Actual Freedom – The Actual Freedom Mailing List Correspondence

May 06 2005

RESPONDENT: Richard, now I question from my own mind: I remember Vineeto saying she is ‘100% certain’ that there is no God or afterlife. I remember thinking then (and still basically thinking the same thing) that it is impossible to ‘100%’ prove a negative.

RICHARD: Or so the epistemologists are prone to claim ... yet as one can indeed prove, for oneself and beyond any doubt whatsoever (not just beyond reasonable doubt), that no afterlife/deity does or can even possibly exist there is at least that (major) exception to their rule.

RESPONDENT: Of course I don’t believe in Gnomes or trolls (internet trolls are a fact of course) and as an actualist I don’t consciously engage in any kind of believing, but that does not ‘100% prove’ that they do not exist.

RICHARD: Indeed not, but what disbelief does prove, however, is that belief is not an essential prerequisite for a comparatively successful life (and thus society) – comparable to believer’s lives (and thus societies) that is – and that is not something to be dismissed lightly.

RESPONDENT: It is of course very improbable that Trolls or a God exists.

RICHARD: Yet improbability is not proof per se, eh?

RESPONDENT: Don’t get me wrong, I find the notion of believing in God, and afterlife, or any spiritual belief to be unobjective, nonfactual, and a silly waste of one’s precious time.

RICHARD: Given that believers do not have a corner on (relatively) successful lives/ successful societies that is demonstrably true.

RESPONDENT: I understand that the notion of anything apart from this physical universe is unconceivable in a PCE, but that still does not seem to warrant Vineeto’s ‘100% certainty’ argument (which seems strangely fundamentalistic in the manner of fundamentalist Christianity to me).

RICHARD: Ahh ... in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) it is not so much that it is inconceivable, that there be anything other than this physical universe, it is patently obvious there be not.

RESPONDENT: I don’t remember you saying exactly ‘I’m 100% certain there is no God’ ...

RICHARD: I may not have said it in those words.

RESPONDENT: ... (as you may have guessed this does go into the Karl Popper view that 100% certainty is impossible for certain topics/ questions).

RICHARD: For certain topics/ questions ...yes (in an infinite and eternal and perpetual universe there just might be a one-eyed one-horned flying purple people-eater somewhere and somewhen); for the topic/ question of an afterlife/a deity ... no, not at all impossible.

RESPONDENT: I remember you saying something to the affect of ‘As for myself, I am certain there is no God or afterlife’. Now to me that is not exactly the same statement as Vineeto’s.

RICHARD: I would rather say it this way: here in this actual world it is as plain as the nose on one’s face that all deities/any afterlife have no existence whatsoever outside of the human psyche.

It is all so peaceful, here, where there are no gods/goddesses to meddle in human affairs.

RESPONDENT: It seems to me that you did not entirely dismiss the Popperian view that some things cannot be known with 100% certainty.

RICHARD: The following may be of interest in this regard:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Please point us in the direction of your actual/factual and thus irrefutable evidence. Thankyou.
• [Richard]: ‘As all it would take to refute my report (of being the first flesh and blood body to be actually free from the human condition) is a recorded instance – be it on paper, carved in stone, impressed into clay tablets, or painted on a cave wall, for example – of another flesh and blood body being so prior to 1992 it can be equally said that the evidence to the contrary is remarkably unforthcoming.
We have been down this path (of abstract logic) before, you and I, in previous discussions inasmuch as, similarly, the evidence that Mr. Edmund Hillary and Mr. Tenzing Norgay were not the first to have ascended Mt. Everest, on May 29 1953, has yet to be found ... to say, by way of illustration, that someone from Tibet/ Nepal/ Mongolia/ Wherever may have already done so 10/100/1000/10,000 years ago (and just never got around to informing their fellow human beings) is to also say they may not have done so, too, as the usage of ‘may’ in such an argument automatically includes ‘or may not’ when spelled-out in full.
As does the word ‘might’: for example, if a person were to argue that someone from, say, Outer Gondwanaland might have already been to the South Pole long before Mr Roald Amundsen travelled there they are also saying they might not have, too.
For an instance of spelling-out such an argument in full:
• [example only]: ‘Mr. Yuri Gagarin may, or may not, have been the first human being to leave the planet’s atmosphere. [end example].
And:
• [example only]: ‘Mr. Neil Armstrong might, or might not, have been the first human being to set foot on the moon. [end example].
In short: it is a variation on what is known as an agnostic argument (that nothing can ever be known with 100% certainty) such as what Mr. Karl Popper made popular and stems, as I understand it, from the occasion wherein, prior to the exploration of Australia’s west coast, all (European) swans were white ... meaning that, somewhere, somewhen, in an infinite and eternal universe a purple swan may very well exist.
Or not, of course, which is why, by and large, Mr. Karl Popper’s logic has been discarded as merely abstract and/or irrelevant and/or useless by many thoughtful human beings’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 53e, 3 November 2004).

RESPONDENT: To me what you were saying is that you are sensibly certain (not 100%/ godlike/ absolutic certain) that there is no God or afterlife.

RICHARD: Ha ... it is not an omniscient certainty, if that is what you mean by ‘godlike’, for that is what Mr. Karl Popper’s logic is based upon (no human can ever be all-knowing).

RESPONDENT: Speaking of the God and afterlife debate, I can easily see the ridiculousness of the idea of an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving Being.

RICHARD: Aye, the religionist versus rationalist debates, both on the internet and elsewhere, have flogged that topic to death via the ‘existence of evil’ dilemma.

RESPONDENT: As for an ‘afterlife’ I suppose there could be some small probability for a physical/ energetic ‘survival’ of some aspect of human consciousness.

RICHARD: About a year and a half ago someone posted reams and reams of words on this mailing list from a web site which proposed that an afterlife was to be found in the (theoretical) dark matter of the (mathematical) universe. Viz.:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘I had put in the list some subjects on metaphysical facts.
• [Richard]: ‘If you are referring to the 12, 027 words you copy-pasted from an after-death survivalist’s web site then you are using the word ‘facts’ very, very loosely ... so loosely that your usage of it is indistinguishable from what the word ‘beliefs’ commonly refers to.
For example, the author you quoted at length first proposes there are two bodies (the finite physical body which contains the brain that dies and an infinite etheric body which contains a mind which does not die) and two worlds (the physical world and an etheric world) and then proposes that etheric body/ mind is made-up of the sub-atomic particles of quantum theory and that etheric world is made-up of the missing dark matter of theoretical physics ... specifically the neutrino.
In short: an after-death abode which lies in an invisible nine-tenths of the universe.
Moreover the author then proposes that invisible universe is what is creating the visible universe:
• [Mr Michael Rolls]: ‘The great strength of the powerful materialists who control orthodox, scientific thinking is that they are banking on the fact that most people are not making an effort to understand even basic subatomic physics. Even a cursory glance at the subject shows that the physical universe is being produced from the invisible – the etheric universe’. [endquote].
As his proof for survival after death comes from materialisations of physically dead people via paranormal mediums I did not consider there was anything in what you copy-pasted to answer ... especially as nowhere on his web page did I see any mention of the meaning of life, peace on earth, happiness and harmlessness, freedom from malice and sorrow, or anything else of that ilk.
Not that those subjects are of particular interest to you, of course, but they are to me’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 44d, 15 September 2003).

RESPONDENT: It would not be ‘spiritual’, but rather a different manifestation of this physical universe. Now, since I don’t engage in believing, I am not proposing that I believe this (not only do I not, I never will again), just saying I don’t see the possibility or even need for an actualist to say with ‘100%’ certainty that such a course of events is impossible.

RICHARD: Oh, there is indeed the possibility to say that ... as for the need to: as more than a few peoples have been horrifically put to death (ostensibly so as to save their immortal souls) over the years, and as more than a few wars have been religious wars, there are certainly some very beneficial reasons to do so.

RESPONDENT: Of course, if my identity ever self-immolates, perhaps I would see things differently. Yet, I presently think I’d reject this ‘100% certain’ notion even after I had attained a actual freedom (or a virtual freedom for that matter). I’d simply say: ‘As for myself, I am sensibly certain that there is no God or afterlife, and that is that’.

RICHARD: Someone once earnestly said to me, quite a few years ago and after having utilised their interaction with me over many, many months to their advantage, that were they to become free they would never speak of it, never mention it to another, but go about living their life in humble obscurity (no doubt being strongly influenced by that ‘he who knows does not speak/he who speaks does not know’ aphorism).

Upon me saying it was just as well that was not the case with me, then (else they would never had even heard of such a freedom), there was a stunned silence.

May 17 2005

RESPONDENT: (...) If someone were to ask your offspring about you, what might they say?

RICHARD: I really do not know ... plus it would depend upon which one them it was who was asked (and, quite possibly, on how they were feeling about me at the time).

RESPONDENT: You’re not at all interested in their reply to such a question?

RICHARD: I am not at all interested in the reply to such a question from any of my fellow human beings, let alone those who happen to be my progeny, as the only person (or persons) that would be worth listening to, in this regard and on any such randomly chosen occasion, is nowhere to be found despite having travelled the country – and overseas – talking with many and varied peoples from many and varied walks of life; despite having watched television, videos, films, whatever media has been available; despite having scoured books, journals, magazines, newspapers, brochures and, latterly, the internet, for twenty five years now, for such a person (or persons).

Furthermore, since I went public on-line in 1997, there have been more than a few of my co-respondents who would be only too pleased to have me be in error that the already always existing peace-on-earth has been enabled for the very first time (as strange as that may seem) ... yet in those eight years not one of them has ever come back to me with a single instance where such a person (or persons) is to be located.

Even the (abstract) person purportedly already actually free from the human condition prior to 1992 – that conceptual creature whom more than a few intellectually challenged peoples are convinced must have an existence somewhere/ somewhen outside of their imagination – has remained remarkably elusive whenever wanted for whatever they might have to say.

There has been the odd occasion, of course, when a person putting in a brief appearance (so to speak) has been well worth listening to.

May 17 2005

RESPONDENT: It is of course very improbable that Trolls or a God exists.

RICHARD: Yet improbability is not proof per se, eh?

RESPONDENT: Yes, that’s what I was getting at.

RICHARD: As probability is not proof per se, either, then the score stands at nil-all.

*

RESPONDENT: (...) as you may have guessed this [a 100% certainty there is no God] does go into the Karl Popper view that 100% certainty is impossible for certain topics/ questions.

RICHARD: For certain topics/ questions ...yes (in an infinite and eternal and perpetual universe there just might be a one-eyed one-horned flying purple people-eater somewhere and somewhen); for the topic/ question of an afterlife/a deity ... no, not at all impossible.

RESPONDENT: Is this because the first example is something physical and the second not?

RICHARD: Not particularly ... it is mainly because the second example is something which is indeed possible for there to be 100% certainty about.

*

RESPONDENT: It seems to me that you did not entirely dismiss the Popperian view that some things cannot be known with 100% certainty.

RICHARD: The following may be of interest in this regard: (snip quote). In short: it [that some body or some thing or some event which may or may not/ might or might not have been/is being/ will be doing/ being or happening/ occurring or whatever wherever/whenever] is a variation on what is known as an agnostic argument (that nothing can ever be known with 100% certainty) such as what Mr. Karl Popper made popular and stems, as I understand it, from the occasion wherein, prior to the exploration of Australia’s west coast, all (European) swans were white ... meaning that, somewhere, somewhen, in an infinite and eternal universe a purple swan may very well exist. Or not, of course, which is why, by and large, Mr. Karl Popper’s logic has been discarded as merely abstract and/or irrelevant and/or useless by many thoughtful human beings’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 53e, 3 November 2004).

RESPONDENT: It is abstract, irrelevant, and useless in many ways. Its even absolutistic as well and yet it has a knack for being hard to fully disagree with as well.

RICHARD: As all it takes to knock any absolutistic principle for a six is but one exception to the rule you may find the following to be of interest (the very first occasion I had ever even heard of Mr. Karl Popper’s logic):

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘My background is science of the Popper kind. His basic assertion is, that we can never be certain about anything positive.
• [Richard]: ‘Well, he is wrong ... just like you. One thing you can be certain of is that you are going to die.
• [Co-Respondent]: ‘For no amount of positive evidence can prove a general statement.
• [Richard]: ‘Yes it can ... people are dying everywhere. There is not one single person alive today that is born more than 150 years ago. Ergo: every person’s inevitable death is an absolute and positive statement.
• [Co-Respondent]: ‘However, we CAN be certain of something negative, for only ONE counterexample is enough to disprove the generality of a general statement.
• [Richard]: ‘Yeah ... well it looks as if I have just given you something positive that you will never be able to give a ‘counterexample’ to, eh? For who do you know that is 60,000 plus years old? (Richard, Konrad Correspondence, Page One, 8 September 1998).

Just as a matter of interest ... here is the rather lame-duck response (of an avowed logician to a boy-from-the-farm’s pragmatism):

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘I was talking about the Popperian school of thinking. I did not say that I back it up. So here I agree with you. I agree that I was not clear enough in my dismissal of it. So this misunderstanding is my responsibility. No discussion. You are simply right here.
• [Richard]: ‘(...) you are ducking for cover as you made quite a big thing of this theory on the Mailing List last week (...)’. (Richard, Konrad Correspondence, Page Three, 9 September 1998).

*

RESPONDENT: As for an ‘afterlife’ I suppose there could be some small probability for a physical/ energetic ‘survival’ of some aspect of human consciousness.

RICHARD: About a year and a half ago someone posted reams and reams of words on this mailing list from a web site which proposed that an afterlife was to be found in the (theoretical) dark matter of the (mathematical) universe. Viz.: (snip quote).

RESPONDENT: Tis all very ‘fantastical’ stuff, is it not? While it *might* not be disprovable, it would be silly to believe in nonetheless.

RICHARD: It not only might be disprovable it is so easily done is it is a wonder you even contemplate it might not: as the word ‘consciousness’ refers to a flesh and blood body being conscious – the suffix ‘-ness’ forms a noun expressing a state or condition – it is as patently absurd to propose that some (undefined) aspect of a body being conscious physically survives that body’s demise in some (theorised) physical after-life as it does to propose that some (undefined) aspect of a body being conscious physically precedes that body’s conception in some (theorised) physical before-life ... in fact it is as blatantly ludicrous as proposing that the warmness of a body (the state or condition of a body being warm) continues to subsist forever even though a body be as cold as ice (as in a morgue).

For those peoples who are unable/incapable or unwilling/ disinclined to discern the difference between consciousness (the state or condition of a body being conscious) and identity – be it both/either the ego/self and/or the soul/spirit – then it would quite possibly be of no avail to point out that, as any such identity is born of the instinctual passions (genetically endowed at conception by blind nature as a rough and ready survival package), upon the cessation of all affections when the body dies so too does any identity formed thereof cease and that, therefore, death is the end, finish ... kaput.

For example:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘As you haven’t died physically yet, you cannot know what actually happens once you die until you die.
• [Richard]: ‘I beg to differ ... as there is no longer an identity (both ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul) inhabiting this body then when this body dies it is patently obvious that all what will happen is that this body will die.
Thus I can know what actually happens without having to die to find out.
• [Co-Respondent]: ‘So your belief that its the end – (ego ends) is based on belief but not on actual experience (...).
• [Richard]: ‘I am having some difficulty in following your line of reasoning ... as the identity in toto (both ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul) has already ended how can you then say that I have a belief that when this body dies the ego will end? (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 37, 4 November 2002a).

*

RESPONDENT: I think I will have to back off the ‘it’s not possible [to 100% prove a negative] line’ for that would just make me an absolutist non-absolutist.

RICHARD: Ha ... so endeth the epistemologists’ autocratic reign, eh?

RESPONDENT: It may be possible, I’m not there yet.

RICHARD: To allow that it *may* be possible is but the first step (away from it being not possible); to intellectually comprehend how it *is* possible is the next step (towards the actuality of the proof).

The third step is a cards-down misère.

May 27 2005

RESPONDENT No. 60: ... and its degree of likelihood [that I have not ruled it out that your condition is/was pathological] mysteriously increases when I am throwing a tantrum.

RICHARD: Okay ... what happened, then, between Saturday 5/03/2005 10:38 AM AEST and Friday 13/05/2005 12:47 PM AEST such as to set-off this latest tantrum?

RESPONDENT No. 60: Yet another instance of this: [‘Problems With The Method’; Monday 16/05/2005 4:40 AM AEST].

RICHARD: Okay ... what happened, then, between Saturday 5/03/2005 10:38 AM AEST and Friday 13/05/2005 12:47 PM AEST such as to set-off yet another instance of your problems with the actualism method?

RESPONDENT No. 60: Nothing happens to set off an instance of my problem with the method. Practising the method itself induces feelings that would not otherwise be present. All I have to do to is start asking myself ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’, and pretty soon it sets off the feedback loop I’ve written about several times now. This does not happen in daily life; it is caused by practising the method. I’ve just this minute been writing about this again here: [‘Re: Some questions on the method to all those practising/practised actualists’; Thursday 26/05/2005 3:36 PM AEST]. I’m no longer interested in practising the method (it’s got so bad that it’s almost like a strong conditioned response now ... ask the question, expect to have poisonous emotions pumping through your veins any minute now ... because it has happened every time). But I’m still very interested in why it is happening. Any ideas? Have you come across this before?

RESPONDENT: (...) I’d like to hear some reasonable explanation of why from a experienced actualist.

RICHARD: You have to be kidding, surely ... was the following not a clear enough warning for you to not even begin thinking about providing some reasonable explanation?

• [Respondent]: ‘Perhaps we are at different ‘places’ in our study/practice of actualism No. 60. As for myself, I already know actualism ‘works’ in making me happier and more harmless, even though I’ve got some work to do before I know it can deliver a virtual freedom ...
• [Respondent No. 60]: ‘Good luck, but it only appears to ‘work’ for people who have a track record of believing fervently in the highly improbable. For a good believer it can take decades to break the habit. For better or worse, I have never been a good believer, and it appears I never will be.
*Before you all reach for the keyboard and start typing* ‘actualism is not about belief, actualism is ...’, I know what the press release says, I’m just not buying it any more’. [emphasis added]. (Friday 13/05/2005 12:47 PM AEST).

Or, just in case you missed it because it was written to another, this one written only two days later is crystal-clear:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘I see the underlying backbone of the AF method as pure intent. You would conclude that the pure intent to become happy does not work to make you happy?
• [Respondent No. 60]: ‘That’s correct. It does not. *I can see what’s going to happen now though*. There will be a flurry of activity and a trawling through old postings to prove that No. 60 is stupid, No. 60 does not understand the method, No. 60 has not practiced it correctly, No. 60 contradicts himself, No. 60 is not sincere, No. 60 was always out for self-aggrandisement ... or something along those lines. Go for it guys. It will not be difficult to find evidence of No. 60’s shortcomings. We can then conclude that actualism rules, the method is absolutely fine, the problem is definitely with No. 60’. [emphasis added]. (Sunday 15/05/2005 5:22 PM AEST).

Although this one, being addressed specifically to you the following day, should have made it abundantly clear:

• [Respondent]: ‘From reading No. 60’s posts, I’ve never personally been surprised by his lack of success with the ‘method’.
• [Respondent No. 60]: ‘No. 68, *I knew someone would start making me out to be an idiot* who just can’t grasp what the method entails, but it is not the case’. [emphasis added]. (Monday 16/05/2005 5:04 AM AEST).

May 31 2005

RESPONDENT No. 60: ... and its degree of likelihood [that I have not ruled it out that your condition is/was pathological] mysteriously increases when I am throwing a tantrum.

RICHARD: Okay ... what happened, then, between Saturday 5/03/2005 10:38 AM AEST and Friday 13/05/2005 12:47 PM AEST such as to set-off this latest tantrum?

RESPONDENT No. 60: Yet another instance of this: [‘Problems With The Method’; Monday 16/05/2005 4:40 AM AEST].

RICHARD: Okay ... what happened, then, between Saturday 5/03/2005 10:38 AM AEST and Friday 13/05/2005 12:47 PM AEST such as to set-off yet another instance of your problems with the actualism method?

RESPONDENT No. 60: Nothing happens to set off an instance of my problem with the method. Practising the method itself induces feelings that would not otherwise be present. All I have to do to is start asking myself ‘How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?’, and pretty soon it sets off the feedback loop I’ve written about several times now. This does not happen in daily life; it is caused by practising the method. I’ve just this minute been writing about this again here: [‘Re: Some questions on the method to all those practising/practised actualists’; Thursday 26/05/2005 3:36 PM AEST]. I’m no longer interested in practising the method (it’s got so bad that it’s almost like a strong conditioned response now ... ask the question, expect to have poisonous emotions pumping through your veins any minute now ... because it has happened every time). But I’m still very interested in why it is happening. Any ideas? Have you come across this before?

RESPONDENT: [As a guess, I’d have to say you’re too ‘normal’ to be ‘a lone freak in regards to this problem. This will come up again, I think]. I’d like to hear some reasonable explanation of why from a experienced actualist.

RICHARD: You have to be kidding, surely ... were the following [quotes which particularly make abundantly clear that the only acceptable responses will be of a kind in accord with the contention there is something amiss with the method itself] not a clear enough warning for you to not even begin thinking about providing some reasonable explanation?

RESPONDENT: While wishing to know why another is having problems with the method may seem unrelated to my own practice of actualism, in this case I’ve had some experiences that mirror No. 60’s.

RICHARD: As your co-respondent has since explained to another that to ask themself, each moment again, how they are experiencing this moment of being alive is to [quote] ‘have some bloody algorithm mechanically running through my head’ [endquote] – which they hate, resent and rebel against such as to induce poisonous emotions to pump, that would not otherwise be present, in a downward spiralling feedback loop somewhat akin to holding a microphone against amplified loudspeakers – has any light been thrown upon your mirrored experiences?

For this is what a dictionary has to say:

• ‘algorithm: a procedure or set of rules for calculation or problem-solving, now esp. with a computer’. (Oxford Dictionary).

RESPONDENT: 1) Asking HAIETMOBA at times seems to create irritation that was not present before I asked it. Yesterday, I wondered why not just simply say to oneself: ‘I’m experiencing (then focus on what your feeling and then verbally label what you find) irritation (just an example). Or ‘I’m feeling sad’ instead of asking HAIETMOBA and then saying ‘I’m feeling anxiety’ after that. I find it difficult to run the question while doing certain tasks at work, mainly from its whopping 16 syllables going threw my head while I try to think through or do something.

RICHARD: I have located the following text:

• [Respondent]: ‘The whole phrase seems like a lot when I’m doing something at times.
• [Richard]: ‘It is a question, not a phrase to be memorised and repeated slogan-like (or as if chanting a mantra for instance), and it soon becomes a non-verbal attitude to life ... a wordless approach each moment again whereupon one cannot be anything else but [affectively] aware of one’s every instinctual impulse/ affective feeling, and thus self-centred thought, as it is happening’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 68, 26 April 2004).

RESPONDENT: 2) Sometimes I just feel ‘shitty’, but I can’t pin point it as irritation (anger), anxiety (fear), or sadness (sorrow). What to do?

RICHARD: All it takes is to trace back to when feeling awful began, ascertain what happened to trigger it off, see how silly it is to have such an event as that (no matter what it is) hijack the enjoyment and appreciation of simply being alive, and thus recommence feeling good once more.

RESPONDENT: If I keep trying to figure it out, I usually feel worse.

RICHARD: I have located the following text:

• [Richard]: ‘(...) any analysing and/or psychologising and/or philosophising whilst one is in the grip of debilitating feelings usually does not achieve much (other than spiralling around and around in varying degrees of despair and despondency or whatever) anyway’. (Richard, Articles, This Moment of Being Alive).

What the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago would do is first get back to feeling good and then, and only then, suss out where, when, how, why – and what for – feeling bad happened as experience had shown ‘him’ that it was counter-productive to do otherwise.

What ‘he’ always did however, as it was often tempting to just get on with life then, was to examine what it was all about within half-an-hour of getting back to feeling good (while the memory was still fresh) even if it meant sometimes falling back into feeling bad by doing so ... else it would crop up again sooner or later.

Nothing, but nothing, can be swept under the carpet.

RESPONDENT: So, sometimes I just accept that I can’t label the feeling and go on with life (why ruin this only moment of living?).

RICHARD: But you did label the feeling ... here:

• [Respondent]: ‘Sometimes I just feel ‘shitty’ ...’. [endquote].

RESPONDENT: While it seems No. 60 has more frequent and intense reactions from HAIETMOBA, I can relate to some extent.

RICHARD: Well now ... if one turns an otherwise very simple query (‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’) into being a computer-like procedure or set of rules for problem-solving, and then hate, resent, and rebel against that, what else can one expect but frequent and intense reactions?

RESPONDENT: While, I’ve had a easier time shortening the question to ‘how am I feeling?’ I’ve chosen to ‘stick it out’ with the original method to possibly figure ‘why’ I have a problem with it ‘as it stands’. Oh, how I wish it to become a ‘nonverbal approach to life’! (whatever that means).

RICHARD: It means that the words ‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’ simply refer to the make-up of the attentiveness awareness-cum-attentiveness method being applied ... as distinct from, say, the buddhistic ‘mindfulness’ (which is another ball-game entirely).

In other words the focus is upon how identity in toto is standing in the way of the already always existing peace-on-earth being apparent just here right now.

RESPONDENT: Does that mean that the question eventually ‘stops’ as you’re always attentive to your experience?

RICHARD: Yes (it is that simple).

RESPONDENT: While, I consider your description of how you experience life to not only be perfect and peerless, that does not negate problems on my part in getting there.

RICHARD: Okay ... basically the question ‘how am I experiencing this moment of being alive’ means ‘what is preventing a pure consciousness experience (PCE) from happening at this moment?’ Or, to put it another way, ‘what is preventing the already always existing peace-on-earth (as evidenced in the PCE) from being apparent?

Perfect peace and harmony is just here – right now – for the very asking.

*

RESPONDENT: I find it odd that you were in VF for only 6 months and P and V have been in it for 7 years.

RICHARD: Whereas I find it more than merely encouraging that they have not lost interest and dropped out of it, discarded it, turned their backs on it, spurned it, and so forth (as some others have done) ... I am pleasantly surprised, on each occasion we meet, that it is all still happening so delightfully for them.

Given it is without precedent (being entirely new to human experience/human history), and that it all hangs on just one human being’s experience so far, is it any wonder I would respond as follows to a related query?

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Do you find it curious that after all these years there is only a small handful of Actualists?
• [Richard]: ‘No ... I am pleasantly surprised that there be so many’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 23, 14 July 2001).

RESPONDENT: If they don’t become AF within the next 3 years, well, something would seem amiss to me.

RICHARD: Whereas if they are still virtually free in three years that would be even more pleasantly surprising to me.

RESPONDENT: It’s a little strange even at this point.

RICHARD: One of the first things I said to my then companion, after the breakthrough into an actual freedom from the human condition in 1992, was that it was quite likely, if not more than likely, that all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides would still be happening as I lay upon my death-bed (circa 100 or so years of age) as the evidence of history is that human beings, as a generalisation, do not embrace change easily ... let alone radical change.

Quite frankly, given the startling lack of precedent, I do not find it strange at all.

RESPONDENT: One thing that I find helpful, which I think others miss is the investigation process brings up lifestyle choices that I will need to change in order to accelerate this process.

RICHARD: Aye, lifestyle changes can indeed be of assistance on occasion ... where sensibly applicable (and not reactionarily so).

RESPONDENT: For example, the Detroit Piston’s are in the playoffs. It’s quite certain to me that being a sport’s fan causes much suffering (irritation/anxiety) in my life at this time of year. So, the sport’s fan identity must be eliminated (just like the identities of being a lover, son, social worker, best friend, liberal, etc.).

RICHARD: I went to a semi-final football match once in Melbourne, Australia, in my early twenties, just for the experience and sat amongst 80,000+ peoples: although I did not know which team was which, and was not at all concerned one way or the other which won the game, I was able to feel the intensity of ‘the roar of the crowd’ coming in waves and thus can recall the attraction to such events.

The last occasion I was ever to feel such an intensity of emotion was in New Delhi, India, at the funeral procession of the recently deceased political leader Ms. Indira Gandhi: after waiting for ages amongst a dense crowd of peoples for the motorcade to drive by I was able to ascertain, long before visually sighting it over the heads of others, its imminent arrival by a rising wave of passion in the crowds lining the motorway way to my right as it approached, reaching a crescendo as it passed by to the immediate front, and ebbing away as it passed on to my left.

It was only then that I was finally able to fully understand how mob violence can so easily take over in otherwise decent, intelligent human beings.

May 31 2005

RESPONDENT No. 60: (...) These possibilities exist; they are not of my making.

RICHARD: Sure ... the possibility that this flesh and blood body was unknowingly abducted by aliens whilst in deep sleep, and subjected to anal probes such as to occasion pure intent for the identity within, with a resultant six month or so virtual freedom, and a final psychic dissolution, also exists. And that possibility is not of my making (someone seriously suggested it to me, face-to-face, many years ago).

RESPONDENT: LOL. :) That’s a good one.

RICHARD: It was back in 1997, upon initially going on-line with a three-page web site containing some of the first rough drafts of a collection of miscellaneous articles eventually strung-together and published under the title ‘Richard’s Journal’, when being entirely green about matters electronic (I considered getting some of the folding stuff out of an ATM to be quite a major achievement at the time) I enlisted the help of someone whom could perhaps best be described as a computer-nerd to facilitate my comprehension of the processes involved.

In the course of so doing they fell to skimming through what was then on offer and were particularly taken by my then-usage of the term ‘lizard-brain’ to denote the primeval collection of nerve-endings more properly known as the brain-stem and spoke most solemnly about the ‘Lizard People’ (and later sent me reams of stuff by Mr. David Icke, whose latest convention they had just recently attended in a major nearby city, and a couple of URL’s).

At the computer technician’s urging I looked through the content of some of what Mr. David Icke had published (at least ten books) and read up on him on the Internet. Although he too talked of the lizard brain any similarity with what I was referring to ends abruptly. He was what could/would be classified as a PCT (Paranoid Conspiracy Theorist). He was also a charismatic public speaker of the ‘Motivational Guru’ type so prevalent in the US. Basically, the world is being run/ manipulated by the ‘lizard people’ disguised as human beings. The day is coming when they will peel of their human skin and reveal their true form: lizard-bodied aliens.

I kid you not.

‘Twas the ‘Illuminato’ thing of yore re-discovered (an even nuttier variation on the ‘Freemasons’/ ‘Club of Rome’ type of thing) … and David Icke’s solution was a combination of consciousness raising and applied love. His ‘Bridge Of Love’ web page was particularly informative … and had a manufactured picture of the current monarch of the UK and associated countries with a partly revealed ‘lizard face’ showing from underneath. He channelled (??) information/ intuitions from aliens and thus had privileged access to what was really going on … I will include some excerpts gleaned from the Internet (further below) back then which give some idea of what motivated him and his modus operandi. For example (in his own words):

• [quote]: ‘(...) this was told to me on March 29th 1990: ‘He [David Icke] is a healer who is here to heal the earth and he will be world famous. He will face enormous opposition, but we will always be there to protect him. He is still a child spiritually, but he will be given the spiritual riches. Sometimes he will say things and wonder where they came from. They will be our words. Knowledge will be put into his mind, and at other times he will be led to knowledge (...) he has been tested and has passed all the tests (...) he had to learn how to cope with disappointment, experience all the emotions, and how to get up and get on with it. The spiritual way is tough and no-one makes it easy. We know he wanted us to contact him, but the time wasn’t right. He was led here to be contacted (...) one man can communicate the message that will change the world. He will write five books in three years. Politics is not for him. He is too spiritual. Politics is anti-spiritual (...) in 20 years [in 2010] there will be a different kind of flying machine, very different from the aircraft of today. Time will have no meaning. Where you want to be, you will be. There will be great earthquakes. These will come as a warning to the human race. They will occur in places that have never experienced them. Taking oil from the seabed is destabilising the inner earth. The centre of the earth will move and the poles will change. The sea spirits will rise and stop men taking oil. The sea will reclaim the land and humans will see that they cannot do these terrible things. They cannot abuse the elements. They have to be treated with respect’ [end quote].

He spoke of ‘Truth Vibrations’ and the ‘Great Awakening’ or the ‘Great Transformation’ that was to happen world-wide in the succeeding ten years ... plus he had just recently aligned himself with an African Shaman.

All in all a fascinating character ... needless is to add that the computer technician saw me as one of those ‘Lizard People’ come to take over the world? They already knew from what I had written that the breakthrough into an actual freedom from the human condition (read ‘transformation into a lizard person’) had happened in a secluded side-glen, of the main valley hosting the main arm of a meandering river running through the mountain ranges hereabouts, and informed me that they would often go far up into the valley, where they had a flat-roofed cottage in the steep and forested hills (purportedly replete with fairies and elves), and lie back spread-eagled on the roof at night endeavouring to communicate with and be abducted by the aliens.

I was further informed that there was a considerable group of specially-chosen peoples in them thar hills maintaining near-constant contact and that the end of the world as we knew it was nigh ... hence the computer technician seriously suggesting to me, face-to-face those many years ago, that this flesh and blood body had been unknowingly abducted by aliens, whilst in deep sleep, and subjected to anal probes such as to occasion my full transformation into a lizard person (aka breakthrough into an actual freedom from the human condition) in the aforementioned valley.

I detail all this as there have been many and varied other (conceptual) possibilities, that many and various other peoples have put to me over the years, other than just this latest rehash of the congenital/ acquired neurological disease/illness (conceptual) possibility already discussed in detail with another on this mailing list last December/January.

I can only guess that the simple fact the complete elimination of the entire affective faculty (which includes its intuitive/ imaginative facility) was deliberatively, and with knowledge aforethought, sought for primarily as a direct result of war-time experiences upon having just recently had a four-hour pure consciousness experience (PCE) – which demonstrated beyond any doubt whatsoever that the solution to all the wars (and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and suicides and so on) was already always just here right now – is far too prosaic a causal agency to be comprehended as being what really happened to make apparent the already always existing peace-on-earth in this current era.

You see, unless it be an esoteric, or in any other way recondite, reason it is too close to the bone ... if a normal person with a normal birth, a normal upbringing, a normal schooling, a normal job, a normal spouse, a normal house, a normal family, and all the rest, can become actually free from the human condition solely by their own dedication then so too can any other normal person.

‘Tis far safer to propose all manner of special reasons beyond the reach of normal people (in that it allows the proposer to carry on being normal).

July 26 2005

RESPONDENT: Richard, would it be correct to say that while you can experience physical pain, you still cannot suffer, as suffering requires a ‘sufferer’?

RICHARD: Yes ... and that observation goes someway towards explaining the query you report as having burnt within you 10 days ago:

• [Respondent]: ‘If there can be thoughts w/o a thinker as the actualist’s say, why can’t there be feelings w/o the feeler (...)? (Saturday 16/07/2005 9:47 AM AEST).

The following may be of assistance:

• [Richard]: ‘As animals other than the human animal display this ‘fright-freeze-fight-flee’ instinctually passionate reaction it is patently obvious that the feeling self [aka soul] is primal and the thinking self [aka ego] derivative ... and that the thinking self is, fundamentally, affective in substance. Moreover, there is some evidence that awareness of being this primordial ‘self’ – as in ‘self’-consciousness – has arisen in other animals: the chimpanzee, for example, can recognise its image in a mirror as being itself and not another of its species (such as the canary does for instance) and there are preliminary reports that the same may be happening for the dolphin.
Further to the point, as the essential affective feelings are in situ before thought first arises in infancy – a baby is born already feeling – it becomes even more obvious that the feeler, as an embryonic feeling being, is innate in sentient beings ... that the already existing basic set of survival passions form themselves into being the intuitive presence which, at root, is what any ‘me’ ultimately is long before the thinker comes into being.
Any and all conditioning, be it familial, societal, peer-group, or environmental imprinting, needs substance to latch onto, sink into, and be ... it all washes off a clean slate like water off a duck’s back.
Innocence is something entirely new to human experience’. (Richard, List B, No. 12r, 16 January 2003).

August 25 2005

RESPONDENT No. 96: Dear friends, here we have to dill with a strwnge phenomenon. Mr.Richard is saying that his was enlightened and he thought he was the parussia.In his own words. Then he met another person that was saying he was the parussia as well,and he said is impossible to be two parussias.Is like some craisy in the mental hospital saying he is Napoleon the grait and then he founds another one saying he is also Napoleon the grait.,so is not possible to be two Napoleons.....I have read about many so called enlightened persons,but nobody said I am Jessus or,this or that. The person,Mr.Richard was in halussination. I think nobody who read about Krishnamurti,Nisargadatta Maharaj etc,nobody said I am this or that. He(Mr.Richard) claims that he was enligntened for so many years,but he was just in one self deciving,halussinating state.

RICHARD: You may find a kindred soul at the following URL: [snip link]. Just in case you cannot access that link the essence of it is as follows: ‘(...) AF for me is the product of a failing enlightenment. Richard wrote me that he was the ‘parousia’and met another that was in the same state, so he thought two can not be Jesus and gave up. It reminds me of a person that things he is Napoleon the grate and meets another person, who things he is Napoleon as well and the most logical of them gives up. Was the state Richard was, one enlighened state? Or one religious psychosis? Till now, when I was reading about enlightenment, I never found one to be Jesus, unless he was in a state of psychosis, because that is what the Greek word ‘parousia’means,the second representation of Jesus. That means he was not enlightened. He is lucky he escaped the psychosis’. [endquote]. (Respondent No. 44, Thursday 15/07/2004 7:19 AM AEST). (see Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 96, 24 August 2005a).

CO-RESPONDENT: Richard, you thought you were Jesus when you were enlightened?

RICHARD: Another co-respondent gained a similar misconstruction from reading only the above quote. Viz.:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘... Richard himself destroyed all his writings during his enlightenment time, that is, when he thought to be the Paraclete (an appellation of the Holy Ghost).
• [Richard]: ‘If you could provide the text, with an appropriate reference, wherein Richard said he thought to be the Paraclete – a god spiritually, as distinct from fleshly, active in the world – for the eleven years 1981 to 1992 it would be most appreciated.
Incidentally, Richard burnt all what he had written, in that period, post-enlightenment/ awakenment ... not during’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 89a, 13 May 2005).

The word Parousia – ‘Greek = presence (of persons), from pareinai be present’ (Oxford Dictionary) – in Christian Theology, and as distinct from the word Paraclete, refers to the Second Advent (aka the second coming) of the Christ (aka the Anointed One) on earth and is derived from the Latin ‘Christus’, from the Greek ‘Khristos’ (meaning ‘anointed’), from ‘khriein’ (anoint), as a translation from the Hebrew ‘masiah’ (Messiah) and refers to ‘The Messiah or Lord’s Anointed of Jewish tradition’ according to the Oxford Dictionary. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 98, 25 August 2005).

RESPONDENT: So being the Parousia is being the Christ. Correct?

RICHARD: By virtue of it being a Greek translation of the Hebrew written form of the Aramaic for ‘Messiah’ ... yes (which is why, despite ecumenicalism, the festering sore betwixt the two religions is incurable).

*

CO-RESPONDENT: If you don’t won’t to recount the whole thing could you just point me to a place where this is discussed on the site?

RICHARD: Here is where the above beat-up stems from:

• [Richard]: ‘If you were to re-read what you have quoted (further above) you will see that it is [quote] ‘an emotional play in a fertile imagination’ [endquote] which is fuelled by an actual hormonal substance ... and there is no way that an emotional play in a fertile imagination is, as you make out, actual (as in your ‘and are actual’ conclusion).
To give an obvious example: for about a week, in the early days of being enlightened, I was ‘The Parousia’ and it was not until I met another person who was similarly afflicted that it dawned upon me it was but an emotional play in a fertile imagination ... there was sufficient rationality operating to comprehend there could not be two (simultaneous) manifestations of the ‘Second Coming’ ... (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 44g, 8 July 2004a).

RESPONDENT: So from the above it seems you are saying you felt/believed yourself to be the second coming of CHRIST. Is that correct?

RICHARD: It is an inherent knowing – intrinsic to the transcendental state of being popularly known as spiritual enlightenment/ mystical awakenment – that one is the expected saviour of humankind (by whatever name) ... had I been raised in a different culture (a buddhistic society for example) the nomenclature would have been different (the Maitreya for example).

*

RICHARD: ... • [Richard]: ‘Incidentally, this other person was far more deluded than I was ... they had manifested the typical stigmata’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 44g, 8 July 2004a1).

RESPONDENT: Either one is very delusional.

RICHARD: Aye ... except that whilst the one receives professional treatment for an illness the other receives reverence and/or adoration (thus having a far-reaching life-or-death influence on entire nations).

There is no prize for guessing which one of the two is the most dangerous.

*

RICHARD: And that is it, in its entirety, written to a person on record as saying they use Greek in their everyday vocabulary. So as to clarify this whole business I will re-post the following:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘What do you make of Krishnamurti’s dying statement that a great energy used his body and such an energy will not re-appear for many years?
• [Richard]: ‘He was accurately and correctly reporting his experience. That Christianity has their Parousia; that Buddhism has their Maitreya; that Islam has their Mahdi; that Hinduism has their Kalki; that Judaism has their Messiah; that Taoism has their Kilin and so on all comes from the same type of experience.
It is part and parcel of being enlightened (‘I Am That’ or ‘That Thou Art’).
• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Was he delusional by any chance?
• [Richard]: ‘All enlightened beings are deluded ... the altered state of consciousness (ASC) known as spiritual enlightenment is a delusional state. I am not ‘guru-bashing’ Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti per se ... it is the ASC itself I am targeting.
I can use the accredited writings of virtually any enlightened being to demonstrate my points’. (Richard, List B, No. 33d, 23 January 2001).

All what a person does, when they liken the enlightened/ awakened experience of being the Parousia, the Maitreya, the Mahdi, the Kalki, the Messiah, the Kilin, and so on, to a patient in a psychiatric ward thinking they be Mr. Napoleon Bonaparte (or Ms. Marie Antoinette or whoever), is to air their ignorance of matters transcendental in public. It is not a strange (as in atypical) phenomenon at all.

RESPONDENT: Working in the mental health field, and experiencing spiritual illumination for varying amounts of time not more than 4-6 hours ‘straight’, and no more than about 10 hours in any day) I recognize the difference of being illuminated and believing that one is illuminated and hence understand the distinction you draw in your example.

RICHARD: Good ... it is not a little thing we are doing here, on this mailing list, discussing such matters.