FEELING GOOD ! The What, How, Where, When, etc. of It?

Actualism
50

I am sitting here now with a strange feeling of sadness …
I felt something a few minutes ago ,a heavy round ball in my stomach full of sadness and anger … it was more anger…i dont know what questions i have to ask myself ? this anger was very huge …

this is the first time i am feeling the anger in my stomach …

ok : from Elgin’s writings : I have to specify the reason.

If you can specify the reason, check it.= angry at somebody …

Is this reason enough to destroy your happiness?

Why is it so important to feel that feeling instead of feeling better?

because i dont want people to think i am stupid …they think i dont know
anything , and if i say i dont know something ,they come and say : "go and check the translations…this makes me very angry …

What is special about it? i feel inferiority …deep shame when somebody tells me what to do , it is as if they say you are not good enough …

Can it solve my problems?
Is it useful?

Why do I keep that feeling? i feel he is always on my back for translations …he always wants to be right , he thinks i am stupid …he does not know farsi and he just likes to make me nervous …

How does this feeling relate to instinctive feelings? i dont know …i guess this is raw anger …or maybe desire …desire of …i want him to know that i did my best for the translations …i put all of myself to it …

…it has been several minutes now , my anger has subsided , i still feel something in my stomach …

from son_of_ bob 's writing :Anger, resentment… there is such a sticky quality to these emotions. It is so easy to feel that what you are feeling is so just and fair.

Now I understand why Srinath has written this : I felt intuitively how my personal malice and sorrow scaled all the way up to the point of the global wars raging around the planet…
I had to ‘die’ so that this body and every other body could live peacefully. I would need to truly die

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51

Or maybe the answer could be, by “anger-ing” , “Being-angry”, “I” can be maintained and survive ???

“I” am very fragile( speaking personally now), so anything that perpetuates me( keeps “me” alive), will be used, even if it causes “me” hardship. Because “I” am sacred ( I need to be defended, against myself and others ).

Speaking of survival of “me”, the opposite side of feeling stupid ( inferiority) would be smart (superiority).
So I get angry for feeling inferior(aversion), because I want to feel superior(desire) ( that would be beneficial, as to maintaining the good feelings( i.e. “me”), plus it is beneficial for the survival of “human” species, i.e. “humanity is me”.

“I” am a master at justifying myself and maintaining “me”!

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52

I wanted to see if anyone could elucidate how to go about feeling and experiencing resentment of being here, so it would be removed as an obstacle to feeling good.

I would appreciate detailed and specific examples of how did you go about it and what to did and not do.
I know the question is broad, but your explanations would be very helpful.
hello, @Felix @Kub933 b @henryyyyyyyyyy or anyone else :slightly_smiling_face:

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That resentment is just about the bottom of what ‘I’ am. ‘I’ don’t like being alive, ‘I’ have a problem with everything, ‘I’ am annoyed that I have to do all this in the first place, that things don’t fall into place just how ‘I’ want it to.

So it’s going on in some form at all times, so long as you are a ‘you.’

So what you’re really trying to do is draw it out into the open to where it’s obvious & polarized enough to be clearly visible.

A good way to do this is find something that you already definitely have a problem with in life, and expose yourself to it. Think through the ramifications of it. Isn’t it annoying that it exists in the way it does? Isn’t it such a bother? Do you not experience suffering as a result of it? That’s not really fair, is it? You didn’t ask for this, did you?

All of this is resentment. It can be very powerful, as it is ‘me’ at base.

Once you see it you can go about investigating & removing it.

It may be the last part of ‘me’ to go.

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Wouldn’t that make it hard to remove … lol ?

Appreciate that very much henry. That is very helpful and I will be thinking about what you said.
Can you say more about the investigation part of it please?

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I guess it’s hard to remove until it’s removed? Either way there’s nothing to do but to do it.

As far as investigation goes I’ll point you toward this recent post by @Elgin

Investigation takes many forms but the gist is to be an interested ‘scientist,’ learn everything you can about it, its ins & outs, how it operates in you, how ‘you’ operate. And as you get to know ‘yourself’ more and more, and have more and more experiences of purity, it becomes more and more a simple choice about how you want to operate, what gets fed, when you can nip things in the bud & when something just needs to be experienced for a bit longer.

A useful idea is that ‘nothing can go wrong,’ so however you investigate has potential fruit to be found. If you’re feeling worse then you know you’re headed the wrong direction, but even feeling worse has interesting information about ‘you’ to be gleaned which can ultimately be useful as well.

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Curious question - - has anyone here succeeded at getting rid of the resentment of being alive entirely? I’ve only managed to get rid of my resentment for certain things, but every now-and-then the resentment of being alive swoops in.

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Yes, I think entirely. But, could you give an example of when it swoops in?

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It seems as long as enough conditions are met, it will be triggered. I can remember a day where I would resent living because I had to go to work or such. Minor things like that - - not so much. But I think when things get particularly rough for me it comes in. I’ll try to be on the lookout for a more specific example but since I’m not currently experiencing it, it’s hard to remember a specific one at the moment.

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59

I am actually not too sure on the difference between the resentment to being alive and the fundamental sorrow of ‘being’ so it is hard to say whether I have eliminated resentment.

It seems resentment as in - actively disapproving of being here - is largely gone however there is still sorrow, in fact I am not sure where the line is between the 2!

I am interested by what you wrote @Miguel, so you think resentment is gone entirely for you, is sorrow equally missing?

It seems resentment has its roots in malice as opposed to sorrow, as in I feel resentful towards the universe or some god for putting me here, or resentful towards society for the way things are etc.

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60

No! Not at all. But I’m talking only about sorrow, not “sorrow of being”; I don’t feel “sorrow of being” anymore either.

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61

OK I think I am confused :laughing: Could you rephrase please?

My understanding so far is that resentment is gone as far as you can tell.

But then this is where I am a bit confused?

Either way it sounds like things are going pretty great for you @Miguel !

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62

Oh, then I guess I’d better ask you:

Is there a difference for you between that “sorrow of being” and the sorrow triggered by other reasons? In my view/experience, the first is indeed related to the resentment of being alive, but not all sorrow is.

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63

I can see what you mean now. In terms of quality/flavour it appears they are the same. The difference is that one seems intrinsic to being an identity who is forever separated and the other one will flare up due to circumstances.

So you mean that you no longer experience this fundamental angst of being forever separated but you do occasionally experience sorrow due to various circumstances?

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64

Yes I am inclined to agree with this also, this is the part of the resentment to being alive that I still experience, that underlying doom and gloom flavour that comes in every now and then.

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65

Exactly

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66

I’m basing my statement that that resentment of being alive may be ‘the last to go’ because of something Richard told me, which is that the basic sorrow/resentment exists because we are aware of perfection, but ‘I’ cannot go there, I’m forever locked out of paradise. That gap is the source of a core sadness (& hence the resentment)

So as long as the gap is there, those feelings are there

For my part I can certainly feel it. There is always something niggling at me

There are all the instinctive reasons we feel bad (or good), and then there’s ‘me’ who is conscious, who has memories, and that memory-awareness creates the human-specific conscious ‘sufferer.’

So the ‘sufferer’ is troubled by that memory of something better. Remember that in all the religious systems you would have to die to become free. Of course it turns out it was just ‘Me’ that has to die, but to ‘me’ that seems like the same thing.

I actually have a friend that had an a PCE while on a large dose of mushrooms, and that was her intuition as well, that to attain that state would surely kill her

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67

Yes, he says the same here:

It is pertinent to note, at this point, that the root cause of sorrow – and, hence, malice (e.g., the ‘basic resentment’ above) – is being forever locked-out of paradise
Selected Correspondence: Hedonism & Anhedonia

I have thought about that gap from time to time and, of course, perhaps I don’t notice that I may still have traces of “sorrow of being” and “resentment to being alive”. But in that case someone like Alan (or anyone in virtual freedom, like Vineeto or Peter once) would also have it until immolation.

I don’t know if they have written about having at least remnants of those feelings from that state (when the gap still exists), or if they didn’t perceive them either…

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Hello! I haven’t written in the forum for a long time, although from time to time I take time to read your posts.

I was particularly interested in this section, because it is where I have felt most stuck lately.

It’s hard for me to feel good throughout the day, let alone constantly.

Normally I tend to think that a large part of the reason for my emotional state is an external factor: work in the civil service, with all the stress that implies, the low blows, the need to be alert and protect oneself from attempts to provoke one succumbs to their intentions.

But I felt tired of that storyline, because that would mean either I quit and seek a life change or I’ll continue to feel bad or at best neutral the rest of the time (I think neutral is my most constant emotional condition, but with difficulties to go from there to feel really good!).

After reading @claudiu 's reply, I wonder how I can manage to enjoy my day to day life despite the stressful circumstances. Am I dealing with a more superficial resentment than just ‘being here’? Resentment for having to comply with a routine, follow certain procedures, deal with human beings who are almost always angry, and with colleagues who seek to put their feet up more than help.

How to enjoy being alive despite the circumstances that trigger stress, anxiety, anger, sadness? Currently I spend my days with this question. I’ll try not to get bogged down in it intellectually and look for opportunities to have fun.

Greetings to all!

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69

Hey @jesus.carlos good to have you writing again :blush: The one thing I would point to is that it is not the circumstances which trigger stress, anxiety etc, it is ‘you’. The problem is that when dealing with rude/difficult people ‘I’ have all the justifications in the world to say that they are the problem. I work in customer service so I experience a similar theme of dealing with disgruntled people all day long and a boss that is less than helpful. In my experience it has been tricky, resentment towards work has been one of those things that has persisted for very long, partly because of the above. But it is certainly going, lately it is very minimal so something can certainly be done without having to change jobs haha

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