Bruce Charlton's Notions

The consciousness of our real self is largely beyond the understanding of our more familiar 'personality self'. 

At its most fundamental level, the real will is divine; and at this level the purpose of the real will mixes perfectly with the purposes of other divine beings. 

The real will is the manifesting of this already-harmonised divine purpose throughout the lower levels of creation, and eventually right down to the physical level. 

Thus our real self witnesses itself as it becomes more fully mature and at the same time helps to perfect the purposes of others. The real self has this power in it as a part of our divine heritage. 

All nature responds to the proper command of the real will of the real self. But the will does not command 'willfully' - it achieves command by being more fully what it is. Thus the 'sound' of the quality of its individual being mingles more loudly with the creative sound of God. 

What we usually call 'will' is actually more like 'desire power' and 'idea power', through which our lower self focuses on things it feels it wants or needs. 

But what we feel as a need in the deepest sense is not something we can 'make a decision about', we just pretend that it is a decision. Our real will has already-decided, and is something we can only be either true-to, or untrue-to: the real will is not something we are in a position to use.

Edited - for clarity, punctuation, emphasis and language - from the Summary of chapter sixteen - The Will; from A Geography of Consciousness, by William Arkle, 1974.

Notes:

1. The true individual nature of each person is divine - that is, it belongs to the nature and function of the absolute - as a consequence of all men and women being God's children.

2. Therefore, we are, each of us, directly in touch with the power and purpose of the absolute, with the divine nature - at least potentially; simply because some of the divine nature is within us.

3. However, although the divine is active within us; we are initially (personally and culturally - in childhood and in early tribal societies) unconscious of the divine within ourselves. It affects us - but we are not aware of the fact.

4. As human consciousness evolves towards higher (ie. including more self-aware) levels - we get to a 'dead centre' of total self-consciousness cut off fro awareness of the divine. This state has been called the 'dead centre' of consciousness, or the consciousness soul - it is the adolescence of human personal and cultural evolution - a necessary transition phase. This position must be moved-through before we can become actively aware of the divine within us; that is the actual experience of the divine within us (not merely the abstract fact of their being a divine element in us). 

5. But, even before we are actively aware of the divine within-us; it may be at work in an unconscious way - expressing itself (or at least trying to express itself) as may be evident implicitly. For example, our behaviours may be shaped against our conscious will - our superficial and intellectually- or socially-moulded plans and schemes may be self-sabotaged; or synchronicities may channel us in certain directions.

6. The real self - that is, the divine self, is attuned-with the divine level of action. Each person is, in this way, an essential part of the divine plan of creation. However, to participate; he or she must freely opt-in to this plan, on the basis of love and awareness of the divine plan (made possible by the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ).

7. At the highest and deepest level our Life is a destiny - and indeed an unique destiny - yet that destiny is a gift, and as-such it may be declined.

8. At the deepest and highest level the true 'will'  of our true self is not chosen by us - because only at this divine level - in which the wills of many beings are harmonised.

9. Thus, because of this high-level harmonisation; the will of any one individual cannot 'sabotage' the divine plan of creation by any act or will at a lower level of consciousness. Each individual can either join in the work of creation, bringing his or her unique nature to the open-ended task; or he or she may decline to participate - leaving a gap in the original divine plan, and causing a change in the unfolding of creation.

10. The divine plan cannot be sabotaged in its character and aim (the specific plan is optional, non-mandatory, freely chosen); but it can be changed in its specifics (the plan is not a blueprint but evolutionary, pluralist, endlessly creative).  

Edited from The Resolution of Grief, an essay published in The Great Gift (1977) by William Arkle:


Behind the ordinary ego, or within the ordinary ego, is the divine ego. So there's nothing wrong with being egotistic - in the proper sense of the word.

There is something wrong with being egotistic in a narrow sense of egotism, in which everything is built up around the importance of its own self centre. But as this egotism grows, as it should do in a healthy being, it naturally grows into its bigger self, and the bigger self naturally grows into the little self, and the two integrate.

This is what psychologists describe as integration. It is the integration of the true self with the personality self of the physical body situation, and the two learn to live together and integrate completely. Then the personality becomes a wonderful instrument through which the divine self can experience, and learn, and interpret its learning, and communicate with other beings through physical forms, and through physical means of expression.

In doing that, it learns a great deal, and helps others to learn a great deal, and it builds and builds and learns to express the divine potentialities that we've been talking about - the divine friendships and the endless possibilities which emanate from its true nature.


So there is nothing wrong with being an ego, which is another word for 'I' and 'Iness'. You never lose the sense of 'Iness'.

You might lose the sense of knowing who your 'I' is, who you are, because the narrow sense of the personality ego - the smaller ego - often gets a very complete but restricted image of who it is, and it spends the rest of its life conforming to that image of who it is.

But the divine ego, the spiritual ego, the true self, is able to be itself and, at the same time, know that it is in a state of becoming. It isn't very concerned to circumscribe itself, to give itself a definite image, because it knows that if it does, that it's going to limit its ability to respond in an ever new way to new possibilities.


So what happens in life, is that we gradually learn to integrate the smaller sense of ego with the deeper and greater sense of ego; and, without losing a sense of 'I', the 'I' begins to become equally concerned with the well-being of others as it is with its own well-being; equally concerned with the happiness and the beauty and the possibility of the others in creation, its brothers and sisters, as it is concerned with its own reality.

So what happens, in a successful life, is that the ego broadens-out and gets bigger in a proper loving, caring way; not bigger in a grasping way, which is centred on its own small and selfishly oriented appetites; more a growing, which is able to grasp the meaningfulness, and the value to itself, of the fulfilment of all other forms of life, and all other beings, and all its other brothers and sisters.

Then the ego just grows and grows to include the well-being of all other egos. But there's nothing wrong in the sense of ego awareness.


What we call 'egotism', on the whole, reflects an unhealthy attitude in which everything is drawn into the small-self for a small-self satisfaction, small-self fulfilment of the wrong order, not large-self fulfilment for the higher order. The small-self fulfilment is a lower order appetite such as appearing to be important in the eyes of other people, appearing to be clever, appearing to be valuable in some way which is superior to other people, trying to be 'one up' on other people and so forth.


Note added (by Charlton): Arkle here is an antidote to the prevalent error that Christianity is aimed-at the loss of self; rather than the true Christian aim of expansion of self. Another error is that the ego-less human may then achieve a union with God that is an assimilation; rather than the true aim of a loving relationship between God (the creator) and his divinised children - the Sons and Daughters of God.

It may be helpful to consider God (the creator, the creat-ing) as, from our perspective, a polarity.

We know God directly and personally in two ways - from outside and from inside: that is, we know God from inspiration (e.g. of the Holy Ghost), and from intuition of the divine within each Man.

The idea of polarity is that both external and internal divine elements are always necessarily present, because we are dealing with an active 'process', ongoing through time; and the polarities are twin poles of that process, generated-by that process.

So God (the divine) is not a structural, separable thing (which would be static, dead, unmoving), but God is a person - and as a person God extends through time.

And we are involved-with God by our inheritance as children of God: we each are, in essence, divine - so we too are (abstractly) processes through time.


We have the divine within each of us (the True Self) and God is also outside of us (as persons, in God and in Men). So there is a kind-of Divine Web - of individuals divine selves in relation with all other divine selves.

In other words, fundamentally, reality is beings in relationships.

As Man has developed to become more conscious, he begins at one pole by being 'inspired' primarily by external sources of divinity; and as Man grows in consciousness he is supposed-to move, voluntarily and by choice, to the other pole of living primarily from personal intuition of his True Self.

This is also a movement from passivity to activity; from being-controlled to being free. 


So, the completeness of divinity is always when external divinity meets with inner divinity; but in a child or in early Man the external source of divinity was primary; and each man was unconsciously, passively driven-by the external. In such a situation, obedience to the authority of external divinity was the primary virtue; and the primary sin was to rebel against divinity.

As Man's consciousness grows (partly by development in his mortal life, partly at a species level and through human history) he becomes more aware of the distinction between himself and external deity. At a certain point (the culmination of spiritual adolescence), he experiences the reality of separation between external deity and the True Self.

At this point, experience of the polarity of deity is lost; because the experience is a static 'moment' of awareness, insight, 'enlightenment' - an epiphany - the truth of which is true in an abstract cross-sectional way (at a particular moment, 'outisde' of time); but the experience of separation from divinity is untrue in terms of life really being longitudinal, experienced through time.

The reality is that the dynamic process of polarity is always the case - and each man is always a meeting between external and internal divinity; but a snap-shot experience of a dynamic process is a 'frozen moment', in which the dynamic and reciprocal relationship is lost.


Man's divine destiny is to move from the child-like, un-free pole of external and passive immersion-in deity, to the free-agent, grown-up pole of working primarily from our own inner divine True Self. But because these are poles, both sides are always actually present.

So, the divine world begins as dominated by God, with Men as little-conscious (and other even less conscious beings), unconsciously and spontaneously (almost wholly, albeit never quite fully so - because this is a polarity) doing what God directs; and through time moving towards a situation in which some Men are much more powerfully conscious, and have chosen to live in mostly from their own inner divinity.

Instead of being unconsciously and passively directed-by God; such men have consciously and actively chosen to work from their independent agency and with God.

And this is the evolutionary movement from inspiration (primarily, not entirely, external divine guidance) to intuition (primarily, not entirely, inner divine guidance).


When we consciously choose to live primarily from the polarity of our True (and divine) self and with God, this is to become our-selves divine (albeit in a much less-continuous and less-able way than the creator). We become active participants in the process of creation.

And at a personal level, we become something more like God's grown-up 'adult' children; and friends (or 'junior colleagues') of God in his work of creation.


This is the plan of creation. God loves all his children - both the young one, the grown-up ones, and the (many) adolescents somewhere in between. But God certainly wants and hopes to have other 'adult' divinities with whom to relate in a loving and comnpanionable fashion; because grown-up divinities are working mainly from their unique selves.

When at least some of God's children choose to grow-up and join with God in the work of loving creation; divine creation becomes an harmonious interaction of increasing complexity and richness, as compared with the original and lesser situation of unitary, top-down control.


In sum, God wants us to participate, actively and consciously, in the process of creation.

And to do this we need to become more conscious, and by this consciousness to choose to live primarily from our inner divinity.

Yet, because of polarity, because inspiration and intuition are poles of the same single process; this inner motivation is necessarily harmonised with all other external sources of divinity.

Thus the universe of creation coheres.

 

When I think rigorously about what is required for 'true creativity' by a Man, then it seems that a pretty extensive set of pre-requisites must be in place; such that true creativity is only possible to some people, at some times and places in history. 

Human creativity is possible because of divine creativity: we dwell 'in' God's creation; so, for a Man's creativity to be real entails first that it comes from the Man himself - from his unique personal 'self'; and second that it harmonizes with divine creation. 

If creativity does not come from the Man himself, then what we have is just an instance of divine creation. 

Through most of history (in most places) Men did not claim to be creative, because their experience was that creativity came from God (or the gods). This was sometimes called inspiration; reflecting that it was breathed-in from some other source - from the divine, from the muses or whatever. 

So most of creativity in the past was not the product of an individual person - because the individual was merely a conduit for the divine; a tool or instrument of the divine. 

This kind of creativity is therefore real - and it harmonizes with divine creation - but it is not personal, its creative aspect is of-God, not of-Man. 

On the other hand; every-thing (every thought or action) which comes from a person innately, from his Real (hence divine) Self; is not of God, is indeed personal - but it is not creative unless it harmonizes-with and adds-to divine creation. 

Thus, most things we do from our-selves is merely personal, is not from God but instead a product of a Man; and it is Not creative. It is indeed anti-creation. 

In other words; of itself, that which originates from Man will Not, of itself, be creative - because it will be individual and out-of-harmony with divine creation. It will therefore be (to a greater of lesser degree) damaging or subversive to divine creation. 

In order, therefore, for a Man to be genuinely creative; he must be sufficiently an independent agent that he can generate thought/action from-himself (rather than simply being a conduit channeling divine creation); and top be genuinely creative, he must also make the choice to align himself with divine creation by a voluntary act. 

All independent acts of a Man that are aligned with divine creation are therefore instances of true personal creativity - but the magnitude of achievement varies between a world-historical genius; and someone 'minor' or altogether unknown, who has lesser ability and application but who nonetheless does 'make a difference' (and an eternal difference) - but a small difference, yet in a positive direction. 

Thus all acts of true personal creativity add-to divine creation, but the amount by which they add to divine creation varies hugely in accordance with the 'stature' of individuals. 

The business of aligning with divine creation is what happens when a scientist is devoted to 'the Truth' or when an artist is devoted to 'Beauty' - both of these are types of alignment with the Reality of divine creation. 

The long period of attunement, learning, practice and preparation which leads-up to a work of genius is exactly this process of alignment. Once the individual is aligned with divine creation; then his spontaneous creativity will contribute to overall creation. 

This model also explains why recent generations of supposedly creative people have the form of the 'evil genius' - in that these are people of great ability who are Not aligned with the Reality of divine creation; and who therefore inevitable do harm to creation. 

That's the order of it, I think...

First we need to look-within - introspect - and that is difficult for most people. Which means we need to want to look within before it can be attained - want it enough to persevere.

Once Introspection is attained then there is the possibility of Intuition.

Intuition is a process - it is thinking with the real-true-divine Self. It is the most fundamental thinking of which we are capable; compared with which the great mass of what we call thinking is merely passive 'processing'.

Most of our thinking is 'caused', automatic, un-thinking - that is, it is 'programmed' by our environment and experiences - but the real-true-divine thinking is itself a cause and has no cause - it is a spontaneous origin coming from nothing prior (that is because it is divine, and that is what divine is).

But real-true-divine thinking is not just some different kind of process that happens to be uncaused - it is participating in reality, which means it is intrinsically true.

(Real-true-divine thinking is Freedom; it is indeed the only Freedom - the only time when we our-selves are agent, because autonomous from being-caused.) 

So when we are thinking intuitively, our thinking is true; intrinsically true, necessarily true - as well as being creative. It is true because it participates in reality, it is creative because it is uncaused - and these attributes are indivisible because they all are consequences of its nature.

Let us call this real-true-divine thinking Imagination - using Coleridge's distinction of Imagination in contrast to 'Fancy' - which is merely passive, caused, secondary and not-true because relating to not-real things. Fancy is merely a product of normal, automatic processing, an output rearranged from inputs...

But when we define Imagination as the primary, creative thinking that participates in reality; we can see that Imagination is intrinsically valid.

Imagination is indeed primary - it is not merely useful or expedient, Imagination is knowledge.

Imagination is indeed the only knowledge - only that which is imagined (in the way and sense described above) is real and true; and other forms of thinking are not.

In normal discourse, Imagination is synonymous with 'imaginary' i.e. untrue, unreal - but now it is apparent that Imagination is our divine selves thinking in the universal realm of reality: Imagination is knowing.



 

One of William Arkle's core insights is that - in normal, everyday life - people act from a multitude of false selves. The true self, which is of divine origin and potentially able to become a god, is what makes us what we are - but it may be completely buried beneath false selves; the true self may be utterly ineffectual.

These false selves are of many types. Some are the collections of traits - hereditary and socialised - that constitute our 'personality' as described and measured by psychology. Others are that mass of automatic, robotic skills and responses that we learn to deal with the problems of living; including skills like typing or driving, small-talk and routine social interaction.

You can see that false selves are the totality of what a person presents to the world; and usually also everything that a person is aware of in himself, insofar as he is aware of anything. So, our consciousness is not the same thing as our true self, because it may be unaware of the true self, may even deny the reality of any such thing as a true self.

False selves are therefore necessary but a problem, because whenever we make an effort to change ourselves in any way, the probability is that this will be a matter of one or more of the false selves trying to change us in a superficial and false direction.

This is why methods of meditation,. methods of self-improvement, will-power... all such endeavours are nearly always ineffective. It is just a matter of distorting ourselves by exaggerating one or more false selves.

And how can we consciously strive to discover and nurture our true self, when the striving is being done by a false self?

Or if we try to relax and let-go the true self; simply 'allowing' the true self to emerge from under the false ones; there is a likelihood that we will instead be releasing one or more of the false selves...

The problem is not insoluble, because it has been achieved by others (and perhaps even by our-selves, albeit infrequently and briefly); but Arkle makes clear that there is no method to it; and indeed part of solving the problem is to recognise why there is no method. We must 'quarry out' our real self from the false ones, by some kind of trial and error - discovering what works for us, here and now; but never able to make the process a standard one.

The answer can be summarised as 'intuition' - but that is just giving a name to the fact that there is no method. But the start of a solution is to define the problem - and after that to recognise when the true self is emerging and strengthening. And this can be done by learning to recognise the uniquely self-validating quality of the true self.

Once you know it is there, real and vital - we can feel the reality of the true self in an absolutely distinctive way - even though we cannot describe it.

 

In attempting to cure ourselves in ingrained habits of positivistic, nihilistic and despair-inducing modes of modern thinking; rather than trying to develop our imaginations and to acknowledge the reality of extra-sensory communications (as I suggested yesterday) - another different (but complementary) approach is to recognise that what we are accustomed to sense as as 'hard facts' of reality - that seem to force themselves upon us, such that we act as passive receivers, those thngs we feel ourselves to be 'sensing' rather than 'imagining' (the sky, this chair, my fingers)... these are as thoroughly 'imagined' as anything else. 

Which is not to say the the sky, my chair, this computer are unreal - but that they are imagined. Facts do not have a direct route into our brains thereby to make accurate representations of themselves - rather, everything we get 'directly' is in a primary sense of divine origin - given us or built-into us by revelation.

Vision, hearing, touch, taste, smeel and feeling are not the direct communication routes for reality; rather the direct route for communication runs between God the creator, and our inmost true self - by 'pathways' (or mechanisms) imperceptible, undetectable, un-measurable to physics and biology. 

It is not 'us and them', mind and facts - because us affects our sensory (as well as imaginative) grasp of them. Indeed (pushed to the limit) with no us, there would be no them - interpretation is more basic than facts, spirit is more basic than material.

Hard facts are neither hard nor facts - although there is a real reality.

The contrast between 'fundamental' sensations which force themselves upon us, and 'fabciful' imagination which we steer from our free agency, is a hierarchy which should be inverted - the most powerful evidence for which is that this has been inverted, by most humans, through most of history and even now in many places of the world.

Instead of perceiving 'reality' (like Western Man does) as a dead and meaningless world with a few temporary subjective and unreliable floating-islands of life and consciousness; the spontaneous and traditional human view is apparently the opposite - of an alive and purposive world, with 'objective' analysis merely an temporary, expedient, pragmatic tactic for attaining certain discrete goals - a means to an end.

In reality there are no facts - so that the contrast between the world of sensed objective facts and the world of imagined subjective ideas is a false dichotomy: these are one world.

This notion is a truth much emphasised in recent decades, partially and to create a falsehood. The project is sometimes termed de-literalisation: and the idea is that we should cease to regard things as true or false, but instead symbolically. This sustains the kind of self-refuting, yet universally destructive, relativism which is now mainstream.

But this relativism is a consequence of atheism, which takes a correct but partial analysis then removes the religious context - indeed, all ideas become nonsense when detached from any root in the divine.

(Most obviously in science - the whole endeavor of science becomes nothing but generic bureaucracy - careerism, as modern research mostly now is, when detached from a religious framework and the pursuit of transcendental truth.)

However, within the religious context of God the creator as our loving Father, then we can understand that imagination is primarily a way of understanding the workings of our deepest true self - which is divine (because we are children of God) albeit only embryonically, or nascently, divine.

In other words, much of our lives are 'automatic' - vegetative and animal processes, many of them simply functioning to perform routine tasks, or else arbitrarily implanted in us by culture and training. But that which makes us human is a deep, divine level of self-consciousness - and that is the core of our being, that is what looks out onto the world - and that is what apprehends reality by the faculty of imagination.

In sum, this is what we need to train in ourselves: this is what we need to make a habit -- that when we look-out-onto the world, we do not either lose-ourselves in a fluid undifferentiated reality (like that of childhood) that seems to 'drown' our self-awareness; or else a world in which our own  self-awareness is mocked and crushed by the rock-like objectivity of cumulative hard facts.

We should aim to retain self-awareness at all times - that is indeed the destined (divinely intended) future of human consciousness.

We should regard what used to be hard facts from our dominant and sustained centre of self-awareness - of consciousness.

So that we look-out-from our sense of self onto a world which contains many kinds of things - we will see, feel and know that all is secondary to that regarding consciousness; that there is nothing out there in the world which is not imagined.

BUT, that the self which does the regarding is not imagined. That conscious, regarding self is the 'given', the 'assumption' which makes possible all other knowledge. It is not infallible nor is it 100 percent correct - but its basic,potential validity is real and fundamental because the true self is partly divine, and it is in communication with the fully divine. 

*

One of the biggest problems nowadays is getting at your True Self; in a world which is characterised by innumerable schemes and devices for erecting and maintaining a False Self - underneath which the True one may be buried so deep as to be all-but cut-off from contact with the outside world; creating a situation when a person's responses and actions are (so far as can be seen) wholly dictated by superficial and artificial processes.

Yet we, each of us, absolutely need to get at our True Self, because it is that which is our indispensable guide in living.

How, then, to get at this True Self?

1. Know that it is there. Know that there is a True Self; and know also that there is a near 100 percent certainty that it will be almost inaccessible to you - and that you are currently operating on the basis of a False Self which has been elaborated through later childhood, adolescence and adulthood.

2. Know the general properties of this True Self. These are two-fold: it is your eternal and proto-divine essence; and it is God within you, which became joined with your personal essence when you were made as a Son or Daughter of God.

3. Be able to recognise your True Self - this is less quick, less easy; and involves experiencing the True Self as providing you with discernment of the heart - your deepest and realest judgement.  

4. Trial & Error, inspiration and intuition, reflection and the results; to discover your personal best methods of connecting with your True Self.

5. Practise the best methods so you can use them as and when required.

6. Use the True Self. It is the one essential - as well as the most powerful, flexible and reliable - 'tool for living' at your disposal. You certainly need it to get started in a spiritual life; at the minimum to identify for yourself the primary source of authority, wisdom, valid experience and example. And once you have located this primary source - matters become easier, faster, more secure.

*

Isn't just a matter of not being alert; because the most alert people include those who are most asleep.

In a spiritual sense, sleep refers to a blindness, rather than a level of consciousness. The sleep of a modern adolescent plugged into social media is certainly very active, very alert; but it is a sleeping-through Life. Such an one is passive, absorptive, reactive. Thoughts go-through the mind; and do not originate-from the mind.

To become awake is consciously to become aware of Living, as it is happening, here-and-now. That is one step. But further it requires a wider appreciation of what is happening in living.  

But if living is conceptualised in the mainstream terms of modern public discourse; then it is indistinguishable from the processing activities of a computer. A person might regard himself as awake when 'switched 'on' and asleep when on standby, energy-saving... Such a person is asleep; always and inevitably.

If living is doing, then what is doing? If doing means altering stuff in the world; then we are constrained by the world. If the world stops us from altering stuff, the world has put us to sleep...

But if doing is thinking - thinking in some deep primary and active way - then thinking is something of tremendous scope on the one hand; yet on the other hand, it might never happen.

The thinking that comes from our divine selves emerges from a 'black-box', the workings of which are inaccessible - utterly inaccessible. That is the nature of freedom - it cannot be known, only its outcome can be known. We can observe the thoughts as they come-out-of the black-box that is our divine self - so, this means there is our real-self and there is an observing ego.

The observing ego is that which has choice - it can choose its attitude to the emerging thoughts of the divine self - for instance, does it regard them as illusory imaginings; does it regard them as necessarily true and real?

Mainstream life regards these thoughts emerging from the divine self as purely subjective and a species of wish-fulfilment. But the Romantic tradition of Christianity regards these same thoughts as real and true, because divine; because a part of ultimate reality - these thoughst from the divine self are direct reality - as constrained by time, experience and capacity (so we can know more, and more, of reality).  

So, in talking to you - it is my ego talking with your ego; and recommending a change of your ego's-attitude to the thinking that is emerging from your divine self.

There is a school of though that says our fundamental assumptions cannot consciously be chosen - or, more accurately, that if they are thus chosen then they will be feeble. The idea is that only those fundamental beliefs which we have without choice are genuinely motivating. 

Robert Frost indignantly denounced college teaching that 'frisks Freshmen of their principles'. At Bread Loaf in 1925 he declared that a boy with all his beliefs drawn out of him is in no condition to learn. Or even to live. Everybody needs some beliefs as unquestionable as the axioms of geometry*. No postulates deliberately adopted could ever have the force. We had to have unarguable, undemonstrable, unmistakeable axioms, just three or four. And if we didn't abuse our minds we should surely have them. One such is genuineness is better than pretense. Another is that meanness is intolerable in oneself. And another is that death is better than being untrustworthy. 

From A Swinger of Birches: a portrait of Robert Frost, by Sidney Cox (1957)  

There is something valid in this argument, that requires response, because our fundamental assumptions are not arbitrary. 

We surely cannot just stick a pin in a list and choose anything that comes-up as our baseline beliefs, and then expect to be motivated strongly enough to resist being derailed by the many temptations of life and infirmities of our own nature. 

On the other hand, it seems obvious that - on the one hand - peoples fundamental assumptions are being inculcated-into-them by deliberate and socio-political propaganda, in ways that harm the people. So, if we just accept our assumptions as something 'given', we are in fact merely blinding ourselves to our own exploitative psychological enslavement.  

Furthermore; modern motivations are actually very feeble, by comparison with the past; as can be seen by the collapse of personal courage and individuality of character - which has been very obvious and evident over recent decades. The docility, homogeneity, and automatic-obedience of Western Man is now astonishing to behold; when compared with the middle twentieth century. 

So, it seems that there is no valuable alternative but to become aware of our own deepest values, assumptions, metaphysical beliefs; and to evaluate them; and then to choose between possibilities. 

It is this choosing upon which all depends: because what we choose must not only be something we regard as right, true, correct; but it must also be something that provides us with a strong motivation - such that we can avoid being deflected off-course by the first problem, the first contrary expediency, we encounter... 

So that we may have the courage of our convictions... Because - without courage, convictions are worthless.  

People often talk as if 'will power', determination is the answer; but the strength of will-power itself derives from fundamental convictions. It is our assumptions that provide the power of will. So our will cannot overcome feeble and false assumptions. Again we are returned to the need to choose assumptions; but to choose the right assumptions. 

Choosing our assumptions is (and should be) more like a quest, or a path of discovery; than it is like an arbitrary coin-flip. 

It is a matter of finding our most fundamental values. We each need to find-out what things we most value, deep down, through time. 

These profound values may be very different from, may indeed oppose or contradict, the values we have expressed, or implemented in previous living. Our fundamental values may be a kind of secret knowing: and, at first, secret even from our conscious-selves.

It may also be the case that these fundamental values turn out to be inconsistent among themselves, that they clash - and therefore tend to cancel-out: this may be another cause of feeble motivation and cowardice of conviction.   

So the choosing of deep assumptions is also, potentially, a choosing-between. 

What is the it that does the exploring, questing, discovering, choosing? That's another matter - I am talking about the real self or true self - which is also the divine self. 

Only when it is the divine self who is doing the choosing can we expect a Good outcome. 

If, instead, the above process was merely done by our 'personality self', that 'self' constructed by societal inculcation, a mere selfish-self, and pleasure-seeking self, or any other kind of evil-motivated self... Then clearly the end result is going to be bad (i.e. bad in a Christian sense). 

It would then merely be a choice made by that which is propagandized, passive, controlled... Thus no real 'choice' at all... 

Therefore, as always, there are (at least) two changes that must be made, two processes that must simultaneously be implemented. 

...This is nearly always true. When only one obstacle is before us, when only one kind of change is needed for our betterment; it will usually be overcome sooner or later, spontaneously, without need for profound change.

What separates us from awakening, from betterment, from initiation of a positive transformative process; is the requirement for (at least) two simultaneous efforts: in this case 1. the need to find and work-with our real/ divine self, in 2. the project searching-for and choosing our fundamental assumptions.  

In conclusion: Yes! fundamental assumptions really can be known, evaluated, and chosen; but for this to be valuable and effective entails that we discover something about our deepest values, and also that this 'discovery' is accomplished by that which is divine within us. 

 

*Note. The fact that there is more-than-one axiomatic system of geometry, more than one set of postulates - and that the best choice between axioms depends on the function to which the geometry is being-put - undercuts Frosts analogy in an ultimate sense; although it still retains rhetorical validity. 

Spiritual progress is possible - but it may be almost invisible to others in terms of behavioural change; especially when judged by the highest standards of behaviour.

This, I think, it part of what Jesus meant when he said he had come to save 'sinners'. He mostly meant that he had come to save (those who would 'follow' him) from death and loss of the self; but he also meant that those saved from death would always be breakers of God's laws. 

(I understand this 'breaking of law' to mean that we behave in ways that conflict with the divine motivations of God's creation, in which we all dwell. Any verbal description of 'laws' is necessarily a partial and distorted model for explaining disharmony with creation.) 

And that it was part of being-saved to know that we personally are a breaker of God's laws - and in a situation where the breaking of any single divine law at any time (no matter how apparently 'trivial') is 'just as bad' as breaking many of God's laws most of the time. 

(In other words, there can be no salvation by perfect adherence to God's laws; because not only is it impossible in practice - but also in theory; because the belief that it is possible to live in full accordance with God's laws is itself a breaking of God's laws!) 

Therefore true, significant spiritual progress should not be measured - Is Not measured, by God - in terms of quantitative adherence to the degree of behavioural compliance with divine laws. It is measured in terms of our knowing what God wants of us, and therefore knowing when (nearly all the time!) we do not live up to this. 

Since what is wanted is not at the behavioural level; we cannot monitor spiritual progress by perceptual means. Which also means that it is extremely rare that we can monitor the spiritual progress of others (although such monitoring can, to some extent, be done for those persons we love and know best.)

In other words we must (must) be able to monitor our own spiritual progress and to do so by the standards and in the way that accords with what God wants. 

This is possible because we are all Sons of God. Which means that we all have in us something of the divine.

The situation can be 'modeled' by stating that there is in each of us a real self that is also divine, and which therefore knows what is in-accordance-with God's ongoing creation; and what is not. 

So - it is spiritual progress to know that we each have a real and divine self; and it is further spiritual progress to be able to discern the evaluations of our own real and divine self. 

Even more progress comes from the choice that inevitably arises when we discern that our own choices and actions are going-against the laws of God/ the harmony of divine creation: the progress comes from our choosing to take the side of God and creation as our highest aspiration. 

It is certain that we will Not be able to put this discernment into action - we cannot align all of our behaviours with God's laws and God's creation: in other words we are always going to be lapsing-into sin, again and again; and we will be unable to prevent this. 

We may align perfectly with God for a moment or two; so we can know what this is like and can choose  - can want it.  

We will always - soon - lapse back into behaviours that fall-away from this known-ideal. 

But it is genuine spiritual progress to be able to discern from our real self; to distinguish the real self from the many fake selves that fit-in with the demands of this mortal world; and to make that recurring choice For God.

So do not despair! 

Spiritual progress is possible even for the worst back-slider (and we are all back-sliders - without any exceptions). 

Judge your-self as you are judged by God; not as you are judged by Men. 

If we use the nomenclature of 'self' to express our true, innermost and embryonically-divine nature, and 'persona' to describe the public, interactive aspect - the 'personality' which is a consequence of experience; then we can see that while they need to be distinguished, the two are bound together as a polarity.

We start-out as the self, interacting with nature (the environment, everything that is not-the-self) and participating in it. At this stage life is real and involving because our selves are interacting with it and we know, therefore, moment to moment; that everything 'out-there' is known only by the interaction with the self 'in here'.

But at this stage, 'nature' overwhelms us and drives us, because pretty much all of the self is used in this interaction. We do not feel separate from the environment (or hardly so) but the cost is that we are unfree - because we cannot separate our self, the self is swept-along by the environment.

(The environment is experienced as real, alive, conscious - but the self is unnoticed and has no distinctive role: life is lived, the self does not live life.)

So, the self develops the persona - the public mask - which serves the useful purpose of interacting with the environment using automatic algorithms. The persona is like a protective robot which does the routine work of dealing with nature (including other people) - and the robot leans from experience how to do this.

(In each life, a human moves - to some extent - from the naked self dealing with the environment in the un-self-consciousness of early childhood, absorbed in the mother and family, home and community; to the later childhood and adolescent experience of becoming self-conscious - when the self is experienced as distinct from, potentially set-against, the environment (both social and physical).

The self benefits from the persona (at least initially, potentially) by having the persona do much of the routine work, and thus the self becomes increasingly aware of itself, and aware that it is separate from the environment - because now the persona is interposed. The self has autonomy, time and energies to devote to contemplating its self, its condition and situation, and to considering strategy beyond the moment to moment interactions with nature. Philosophy becomes possible.


As the environment becomes more complex and demanding (for example with increasing complexity of society) so the self diminishes in significance, and the persona increases in importance; until the persona is doing almost everything, using the 'automatic' (robotic) processes it has evolved. The self begins to lose contact with reality, because it no longer deals with nature; the self - that was master - becomes a helpless prisoner of its slave, the persona  - the robot takes-over and imprisons the divine self.

(Initially the self was like an ideal manager who deals with strategy; while the persona was like the front-like workforce who mostly implement standard protocols to deal with the outside world. The manager knows about the outside world via the workforce and has a strong sense of the identity of the whole organization. But later the front-line workers imprison the manager and there is then no strategy at all, nobody has any knowledge of the overall situation of the organization in term of its own goals or the organizations situation in the environment: there is just the workforce, who are unconscious of everything except the immediate business of implementing predetermined protocols.)

So the persona is now doing pretty-much all the work and the self is no longer aware of 'nature' nor is the self directing the persona strategically; but is living in enforced idleness and impotence, having no direct contact with outer reality. Since we as individuals live ultimately in the self as the default to which we revert when not actively engaged with the outer world; insofar as we are aware at all, we experience our state (i.e. the state of the self) as alienation, impotence, meaninglessness, frustration - and indeed begin to doubt first our significance and then our reality.

Thus nihilism; when our self begins to doubt first its own reality (materialism, positivism), then - by a natural inference - doubt the reality of everything else (solipsism).

However, the relationship between self and persona is one of polarity; they cannot really be divided. The self can be overwhelmingly dominant, or the persona can be - as in modern culture; but they are both part of the same phenomenon (there must be an inner core and there must also be a periphery where this inner core interacts with what surrounds it - although the relative size of core and periphery may vary widely) and the reality is that the persona is generated continually by the self, and vice versa.


There are three possible futures:

1. We might stay as we are (and have been for more than two centuries in The West): We have a self that is unaware not just of the outer world but of its own reality - and therefore utterly unaware of the work of the persona: a self that simply takes for granted the persona, and since it lacks contact with environment it is unconscious of that too. So there is just a demoralized and self-despizing isolated self, for whom 'reality' is the product of the persona - and the self is alternately overwhelmed by this reality and doubting of its own reality; or doubts outer-reality and supposes that everything is a product of the self: the state of solipsism.

2. We might go back to the earlier stage of the self interacting directly with the outer world (unprotected by the persona), and unconscious of itself - the persona shrinking back to its earlier minimal state. This could probably only happen if the environment was greatly reduced in complexity (including size). This move to extinguish self-consciousness also amounts to a kind of death wish by which consciousness wills its own extinction.


3. We might go forward to a state of greater consciousness. The Self becomes aware of the persona, aware of the reality of the persona (and therefore of the outer environment with which the persona deals), and aware of the work-methods of the persona - aware that is, of the standard protocols of the persona in dealing with nature.

 This is metaphysics as an active process; it is awareness of our fundamental assumptions. Stage 3 is, indeed, primarily about increased awareness - new awareness of that which we previous took for granted hence were constrained by. It is therefore awareness that makes us ultimately free.

(It is as if we are currently sleepwalking, and have indeed been sleepwalking through all history - either unconsciously dominated by or unknowingly cut-off-from the outer environment. The evolution of consciousness is about increasing that of which we are aware, of bringing it to consciousness: a matter of waking-up!)

The self again becomes real - remains free and autonomous, because it retains the benefits of being protected by the persona. But the persona is no longer taken for granted nor assumed to be giving a complete and unbiased picture of the outer environment - rather, the persona is brought to awareness in its reality and qualities.

We will know that the outer environment is real, and we will also know that we are inextricably and necessarily involved in that outer environment - because everything we know about it comes from interaction. The division between inner and outer is therefore erased, and replaced by awareness of the distinction (but not division) between the self and the persona.


So, with the polarity of self and persona we reach an ultimate reality - beyond which we cannot go, because it makes no sense to try and do so. The polarity of self and persona is the conscious recognition and awareness that the two are different but make up a single process operating through time - indeed, operating eternally.

It is meditation on, contemplation of, the polarity between self and persona that holds the key to moving onto Stage 3.

**
(Beyond an ultimate reality of the polarity of self and persona, lies the ultimate polarity of God and Man - but that is already dealt with by Christian faith; within which the above schema should be embedded.)

There is a sense of timeliness about some things that need to be done now - it is not meant to be exhaustive but...

1. Freedom
We need to be free because it is divine. Only if we are free can we be purposive.

2. Consciousness
...And freedom requires consciousness - self-awareness, or awareness of the Self (otherwise we are just responding to externals).

3. The self
It is the self which is (potentially) free. Our self is primordial, and also (partly) divine (God within). So we must work from The Self, and that is the basis of freedom.

4. Creation
Creation is pretty much the same thing as acting from our Self - our true, primordial and divine Self - because that is the only basis for true creation. Creation is further defined in terms of its harmony with the divine plan - in creating we are joining God's team. Creation (in this sense) is what we are supposed to Do in life.

5. Thinking
Thinking is the realm of reality in mortal life - not 'action'. This is because in true, real, primary thinking we are participating in a universal world, in principle perfectly accessible to everybody at any time or place henceforth.

6. Purpose
To have purpose requires the above. To do this, not another thing; to act from the Self as a Cause - and not be merely driven and a passive consequence... This is what makes sense of our having purpose in life. It is God and his plans (destiny) which makes that purpose non-arbitrary/ meaning-full. It is our Freedom to join in with this destiny, and Thinking which is the reality of our being participators, not-existentially-alone.

7. Love
So where is Love? Not something fitted-into - but some thing which contains. Love is why everything is related, and not detached; what even makes meaning and purpose possible. And why only in God's creation can there be meaning, purpose and the rest. God's realm is the realm of love - outside of which there is just stuff, chaos, isolated conscious entities.

The primary choice is therefore, to join with God's created realm of Love.

What do the social conditions in the modern West tell us of the nature of souls being incarnated in this era? These are, after all, novel conditions - unique in the history of Man.

We may potentially be able to reverse engineer our features and trends; that is, we may be able to discover the spiritual functionality, on the assumption that God has designed this world for the salvation of souls.

The features include a pervasive arrested adolescence due to a refusal to grow-up spiritually. This includes an extreme of adolescent detachment from The World, self-consciousness, solipsism, sensitivity, mood instability. Alternations between hedonistic excitement and existential despair. And the usual tradition/ parent detaching adolescent rebellion perpetuated to the point of subversion and then a satanic, systematic value-inversion.


So far, so bad - and the evidence of increasing demonic domination is undeniable; but the fact that this is allowed to continue should lead us to suspect that God is 'using' the evil with the intent of turning it to some good.

Specifically, it may be that the people (that relatively small and shrinking minority of the human race) who are born into The West include many souls for whom this is a suitable environment for them to attain salvation (paradoxical though that may, at first, seem).

Here is a guess. The Modern West takes us to an historically unprecedented extreme point of driving home harsh lessons; to the point that there is No Escape. The soul is finally stripped down to a level at which Life has nothing to offer, and then the soul looks at God... Eventually, there is nowhere else to look.

This is things coming to a point - this is the point toward which things are tending.


We live in a world of increasing incoherence, and this incoherence is increasingly coerced. What might be learned from an environment of mandatory incoherence, official insanity, moral/ aesthetic and truth inversion?

The answer: to experience these, each for himself, in the fullest possible degree; to have them strike deeper and deeper; past the many and superficial facets of personality and fakery; and in towards our true and divine selves.  This is the confrontation that God (perhaps) is engineering; the starkest possible contrast between our naked self and the literally-hellish environment of The World...

A stark contrast leading to a stark choice: affirmation of that which we know (from experience) to be incoherent and nihilistic; or affirmation of God. That is, affirmation of love.

A hammered-home knowledge of meaninglessness, purposelessness and utter isolation in a dead world of materialism; and then, a direct knowing of creation, Being, and the friendship of Jesus Christ.


Things are brought to a point where the experiential knowledge confronts our divine self, by virtue of being children of God; our true self with its innate and hereditary knowledge of the divine. And this need not be taught - it is a fact, spontaneously knowable.  

If we further assume that many or most people born into the modern West are souls who were, before incarnation and from our pre-mortal spiritual existence, exceptionally beset with sins... then this extreme harshness of experience may be necessary for there to be the best chance of salvation. These are souls so short-termist and selfish that these sins must be stripped-away by despair to leave-behind what may be a small residual core of divine goodness.

In other words, the consequences of the sins are allowed the fullest operation to provide the harshest spiritual outcomes in order that their true nature may become as obvious as may be contrived; such that at the moment of choice the starkest possible contrast with salvation will become apparent to the densest and most recalcitrant of selfish hedonic natures (such as seem to prevail here and now).


Of course, Men are free agents and there is always the possibility of denial - every Man can deny God the creator of the universe (it was his prideful intoxication by this astonishing fact that seemed to corrupt the Lucifer, and many others). Yet we can imagine that at the 'moment' of death, that 'moment' can be concertinaed-out - much as we experience in a dream - so that the full consequences of Life may be surveyed fully and the choice made.

And not just our own life is relevant, not a person's residual love; but also the love of others will (at that expansile 'moment') be known as experienced reality.

Those whom we love, those who love us; this goes into the balance at the moment of choice, and tends to draw us to choose salvation and the Heaven where such love may be sustained and increased for eternity.


Thus evil is used against itself. The worse the evil, the deeper and more considered the evil, the more sustained and systematic the evil - the greater the incoherence and despair at the last - and the more complete the stripping away to reveal the residuum of the true self in its nakedness.

So long as there is indeed love, there is a chance. But those souls that lack love have nothing to set against the evil. They have nothing to weigh in the balance; and their choice is highly likely to be for damnation, where their sins are retained, and the 'promise' is that they may be indulged without restraint. What would such people want with a Heaven that is eternal loving creation?

But God cannot see-into our divine self to know whether there is, or is not, love. The conclusion of our time of choice cannot be foreseen. And this is exactly why the earthly experiences and trails are necessary; why - in our current extreme - the situation is engineered that things are brought to a point of maximum contrast and clarity.


Our time is one by which love will be revealed no matter how small and feeble: if love is there, somewhere, hidden, buried deep and covered-over by sins... by superficial materialism, short-termism, selfishness, hedonism; no matter how distorted by value inversion and lusts for sex, power, status...

The conditions of modernity are well-suited to bring those who most need it to a clear recognition of the nature of good and evil, the distinction and difference between them - and to the making of a final choice based upon the malign experience of sin that is intense, painful; and very hard (but not impossible) to deny.

Real freedom is something that happens - or more often doesn't happen - in thinking; and only in thinking. (What we do is constrained - but how we think may be free.)

Of course, much, most and in some people all thinking is automatic; merely trained or habitual - or a product not of thinking but instead of some causal factor, whether internal or external.

Free thinking is self-caused - and if your metaphysical understanding does not allow for self-causation, then you cannot be free (or, you cannot acknowledge and will deny your own freedom).

Freedom is that thinking which comes from the true self - and the true self is able to be free because it is divine - at least partly.

We are divine because we are children of God - and not fully divine because we are only very immature children of God. It follows that we are not always free - and some people are, apparently, not-at-all free - not least because they deny their freedom (as above).

(Self-caused thinking is a property of the divine; and for an individual person to be free entails that that individual person is individually divine.)

Self-acknowledged freedom is, therefore, pretty much restricted to Christians - and among Christians only to those who really believe that: 1. we are really Children of God; 2. with something of divinity in us (even in mortal earthly life); and 3. (sometimes, potentially) autonomous agents, capable of originating new, uncaused thoughts from an uncorrupted (albeit embryonic) true self.

**

Note added in explanation: By 'restricted to Christians' I mean that Eastern philosophies tend to regard external reality and the self as illusions - as does scientism/ positivism/ materialism; and the pure monotheisms tend to regard the autonomous self as essentially operating in defiance of God - and indeed quite a few Christians have also seemed to adopt this assumption in practice, if not in theory. Only a (relatively) few Christians seem to give free will/ agency/ the autonomous and primarily creative self the full value (both in theory and in practice) which is in line with the fundamental requirements of Gospel teaching.

It used to be almost universal that becoming more-good, a better person, was a thing that was imposed from externally. 

Society imposed values in a mandatory and exclusive fashion; or maybe the individual's role was to choose (from available external options) what set-of-values he would impose on himself. 

And when (with the advent of "romanticism") the increasingly-alienated people of The West began to become concerned with attaining higher consciousness; the solution was presented in similar terms: as externally-defined methods or techniques that were practiced until habitual. 

But we cannot, anymore, impose goodness from outside; neither can we achieve a higher, more spiritual or romantic consciousness by learning techniques. 

Both goodness and higher consciousness need to be be discovered within - and their sources are different, albeit related. 

They are related because attaining higher consciousness requires that our selves simultaneously be aligned with divine creation: only from a basis of harmony with God's creative intent, can we "connect" with our True Selves within, and with The World all around us. 

All of which explains both the failure of all systematic attempts to raise human consciousness, and also the failures of Christian (and other) churches to attain their goals. 

There are, it turns out, serious problems with what used to be standard procedures for self-improvement. 

First that we are unwilling to leave-off from seeking external solutions. We want answers to come from public discourse, and be applicable generally. 

Another problem is that we are not spontaneously conscious of our True Selves; and are instead conscious of a variety of superficial and "false" selves that have been constructed by our net-evil society interacting with those of our values that are dissonant-with or opposed-to divine creation. 

In other words, our consciousness (that from-which we are aware) is not located inside the True Self, but needs to discover and become aware of it. 

Since we are creatures of mixed motivations, it is difficult for this state of awareness-of-True Self to be sustained - we are easily distracted by mundane considerations that seem to promise current gratifications, or seem more urgent. 

After all, during this mortal life almost-anything can seem in the here-and-now - and in a way it is! - more urgent than the meaning and direction of divine creation - including our death and resurrection.

Furthermore, the True Self cannot be discovered by the exercise of Will Power - if (as is usually the case) that Will is located in a an external-false self!

So, to escape the Normal Human Condition of alienated consciousness is alliance with the powers of this-worldly evil, turns out to be a completely new and different kind of problem than anything else we are ever likely to have heard-of or tried!

To genuinely improve ourselves is not just difficult (that has always been the case) but traditional-methods diligently pursued - indeed "methods" as such! - are at best useless, and may well make things even-worse. 

Which helps explain why genuine self-improvement (whether of goodness or higher consciousness) seems only rarely and temporarily to be achieved. 

There isn't an agreed word to describe the kind of Christian I am - so I will label it Intuitive Christianity for present purposes - and compare it with what might broadly be called Catholic and Protestant versions. Understand that this is a short post - and what is described are 'ideal types' meant to capture a particular essence of each version. I am talking of ultimates - not of practical living - which will surely be multi-factorial...

The transition between childhood and adulthood takes place at adolescence - and adolescence is the only path from the one to the other. The essence of this transition - from an ultimate and divine perspective - is the transition from Obedience to Freedom.

(Noting that Freedom means something like Agency - i.e. becoming a conscious, actively-autonomous, personally-strategic adult: a source of innate motivation, decision, creativity.)

Obedience roots The Good externally - in some person, institution or social group. The Christian assumption is that these external sources are conduits of God's will.

(As in childhood - the child's role is to know and follow the guidance of parents, family, church, school, social group etc. - and such obedience is 'passive' - it does not require consciousness, and indeed young children are only somewhat conscious.) 

Freedom roots The Good in The Self, internally. The Christian assumption here is that God is within-us - as a deep, true Real Self.

Note that Freedom (that is Agency) is truly Good only if the Real Self is Good. And in practice this is a matter of contention among Christians - because clearly the overall-self is not wholly Good - so some kind of discrimination, definition and distinction concerning the Self is required.

1. The Catholic belief is that the Church (the mystical Church, contrasted with the organisation) is Good, is the conduit of God's will - but the individual is fallen and (in essence) depraved such that for the individual to be Good entails Obedience to the (mystical) Church.

God intervenes to ensure that The Church is and remains the conduit for God's will, and worthy of Obedience. Freedom is mostly about choosing this Obedience.

In practice, therefore, all Men are more-or-less permanently children; so permanent Obedience a necessity. Freedom/ Agency of The Self would be a cruelty; because as individual agents all Men are damned... self-damned by their sin and incapacities.

Freedom is therefore, and necessarily, tightly circumscribed by the overall duty of Obedience.  

2. The Protestant also believes that Men are depraved; but with the capacity to know Good by Obedience to divine revelation, especially as encapsulated in Scripture.

That is, all Men - as autonomous selves - are incapable of Freedom in the ultimate sense of agency rooted in the Self; but all Men have the innate capacity to understand Scripture and choose Obedience to it.

God intervenes to make this understanding of scripture possible; and that the Freedom of choosing to obey Scripture will be under God's will. Freedom is tightly circumscribed by the overall duty of Obedience.

3. My understanding (Intuitive Christianity) is that Freedom/ Agency is our proper, divinely-destined and ultimate goal - here-and-now, in The West; superseding the primacy of Obedience (whether to Church, Scripture or any other external source).

Christianity therefore ought to be rooted in the Real Self and pervasively based upon the Real Self; and Freedom ought not to be constrained to the primal chose of Obedience to Church or Scripture; but this discerning Freedom ought to be incrementally extended to all other matters of primary importance.

This is based upon a conviction that the Real Self is in fact God-within-us; and also distinctive to ourselves alone. In other words, as children of God we inherit God's divinity - but also each child is unique and has an unique destiny within creation.

(There must be a distinction between the true-real-divine Self which is intrinsically Good - and the multiptude of false selves which arise from error, sin, by inculcation, for expedience etc. - which may be good or evil; but are not divine, are often arbitrary and typically transient.) 

We all (potentially) know The Good innately and directly - and the ultimate authority is therefore with, not external; the ultimate value is Freedom to live from the Real Self, not by Obedience to any external source excepting our direct knowing of God.

Therefore, in an ultimate sense, my conviction is that Man - any man, any woman - may attain to salvation and live a life of theosis from-within; without membership of The Church or access to Scripture of other external sources; and, indeed, in an ultimate sense it is proper and best for a Christian's Life to be rooted in n the Freedom of the Real Self, and not in any external source.

In sum: Freedom is a higher (more mature, more adult) value than Obedience. 

External sources may of course be helpful, perhaps very helpful - but here-and-now in The West external sources may also be extremely harmful - the Church may be (usually is) subverted, corrupted and anti-Christian; Scripture, its translation and its interpretation is likewise usually corrupted, distorted, selective, misrepresented - inverted.

Indeed, it is precisely this situation that creates the urgent necessity of an Intuitive Christianity based on the individual and Freedom.

My understanding, therefore, is that Freedom has always been an essential element of Christianity; but in the past Freedom was used to make a single choice of Obedience; of whom or what to serve. In the past Obedience was more important than Freedom.

My contention is that this primal and vital Christian Freedom ought now to be extended to all major and significant aspects of Faith. From now, Freedom is more important than Obedience. That is our divine destiny; if Man is to move from his current spiritual adolescence into adult maturity.

Because too many people are operating from false selves - that are merely automatic processes built by our interactions. Only the true self is free.

The true self is free, and nothing else is free. It is unique, thus all free thought is unique - it is also a child of divinity so the true self is godlike and in relationship with deity and all other true selves among our siblings (men and women, also angels and demons).

If we are not thinking from our true selves, we are just responding robots - we are automatic and we are existentially isolated.

There is a chosen state of unfreedom that is the entombing of the true self within automatic responses, stimulations. Such a person is a true slave - such a person has enslaved himself to the environment. (True slavery is a mental choice - a physical slave may have complete freedom in thinking from his true self.)

Another state is to choose freedom but deny relation - to cut-off the divine relation with deity. This is a complete freedom without meaning - it is total isolation.

To accept unfreedom is either mental slavery or isolation.

(We are born free, but from our freedom choose unfreedom - this is usual, it happens sometime in childhood, adolescence, or as young adults. There is temptation, and mostly people choose to succumb. And they know it. They could escape - but pretend they cannot, that there is no escape -- or that there is nowhere to escape to...)

It is our task to live in freedom and in relation, live in thinking located in the true self. The enemies are confusion, hedonism, cowardice, dishonesty... pride. Freedom is a state of simplicity and clarity - unique and potentially universal. And there are no shortcuts to it, no standard methods, no single or safe path.

We must reach our unique freedom from our unique circumstances - this is a quest, an adventure, it is happening now.

Only from a condition of freedom can we be Christian.

Theosis (at root the same notion as sanctification, exaltation or deification) is the general idea that throughout our earthly mortal lives we are supposed to become (in some way) more like God, or perhaps more like "a god". 

"Supposed to" because this is why we are sustained alive -- After all, why stay-alive (in the past and now) rather than simply dying and achieving salvation as soon as we choose to follow Jesus Christ to eternal life?

(Because that would surely be a more certain salvation: To die at the split second we converted, at the instant we made a commitment to follow Jesus. There must therefore be a very important reason why it does not happen.)  

But theosis is difficult to conceptualize except in the rare instance of the greatest Saints; who have very obviously become more divine throughout their mortal lives (head in Heaven, feet still upon earth - as the Eastern Orthodox say). 

It has often, and truly, been observed that becoming a Christian does not (or only seldom) make somebody overall a better person - so that, if theosis is indeed an integral aspect of genuinely Christian living, then the process doesn't seem to work very well... 

I have, therefore, found it difficult to explain to myself - in some kind of comprehensible 'model' - what is supposedly going-on with theosis - but I now think I may have found a useful picture of the process, as it is intended to operate. 

My assumption is that we have a primal self - which could also be called our real, true or divine self; and it is this which is eternal, and has existed from eternity. My primal self is "encased" within a mortal and temporarily-incarnated self; which is (approximately) our body and our personality - that which other people observe, and which interacts with The World. 

The process called theosis describes the transformation of my primal self, across a timescale of eternity; but at present intended to be achieved by interaction-with, and learning-from, the experiences of my mortal self in this world. 

So -- if I succeed in my God-given task of learning from the experiences God has set-up for me in this mortal world; then it is my primal self that is positively-transformed by this learning. 

And it is this process of positive transformation of the primal self that can be called theosis. 

This model may explain why it is that theosis is not necessarily (or usually) observable in a Christian individual. 

What is happening is that the primal self is being-transformed positively and eternally - but the bodily behaviour and actions, and personality level motivations and thoughts; are Not (or not usually) being transformed. 

So the primal self is getting-better when we learn Godly-lessons from our life experiences  - whether or not the mortal self improves... or even gets worse!

This depiction maybe explains why and how it is that we may know someone who we are convinced has a Good Heart (i.e. the primal self); despite that his behaviour is clearly sinful and not improving; or exhibits grossly inconsistent, incoherent or chaotic behaviour.  

And, on the other side; why it often seems (to our intuitive inference) that someone who leads "a Christian life", who seems to think and do the Right Things, who is nice, socially responsible, devout, a good neighbour etc.; may strike us as heartless, cold, unloving - and certainly Not improving as a result of his continued-living. 

Or why we perhaps are sure that we our-selves are being made better by being-a-Christian; despite that we continue to sin in the same ways as much as ever, or in new ways, or backslide repeatedly - or even behave (to an external observer) overall worse than we did before becoming a Christian.  

Another aspect of this mismatch between primal self and mortal self, is that it becomes understandable why God would allow (or even want) such a divergence. 

The reason why we are sustained alive is to challenge us with repeated and multiple interactions with this world: experiences that are intended as learning opportunities. 

And this situation may be easier to arrange if our mortal selves are Not (or not much, or only unevenly) positively transformed by life. 

After all; the ultimate value of this mortal life is not within this temporary world, where nothing lasts and everything dies; its ultimate value is found in Heavenly life everlasting. 

For the materialist-atheist mind; it is measurable outcomes that matter. 'Outcomes' are what gets monitored, measured and controlled. For example, human behaviour is an outcome - it can be observed, and increasingly is observed. 

Power can substantially control outcomes - by means of incentives and deterrents. And what cannot be controlled can be faked - because, when the focus is on observation and measurement, then the desired observations and measurements can be generated from within The System (this is one of the main roles of 'science').   

 

If some-thing is Not observed by The System, then - from The System's point of view - it has Not happened and does Not exist; thus it cannot be a problem (even when it affects many individuals, even if it kills many individuals). 

Contrariwise; if The System observes a thing, and defines that thing as a problem - then it is a problem (even when the thing does not exist to individual observation).

 

What about motivations? Well, for the materialist mind, motivations are something than can be imputed as is expedient. What is the significance of an observation made by The System? The System will tell us...

(The System does not discover the motivation, instead The System defines the motivation - according to Syetm expedience.)

For instance; one person dies in one situation; The System observes this death, tells us the motivations of the individuals involved, and classifies the death as an instance of a global, systemic problem. The System describes how to address that problem, implements the solution; observes and measures the response... 

Another person dies in another situation; but The System does not observe it. Or it tells us that this death  has no general meaning, is an accident; and nothing systemic can - or should - be done about it. This other death is not classified as a problem, it is just the deletion of a personnel unit. This death is excluded from The System.

My point is that The System (which is the product and tool of purposive supernatural evil: of Satan and demons and their servants) is focused on materialistic 'facts' - on outcomes.  Motivations are secondarily manufactured as fake-explanations for the primary observations.

But as Christians - as specifically Romantic Christians, who seek authority outwith The System - that is from the Holy Ghost directly by intuitive prayer and meditation, and from our innate divinity as sons and daughters of God... 

As Romantic Christians we know that outcomes have been captured by The System. Therefore we focus upon motivations; and motivations are either for God, divine creation and The Good; or against these.   

We focus upon motivations - and these are Not inferred from 'outcomes'; but are known directly. 

And, because God always makes it possible for every person to know The Good; the necessary knowledge of motivations is here-and-now very easy to attain; and is getting easier, as evil gaims more and more dominance over the 'observations'; of this world.

 

This is Their weakness: That They mistake their own power to dictate outcomes with the actuality of motivation. 

'They' can indeed (pretty much) dictate outcomes; but they cannot direct motivations: They cannot - in particular - direct a person's affilitation for, or against, God. 

 

Motivation is a choice, but more than a choice: it is a commitment. Motivation is, ultimately, a judgment of truth, and an attitude to that truth.   

If an individual has detached from the power-dominated world of System-endorsed outcomes; including a detachment from his own 'outcomes'/ observable behaviours; then his motivation, commitment, way of thinking (his divine-affiliation) can be free of The System. 

This is the ultimate nature of Man's agency: Because Man is a god (albeit in a temporary and corrupt form); his true self is divine, and cannot be compelled. 

Indeed; Man's true self cannot be compelled even by God; much less by Satan. 

 

We do not have much power to control our own behavioural outcomes. But, we have the inalienable power - hence the absolute responsibility - to choose our affiliation and motivations.  

Therefore, I suggest that we resist all attempts to induce us onto the grounds of mainstream demonic materialism with its manufactured 'facts' and contrived pseudo-explanatory imputed 'motivations' ; and instead we should seek discover, encourage, strengthen our awareness of that indomitable divine self within. 

Our divine self knows true facts without observations, knows motivations without being told. What it knows may well be very simple, and apparently dysfunctional ('dysfunctional' in terms of immediate adaptation to this System-created virtual world)... 

But so long as we have both chosen to commit to the side of God, and are also motivated towards the resurrected eternal life in Heaven; then no worldly facts and considerations can make any difference - if we do not 'invite them in'. 

 

(And even if we do, in a moment of weakness, invite evil to cross our mental threshold; evil can always be expelled by the infinite power of repentance; that is, by recognising and affirming the Truth.)

 

We cannot lose, ultimately; so long as we know Good and our motivation is to win salvation. We can only lose salvation if we personally make that decision.