We’re not surgeons removing shrapnel from our psyche. If a belief is removed and gone forever then great but it’s never happened to me before. In fact, Vineeto once tried to calm my roll once when she said that it’ll take time before a certain belief completely goes away. I realized something profound and was pretty excited for a couple of days and she tried to temper expectations and let me know to expect the belief to reoccur indefinitely. So my M.O. is to get back to happy and harmlessness and let whatever insights come may be.
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I’ve seen it go both ways, when I’ve tried to force a realization to happen or force it to be more permanent, it hasn’t been. But sometimes when a really genuine realization has occurred, it has been immediate and permanent.
A lot of what I’ve been trying to figure out this year has been having more of the genuine and less fooling myself… really that’s what this ‘trying to find the most sincere part of myself’ is about. When I’m sincere, I’m far more likely to have genuine realizations.
Interesting:
The Oxford English Dictionary and most scholars state that sincerity from sincere is derived from the Latin sincerus meaning clean, pure, sound (1525–35). Sincerus may have once meant “one growth” (not mixed), from sin- (one) and crescere (to grow).
Would you rather have a major realization right now or be happy and harmless right now?
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Ha, well said.
Just 10 minutes ago I realized I was carrying an energy of ‘intensity’… I was ‘looking for answers’ as a ‘must,’ which is all well and good but happy and harmless was not the predominant emotion.
I can find out if happy and harmless works better than ‘intense.’
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I think the biggest realization one can have is knowing that happiness and harmlessness is a simple reflex that can be done anywhere at anytime. Whenever one allows that reflex to occur, one has the realization anew.
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Hmm, yes. I’ve been thinking about “feelings about feelings”.
Feeling good can happen even when other feelings are playing out. It’s the over-arching feeling which is the goal.
Feeling good, with it’s built in sense of humour, is popping up more often now and making realisations more a natural process of thinking.
That used to be stressful for me, having a realisation, because they were so rare that I wanted to enshrine them. What is starting to be a daily normality is thinking is realisations
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I can agree with this. To what extent it’s true is probably different for everyone. But I do think anyone can have some intrinsic confidence that happy and harmlessness is a simple choice away even while feeling distressed. An intrinsic confidence, at the very least, will put a limit on the how low the distressed feeling can make one. And that confidence is built up by becoming happy and harmless over and over again.
I love the word ‘enshrine’! I think this instinct should be gotten rid of asap. Realizations feel more powerful and profound then they really are. And because one is still a ways away from happy and harmlessness, one may want to leverage the realization for personal gain. This may even be subconscious. The fact is that any realization you have will be had again and again. And others have had the exact same one multiple times. I do recommend writing them down in your phone however. It can ease the feeling-need to remember our realizations and allow us to chill out better.
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Yes, I started this morning writing them in my phone, because it seems that I am on here posting by the minute otherwise. I’ve always made voice recordings. Sometimes just to think out loud.
Like you say, realisations can feel more special than they are, or maybe are made to be special for personal gain.
The main goal is that confidence that feeling good is possible all the time by committing to feel good no matter what. Success breeds success.
Went for a hike in the dark last night (no headlamp) in what can only be described as bear country
Several times seeing a black shape in the dark I was frozen in my tracks… “is it a bear?” but it was just a rock each time
One time I fantasized I had just seen a huge bear in a spot next to the trail, and found when I walked past that spot I could ‘feel’ its presence behind me… it made me want to run
And at one point, concerned about how dark it was and maybe getting lost, or rolling my ankle miles from any help, I could feel that if I had hackles to rise, they would have been standing on the back of my neck
Each time I was able to turn this fear into thrill and continue on my walk… many magical periods as I enjoyed the unique situation
The funny part being, even with the fear of bears, or injury, or getting lost, I could see that I’m more afraid of girls and workplace issues than I was in that situation. That type of situation is more familiar for me, I’ve had loads of experience in the woods in the dark.
But now I’ve seen that I can turn that fear into thrill… the fear is no different really.
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9|1|22
Years ago I had a series of bad arguments with my Dad where he would emotionally dominate me over the issues of work / being an adult.
I didn’t want to be an adult, I wanted to socialize, chase girls. Just like I do now
This issue would crop up a few times a year or later once every few years
Each time I’d be reduced to a puddle, tears
I’m to the point where I can see that the impression this interaction had on ‘me’ is a firewall between where I am and unconfined wonder, delight
And now I have greater confidence to approach this
My fear of bears in the wilderness is the same fear I have toward my Dad, his psychic influence
There is wonder here, too
Right now on this planet there are creatures with multi-layered animal and intelligent consciousness, constantly being triggered by fears, beliefs, depressions, angers
And they are me
A remarkable situation
So when I’m experiencing that fear, I’m exhibit 1A
That animal-intelligent nature
I’m determined not to live my life in fear
I don’t want anyone else to be able to control me anymore.
It comes down to authority.
Can I take care of myself? Is he or anyone in a position to decide for me?
I’ve been taking care of myself for awhile… it hasn’t always been perfect, but it’s been me doing it
Something useful I realized last night is that the real(actual?) judgment of my success or failure is physical. If I break my leg, then you have an issue. Anything short of that is not that big of a deal.
So you have to fall pretty far before that’s happening. I can definitely take care of myself with that in mind.
Even breaking my leg, there are measures in place in society to get help with that situation
My friend had a realization in a PCE, “I could even stop breathing right now” and everything would be perfect.
Fascinating
All this going on outside of me… certainly outside of my fears
That’s where my Dad’s power is… there’s something ‘out there’ to be afraid of
If I do the wrong thing
But it’s always somewhere else
Right now there’s just fear, or perfection
Fear, or perfection
Of course there’s enjoyment, happy & harmless, wonder… not much fear there. I’ve underplayed that aspect in my mental model
I’ve made it all or nothing, but that hasn’t allowed for gradual improvement
Tried to accomplish everything via ‘intensity’
Well, it got me this far. But it’s not necessarily enjoying & appreciating
Fascination and wonder are the order of the day
I don’t have to believe where they’ll get me. I can watch and see.
–
I’m upset because my friend group has pretty much dissolved
What can be done?
Not whimper and moan. Accept the challenge.
The ingredient missing from my investigations has been “If it’s silly to be doing ‘x’ / feeling ‘x,’ then stop!"
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This is a pretty big shot in the dark so feel free to ignore me here but when I read this something stood out to me in terms of the approval seeking you have been describing lately. I wonder just how much of an after-effect these sort of situations have had on what you are facing now?
Few years ago I had a lot of very intense situations with my boss and an overall toxic situation at work. I still notice now the underlying emotional turmoil that I am sifting through now since those situations. It really ‘imprinted’ itself onto me and expressed in so many different ways afterwards.
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Yep, that’s hit the nail on the head, and is the exact reason I’m looking into this issue
It seems that with some ‘major events’ in life it can have a personality-defining effect, change the course of personality so to speak. As such, deep-seated doubts, worries, insecurities, have a history that traces back to these events.
A few days ago I was able to resolve a longstanding social issue which had been giving me trouble for years as a similar psychic imprint, and now I’m seeing that this issue is the next thing - a bigger thing, too.
I’m not quite seeing a straight line between these arguments and the approval-seeking, but I can see that the arguments produced an overall atmosphere of insecurity which is ripe for approval-seeking to occur as a coping mechanism.
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I’ve made a spreadsheet of ‘L’s thru the years’
All the different defining traumatic events which have left a similar psychic imprint
Together with the reasons they happened
Something significant I noticed is that most of them (all the bolded events) were social in nature - even beyond the ways I was contributing to events, other people were too. Completely out of my control.
Every one of these events had some reasons behind them, when I look at each one individually I can put together the why. Shit just happens.
For this stuff, Vineeto’s quote “Most of the time we don’t get what we want” is useful as well as
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv9sDn_2XkI
I’ve been carrying a sense of disappointment in life for a long time, and have taken these different events as a reason. But the events themselves were unavoidable - if for no other reason than I didn’t know any better at the time. This is just what life is!
People cause a ruckus as a matter of course - myself included.
I’ve chased so many white whales, most of which turned out to be a fantasy. And I’m glad I did, because I answered all those things for myself. But it’s not necessary to maintain disappointment when a fantasy turns out to not exist.
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Most have my disappointments have been social in nature, and most of my desires have been and remain social in nature. That’s a straight line of connection.
I’ve had false beliefs in what is likely in the social sphere. They haven’t been borne out - most of the time - in experience.
9|6|22
The last 2 days I’ve been thoroughly ‘down in the dumps’ and could not figure out why - turns out I’d fallen in love!
The rotten feelings were because of uncertainty about the love being reciprocated. I then was trying to ‘hide’ from my own feelings by distracting myself via various means.
It’s never been this apparent to me how damaging the ‘downside’ of love is. Especially after coming off a long stretch of feeling quite good.
I was able to crack my interest in this love by seeing that, were she to reciprocate, this love imposes a serious mental handicap upon me (really the both of us). Knowing the possible, this is not something I’m interested in accepting. So I don’t have to give up the possibility of hanging out with this person, but the love has to go if I’m to reach my potential as a human.
Dropping the love actually compliments any ‘relationship’ that forms; the love only makes things more dramatic and difficult.
It was a bit of a surprise when I connected that it was love that was bothering me, I spent several days really not knowing what was going on! Turns out it is that simple… love keeps ‘me,’ aka ‘suffering,’ alive.
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There is that bit of writing from Richard somewhere (someone shared it recently) where he explains that one doesn’t just fall in love. That there is a choice ‘I’ make at the core of ‘my’ being to go in that direction, to surrender to love.
I think that’s a super useful one for an actualist because it means that ‘I’ am not just a victim to falling in love, there is something ‘I’ can do.
It is what helped me when I met @Sonyaxx to avoid going down that path. I could tell the signs of love developing, that maybe ‘I’ didn’t have so much control over, however ‘I’ never made that choice deep down to allow love to take over and so sooner or later it disappeared.
The same thing happened with poncho recently and it was all over and done with within a space of a couple of weeks. The loving feelings began to happen but that’s really as far as it got, the alarm bells started ringing and I never went ‘there’.
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Yes I was just reading it, I think it was something @Andrew posted.
I think I’ve known the difference for a long time, even when I first came across actualism in 2017 I could immediately tell when I was in love-states vs. what PCE / happy + harmless felt like… I had been a love-addict, and a PCE addict, so I knew both well lol
My challenge over these years has been that that same love addiction has kicked me out of numerous PCEs, as I’ve “fondly imagined” (as Richard likes to say 
) that the attributes of PCE would be what would help me ‘find love’.
It’s now apparent that ‘finding love’ means forsaking the PCE… as well as peace, harmony, intelligence, and intimacy itself. Not such a good deal after all…
What do you think helped you make that choice to go for the felicitous over the amorous?
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I think this totally came down to being done with love, being confident that I don’t want to go down that path anymore. I guess this can only be done if I have explored love sufficiently, but then again it’s possible to explore loving feelings without surrendering to love, unless there is a desire to explore that rabbit hole too.