Actual Freedom ~ Frequently Asked Questions

RICHARD: The following exchange may be helpful in this regard:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Surely there are patterns associated with your reflectivity. You tend to reflect on things in a certain way, and I have a different tendency. Does not that tendency define your identity? Or do you have no such tendency?
• [Richard]: ‘I certainly have that tendency ... and I revel in it. These are attributes, traits, quirks, idiosyncrasies, features, peculiarities, flavours, mannerisms, gestures and so on. They are not the ‘thing-in-itself’.

And:

• [Co-Respondent]: ‘Your awareness remains associated with your body whilst mine remains associated with mine. As the circumstances change around you surely there is something that remains the same, that defines you as you, and as separate to me. It is that claim of yours to have no identity I was wanting to chip away at, and am wanting to again.
• [Richard]: ‘It is the flesh and blood body that remains the same (with due allowance for the aging process) and defines Richard as Richard and you as you. The flesh and blood body’s characteristics (attributes, traits, quirks, idiosyncrasies, features, peculiarities, flavours, mannerisms, gestures and so on) tend to stay the same ... but characteristics do not necessarily have to define an identity as being a ‘thing-in-itself’.

RESPONDENT: That is, if the f&b b (can I refer to this as a person for now?) liked telling jokes, would the person still like this after the identity has died?

RICHARD: I like to joke and I laugh a lot – there is so much that is irrepressibly humorous about life itself – and what has changed is that the joking and laughing is not malicious (as in spiteful, for instance) and/or sorrowful (as in lugubrious, for example).

‘Tis a remarkable change, by the way, and not some minor thing.

RESPONDENT: Is it physically draining to be enlightened?

RICHARD: It can be ... especially when interacting with others as the transmission of love, and the intensity of compassion, consumes an inordinate amount of psychic energy. Roaming alone in nature was not as draining, however, as it was mostly affective energy ... although it must be said that there was 7-8 hours of sleep and three meals a day back then (as contrasted to 3-4 or 4-5 hours of sleep and one meal a day plus a snack now).

RESPONDENT: Was there a change in your general or subtle state of health after AF?

RICHARD: I have had what is called a healthy constitution all my life – I very rarely had the need of doctors – so I cannot readily point to any specific change other than the marked absence of any psychosomatic ailments.

I can still come down with colds and flu’s, for example, although nowhere as near as often or as severe.

RESPONDENT: It seems like a load is taken off my nervous system or something in a PCE.

RICHARD: Indeed ... the entire load, in fact, which absence of stress can only have the effect of ensuring a more healthy immune system.

RESPONDENT: 1 – The ‘something turning over the nape’ was when you were enlightened in 1981 or so, correct?

RICHARD: Correct ... and it was of the nature that it would never, ever, turn back again.

RESPONDENT: When you ended the second self (or when it ended), was there any physical brain sensation?

RICHARD: Yes ... an intense pressure-pain in the base of the brain/nape of the neck which continued, with varying intensities, for 30+ months.

RESPONDENT: What was the nature of your life during this 30+ months?

RICHARD: It was of the nature of an actual freedom from the human condition ... put briefly: as a flesh and blood body only (sans identity in toto) it was epitomised by apperception.

RESPONDENT: Would you have claimed to be free during this period?

RICHARD: I spoke to nobody about it in those terms during that period (other than my then companion, of course, as she was witness to all that occurred) as it took some time for all the implications and ramifications of what had happened to sort themselves out.

I had, and have, no interest in leading my fellow human being astray with hasty appraisals and/or ill-founded diagnoses.

RESPONDENT: Free from concepts, illusions and delusions?

RICHARD: Free from illusion and delusion ... yes; concepts are another matter, however, as many of them were fed in from an early age (the sun, for instance, being a giant ball of nuclear fusion ... or, for another example, tobacco use being the cause of various illnesses).

RESPONDENT: Do you think if anybody were to become free from the condition through the bypass (via virtual freedom shortcutting the enlightenment), can you hazard a guess on the nature of the process?

RICHARD: It would be both a lot easier and a lot less traumatic (if at all) – it is incredibly difficult to escape from the massive delusion that spiritual enlightenment is – as there is now both a precedent and a detailed report/description/explanation available of both a virtual freedom and an actual freedom.

*

RESPONDENT: 2 – You have mentioned that you took DSM-IV or a psychiatric appraisal; were you ever interested in a MRI or relevant brain scans …

RICHARD: One of the professionals in the field that I consulted was initially keen to have an fMRI scan done but when I rigorously enquired as to why – as in what purpose it would serve – they could come up with no satisfactory answer.

RESPONDENT: And if done, though they haven’t located the self, would you think you will be aiding the research?

RICHARD: In what way would a brain scan be an aid ... and an aid to what? For example: what do you mean by ‘relevant’ and what do you mean by ‘the research’ (as in relevant to what specific research)?

I only ask because, as far as I have been able to ascertain, nobody has ever contemplated – let alone conducted research – on there even being a possibility of becoming actually free from the human condition ... it is a blank area in human consideration (let alone in human experience/human history).

RESPONDENT: Maybe measure the amygdala activity?

RICHARD: Presuming there is any such activity to measure ... in what way would that be an aid (and an aid to what research)?

RESPONDENT: I don’t know much about the scans, but I thought since you are a singular case, some such measurements can provide some pointers to those (just like the brain circuitry examples in the writings).

RICHARD: Presuming there is any such measurement-pointers to those (presumed) activities ... in what way would that be an aid (and an aid to what research)?

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RESPONDENT: Do you think comparing scans of normal being like myself with yours reveal useful information?

RICHARD: Again ... in what way would such a comparison reveal useful information? Or, to put that another way, what is it that you know about ‘MRI or relevant brain scans’ which prompts you to ask these questions?

What I have found, when people ask this question/suggest this course of action (including the professional already mentioned), is that they know very little about what brain scans can or cannot reveal ... if anything at all.

RESPONDENT: I am not sure of what use they might be ... just thought that as a supplement to the DSM IV, maybe.

RICHARD: The DSM-IV (the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders – fourth edition – the diagnostic criteria used by all psychiatrists and psychologists around the world for diagnosing mental disorders) is only about illness, not wellness.

RESPONDENT: Just to take a snapshot with all those parameters alpha, beta etc. Maybe in the future there might be enough understanding to make sense of the data.

RICHARD: Make some sense of the (presumed) data for what purpose, though?

ALAN: I have had three protracted periods (1-2 weeks) when I experienced the same as Richard: 3-4 hours sleep per day was all that was required; much reduced intake of food. I would guess the reason for this is that the body is operating to its optimum. No ‘self’ requiring large amounts of energy to fuel its requirements. Richard, do you notice any increase in either food or sleep after engaging in extra physical activity?

RICHARD: Being retired and on a pension I lead a sedentary lifestyle so I cannot report with any on-going surety. However, some months ago I became physically active in the back garden for a few weeks: building a concrete-block retaining wall; wheelbarrowing in 3-4 cubic metres of sub-soil and top-soil and mulch from where a delivery truck had dumped it at the front of the house; laying the foundations and building a wooden decking; erecting a pre-fabricated gazebo and various associated physical tasks (hammering, sawing, drilling, screwing and so on). Apart from an initial shortness of breath (which is to be expected due to the indolent lifestyle) there was neither an increase in sleep requirements nor food intake. Also, after the first two-three days the ready shortness of breath disappeared ... which is my experience upon taking up cycling again after any prolonged period of not cycling.

Normally my daily or on-going exercise regime involves manipulating the TV remote control with my left hand whilst raising the coffee-cup to my lips with the right hand (when not partaking of vigorous sexual exercise that is).

Plus a stroll into the village centre now and then.

ALAN: I was also intrigued that the decrease in sleep and food requirements did not occur during your ‘enlightened’ period.

RICHARD: Being the embodiment of Love Agapé and Divine Compassion does require more than a little calorific-energy and night-time repose to maintain (despite them being ‘not of the body’) ... plus the brain requires considerable calorific energy and night-time repose to support the Universal Mind (despite it being ‘a non-material mind’). Apart from that ... night-time dreaming continued to occur during that entire period (except for a three-week period in the third year which prompted an intensive investigation into the whole business of dreaming per se wherein I tracked down the dreaming entity over the ensuing years in the same way one tracks down the waking entity). All-in-all the four states of consciousness were fully functioning as is exemplified by other people’s reports of the workings of the ASC known as spiritual enlightenment.

Also, the libido was still functioning all through that period (primarily fuelling the delusion).

RESPONDENT No. 94: Do you experience hunger?

RICHARD: No (all appetitive desires are null and void).

RESPONDENT: If you don’t eat for a day or two, there would be certain sensations in your body which are usually classified as hunger by normal humans.

RICHARD: The bodily sensation of an empty stomach is not what is usually classified as hunger by normal humans – and it does not take a day or two of not eating anyway but only a few hours – as what is usually classified by normal humans as hunger is a feeling of being hungry which arises from that sensation ... which feeling desists (in normal humans) when replaced by a feeling of satiety which arises from the sensation of a full stomach after having eaten.

I have quite often gone without food for twenty four hours or more yet have never, ever, experienced hunger.

RESPONDENT: Appetitive desires are something different.

RICHARD: On the contrary, hunger *is* an appetitive desire.

RESPONDENT: Richard, I was wondering if you have experientially noticed whether or not your body responds more favourably towards certain foods. It would seem common sense to me that if one is serious about becoming free one would want all the vitality possible in order to fuel this pursuit.

RICHARD: I have indeed noticed whether or not I respond more favourably towards certain foods (in terms of being able to have all the vitality possible in order to become actually free from the human condition) .... else I would never have written the following:

• [Richard]: ‘The words and writings promulgated and promoted by The Actual Freedom Trust explicate the workings of an actual freedom from the human condition and a virtual freedom in practice in the market place. There is no meditating in silence or living in a monastery shut away from the world. There are no celibacy or obedience requirements. There are *no dietary demands* or daily regimes of exercise. No one is excluded by age or racial or gender origins. There are no prescribed books to study ... upwards of maybe two million words are available [in the year 2000] for free on The Actual Freedom Web Page. There are no courses to follow or therapies to undergo or workshops to endure. There are no fees to pay or any clique to join ... there are no rules at all’. [emphasis added].

I expressly mentioned what provides all the vitality possible (‘energises’ = ‘vitalises’) only the day before you posted this e-mail I am responding to:

• [Richard]: ‘If there is no vital interest in peace-on-earth, or were that vital interest to fade away such that the pure intent to attain to one’s destiny dissipates, then the actualism method would fail, or begin to fail, like any other action done within the human condition as it is the end which energises the means (and which is why the means needs not to be dissimilar from the end) (...) the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago had that magic elixir (so to speak) by the bucket-load for the meaning of life had become stunningly apparent in that 1980 PCE which set the entire process in motion ... peace-on-earth is a fringe-benefit, a side-effect, of living in this actual world’.

And the following has been re-posted twice this week by others (‘vivacity’ = ‘vitality’):

• [Richard]: ‘(...) To live a virtual freedom one knowingly and deliberately imitates the actual inasmuch as is possible given that one is still human. It is the pure intent to ingenuously live the actual that imbues virtual freedom with its feeling of perfection and subsequent delight and joy. To be without this connection betwixt naiveté and the perfection of the infinitude of this very material universe, then any freedom loses its dynamism, its lustre, its brilliance, its vivacity ... ’.

(...)

RESPONDENT: I am surprised that your body seemingly is equally vital, no matter what you ingest (that is what I gather from your above requotes).

RICHARD: I never said that I was equally vital (seemingly or otherwise) no matter what I ingest ... I was speaking in terms of an identity having [quote] ‘all the vitality possible’ [endquote], in order for an actual freedom from the human condition to come about, as I was answering your query to that very effect.

To explain: the identity in residence all those years ago had me ingest all manner of different diets (such as vegetarianism, veganism, and fruitarianism, for instance), in place of the common or garden variety of omnivorism prevalent in mainstream western societies, and it made absolutely no difference – none whatsoever – in regards to ‘him’ having [quote] ‘all the vitality possible’ [endquote] so as to bring about an actual freedom from the human condition for me.

In other words, ‘he’ could have put me on a bread-and-water diet (as in solitary confinement in some insalubrious penitentiary) and yet, because there was that ‘magic elixir’ energising the means, ‘he’ would still have had all the vitality necessary – bucket-loads of it in fact – in order for an actual freedom from the human condition to come about for me

Put simply: ‘you’ are not the body ‘you’ are inhabiting – never have been and never will be – despite any and all attempts to identify as same.

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P.S.: Just so that there is no misunderstanding:

• [Richard]: ‘I am having so much fun here at the keyboard. I have arrived at my destiny and am already always here (...).
• [Co-respondent]: ‘If you have arrived at your ‘destiny’ you should know that you have arrived at the height of your self-invented illusion.
• [Richard]: ‘May I ask? Are you of that school of thought that says that the journey is the thing ... that one never arrives?
• [Co-respondent]: ‘Destiny? What is that?
• [Richard]: ‘Destination, of course. Which is here ... now. Where one is living at this moment in eternal time and this place in infinite space one is experiencing the purity and perfection of the infinitude of this very actual universe. One is this universe’s experience of itself as a sensate and reflective human being. This is one’s destiny’.

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RESPONDENT: How does the extinction of that survival package [blind nature’s rough and ready survival package] translate at the level of brain architecture?

RICHARD: Presuming that by [quote] ‘brain architecture’ [endquote] you mean the brain’s neurones (nerve cells) ... it does not translate.

RESPONDENT: What changes?

RICHARD: Again presuming that by [quote] ‘brain architecture’ [endquote] you mean the brain’s neurones (nerve cells) ... there are no changes.

RESPONDENT: And where’s the evidence?

RICHARD: Perhaps if I were to put it this way: when a software programme in a computer is deleted, not only does that deletion not translate at the level of a computer’s hardware/not make any changes to a computer’s hardware, there is no evidence – were there no ‘Recycle Bin’ to retrieve it from – that it was ever installed in the first place.

RESPONDENT: So nothing changed at the level of brain architecture?

RICHARD: Presuming that by [quote] ‘at the level of brain architecture’ [endquote] you mean the brain’s neurones (nerve cells) ... nothing changed.

RESPONDENT: Not only no major re-wiring, but no re-wiring at all took place, nothing changed in the way your neurons function – nothing observable from the outside. Did I get that correctly?

RICHARD: Presuming that by [quote] ‘re-wiring’ [endquote] you mean the way the brain’s dendrites receive information from its axons ... nothing either privately or publicly observable changed.

Put simply: ‘my’ demise was as fictitious as ‘my’ apparent presence.

RESPONDENT: So, to stay in the computer analogy, nature’s rough and ready survival package is not like a bios chip ...

RICHARD: No ... if anything it would be akin to the ROM (software) programme of a bios chip.

RESPONDENT: ... which, when it has been taken out and replaced, you can recognize from the outside as changed, but rather a software on a hard-disk which can be erased in a way so as to leave no trace at all and leave the hard disk exactly as before?

RICHARD: Have you never flashed a (EEPROM) bios chip?

*

RESPONDENT: Is the demise of ‘me’ a simple (un-)learning process involving the neural network in its structure (...)

RICHARD: No ... put simply: ‘my’ demise was as fictitious as ‘my’ apparent presence.

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