Competitiveness. That’s what gets triggered in many of my interactions. I need to trigger a PCE. Per Vineeto in regards to a PCE: “I am going for whatever obstacle I find at the time whenever I don’t experience this moment of being alive as perfect as I remember those moments of the peak experience”. I find that much of my anxiety is about defending. I am vying for position within some hierarchy. I feel it. It’s psychic in nature as it is operating even when I am not directly interacting with others. This defending is a clue that I am not going in the right direction. The competitiveness is also a clue that I am not going in the right direction. As soon as I notice I will turn around.
The main reason I keep going back to it is that there’s some compelling/compulsory aspect to it. As if I “must” do it. A feeling like I may have missed something. Maybe this time I will find a resolution and may be able to live in peace there. There’s no peace there. It really is like that old definition of insanity. But another reason I go back to it is the undefined feeling of retribution were I to turn away from it.
The reason seems to be that it provides safety. To be in a position means that the group accepts me and so that means I am safe. Ironically, it is also the group which makes me feel unsafe if I don’t get into a position. All of those feelings stem from both work and cultural scenarios, but the underlying workings seem to be the same everywhere. And even further to that, I have to always be trying to climb the hierarchy as being on the bottom is also unsafe. Now that I think about it, it does make sense what Claudiu writes further above about it always feeling unsafe no matter where you are in the hierarchy. But it’s like this feeling that society is always on the brink of collapse, but if I am in a “higher” position then that group will provide better safety and protection. It’s a primal feeling that colors all of reality. When I am in it, I can only feel and imagine danger outside of it. It’s also unwittingly reinforced by my friends and peers as well. I could see now though how if more people were virtually free or actually free then this would greatly lessen its strength.
Something related: It’s funny how when my friend and I are talking, the conversation always turns on how we are no longer able to enjoy life as we used to when we were younger. Suppressed naivete is what I want to say. Then he will predictably say that we need to do something like start a business or change careers as if that would fix the issue. When I bring up that that wouldn’t fix the root issue, then he will say at least it will alleviate some of it. But I’m facing the fact now how I’ll remain the same irregardless as it’s not work per se that’s the problem. I won’t lie and say I don’t have this dream of how if I didn’t have to work anymore then that would unplug me from the hierarchy, but on reflection I don’t think it would. A different thing but with the workings of a hierarchy would take its place.
Maybe it’s just me, but I think part of it is that everyone just seems so confident that they have life figured out even though they become humble when they are pressed about it. It’s like I must be missing something or I haven’t done it the right way and everyone else is. This is in regards to peace, happiness, and the meaning of life. I’ve had this feeling since I was a child. I suspect that past this line is where naivete got locked away so to speak. This combined with the feeling of retribution if I were to venture out independently (as in being happy and harmless for no reason) creates a prison. I’m not sure if that was specific enough lol Do I need to trace it to the triggers? But I’m planning on taking some time off and trying for a PCE.
People love to project they have it figured out. They can even believe they do. If you watch them closely, feel it out, it’s obvious they are lying.
Right. We are hardly being hunted by sabre tooth tigers, most of our predators are extinct or close to it. Humans prey on each other. Once, the group was our very actual protection. Now? What are we being protected from?
We need each other to perform various tasks, but very rarely is it protection. Often, when it is protection, it doesn’t arrive until it’s too late.
This makes sense.
One would lose the respect of the group; even the most famous and successful have to project some worth to the group.
When I have had the same fantasy, it inevitably will include me doing something significant and admirable with all that free time. Why?
It’s against our program, those primal feelings, to exist without a “group approved” purpose.
Further, it’s the appearance of being useful to the group rather than actually be useful to anyone.
If one is well dressed and pleasant, 99% of “fitting in” is achieved. The judgement of most of the group is visual.
Of course, in workplaces, our performance is obvious to those around us. However, how much of the “group” does our workplace consist of? 12? 200?
Job security comes down to two things; skill (including social skill) and appearance.
The feeling of fitting in, not so much. I have seen or been in a few companies that went broke. All those precious feelings counted for nothing in the end.
Skill and appearance. These are practical vs the “gone in a instant” feeling of loyalty and belonging.
RESPONDENT:Since practising the method I find that is more important to enjoy what one does than vice-versa.
RICHARD: Good … but even better is to enjoy (and appreciate) how one is whilst one is enjoying what one does. Vis.:
• [Richard to Respondent]: ‘… one is the experiencing of what is happening …’
It just hit me like “Oh that’s all I have to do”? There’s no effort involved. Now I’m feeling good! I sure like to make things complicated. But something about that reading also really highlighted that it’s me and not the things happening that the focus is on. Maybe it was just because it was written differently that it hit me.
The past week has been better. I’m at a place of feeling between neutral to good.
I re-read what I wrote about experiencing pure intent further above. I can’t believe I just forgot all about that. I’ve been keeping that as my focus and it makes things much less complicated. This past week has been noticeably better with that in mind. I notice that pure intent is always there, but only very dimly when I’m in turmoil. The times I suffer most is when I forget that it’s there and allow the good or bad feelings to take full reign. But there’s the small awareness in the back like I’m playing pretend. It also has to do with working with my self so that I can allow it to function more than just the dim amount that I seem to constantly constrain it to.
I’m reminded of something Richard wrote in his description of becoming enlightened. It’s something along the lines of 'What is observing these two 'I’s? It’s kind of like that. This sort of background awareness is like “Yes, I am alive, right now” and “How can there be any other time and place when everything is happening now?”. I’m experiencing this as I am writing this! There’s no doubt here.
It’s time for my quarterly post lol. A lot of this may be in line with and similar to what I wrote further above. But it does create a better picture for me. Some root causes of not feeling happy and harmless.
After some gradual reflections about my conditioning and identity it has become clear that a big portion of relating to others comes from an inferiority complex. Whenever I see someone succeed then I feel inadequate or unworthy (i.e. inferior). I immediately feel a sense of urgency to attain something of similar value that they may have in order to compete and stay at the same level or go higher. Otherwise I am left with the feeling of being inferior. Conversely, if I see that I am more well off than others then I feel superior. I can see it operating more clearly and consistently in my interactions now. Both in work-related settings and in personal relationships. It’s really unpleasant and I don’t like the dynamic or paradigm of operating this way at all. There’s constant comparison to others in terms of status, wealth, relationships, etc. It functions on many layers and has a cunning scanning component to it.
As for the source of feeling that way, well it could be something I’ve picked up from my parents or teachers or whatever. I can’t be too sure that it’s from one source. But another part of it also feels like it’s something more basically ‘me’ in essence. That is, I am a competitive person by nature. It’s my default way of relating to others. If I don’t go with the feelings, then the “punishment” is that I feel inferior, left behind, alienated, isolated, like an outcast. It’s taken me so long to acknowledge as acknowledging it itself makes me feel like I am inferior. Like no one else feels this way or should feel this way. Behind all this it’s further becoming more clear that it’s really about power. To be inferior or superior means either you have power or you don’t. The promise of power is that I will finally be fulfilled if I am at the “top”. I’ll finally be accepted, belong, and have complete safety.
Even in terms of actualism, it’s like wow everyone here seems much more happy and harmless than me. And I’ve been at this for years now. Though I have gained many insights into myself, I am essentially the same. But if I think about it a little more I could say that it does give me a more stable platform to feel better. Even though I’ve had plenty of times where I’ve been able to summon up enough intent to feel great for weeks these suite of feelings have brought me crashing down so hard that I end up feeling like I was fooling myself afterwards. Then I have to claw myself back up and that gets exhausting after a while.
With that said, I’ve been thinking what would life be like if I didn’t feel this way or relate to others this way. Just thinking about it makes me feel empty. Like I wouldn’t care about others at all. There’s no relationships to be had. The few times I’ve had relationships with acquaintances where these feelings were minimal were delightful. But to apply it to all interactions? How sustainable is that? Seems daunting. The other person would get the “upper hand” and take advantage of me. They’d make a fool out of me!
Aside from that the general trend has been that I’ve been feeling better than the last time I posted. So thumbs up to that . It’s only that these feelings sit more deeply in my heart so it seems to be a recurring theme. Very central to ‘me’. I’ve had times where I’ve allowed pure intent to operate more freely and when I think of that, these feelings say “there’s no way that’s possible”. Even though I’ve experienced it, I’m vehemently holding onto the belief that it’s not possible. Or rather, it’s not possible to let it happen more often because the feeling is that the world would chew me up and spit me back out.
What I have found in exploring the same issues is that there is indeed something more fundamental at play here. ‘I’ play these games in order to continue sustaining the glass house that ‘I’ exist in/as. As a ‘being’ ‘I’ am continually grasping for a means to generate some form of security and it never works as ‘I’ am fear and fear is ‘me’.
So I have found that the way forward is to continue exposing this societal structure of power plays, sometimes riding out the automatic passionate reactions that come as a result of taking this ‘mask’ off. At the same time I keep coming back to purity, to something that offers a safety which does not require power for its existence, and allowing this more and more. Eventually looking back I see that none of the games were ever needed, because this safety is already always here. ‘I’ just instinctually felt that there is a ‘danger out there’ which ‘I’ must protect ‘myself’ from by being a ‘someone’ - it is all eventually seen as a big lie.
Hehe and the funny thing is , what sort of “caring” is it to be always comparing yourself and feeling resultantly either superior or inferior to them? What sort of quality are such relationships based on superiority/inferiority? What value do they ultimately have?
So the things preventing you from going further away from this MO are not really about caring or having a fulfilling interaction or association!
Yea! It’s really about this. The easier answer might be to ask — is the world chewing up and spitting Richard , Vineeto , Peter , Geoffrey , Srinath , etc, back out? They can be an example to help show you that it’s safe, up until you can more easily reflect on it by rememorating a PCE.
I was writing the post below almost 2 months back and never got around to submitting it:
I think I’ve made some progress lol. What I’m finding out more is that there is a certain “gravity” that seems to exist. Every person has a gravity that seems to pull me into their world. I’m sure I have a gravity too and there’s a certain connected-ness there. It always feels like I have to battle them. I’m only now seeing it clearly as one of the reasons that it’s been difficult and confusing in maintaining being happy and harmless is that I seem to automatically go with those feelings and not stay with intent to be happy and harmless. But seeing this in action has made me realize that there is nothing to be gained from going with these feelings. I can maintain my intent in all interactions and see that these feelings of battle and power in essence are what interactions within Humanity is. Thinking on it now, I can see how war is inevitable within Humanity.
Just last week I attended a social event and spoke with a number of people all the while feeling good. There was barely any social anxiety (which featured a lot in the past) and it was a delight to operate and relate with people while feeling good. And there was no social lubricant needed either. Something which many people seem to need to be able to be comfortable interacting with others. In light of this, it’s making my previous post seem silly. I said that perhaps the world would chew me up and spit me back out, but it seems more silly to go with these feelings of power. Reflecting on it now, the more insensible thing seems to be to go with these feelings of power when all interactions could be peaceful and harmonious.
Yes it is rather funny when you think about it. Because even intellectually I can see that those feelings don’t make sense, but nonetheless I feel them.
After I wrote the last post I started to read some of the posts here about global warming and facts. I read Richard’s new post regarding facts and groupthink and it really made me start to question my own reality. In particular this stood out:
RICHARD: If a wannabe actualiser – let alone a practicing actualist – cannot easily differentiate between the facts and factoids which are so prolific in current-affairs and/or is unable to readily descry factuality amidst fantasy in everyday interactions and/or is having difficulty in drawing distinctions amongst the lies, the bull, and the truth in the political arena and/or is struggling with discriminating betwixt scientism and scientolism in specialist areas of human endeavour and/or is largely unaware of the operation of an oh-so-prevalent peasant-mentality defence of groupthink orthodoxy regarding public policy agendas – somewhat similar in manner to what is known in psychological and/or psychiatric terms as Capture-Bonding (popularly known as Stockholm Syndrome when localised, and Oslo Syndrome when communalised) – and/or cannot distinguish in a ready manner how subjectivity differs from objectivity in daily appraisals of their outer-world reality, then how is any such actualiser and/or actualist going to fare upon embarking on an exploration of their inner-world reality in order to determine how they ‘tick’, so to speak, where all such real-world lines of demarcation are blurred and/or non-existent?
I started to think how much of my world-view is based on facts? I can honestly say that much of it is based on factoids. I’ve basically accepted global warming as a fact without doing any research. It’s been talked about so much and accepted by so many people that I just thought then it must be true. There’s just so much crap that you have to sift through to get to the facts. So many assumptions and let’s not forget the mathematical formulas. In the end these “authorities” seem to have the final say in how I see the world. Maybe the easier approach is to question the fundamental assumptions that are taken for granted that these theories and “facts” are based on.
Then I started to wonder what is a fact in regards to my own experience? So I started to read up on correspondence on “Facts”. This came up and it stood out as it was so …to the point:
RESPONDENT:Yes, I have got angry in the past. I can recall various occasions in which I felt anger. Now how do I know anger? I know it by experience. I experienced ‘anger’.
RICHARD: So you know from first-hand experience that it is a fact you got angry; that friend of yours knows from first-hand experience it is a fact he got angry; each and every one of those people getting angry knows from first-hand experience it is a fact they are angry?
A lot of the present “acceptance” type movement is based on denial. It’s actually the same old stuff being played out. You “accept” the negative parts of you but identify more with the positive or lean more towards the positive and say that’s the real you. But that’ll never be the case nor has ever been the case. At best you are uneasily maintaining a semblance of peace. A mockery of the word.
What I also find interesting now is how much of my world view is made up of doom and gloom. Most assuredly due to un-critically taking on board all these assumptions and factoids. All of it adds more and more to the cynicism and resentment at having to be alive at all. So perhaps it behooves me to truly question a lot of this now. I just never thought about how all-encompassing it all is and had fondly been imagining myself as being unaffected.
Now I finished one read through of the The Formation and Persistence of Social Identity article. This has been a very insightful and comprehensive writing. I’m always glad to see Richard writing more and hope he continues to do so. The conveyed clarity and attention to the precision of words that he gives is an example of actual caring in action.
One aspect that it has made me see is the difference between social identity and ego. This has previously caused a lot of confusion for me. But knowing the difference is quite empowering as I have a tendency to be agitated and frustrated on how to do something “right” or “wrong”. This was surely pressed into me from childhood. Thus I inevitably end up experiencing discomfort when I don’t do something the way I’m “supposed to”. This has led to an “actualist identity” too. Like beating myself up if I don’t feel good (and not doing the method in the “right” way). I initially thought that this was ego. But it’s not that exactly.
Most of my previous posts and struggle also relate to social identity and in-particular the peasant mentality. But the fundamental thing that keeps it in place and keeps me from venturing outside the herd is the fear of punishment. I experience this fear below my chest and deeper down. I think it’s the source of the suppression of naivete.
This in-particular caught my eye:
In other words, the persona who landed at the airport (that so-called ‘mature adult’ who wanted to gain clarity in regards ASC’s/PCE’s and life after parentage) had vanished without a trace in a matter of seconds the following evening, during intensive interaction with two fully-free fellow human beings, and thereafter she was living – as a feeling-being still – in a way which is akin to being as a child again but with the undeniable advantage of adult sensibilities.
I’ve experience this kind of thing on many occasions now that I think on it. But I’ve always fallen back into cynicism thinking that that’s not the “right” way to do it. That’s not really actuality and so it doesn’t matter. I’ve had this “mature-adult” persona slip up and when I notice what happens I immediately re-instate seriousness because otherwise I will be punished or something will bring me back down.
There was an experience about 9 years ago when I was reading a post by Richard that I can’t seem to find now. It was on how he was reading a book to someone he was baby-sitting(?) and how in that moment they both looked at each other and neither of them had ever known sorrow (I’m paraphrasing), but when I was reading that I was also experiencing that and how precious it is and how everybody should have this. It brought tears to my eyes and I remember reacting and thinking of how I don’t deserve that or how I can’t have it. What made it stand out even more for me was I was also experiencing a dark time in my life but that stood out because there was this place where sorrow didn’t exist. But now I experience this as being closer. And the wall standing in my way is also more clear.
It gladdens me to know that the below may be possible:
As will be the case for that elderly couple Mr. & Ms. Smith, of High Street, Any-Town[]), who will wake-up in a good mood on that extraordinarily auspicious and historically momentous day – which good spirits will of course persist throughout the day and all their days thereafter – and only gradually come to realise they were “always in a good mood” (as Kath had so nonchalantly observed in her river-view caff that fateful morn), and, further, as they compare notes with kith and kin, how humankind’s long-desired global peace had finally eventuated.
I’ve seen this in others frequently especially with the global warming issue, basically the attitude that “the world is fucked, and people are terrible so therefore life is terrible” expressed in this way that they expect others to agree with them as it is the ‘correct way to feel.’ It’s also a way to demonstrate that they’re correctly educated about the issues happening in the world.
It’s such a miserable existence, I guess people don’t realize the effects of feeling miserable about something all the time and transmitting it to everyone around them. But as you said it requires questioning that received knowledge, as well as questioning whether it’s worth feeling bad about.
I often catch myself in these situations where I feel I must feel bad and that I have no good options. Once I find myself thinking that I have no good options I know I’m missing something, because there is always the possibility of feeling good, regardless of the situation. It kind of breaks the psychic narratives that always seem to end in reasons to feel bad.
Awesome stuff! I was reading your post and thinking it might as well be me writing it all, so much similarity in terms of the terrain that is being explored and the discoveries being made.
The place where sorrow has never existed… this has also been lodged in my mind, the memory of actually being there, experiencing it as a fact.
Now to have the audacity to live it each moment again!
This must be the story you are remembering, and it’s contained within one of those tool-tip pop-ups; content inside those pop-ups is invisible to search engines, hence your inability to find it.
[T]here was a long-lost recall of reading aloud a child’s storybook tale (by virtue of being able to read before being sent to school at age five) upon being asked to by a platinum-haired girl a few months older than me.
She was one of the several daughters born of a farmer and his wife some miles away and was quite special in the way she locked onto my reading eyes, drinking in each and every uttered word and meaning, as if being able to be reading for herself. With her wide-open eyes lustrous in excitation, her features alive with an eager anticipation, her whole being absorbed by intense comprehension, the simple tale unfolding soon drew us inexorably further and farther together.
This expansive togetherness engendered, along with the sensitive closeness by-now ensuing, soon segues into a delicate tenderness blossoming, which is flowering as this luscious richness now opening up, out of which splendid exquisiteness the magical realm, where separation has never been nor ever will be, is oh-so-sweetly manifesting in all its wondrous splendour.
Looking up over the pages of the booklet, gazing softly into those velvety eyes gazing softly back into my own, there is the mutual recognition of fellow travellers in this (normally) faraway land where time stands eternally still.
She is the first to come with me, into this altogether other world, and her naive delight at this haply event is a wonder in itself. Here is a female, my favoured of the human kind, who has never hurt me nor ever will, as here is a female who has never been hurt nor ever will be.
For here, where separation has no subsistence at all, both hurting and being hurt never happen, thusly here is a female who is ever with me, with her fresh femininity pervasive, just as is ever the same with me for her, with my mint masculinity immanent.
There is no modesty here as we are fully out-in-the-open, in total exposure, having nothing to hide and the very daring of doing so has rendered no privacy undisclosed for our naked ambition to be exactly as we are has revealed all. We can no longer pretend, upon any association hence, to again be someone we are not as our most intimate secret has outed itself.
Her soft gaze shows, in this eternal instant of mutual showing, how she knows we both know what she too is knowing. Nary a word is expressed of this most precious revelation—indeed five year-old children know naught of these manner of words—as our very outing is speaking for itself in a language of its own.
She asks, instead, where Kalamazoo and Timbuktu are.
. It’s only that these feelings sit more deeply in my heart so it seems to be a recurring theme. Very central to ‘me’. I’ve had times where I’ve allowed pure intent to operate more freely and when I think of that, these feelings say “there’s no way that’s possible”. Even though I’ve experienced it, I’m vehemently holding onto the belief that it’s not possible. Or rather, it’s not possible to let it happen more often because the feeling is that the world would chew me up and spit me back out.
– let alone a practicing actualist – cannot easily differentiate
]), who will wake-up in a good mood on that extraordinarily auspicious and historically momentous day – which good spirits will of course persist throughout the day and all their days thereafter – and only gradually come to realise they were “always in a good mood” (as Kath had so nonchalantly observed in her river-view caff that fateful morn), and, further, as they compare notes with kith and kin, how humankind’s long-desired global peace had finally eventuated.