How To Attain The Awareness Of Immortality

Our title is How to Attain Awareness of Immortality.

Actually, in many ways, it's a continuation of last Sunday morning's talk when we were speaking together about the Qabalistic teachings regarding life after death. And if you will recall, we pointed out that when we drop the physical vehicle, that is the dress so to speak actually we find ourselves looking exactly the same as we were when we were embodied so that many people incidentally who are not familiar with survival or who don't believe in survival or who are very materialistically oriented they don't know they've died and they wander around they're quite a problem on the astral plane and quite a problem to themselves because they are all they know is that people are acting very peculiarly they talk to people they're not answered they're being ignored they get very angry or very bewildered and this has been verified over and over again incidentally by scientific researchers in psychic phenomena the fact that there are such instances. Now the idea that after death, for example, we find ourselves as we were is really an interesting thing to consider because in essence if you'll recall we've been pointing out to you that when we build ourselves a vehicle as embryos, that is when we were conceived by our parents. Actually it is our own self-image. We wanted to remind you of this.

It is our own self-image of ourselves which starts to draw on the materials from the mother who is the instrument for us and we start filling in a sort of electromagnetic framework of our own self-image which isn't really completed incidentally until we're grown up. Being born that is the emerging from the womb of the physical mother is just part of the process and it isn't until we have developed an adult vehicle that we have finished weaving the materials of the environment which are really the materials of god's universe that is we have finished weaving these materials in accordance with our own self-image at about approximately age 21 to 25 though it varies with different people and it's only at that point that we really have the opportunity to start changing this previous image and start making it something that's closer to the heart's desire you see our problem usually is in terms of time and as we pointed out to one of our classes recently if we could see the growth of a plant you know with its budding flower not from day to day and week to week but condensed in time which has been done I wonder how many of you have seen this where they take a picture of a growing plant every half hour or so and just continue taking that picture for a week or two you discover there's something in flowing motion that's alive because the time has been condensed down and we see it in fast motion just like the movies can give us slow motion and we discover something that looks utterly different well in the same way when we build our vehicles from our own self-image it is a matter of a condensation of time which which would make the difference if we were able to experience that other time level, which, incidentally, we can eventually.

So anyway, because of this slow process, it seems like an awful lot of separate stages taking place where really one thing is occurring, the immortal awareness, the eternal center of consciousness, which we are, is using the materials of the universal substance of which it's a part to experience itself, to make vehicles for itself, in order to become ever more aware, that is, to expand its sense of self-awareness. And curiously enough, the very fact that scientists look out into the universe and see it expanding as an outer evidence of just what's really taking place with consciousness, yours yours and mine, and all centers of consciousness within the one self. As without, so within. As above, so below. And often by studying the outer physical phenomena, we can get a hint of what the real inner spiritual reality is actually like. Now then, in terms of really attaining our own awareness of immortality, here we come across a real problem. You see, even though I've no doubt all of us sitting here would agree without any question that we believe in survival.

Though we would certainly talk in that manner with other people. Though we think that we have complete faith in life after death. In actuality if we will watch ourselves, if we will watch our thoughts, if we will watch our attitudes and our reactions to other things and people and conditions we'll see that there's a part of us that doesn't really believe it at all because it's caught in this net or this web of physical manifestation because it's so centered or imprisoned in a certain vibrational level that we find when anything occurs we go into actual terrors in relation to death whether it be regarding ourselves or others there's one person I was speaking to recently who apparently has a complete faith in the spiritual way in the immortality of the soul is very much of a sensitive spiritually and psychically and yet this individual upon hearing that a relative was seriously ill and very likely would die quite soon this person went into a tremendous emotional disturbance the peculiar thing is that this person was not close to the relative there had been very little of contact. And yet suddenly there was this tremendous disturbance, actually even to the point of tears, wondering what should I do? Should I rush to that person's bedside, even though it would mean I have to borrow money for it, and things of that type. This is the sort of emotional disturbance that occurred in this individual. So I asked her, this woman, I said, tell me, do you think that when a person dies that this is a tragedy? And she said, no. I said, then why are you acting like it's a tragedy?

You are emotionally disturbed and you're weeping. Are you going to be suffering a physical loss?

Have you ever had really close contact no she said I never have and I said could it be that just the very idea of death is so disturbing to you that you have to pick on wherever the information comes where it hits at least somewhere close to home you have to pick something in your environment in order to show this disturbance could it be that you really think death is a terrible thing and that being in a physical vehicle is something one should fight to keep beyond all else well she saw of what I was driving at because you see what we don't seem to realize is that death is not an enemy I mean we may realize it intellectually but we don't seem to realize it with our hearts as we should as has been pointed out many a time if we did not have the phenomenon of death we couldn't have life at all for instance just take one pair of fish suppose there was no death from that one pair of fish they would keep multiplying and multiplying until they would not only stack the every ocean but they would reach inside as I think it was estimated something like a year or it might be two years I've forgotten the exact time they would pack space thickly through right to the orbit of Mars I mean what else would have a chance to live I ask you if vehicles didn't dissolve and go come and go. You can see just from that one example that death is not the enemy that we think it is. You see the enemy we have really is in our attitude towards death and when we manage to change that then we're in a position to really learn how to become aware of our own immortality. So the first thing we have to do is analyze death itself and it's here to close our eyes to turn our back on it is pretty much like the story which isn't true still it's a good analogy like the stork that hides its head in the sand you know because it's in danger it figures it's it can't see it so the danger is gone well you know we do that about death we hide our heads in the sand we don't dare look at it because we're afraid of it.

And why are we afraid of it?

We wouldn't be so afraid of it if we were sure that we are something more than our bodies, now would we?

Now, if you were really certain that you were an immortal soul and that you cannot die, would you get that upset as you have done, or do, or cringe away, or turn your back on the various thoughts or ideas is that relate to the physical the physical body's demise we know that we wouldn't because a part of us really is very much centered on the materialistic side of our lives and it's inevitable that this be so incidentally until we achieve a certain perception of just what the physical vehicle is for. Now what is the physical vehicle for? Well we tell you in as many ways as we can to try to give you the real inner perception in relation to that. The physical vehicle is really in a sense like a death. It's the imprisonment of your immortal spirit for certain short time periods, an actual imprisonment. In other words, we encase ourselves in a bunch of very compressed vibrations which we experience as physical matter. And why do we do this?

It's because we are developing a strong center of individualized self- consciousness. In other words, we or the God in us is developing in us an an absolute invulnerable center of awareness of who and what we are, so that we know ourselves without any question to be sons and daughters of God as Jesus knew. And the only way this can be attained is by getting that self-conscious center strong enough so it can't be pulled and washed and impressed by the vibrational levels that are on lower spheres of evolution than ours.

Because notice, we are all telepathically in rapport, and we're always being pushed around on the telepathic level by the thinking, the feeling, and the doing of others. It's inevitable, but why are we being pushed around? It's the same principle as why do people go to a gymnasium, and pick up these dumbbells and various things to develop muscles.

You see, it's by resistance against something that we develop strength.

We develop strength of muscle because of a resistance, the phenomena of resistance, of pull and push.

And we develop spiritual strength by the phenomena of resistance, pull and push. So our center of awareness encases itself in a sort of forgetfulness a compression that will strengthen it more it's just like you know how they make certain metals strong they compress it as you know so that the atoms are as close together as they can get them and the closer together they can get the atoms in the compression chamber the stronger the material comes out and that's exactly what our own Higher Soul which is our immortal and eternal self is doing with itself through the physical vehicle and the phenomena of a physical world now this compressive compression we can take it just so long you see and then we get kind of tired and that's when the Higher Soul decides well now there's been this much compression this much development of awareness this much development of a finer sensitive emotional nature this much more development of whatever it is that our own selfhood has been working on in an incarnation and then it's this then it's time to assimilate because you see when you eat a meal that's one thing and in a sense the physical incarnation is like eating a meal then you have to drop your physical vehicle in other words you have to stop eating your meal in order to digest this food, this mental emotional food that you have been absorbing for the growth and the strengthening of your center of selfhood so you can become a conscious co-creating center with God, which you already are but not as conscious as you are going to be. You see it's from less to more to more to more so when we start seeing a physical incarnation as being something like that we stop fearing the periods where we withdraw from the physical body we stop fearing death and when we stop fearing death when we start looking death in the face that's when we're in a position to start overcoming this as you know which has been called our last enemy And yet, you see, it isn't so much that it's an enemy.

It's our attitude towards it that makes it an enemy. Remember what Jesus said, Agree with thine adversaries quickly.

And when we start agreeing with the principle of change, which is death, then it stops frightening us, and then we start gaining control. What do you think makes a master of wisdom, for example, able to keep a vehicle going for several hundred years? Which a master of wisdom can do. It's because he has mastered the death type of energy in this manner. He knows what it is, he's faced it, and he uses it. In other words, he dies daily, again, as we're told to do in the Bible. He dies daily by learning how to hold a mental-emotional atmosphere about himself so that he keeps the atoms which collect together to make the cell of the body, he keeps them in a certain state of balance. He uses the principle of death to let the cells die instead of hanging on to them, as we do.

You see, incidentally, that is part of the big problem in almost all our areas of life. We hang on to the thought we hang on to our concept of physical embodiment of materialistic things and this hanging on freezes us in a sense it solidifies us it makes us like tough steak you know you can't bite into it very good and so we're not very tender at that point and that and so we have to get ground up and come back and see if we can grow ourselves some more extra tender flesh so to speak which we do with our mental emotional attitudes now awareness of our immortality we can develop here and now there may be some things that will take us another incarnation or two or more I mean there are certain powers certainly that probably require a greater length of time for development. But the truth of the matter is that anyone who really wants to, who really works for it, can attain that realization of his or her own immortality. And how do we do it?

As we were just saying. First of all, we watch our attitude towards embodiment. We watch our attitude towards death, and we try to change it. For instance, when we hear that someone has passed on, do you know it might be a much more intelligent reaction to be able to immediately think and feel, oh how very nice for that person now they've gone to a state of digestion a state of relative freedom in comparison to the physical plane though as we told you last week there are different levels on the astral plane and so the degree of beauty and loveliness and so on really is in accordance with the degree of spiritual orientation that we've managed to attain here. Still, even with fairly unevolved types, unless they're truly barbaric and primitive, the major part of the astral life is a pleasant thing.

And so for the first response, we certainly should train ourselves to think and feel how lovely for them that they are now having a sort of vacation. They don't have to be struggling with pushing around a very condensed and heavy vehicle. They don't have to be quite as imprisoned as we are in a physical vehicle. That's point number one. But on the other hand, if we think of the imprisonment as being something terrible and sad, we will be ruining the very thing we're trying to get. Point number two then is to start seeing the soul as it uses a physical vehicle as being tremendously privileged so to do. In other words to see that in order to develop the awareness of blue sky and flower and tree, in order to develop the awareness of a tenderly blowing breeze, of eyes that tenderly look into other pairs of eyes, all of the little things that come from the experience of the senses, to see that this kind of experience is a privilege, and that it is from using the imprisonment with which to manufacture more beauty into our souls that then we are truly using the incarnation in its highest sense and because of that then we can have a feeling of peace in relation to the digestive period that is the astral period to be able to look upon trials for instance as being the testings of the strengths of the self-conscious awareness in the soul rather than and when we say test we don't mean the tests that make us moan and groan you know oh when will I ever get over this bitter karma because when we do that we are saying in essence that we are not being grateful to God for the privilege of developing these amazing expansions in our own self-experience so we have to watch that part of our self in order to try to attain our really conscious immortality and then we have to teach ourselves to look upon everything and every creature and every being with eyes that come from the higher soul rather than from the lower interpretive faculties in other words let's put it pretty much like this suppose when you walk out of this temple after the service you will be seeing a blue sky when you walk out. When you look at that sky, suppose you reach to that something that's just a little above you, that which is the real watcher, the experiencer, the real knower. Reach to that and say to it in essence mentally, mentally, thine is the power that sees this sky. Then you walk along, you get into your car, thine is the power, thine is the glory, thine is the motion that has made it possible for the development of this vehicle, which is an extension of the flesh and blood vehicle that thou hast made, has fashioned for thee and me. You go home and suppose of course if you have a husband or wife you don't like it's more difficult so I hope for your sake you like your husband and or wife and or else of whoever it is that you live with but you can learn to like them more if when you do go home you look at whoever it is that you live with and this is true also of associates of course and you look into their eyes and you ask them mentally what is this miracle and mystery of livingness that looks out at me from your eyes and what is this miracle or mystery that is aware and searches for something in your eyes and of course you look into the eyes of a little dog or a little cat or you look into the bud of a flower and you keep asking that question ask what is this miracle you keep searching with your consciousness you see what it becomes then notice is a meditation in living and actually this is the secret of walking and conscious immortality because you don't then sit down for half an hour say in the morning and or at night and meditate which you should do this is necessary but you take these meditation periods out and you bring them in suddenly over everything over the sudden experience of the breeze the wind the rain on your face over the sudden experience of the voice of a friend or even the voice of an enemy it's very hard to feel grateful for that though isn't it that I don't think we should try to bother ourselves about that at the moment though in time we will even come to see that the voice of the enemy is really god's way of strengthening us growing us and bringing us to greater beauty in the final analysis still it's rather difficult to see while it's happening most of the time so we might as well do it in the areas where it's easy to do and of course you know I always believe in doing things the easy way truly because you see life is going to give us enough problems without us making extra problems for ourselves and the easy way is to start searching with our consciousness in those areas where we normally experience beauty in any case. Music for instance is a wonderful way to do it, if you happen to love music. The wise art, but certainly the music and art of God through the sounds of life wherever we go. This is the primary way to start searching for that which is behind the outer form wherever we look and by reaching like that with that searching quest in the heart as we said what we are doing is actually meditating and we are in a sense subconsciously saying to this person and to this mountain and this breeze we are saying God reveal I self to me through this sensory experience that's what we're saying even when we're not saying it if we search with our consciousness in that manner and then suddenly you will see it suddenly you will have it though you might have to practice this for a long time and you might suddenly have it within five minutes of practice you never know or it might come softly you know like the beginning of a dawn it might dawn on you like that tenderly so that you hardly remember how it started this awareness of a miraculous eternal immortal something that is you that is not subject to time that is not subject to death that is not subject to pain that is not subject to any of the unhappy and negative things but uses those things in order to attain ever more awareness of the glory of the the universe of God with God from God and as a part of that one creator the Lord of the universe and then in finishing our little talk for this morning I'd like to quote to you this is from the Bhagavad Gita such a beautiful thing because I it is true of you you see there is that something in you that which is aware that which is looking out at me from your eyes that which is listening to me through your ears that which is aware of its selfhood there is that in you which has always been and can never not be because it is an aspect a part of the divine being and there is not else all there is is the divine essence and therefore everything that exists must be part of it and consciousness which is the essence of it with love naturally uh this is just it just seems like uh one should be able to see it right now consciousness who could create consciousness you see that you have always had that you will always have this is what you must hold in mind and therefore as I said quoting from this Bhagavad Gita it says never the spirit was born the spirit will cease to be never never was time it was not end and beginnings are dreams birthless and deathless and timeless abideth the spirit forever death hath not changed it at all dead though the house of it seems walk in that spirit with a searching heart walk in that meditation wherever you look and you will know your immortality you will know it and you will be able to shed its radiance on those about you.

Let us bow our heads in prayer.