Freed*Dumb: The Illusion of a Journey to Find Your True Nature

By Michael Annese

How many mental images have you had of yourself? Did you ever ask yourself if you needed one?

Does your current self-perception serve you? Does it limit you? Do you need one to stay sane—or is it just programming?

These are some of the questions that Michael Annese considers in Freed*Dumb.

The book offers the same pill from The Matrix: A pill of truth that you should take if you want to end suffering. Drawing on lessons from his own suffering—and his decision to end it—the author shares lessons such as:

• Suffering does not need to be your destiny.
• You will free your mind once you decide you don’t need an identity.
• Focus on how your helping fellow human beings—not your job.

The author also explores the law of momentum, which includes each motion causing another motion. This is why it’s so important to think about each action you take.

Ask the right questions, find answers, and stop suffering with the lessons and insights in Freed*Dumb.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Jun 29, 2021
• ISBN: 9781982270766

Michael Annese

Michael Annese grew up feeling as though he was never good enough. He did not fit in and was bullied at school. After years of therapy and medication, he realized the answers to his problems had to come from inside. It was at that moment that he surrendered to that which he had been running from and his real journey began.

Book preview

Copyright © 2021 Michael Annese.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means,

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except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher

make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book

and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

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views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any

technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the

advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer

information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-

being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your

constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

ISBN: 978-1-9822-7075-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-7077-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-7076-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021912697

Balboa Press rev. date: 06/22/2021

CONTENTS

Introduction

Part 1

Chapter 1     Wake Up

Chapter 2     The Greatest Computer Ever Created

Chapter 3     Your Name Is a File Folder

Chapter 4     Title

Chapter 5     What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?

Chapter 6     Not Being Able to Choose Our Own Belief Systems

Chapter7     There Is No Good and Bad

Chapter 8     Interior vs. Exterior

Chapter 9     Time: The Greatest Illusion

Chapter 10   Space or Distance

Chapter 11   Language

Chapter 12   The Inner Critic Gimmick

Chapter 13   Criticism

Chapter 14   Self-Image: The Grand Deception

Chapter 15   Emotions

Chapter 16   Attachments and Pets

Chapter 17   The Love Drug

Chapter 18   Attention: What People Think They Are

Chapter 19   Happiness Handcuffs

Chapter 20   Effort Is Useless

Chapter 21   Boredom

Part 2

Chapter 1     Energy

Chapter 2     Security

Chapter 3     Doubt

Chapter 4     Everything Is Thought—No Really, Everything

Chapter 5     What You Really Are

Chapter 6     The I Loving the Me

Chapter7     No Labels

Chapter 8     Control Freak

Chapter 9     Reputation: The Invisible You

Chapter 10   Word Deprogramming

Chapter 11   The Most Important Word

Chapter 12   Inner Spinner

Chapter 13   The Alone Groan

Chapter 14   The I Why

Chapter 15   Expectations/Expec: Take: Tions

Chapter 16   Put Your Emotions on a Stage

Chapter 17   Where the Power Lies

Chapter 18   Seeing

Chapter 19   The Five Gems

Chapter 20   The Big Three

INTRODUCTION

Before I begin sharing the wisdom gleaned from experience, I want to give you a glimpse into why I am writing this book. This book is here because I want to express to the planet that I am done with suffering. Its mission is complete because I have awakened to my true self. The seeming play of duality has ended and gracefully returned my crown. A sense of purpose has emerged amid the remainder of mental programming that is still being dissolved. When I realized that I was one and not two, and my intention merged with reality. My inner critic was chloroformed and sent packing by my innocence accepting every worst-case scenario it presented. You probably know this voice, the one you entered into a contract with just by acknowledging its existence. That deep urge to embrace truth in turn shedding the lies and beliefs that are held tightly due to the fear of uncertainty.

I can offer you the same pill from the Matrix, and it glistens with inevitability. Perhaps this is your time to swallow this pill of truth; it all depends on whether you are done with suffering. Like anything else that’s worthwhile, it contains some uncomfortable feelings, like having no context of oneself or one’s environment as you trade comfort for this moment in its entirety. An unfamiliar joy becomes your moment-to-moment expression, with impending doom still lurking from the critic’s imagination. The risk reward factor is soon overlooked because the feelings one experiences from aligning with the true essence cannot be formulated into words. You start to witness your mind regressing to its joyful two-year-old self, where it barely knew a name, let alone a self-image. Yes, shedding the mind-made prison and realizing you have no natural enemies except your own unconscious behaviors that have been spinning round and round in your head like a broken record.

I can show you that they are only illusions if you can go beyond your mind. I hope you are ready to grab the baton of truth I am passing to you from a professional in the game of misery, sprinting at you with the most authentic of intentions to show you that suffering is a choice, not a destiny.

PART 1

CHAPTER 1

WAKE UP

I would like to ask you a question: What is reality? Webster’s Dictionary says it is the true situation that exists; the real situation; something that actually exists or happens; a real event occurrence, or situation. Now look at your current awareness and tell me, Do you think you’ve ever experienced reality? I can tell you I haven’t and you haven’t. What we actually experience when we are awake is a distortion chock-full of ups and downs from our own emotional elevators. Even when we are awake to our true natures, we still perceive through a filter. But the difference is we have become aware of the filter, so life’s context does not disturb us any longer.

We enter this world with a fervor incomparable to anything except the source’s eyes glistening from within our frail human bodies. An infant, actually a cellular miracle, stares out into a blurry perception and is a blank slate of expression aching to display its talents. Early on we are conditioned by picking up the energies that enter through our new environment. This is before we are taught language, which is a type of prison for our perception that I discuss in detail in another chapter.

Studies show that even during their time in the womb, fetuses are affected by the stimuli they are subjected to, perhaps to the point that they develop their personalities. Once they emerge into this new strange world, their brains are barely able to handle regular stimuli, much less the emotional baggage that the ones close to them possess. It is really a thing of beauty to see how raw and authentic a human being is when entering this dimension. Shortly after being born, we are clothed and fed, and then we are conditioned to sleep and eat at specific times. Now this is clearly necessary; I cannot deny that something so fragile cannot think or provide for itself. But it sets the stage to become an obedient member of a system.

In a way, conditioning is unavoidable and necessary to return to one’s true nature. I am not shocked that a discreet intelligence is at work within the human evolution of consciousness. The same force that beats our hearts and provides for us in immeasurable ways shows up in our perceivable game with the prize being oneness with it. We only dream separation from our source, which nourished us into this level of existence. It is impossible to take our seed, which is one, and split it into two. I assure you this is an illusion. As Einstein said, it’s a persistent one, and if you don’t believe me, curl up with a book about quantum physics on the weekend and prepare to question everything in your current perception.

Everything emerges from nothingness—or spirit, depending on your language conditioning because even here we have to use language to communicate something that is beyond language. Actually, the only thing that is the same for any expression of consciousness, no matter what form it is expressed through, is silence. Silence, which is mostly taken for granted, holds the key to awakening. It’s not the message that was received that triggers awakening; it’s the silent contemplation that engulfs the contemplator. So what does your silence look like? Does it look like mine? Or your neighbor’s? Of course, it does because when we say silence, we are actually talking about the essence of everything.

Let’s take in that last statement before we move on. One who can use and harness the power that flows from one’s being and is only perceived as silence is indeed powerful beyond measure. Silence is actually a reference to a field of unlimited possibilities, so you can see how we could regard it. In order to wake up and see our conditioned behaviors and thoughts at work in our lives today, we must at some point work from a place of silence. Many people don’t integrate their words into reality and, therefore, are not free because freedom is truly accepting whatever appears on this three-dimensional screen of silence or consciousness we know as perception. Accepting this blankness or perceived space is the key to liberation. As you experience life from a different context, you will come to recognize silence for what it is. When there are no conceived parameters or guidelines for your version of heaven, success is inevitable.

The only thing that blocks this expression of who you really are is the mental image you have affixed to your reality. The space, or blank sheet, that resurrects itself after sleep is inherent in every moment. Memory interferes with reality. Think about it—but not for too long. The image attaches certain thought streams to it, and your current mental projection of yourself, which is obviously imageless, influences your reality. When wild animals are shown a mirror, they react in horror or surprise, having never perceived themselves before. Your true nature is an imageless mirror that obstructs your ability to perceive with the eyes of innocence.

How many mental images have you had of yourself or perhaps are still holding onto? Did you ever ask yourself if you even needed one? Does your current self-perception serve you? Does it limit you? Do you need one to stay sane, or is it just programming? Are you different from those wild animals in the jungle?

CHAPTER 2

THE GREATEST COMPUTER

EVER CREATED

So you open your eyes from a good night’s sleep feeling refreshed, unaware that what has just happened was a disk cleanup in your mind. You actually have run a program overnight to deal with all the fragmented files from the experience of your previous twenty-four hours and other thought residue. You see, the human brain is the greatest computer ever constructed, and it is unbelievably efficient when its operating system is functioning properly. For the rest of this chapter I make analogies using computer jargon to show the similarities between the human mind and a computer.

Your operating system is made up of the beliefs and intentions that you hold as your identity. So you rise out of bed, and right away programs start running. Do I have work today? Do I need gas for my car? What day is it? These are just a few programs that are initialized by thinking about your day. If you listen closely enough with powerful enough equipment, you can actually hear them running, and they sound just like white noise. Now your programs are running, and pop-ups keep filling your screen. You need to acknowledge them or click that little x in the top right-hand corner. If you have another program installed, say Eckhart Tolle or Buddhism, you will be able to observe these thoughts appearing out of habit. Your system will still be able to function at top speed regardless of these pop-ups. However, many people haven’t downloaded such programs, so they are tormented by these windows of distraction that interfere with the natural mind or the original operating system. You have ads and commercials that are designed to attach specific mental files or primitive tendencies and trigger desire.

It is important to note that this desire didn’t create the means. The means created the desire by using sophisticated marketing techniques to interact with the mind’s primitive drive. Marketing teams and psychologists have figured out how the brain seems to work. What actually happens is a window pops up in your perception, and if this window is considered important and you have clicked (identified with) it in the past, it will appear more frequently. Now the floodgates have opened, and you have accidently clicked on a virus, a past thought that has accumulated a negative energy field and can affect the functioning of your marvelous operating system. It could also be something from your childhood that the synapses in your brain have labeled as a threat, something that makes you lose the context of yourself and disorients you from your natural