Quotes

The below is from Richard’s Article :
Attentiveness is sensuous attention and sensuousness enables the experiencing of things without distorting feelings …whilst seeing the world of people, things and events as-it-is is apperception

Can you please tell me what is the difference between: “sensuous attention” and “sensuousness”.

Thanks

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“…the actual changing of behaviour required my total self-obsession in order to be aware of what I was doing or feeling at every moment. What is it, in me, which is in the road between us? Why am I upset? Why am I annoyed or moody? What is now that is preventing my experiencing peace and harmony? I was totally interested in what it was in me.”

-From Peter’s Journal

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I think they’re the same thing, ‘sensuous attention’ is just ‘attention in a sensuous way’

Attention: “notice taken of someone or something”

So it’s taking notice of things in a sensuous way, that is, based on the senses rather than affect.

It’s interesting because in the article Richard also emphasizes the importance of not side-stepping the emotions when they are happening:

It is impossible for one to intelligently observe what is going on within if one does not at the same time acknowledge the occurrence of one’s various feeling-tones with attentiveness. This is especially true with the hostile and invidious emotions and passions (those that are hateful and fearful). In order to observe one’s own fear, for instance, one must admit to the fact that one is afraid. Nor can one examine one’s own depression, for another example, without acknowledging it fully. The same is true for irritation and agitation and frustration and all those other uncomfortable emotional and passionate moods. One cannot examine something fully if one is busy denying its existence.

So with that in mind, sensuous attention is something that happens specifically when emotion/affect is out of the way, so the attention is there to be given to whatever is sensuous-sensitively happening.

This has to do with the advice that @Srinath and @Felix have been emphasizing in the other thread, which is to ensure that felicity is happening before/while ‘looking’ for sensuousness.

And I’ve said it elsewhere but I am certainly one of those who has gotten stalled by emphasizing ‘sensuousness’ without ensuring that felicity is firmly in place.

Richard equates felicity with delight and happiness as well.

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Thank you so much henryyyyyyy that is very helpful!

I also found this said by an actualist:
The seeing that it is this moment of being alive automatically makes ‘me’ feel felicitous feelings. It was also this approach that Richard responded to saying that it delineated the difference between caused and un-caused enjoyment. Further to that, it has been my experience that if you consistently stay with that seeing (which can also potentially devolve into “living in the present” if no attentiveness is applied) then a PCE will inevitably occur.

Attentiveness [ seeing ] ( cognitive of this moment ) is – the fascination – of – the reflective contemplation –
that this moment is one’s only moment of being alive – and one is never alive at any other time than now.
Attentiveness – leads to – > Sensuousnes
cognative >>>>> pre-emotional fidelity

Sensuousness ( nonaffective awareness of this place ) is – the wondrous awareness – of
– the marvel of being here – now at this moment in time and this place in space.

With Attentiveness one starts to feel ‘alive’. Being ‘alive’ is to be paying attention – exclusive attention – to this moment in time and this place in space. This attention becomes fascination … and fascination leads to reflective contemplation. Then – and only then – apperception can occur.

Attentiveness is seeing how any feeling makes ‘me’ tick – and how ‘I’ react to it – with the perspicacity of seeing how it affects others as well. In attentiveness, there is an unbiased observing of the constant showing-up of the ‘reality’ within, and is examining the feelings arising one after the other … and such attentiveness is the ending of its (feeling) grip. Please note that last point: in attentiveness, there is an observance of the ‘reality’ within, and such attention is the end of its embrace … finish.
Here lies apperception.
,
I, FrankN, am trying to feel good :slight_smile:

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Kuba said:

mortality is not a curse, being here on this planet earth is not some punishment to endure.

Writing this is I am having the flavor of the perfection that lies just outside of being ‘human’.

Whenever I taste this perfection I am left with the acute reminder that I am missing out on living it fully. It’s a funny one because also ‘I’ cannot really speed the process up by wishful thinking or by getting emotionally involved. Genuine change does not go according to ‘my’ timeline.

3 posts were split to a new topic: Posts appear in other threads

“This fear I overcame by simply doing what I had decided to do despite my fears. This is not confronting the feeling of fear itself but simply setting oneself a goal in life and getting on with doing it. This way I did something useful with the fear by turning the feeling of fear into the thrill of discovery. I also did a similar thing with desire – I used it as the desire to succeed in my newfound life’s aim. Nurture was similarly utilized in wanting to be part of the ending to human suffering, and aggression was channelled into a quiet stubbornness and determination to succeed.”

-Vineeto

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Richard:
Pure contemplation is a state of unsullied wonderment: ‘how can this world happen?’, or ‘what is this universe doing here?’, or ‘where does this body come from?’. These questions are posed in such a way so as not to get a thought-out answer, but to simply wonder, in a pure contemplation of the actual. One stays with the notion: ‘I am this body’ and regards that magical world of the PCE. Opening up to that fairy tale-like world by seeing that it is indeed possible now makes it close … so close as to be already here. It is always already here. Regard the very best as possible for oneself … and for all human beings. There is a must in pure contemplation that something amazing can happen: all of a sudden ‘I’ am no more and the actual is already here. I am here where I always have been.

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This is an interesting one, maybe someone could shed some light on it for me? Specifically the part - “one stays with the notion ‘I am this body’”

I have always avoided these notions as they seemed to me to be a sort of kidding myself, or splitting of myself. Because unless I am in a PCE I am not this body, I am ‘me’.

Perhaps it is a way to draw ‘myself’ closer to Actuality until ‘I’ go into abeyance, some version of fake it till you make it :man_shrugging:?

I suspect it’s there to counter the classic spiritual “I am not the body”

So much of the actualism corpus exists in direct relation to spiritual teachings because so much of it was sourced in spiritually-based mailing lists

Another useful quote is Richard’s “I asked not who I am, but what I am”

Yes @Kub933 is the identity, but what you are is that flesh & blood body

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Right so it’s sort of rooting ones contemplation in the fact that what one actually is, is this flesh and blood body. This is to ensure that the contemplation leads one towards a PCE as opposed to ASC.

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Identity can very easily take up the whole of one’s attention, it’s like the Minotaur’s labyrinth. We here probably take it for granted somewhat but it’s radical to regard the ‘self’ as insubstantial

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• [Richard]: ‘… the very stuff of this body (and all bodies) is the very same-same stuff as the stuff of the universe in that it comes out of the ground in the form of the carrots and lettuce and milk and cheese, and whatever else is consumed, in conjunction with the air breathed and the water drunk and the sunlight absorbed.

I am nothing other than that … that is what I am, literally’.

Were you to hold a hand up before the eyes, palm towards the face, and rotate it slowly to its obverse – all the while considering that the very stuff the hand is comprised of is as old as the universe – whilst looking from the front of the eyes, as it were (and not through the eyes), then what I am reporting/ describing/ explaining may very well become apparent as an experiential understanding.

RICHARD: Just so that there is no misunderstanding: what really worked, when the identity was that ‘Altered State Of Being’, was

(1) a continuation of the totally dedicated and/or devoted pure intent to evince what the PCE’s evidenced … and

(2) a furtherance of the irreversible momentum, or inevitability, already set in place on day one as the process is, essentially, that of escaping from one’s fate and attaining to one’s destiny … and

(3) a prolongation of the attentiveness as to how the only moment of being alive was experienced … and

(4) an utter lack of dignity in being so far up oneself (narcissistic) as to render the term ‘egotistical’ a mere bagatelle in comparison … and

(5) a sense of humour which, if nothing else, made possible (6) a delightful resurgence of the earlier felicity/innocuity which again brought about, in combination with sensuousness, an outstandingly ingenuous sense of amazement, marvel and wonder.

And it was that last-named – the wide-eyed wonder of naiveté – which resulted in apperceptiveness (unmediated perception).

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hi henry, just before I read your above post, I ran across this one:

Peter: 1

The method of becoming free from the Human Condition is devastatingly simple but requires a few initial ingredients for success to be guaranteed.

  • A recognition that what you are currently doing is not working, an awareness of not being fully alive, an acknowledgement of living a second-rate life, the admission of failure in your relationships or on the spiritual path, an admission of not being free or maybe a haunting memory of a peak experience of perfection and purity.

  • A willingness or intent to make freedom from malice and sorrow one’s main ambition in life – to become happy and harmless.

  • An acknowledgement that the only moment one can experience life is this very moment.


What hit me hard, was the fact that I can only experience life at this very moment, I can not experience life in the past ( I can only “remember”/ imagine/ regret/ anger/ nostalgia etc. etc. ), same for the future ( I can only imagine it = hopes and fears / fantasies ) .

So I can choose to either “imagine” being alive – or – actually experience being alive at this very moment !

I think this will help me ( experientially ) much with applying the method :slight_smile:

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Can you or anyone, please elaborate on this point :appreciation:

Basically increasing the amount of time you spend being sensitively aware of how you’re feeling

Written by a fairly successful Actualist ( not FrankN ):

I wanted to write about feeling good - it’s probably the thing I’ve most neglected about actualism or have always found most difficult. I never even made the official commitment to “feeling good each moment again” because I basically just didn’t believe it was possible. I always thought it was so unfair - I wanted so badly to feel good yet I just couldn’t get it to happen. That was my perception of things at least .

The thing is though, yes I wanted/desired to feel good as a notion but
what I realise now is that I was not WILLING to feel good ultimately.

I was basically doubling down on existing sorrowful and malicious feelings - seeing them as impossible impediments to the feeling good which I apparently so badly wanted.

The thing is though, I was the one perpetuating those sorrowful and malicious feelings all along.
I was the one that was sustaining the beliefs behind those feelings as well.
Basically, I wasn’t actually willing to feel good come what may

  • I had so many reasons why I couldn’t, shouldn’t and wouldn’t, feel good .
    As a result, I also felt additionally like it was all so unfair that the actualism method wasn’t working for me!

It reminds me of this quote, which to me is just an all-time quote, from
Peter — it was key to changing my attitude about the whole thing
(of thinking I needed to find some secret method/technique):
Peter: “As for ‘one’s grip one the method’, the main difficulty with the method is its simplicity and straightforwardness – denial and obscuration being the main tricks a social/instinctual identity employs in order to evade exposure.”

It has taken me a long time and a lot of getting hit in the face and groin to finally find out that it’s possible to feel good if one is willing (as opposed to merely wanting) to do so.
This does require a strong intent I think,
enough to override the natural tendency of any feeling being to be malicious and sorrowful in many various ways. Now I want to prove to myself that it’s possible to feel good come what may as well. I am finally willing to commit to it!

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[Richard]: Do you comprehend that an identity’s anger, for instance, can be affectively felt by another identity from a near-distance and, as such, can have an effect (and, quite often, the desired effect) despite the intervening physical space … and that the same applies to love (for another instance) or virtually any other strongly-felt feeling?

If so, then by experientially going deeper into those affective feelings it can be found that they swirl around, as it were, forming a whirlpool or an eddy and thus creating a centre (a vortex) which is the very stuff of the swirling as the one is not distinct from the other … ‘you’ are ‘your’ feelings and ‘your’ feelings are ‘you’.

It is that vortex – which is essentially ‘you’ at the core of ‘your’ being – that is the (affective) force known as a psychic force … it is not for nothing that I say psychic currents are the most effective power plays.

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Richard This Moment Of Being Alive.
: When I am what-I-am, there is no void. By being what I actually am – this body only – I have no need for others; hence I also have no need to place the burden upon them to fulfil that what was lacking. Not only do I free myself from that perpetual pursuit, but I also free others in my company from the task ‘I’ impose upon them. Being this sensual body is actual fulfilment, each moment again. Nevermore will I be needy, greedy and grasping. Nevermore will I plot and plan and manipulate others. Nevermore will I have to pro… myself to others to assuage those main attributes of the identity within: being lost, lonely, frightened and cunning. Being what-I-am is to be free-flowing, spontaneous, delightful … and it is fun, for one can never be hurt again.[quote=“leila, post:74, topic:184, full:true”]

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