: I am still reading over the reply and correspondence, but this is what I find in that correspondence. He says “acutely-empathic caring” rather than acutely-empathetic caring. Maybe I am misunderstanding something. Relevant quote:
Richard: Now, as the identity inhabiting this flesh-and-blood body all those years ago was in an out-from-control virtual freedom for something like five months – although not named as such back then, of course, nor thought of in those terms – I can readily report how ‘he’ was more empathetic during that period than ‘he’ ever had been in all ‘his’ 34 years of existence. So much so, in fact, that I would be inclined to characterise a near-actual caring as an acutely-empathic caring. (Richard, List D, Srinath2, 13 Aug 2016)
Hi Chrono,
Thank you very much for helping me find the quote. I omitted the hyphen between “acutely” and “empathic” and therefore could not find it. I should have persisted because the world “acutely” is only used twice on that page. You did not misunderstand. What I said above in my last message was incorrect. Being “acutely-empathic caring” is not in conflict with “near-actual-caring”, in fact Richard characterised them as equivalent.
Chrono: EDIT: Actually he explains it in the same correspondence :
Srinath: Q3) I take that it would not be possible for someone who has a high degree of agency – say when they are feeling good or great to experience a near actual caring?
Richard: As the term ‘agency’ of necessity implies an agent (i.e., a doer) when used in reference to human beings then it is the presence or absence of that agent (i.e., that doer) which determines whether or not a near-actual caring occurs and not some “degree of agency” (be it higher or lower; greater or lesser; larger or smaller) by which you presumably mean the degree of involvement of the agent (i.e., the doer) on some scale, as is your wont, ranging from passive to active.
Chrono: EDIT 2: I’m still trying to wrap my head around this entirely. (link)
Perhaps if I put it this way – to be able to be “acutely-empathic caring” one is necessarily aware of and sensitive to (not closed off from) one’s own and other people’s feelings.
In the below quote Richard used the word “acutely” in a related context –
Richard: It is initially difficult to comprehend living life sans feelings … as a child, a youth and as a young man I was particularly sensitive in comparison with my then peers – I felt everything keenly, acutely – and always preferred the company of females to males anytime. I was easily hurt by others and had difficulty hurting anyone or anything – boys pulling wings off flies at grade school sickened me to the stomach – and all the killing I did as a farmer’s son was quick and efficient in that I ensured it was as painless as is possible (I have no objection to killing per se). The rough and tumble of typical manly pursuits such as competitive sports did not interest me at all … and I felt like a fish out of water during my six years in the military. I felt life deeply, passionately and it is no wonder I fell for the summum bonum of human feelings: the altered state of consciousness known as ‘Spiritual Enlightenment’. After my break-through into actual freedom I went through thirty months of mental anguish thinking that I had lost the plot completely (although physically everything was perfect). (Richard, AF List, No. 7, 14 Jun 2000).
When this “acutely-empathic caring” is combined with the naïve/ pure intent to bring an end to all the suffering and mayhem within the human condition (which had certainly been the case for ‘Richard’ in the period he described in his above correspondence, then this deeply felt empathic caring results in action. Viz.:
Richard: First, a select quote:
June 19 1999:
• Richard: I have no intuitive or imaginative faculties whatsoever … that all disappeared in 1992. I am incapable of the activity of believing … let alone believing in something.
• Co-Respondent You are not a machine (computer) are you? Do you have a heart?
• Richard: A physical heart that pumps blood, yes … a ‘bleeding heart’ as in piteous sentimentality, no. You see, I actually care about my fellow human being … not merely feel that I care.
• Co-Respondent: By heart I did not mean a physical heart nor a ‘bleeding heart’ (which, by the way, is an image you have).
• Richard: Yet it is not “an image that I have” (…) but an expression of a factual reality for 6.0 billion peoples. They feel that they care about all the misery and mayhem instead of actually caring. If they actually cared there would be action … and that action would not be of ‘my’ doing.
It would be the ending of ‘me’ and all ‘my’ subterfuge and trickery. (Richard, List B, No. 25a, 19 Jun 1999).
Hence it came to pass one fine evening that feeling-being ‘Vineeto’ realised, with a profound visceral impact, how ‘she’ had never actually cared – although ‘she’ certainly felt caring (in fact ‘she’ had a deeply-ingrained and ongoing feeling of caring about all the misery and mayhem) – and upon that realisation transforming itself into an actualisation (as per the intimacy-yearning process detailed in the ‘Direct Route Mail-Out № 05 email[1] part-quoted at the top of this page) it activated “a caring which is as close to an actual caring as an identity can muster” and there was indeed action which was not of ‘her’ doing … to wit: the ending of ‘her’ and all ‘her’ subterfuge and trickery (just to stay in keeping with the above wording purely for effect).
Thus Vineeto is emphatic that unless this “near-actual caring” term refers to “a caring which is as close to an actual caring as an identity can muster” with a marked-action effect, such as is illustrated above, it is to no avail to utilise such terminology. (Richard, List D, Srinath2, 6 Aug 2016)
Footnote [1]: 5. Since a near-actual caring is, of course, epitomised by a vital interest in the suffering of all human beings coming to an end, forever, as a number one priority, then ‘her’ single-minded focus was essentially centred upon the most immediate way of ensuring this long-awaited global event could begin to take effect the soonest … to wit: bringing ‘her’ own inevitable demise, at physical death, forward into a liminal imminence.
6. Because the means ‘she’ elected to utilise towards these ends was the near-actual intimacy which goes hand-in-hand with a near-actual caring (per favour that afore-mentioned absence of self-centredness/ self-centricity which typifies being out-from-control) it is apposite to defer to what Vineeto herself wrote on the 20th of January 2010, only fifteen days after her pivotal moment/ definitive event, as its refreshingly simple directness speaks for itself.
Viz.:
• [Vineeto]: “(…). Further it was obvious for me that it would be Richard who would facilitate and trigger my transition into an actual freedom because he was the most obvious person with whom a near-actual intimacy would change into an actual intimacy – simply because Richard had been my guide and mentor for the last 13 years and particularly so for the period since I stepped out-from-control.
As I have written to James recently –
‘The final clue was again about caring, a caring as close to an actual caring as an identity can muster. Only when I cared enough to give all of ‘me’ to another person, to give them what they want most, was I then ready to give it to the one I cared for most, the one I was closest to, and then I was able to leave all remnant concerns and inhibitions of my identity behind.
And that’s what happened”. (Direct Route, James, 17 January 2010).
(Direct Route, No. 20, 20 January 2010).
Perhaps this information may also be explanatory –
• [Richard]: “1. When feeling-being ‘Vineeto’s everyday feeling of caring first shifted into what has since become known as a near-actual caring the qualitative difference was so marked in its effect ‘she’ initially mistook it to be an actual caring (as per ‘her’ memories of PCE’s)”.
Cheers Vineeto