[quote=“Vineeto, post:259, topic:445”]
• [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).
Vineeto: (…) What is it about Richard’s follow-up comment which is not clear to you? (snip Richard’s quote) (snip Richard’s quote) [/quote]
Chrono: It wasn’t his comment that wasn’t clear but in the previous paragraph it sounded to me like there were two different people that you were caring for. You first cared enough to give all of ‘me’ to another person (which I understand as Richard) and then you were ready to give it to the one you cared for most. Or maybe you are describing a process rather than two separate people. I may just not be reading this correctly.
Hi Chrono,
I do understand your confusion because in the paragraphs before the above quoted words I was talking about caring for Peter –
Vineeto: Peter and I compared notes about our respective processes of becoming free and, making sense about it in hindsight, have determined what makes the process replicable for everyone.
The key component for both of us had been caring, a caring as close to an actual caring as an identity can muster.
To put it in context of my own experiences: Over the years I increasingly allowed myself to dare to care for my fellow human beings, and gave up dissociating, rationalizing and turning away from the plight of humanity, something which I had practiced as a kind of ‘self’-defence during my spiritual years. I instead gave myself permission to become acutely aware of their pain and suffering, which was also ‘my’ pain and suffering. This in turn increased the urgency to do something about the human condition in myself in order to set others free from my suffering and animosity with the added intention that after becoming actually free I would be able to show by example how others who are interested could do it for themselves.
I had also entered a contract with Peter to look at everything that stood in the way of peace and harmony/ intimacy between us. I discovered that I needed to perceive him not as an extension of ‘me’ (as is usual in normal relationships), a projection of ‘my’ needs and preferences, but as a fellow human being in his own right – and my caring for him meant whittling away my identity as much as possible in order to give him (and me) the intimacy we both yearned for.
When I finally overcame the wall of fear it initiated the process of being out-from-control and the resulting intimacy with my fellow human beings (not only Peter but everyone) became stunningly available as I have described in my last post (see above). My own agenda had become so irrelevant that ‘I’ was able to take a back seat and let events take care of themselves.
My only agenda then, the only thing that I wanted like I never wanted anything before, was to finish the process, to become actually free.
The final clue … (see quote above). (Direct Route, James, 17 January 2010).
However, in the last paragraph I was referring to Richard, describing who the most obvious person was to facilitate and trigger my transition by giving “all of ‘me’ to another person” to then understanding (in hindsight) that it was “to give them (Richard) what they want most” which resulted in ‘my’ immolation.
See, in actuality the actual event happens first and the sorting out of the whys and wherefores comes afterwards. You will be able to observe this yourself, when you naïvely dare to let go of the controls, and allow the universe to live you, then you can experience, each moment, what actually happens without concept, and sort out the whys and wherefores afterwards.
Chrono: I have been reflecting again on this addiction correspondence and it’s interesting how every time I go back to an article later, I can see things that I did not before. My current thinking on this is that every time I choose the conditional enjoyment and appreciation then I am choosing suffering. Could it be that to abandon the path of suffering, that I must also abandon conditional enjoyment and appreciation? The only way “out” of the real-world then is to exclusively choose the unconditional enjoyment and appreciation.
‘I’ do not like being ‘me’ but ‘I’ instinctually try to escape being ‘me’ through ‘good’ feelings. Which is more of ‘me’. ‘I’ am instinctually charged to survive. But what I can say from where I am at is that I prefer the quality of felicitous feelings over good feelings. I enjoy them more than I do the good feelings. It feels more simple and easy. I do want to be like that always.
It is strange that ‘I’ need so much reinforcement to give credence to ‘my’ existence. The good and bad feelings compel because of ‘my’ instinctual charge to survive.
I am pleased to read that you see things you did not grasp before each time you go back to the ‘addiction correspondence’. I would warn though that the expression “I must also abandon conditional enjoyment and appreciation” sounds rather like the tenant of an ascetic, as if any and every conditional enjoyment was addictive and therefore leads to suffering. Why not keep it simple and watch out for the ‘good’ feelings, like love, compassion, pride, honour, loyalty, virtuousness, pacifism and the like?
Indeed, feeling felicitous and appreciative being alive is “more simple and easy” and that’s how you can always tell them apart from ‘good’ or ‘bad’ feelings, which always have strings attached.
Chrono: Some things also hit me recently. One of ‘my’ objections was something like ‘how could there be suffering if this universe is perfect?’. But there are other beliefs behind this notion. First was the belief that there is an ‘Intelligence’ behind this physical universe. But this physical universe is only intelligent as a flesh and blood human body. It is ‘me’ causing the suffering. ‘Me’ is blind nature in action and not the physical universe. Then the objection changed to “‘me’ is required for this physical body to survive”. Then I had a subsequent realization that blind nature (‘me’) only cares about perpetuating ‘me’ (as any species) and not this physical body.
There’s more to write but I will have to come back to it. (link)
Chrono: To continue on with this contemplation, I noticed in everyday events that ‘I’ am indeed a mediator claiming what is happening. I see how “matter is not merely passive”.
I noticed how this moment is consistently reliable. I can feel good because it is this moment. Being here at this moment is dynamic. As opposed to ‘me’. It’s like ‘I’ am trying to be in a state of stasis. Always trying to crystallize ‘my’ self in whatever way to show that ‘I’ exist. Whereas this moment which is dynamic requires no effort. I noticed the objects in my room, the trees outside, the light shining in, the sound of cars driving by. All dynamically existing. Matter has arranged itself in this way and is constantly re-arranging itself. Further to that, without ‘me’, matter as this body is here aware of all this, in this dynamic moment of being alive. This awareness of being alive is here effortlessly. A stark contrast to ‘me’, who is unsure of ‘my’ existence. This being here like this, this seeing, is unconditional enjoyment and appreciation.
What a great description and distinction of what is actual and what is synthetic/ real/ “unsure of ‘my’ existence”.
Chrono: I’ve been wondering what prevents me from allowing this experience more consistently. There are varying beliefs but I think it may be one belief that keeps changing. Maybe I have not seen what it really is. My belief that it is not possible (for me) is what pulls me back. It is made to be a fairy tale. But I think this is also cunning. Because by doing so, ‘I’ can perpetuate my existence. It is after all ‘my’ whole drive. I then became rather sorrowful when I realized just what it was that I was holding back (everything this body is aware of without ‘me’). It is of a precious nature. My belief morphed back to ‘I must protect this body’. I immediately remembered that this is not true and how ‘I’ only care about ‘me’ surviving and not this body. And that remembrance instantly got rid of that feeling. I was feeling it rather deeply as it was like there was a locality in the body to it. My whole head was focused on it in a visceral way and there’s the sensations of crackling inside of my head. There are some varying psychosomatic symptoms that go along with this when I reflect on it. It gives the impression ‘I’ am deeply embedded somewhere in the body.
I now have come back to the same feeling and the feeling of it not being possible is backed really by that ‘life is a vale of tears’ belief. Because of so much suffering in the world. And I cannot find the reason for it. I feel that I am going in circles. It’s why I had previously asked if ‘my’ absence would affect the psychic web. I’ll have to come back to it. (link)
“I must protect this body” is more than merely a belief. It is the very identity formed of the instinctual survival passions. As such it won’t work to try and abandon this as a ‘belief’. What you do instead is diminish the ‘self’, the identity.
Richard: “One minimises the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ feelings and activates the felicitous/ innocuous feelings – happiness, delight, appreciation, joie de vivre/ bonhomie, friendliness, amiability and so on – in conjunction with sensuousness – then the ensuing sense of amazement, marvel and wonder can result in apperceptiveness.” (Richard, Articles, A Précis of Actual Freedom).
When you say you are going in circles, it might be that you are asking the wrong question, or thinking if only you find the correct belief to dismantle you can solve the puzzle of ‘me’. Whereas the direction to weakening ‘me’ is to gradually relinquish control and naïvely allow what you have already experienced on occasions, that the flesh-and-blood body combined with your native intelligence, as unsullied from ‘good’ and bad feelings as possible, can take care of itself – and enjoy and appreciate.
Cheers Vineeto