Journal de Henry

Journals
54

@henryyyyyyyyyy I am glad you know the options.

You have written a lot above, however i didn’t catch if the non-exclusive arrangement was your idea or not?

As far as investigating anything, would you rather it was exclusive?

Not that it would really mean less jealousy per se. That’s par for the course.

I am thinking about this regarding my working situation. Obviously, i need to work, but it is very difficult being around people. Full stop. :joy: Ha, no the point is spending 8 hours a day being triggered by these people seems silly considering that given some effort, i could come up with a better working situation.

I can’t see you being better or worse off naturally, jealous is jealous, but i wonder if it (the arrangement) was your idea or not.

That’s where i would start investigating this particular issue.

What would you want, if you could have anything?

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Part of what has made my jealousy so surprising was, that it has always been my idea! Even before starting the current relationship, I knew that I was aiming for something ‘open,’ and I have gone to great pains making that clear with her and have persevered with it through various ups & downs. It is very clear to me that that’s what I want. So, when the jealousy swooped in, in such stereotypical fashion, I was quite surprised.

I do think I’d like to continue with it, if only because from my own side I like to have the option of seeing others as part of the expectation/arrangement.

And with that, all that’s left to do is take care of my own discomfort. Another part that is obvious to me is that I don’t want to ‘step in’ and ‘say no’ to something that she is enjoying, and as long as I enjoy hanging out with her / there is mutual benefit from that, I want to continue seeing her. Subject to change, as all things are.

If I could have anything, I would have a few different people (I guess between 0 and like… 3 maybe?) that I saw in varying amounts, and that they were equally to come & go & see others as they chose. Another aspect of all this that I’ve explored quite a bit is freedom in terms of coming/going/time spent. Especially as more people are involved that becomes a key aspect, and tellingly has been big jealousy fodder for me (as in, ‘she is spending too much time with them and not enough time with me’).

(edit: There’s something interesting about the concept of like ‘seeing people.’ I already go around and hang out with all kinds of different people, some regularly, some randomly, and the only difference between ‘relationship’ and ‘not relationship’ being if there is sex or not. Which is totally arbitrary as a ‘line.’ So with that in mind I don’t want any lines or rules… outside of care taken to avoid STDs/unwanted pregnancies.)

That has always kept my feet moving regarding work places: if a work situation is sub-optimal, I am free to go elsewhere (within the bounds of this physical universe, of course!), and that there are so many individuals in this world with so many different means of providing for themselves (I would estimate 3 billion or so ‘working’ in the normal sense of the word), that it’s foolish of me to sit in one situation moaning about it when I could work toward finding something else. And it can look like almost anything (perhaps I could mention onlyfans as being one option out there in the world - not as advice but as an example of the range).

With that approach, I have had about 12 jobs at this stage (I am 32 and have been working since I was 14, with the bulk of the work-years at just one of those jobs), and am currently in the most amicable of the jobs to date. Personally what I’ve found is that most of what a job consists of in terms of quality is the character of one’s boss/direct supervisor, one’s coworkers, and then a distant third in terms of importance is the work itself… though that does still matter.

56

11|23|21

What’s preventing me from becoming free right now?

I’m watching soccer and I’m not quite at ease

Trying to figure out my plans for the afternoon and how they’ll work with my workday in terms of timing

A little guilt for ‘skipping out’ of work for the afternoon

Can I say, ‘this is what I am doing’ without guilt?

I’m a bit torn within myself because I also want the money, so I’m going two ways internally

I’m imagining my boss being angry with me for taking the afternoon off

The problem is I think his anger would be justified

Which clearly means that I think anger in general is justified in certain cases

In other words, I haven’t become free of anger.

It really is in terms of good & bad for me around this issue right now.

I am humanity!!!

And I’m scared of the anger, hm hmm

I think I just needed to re-check within myself what I see as reasonable/sensible, and then whatever anyone else getting angry doesn’t bother me because I’m confident I’m doing what I see as best, any feedback is accepted but anger is clearly seen as being ridiculous.

It’s actually funny because I had a dream last night that I was having a disagreement with my dad (about what screws to use in a certain construction project, lol) and I was super cut up about it. So this seems a similar situation, a discomfort with disagreement. It’s challenging for me to exist in that situation. So it’s nice having some direction with that.

–

What’s keeping me from becoming free right now?

I’m a bit tired, but I can be a bit tired. That’s ok.

Now I’m getting into a bit of perfection

It’s interesting, it doesn’t feel like such a big deal, I’m not getting excited. I’ve been here before, I know how to get here. It’s still delightful. There’s satisfaction in that.

What a journey it has been, and now I’m locked onto the actual, it’s almost filling my vision. After all that time of having the wrong idea, of having to ‘figure it out,’ of being confused in various ways
–

Felt a wave of frustration earlier at the continual conflict that I experience with others… it is clear that they will not stop. I can see that I carry wounds about that as ‘I’ have become an ‘adult’ and attempted to ‘find my way in the world.’

As I’ve grown physically, there is a believed expectation that as an adult I’m supposed to have ‘figured it out’ or ‘man up’ or ‘deal with it,’ but it feels so rotten to be fighting all the time. And here is the third alternative, of dropping myself entirely and with nothing to defend having no reason to attack. Not quite there yet. But I am very interested right now.

I wind up fighting because of beliefs that there’s somewhere ‘over there’ that it’s important I get to, and that apparently, to me, that necessitates getting angry with others, frustrated with others. And on the other side feeling sad, disappointed when I don’t get my way.

I don’t need anyone to agree with me to be free, right now.

I don’t need anyone to think that I’m good, to like me. To be free. To enjoy life to the maximum possible.

I don’t need to have all the workplace success. I don’t need to date all the girls.

Everything that is happening, is happening right here & right now.

57

Hi @henryyyyyyyyyy

Is your “wizard” explanation in this thread? Sorta hard to search without rereading everything.

58

@Andrew

I was able to use the search tool & find it (with the ‘search this topic’ box checked)

59

11|24|21

Made something of a breakthrough around ‘relating’ this morning.

Last night, my partner shared something on social media that immediately filled me with disgust/anger. I went through various stages of feeling that I should push the feeling away (that it was ‘wrong of me’ to feel that), of feeling that I should say something to her (this one came up several times; I don’t think there’s anything bad about doing that, but I wanted to figure out my own emotions out first), and of trying to figure out how I should relate to her.

This last one ended up being the most relevant, I allowed myself to follow the thread of various ‘options’ of relating, whether it be express certain boundaries to her, or break up, or arrange for us to see each other in some situations but not others, to break up but not yet, to ‘wait & see’ (but still with an eye toward ‘determining the best relating.’

When I eventually tired myself out (at this point I had returned mostly to feeling good, thanks to allowing myself to genuinely consider the options), I fell asleep and had a very interesting and relevant dream:

I was at an event with some friends (for some reason I was being drug tested too… I forgot this element until just now, interesting), and I found myself sitting next to a pretty girl… my attraction was palpable. Our hands touched. She was shy/cautious/not showing her cards. We talked, face to face. Eventually we ended up in a context of her workplace… she was doing this & that & I was helping in some capacity. I felt ‘close’ to her.

At this stage another former-partner came into the scene (energetically this was equivalent to my current partner… interesting, because I had mentally accepted the possibility of breaking up just before falling asleep): she was saddened by my interest in this ‘new girl.’ I can still see the mournful expression on her face. I followed her to talk to her, explain, comfort her. When I returned, looking for the new girl, she had left. I actually saw her crossing a parking lot, getting into her car, and driving away. At this stage of the dream I somehow found myself hanging from some rusty machinery, maybe 30 feet in the air, barely preventing myself from falling… there was no way I could follow her, and even my survival was questionable. I let out an animal, mournful howl. Even I was surprised at that, in the dream.

On awakening, I was struck by the intensity of my emotions, the deep direct purity that was ‘me’ in the dream: all that is Henry was laid bare - I have been pursuing that type of situation since I was very young, and similarly have felt the need to comfort the sad. Both are extremely strong seductions for me.

What is immediately clear is that the archetype is in me: I desire a girl to fill that particular role for me, and similarly I am on the lookout for sad people to comfort. The ‘recognition’ happens automatically in ‘me,’ the unconscious. In that sense, to ‘me,’ my partner is only filling a role: sometimes she is the ‘desirable pretty girl,’ sometimes she is the ‘sad one’ who must be comforted, sometimes she is ‘bad’ and must be corrected, etc etc etc.

Shortly after awakening, I read Claudiu’s Journal post about Consideration, and it injected greater clarity to the situation:

‘I’ am trying to navigate the world through the fulfillment of feeling-based dream-archetypes, when here before me (technically she is in another city right now but you get the idea :wink: ) is an actually-existing human being. It requires an entirely new way-of-being; one in which relating itself no longer exists:

“After a while I turn to my partner who is sitting in the shade beneath a wonderfully gnarled and ancient tree on the lake’s edge. There sits a fellow human being to whom I have no ‘relationship’. Any past or future disappears; she and I are simply here together, experiencing these perfect moments. The past five years that I have known her, with all the memories of good and bad times, simply do not exist. It is just delightful that she is here with me, and I do not even have any thoughts of ‘our’ future.” (Peter)

The ‘relating’ is only ever ‘my’ emotional way-of-being ‘in relation’ to another ‘being.’

The entire situation that I was trying to ‘figure out’ the night before (and to a larger extent my entire life) does not exist. As Claudiu points out, I can

“(allow) the actual body’s actual intelligence to inevitably, inexorably, with no decision-making required per se, arrive at what is indeed clearly the most optimum thing that can possibly be done given a situation”

This works in every direction: I don’t have to ‘relate’ to the pretty girl, I don’t have to ‘relate’ to a sad person, I don’t have to ‘relate’ to a friend, I don’t have to ‘relate’ to someone engaging in malice, or someone threatening me in any way. It’s just an emotional interruption of the actually-existing fact of what is happening.

Safe to say my mind is blown and I expect further repercussions of this to come out.

Our previous attempts to arrange our relationship are now clearly visible as futile attempts at mimicking the actual, though I do have a great appreciation for those attempts as they made the actual emotional interplays clearer.

I have shared this investigation with her and am excited to see what comes next!

(Additional thanks to @Andrew for asking some questions which inched me closer to clarity in seeing what ‘I’ was ‘putting in place’)

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Additionally, the way forward is clear: I now ‘relate’ to everything I encounter as near to perfection as I can: this is perfect, that is perfect, he is perfect, she is perfect.

61

(Cont.)

This relating stuff also has an effect on the sense of conflict that I was struggling with yesterday. I’m relating to others in a sense of fear of conflict, readiness for conflict, as well as returning/bringing the conflict myself.

Relating to others in conflict = feeling the conflict in myself

So even feeling that there is conflict, I’m doing that

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11|25|21

Exiting the archetype.

Every archetype has a connection to an instinctual passion, as well as an analogue in the actual world.

With a pretty girl, the instinctual passion is lust (sex-desire) / love-desire (connected to the need to breed/create a stable ‘family’ for reproductive-life success, and group success). Indicated by lust-feeling, love-feeling, as well as cold loneliness & sorrow when those feelings are not reciprocated satisfactorily, whether that is not at all (as in rejection/lack of available options) or not enough (as in, this person / these people are not good enough for me).

The analogue to the actual is the fact of humans existing, the factually existing sensate enjoyment of the act of sex, the actually existing aesthetic appreciation of the seeing of another human being, the actual enjoyment of conversing or co-existing in whatever form it may take, the actual convenience afforded by working in harmony with another to accomplish mutual goals.

I could, for example, go through a tarot deck and draw these comparisons for every card, or go through fairy-tales and draw these comparisons for every archetype that arises, or go through a 30-second TV advertisement and draw these from the archetypes that arise.

In every moment of ‘being,’ we are on the lookout for these archetypes as ‘we’ the ‘being’ are ‘analyzing’ the incoming sense-data, looking for ‘meaning’ (as in, what does it mean for ‘me’). Am I safe? Am I unsafe? What do ‘I’ ‘need to do’ right now? What is the ‘right thing to do?’ Am ‘I’ ‘bad?’ Am ‘I’ ‘good?’ Is he/she/it ‘good/bad?’

Ultimately with the fundamental insecurity of ‘being’ (as in, ‘I’ will do everything to survive, ‘I’ must survive, ‘I’ must pass on my genetic material, ‘I’ must kill to keep myself alive, ‘I’ must raise my status, ‘I’ must become ‘great’), there is always ‘something that must be done,’ another thing to chase. At all times there is a touch of discomfort… in the moments of greatest love-gratitude, there is the insecurity of ‘I must keep this, I must protect this, I cannot allow this out of my grasp’ - for there lurks the chasm of not-having, of not-success, of not-love, instinctually born to ensure that we pass on our genetic material and generally behave in a way that satisfies the biological mandate.

We are essentially fish with a lot of thinking, ‘meaning,’ tacked on top.

“Is she the one? Is he the one?”

We ask, hoping that our love-desire-lust will be allowed to accelerate, that we can complete the bio-emotional dance.

“Will he prevent me from love? Will she prevent me from love? Will they prevent me from success?”

We ask, wondering how we can wheedle, how we can attack, how we can cut them down to get to our goals.

–

Perfection is completion. The job is done. There is no-where to go, no-thing to get, no-thing to accomplish. It’s all here already. No insecurity driving behind the scenes. No hopeful pies in the sky to yearn for. She is not The One, because The One was inside of ‘me,’ I was desperately chasing a bio-lure toward further misery, deeper distress. The only way out being the grey dissociation of ‘normal,’ at best expressed as ‘good enough’ settling, and for that rare .000001% (for most dismissed as fable), the ecstatic dissociation of enlight-enment, wildly loving one’s way through life caring not for the great swath of destruction left not just during one’s own lifetime, but the great historical swaths we’ve seen recur time and time again.

I am the problem. I always have been, as expressed in every previous one of the 107 billions of me’s.

Every time I open my phone & wistfully hope to ‘connect’ with this or that girl, every time I go out & lust after this or that girl, every time I ambitiously push to make more money, every time I sorrowfully sulk in the dark when I don’t get what I want. I am the problem. I’m ready to fight anyone to try and get this or that shiny bauble, blissfully self-deceptive in my belief that everything will be great when I get ‘over there…’ over there simply being temporarily over to one of the 7 different possible me’s with their various available flavors (sadness: now in cherry cream soda flavor!)… ready to destroy anyone that gets in my way… but subtly, with a velvet dagger, because I’m cultured enough to know that outright violence, anger-uncovered, will get me banished.

And with no shortage of various belief-systems ready to ‘back me up’ in the importance, genius, logic, right-ness of my particular emotion (& of course the other side’s emotion is simply quite silly, if not Dangerous 2 Society).

Good grief!

And here is perfection… once I can say, ok, I’ll die one day… ok, maybe this or that girl doesn’t want to make out with me… ok, maybe he or she left some dishes out on the counter… ok, maybe I’m alone tonight (or this year… or this decade…). Maybe I’ll get sick, maybe someone will be angry with me, maybe I’ll be poor, maybe something will break, something will rot. Someone won’t text me back, or I’ll lose in a game, or someone will think I’m stupid. These things happen all the time! That’s what’s going on, that’s actually this very scintillating universe in action, vibrating & flowing & all the other various fascinating things it does. Not to mention humans! Inventing new ways to do this or that left & right, and it’s actually fascinating in itself the emotional waves flying everywhere, in everyone & in myself. Perfection.

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11|26|21

What’s in the way of ‘perfect,’ right now?

I forgot something that would have been useful to remember with a social element and I’m feeling guilt right now. I don’t think there’s a lot I can do about it, certainly not now that the forgetting has already happened. I certainly intended to take care of it / remember. Forgetting happened. Ok, I can live with that.

–

What’s in the way of ‘perfect,’ right now?

Mild tiredness.

A bit of ‘I don’t want to do ‘x’’

In the larger context I do want to do ‘x,’ though.

I guess that’s settled, then.

I can sit here tired. I can go do the task tired. Ok.

–

What’s in the way of ‘perfect,’ right now?

Jealousy: round IXVI: FIGHT!

Reading Peter on love & jealousy with some progress:

Over the next few days something continued to nag me. Why was it that this relationship seemed to be going off the rails? Why, increasingly, were there misunderstandings, petty conflicts and difficulties between us? Why was I becoming more and more obsessed about what Vineeto was doing when we weren’t together, and what she was thinking about when we were together? Over the next days I contemplated on what was wrong and suddenly it dawned on me that, despite our matter-of-fact contract and investigations, we had fallen in love! We were both exhibiting the classic symptoms, emotions and feelings associated with being in love. I was battling her and trying to force my opinions on her. I realized that I had been jealous, possessive, pushy, demanding and obsessive with her. And, most appallingly, I saw how when the impossible demands of love are not fulfilled then it can all so quickly turn to disappointment, resentment, withdrawal, spite and eventually hate. It had got to the stage where it was obvious to me that, unless something changed, this relationship was heading exactly the same way as all my previous ones – doomed to failure.

Armed with the conviction of the blindingly obvious, I confronted Vineeto with the news. I told her I was simply going to stop battling her and acting the way I had been. I remember her response as somewhat bewildered and unbelieving, but I knew that, at least, I had to stop the torment of raging feelings in me. What happened in the ensuing week was quite remarkable. I found that the strength of my intention for peace and harmony made me able to completely drop this destructive behaviour. Somehow I knew this was the only course of action I could take to make this relationship work and I knew it was my last chance. The realizing and facing of the facts, coupled with a clear intent, left ‘me’ with no choice. It wasn’t that ‘I’ made a decision – there was actually no decision to make. Action happened by itself, exactly as it would in swerving to avoid hitting another car while driving.

I’m beginning to feel similarly determined. The solution must be found.

–

I’m so worried that she’ll run off with someone else.

Why?

Because then she won’t be ‘here’ ‘with me.’

The possession is a belief, she isn’t here right now anyway.

I can’t guarantee that if I text her that she’ll respond anyway, and certainly can’t guarantee that it’ll be an excellent time between us. I’m trying to ‘set up’ something that can’t be ‘set up.’

And it’s controlling anyway. I know from my own past experiences how uncomfortable that is for her.

I can either continue the discomfort, or I can drop it.

Love love love love love love love love. Love.

That was what I was 100% about for like 6 or 7 years of life. All-in.

Right now it’s like gazing out at a huge open field below me. A glimpse of infinitude.

With love it’s all about her, with infinitude there’s no direction

Just consideration of what is happening, now.

Love is trying to ‘understand’ her, ‘pin her down,’ predict how she ‘fits into my life.’

Love will always try to shape her actions/life.

It creates a reaction in her when I love

Perfection/purity/PCE/freedom is non-reactive, non-influential, meaning ease for her.

Freedom for her means she is at ease to do what is best for her.

To act in her own life at ease without influence.

My jealousy is me ‘reaching-in’-to her life (energetically)

“Any outcome is ok with me except if you end up with another dude.”

“You are not free.”

“That outcome is bad.”

“I (who you love) am not safe if you choose to be with someone other than me.”

But I am safe.

Maybe she’ll spend her night elsewhere.

Think of someone else.

I’ll be alone.

There’s sweetness bleeding through my vision.

–

Talking with her on the phone and when it came time to hang up I felt numbing pain of unhappiness

Realization shortly after that it’s our group-nature, it’s safe when others are around and not safe when I’m alone

I’ve been playing the new Halo video game and it’s very obvious in that game that when I play with the group that there’s a lot more success, when I’m by myself I die a lot

It was the same for us in the wild for most of history, it’s only very recently that we’re quite safe in the world

So that energetic information was put there to keep me alive. But it’s not relevant anymore, it’s unnecessary pain.

So I just stopped

The stopping put me in a very very large space, everything was very sweet but ‘I’ was still there. It was a palpably sweet ‘I,’ with the actual very very close.

I came down when I went on some social media, because I was doing the same thing again, looking for ‘my’ group. I can investigate that more right now.

I do the same thing with this discourse group, everyone here becomes ‘my’ group so I’m needing to be a sheep being herded and a sheepdog ‘keeping everyone on the same page.’ Lol. It’s so intrusive.

And ‘I’ need feedback from others that I’m ok, that I’m safe, that I’m ‘doing the right thing.’

Best case scenario I get a ‘powerful’ ‘me,’ with a lot of influence over others. And I’m prodding them with that same invasive emotional control.

No sweetness in it. Any sweetness is too sticky, it leaves with a sour taste. ‘My’ fake sweetness. I’m sweet as long as you’re playing ‘my’ game, I’ve seen how fast it can turn.

Everything is so open right now. I can walk out my front door right now and just go wherever. Talk to whoever.

It’s all very close. In the past when I’ve been this close I’ve subsumed it into myself, bragged a lot about what I’ve accomplished. Another way to get more influence for my goals.

I’m going to become free, it’s not about the girls anymore.

There’s no one that can do what ‘I’ want anyway. That doesn’t exist. I’ve always blamed myself for that in the past.

The disappointment comes from the hope, which comes from the desire for someone to rescue me from feeling lonely. But the loneliness is only there because 5,000 years ago I wasn’t safe in the woods.

–

Perfection is now.

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I really enjoy your entries Henry. Especially the jealousy parts have been intriguing and helpful lately.

I’ve managed to fall in love/lust for the first time in about 10 years so I was completely blindsided about how ridiculously hard being in love actually is. It’s interesting how it can seem so alluring when it’s in the distance (enough to make me go for it) but as soon as you’re in it it’s a screeching bag of weasels.

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Nevermind @henryyyyyyyyyy Just wait long enough and nature will forget you exist.

So will your libido.

As long as you believe you need her, she will control you.

Remember when all of this started? A man and woman making a pact to look into anything that got in the way of peace and harmony, intimacy and sensuosity.

If such a woman isn’t in your life, then how will it happen? Fast forward 10 years ; it won’t.

You will wait. And wait.

We are social identities. The heart of society is the sexual paring of men and women. It is no wonder that of all the dramas Richard encouraged, having a partner was often a topic.

How would we discover that that is essentially all ‘we’ are? Social identity pasted over whatever this animal self is. (a more primative version of the matrix :wink::sunglasses:).

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Regarding ‘jealous’ feelings.

Getting rid of the ‘bad’ feelings, without understanding that they come with a set of ‘good’ feelings, is a great way to stay a self.

Without ‘jealousy’, there is no 'possessive ’ feeling, without a ‘possessive’ feeling, no ‘protective’ feeling, without that no ‘caring’ feeling. Millions of years of evolution and thousands of years of civilisation are there for a reason. Even if the premise of actualism is that the ‘feeling suite’ is now obsolete, the method of actualism is feeling good, enjoying and appreciating and otherwise choosing to be as close to the actuality of things.

One, in other words, is choosing what drama they have, until they have had enough. The normal drama, where everything is about sex and social identity, or the personal, individual, journey towards being here and now fully enjoying being alive for it’s own sake.

Sorry about the lecture, i swear i am much more diplomatic in person. :sweat_smile:

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@emp

Thank you, I’m glad you’ve been finding interest!

Haha yes, that was my experience as well when I began my current relationship a couple of years ago. I was doing so well with actualism, and then once the relationship started I found all kinds of parts of ‘me’ that had apparently been concealing themselves! They’re hidden in that lonely-desire, I suppose.

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@Andrew no apologies necessary, diplomacy only slows things down anyway lol!

Yes, this is true. Even further, as long as I have any desire for her she controls me.

You anticipated me: the shift I’ve been making this week has been all about re-directing the affective energy from ‘girls’ to ‘freedom/perfection.’ Where before all my interest has been arranging things to be attractive to women, I’m now using the ‘critical self’ (and its energy) toward noticing when I’m not in perfection, and making whatever corrections necessary to move into perfection.

The great thing is, I’m not really giving anything up: I’m free to spend my time making out with whoever, and a perfected Henry is the most attractive of all possible Henry’s.

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11|27|21

Playing soccer last night I could see that I felt a similar desire-attraction toward another girl, and could similarly see the discomfort involved. Like I had to ‘do something,’ ‘get over there.’ I wasn’t able to just relax and appreciate her being there, it was that it wasn’t ok unless we had sex.

In the past I’ve always taken it for granted as that’s what attraction looks like, but now I can see the ‘push’ happening inside of me. That’s what I have to work on. I’d always seen it as a good thing.

It’s exciting when it’s happening but it means I have someone ‘in my sights’ with a ‘must,’ making it uncomfortable for them, and if I don’t get my desire then I’m unhappy too. And it’s recurring, no matter how many times I get what I want there’s another chance to be dissatisfied.

–

My approach to this point has been very me-centered, I’ve used my desire to be with girls as motivation to become more free, but now that desire is what’s in the way. ‘I’ can’t quite see how traipsing perfect-ly through the world is better than existing in love & lust.

Continuing to exist.

‘I’ still think I can get everything I want, that it’s worth it to keep fighting for my own ends.

I remember when I first found actualism I was delighted because for the first time, here was a verification of everything I had experienced. Where ‘normal’ says you can never be very happy, you just have to ‘grin & bear it,’ here was Richard saying that the sky is not the limit. Where the spiritual folks say you just have to love even more, here is Richard verifying my experience that love doesn’t work. As a means for having a good life it just doesn’t work. And it was so nice to hear that there wasn’t something ‘wrong’ with me specifically, it’s the human condition. Love doesn’t work for anyone. When I read those words I could see it immediately.

So it’s a bit funny that now 4 years later I’m hanging onto it so fiercely. Just shows the strength of it, I guess.

–

Now, I use the ‘critical me,’ ‘the one who has a problem,’ ‘the creator of separation,’ ‘the creator of loneliness,’ to notice when I am not in perfection over all other things. ‘My’ job, now, is to remove myself. It is the last thing ‘I’ have to do, and the most noble of all ‘my’ tasks to date.

I notice my own presence, and gently figure out why I don’t need to be there. In doing that, my loneliness, separation, dissipate. With that dissipation, perfection.

Nothing is going wrong anymore. It’s nothing but paranoia, ‘my’ paranoia. If I have a sense that something is going wrong, then I can use my very desire to ‘find something wrong’ to notice that I have a sense that something is going wrong.

–

Since starting doing it that way, I can see that ‘I’ have a problem with so many things all the time, it’s not just the big things. It’s constant chatter. That’s ok, it means I always have something to do. Some way to be useful.

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I think that is the point of having ‘relationships’ in actualism. One can’t hide from the dawning realisation that i am a social identity, and that ‘i’ can never be free, because ‘i’ am the very reason for the issues ‘i’ seek freedom from.

I was reflecting on my comment about love, that it’s an attempt to shove the object of desire in the void one wishes to fill.

So, funny to see it like this. Just the visual of it. Jamming another person into one’s soul, to try and feel whole. :joy:

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11|29|21

What’s in the way of perfection, right now?

General worry.

Sort of anxiety.

There’s nothing to worry about. Hm

Everything I need is not ‘over there’ anymore, it’s already happening.

–

What’s in the way of becoming free, right now?

A little difficulty breathing… I’ve been down this before, but I do persistently keep feeling stuff about it. Worth a peek.

Obviously biological imperative there. Breathing is pretty useful for being alive.

I’m not in actual danger of dying (right now).

There are some things I can do to feel better.

Other than that, it’s just happening. Right now.

Just another thing that ‘I’ have a problem with. Always ‘on the lookout’ for trouble, me! Well, no real trouble here… I can move along.

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Indeed, trouble is what trouble does.

:rofl:

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11|30|21

What’s in the way of perfection, now?

Still a bit of ‘shepherding’ ‘my people.’

In actuality I don’t have any people.

Quite the weight off, actually!

Reading Srinath’s report of becoming free and he talks about his pacing, at first he says he’s going to use a ‘short runway,’ but then in the next paragraph says he was going to gather everything together experientially while focusing on the end, take his time, rather than force it. So, he kind of shifted.

And this prompted me to think, ‘I can go at my own pace,’ sometimes faster, sometimes slower. A lot of delight for me in that thought. I can put it together however I want, it’s ‘my’ immolation after all! And then the universe will come ‘pick me up’ when I’m ready.

Am I ready? Right now? What’s in the way?

Everything seems pretty perfect… still a bit worried about money…

Ok, the elephant in the room is maybe having to ask for help with money and/or work another job. ‘I’ do not like those options.

Ok, I can do those things.

What’s in the way, now?

Being alive is fun!!! (This is not an obstacle)

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