‘There are three classes of people:
those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see.’

~Leonardo da Vinci

It should be fairly obvious that statements like these are generally oversimplifications however they often contain much truth. In fact, based on the subject matter and the individual, each of us at times may find ourselves in any one of these three classes.

The topic I will be discussing here is what I see as the practical first steps towards basic knowledge of self and environment. Herein lays the conundrum, as Manly Hall states ‘It never occurs to the average person that there’s any reason why he should be anything else except what he appears to be. There’s no reason why he should give up all his pleasure for something he doesn’t understand… thus we are locked in the lowest level of achievement… one must sense that there is more’. One of the most practical ways to sense that there is more is through inquiry, it is through inquiry that one is able to suspend the idea of knowing in order to obtain new information.

You can even see it written in the word, for if you are truly asking with the expectation to understand the meaning of your life then you are acting as King, and you will find the answers.

It has been said that each religion holds a portion of the whole truth, this statement is probably misleading at best. It may be more accurate to say that the individuals, from whose teachings, religions may have arisen, that these individuals and the true meanings of their teachings are what hold many of the keys towards being able to know and act with wisdom and truth.

It is important to make the distinction between the true teachings of enlightened beings, as best as can be discerned by study and research, and what is practiced by religion; they are incongruent with one another.

As we examine what is recorded to be known of these great teachers we find that they were living examples of truth, compassion, gnosis and solitary discipline. However, the organizers of religion knew well that the average man and woman was not interested in this level of discipline and these controllers were, and still are, happy to keep the masses disinterested in what is truly beneficial. Ultimately, many religious institutions are just dark parasitical business enterprises.

Whether it was Buddha, Pythagoras, Jesus or even the sorcerer Don Juan, they all separated themselves from the social norms; they lived in a different world than the average man. Many great writers popular even to the general masses pointed this out, like Mark Twain here:

“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.”.

This is indeed significant. Some of the most common daily activities of today’s culture are explicitly forbidden by many of these teachers. And when we then look closely at our own everyday lives and compare them in regards to allegiance towards truth or man, we find that many of our daily actions, out of habit or social norm, do not pass the test of allegiance to truth as laid out by these great teachers.

Great beings such as these would not participate in any of the folly we call normal, whether it be watching TV, voting, condoning the corporate government and war machine and countless others. One therefore, cannot separate the daily mundane activities and how we perform them, from the search for truth and what the realizations consistent with these truths would dictate. Are the thoughts we think, the words we speak, the actions we perform congruent with these truths? We must leave no stone unturned, everything must be revealed, the Day of Judgment is upon us.

The task at hand then is that we must unlearn what is false while at the same time convince, persuade and re-train ourselves to carry out what we innately know to be true, this re-membering to our own innate intuitive faculties occurs by removing misapprehensions or the clinging to what is false. This task however is not for the faint of heart, it takes a herculean effort to break the old patterns and habits and create new ones.

There is something required before we can start this task. You may have noticed that I only touched on a very few of the common social activities deemed unacceptable to the student of the real. That’s because it’s your job to do it and find all of the misapprehensions that apply to yourself and eliminate them. ‘To pause and reflect’, as Peter Kingsley states in his book Reality ‘The real issue is not what we decide to think when we are reading Parmenides. It is what we do all the rest of the time.

Everything is on the line.’ Yes, that’s right folks, it is paramount that you endeavor to be self aware of all of your thoughts, speech and actions at all times. There are countless methods devised to assist in these matters, suffice to say, we must deeply examine the beliefs, assumptions and filters that effect what we do and all the implications and consequences related to our own thoughts, speech and actions.

To think that anyone could achieve the levels of enlightenment and wisdom, that these great teachers are known for, without the prerequisite discipline and determination, one would only be fooling themselves. No matter where we are now, this is the only place where we can start from, and the key to it ultimately is just deciding to start.

If you actually do start the enterprise of really trying to identify all that is false or incongruent in your life and create a plan to fix and improve yourself in this manner and continue to follow it, then no matter what level of progress you are able to achieve in the right direction, your life will start to change for the better. Ask yourself, what does it cost everybody else, the environment and the world for me to exist? What debt to society am I because of what I buy and consume? What am I missing?

Dig deep, questions like these are where one could start.

So in essence, this process is one of purification. If we look further into this word we find that purify means ‘to free from extraneous matter’ and we will also find that the word purification directly makes reference to the Feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary. This in turn leads me then to Jesus’ first miracle, the turning of water into wine at a marriage (making the two one). Let us first look at the one statement in this story that seems out of place, Jesus speaking to his mother Mary ‘Woman, what have I to do with thee? Mine hour has not yet come.’

Let us also acknowledge the fact here that Mary here is attributed full authority as Jesus’ mother as she is the one who commands the servants, she then transfers this authority to Jesus by stating ‘Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it’.

At this point Jesus commands the servants to fill six stone vessels which were made for purifying, which are symbolic of the purification of the five senses and the mind. So then this ‘out of place’ statement above can make sense when it is recognized that Mary represents the virgin spirit which is what gives birth to the Christ and that virgin spirit is timeless and always exists, however it is not until one goes through the purifying of one’s mind and senses that one can truly be a son or daughter of that divine spirit, until that time the ‘hour has not yet come’.

Wine is also symbolic in that it is the fruit of a vine, and a vine is something that is connected to something greater, the pure virgin spirit, making the two, flesh and spirit, one.

I would like to state at this point, since making reference to Jesus, that one should remove all sense of regret, shame or guilt in regards to any moral dictates of any church or supposed religious authority. One must face and make peace with their past and move on.

Regret or any of the other negative emotions are in fact some of the unessential items that must be hacked away. If not, they become a great impediment. The same is true of anxiety for the future, the actions in our now moments will determine the quality of our ‘future’; this is why mindfulness is emphasized in many traditions.

Are you always aware of your thoughts and actions? Your attention is probably the most valuable thing you possess. Do not let your attention be crucified between the two thieves, regret of the past and anxiety/fear for the future.

‘It was said of old, thou shall not covet any thing that is thy neighbor’s; and now I say unto thee, thou shall not desire any thing which is not in thy power, for only that which is within thee doth belong to thee; and that which is without thee doth belong to another. In this doth happiness lie; to know what is thine, and what is not thine’.  ‘The Teacher of Righteousness’ an Essene book.

Anyone who has worked for a medium to large company may be familiar with the terms continuous improvement and corrective action. They mean exactly what they say, and companies that have ‘quality systems’ document their procedures, improvements to them, as well as the time, energy and money saved, through these systems, by measuring a variety of statistics or indicators.

Why do they do it? because it works. Do you have any friends that seem to complain and get themselves in the same predicaments repeatedly? Do you do this yourself? Maybe you should consider corrective action.

Castaneda’s Don Juan spoke of a term called ‘The end of an era’, ‘The end of an era is an accurate description of a process that shamans go through in dismantling the structure of the world they know in order to replace it with another way of understanding the world around them’.

There seem to be a variety of methods devised to achieve the effects of the solitary disciplines, effects such as improved concentration, awareness, intuition, understanding, wisdom, and ultimately finding out who you truly are and why you are here.

What is metaphorically described as ‘withdrawing from society’ can become possible without having to be a total recluse and free of all human contact; If ones intentions and attitude are pure and in alignment with ones heart, the spirit will provide the conditions for this withdrawal to occur in whatever way is appropriate for the individual.

Even so, it will demand a dismantling of the structure of your world in order that it be replaced with another.

Before concluding, I would like to state that, to the best of my understanding and discernment, the writings contained herein are consistent with my interpretation of the traditions and schools of thought that I have researched, studied and practiced.

They are also congruent with the actions and life path that I have followed as well as with the conclusions I have arrived at from these life experiences. One of the most important ideas here then is that regardless of whether any of these ‘saints’, ‘adepts’ or ‘men or women of God’ are shown in their stories as being in some way divinely ordained for their calling, all the story lines also include their need to go through the same mundane purification practices, just like everyone else.

This is truly what the good news is, that the ultimate is available to all who are willing to seek with a pure heart.

Summary of ideas:

• One must be open to the possibility that there is a need for improvement in one’s life. Do you sense that there is something you are missing? Do you follow the masses or are you sovereign?

• One must endeavor to proactively and objectively observe, examine and scrutinize all thoughts, speech and action, and the implications of these in order to identify areas of improvement and implement corrective action.

• A purification process should be undertaken where a hacking away of the unessential, extraneous matter is begun. This will also include some form of ‘withdrawing from society’.

• In the Essene text, ‘God” has essentially commanded man not to worry ‘thou shall not desire any thing which is not in thy power’. Regret and misapprehension of the past and the false imagination and anxiety for the future are two of the biggest impediments to intuition and growth. Both of these, along with fear, must be rooted out, reduced and eliminated.

• In the most rational and logical manner possible, continue in developing your plan for progress, to prepare for and implement the dismantling the old structures of your world in order that they be replaced by new ones.

• The above is congruent with many traditions as well as the conclusions I have arrived at from my own life experiences.

This is the true Day of Judgment, when you recapitulate and judge your own life, clean your own house and create your new city of peace to live in. ‘re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book, and dismiss whatever insults your own soul’ (Walt Whitman) ‘He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still.’