On the Given World-Picture (or 'sensuous manifold')

[AshvinP]

Let's start with something else. This following exercise may sound very trivial, even insultingly so, but I just want to make sure we are on the same page concerning the inner experience of cognitive activity before continuing.

We can forget the triangle image. Pick a random point, say, the corner of the table, and hold your attention still at it for a few seconds, then move to another point. It’s not important what the object is – it acts only as an anchor point. Try to feel the act of focusing your attention.

Then, after you get a good feel for this, try with eyes closed and focus your attention at random points. The eyes are closed only to avoid distractions, you are in the same room space. You can also think of it as, instead of closing your eyes, the lights simply go down. Then you focus your attention at the space where, for example, the chair should be, the table, and so on. But this is only for reference. In reality, you need not try to imagine anything at the points of focus. At the center of the experiment is the very act of pointing your ray of attention at various points in space. You can also try something more advanced like smoothly moving the focus of your attention in circular, spiral, rectangular, etc. paths.

Now after you do this experiment, I guess you would agree that what you experience is entirely your willed movement of the focused attentional activity within empty space. Is that an accurate characterization of the inner experience?

Sorry for bumping this topic. I just wanted to point out that this specific exercise by Ashvin was the one that helped me succeeding the Inner Space Pt. 1 exercise by Cleric.

Well, at this point of the discussion, I think that I was basically copying and pasting things Cleric had proposed before

But yes, it's amazing what a little bit of concentrated effort to feel our inner movements can help us do, the new degrees of freedom it can help us attain. Such inner experiences can then set off a positive feedback spiral, as our 'densified' inner gestures begin to render the ideal landscape we probe in our intellectual inquiries as more expansive and substantial, as overlapping more with the wisdom communicated by the spiritual seers of all ages. Then the sharp divide between 'intellectual thinking' and 'exact clairvoyance' begins to loosen and diffuse, such that we can intuit how our thoughts about reality testify to the contextual constraints of the ideal flow.

Since you attained your initial success with the inner stretching, have you noticed any other inner developments in the following weeks (which you don't mind sharing)?

[Kaje977]

Well, at this point of the discussion, I think that I was basically copying and pasting things Cleric had proposed before

But yes, it's amazing what a little bit of concentrated effort to feel our inner movements can help us do, the new degrees of freedom it can help us attain. Such inner experiences can then set off a positive feedback spiral, as our 'densified' inner gestures begin to render the ideal landscape we probe in our intellectual inquiries as more expansive and substantial, as overlapping more with the wisdom communicated by the spiritual seers of all ages. Then the sharp divide between 'intellectual thinking' and 'exact clairvoyance' begins to loosen and diffuse, such that we can intuit how our thoughts about reality testify to the contextual constraints of the ideal flow.

Since you attained your initial success with the inner stretching, have you noticed any other inner developments in the following weeks (which you don't mind sharing)?

Hello, Ashvin.
Well, I didn't notice any real progress in the weeks that followed. To be more precise, things went in the opposite direction for me. For some reason, my perception receded again. So the “unwiggling of the physical kernel” retracted again. I described it to Cleric like this:

"Now I notice that this state of inner gestures seems to be gradually flattening out again, i.e. it no longer feels as "clear" as before. By "clear", I mean that the degree of awareness of this state is slowly returning to my usual previous state. I can still induce the state and be aware of the inner gestures, but the clarity no longer seems to be the same as it was a few days ago. I don't know exactly what it has to do with, but here I come to my motive: my original question feels answered. The moment the exercise worked, I felt a lot emotionally (spiritually) inside, I was emotionally overwhelmed and euphoric, cried even: the questions that thousands of philosophers couldn't answer were suddenly "answered", or more precisely, I now not only read about this new direction intellectually, but also actually experienced it alive and can vividly feel that there is a direction to go. And this is exactly where I seem to be "stuck" now, so to speak. My mind still wants to delve deeper, to begin the spiritual journey, the Hero's Journey but my soul now seems to be satisfied in the sense of: "Okay, so spiritual science is true, there is more. The direction exists. Done. Back to usual""

In a certain sense, one could say that I did end up leaving the waiting room, but only to return to it later, after having witnessed that behind it is the real deal, or better: It felt like a "touristic" trip. You carry along certain gifts and souvenirs (=> certain inner gestures) and I can repeatedly awaken them, but no new experiences seem to be added since instead of "seeking the experience anew, we try to experience it by remembering what it was previously", as Cleric put it bluntly. Basically, I was merely curious while I did that exercise, I wasn't really seeking although I do know, in myself, that I truly want to walk the Hero's Journey. I just don't really feel ready yet due to certain issues in my Soul.

Another issue concerns my Soul. Specifically, certain negative characteristics and a very powerful astral parasite (Bardon usually refers to them as “larvae” and “phantoms”), as I have (unfortunately) nourished this parasite for many, many years through certain habits. Previously, I attempted to address this through brute force (i.e., willpower), but this did not yield significant results. So I tried to change my environment a little so that I would no longer resort to said habit. However, I then realized that this was only delaying the inevitable, and it became clear to me that the change in my soul really had to come from deep within myself, so that I myself (metaphorically) would no longer be attracted to anything in the “space of desires” or, if I felt the "pull" I would no longer allow myself to be tempted.

Recently, I managed to go without it for several days again, despite the urge. I then practiced consciously observing trigger moments as regular feedback on how my instincts react to them. This allowed me to understand the feeling of being “pulled” a little more vividly and precisely.

So, in general, as of now, I'm currently very focused on Soul aspects, so I haven't really managed to get to the exercises.

[Kaje977]

However, recently I did perceive this "parasite" actually, at least symbolically as I unfortunately gave in to my strongest negative habit again. The imagination that popped in my head (similar to the gyroscope-like imagination) was that of a parasite. Unfortunately, I can't draw it, but the closest picture to what I perceived was this ("symbolic clairvoyance"):



All I can say that it truly did look kind of horrifying, scary, disgusting, repulsive and very powerful.

[Federica]

However, recently I did perceive this "parasite" actually, at least symbolically as I unfortunately gave in to my strongest negative habit again. The imagination that popped in my head (similar to the gyroscope-like imagination) was that of a parasite. Unfortunately, I can't draw it, but the closest picture to what I perceived was this ("symbolic clairvoyance"):

All I can say that it truly did look kind of horrifying, scary, disgusting, repulsive and very powerful.

I'm not sure whether this is it. Up to your consideration:

Among the important experiences that accompany an ascent into the higher worlds is that of “Meeting with the Guardian of the Threshold.” In reality there is not only one such Guardian, but two; one known as “the Lesser,” the other as “the Greater.” The student meets with the former when, in the manner described in the last chapter, he begins to loosen the connection between the volitions, the thoughts, and the feelings so far as they concern the etheric and astral bodies. The meeting with the Greater Guardian occurs when this loosening of the links further extends to the physical body (that is to say, the brain).

The Lesser Guardian of the Threshold is an independent being. It did not exist before the individual had arrived at this particular point in his evolution. It is the individual's creation. Only one of its essential functions can be here described,—indeed it were no easy matter to furnish a complete description.

First of all, let us present in narrative form the meeting of the occult student with the Guardian of the Threshold. Only by means of this meeting does the former become aware of the separation of the threads that connected his thoughts, his volitions, and his feelings.

A terrible spectral creature, in truth, is this that confronts the student. The latter needs all the presence of mind and all the faith in the security of his way to wisdom which he could acquire during his previous training.

The Guardian proclaims his significance in something like these words:—“Hitherto, powers which were invisible to you have watched over you. They worked so that in the course of your life your good deeds brought their reward, your evil actions their disastrous results. Through their influence your character formed itself out of your experiences and your thoughts. They were the instruments of your fate. It was they that ordered the measure of joy and pain which was meted out to you in any one of your incarnations, according to your conduct in earlier lives. They ruled you by the all-binding law of Karma. Now they shall free you from a part of their constraint, and a portion of that which they have accomplished for you must you now accomplish for yourself. In the past you have borne many hard blows from Fate. Did you not know wherefore? Each was the effect of a pernicious deed in a life gone by. You found joy and gladness, and you partook of them. They, too, were the fruits of earlier deeds. In your character you have many beautiful qualities, many ugly flaws ; and both of these you have woven for yourself out of your bygone experiences and thoughts. Till now you did not know of this; only the effects were revealed to you. But they, the Karmic Powers, beheld all the deeds of your former lives, all your obscure thoughts and feelings; and thus have they determined what you now are and the manner in which you now live.

“But the hour has come when all the good and the evil aspects of your bygone lives shall be laid open before you. Till now they were interwoven with your whole being; they were in you, and you could not see them, even as with physical eyes you cannot see your own physical brain. Now, however, they detach themselves from you; they emerge from your personality. They assume an independent form which you can observe, even as you observe the stones and flowers of the external world. And I—I am that very being which has found for itself a body wrought of your noble and your ignoble deeds. My spectral robe is woven according to the entries in your life's ledger. Hitherto you have borne me invisibly within yourself, yet it was well for you that this should be, for the wisdom of the destiny which was hidden even from yourself has therefore worked hitherto toward the extinguishing of the hideous stains that were upon my form. Now that I have emerged, that hidden wisdom also departs from you. It will henceforth trouble itself no more concerning you. It will now leave the work in your hands alone. It is for me to become a complete and splendid being, if I am not, indeed, to fall into decay. If this, the latter, should occur, then should I drag you also down into a dark and ruined world. If you would avoid this, then let your own wisdom become so great that it can take over to itself the task of that other wisdom which was hidden from you, and is now departed. When you have passed my threshold I shall never leave your side for a single moment. From henceforth, when you do or think anything that is evil, you will straightway discern your guilt as a hideous, demoniacal distortion of this that is my form. Only when you have made good all your bygone evil deeds and have so elevated yourself that further evil becomes a thing impossible to you,—only then will my being be transformed into glorious beauty. Then, too, shall I again unite myself with you in one being for the helping of your further activity.

“My threshold is constructed out of every feeling of fear to which you are still accessible, out of every shrinking from the power which will take over to itself the complete responsibility for all your deeds and thoughts. So long as you have still any fear of that self-government of your fate, all that belongs to this threshold has not yet been built into it; and so long as a single stone is there found missing, you must remain standing as one forbidden entrance, or else must you stumble. Seek not, then, to pass my threshold until you feel yourself liberated from all fear, ready for the highest responsibility."
...
...
...


From GA 10 Retrieved from the Rudolf Steiner Archive

[AshvinP]

Hello, Ashvin.
Well, I didn't notice any real progress in the weeks that followed. To be more precise, things went in the opposite direction for me. For some reason, my perception receded again. So the “unwiggling of the physical kernel” retracted again. I described it to Cleric like this:

"Now I notice that this state of inner gestures seems to be gradually flattening out again, i.e. it no longer feels as "clear" as before. By "clear", I mean that the degree of awareness of this state is slowly returning to my usual previous state. I can still induce the state and be aware of the inner gestures, but the clarity no longer seems to be the same as it was a few days ago. I don't know exactly what it has to do with, but here I come to my motive: my original question feels answered. The moment the exercise worked, I felt a lot emotionally (spiritually) inside, I was emotionally overwhelmed and euphoric, cried even: the questions that thousands of philosophers couldn't answer were suddenly "answered", or more precisely, I now not only read about this new direction intellectually, but also actually experienced it alive and can vividly feel that there is a direction to go. And this is exactly where I seem to be "stuck" now, so to speak. My mind still wants to delve deeper, to begin the spiritual journey, the Hero's Journey but my soul now seems to be satisfied in the sense of: "Okay, so spiritual science is true, there is more. The direction exists. Done. Back to usual""

In a certain sense, one could say that I did end up leaving the waiting room, but only to return to it later, after having witnessed that behind it is the real deal, or better: It felt like a "touristic" trip. You carry along certain gifts and souvenirs (=> certain inner gestures) and I can repeatedly awaken them, but no new experiences seem to be added since instead of "seeking the experience anew, we try to experience it by remembering what it was previously", as Cleric put it bluntly. Basically, I was merely curious while I did that exercise, I wasn't really seeking although I do know, in myself, that I truly want to walk the Hero's Journey. I just don't really feel ready yet due to certain issues in my Soul.

Another issue concerns my Soul. Specifically, certain negative characteristics and a very powerful astral parasite (Bardon usually refers to them as “larvae” and “phantoms”), as I have (unfortunately) nourished this parasite for many, many years through certain habits. Previously, I attempted to address this through brute force (i.e., willpower), but this did not yield significant results. So I tried to change my environment a little so that I would no longer resort to said habit. However, I then realized that this was only delaying the inevitable, and it became clear to me that the change in my soul really had to come from deep within myself, so that I myself (metaphorically) would no longer be attracted to anything in the “space of desires” or, if I felt the "pull" I would no longer allow myself to be tempted.

Recently, I managed to go without it for several days again, despite the urge. I then practiced consciously observing trigger moments as regular feedback on how my instincts react to them. This allowed me to understand the feeling of being “pulled” a little more vividly and precisely.

So, in general, as of now, I'm currently very focused on Soul aspects, so I haven't really managed to get to the exercises.

Thanks for sharing, Kaje. I suppose my question was even a bit rhetorical, in a sense, because from your posts, I can clearly see your intuitive orientation to the inner dynamics expanding. This is the 'second-order' element that I mention frequently and is the bedrock of modern initiation - we don't necessarily attain new clear-cut spiritual experiences, new kinds of exotic content or mind-blowing trips, but a growing insight into what we are doing in life and how certain constraints (like the said habit) are modulating our trajectory toward more ideal states that we desire (or, more accurately, that we desire to desire, but don't yet desire strongly enough). These are really the inner developments that make the difference between stagnation and progress.

I remember my initial 'breakthrough' experiences quite vividly and it followed a similar trajectory to what you describe. What strikes me now was how quickly an expectation formed for the experiences to continue in a steady flow. It was like I was saying, "Ok, so this is the new normal for me, I have broken through to a deeper stratum of existence and now the spiritual worlds are bringing their higher revelations to me. I am not sure what this imagery means, but from now on my days will be filled with such exotic imagery and I will head straight toward clairvoyance and spiritual research." In retrospect, such a feeling seems so obviously haughty - these were previously unsuspected degrees of imaginative freedom, yet I was already taking them for granted! Yet that is a deeply embedded aspect of our lower organism conditioned on decades of sensory life, where our intuitive experience of the lawful flow is taken for granted.  I remember this expectation formed quite quickly and strongly. Alas, these initial stages later felt like they were the peak of a roller coaster track and now I was back in the valleys, waiting for the thrill of new spiritual experience to return. I am still in those valleys, in a way, as my most vivid spiritual experiences (such as imagery) are the ones that I seek by trying to remember how they once looked and felt.

It sounds like you are already dealing with a such an expectation in a healthy way. Perhaps the expectation never formed as deeply due to your prior introspective work via Bardon/IIH. You seem to know the novel spiritual experiences are not necessarily the task at hand, but rather the task is to perceive such expectations, desires, habits, etc. and gradually work out strategic ways of resisting them and expanding intuitive orientation to how they take shape in our soul flow, what they add or detract from the experience of that flow, how they carve out certain possible trajectories within that flow, and so on. Although we may feel like we are rolling through the valleys in terms of novel spiritual experience, the sober consciousness of this rollercoaster dynamic is a peak in terms of inner development. These peaks are what help our intuitive perspective overlap more with the higher perspectives that shape the World flow (our higher/future self). We realize this higher self doesn't simply live in more exotic imagery about spiritual reality, but its novel spiritual experiences are what we feel in our expanding orientation to the rhythms of the soul flow.

We can get a vivid sense of this distinction if we try a simple exercise. For example, we sit down, close our eyes, and bring forth something like this image:





The image is imbued with the meaning: "The receding flow of imagery in my mind's eye is a testimony to the spiritual activity from which the flow proceeds - it is spiritual activity constantly reflecting its life in the flow of my imaginative substance, consuming itself with that substance". That meaning of the ouroboros image is certainly truthful and it is helpful to contemplate. Yet, as long as we hear those words (or something like them) precipitating at the horizon of attention, we are still contemplating the image at the ordinary mental scale. Even if the image is super vivid or becomes a living, breathing entity in our imagination, the scale remains the same as long as we feel there is a distinction between the contemplation of its meaning and the experience of that meaning. In the latter case, there is no longer precipitating explication of the meaning at the horizon, but rather the image continuously anchors the experience of ouroboric existence. We feel, without any need for commentary, that the act of producing the image is testified to by the image - it is continually reinforced and amplified by the image. 

In that sense, our present imaginative activity becomes 'phase-locked' with the image and we enter a deeper scale of steering the flow. The steering at this scale has the characteristic quality of unfolding within a phase-locked stratum, where what we refer to as 'intuitive orientation to habits' is the medium of that stratum. Our ordinary process of gaining insights about the soul flow is felt like a chopped up version of this phase-locked steering, where the contemplating and the experiencing of meaning often break 'perfect symmetry' and shift in a precarious, bistable way. I am sure you are mostly aware of these things, but I am only expressing them as a general reminder. As we persist with our introspective efforts on our soul flow, we realize how this prepares us for truly spiritual experiences of the disincarnate state. Our interest and orientation within this flow begins to coincide more with how our deeper soul being steers and understands the flow at its native scale. Then even our ordinary (living and introspective) imaginative movements feel like novel spiritual experiences, that is, novel degrees of freedom to explore the contextual gradient of intuitive intents through which life unfolds. This is the true journey of the Hero.