Hi @Kuba, hi @Claudiu, hi everyone,
In the last week I have been busy reformatting and publishing Dona’s and Alan’s [dead-link] web-page on the AFT website at [Dona’s and Alan’s Report](www.actualfreedom.com.au/actualism/others/donaandalan’sreport.htm).
One of the major topics of this three-week event of answers to questions from forum members in 2017 was that there are no conditions to become actually free.
“Richard said there is no connection at all between feeling good each moment again and actual freedom. You can become actually free right now. But … In the meantime, while you’re living your life not actually free, why not feel good? As he says, this is your only moment of being alive, why waste it feeling bad?”
For instance –
9 Nov 2017
Geoffrey: There is something I’ve been thinking about since:
James: Dona, I have a question for Richard: What will it take for me to go the rest of the way to af?
Dona: Richard was confused by this question, as it sounds like you think there are steps, or “a way”. Actual freedom from the human condition is a pivotal/decisive moment. You are either actually free or you are not (full stop). It is not possible to go “the rest of the way”.
(my remark: same as a PCE… you are either in a PCE or you are not)
Dona: Since we cannot eliminate ourselves, by ourselves (you cannot pull yourself up with your own bootstraps) he suggests that you set this intention: “I give myself permission to allow it to happen.”
I remember making a remark on Slack that ‘allowing it to happen’ we usually used in reference to having PCEs, not self-immolation. And that it was a nice ‘parallel’ between the identity going in abeyance, and in oblivion.
But I was wondering if there was more to this than just a ‘parallel’.
Alan: Richard has never suggested “trying to self-immolate”. There are no ‘rules’ and no conditions for self-immolation to happen
… and there go my many ‘attempts’ lol, including yesterday’s one (when I was “contemplating on altruism”) – which interestingly ended in a PCE. This has happened lately, that when ‘trying’ to self-immolate I don’t end up in ASCs anymore, but in PCEs. This is the case since I’ve stopped ‘forcing it’, but instead trying to ‘allow it to happen’.
Alan: Such giving of oneself could result in self-immolation rather than a PCE but so far no one has self immolated by doing so. It is also very unlikely as, unless one has fully committed to becoming actually free (and any fear of becoming actually free means one has not done so), it will not happen.
Dona: yesterday Claudiu had a question regarding a fear of “losing himself” when intimate. Vineeto said that if he did give 100% it would most likely cause a PCE.
Today I questioned why it wouldn’t cause an actual freedom, and they answered that it could, but only when the person was ready and all of them agrees to it.
So the same thing that causes a PCE could result in self-immolation instead, if one is ready/has fully committed to becoming actually free.
And since:
Dona: perhaps you think that practicing the actualism method produces PCEs? It does not. PCEs are spontaneous occurrences
Then Self-immolation is a ‘spontaneous’ occurrence – when one is ready/fully committed.
- Is all the above correct?
- The same way PCEs can be ‘induced’, by ‘allowing them to happen’, can self-immolation be ‘induced’ by ‘allowing it to happen’ (if one is ready/committed)?
- Can I deduce from an ‘attempt’ that resulted in a PCE that the only thing lacking was the readiness, the commitment to becoming actually free? That the attempt was ‘correct’ so to speak… aiming in the right direction, but ‘failing’ because of a lack of ‘readiness’?
Dona: you posted Alan saying, “there is no trying” to self-immolate… And that there are no ‘rules’ and no conditions for self-immolation to happen. So, that same answer still applies to all your questions above.
Geoffrey: 4. If so I have to ask once more the question you must be tired to hear: how do I get ready?
Dona: again, there are no conditions, you are ready when you are ready.
Then in the meantime… (Lol… You know the answer…) … Yep, the actualism method.
Though Richard and Vineeto understand that you want a “formula” (Dona sidenote: so do I!) … There is none. Everyone is different and has their own way.
There are things that Vineeto suggested that she did … But … they are NOT to be considered “conditions”.
Know yourself (Dona: I recommend using the website for ideas on that).
Find all the objections to self-immolation (goes with the first one, know yourself).
Imitate the actual world as much as humanly possible.
Make it your number one aim/goal/ intent.
Allow it to happen (no forcing it).
Richard added: “there’s nothing you can do to become actually free, and there’s nothing you can’t do”.
Alan: Much the same as Dona has written. The main thing I got (again!) from our conversation is that there is no particular route to be followed. Your second and third questions are setting conditions. There are none! The experience (what they have ‘done’) of each person who has become actually free so far has been different. Vineeto said her experience was giving ‘herself’ permission to allow it to happen – but others did not experience that.
Become interested, vitally interested (until it becomes a fascination) in ‘you’ and how ‘you’ operate. Discover what objections there are to becoming actually free.
In the meantime commit to feeling good each moment again for the rest of your life and enjoy and appreciate this only moment of being alive – there is no difference between the ends and the means.
Richard: The way to an actual freedom from the human condition is the same as an actual freedom from the human condition – the means to the end are not different from the end – inasmuch that where one is happy and harmless as an on-going modus operandi benevolence operates of its own accord. [Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27d, 6 December 2002]
As we all know, Geoffrey succeeded in becoming actually free 10 months later and thus made good on his promise at the end of the question-answer-event –
13 Nov 2017
Geoffrey: No more questions for me.
Would you please transfer my most sincere thanks to them for the time they took to answer our questions, and for everything they’ve done since years to give us the life-changing opportunity to learn about actual freedom and walk the wide and wondrous path.
The third wave is coming! (it’s us).
Dona: Richard and Vineeto appreciated hearing this, with big smiles.
[link]
I very much enjoyed reading the whole web-page anew, and I also much appreciate reading on the forum now that another wave is coming yet again.
Cheers Vineeto