Monstaville Book III. Chapter 4

4

“Fitting hospitality must be shown even towards an enemy arrived at the house. The tree does not withdraw from the wood-cutter the shade at its side.”

- Hitopadesa.

 

May 2008.

I have never said I don’t have an ego. My ego is one of independence, and of rebellion. I just don’t have egocentric intentions or a proud, competitive, aggressive attitude. Um, until, that is, someone else has egocentric intentions towards me and want me to fail or lose or suffer so that they can feel powerful and superior - then I react like a tiger. Then expressing power feels justified because I am defending not just my ego or my ‘honour’ but also trying to deter that person from gloating and walking all over me in a shamelessly dominant manner. I seek to dislodge the oppressive force that wants me to lie down and be a victim. And, often, my generally gentle, introverted, sensitive nature seems to send out signals that I am an easy target and therefore attracts displays of egocentric behaviour. And my struggle with attention does make me somewhat vulnerable and fearful because it’s all I can do to cope and get through the day sometimes. I can’t rely on my brain to function well enough in relation to the external environment and especially other people. I miss some of what they say, fail to absorb some information and my short-term memory can be atrocious. In social and employment settings this can lead to problems and conflicts as well as bringing out the worst in people whose savage egos ‘smell blood’ and like to go in for the kill, to assert their power and take charge.

I have free will and it is my right not to fall prey to childish monsters or to the savagery born of eating meat (this feeding the animal self). It is a choice. But that surprises such people because they recognise the signs of an easy target not realising that I have a strong will, and the confidence and power of being an individual in my own right. The truth is that they are far more insecure than me, which is why they project them on to others. I am not at Buddha’s level where I will simply direct positive energy or love towards my aggressors and, consequently, remain unaffected by their anger and aggressive behaviour. I don’t possess that kind of power (or realisation of the source of that energy, the Self). You know, life shouldn’t be a game of cat and mouse! I’m neither cat nor mouse; I just want to be myself and be free of all that insanity. But why should I suffer in silence while others are inconsiderate or aggressive?

“Be true to your heart and you will honour them: their Spirit will celebrate.” -  St. Germain (from the discourse and discussion, ‘Connecting to Your Authentic Self,’ channelled through Ashamarae McNamara, 26 June 2009, Violet Hill Studios, London).

Many people in Britain, and in the ‘West’ generally, place so much importance on the rational intellect. If that does not function very well they regard it as a weakness or a serious defect that makes one less normal or competent. There is something seriously wrong with you - with me - they assume. They do not see that there are other, more subtle, more important qualities such as depth of feeling, honesty and integrity that they themselves have not developed. The ‘silent witness,’ the Higher Self, resides within, the segment of Being that has not (yet) incarnated [Retrospective note: one of twelve segments that represents dimensional expressions of the I AM Presence].

“Why be a great composer with your rent in arrears?

Why be a major poet and you’ll owe it for years?

When crowds’ll pay to giggle if you wiggle your ears
 Be a clown, be a clown, be a clown.”

- Cole Porter (excerpt from the lyrics to ‘Be A Clown’ from the film The Pirate, 1948).

 I have no money, very few friends, no girlfriend, no house, no car, no social life, no (worldly) ‘career.’ I am simply an artist forever on the cusp of worldly life. In Western terms, in modern terms, I have nothing. And, yet, I have everything! I have a creative purpose; I have deeply fulfilling interests, especially music and dancing; I have a daily meditation and tai chi practice and more; I enjoy nature and I am highly visual and appreciative of beauty and enjoy profound feelings of pleasure and bliss. In this respect, I am unusually fortunate. I have a rich inner life. But, I struggle to survive, to be free and to avoid persecution out in the world. And, on a spiritual level, perhaps I need to surrender, to let go and relax my will more, and just allow all this insanity and cacophony to gurgle around me, and train myself not to be affected by it. Perhaps.

“Be crumbled.

So wild flowers will come up where you are.

You have been stony for too many years.

Try something different.

Surrender.”

- Rumi.

Incidentally, on the subject of British people and spirituality, I once asked an American friend in a MySpace message how she blesses food and water after she informed me that she always does this:

So it's inspiring to learn about your way of blessing! It's not as obvious as you might think and I'd hate to feel I was behaving too religiously! 'Bless this to me with pure love, light' is cool. I'll write it in my little notebook. Thanks. :) I could never say 'the father…and whatnot holy ghost.' But I wasn't raised on religion so it's not familiar. I just feel an instinctive aversion to the whole control and corruption campaign that religion in its essence is. That's not to say that some individuals don't use it wisely or even attain enlightenment though it. But, then, as Richard Bach suggested, you can find wisdom in anything, including Snoopy! You know, like you suddenly think of the fucking Pope doing something similar for God's sake! Haha. Britain's the little devil who kicked the religion 'habit' yonks ago. Pardon the pun. Now it's a dark, rational, negative little corner of the world but perhaps the Rubber Band Theory (according to Bashar: see Chapter 11) will work here: a little light and millions of people wake up (although I expect it will be mostly younger people).

“A spiritual seeker asks his master what is needed to reach true realisation or awakening. Rather than give a long explanation, the master pushes his students head into a lake and holds him there until the seeker struggles to the surface. The master then asks him what he longed for when his head was under water.

‘To breathe,’ he answers.

‘And how intense was this longing for breath?’ asks the master.

‘With all my strength,’ replies the seeker.

The master says, ‘when you will feel the same desire to reach the divine, you will be on the right track...’"

[Retrospective note: “Yet for all the benefits that the new knowledge has brought us since the watershed of the seventeenth century, there is an ever-growing disquiet. When we look around us, we see an afflicted world – we see dying rivers and oceans, forests destroyed, species becoming extinct, ever more people crowded into ugly, sprawling cities, and so many areas of modern life infected by a creeping soullessness. Leading representatives of the new knowledge assert that there is no reality other than what has material existence, and promulgate the view that human beings are merely biological machines, whose lives are essentially purposeless. From their standpoint, the cultures of the past, with their sensitivity to subtle realms and their pantheons of gods and spirits, were simply ignorant and superstitious. This, however, is far from the truth. The cultures of antiquity, like many of today’s surviving traditional cultures, were wise and knowledgeable about things of which we today are but dimly aware. Contemporary mainstream culture is still balefully ignorant of the spiritual dimension of life, rarely questioning the modern superstition that only material existence has a reality. This is why the ancient world has become so vitally relevant for us today.” – Jeremy Naydler (‘The Future of the Ancient World,’ Watkins Review, Autumn/Winter 2010/11, Issue 25, www.watkinsbooks.com).]

My friend explained that she gives voice to whatever flows through her heart. “It’s not so much the words as the way they are motivated. Does that make any sense? Sometimes I visualise white light and I bless it to my own body...or to their bodies, their water, whatever [talking about her dogs]. I have this crystallised sage...liquid. I cover my third eye with a cross with the liquid on my fingertips...haha...I have so many little traditions :) I think it is the energy of love that is most important.” She also dabs liquid crystallised sage on her third eye whilst uttering, ‘I am willing to let go of my old ideas...old beliefs which no longer serve me...and I am willing to be compassionate with myself as I progress.’ In my reply, I noted, ‘Yes, I know what you mean...you feel it in your heart, intend, and use whatever words appear to reflect that. Speaking words has much power.’ My friend was brought up a Catholic but dropped religion decades ago. Yet, wisely and intuitively, she kept such ideas and expanded on them as her spiritual growth unfolded and she learned about divine energy.

 

I am human but that is, I suppose, no excuse to remain one. Always we must strive to express our higher potential, to centre ourselves in the Divine. And, they say, in the midst of worldly activity...with all its raging ‘madness and mayhem.’ And that, I guess, is why the universe continues to place me in challenging circumstances. Power must be expressed but, always, it should be that of the true Self, not the animal ego, not the restless tiger and not even the lone leopard that simply wants to survive and be left in peace. The ego may not be active but by its very nature it is ready to take action if it feels threatened. It is there somewhere and needs to be mastered if we are to elevate ourselves spiritually.

The ego is, by its very nature, active while the soul is passive by nature. The reverse ego is a repressed one. Egocentric intentions bubble beneath the surface. The heat is there but it is under water, as it were, buried under the subconscious, under the emotions. The tiger appears to be sleeping or to have died. But it is camouflaged in the long grass, now resting when it feels safe, not prowling when it identifies prey. Its agenda - to survive - lurks beneath the surface, conditioned by childhood and hungry for life in a difficult and often dangerous world. The reverse ego cannot or does not involve itself directly and therefore appears harmless whilst accusing over displays of power - any and every kind of power, positive or negative - as being egocentric. It hides under a rock like a scorpion, seemingly quiet, peaceful, even non-existent. Yet, it will sting at every opportunity. Be careful where you tread, lest its poison kill you stone dead. It uses the water of the soul’s habitat - the subconscious - to pull you down, to dowse your fire of positive energy with negative emotion.

"There is no need of any competition with anybody. You are yourself, and as you are, you are perfectly good. Accept yourself." - Osho.

Some men (and certain women) do this, not in an entirely feminine way which is nurturing and open, but with a sharp set of teeth behind it ready to snap shut on their prey. Basically, they satisfy or empower their own (suppressed or otherwise hidden) egos by extinguishing those of others. They are enthroned in their underwater kingdoms on the river bed only when there are no other egos around to inhibit their expression. They thrive in a group of sensitive, caring people (OK, mostly women) in which they can appear to be likewise gentle and supportive whilst concealing their intentions (or deluding even themselves that they are similarly peace-loving). They criticise anyone who expresses power, anyone with a male ego, anyone who is confident or has high-esteem or a strong will. They put other people down, fearing that they will succeed, thereby making them seem even more unmotivated, uncourageous, unfulfilled and lacking purpose. This is how the ‘reverse ego’ behaves. It is active in an inactive, or indirect, capacity. It is different to someone defending their boundaries and protecting themselves from harm, although that, too, can be disguised as egolessness. People use masks to deceive both themselves and others, to deny truth and reality, to see things as they wish to and when such behavioural responses are habitual they believe the fantasy created in their subconscious minds. It is a tricky arena that of the ego!

“One nice thing about egotists: they don’t talk about other people.” – George Carlin.

Egocentric behaviour, basically, amounts to taking one’s frustration out on whoever one can target. The direct ego does this openly and brazenly (just getting on with it) while the reverse ego also satisfies itself that the target is deserving of such treatment (being pulled down). The directly-displayed ego, however, may also seek to justify its actions by looking down on those whom it seeks to trample underfoot. The reverse ego concentrates on the feeling of being superior and is therefore more subtle and passive, harbouring jealousy perhaps, for example.

The active, assertive ego and passive, receptive soul need to be balanced in order to reunite with, and express, the true Self. Fire and water must be fused in oneness and they then form a conduit, or bridge, to the creative Source. Thus, the path from Samsara to Nirvana, worldly illusion to divine reality, from frustration and suffering to peace and happiness (which is relative when isolated in the physical body) is revealed and we can find our way back to eternal oneness. How we achieve this state is generally beyond our intelligence and understanding while we are stuck in the world of matter, blinded by its sluggish energy and apparent concrete nature. Only those who guide us from beyond the veil of illusion (‘evil’ being blind and generally stubborn and fearful ignorance) really know where we need to go and how we may reach our spiritual goal. The Self knows too, of course, but until we are able to operate on that level we need assistance. Surrender rather than resistance to the experiences we encounter enables us, at least, to return the fish to the river, the soul to the sea of collective consciousness, providing us with a foundation for growth.

We should relax and play, be as innocent children, open and free, and centre ourselves in the Sun shining above - in the Creator’s Being. Unfortunately, the ego wants to be the Sun and is too impatient, too restless, too single-minded. It isolates itself from the river and flaps around on the river bank, rarely resting, except from exhaustion or injury. Always active, it even chooses intense activity to switch its brain off and feel comparatively relaxed. As Blaise Pascal observed, “Most of humanity’s problems result from the inability to sit still in a room.” The more active is our ego, our isolated spark of divine power, the more individualistic and aggressive the fish of soul is forced to become, dragged into violent behaviour by the net of physical identification and subconscious patterns, separating itself from its natural environment indefinitely by perpetuating the myth of land-loving identity. It never thinks to refresh its scales in the river, yet the soul-fish remains pure underneath the layers of trouble and disturbance. The ego fears relaxing into its more soulful feelings or expanding its self-awareness to realise its true (divine) nature lest it fall prey to other aggressive predators. Welcome to the rat race, the bizarre spectacle of stranded fishes competing and fighting for an illusory goal of success, power, wealth and happiness. Such is the foul stench of dried-out, dying fishes.

"The images of the unconscious place a great responsibility upon a man. Failure to understand them, or a shirking of ethical responsibility, deprives him of his wholeness and imposes a painful fragmentariness on his life." - Carl Jung (Memories, Dreams and Reflections).

What we fear is our own inner pain which we have blocked out. Each strand of our efforts to cope with life slowly becomes crystallised, or so entangled that the result is a tight knot. It is difficult to know where or how to start loosening it. Each becomes ‘another brick in the wall’ that divides us from this pure foundation of feeling and consciousness that is the pure soul. Osho describes a process of getting in touch with one’s feelings through his Primal exercise, of returning to “the primal pain that everybody passes through while coming out of the womb.” The ‘door of feeling’ is ‘very shy,’ he says. We judge with our (masculine) minds and this creates an obstacle to getting touch with our (feminine) feelings...which are so taboo in a patriarchal world and have been denied for millennia. Increased awareness, however, is now helping us to recognise the need for, and importance of, feeling. It is overriding the limitations of the rational intellect and affording us a higher perspective which is not confined to shallow states of mind or influenced by emotional responses. “The mind is never shy, the heart is always shy. Once the mind is looking at it, the door to feelings closes, you cave in,” he explains. “It is natural in the beginning to judge so don't be worried about it, because that worry about the judgement will be more harmful than the judgement itself. Don't judge the judgement - just take note that you have judged and that is why the door has closed. Forget about the judgement and start working. Next time the judgement comes it will not be so strong or so harmful or so certain; it will be more hesitant. Just by your being aware, by and by the judgement will disappear. Look at this: if thinking looks at feeling, feeling closes; and if awareness looks at thought, thoughts disappear. So just look, watch the judgement, and by and by it will go.” (Above All Don't Wobble, Chapter 14, 29 January 1976, Chuang Tzu Auditorium, Rajneesh Foundation, Pune, India, 1976, p.226). Prior to this explanation, he says:

“Anger arises as a protection against pain. If somebody hurts you, you become angry as a protection of your being against pain. So every pain is suppressed by anger - layers and layers of anger on pain. So just continue working on anger, and suddenly any moment you will feel the anger has disappeared, that you are becoming sad, not angry. The climate will change from anger to sadness, and when it does you can be certain that now you are close to pain; then the pain will erupt. It is just as if we dig a hole in the earth to make a well. First we have to remove the earth and many layers of stone, and then the water comes up. At first it is not clean water, it is muddy; then by and by cleaner sources become available. First anger will come - and it has many layers like earth. Then sadness will come like muddy water, and then pain, clean pure pain, will be available. And pure pain is tremendously beautiful because it will give you another birth immediately...The pain arises, or some feeling spring is touched, something uncoils.” (ibid. p.86).

The unconscious urge of the ego is legitimate. Its instinct for survival and its impulse for expression are the root of one’s growth, the stimulus behind one’s experiences and therefore the key to illumination, to blossoming as the flower. The divine spark naturally wishes to find its way back to the eternal glory that is its essential Reality. That is the purpose for which we have taken on the materialisation process. The life force that propels the fish, enabling it to move, gravitates towards the Sun. Yet, the fish cannot fly. Paradoxically, to find its way home, it must venture back down from whence it came, not to return to complete unconsciousness, but back into the water, nevertheless, into which the sunlight shines. It is as through consciousness that we arrive at the centre, the centre of consciousness. It is also by separating ourselves from oneness and knowing what we are not that we awaken to conscious Light. It is by being one with all life that we are able to become conscious of the Sun and centre ourselves in our eternal nature. But, we regard such a passive and simple, uncomplicated excursion to be a weakness. We fear re-immersion into the unconscious lest we completely forget that we are individuals. After all, we are here to attain individuation from the collective as expressions of the One Source. Until we change our habits, however, we will remain stranded in the dirt, and dried out inside, always trying to be something we are not. The ‘measure of our happiness is our unhappiness,’ and the experience of dis-ease, the frustration of living in such an unnatural and self-defeating way, is a tool that we can use to finally find our way back to Light, and to balance, flow and composure. Too much fire, excessive yang (male energy) does not bring us closer to the Sun of true Being. We end up harming ourselves and others, especially those closest to us. We imagine that the external world can offer us happiness. We search for it outside of ourselves and remain frustrated and lost. We have neglected the inner life which needs to come first, since it is the foundation from which all growth and therefore attainment in terms of consciousness, can take place. Only when we relax and feel whole can we bask in the Sun, incarnate spiritually and feel alive as Light.

This is nigh impossible to achieve in a country like Britain where we are all wrestling for space and money on the river bank (the Sun being concealed behind whingeing clouds most of the time anyway). We moan about how unfair life is. We live just to pay taxes and heating bills. The relaxed pace of countries like India is more conducive to spiritual growth should people be thus inspired (I am not suggesting that the majority of Indians are but the opportunity is more evident there). Certainly, each way of life has its value as do both the ego and the soul, masculine and feminine. It is, as I said previously, the fusion and balance of the two principles which brings us closer to God and the fulfilment of our life’s purpose both collectively and individually.

We interrupt this programme to bring you…a true story (about biscuits, so not entirely irrelevant):

“This actually did happen to a real person, and the real person was me. This was April, 1976, in Cambridge. I had gone to catch a train. I was a bit early so I went to get myself a newspaper, a cup of coffee and a packet of biscuits. I went and sat at a table. I want you to picture the scene. It’s very important that you get this clear in your mind: here’s the table, newspaper, cup of coffee, packet of biscuits. There’s a guy sitting opposite me, perfectly ordinary-looking guy wearing a business suit, carrying a briefcase. It didn’t look like he would do anything weird. What he did was this: he suddenly leant across, picked up the packet of biscuits, tore it open, took one out and ate it. ”

               Now this, I have to say, is the sort of thing the British are very bad at dealing with. There’s nothing in our background, upbringing or education that teaches you how to deal with someone who in broad daylight had just stolen your biscuits. You know what would happen if this had been South Central Los Angeles. There would have very quickly been gunfire, helicopters coming in, CNN, you know...But in the end, I did what any red-blooded Englishman would have done: I ignored it.”

                I stared at the newspaper, took a sip of coffee, attempted a clue in the crossword, couldn't do anything, and thought, what am I going to do? In the end I thought, nothing for it, I’ll just have to go for it, and I tried very hard not to notice the fact that the packet was already mysteriously opened. I took out a biscuit for myself. I thought, that’s settled him. But it hadn't, because a moment or two later he did it again. He took another biscuit. Having not mentioned it the first time, it was somehow even harder to raise the subject the second time around. ‘Excuse me, I couldn’t help but notice…’ I mean, it doesn’t really work.”

                We went through the whole packet like this. When I say the whole packet, I mean there were only about eight biscuits, but it felt like a lifetime. I took one, he took one, I took one, he took one. Finally, when we got to the end, he stood up and walked away. Well, we exchanged meaningful looks, then he walked away and I breathed a sigh of relief and sat back. A moment or two later, the train was coming in, so I tossed back the rest of my coffee, stood up, picked up the newspaper, and underneath the newspaper…were my biscuits.””

                The thing I particularly like about this story is the sensation that somewhere in England there has been wandering around for the last quarter of a century a perfectly ordinary guy with the exact same story; only he doesn't have the punch line.””

                - Douglas Adams (The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking The Galaxy One Last Time, Macmillan, 2002).

Britain has much to teach the world in terms of individual responsibility, of combining independent identity and social justice in order for different types of people to live together in relative harmony. The heat has been turned up over the past couple of decades and the British people have lost faith in this sense of justice. Rampant capitalism has emboldened and empowered the egotists whilst impoverishing those less hungry for material wealth, unwilling or unable to sell their souls for a slice of the cake. We no longer feel protected by the Government from the vicious and greedy sharks of trade and industry and even the Government and councils themselves now appear to treat us like victims, demanding so many taxes and communicating with us in insensitive, unsympathetic, even sinister, ways when we struggle to pay their price for living in this marvellous free - and don’t forget ‘tolerant’ - country! We feel criminalised and marginalised. The old British principle of leniency towards those who are humble and sincere and who show sufficient respect towards the System has all but gone - as, subsequently, has the people’s trust. Unlimited immigration (out of economic ‘necessity’ through materialistic greed), overcrowding and mixing people who clearly clash culturally has meant that many British people are themselves bent on emigrating in order to enjoy a better quality of life.

I’m wont to blame everything on the Normans. The Ancient Celts used to say, "May those who love us, love us. And those who hate us, may God turn their hearts. And if he doesn't turn their hearts, may he turn their ankles so we'll know them by their limping.” British people generally value their space. Didn’t the Normans eventually come to an agreement with the Anglo-Saxons on this island in order to exploit their feudal ownership of its people and lands? Demanding sacrifices of life, liberty and property beyond which they were left in peace and afforded a degree of freedom and space to do the things they enjoyed and pursue their personal interests. I mentioned this notion to an intelligent lady from New Zealand and she raised an eyebrow, saying that Britain is now so overpopulated that we no longer have the space we have always valued. Well, certainly that is true where we live and in certain other parts of the country but I’m not sure if it applies to the country as a whole. A lot of people must feel angry or want to react to the overcrowding here. It’s probably not so bad if you’ve grown up with it, if you are used to it or accept it as a price to pay for emigrating, or if, in the culture from which you hail, people don’t even want or enjoy personal space. ‘Tolerance,’ the word the Government loves to impose on our forever oppressed population, is a passive form of love but it can also be the result of feeling powerless, having no choice and being stuck.

Tensions have risen to new heights.

Public places are avoided for fear of ending up in fights.

Afraid to walk the streets at night

Lest some dark force come and turn out the lights.

Life in the U.K. is a thriller! The ‘hounds of Hell’ have risen from the dead to further inhibit our freedom and self-expression, our individual identities and celebration of diversity in which quality may or may not thrive but has some chance to survive all the same.

It seems unlikely that the balance between ego and soul will take off culturally in Britain now. We had our chance and blew it (by voting in Margaret Thatcher I expect although we Western folk needed to understand what damage right wing politics can do as a springboard for collective political awakening). It has been a social laboratory in which divergent people have lived together for centuries - not always harmoniously, of course, but largely developing and respecting some kind of genetic code relating to the principle of ‘live and let live.’ The excessive influx of outsiders who do not have this code built into their genes is bringing tension to the surface and appears to be erasing the old programme. Whether this will be resolved in the future or not no one can say, but, certainly, it is ‘for ill’ in the short-term. Fearing change can be healthy if faced with disaster! I am living in the thick of it and my instinct is to seek a solution through a more integrated Europe because we need solidarity through certain values that we simply cannot afford to see abandoned. The British Government, whatever party is in office, is evidently unable to resolve the issues resulting from gross inequality introduced by way of free-market (or corporate) capitalism. It can no sooner turn back the clock as it can unite people in future unless it suddenly finds enlightenment and seeks to learn from the example of Bhutan or something, where the gross national happiness (ever-spiritually-based) is considered more significant than the gross national product (surely this is the coolest feature on our globe at present?). I believe that encouraging people to experience and grow spiritually as individuals is the only hope for our society now. Religious identity and disciplines fuse people together on an ego-level like sparks huddled together. They divide groups from everyone else through external identity, that is, being something they are not - failing to express their own unique purpose and potential as individual souls.

Good Warriors do not arm,

good fighters don’t get mad,

good winners don’t contend,

good employers serve their workers.

This is called the virtue

Of noncontention;

This is called mating with

The supremely natural and pristine.

- Laozi (Daodejing 68, The Essential Tao, translated and presented by Thomas Cleary, Castle Books, New Jersey, U.S., 1998, p.53).

In this social laboratory, we can observe that the basic principle of individuality is a potential we cannot afford to live without. Even though we have sunk into a banal culture of shallow materialism and individualism, we islanders shun the idea of clinging together in a fisherman’s bucket. Regardless of the water available to share (in which all the other fishes have poohed!), the price is too high and we will not tolerate an autocratic regime that does not recognise our rights as individual human beings. Well, at least, I think that is where we still stand as a nation (I observe that many people seem to be willing to settle for less).

The temporary experience of individualism, of being centred in our physical egos, can serve to remind us of our individual potential, our higher purpose, as Light. If we then find our way back into the river, we are unlikely to ignore the Sun shining down from above and lighting our way, illuminating our very existence, as the One Centre that is the true, eternal Being of all. That is predominantly the value of Western secular life and culture. It is not an end in itself but a means to an end. It is an experiment from which other cultures can learn, potentially bypassing the numerous failings and imitating or using our successes (which even British culture itself seems to fail to recognise or appreciate).

“In my high school days, I was almost always late because I was interested in so many things on the way. I always started from home to reach the school at the right time, but I never reached because so much was going on along the way - some magician was doing his tricks, and it was irresistible. Just to leave that magician and go to study...some stupid teacher talking about geography...So I was punished continually, but soon my teachers realised that it was useless to punish me. Their first punishment was to tell me to go around the high school building seven times. I would ask, ‘If I go eleven times will it do?’ They would say, ‘Are you mad? This is a punishment.’ I said, ‘I know this is a punishment, but I have missed my morning exercise. So if I make it my morning exercise, you are not losing anything. Your punishment is covered, my morning exercise is complete; nobody is losing anything, both are gaining.’ So they stopped that, because this wouldn't do. They would tell me to stand outside the class. I said, ‘That's good, because I love the open air. The class is dark and dirty, and outside it is so beautiful. And in fact, sitting inside I am always looking outside. Who cares what you are teaching? - the birds are singing, the trees are blossoming...it is so beautiful outside.’ The headmaster would come on his round, and every day he would find me standing outside. And he would say, ‘What is the matter?’ I said, ‘Nothing is the matter. I love to stand outside; it is healthier, hygienic. And you can see how beautiful it is.’ But he said, ‘I will see your teacher. How is it that he allows you to stand outside?’ I said, ‘I don't know, but he tells me himself, every day...Stand outside.' So now I don't even ask him. It has become a routine, so I simply come and stand here.’ He asked the teacher. The teacher said, ‘It must have been thirty days ago! I told him only once to stand outside - since then he has not entered the class. I was thinking it was a punishment, and he is enjoying it. Not only that, he is spreading the rumour among the students that it is hygienic, it is healthy. And they are asking me...Sir, can we also stand outside?' Then what am I to do here? Then I will also go and stand outside.’

                It is a question of how you take things.”

                - Osho.

(He is showing that the ego can turn discipline on its head and turn it to its own advantage, fuelling its own pride and survival without endeavouring to learn or understand the lesson intended).

Forgiveness: These psychic assaults are a reminder to smile and laugh, and be happy. Either you go one way and respond negatively through your subconscious or t’other - with conscious effort and intent...and love, thereby centring yourself in who you truly are...an expression of the Mother-Father God deepening and strengthening the roots of your individuality in a world that challenges you to choose between what you are and what you are not.

“How very dare you!” (Catch phrase of Catherine Tate’s effeminate character Derek).

‘Life is a quest toward Self Mastery’ by Rabbi Shem (channelled by Karine Daly 30 January 2009, www.snoedel.punt.nl/?id=429553&r=1&tbl_archief=0&).

“No people, the only war you need to fight is the inner turmoil created by your ego. It's the ego that concentrates on the neighbour or on the enemy or on the person who is soon to be your enemy.

                How do you create war?

                First you find an enemy and the enemy is the person who skipped the traffic light or who was rude to you at the supermarket or even who did not greet you nicely at church, and POW! you have an enemy and now you can wage war. Remember that you are no different from any other person and on a grander scale, from any other country. It is all about the ego and the war games the ego plays. 

                So, now I am telling you to wage war, but, with the ego and the war with the ego is going to have to be subtle. The bombs you drop must be love bombs, the words you speak must be loving words and the action you take must be based on love. And then you will see the ego blossom and do the work it was always intended to do, not be the tyrant it has become.

                What is the job of the ego? Aha! Now, there is a question. The ego was created by you so that you could grow, so that you could grapple and so that you could eventually stop fighting, put back your shoulders, put a spring in your step and acknowledge to yourself that at last you are learning to control the ego. 

                You have now put one foot onto the first rung of the ladder to the long climb to SELF MASTERY.”

"Whenever you encounter a person that you don't like, or you feel is difficult, strange, different, not easy to get along with, and you may meet others who then agree with you, compounding the dislike of this person, stop, breathe and look at this person through the eyes of an Angel, and then send this person extra love and blessings, for in truth you are looking at parts of yourself that you do not like very much and want to learn to love." - Elizabeth Anne Hill.

                ’Doctor, Doctor I keep thinking I’m invisible.’

                ‘Who said that?’

                - Unknown.

Invisible by Laura, 1995