T o t h e F o l l y o f
t h e B r a v e s
From the book "Transfiguration" by I. Kalinauskas, 2006
Translation by I. Shpigelman, 2007
Now it must be absolutely clear for us that, unlike a reasonable
man, the man who has finally managed to go nuts, or, shall I say,
to run nuts, and leave the pressure of sanity behind, must realize
one very important fact about his Path. And this fact is that,
although, as they say, every Path leads to the same place, each
Path is a very specific Path. It is limited by time, space, route,
and even by the specifics of the landscape.
But then, even a man deprived of last bits of sanity, finds out
another fact, that fills him with gloom: the Path does not give
any guarantees, but the years are passing. Nine to twelve years
only to the chance of something happening. This is the most honest
point of view. After ten years something can be seen. So, ten to
twelve years must be spent, the brain is still moving, the common
sense is reeling, but the result is very questionable.
"A-a-ah!!!" laments the common sense in the last attempt to save
the personality. And plants yet another brilliant booby trap.
There is this everyday life, is it not? And it must be lived. And
then, I may be insane there, but quite sane here. And the torments
begin. As you may realize for yourselves, the Path necessarily
starts meandering between the "normal" life and a possibility of
other life in twelve years. And meandering Path leads to a
meandering inner world, and such a development requires now a
company in order to assure oneself, that I am not the only
"meandering player". Thus appears a group of spiritually aspired
people, who try to help each other to somehow move ahead, to
somehow advance within Tradition.
And in this advancement our hero realizes that all so called
life is only a place for work, if such work was assigned by the
Tradition, and also a place for learning, in any case. And so he
moves within Tradition, transforming little by little. Or, in
other words, more and more going nuts, our hero is changing his
world outlook, his Self-concept, constantly modifying his value
scale, making any event on the Path most valuable compared to
anything else. There is no escape from this standard psychological
mechanism of self-motivation, without it this very aspiration
would have been lost.
There are certain traditions that for a long period of time allow
to use as a base the counter position of "us" and "them". "We
follow the right path. They follow the wrong path." There are
different ways: tougher or softer.
And there are such soft ways, that, all in all, it is unclear
whether they go anywhere at all. Well, maybe they decided to reach
the end in a hundred or couple of hundred reincarnations. Very
soft ways. But, even despite this softness, the transformations
still happen, and at some point of time, the man ultimately
reaches the point of no return back to the life of normal people.
Ah, my dear essence
The Essence and its life is the only support on the Path.
And since many step on the Path with the essence of the child, or,
at best, of a teenager, the first task is to help the essence to
grow and develop. Without it, the personality will have its revenge,
and will repeatedly have it on every occasion. This is how
spiritual people turn into Gruppenfuhrers, and spiritual
groups turn into sects.
This is why a knowledgeable guide, an instructor, a trainer is
needed. Until the essence is developed to such a level that it can
withstand the duel with the personality, and to help, when needed,
to the individuality, the man can only live on illusions and bang
his head against the wall at every failure. You should understand
the situation - a five years old child is carrying on his
shoulders the life of an adult. And the personality cannot give
any support on treading the Path.
Here is the first serious task that needs to be solved by
the professional representatives of the Tradition, in order for it
to become substantial.
A social man is formed in a kind of vice. On one side, the
individuality regulating grip. It is mainly the regulation of the
procreational need, and derived from it sexual desires. On the
other side, the grip that regulate emotional and sensual
reactions, and limits them to the acceptable level of the given
socio-psychological world. Therefore, a desire to break this vice
is not yet a spiritual impulse, but, rather, a normal reaction of
a man who perceived that he overgrown the limits allotted for him
by the society.
There are only a few ways to obtain more freedom, more indulgence
from society for substandard behavior. The first one is the way
of social career, which is easy to understand, since the
higher on the social ladder the man climbs, the more degrees of
freedom he has. Simply put, the wealthier he is, the more goods he
can afford.
If he does not succeed in social career, there are two more ways.
It is either an exotic socium built around art and
entertainment, Bohemia, or the marginal socium. The
marginal socium is represented by social outcasts, gangsters, criminal
elements... and so called "spiritual flee market". The man
find all this in the quest for the freedom from social pressure.
If, in his quest, the man ends up in the exotic socium called
"spirituality", or, well, "spiritual flee market", he is again
facing the choice between various Us and various
merchandises of this market. Albeit, the choice here is quite a
relative term. In most cases, the men ends up in a certain place
rather then comes to it.
Very few people have enough information and, also, comprehension
of this information so that they could make a certain choice. It
is all the concourse of circumstances. All our life is governed by
circumstances.
And when a men, under the force of circumstances
comes into a socio-psychological world of the Tradition, he
obtains a chance to build a new career within this world, since
his new socium is smaller and simper than the outer one.
Or... the initial event happens. What may be called a necessity
of other life, of other principles of existence in the world
suddenly arises. And from this event, the Path begins.
Because the Path does not issue any guaranties, the man tries to
find such a life line where he could reconcile the Path and his
biography. Therefore, he needs the following two things. First, he
needs a company of people like him, and he is now included
in such a company, in order to execute certain practical tasks
given by the Tradition. And second, he need a mentor, who
will help him to solve the initial problem on the Path - the
problem of self-development, of growing up and acquiring a certain
volume, a certain power of his own Essence. If a tradition does
not have means for solving this problem, it must follow the blind
trial-and-error method, and pay off by tremendous numbers of
casualties.
The development of the Essence is impeded, first of all, by
strong negative experiences. Therefore, the creation of a
healthy, trained body for the Essence is an immediate task. And
the body for the Essence is the psycho-energetics. At the same
time, the specific information that is targeted toward rethinking
of one's own relations with oneself must be digested.
The inner work is directed toward rethinking of self-image, of
self-relation, of one's own instrumental concept. The outer work
is the training intended for creation of a healthy
psycho-energetics body for your Essence. In our Tradition, DFS
is such a training. And if the man does not do it, then it is
pointless, to put it mildly, to talk about any advancement on the
Path. That is, mildly speaking.
An attempt to solve the problem of development of the Essence by
purely rational means, that is, only by comprehension, leads to
formation of traditions that I call "librarian's traditions".
These traditions are formed by librarian, by intellectuals, by
well-educated, sophisticated people with rich inner world. But
they do not change in the most important place. Their Essence
develops or does not develop depending only on external
circumstances. As all people of such type, they form secret
societies and usually their search ends in a place where Hermann
Hesse placed the heroes of his Das Glasperlenspiel book.
Therefore, the responsibility of the members of our Tradition
toward the people they work with lies, in the first place, in the
quality of their work toward the development of Essence.
Otherwise, both you and your pupils will lose the game, and the
Personality will be the winner. And the victory of the Personality
will result in even higher degree of inner conflict, even higher
degree of suffering, and frustrations, crisis's, acute attacks
of cynical realism will certainly follow.
It's so easy to fool oneself
Do you remember the old woman from Osho
parable? She heard that faith could move mountains, came to the
window, closed her eyes and said to the mountain, "Go, go, go!"
Then she opened her eyes: "Ah! I knew nothing would happen!"
This is the common approach to faith: I will have faith until I
start acting... without faith.
Where does it come from? It comes from the very interesting thing
that lives in our mind. It is called "how it should be".
This thing is akin another one, "I am permanently in the need of
something that I lack". Why I permanently lack something?
Because I know what I need for the future. So, try to think, to
feel, to experience yourself here and now. Allow it to yourself.
And it will turn out that the world is wonderful, the life is
beautiful, the people are great, and even the country is no worse
and no better then others. And, all in all, everything is good.
We stated on many occasions that the man is formed to correspond
the configuration of the social pressure. This is how he is
created, this is how he exists, and how his existence is
sustained. The social pressure forms his Self-concept, and, first
of all, his Self as Us block of his Self-concept
NOTE: Self-concept is a psychological term that describes the
collection of one's own perception. I.~N.~Kalinauskas defines
the following three aspects of Self-concept: Self as I, Self as
Other, and Self as Us. The first aspect, Self as I, describes
the self-identity, the pure subject. In the second block, Self
as Other, the person perceives oneself as an object, and
describes oneself in the object's terms: "I am such and such,
I have this and that, etc." The third block describes the
reference group of the person.
It is very important.
If the person has not mastered self-reflection, if he applies the
received knowledge to others instead of oneself, he is making a
grave mistake. To study others is a foolish exercise, as there are
so many others, but you are only one, thus, there is no chance to
learn enough of others with any significant use for yourself, but
if you study yourself, you may learn something significant in the
limited time frame that is allotted to you.
When you study yourself, you discover that Self as Us aspect
makes you into a person, that is accepted in the society. But
when you become a spiritual seeker, you follow something that lies
beyond Us, and become an asocial person. Why? Because from
this moment the pressure that forms you no longer comes from
socium, and, therefore, you obtain certain traits that socium
recognizes as alien. And now, you are aggravating the socium,
and socium is aggravating you. And the epoch of endless conflict
begins. And some people manage to use even this knowledge under
the umbrella of "how it should be". If you use the new
knowledge not as knowledge but as ideology you are back in the
trap of "how it should be".
And what are the consequences? Under the pressure of an alien,
asocial structure you suddenly fall out of your accustomed
Us. It is very unpleasant. So unpleasant that the desire to
escape is born. To escape and to move everything that we call
faith, conscious devotion, somewhere far away, overseas. Let it exist
everywhere, but not here. Let the pastures be greener there, but
not here.
But I always said that such proverbs should be inverted.
And then they will become valuable signs on the
spiritual path. Was: "the pastures are greener there". We
invert it and come up with "the pastures are greener
here". This is already a valuable sign. There are many such
proverbs. The fact that they must be inversed, shows that when you
step on the spiritual path you become an inverse being yourself.
The spiritual path is the path to oneself. It is the path from
We to I. This is the direction which is opposite to
the direction of socialization.
I am sick and tired hearing from "our people" that spiritual
path is a fairy tale a la C. Castaneda.
I used to "fearlessly absorb the punches"... but I cannot take it
anymore. Because how many times should I repeat it over and over?
The spiritual path is the path to oneself, and there is no
other meaning to it at all. There is nothing to do on the path
until you meet yourself. If in order to schedule this meeting you
need to go to astral plane, so go there. If you need to stay in
place, then stay in place. But reach out and meet with yourself!
Everything else comes only after this meeting.
A man comes to me and starts the usual: "Igor Nikolayevich, you
see..." But he does not exist! With whom I am
supposed to talk? Should I really play social games with the man of
Tradition? I would pretend that he exists and he would pretend
that I exist... Mutual patting. He knows nothing about his own
existence but he already dreams of Creation. So what is the
difference between him, spiritual seeker, and all those
non-spiritual non-seekers? Only that he has one more illusion?
I understand, it is difficult to attend to yourself. But there is
nothing else to attend to, nothing at all. You may try to hide
anywhere. You may hide into heavy activity, into reading crabbed
texts, into so called meditation. But if the firm desire to find
yourself does not stand behind all this then any of those
activities have nothing to do with spirituality.
All religions of the World agree that "the Temple is inside
you". Little creature, get acquainted with yourself. Who are you,
created in His own similitude? Climb out of the womb of Us.
Make an effort and overcome this pressure. It is difficult,
indeed. It may hurt someone, especially someone close to you,
indeed. But it is necessary. Because otherwise it is only the
illusion - illusion of Path, illusion of Faith, illusion of
Redemption.
What does it mean, "to have faith"?
To have faith, to believe is the virtue of the Essence. The
Personality may only have trust. The ignorance of this fact leads
to a large amount of tragic, dramatic and comic consequences.
Ah, Personality, my Personality,
Where do you wander, what flowers do you trample?
Are the flowers of eternal beauty
Catered to the demands of your arrogance?
The Personality does not possess the quality of totality, and,
therefore, it cannot have faith. Event the so called mature
personality. The Faith is a total feeling that is born out of
total experience. And only the Essence is capable of such a
feeling. This is why the child's disillusions are so tragic, this
is why we remember the treachery, betrayals and woes of our
childhood. Because it was the total experience. And all the
mechanisms of social pressure and regulation where created to
prevent a human being from such total experiences. With the rare
exception of some specific socium where the quality of totality
is welcomed, as it happened with Maharishi.
The Essence of a pupil on the Path must grow from the
childhood to the adult state. It must have a steadfast faith, a
faith of a quality that is described in all Holy Scriptures. Only
with such faith the real transformation, the real Transfiguration
may be performed and completed.
Neglect to the work and training toward the development of the
Essence means that there could be no serious attempts to thread
the Path. It is a simple logic: only the Essence may have faith,
thus the Essence must be developed, so that the faith may come and
complete the transformation.
I often see the reason why our people are not effective in the
socium. They kind of "know" what social effectiveness depend
upon: upon social status, upon social acceptance, or upon the
ability to dodge, to play it up. But since a man who stepped on
the Path is asocial by definition, he is now kind of sitting
between two chairs. He denies himself his social status, even if
he has one, and he also denies himself his social skills, even if
he possesses some. He feels that he is different from other people
that he is separated from them by the Law that he accepted for
himself.
- The Law. The meaning of the ritual of the Tradition
"to step under the Law" is that the man accepted the Law from
within, and also put the Law above himself so that he could live
and act in accordance with the Law. On the level of
self-consciousness it comes as a positive reinforcement: I have
accepted the spiritual law, I obey it, this is my light and my
meaning. But on the level of Personality, in its deep recesses,
such an act entails the feeling of a social guilt, or a social
treason. A subconscious guilt, in turn, entails a subconscious
aggression toward the very same socium. "Socium comes and goes,
but the spirituality stays!" Well, from historical perspective it
is true, but from the perspective of one live, it all happens
here and now. Then how to get rid of this social guilt and to get
rid of increasing boasting about your spirituality? With the help
of Faith.
- The Faith. Faith, according to our point of view, is
conscious devotion. The faith that is not a conscious devotion,
but just devotion is quite amateurish. The person kind of have
faith, he is sincere, but his self-expression cannot replace his
lack of qualification. He cannot realize his faith. Such faith is
vain. With such faith any defeat may lead to doubts and loss of
enthusiasm. Conscious faith is the faith of a man who knows
that faith is power. Such a man understands that the only problem
lies in the ability to have faith.
The people who stepped on the Path often adopt the following
social behavior: "Excuse us, you know, we have this Tradition, we
understand that it is kind of inferior, not really like others,
but it is still kind of spiritual. And our leader, too, you
know... Well, he says that the Tradition is five thousand seven
hundred fifty seven years old, and we kind of believe him. Well,
help us, please..." Of course, what kind of effectiveness we
are talking here? The man constantly forgets the he is the part of
the Tradition, and so, he deprives himself of many capabilities.
Social life separately, spiritual life separately. Because, as it
seems to those people, whatever is applicable to their spiritual
life is not applicable to their social life. Well, based on my
own, quite extensive experience, I can say: "It is not so!"
We exist and expand only because we always have abilities to act
based upon the knowledge given by the Tradition. If you recall,
the main goal that exist on the Path is formulated in our
technological language as resonance-based interaction between
subjective and objective realities with all the consequences that
may follow. And the consequences are plenty, most of them are
quite unusual, and, therefore, in strict accordance with the laws
of psychology, this information is quickly forgotten.
If you really need it, if you need it according to the principle,
for oneself, for the people, for the Temple, that is, for
our work, then anyone of us may get any information that is needed
for a given moment in a given situation. One of the events that
occurs on the Path is that moment when you become a person that
know everything what is needed for a given moment and have
everything that is needed for a given moment. As soon as you
get rid of the guaranteed future syndrome, you obtain this very
quality. You are transformed from the man who always lack
something into a man who always have everything.
These are all basics, but it must happen to you. And so it could
happen, in practice, you must believe that it can happen. Believe,
and test it for yourself. Tell me, who, in this very moment does
not have something that is required for this moment? Who? Everyone
have everything he needs. If you take each specific moment of life
- everything is there.
Just turn off the guaranteed future syndrome, and you suddenly
have everything, turn it back on and you suddenly lack almost
everything. Certainly, the psychology of a man who
has everything is quite different from the psychology of a man
who lacks almost everything.
An all-sufficient man cannot be controlled or manipulated.
Therefore all manipulators first try to frighten their subjects,
try to increase his feeling of inferiority. "You think you
only lack this? But you also lack that and that. You think it
should only be this way? But it also should be that way, too."
And thus the man can be manipulated. The more dissatisfied, the
prouder of his own pessimism the person is, the easier he is
manipulated. But a happy, all-sufficient person cannot be
manipulated at all.
What is manipulation? A positive reinforcement here, a negative
reinforcement there, and that's it, it is working.
How a man that has everything, an all-sufficient man can be
possibly manipulated? Having everything aside, he is also
completely ignorant of "how it is in fact". He is told: "It
must be so"
"And so be it."
"But you don't have principles!"
"Ok, I don't."
"But how it should be?"
"I don't know."
"Then you don't have any ideals?!"
"Nope. Just pure greed. I want to reach the end of the spiritual
path."
"And what is awaiting you there?"
"Nothing awaits me there. And it is such a wonderful Nothing."
"What nothing?"
"Just nothing."
"How?"
"Nothing"
"How is nothing???"
Inside of this "great void', inside of this "nothing" toward
which our seeker is rushing, there grows the crystal of faith, the
crystal of self-awareness, every paramount thing that may grow -
the Light. The more transparent for this Light the man is, the
better he sees. And then the consciousness will not require any
ideology. You just see it. And it does not matter whether what you
see is how it is in fact or how it is not. I see. Here is a man.
Here I am. Here We are. See.
Come to the ministry. Oh! How self-important everyone is here!
But in this place I see no face control. So, I go there. I do not
know how it should be when one goes to the Minister. I just go.
And the Minister does not know what to do with me. I say:
"Do not worry, just sign here, and I will disappear again." He
says: "No problem. Here you are."
"How could you sign him that???"
"Well, he is crazy. Does not understand anything. Just his
luck"
Come to the third level of reality.
"If you don't mind, if we are not mistaken that we really need
it, could you tell us please, the dollar's exchange rate for
tomorrow?"
"No, you are not mistaken. You really need it. Here is you
rate."
"How could you possibly get there?"
"How do I know?"
When I become sicken and tired to repeat the same things over and
over, I thought, what is the matter? And I saw, plain and simple
lack of faith. The people use it all as a refuge, but they
do not have faith. Anything that questions their accustomed
relations with the world, their ways of acting, their value
system is strictly forbidden. Tradition? Oh, yes, the
Tradition. But I came to the Ministry, where do I find the
Tradition? There is no Tradition in there!"
But if it is not even in one single place then it is not anywhere.
If I have faith, I have it everywhere. Because then there is
I that believes. It is not possible to have faith in one place
and not to have it in another. It is only possible to talk about
faith when it is convenient for someone in us, in the inner
collective that we call ourselves.
Do you know, how the Russian tzars referred to themselves? "Us,
by the Grace of God the emperor of all Russia, Us, the emperor of
Poland, Us, the prince of Kazan and so on." Here is an example of
honest confession of the fact that the wholeness does not exist.
There is only Us. And so we should also honestly confess:
"Us, by the Grace of God, the husband, the lover, the worker, the
pedestrian, the citizen and so on."
There is also another position. It seems to be quite different,
but, under closer observation, it is also born out of lack of
faith. The man have heard that the knowledge given by the
Tradition helps, assists solving his problems, and so he demands:
"I need everything, and quickly! A personal jet, a personal
yacht, a bank... What's wrong? I represent the Tradition, I
want it all"
Yet another idea that gives birth to fear and inability to believe
is that there exists something called "how it is in actual
fact". "Oh, in fact it is not so! In actual fact it
is..." And we are super beings again. As if it is not enough
to know a priori "how it should be", but now we also know
precisely "how it is in fact". The superiority complex of a man
is something colossal, indeed. But then, thanks to this complex he
won all the battles.
But is there such thing as in actual fact? No, there is not.
And it is quite easy to prove.
From the point of view of physics all things are electron clouds,
and there is much more void there than matter. About 80% of void.
"The hand does not go through the wall, but they are saying 80%
void?" Then how it is in actual fact? Maybe relative?
For a believer the world is yielding, inherently yielding,
that is, inherently flexible and mobile. The idea of flexibility
is put into the very notion of spirituality, spiritual life,
spiritual development.
Do you remember the saying of Socrates?
"I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance." And
he was so glad about it. Nicolas of Cusa in his "De Docta Ignorantia"
was talking about learned ignorance. It is learned ignorance,
because one must understand it, must willingly abandon all a
priori knowledge, all social inheritance, that was put into my had
without any agreement or disagreement from my side, simply as a
mechanism of social adaptation and of social control.
Here, look: an electron cloud sits on the top of another electron
cloud and shakes the other electron clouds. This is from the point
of view of physics. And what about the point of view of
psychology? And what about the point of view of this, or of that?
How could you believe into this? How could you refuse this great
treasure that came from nowhere, the treasure of knowing
everything? I know how it should be. I know how
it is in actual fact. I know what I will need in the
future. I know precisely that I lack today what I must
have. I know everything. Or, is it my Us knows everything?
But the spiritual knowledge says: no, a man is full of shit, which
has played its role - it used to be food and it has been
digested. And kind of enema is needed. And the spiritual teaching
becomes such an enema. Get rid of old stuff and now you have room
for faith.
You should monitor the moments in yourself when you are free of
"should", "lack", and "actual fact", and in those moments
act according to your faith. And "According to your faith be it
done unto you". (Matthew, 9:29)
This is not wishful thinking, and not an abstract metaphor. It
is a precise formula. By your faith will be done.
Sign it, please
It does not look so scary in those systems of believes that
include the Father or the Mother. Why so? Because it is not a
self-dependent act, it is simply an execution of someone's order.
He (or she, or it) orders, "Make it so!" And I do. And if
something goes wrong, no one is to blame. There is no personal
signature there. And in such a situation it is not a question of
faith, it is rather a question of obedience.
Suppose that reputable people said that there is
a supreme being, let us call him Rick-Pick, so that we would
not offend anyone. This knowledge was planted from early
childhood. The social pressure was organized in an efficient
manner, it finally reached me, and now I believe that there is
such a supreme being. I joined the army of Rick-Pick followers and
my life is great, because Rick-Pick commands, and I obey. Like on
a navy ship: "Ay, ay!" As soon as I said, "ay, ay, sir!" I am
no longer responsible for anything. I execute the order.
Faith is the question of inner responsibility. Faith is the
spiritual goal and spiritual comprehension at the same time. I
have faith and, therefore, I bear personal responsibility for
everything that I do. I have faith and so I can say: "I did
this. I said this."
And then the power appears. This kind of power that is so well
described in different books. But you bear the full responsibility
for any use of this power. And it becomes crystal clear that
maybe this power is not immediately needed, that maybe I should
not use it yet, because I am not ready to be responsible for the
use of astral energies in the battles against the clerks in the
Ministry of Agriculture. To be personally responsible.
I wish we could all remember while applying magical powers to
social life that the true work is always done in three directions:
for oneself, for the people, for the Temple.
And I can see the biggest problem in the direction for
oneself. All patriots of the Tradition are ready to give up the
last five dollars for the Tradition. But they are not ready at all
to put their signature. Not in the sense of megalomania, but in
the sense of responsibility. As if there is I, then there is
the world that I beget, and so I am responsible for this
world.
In such a case it does not really matter, how it should be,
because it already is, the way how I have made it. It is neither
good nor bad. People will say what they say - it is their right.
I will think what I think - it is my problem. But it is now how I
made it. And no other way.
When there is not any "how it should be" then there is no
enemies who usually appear when I know "how it should be" but
they think differently.
When there is not any "how it is in actual fact" then the
last opportunity to rise over the others disappears. But what about
my medals? What about my experience? My qualification? For all my
sacrifices, for all my work, my time... nothing?! Nothing.
NOTHING indeed. This is what we work for, as it turns out.
At this place some feel scared, and others feel bored. What kind
of tradition is that? No adventures, no astral beings, no
romanticism? The prose of existence, making money. But we have said
already, there are many traditions. If you do not like it, no need
to agonize - look for another one. This tradition lives on the
Bazaar of Life. Its technological goal - the resonance between
the subjective and the objective realities that is an unambiguous
denial of any "how it should be".
If to love is to remove the distance then where an instruction to
the loved one what he or she should be could possibly come from?
You are in the resonance with your loved one, are you not? He is
such as he is. And for him you are such as you are. Resonance
destroys any appraisals who should be what.
Love is scary, because love destroys the distance, love makes the
lover absolutely vulnerable toward the loved one, be it a person
or be it the whole world.
But faith is even scarier. When you have faith you find out that
there is not anything habitual and solid. You find out that
everything, including your very self is created and destroyed every
moment. If in love disappears "how it should be", in faith
disappears {"how it is in actual fact"}.
Faith leads a person to such a quality of realization that he
abandons even "how it is in actual fact". It turns out that
there is no "actual fact" at all.
Clear the room!
You should abandon a silly preconception that everything that
exists in your consciousness is really needed. These are not your
liver, or kidneys, or intestines. Do you understand? These are
thoughts. The thought patterns, the clichés. They are only needed
until you decided, for whatever reason, to become a spiritual
seeker. And the first thing that the spirituality tells you: "Oh
God, how much shit you keep inside!" And so you go: "What?!
But... Where are the flowers, the orchestra, the medals? I came
to spirituality! And you..."
It is difficult to believe and to love because of the same reason.
Because it is so difficult to abandon the competition: who knows
more, who loves more and who loves less, who is the leader and who
is the follower.
Want to love - abandon the thought that you know "how it
should be".
Want to have faith - abandon the thought that you know "how
it is in fact".
Otherwise you will not meet yourself. Because you will keep
meeting with yet another reflection of yourself. In one of the
many mirrors that surround us. But those are not mirrors, those
are the cinema screens. Those are not our reflections there but
"how it should be" and "how it is in actual fact".
And we look there and are trying to conform. This is what I should
be like!
Those are simply the cinema screens from the human making factory.
This is precisely the way how humans are made. They are shown on
the screens what they should be and they are told that those are
not screens, but mirrors.
You should calmly accept the fact that from the spiritual
point of view you have lots of excess baggage. There are many
ill, unnecessary, excessive objects in our consciousness, and all
those should be thrown away. The process of cleansing is
necessary. It will make you strong, light, jolly and happy.
Because you know in the name of what this is done, and you also
know what you fill the empty space with. The Tradition is with
you, she is ready to nourish you from its infinite ocean
of knowledge and power. And she was always ready, it is the people
who are not ready to accept it. There is no empty room.
There is no place to offer to the guest.
Just in case, many of you keep two systems: I kind of
have faith and I kind of don't have faith. Both of
them -
"kind of". Our Tradition is accepted with great deal of
difficulty in the outside world, it may even seem non-spiritual at
all, because it asserts: "to have faith is auspicious",
"to have faith is profitable". That is, if you have chosen
the spiritual tradition as your way of life. It is very effective
to have faith. It is much more adequate than not to have it. The
faith into the Tradition cleanses you. In the light of this faith
many things become unnecessary, spurious, past.
When we don't want to be a mechanism anymore, when we want to wake
up something spiritual within ourselves, we must attend to this
mechanism and throw away the parts that are no longer required.
"And he's burned what he'd bowed to, and he's bowed to
what he's burned." Not so that you could run and shout: "It's
all rubbish!" It is not rubbish. But from the point of view of
spiritual path it is waste products.
Some things should be digested within yourselves. Digested with
the help of gastric juice of the Tradition. To digest and to get
rid of.
The miracles happen in certain quantities every day. But inside
our socio-psychological world no one notice them. Then someone
comes from outside:
"Oh! How do you do it?"
"What exactly? We just live."
"No, but how? How it can be done?"
"In no way."
If you begin to examine yourself, your own thoughts, and to trace,
from time to time: this comes from "the actual fact", and that
comes from "how it should be", and what about that? oh, it is
the "I lack something again"... You do that, and little by
little you realize that it is much more interesting to rest upon
knowledge and faith than upon common sense. Because the main thing
is to understand what do you want to do with it, to have an urge
to do it; and then everything what is required will be there and
everything what need to happen will happen. Because there is a law
of wholesome realization: for oneself, for the people, for
the Temple.
When you rest your life upon knowledge and faith you will realize
that wealth and abundance (what a beautiful word -
"abundance"!) that serve as nourishment and fertilizer
for the spiritual grows should not be avoided.
What are the believes of the Tradition?
The Tradition believes that the potential of a human being is
much higher than what is realized by a human being under the
modern conditions of living. It is the principal point of the
faith on which our Tradition is built.
What does it mean?
- First. The Tradition believes that when we say
"spirituality" we first of all mean the capability to use
the offered knowledge and skills in order to form the Subject
within ourselves. The Subject will become the master of ourselves,
and, thus, we may completely break the dependency on outer
conditioning. Certainly, the assertion that without a developed
subject a man is conditioned from outside and cannot become a master
of himself must be accepted and experienced as a subjective truth.
This position of our Tradition coincides with the position of many
other traditions.
- Second. (This is one of the specific to our Tradition
views - it is not so widely accepted among other traditions.) The
Tradition tells us that to form the Subject, to become a master of
oneself is not enough. When it is achieved, a man has a chance to
completely rebuild his relations with reality. Technologically we
call it a resonance between the subject and the reality.
Our Tradition exists in the forms given by life and in the
very fabric of life itself. And therefore it asserts that full
realization of the Path that is offered by the Tradition is only
possible when intense inner work is combined with hard outer work.
So, as it turns out, as soon as you have formed the subject, as
soon as you have become the master of yourself the Tradition
offers you only more work - now it is the work on becoming the
master of your own life.
The outer work is aimed toward objectification of the knowledge of
the Tradition, objectification of the potential of a human being.
That is, a man who believes the Tradition, sets before himself
nontrivial goals that cannot be realized from the point of view of
the common sense, and yet, he achieves his goals. The Tradition
believes that it is quite possible.
As you can see, the subject of our faith is quite complex, because
it proposes you to realize, to prove in practice the statements of the
Tradition.
The faith is not a conclusion that may be born out of a rational
consideration. The subject uses the rational considerations for
conscious evolution and objectification of the fruits of his faith.
The faith is the result of revelation, that is the result of
a total experience.
Do not forget the guidebook
As any tradition that exists in an open space of socium, our
Tradition has realized on different levels.
It has realized on the level of retreat, where the
socio-psychological world has been formed. It is easy to critique
this world, but many people like to stay at the bonfire and enjoy
the high level of protection in it.
The next level is the School that gives a chance to master
the knowledge and the technologies to a level that is only
limited by the strength of your own aspiration.
The following level of realization that has been formulated as a
practical task is the stage of creating the world of
realization for those who desires to solve the problem of
practical realization of their faith on the Bazaar of Life. I
deliberately do not use the terminology and notions that permeate
the spiritual literature, because our Tradition in its
objectification attempts to realize the principle the time, the
place, the people. Thus we use the language that best suits this
principle.
By the present time we have got everything that is needed for
solving this task:
- There is an appropriate world view.
- There are appropriate technologies for working with oneself
and with the reality.
- There is an appropriate description of what is given to a man,
that is there is a description of what we receive at birth and
during the process of socialization.
- There is a description of social reality, of social nature with
its mechanisms, instruments and construction.
- There is a clearly defined position regarding all of the above.
Everything is there for those for whom the only Path, the
only faith and the only meaning lies in the Tradition.
Land navigation
Now let's see what are the stages defined by the Tradition
on its Path.
- The first stage. The master of oneself is a person
who is the mastered what is given to him, or, in other words, a
competent user. He is competent in using his individuality,
his personality and his essence using our terminology in our
context.
- The second stage. The master of one's life, the life
that was given to him in this time and in this place. We are
using the notion of "life" in our specific context again: life
as a mechanism for the joint existence of people in this world.
The Tradition does not depreciate the common values, the usual
values, the commonplace human life. The Tradition only defines
their place, role, and function in the generic laws of social
nature. Life as it is, as it is given to us is a necessity and to
depreciate it is like depreciating your mother.
But the Tradition insists that such an approach to life is only a
preparation class toward the possibility to create, to shape one's
own life. A man is capable to grasp this shape and to use
competently use what is given to him. The Tradition insists
that the man may not only become a master of what was given to him
under the name of "human being", but he may also become a master
of his life into which he is immersed. That is, by no means does the
Tradition proclaim the escape from the world and the world's vanity.
Quite the opposite - the people of Tradition work on the Bazaar
of Life.
- The third stage. After the first two stages have been
realized, the next stage offers to establish conscious relations
between oneself as a Subject and the Reality, so that the given
becomes only a part of existence of a man in the world. In order
to realize this stage in reality rather than in one's imagination
the Tradition offers such assignments that could not be carried
out without the specific knowledge and skills that are provided by
this very Tradition.
- The fourth stage, and the last one. The man as an
objective embodiment of the knowledge and skills, the embodiment
of the Tradition itself. The Tradition insists that it can be
done, and it is also a question of faith. And we are talking one,
single human life without postponing this task to other words and
other incarnations. Here and now.
Jesus said that doubt is the worst sin. But in my opinion,
the second worst sin is to think that your faith is the only
true faith.
Each of you defines his own level of need in the converse
with the Tradition. Each of you defines what obstacles you are
ready to overcome to gratify this need. For the past twenty five
years such a world has been created that now there is a chance to
come in touch with the Tradition in many different ways.
And those of you who feels the inner desire to thread the Path to
its end and to objectify the Tradition in the world of people must
remember the volume of such a task on one hand, and the number of
necessary actions, inner and outer alike, on the other hand.
The dog barks, but the coffle keeps going
The development of the Essence defines the possibility of the
event that is called "a moment of faith" and provides the key to
the world of miracles. But, at the same time the Personality
little by little assimilates the aspiration of our heroes -
spiritual seekers. Thus all the groups, side movements, sects,
interpretations and exegeses. All those are the results of
illiteracy, incomprehension, mis-perception.
Our hero on his Path inside and outside stumbles across obstacles,
traps, pitfalls, habits, fears, weakness that all come from the
Personality's stockpile. That is, with help of those gadgets the
Personality stays in power, in the place of the Master, and quickly
turns our hero's aspiration somewhere.
But this very aspiration flows from the Essence, because it is the
Essence that strives away from this basement-like existence. This
is perceived by the man as a need for something... undefined.
The principal instrument of the Essence, or, so to speak, its
trump is its ability to have faith, to believe. The same ability
and its realization is the very path to the world of spirituality.
Or, to the other life, by the path of knowledge and faith.
"Be as children, but do not be children."
"Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become
as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of
heaven." (Matthew 18:2)
What does it mean? Master the total experience, as children, but
not in a child's fragile form. This is why in our Tradition that
almost does not have any rigid requirements, there exist one
unbreakable rule: any converse with a person must contribute
to the developments of his Essence. But only a live, emotional
converse may contribute to that. No other one will, whatever you
could invent in your intellectual endeavors.
A struggle between the Essence and the Personality keeps on going
in every one of us. Because historically the Personality became
the strongest part of a man. And even when you have achieved
de-identification with the Personality... and so on, steady
work in this direction is still required. Since our Tradition
lives on the Bazaar of Life the social suggestion on subconscious
level never stops.
What contributes to the development and growing up of the
Essence?
- Review of one's own biography, one's own inner history, in
order to find the events that blocked the development of the
Essence, finding the reasons of those blocks and taking them away.
- Training aimed to develop, strengthen and expand the
emotional and sensual spheres. Development of their integrity (up
to the totality level) yet preserving the adequate level of
social integration, e.g. the relations with people.
- Resonance based relations with other people, e.g. the
relations based on removal of the distance.
Look what our Tradition is doing. It is assembling completely
different people, and many of those actively dislike each other.
Openly, covertly, consciously, subconsciously, on the level of
informational metabolism or because of the shape of their ears.
In order for this situation, for this Us to be helpful in
your advancement on the Path, you are given a precise compass -
the resonance. Because the relations that are based on the
resonance can reach through the boundaries that are drawn by the
other parts of our embodiment, including informational metabolism,
temperament, and socio-psychological world that gave birth to your
Personality. Only such relations contribute to the development of
your own Essence and the Essence of the other person.
There is only one way to help to develop the Essence of the
other person - to enter into the resonance-based
relationship. In
this sense the ancient books talk about love - love is the
removal of the distance, and such removal is only possible in the
resonance-based relationship.
And one more thing.
As long as the person explains the lack of the inner work by
the outer circumstances we can say that his Personality is still a
dominant.
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