So there are no half measures in actualism, the wide and wondrous path is one that leads to ‘my’ demise. If ‘I’ want to use actualism to feed back into ‘my’ identity then ‘I’ never step on the wide and wondrous path to begin with.
I have noticed that most of the times when I have essentially done nothing with regards to progress was exactly this, that ‘I’ wanted to keep ‘myself’ and ‘my’ life exactly as it was and then use actualism to super charge the whole thing. This creates a nice circular process that succeeds in keeping ‘me’ exactly as ‘I’ am.
So it is not that there is a barrier to entry as such, the barrier is ‘me’, whether ‘I’ am ready for something fundamentally different, extreme by any ‘normal’ measures. Even stepping on the path to begin with ‘my’ whole world is being undermined. Richard saw this in that first PCE, that the totality of who ‘he’ was would have to go in order to live that experience 24/7. There is no way around this, perhaps why the numbers of sincere actualists are so low. I do remember this from the first few months of applying the method, I remember writing that it was as if ‘I’ was stuck in this deep dark cave that ‘I’ have made ‘my’ home and actuality was being glanced, however contemplating stepping out of that cave and into the bright light of actuality was something so audacious. Even though release was in that direction ‘I’ was screaming with all of ‘my’ being not to step out.