Several years ago, despite my best intentions (and initial success, particularly
around the time of my induced PCE which I wrote in to the list about in early
2006), I could not apply actualism beyond a certain point. Several things seemed
to stand in the way:
1- I felt truly and unexpectedly horrible from time to time, for unclear
reasons.
2- Sometimes, I could tell I was over-complicating the actualist instructions
and making their application difficult for myself. The irony was that I could
see that something of this nature was happening and recurring, yet could not
stop doing it.
3- I didn't understand, deeply and experientially, how 'I' am 'my feelings' and
'my feelings' are 'me'. This seemed a crucial point, but there was this echo
effect between thinker and feeler that kept 'me' (the thinker) at bay from 'his
feelings'. Whittling away at 'my' social identity as best I knew how was not
solving this problem, which I thought was because of point 2, above, which I
kept running into.
Then point 1 was explained to me in spiritual terms, as being the Dark Night of
the Soul (or in a Buddhist context, the Knowledges of Suffering) which is
inevitably brought about by progressing past a certain point in spiritual
development and practice, which I had already done at that point. I started
paying attention to how I was really experiencing the discomfort, and found that
it lined up with the explanations I'd been given well. The waves of discomfort,
ranging from anxiety to agony, did tend to follow closely after ecstatic
experience, even in dreams, were temporary (though it certainly wouldn't feel
like it while going through it), and were unrelated to the surrounding
circumstances.
Because these were spiritual problems (problems of a feeling being), I then
suspected that the trouble of point 2 (over-complicating matters) was caused by
point 3 (and not vice versa as I'd been assuming). I concluded I should figure
out how 'I' am 'my feelings' and 'my feelings' are 'me'. Knowing what a PCE is
from my own experience, knowing what felicitous feelings are, both as
experiences in and of themselves as well as a road to pure consciousness, and
having the precedent Richard set when he proved that it was possible (even
though he said harder) to go from an ego-dissolved state to actual freedom, I
set out to do the same; I was going to really bust ass and get enlightened so
that the thinker (sense of separate self) would be out of the way, and this
dualistic riddle of sorts my mind was caught in would be solved, freeing the
energy that was currently going into maintaining it for other purposes. I
recognised the potential danger that the energy thus freed would be
automatically reassigned to the instinctual commitment to survival (and on top
of that, self-aggrandisement). However, I felt safe in taking this risk because
I know myself to be genuinely committed to being happy and harmless, as best as
I know how, as best I can here and now.. and because of the warnings I've
received about the perils of enlightenment, mostly on the AF site but also from
the more honest and open spiritual communities I've come across, as well as what
I've witnessed in their effect on enlightened humans. And, I expected what I had
already discovered about the difference between good feelings and feeling
good/feeling felicitous to maintain the integrity of the journey in the long
run, so knowing thus, I set out.
Long spiritual story short, I took the Theravadan Buddhist approach I was
already familiar with and did vipassana. I put in a heroic amount of effort in a
period spanning months, then took a do-or-die (I am not using these words
lightly, as it really did feel that way, especially toward the end), nirvana or
bust approach for a couple weeks, dedicating every single second of my waking
life to pursuing a continuous understanding of how everything is a fleeting
experience, how nothing that arises lasts, and that everything that ceases,
ceases instantaneously. Finally, I arrived to what such experiential cessation
and utter discontinuity implies, which is that the 'real world' doesn't exist,
whereas This, the That-which-is-the-Ground-of-Existence does (the spiritual
thing about going beyond existence and non-existence). Seeing it so clearly and
directly, the thinker took a hard hit and buggered off. There was a blankness,
then sense of something being done, for a while. Then, slowly a huge bliss wave
crept in. I felt it, *as it*, as well as the innate temptation to solidify as a
new identity as Everything.. and awareness of that instinctual response stopped
it right in its tracks. Meanwhile, the 'thinker' did not return. And so also
disappeared a tremendous amount of mind noise.
In the months that followed, I explored the territory that had opened up.
Psychic phenomena, ease moving through the cycles (distinct recurring modes of
experience defined by their perceptual thresholds, a common feature of mystical
practice), an amount of perceptual (like actually being able to hold my eye
still to see more clearly, power that had been previously unavailable, were now
available. Deeper explorations into what seemed to be the
Everything-behind-reality, the Emptiness itself, led to the realisation, again
and again, that these experiences were imaginary. The only thing that made sense
to do was be attentive to sensuous experience, which was now leading,
invariably, to glimpses of apperception. The further I went, the more obvious
and simple it became that this was the way I wished to go. I thought to myself
from time to time, 'If only I had known this from the very beginning.' But yet,
I couldn't have known, despite 'my' best efforts, for, to use Richard's analogy
from sometime back, 'I' was that arrogant captain of the ship, trying, in vain,
to steer something beyond 'his' control. And I just didn't know how to, nor even
know how to stop doing it! Now that 'I' knew, experientially, that 'I',
'myself', *am* these very feelings that 'I' was trying to catch hold of, the job
became so. much. simpler.
Then, I went for a walk very early one morning, spontaneously and unexpectedly.
I upped and threw on a heavy jacket, as it was then still quite cold outside,
slipped into my shoes, and set out the door, down the staircase. I tromped out
from my building, across a road, with no destination in mind, and set foot onto
a grassy field that led to a city park. It was then, while walking through this
field, that I noticed the thousands of glimmering dewdrops frozen onto
individual blades of grass coming to life. The winter trees were firm, their
twigs and branches zig-zagging like cracks, framing the now-lightening sky, in
such a natural and elegant way. The hues of the faded colours of the old bricks
buildings before me stood out, their artistry becoming apparent, and the
man-made world was right where it belonged. My pace seemed to quicken slightly,
the stride of my legs became effortless, and feeling the full weight of my body
as it sprung through the motions, I walked right into the biggest PCE of my
life. It lasted 5 or 6 hours, ocasionally fading from time to time into
excellence, but hey, all the better, as that just made it even more clear how to
get back to it, from felicity to purity, naivete to innocence. The line I often
read on the AF site, 'But refrain from possessing it and making it your own ...
or else `twill vanish as softly as it appeared', kept coming to mind and was the
biggest clue. When 'I' was already that close to abeyance, all 'I' had to do was
remember that.
The infinitude of the universe was so clearly apparent then, as it was that now
is the only moment there ever has been. The character of this world is so
completely unassumingly friendly, that nothing could ever go wrong, and in light
of such evident benignity, it is such a joke, such a comedy, to consider that it
could ever have been seen another way, as either good or evil, or divine.
Walking, alone, as I was, it was clear to me that 'alone' as such did not exist
- I am these senses that are this world, as is everyone else, and we are all
here together in this world, as the universe itself. The infinitude is the
eternal is the benignity is the security is the peace is the freedom is the
universe itself.
After that experience, it became not hard to get out of the way, and doing so
became automatic much of the time.. to the point now where apperception is the
case also much of the time. I spend a large amount of my day fading/switching in
and out in worlds that are truly delightful; either actual or pretty darn close,
from where actuality is a close memory and very real possibility right here and
now and then ..pop!, actual again, and then fade. Over and over, much of the
day.
Then, a few months after this, just one month ago in fact, my spiritual journey
came to an end in an unprecedented (in my experience) way. It had been winding
down, since the recent PCE, which served to remind me of how immediately
accessible pure intent, and thus the clear road to pure consciousness, was ...
and since what I had learnt from experiencing ego-dissolution that while ago
(that 'I' am 'my feelings' and 'my feelings' are 'me'), which allowed me to
understand, in real time, just how accessible said intent always is. So long as
'I' am, so it (pure intent) also is. My spiritual inclinations - the sense that
there was something to look for or some humanity to save (I very quickly
understood the latter to be a natural sublimation of the same urge) - wound down
until they just kind of, rather uneventfully, fizzled out.
This was tremendously liberating, in a very down-to-earth concrete way. However,
I wouldn't class my life as a 'virtual freedom' just yet, as occasionally things
do upset me, I am afraid of some things, and nurture and desire do arise. Yet,
all these things do seem like less of a big deal than before, while at the same
time, my interest in investigating them has not diminished any (I have not
become apathetic). What is clear is that a virtual freedom seems guaranteed at
this point, and it is just a matter of time before 90% becomes 95% becomes 99%.
When I wake up to perfection, and fall asleep to perfection, having only 'lost'
a minute or so of my day in total to some turmoil or conflict, and am doing this
day after day, I will say so. Now that, in my mind, is a high standard.. but a
realistic one, and one worth reaching!
Well, that was quite long enough. I wrote in to share my own experience, with
what I have done with the wealth of knowledge and information that the AF Trust
has made available and that the contributors to the old AF list have discussed,
debated, and attempted to implement for themselves. What you make of it is, of
course, up to you, and I'm not trying to convince anyone here of anything,
including that others should make the spiritual journey that I have (in before
someone accuses me of it). I can only speak for myself when I say that the path
i took, and the dedication with which I set into it, has paid off, and in
spades. It was a risk, and one I'm completely glad I took.