Usually, when we talk about ourselves, we say "I". We say: "I" do this, "I" think about that, "I" want to do this and that. But this is our delusion. This "I" does not exist, or rather there are hundreds, thousands of small "I" in each of us. We are divided in ourselves, but we can only know the plurality of our being through observation and study. At the moment it is one “I”, the next moment it is another “I”.
Many of the “I's” in us are contradictory, which is why we do not function harmoniously. We usually live with only a tiny fraction of our functions and our strength, because we do not realize that we are machines and that we do not know the nature and functioning of our mechanism.
We are machines. We are completely controlled by external circumstances. All our actions follow the direction of less resistance to the pressure of external circumstances.
Experiment: Can You Manage Your Emotions? Not. You can try to destroy an emotion or replace one emotion with another. But you cannot control them. They are the ones who control you.
Or you decide to do something - your intellectual self can make a decision. But when the moment of execution comes, you might be catching yourself off guard by doing the exact opposite.
If the circumstances are favorable to your decision, you might be able to fulfill it, but if they are unfavorable, then you will do whatever they tell you to do. You have no control over your actions. You are a machine and external circumstances direct your actions, regardless of your desires.
I am not saying: no one can control their actions. I say: you cannot because you are divided. There are two parts in you: one is strong, the other is weak. If your strength increases, then your weakness will also increase and become a negative force, unless you have learned how to stop it.
If we learned to control our actions, everything would be completely different. When a certain level of being is reached, we can actually control every part of ourselves. But today we are such that we cannot even do what we decided.
Promotional video:
(At this point, the Theosophist intervenes, claiming that we can change conditions.)
Our conditioning never changes. It is always unchanged. There is no true change, only the modification of circumstances.
QUESTION: Isn't it a change if a person gets better?
ANSWER: Man means nothing to humanity. One person gets better, another gets worse; It is the same.
QUESTION: Is it not progress for the liar, and not for the one who wants to be sincere?
ANSWER: No. It is the same. At first, he lies mechanically because he cannot tell the truth. Then he mechanically speaks the truth, because it has become easier for him. Truth and lies have value only in relation to ourselves, if we can control them. In our position, we cannot be "moral" because we are mechanical.
Morality is relative - subjective, contradictory, and mechanistic. Both for her and for us. A physical person, an emotional person, an intellectual person - each has a set of moral principles that correspond to their nature.
In every person, the machine is divided into three essential parts, three centers.
Observe yourself (no matter when) and ask yourself: “Where did the“I”that is working at this moment come from? Does it belong to the intellectual center, the emotional center, or the motor center? You will find that it is probably very different from what you might imagine, but it belongs to one of these three centers.
QUESTION: Isn't there an absolute code of morality that should force everyone to recognize themselves in the same way?
ANSWER: Yes, of course. When we can use all the forces that control the centers, then we can be "moral". But as long as we use only part of our functions, we cannot be "moral". In everything we do, we act mechanically, and machines cannot be moral.
QUESTION: This seems like a hopeless situation …
ANSWER: Very true. This is hopeless.
QUESTION: Then how can we change and use all our strength?
ANSWER: This is another matter. The main reason for our weakness is our inability to apply our will simultaneously to the three centers.
QUESTION: Can we at least apply our will to one of them?
ANSWER: Of course, we do it sometimes. Sometimes we are able to control one of them for a certain moment, but with a completely extraordinary result.
(He tells the story of a prisoner who, to send a note to his wife, throws a ball of paper through a very high and hard-to-reach window. This is his only means of gaining freedom. If he misses the first time, he has no other chance. achieves success by exercising absolute control over his physical center, thanks to which he can do what in other conditions he could never do).
QUESTION: Do you know anyone who has ever reached this highest state of being?
ANSWER: It won't do anything, whether I say yes or no. If I say yes, then you cannot check it, and if I say no, then you will not advance further. It's not about trusting me. I ask you not to believe anything that you cannot verify for yourself.
QUESTION: If we are completely mechanical, then how can we achieve control over ourselves? Can a machine control itself?
ANSWER: Right. Of course not. We cannot change ourselves, we can only modify a little. But with outside help, we can be changed. According to esoteric theories, humanity is divided into two circles: a large outer circle that encompasses all human beings, and in the center a small circle of people who are instructed and who understand. It is the real instruction that can change us that can only come from this center, and the purpose of this education is to prepare us to receive such instruction. We cannot change ourselves. This can only happen from the outside.
All religions create the illusion of a common center of knowledge. Knowledge is present in all sacred books. But people do not seek to find it.
QUESTION: But don't we already have a lot of knowledge?
ANSWER: Yes, we have too much knowledge of all kinds. Our actual knowledge is based on the perceptions of the senses - as in children. If we want to acquire the true form of knowledge, we must change ourselves. By developing our being, we can reach a higher state of consciousness. The change in knowledge comes from a change in the being. Knowledge in itself is nothing. First, we must attain "self-knowledge." And with the help of this knowledge of ourselves, we will learn to change, if, after all, we want to change.
QUESTION: However, this change must come from the outside?
ANSWER: Yes. When we are ready for new knowledge, it comes to us.
QUESTION: Can we change our emotions through consciousness?
ANSWER: The center of our machine cannot change another center. For example, in London I am irritable, the climate oppresses me and I am in a bad mood, while in India I feel good. My sanity advises me to go to India, where I can get rid of this irritability. On the contrary, in London I see that I can work. In the tropics, I could not work so well; hence I would be annoyed in a different sense. You see that emotions exist independently of the rational, and you cannot change one through the other.
QUESTION: What is the state of a higher being?
ANSWER: There are several states of consciousness:
1. A dream in which our car continues to function, but under very weak pressure.
2. The state of vigilance in which we are at the moment. The common man knows only these two states.
3. What is called “self-awareness”. This is the moment when a person is left to himself and his car. We have it in flashes, but only in flashes. There are times when you are presented not only to what you are doing, but to yourself in the course of that action. You simultaneously see "I" and "here" of such "I am here", at the same time anger and "I" that is in anger. Let's call this, if you like, "self-call."
Now that you are a fully and constantly conscious “I” and what it does, and you know what “I” it is, then you are aware of yourself. Self-awareness is the third state.
QUESTION: Isn't it easier to achieve this in a passive state?
ANSWER: Yes, but it's useless. You have to study your car when it is running.
There are other states on the other side of the third state of consciousness, but today there is no need to talk about it. Only a person who has attained the state of the highest being is a complete person. Others are only parts of people.
The necessary outside help comes either from the owners or from the education I'm talking about.
The starting points for self-observation are:
1. We are not "one".
2. We have no self-control: we do not control our mechanism. Our puppeteers do it for us.
3. We do not challenge ourselves. If I say, "I am reading a book," and I do not know that "I" am in the course of reading, then this is one thing. But if I realize that "I" am reading, then this is self-challenge.
QUESTION: Doesn't this lead to cynicism?
ANSWER: Of course. If you are satisfied with seeing that you and all people are machines, then you will simply become a cynic. But if you continue your work, then you stop being a cynic.
QUESTION: Why?
ANSWER: Because you made a choice by thinking about who you want to become: either completely mechanical or completely conscious. This is the section of the paths that all traditional teachings talk about.
QUESTION: Are there no other ways to achieve our goal?
ANSWER: Not in England. In the East, this is another thing. There are different methods for different people. But you must find a master.
You can only decide what you want to do. Ask deep down in your heart for what you want the most, and if you are capable of it, then you will know how to do it.