I have been contemplating more about the social identity and being on the look out to see it in play in my life. It plays a big role in my life and has a huge stranglehold on me. Loosening up more of it would help feeling good come much easier and ensure that it is more enduring.
One of the most obvious aspects is the obligation to my parents. Being a ‘son’…and a “good” son at that. It’s not even a pleasant relationship. I’m constantly being guilt tripped and blamed for making them unhappy by simply living my own life. It could be as simple as not visiting them or not wanting to go out to eat dinner with them. It’s being presented as if I am responsible for their happiness. And if I were to tell them that I am not responsible for that then they will say that I am callous and have no love for them. But the thing is I don’t love them the way they love me…if at all. As is typical of many Asian households, I was physically abused and it was justified because that made me not “stray off course”. With that in mind, I simply do not feel that loving loyalty to them. I also have nothing in common with them. Anytime I share anything about the way I perceive life that is different from them (and I think very different from them) then I am called “abnormal”. It doesn’t even seem like I’m talking to individuals, but rather something like online chat bots. Everything they say is regurgitated truisms backed by fear.
I have been thinking about not talking to them at all. And I can’t imagine the drama that would ensue. But I’ve also been thinking that it seems like I’m running away from an issue. Why am I not able to maintain feeling good with them? They don’t exactly force me to do anything. But I dutifully play the role that has been instilled in me. It was impressed into my mind through fear. Perhaps this is the root of that fear of being punished if I were to feel good for no reason. To enjoy life simply because I am alive. I’ve been able to feel good before but I am guilt tripped back into the role that they want me to play. What keeps it in place? Basically that if I don’t play the role then I am a “bad” or whatever. Even contemplating and typing this now I am having self-doubting thoughts such as “oh I am having this insight now but it is fake. There’s no way such a thing is possible for me”. I’ve experienced this in the past and this is where I would stop and turn back. But I can’t keep doing the same thing over and over. Right now all I can think is that this must be the way forward as this is where I feel myself more ruffled up and agitated. Yet also weirdly energized simultaneously.
This connection to them is made of the same stuff as my connection to everyone else. It’s all made of fear. The boundaries are made of fear. In fact this fear expands and encompasses all of my reality. I’m having to sift through so many fears by trying to contemplate “what if I just abandon these connections?”. It’s like I’ve allowed my whole life to let everyone have the final say in how I think and feel. Like my experiences do not have any validity. The initial feeling is an instant feeling good and a feeling of immediacy. Then there is a bounce back of “oh I am crazy and I’ll look like a simpleton” or even just the feeling that I’ll literally become stupid.
I’ve also been trying to think of any PCEs that I’ve had happen spontaneously in my past. The nearest one I can think of was when I was outside of my house near my patio. It only lasted less than a minute but it stands out. There was an instant and complete immediateness and closeness. The ground was so close to me and I was in the world. It’s so strange that the ground usually seems so far away from me but it’s like always right there. Then there was the closeness of the air. Was it even air? Maybe I had never noticed air before. The air itself was friendly.
Now as I’m thinking of this I had a light bulb! I have in fact had those kinds of experiences before. It’s like a glimmer but it happened when I would go to the park to play. I can’t recall the exact experiences but I can remember its flavor. I will try to recall more.
Of course this approach is worth trying. I’m at a point that I don’t think any other approach is worth it. No one else I see is genuinely experiencing complete peace. Nor have I been able to find and read of anything that even comes close to such a thing. If I’m speaking from a practical standpoint then really nothing would happen. But the fears feel very real. What’s starting to become apparent is that I would have to give up a part of myself or some connection to be free of it. I would have to stop trying to be a ‘good’ son or whatever in order to be happier. It feels like I would be being callous if I were to do that. If I’m being honest, there’s also a sort of bitterness or resentment about it. That I didn’t get that normal relationship with my parents. It’s probably conditioning from what I’ve seen on TV. But I wished I could have that “domestic bliss” that’s always presented in a lot of media (at least the ones that I saw when I used to watch TV). So there’s also this dream aspect of it. It basically never existed. Maybe there’s no way around it but to face these feeling objections about being callous or inconsiderate and just “not care” about what they are saying about how I make them feel.
Aside from that I’ve been reading some material on the AFT website and it always helps me and orients me. I get a flavor of it almost every time I read it. So today I felt pretty good for most of the day. Then when I was at the gym I started to lose it but it was still different from before. The moment I lost that connection I became immediately agitated and confused. And I think I understood the reason why after reflecting on it. Earlier this morning I was able to tap into it. This time it had a flavor of freshness. It’s always new and it’s just such a relief and delight to be here. Something else I noticed on top of that is that it’s completely something else from ‘me’. And I think this is the source of my feeling confusion. There’s this contrast of this confused/agitated me and this world which exists on its own where it is so simple. It doesn’t require any agreement from anyone or me to exist. It’s always here right now just by being alive. Now that I am seeing it in real time this contrast it’s like I’m trying to claim this other world for myself. There’s a sort of war that I’ve seen before within myself of how I want this world for me but also that I don’t deserve it or there’s no way that it could be the case. Utter disbelief and also some embarrassment follows when I see how I’ve spent my life in a serious way so far. But I get a sense of optimism that it is right here too. Every time I think about going deeper into it I get this notion of “oh there’s some thing else I need to do or think about”. I’m not entirely sure. What makes it even more confusing to me is that there’s all the above problems that I wrote about but they are completely separate from this. This is just always here but I feel like I have to solve all the above problems before I’ll go deeper into this.
I think all of this stems from authority. I had a relationship like that with my parents, which has since changed because my source of authority changed from them to my partner. I didn’t solve the issue, merely transferred it. But nonetheless, guilt/resentment comes because you acknowledge that your parents have authority over you. No authority = no fear/guilt. You’ll say “no” and it won’t be callous because YOU won’t be callous. But you can’t fake this, you have to break down the internal authority structures that are specific to you. And why is this hard? Because we’re still kids, and standing on our own feet terrifies us, even though the price for not doing so is really too much.
There is a bit in one of the audio taped dialogues that explores something pertinent to this, I couldn’t find the specific one though.
Essentially though it discusses using the energy of indignation to tear away from these loyalties. I’ve found that with these things it isn’t always so clean, it will eventually become clean once things settle.
But at first when I finally get sick of remaining in these games there is initially this indignation, this being completely fed up with playing the game and just stepping out no matter what.
Once the loyalty is broken then the energy of indignation can be attended to also and the whole thing can become clean.
But I think it may stall progress if one expects this tearing away to be a completely clean business.
Of course the focus is to keep one’s hands in one’s pockets and to act as sensibly as possible through the thing, but I think sometimes there is no way not to ruffle some feathers in the process.
What I have found is that the real world and its denizens is extremely adept at using all sorts of psychic fuckery to ensure that one remains, it’s all designed in this way, it’s kind of sickening to contemplate the extent of this actually. But either way somehow this has to be dealt with, it requires a certain tenacity at times I think.
Yes I have been observing and reflecting myself since I last wrote and it is more and more obvious that it is about authority. This authority was implanted into me since I was little and it controls and utilizes the emotions within. I am reminded of an experience I wrote about further above of experiencing how there was no authority or anyone in charge of this universe. It was one of the most freeing experiences and when I think about it I wouldn’t even say that I was experiencing a PCE for the bulk of it. I ask myself why don’t I just use that experience to tear down this authority construct? And I experience a great doubt. I have been programmed to not stand up on my own two feet and maintain an experiential fence made of constant doubt. To not think for myself, but instead only validate my experiences if it aligns with the herd. In fact I am experiencing it as I am writing this post!
All of this started with my parents and extended out into perhaps the entirety of the real world. It’s all coming together now. I wrote about work related issues further up as well. I saw how all of it was about my role in society. My role is to be in a “good standing” in relation to everyone else. To be seen by society (all of which is composed roles) as a “good” or “successful” person in whatever role I am playing at the time. The cost of this is that I am a complete sell-out. What’s even funnier about this as I keep my experience of no authority in mind is that this authority known as society doesn’t exist outside of being a feeling.
I’ve had this unraveling for the past couple of weeks about how much of it all is made of fantasy and illusion. It has all been very freeing and I’ve been feeling much better in general. I’ve always turned back at this point but now I am continuing further. Another insight I had is about how there is no actual “depth” to a feeling. I’m not sure how to explain this. When I am feeling something then that is what I am feeling . There’s no side stepping it or denying it or expressing it (which gives the illusion of depth).
Yes I remember reading this too and I will have to find the article. I think the hard part of it is that there is a feeling of responsibility of how I am hurting others by tearing away. I remember when I asked my friend if I am responsible for my parents’ feelings and he resounded with a confident “Yes!”. All from something as simple as I don’t really want to talk to them. I can feel the dark reality that’s left for them without their children. A dark reality communicated to me non-verbally. These loyalties are made of an interconnected affective mesh. It’s all so very strange. Lots of psychic fuckery to use your word .
There had been some realizations that had been coming to a head for a while now. I had some experiential insights during my flight home from vacation. Even just asking “How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?” causes immediate discomfort. What’s also interesting is that asking it almost always causes the discomfort. It’s because my normal mode of operation is one of judging and deciding how I SHOULD be thinking and feeling rather than a direct and simple acknowledging and seeing if that is silly or sensible. This creates a great amount of discomfort in my chest and head. I can feel it as something almost moving. I stayed with this discomfort and it was as if it was an entity on its own. It felt like the middle of my head was turning over. Like my whole brain was being flipped over. It felt like a real physical sensation. I thought my brain was going to detach from the spinal cord. But it wasn’t painful. During all this it occurred to me that I had been a drone my whole life and I continue to be. A marionette. All of my self-doubt stems from my conditioning. I thought maybe my whole brain will become turned over but I couldn’t stay with it as there also started to be a strange sense of not having any control over it. That caused some frustration for me as it felt like I was headed into a new way of operating. But now when I ask “How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?”, I label the feeling matter of factly. No need to go through the lens of discomfort. This experience of discomfort I think is rather peculiar to me as I’ve always had it. Maybe it’s some sort of dissociation? I’ve never been able to completely dissolve it. But asking and labeling in this matter of fact way rather than letting the discomfort be the final decider has actually brought a good deal of comfort.
This could be the core suffering of being a ‘being,’ if you look for it you’ll always find it because it’s always there. Do you have any PCE to compare to?
This is a major part of the inspiration to become free… suffering sucks! And everyone is doing it. It would be a major downer if it weren’t for the alternative being possible.
Yeah I saw it similar to @henryyyyyyyyyy, that this ‘shifting discomfort’ is actually ‘you’!
It’s just that the ‘normal’ MO basically involves some level of dissociation, suppression, (or any other form of distraction/escapism) happening more or less at all times.
So when the question is asked and awareness-cum-attentiveness is activated, then light is being shone directly onto what is going on underneath.
I guess if any morality is also being applied at this point then indeed it will build a pressure cooker haha.
What I find is that this ‘shifting discomfort’ that is ‘me’ can be transformed though, it can shift to ‘be’ felicity and innocuity. This seems most obvious in an excellence experience where it is the pure intent which is so freely accessible that seems to transform ‘my’ very core of ‘being’.
When back to normal though it seems that this discomfort is there more or less at all times. Which brings an interesting point actually - that without pure intent, ‘I’ am truly lost, without purity ‘I’ can only revert back to ‘my’ fundamental nature which is sorrow and malice.
It’s funny actually pure intent seems to work like some occult spells, it only takes for me to speak of its name and contemplate its existence for it to become apparent
If I recall and compare then this discomfort is not there. But another one of the characteristics of this discomfort is a deep-seated confusion. When I compare it…I am very confused as to what I am. It’s like I’m trying to bring that memory to happen right now, but I am trying to get rid of the discomfort myself. Kind of like a ‘me’ trying to get rid of ‘me’ type of thing. I’ve considered whether if this is what the core suffering of being a ‘being’ is and I think wow…this is all ‘I’ am? And ‘I’ am causing all this havoc? Another thing that is slowly dawning on me is that I already know my ‘hiding place’ and I am trying to run away. I need to be completely sure and honest with myself before I reveal it. I’m just trying to hide every way I can.
Do you feel this discomfort?
Actually I have considered it too and I very much intuit it. Like if I really allow myself to just feel good for the rest of my life, it’s the end for ‘me’. It’s like that feeling of looking over a precipice and getting that feeling of falling. There is no place for me.
Related to my previous post: The issues involving parents also came to a head on my flight and on my vacation trip. There’s no way around it that I had given them power over me. Or rather I had been coerced as a child to give them power over me. My grandma even would tell me “parents are like God”. I roll my eyes when I think about that now but I still have a feeling of “I am betraying them” by not going with that sentiment. There is no way around it except to live my own life and they will be themselves and try to guilt trip or emotionally manipulate me but I no longer have to go with the feelings. Maybe this may seem callous from their end but I am not doing it out of malice but a desire for freedom. Simply put, they only have as much power over me as I give them. And perhaps this extends to all relationships. This was such a freeing feeling. There’s fear behind going in this new direction. Mainly a nebulous fear of punishment. But that’s the only way to go.
Something unrelated to the previous posts now. I think it’s time to investigate desire and love a little more. There’s this pull that starts with sexual desire. Sexual appeal is used everywhere to sell all manner of things. It’s because it’s very powerful. It’s something that’s hard to question because it’s something that just is. Following the fantasies that start with that desire though, there seems to be a promise made by those passions. A promise of fulfillment. A promise of intimacy. But it’s also further complicated on top with expectations and demands.
I’ve been wondering if I should pursue a relationship or if I should remain single as I do enjoy my alone time as well. I suppose there’s no real ‘should’ and ‘should nots’ here. One of the “objections” or imagery that is conjured up when I contemplate freedom is of being alone and single forever. That I’ll never attain the intimacy promised by those passions. But is that really true though? And why is it that matters also?
I’m trying to read between the lines here but it could be an issue of clarity. A direct experience of the self is miles apart from the normal self as experienced from the position of ‘comfortably numb.’ From my own experience, going through some fever dreams resulted in terrifyingly tangible experiences of the self that left me shaken. You could probably recreate such an experience with a large dose of psychedelics. That type of clarity is something that comes and goes, and can’t necessarily be summoned even with direct intention to experience it. The self does not like to be seen… or maybe it’s more accurate to say the self does not like to see itself.
It’s notoriously slippery stuff, which is part of how we’ve ended up with this 5,000+ years of spirituality. The vast majority of people give up on the entire issue as being unfathomable. The minority become spiritual in the attempt to pierce the mystery. Even the majority of people that claim a spiritual identity are totally at sea.
The confusion is itself an aspect of the self operating… it’s another way of ‘bailing out’ clarity. One experiences confusion and it’s a reason to give up. It’s similar to disgust in that aspect. It doesn’t want to be seen or understood because its entire point is to get you to bail out.
The counterpart to confusion is certainty, which can come in a false certainty - there is no one more certain than god incarnate, for example - but also in the reliable form which comes from direct experience. In a lot of ways actualism consists of gradually exiting both confusion & that false security of overconfidence and replacing both with experience.
Agreed. It’s quite absurd when it’s seen that clearly. Which is great news when it comes to making the choice to enjoy & appreciate!
This seems to me like a good course of action. The key is sincerity. It can’t be just to be able to brag to others about your experiences. There is a reason deep within yourself that will fuel that sincerity to penetrate. Once you have that you’re good to go.
Yes. Technically everyone does but as I said above, the degree of clarity is relative. I’ve observed that many of those who became free later reported going through some traumatic experience, and a traumatic experience frequently has the quality of bringing out genuine terror &/or despair. From those experiences the depths of the self reveals itself. It also can supply motivation to do something about the situation, though again the amount of people that will become an actualist as a result is incredibly small at this time.
Most of what an identity consists of is various masking techniques to avoid experiencing oneself, to try and grasp onto various good feelings. That’s why the second job of an actualist… after getting some grasp on pure intent… is dismantling the social identity. The social identity is the protector of & from the self. It will routinely shepherd you away from the source until significant confidence & boldness have developed. That’s why the deeper discomfort isn’t always accessible. Somnolent states are useful for accessing these levels.
The deeper you go & the less social identity there is, the clearer this discomfort is. This is only possible with pure intent as a guide & with gradually increasing enjoying creating an environment of success & confidence to operate from. You go in a little bit, remove some suffering, enjoy the newly accessible open space, and go in again, over & over. By the time you get somewhere deep it’s almost routine, except for the fact that we’re talking about suffering itself.
I was going to write something about one of my objections to becoming free, but I think what you write here may be the answer to it. I intellectually see that it may not be true but it feels pretty real. That is every time I contemplate gathering all of my intent to become free, the one objection that stands out the most is if I’ll be safe (physically). How will I protect myself? Like I need to be here to protect this body. One of my main modus operandi is being ‘alert’. The world is a dangerous place. The more I feel the suffering of Humanity, the more I feel that it is unsafe to let go. But maybe if I establish further this baseline of enjoying and appreciating, that will alleviate that concern. After all it is coming from a place of being ‘alert’. Maybe
Yeah you don’t have to worry about the full-Monty becoming free today for it to be worth enjoying & appreciating more & seeing what it does for you & your life.
You don’t have to drop all your street smarts in one go to see what happens if you enjoy & appreciate the next time you’re on the street
And once you’ve had that experience then you may find you see things differently and have found a new way to feel safe
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Speaking from my own recent experiences I didn’t know when I set out how I would go about being/feeling safe, but I was determined enough for it to happen that I started and have been figuring it out as I’ve gone along. And now that I’m here, I see that it is safe… and so I keep going…
consider this: an actually free person has no affective passions to cloud their intellect/awareness/attention so they are much more alert. They also have no affective “breaks” or squeamishness preventing them to defend themselves with full force and awareness. Seems like they’d be far more capable of defending themselves if needed
This made me realize that this is a feeling of being unsafe vs actually being unsafe. And when I reflect on it it’s kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Yet I still feel it deeply. This kind of ties into the next thing mentioned:
What feels like it would be crippling to me is the loss of being able to “feel out” the world. Being without vibes or currents. Part of being ‘alert’ is being sensitive and receptive to malicious vibes. It’s this aspect of it that feels like it would be unsafe. I think part of this for me also comes from a place of having been bullied and also suffering physical abuse when I was younger. So maybe I have to separate some more facts from feelings out here.
. There’s no side stepping it or denying it or expressing it (which gives the illusion of depth).
And why is it that matters also?