Kuba: Ok so I think it’s about time to write some kind of an update, even though not much has been going on recently.
Richard: ‘I’ do not make it happen, because ‘I’ cannot make it happen. What is more … ‘I’ am not required to make it happen. An actual freedom happens of itself only when one is fully ready, and not before. (…) The in-built tendency of the universe to achieve the optimum knows best as to when the time is right.
Kuba: It seems this is exactly the case recently, everything/ anything that ‘I’ could do has been done, however there is 1 exception in that ‘my’ very being is not in full agreement yet. Those passions are still burning away and it is different than in the past because there is not any specific triggers or any aspects of ‘my’ social identity that can be chipped away at here.
‘I’ am screaming around for no apparent reason, although even those ‘screams’ are no longer as overwhelming as in the past, they are getting progressively quieter. There are times when those screams will temporarily wear themselves out and then I find myself here where this moment is happening, not a PCE but still very close to the actual world. When this happens it is so clear that ‘I’ am the thing spoiling/ getting in the way of perfection, perfection is all around but with ‘me’ ‘screaming’ constantly it cannot be seen or appreciated.
Hi Kuba,
Thank you for the update.
It is very graphic the way you describe how you presently experience being alive (“‘me’ ‘screaming’ constantly”), so much so that what came to mind was what Richard wrote about being friends with oneself –
Richard: ‘It is important not to view ‘I’ and/or ‘me’ as an enemy – blind nature is the culprit – and to be friends with yourself … only you live with yourself twenty four hours a day. Coopt any aspect of yourself as an ally in this investigation into the human psyche … eventually ‘I’ come to realise that the very best thing that ‘I’ can do is altruistically ‘self’-immolate for the benefit of this body and all bodies. [Emphasis added]. (Richard, AF List, No. 7, 18 Feb 1999).
Richard: ‘Nothing of substance will happen less ‘I’ be the willing participant … the 100% committed participant. (…) When ‘I’ freely and cheerfully sacrifice ‘myself’ – the psychological and psychic entities residing inside this body – ‘I’ am gladly making ‘my’ most supreme donation, for ‘I’ am what ‘I’ hold most dear. It is the greatest gift one can bestow upon this body and that body and every body. [Emphases added]. (Richard, AF List, Alan-b, 12 June 2001).
You also describe that “those passions are still burning away” and “‘I’ am screaming around for no apparent reason”. What you could do instead is channelling those “burning”, “screaming” passions into affective felicitous and innocuous passions, just like (I presume) you did with sorrowful and malicious feelings before.
Why are ‘you’ screaming (and perhaps kicking) if you really followed Richard’s suggestion from the quote you gave above – “An actual freedom happens of itself only when one is fully ready, and not before”?
Kuba: The other day as I was driving I had a glimpse of what it means to be innocence personified, that without ‘me’ there is an immaculate purity permeating everything and it is so clean, with not even a trace of ‘dirt’, to be that purity is to be innocence personified. Shortly after this happened I could see ‘my’ place from a different vantage point, it gave me a lot of confidence that it is safe for ‘me’ to die.
You may be perceiving it to be “safe” to die, but do you willingly and gladly agree to blessedly [characterised by happiness and good fortune] go into the secretly longed for oblivion?
Would you treat any of your fellow human beings the way you seem to be treating yourself such that you are “‘screaming’ constantly”? How can you agree to this noble self-sacrifice, when there is neither respect nor appreciation, neither dignity nor admiration for “‘my’ most supreme donation”?
Kuba: Usually ‘I’ am seen as the only thing in existence and so to contemplate ‘my’ death is to contemplate the end of everything, very scary business! But since then I have seen ‘myself’ differently, this diagram that I made a while back actually depicts it quite well : (diagram)
I like the diagram – it is simple and self-explanatory.
Kuba: In that there is the “field” of apperceptive awareness which ultimately precedes ‘me’, this apperceptive awareness allows the seeing of ‘me’ in ‘my’ proper place, which is not that important at all! Essentially this means that there is this entire world going on outside of ‘my’ self centred bubble.
I could see from that vantage point that it is very possible for ‘me’ to disappear, it is just in a direction which ‘I’ don’t normally see or know that it exists, the apperceptive seeing showed that this direction is there to be taken and that it exists just outside of ‘me’.
So yes by all means everything seems in place but as above ‘my’ being is still trying to ‘survive’ or perhaps it’s slowly dying, those passions are still burning away to some degree which means that ‘I’ am not in full agreement, yet. (link)
You seem to have turned this originally apperceptive seeing into a concept (“‘my’ proper place “) by which to treat you, ‘your’ ‘being’, as the antagonist who will not do as your concept demands.
It is not for nothing that the actualism method is about enjoyment and appreciation, all the way. In other words, you have the option to enjoy and appreciate your slowly coming to terms with your being redundant.
Cheers Vineeto