How Prayers For The Dead Can Heal Your Family Tree

Yesterday I wrote about praying for the dead. Some people think this practice is truly bizarre, but those of Anglican, Catholic, Orthodox Christian or Jewish background understand completely why this is necessary.

But we can go still further. Besides praying for the well being of those who have passed away, we can actually bring healing to living family members - including ourselves - through prayers for the dead.

How? It's all explained in an excellent book, "Healing Your Family Tree", by Dr. Kenneth McAll.

And by a truly extraordinary piece of synchronicity that very book arrived at my house just as soon as I'd finished writing yesterday's post!

I'd ordered it weeks ago and had despaired of its ever arriving. I thought it would give some clues as to the origins of various familial problems which are clearly connected to both genetics (our faulty DNA) and family environments.

To my great delight, however, this book not only answers many questions in connection with how family problems may be passed down through the generations, it gives explicit guidance on how these problems may be healed. It shows how spiritual illnesses, as well as physical diseases, may be passed down and cause problems in the present. And it shows the way that all such diseases, whether of the body, mind or spirit, may be healed.

In previous posts I've looked at how our DNA carries the seeds of serious problems in our own lives and those of our families. It is becoming ever more apparent that here lie many of the physical origins of problems such as alcoholism, addictions of all kinds, mental illnesses and so on. We know now that various genetic flaws predispose some of us to addictive diseases and mental problems. There are known genes for opiate addiction, alcoholism, mood swings, and a sort of catch-all mental problem gene - the so-called "Warrior Gene" - which seems to compound many such addictions.

We also know that healing of all kinds comes ultimately from God, and His help is being sought quite openly by those who accept the Twelve Step programs.

Counselling, medication, family therapy and all sorts of interventions can work wonders in dealing with the symptoms of these deep-seated illnesses. But, as Jung said, no true healing is possible unless it takes place in the spirit, because all addictions - and many other mental problems, too - are actually spiritual problems manifesting in the physical sphere.

Those who've traced their family trees can often see these problems going back for many generations. Sometimes they seem to skip a generation, but generally, in every family, there are living members and ancestors who are known as the black sheep of the family, the ones that nobody talks about.

As an alcoholic who, thank God, has not had a drink for more than 25 years, I was especially interested in tracing the origins of this problem in my own family. True enough, in each generation I found someone who seemed especially problematic. He or she was known for a drinking problem, sometimes compounded with other physical and mental problems.

An alcoholic parent will not only pass on the alcoholic gene to some or all his children, he will also raise them in an unhealthy atmosphere. Until the actual genes were discovered, we could not be sure  whether it was nurture or nature that caused the alcoholism. Today, we see it is a combination of both.

To me, this is a clear indication of what is meant by "original sin". There are faults in our DNA, in our very Essence, which must be healed before true spiritual progress may be made. It could well be that it is for that very purpose that each alcoholic, each addict has chosen to become incarnated today, when so much help is available to heal these diseases. And our own healing efforts can stretch backwards and forwards, into the past and into the future, affecting all those related to us who may have suffered spiritual sickness and passing on a cleansed, renewed heritage to our children.

Dr McAll's book points out that as well as healing those now living, who suffer from inherited addictions and other illnesses, we also need to heal the dead. It may be those deceased ancestors, unhealed and so unable or unwilling to pass further into the afterlife, and who could have attracted evil spirits, who could be causing many of the problems of living family members.

He gives numerous examples of how this can happen. He points out that God can allow unhealed souls to linger, dogging the following generations, waiting until someone, usually one of their descendants, eventually realizes the true nature of the problem and prays for and with them.

Many of these ancestors will have rejected the Christian faith of their families, or else were raised with no faith at all. Many were never baptised, and others have turned their backs on God. The Bible speaks of "generational curses", and it could well be that in many families today this is what is happening, and why so many people are still unhealed despite the best efforts of their friends and families.

Perhaps our ancestors dabbled in the occult and attracted evil spirits, which are now attached to living family members. Maybe they took part in magical rituals, read the tarot or sold horoscopes for financial gain rather than knowledge and understanding, or tried to contact the dead through a medium or a ouija board. Any of these activities, however innocently entered into, creates a psychic "leak" and issues an invitation for an evil spiritual entity to come in, which can then obsess a family tree for many generations.

Dr McAll emphasizes the need to pray for these ancestors by name, if we know it; if we don't, we must pray to be given a name under which they may be interceded for. We can then baptise them into the Christian faith and hold a Eucharistic service for them, in which the healing powers of Jesus's body and blood are applied to the sick and suffering ancestor, and that ancestor is released from whatever is holding them and us in bondage.

Releasing them brings healing and peace to the living family members. And in this way, an entire family tree may be healed.

Dr McAll is an Anglican psychiatrist, and his book approaches the question of family curses in a thoroughly Biblical, Christian way.  If you don't accept this approach, you will gain nothing from reading this book.

But for anyone with an open mind who has noted recurring patterns of physical illness, addictions, mental illness and other problems in their own family, this book could be the way to ending all such suffering.

Readers already in recovery and following the Twelve Steps, and especially if they are also in the Work, will have seen great healing result from the influx of divine energies into their life.  Dr McAll is suggesting that we may extend this healing to everyone in our family tree who has ever suffered from such problems, and thus put a complete end to any and all curses that may have attached themselves to our family.

As he says, "In all cases of bondage the best efforts of psychiatry should be utilized to integrate the personality, but it is essential that they are used in conjunction with prayer and the Eucharist service, which has the power both to break the destructive bondage and to form life-giving bonds with Jesus Christ".

Amen.

Note: I'm indebted to Phil Rickman, author of the very successful Merrily Watkins deliverance ministry series of thrillers, for mentioning this book.

What is the Communion of Saints?

The Communion of Saints - a concept familiar to every Catholic, Anglican and Orthodox Christian  - simply means that we, as Christians, are connected with all other believers and people of good will, both living and dead.

Death does not separate us from them.

We may call the Communion of Saints by its Work name, Conscious Humanity, although, strictly speaking, only the more spiritually advanced members of that communion may be called conscious. Nevertheless, all of us in the Work belong to the Communion of Saints, even if more through desire than through achievement.

And it's not only those who were Christian during their lifetime who are included in this community. Sufis, Buddhists, Hindus, Orthodox Jews, those who have been Good Householders although they may never have followed any particular religion, together with everyone who has lived according to their conscience, may eventually be admitted to this group.

Brother John of the Carmelite Order used to preach that after death there will lots of people who, meeting Jesus for the first time, will exclaim in wonder "So it was You, all the time, and I didn't know!You were the One who healed my child, saved my life, gave me the courage to carry on! Thank You!"

Not everyone will reach Paradise all at once, of course, because we're not fit for it as we are. And Paradise is, in any case, "Only good for two-three days", according to Gurdjieff. What we shall do after we've enjoyed a well-earned rest will depend on us, our abilities, our deepest wishes, and on God and His many helpers, the saints, angels, and archangels.

We may be put to work maintaining the balance of energies on a particular planet; to educating young souls about to incarnate; to helping those in Purgatory to endure the pain of remorse and repentance. We don't know; it's not entirely up to us, in any case. But we believe that death is only a veil, a curtain, which separates those alive on Earth from those already in a different dimension, and that communication between us is still possible.

We are all working for a common aim, the perfecting of our being and the subsequent coming of the Kingdom of God.

We Catholics know that, when we pray to the saints for help, they respond. Proof of this is given daily in the form of miraculous happenings, both great and small. Some have been solidly proven by medical and scientific evidence, the criteria the Vatican uses to decide who is to be recognized as a bone fide Catholic saint.

We know that we may also pray to - and for - our ancestors. Many cultures, both Eastern and Western, encourage the setting up of family shrines in the home, where we can remember our dead and pray to and for them.

Gurdjieff believed that doing so helps us and them. He gave several examples of this type of prayer, from the need to pray for our direct family ancestors (and thus help our "grandfathers" and those even earlier than that generation) to the way in which one person's ancestor (in this case, Gurdjieff's own mother, who had passed away) could help the mother of a Work student.

Daily, in the Catholic church, Masses are offered for the dead. We believe this confers great honour on the deceased one, and helps him or her in the afterlife, wherever they may be. In Work language, we are dedicating a quantity of the very highest, finest energy - that of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ - to those we honour in this way.We also ask our dead loved ones to pray for us, just as we petition the saints to do the same. We are all one family, and we help one another.

No, our family dead are not necessarily out and out saints, not yet, but they are closer than we are to the miraculous realm where Conscious Humanity lives, and they can add their prayers to ours in cases of need.

What is the post-death state like? And will we all be part of Conscious Humanity one day?

All religions believe in some sort of afterlife. The Jewish and Christian faiths postulate a post-death period of assessment, where our next destination will be decided. We Christians call it Purgatory.

Purgatory is not a state of physical torture; it is the place where, with great compassion and empathy, we are helped by those more conscious than ourselves to relive the unrepented sins of our earthly life, and to make atonement for them by our sincere remorse.

Painful, yes. And this is the reason why we are urged, in the Jewish and Christian faiths and most of all in the Work, which is Esoteric Christianity, to repent - undergo metanoia - in our present life. Those sins, those errors, we have committed need to be faced and accepted before we can proceed any further.

It is this belief which underlies the practice, common to many religions and to the Twelve Step programs, of taking a personal inventory at the end of the day. I prefer to do this during the day, so that problems may be dealt with as they come up, but either way is fine. What is certain is that we will have no escape from facing our own sinful, mechanical nature, and we can either do this now, on Earth, or later, in Purgatory. The choice is ours.

A modern Kabbalistic interpretation of Purgatory says that after we die we are placed in a private cinema, with a comfortable chair and a large screen. The film of our life is then projected for us to view, over and over again, until we have repented for the evil, the mechanical acts, we have committed. Then, and only then, may we allowed to ascend to the next stage of our existence.

What will that stage be like?

Marian, my Work teacher, explained that the substance of our Essence is immortal and therefore cannot be physically destroyed in the same way that our bodies can. After death, if someone has remained asleep all their lives, if they have not worked on themselves at all, if they have stifled the voice of their conscience and lived mechanically, their body will decay and their Essence will be thrown back into the melting pot. Nothing of them will survive, because they had not achieved any individuality.

This is Work teaching, and of course it is subtly different from the exoteric, Christian, doctrine.

If, on the other hand, we have begun to wake up, then our spiritual journey is commencing. We will be sent again and again into incarnation so that every lesson we need to learn can be fully assimilated. Only then will we be allowed to remain in "Heaven", however we picture that realm.

For me, it's a world of education, activity, and purpose. It's the fount of order in the universal battle against entropy. It's the state we picture ourselves in when we yearn to be of use to God. And if we follow our conscience, one day we shall certainly find ourselves there, with all the necessary Higher Being Bodies that we have created with the help of Conscious Humanity, which will give us the ability to survive in that rarefied atmosphere.

The Way of the Good Householder will eventually lead there, especially if followed in conjunction with one of the true religions.

For us in the Work, we are following the Way of Accelerated Completion. We hope to reach our destination more quickly than if we simply followed an exoteric religion, but there are no guarantees.

 In the meantime, we need all the help we can get, and praying to the saints, both known and unknown, who are part of Conscious Humanity will help us in more ways than we can possibly imagine.

Please note that, although we are encouraged to pray to the dead, and to offer our own prayers for them, we are not to contact them through a medium or any other occult activity. This is strictly forbidden by all religions and by the Work. Why? Because it is an illegitimate method of communicating with the dead, and calls on the astral realm rather than the spiritual dimension. This being so, all sorts of mischievous, possibly very evil, entities may respond and pretend to be the person summoned when they are nothing of the kind.

I have personally experienced this realm when in the presence of a medium, even though I did not give her permission to call on the dead and did not realize that this was what she was doing. The frightening consequence was only too real, and I have heard of others who also experienced this type of happening while physically in the presence of a medium. If we have not asked for it, the evil realm - the "sitra achra", or other side, in Hebrew - does not have permission to stay, so the remedy is to pray to God and ask for it to be stopped. This is always effective. But it is much better not to court this sort of experience at all. Some types of evil entities are very hard to dismiss.

Real communication with the dead takes places through the spiritual realm, without any medium, and always with the understanding that God may allow it or may prevent it for a particular reason. This is the only legitimate way.

That said, I do have a family shrine in my own house, where I honour the living and dead members of my family and pray for their wellbeing every day. And I ask for their prayers, too, because we are all members of the Communion of Saints, even though some of us are only potentially, not actually, thorough going saints!

Sometimes the dead may communicate with us directly, through a dream sent via the Higher Emotional Centre. This is a very powerful experience, very cleansing and fructifying. And while it should not be sought, neither should it be ignored. It is useful to write it down so that we don't forget the content, and can meditate on it later for guidance.

My personal practice is to pray to the saints, especially St Therese of Lisieux, when in particular need of enlightenment or understanding. There are saints for every type of problem, however, as you will find if you study the saints of the Catholic and Orthodox churches. They are all much closer to God than we are, and they invite our prayers. They long to help us, because in helping us, they help God Himself.

 And that is the purpose of the Communion of Saints - a great mutual-help society, formed of goodwill and spiritual energy, a tremendous source of help which we are foolish to ignore.

Why Gurdjieff Says We Need A "Critical Mind" In The Work

"It is useless to come here unless you have a critical mind".

Thus read one of the sayings attached to the wall of the Study House at the Prieure.

At first glance, this sounds a little odd. When we think of a "critical mind" in a Life context, we probably associate the phrase with someone who's always arguing, objecting or putting up difficulties. Such a person is emphatically not suited to the Work unless they can overcome such unhelpful habits of thinking.

 If they have Magnetic Centre and find their way to a group, the teacher will have her own work cut out in trying to help the student to discard these bad habits. And they may be so ingrained that a student is quite unable to rid themselves of this type of purely negative thinking, and will have to leave the Work altogether.

What, then, did Gurdjieff himself mean by the phrase "a critical mind", and why is it so essential for  work on ourselves?

First, we need to remind ourselves that our Intellectual Centre consists of two major areas, one positive and one negative. Unlike the Emotional Centre, which ideally does not have a negative division - a situation achieved usually only after years of painful work on ourselves - the Intellectual Centre is meant to have a negative part.

Why? Because without it, we could not evaluate ideas. We would be unable to compare, contrast, assess and either accept or discard thoughts and theories. We would have no way of evaluating the Work, for how is one to do this if one cannot compare it with other systems, and see where the Work differs or agrees with them?

For most people starting out in the Work today, a university education is part of their background. If they have been well taught at undergraduate level, they will know how to weigh up different ideas and how to assess their value. There will still be a lot of old ideas that will need discarding, but they will have been trained in the basic thinking processes that give them the expertise to do this.

If they can avoid the trap of "wiseacring" - indulging in pointless speculation for its own sake rather than as an aid to enlightenment, something all too common in academia - their Intellectual Centre will be able to help them in the Work. It will be much easier for someone with a well trained mind to eventually achieve metanoia.

Yet a degree isn't vital when it comes to studying and practicing the Work. Gurdjieff himself had studied at a military academy, but he did not have a university education as we know it. Although many of his male students did have such a background, his female students usually did not. University education was widely closed to women before the middle part of the 20th century, and even then a woman had to be unusually gifted and persevering before she could be accepted at a university.

What is vital, however, is that the student should have undergone some sort of mental training that will help him or her to separate ideas, weigh them, evaluate them and - in the case of the Work - apply them. If she does not possess such a background, her teacher will instruct her to study the type of material that will help in developing her mind. She may be asked to read theology, or philosophy, or science, and then to evaluate the ideas in a cogent manner. It is hard going, but it is necessary.

Without the ability to do this, there can be no progress in the Work.

While it's obvious that the type of person I mentioned at the start of this post, the chronically negative, complaining individual who loves to argue for its own sake, is not likely to last long in the Work unless they are willing to change these profoundly unhelpful habits of thought, the opposite type is just as difficult to teach.

I'm thinking now of the student who's read each and every self-help book, studied every esoteric system, as far their mental capacity allows, and who completely approves of them all. Such a person can't possibly appreciate the Work, because they can't understand how the Work differs from all other systems. They have no critical ability.

Such a student may have read, say, Louise Hay, and loved it. They loved it so much they got identified with it! Then they went on to read A Course In Miracles, and loved that too. Again, they became identified. When the Celestine Prophecies came along they devoured that too, as they did with The Power of Now, Rosicrucianism, Anthroposophy and everything else they could find.

They did not ponder each system of ideas. They did not see how each differs subtly from the rest, how each has helpful ideas but also theories which contradict other systems. Because they did not perceive these differences, they accepted them all uncritically, and when they met the Work they could not see how it differed from all their previous studies. They simply tried to add it on to what they had already read, and the result was a muddle.

It's as though such a student has gulped down everything they could find and has a monumental case of mental indigestion!

Asking them to explain how each system differs from the others, and to outline each one's stronger and weaker aspects, let alone compare any of them to the Work, proves fruitless. They identified with each set of ideas as they came across them, and they are so thoroughly glued to them that they can't break free and judge them objectively.

They have completely neglected to apply the negative side of their Intellectual Center. They probably didn't even know they had one. And unless this sort of casual, uncritical acceptance of any and all "spiritual" ideas can be broken, such a student will not get very far in the Work.

Unless we can begin to think in a new way - to undergo a true metanoia, or repentance - we will stay at the same level. We will not progress. The Work contains many fertilizing ideas that can shock us into thinking differently, more profoundly. But we need to reflect on, not just uncritically swallow, these ideas.

To ponder in the Work sense means to apply both the Emotional and the Intellectual Centres in thinking about a Work idea. We can often feel the good of the Work before we can truly understand it, but the work on Knowledge - carried out by the correct functioning of the Intellectual Centre - is absolutely vital to spiritual growth.

All genuine thinking, says Dr Nicoll, requires an effort, and this is something that people are generally unwilling to make. Without real effort in the Intellectual Centre, however, the Work will fall on stony ground. It will lead nowhere.

We must constantly evaluate what we have heard and read about the Work. We must "think longer thoughts", as Gurdjieff said. Unless we do this, we will not be able to change our thoughts, will not undergo this essential metanoia, which Jesus Christ and all the great spiritual teachers have urged.

We must discard our mechanical associations, our mechanical likes and dislikes. We must thoroughly digest and apply the Work ideas until we can think about Life from the point of view of the Work - and not the other way round.

When we do this, Dr Nicoll says, "You will begin to occupy higher divisions of the Intellectual Centre, and through this maybe you will change the state of your being".

Maybe,

There are no guarantees, but genuine effort and perseverance will meet with eventual understanding. And that is the use, the necessity, of having what Gurdjieff calls "a critical mind".

"Courageously and even joyously"

The above phrase is taken from a beautiful prayer that is said every day by members of a Catholic apostolate.

In context, it is "Lord ... bless my brothers and sisters ... and may we all glorify you and give proof of our love for you by bearing courageously and even joyously the cross which is ours" (my italics).

The prayer is spoken each morning by members of a Catholic apostolate for people with chronic sickness or disabilities, CUSA (Catholic Union of the Sick in America). It's part of a longer prayer, and there is also an evening prayer which accompanies their night time reflections. During the day, members are encouraged to raise their hearts and minds to God, and to remember that they carry a cross which, though painful and hard to bear, can bring healing to others and to mankind as a whole.

Despite its name, CUSA is international, with members in many countries who keep in touch with each other by letter or email, in smaller groups, and encourage one another to grow spiritually through the "joyous" acceptance of their crosses. Each group has a spiritual adviser who is a member of a religious order and who also suffers long-term sickness or disability.

In its attitude to suffering, CUSA is very close to the Work teaching.

The Catholic church, as far as I know, is the only Christian organization which has preserved Christ's sublime teaching on suffering. It tells us that when we offer up our personal suffering, whether physical or mental, we assist suffering people all over the world, and even assist Jesus Christ in his plan for the redemption of mankind.

St Paul exhorts us to join to Jesus's passion on the Cross all the suffering that is ours on Earth, and to bear all things with calmness and patience, including the difficult knowledge of our own inadequacy to the task.

Gurdjieff actually showed us how this cross-bearing could help others, could even help God. He taught that when we bear misfortunes and suffering with patience and goodwill, we create a very fine substance that God needs for his saving work, and which helps the universe to evolve. This substance he called "higher hydrogens".

All of us, Gurdjieff said, will release a quantity of this energy when we die. But, if we wish, we may also participate in God's plan for salvation by acting against our self-will during life, by bearing one another's unpleasant manifestations, by accepting all the many kinds of suffering that come our way and refusing to be defeated by them.

Of course, suffering takes many forms. One particular type, which all of us in the Work must bear, is that of seeing ourselves as we really are, with all our mechanicalness, negativity and ill-will. We must  look at the harm our False Personality causes, the many I's within us that harbour negativity, resentment, and so on. When we truly see all this without flinching and without turning away from it, we open the way for our own transformation and for the fine energy of creation, the higher hydrogens, to be released.

Catholic Christians, if they honestly try to live out their faith, are faced with the truth of themselves in their daily self-examination and also when they make confession to a priest. We're encouraged to leave nothing out, but to be completely honest and unsparing in our account of ourselves and the sins we've committed "in thought and in word, in what I have done and in what I have failed to do". And we ask for the prayers of others, especially the saints, to help us in our determination to avoid sin in the future. We know that the communion of saints is real, and that we can all help one another - both the living and those gone before us - in the great work of spiritual growth.

In the Work, it is our daily task to note the ways in which we continually fail to live up to our ideals, fail to keep our aim. But we don't become discouraged because of this - far from it! We know this honest facing of our failures is the necessary prerequisite to spiritual growth. We fail anyway, so to be given the opportunity to actually see what we are like, and how we behave, think and feel, is a tremendous blessing. We don't judge ourselves, we don't criticize ourselves for our failures. That is simply the way we are. We accept this knowledge, and resolve to renew our efforts.

God does not judge or criticize us when we are honest with Him. Jesus did not condemn the woman taken in adultery, but told her go and sin no more. That is what we must do, as Work students, as would-be Christians.

Members of AA do this each day when they take their inventory. Again, it is not an instrument of condemnation but an aid to greater self-knowledge, and to be welcomed. The love of God is made plain in the AA community, where AA members can be honest with one another and can forgive and help to heal the wounded member. M. Scott Peck says that AA shows what a truly Christian community would be like. And the same is true for all AA's offshoot organizations - Alanon, Narcotics Anonymous, Emotions Anonymous, and so on.

As well as the burden of self-knowledge, the additional crosses we are given vary with each individual. For some, they will be the trials imposed by those we live with and care about - the sick, the addicted, the continual calls on our love and goodwill.

For alcoholics and addicts it includes their particular addiction, along with the character defects that accompany it. There are many, too, who struggle with other forms of addiction, such as codependence, sex addiction, compulsive helping, addiction to spending, and much more.

For members of CUSA, as well as for many who've never heard of that organization, our crosses include chronic, ongoing physical and mental suffering which is part of daily lot and which would, without spiritual insight, become a means of destroying our faith and our hope.

Some members are physically disabled, like me. Many readers know that I use a wheelchair for much of the time and cope with various types of pain and disability as a result of a near-fatal car crash I experienced in 1983. The effects of that crash on my body will never disappear, and will get worse each year. But in contrast, the spiritual benefits - the insights, the understanding, the ability to carry my own cross, and much more - have been beyond all I could have imagined. The apparent catastrophe has been turned into a blessing, thank God. And it's the Work, the teaching of esoteric Christianity, which has brought about this reversal.

I'm also tremendously grateful to the many Catholic saints, such as St Therese of Lisieux, Padre Pio, and St John Paul II, who have offered us the example of their own suffering willingly borne and who have shown us the way to carry our own cross. And as well as trying to imitate their superb example, we can profit from their prayers. They understand suffering because, like Jesus, they have undergone it themselves. A god, a saint, who is beyond all pain and who had never suffered would be useless to us who must cope with suffering on Earth.

You don't have to be a Catholic to understand this teaching, but it definitely helps, because the church upholds and promotes the value of suffering whilst other churches - and the world at large - see suffering as quite useless. It is one of the reasons why Gurdjieff said the Catholic church was a true religious path, along with the Orthodox Churches; most Protestants have largely lost sight of the true value of suffering.

Other members of CUSA have serious mental problems, such as schizophrenia or depression; yet others battle with chronic, progressive conditions such as Parkinson's or Alzheimer's diseases.

But what joins us all together in CUSA is our love of God and our determination to use the crosses we have been given as a way of coming closer to Him and of taking part in his plan of salvation for the world.

And the phrase that I carry round with me at all times is that which I've quoted in the title of this post - "courageously and even joyously".

What a wonderful exhortation! And how impossible it sounds when we first hear it! We would all agree that courage is needed to bear our individual cross, but how can that cross possibly be carried "joyously"?

How can we be glad that we're physically handicapped, or mentally ill, or suffering the scourge of alcoholism? How can this possibly be turned to joy?

The answer is, of course, because it brings us closer to God, and most particularly to the sufferings God experiences in the person of Jesus.

Anyone who makes a serious effort to carry their cross not only with courage but also with joy will find a wonderful new energy, so fine as to be almost imperceptible at first, filling their spirit. If they are in the Work, they will know that this is a positive emotion, sent by God via the Higher Emotional Centre, to encourage them and console them.

It is the love of God made manifest to our limited perception.

And the only way to know that love is bear our cross - courageously and yes, even joyously.

Above all, keep in mind the words of Thomas a Kempis:

"Nothing, how little so ever it be, if it is suffered for God's sake, can pass without merit in the sight of God".

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.