My recent reply to @henryyyyyyyyyy got me thinking about the differences between becoming actually free via an out-from-control VF vs. doing it via the so-called rapid method.
The homepage of the AFT recommends this:
The way of becoming actually free is both simple and practical. One starts by dismantling the shadowy social identity which has been overlaid, from birth onward, on top of the innate self until one is virtually free from all the social mores and psittacisms (those mechanical repetitions of previously received ideas or images, reflecting neither apperception nor autonomous reasoning). One can be virtually free from all the beliefs, ideas, values, theories, truths, customs, traditions, ideals, superstitions and all the other schemes and dreams. One can become aware of all the socialisation, of all the conditioning, of all the programming, of all the methods and techniques which were used to produce what one feels and thus thinks oneself to be: a wayward identity careering around in confusion and illusion. A āmature adultā is actually a lost, lonely, frightened and very cunning entity. However, it is never too late to start in on uncovering and discovering what one actually is.
One can become virtually free from all the insidious feelings ā the emotions and passions and calentures ā which fuel the mind and give credence to all the illusions and delusions and fantasies and hallucinations which masquerade as visions of The Truth. One can become virtually free of all that which has encumbered humans with misery and despair and live in a state of virtual freedom ā¦ which is beyond ānormalā human expectations anyway. Then, and only then, can the day of destiny dawn wherein one becomes actually free.
So essentially VF first and then actual freedom after. But that isnāt the method that Geoffrey and myself used - or Craig if he is considered actually free. Also I wonder who else became actually free through virtual freedom apart from Vineeto and Peter? Did Pamela, Tom, Grace or anyone else also go through virtual freedom? Anyone who knows the answer do let me know.
Technically we got free using the ārapid methodā. I canāt say Iām a fan of that name for all sorts of reasons. I simply think of it in terms of going through to actual freedom without becoming VF first.
Essentially when I look back at it āIā dismantled social identity just enough to become happy and harmless relatively constantly and to have regular EEās and PCEās. It got me to a point where self-immolation presented itself as an option and āIā took it. Upon actual freedom though there has been cleaning up to do of social identity - which logic would tell you should have been easier for Vineeto as she had largely eliminated this prior to AF and her journey to a full freedom relatively quickly bears this out. But it didnāt work that way for Peter or anyone else, so who knows maybe itās not that simple.
Reflecting on all of this my advice would still be the same. To focus on being happy and harmless each moment again, gradually separate purity from āyouā, have EEās and PCEās galore, get a feeling of being as a totality and donāt overdo the investigation and attempt to eliminate social identity as it is quite tricky to do when one has feelings because of the noise factor. Once you are free, social identity is all that remains so cleanup is straight-forward. By all means investigate if thatās what you are interested in and getting something out of it while keeping eyes on the prize.
I think VF is a tricky goal. Peter and Vineeto did have fairly relaxed lives it seems (some conjecture here) and round the clock access to Richard. This may be a little controversial but just my opinion.
Iād welcome your thoughts and comments about all this!
), then getting closer to it, which is about enjoying and appreciating being alive, which is what the actualism method isā¦ which is done more and more via gradually dismantling the social identity, etc. So in the process of the above I gradually become free relatively-speaking. But itās not a prerequisite to have any short or extended period of feeling or being one way or another, to become free.
This figure-ground reversal which you mention I can really relate to as I have had glimpses of it recently. It has been coming on and off, I was experiencing it for a while today when at work. I was watching a video online (hope my boss does not read this 
) and I began to clearly experience the ārealā as nothing but a fading dream world, barely any substance and the actual was clearly seen as what genuinely exists, the only world that actually exists or ever existed. Itās like what you wrote in your report of becoming free, that the ārealā is nothing but a dream and the actual is the real (as in the genuinely existing world) and that we have it all back to front.
