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Word Gems 

exploring self-realization, sacred personhood, and full humanity

Human Potential

Editor's Essay

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Let’s look at many examples of each view:

the weight-lifter

The weight-lifter approach, trying very hard, is everywhere. It’s everywhere because it often works, or seems to. Much of the world’s educational system is based on this:

We cram for exams. It’s part of piano lessons, swimming lessons, any sport, any skill to be gained. A child learns her “time tables” by this method. And a baby learns to walk by it.

Religious instruction might be seen as an exercise in “trying very hard to keep rituals and rules.”

The doctrine of reincarnation, errant as it is, is built around the sheer force of much trying -- 100,000 lifetimes of trying to evolve.

Marriage counselors use it to attempt to revive flagging unions: “Go out on dates, do the things you used to do, take a trip together, go for walks.” In other words, "try very hard to recapture what you’ve lost."

As I began to think about these various examples of “exertion,” it occurred to me, “Maybe the weight-lifting approach works for content of the mind, like memorizing a poem. Maybe it’s not for the higher order sentience.”

But then I realized – not so fast! It’s said that we come to planet Earth to “wake up,” to become a person. This is not just content for the mind.

And why do we come to the Earth for this? and not just remain in a better world to learn our “ABCs”?

Well, the claim is also made that this world is a place of polarities, of great opposites: the hot and the cold, the evil and the good, the sadness and the happiness, on and on.

And when we experience the difference it can be like being plunged into ice-cold water, all of which, it is said, can help to “wake us up”.

These polarities, and pushing back against them, are just the weight-lifter in disguise.

the germinating seed

“And Jesus said, the kingdom of heaven is like sowing seeds in a field; some seeds fell on good ground, some on stony ground, some on ground filled with weeds, and some seeds were eaten by the birds of the air before taking root”

Krishnamurti was not impressed by weight-lifter tactics.

He said that the sheer force of chanting some phrase can, indeed, quiet the mind, but not without also dulling the mind. And it doesn’t matter what the phrase is: we could be chanting the name of our favorite saint or even the word “Coca-Cola,” and if we chant either of these a hundred or five hundred times, the mind will be quieted, but at the cost of sentience. We've lost our sharpness.

Ben Franklin, as recounted in his autobiography, tried repetition, daily rituals, and “trying very hard” as a program to eliminate character flaws and to inculcate virtues. He kept a list, made a schedule, was diligent in this effort. But after many months of regimen, he gave it all up as it wasn’t working.

It’s reported of the Buddha that his first attempts to achieve enlightenment were by asceticism, denying and punishing the body with much fasting and the like. Finally, he set aside all this will-power because he could see that it wasn’t helping him. He entered enlightenment only after he stopped “trying very hard to be good.” The truth is, we can't change in the way that we need to change without a mystical experience.

To reference Franklin again, he said, “That which is learned with pleasure is learned full measure.” Those who learn with pleasure, not having been forced, see much farther.

It's true, we can learn many things by the weight-lifter method - but it can have bad side-effects. Some of the religious elite, 2000 years ago, had studied very hard and had memorized much of the thousand pages of the Torah. They could tell you the middle word, the very middle letter, of the entire Torah, but – with all of that super-human effort – they missed the point of the Law, and ended up killing Christ.

Things that are learned with pleasure – not just as a function of “I was forced to learn this as a child” – affect us on the deep inside, and become part of us, in a pleasant and good way. I think of my own experience: as a child I was forced to work long hours on the farm, some of the work, very unpleasant and even dangerous (more than one of my child-peers were killed in farm accidents). Today, as an old man, I know that I still retain much knowledge and skill concerning managing a farm – but I never go back to the old farm, even to visit. Haven’t been there in many decades. It’s not a place of joy for me.

In many of the WG writings we’ve discussed how the soul has its own timetable for waking up. It does what it wants to do and no amount of will-power or trying very hard will move it an inch if it’s not ready to “germinate.”

In fact, as Krishnamurti also pointed out, when we “try very hard” to become “good” or some such, we immediately set up a conflict in the mind: we see what we want but also realize how far we need to go, and this dichotomy creates a tension which blocks and stifles spiritual growth. On some level, the weight-lifter technique actually shuts down real spiritual growth.

What does this mean? As we’ve seen, it’s complicated. In the main, I think the soul is like a seed that will naturally germinate and grow, when all the conditions are right. It’s not possible to force a seed to grow if it’s inclined not to. The soul is a direct extension of the energies of God, and any attempt to regulate this divine essence by human will-power will end in utter failure. God doesn’t respond well to commands, She's funny that way.

What I’ve just said here is absolutely true. But, acknowledging this, why do we come to the Earth with the “polar opposites” if the soul cannot be affected by externals?

My sense here is cloudy. Perhaps there are different kinds, different levels, of awakenings. We come to planet Earth without well-defined personhood – we’re not yet persons in our own right. We don’t yet have a crisp notion of “self”.

"ok, whatever else I may be, I'm definitely awake now"

Maybe the sorrowful Earth and its polar opposites are at least good for this - that existential splash of ice-cold water down the back jarring us into a vague perception of human self-sentience – not yet a spiritual sentience, but just an activation of the human spirit, a mere beginning. The cold water could be like flipping the on-switch. This idea could be correct.

Editor’s note: This “on-switch” concept might well be on the right track. James Webster always said that, concerning aborted babies, even briefly touching the trauma-energy of the Earth-plane, sensed even in the womb via the mother’s disconcertion, is enough to begin the selfhood process. This trauma-experience, even so very briefly, is something that the babe can build upon for its spiritual growth as it grows up in Summerland. I think this is right, and it also answers the question about the “fairness” of the little ones being robbed of Earth experience. The core, essential part of vital education will have been gained, and the rest can be added to, even from Summerland.

I think that a later coming to spiritual enlightenment is a different kind of “waking up”. Many or most do not even achieve this while on Earth. At this level, it’s all “germination,” with the weight-lifter totally shut out of the process.