In the 4-year ongoing saga of me grappling with the 'only moment of being alive' ideas, I've got an update I'd like to share. Previously, I failed to understand the motivating factor behind it being the only moment of being alive because 'there will be future moments after all' and because it seemed tautologous to state that right now is - present tense - the only moment of being alive.

For the second time, something has clicked and I don't have a problem with it again. My current understanding of the 'only moment' fact is that it's an excellent device for inducing a right-here right-now awareness. It's not tautologous because there's often a subtle feeling that 'over there somewhere' is the past... and 'over there' is some future. But oh no, over there is just a wall, over there is just a door, right now. This is my only existing moment of being alive. So... how am I spending it?

Makes me want to fully experience being human. Makes me want to live to the max! Where's the nearest roller-coaster?

Now I need to find how to practice it more often than 30mins a day.

The last time this started making sense, I later magically forgot why and went back to being in conflict with it. I don't feel I've really put into words the answer to my philosophical problem yet: there will indeed be future moments so why is it so motivating? But it suddenly is motivating again and I don't care that there will (might) be future moments, so to speak.

Any thoughts?

Why not try and be 'in the moment' the entire waking day?



A fun thing to try as a way to further refine the difference between imagination and reality (time and timeless): Be in a room with draped/no windows and a closed door. Now, reflect upon if the world outside of that room still exists. It probably does, but before you see it with your own eyes, does it exist anywhere else then in your imagination? Notice while doing this how your perception of time also changes in accordance with reduced imagination.

Hey, two things I think might help you

1. You don't need to be on a roller coaster, you can be incredibly happy here and now, wherever that is.

Just don't want anything, be content with the perfection of the universe, any idea of it being less that perfect is just the pesky ego/soul talking, show it how silly wanting anything is, it makes you miss out on the perfect present moment (this is the hard part).

2. HAIETMOBA can be practiced constantly, maybe set a time for yourself, every 30 minutes ask the question, there will probably be something in the past 30 minutes that irritated your ego/soul and is making the present less than perfect, show it how silly it is.

Yeah, totally! I like the way you put that. Or, another way of saying it... this is my only actual moment of being alive. Sounds like progress. Enjoy.

- Daniel.

Yes of course. But note that the ego/soul is me, it's not separate from me or a pesky part of me... and though the elimination of desire may be a consequence of actualism I don't think it's a case of deliberately setting out to not want anything. That would be closer to spiritual paths of denial and suppression.





Practicing all the time is the ideal obviously. But things get in the way. One thing which didn't help was that I normally only get back to feeling good a minority of times I practice HAIETMOBA, and that it rarely went the simplistic way Richard describes the process. The hope is that now with the 'crucial' understanding of this moment being my only moment - if it lasts - the whole thing will become smoother.

Well, when I say don't want anything I don't mean repress your desires, I just mean investigate them, and see that they are unnecessary and silly, and that the universe is perfect with or without the thing you want.

Ah well, I thought I'd made progress. It had seemed to be working consistently for almost a whole week. Now there's no sign of those subtle feelings of 'future' and 'past' but there's nothing motivating about it being the only existing/actual moment of being alive. Don't see why it would be. Future 'moments' will - in all likelihood - happen, after all.

I'm finding that various things at odd times will seem to produce felicity but then utterly fail on most occasions.

So there's still no reason for me to nominate Richard or actualists for the Nobel prize for being the first to formulate a consistent, repeatable way to feel happy at will.

Hello Nad

Connecting with nature is working for me in pumping up the felicity, and there is a definite hangover after getting back to my normal environment, maybe you can try that.

I go for a small trek to a mountain fort (every Sunday same place), and during weekdays trying to use the window more, sun rise /set, the waning / waxing moon, its a concrete jungle out there but fortunately have 3 trees just outside my window, providing me innumerable moments of pure delight. The birds on the wild fig tree, the mango tree especially with summer coming up seeing the full bloom turning into tiny fruits, and the new pristine leaves on the Jamun tree . . .

I am staying at the same place for 4 years but never noticed all this during the last 3. Maybe the DN gave me eyes only for seeing the monstrous tower of a mobile company on the next apartment block and the ugly overhead wires crisscrossing over, never saw the crows (ravens) that gather on these wires in the evening, maybe they meet to discuss meditation

btw 'I' feels it is silly to be Happy for no reason at all

Cheers
Sanjay

I see this as a very pragmatical thing to
a) keep up attentiveness (for as I´m not paying attention to my current way of experiencing there´s no way of influencing it)
b) turn on sensousness / cultivate felicity (as a concious decision to enjoy this moment).

If I don´t practice a)+b) now (i.e. my only moment of being alive), when am I going to do it?
Later? Well, that´s going to be now, too (obviously). So if I´m unwilling to do it now, why should that be different in an hour, tomorrow, a year? The inevitable result would be that I never get around to it.

With that being said, I find the resistance to do it now a useful starting point to see why I´m putting it of:
complacency, lazyness (as in lacking pure intent) or some sense of feeling bad and out of that an unwillingness to put in the effort.

I don´t see that there´s neccessarily a "magic insight" to this phrase which of its own is going to produce the pure intent that is neccessary to overcome my habitual resentment to this (and every consecutive) moment.



Have you noticed the difference between occassions when those "various things" produce felicity or fail to do so?

For me certain objects are easier to take delight in than others which is manifesting in a sense of indifference "Bla, I´ve seen that before!" and that´s where I find having / being naivete is especially neccessary ...in a curious, questioning attitude to everything "Hmm, I wonder what that is?". (wordless of course)
I had (and sometimes still have) to investigate why I feel stupid/cynical for being naive, but it certainly seems to be an important factor for felicity.

When I say to myself, 'right now', 'this moment', or 'only moment', I no longer try to induce any kind of magical AF 'only moment of being alive' with no past or future. To me, HAIETMOBA is only asking about how I'm experiencing this pinprick of a moment that's gone in the blink of an eye.

Here's an interesting quote from Richard I read today:



The way i interpret it is all experience happens now, in this moment. Whether it's yesterday or today it's always experienced now. So even though objects move and things change, the one constant is it's always experienced now. So time doesn't move (it's always this moment) but objects are moving and matter is rearranging itself. As Richard says somewhere else, as space allows things to exist, time allows objects to move.

Just found another quote which sums this up:



So, it's dark here while i'm writing this and it's being experienced now. Earlier it was sunny and it was experienced as now. The earth has rotated on its axis, so all that's really happened is objects have moved, it's been now all along.

I'm sort of getting it.

- Martin

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¹ http://actualfreedom.com.au/richard/listbcorrespondence/listb33e.htm#01June01
² Richard, http://actualfreedom.com.au/richard/listbcorrespondence/listb33b.htm#29Nov99

No, in an hour, a day, a week, I might be in a different mood. It doesn't mean I would never get round to it.


Do you know why Richard would say it is "crucial" to understand that this is ones only moment of being alive?


No, in the years of trying I haven't yet noticed any consistent factors during the times when things click just right and when they don't.




I don't know a reliable way to activate sincerity, which is needed to activate naivete, which may be needed to activate felicity. Of course I can occasionally get there and delight even in things I'm used to seeing but what use is that if it's not repeatable and consistent?

The 'time not moving' stuff is fascinating. It means that this very moment is the same moment you were born in.

But it's a little inappropriate to use the word 'moment' then, because a moment is normally a short 'period of time' among other periods of time. Perhaps just the problem with terms being made by humans for whom time is felt to be moving/changing.

Still, I don't see why realising that time is not moving would specifically motivate one to feel happy now... or why it is crucial to the actualism process.

it was this moment before you were born. your entire life happens in this moment. and it will be this moment after you die. the this momentness itself, is stillness. you can't actually change the stillness in any way, but the movement/experience that is your flesh and blood body can be changed, while alive in the stillness.

edited to add:

i agree the reference to moments within a more epic eternal moment can be confusing. how about thinking of aspects of life that people tend to measure as chronological time based "moments" that occur.. as movements? each event, change, etc. is a movement happening in this eternal moment. there is no actual predicting which movements will occur, which lends to surprise and wonder.

For my practice it was crucial as it made me realise that if I was 'somewhere else' for example in a daydream or a fond imagination then I wasn't experiencing this moment - which is the only moment I can be alive. Further, if I am not experiencing this moment then 'I' am certainly not here in this space where "people, things and events" occur. What happens for me is when I contemplate this it abruptly brings 'me' to my senses to investigate this whole being alive thing.

Sometimes I am astonished as in 'holy fuck!' to find that I am here and alive.

I’ll give you my two cents on why staying in the present moment is crucial to this whole thing. It relates to my practice on finding and destroying the things that take me away from being happy and harmless now.

I’ve made the commitment to change, but I’m finding it a little challenging to be happy now when I’ve just admitted being AF is preferable to not being AF. I’ve identified this belief as causing me to worry or be fearful that I won’t be able to land this thing and become AF. Then it makes me angry/frustrated at having to wait for an unknown amount of “time” for this to happen, if it even happens at all. Regardless the emotions, it keeps yanking me out of being happy now so first I asked:
1) Is my belief true? I decided it is true, that being actually free is better than not being actually free.
2) Then I asked, do I need to suffer because it’s true? I decided that I don’t need to suffer for two reasons:
A) It’s counterproductive and this suffering will actually prevent me from reaching the goal so on a practical level I shouldn’t allow myself to suffer if I really want to be AF.
Given that just intellectually knowing this is counter-productive isn’t always enough to make it go away, I tried to figure out if I could make thought be unable to come up, rather than applying a counter weight against it. I remembered how this suffering is contingent upon time. Try and stay in this moment and then see if you can suffer from the thought that being AF is better than not being AF? It’s just a statement, until you apply a sense of time to that translates that into the “future” state will be better than your “current” state. Then and only then can the thought create suffering now, because you want to be somewhere else in time. If you are here in this moment, there is no suffering.

I say all this fully admitting I’ve been doing this about a week and I’m still struggling with this somewhat which could be a sign I’ve missed something, that I’m just resisting a little or simple need “time” to let it sink it. To see it in action; to experience the truth of it enough that it stops the suffering from even arising and by either holding me in the present moment or snapping me back when I start to wonder and suffer. I have more thoughts on what my beliefs are that make it feel important to go into the past or future. But I need time to sort this out and practice a bit. With the goal being to identify these beliefs and demonstrate why they are harmful so when "I" wander to the past or future in harmful ways I can catch it and bring it back not with sheer willpower but with an understanding of why what I was about to do was wrong. Work in progress…

Thanks for the replies. I'm just exploring further. I'll probably be keen to post if I find any consistent results.

Hi Steph,

You suggested using the idea of 'movements' (of events and things) instead of moments (periods of time) to avoid the confusion of moments within the eternal moment.

What I think I would find easier is if we could rephrase your first paragraph but without using the word 'moment'. In other words, if we accept the common definition of 'moment' (a definite period of time), then what word would we use instead when contemplating:

it was this (moment) before you were born. your entire life happens in this (moment). and it will be this (moment) after you die. the this (moment)ness itself, is stillness. you can't actually change the stillness in any way, but the movement/experience that is your flesh and blood body can be changed, while alive in the stillness.

Could you help me rephrase it?