Actual Freedom – Audio-Taped Dialogues

Q: There are periods in one’s life, if one is a normal person, that are slotted into time and that is a wrong measurement, a wrong understanding.

R: When was the last time when you could say you were ‘slotted into time’?

Q: I can’t remember ... I have lost the track of ‘human’ time. I have to date it from the 11th of November 1995 ... from there on I lost interest in the date upon which things happened ... nowadays this moment simply keeps on happening.

R: This moment keeps happening?

Q: This moment keeps happening ... when I go to bed and sleep, this moment stops and when I wake up this moment starts again. It’s like there is nothing in between, although I know that I have slept, and instantly I am here again.

R: Would you say that you were always here?

Q: Yes. I’m always here ... it’s funny for I have always objected to it in the past; I wanted to go away from being here and you would encourage me to be here ... where this moment is happening.

R: I have always said that you are already here, whether you liked it or not, whether you approve of it or not, we are all here.

Q: And that is what I am living now ... what I used to resist. It’s like a commitment to being here, forsaking all the Glamour and the Glitz of how it could be or should be.

R: This is what I was discussing with someone only the other day and I saw a resistance in her eyes to being here ... she called it a reluctance but it was actually a resistance. I said ‘Why do you not want to be here, for this is where it is all happening; this is the ‘cutting edge’ of your reality’. This moment is one’s moment of being alive; this is where you can be free and happy. She said that ‘There is the known, where I am safe, and this I don’t know’ ... thereby implying ‘unsafe’.

Is that what you did on the 11th of November? You took the ‘risk’?

Q: No, I’ve been looking at it while we were talking. Where did I stop ‘slotting’ my experience of life into time-slots? From here to there? The old time limits I put on events?

R: Can I suggest a word? Was it that back then time had a periodicity?

Q: Yes!

R: And now, this moment has no duration?

Q: Yes, yes there is no duration here.

R: This is different to being ‘Timeless’?

Q: Yes. This is right inside time but it is completely another ... what’s the word ... arbiter? ... another way of time. There is the orthodox human way of experiencing time and this is an alternative way of experiencing.

R: You may remember us talking last week about how I have no ‘bench-mark’ against which I measure myself against, compare myself ... can you see that this is also to do with time?

Q: Yes, it’s like I can not rely ... the bench-mark has gone and what do I actually rely on?

R: Do you compare yourself with how you were last week, or last month, any more?

Q: No, No! This is totally unlike anything I’ve ever experienced ... and this is how it is meant to be.

R: Definitely. So you are in unknown territory?

Q: Yes. And you’re already here. That’s so good, for when you arrive, [now speaking to Q.] there is already other people here for reassurance that it is safe.

There still has to be a guarantee made. I am already here, but the stamp of guarantee is yet to be made.

R: The irreversibility is yet to happen?

Q: Yes, the irreversibility ... something will make this state permanent. This is incredible! I knew it would all work out, but I didn’t know it would work out like this! Because everything is taken care of.

R: You still do things though: Take a shower, brush your hair, go to the toilet; you still feed yourself, go to the bank, manage your money, budget and so on.

Q: Yes, but it doesn’t cost me any effort. I don’t have to go back into normal time; everything is instantly still here.

R: Okay. Have you lost the feeling of ‘running out of time’? Of ‘not enough hours in the day’? Of ‘catching up with time’? Has all that gone?

Q: That’s right, I’m not ‘running out of time’ any more.

R: You have all the time in the universe?

Q: All the time in the world ... yet at the same time, every moment is totally booked up.

R: I often say that I am too busy living this moment to think about the past or the future. [now speaking to Q.] Does any of this make sense to you?

Q(1): I must say it should make sense, but I don’t know if I ‘get it’. I feel a sense of excitement. That my life can get better ... much better. I see that it is possible.

Q: Sometimes when people talk with us they feel afraid ... or that they ought to be afraid; you don’t seem to have that.

Q(1): I’ve always liked it that you are so practical ... really ordinary and matter-of-fact. Not ‘over the top’ ... not under the top either! Right on the top.

Q: This is simply the most easiest way – and the most sensible way – of living.

Q(1): It makes good sense to practice all this.

Q: But most people are put off by ‘practical’. I used to have an aversion to being practical, but when I came to start living with Richard I confronted myself with that rebellious streak and saw what a nuisance I was to myself and others. With Richard, it all of a sudden made sense to change my modus operandi, my way of living.

This moment is so pregnant, so overflowing ... almost bursting.

R: This moment is rich, full.

Q: This is a full ... this is living fully.

R: Not holding back? Not ‘saving yourself for something or someone’?

Q: No. There are waves coming over me ... waves of pleasure. Pure pleasure. It feels like it’s on the verge of being out of control ... yet it has nothing to do with being in or out of control. It is all so delicious.

R: Ripples of pleasure throughout your entire body. From the tips of your toes to the top of your head. The sheer pleasure of being alive, of being here doing this business of living this moment. Does it seem like it does away with the need to have a sexual orgasm?

Q: Well ... yes [laughter]. I never thought I would say that! It’s like I’m orgastic all the time. It’s not of my doing, it happens of itself.

R: One can still enjoy sexuality ... the important thing is to be self-generating, self-reliant, self-contained. Then whatever happens with another is a bonus. One is not dependent upon anyone for anything ... the need for sexual gratification is gone. Then, and only then, sexuality is a delight; a freely enjoyed delight. There is no necessity, no need for claims upon another, no bargaining, no power-trips, no being caught-up in the grip of addictive compulsions ... and so on. This is freedom indeed!

Q: This is delicious ... I am enjoying this.

R: You see, anything one has with another is, per definition, not lasting. They can turn away, disappear, whatever. What you have for yourself is yours forever. The cute part in all this is that when you are totally self-sufficient, self-generating, then you can be with another one hundred per cent. This is a joy and a felicity for both yourself and the other.

Q: Yes. That’s what it is. Anything I feel for another is actually polluting me.

R: Without feelings, only then can you enjoy the other fully ... which allows for mutual pleasure. Then you are not dependent on another for your core being, your basic being.

When I get up early in the morning, when everyone else is asleep, I am on my own, physically. How I experience myself then is the same as I experience myself now, with company. This exchange of views, this interaction with you two is a delightful bonus, a freely enjoyed interchange. Yet how I am in myself now is no different to being on my own.

Q: I experience that at night when you are asleep ... I am on my own and I don’t miss you.

R: This orgastic sensation ... is it your core state of being?

Q: Yes it is; it is me. But I am eager to share it with another person.

R: Good.