I was only just thinking about this very point, the place of desire, and specifically “what do I want?”
It sheds a different light on desire. Normally, it’s seemingly a “bad” thing, like you said about being brought up like that. It’s also a clouded thing, being the main focus of morality and social adjustment.
Then what is desire really? Considering that it’s essential for success in actualism!
It gets a bad rep.
This is really cool to read I have had similar experiences lately, it’s always odd how these things synch up.
I have been observing this limbo too, it’s like there is not much more do to, no other direction I can travel anymore because they are all directions within myself.
Then at times (one happened yesterday) there is a genuine/sincere me that gets very close (it seems) to going all the way. In this case it eventually faded and now it’s back to the limbo. But I also observe that each time I am back to the limbo I build up even closer to the next ‘attempt’ so I am no longer dissuaded by this happening.
Yesterday when it happened I was driving my car and it became very clear what I need to do, there was very little drama around it, there was sincerity in the face of that which needs to happen. A seeing that setting myself free is to break that bond/agreement which keeps us all bound and in doing so it is demonstrating to others that we no longer need to remain within the human condition. This was clearer than I ever saw before. I could see that this is what all the actually free guys are doing all this time, that is their contribution, demonstrating by living example that this bond can be safely broken, no need to remain a being anymore.
Interesting. I am experiencing this talking with a woman. There is an expectation, a “bond/agreement” which I keep having to politely push through. Perhaps it’s the same with everyone; politely breaking this bond.
But as Claudiu ponders; where will that leave me socially?
I guess those fears of what will happen socially need to be fully explored and eventually put aside because where it will leave me is far superior, to turn this into a problem of how others will see me means there is more to look at first.
I was just thinking about this same concept yesterday
It’s about ‘who’ you’re ‘being’
So for me I’m used to ‘being’ a ‘lonely guy’ (with everything that comes with that). I realized I could ‘be’ something else. There are lots of ‘beings’ I could be, but as an actualist what I want to be is happy & harmless, aka a ‘naive guy’ (in the sense of ingenuous & delighted).
So it’s still Henry, but it’s naive-sincere Henry now
We’ve had hints of what that looks like in the past in EEs and IEs, it’s just about making the commitment to be that all the time
edit:
It occurs to me that another crucial element is that it’s always now, so the confusing situation you describe of there being a ‘sensible’ and ‘senseless’ Claudiu that seem to inhabit the same body is quite simple: when certain structures within the brain/self are triggered, the ‘senseless’ is occurring, and when they are not, the ‘sensible’ is able to operate. There is no contradiction in ‘you,’ it’s just that different ‘programs’ are operating at different times. During a PCE, ‘I’ am not really operating at all.
Lol I feel foolish. This whole time , the sole point of it all is WANTING to enjoy and appreciate!! That’s the “missing element”. That’s the piece that can’t be gotten by following a list of instructions. It’s just that you have to want to do it lol. And if you do then the rest falls into place aided by the reports and descriptions etc.
Another one of those things sitting in plain sight of every second page of the AFT!
Dang! What else am I not “reading with both eyes open” 
Haha you have no idea how often I’ve had that same realization. I’m saying to myself: “why don’t they just say that” until I remeber it’s stated over and over and over again even on a rolling banner 
@claudiu Sorry for the late response. I was busy. But also it wasn’t clear to me what you were asking 
It can be confusing dealing with desire, as there is a raw instinctual component to it – but also a more social identity aspect, which is less capital ‘D’ desire, than being told what to value and want. Then there is simple, naive preferences and likes. As a feeling being this is all rather mixed up. I remember at various times as a feeling being I would separate into naive and non-naive personalities – then it would snap back and I was one again. I don’t think this was an entirely fabricated or dissociative process. The further one goes and the more pure intent, the more obvious, ill-fitting and flimsy feeling being and social identity become. But one does have to watch out for fabricating the process and bringing a moral tinge to it. Let sincerity and pure intent be your guide.
At the end of the day the fear of you being left behind and of you becoming someone else is very real - because it is true. As Geoffrey once said, you need to be prepared to give up everything but you realise later you have lost only your chains. Its not for nothing that self-immolation is called the ultimate sacrifice
Hi @Srinath
I’m very interested in this topic myself right now. I’ve been observing the mixed up categories of instinctual desire, socially conditioned ‘values’/‘desires’ and naive preferences and likes. I can’t always clearly sort them.
I am wondering how to ‘stay the course’ so that I can be consistently in touch with and guided by those naive preferences and likes. I find that at moments I am so authentic and spontaneous yet also harmless. I am almost certain that I want to live that way as it seems infinitely more happy, harmless, and also ‘involved’ rather than withdrawn. I could almost cry thinking of how harmful corrupted and calculating I am at even this moment relative to those times of naivete, there is plenty of intention to get to that place and stay there.
This quality of ‘involved’ appears to be based on being fully in touch with those naive preferences and likes I think, and somehow it leaves me automatically happy and harmless. It seems as simple as that if I am being guided by those alone then things are perfect or at least near-perfect. Honestly this really confuses me. Why is it that these naives likes and preferences are so harmless? Couldn’t there be a naive ingenuous like/preference for something harmful? Experientially I don’t find this to be an issue or concern once I am in that state but because I don’t understand why it is this way, it is much harder to convince myself to be solely guided by the naive likes/preferences because I don’t intellectually understand. I guess it is just evidence of some connection to pure intent? Ultimately I am just tapping in to stream of benignity? And that benignity is simply a feature of the universe?
I find that when the social identity takes the wheel again, it starts trying to operate by judging which potential actions are harmful and which are harmless. Although it seems to just be pseudo-actualism morality at work. I think I get flashes of naive likes and preferences through the cracks though, and the social identity can easily dismiss them as harmful or self-centered, so I fail to ‘board the train’.
Or alternatively, a naive like or preference will tell me to not do something that I have labeled as ‘right’ and so I get out of touch with the stream of naivete that way. Is there anything I can understand to keep on track more? Or is it just a matter of courage essentially that leads to seeing it experientially over and over? Because I do find it to be an act of courage that leads to me tapping into that 'stream of naivete since I can’t be sure where it will lead exactly…
@hunterad it’s all very simple. You choose to be happy and harmless each moment again. I’m not sure I’ll call that courageous as such - although sure, some effort is required from time to time. The higher your baseline the stronger the link to pure intent. Pure intent is what you need to tell the difference between these things. Its only on self-immolating – or at least when one is virtually free that you are consistently naive. Until then this mess and inconsistency is what you have to settle for! You make your own bed in that sense.
It could be your new profile picture 
VERY “INTENSE” PCE (but not really ‘intense’)
Had that experience of experiencing that rich or magic thing that I don’t have a word for. Delight don’t do it justice… ‘intrinsic joy of experiencing’ maybe but ‘joy’ doesn’t work. Just that richness that Is THERE as part of being conscious (?)
And infinitude was part of it! I experienced that the universe was infinite and that this joy or delight came from that somehow. Informed me of it. It could go forever!
I am not ‘part of’ or ‘in’ the universe… (actual) I IS the infinite universe, experiencing itself, AS a human .
Just went with continuing to go into and experience that more. Seemed potentially infinite. Utter joy. And!! While showering. The delight was NOT a reaction to the senses! The pleasure of the senses didn’t affect’ it somehow.
TRULY UNCONDITIONAL. It was there regardless. Within that unconditionality (not even affected by such pleasurable things) there is the experience of the pleasure of the senses, where ‘delight’ now becomes a more appropriate term. Joy and delight in the pleasure of warm water and soap etc. But it didn’t affect the richness-magic-meaning-joy experience (me?) at all! It (me?) was there regardless. Apperceptive ? ?
I did not even realise until a few minutes after that it was a PCE, until ‘I’ came back. Then I saw that the “me” that I was just being, the actual me, was not this ‘me’ that ‘I’ am as a feeling-being. It’s a different me. But literally I didn’t notice this as I went from regular me to actual me. It was like I was just continuing to exist but now in a better way. But then ‘feeling-being-me’ came back and I saw ‘I ‘wasn’t that. ‘I’ do really have to ‘die’ for that to happen… even though i didn’t notice ‘my’ disappearance? WTF …
And the thought: “well look at me, I learned something today… because i was actually doing something and not just reading or thinking about it :D”
That’s a metric fuckton of awesome!!!
That’s awesome @claudiu. This richness is exactly what I was writing about the other day, about the memories from gaming when I was a child.
I like how you have distinguished the pleasure of the senses from this richness which seems intrinsic to consciousness being aware of being conscious. I know exactly the thing you are writing about! There is a depth to it that is so magical that it’s really difficult to convey this depth/richness with any words, they don’t seem to do justice to the infinite richness of what’s apperceived.
Very exciting stuff, I can tell it is definitely exciting for you because your posts are usually way less frantic 
This seems to be it, it’s to do with infinity because to apperceive infinity means that the very definition of perfection and completeness is being experienced. There is only this place which means it’s complete beyond description. It means it’s impossible for anything more complete or more perfect to exist. It seems this richness is the direct experience of this fact! It’s got me all giddy now contemplating this.
That’s really interesting. Thank you.
This seemed super strange and trippy at the time but now I recognize it for what it is — anhedonic pleasure . That was the experience of anhedonic pleasure (or pain if it was pain)…
it’s also why the richness-experiential-innate-joy thing, “intense” isn’t quite the right word. “Intense” describes hedonic/affective pleasure, where if it is too much it is overwhelming. This one at first SEEMED like it could be ‘too much’, but it never was. It doesn’t appear to have a ‘cap’ in the way hedonic pleasure does. Those circuits don’t get overloaded in that way
Also ‘me’ as a feeling-being, all ‘I’ have is the hedonic pleasure haha. There’s no way to get ‘outside’ of it … it is such a paltry substitute for the anhedonic experience tho !!
live from rock wall in El Potrero Chico