Sonya: I had an “ah ha!” moment last week as I was driving to dance class. The sun was shining and just starting to set, I had my music on, window down, and the golden sunlight shining through the window was marvelous. I found myself thoroughly enjoying all the sights and sounds. It made me feel giddy with happiness. This feeling carried on through out my drive to the studio, then all a sudden I realised things were happening on its own with out me “choosing” to? It was like I noticed that I was changing gear, breaking, accelerating, signaling without choosing to? Like my body was doing things on its own accord without ‘me’ consciously deciding these things. I kinda realised that it was always like this, that ‘I’ haven’t really been making any decisions this whole time and things were just happening. It was almost like the most obvious thing ever.
Then I parked up, went into class and had a great time. (link)
Hi Sonya,
This was a great “‘ah ha!’ moment”. Keep it in mind – the more you remember that “things were happening on its own with out me “choosing” to” the more you can safely allow things happening on their own and be done much better without ‘you’ interfering.
Richard: This body is eminently competent in functioning autonomously: the stomach tells the brain (wherein lies the will which, with its data-correlating ability, is nothing more grand than the nerve-organising organ of the body) when it is empty. The stomach secretes a chemical when unoccupied which triggers a receptor in the brain that gives rise to a sensation humans ignorantly call ‘I am hungry’. Indeed, tests have been done by people who delight in doing these things, wherein the chemical was injected into volunteers who had just eaten a full meal: the chemical caused them to feel hungry despite their distended stomachs. Thus ‘I’, thinking and feeling that ‘I’ am an important part of the process, step in and incorrectly say: ‘‘I’ am hungry’. ‘I’ am not hungry at all (how can a psychological or psychic entity need corporeal food) … it is that the stomach is simply signalling its emptiness to the brain via the autonomic nervous system.
Likewise the bladder tells the brain when it is full, and so on. When ‘I’ says ‘I want to go to the toilet’, ‘I’ am not busting for a pee at all … the bladder is merely indicating its fullness. Once again, a psychological and psychic entity cannot manufacture physical urine … it is absurd. Furthermore, the empty stomach instructs the legs, via the will function of the physical brain, to walk to the cupboard for food. The eyes, seeing an empty cupboard and thus triggering remembered experience, will advise the legs, via the brain’s organising capability, to walk the body to a shop. An empty wallet will tell the legs to take the body to a bank … and an empty bank account will demonstrate that it is time to get a job (or go on a pension or whatever). I am neither being pedantic nor facetious here … it is actually this simple. Without an ‘I’ and/or ‘me’, one is this very sensuous flesh and blood body being apperceptively aware, living in the actual world of people, things and events … not an ‘I’ and/or ‘me’ living in the grim and glum real world, forever cut off from the magnificence of this luscious actual world by ‘my’ unreal existence, thinking and feeling that ‘I’ have to make responsible and onerous decisions. (Richard, List C, No. 4b, 1 May 2000)
You may remember Richard’s story how the painting painted itself –
Richard: ‘In the years I successfully made a living as a practising artist I never took any notice of the critics’ opinions … indeed, if I had I would never had made a living out of it as my artistic output came about despite both the institutionalised training I received during three years fulltime study at art college and the two years fulltime application of same immediately following graduation (wherein I had to teach art part-time of an evening to supplement my then-meagre income).
It was only when ‘I’ got out of the way and the painting painted itself, so to speak, or the drawing drew itself/ the sculpture sculpted itself/ the pottery formed itself (and so on) that craft – all the painstakingly acquired skills – became art.
I clearly remember the opening night of my first one-man exhibition (in a major city of this country I reside in): it virtually sold-out on that first night and, of course, being the star of the show ‘I’ was the recipient of the judgements of those assembled who chose to voice their opinion … yet what they did not realise, as only ‘I’ knew how that artistic output came about, was that their opinion was of no value to ‘me’ whatsoever either one way or the other.
The opinion of another identity did not mean a thing either’. (Richard, AF List, No. 90a, 3 Jul 2005).
… and ‘he’ then wished to live life in the same way –
Richard: ‘… all art is initially a representation of the actual and, as such, is a reflection funnelled by the artist so that he/she can express what they are experiencing in order to see for themselves – and show to others – what is going on ‘behind the scenes’ as it were. However, when one is fully engrossed in the act of creating art – wherein the painting paints itself – the art-form takes on a life of its own and ceases to be a representation. It is its own actuality. One can only stand in amazement and wonder … this is what ‘I’ experienced back when I was a normal person.
Thus ‘I’ wished to live ‘my’ life this way – where my life lived itself – and consequently here I am … now’. (Richard, AF List, No. 12a, 2 Feb 1999).
Sonya: It was like I was autopilot but aware I was on autopilot. Whereas in the past when I would be on ‘autopilot’ I would also be in fantasy land somewhere in my head. This time felt significant cause I was firmly right here. (link)
That is a great description – “I was autopilot but aware I was on autopilot”. It refers to the same fascinating occurrence of apperception Richard describes: the mind’s perception of itself.
Richard: Apperception is another ball-game entirely and has nothing to do with any of the above. I take the Oxford Dictionary definition as an established ‘given’: ‘apperception is the mind’s perception of itself’. This means that there is not an ‘I’ being aware of ‘me’ being conscious, but it is an un-mediated awareness of itself. Thinking may or may not occur … and apperception happens regardless. Thought does not have to stop for apperception to happen … it is that the ‘thinker’ disappears. As for feelings in apperception; not only does the ‘feeler’ disappear, but so too do feelings themselves.
Apperception is the direct – unmediated – apprehension of actuality … the world as-it-is. (Richard, List B, No. 20, 28 Feb 1998).
Sonya: Basically, all this made me really start to wonder if ‘I’ am really needed. (link)
Indeed, and once you begin to wonder if ‘you’ are really needed, you put the first nail in the coffin of ‘me’ and ‘my’ importance. Then seriousness falls by the wayside and being alive in this modus operandi becomes more and more easy and fun.
Cheers Vineeto