Quotes

[Kub933]

Hi Proporcrutch,

Your reply reminded me of another good quote, this time by Geoffrey, the post was a response to the question of… “Let’s say an actually free person witnesses their child being brutally murdered, would he feel anything?”

Geoffrey: Is my child being brutally murdered again? It’s not the first time. It appears to be the default scenario that pops up every time there is talk about having no emotions. “But what if your child is being murdered?!” Maybe because it’s as close as it gets to a I WIN button, in this kind of discussion. Either one admits that of course, they’d feel something… and they’ve just shown they’re not actually free. Or they confess that no, they wouldn’t feel anything, and they’re immediately diagnosed/internalized/executed, lose all possibility of being heard even again, get thrown away from any admissible discourse and, let’s not shy away from for it, get thrown away from humanity at large.

What’s very interesting here, is that the question is not about what one would DO in such a situation, but only what one would FEEL. And if that was the criterium for belonging to humanity…

Various people’s behavior in such a situation, be it just before, during, or after the event, would vary widely… but surely, they’d all feel the same… at least all the normal people. That’s the important thing, right? How they’d feel.

Curiously the question is never asked why anybody cares about what these people would feel, since the decisive factor in any objective situation, the only important factor in dealing with it in the best possible way, is what they’d do.

What’s implied is that what people do - what anybody, surely, does under such a situation - is notpredicated on the facts of the situation, in a sensible way, in order to do whatever can be done under the particular circumstances… BUT on the feelings one is having at the time, the justifiablyoverwhelming feelings one is having at the time.

Feeling anger, tremendous anger, to the point of jumping at the aggressor, and say, his four friends with guns, to quickly find oneself on the floor weakly clawing at the aggressor’s leg, bleeding out? Fine.

Feeling sorrow, to the point of despair, and getting to one’s knees begging the aggressor to also take one’s life, confident that if he does not, you’ll do it yourself as soon as you can? Fine.

Feeling fear for one’s life - surely, those child killers won’t stop there -, beg to be spared, and then live one’s life in insurmountable guilt, for who thinks about one’s life when one’s child is dead? Fine.

I could go on.

I could even mention, even if that wouldn’t really be considered normal: Feeling bliss, love and compassion, and smiling at the aggressor. For the aggressor is you and you are him, or it’s just a dream anyway, or it’s just the unveiling of universal consciousness, or it’s god’s plan, or there was never a child in the first place, or you’re so enlightened that you just feel bliss love and compassion whatever happens anyway, utterly detached.

But… which behavior is it, that is the appropriate response to the situation? Those are quite different behaviors… And yet they’re all fine, as far as humanity goes (even though you’d have to get into special circles for the last one to be appropriate lol), they’re all fine because they are dictated by feelings. Whatever one does, as long as it’s dictated by feelings, is considered fundamentally fine. Even though it does nothing to deal with the actual situation at hand - or worsens it -, it’s fine because it’s human.

Now, what would an actually free person do?

This is where Claudiu’s use of the term « hypothetical » is appropriate. An actually free person does not deal in hypotheticals. This is not a sleight of hand, not an escape, not a refusal to answer the question. There is not actually such a thing as an hypothetical situation. So there is no way to answer that question. If I were to indulge nevertheless, I could only answer: I do not know what I would do. Not in the sense that this phrase is commonly used, which is “I don’t know what feeling reaction I’d get, and what behavior would ensue”, but in the sense that the particulars of the situation would be everything. The actual situation at hand. Which would include me. You may specify the situation with as many details as you want, draw the scenario to painful precision, you’d still be infinitely away from an actual situation.

All I know is that a decision would be made, and an action would take place, and that it would be the most sensible action that could take place under the circumstances of the situation. I am experientially 100% confident in this. Not that it would be the ‘best’ action in an abstract hypothetical scenario, nor that it would be the ‘best’ action anybody could take - for the reason that an integral part of the actual situation would be me, this actual body, in all its particularity. But that it would be the ‘best’ action possible that this body could take considering the actual situation in its integrality.

This confidence (that whatever happens, this body will do the best possible thing it can) is congruent with an absence of consideration for hypothetical scenarios in actually free human beings. Because why do people usually consider hypothetical scenarios? Why do they ask themselves “what would I do if…”… because they (rightfully) lack any confidence that when the moment comes, they’ll make the best decision possible according to the circumstances. So they draw hypothetical scenarios, and derive from abstract moral or ethical rules what the appropriate behavior in that scenario is, or they just directly copy what they’ve seen or heard the appropriate behavior to be, and convince themselves that this is what they would do, so that when that moment comes, there is a chance they might do this. But without even considering that when/if the moment ever comes, their feelings will be what dictates their behavior, one can see that this action they’ve decided on - on the basis of abstract principles or social propriety, in an hypothetical scenario miles away from the actual situation - is probably not be the best action they could have taken in the actual situation.

I remember that before ‘I’ had enough PCEs, and was trying to picture such an actually free person not feeling anything in such a situation (and ‘I’ was having trouble going over the moral condemnation, the scandal, the inhumanity of such), ‘I’ tended to picture them doing something alien, like just walking away, or making a joke, not caring at all. Because if they don’t feel, it’s that they don’t care, right?
Nothing could be more wrong. An actually free person utterly cares about one’s fellow human beings. That actual caring is in its scope without any comparison to the caring that stems from feelings such as love. Even paternal love.

In conclusion, what an actually free person would do, in such a situation - what an actually free person does in any situation -, is simply taking the most sensible action, the best action possible considering the facts available to them of the actual situation, which include themselves (and their actual caring for their fellow human beings).

I remember the next bit in particular got some laughs out of me back then :

@Kiman

In the event of someone trying to stab your child, will you risk sacrificing your life by throwing yourself on the assaulter to protect your child? A feeling being for sure does. Or won’t you risk your life, because that is the most sensible thing to do for your body?

Geoffrey: You say it’s one person with a knife. Ok. What person? Are we talking crack addict, vengeful ex-girlfriend, mafia goon, terrorist, pissed-off neighbor, anti-actualist radical activist? Are we talking somewhat reasonable person or psych ward? Are we talking ex-spetsnaz or soccer mom? Can the situation be defused without a fight? How would a fight likely go? I could go on for pages… What’s the room configuration, how far am I, how sharp is that knife, is it double bladed or can I somehow grab it if necessary, is the floor slippery, are there objects around that might help… I could go on for pages and the hypothetical scenario would not even remotely approach the actual situation.

But that’s not the answer you want. You want, out of this pretty barebones hypothetical scenario of yours, an answer on principle. Something like: this is what I’d do in this situation and every situation related to it. Which is precisely what I described in that post above, what feeling-beings do when they make hypotheticals. And then… they actually do whatever. Because I can picture many scenarios in which a random feeling-being, in the situation above, and despite having made the firm and constant decision in their hypothetical scenario that “I’d jump on the aggressor without any consideration for anything, to give my life away for my child, because that’s the right thing to do”, would actually freeze, or collapse on the floor, or be terrified for their own life, or start making grim scenarios about what will happen after the whole thing is over, or prioritize saying goodbye to their kid, or do some crazy thing like putting a knife to their own throat in some weird threat, etc. All behaviors that presumably would not resolve the situation because they’re actually not taking the facts of it into consideration, only the overwhelming feelings that are being had at the time.

What actual freedom does in that regards, is free up native intelligence, and allow it to come to most sensible decision possible according to the available facts of the situation at hand, in the moment, and as such provide the best probabibility of seeing the said situation resolve for the best.

[FrankN]

Richard:
The feeling of ‘being’ is the impression of being present; it is the perception of a ‘presence’ that transcends time and space … giving rise to the improper assumption that ‘I’ am Immortal.

====================================
( maybe that is why Palaces are build and that is why people “plan” for what should happen after “they” die ).

[henryyyyyyyyyy]

“Lost in awe at the beauty around me, I must have slipped into a state of heightened awareness. It is hard – impossible really – to put into words the moment of truth that suddenly came upon me then. Even the mystics are unable to describe their brief flashes of spiritual ecstasy. It seemed to me, as I struggled afterward to recall the experience, the self was utterly absent: I and the chimpanzees, the earth and trees and air, seemed to merge, to become one with the spirit power of life itself. The air was filled with a feathered symphony, the evensong of birds. I heard new frequencies in their music and also in singing insects’ voices – notes so high and sweet I was amazed. Never had I been so intensely aware of the shape, the color of the individual leaves, the varied patterns of the veins that made each one unique.

Scents were clear as well, easily identifiable: fermenting, overripe fruit; waterlogged earth; cold, wet bark; the damp odor of chimpanzee hair, and yes, my own too. And the aromatic scent of young, crushed leaves was almost overpowering.

That afternoon, it had been as though an unseen hand had drawn back a curtain and, for the briefest moment, I had seen through such a window. In a flash of “outsight” I had known timelessness and quiet ecstasy, sensed a truth of which mainstream science is merely a small fraction. And I knew that the revelation would be with me for the rest of my life, imperfectly remembered yet always within. A source of strength on which I could draw when life seemed harsh or cruel or desperate.”

• Jane Goodall

[Vineeto]

Henry:

[quote]: “Lost in awe at the beauty around me, I must have slipped into a state of heightened awareness. It is hard – impossible really – to put into words the moment of truth that suddenly came upon me then. Even the mystics are unable to describe their brief flashes of spiritual ecstasy. It seemed to me, as I struggled afterward to recall the experience, the self was utterly absent: I and the chimpanzees, the earth and trees and air, seemed to merge, to become one with the spirit power of life itself. The air was filled with a feathered symphony, the evensong of birds. I heard new frequencies in their music and also in singing insects’ voices – notes so high and sweet I was amazed. Never had I been so intensely aware of the shape, the color of the individual leaves, the varied patterns of the veins that made each one unique.
Scents were clear as well, easily identifiable: fermenting, overripe fruit; waterlogged earth; cold, wet bark; the damp odor of chimpanzee hair, and yes, my own too. And the aromatic scent of young, crushed leaves was almost overpowering.
That afternoon, it had been as though an unseen hand had drawn back a curtain and, for the briefest moment, I had seen through such a window. In a flash of “outsight” I had known timelessness and quiet ecstasy, sensed a truth of which mainstream science is merely a small fraction. And I knew that the revelation would be with me for the rest of my life, imperfectly remembered yet always within. A source of strength on which I could draw when life seemed harsh or cruel or desperate.” (Jane Goodall) (link)

Hi Henry,

I was puzzling why you put up this quote.

I guess you are aware she is describing an altered state of consciousness?

Here are some of the give-aways – “Lost in awe at the beauty”, “the moment of truth”, “even the mystics are unable …”, “brief flashes of spiritual ecstasy”, “become one with the spirit power of life itself”, “I had known timelessness and quiet ecstasy”, just to list the most obvious ones.

Did you want to demonstrate how to recognize an altered state in contrast to a PCE perhaps?

Cheers Vineeto

[henryyyyyyyyyy]

Hi Vineeto,

My impression was that it was a PCE, so perhaps this an opportunity for me to become more incisive.

Could this be a case of a PCE devolving into an altered state? I think that the limitations of language play a role as well often, for example someone who hadn’t ever read the Actualism site might find themselves describing a PCE as ‘beautiful,’ having not observed that there was in fact no beauty at play.

[claudiu]

Hi Henry,

@henryyyyyyyyyy

Could this be a case of a PCE devolving into an altered state? I think that the limitations of language play a role as well often, for example someone who hadn’t ever read the Actualism site might find themselves describing a PCE as ‘beautiful,’ having not observed that there was in fact no beauty at play.

You just have to look at how she describes it. What you quoted appears to have been stitched together from different pieces of an article (link) and/or book chapter (link) without any ellipses marking the cuts (perhaps from here?).

It looks like the experience happened in the context of her grieving the death of her husband, which can help explain why the experience was precipitated the way it was. Emphases added to draw attention:

It was in the forests of Gombe that I sought healing after Derek’s death. […]

[…]

Lost in awe at the beauty around me, I must have slipped into a state of heightened awareness.[…] Scents were clear as well, easily identifiable: fermenting overripe fruit; waterlogged earth; cold, wet bark; the damp odor of chimpanzee hair and, yes, my own too. I sensed a new presence […] Suddenly a distant chorus of pant-hoots elicited a reply from Fifi. As though wakening from some vivid dream I was back in the everyday world, cold, yet intensely alive. When the chimpanzees left, I stayed in that place—it seemed a most sacred place—scribbling some notes, trying to describe what, so briefly, I had experienced.

[…] Yes, I thought, there are many windows through which we humans, searching for meaning, can look out into the world around us. There are those carved out by Western science […] Yet there are other windows through which we humans can look out into the world around us, windows through which the mystics and the holy men of the East, and the founders of the great world religions, have gazed as they searched for the meaning and purpose of our life on earth, not only in the wondrous beauty of the world, but also in its darkness and ugliness. And those Masters contemplated the truths that they saw, not with their minds only but with their hearts and souls also. From those revelations came the spiritual essence of the great scriptures, the holy books, and the most beautiful mystic poems and writings. That afternoon it had been as though an unseen hand had drawn back a curtain and, for the briefest moment, I had seen through such a window.

[… snip 2 paragraphs …] I lay flat on my back and looked up into the darkening sky. I thought about the young man I had met during the six-week tour I had finished before my return to Gombe. He had a holiday job working as a bellhop […] [… snip 7 paragraphs …]

Thinking about that brief encounter, I smiled too, there on the beach at Gombe. A wind sprang up and it grew chilly. I left the bright stars and went inside to bed. I knew that while I would always grieve Derek’s passing, I could cope with my grieving. That afternoon, in a flash of “outsight” I had known timelessness and quiet ecstasy, sensed a truth of which mainstream science is merely a small fraction. And I knew that the revelation would be with me for the rest of my life, imperfectly remembered yet always within. A source of strength on which I could draw when life seemed harsh or cruel or desperate. The forest, and the spiritual power that was so real in it, had given me the “peace that passeth understanding.”

Altered states of consciousness can be marvelous and wondrous as well, with heightened sensory awareness. The key factor is whether I (identity) is present, either as ego or as soul. In this case, it appears Jane’s ego went into abeyance, resulting in an experience of being just her soul, her soul expanding and merging with everything (“I and the chimpanzees, the earth and trees and air, seemed to merge, to become one with the spirit power of life itself”). When she writes “self was utterly absent” it was her small-s/ego self, but large-S Soul Self, is what was present.

It’s not just word-play, it is a different experience. In the PCE you don’t merge or seem to merge with everything, you disappear entirely. Instead what shines through is the objective, on-its-own existence of that which is being perceived, which existence includes this body being conscious of course.

There’s no inconsistencies in her report, she describes it precisely as having seen the spiritual realm through a spiritual window which is what all the great religious, scriptures, and holy books accurately describe, which they saw (and which therefore she saw) using their “hearts and souls”. Richard also indicated knowing, in an extra-ordinary sense, that he was walking down/living the path of past great Enlightened Masters, while Enlightened/becoming Enlightened.

Basically like recognizes like, and she recognized the spiritual (“the spiritual power that was so real in it”, “the spirit power of life itself”) and the divine in what she experienced. ‘Spirit’ is another word for ‘soul’, of course. Pure intent is not ‘spiritual’ and that is evident by the experience of it, it is something outside of both ‘me’ as ego and ‘Me’ as ‘Soul’.

If you just look at certain parts of it and tilt your head and replace some words with actualist ones and excuse the language she uses, then sure you could kinda squint and say ok maybe. But if you look at the whole context and how she describes it in the rest of the piece, it is quite clear it was explicitly a spiritual experience.

TLDR: not a PCE

Cheers,
Claudiu

[Kub933]

What I was wondering was also, why dig around in the trash trying to find something that could (but probably does not) describe a PCE, when the PCE has been so meticulously and wondrously described by Richard and other actualists.

It’s kind of like as an actualist trying to find some wisdom in the ‘tried and true’ ways, which actually is also this weird inclination I have seen and also indulged in myself - For example trying to find scientific support for the actualism method etc.

It’s like anything as long as ‘I’ can hang onto the ‘the known’ in some way or another.

[Kub933]

Also Claudiu you haven’t been writing for a while and now I am struggling to find any ‘I’ in that post of yours…

Am I imagining things?

[Vineeto]

Henry: Hi Vineeto,
My impression was that it was a PCE, so perhaps this an opportunity for me to become more incisive.
Could this be a case of a PCE devolving into an altered state? I think that the limitations of language play a role as well often, for example someone who hadn’t ever read the Actualism site might find themselves describing a PCE as ‘beautiful,’ having not observed that there was in fact no beauty at play. (link)

Hi Henry,

Thank you for your reply. It is indeed vital to be “incisive” [astute] when assessing another’s (and your own) extraordinary experiences.

Even though Claudiu wrote an excellent exposé already, I post this one as well as it was already written.

Let’s have a close look at her wording and consider if you would use such words describing your own PCE –

Jane Goodall: “Lost in awe at the beauty around me”

Both “awe” and “beauty” are definitely feeling words.

Jane Goodall: “the moment of truth that suddenly came upon me then. Even the mystics are unable to describe their brief flashes of spiritual ecstasy.”

“Truth” is clearly a spiritual/ religious word, so is “spiritual ecstasy”. Ecstasy also means ‘rapture, bliss, euphoria, jubilation, exaltation’ per Oxford Dictionary, which is clearly not describing an experience where the instinctual/ feeling self, both ‘I’ and ‘me’, is in abeyance. Also why mention “the mystics” unless one believes in a spiritual reality beyond the physical reality.

Jane Goodall: “the self was utterly absent: I and the chimpanzees, the earth and trees and air, seemed to merge, to become one with the spirit power of life itself.”

The “self” Jane Goodall is referring to is the ego-self, not the ‘Self’ with a capital “S”. With the ego-self absent she temporarily becomes “one with the spirit power [sic!] of life itself” and merges with “the chimpanzees, the earth and trees and air” – a oneness as is described being experienced in many altered states of consciousness.

Jane Goodall: “The air was filled with a feathered symphony, the evensong of birds. I heard new frequencies in their music and also in singing insects’ voices – notes so high and sweet I was amazed. Never had I been so intensely aware of the shape, the color of the individual leaves, the varied patterns of the veins that made each one unique.”

This part of her description could be similar to that of a pure consciousness experience, even though it has a poetic tinge to it.

Jane Goodall: “Scents were clear as well, easily identifiable: fermenting, overripe fruit; waterlogged earth; cold, wet bark; the damp odor of chimpanzee hair, and yes, my own too. And the aromatic scent of young, crushed leaves was almost overpowering.
That afternoon, it had been as though an unseen hand had drawn back a curtain and, for the briefest moment, I had seen through such a window.”

This indicates that the experience may have started as a PCE but very quickly devolved into an ASC, as demonstrated by her unequivocal spiritual sentences at the beginning and referral to malice and sorrow at the end.

Jane Goodall: “In a flash of “outsight” I had known timelessness and quiet ecstasy, sensed a truth of which mainstream science is merely a small fraction. And I knew that the revelation would be with me for the rest of my life, imperfectly remembered yet always within. A source of strength on which I could draw when life seemed harsh or cruel or desperate.”

The mentioning of the “revelation” being a strength “on which I could draw when life seemed harsh or cruel or desperate” means that nothing she experienced has revealed that there is an actual world where life is already, and always, perfect and pure. This is really the strongest clue that it was not ever a PCE despite her heightened awareness experience.

I did not mention “timelessness” as the experience of time standing still in a PCE can be easily misnamed – Richard explains it well in Pamela’s video. (link)

Does this help to draw a distinction between a pure consciousness experience and an altered state of consciousness (for millennia considered as the summum bonum of human consciousness)?

Here is the selected correspondence on differentiating altered states and PCEs – (Richard, Selected Correspondence, Affective vs. Pure Experiences)

Cheers Vineeto

[henryyyyyyyyyy]

Hi @claudiu and @Vineeto , thanks for the thoughtful responses!

It was clear to me when I initially read it that there was some spiritual language at minimum mixed in, but it is more obvious following both of your analyses that it is more than just that. Claudiu I appreciate that you found the original sources - they are much more obviously spiritually tinged - and Vineeto I agree that the thrust is going toward spirituality, if there was a PCE at all (perhaps!) it clearly was quickly co-opted.

I can see in myself a habit of playing things “fast and loose” which I am seeing as a product of an anxious demeanor… rushing for ‘optimism’ when the baseline is doubt. Looking at this now!

[Vineeto]

Henry: Hi Claudiu and Vineeto, thanks for the thoughtful responses!
It was clear to me when I initially read it that there was some spiritual language at minimum mixed in, but it is more obvious following both of your analyses that it is more than just that. Claudiu I appreciate that you found the original sources – they are much more obviously spiritually tinged – and Vineeto I agree that the thrust is going toward spirituality, if there was a PCE at all (perhaps!) it clearly was quickly co-opted.
I can see in myself a habit of playing things “fast and loose” which I am seeing as a product of an anxious demeanor… rushing for ‘optimism’ when the baseline is doubt. Looking at this now! (link)

Hi Henry,

You have been interested in actualism for a while, and if you still are, then a distinction between a PCE – the (temporary) abeyance of ‘I’ and ‘me’ – and an altered state of consciousness – the (temporary) abeyance of ego – is vital. On making this distinction hinges what it is you pursue in your life – the perceived best of the real world or being a pioneer for something entirely new to human consciousness.

It has not so much to do with “rushing for ‘optimism’” or following “the baseline” of “doubt” – it is not even “a product of an anxious demeanor”. It is rather a matter how interested you are in sincerely imitating the actual as experienced/ rememorated in a PCE. It is your sincerity of purpose which will inform you if you are closer to imitating the actual or just ‘getting by’.

Cheers Vineeto