Qabalistic Paths to the Inner Planes - Class 5

We will start with a reading from the Book of Tokens, The Meditation on Faith, Tarot Key Number 7.

I am the hedge of protection enclosing the field of existence. In this field thou dwellest, and I am thy defense against the darkness which is without. Out. Yet is this hedge of safety also a wall of limitation, and the darkness against which it defendeth thee is the radiant darkness of the limitless light, too brilliant for thine eyes.

For within the wall of limitation is the field of mine activity. In the world of manifestation this also is that which the wise call the path of the house of influence, for into it descendeth the influx of my power. Because it seemeth to be set apart, it is also the field of sin and of punishment, because limitation is the root of failure, and sin is but the missing of the target of perfection. Yet as the archer gaineth skill by reason of aiming again and again at his mark, Though in the beginning he missed it a thousand times, so doth the fruit of sin, which men call punishment, perfect the skill of my chosen ones. Behold, sin and punishment are one, and the fire of punishment is the fire that refineth my works. Even in the sinner I am the actor, and I too am the sufferer in the experience of punishment. Thy pain is my pain thy suffering my suffering thy sorrows pierce my heart thine anguish is mine anguish I stand not aloof unmoved watching my handiwork as a Potter watches the clay upon his his wheel nay nay not so for I am the clay and the wheel and the potter too I am the work and the worker and the means of working take heed lest you mistake these words be not deluded by false reasoning they err who say the lord is the doer of all therefore may we do what pleases us for we can do naught of ourselves, know that the error of their thought is the folly that any man do what pleases him. This false reasoning is rooted in the delusion of separateness.

The appearance of separateness cometh of necessity for my self-manifestation. The delusion from it is the root of sin and pain, yet the delusion passeth with the completion of the work for which I enter into manifestation. And because nothing can prevail against me, even the worst of sinners shall come in their appointed time to liberation. If thou canst grasp it, that liberation consisteth in the breaking down and utter destruction of the hedge of protection which encircleth thee and guardeth thee from the terror of the darkness which is without. For when the work is finished in the field of ches, when the abode of influence hath served its purpose, then shalt thou know, O Israel, that thou hast not to fear, not to be guarded against. Then shall the dreadful darkness be revealed to thy perfected vision as the flashing radiance of light limitless and from the field of sin and punishment thou shalt pass into the boundless freedom of my divine perfection I see we didn't chase you away last week congratulations Congratulations.

What was that?

How nice.

Last week we covered, and not at all thoroughly, because it's impossible to thoroughly cover each of these grades, the paths that are connected with them, the evolutionary levels that are involved in the type of forces that are promoted in these various advancements through the grades of the tree of life.

We covered it far less than we would have liked to, but we feel we did at least bring to you, at least we hope, we brought to you some perception regarding a subject which has been so misunderstood and perhaps more than ever in our particular era, though that's hard to believe because through every era as we look back into history, we see that the greatest problems have arisen due to the conditioned patterns of the mass mind laying down certain strict rules and regulations as to what is right and what is wrong.

And of course the point is this is necessary. As long as we have an evolved level of consciousness and humanity is an infant we do have to have rules and regulations otherwise we'd have even greater chaos than we have now believe it or not some people think it's about as great as it could get considering the world tensions but there's a reason for that the point is that that very energy with which we evolve we're going to repeat that one statement before we go on with the rest of the grades and show how one leads into the other the point is that the complete mental emotional attitude which rests with our thinking feeling responses to the sex energies this is what is involved in achieving in achieving liberation, in achieving illumination, in achieving mastery over the personality, in achieving that state of true unity with God, because this is the creating energy of the universe from the all-self, the white circle as represented by the white circle on our tree, the one, the indivisible. From that down the line of the various aspects or expressions of that one through the smallest and most infinitesimal expression, all of creation takes place through that energy on different levels. And on the physical level, as we have mentioned we repeat it again on the physical level it is expressed as sex between male and female now the reason it becomes so vital especially at this stage of our evolution to change our concepts is because in this area we have tied up patterns we are sort of you might say locked away in our own self made coffins and this is energy that's tied up in such a way that it keeps us running in the opposite direction from which we want to go without our realizing it it keeps us in a state of separativeness it keeps us in the state of clicking our tongue saying shame shame always the other person naturally or almost always and as jesus said we we reminded you last week he who is without sin let him cast the first stone well the pure in heart are these human beings who have either in past incarnations or at least are getting busy on it in this one completely reconditioned their attitude towards this amazing and glorious expression of the unity of life.

Those who want to achieve true spiritual liberation should know right now that there is no hope of attaining it, while the guilt complexes, the leering attitudes, the sneering attitudes, attitudes, the condemning attitudes, the feelings, the inner feelings of dirtiness, of something to be hidden away, and so on. You know. You've all been exposed to it because it's rampant in the race mind and in the creatures. And today, in some ways, more than ever, when we see what kind of movies, TV plays, what kind of entertainment being splashed all over the place. Either people are being, imagine, entertained by being shown all kinds of gruesome bang-bang, boom-boom, dart-dart, the killings, the cruelties, the sadisms. They're being entertained with this kind of thing or with having the imagination titillated in every way possible in relation to sex as we all know even our billboards one wit exclaimed that whether they trying to sell you toothpaste or peroxide or a cigarette they put expressions in the faces of their males and females on the posters and in the pictures which would indicate the highest state of ecstasy that one could only achieve in the state of union a sort of subconscious effort to titillate the imagination by making people feel that they are going to be that much more uh admired and desirable if they smoke this or dab themselves with that or use the other soap or smoke or buy a particular car that has an extra little fender or something like that at any rate we must start looking everywhere we go at the inevitable presentation which will come to us wherever we go that the union of creature and creature is a sacramental expression of God's unity on animal levels they They respond to each other with the purity of their own level.

On primitive levels, they respond in the only level they can respond in. When they get a little beyond it, they really start going haywire, wasting this energy in every astonishing way that you can imagine. But then we must come to a point where we revere this energy, and then we don't have to worry about our own morals or anyone else's morals. When we see an expression of love and unity between creatures in our mind as being a holy sacrament, we will not be even tempted to express this glorious energy through ourselves in any way but the most holy, the most sacramental, the most beautiful, the most spiritual. Furthermore, we must always remember this, that if we desire to have this high and exalted response, we not only must practice the attitude wherever we see the unity taking place in the world between flowers, trees, creatures, and so on. It's all the same thing, the same thing. But we must start working on ourselves, make ourselves the sort of creatures who deserve the highest level of expression, who can attract this high and sacramental level of expression. Now one One person here last week said, what about those people who are not married, who haven't got a mate?

You see, we are not speaking basically about whether one has a mate or whether one has not got a mate. We're speaking about the attitude towards the act of love, of union.

Our thinking, feeling responses. Responses. This is the beginning of all things in relation to the transmutation. And as we practice this new attitude, and we have to practice it because we'll find ourselves having all the other attitudes impinged on us wherever we go, and perhaps men have a harder time than women because they go to work and they're exposed to all the bragging that some unhappy men are prone to as to their great prowess in luring the female I know I have had so many men come and tell me that it is so difficult to keep the attention away from that level of union because they are so exposed to this lower thinking feeling attitude. Nevertheless, it shouldn't be too difficult. When the mind instantly corrects what it is hearing from another, it doesn't become influenced. Well, at any rate, this is the basic energy with which we achieve illumination, with which we achieve transmutation of all the part of our nature and because of that we must release it from the sins of yesterday this energy which means no matter what we did yesterday doesn't matter that may sound strange coming from a spiritual leader but you see let the dead bury the dead yesterday was yesterday It doesn't matter what we did in any way, shape, or form.

It was part of what we had to be and do to learn whatever lessons, as we read to you from the Book of Tokens, to become ripened. And what we need to do is recognize these attitudes, these actions, these reactions of yesterday in that light, that they were part of the growth pattern bringing us to today. And what we are doing with our thinking feeling process today how we feel about another human being and other human beings today this is what's making tomorrow now so all we need be concerned with is now and if you have any guilt complexes about yesterday I invite you now to take them out and let's put them on the altar and we'll do a banishing ritual over them or something and just help you get rid of them clear it out we don't need it we have enough problems and we can't afford to walk around with guilt complexes they only hold us down they hold us back these attitudes and new responses do not unfold immediately as we told you when one has had the privilege of advancement into this particular grade but they are stirred and it varies with different people as to how long the process takes because this is such a very intensive area of the life since it involves don't forget the subconsciousness therefore the whole astral being the thought forms the emotional forms and so on it is something that usually takes a long, long time, even though the point at which one is advanced is the point where it is stirred.

Now, another thing to remember in that particular grade is that it is related to air. Remember we told you each of these grades are related to one of the elements, which means it functions through that part of the cosmic consciousness, that group of angelic beings from the elementals right on up to the archangelic and into the divine emanation expression that in this grade which we call the two nine grade foundation and the the oracus. The contact, the inner key-in, so to speak, is made with the elemental livingness of the air elementals from the sylph right on up the ladder to the most divine. Now, what happens? In relation to that, we start becoming more aware of subtleties that have to do with the air. It was at this point, incidentally, in my work that I discovered that the breeze was in love with me. Now, don't smile. Laugh, but don't smile.

This was a very amazing discovery. I went out into my garden and I'd feel this caressing breeze on my brow.

And suddenly I realized, my God.

God's making love to me, caressing my brow. Does it sound like egomania? We could all afford a little egomania of that kind because we are all dear and precious to the one Lord of life whose children after all we are and we could afford to accept the lovingness of the touch of the breeze. Now why is it that I became aware of that? Well basically, being stirred in that area of the subtle livingness, I was in a strange way looking for extra awareness without knowing that this is what I was doing. In other words, that which we give attention to, this is what we become acquainted with and the trouble is when we walk down the street or into our garden or visit people or drive our car we're usually not giving attention to the miracles around us we're closed away in our coffins and so we fail to experience the miracles which are there for us until we start waking up so in the next grade then once the tests have been taken and passed those though there's a fantastic amount of work of transmutation to be done in that patterned area of our consciousness still we go on because we're out to stimulate and bring awake the whole nature and we cannot hope to perfect one part of it and then go on to the next. It doesn't work that way. We're not just a mind, and we're not just an emotion, and we're not just a subconsciousness, and we're not just a body, we're not just a desire nature. We have to get the whole stimulated. Only then will we become able and be in a position to truly get them balanced with each other. And this is what we aim for in the evolutionary gratings of the true Rosicrucian pattern of attainment. So if you will look at the tree I'd like to point out to you what occurs next. In the next advancement, mind you they've gone up to that violet circle foundation, the 2-9 grade, sub-consciousness. Nevertheless, the first step in the ritual ceremonial system, they return to Malkuth, the bottom circle, and they go through the stimulus and the tune-in that has all been given, remember, by those who've gone before. They return to Malkuth to go along that path, the path of Sheem, 20th Tarot key, which connects Malkuth with that orange circle called Splendor, that's Hod. Now you can see the paths go exactly backward and if you will think that the last Tarot key was the first path that connected Malkuth to yesid or foundation is what it is on this chart you'll see that that was the first path that was trod that's key number 21 sheen is key number 20 that's why that is the next path that is trod now why does one symbolically return to malkuth to that which represents the physical universe, the vehicle, in terms of our own bodies. Because with our minds, we have a double connection. Actually, it's a triple connection, a quadruple, as I think about it. But you see, the mind has a direct connection with the body. Otherwise, we couldn't say, say, I wish to raise my hand. In other words, we can directly control what we do with our body through our mind. Although also the subconsciousness controls the body in its processes, which is shown in the connection between subconsciousness and the body and that central pillar, you see. And if you look on the opposite side, you'll see there's a path that connects victory with Malkuth and victory remembers the desire nature because the desire nature also immediately affects the body and if you think not take your pulse when you get frightened and see what happens I mean you know you have watched your physical symptoms there's an immediate direct connection in the subtle bodies and that is why these connections have to be stimulated to develop the various controls. These subtle forces have to come awake so that we all know what we're dealing with. So the aspirant symbolically is placed in Malkuth again, representing the physical vehicle, and has a special ceremonial that involves the particular intensification of those inner subjective forces which are symbolized by tarot key number 20. That's called judgment, those of you who don't remember it by number.

Now in that tarot key, as you, I hope, recall, you have three figures rising up out of a coffin. This coffin is floating on an ocean. Now there's a man, a woman, and a child.

All reaching upwards, standing, and reaching towards an angel with a brilliant sun effect in the back.

And what is this saying? Of course, it says many things, and we can't tell you all of what it says because we aren't giving that long a class. But we do want to bring out whatever highlights you need as a group here at this time. Every time we give the class, it's something different that comes up because you are the ones who pull out from me that which you need now that's the way it has always worked and that's the way it does work that is why you find so many of your questions answered when you come here because the whole purpose of group work is to form this glorious interconnectedness so that we each become a light and a lamp to the other in various ways Now this particular parakeet is involving this kind of message to the soul of the aspirant. It is saying in essence you are now at least stimulated in such a way that you are releasing yourself from your coffins, your coffins of ignorance, your coffins of unawareness, your your coffins of bigotry, your coffins of condemnation, your coffins of sorrow, of hanging on to all sorts of yesterdays, because it's the hanging on to yesterday, to the sorrows of yesterday, as well as to the joys of yesterday, to the so-called principles of yesterday, today, as well as those things we call principles which are really so often our prejudices.

All of these things have been stimulated into an awakening, and traveling this particular path is aimed at furthering this main and basic development that the mind, don't forget the orange circle to which it is traveling represents the intellect. That the intellect can become aware of its own coffins and release itself from bondage to form.

This is one of the most vital aspects of this path, though there's much more than than this involved. It takes in every level of our lives, every area of our expressions. But in this going from the grade of 2.9 to the grade of 3.8, which the orange circle represents, actually, don't forget, is an attempt to take that which is from subconsciousness at this point into an objective awareness of the intellect, so that the intellect can learn how to watch its own subconscious processes and thereby really transmute them to catch itself in the act of hating to catch itself in the act of anger to catch itself in the act of irritation to be able to dig in this is what is being connected inside the ability to do it if you have done it well you're intensified so you'll do it better if you haven't done it at all the intensification starts to bring this ability about and incidentally this is one of the most vital points on the path of return because not until we start seeing objectively what it is we have been doing with our thinking, with our feeling, with our attitudes, with our hopes, with our despairs, not until we can objectively see and analyze yesterday. And we can objectively do this only when we free ourselves from bondage to it. That's why the coffins, the whole suggestion, free, free yourself is taking place there way deep in the subconsciousness. Not until we can do that are we really in a position to start consciously working with the more creative forces. So this is the first path that is trod towards the intellect. Then, but there are several parts to this advancement. Then the aspirant is placed symbolically in Yesod.

That is the 2-9 grade, the violet circle. And you notice there's the path connecting the violet circle to the orange one. That's the Sun. Tarot key number 19. Remember the path before was key 20? We're going backwards. The path of return now we have tarot key 19 so and incidentally the reason one could not have traveled for instance tarot key number the path of tarot key number 20 before is because that path has not yet been opened that path only opens after one has been advanced and made inner contact with those forces which rule the two nines the subconscious elements or astral elements of the nature it is not open you have to take each step even though that path comes up from malkuth it was not open it's a locked door it's like people who have certain desires and feel I haven't got the power to express them or like uh wasn't it paul who said the good that I would I do not but the evil that I would not this I do I mean there's like a a door or a wall before us and the real ability to develop this objective a handling of our lives comes only after we have had at least some awakening in that previous area which we discussed last week you see that two nine grade so they travel the aspirant travels then the path of the sun symbolically from yes it to splendor or hode that is called the intellect and this the path of the sun remember what this tarot key is there are two children playing and dancing in something like a fairy ring with sunflowers reaching towards them as though they were the sun them and then a sun overhead with a face smiling down now what is involved there well so many things naturally we can't give them all as we said but we give the few things that will highlight it for us here a connection is being made on the subtle planes between subconsciousness and intellect Now, but a very special kind of connection. It is a connection which deals with a new outlook.

The children represent, after all, something rather newborn. Our problems, practically all our problems, arise out of looking with despondency, like the crepe hangers. We've We've been crape hangers about our lives, about our past, about our expectations. We fear who we're going to meet. We fear how they'll treat us. We fear that they will not like us or that they will think that we're not bright or all sorts of things. We're forever keeping ourselves locked away in these fears and insecurities and this separative idea of ourselves. And this of course is continuously pounded into our subconsciousness and the result is that we create just like Job that which I feared has come upon me whatever we hold is a picture and we stock it up and give it livingness with our emotions this becomes our reality so here a connection is being made to help the aspirant to change that. How well the aspirant does it, how long it takes, depends again on each aspirant. They're each, everyone is different. Nevertheless, the process is started, the connection, the inner connection has been made, and the idea is to start training oneself to look upon all things with the wonder of the child. Except you become as a little child, ye shall in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven and here you're being given isn't it fantastic the way these grades go right in with their symbolism it starts opening up the real meaning of the bible to you remember jesus was trained in this so here we have that except you become as a little child and what is it being becoming as a little child well first of all remember what what it's connecting that pure beauty and innocence that the child has regarding its body what is more charming than a little girl or boy of somewhere around two three years old getting away from mom and papa and go prancing down the street in all its glory haven't you seen it and always there's such a chuckle of delight that comes up and it is so adorable the child goes dancing off with magic and purity and unfortunately the way we are trained mama and or Papa run horrified to catch little wondrous beauty there and rush it back into the house to cover the evil from the world isn't it isn't it ridiculous I hope you're seeing this maybe you're starting to see what we mean a little more fully by the pure in heart you see this is how we have to start feeling about our bodies not that we're going to advise you to join a nudist colony and certainly we don't want you to go prancing up the street and land in jail I mean we have to live in the society we live in besides if you were in jail you wouldn't be here and I wouldn't like that either and in as much as we love our fratres and sorores our dear brothers and sisters it would just give us an extra job to do bring you cigarettes or or some other little vice to help you pass the time away until they released you but we don't want that but it's the attitude that we speak about we must see our bodies in the same way that we see that little child prancing down the street. And we must think of everybody's body in the same manner. The miracle of God. This is part of what we're already being stirred in when we've taken that previous path, connecting the mind, the intellect, and the body in that special way to stir certain insights. And here there's an extra stimulus towards this entire feeling of the wonder of the vehicle. And this goes out into all of life, you see. We start seeing it then in the tree. We see it in the little creatures. We see things we never saw before, because we are having this wonder re-established in our hearts and souls because we are becoming more pure in heart we are seeing that every vehicle is a magical glorious creation from god that in fact we are begotten of god remember we are begotten of god because there's nothing except god and what else is there to get us this is the thing that helps make us pure in heart to see all the interaction of forces in this manner and this wonder then creates this lovely magic fairy ring and incidentally this is one of the reasons god has decided to express himself as us to have this wondrous magic fairy ring unique experience through you and you and you and me each of us special each of us different each of us eternal unique and this is how we must see ourselves we must look in the mirror and say oh you adorable thing you can you do it not yet maybe but practice it won't you and the husbands and wives could remind each other in a little different way husband can say to wife oh you lucky girl I have such an adorable husband or something to that effect and then I wonder what will happen it would be a lovely harmonious home provided the laughter is there the laughter of the child don't you think so then there's this element of seeing magic where before it was just a tree now it's a living being it's opening it's opening it uh when I was going through that portion of my work I remember I was out watering the roses and as I was moving from one place to another the thorn got hold of my sleeve and I couldn't go well if you think I'm a little bit batty I don't mind as long as you'll still love me and feel there's something worthwhile to receive thieves but I was quite sure in my heart that that rose bush deliberately held me because it wanted me to admire its flowers I had been too busy concentrated on the water and had overlooked the actual communication to this bush the telling it how beautiful its lovely new buds were which had just come out the day before. And so I stopped. I had that absolute certainty that this was so.

And the Bush and I had a lovely communion at that point. And of course, I'll tell you more about what happened to me with the water part in the last half of tonight's class, because then we have the actual third part of the this grade where the stimulus is given for actual reception then into the grade of 3-8 or the orange circle having traveled the two paths there there now is a stability a linkage then to be made with the elemental livingness of this aspect of our nature that has to do with our intellect you see and that part will take up then maybe we'll get you to sort of adore your intellects a little more too if we learn how to how to train it to keep us out of trouble instead of getting us into the trouble it usually does so we'll take that up in the latter half of tonight's class now we'll have the announcements and then we'll have a five-minute intermission after that Are you pleased with me that I'm having the intermission on time?

You're wonderful. I do anyway. She's there.

Now we come to the next step in the inner stimulus, and that's the actual admission into the grade of 3.8, called incidentally practicus. The 2.9 is called theoricus. The 1.10, that's the mockus, is called zelotere. Now there's the actual admission into the grade of practicus. Now why is it called practicus? That of course, as you know, is the Latin for practical.

Theoricus, part of the work that the aspirant does, is being trained in certain specialized theories.

In Hodes, or 3.8, in Practicus, the aspirant is given very special exercises in order to develop a practical application of these theories. In other words, in order to learn how to use the intellect more effectively for image-making. And we know that most of us have great problems that way. We want to image one thing, and instead we find ourselves imaging all sorts of catastrophes, or all sorts of sorrows.

Our minds run away with us, of course, stirred by the emotions, but they work together as twins. And none of these parts of the being are really separate at any time. Nevertheless, the stimulus through the grades are taken separately because that is the way we have to work. We have to take one step at a time and not until all of it is awakened properly can we begin to interrelate them as we need to, and to develop the proper control, the practical control.

So in Practicus, this is one of the main aspects of the work. However, you see, it has to do with all sorts of inner, sahal awakenings, which again, as usual, takes time. It has to do with the awareness of the consciousness, the intellect, as being something non-material. And of course we work on that together through all through the lessons also. This is a part of a continuous training program because it takes a lot to get out of patterns. Now in relation to water, why Why should the intellect have the symbolic relationship to the elemental nature which is referred to water? Well, if you will stop to think for a moment, you will realize that everything is said to have come out of the great deep. And in Qabalah, the cosmic mother, one of the names for her is the great seas, in plural.

The consciousness in itself, remember, is a fluidic type of substance. Those who are psychic or who are super sensitive on the subtle level often become aware of a flowing sort of experience in relation to consciousness, because everything we think and feel has this flow. It's this subtle first matter really which is fluidic in nature it is like a light but more like a fluid light and it's it's a real thing just as real as anything you might think that's solid in fact more real because this is the basis of all forms before anything occurs anywhere in the universe at all times even from the beginnings of the creations of the universe to our own individual creations. First they are imaged in the flowing substance of consciousness and the characteristic of the flow is why it is attributed to water which is its most outer representation. And remember too all life has come out of water even in the physical sense that is living creatures the first living things came from the sea and our bodies right now are of I forget the 90 some isn't it 97 percent water it's 90 something anyway water actually hmm something 94 to 96 you've learned you've been in school more recently please so you probably remember thank you uh so you see even this physical body is just a great sea that we walk around with solid though it may appear to us imagine 92 to 94 percent water that's what you're made up out of and the rest is a throwing in of a few extra little minerals and things like that but it's the consciousness that's the fluidic watery something and uh we carry around the sea you know our blood is salty we must have salt the analysis chemical analysis is very similar to whatever our own evolutionary development in terms of our body has been to the the chemistry of the sea so we're still sea creatures we're creatures of the the fluidic substance of life, of God, consciousness. And we manipulate this flow through our thinking, feeling process. We create at all times, but we've been doing it ignorantly. We've been washed with the flow from other minds and other hearts and lots of things that we think we are thinking.

It's really our intake from this continuous flowing that goes back and around.

And we receive into ourselves that which is the most akin to ourselves.

The more highly evolved we become, the more we work at becoming something more than we were, the more we start taking in from the fluidic flow of life itself the most highly evolved forms of consciousness, of the thought patterns that come from the hierarchy of those who've gone before. And this is again part of what is intended in the first stimulus of this grade. Now during the time that I was in this grade, of course, a very wonderful thing happened to me, because up until and through the grade of 2.9, I didn't... nothing had clicked for me in chapter at all consciously.

In fact, I was still very suspicious of the whole affair, being by nature a skeptic and having had a natural, I thought, antipathy towards ritual and ceremonial. Yet the strangest thing is things happened, even though I didn't realize what was happening until later. You see, I gave you the story of how I became aware of the livingness of Earth and then the actual livingness of the air, of the flow of air, but I didn't tie that up with the chapter stimulus at all at those points I just figured that I'm becoming more sensitive to life as far I couldn't see anything until I got to 3.8 and of course during the 2.9 with me too I lost my whole foundation which was good if all our aspirants could lose their foundations that thoroughly and of course it's very unpleasant as you know they would be able to get farther faster but there was so many it's such a slow process all the things I thought I had held dear my I had such very strong notions about things about just what is right and what is wrong and what is proper and what is not proper no matter what field you took it into I had a real strong opinion about it and it was while I was in the grade of 2-9 that I was just shaken to the core of my soul and felt for a while and you see I didn't even tie it up with the chapter and I used to use the expression towards a few people close to me I have lost my foundation and I didn't realize why that was the grade I was in that is foundation I remember Dr. Case used to look at me and give give that whimsical smile he never said a word at that point and I used to say I just feel like I have no place to stand I'm floating in air I didn't realize this was assigned to the air element and I went through terrific upheaval because of so many prejudices which I had of course called idealistic principles that was the name I gave them and to discover so many prejudices which I thought had made me something so much lovelier than most these principles don't you know it was very it was very uh tough and I had a very trying and unhappy time but I really had it swept away at that point you see but when I got into 3.8 all of a sudden it started to click in my mind you see this is the intellect and I started to see what had been occurring up until that point from the other sefiris from the other grades I realized at what points I had had these stimulations you know these openings up into awarenesses that I had been blind to before and I found a new curious peace a willingness not to have any foundation at all but to just live life and watch it to watch and analyze analyze and watch catch this emotion catch this attitude become aware of it I was charmed with it I had stopped I had lost this feeling of grief and the feeling of loss actually I was willing just not to be anything one way or another and this is the reason that the grade of 3.8 was such a joy to me because along with that of course the development of this awareness of what went on subconsciously that was one of the most fascinating things to me I actually started to watch my subconscious processes just like a person standing outside both on the emotional and a pattern level and I discovered that I was just as animalistic as everybody and just as this and that the every prisoner crouched behind cages of his cell was my brother and I discovered that no matter what anyone one was no matter what it was kin to me because I was able to see into these subtleties and to catch them as they attempted to come up these strange entities you might say which are one's own one's own thought feeling patterns and to catch them and start doing things with them and I was delighted with it because I didn't mind discovering all these things about myself I thought really it It was really quite charming.

It made me feel so much more at home with everybody.

I didn't have to feel superior anymore.

And you know, that's very comfortable.

It is so comfortable.

I think it's perhaps one of the real secrets behind my love of people.

It's because I know we're all the same underneath. It's just the difference of degree of awareness and control. All we handle the forces of the universe as they swim around in the same ways have the same basic problems way deep down all of us but then also in connection with the outer or so-called outer world you see I have a fish pond and it was at this point as this was developing that I stocked it I had it repaired and I stocked it with very special goldfish and I started to spend hours just lying on my stomach, just brooding over that pond with this little goldfish. And I talked to them and communed with them, and they knew me so well. I used to reach my fingers down in there. They'd all come swimming, the whole batch of them. They started to give birth. I'd watch them.

I discovered so many things that I had never known. Don't forget, I was a city girl. When I say city girl I mean city girl no no flight about it at all I mean it was complete and nature was something I just knew about from a book or two which usually bored me anyway about in the earlier days and here I was with it and not just with it in the usual way but I mean with an inner communion developing from area to area so I was just fascinated to discover of first a bunch of little fish so tiny they weren't gold at all now remember I just charged up to my neighbors real indignant and said which of you boys went and stuck some minnows in my pond I thought somebody played a joke on me and sent a bunch of strange little tiny gray minnows so they both boys my neighbors they said we're innocent and I said yeah I'll bet and then I found out that goldfish when they're born are all dark they get gold later that was just one of the things well they were so tame I would put my fingers down they'd all come running they would let me pet them in the water they would take food right out of my hand I would take a pinch of it not that they needed it that pond was just teeming with life and I examined all the different things and I had several nervous breakdowns thinking that this was perhaps a terrifying thing that might hurt my goldfish you know I was always very overly protective towards the helpless thing and so I just put myself in for a lot of disturbance too afraid that this or that would hurt my little goldfish and then along with that the miracle a couple of toads got married right there next to my pond and I watched the whole process of the first long miles and miles of eggs fantastic in a jelly-like substance the miracle of God unfolding there God creating through the these miracle forms of his and I watched those little things hatch into the most astonishingly wiggly pollywogs and grow from just well nothing but a little worm that's all they looked like into the gradual development of an act of a toad and at first oh I was worried terribly I thought that these were frogs I couldn't tell the difference between a toad or a frog and I heard that frogs eat fish you know I gave myself several nervous was breakdowns along with all the joys I had but it turned out they were toads and I watched these little things finally develop the full form of the toad right there in the water it was it was so beautiful and I would get tuned in to both the fish and the toad and I'd feel that I was in there and the water was going over me their sensations we we shared such a beautiful communion I just hated to pull myself away from that pond with all the miracles that I saw unfolding and watching and that many more little things to love you see and I was always in favor of loving because it's a pleasant sensation so here I was able to have even more pleasure I had all these little baby toads and all the fish added to my loving capacities and then the rain that was just in some ways different and yet similar to the breeze because I discovered here again by golly the rain was in love with me and I still insist system the wash of the rain on my skin over my hair it was a it was a miracle it was like being washed by god the beauty of it and I never lost this uh these reactions on any level the as I got tuned into the actual living spirit of each of these elements with their outer representations temptations I never lost it I go out and the breeze exalts me still especially when I leave town I usually when I come back to california after a trip the first thing I notice is how the breeze rushes to welcome me and and gently stroke my brow or cheek that's the first thing I noticed so anyway that in itself if there were nothing else would really be worth everything thing to find right here in the world we live in the world where we sigh and moan where we walk around lost in god why did I do this why did he do that he said I said oh what's going to happen now I mean this is what goes on in our minds usually as a running record anxieties fears or oh I'm so bored what can I do now to entertain myself oh I wish I had some friends and so on this is what we're usually this is much more saying to ourselves in a running stream yet the stimulus that takes place from this area helps to bring that attention right here into the world in which we walk almost blind we start looking at the sky and at the tree and at the creature with a new feelingness and we start experiencing the loving the loving livingness that we share, that we share together with the rest of life.

And, of course, perhaps the greatest miracle, if one could call one miracle more or less than another, is this gradual development of this strange objectivity, like the magician, you know, because a hose, this grade of 3.8, is the sphere of activity of mercury.

It's tied into that particular process, and Mercury, remember, is assigned to the magician. So you have your outer sphere of activity of what the inner forces or subjective powers of the magician represent. So this ability to give attention to something so that its magic can become opened up to you, is the most rewarding thing. And this attention, we start being able to see other people's real motives and thoughts and hopes and desires. We start developing a discrimination about people we never had before without losing anything that's important. In other words we don't gain it by saying or by feeling people are horrible the thing to do is to get away from them and get out in the desert or on a mountain top which is something it's amazing how many aspirants say that no seeing into people into their motives into their hearts does not make us dislike them or want to run away from them not when we see because as we read to you from the book of tokens your pain is my pain your sorrows pierce my heart this when we see when we start looking objectively when we stop projecting our own dislikes our own prejudices our own feelings of inadequacy and failures when we stop projecting them on the other person we can see their weaknesses we can see their immaturities but we also see that they are like the adorable baby has gotten away from mama and papa we can see that too and we can see that there's no pain that there's no mishap that there's no fall that anyone else undertakes in which we're not also tied up. Now of course this just starts, this awareness just begins there, though some people have it a little more fully than others.

But to be able to see what people are like, really, not what we want them to be like, helps to save us from making many mistakes. Not that we can always be perfect about it. No human being, not even the Masters of Wisdom, are forever exact in what they see and interpret.

There are times when one just isn't alert enough, one's attention is elsewhere, or when one sees but misinterprets the meaning of what one is seeing, and therefore gets into trouble. And always we do get into trouble when we lack discrimination, when we fail to see into the motives of others, and sometimes we can see, and we do nothing because we feel it has to work itself out there's nothing to do but it's a different kind of living when you can live aware even though you're not going to eliminate problems there are some problems you're going to eliminate by seeing people in this other way and you see you can only do it by practicing it that's again why this is called the grade of of practicus, because you discover in this grade that you'll be nothing ever that you wish to be and aspire to be unless you practice being it. That's really one of the primary secrets.

You want love, you have to practice being loving. You want intelligence, you have to practice being intelligent, using your mind. You want friendship, you have to practice being a friend. You see that it's all a matter of practice whatever you practice being you become and when you become it you get it to him who has shall be given to him who has not even that which he has shall be taken away and it's all a matter of what we are watching for what we are looking for in the other person so that uh certainly there there are times when when a real miracle can take place in relation to other people some people may have some parts of their nature that would lend itself to the description quite accurately of sob without even using the initials and yet towards you that part which is beauty and goodness towards you the sob will not come out a good part of the time or most of the time because you're pulling from the other level of that person you'll find that though it can never be a hundred percent it can be a good at least I would venture a guess and say 75 I know I had this neighbor bless his soul he's gone on to I don't know know whether it's heaven or not he's gone on uh who was a terrible problem to himself and everyone else he had such a temper he had a chain maid he put in big posts and had a chain maid reaching right out to the sidewalk saying uh keep out and that his is the last house on the top of a dead end street so the poor car is coming out there they were stopped they couldn't go into the driveway way to make a turnaround and if anybody did attempt to go in at least up to the sidewalk he'd come rushing out it seemed as though he was just sitting there lying in wait all the time you see he come rushing out and the language he used oh it was horrible and he turned in the neighbor in the back he called the police and turned them into the police because they had a a part a party where their guests went swimming at one in the morning and it was towards the back of the splashing of the water and the laughing kept him awake so he called the police he called the police on the neighbor on the other side of me because their dog managed to get into his yard or something I don't know he found reasons for calling the police all over the lot if you know what that sweet lamb did for me he used to come in and do all my gardening he used to say that he didn't have anything more to do in his in his garden and he thought maybe I wouldn't mind at first he used to sneak up on it and do it behind my back you see and I'd come home and suddenly I'd find that the hedges had been trimmed up along the hill there you see he was afraid that I'd uh really raise a little cane but uh I was very happy I needed that help and he'd come marching over to take my rubbish out for me all sorts of beautiful things and he never turned me into the police at all and I was the only one had that honor just an example of what can happen it would be nice if it worked that way all the time it doesn't but it does enough of the time so we see the principle is there real well this is as far as we'll take you this trip next week we're really we're going to give you a little bit of excitement I again I think because we're going to be covering the paths that lead to the desire nature and get a little inkling into the desire nature so we will again take up some parts some aspects of the sex energy as related to the desire nature and also as they the desire nature and the intellect are blended and balanced because it's the cross path which does that so we ought to have a rather exciting time I hope next thursday night and tonight we will throw the floor open to questions see I only ran seven minutes over she told me to stop the class at 9 30 for questions and I only ran seven minutes over yes Yes.

Actually, Pluto belongs. Remember, when these tarot keys were made up, they had not yet discovered Uranus or Neptune or Pluto, but the keys were left for those principles. And if you will notice that key exactly represents what Pluto would be it's very apparent so they gave it the hypothetical name of Vulcan just to give it a name but it certainly does apply to Pluto any other questions yes In our power and sound work, yellow corresponds to the intellect. Why is eight the source of the intellect? Because you see here, this again is part of the subtlety of the work as it's done. As we pointed out to you, the tarot keys in themselves represent the subjective powers.

The sefiris represent the outer sphere of activity. Now in actuality, if you look, you'll see that yellow on the tree is given there to beauty which is Tiphareth that remember is adam the king christ and it's the image making power uh what and and orange is the color assigned to it in tarot but you see our intellect actually is after all our power of objective awareness and this power is really the power of the sun of the true ego but expressing outwardly it's given the orange because this is the way the true Sun expresses through that coloration and it's also telling you subtly that the intellect and the Sun are interchangeable because it's our minds that make us human beings only are with our intellect and when it functions in the personality sphere itself as an outer function you see it functions through the vibrational element that we call orange I hope I explained that I know it was a puzzle to me at first too any other questions well in that case you lucky people you'll get to go home early tonight at the time you're supposed to get home maybe it will encourage you to keep coming regularly for the rest of the class this series good night my darling Thank you.