Also one thing I realized. In the past, I experienced feeling bad as somehow a detriment to actualism. Like either that I’m failing or it means I’m not worthy of it or what-not.
But then I realized that, feeling bad in and of itself literally is the thing that reveals actualism to be perfectly sensible. Because you see that feeling bad feels bad, it sucks, and then it becomes clear that you have to do something about it… and that’s what actualism is! Doing something about it, in the most fundamental way possible. So whenever you feel bad, use that as the motivation to get back on track
So still aiming for this commitment to feel good each moment again for the rest of my life. I woke up this morning and I saw this right in front of me as an experiential possibility, it seemed so obvious, like all I have to do is want to be here. It seemed very simple until of course some worry kicked in here or there, in general things are really good but, and it is a significant but, I am not actively relishing being here each moment again. There is still this possibility at any moment of some slight worry coming up, some nervous energy here and there etc.
I was looking at all this and I noticed that as an ‘entity’ I instinctually feel the universe to be somewhat of a dangerous/evil/bad/unsafe place. This is that underlying current of fearful energy that is always but a step away from spoiling things.
And so I noticed that as long as I intuitively feel the universe to be an unsafe place I will never want to be here - I will never live that thing which I got a glimpse of in the morning. Of course not, why would I genuinely want to be in some place where I feel there is evil and danger? So of course I will continue looking for an escape from being here.
And this led me to the next thing… I have confirmed experientially for myself with a high degree of confidence that the universe is indeed perfect and pure. Perfection and purity is imbued into every inch of this infinite and eternal universe. I do not live this as an ongoing and direct seeing but I know that it is the case hence as an ‘entity’ I can get close to it.
However I have never confirmed for myself with the same degree of confidence that I do indeed live in a friendly universe. I never liked the word benevolent because somehow it has loving connotations for me, however friendly clicks. I can somewhat allow that the universe is ultimately a friendly place but I am still stuck in seeing it as some form of anthropomorphism, probably because somewhere I have accepted the belief that the universe is an empty and meaningless place, therefore to accept that it is actually a friendly place seems naive.
But this seems a good place to look, because if it is indeed a fact then I can discover it, and if I can discover it I can find my way back to it over and over, I can have a connection to that aspect of actuality as a feeling being each moment again. And it seems to me that to genuinely want to be here (and therefore to enjoy and appreciate being here each moment again) I must experience this universe as a friendly place, why else would I want to be here lol?
It is the weirdest thing isn’t it, traversing a wall of utter dread and terror only to realise that one has been safe all along haha - this is the kinda actualism art I wanna make @henryyyyyyyyyy
Yeah, I am starting to “get it”. It psychological ‘time’.
Whilst I am ‘normal’ , I feel as if I have decades of life in my possession. As if I can continue to put off feeling good until later, because to me, later exists.
So another little reminder a minute ago that a place where sorrow and malice has never existed, exists.
It’s always such a level up to anything that ‘I’ can experience. Because it seems that ‘I’ am fundamentally mired in sorrow and malice so even the best experiences that ‘I’ can have, posses some degree of this sorrow and malice.
When I find myself in the place where sorrow and malice has never existed it is such an incredible jump, so freeing beyond anything that ‘I’ can have, it’s really indescribable in terms of the magnitude of freedom and release that’s experienced. Man talk about the freedom from stress being good for one…There is a place where stress has never existed!
The thing is that as soon as this experience happens it kind of dissolves into the past, now I have the intellectual memory of it but even right now I cannot comprehend how precious it is because I am not experiencing it. And it seems like as a feeling being ‘I’ can never experience it, ‘I’ can have a taste via pure intent but it’s not the same, that complete absence of sorrow and malice is only present in a PCE or actual freedom. I guess the logical answer would be to aim for more PCEs, to allow myself more holidays away from sorrow and malice haha.
It seems to be a case of getting to a place where I can allow something so pristine to be lived all the time, its kind of weird, like a resistance to something so incredible being so freely given, it seems so very wrong.
Sure I can accidentally find myself in a PCE but to aim for one… no that’s asking for too much of a good thing
It seems usually if I aim for a PCE I am not operating from a place of sufficient wonder to actually have one happen. It seems that abandoning ‘my’ worries as a ‘self’ needs to happen first, then there is movement into naïveté, wonder etc and then PCE. But yeah I guess there is no reason I could not aim to go through this process on demand.
I think the mistake is that I would try to go from say feeling neutral to a PCE, or even from feeling good into a PCE and this approach is just the ‘doer’ trying to control, to force. Thinking about it now it must be feeling good first, then allowing naïveté to flower so I can move into wonder at being here (still as a ‘self’) and then the jump can happen.
So I guess the short answer is that having a PCE does not seem to happen on the level of the ‘doer’ and this is where I normally operate from.
But if I was to answer your question directly then what happens usually when I try to have a PCE is that I fail
Actually I think this is a good direction to look. What I can see is that ‘I’ cannot as an identity decide to have a PCE in that normal sense of the ‘doer’ doing things.
What ‘I’ can do however is allow ‘myself’ to move into feeling good, great, excellent and then to hover in that place of naïveté and wonder where the chance of the PCE happening (as always of its own accord) is ever immanent.
In fact that is exactly what Richard describes in that bit of writing below, so nice when things click! And now it makes sense why the PCE can be so elusive, especially when one is trying to induce it in that normal ‘doer’ sense. The focus is not on making a PCE happen but rather on moving into marvelling at being here - that is what does the PCE.
“To get out of stuckness and induce a Pure Consciousness Experience one gets off one’s backside and does whatever one knows best to activate delight. Delight is what is humanly possible, given sufficient pure intent obtained from the felicity/ innocuity born of the pure consciousness experience, and from the position of delight, one can vitalise one’s joie de vivre by the amazement at the fun of it all … and then one can – with sufficient abandon – become over-joyed and move into marvelling at being here and doing this business called being alive now. Then one is no longer intuitively making sense of life … the delicious wonder of it all drives any such instinctive meaning away. Such luscious wonder fosters the innate condition of naiveté – the nourishing of which is essential if fascination in it all is to occur – and the charm of life itself easily engages dedication to peace-on-earth. Then, as one gazes intently at the world about by glancing lightly with sensuously caressing eyes, out of the corner of one’s eye comes – sweetly – the magical fairy-tale-like paradise that this verdant earth actually is … and one is the experiencing of what is happening. But refrain from possessing it and making it your own … or else ‘twill vanish as softly as it appeared.”
It seems like I don’t want to arrive, I want the ride to continue, it’s bizarre actually. There is a resistance to arriving at a place where nothing else needs to be done, where I am no longer going anywhere, where ‘my’ story comes to a solid halt. That’s the best I can see so far, there is more to explore for sure.
But to bring it round a full circle, why on earth would I not want to arrive in that place I saw earlier? Where sorrow and malice has never existed.
There’s also this thing of not wanting a PCE because I know it will end, it’s like unless it’s for keeps I don’t want it cos of the inevitable crash back into reality.
So I do the sensible thing and choose to stay in reality at all times
Maybe one thing that may help, instead of trying to figure out why you have the resistance or why you don’t wanna arrive etc., just set it aside and do it anyway!
So I was just washing the dishes and ‘I’ slipped away for a few seconds, how original hey!
Lately it seems that I am not fully satisfied unless I am in that place, there is a certain release that comes with the complete absence of affect/being, it seems now it’s either that for keeps or it’s not good enough.
