Essence Relationships

We think of Essence relationships as something very beneficial - a vitally important link to other people, much stronger than relationships formed in Personality.

And often that is exactly what they are. Our spouse, our children, our parents are all related to us in our Essence, and our feelings for them are very deep.

If we're lucky enough to find Essence friends, we cherish these relationships and value them above most others in our lives.

Essence friends are people with whom we're very close and connected at a fundamental level. This connection can be through our common spiritual journeys, especially if we are in the Work and develop friendships among others in our group.  But it may also be formed by other religious contacts, such as people we meet at church, or in a philosophical or religious discussion group, and to whom we're drawn through a common interest and outlook.

Sometimes they develop through our hobbies; perhaps we've taken an art class, for example, and found someone there whose ideas we share, and with whom we develop a friendship. Any pursuit which brings people together to follow a spiritual, intellectual or creative path can lead to strong Essence friendships, and is one of the benefits of such groups.

But not all Essence relationships are good for us in the long run. It may be that we find ourselves drawn to people who don't have our welfare at heart. We recall that Gurdjieff taught that all sexual contacts take place in Essence, no matter how casual, how unpleasant, or how harmful they may turn out to be.

This is because our Essence is often childish and unable to make good judgments about whether those we choose to spend time with - let alone share our lives with - are actually going to hurt us.

False Personality plays a part in bringing about such sexual relationships, for we may be attracted to those whom we know, at an unconscious level, are bad for us. Such a relationship can easily become abusive, but is always codependent and therefore very difficult to break away from.

All therapists have known people trapped in such relationships. They bring much grief and sorrow, and can even cause death when one of the partners becomes so unhappy that they wish to end their life.

Personality and False Personality are, of course, the main initiators of abusive relationships but, once they have become sexual, they are Essence relationships, and as such they are very, very harmful. They can cause us to fall into depression; to relapse into addiction; to harm ourselves; to leave the Work, or abandon our religious beliefs. Again at the unconscious level, we may realize that our abusive relationship is in conflict with what our Higher Power, or Conscious Humanity, wishes for us. But the codependence is so strong that we feel paralyzed, unable to free ourselves.

Essence friendships can also turn sour. At the beginning of this post, I noted that our close family relationships are in Essence, and we know how destructive the family can be. Parents and children may bear one another ill will for some long-ago incident; sibling rivalry is very real and painful; and the Bible notes that a person's worst enemies "are those of his own household". This, of course, refers to our spiritual world as well as our actual, physical household.

 And so it can be with Essence friendships. What was once a source of joy can become a festering pit of resentment. All too often, relationships that have progressed to become part of our Essence can later become contaminated with I's in False Personality.

This happens because, as we are, we cannot "do". We so easily fall back into False Personality, especially when someone "treads on our corns", and all those resentful, angry and arrogant I's spring forth to defend some imaginary insult or avenge some perceived slight. Sometimes this is the fault of both people in a relationship, who have not been working on themselves and have not observed the gradual slide into False Personality that has taken place in their interactions.

Sometimes it is mainly the fault of one person, usually the man or woman who has been in the Work for a lesser amount of time, or who is less developed spiritually no matter what the context is; or who has not been working on themselves for some while.

If both people have good will and wish to repair the quarrel, they may invoke the Third Force of the Work to bring about reconciliation, and clearly this is the best course of action. It can be done by both parties' externally considering one another, and seeing their own part in the misunderstanding. They may pray about the relationship, entrusting it to their Higher Power, to Conscious Humanity. If both are willing to do this, the result is usually a relationship that has become stronger because of their efforts. It will be stronger, in fact, than if the breach had not taken place, because both have had to make Work efforts and will appreciate the relationship all the more.

The problem is that it takes not only good will to bridge a gap, but insight and remorse. Both people must examine their conscience and see where they went wrong. Such a process is painful and difficult, and in Life it is often shirked. The result is a string of broken relationships, hurt feelings, and family quarrels.

In the Work we cannot avoid this process if we wish to remain in a good spiritual state, and able to make progress. No matter how hard it is, we must be willing to examine ourselves and see where we may have contributed to the brokenness. To do this requires humility, the very opposite of the False Personality, arrogant, "hot air" I's, which prefer to keep a quarrel going, and rather enjoy feeling angry and hurt!

But if the result is to repair an Essence relationship, the effort will be very worthwhile.

And if, unfortunately, we are forced to realize that the other person cannot change, cannot experience remorse, and that consequently they will continue to act destructively, then the relationship must be ended for our own sake. In such a case we must forgive the other person, because it is not their fault that they are unable to make efforts. And then, having forgiven them and entrusted their care to Conscious Humanity, we simply let go.

The Summer Solstice, Personality and Essence

We're now at the climax of the Sun's powers in the Northern Hemisphere. As the Earth tilts towards the Sun, so the days grow longer and the strength of the Sun's rays increase.

But now, after the Solstice and marking St. John's Tide (June 24th), we experience the beginning of the second major cycle that makes up the Earth's year: the breathing in which takes place from St.John's Day (celebrated as Midsummer throughout Europe and Russia) until Christmas.

The two festivals are perfectly balanced. The Earth's year comprises one complete breathing cycle. From Christmas Eve until St. John's Tide the Earth breathes out all she has received from the furthest reaches of the Universe. Then, six months later, the Earth once more begins to breathe in, culminating in the Feast of Christmas.

St. John's Tide is the feast day of John the Baptist, who said "He must increase, and I must decrease". He, of course, is Christ, the Head of Conscious Humanity, whom we may approach through our Essence, through Real I.

It was always explained in groups that St. John the Baptist represents the highest level of the Personality, someone who has seen and understood the purpose of the spiritual life, and whose deepest wish is to practice what he has learned, and to inspire others to do the same.

The skillful I's in Personality are of use only when they serve Essence, however. There is no point in serving the Personality for its own sake, as this only leads to deeper enmeshment in Life; and Life, as we all know, leads nowhere but stays on its own level.

When Personality serves Essence, however, we are structured aright in our inner lives. Essence which has matured through spiritual work knows and understands what must be done in each situation. It is Personality which gives the individual the power to respond with appropriate actions at the right time. This is right ordering of the two.

To take an example from my own life, I trained as both a teacher and a writer, because my Essence and Personality enjoyed these activities and I wanted to learn to do both of them as well as I could.

When I began to understand the Work, and was eventually authorized to teach it, those Personality I's which had studied and practised how to teach and how to write really came into their own. They now serve my Essence, which loves the Work and longs to help others to understand it.

When I teach and when I write I'm in my Essence. Of course, there are many other activities which also stem from the needs and desires of Essence: listening to beautiful music, especially Eastern Orthodox and Western sacred liturgical music, and the great composers of the Renaissance; when I'm painting; when I'm outdoors, surrounded by nature, in the countryside or at the seashore, or simply gardening in our long back yard; reading poetry, especially Christian and Sufi poems; and many, many more.

Most of them, however, don't require any special skills to carry them out. But teaching a class or a Work group, or writing - whether it's this blog, a book, or an article for publication - all call for trained skills, which Essence uses to express itself in these activities.

In the same way, people who've made a difference to the world (and I don't mean here the Sacred Messengers, but simply ordinary men and women of good will, living at the level of the Good Householder) have had trained Personality I's which were useful to the impulses that came to them from Higher Centres, from their Essence, perhaps even from Real I.

I'm thinking here of people such as Dr. Martin Luther King, who trained as a preacher and spoke most eloquently to the crowds, and whose commitment to the right action demanded that he be willing to sacrifice his life. His sacrifice, and his words, brought healing and justice to the black people of America who had been cruelly oppressed for more than a hundred years.

Think, too, of Mahatma Gandhi, the lawyer whose words and deeds culminated in ending the British Raj in India, putting an end to centuries of exploitation. He, too, worked with a trained and highly intelligent legal mind, and he also sacrificed his own life for the cause of justice.

Closer to our own time, I think of Nelson Mandela, whose refusal to seek revenge for his imprisonment led to a great breakthrough in human rights in South Africa. Like Dr. King and Gandhi, Mandela was committed to justice and equality, and like them, his own actions brought about a healing of divisions in South Africa so that apartheid was ended and power shared between blacks and whites.

Dr Nicoll and Mrs Pogson used to speak of the great sacrifices made by very young pilots in World War II, who knew they faced probable death and yet gave their lives to fight for the cause of freedom and liberty, and oppose the demonic Nazi regime which threatened the world. Dr  Nicoll thought these incredibly brave young men had incarnated for that purpose, and that somewhere deep within they knew this, and remembered their mission. That war was truly a battle of good against evil, and it was not a foregone conclusion that the good would win - at times, it seemed that evil had the upper hand, and it was only through the willing sacrifices made by men such as these, "the Few", that civilization was saved.

All of these men - and there are, of course, many more, including women, who are both known to us and unknown - allowed their Personalities to be used by something higher. They
embodied the principal of the Baptist, by letting their own wishes be subordinated to a higher influence, that of Conscious Humanity, which used these willing "volunteers" to bring about an improvement on the Earth.

Of course, there is no real progress overall in Life, and the most we can hope for is to stave off disaster, to make things a little better here and there, and to work towards becoming more conscious and helping others to do so, so that eventually the level of humanity may rise and a real transformation can occur. But it is not certain that any such breakthrough will ever occur.

As the Talmud says, we may not be able to complete the task, but neither are we free to desist from the effort.

When speaking of these matters, both Mrs Pogson and my own teacher, Mrs Davison, would ask us whether we could be used by something higher. It is a question we should ask ourselves, especially now, when at the Summer Solstice our actions in the world are emphasize.

 And if not, what would stand in the way?

A Quick Post About My Book .....

My book, "A Raging Thirst", is now out in paperback! 

Excuse this minor trumpet note, but I've been told by quite a few people that the Kindle edition, out for two years now, has really helped them.  So - with the encouragement and help of another Work teacher and of my spiritual advisor - I decided to go ahead and publish my book in paperback form.

It's now available to buy from Amazon, and I've priced it as cheaply as possible so that it may reach the people who will benefit from it. 

The Kindle edition is free of charge if you belong to the Kindle library programme, and the new print edition (revised and updated) will soon also be available on Kindle.

Who might benefit from reading it?

Anyone interested in the Work; the Twelve Steps; Catholic teachings on suffering; the Sufis; alcoholism and other addictions; and disability.

Anyone with an addiction problem or who has a family member or friend with such a devastating illness.

Anyone who lives with disability and pain.

Anyone in the Work or in the Twelve Step programmes, or who is interested in the Christian teachings on suffering and how all these paths may be connected.

I've already had great feedback on all these issues, and several people have pointed out that my memoir is unique in combining so many different areas and explaining how they mesh together.

It's a very personal story, and writing it was a true labour of love. Love for the Work, for the Twelve Steps, for Christian teachings on redemptive suffering, and above all, love for my family. 

Writing honestly about oneself is a very difficult task. But it's very necessary - if a memoir is meant to help people, it can only do so when the author includes her "warts and all". So that is what I have done, and I hope it will reach all those who may be helped by what I've written.

Of course, years of being totally honest with myself in my Work observations, and honest with my family and friends about my experiences, have helped me write truthfully and with understanding.

There's no point in any form of autobiography, including a blog, unless the writer is prepared to tell the truth. Otherwise, he or she might just as well take out an ad! Post a selfie!

But in being so honest, all of us who strive to follow the path of truthful self-disclosure with the aim of helping others are bound to come in for some criticism from formatory thinkers, and those who haven't managed to break free of their judgmental, critical I's.

So be it. Just as there's nothing to be gained by going to an AA meeting or sharing your Work observations unless you tell the truth, so there's no point in trying to make oneself look good in a memoir or a blog. Everyone will see through it, and you will gain nothing. Nor will anyone else.

So, if you're interested in reading my sometimes painful and "brutally honest" (in the words of one reviewer) memoir, please either buy it cheaply as a paperback, or download it for free.

I'm trusting that the Work and Conscious Humanity will see that it falls into the hands of those who may gain insight from reading it. Therefore, this is the only notice that you will see. I'm not interested in making money from my writing or in becoming famous. I've already achieved recognition in my career as a journalist, under various noms de plume to preserve my anonymity and that of my family.

My sole aim writing this memoir was to tell my story and share my understanding, so that others may be helped.

If you haven't read it, I hope you will. And if you know anyone who might benefit from reading it, then please pass it on to them.

And thank you for reading this post!