Ed: Hi all, I figure I should carry on this discussion in its own space…
Ed: It is now 2026, and I have been at this for 7 years. There has not been a single day where I didn’t think about actualism/ peace on earth in that time. (link)
Vineeto: I do remember (if I may mention it) your hesitation in the early stages to come down to earth and not only “think about actualism”. One could call it the gestation period. (link)
Ed: With an affective awareness up-and-running it segued into a moment-to-moment participation – as in, I’m not just going to think about it, I will also do something about it.
Vineeto: Your description reads as if “an affective awareness up-and-running” did not yet include “participation”. Just to head a possible misunderstanding at the pass, the actualist affective awareness, which Richard emphasises wherever he explains the actualism method, is far more than sitting on the sidelines watching one’s thoughts and emotions go by – the affective awareness is employed for the sole purpose of taking action whenever one’s mood dips below feeling good and needs attention. I posted something on this very topic a few days ago (Kuba14, 4 June 2026).
With most people having had some previous experience in various forms of buddhistic practice it may well be of use to clear any remnants of one’s ‘workbench’ to freshly understand the actualist usage of affective awareness – (snipped quote)
Can you see how the very activity of affective awareness includes your active participation else it be a variation on the ‘noting’ technique of buddhistic flavour? (…)
Ed: Reading back what I wrote I can see why you would say that. I attempted to encapsulate a 7-year journey into a few short sentences and did a clumsy job. You would be right to characterize those early days (hah, years) as coming back down to earth. I think what you see as “hesitation,” I see more as pride, ignorance, and a know-it-all pattern.
Hi Ed,
Indeed, from the onlooker’s perspective the hesitation in putting the actualism method into down-to-earth practice was obvious, whereas you would know better which feelings caused the delay, and they are not easy to admit at first, even to oneself. I commend your courage to do so.
Ed: Regarding affective awareness – it is like you say. An actualist uses that awareness to take action (with an actualist intent) when they notice an affective dip. Simply noting thoughts and feelings doesn’t actually lead to any change and in my opinion can be dissociative and lead to creating a new identity (the watcher / awareness as an identity). As in, “I’m not the feelings/ thoughts, I’m what’s watching them.”
I am pleased you can understand this clearly – it is often a long-lasting misunderstanding when attempting to fit this totally new paradigm into ones existing mindset, which consequently stymies any progress with the actualism method. Richard described it this way, using ‘Vineeto’ as an example –
Richard: … such tergiversation reminds me of what feeling-being ‘Vineeto’ reported after the first few weeks of listening to me/ reading my words.
Speaking in regards to the effects any and all attempts to fit this totally new paradigm into ‘her’ existing mindset were having, ‘she’ explained the process as being … (1.) as if ‘her’ brain was being turned upside-down … and how (2.) ‘she’ was having to relearn how to think all over again. (Richard, List D, Alan, #1)
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Vineeto: It’s helpful to remember that ‘I’ am a lost, lonely, frightened and very, very cunning entity and will invent and engender any trick to prevent one diminishing the scope of ‘my’ dominion. For ‘Vineeto’ it became more and more like a fascinating puzzle or mystery-solving game to discover and dismantle ‘her’ tricks, lies and furphies, which were preventing ‘her’ from feeling (unconditionally) good. Like a chess-game of intelligence vs. human nature.
Ed: Speaking of clearing the work-bench. I most certainly had a spiritual hangover for some time in regards to thinking and thought.
Everyone interested in actualism has a materialistic/ spiritualistic mindset of some description – it is part and parcel of the disease called the human condition. Both ‘Vineeto’ and ‘Peter’ had a long history in Eastern spiritual indoctrination and practice, and both wrote a lot about the process of disentangling themselves from the various aspects of this old mindset. For ‘Vineeto’ one of the first stumbling blocks which touched a chord was loyalty, which is recorded here –
R: I remember you and I having a conversation about loyalty the second or third time you came here. You were realising that you had loyalty to hold you back
Q2: Yes, it took a while for me to work through. It is a feeling of belonging, and when I dismantled what loyalty is made up of then it loses its virtue.
R: It is connected with belonging? To a particular group? So all these group therapies that people do, they would not question that loyalty, would they? Because they belong to that very group that is running the therapies. The whole thing of the commune.
Q(2): It’s a new loyalty – away from the family and toward the commune.
R: Whereas I am only interested in being rid of loyalty altogether – however strange that may initially seem. (Richard, Audiotaped Dialogues, Compassion Gained through Forgiveness Binds)
It continues here (Richard, List D, No. 32a, 19 Jun 2015).
Feeling being ‘Vineeto’ wrote about this course of events –
‘Vineeto’: I remember this course of events very well, I remember that feeling being ‘Vineeto’ sat on the floor next to Richard, leaning against the wall in his living room when ‘she’ had this fascinating discussion with him about loyalty. ‘She’ was telling him about ‘her’ concerns that ‘she’ was being traitor to ‘her’ community of Rajneeshees, including the people ‘she’ worked for as an employee, when ‘she’ was doubting and questioning the validity and efficacy of ‘her’ belief in, and dedication to, ‘her’ Master and spiritual enlightenment, after ‘she’ had had a glimpse from the conversations with Richard that there might be something superior on offer. Richard listened intently and at the end of the conversation said to ‘her’ “Ah, you are talking about loyalty”.
This really had hit a chord. Was ‘her’ apparently multifaceted concern really only about loyalty? Loyalty was something ‘she’ could understand, and ‘she’ recalled many times in ‘her’ life where ‘she’ had changed loyalty to something which suited ‘her’ search for meaning better than ‘her’ previous pursuit, for instance as Richard described it in the above correspondence. And ‘she’ had landed here, in Richard’s living room, in a small seaside town in Australia. It was quite amazing.
It still took several more months, in which ‘she’ discovered that there was something presented to ‘her’ which was utterly fresh, sensible, sincere and, contrary to spiritual belief, appealed to ‘her’ intelligence. Besides, ‘she’ realized eventually that ‘she’ had nothing to lose but ‘her’ weakening spiritual dreams and ‘her’ devotion for a dead master. ‘Vineeto’ wrote about one decisive incident – (continued here).
As you can see it wasn’t an overnight process to “clear the workbench and start afresh” but took several months to find and disentangle from the various feelings which connected ‘Vineeto’ to the spiritual world and the ‘Sannyas’ community.
Ed: When you told me that I’m more than just a feeler, I’m also a thinker and senser, it caused me to take note of thought and how it had been crippled by self-imposed boundaries. I gave myself full permission to use it. (Again, with an actualist’s intent.)
When I looked through our previous correspondences, I am not clear what you are referring to? I found this quote containing the words “feeler” and “thinker” from 7 April 2025 (link) while the word “senser” was nowhere to be found –
Richard: Thus attention becomes a fascination with the fact that one is always here … and it is already now. Fascination leads to reflective contemplation. As one is already here, and it is always now … then one has arrived before one starts.
The potent combination of attention, fascination, reflection and contemplation produces apperception, which happens when the mind becomes aware of itself. Apperception is an awareness of consciousness. It is not ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious; it is the mind’s awareness of itself. Apperception – a way of seeing that can be arrived at by reflective and fascinating contemplative thought – is when ‘I’ cease thinking and thinking takes place of its own accord … and ‘me’ disappears along with all the feelings. Such a mind, being free of the thinker and the feeler – ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul – is capable of immense clarity and purity … as a sensate body only, one is automatically benevolent and benign. (Richard, Articles, This Moment of Being Alive).
I also wrote regarding being the feeling in contrast to having the feeling –
Vineeto: So, your challenge is to pay affective attention to how you experience this moment – and it is in this moment where you can experience being the feeling you feel and fully being it (without objection or endorsement) choose to be. For instance if you experience being angry (or fearful, or sad) you recognize and acknowledge that you are this feeling (that is all you are as an identity when you are ruthless honest with yourself). Experiencing that you are this feeling then you have the choice to be a felicitous feeling instead (recognizing that it is silly to be anger or fear or sadness). (Actualvineeto, Ed, 17 Apr 2025).
If you can point me to the quote from where you gained the understanding that “I’m more than just a feeler, I’m also a thinker and senser” it will be appreciated.
Ed: It is very much like a fascinating puzzle. For a time when I would find myself lost in fantasies or fears, upon becoming aware I’d shift gears and use all that thinking to consider said puzzle. Either what was behind all these fantasies or fears, or upon earlier events in the day that caused affective dips. I could write more but I have to go. These days I’ve been very busy and by the evening I find it can be challenging to write. (link)
Remember, that one’s thinking is both polluted and crippled by one’s feelings, and as such it is far more productive to first get back to feeling good so that thinking does not merely revolve around those feelings, “fantasies or fears”. You might find that when you are feeling good, and more so when you enjoy and appreciate being alive, there are no fantasies at all to distract you from being here.
Cheers Vineeto