Identification

Identification is a kind of glue that joins us to something without our knowledge. It keeps us asleep. It is very dangerous, because it can ruin your own life and the lives of others by keeping you blind to important facts.

What you identify with depends on what kind of person you are. An emotional person may get identified with an emotional issue - a love affair, perhaps, or a family member, or a pet. An intellectual type will be likely to identify with a theory, a set of beliefs, an opinion. A moving centre person often identifies with something connected to their own body, perhaps their appetite or their . feeling of discomfort during an illness; they may also identify with political figures who they think may be able to bring about a change they believe is necessary.

Yet anyone can be identified with anything at all! It depends on how asleep you are, and what catches your interest.

In life, we're encouraged by the mass media to become identified with our False Personality I's, our feelings of anxiety, petty worries, vanity and the wish to put a good spin on things. By doing so, advertisers can get us to buy products that promise to solve these non-existent "problems", while politicians can keep us hypnotized with lies and deception so that we don't question the prevailing system and its injustices.

Very often people identify with some major event in their lives and go to sleep for months, even years. Dr Nicoll told one student that she had fallen asleep on her birthday - six months previously! - and had only just woken up.

Identification is the main cause of failure to make progress in the Work, and it's the state in which the majority of people live for much of the time. That is why the world has so many problems.

If you can discover what you yourself are identified with, it will give a tremendous boost to your personal work on yourself. It will provide you with valuable material to work on, and show you the way forward in your progress towards greater consciousness.

Pause for a moment now, and ask yourself: with what do I identify?

Perhaps it's your work. Perhaps you are in a competitive environment and are pressured to produce more results, climb higher up the promotional ladder. If someone were to point this out to you, you would react strongly against the idea, but let your boss make a mild criticism of your efforts one day and you feel threatened, panicky, as though your very existence is being called into question.

Perhaps it's a family member and his or her problems. Often this is true of codependent people in a family where there's addiction or alcoholism. We concentrate on this problem to the exclusion of other matters, but our very identification prevents us from acting effectively towards this person. It also keeps us from seeing our own illness, that of codependence, and thus from doing anything about it.

Many people identify with their bodies, with their state of health. The shelves of bookstores and libraries everywhere, not to mention the internet, are full of information about mental and physical health problems, some of it useful, much of it not. People become preoccupied with the best way to improve this or that aspect of their health, and devote so much time and money to it that they become hypochondriacs or valetudinarians, like Mr Woodhouse in Jane Austen's "Emma". 

Sometimes it's something they've produced - a painting, a piece of writing, a roast dinner, a blog. I mention the latter because I'm writing one, and because, as a professional writer, I started out by being very identified with everything I wrote. I wanted it to be perfect, and the only cure was to work for a large, daily newspaper where each story or column I wrote would be snatched up by editors eager to meet deadlines. Perfect or not - and it never was, of course - off my story would go, and I had to give up any hope of controlling what happened to it. 

If you are identified with something, a sure giveaway is how you react to criticism. 

As a writer, I used to think of my stories as my "babies", so that when they were criticized or questioned I would feel my children were being threatened. This was an extremely difficult state to be in, of course, and I soon adopted the only professional attitude possible if one is to survive in the marketplace - I let go of what I'd written, wished it well, as it were, and turned my attention to something else.

Instead of feeling my stories were my babies, or even a part of myself, I began to see them as something I'd produced, which could be worked on further or let go. And once a story, an article, an essay or a book had "left home", it become impersonal. Yes, I'd written it, but in releasing it to an audience it was no longer my private property and I no longer felt my very existence was threatened if someone didn't happen to like it. I soon discovered this was the attitude of most professional writers and artists; it has to be, if we're to carry on creating. Otherwise, it's just too painful.

You may be identified with one thing or with many. Some people identify with every passing event, every interest. 

Identification is at the root of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). Carried to an extreme, OCD prevents people from living full lives because they become identified with one portion of it to the exclusion of almost everything else. Thus, for example, someone identified with hygiene may feel compelled to wash their hands fifty times a day. Someone identified with food may follow a strict - and near-anorexic - diet, or go to the other extreme and insist on only the most "gourmet" morsels entering their mouths. They may spend hours searching for the perfect wine to accompany their meal, or the perfect Middle Eastern spice to complete their signature dinner party dish. They have made a god of their belly, as the Bible puts it.

Do you want to know what you are identified with? Look for what offends you. When did you last take offence about something that somebody said or did? What was the context?

One person I knew took offence when I mistakenly thought he was out of work and living on benefits. Since many alcoholics and addicts do lose their jobs, and have to accept benefits from the State in the early weeks and even months of their recovery, I could not see any reason for him to take offence. It is often a perfectly normal, sensible, thing to do in the circumstances. This man seemed to have no visible means of support and did not go to work each day, but he became furious at my mistaken assumption that he was living on benefits! He reacted far out of proportion to my mistake, and even when I apologized he bridled and pursed his lips; I don't think he ever forgave me.

It turned out he was living on an insurance payout that he had been awarded when he was the victim of a car accident. It was his vanity that had been offended - he was identified with his public image, and wanted to be seen as a man of means rather than a person who was temporarily out of work. A huge False Personality "hot air pie" was the cause of his identification!

Another person became offended when a friend thought she had been "dumped" by a boyfriend. Oh no, the offended party insisted, it was she who had done the dumping! She could not bear to have anyone think she had been rejected, so great was her vanity. She would rather be seen as cruel than abandoned. Again, a massive False Personality attitude was at the root of her offended feelings.

What offends you? When did you last feel you were - quite justifiably, of course - outraged? Can you see what lies behind the feeling of outrage, or insult, that you experience now when you think of it? What aspect of your existence is being questioned? What I's in False Personality are conspiring to drive this feeling?

It might be something as minor as having to wait for a long time in a supermarket queue, a feeling of "it isn't fair", or "why does it have to happen to me, of all people". Or it could be that you felt left out in a group discussion, or failed to be recognized in the street by a passing acquaintance. Any minor incident can lead to a feeling of being offended. And this feeling is the clue that we are identified with something or other.

What would happen if you gave it up?  

A good Work exercise, especially for Lent when we are looking for things to sacrifice, is to give up being offended. Try it for one day; then a week; then two. If you are so free of False Personality that nothing at all offends you, you are either very fortunate or you have worked hard on disidentifying from vanity. Or you are deceiving yourself.

Either way, seeing what you identify with is a great step forward on your spiritual path, and you may be amazed to see how much of your life has been lived in that state. 

Adult ADHD - An Often Overlooked Condition

When you see the abbreviation ADHD, what comes to mind?

A hyperactive child? A disruptive, overactive little boy or girl, who's probably going to need Ritalin? Or just a naughty little kid who needs more discipline at home (a commonly held misunderstanding)?

Chances are you thought of one or all of the above. The common perception of ADD or ADHD (Attention Deficit Disorder, sometimes with hyperactivity) is that it applies only to children, and they are always physically restless, often disruptive in class, lack concentration and need medications or stricter home discipline. The latter, by the way, is totally inappropriate, since children with this condition need help with building skills, not punishment for something they didn't choose to do.

 Children with this condition are often restless, but they are not always disruptive, and their state has  nothing to do with "being naughty".

What's more, it's now increasingly diagnosed among adults. You, or someone you know, may have this condition without ever having been aware of it - yet it may have had profound effects on your life.

In this post, I want to look at Adult ADHD.

How can tell whether you have it?

Signs and symptoms include having trouble concentrating and staying focused. You may be someone who's easily distracted by minor stimuli, quickly move from one activity to another, who becomes easily bored and dislikes intellectual work that requires sustained focus, or directed attention, as it's called in the Work. If you are, in fact, in the Work, a perceptive teacher would set you tasks to help develop your Intellectual Center, but this alone may not be enough.

Perhaps you struggle to complete tasks? You may enjoy starting new projects, but have problems following through. You may easily lose track of time and fail to meet deadlines. You feel badly about this, but finishing tasks is a recurring problem for you, though you don't understand why.

You may be forgetful and disorganized. This is not, for you, a matter of lacking will-power. You actually find it really difficult to remember important dates and times, and you may miss appointments.

Your home or work environment quickly becomes messy and cluttered, with dirty cups and dishes, piles of paper, and unread mail stacking up on the table. Because all this is hard to clean, your home or workplace may actually become dirty. It all seems an impossible task to clear up, so you never begin.

You may be impulsive - frequently blurting out thoughts and feelings that are rude and inappropriate towards others. You may have poor self-control, and may also have addictive tendencies.

Other signs that are often taken for another problem include mood swings, irritability, short temper with explosive outbursts, hypersensitivity to criticism and low self-esteem.

The restlessness so often accompanying this disorder in children may, in adults, be expressed as a mental restlessness rather than a physical state. You may have racing thoughts, be easily bored, crave excitement and talk excessively. 

In attempt to overcome this restlessness, some adults develop a tendency to hyperfocus, or obsess about one or two things to the exclusion of others. This coping mechanism may help them to complete a task, but it often causes relationship problems when those around you cannot understand why you keep focusing on some minor detail which, to them, is irrelevant. Or they may resent the time you spend reading or at the computer, when you find something that absorbs your attention and brings some relief from your wandering thoughts.

You could have all of these symptoms, or just a few. Only a trained professional can make a diagnosis and ensure you get appropriate help, but it's worth considering whether you may have Adult ADHD if any of the above descriptions ring a bell.

And it's not all bad news.

Someone with this condition will often be a creative thinker, and when they learn to channel the flow of ideas and calm their racing thoughts they may have much to offer the world and themselves.

It's relatively easy these days to get help for this condition. Usually, this will include counselling - especially involving behavioural and cognitive work - together with practicing organizational skills and developing systems to keep you focused on daily tasks and setting up useful routines. Sometimes medication is hepful, but that is a very individual decision which is best be taken in consultation with a psychiatrist trained in this field. Not everyone needs it; in fact, most manage very well without it.

Let me illustrate this condition by describing someone I know well, who was diagnosed with Adult ADHD; she's the daughter of a friend, and I've known her since she was a baby. I'll call her Ruth.

At school, Ruth was recognized early on as being exceptionally intelligent. She passed tests with ease and often came top of her class, but her desk was the most messy in the room and the work she handed in was frequently missing pages or was stained with tea or coffee. Her handwriting was very hard to read, so she used a word processor whenever possible.

At home, her room was described by her parents as "a complete tip". Toys, clothes, books and school papers were strewn all over the floor. Every time her mother made an attempt to tidy up, the effect was lost within a day or two. In the end, the rest of her family gave up the effort - but the room had to be cleaned for health and hygiene reasons, and this was a frustrating process for everyone, often ending in tears.

Eventually, when Ruth was ten years old, a wise and perceptive teacher spotted what seemed to her the signs of a newly discovered condition, then described as a form of learning disability: Attention Deficit Disorder. In Ruth's case, she had no problem paying attention to theories and facts in the classroom, which was why she was always top in most subjects. But she simply could not organize her work or her desk! Nor could she organize her room at home.

Ruth was emphatically not a "naughty" child, whatever that may mean. She had a real problem for which she was not responsible and which threatened to overwhelm her, and she needed help.

Her teacher took time every day to help Ruth organize her books and folders. She suggested to her parents that their daughter could benefit from seeing a child psychologist, and he did indeed offer her extra help in the form of a support group, counselling and more training in organization skills. No medication was needed, to everyone's relief.

Ruth eventually won a scholarship to an American Ivy League University, where she did outstandingly well in humanities and in sciences, an unusual combination. After graduate school she took a series of jobs which offered her the chance to use both her reasoning skills and her creativity, and today she holds down an important position in an international company. She finds her job fulfilling and rewarding==, and her home life is also happy, except for the fact that she could never quite take to organizing and cleaning her house! Fortunately, she has an understanding spouse, and can afford to employ a cleaner.

I'm interested in this condition because I believe a relatively large number of people struggle with it, and are undiagnosed.

Of course, any of the symptoms I've mentioned could point to another condition. To get the right diagnosis it's essential to consult a specialist. But, if you're someone who experiences problems with impulsivity, organization, focusing, mood swings or obsessional thinking, it would be well worth finding out whether you might have Adult ADHD.

Everyone has some of these problems, some of the time. You may have Adult ADHD if you suffer from more than one, and if they cause you real problems in your daily life.

As well as individual counselling and group support, there is much you can do to improve your own
condition.

It's very important that you ensure you have a nourishing and healthy diet, for example. You need a wide variety of nutrients, many of which can improve your mood, and you should avoid sugar, because it will exacerbate your problems. Plenty of whole grains, fruit and vegetables are essential and will help improve your mood.

Getting enough sleep, organizing your environment, and taking sufficient exercise are important for everyone, but especially for someone with ADHD. You may benefit by employing a cleaner to help with your home space.

Work on your relationships in order to improve your mood and increase your support network. Try not to take offence easily, and don't be over-sensitive to well-meant criticism. Most people want to help you when they understand your problems: let them. They may not understand that you have a specific condition, so explain to your friends that you have been diagnosed with Adult ADHD, and tell them that you need their support to help deal with it.

Learn meditation to calm your racing thoughts. Your spiritual connection is extremely important, reminding you not to become immersed in the daily problems you face. If you are in the Work, the morning exercise is the best way to become calmer, and you may practice short periods of "sitting" and sensing your body during the day whenever you find yourself becoming anxious.

You may be surprised to discover how much better you feel when you've learned how to cope with this condition. Like Ruth, you can then harness all your creative energy and use it for your own benefit and that of those around you.

Giving Up Unnecessary Suffering For Lent - And For Ever!

This week sees a powerful combination of astrological influences that usher in Lent, the Chinese New Year, and the very important Jewish month of Adar, the herald of Spring. Lent means "Spring" in Old English, by the way, and as we all know, it's the time when Christians meditate on the 40 days that Christ spent in the wilderness, battling temptations.

We mark the season of Lent by giving up something that is normally part of our life. Christians the world over practice this sacrifice, and if they have saved money by doing so, they donate the savings to charity. Orthodox Christians give up meat and eat a semi-vegan diet. Most Western Christians will give up an item they like, such as chocolate or coffee, which they will miss; when they do so they remember the great sacrifice Christ made at His Passion, to which the Lenten season leads us.

In the Work, we also give something up for Lent. What we choose, however, is something that's hindering our spiritual progress.

We've seen from observing ourselves how much we have to sacrifice before we can awaken, and it can be generally summed up as "unnecessary suffering". That is all the Work ever asks us to sacrifice, but it is a huge undertaking.

Why? Because, paradoxically, unnecessary suffering is the very last thing people want to give up!

What, then, do we mean by this suffering?

It is our mechanicalness. It includes negative emotions, negative thinking, unnecessary patterns of action that are burdensome to ourselves and those around us, and even actions which might seem to others to be praiseworthy but which are part of our unnecessary suffering. This list is only a beginning. Everyone has to think for themselves about what constitutes their own favorite form of unnecessary suffering. Then pick one item - just one, but it should be a form of unnecessary suffering that takes up your time and energy.

Let's take an example. Think of someone who's a compulsive helper. Someone who's always rescuing people from the consequences of their own actions. She - it's usually a woman - steps in with money, a spare bed for the night, and endless listening to someone's real or imaginary problems; a seemingly bottomless concern for others marks all her actions. Her door is always open, her purse always at the ready.

And yet, no lasting good ever comes of it.

The "rescued" alcoholic returns to his drinking. The abused partner goes back to her abuser. The money that a feckless person squanders is soon needed again, and those who've come to see this rescuer - let's call her Louise - as an unpaid counsellor, mother substitute and unlimited caregiver never stop demanding more and more from her. She's taught them to do that. She's encouraged their dependence. She would never admit it, but it feeds her self-importance, or False Personality, by giving her a belief that she is needed.

No wonder she's feeling depleted and lacking in energy. Her health suffers. Her life fills up with other people's demands, and yet the calls on her time never seem to do any real good to anyone.

As the saying goes, give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach him to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

Louis is always giving out fish, but the recipients never need to learn how to fish for themselves, because they know they can simply come back to her.

This is only one example of unnecessary suffering, but it's a common one.

If you recognize this pattern in yourself, why not take Lent as a time to give up rescuing people? You can always go back afterwards, if you really want to, but just try not intervening, not handing out money, not listening to endless tales of woe, for the next six weeks and observe how you feel.

Do you feel guilty? There's absolutely no need. You are not in charge of the world, and it will carry on running very well without your intervention. Those you've been "helping" may finally learn to help themselves, which is what they really need.

Do you fear loneliness? You may lose some of your false friends, but those who know and really appreciate you will be glad to see you taking more care of yourself and less care of your usual "lame ducks".

I don't mean that we should all become uncaring, because a world without love would be unbearable. But compulsive helping is not really caring at all. Consciously helping is good; it takes insight and determination, and will be the equivalent of teaching people to fish; but this constant rescuing, if you're prone to it, is a real nuisance. It takes the focus away from you and your own needs, away from your spiritual development; away, that is, from the most important thing you have to do in this life. And it stops the people you "rescue" from ever becoming independent.

If you make an aim to give it up, the chances are you will find you have so much more energy and time after these 40 days that you won't want to go back to this mode of living.

Other forms of unnecessary suffering include worrying, brooding over resentments (internal considering), hypochondria, procrastination, and making requirements. For some people it will be venting anger, arguing, complaining, insisting on your "rights"; the list goes on and on.

You'll be able to think of many more.

I suggest choosing one of them - but make it something you know is really a problem for you. You may not be a compulsive helper, but perhaps you're addicted to your smartphone, say, and can't switch off for long. Try taking a whole day at the weekend to be free from its tyranny. During the week, take one or two hours a day of your free time and instead of emailing, talking or texting, read something serious that will stimulate your intellectual centre and help your spiritual development instead of wasting your energy.

Or maybe your favourite form of suffering is worrying. What if my liver packs up? What if the money I'm owed doesn't arrive? What if so-and-so gossips about me behind my back? What if I lose my job? What if my partner leaves me? What if my new colleague doesn't like me?

We can and must give up all forms of worry. They not only exhaust us, they also spoil our health and make us poor company. And they distract us from thinking about more important matters, such as the fact that we and those we love could die at any time, and then all this petty negativity will become the nothingness it truly is! And we would have let it steal our joy.

While we obviously need to take action so that we avoid disasters, we do so simply and without holding on to the negative thought. We let it go, and we practice self-remembering. Essence doesn't worry about anything, it simply IS. And all we can ever do is the Very Next Thing, as Mrs Pogson says.

What you choose to sacrifice for Lent is up to you, but if you are in the Work, do choose. Pick something real, and stick with it for 40 days until Easter. Each day, note how well you've done, or how you've failed, and write down your honest observations. Of course you will fail, and that's really helpful, because it will teach you things about yourself that you didn't know. If we never failed, we would never learn anything about ourselves.

And self-knowledge, self-observation are the first steps to increased understanding.

At Easter, the Passion of Christ depicts the great cosmic drama of the sacrifice of the False Self, the Imaginary I, with all its unnecessary suffering that does so much harm to ourselves, those around us, and the world at large.

If we have made our own small sacrifice during Lent, we will be able all the better to take part in the glorious Day of Resurrection, when Real I rises triumphant from its time in darkness. And for a while, we have the chance to lighten the suffering of God.

Groundhog Day: Deja Vu All Over Again

Today, February 2, is Groundhog Day. It's also Candlemas and Imbolc, the Christian and Celtic festivals which respectively celebrate the Purification of the Virgin Mary and the beginning of Spring.

We can already see the increase in physical light now; the extra length of the days is noticeable and very heartening. If we are sensitive, we intuit a subtle shift in cosmic energy as the Earth moves to a different part in her yearly orbit, away from the intense inwardness of the Winter Solstice and Christmas, and on towards the fresh energies of Spring.

Groundhog Day, celebrated in the USA, is the day when a groundhog is released from his lair and watchers determine whether the little rodent can see his shadow. If he can, it presages six more weeks of cold; if not, the weather will get milder.

But more than that, Groundhog Day is also a  marvellous, Work-based film, which has been voted one of the most spiritual movies ever made. And for good reason. If you haven't seen it, do beg, buy or borrow a copy and watch it as soon as you can.

Chances are, though you probably already know the story. Obnoxious weatherman Paul is sent to cover the annual groundhog release for a television station. Embittered, angry, thoroughly resentful, he makes enemies wherever he goes. Everyone dislikes him, and he seems to have no chance of happiness.

And then something mysterious happens. Paul finds himself waking up to Groundhog Day over and over again. It's always the same day, always the same sequence of disastrous events, always the same people he meets. What can he do to change it? Will he be trapped forever in this particular day? In despair he even tries to kill himself, but to no avail - Groundhog Day recurs, ever the same morning, no matter what he's done the previous day.

Clearly inspired by the story "The Strange Life of Ivan Osokin" by P.D. Ouspensky, the film depicts the theory of recurrence, that we will have to go back over and over the same events until finally we begin to change.  In daily life, those of us in the Work know that this is what actually happens. We don't - thank goodness - have to live through the same day recurring forever until we change. But we do encounter the same sort of situation, the same types of people, the same circumstances in our lives until we see that what needs to change is us.

And so Paul slowly begins to make little changes. He becomes more helpful, no longer punches someone he dislikes, shows a little patience with a child. And as the day goes on, as it recurs and his life changes, he eventually becomes completely transformed. He does find happiness. People start to like him. He enjoys his newfound popularity, and - in the end - gets just what he wants. I won't describe it any further in case you haven't seen the film, but suffice it to say it is a parable of the Work teaching on how to change.

It's not surprising that this film reflects the Work. Its star, actor Bill Murray, has been in the Work for many years, and a number of his films - The Razor's Edge and Lost in Translation, for example - embody spiritual values.

I once encountered Mr Murray, at a Work weekend in upstate New York, and was impressed by his modesty. I'd been asked to clean a room ready for a group meeting, and Murray walked in unexpectedly; he said very little, but what I noticed was the way that, unlike every other actor or actress I've ever met (and as a journalist I met quite a few),  he was not concerned with my perception of him. Many celebrities look at you with brief, split-second glances, the purpose of which is not to notice you, for you are of no significance to these august beings, but to clock whether you're properly noticing them.

Murray, however, was fully present and showed no vanity, no concern over whether we knew who he was. He was there to work, as were we, and that was all that mattered.

The film's scriptwriter, Danny Rubin, denies any spiritual intention. Of course he does. To label a popular film as "spiritual" would be to give it the kiss of death and deny it the audience it deserves.
Yet in 2006 the film was granted cult classic status when it was added to the United States National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant". And audiences the world over have recognized it as a truly spiritual, uplifting, enlightening film which works on every level to entertain while conveying its deeply meaningful message.

It is, in the Work sense, an objective work of art.

British entrepreneur Paul Hannam has just published a book entitled "The Wisdom of Groundhog Day". Hannam says the film literally changed his life. He saw it when he was at his lowest ebb, his business failing, his marriage in ruins, and his own mental state one of great distress. Today, having assimilated the lessons of Groundhog Day, he's a happier, more fulfilled person, both in his private life and professionally. He now runs a business teaching "emotional intelligence", and wants to pass on the insights he gained from the film.

  In a recent article in the Daily Telegraph, Hannam is quoted as saying, "I want to notice what's going on around me, but to do so in the right frame of mind, by interrupting negative behaviour cycles". As a working description of self-remembering, this is a good start.

For this practice of "noticing ... in the right frame of mind" is exactly what we try to do when we work on ourselves. The film showed Hannam how it was possible to change one's life by changing one's being; that by making small, positive changes every day, working on our negative thoughts, negative emotions and destructive patterns of behaviour, we can in the end reach a higher state of consciousness.

The film shows that, "irrespective of our circumstances, we can create an amazing day," Hannam adds.

And by living more consciously day by day, we ultimately transform our entire being - and affect everyone around us.

The Connection Between Counseling and Self-Remembering

Although there's no obvious connection between counseling and self-remembering, in practice each facilitates the other. I'm talking here from the point of view of the counselor, not the client, although much that is said here also applies if a Work student enters into therapy.

Obviously, you have to be in the Work to understand the meaning of self-remembering, and to have practiced with an experienced and authorized Work teacher so that you recognize when it takes place.

And, equally obviously, you also have to be a trained and experienced counselor who's familiar with Freudian, Jungian and Rogerian therapy, at the very least, in order to see how counseling links with self-remembering. Here it's important to distinguish between the psychoanalytic, emotion-based counseling systems and the purely cognitive and behavioural therapies. The latter have no necessary connection to self-remembering, whereas the former certainly do.

Assuming both these requirements are met, and that the therapist is in the Work while also being an experienced, fully competent counselor, let's look at how the connection works.

First, we need to recall that there are many degrees of self-remembering, from the blissful "epiphany" states that are sometimes granted to us, and which could be compared to the Sufi and Buddhist concept of "enlightenment", to those more common moments when we are suddenly more than usually aware of ourselves, our thoughts and feelings, our surroundings, and the company we're with.

Sometimes such moments are granted early in our Work life, to give us the impetus to carry on. Sometimes they are the culmination of years of effort in our struggle against sleep. We don't know when they will come, and we can't control them, but we can work to increase the likelihood and the number of such experiences.

How can these states possibly be related to counseling?

A well-trained and experienced therapist or counselor will be used to monitoring her own reactions to whatever the client is presenting (I'm using the feminine pronoun to include both men and women counselors here, of course, and shall refer to the client as "he", also inclusively),

In observing the client, the therapist will be aware of his posture, his facial expressions, the words he uses and the feelings he is conveying - which may well be very different from, even at odds with, one another. She is actually observing all three centres in the client. And the expert therapist goes further: as well as observing the client, she also observes her own reactions to the client, also in all centres. This must be carried out simultaneously, as the reactions the client evokes may be quite different from the material which he intends to convey.

As an example, any experienced counselor will sometimes be aware of feeling fear or anger as a client speaks - and that these feelings have absolutely nothing to do with what the client is saying, or the client's posture. Observing her own reactions, the counselor needs to see whether these feelings are evoked by something within her own psychology, or whether they are arriving out of the blue, as it were.

A skilled counselor may find that a particular client reminds her of her own strict father, and this unconscious memory - evoked during the counseling process - is causing her to feel a counter-transference towards the client. If this happens, it's necessary for the counselor to detach from it - to disidentify with those I's the client is bringing out, in Work language - and return to the present moment.

On the other hand, if the therapist has checked her own thoughts and emotions and knows that the sudden feeling she is experiencing does not come from within her own psyche, it gives a valuable key to the client's true feelings. She is actually experiencing the client's own feelings, of which the client may be completely unaware. These feelings can then be verbalized, to give the client extra feedback, and can be very helpful indeed to the client's therapy.

Clearly, if a counselor has been in the Work for a number of years and is familiar with many of her own I's, she will find detachment easier and faster. This is where the experience of self-remembering, in one of its forms, will step in to help her understand what is happening.

And it can, of course, work the other way round. If someone is beginning to study herself in the Work, under a teacher, she may well find it an advantage to have taken counseling training so that she is used to acknowledging her own feelings and separating them from those of the client.

Anyone who chooses counseling as a career is obviously interested in her own psychological world and in the thoughts and feelings of other people. A thorough and rigorous training will help her to distinguish the two, and to see when feelings of counter-transference are occurring. In addition, she will have learned about transference - the feelings projected on to her by the client - and will able to pick up such feelings when they are taking place.

Of course, the client's feelings in therapy sessions may have nothing to do with either transference or counter-transference. In that case, they arise from the memories and associations taking place in the client during the present moment, the actual session. And these memories may be completely unconscious, so the therapist provides an invaluable service when she makes the client aware of what is actually happening.

We can now understand the complexity of these layers of emotion that may be revealed during therapy. Transference and counter-transference refer to the relationship between the counselor and the client, and the counselor's duty is to monitor and include these processes in the therapy, to work with the transference, as it's sometimes expressed. Beyond and distinct from these processes, however, there are also the feelings evoked in the counselor when the client accesses hidden memories and takes up unconscious attitudes to what is evoked by the session. Such feelings seemingly emerge from nowhere, and are very significant.

The skilled counselor must be aware of all these processes at once, calling for an enhanced state of consciousness. It can take many years of counseling experience before one is fully conscious of all that is taking place in a therapy session. Counseling skills can only be partially taught; the acquisition of advanced skills is down to the counselor's own ability to be honest about her own thoughts and feelings, and to be willing to face the pain of the client, even, at times, to the point of  experiencing this pain.

To be able to understand the multi-layered process of therapy therefore demands serious and consistent self-observation, although it is not called such in counseling training. And I think this fact accounts for the larger-than-normal numbers of counselors who become drawn to the Work.

Perhaps the counselor's previous professional training was a preparation for her studies in the Work. And vice-versa: if, like me, you become a therapist after many years' experience in the Work, the practice of self-observation, leading to self-remembering, makes for a much easier time during training, and a more enhanced awareness during actual therapy with a client.

And, at their highest potential, counseling and therapy may become an experience of self-remembering for both client and therapist, and a form of external considering on the part of the therapist.

On Progress

A Lunatic in the Work sense is someone who thinks he can "do", that he - alone or with others - can change the world for the better; that progress exists and can be imposed from the outside. In the Work, we know that true progress, whether spiritual or social, can be achieved only when we become more conscious. Society as a whole will not progress until mankind has become more awake.

Politicians make their living from trying to persuade us otherwise. And how we want to believe them! We forget that life, as Gurdjieff reminds us, is a pain factory. Pain is built into the system, as it were. We become more conscious only through struggling with sleep; in order to overcome the inevitable pain of living, we must accept real suffering as our lot, while striving to overcome the mechanicalness which leads to so much unnecessary suffering.

But nobody wants to hear this message. We want to believe in a quick fix, an immediate solution to mankind's many problems.

And when it comes to the suffering of others, who can blame us for wanting to relieve it as quickly as possible?

It's true that in many relatively simple situations, such as natural disasters, efforts to help those in distress can be swift and effective. But what of more complex matters? Can we really believe that progress exists when we see the state that society is in today?

When I was young, I believed that society was unfair, and that by changing our laws and improving the physical conditions of the poor, suffering would be alleviated and everyone could be set free from poverty to enjoy life to the full.

I wish that were true! If only! But in my own lifetime of 70 years I've seen no real progress at all.
Yes, in some groups within society there is noticeably less material poverty today than 50 years ago. But in the spiritual sense, Western society in the 21st century is more impoverished than ever.

As the world is structured today, the illusion that continuous growth is possible must be fostered. Giant corporations need to constantly stimulate our appetites for unnecessary and harmful "stuff". We must be manipulated into feeling anxiety, fear, envy, greed and lust, all of which - advertising tells us - can be assuaged by buying the right products.

We are fed "bread and circuses", exactly as were the Roman populace, to lull us further to sleep.

Spirituality is pushed into the background, or made disastrously "relevant" by churches' adopting the standards of the day. Greed is good. Don't think about the afterlife; don't turn away from the treadmill and speculate about your soul. This life is all there is. Progress is unending. You might live forever.

But it's lies, all lies. Some groups have seen their physical state improved, others have not. Yet others are descending further into entropy.

If you think I'm being unduly pessimistic, let me show you what has happened in one small area of society where reformers believed they were making things better.

I'm going to take the example of single parents, since it's one I've followed closely since the 1970s. And it's a state I know well, because I was - much against my will - left a single parent when my children were still very young.

Before the 1970s, if a young woman had a child outside marriage the baby was generally given up for adoption. In the worst extreme, an illegal abortion might be sought, and all too often this killed the mother as well as the unborn child.

Today, abortions are legal for every woman in the West. If babies are brought into the world, it's because the mother actually wants to give birth to a child. But in the 1970s, before the UK legislation was changed by a well-intentioned government, being a single parent meant bringing up a child in poverty.

At that time, women were rarely single mothers by choice. That state was imposed on them by an irresponsible boyfriend, or a deserting spouse, as in my own case, or by the death of the husband. Generally, everyone believed the best environment for a child was to have two parents, a mother and a father, married to each other, because marriage was, and is, a far more stable situation than cohabitation. And that was the ideal for which most people strove.

The most recent studies support this view. Children raised without one of their parents, or raised in same-sex households, suffer more bullying, are more confused about their identity, have lower self-esteem and do less well in school and in later life than those brought up with a mother and a father.

Until recently, moreover, there was undoubtedly a stigma against illegitimacy. Clearly, this was unfair to the child. The mother's sheer bad luck or irresponsible behaviour, however the situation had come about, was not the child's fault, and the child should not have to suffer the consequences. So, gradually, the idea of birth outside marriage became more acceptable. It was seen as less than ideal, but not a catastrophe, either.

The government of the 70s wondered next what could be done to make sure that children raised by single parents could be free from grinding poverty.

And our British lawmakers had a wonderful solution: give the mothers money for each illegitimate child they bore. More than that, give them their own flat! Then the child would be raised in better circumstances, the mother would not be forced to give her child up for adoption, and society would benefit. Progress!

Now, in the 21st century, we are seeing the results of that "progress".  Being a single mother has become a career choice for many young girls who want to drop out of education and are disinclined to look for a job. Far from being an exception - albeit an exception tolerated and supported by society - this state has become a way of life. You have only to visit any housing estate to see the results this shortsighted, "progressive" policy has produced.

Hundreds of thousands of children are being raised without a father in the home. Deprived of this most basic right, they grow up undisciplined and semi-feral. Not all of them are reduced to this state, of course. Sometimes a single mother will eventually find a partner; sometimes she will marry the father of her child, or children; sometimes another male family figure will fill the role of guide and mentor, and supply the discipline that the overworked single mother simply has no time to impose.

But many more grow up with the idea that society owes them a living, and that criminal behaviour is acceptable. Without anyone to give them boundaries and inspire them to achieve, what else can they do? Gangs often take the place of the family as children grow up, and with no moral guidelines they are prey to drug dealers and pimps. Nobody has told them this is wrong. Nobody has set limits.

Many single mothers do an excellent job, working hard to provide for their children and teaching them moral standards as well as giving them love and support. We all know mothers who've raised children in these very difficult conditions, and who deserve praise and respect for the tremendous efforts they've made. Their children grow up to be loving and responsible citizens, Good Householders in their turn.

I was once a single mother, as I have explained, and I struggled to provide a happy and loving home in the absence of the children's father. It was incredibly difficult. I cannot imagine choosing such a situation - those who do so can have no idea of what such a life is really like, or how their children will suffer because of it. Nobody would choose to handicap their own or their child's life in this way.

 But it is not entirely the fault of the mothers that they are raising children in this difficult situation; society has encouraged it by rewarding them for their behaviour.

So progress has not been achieved, and children raised without fathers still suffer. And society as a whole suffers from the behaviour of these fatherless children, whose mothers could not cope.

I mention this as only one example of how well-meaning legislation has not brought about the effects it sought to impose - in this case, the relief of poverty and of suffering. If we encourage people to abandon the attempt to live as Good Householders, what else can we expect?

Think of the truly ridiculous policies recently pursued by Western governments; from toppling a cruel leader in a foreign country only to see him replaced by the murderous fanatics of Islamist State, to compassionately but very stupidly inviting in an unlimited number of unchecked, unknown foreign migrants amongst whom we now know there were groups of terrorists, rapists and criminals. And then we wonder why our so well-meaning, so generous policies bring nothing but tragedy.

These are the politics of lunacy, created by Lunatics.

Yes, a certain degree of material improvement has taken place between our times and the Victorian age, when children were made to work in factories or sent up chimneys, and huge numbers of single or deserted women were forced to become prostitutes or die of poverty. The legislators who brought an end to these conditions were acting from the highest motives. Some progress has taken place in this respect.

But spiritually, we are in a worse state than ever.

What the world needs in order to make real progress possible is that more conscious people should exist at any given time. The Talmud says that there are always 36 hidden saints living among us, unknown even to themselves. If they should ever suspect their sainthood, they immediately cease to be one, and another takes their place.

Some Sufi traditions have the same idea; as well as the hidden saints, they say, there must be a sufficient number of relatively conscious people below them in the hierarchy of spirituality, to support the existence of the saintly ones.

In the Work, we accept that the only true progress is spiritual. But if, say, 200 conscious people existed in the world, then the consciousness of the whole of human society would be increased, and real progress could be made in every sense - spiritually and physically.

Only people with objective consciousness are able to change society for the better. Only they can foresee the results that will follow from changes in the law. Without such knowledge we are worse than blind - we are doomed to create more and more entropy.

While compassion demands that we must all, as individuals and as a society, relieve the suffering of others as well and as quickly as possible, we must always keep in mind that the best effort we can make is to struggle constantly against sleep, against mechanicalness.

Our own individual efforts to grow more conscious will, in unimaginable ways, benefit the whole of humanity. We have a responsibility to ourselves and to others - and to God.

The need is urgent. We have no time to waste, either for ourselves or for mankind.

New Moons, the Kabbalah, Judaism and the Fourth Way

Tomorrow we'll be experiencing the first new moon of 2016, which marks the start of the Jewish month of Shevat.

Recently we've been thinking about the cosmological significance of Christmas, the Solstice, and other traditions which mark the deepest part of winter in the northern hemisphere. We saw how the Earth is closer at this time to the outer parts of the galaxy and therefore receives rare and unique energies from the furthest reaches of space, from the level closest to the Absolute, to use Fourth Way terminology. At present, those influences are waning but are still there, while the Earth moves forward towards the year's next festival, the next special influences, marked by Candlemass and the New Year for Trees.

Throughout this year I want to continue to look at this interaction between the Earth, the planets and the energies they represent, and in particular to consider at how we can benefit from each change in the Earth's position.

So, from time to time, I'll be talking about astrological and astronomical phenomena and relating them to the Fourth Way and to religions which - because they were founded by conscious people - understand and mark these different stages in the Earth's journey round the Sun.

The religion which, today, has developed the best and fullest, most comprehensive, understanding of these matters is Judaism. The Christian religion also understands and marks the passage of the Earth through the solar system, and its festivals celebrate each stage.

Other religions, such as Buddhism and Islam, take into account the relative positions of the planets and the Earth, but they give less importance to their influence on the life of Man. 

The Jewish religion, however, has for more than three thousand years sought to understand and elaborate the meaning and potential of the planetary influences, especially that of the Moon.

In particular, the Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical tradition, gives prominence to cultivating the right attitude to each change in the position of the Moon relative to the Earth, and also to the cosmic atmosphere surrounding each month. There are different festivals to mark the new energies coming to the Earth each month, and at each festival. The Kabbalah understands and explains them so that we can best take advantage of the opportunities (and dangers) each phase offers.

First, though, a word of warning: in these posts I'll necessarily have to over-simplify the teaching of the Kabbalah. Space doesn't permit me to go into the theory and practice of this ancient system more fully here, but I shall try to situate each festival, each new month, within the greater Jewish tradition.

And please be aware: it's really not possible to understand the Kabbalah unless you have a good knowledge and grounding in Judaism. This is a mistake often made by New Age "Kabbalists", who have studied some part of the Kabbalah without reference to the whole, or to its religious setting. When they do this, the New Agers distort the Kabbalah and misunderstand its intent. It's like religious followers who seize on one verse of their holy scriptures and emphasize it to the exclusion of others: it loses context, loses meaning.

The Kabbalah is not simply something - like, say, astrology or numerology - which you can "add on" to any New Age philosophy. It demands a rethinking of our attitudes towards monotheism, towards mysticism, and towards the Jewish and Christian scriptures. It demands a commitment to ethical behaviour and to spiritual growth, and is very practical in its insistence that we must live out our understanding in actions, or mitzvahs, which is sometimes translated as "good deeds", but means something like "following the commandments".

 The Kabbalah is anything but New Age in its orientation towards transforming the world whilst transforming ourselves; it means hard work for those who commit themselves to it, but promises new understanding and insights, and new opportunities for working on oneself,  in just the same way as does the Work.

In its essence, Kabbalah comes very close to the Fourth Way. In fact, someone who follows the Kabbalah and also practices the Way of the Good Householder by living the Jewish or Christian teachings will be to all intents and purposes also following a Fourth Way school.

One writer who makes this clear is the excellent Zvi ben Shimon Halevi, otherwise known as Warren Kenton. Another is the writer Brian Lancaster. 

Yet another is the equally good, but differently oriented, Melissa Ribner.

I would also recommend the writings of David Aaron, Martin Buber, Gershon Scholem and - for a creative, imaginative approach - some of the works of Isaac Bashevis Singer.

Beryl Pogson, whose teachings I honour as part of the Nicoll line in the Work, and who was my own teacher's teacher, placed great importance on knowing the Jewish Bible and the background of the Jewish religion. I heartily recommend those who want to understand more about the significance of the Kabbalah and Judaism in relation to the Work to seek out her teachings on the Bible and Jewish festivals.

All this is by way of introducing the subject of the current New Moon, which on Sunday ushers in the month of Shevat.

Shevat, in Kabblistic teaching, brings new life. In this month, under the astrological sign of Aquarius, we celebrate the wonderful and unique "New Year of Trees", when trees are planted, existing trees tended, and new life celebrated. It is very close in feeling to the Christian festival of Candlemass, celebrated on February 2nd. 

On Tu b'Shvat, the New Year of Trees, fruit is eaten and wine, or fruit juice, drunk, to celebrate the blessings that trees bring us. But also, to the mystic, concentrating on the archetype of the tree suggests the original Trees in the Garden of Eden. What does it mean to us to contemplate the Tree of Life? The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil?

How does the story of the Garden of Eden, with its tale of disobedience, pride and blame, reveal to us our own faults? How have we blamed others for the errors into which our own rebellious I's, our own pride, our refusal to listen to our teachers and the knowledge of our own Higher Centres, have led us? If we are to carry out our Work Aim in the coming year, we need to see what has lured us away from the Work in the past, which habitual thoughts, which negative emotions, which recurring temptations and distractions, keep us from fulfilling our aims and really living the Fourth Way.

We're given the chance this month to become more open to new plans and projects, which will help us in the Work when we formulate our Aim for the New Year and seek to put it into practical form. If you're thinking of keeping a spiritual journal - a highly recommended practice - this month is a very good time to begin it.

The Kabbalah, with its emphasis on practical action, including eating the right food for each cosmic season, reminds us that what we take in is extremely important.

 In the Kabbalah as in the Work, this is not just physical food, but the three being-foods we study in the Work - the quality of the air we breathe, and how conscious we can be in assimilating it; and the attention we bring to incoming impressions. Eating fruit reminds us that our food comes ultimately from God, and our bodies are temples which should be honored as such. As far as possible we try to avoid "non-foods" such as artificial flavorings and colorings, and foods we know are harmful to our health, such as sugar, trans fats and all sorts of junk food. Intuition is essential here, since some food may be of good quality but not suited to our individual constitution. Paying close attention to the effects of different foods on the body and mind will bring rich rewards this month.

There is much to ponder here. Every month we'll look at the changing cosmic situation, and consider how each affects us, drawing on the teaching of the Kabbalah as well as that of the Fourth Way.

And meanwhile, let our Aim include the ideal of continuing to live our lives in sobriety, in appreciation, and gratitude. Those of us in recovery have been given new lives. Those of us in the Work are offered the chance to become fully transformed by following its call. Those of us who have both, are privileged indeed.

New Year, Sobriety and the Work

Happy New Year!

Like everyone else in the Work, I find the New Year a convenient reference point from which to look at the past year and make Aim for the year to come.

The actual date of the New Year has no spiritual or religious significance. It's just the date that Julius Caesar would best suit the start of the new year, because January was ruled by Januarius, the god who looks backward and forward at the same time.

Astrologically and astronomically, we are still celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas, with Twelfth Night, the end of the concentrated period, falling on January 6th. In England - though not in many other countries - most of us still keep the tradition, even if many celebrants don't understand why.

January 6th, Twelfth Night, is the Feast of the Three Kings (or Magi, or Wise Men). It's also known as the Epiphany, the showing of the newborn Christ child to the representatives of other countries and older religions. The Magi, who seem to have come from Persian and Babylon, and who I believe were members of the Sarmoung Brotherhood, realized that a new Sacred Messenger had been incarnated, and were keen to be among the first to greet him.

In Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, the Protestant reformation took greater hold than in England, and Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans saw the celebration of Christmas as a reversion to pagan practices. They therefore forbade it, and armies of men would scour the countryside on December 25th, putting out any fires that had been lit in manor houses or cottages - because such a fire might be used for cooking a Christmas pudding! The celebration of Christmas was banned, but the inborn need for human beings in the northern hemisphere to enliven the long, dark nights of winter remained, and the parties and revels were simply transferred to New Year's Eve, or Hogmanay.

England was a little different, however, and we never really adopted this extreme form of Protestantism. Catholicism remained a potent force, even when outlawed, causing the Church of England to adopt many Catholic practices at the same time as it denounced "Papism"! And among the traditions the English refused to abandon is the custom of Twelfth Night. Most English households will keep their Christmas decorations up until January 6th, and continue to enjoy mince pies, Christmas cake, and even Christmas pudding, which I absolutely love but discovered that hardly any Americans did. Perhaps you need English DNA to appreciate it.

New Year falls towards the end of these twelve days. It's a good time to take stock of one's life, and to consider one's Aim in the Work. Setting a new Aim for 2016 is strongly recommended.

I almost never made it to this year. My first New Year's Eve in sobriety stands out in my memory as a huge struggle, one which separated the past and present quite radically.

My lover had come to visit me, armed with a large stock of beer. He thought we could drink our way through it, and then celebrate the New Year with the rest of his family. But I was horrified. And very torn. I'd stopped drinking six months previously, but faced with this huge temptation I wasn't sure I could hold out.

Euphoric recall kicked in, and the beer bottles looked tempting. I could smell the aroma as he opened the first bottle, hear the little fizz of foam, saw the dewdrops forming on the ice-cold glass.

But I'd already begun to live the AA Steps, and I knew with certainty that if I were to drink, I would die. Not at once, perhaps, but quite soon after I picked up that first drink. I'd lose control, lose my sobriety, lose my life.

And no relationship, no temporary euphoria, was worth that cost.

So - with tremendous reluctance, and with tears in my eyes - I asked my lover to leave, and to make sure he took the beer with him. Then I got into my car and drove myself to the nearest AA meeting. There are always plenty of meetings on New Year's Eve, because it's such a large temptation for alcoholics, and fortunately there was one near me.

And I went to bed sober.

Every New Year's Eve since then, I remember that night.

And every New Year's Day I think about what my Aim is going to be for the year to come. I look back over the past 12 months and take a mini-inventory. What were my greatest trials, and where do I need to place most effort in the year ahead?

Marian always encouraged us to keep spiritual journals, and I've found this highly beneficial. We can look back over many years' worth of efforts and observations, and we generally find the same sort of trials, the same sort of temptations, running like a red thread through the journal.

But it's not quite a repeat of each.  The spiritual life is like a spiral, not a circle. Yes, similar situations recur, similar types of people - if not the very same people!- provide us with challenges. Our Second Force is never exactly the same, but it will take the form each time of something we deeply need to overcome, situations and temptations from which we can learn.

If you haven't kept a spiritual journal before, now might be the year to begin. Write your aim on the first page of the first entry you make. When you look back a year from now, it's sure to be enlightening.

The Esoteric Meaning of the Twelve Days of Christmas

The esoteric meaning of the Twelve Days of Christmas has been known since ancient times - actually, since before Christmas itself, since, prior to the birth of Christ, the Winter Solstice and the rebirth of the Sun were celebrated as sacred mysteries.

Everyone knows the song, "The Twelve Days of Christmas". It's sung and illustrated everywhere you turn during this season.

But why twelve days? What is the importance of this period?

As I've tried to show in previous posts, this length of time has great significance. The twelve days were always a time of feasting, celebration, joy and goodwill. Christmas, and the festivals that preceded it in ancient Egypt, Babylon, Rome, Greece and all over the Northern Hemisphere, was never just one day. 

Only in modern times has mankind forgotten the real meaning of the winter festivals, turning them into orgies of consumerism. Few now remember what it is they are supposed to be celebrating.

Esoteric studies in astrology and astronomy showed ancient philosophers - which, of course, included first and foremost the Sarmoung Brotherhood - that this time of year was exceptionally sacred.

From the farthest reaches of the Universe, energies sent to Earth now are of the very finest, most spiritual nature. They are sent to all forms of organic life, and convey the ideal pattern that the year's unfoldment is meant to bring. They proceed from the heavenly realms closest to the Most Holy Sun Absolute, and reach us in their undiluted form only at this time.

Seeds now dormant in the earth receive the pattern of their growth. This genetic pattern is inherent within the material from which the seed is made, yes, but the vivifying energies of the season that follows the Winter Solstice are essential for the seed to germinate.

Likewise, the animal kingdom also receives the energies needed for continued growth and for new births to occur.

In the case of Man, the three-brained being, these energies are intended to reach our Essence at this time. They will allow Essence to understand the pattern of its growth during the coming year. They will nourish the new birth that takes place at Christmas and allow it to unfold in the intended direction. Essence may now receive these vivifying, nourishing, creative energies deep within, but only those who are conscious will be able to use them for their own transformation.

Indeed, for many three-brained beings their Essence has become surrounded by a thick "crust" of Personality, and even False Personality. In these cases, the finer energies of the Twelve Days fall on stony ground and are lost.

For those of us trying to awaken, however, then as well as attempting to live in an atmosphere of joy and to keep our emotional balance amid the conflicting energies of Earth that surround us now, our spiritual growth depends on our consciously assimilating and cherishing these sacred energies. Without them, no growth takes place. 

If we have prepared well during Advent, the new birth in Essence that takes place at Christmas now receives everything necessary for its own growth and wellbeing, so that our whole planetary presence will be able to attain a higher level of understanding during the coming year. What's more, our Essence will be strengthened so that in time it may direct our actions, using Personality to achieve its aims, rather than the other way round. 

This is our Aim in the Work. 

The concentrated period of Twelve Days lasts until January 6th, the time when traditionally the most intense celebrations of Christmas come to an end. It's considered unlucky to take down one's Christmas tree and decorations before that date, at least in England, and this tradition embodies the ancient knowledge of the importance of this time.

For many, indeed, the holy energies of Christmas continue to resound, though in an attenuated form, right through to February 2nd, Candle Mass.

The meaning of these dates is that, on January 6th, the increased time and strength of the Sun's rays= is visible in the heavens. What we have celebrated in our earthly world is now apparent above, and we can relax somewhat in our efforts to encourage the Sun to be reborn!

But the sacred energies I've described will continue to be transmitted, even though the planet Earth now moves out of direct alignment with those furthest reaches of the galaxy, right through until the beginning of February. Then, the increased light of the Sun becomes more and more obvious, and the emphasis in the natural world is towards physical growth and reproduction.

In ancient lore, the Earth is seen as completing one breath during the cycle of the year. We can see this in certain Work diagrams. The Earth begins to breath in, as it were, at Midsummer, and the breath is retained throughout the period of the Winter solstice. Then, during the Twelve Days of Christmas, the gentle out-breathing begins, until the complete exhalation takes place at the next Midsummer.

During each solstitial period, approximately four days, the Sun literally appears to stand still; this is the meaning of "solstice". At this point, the Earth is "holding its breath", leaving a space of time at the end of the inbreath, when the breath is retained, and again at the completion of the outbreath.

Such teaching is found throughout esoteric studies, and can be traced in the Egyptian, Babylonian and Greek Mysteries. It was well-known to the Sarmoung Brotherhood, of whom I firmly believe the Three Wise Men were members.

It was lost to the world for many centuries, though kept alive in underground traditions. It resurfaced for a time during the Neo-Platonic revival at the Renaissance, and again in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, which was a period when much real knowledge was again given to the world; this, of course, is supremely exemplified by the Work.

Knowledge, we are told, becomes more available when our planet is passing through critical periods, times of extreme stress and danger. It is given out freely so that those who can respond, and contribute to the evolution of life itself, may play their part.

All our teachers in the Work, from Gurdjieff and Ouspensky on through Dr Nicholl, Mrs Pogson, Marian and others both known and unknown to the public, have transmitted such knowledge to us.

We honour their memory and continue the great tradition when we practice what they taught. And right now, celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas and responding to the sacred energies most present now, is our Work task.

A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Christmas Eve, and the sun is descending behind a bank of cloud over the Fens. The village shops are about to close. A few cars chase along the B roads, hoping to get home before dark; lights are coming on in all the farmhouses and cottages dotting the brown, ploughed fields.

Christmas Eve, and once again the world awaits a miraculous birth.

Christmas Eve, and the King's College Choir is getting ready to begin the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols that has been part of the English Christmas for decades.

For me, the sounds of the first carol, invariably "Once In Royals David's City", mingled with the scent of baking mince pies, heralds the real start of Christmas.

And for the last 25 years, the time I've been sober, Christmas has been a very happy, joyful, family festival, every moment of which I can recall with perfect clarity on Boxing Day morning!

Each Christmas in the Work brings with it the hope of a new birth for us, personally, as well as for the wide world and for everyone else on the Fourth Way. That new birth will, we all devoutly wish, bring new growth in Essence, new possibilities for the following year, that more and more we will live according to our deepest nature, our Real I, that particle of Conscious Humanity that longs to direct our lives according to the Will of the Absolute.

As we who are in recovery as well as in the Work know so well, it's all too simple to let the wish to Work become submerged in everyday worries and concerns.

Now, at this blessed, sacred festival of the Holy Birth, let us all draw sustenance from the memory of past Christmases in the Work, past Christmases in sobriety. Let us withdraw a while from the busy, fussy Personality I's, in ourselves and in others, and remember why we are really here on Earth, this planet that is very far down in the Ray of Creation.

We are here to transform, and to be transformed. To ascend the ladder that connects our earthly selves with the heavenly realm, to become a cell in the body of Conscious Humanity.

The Northern Hemisphere of this little planet now tilts towards the furthest reaches of outer space, beyond the edge of our galaxy, and brings us the chance to receive the highest levels of spiritual energy from those unimaginably far away stars.

Let us receive them in our Essence, and let Essence bring forth a new birth of understanding.

I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

A Short(ish) Post on Advent and Second Force

Advent can be a potent time for Second Force to manifest.

It's bound to happen this way. If we have a strong First Force, then a strong Second Force will rise to oppose it. We must look to the Third Force, the Reconciling Force, to resolve the conflicts and problems that are all too common at Advent.

What is our First Force at this time? Obviously, for those of us in the Work it will be preparing to celebrate Christmas, both in the inner and outer worlds. For people in life, without any religious faith, Christmas preparations will consist merely of material goods. Buying presents, stocking up with food and drink, decorating the home, going to Christmas parties - all these are part of life's Christmas rituals.

And they surely apply to Work students, too. We need to show on an outer level what Christmas means to us spiritually; we want to share our celebrations with others, and to experience that much-needed New Birth in Essence.

But for those in the Work, the inner preparations are much more important. For Catholic and Orthodox Christians, Advent is a time of extra spiritual reading, extra prayers, extra efforts of fasting and abstinence, and so it must be for us.

 For Christians, the season of Advent is quite distinct from that of Christmas itself. Advent is that quiet season of expectation, anticipation, and hope. Catholic churches will cover their statues and artwork with purple drapery, as in Lent, to symbolize the fact that Christ has not yet been born in the liturgical year.

On Christmas Eve, for the Midnight Mass, the churches will be decorated, and will display the traditional Crib for the arrival of the Christ Child. The Child will be symbolically laid in the manger during the Midnight Mass ceremony, and then Christmas will truly begin.

In the UK, which retains so many Catholic traditions, we celebrate the entire season of Christmas through to January 6, Twelfth Night. Only then do we take down our Christmas tree and other decorations. Superstition has it that it's bad luck to remove them before that date - and in many Catholic countries the end of the season is marked by Twelfth Night parties and gifts, just as in Shakespeare's time.

When I lived in the US, I noticed with dismay that many Christmas trees were thrown out on December 26th - our Boxing Day. There they lay, forlorn and abandoned, as if Christmas had consisted in only that one day. For many Americans, and increasingly for many Britons too, that has become true. Christmas is one day - then on to the orgy of spending on Boxing Day! There is no time to digest the new impressions that should be falling on Essence during Christmas.

In the Work, while we too must make material preparations to celebrate Christmas, they take second place to our spiritual life. We may increase the length of our meditations, add extra readings from Scripture and Work books, and make special efforts to remember ourselves as we go about the bustle of everyday life.

No matter how far ahead we have tried to prepare for Christmas, however, there is always Second Force during Advent. We meet it in the outer world, in the form of travelling delays, crowded shops, fatigue, lack of time. It's important not to become identified with any of that. Instead, we find we must make extra efforts to remember ourselves in the midst of all this apparent chaos.

In our inner world, however, no matter how difficult our outer circumstances may be, Advent can always be a fruitful season. Gurdjieff said that when the outer world presented him with "roses, roses", then in his inner world there were thorns. And vice versa! He asked his students which they thought he preferred.

 He was trying to show them that the struggle with Second Force can serve to increase our wish to be, to keep the aim of experiencing a New Birth in Essence. Second Force is difficult, even painful at times, but it is necessary, otherwise we grow slack and complacent.

Whether we meet it in the right way, of course, depends on keeping the Third Force of the Work in our consciousness. Christmas, for us, is not simply a time for parties and celebrations. It is that, of course, and quite rightly, though in Work groups not too much celebration takes place before Christmas Eve; but inwardly, the joy we hope for at Christmas is the result of constant efforts to remember ourselves in the preceding weeks, creating the higher hydrogens that allow our Higher Emotional Centre to speak to us.

It is in that Centre, symbolized by the Virgin Mary, that Christ will be born in us. That Centre is pure of any negative emotion, which is why the Blessed Virgin is such a powerful symbol for us. She is Immaculate, as is our Higher Emotional Centre. Nothing dirty, nothing spoiled by life, touches her.

For people without any spiritual beliefs, Advent and Christmas can become a very negative time. There is bound to be a good deal of stress, because of the importance of the celebration to come and all the expectation we place upon it. And conversations can run negative because of this - people can begin talking about how they hate Christmas, how the stress is making them tired and ill, and so on.

In our Work groups, Marian always gave us the task of turning these inevitable life conversations around so that a potential negative energy was transformed and the situation redeemed by our goodwill. No matter what other Work tasks we had, this was always extremely important.

Without the Third Force of the Work or of Christian Love, life takes over during Advent and Christmas and makes them barren of hope. Presents are never up to expectations. Parties end in fights and disputes. Hangovers, quarrels, family separations - all can bring about more entropy and more chaos in life.

But with the Work as our Third Force, we can transcend the latent negativity and any stress we are experiencing, and use the extra effort to create a beautiful and fulfilling Christmas birth.

May the Christ Child be born in you this Christmas!

Hanukkah,Advent and the Cosmic Cult of the Sun

Just as Christians celebrate Advent and the birth of the Divine Light in human form at Christmas, so Jews celebrate Hanukkah during this season. As I write this post, we're in the second day of the eight-day Hanukkah festival, which children particularly enjoy because they get to eat doughnuts, chocolate coins and pancakes, and receive gifts each evening at the lighting of candles.

Hanukkah is the celebration of the rededication of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem in 164 BC. The temple had been defiled by the Greeks, reflecting the way Greek philosophical ideas were also starting to undermine the religious faith of many Jews. The Greeks believed in the power of logical thinking above all else, and used this belief system to try to weaken the spiritual faith of the Jews.

The Maccabeans defied the authorities and cleansed the Temple. Their redemption of this holiest of holy places necessitated lighting the precious space with an oil lamp, or Menorah, but when they had retaken the Temple they found that there was enough oil for only one day. The ritual had to continue for eight days, but although there seemed little hope of that happening, the Rabbis went ahead and lit the first lamp, showing their faith in God.

And then, the story goes, God performed a great miracle. The oil, which had been kept pure and undefiled during the times of spiritual darkness, miraculously burned for eight days. The entire Temple was cleansed and dedicated once again to the worship of God, Yahweh, the great Spirit beyond all human comprehension and logic.

Without Hanukkah, we would have no Christmas. If the Jewish religion had died out, there would have been no Jewish Messiah, no Jesus Christ. It would have been as C.S. Lewis describes the fallen land of Narnia, "Always winter but never Christmas".

Today, the festival of Hanukkah is celebrated in Jewish homes around the world with the lighting of candles, increasing by one every night, until finally all eight candles in the special Hannukiah, or Hanukkah menorah, are burning brightly.

The ceremony is accompanied by prayers and songs, and special foods are eaten - specifically, doughnuts and potato pancakes, or latkes. These foods are round and golden, and remind us of the round foods eaten at Christmas, to encourage the Sun to return. Gifts of gold foil-wrapped coins are exchanged, small symbolic Suns.

These facts, together with the emphasis on the importance of light in the Hanukkah story, hint that although there is a religious story, as well as a piece of verifiable Jewish history, attached to the festival, its origins must lie much further back in time, reflecting the universality of solar worship and the importance of the Sun in the Northern Hemisphere.

If the Sun dies, then life is extinguished. If there is no inner light, spiritual life perishes. The festival of Hanukkah reminds us of the supreme importance of the external and internal Sun in our lives. And this links us once more to Advent and Christmas, and to our primal need for light in both forms.

We also celebrate Advent with carols and candle lighting. In this celebration that anticipates the coming of the great Light of Christ, however, we also find echoes of the very ancient solar religious cults that our own ancestors followed.

Many Christians are horrified at this suggestion - that various elements combine in our modern religious celebrations - but to me, this only underlines the deep, archetypal forces of spirituality linked to the cosmos which play a paramount part in the world's great religions.

When you reflect on the importance of the harvest and of the crucial need of the Sun to bring about new growth, then the threat of the "death" of the Sun, which happens every year at the time of the Winter Solstice, must have terrified our ancestors.

They would therefore come together for huge seasonal festivals at sacred sites, would feast and sing and offer prayers to the gods, and generally - and horrifyingly, to us - accompany their rites with sacrifice. If there had been a good harvest and if the weather had been fine, the gods might be appeased by an animal sacrifice, but if the harvest had failed, especially if the weather had been particularly bad, then the elders of the tribe might conclude that a human sacrifice was necessary.

It would have been considered a great honour to be sacrificed for the good of the tribe. Such sacrifices took place throughout Europe, including the British Isles, and we may trace their rituals through the perfectly preserved "bog people" that have been discovered at archaeological sites. That they were ritual sacrifices may be seen from the fact that three types of killing were used: usually stabbing, poisoning and garotting. The power of the number three was considered very great in many ancestral religions, so a sacrifice had to be carried out in triplicate.

Perhaps the king or chief of the tribe, if his powers were waning along with that of the Sun, would accept the need to be sacrificed. Sometimes an important man or woman would volunteer to become the sacrifice. But there was a universal belief that human sacrifice was the only way of appeasing the gods when their wrath was evident, or when the powers of the Sun God himself seemed to be diminishing. The heavenly gods must be fed by animal or human blood.

Only with the coming of Christianity did these dreadful practices cease.

In some of our current Christmas carols, we may trace the outlines of a ritual long abandoned, but still half alive in the memory of the tribes.

The most obvious example is one of my own favourite carols, "The Holly and the Ivy".

First, a bit of background: Druids, the priests and priestesses of the Celtic religion, held many beliefs about trees. Each tree had an important role to play in the spiritual world as well in the physical realm, and a whole language was based on the meaning of each tree. The name "Druid" can be derived from the Celtic word for a wise person, "wid" or "wit", and the word for oak, "der" or"derry". So the Druids were the wise ones who gathered by the oaks, and performed rituals for the benefit of the people.

"The Holly and the Ivy" clearly reflects this practice, together with the shamanistic beliefs of the worshippers of Cernunnos, or Herne, the mighty hunter. Animal foods were vital in the winter, and the god of hunting must be invoked to help continue the tribal food supply. The deer must be made to run into the tribal hunting grounds, and you can hear this in the words of the hymn.

I'm going to italicize the "ancient" words, which I believe represent the ancestral rituals that preceded the coming of Christianity, and you can see what I mean here:-

The holly and the ivy,
When they are both full grown,
Of all the trees that are in the wood,
The holly bears the crown.

The holly bears a berry 
As red as any blood,
As Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ
To do poor sinners good.

O the rising of the Sun
And the running of the deer -
The playing of the merry organ,
Sweet singing in the choir.

As a child, I wondered what on earth the deer had to do with Christmas! And the answer, of course, is nothing! But the deer had everything to do with the old religion, and the seeking of the tree spirits and the god of hunting to sustain the tribe. Shamans would even don antlers and act out the ritual of hunting, as is still carried on today in the Horn Dance of Abbots Bromley, in England.

The first verse is clearly the start of a very old song about the tree spirits, and then comes the mention of blood, symbolizing sacrifice. Very shrewdly, the early Christians replaced the second half of the second verse, and of all subsequent verses, with the Christian doctrine, as in,  "As Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ ...".  There is no room to quote the entire carol here, but if you can get hold of the words, you'll see what has happened.

They also replaced the second half of the chorus, which is repeated throughout the song, with "The playing of the merry organ ..."; again, this banished the old religion and brought the song firmly into line with Christian practice.

Nevertheless, the sudden irruption of the "running of the deer" into a Christmas carol is in its way as shocking as the quick switch in Monty Python's famous Lumberjack Song! You know, the song which starts out with the very butch, macho lumberjack chopping down trees, and soon brings in his enjoyment of putting on women's clothing, etc., etc. Both songs are a kind of subversion of the original meaning.

If you're lighting Hanukkah candles during this week, or lighting candles on an Advent wreath each Sunday, please spare a thought for our poor ancestors, ignorant of the true nature of God and of spirituality, but aware that above all we humans need Light.

Our bodies and souls depend on it. And we must prepared to make great sacrifices in order to increase the Light in the world.

Advent: Waiting for a New Birth in Essence

At this time of year - the end of November and the start of December - the Earth is in a very quiet, dormant state.

When we look outside, we see that leaves have fallen, the trees now rear their skeletal arms to the sky, while the grass has stopped growing and few plants keep their greenery. To the unobservant eye, everything seems dead or dying.

Yet this is not quite true. When we look closely, we see tiny buds forming on shrubs, waiting for the days to lengthen again and the sun to reappear. There is the promise, but not yet the fact, of new birth.

The conscious men and women who planned the major religious festivals for the Northern Hemisphere chose this time to celebrate the birth of the Saviour, the Christ, Light of the World, leader of Conscious Humanity. Since prehistoric times, the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, has been the point when human beings held feasts and rituals to urge the dying Sun to return.

Excavations at Stonehenge, Avebury and elsewhere, have - as I mentioned in the post on November - shown that huge gatherings took place during the seasonal rituals. Enormous heaps of animal bones and broken pottery testify to the great "barbecues" of prehistory, accompanied, no doubt, by ritual drumming, chanting and shamanic rites, as still take place in Siberia and the tundra.

When the time to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ was selected, the winter solstice was the obvious choice to inaugurate a new feast. It would take place at the same time as the previous religious rituals, because it was the natural, cosmic season for new birth, new hope, to be celebrated. And so we have Advent, the season of waiting, leading up to Christmas, on December 25th; the date on which the length of time the Sun shines can be almost imperceptibly seen to increase.

All the festive accoutrements of the West testify to the solar past of these rituals. We eat mince pies and Christmas puddings and Christmas cake - all traditionally round, to imitate the shape of the Sun and show how much we hope for its increase. We set fire to the Christmas pudding, to show the Sun what we wish it to do, as though reminding the great star of its chief duty. We even hide gold or silver coins inside it, miniature Suns, to be discovered and held up to the Sun by the children of the family.

We hold family feasts, as men and women have done from time immemorial, to strengthen our spirits and to welcome and "encourage" the newly reborn Sun, the Christ, to illuminate the Earth.

Of course, I'm describing the customs and traditions that I grew up with in England, but all over the Northern Hemisphere there are similar actions and symbols that relate to the same idea. I have no idea how residents of the Southern Hemisphere celebrate Christmas! Their yearly cycle is the opposite of ours, and the major religions all developed in the Northern Hemisphere, giving a different cosmic flavour to our celebrations.

In the Work, we look to the period of Advent and Christmas as the time when we prepare to celebrate a new birth in Essence.

This description puzzled me when I first came into the Work. How could Essence have anything resembling a birth? Surely it was there, fixed, for all time?

I began to understand the mystery after some time in the Work, when I had actually experienced some growth in Essence. Of course, this is not limited to the Advent and Christmas period, just as Christ's coming into the world may be experienced at any time during the year, when we remember all that Conscious Humanity has done for mankind.

At Advent, however, the Earth is in a propitious place for self-remembering and for receiving higher influences.

If you think of the way the Earth orbits the Sun, and how it is tilted away from the Sun during our Winter season, we can see that this means a corresponding shift towards the orbits of other planets in the solar system, and beyond that, to the galaxy itself.

And, as the yearly cycle brings us to the time of Sagittarius and Capricorn, the Earth is positioned in such a way that it is actually closer to different parts of the galaxy.  In the period from the beginning of Advent to the Feast of Candlemass, the orbit of our solar system crosses the orbit of the Dog Star, Sirius. Since our Sun orbits Sirius, it can be said that in some ways Sirius is the "Sun" of our own Sun. Influences from that very high realm reach us directly now, as we are closer to Sirius itself.

It's interesting to remind ourselves that Gurdjieff sometimes spoke of the need "to bury the dog deeper", as he was writing "All and Everything", and that some scholars think he may have been referring to the influence of Sirius here.

In any case, these very special cosmic influences, which include the unimaginably fine substances from which Essence itself is made, come to us most of all at the season of Advent and Christmas, right through to the beginning of February and the celebration of Candlemass.

During this period the cosmic position of the Earth is most propitious to working on ourselves. Efforts made at this time will be helped by the galaxy itself, making it the most suitable and likely time for a new birth in Essence to take place.

What does this mean for us?

We know that for Essence to grow, to experience new birth, it must be fed by Personality. And Personality feeds Essence when we work against our habitual little I's, our negative emotions, our worries, our habitual likes and dislikes.

Advent, therefore, is the traditional time for sacrifices to be made. Many Orthodox Christians eat a vegan diet in these four weeks, giving up their attachment to meat, fish and dairy foods. In the West, Catholics generally undertake some sort of voluntary fast or abstinence, and, just as in Lent, make extra donations to charity with the money saved, thus symbolically feeding Essence (love, or caritas) by the sacrifice of Personality (our habits).

As all this takes place, Essence begins to grow, experiencing an expansion of its capabilities. No longer limited by these petty I's, Essence may express itself more freely in our lives. The Essence within, often pictured in art as a small child or a baby, begins to grow and mature. Eventually, it will be able to direct our lives for us, so that we live according to our Essence needs, not according to what our Personality wants, or even - heaven forbid - according to the dictatorship of False Personality.

What we wish is for Essence is to be able to express itself in us, until, after many long years of work, our lives are shaped by the pattern that Essence knows is right for us. And this will be to live according to our Fate. To live according to the will of Real I, which is reached through Essence, and is the truly sacred place where we meet with the God of our understanding.

Essence in us is so often neglected, its needs and desires relegated to the background as we become caught up in the passions of the Personality and False Personality.  At the time of Advent we begin to understand that it can grow only from what is truly humble within us, not from the puffed-up False Personality or the Know-it-all Personality.

It's no coincidence that the Feast of St. John the Baptist takes place at the exact opposite part of the yearly cycle from that of Christmas, on June 24th, Midsummer Day. In the Bible, St. John symbolizes the full potential of the human Personality. Of him, Jesus says that he is the greatest of all the children of men, but of himself, John - recognizing the limitations of Personality - says only that "He (Christ, Essence) must increase, while I must decrease". No clearer example could be given of the relationship of Personality to Essence. There are many very useful I's in Personality, but even the greatest of these I's must subordinate itself to the rulership of Essence.

This truth is pictured in the True Myth of Christmas, where the Cosmic Christ, the Logos of God, comes to us not through the pomp of a royal palace, but in the lowly, neglected, overlooked stable. And this most royal of all births takes place at midnight, in darkness, unheralded by mankind, amongst the lowliest of people.

 Kings visit Him, to be sure, for they must acknowledge their place in the cosmos as servants of the Most High, just as even the highest, most developed I's in Personality must give way to the rule of Essence.

But it is the humble creatures, Mary and Joseph, the animals and the shepherds, who are the first to hear the angelic voices and to bow to Essence.

At Advent, we move more deeply within and concentrate our Work on helping Essence to grow. This is the real meaning of the season, and the entire Universe moves to help us when we do so.